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Post by Deleted on Jul 13, 2006 17:16:00 GMT -5
I don't know if I ever pulled an even 500... I think I skipped from 495 - 505, and this week to 515 and 525. No use looking back, maybe I'll make it an even 600.
To be honest, I look at PR's more in terms of adding a plate than in terms of the actual weight. When I go from a dime and a 5 to adding a 25 on each side, or when I add another plate, that's what's exciting to me. So adding a 10 on each side for 525 was less satisfying than slapping that fifth plate on for 505 (I use 5 lb. collars).
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Post by dopar66 on Jul 17, 2006 7:24:10 GMT -5
I hear ya! I'd sure be tickled if I were able to add ten pounds each time I deadlifted.
That's a good PR philosophy! I like that. I'll have to remember that and try to get that concept engrained in the membrane.
God Bless. Doug
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Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2006 12:43:24 GMT -5
Strongman Competition
I did my DE days last Saturday and Sunday and took Monday - Friday off. My gym's strongman competition was on Saturday.
As far as my chances of winning the thing, the good news was that there was only one other guy competing; his name is Ronnie. The bad news was that he's 6'2", 300 lbs. and in addition to training at my gym, he trains with Odd Haugen, a pro strongman. He has also competed in amateur strongman events, so he has quite a bit of experience. Fortunately, I didn't care about winning, I came to give my best effort, and Ronnie inspired me to do just that. I'd rather compete against him and lose than compete against 20 guys who wouldn't push me to do my best and win. And while I didn't win, I did a lot better than I expected to do against this guy, so in my book I didn't lose either.
The first event was the stones. Our gym only has stones up to 200 lbs., so we used a 160 lb. stone, a 200 lb. stone and a canvas bag filled with sand of a weight unknown to me, maybe 120-150 lbs. The implements weren't heavy enough to really test our maximum strength, but this was a timed event, so it was more about speed. We had to put the stones on a platform that was a few inches below my neck, and amazingly, I won this one. I think my advantage here was explosiveness off the ground, so I have my Westside training to thank for that. Ronnie handled the stones easily enough, but maybe didn't have quite the pop off of the ground. Or maybe he just wasn't warmed up enough. In any case, this was a great confidence booster for me, and although it would be the only event that I'd win, it helped me make it through the rest of the day.
The second event was the log press. I've only attempted a max weight once before, and my technique definitely needs some improvement, but I did what I thought I'd do; 210 lbs. I missed 230 lbs. Ronnie got 230 then missed 250, so he won this one.
The third event was a deadlift on an implement where the bar came up a couple inches below my knees. The bar was really thick, about 2.5" diameter, so grip was a big factor. I got 460 lbs. and missed 480. Ronnie got 480 and missed 500. I was pretty close on the 480. You get 60 seconds to lift it, so when I missed, I changed my grip and went at it again and had it really close to lockout when my grip slipped again. If I had used the second grip from the beginning, I might have had it. Live and learn.
The fourth event was the tire flip, 6 flips for time. I didn't ask how much the tire weighed, but whatever it was, it was enough! Its diameter was a couple inches shorter than me, maybe 5' 8". I had never done the tire flip before, so Ronnie showed me the technique and we went at it. I went first, and got a time of around 25 seconds. Ronnie went and got about 23 seconds. I went again and got 21.11 seconds, and on his second attempt Ronnie got 21.01 seconds. All in all, I feel pretty good about losing by 0.1 seconds on my first time doing the event. Again, it was all about explosiveness off the ground. Oh, and also not letting the tire knock you on the chin on the way up. My teeth still hurt from that one.
The last event was the farmer's walk, again an event I haven't really had any experience with. The implements were 255 each, to a total of 510 lbs. Picking them up was no problem, holding onto them wasn't even that much of a problem, but as soon as I took a few steps, I could tell there was going to be a problem. As usual, I gave it everything I had, but after maybe 10 steps my hips both gave out at the same time and I collapsed. Fortunately I wasn't really injured, although my hips and knees still hurt a bit, but the other guy smoked me on this one. He got about 50 ft. and I got maybe 10 ft. For one thing, I probably need to get some knee sleeves, I imagine that would help on this event. More than that, though, I just need to train this event; unlike the other events, nothing I do in the gym comes anywhere close to this.
So, at the end of the day I won 1 of 5 events, which is better than I expected. More importantly, I identified some areas of improvement for my training if I want to get better at this stuff; front squats, sumo deadlifts and farmer's walk will all help. And most importantly, I had a really great time and good fellowship with Ronnie, my wife and son, and the other guys who were helping out or watching the event.
Oh, and the funny moment. I didn't know about this until my wife told me afterwards, but while I was doing the tire flip some random lady off the street came up and started cheering for me and singing that "Macho, macho man" song. I didn't see or hear her since I was too focused on what I was doing but my wife is still teasing me about my "groupie." LOL.
Next competition at my gym is in October, a full powerlifting event, so I'll rest up this week then start training for that. I think we'll have some more compeition for that one.
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Post by dopar66 on Jul 25, 2006 6:32:49 GMT -5
Awesome, Bow! Congratulations on a job well done! You pointed this out, but you may have only won one event, but you were pushing this dude to the max on averything but the farmer's walk. Plus he trains with Odd Haugen (the oldest guy to ever make the worlds, by the way) so he has had a lot of input on technique. All in all I'd say that was a great one to notch on the belt!
Hopefully a lot of your strongman experience will carry over to your power meet, some of the planning and training stuff, and in October you'll completely dominate.
Great stuff, Bow!
God Bless. Doug
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