Sorry for the lack of posting, but I have this whole other blog that I write, and the 2 of you who read this know that. But, on the off chance you don’t, I’m gonna re-post my meet write-ups from there (But with new exclusive content!!!).
My general thoughts:
Check out the montage of Duane’s lifts from the weekend. He did great and won his weight class by 2 kilos. Duane can feel free to elaborate on his experience in the comments. The following is a brief overview of my impressions of the meet and what I learned. When they are available, I’ll post vids of my attempts and get into them in detail.
Brute Strength Gym is a very large and well equipped space. They’ve got plenty of bars and plates for any kind of lifting you want to do, and all of it high quality. It had decent amenities all while keeping that garage gym feel. Very cool. The meet itself was tightly run, and we were done way earlier than expected. We showed up at 7:30, and were out of there by 3, even after a long and drawn out calculation process. For most of you, a powerlifting meet consists of:
- Weigh-in and equipment check
- Rules briefing
- Opening attempt listing and warm-up for squat
- Squat, in flights (explained below)
- Very short break
- Bench Press, in flights
- Very short break
- Deadlift, in flights
- Cal…cu…la…te…to…tals
- Awards!
Being a weight class sport, obviously they have to determine which weight class you’ll be in. This is also where you declare your opening attempts for the three lifts. You also have to show the judge what sort of belt, shirt, singlet, knee sleeves etc, you’ll be wearing, so that they can make sure it’s all within the rules. From there, they go over the rules, and tell you how the flights are divided. For our meet, the flights were 220 and below, and 242 and above, which was nice, since Duane and I were placed in different flights. A flight is simply the group you lift with, and the first flight will do all three of their attempts before the second flight starts. There is an important difference between powerlifting and weightlifting in how the attempts work as well. In weightlifting, the bar simply moves up in weight, so if your attempts are 90, 93, and 96 kilos, and the next lowest person jumped from 90 to 100 kilos, you’ll be taking all three attempts in a row (this is very rare). However, in powerlifting, everyone (in the flight) takes their first attempt, and then the bar resets for everyone’s second attempt, which you declare within a minute of your first one. Unlike weightlifting, you are somewhat limited in changing your attempts.
During a flight, things move fast. The bar is loaded, and once they declare the bar set up, the person lifting has 60 seconds to get a start command. It seems like you would feel rushed, but if you’re ready, it’s plenty of time. At this meet, there was no board for you to see how many out you were, you just had to listen to the announcer who gave the next 5 people. It wasn’t too hard, but you couldn’t totally lose yourself in rocking out to your headphones. In retrospect, it might have been nice to have a coach for the sole purpose of tapping me on the shoulder when I was 2 people out, so that I could tighten the belt and not think about it. However, Cheese did a good job of coaching from afar by helping us pick out some weights for our attempts, so we didn’t have to think of them at the time. Somehow thinking and lifting don’t mix.
The attitude at the meets is very supportive, and most people want to do the best they can, and for you to do the best you can. Often there aren’t but one or two people per weight class anyway, so everyone’s going to walk away with something. You’ve prepared, and should be relaxed. You just have to pay attention, and not let things get out of hand. Some lessons from the meet:
- Come Prepared! Bring everything you think you’ll need and some things you don’t think you’ll ever need. A foam roller and a trigger point ball were indispensable (this time). I didn’t end up needing my eggs and turkey, but if the meet had dragged out I would have sorely missed them if they weren’t there.
- Start conservatively! If you miss all 3 attempts of any one lift you don’t get a total and you finish last in your weight class. Get on the books and then challenge yourself.
- Don’t “make weight.” This is the dumbest thing that you can possibly do as a beginner. When I went to weigh in, some weenie was running around the parking lot in hopes of getting down to 181 or some such nonsense. Look, not winning the 198′s is exactly like not winning the 181′s, especially when you’re going to total like 300 kilos. Just do your best at whatever weight you show up at.
- Relax and have fun. You’re just lifting weights, so don’t get all nuts about it.
- You probably won’t surprise yourself at the meet. You’ll more than likely do weights you’ve already done in the gym. Remember the meet circumstances aren’t ideal. You don’t have your favorite bar, or squat rack. You don’t get to go at the right moment in the song. You don’t get to rest exactly as much as you want. The judges might red light you on a good lift. You never know. Don’t put a lot of (emotional, expectational)weight into your total, just go and do the best that the circumstances allow.
- You’re a lot better than some, and a lot worse than others. I saw 600+ lb raw deadlift, and I out-squatted several people. You won’t be the worst and you won’t be the best.
- Just go to a meet. You’ll probably do way better than you think. Only my and Duane’s weight class had 3 people in them! That means, you probably would have walked away with a bronze solely for totaling. Just come to one and see what you can do in a competitive situation!
