Who needs to squat!....Or how I performed well at the Arnolds without training squat...

Ahhhh the Arnold Weightlifting Championships, part competition, part freak show.  The theme for the weekend was "Let's get weird!"  And speaking of weird, my training going into the competition was the weirdest, most inconsistent, directionless training I've ever had.  I wasn't really following a specific cycle or plan for most of the time frame between the American Open and the Arnold.  I had a collaborative training cycle for about 3 weeks leading into the competition and that's about the extent of planning.  Since about the end of October I had done a back squat a grand total of one time and front squats maybe a total of three times, essentially zero focus on training a heavy bilateral squat for strength.  My squat training came in two forms: full lifts and split squats.  The rest of my strength training involved snatch pulls.  Yep, basically three things got me healthy, got me strong, and helped me nail a PR.  It's not the normal training I would prescribe but I had to think outside the box after pissing a year's worth of good training down my leg and hurting myself at the American Open.  And well, it worked so well it even got rid of nagging pains I've experienced for years. 

After waiting months to redeem myself from having to withdraw from the American Open it was time for a little ol' road trip to the thriving metropolis of Columbus, OH.  As the sun rose Thursday I was packing before heading to the airport to pick up my lifter, James, who unhappily arrived from Arizona to a snowy Chicago landscape.  We hit the road where we stopped in Indiana for a quality breakfast with the old folks at Bob Evans then gassed up & got provisions for the trip.  About 5 hours and one video of dancing gummy bears later, we arrived in Columbus.  A little pre-workout meal from Wendy's and we headed to the venue for our final training session before the competition.  I can happily and excitedly tell you that we were the very first people to use the warm-up room that was stocked with brand new Eleiko bars.  Post training meal involved James and Terry making fun of me for my lack of desire to parallel park my truck outside of the restaurant and then eventually getting a parking ticket for parking in a residential area.  Damn you, Columbus Meter Maids!

Friday was all about watching teammates compete, cups of bacon, exploring the expo, and one smart ass comment almost setting of a 'Roid Rage.  The hotel we were setup in thankfully had a free breakfast that involved more than tiny boxes of cereal and a box of mixed bagels, donuts, and danishes.  Post-breakfast we decided Terry would need a pick-me-up since he was trouble-shooting the scoreboard all weekend long so we packed a coffee to-go cup with bacon.  It was much appreciated and later repeated.  After the bacon delivery it was time to wander the expo, get free crap, and enjoy the freak show.  However, when at the Arnold Sports Festival I would recommend against offering to hold a man's purse while he attempts to axel deadlift 480lbs.  Otherwise you get an overly acned, overly large dude puffing his chest up in your face, posturing up like a gorilla in the safari telling you that that's his brother and not to call it a purse.  And that's when I quickly wandered away.  Haha!  Friday evening ended with a little driving tour around the Ohio State University campus and surprising my men's volleyball team when I showed up to watch them play against OSU.  While they played amazing and took it to 5 games, they eventually lost. 

Saturday!  Game day!  After breakfast with the teammates, they went off to the venue to wait around for weigh-ins and I stuck around the hotel awhile.  About an hour and half later, I was in rare form.  Showered up, make-up on, hair & nails did.  I figured if I looked pretty I would lift pretty.  Turns out that wasn't too far off.  Everything was feeling great during warm-ups and I told my coach that I wanted to open with a conservative 70, then jump to 74, and finally take a PR attempt at 78.  This was one of the few meets where I've ever had to go back into the warm-up room for extra lifts because there were so many attempts by other lifters between my announced attempts.  Opened with a solid 70, came out with an even more solid 74 on the second attempt, missed an extra lift back in the warm up room, shrugged it off, and boldly walked out for a stab at 78.  I don't recall anything between the point of lift off and when I was sitting in the bottom of the snatch just holding on to it, recovering slowly.  Stood up with it, got the down signal, stared down the scoreboard looking for those little white lights, and then bounced down off the platform like a 15-year-old cheerleader.  Three white lights and a confirmed PR!

