Saturday 13th September – Friday 19th September 2014
– Been a bit of a crazy time since the meet, so website been a little ignored recently. Back up to speed again now so will be posting regularly again.
8 Weeks to the World’s! For my training leading up to it, I’ll be following Jim Wendler’s 5/3/1 for Powerlifting with some customisation.
Week 1 – 3’s week with Heavy singles
Bench – Shirted up for the Bench after my 3’s and got up to 150kg. That’s up 15kg from the meet. Not bad for first time in a shirt! Did some assistance work, machine incline press, abs & rear delts
Deadlift – I don’t have a suit as yet so just did my 3’s and went for a couple of heavy singles and managed to pull 202.5kg (ugly as hell!) so again a PR of 2.5kg. Assistance was some Good Mornings, Ab wheel and chin-ups
Squat – Now the fun begins! After my 3’s and finally getting into the squat suit (ha ha), I went up to 200kg for 2, then my coach spurred me on to make 210kg. Best increase yet of 25kg on my meet PR .. could get used to this ‘geared’ lifting thing!
Bench/Board Press – On my own today so instead of board press I used Dead Bench to increase strength in the bottom of the lift up to 100kg x9 and then Rows, Dips, Curls and Rear Raises to finish
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My First Meet Experience at the BPO UK Open Championships 2014
My first meet!
What a day! To carry on from last post I got up on the Friday morning and weighed in at 83.1kg only 0.6kg over what I need to be on Saturday. No water at all allowed today, only enough to wet my lips when need be! I ate very little over the day and kept it to protein only and BCAA’s and by the evening I was weighing in at 82kg so just where I needed to be. It wasn’t too bad, I was a little irritable and felt really tired by the evening so just tried to relax and not think about how thirsty I was!
Saturday morning stepped on scales to find I had dropped to 81.1kg so treated myself to some scrambled eggs and a coffee which took me back up to just under 82kg with 3 hours till weigh-in. Travelled up to Swansea then for weighing and recorded at 81.5kg so nice and happy and ready to feed up and hydrate.
Immediately after weigh-in I took a sachet of Dioralyte and filled a shaker with electrolyte drink which I kept drinking throughout the day (managed to get around 4 litres in total) and about 2 litres of water. Then hit Greggs for a breakfast baguette 😉
Spent the rest of the day just eating and drinking and preparing myself mentally for Saturdays meet, then one more Dioralyte in the evening.
Got up Sunday and had a cooked breakfast and another litre of electrolytes and relaxed for a bit before heading off to the meet.
Arrived at the hall met up with my coach and the other lifters and headed to the warm-up room pretty much straight away as at 82.5kg I would be in the first flight. Warmed up with my squats up to a couple of singles 160kg which was feeling nice and smooth and opened with 175kg which felt heavy but manageable and submitted my next attempt at 185kg, hit that (just!) with a close call from the judges as my knee just started to drift in a little and the spotters moved in but I got it up anyway and got 3 white lights so happy with that! Went for broke on my 3rd attempt with 192.5kg but something didn’t feel right on the way down, not sure if it was in my head as I had different knee wraps for this attempt as I had been sharing them with a teammate, or just wasn’t ready for it, and failed the lift. Never mind, happy with 185kg so next the bench press ..
There was a half hour break so had a quick protein shake and a handful of jelly sweets to keep sugar levels up and started to warm up for bench. Was feeling really good about this, bar was moving smoothly and shoulder (for once) was behaving and I had no pain at all. I was pretty much learning to lift on command in the warm-up room, I’ve done pause bench in training, but actually waiting for someone to call ‘press’ when in the bottom position, and ‘rack’ before racking it up, was totally different, however I was determined not to get red lighted for missing commands as a few other lifters ahead of me had been doing. Opened with 130kg, and had no problems making the lift so went up to 135kg for 2nd attempt. Bit of a grinder but again, went up and more importantly, no red lights! I was happy with 135kg as a total so just to push myself tried a 140kg but failed to get it. Another half hour and on to deadlifts.