All in all I had a lot of fun and it was a generally positive experience.
My specific walkthrough:
In this installment, I’d like to get more into the details of the meet. The first lift is the squat, and as I said before, the lifting is organized into flights. The opening lifts for my flight were posted on a squat rack in the warm-up area, and the announcer called out how many minutes it was until the start. I was going fairly late in my flight, and was about 10th. Since each competitor has a minute once the bar is loaded, it allows you to time your last warm-up with which lifter is going. It’s best to take your last warm-up about 5 to 8 min out from your first attempt, so I took my last warm-up when there were 6 people left to go before me. It’s worth mentioning here that the warm-up area often only has a few squat racks, so you have to work in with people. However, everyone is good-natured and it’s pretty easy to tell who will be squatting around what you’ll be (kind of like in the gym).
After my last warm-up, I went to sit in the waiting area with my headphones in. Aside from the lift itself, the few minutes before the lift are the most critical. You need to start focusing in on what you’re about to do, and you want to get psyched up and start feeling the adrenaline. However, you don’t want to get too excited while waiting. Your body can only be in fight or flight mode for so much time, so it’s a delicate balance between focused and psyched, and frazzled and nervous. Also you have commands to listen to, so you can’t be too in your head.
The first squat is the most important lift of the whole meet, so you want to nail it. If you’re smart (or have a smart coach) you’ve chosen a weight you can do for 3. Really that light? YES. NEVER NEVER NEVER miss your first attempt of any one lift. The first weight is light for several reasons:
- If you fail all three attempts at any one lift, you get no total.
- Things move at the pace of the meet, not at your pace.
- The equipment is different.
- Everyone is watching you.
- There are commands to remember.
So, I started light at 167.5 (368.5 my best 5 rep is 355), and buried the squat way deeper than needed. 3 white lights and I’m on the board. My second attempt was technically a 1lb PR, but very close to something I’ve done before at 180 (396). You want to keep the confidence building and not go crazy with your jump on the second lift. Looking at the video afterward, I could have and should have gone a bit deeper to be sure. My third attempt was the PR attempt, or what I wanted to hit when I got there. The two previous lifts have been building to this, and my attempts were well chosen. My third attempt is the vid above at 185 (407), and represents an 11lb PR, and one of my goals for this year. It was hard, but not impossible, and I stood it up only to be greeted with 2 red lights and 1 white light. No lift. It was for depth I’m told, but you be the judge (cheat sheet: it’s a fine squat). I was disappointed but I let it go. Things like this happen at meets and there’s a lot of lifting yet!
The other two lifts go generally like the squat, so I won’t go through them in much detail. However there is something to be learned about what happened to me in the bench: you need to be flexible enough to adapt if circumstances at the meet throw you off! My first bench attempt was a very light 92.5 (203.5 my best 5 rep is 205). However the bench is the most finicky of the lifts. You get three commands: start, press, and rack, so it’s the least like what you’d actually do in the gym. My first attempt was a success, but the lady was having us sit the bar on our chest for a full second and sometimes more. I should have adapted and lowered my second attempt. I didn’t lower it, and my back tightened up during my second attempt at 102.5 (225.5), and I didn’t make it. I didn’t want to compromise my deadlift, so I did my third attempt with a flat back and didn’t make that either. A disappointing bench outing, BUT, I started light and got on the board.
Luckily, I was prepared, and I was able to fish oil and foam roll my back out of trouble for the deadlift. My three attempts for the deadlift were 182.5 (401.5 an easy triple), 205 (451 just under gym PR), 217.5 (478.5 a big PR). The deadlift is simple, just pick up the weight and don’t put it down until they tell you to. The first and second ones went well (second one is posted here), so I was confident going into the third lift. I pulled with all my might, and it eventually came up. 3 reds for hitching. I didn’t hitch it, but it did pause above my knee and press into my leg. I was happier about this call than the squat, but that’s how meets go. My total was 475.5 (1046), under my goal of 500, but I learned a lot and was happy with my performance. I look forward to totaling 500 at the next one.
Exclusive Content!!!
Final thought:
I’m back on Texas Method now after a week on break. Started my volume day on Monday at 315 (press: 140) and I’m pretty damn sore at the moment. Squats felt very strong, press a bit weaker than normal, but, happy to be training (and gorging) again. Weighed in at 205 at the meet, hope to weigh in closer to 220 at the next one. Also, I officially (via email to coach) withdrew myself from future Australian Rules football competitions this year, since my new training methods and goals ran counter to what I’d need to do to be successful in the team. This alleviates some mental stress, since I no longer wonder when I’ll have to get back into “match fitness” and don’t need to feel guilty for skipping practice cause I’m working at the gym.