On to the clean & jerks!  I realized that I'm either getting stronger or smarter or both but it really doesn't take me many attempts to get to my openers anymore. In this case I was ready for my opener after 4 warm-up attempts.  Again I went with a conservative opener at 85, I just needed to hit that to nail a good enough total to qualify for Nationals.  Solid, easy clean but a weeee bit of an unlock on the jerk.  Thanks to inconsistent judging I was able to get 2 of 3 white lights on it though.  After another lift in the warm up room, came back out on the platform with 90, again an easy clean but Lordy did I throw the jerk forward.  Locked it out, lunged forward, again got 2 of 3 white lights.  Again there were what felt like a million attempts between my second and third attempts and I was running out of gas so I didn't want to take an extra lift in the back.  I had gummy bears between snatch and clean & jerk (*gasp* don't care, don't want your nutritional advice) and they were quickly disappearing from their intended energy boost.  Stepped on the platform determined to go for broke on an attempt at 94.  Crussssshhhhhhhed the clean, stood up, and then the room started getting small.  One breath, two breath, dip, annnnd dumped the weight.  Holy hell was I gassed.  In the end I was credited with 78 & 90 on a 5 for 6 performance and within 1k of my best total ever.  Check it out.....

Overall I really do credit the split squats with not only being my saving grace but also the reason I was able to perform as well as I did without training heavy front or back squats.  One week out from the competition I was able to split squat holding 160lbs for two reps each leg.  In case you're wondering that's essentially what I weigh and I squatted it primarily using one leg.  I call that a win.  Who needs to train squats!  Well actually we all do but split squats are now going to be a staple of all my training cycles in some capacity.  8 hours worth of driving and 3 days later, I've already been back in on the platform twice.  One day of working of being patient during snatch and finding better balance & transition on the snatch pull.  One day of working on feeling the difference between a good jerk and a bad jerk.  Annnnnnd I squatted!  Back squat 100x3 like it was a warm up weight.  I know it's not that heavy but blah blah blah don't care, the point is I squatted 100k after not squatting since October! 

Who's back on the right track for big things this year?  This girl!  I hear a PR train rolling into the station and it's time to hop on.  Chugga chugga chooooo chooooo! 

Beastess Athletics

I will preface this post with the mere statement that it will be nothing but gratuitous self-promotion from here to the end of the post.  As if that were something new for this blog haha!  Anywayyyyyyy.......

I've spent the last couple years sending out email updates about local meets.  What started out as a small endeavor has grown immensely and I now seem to be somewhat of a go-to person for weightlifting in Chicagoland and the area.  I wanted to create a website that would allow people an online resource for all things weightlifting in Chicagoland and the Midwest region, a place people could refer others to for questions regarding upcoming meets, local coach information, and educational materials.  So I now proudly give you

BeastessAthletics.com

Beastess Athletics will be constantly evolving.  I'm a strength coach not a web developer so you'll have to be patient with me as I work on it.  Please check out the webpage and even better, click the box on the page that says "Follow blog via email."  

So there you have it, I made you read this blog (boosting my numbers) and made you click the link to the new page (boosting those numbers)...BOOM gratuitous self-promotion!

A Few Favorite Lifters

There are superstars in every sport that people idolize for one reason or another.  Being a strength & conditioning coach by profession I always get asked about my favorite sports or athletes.  Or I'll get a "hey did you watch the game last night?"  Honestly my answer is while I will cheer for specific teams, I don't really watch sports.  I like going to games, atmosphere always makes a huge difference, or I'll watch something like the Super Bowl but in the end I really just don't give a crap.  The only thing I will watch sports-related on a regular basis is lifting videos and since that's not a mainstream sport here I can spend endless hours watching online.

Some of the really old lifting videos are awesome to watch.  I don't mean like 20 years old.  We're talking the realllly old school, black & white videos.  Those guys were strength athletes, true specimens.  

But this post isn't about old school lifting.  It's about a few of the lifters out there that I admire.  Most of them will be US lifters, I like to support where I came from, honor those who came before me, and those who are still cutting a trail.  I'm also going to start with the female lifters first.

Tara Nott & Cheryl Haworth
The first female Olympic gold medalist in weightlifting under the current style of events and the last females to place in the top 3 at any of the recent Olympic Games.  Do I really need to say much more than that?   In the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games Tara captured the gold medal in the 48k class.  At those same Games, Cheryl took home a bronze in the +75k class.  Both amazing women, trail-blazers.  I have been fortunate enough to train under and work with Tara's personal coach from those Games.  Cheryl was also part of a short film called "Strong!" which I highly recommend you check out.

