2012 USAPL Richmond Open: Meet Results

I competed in the 2012 USAPL Richmond Open this past weekend and it was a huge success for me.  I hit a PR in the squat and deadlift as well as my meet total!  I competed at 181 and weighed in Saturday morning at 180.9 after cutting about 10lbs (first time I’ve had to cut weight).  For anyone who read my post last week you know that I was very unsure going into the meet so for me to come out with PRs and meeting my goal of an 1100lbs total (finished with 1136lbs)is a huge deal for me.  So without wasting any more time here is the video compilation of my attempts...

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The only thing that even remotely ruffled my feathers as far as judging went was on my squat.  On my first attempt I got red lighted for my depth even though I felt I was below parallel.  Then on my second I got a white light but the judge still told me I was almost high.  So for good measure on my third attempt I decided to hang out in the bottom so there wouldn’t be any question.

Bench press went alright.  I was hoping to get around 325 but after my second attempt I only took a little jump.  After all the trouble I’d been having with my shirt I was just glad to get on the board.  After watching the videos I noticed a bunch of problems.  My arch wasn’t as big as it could have been, I tucked my elbows too much then I didn’t flare them on the way up (this causes a loss in leverage), and for the position I started in I hit to low on my chest which threw off my whole stroke.

My deadlift went a lot better than expected.  I actually feel like I could have gone much heavier on my last one but whatever I got the weight and the total. I still need to sit back into my heels more and pull back more as opposed to standing straight up which is very evident on my last attempt.

Right now my upcoming goals are to get stronger and continue to refine my technique on my lifts.  I don’t like saying that I have to work on my weak points because as far as I’m concerned everything is weak and it all needs to be worked on.  Is this the wrong attitude to have? Absolutely not, as I’ve stated before I don’t like feeling content.  The moment I feel content and that I’m strong is the moment that I stop working hard and I don’t ever want to stop working hard.

I want to congratulate Carson on his first meet, he did a great job and we are all very proud of him.  I also want to thank everyone who came out to support me and who helped me out with my training and everything else.  Thanks to Gabe Naspinski who did my programming and also congratulations to him as well for totaling 2100 pounds at his meet in Tampa! Sean was a great training partner and it was a shame he couldn’t attend but he had some very important things to do in New York but thanks again man!  My friend and current SAPT intern Tadashi was my handler for the whole thing and did an awesome job taking the stress off me, wrapping my knees, picking weights, etc. so thanks a lot man I couldn’t have done it without you.  Steve was there to handle Carson but helped me out as well, he is a great friend and I’m glad he came down.

Tim Henriques was in attendance with his powerlifting team as well.  Tim is someone that I look up to in this industry and for him to help out and lend his support like he did was a huge deal for me so thanks Tim!

SAPT’s longtime client and friend Ron came down, which was awesome that he would take a whole Saturday to support Carson and I, thanks Ron!  Two of my buddies who I’ve been friends with for as long as I can remember came out as well which was cool for me to share this experience with them, thanks guys.  Part of my family made the trek to Richmond too.  This meant the world to me so thanks to my sisters, Sissy and Stephanie and to my nephew Trevor who is one of my best friends so that was doubly awesome that he came out.

Last but certainly not least I really want to thank my girlfriend Shannon for everything she did, has done, and will do.  She learned very quickly how important competing in powerlifting is for me and she jumped right on board. Without any hint of boredom or annoyance she listens to me day in and day out talk about my training successes and struggles which very few people can pull off.  She watches my videos and reads my articles and doesn’t think twice about it.  She made the trip with me to Philadelphia to spend two days watching a powerlifting meet that I wasn’t even in!  She even drove Tadashi and me to this meet and spent 7 hours waiting to film me and support me for only the 3 total minutes that I was on the platform.  I am truly lucky to have her in my life so thank you Shannon, I love you very much!

