Deeko's powerlifting thread

[KingGheedora]

Good luck, man.

 

[Deeko]

Thanks guys - I'll be posting updates to my twitter throughout the day if you're actually interested in following along - www.twitter.com/deekovb5

 

[TallBill]

Heh, Deeko is raging. Be happy man, I'd love a 2x bodyweight squat.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Originally posted by: TallBill
Heh, Deeko is raging. Be happy man, I'd love a 2x bodyweight squat.

2x squat doesn't win the overall 336 is pretty impressive at 148. Catch it up with the bench and DL, man. You got this.

 

[TallBill]

Missed my 3rd attempt.opponent hit his. I need to beat him by 60 in deadlift. I do not like him and his gay haircut.

 

[Deeko]

So I'm state champion - technically.

In case you aren't following the twitter, here's a summary:

Squat: 275, 303, miss (314)
Bench: 225, 242, miss (259)
Deadlift: 365, miss (385), 385

Squat: I am most pissed about this one. I already lowered my target 3rd lift down to 314 because I didn't feel like the 2nd went that strong. There's really no excuse for me to miss 314. I had the strength - but I leaned forward some and got stuck. Its been a problem ever since I widened my stance - not flexible enough. Ugh. Ironically, this is the single lift that I set the state record in.

Bench: Blah, I just didn't have the strength for this. The judge was doing some SERIOUS pauses, and I just couldn't finish it.

Deadlift: 2nd attempt I screwed up, I was too high, and just couldn't do it. Was obviously pissed about that, did it again on the 3rd attempt and got it up.

Total: 930. There was a guy in my weight class that beat me in every lift (he actually hit the 3rd attempts I WANTED to hit. On a good day I'd have tied him.) Turns out he is 22 and was in the junior division, so I still get the Open championship & two state records (squat, total). I blame part of my performance to just a bad day, part to the earliness. I just don't lift well in the morning, plus I was only going on 5 hours asleep because I had to get up so early. So that's that. We'll see what happens next meet. I got videos of all my lifts, I'll work on getting those uploaded.

 

[TallBill]

Haha, first place and enough motivation to kick it up a notch for the next competition. Nice work man!

 

[Deeko]

Squat - Attempt 1
Squat - Attempt 2 (state record!)
Squat - Attempt 3 (miss)

Bench - Attempt 1
Bench - Attempt 2
Bench - Attempt 3 (miss, would have been state record)

Deadlift - Attempt 1
Deadlift - Attempt 2 (miss)
Deadlift - Attempt 3

my form was not great today, and it cost me on two of my attempts (squat 3 and deadlift 2).

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Hm, state record at 303 pounds for 148 weight class in your age bracket? Seems low for a record (clearly no offense meant).

 

[Deeko]

Well there's 2 things to consider:

1) most people in the open division compete in gear
2) they've only been keeping raw division records since 06.

So setting a record is a nice feeling but its not extremely meaningful. Its actually weird - prior to my lifts the bench and squat record were both 253. At any rate, I'm a little disappointed in how this meet turned out, but there's still positives to take from it. I at least got all my 2nd attempts. In talking to other lifters, they were surprised that it was my first meet based on my poise & strength. My biggest issue was depth on squat, which was not a problem in any of my attempts. So, could have been better, but I will take it.

 

[KoolDrew]

Congrats, and not bad at all for your size. It seems like you have more in you with a bit more form work and a better day as well. One thing I noticed though is it looks like you have very little arch on your bench. It could just be the angle in the video, but if you work on keeping your elbows tucked and getting a hard arch, you would likely see a lot of improvement in your bench. In an ideal PL style bench press your upper traps should dig into the bench and you'll want to retract and depress the scapula. Your feet should also be underneath your hips and wide. Then set up your arch, by bringing your upper back towards your butt. The harder your arch (while keeping your ass on the bench), the less ROM and the more weight being placed on your upper back creating a nicer base to bench from, given everything is tight. Just like any other lift, your entire body should be tight before the lift.

Example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...A&feature=channel_page

 

[GenHoth]

Nice work dude!

 

[Spamela]

congrats. making a 3rd attempt in the DL after a miss is tough.

 

[buck]

Holy shit that is impressive.

 

[Deeko]

Originally posted by: KoolDrew
Congrats, and not bad at all for your size. It seems like you have more in you with a bit more form work and a better day as well. One thing I noticed though is it looks like you have very little arch on your bench. It could just be the angle in the video, but if you work on keeping your elbows tucked and getting a hard arch, you would likely see a lot of improvement in your bench. In an ideal PL style bench press your upper traps should dig into the bench and you'll want to retract and depress the scapula. Your feet should also be underneath your hips and wide. Then set up your arch, by bringing your upper back towards your butt. The harder your arch (while keeping your ass on the bench), the less ROM and the more weight being placed on your upper back creating a nicer base to bench from, given everything is tight. Just like any other lift, your entire body should be tight before the lift.

