Under a Gibbous Moon

I did a raw meet yesterday. I wasn’t expecting much of a performance since I have been killing my lifts with this whole weight loss thing. Also, due to being short handed, I set up the meet venue (the platform, equipment, and weights) and spotted and loaded as well as competing.

Anyway, I weighed in at 135 kg flat. (297.6 lbs) This puts me 10 kg from the top of my weight class and 10 kgs from the bottom. Needless to say, I wasn’t worried about what weight class I was going to be in. I haven’t competed or been under 300 lbs for about 3 years. The weightloss/ dieting has made my performance a little hit or miss, so I opened conservatively to make sure I stayed in the game.

Squats
1st – 230 kg (507 lbs) good and easy
2nd -250 kg (551 lbs) good- slow but smooth
3rd -265 kg (584 lbs) miss – bad techique and too slow

Bench
1st – 185 kg (407 lbs) good and easy
2nd -195 kg (430 lbs) good but slow
3rd -197.5kg(435 lbs) miss

My right shoulder has been giving me a lot of trouble and squat just took too much out of it. It was hurting a lot during these. Maybe I could have got the third, but it hurt and this meet isn’t that important. Too bad. I did a solid pause with 200 kg on Monday, but of course I didn’t squat right before that.

Deadlift
1st – 250 kg (551 lbs) Good and easy
2nd -275 kg (607 lbs) Good and easy
3rd -295 kg (650 lbs) Miss.

I was tired. Plain and simple. I have been having trouble with deadlift lately and 600 lbs has been a hard pull. The 607 went well enough that I thought I could get the 650. I got it off the floor and I could feel my middle traps just give out and relax and I hunched over. I decided not to risk it and just set it back down.

Total was 720 kg or 1588 lbs. If I was paying attention, I would have called somewhere around 630 instead and cleared 1600. Anyway this is about a 100 lbs less than my best raw total. No pictures and no video. When the meet was done, disassemble everything and load the trailer and take the equipment back to Macomb and unload it that. I had much more help for the disassembly, so that wasn’t so bad. I was still pretty beat. In my usual fashion, I also did not sleep the night before because that just isn’t my style, apparently.

This weekend I competed in this years ADFPF National Championships. It was held in the university rec center in Columbia, Missouri. It was a nice facility with plenty of room for spectators. The meet was run fairly quickly and as smoothly as can be expected for a meet with about 70 lifters. Everybody put in a lot of work to pull this off and I thank them for their efforts.

The warm-up room was the rec center’s weight room, so it was very well supplied. I competed in the equipped division which is single-ply. I was in the 145 kg division and weighed in at 142 kg.

Squats

1st- 305 kg -good 673 lbs
2nd-325 kg -good 717 lbs
3rd- 340 kg -good 750 lbs

Squats went well and were pretty fast and relatively easy. For some reason, all three felt like 8 tons to unrack but once I did that it felt normal. I had more in me, but it was a 20 kg meet pr, so I can’t complain.

I want to extend a special thank-you to Tayler Epperson for his help with my squat suit.

Bench

1st- 220 kg -good 485 lbs
2nd-250 kg -bad 551 lbs
3rd- 250 kg -bad 551 lbs

I have been having a little trouble with my bench for a while and it is really been hard to pull that piece in on meet day. I lowered my anticipated opener 10 kg to secure my squat. I screwed up my technique twice for my 2nd and 3rd. First time I moved too high too fast and started to lose it towards my face. Next time I over compensated and didn’t move up at all initially and I started to lose it toward my belly but pulled it back, but by then I stalled half way up. Done this weight many times in the gym without a hitch, but that’s how things go.

I want to put out a special thank-you to Tim Piper for doing my hand-offs and helping me to switch shirts. You did a fantastic job.

Deadlift

1st- 300 kg -good 661 lbs
2nd-320 kg -good 705 lbs
3rd- 330 kg -good 727 lbs

The 3rd was a 5 kg meet pr. It went up surprisingly fast for the beating I took on squats already. I probably could have gotten 5 kg more, but a pr is a pr. Tore both hands too. I don’t deadlift in training, so it’s a little much for them.

Total 890 kg or 1,963 lbs. Also a meet pr. I was really gunning for 2,000+ lbs that day, but my bench failure cost me that. I ended up getting 1st in my weight class and was just edged out for the overall by formula. Bench cost me that too. Next time. Total is moving up, but I have not got a 500+ bench in at a meet in almost a year and a half and that really burns me.