Sarah Robles
Sarah is one of our current Olympians from 2012 and is working towards 2016 in Rio.  She competed in the London Games in the +75k class where she took 7th overall.  Teammate Holley Mangold finished 10th at those Games.  Sarah is one of my favorites because she's probably one of the most exuberant upbeat people I've ever met in my life.  She's passionate about the sport and is so positive about life.  She's currently the strongest woman in America and it really doesn't get more awesome than that.  She even co-writes the blog Pretty Strong with another female lifter and they tend to get quite humorous at times. 

Other favorite female lifters include Melanie Roach of the US.  She's a wife, mother, business owner, and Olympian.  She's beautiful, successful, and strong.  A quick little jaunt over to Google will show you everything I just mentioned.  Then I'll briefly mention Lidia Valentin, a 75k lifter from Spain.  She's crazyyyyy strong, beautiful, and just a total bad ass.  She's also in the weight class that I compete in and finished 4th at the 2012 London Games.  Definitely someone to watch endless clips of on YouTube. 

Now on to the men.  There's no beating around the bush here.  It's all about the gigantic guys picking up stupidly heavy things and throwing them over their heads.  It's also about all of them being juussst a bit on the crazy side.  I just love watching these guys compete live or watching their videos online.  It's all insane!  From the US there are three guys that I like watching lift.  From the Super Heavyweights (+105k class) a good friend of mine, Zach Schluender, and of course my very own teammate, Shane Maier.  Both have represented the US on international stages and both are ridiculously strong.  Both are great people on and off the platform.  Zach has been around the sport for quite some time, is insanely smart about lifting and a great motivator.  Shane is also a great motivator and it's a blast training on the platform next to him.  I definitely encourage you to YouTube both guys.  Zach has a couple of videos that start out with "CRAZY" in the title. 

 

 

Then there's the perennial favorite of CrossFitters and man-crush for many of my male lifters, Donny Shankle.  Donny is a 105k lifter but he's lifting almost as much as the +105k guys.  YouTube has no shortage of Donny videos.  As mentioned in my previous post, A Day with Donny, I was actually really impressed with his coaching abilities as well.

And last but not least a foreign lifter, Matthias Steiner of Germany.  He's got an incredibly inspirational story leading up to the 2008 Beijing Games where he took the gold medal and which you only get a small taste of in the clip that I'm going to share with you.  Not only is he pretty inspirational but he's an all out beast.  In the 2012 London Games he dropped 196k snatch on his neck and walked away from it.  Obviously he ended up withdrawing from the meet but damn it's just a little bit crazy to get up and dust yourself off after something like that.

 I love watching lifting.  These are just some awesome individuals that I enjoy watching more than others.  To each their own as I'm sure people will have their own opinions on who they like to watch.  Who are your favorites to watch?

Weight Room Etiquette

Do's & Don'ts of Being in a Weight Room

DO
- Clean up your weights when you're done. Oh you don't like picking up after people?  Well neither do I so clean up your shit.

- Use bigger plates.  Loading the bar with a bunch of 10k plates is a dick move, especially if there are other lifters who actually need those plates.  The plates you're looking for are generally colored blue and red so don't be a dipshit, use them.

- Clean the bar if you bleed on it.  I don't know where you've been.  I don't want your cooties.  Torn callouses = badge of bad-ass honor.  Leaving your blood on the bar = dirty vagabond asshole.

- Use your time wisely.  Spending 10 minutes between sets because you're updating Facebook about every tiny sensation you experienced during your last set of squats is STRICTLY PROHIBITED.  And your phone may become a victim of "I don't know how it ended up under the weights I was dropping."

- Shout appropriate well-timed encouragement to fellow lifters.  If you're not sure of what to yell the basic standbys are "Let's go!" or "Come on!" or "Get after it!"  If you don't know the lifter's particular nuances or you're one of those newbie lifters, please refrain from shouting technical cues at the lifter.

- Get used to not having super soft girly hands.  We're lifting weights not petting kitties.

- Wear spandex or other applicable tight clothing.  Why?  So it doesn't get in the way of your lifting, genius.  No it doesn't have to come from Lululemon.  You can buy 4 pairs of tights at Target and support a child in Malaysia for what one pair of Lulu tights cost.

