An update from your friendly neighborhood powerlifter
It’s a new year. Crazy, no?
The holiday binge is over. It’s now time to refocus on a few goals. The first few of which are right around the corner.
Most of our guys are competing in a few meets this month. First, a group of us (me included) are going over to Russellville, Arkansas for a meet January 21st. Second, Sam Byrd will be going down to Corpus Christi, Texas for the big Raw Unity meet on the same weekend. He’ll be taking a shot at a very big squat while he’s down there. Stay tuned to the Faction Facebook page later this month for all the media.
In the meantime, we’re working about as hard as we can to prepare. The following adjustments have been made in my training.
1. While I actually like conditioning, this work has been largely eliminated over the last several weeks. This makes more room for specialized training, like squats…I feel fat, though.
2. I’ve backed off the standing press just a bit so that I can focus a bit on the bench press. I hate it. It hurts. It’s stupid. But it’s one of the lifts, so it must be practiced.
3. I’m still doing quite a bit of assistance work, but it’s tailored to what I feel are my specific weaknesses. For example, I’ve been doing lots of glute-ham raises with a band to try and increase my deadlift speed off the floor. It worked in the past, we’ll see if it helps me now.
4. In the deadlift and squat, we’ve been doing quite a bit of heavy competitive form lifts. This means less use of partial range of motion special exercises. Less band and chain. Less specialty bar work (Note: less, but we still do it). To be honest, my strength is a little wavering right now. I’ve had some bad days that are likely due to a bit of fatigue. But I’ll be just fine. Nothing a little taper will not address. Speaking of which…
5. The taper. My plan is to keep grinding for another week. I’ll try my best to not get injured. After January 7th, I will not touch another deadlift. I need my lower back to be fresh going into the meet on the 21st. Also, my last heavy day will be on the 10th. This will give me some 11 days to get rid of the fatigue and bring some zip back in my body. I’m hoping that’s enough to enable a good showing at the competition.
I really do not have many goals this time around, other than to have a good time. But I do know my openers (this is a raw meet).
Squat – 600 lbs.
Close grip bench press – 400 lbs…if I can hold myself together.
Deadlift – 600 lbs.
We’ll see how things go.
Happy New Year!
Chris