Surprisingly, warming up for deadlifts I felt really strong and confident. I have always considered deadlifts to be my weakest lift but today they were feeling good and I was hoping to get a PR. Opened with a 180kg, easy lockout so went up to 190kg. A little tougher and only 5kg away from my previous 1RM, but again locked out no problem so decided to go for it and attempt 200kg a new PR. My coach then advised me to hitch up my singlet legs and talc my thighs as he could see it was slowing the bar down on lockout, did it and then got my 200kg to bring my total to 520kg.
Happy to have made 7 of 9 lifts and achieving the lifts I wanted I sat down to watch the rest of the competition and award ceremony. I hadn’t been looking at the board so had no idea where I had placed, but I had come to test myself and was quite happy to have made it through and got a good total so when I was called forward as the winner in my category I was over the moon!
To top it off I received an invite the next morning to compete at the WPF World Championships in France in November to represent Great Britain so I think it’s safe to say a successful first meet!
8 weeks now to prep for the World’s! Yikes!!
On a side note, the BPO doesn’t have a RAW (unequipped) category for lifters so even though I got through the UK’s raw, I will be suiting up for the world’s otherwise I’ll stand little chance of keeping up!
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Thursday 4th September 2014 – Meet Preparation
3 days to go! Dropping the water intake as of yesterday (only 1 gallon), today only half a gallon allowed – already struggling, feel thirsty as hell!
Yesterday I weighed at 84.2kg, weighed in this morning at 83.5kg so on track to make weight at the moment. Most important thing now is to ensure I have everything I need to rehydrate after weigh-in (24 hours). Also need to decide my opening lifts, at this stage I am looking at my most recent max sessions and using that as I will be confident I can lift it so that will mean a 172.5kg squat, 135kg bench and 180kg deadlift. I’ll see how these feel and increase from there.
Also I will spending the next couple of days foam rolling and performing mobility work, and just generally trying to relax and recouperate and be ready mentally for a great day! 😉
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Monday 3rd September 2014
Last lifting session till the meet! Started the water loading on saturday, drinking 2 gallons a day at the moment so weight up a little at 85kg this morning.
Squats (max)
Squat (belted) 162.5kg x2, 167.5kg x1, 172.5kg x1 (with wraps)
Squat 145kg x5
DB Farmers Walk 45kg x 35 secs, 40kg x30s x30s (60s rest)
Lying Leg Curl (4) x15x15x13 (superset with chins) (90s)
Chins x12x9x8 (superset with leg curls)
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Friday 29th August 2014
Bench (speed)
Bench 110kg x2x2x2x2x2 (30-60s rest)
Close Grip Bench 100kg x5x5x4 (30-60s)
Pause Bench (1″) 100kg x6x6 (30-60s)
Pulldowns (10) x12, (9) x11, (8) x10, (7) x10 (superset with Lat Raise) (90s)
DB Lat Raise 12.5kg x10, 10kg x10x10 (superset with Pulldowns)
Chins x7x7x6 (60s)
Bit of a crappy session, didn’t get a great nights sleep and the dieting is starting to catch up with me! Starting the water cut method this weekend as still not made weight. Just need to ensure I get enough food to recover and don’t reduce too much!
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Wednesday 27th August 2014
Deadlift (reps)
Deadlift 162.5kg x4x3, (belt) x5 (60-90s rest)
Rack Pull (below knee) 197.5kg x1x1 (belt) (60-90s)
Defecit Deadlift (2″) 152.5kg x5, (belt)x3x2 (60-90s)
Pulldowns (10) x15x15x11, (9) x11 (60s)
Shrugs 140kg x10x10x10 (60s)
Week 9 – current weight 84kg
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Monday 25th August 2014
Squat (reps)
Squat 152.5kg x3x3x3 (60-90s rest)
Front Squat (belt) 117.5kg x2x2 (60-90s)
Pause Squat (belt) 145kg x3x2 (60-90s)
DB Farmers Walk 45kg x35 secs x 25 secs, 40kg x 25 secs (60s rest)
Lying Leg Curl (4) x15x15 x10n (superset with chins) (90s rest)
Chins x12x9x7 (superset with leg curls)
BE HENCH 