- Get used to speaking in grunts.  It means you're trying hard.  It's also easier to describe in grunts what you're trying to do. 

DON'T
- Walk in front of a lifter that's taking an attempt, especially if it's a max attempt.  If you're not sure if it's a max attempt ask yourself this, "Does it look heavy?"  Yes?  Then move your dumb ass out of the way.  And most certainly DO NOT stand right there in front of them and stare.  This gives them license to drop kick your ass across the weight room. 

- Take weights from a platform that someone else is using.  Walk your lazy ass over to the rack & get your own damn weights.  If you absolutely must share weights, be a gentleman(woman) and ask first, even if you only need them for one set.  Otherwise you deserve to get charlie-horsed in both calves. 

- Talk to someone chalking up if they appear to be "in the zone."  This is usually indicated by screaming, muttering to themselves, a solemn face staring into the distance, or any combination of the above.  Punishment might include a backhand to the face.

- Lift face to face on the same platform at the same time.  I mean come on this isn't Jazzercise.  It's also not the club so I don't need you all up in my personal lifting bubble.  Get your face outta my face or I'm gonna throw my weights at you. 

- Strut around the weight room like a peacock.  Save that shit for a Globo Gym bench-a-thon.  Pay your dues and earn your stripes like the rest of us.  Shut up, pick up something heavy, repeat.  Peacocking belongs at the zoo.

- Talk back to your coach.  They're your coach for a reason.  If you aren't going to listen to them and their programming then they have no reason to listen to you whine about not making gains.  Shut your mouth, do your work, trust your coach.

- Take a perfectly good block of chalk and break it into 1000 pieces.  Or that's what will happen to your face.

- Give pointers if you don't know what you're talking about.  Also don't demonstrate your lack of knowledge, it only makes your lack thereof more glaring in your attempt to be "helpful."  The less you really know about it the dumber you will appear, especially when pantomiming.


Happy lifting!

A Day with Donny

Yeah I know.  I've been a little remiss in posting lately.  It's not that I haven't been motivated to write a post.  More like life got in the way and I haven't really had time to sit down and post what is really bouncing around my noggin.  Then as you may know, the moment you get time to sit down and do it your head goes blank.

At any rate I'm now going to go back about 3 weeks ago when Eleiko Sport Center was paid a little visit by Donny Shankle.  Yes THE Donny Shankle, the originator of "Pull the bar like you're ripping the head off a goddamn lion."  For one entire Saturday the ten or so of us that attended his seminar were picked apart & coached by Donny.  By the end of the day we were all going to attempt PRs in the snatch and clean & jerk.

Going into the weekend I was a bit nervous as I hadn't done a single lift from the floor nor had I bilaterally squatted since before the American Open.  That was the last time I had attempted full lifts before my body/back gave me the middle finger.  I'd been lifting at or above knee in all the lifts and most certainly hadn't dropped below parallel on a single lift.  The only strength and below parallel work I'd been working on was split squats with my rear foot elevated.  Those didn't cause any back pain whatsoever and as it turns out, I was pretty weak on them.  They made my legs sore like I had just ridden a horse cross country for the Pony Express.  Gee, I wonder what has been lacking in my training program....unilateral work much?!

Anyway I had fully prepared for Saturday by borrowing some blocks from a local CrossFit so if worse came to worse I could do partial movements from the block.  I walked into Eleiko that morning over a half an hour early and found Donny laying on a stretch board on a platform, weight room completely silent and devoid of any music.  I'll admit even having met him on a previous occasion and been in the warm up room at a national meet at the same time as he was, I was still pretty excited to meet and work with him.  I had heard good things from people who really knew him on a personal level.

We started off working on overhead squat and snatching technique.  As I had suspected but really kind of refused to acknowledge, I don't squat near low enough in the overhead.  I had several inches range of motion I had yet to achieve which could and will help me hit a lower position in the snatch. Donny showed us a stretch to help with pulling yourself down into a deeper overhead squat position and I've actually been working on squatting lower across the board in all squats.  From there we worked on positional snatches and I needed a slight modification on my second pull positioning and transition.  At this point I continue to be amazed that I've been relatively successful in lifting with questionable lift technique.  Maybe not so much questionable technique more as I have plenty of room for fine tuning which should lead to huge improvements.  That was really the take-home message for me: fine tune and correct my snatch pull while dropping into a deeper squat should make the improvements I've been striving for.  It'll take me being a bit more cognizant about hitting the right positions but with a few hundred+ reps I'm certain I can get there. 

