First Meet: 1471.5 Total @ 181 Bodyweight

I have videos of all my best lifts, I’ll try to get them up on here. I don’t have them on youtube yet. But here’s a rundown of the meet.

I weighed in at 180.2 on Friday. Probably between 192 and 197 throughout the day on Saturday. I’m sure it varied quite a bit with fluid intake and exertion.

I went 9/9 on my lifts, hitting PR’s on all 3. Approximate numbers were 514/384/584. KG’s were exactly 232.5/170/265.

So some things of note: I’d never lifted with a monolift before. My first attempt I walked out. The second attempt I forgot to tell the spotters I planned to walk it out, so I didn’t. It felt just fine, even though my feet weren’t spaced right. I got away with it. 3rd attempt I planned to not walk it out, so my set up was better. Wasn’t even much of a grinder, for a 20lbs PR.

Bench press was a smoke show on my first 2 attempts. I turned in 170kg for my 3rd attempt, watched a video, and immediately went back to the table to raise it to 172.5, which should have been allowable in the rules; however, they wouldn’t do it for me for some reason. I’ve notified the APF of the incident, hopefully they can better inform their scorers for future meets. Anyway, smoked my 3rd attempt, for a 10 lbs PR. More than 2x bodyweight.

Deadlift warm ups felt kinda heavy. Warmed up to 495. But my first attempt was easy, 2nd attempt wasn’t bad. Had a little leg shake on my last attempt, and I strained a bicep, but the lift looked great. I pulled hard through the sticking point, and it never slowed. 30 lbs PR. Well over 3x bodyweight.

My takeaways from the meet:

Competing is awesome. I can’t recommend it enough. I had a blast. One of the best days of my life.

Plazma was AWESOME to have. I went through 6-8 scoops throughout the day. Energy stayed high, and obviously I stayed strong.

I don’t video a lot of training, so it was good to see all my lifts from the meet. I learned that my bench press actually looks to be my best lift technically, and deadlift is probably worst, although all the lifts looked really solid. I’ve put a ton of work into fixing my pressing, so I was glad to see this.

The deload starting nearly weeks out of the meet was a good idea. Everything felt great. I should deload regularly.

The water cut did not affect my strength at all.

I squat to depth easily. This was not an issue.

Sounds like a great meet. How old are you?

Nice work. Are you planning to stay in that weight class?

I’m 31. And no, I don’t really plan to stay in the same weight class, unless I get to the point where I can set some real records without cutting more than 15 lbs. They’d have to be national records or better though, which is unlikely. I can add 20 lbs of muscle to my frame and still compete easily as a 198, so that would be the best thing to work towards now.

Nice work! Crushed my first meet, and I have over 100 lbs on you haha.

I too walked out the monolift, I just couldn’t get comfortable on it. Probably because the height of it I set up was for walking out instead of just squatting. I’m competing at the end of July again and plan to use the mono this time.

Question - How much of the PR do you think was training and how much do you think was pure adrenaline from the meet? I know the adrenaline is insane being on the platform, the tunnel vision is for real. Everything goes black, everything goes silent, it’s intense. For me, my first meet I didnt’ set any PR’s, but I wasn’t really planning to, just got a feel for the competition.

Awesome job Flip. 1500+ easy next time. pretty jealous of your bench.

Besides your bicep, sounds like exactly what a perfect meet should look like. Excellent work!!!

[quote]dzirkelb wrote:
Nice work! Crushed my first meet, and I have over 100 lbs on you haha.

I too walked out the monolift, I just couldn’t get comfortable on it. Probably because the height of it I set up was for walking out instead of just squatting. I’m competing at the end of July again and plan to use the mono this time.

Question - How much of the PR do you think was training and how much do you think was pure adrenaline from the meet? I know the adrenaline is insane being on the platform, the tunnel vision is for real. Everything goes black, everything goes silent, it’s intense. For me, my first meet I didnt’ set any PR’s, but I wasn’t really planning to, just got a feel for the competition.[/quote]

It’s hard to say. I suppose it was a bit of a combination, but the numbers I hit were almost exactly what I had ‘planned’ to hit. I was very much on track for those numbers in training, and the deload leading up to the meet allowed me to be as fresh as possible.

I also used nose tork for each lift. The adrenaline from that was nice.

[quote]GrizzlyBerg wrote:
Awesome job Flip. 1500+ easy next time. pretty jealous of your bench. [/quote]

Absolutely. That would just be 10 lbs on each lift. TBH, I expect something more along the lines of 1550+, assuming I compete as a 198 next time. I plan to peak again in 6-8 months for another meet.