Example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...A&feature=channel_page

yes I am aware of the arch - you should have seen the guy that beat me - I would say my chest is a decent amount stronger than his, but his arch was freaky, made his bench a good 4" shorter than mine. Anyway, its something I'm working on, its more flexibility than anything. If you watch the 3rd attempt, there is a little better arch. but it was pretty painful. Flexibility is not my friend - it hurts my squat as well.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Well done dude. :beer:

 

[dealmaster00]

nice job! how long have you been lifting?

 

[Whisper]

Originally posted by: Deeko

Originally posted by: KoolDrew
Congrats, and not bad at all for your size. It seems like you have more in you with a bit more form work and a better day as well. One thing I noticed though is it looks like you have very little arch on your bench. It could just be the angle in the video, but if you work on keeping your elbows tucked and getting a hard arch, you would likely see a lot of improvement in your bench. In an ideal PL style bench press your upper traps should dig into the bench and you'll want to retract and depress the scapula. Your feet should also be underneath your hips and wide. Then set up your arch, by bringing your upper back towards your butt. The harder your arch (while keeping your ass on the bench), the less ROM and the more weight being placed on your upper back creating a nicer base to bench from, given everything is tight. Just like any other lift, your entire body should be tight before the lift.

Example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...A&feature=channel_page

yes I am aware of the arch - you should have seen the guy that beat me - I would say my chest is a decent amount stronger than his, but his arch was freaky, made his bench a good 4" shorter than mine. Anyway, its something I'm working on, its more flexibility than anything. If you watch the 3rd attempt, there is a little better arch. but it was pretty painful. Flexibility is not my friend - it hurts my squat as well.

Exactly what I ran into when I competed in my university's raw bench press competition a couple months back. I stuck with "standard" form (i.e., flat back, feet near the end of the bench, etc.), while the guy in my weight class who squeeked by my lift was arched all to hell. That, and he had the strangest positioning of his elbows I've ever seen (they were nearly touching his lats).

I'm not terribly interested in competitions or power lifting, so I haven't tried changing my form around to see how much additional weight it would let me lift...but I'd imagine it's quite helpful.

Edit: Also, congrats on the performance. Those lifts are nothing to scoff at, especially given it was your first try at the whole process.

 

[brikis98]

Congrats Deeko. Awesome performance and it definitely looks like you have more in you to improve on it next time.

BTW, the pause on the bench press is nuts. Having to wait down there must take a serious toll on how much you can actually lift. Do they enforce that to prevent bouncing?

 

[yelo333]

Originally posted by: brikis98
Congrats Deeko. Awesome performance and it definitely looks like you have more in you to improve on it next time.

BTW, the pause on the bench press is nuts. Having to wait down there must take a serious toll on how much you can actually lift. Do they enforce that to prevent bouncing?

Not only bouncing, but it takes as much as a couple seconds for the elastic energy stored in the muscles to dissipate.

 

[Deeko]

Yes, the pause remove the bounce & any elastic energy. It does make the bench MUCH harder. The length of the pause is really up to the judge - the rule just says the bar has to be motionless on your chest before the judge says 'press', but the judge can hold you down there as long as they want.

 

[Deeko]

Originally posted by: dealmaster00
nice job! how long have you been lifting?

I started lifting towards the end of my freshman year of college - so about 6-7 years ago. Started doing serious powerlifting training with a coach (the only formal training I've had) in mid January or so - when I posted about it in this thread, basically.

 

[Deeko]

So its official - I've signed up at this gym on an ongoing basis and I'll be competing in the Seattle Summer Classic on 6/27/09. That gives me 3 months of training. Considering I only really trained 7 weeks for this one - and most of that time was spent re-learning my form and preparing for the meet - I think I can see some big improvements by June. My (admittedly lofty) goal is 1100.

Did squats today. First time doing them since the meet - and we did sets of 5, this is the first time I've done volume like that in almost 2 months. Focused on keeping my upper back tight & not bending over so far at the waist, which was my downfall on my 3rd attempt in the meet. Felt pretty good towards the end - did 5 sets of regular squats, 4 sets of chain squats, 3 sets of box squats. Gonna be a painful Tuesday and Wednesday though.

 

[Deeko]

Scroll down to 148lb raw....

 

[Deeko]

Pretty beefy day deadlifting today. Did work sets of 335x3 350x3 365x3. Then did reverse bands with 495x3 545x3 565x3 585x3. The bands take off about 200 from the bottom, 130 from the top. So I was essentially pulling 385 off the floor and locking out 455 for a set of 3.....nice. I'm definitely pulling 4 plates next time I deadlift. Finished the day off with 3x5x130 in one armed rows. Solid indeed, especially considering I got blackout drunk last night...