Moving on to cleans there wasn't anything terribly glaring that I needed to correct.  Yes my clean grip is a bit wider than most, thank you freakishly long arms, but I feel the wider grip is my one nuance that I've actually made work well for me.  The basic take home message for cleans was get into that deep squat but utilize the stretch reflex to get out of the hole quicker.  I mean we've all had one of those cleans you just grind out that crushes your soul right before you have to jerk.  Let's not even talk about missing that bounce and getting buried by a clean, frustrating but at least you racked it right?!

Speaking of soul crushing....jerks, the bane of my existence.  I feel like I've tried every possible combo available for improving my jerk.  From behind the neck, from in front, off the blocks, not off the blocks, front squats plus jerks, overloaded dips, overloaded recoveries, with a pause, without a pause, deeper dip, shorter dip, presses in a split, push presses, push jerks, and whatever magical cure-all you can come up with involving any of that mess.  Donny presented a simple solution to determining your split stance and then all you have to do is drop under.  I have always felt like I don't get under a jerk all that well, like I catch without much of a knee bend but up until this point no one has ever recommended anything regards to my foot placement or how to get under it better.  The focus seems to have been on what my body does from the waist up.  Moment of epiphany when after correcting my legs/stance/foot placement, a jerk, albeit a light one, actually locked into place.  Effortless.  8 years struggling for every kilo on a jerk and Donny seemed to fix it in a matter of about 10 minutes.  Now I know that's jumping the gun.  Effortlessly locking in a 65k jerk doesn't equate to locking in 100k jerk but becoming consistent in the new/revised version of my jerk is the key to working my way up to that 100k.  It's just small changes in my inner voice cues before I jerk but I'm already starting to feel a difference. 

So after a few hours of working on refinements it was moment of truth time, going after full lift PRs.  And I was still nervous as hell.  Questions were bouncing around my head like a ping pong ball.  Was this really the brightest thing to do?  I haven't even been squatting, should I even attempt the full lifts?  Is this going to set me back on my road to recovery?  Will my coach kill me when he finds out I did the lifts after having not done them in almost 2 months?  Then the inner Beastess voice piped up and quieted all those thoughts.  She simply said, "Go for it.  If it hurts, you shut it down.  Now get your ass on that platform."

After commandeering a platform with the one other girl that was taking the seminar, we started warming up with the goal of hitting a PR within 8 reps.  For me that equated to hitting a 78k snatch which seemed like a pretty sizeable task considering I hadn't touched anything snatch related that weighed more than 60k.   Worked my way up hitting a 65 pretty easily.  The snatches felt snappy and light.  Donny said to put on 71, missed it.  Dropped back down to 68 and made it.  Went back to 71....nailed it!  By now I was pretty impressed with myself, not only was I still pain and discomfort free but I was up in heavy weight territory that I hadn't attempted since before the Open.  I took two attempts at 74 missing both before doing a couple of down sets.  Holy hell I snatched 71 without having squat or pulled in weeeeeeks!

On to clean & jerks!  This was actually more nerve racking than the snatches since technically this was the lift that I was performing when I solidified my status as injured.  Not to mention the last meet prior to the Open I completely bombed out on clean & jerks.  So needless to say clean & jerking could prove to be either really great or really grotesque.  Turns out it was somewhere in that middle ground.  Again we were tasked with hitting a PR within 8 reps which means I was aiming for 96k.  Much like on snatch, I worked up to 65k and hit that pretty easily.  Jumped to 75, a normal jump for me.  Crushed the clean, failed the jerk.  Okay mental check, let's get it the second time around.  Again I cleaned it annnnnnnnd failed yet again on the jerk.  Now I'm pissed off so I rip the weights off and go back down to 65....uuuuuggggllllyyy!  Stupid stupid jerks, bane of my existence!!  So Donny had me do a clean & jerk combo of one clean plus two jerks.  After 3 rounds of that at 65 it was time to just shut things down. 