As for bench, it’s been all about improved technique for me. Touching lower on my sternum, arching more, and practicing the pause regularly has done wonders for my bench press. Also tucking my elbows on the descent.

[quote]flipcollar wrote:

[quote]dzirkelb wrote:
Nice work! Crushed my first meet, and I have over 100 lbs on you haha.

I too walked out the monolift, I just couldn’t get comfortable on it. Probably because the height of it I set up was for walking out instead of just squatting. I’m competing at the end of July again and plan to use the mono this time.

Question - How much of the PR do you think was training and how much do you think was pure adrenaline from the meet? I know the adrenaline is insane being on the platform, the tunnel vision is for real. Everything goes black, everything goes silent, it’s intense. For me, my first meet I didnt’ set any PR’s, but I wasn’t really planning to, just got a feel for the competition.[/quote]

It’s hard to say. I suppose it was a bit of a combination, but the numbers I hit were almost exactly what I had ‘planned’ to hit. I was very much on track for those numbers in training, and the deload leading up to the meet allowed me to be as fresh as possible.

I also used nose tork for each lift. The adrenaline from that was nice.
[/quote]

Nose Tork is awesome, I love that stuff. I use it on all of my heavy sets (my training makes me basically hit a PR each week for reps).

What was your deload / peak schedule like? I plan to do 3 more weeks of strength training, then 3 weeks of peaking, then basically 7 days of rest up to the meet.

[quote]flipcollar wrote:
I’m 31. And no, I don’t really plan to stay in the same weight class, unless I get to the point where I can set some real records without cutting more than 15 lbs. They’d have to be national records or better though, which is unlikely. I can add 20 lbs of muscle to my frame and still compete easily as a 198, so that would be the best thing to work towards now.[/quote]

Solid plan.

So cool! Awesome work mate. Well done.

[quote]flipcollar wrote:

[quote]GrizzlyBerg wrote:
Awesome job Flip. 1500+ easy next time. pretty jealous of your bench. [/quote]

Absolutely. That would just be 10 lbs on each lift. TBH, I expect something more along the lines of 1550+, assuming I compete as a 198 next time. I plan to peak again in 6-8 months for another meet.

As for bench, it’s been all about improved technique for me. Touching lower on my sternum, arching more, and practicing the pause regularly has done wonders for my bench press. Also tucking my elbows on the descent. [/quote]

Sounds great. I am excited to see how you progress considering we have super similar goals.

Congratulations! All those numbers are solid, but I’m especially impressed with that deadlift. Great work! Any plans to do any national meets in the APF? If I get my money straight, I’m going to do AWPC World’s in September. I’ll likely do WPC World’s in 2016 as well. I won’t be very competitive in the WPC, but it will be close to home in Baton Rouge, and the experience will be great.

Great job man, glad to see you compete as I always see you putting up really solid numbers. Any plans to compete in wraps or anything?

Great job! I was wicked nervous my first time competing, but as you said it turns out to be a great experience. The adrenaline rush is awesome, plus the feeling of hitting PRs after months of preparation in a competition is a feeling that cannot be duplicated.

By the way, can’t wait to see the vids.

[quote]Dr J wrote:
Congratulations! All those numbers are solid, but I’m especially impressed with that deadlift. Great work! Any plans to do any national meets in the APF? If I get my money straight, I’m going to do AWPC World’s in September. I’ll likely do WPC World’s in 2016 as well. I won’t be very competitive in the WPC, but it will be close to home in Baton Rouge, and the experience will be great.[/quote]

Question for you, since you lift in the APF. It looks like my 170kg bench press ties the national record in my weight class, and beats the state record… the problem is, I just went on to the WPC website, and they recorded 165kg instead of 170kg for the meet results as my best lift. I have 2 videos that show me getting white lights on the lift, and clearly show what is loaded on the bar, along with the announcer calling out the weight. How hard should it be to get this fixed, and who should I contact?

I don’t have plans to do another meet right now, but it’s certainly something I’d consider in the future. Since I tied a national record at this one, and was very close to the national records on the other 2, it would be reasonable to compete at a higher level. If timing ever works out for me, I’ll do it.

Start with your state chairman. According to your hub, you’re from Texas. If the meet was in Texas your chairman is Randy Nesuda. His contact info is on the World Powerlifting Congress Website. If that doesn’t get you any results you might try contacting the WPC secretary, Amy Jackson. Mike McDaniel is also very involved in Texas and is another good guy.