2012 USAPL Richmond Open: Opening Attempts

The 2012 USAPL Richmond Open is a couple days away and I’ve officially switched into competition mode.  This has been a very up and down training cycle.  I’m attributing this to trying to get used to my gear and my own impatience.  This is my first geared competition (single-ply) and I spent FAR too much time trying to get a lot of weight out of my gear.  I rushed into trying to get a lot of support out of my gear which in hindsight was the worst thing I could have done, why?  People spend years trying to figure out and use their equipment correctly; I tried to figure it all out in about 11 weeks.  This took all of my energy and focus off the NUMBER ONE thing…. Getting stronger!  Instead of spending those 11 weeks trying to get the most weight out of my equipment I should have just been trying to get stronger.  After all this time I’ve gotten VERY little help out of my equipment and didn’t get much stronger at all.  It was extremely impatient and immature of me to do that and trust me when I say I have learned from my mistakes.  I know now that learning the gear will come I just need to focus on getting strong.  With all that said I’ve sat down and examined everything that has gone on and what I hope to accomplish out of the meet and it’s quite simple…. Perform to the best of my abilities and get at least an 1100 pound total. I put all of this behind me a couple days ago and am now completely focused on the positive.  I can tell everyone one thing, no one will compete as hard as me and no one will leave it all on the platform like I will.

Opening Attempts...

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It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.  

-Theodore Roosevelt

Steve & Kelsey Compete in a Wife Carrying Contest

I just returned from a trip to Pennsylvania and was trying to think of a very brief yet entertaining blog to post before heading into SAPT for the day. What immediately came to mind was to share a snippet of something AWESOME that Kelsey and I got to participate in last weekend: A wife carrying contest. What are these weird and wild things I speak of, you ask?

Well, some good friends of ours are getting married, and, instead of holding a women-only bridal shower (which is typically done....I think...) as part of the pre-wedding festivities, the couple wanted to have a large group, co-ed get together. Since their goal is to move to Finland after they get married, they desired to host a Wife Carrying Contest in honor of the national game of Finland.

Needless to say, the event was hilarious, fun, and challenging all at the same time (more than one couple took a spill upon the man tripping and falling headfirst).

Annnnddd......Kelsey and I took the gold medal, so you can rest assured your SAPT coaches did you proud! (Kelsey wrote a post on training for a wife carrying contest HERE, if you're interested)

Fortunately, someone grabbed an action shot of us, so I have proof that I'm not making this entire contest up:

wifecarrying

"Why are you carrying Kelsey upside down like that" is probably the question you are asking me. Well, there are typically four ways to carry the woman (piggyback, over-shoulder, fireman carry, and upside down), and since the upside down method is the one typically used by the national champions in Europe, I figured I'd be foolish not to carry Kelsey like that. Naturally.

Here are a few wife carrying contest rules:

• The course has two dry obstacles and one water obstacle (typically a meter deep).
• The minimum weight of the wife to be carried must be 108lbs. If the wife does not weigh this much, then she must wear a backpack/rucksack on her to make her weigh at least 108lbs.
• The contestants only run the race two at a time (so you only have two couples running at once). The best time is then taken to determine the winner.
• The winner receives the wife's weight in beer.
• And, perhaps my favorite: The wife to be carried may be your own, the neighbor's, or "you may have found her farther afield", but she must be at least 17 years of age.

I'm heavily considering traveling to Maine (the North American wife carrying contest is held up there) to do this because, well, I don't think I really need to explain why this would be so epic.

Anyway, I'm done for now, hope you all have a great weekend.

3 Awesome Things I've Learned...

I’ve been in the strength and conditioning field for a very short time; luckily I have luck on my side and ended up surrounded by very smart people.  Whether it’s coaching, watching my colleagues coach, reading, or training myself I consistently learn something new every day.  With that said here are 3 awesome things I’ve learned both as a coach and as someone who trains.  

• Keep things simple…

If you’re an inexperienced lifter or you’re dealing with an inexperienced athlete don’t try and get to crazy; you’re not and their not as advanced as you think.  Squatting (bodyweight, goblet, barbell), deadlifting (kettlebells, trap bar, straight bar), and pressing (pushups, bench press, overhead press) are the best ways to gain strength, power, and body awareness.  If you are just starting out or are coaching someone who is just starting out you will be much better off refining these motor patterns, using progressive overload, and coupling them with unilateral movements like split squats, stepback lunges, bowler squats, single leg balancing.  I don’t care if someone is 8 years old or 50 years old these movements form the foundation for athletics and everyday life and should be learned proficiently.  Things like powercleans or Turkish getups are awesome but they are advanced.  I see absolutely no need to give them to someone who cannot squat, deadlift, or do a pushup correctly.  Milk the simplicity of the other exercises for all their worth; you or your athlete will be better for it in the long run.