After all that lifting I was shaking and tears were starting to build up that I knew I wouldn't be able to control.  I took a moment off to the side, letting them flow a little bit, trying to calm my body back down.  It was a strange little roller coaster of emotion.  Going from the fear of lifting to the adrenaline bomb of snatching well to the irritation of not locking in those jerks.  I had to remind myself that not only was I able to fully participate and lift in the seminar but I was able to do so without any pain or feeling like I had set myself back.  I can't help that I was crying over all of that.  I'm still a girl dammit!  I know that my injury wasn't much compared to what others have experienced but to finally be able to do something again that I'm so passionate about was absolutely wonderful to me!

In the aftermath of the Day with Donny I spent the next two days walking around like my body was put thru the spin-cycle on a washing machine but it was the most glorious feeling!  Why?  Because it was still pain free!  I also realized that it was the first and the last time I will EVER out snatch my clean & jerk.  I almost consider Donny a miracle worker.  One day had restored my confidence that I could lift and lift well.  It restored the roar in my inner Beastess to step on the platform and just get after it.  I might not be at top levels yet but damn if I'm not on my way. 

Beware the Beastess! 

Okay 2013, let's do this!

I am coming off an amazing 2012 for the most part.  Granted it didn't quite end like I had hoped, which would've included getting on the podium at the American Open, but that would've required actually lifting at the competition.  Alas I was unable to compete (see American Open 2012 for reference) and am reminded that "without struggle there is no progress." 

It's that time of year now where people start thinking about their resolutions and goals for 2013.  Well for starters I think resolutions are stupid since 99% of the population makes them about getting in-shape and most have given up 2 weeks after making those resolutions.  Not to mention it shouldn't take a date change on the calendar to be resolved to accomplish something in your life.  As an athlete I'm constantly making goals, whether its a small goal for what I would like to achieve this week in training or what I would like to achieve in a few months at my next competition.  Hitting the next mark and going a little batshit crazy in the weight room is what keeps me going despite setbacks.  It's a bit of a passion bordering on obsession I would say.

In reviewing my goals for 2012 I found that I came very close to most of them.  My training book is littered with PRs for the first half of the year.  As the year progressed they tapered off, by September they completely disappeared, and by November this is what my training log looked like:

Please forgive the expletives in the training log, I was only expressing my sentiments at the time.  However, I'd rather look at what I accomplished over the year....

Snatch - my goal was to snatch 80kg and I managed to hit 77 in both training and in competition.  That's 10k over what I would normally be hitting for openers and a 4k improvement over my all time best.  I jussssst barely missed the 80k the last time I was able to compete.

Clean - my goal was to clean 100k and ultimately also clean & jerk it.  I was able to clean 98k pretty early in my training. which equated to an 8k PR on my best ever clean and at least 10k above my best clean & jerk.  On the actual clean & jerk side I managed to hit 95k in training, a 7k improvement over my best clean & jerk, and actually hit 93k in competition.  The next two videos show both the PR clean and the PR clean & jerk.

On the straight up strength side of things I also got very close to hitting my goals.  Most notably I finally got within reach of the double body weight back squat goal of 137k, ultimately hitting 131k.  As I've mentioned in previous posts the double weight is actually now more resembling 150k thanks to moving up a weight class.  I also deadlifted 140k and benched 66k which are both PRs but I never had goals for those having never really trained those or aimed for high weight on them.  The 140k deadlift is actually the most weight I've ever moved in any lift ever!

So overall 2012 treated me quite well.  Adding almost 20k to my total, whether I achieved it at random moments in training or in competition, is a huge success for me. It was a huge upswing in my abilities and gave me the confidence to really go after big lifts. 

This year I'm starting off a bit different than I started last year.  This year my first and ultimate goal is to overcome whatever the hell is going on with my hips and back.  While doing that I have to get my my mind right and find the big inspiration inside me that before I had found from outside sources.  This year its entirely 100% up to me.

The goals for this year include but are not limited to:
Get healthy - most namely my back/hips but also overall general health since I kicked off 2013 with a nice sinus infection.  I would like to be able to bilateral squat, lift from the floor, and perform full lifts again some time in the near future.
Stay healthy & get ridiculously strong.  Strong everything, everywhere.
Snatch 80+
Clean & Jerk 100
Clean 101+ yep I put 101k because I think 100k might be one of those stupid mental block type weights so we'll just go ahead and skip right over it. 
Squat 137-150
Deadlift 150+
Bench 75 - yes I am fully aware that this has no particular function towards Olympic lifting and tends to be on the douche-y side of things but it would also mean that I'm getting stronger overall, not to mention I think benching body weight would be a pretty cool accomplishment.  And let's face it, upper body lifts in any capacity are not my strong suit and could use some work anyway.
Total 180k - obviously in a competition would be great but I will also take training total.
Hit the podium at a national level meet - shouldn't take a genius to figure out why this would be awesome.


