So I’m just kind of posting this because I want to. Not necessarily looking for critiques or anything, although I’m open to whatever advice or criticism people have for me.
I tend to program in 18 weeks blocks. I have found that 9 weeks on, rest week, 9 more weeks on, then do a mock meet, has been working really well for me. Last cycle, I had the thought that maybe instead of taking a full deload week, I might try doing an “odd lifts meet,” where i get to max out on a few lifts that I train for assistance and are highly correlated to squat/bench/dead. I figured it would be a lot of fun, and that if I hit some big PR’s in this odd lifts meet, it probably meant I’m on my way to some big PR’s in my power lifts.
So, I chose front squat, strict press, and snatch grip deadlift, and tested them all this week. It went really well, and I had a lot of fun doing it. Front squat looked pretty good. My back is my weak point, I need to drive my elbows up harder, but still not bad considering I hit a 30 lb PR from just 9 weeks ago. Strict press moved so easy that I jumped up 10 lbs after like an asshat and missed terrible. Overall it’s good, I just need to be careful of the little “body tremor” I do when I tense up for the lift, because in the vid it looks like I use it as a sort of “shrug” to get the weight moving, and I don’t like doubting my lifts haha. I just need to be careful to take my breath and tense up, then give a moment before I press so its from a nice completely dead stop. And snatch grip deads, which are my new favorite/most fun exercise, went great - I’d never pulled more than 345 for a triple, so 405 was a huge PR, and although it was quite the grinder I’m very happy with that, considering my best conventional pull is 435. Hopefully I will be able to smash that in 10 weeks, based on how this pull went.
Anyways, thanks for checking out the video, and any comments, concerns, ideas, criticisms are welcome.
Hey you may as well use straps on your snatch grip deads. It helps keep your hands from sliding inward so you can really get them out wide and make sure the lift is hard!
Nice job btw on everything, especially the strict press.
My friends and I joke all the time about holding an odd lifts meet. Except the lifts we discuss are more silly than odd. Like max misloaded deadlift (all the weight is on one side of the barbell), snatch grip bench press, one arm barbell muscle snatch, etc.
Shovel deadlifts (all of the weight on one side of the bar) is a legit ab exercise, Csulli. So are one arm front deadlifts, and of course suitcase deadlifts/pulls (of course the last two also work your grip a lot too) . I think my shoulders would explode if I even did what I consider an ultra wide grip bench press for a max triple let alone a snatch grip (widen the grip out a couple fingers per side) for a max. The one arm muscle snatch sounds fucking awesome though.
Haha tredmark. That is my friend and often times coach. He was just screaming at me to lock it out, as any good friend would lol.
Csulli, thanks. I thought about using straps to snatch grip dead, but I decided not to this past cycle because I wanted to teach myself how to hook grip. Now that I have proved to myself that I can pull up to 405 without them, however, maybe I’ll try using straps over the next nine weeks, So I can load up heavier more often and really hammer my back, ass and hamstrings.
Also, those are definitely some ODD lifts haha. My meet wasn’t nearly as exciting. But It was a lot of fun, you should definitely try and get a little backyard odd lifts competition going and post it up for us to see. IT would probably be a blast, and a blast to watch.
I like this idea a lot! I feel like a lose a little bit on my programmed deload weeks on 5/3/1 (every 4 weeks) and I may try adding this is for a little fun. Currently I’ve been doing a lot of banded speed/rep work on my deload weeks so I don’t feel like I’ve lost anything and to mix it up. Good work!