• Get Experience Under the Bar…

In one of the first conversations I ever had with Sarah was her telling me I need to compete in powerlifting.  Her reasons were it would help me learn more about strength and conditioning and it would make me a better coach.  I wasn’t quite sure how competing would do both those things but I started training for powerlifting anyway.  Time has gone on since then and looking back I completely understand what she was talking about.  You cannot be a coach or a trainer unless you get experience under the bar.  I was re-watching the EliteFTS BIG seminar with Jim Wendler the other day (which everyone should watch) and he said two things that really stuck with me.  Keep in mind I’m paraphrasing here but he said something along the lines of “I have authority on the subject (strength training) because I’ve had a bar on my back, not because of a certification I have or something I read” and later “everything you want to know about lifting can be learned through training”.  These are bold statements but they are absolutely true.

If you’re a coach you need to try everything out, you need to get some scratches on you or no one will take your advice.  It’s like a tennis player telling you how to improve your golf swing because they read an article about it once, doesn’t make any sense.  And if you’re just trying to train stop reading internet articles all day long and go put a barbell on your back and squat it, go pull something heavy off the ground and then press something off your chest or over your head.  You can listen all you want to this guy or this girl but the truth is you will NEVER know what works until you do it yourself.  Get under the bar!

• Don’t Ever be Content and Always Have Fun…

This is where I feel people lose it.  No one should be content whether it’s your knowledge base, your numbers, the money your business brings in, your teaching abilities, it doesn’t matter always strive to be better.  If you’re a coach you shouldn’t ever come to a place where you say “I know everything I need to know” because you don’t.  The greatest strength coaches in the world still educate themselves and then apply it.  This is what’s going to make you and your athletes better.  If you’re just a person trying to get stronger that’s great but once you hit a specific goal, don’t stop there, make a new one.  I’m not saying don’t be happy about what you’ve done because that’s ridiculous.  You should be happy about what you’ve accomplished and you should reflect on those achievements but strive for more.

This leads into my next point of having fun while you’re doing all of this.  There hasn’t been one day where I haven’t had fun training or coaching.  Are there days where I’m tired and don’t necessarily feel like going to train?  Yeah, but by the end I had fun and am glad I did it.  And as far as coaching or teaching for that matter, if you’re not enjoying helping people get better and realize their potential than you need a new career.  That has been the best part of coaching and teaching for me is that I can truly have fun.  I can joke around with the clients and athletes and I can help them reach their goals.  People want to be so serious and mope around all the time, I don’t get it.  We have all had some bad stuff happen in our lives but its our ability to overcome that makes life great. Life is truly short and we need to enjoy it and have some fun while we’re living it.  With that said, I’ll leave you with this… because it’s funny!

Runner's High Measured in Humans, Dogs, & Ferrets

Here is some pretty cool research highlighted by SweatScience. I don't so much care about the ferrets, but the measured "high" in humans and dogs is fascinating!

A Tool for the Toolbox

An awesome aspect about being a strength coach is you get to watch great coaches do what they do best and at the same time be taught by them yourself.  You have the pleasure of learning and then applying this knowledge gained to your athletes and you alike.  The following deadlift refinement technique is not something I made up; again it’s something that I learned from the awesome coaches I’ve worked with and something I’ve been able to utilize with the athletes and my own training.  Try this to fix up your deadlift technique…  The volume is a little low for some reason (my apologies); better than last time though…

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A few supplementary notes…

• This is not something to go super heavy on.  This is a tool to refine your deadlift technique.
• Keep the bar weight light but use bumper plates; as I mentioned in the video it was only 95lbs of bar weight.
• As far as band tension goes you shouldn’t be using anything more than a mini band.
• Use this during your warm-up or during your off days as a way to improve your form.

Also the below video is definitely worth checking out if you’re looking for some motivation before going to train.  The video is of Jeremy Frey, a strength coach and powerlifter from EliteFTS.  This guy is ridiculously smart when it comes to training and STRONG!

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