So those are a rough outline of the goals that I would like to accomplish this year.  They're mostly carry-overs from last year and since we're starting from a totally different place physically speaking I think they are reasonable enough.  I'm not putting a deadline on any of my goals.  It's not about accomplishing them all right away.  It's about setting myself up to be successful.  Let's do this!

American Open 2012

View from the hotel room

It's been more than a week since I traveled to Palm Springs for the American Open 2012. The weekend started off with a 3a.m. alarm clock to pick up a fellow lifter and catch a 6a.m. flight with a brief, like 5-minute, layover in Denver.  The flight from Denver to Palm Springs was about 50% weightlifters and 50% old people.  I'd say at least half of the lifters from the OTC were on that flight.  Not a bad crew to share a flight and a shuttle with!

View on our walk to our third breakfast of day one

The hotel and the venue...yeah pretty damn awesome.  Great rooms, gorgeous views.  Although I swear the hotel hallways were lifted straight out of The Shining for as never-ending as they were and I half expected a little boy to zip by riding his tricycle whispering "redrum redrum."  The convention center was connected to the hotel by more and more hallways and based on that you'd think the venue would be easy to find.  Well let's just say it took three of us about 20 minutes to find it only to be sent back to the hotel for the check-scale.  Haha!  Thursday was mostly about hanging by the pool, waiting for others to get in, and eating.  Palm Springs has some damn good places to eat and the people watching was pretty phenomenal.

Beautiful pool to waste away an afternoon

Friday, day one, saw a pretty busy day. There were so many lifters entered that Friday was a two-platform format with all the B sessions running and often in a combined classes format.  For three of the four lifters that lifted on Friday it was their first appearance on the national level.  Two of our girls competed in the 58kg class and finished 19th & 26th out of 36 lifters, which I actually think was the largest of all the weight classes this year.  I'm very proud of how well they did and I believe they were also able to qualify for Nationals.

Yummmmmy breakfast at Pinnochio's

On the men's side of things I had two guys in the 85kg class going.  The warm up room was a madhouse and I'm absolutely certain there were not enough sets of weights in there, which lead to a whole lot of "borrowing" and a bit of tension between coaches getting their lifters warm.  For one of of my guys it was his first time on the national stage and needless to say he was a bit excited. The other guy was making his second appearance and looking for a little redemption from his first time at the American Open last year.  Both wonderfully and unfortunately we had completely opposite ends of the performance spectrum.  The first-timer unfortunately wasn't able to lock in a clean & jerk and it always breaks my heart to have someone not get a total.  That now makes two lifters I've coached bomb out at the American Open, not a good track record so far.

3 Thumbs Up for Fajitas!

My other 85kg lifter was making his second appearance at the American Open.  Last year he was lifting in the 77kg class and unfortunately his debut didn't end up well.  This year we came back with a vengeance.  After much coaxing he finally moved up the 85kg class and has enjoyed every single part about adding body weight including hitting bigger and bigger lifts.  Not only did he get a total this year but he got a PR clean & jerk AND added 7kg to his best total ever.  He managed to nudge a teammate that lifted in a different session on Saturday who also totaled 280kg out of the 10th place spot based on a difference in body weight of 0.15kg.  Out of 23 lifters we had 2 guys place in the top half of the class.  I call that a great win!

Day two of lifting saw my teammate Gina making her return to the national stage.  While I know if you ask her she's not 100% happy with her performance.  However, I would like to point out that she took home the SILVER medal in the 48kg class.  For those of you that aren't versed in kilograms Gina weighs under 105lbs and between the two lifts throws a total of 268lbs (122kg) over her head. 

Sunday, day 3, final day of competition.  Again one of my teammates took home some hardware.  My teammate Shane crushed the competition taking home the gold in what turned out to be a very slim 105+ kg class with at least two of the top supers not attending this meet.  I also know he was not 100% satisfied with his performance and was disappointed to get red-lighted on his final lift.  However, I think that's the nature of the beast for lifters, we're never satisfied and always want the next level.

