I wanted to know if my bench, squat and deadlift are decent.
I’ve been training for 5 months and i weight 63kg at 174mc tall.
Bench 60kg
squat 85kg
deadlift 145kg
If your happy with them and your progress the answer is yes.
4 Likes
Compared to what is the question. Other kids your age? Other people 5 months into training? People who weigh 63kg?
Depends where you started too. How much have you improved in 5 months?
other kids my age
Your numbers right now don’t really matter. Just look around your school gym and see how you stack up.
What does matter is that you learn proper technique. Technique in high school weight rooms is pretty horrendous. Use a full range of motion (especially on squats) and focus on execution of each rep, not just adding as much weight to the bar as possible.
Also find a program around a few lifts and stick to it. I think 5/3/1 is an excellent choice for new lifters. If you follow 5/3/1 for the next year I can almost guarantee that you’ll be one of the strongest people in your weight room.
2 Likes
This.
Focus on what you can do to be the strongest guy you know in 3 years time. On that kind of time scale you have the opportunity to achieve the kind of things that will make people take notice.
1 Like
Yup, and keep a workout log! Keeping a log and following a program are the 2 things I did differently than all my friends who lifted weights. It’s not a coincidence that I got stronger than all my friends.
1 Like
I can compare you to me, I’ve been training since I was younger than you. I’m 17 now, 75kg, 173cm tall. A few days before I turned 17, I squatted 195kg, benched 105kg, deadlifted 200kg in a powerlifting meet.
I deadlifted 143kg for the first time on my 16th birthday weighing about 70kg. When I was 15 and 9 months, I deadlifted 120kg for 5 reps, weighing about 68kg. This was a huge PR at the time.
I benched 61kg for the first time when I was around 15 and 4-5 months weighing about 66kg. By my 16th birthday, I benched 84kg for 2 reps paused weighing about 70kg.
As someone who started off weighing 55kg, I can tell you that gaining weight is EXTREMELY helpful for building strength and size. Gain weight, trust me. Thank me later.
My squat has always been a real strong point for me, I even have a thread on here called “I’m 16, and my deadlift sucks” where I was concerned about my squat being higher than my deadlift. In that thread, I basically discovered that I’m just good at squatting. I think at my 16th birthday I could squat around 125kg.
As someone who always wanted to compare myself to other people when I was 15 (I still do a little bit now to be honest), this is the kind of post I wanted to see someone make for me. If there’s any other advice or anything you want, let me know, I’ve probably been there.
All that being said, I’ve realized that (for me at least) focusing too much on other people is pointless. All you can do is become a better version of yourself. Will you beat my squat PRs at a younger age? Probably not, but it’s possible. will you beat my deadlift PRs at a younger age and lower bodyweight? You already have.
Yesterday my friend sent me a link to an article that claimed it could calculate your maximum natural strength and muscle potential. I didn’t calculate it on myself because seeing a number at the top just limits myself. Jesse Norris (he broke the 90kg record by a huge amount) said he never looked up what other people lifted, he just lifted himself, with no idea how he compared to other people until he was deadlifting 600lbs or something. He was a teenager at the time. Don’t worry too much about how strong other people are. You’re doing well for your age and bodyweight, and you need to put in the time to get better.
I think this is why alot of people who start powerlifting never go beyond 1 or two meets. They look at their competition and think: yeh, I am years behind these people, fuck it. That and they keep comparing themselves to everyone else. They get frustrated, and quit.
Honestyl, I have my first meet soon and I am expected to come dead last. It does not bother me, because every meet is an opportunity for me to get better.
I try not to compare myself to other people. I go tunnel vision. Helps keep me focused on the long goal.
3 Likes
Leading up to my meet, I expected to come dead last. I saw a bunch of people on YouTube and Instagram younger than me and stronger than me. That being said, I do find it motivating to see people who had the same stats as me looking back on how far they’ve come. It makes me feel like I could be there. Still, focus on your own long term progress. You’re going to be very strong if you do so for a long time .
1 Like
While this is probably good advice for some people, I am the opposite. I tend to constantly compare myself to others who are stronger than me, it is one of the major factors in keeping that fire lit to keep progressing and getting stronger. I’m a very competitive person, and use those that are stronger than me as motivation…but I guess I can see how some could adopt the “fuck it” attitude and give up…
1 Like
I’m sorta the same way… I have noticed as of late the level of the guys people seem to gauge themselves by online has lowered.
Its weird to me to see guys thinking a 315 bench is massive drug free or not.
2 Likes
Well it probably comes back to the whole expectation of instant gratification. While a 315lb bench is not massive, it also isn’t easy and typically takes a couple/few years of work under the bar to get there.
Add a low work ethic to the mix and you get a kid claiming anyone who has done anything impressive is on the sauce.
I’m not really sure where I’m going with this…just killing time before my appointment to hopefully get this damn cast off my foot.
1 Like
Yeah I blame the whole fake natty thing for allot of it. It’s created this mind set that no one can lift a certain amount with out being on something.with some of those amounts being kinda mediocre imo.
1 Like
It’s more than 95% of commercial gym members can bench, and some of them take steroids, so I while it’s nonsense I can understand the confusion.
When I used to train in a commercial gym there was one time that I deadlifted something like 385x10 (can’t remember exactly but it was a AMRAP set on 5/3/1) and I sat down to catch my breath, this guy walked up to me and was like “wow man, that was awesome, where do you get your juice from”. All I could do is laugh.
2 Likes
Speaking of which. Came across a video of some popular physique guy I guess. He was defiantly traveling out of his lane. He was telling his core audiences he was slowly coming up on elite level numbers on the bench. At the moment it was 335lbs at a bodyweight of 200. I got a smile and head shake out of that one.
2 Likes
Some people don’t know the difference between elite an mediocre.
1 Like
Here is the funny part. The guy was claiming it was based on competitive standard’s.
There are some charts out there with “elite” numbers that don’t seem to have anything to do with powerlifting, like this site called ExRx and some book that Rippetoe wrote. I just looked up the ExRx one and all my lifts are elite or close.
1 Like
Yeah some of my younger day lifts fall into those categories based on those charts.no way in comp circles could you call them elite.
2 Likes