By now if you've made it this far and if you're a regular reader of this blog you're probably wondering where I fit into all of this, after all I did commence Operation 180 back in October.  Well to put it simply I had to withdraw from the competition all together.  Starting in about September my performance started to decline.  I attributed much of it to a perfect storm of stress.  My work load increased dramatically, I was still working 4 jobs, and personal stresses all seemed likely culprits especially when added together.  Being the big stubborn ass that I tend to be I continued to push and push and push.  Eventually my body said stop so I took 10 straight days off and stupidly did nothing, not a single athletic movement, not even foam rolling or stretching.  Coming back I thought the "rest" would be enough.  Turns out I should think a little less and listen to my body a little more.  Practice what I preach in essence.  I started experiencing a tight feeling in my low back which I attributed to extremely tight hips, both hip flexors and hip rotators.  It was really more just an annoyance and a slight discomfort than pain.  As time rolled on it started to effect my ability to perform.  I wasn't able to squat much and since lifting involves getting into full ass to grass squats you can see how this can be a detriment to performance.  I could make it through a session of snatching but I could only get in one or two clean & jerks before I had to pull the plug on that training session.  It was still only discomfort and not actual pain.  Over about 5 weeks leading up the competition I had one chiropractic session, two ART sessions, and three 90-minute deep tissue massages. 

Fast forward to competition week.  I knew going into the week there was a possibility I wouldn't be able to compete over the weekend.  On Monday I wanted to hit near my openers just to prove to myself that I could overcome and get it done.  I made it to 60kg on a snatch before my body started working against me so I shut it down.  I decided not to lift again until I got to Palm Springs.  On Friday I started what would be my last training session before competition and I wanted to summon some "old man strength," as my friend refers to it.  Snatches felt okay, snatched up to 50kg for a single.  Decided I would move on to clean & jerks since I hadn't touched those in about a week.  I did 40kg for a couple singles and then jumped to 60kg, a normal jump for me.  I got it to knee level, my body screamed NO so I dropped it.  That was the final straw for my body and I knew I wouldn't even be able to gut it out.  In tears I found my way to my coach to let him know there was no way I would be able to compete.

It was a heart breaking moment having to withdraw from the competition.  Seriously the hurt in my heart actually far exceeded the physical pain.  I've had the most phenomenal year of training adding almost 10kg to each of the two competition lifts and I really felt like I managed to piss it straight down my leg. I've never had to withdraw from a competition because of a physical inability to perform.  I had extremely high hopes and huge goals for this meet.  To many it may seem trivial, completely unimportant, an injury setback but I set high expectations for myself.  I love this sport and all I want to do is lift but I can't right now. 

Since the meet I've seen two different doctors.  One thinks it's a disc problem and I need to get an MRI to be certain.  The other one thinks it's a facet issue and I just need to let it rest and do some rehab to see how it responds.  At the moment I've lifted a grand total of twice since that Friday in Palm Springs.  I won't be doing any lifts from the floor, no lifts into a full squat, and no bilateral squatting for at least 2-3 weeks.   All of my lifting will be from blocks, overhead work, and split squats, all of which my body tolerates well.  I'm also speaking with my physical therapy friends and getting rehab from them.  We'll see how my body responds to my game plan.  It still hurts a little bit when I do something dumb but for the most part its just discomfort and a tight feeling in my low back, sacrum area, and occasionally my glutes feel really fired up and tight. 

I can't say I'm not frustrated but this is a good opportunity to peel everything back to the very basics as well as a great opportunity to re-work my jerk which is something I've been wanting to do lately.  The hopes are to be ready to start getting back to business by January and ready to start tossing up some real weight by the time the Arnolds roll around in March.  Long term goals would include making a huge statement at Nationals in July.  For right now though I have to start slow again and build myself back up both physically and mentally.  If other lifters can comeback from injury, big or small, then so can I.  If I find myself slipping and needing a little motivation then I can just watch this video.....

Overall the American Open was an interesting learning experience.  Humbling to say the least.  I still had a great time, talked to old friends, met some new friends, and had a great time coaching and supporting my teammates.  The whole experience really just leaves me very hungry to get my body right and get back on that platform.  2013 might just be the Year of the Beastess!