I’m 5’8" 88.5kg, and I’ll be entering my first powerlifting competition in just under 2 months. I’m torn between moving up to the 93kg weight class or down to 83kg. While I’m so close to my longtime goal of reaching 200lbs BW, I recently learned I may have a shot at the 83kg junior men’s deadlift regional record (227.5kg).
I don’t know what my 1RM is, but I have recently done 185kg x 8 and 180kg x 9 (deadstop, raw). This will be the last year I can compete as a junior.
I already know one 83kg junior who will likely pose some heavy competition and I don’t know if the guy who got the record last year will be back. Thoughts?
Go down. Chances are it will be easier to cut 10 flabby pounds than gain 10 useful ones in this timeframe. pound for pound, you’ll be stronger at the lower weight.
just stay where you are and compete man. Its your first meet its all about experience and getting out there at this point. Unless you have a chance to break a state, national, or world record whats the point. Continue to eat and get strong.
My initial feeling is to say don’t cut, especially as you dont know for a fact that you can break it - high rep sets like you live really dont mean jack. BUT given that this is your last year as a junior, and 10 lbs is really not a difficult cut, it’s not out of the question
[quote]Reed wrote:
just stay where you are and compete man. Its your first meet its all about experience and getting out there at this point. Unless you have a chance to break a state, national, or world record whats the point. Continue to eat and get strong.[/quote]
For a first meet, don’t do either. A meet is already going to be a very new experience for you lifting wise, and you don’t want to compound that with dealing with weight manipulation. Just get the experience.
I know most people will say don’t cut weight and I can kind of agree with them. But sometimes you just got to take a chance and go for something, I was in a similar position at my first meet. I was over my weight class by about 10lbs but I wanted a DL and bench record, so I cut the crap out of my diet, got down to where I needed to be and took home 2 state records in my first meet. So just some perspective on the situation.
[quote]KBCThird wrote:
Is it a 24 hour weigh in, or day of?
My initial feeling is to say don’t cut, especially as you dont know for a fact that you can break it - high rep sets like you live really dont mean jack. BUT given that this is your last year as a junior, and 10 lbs is really not a difficult cut, it’s not out of the question[/quote]
That’s why I was kind of unsure.
@Reed: I may have a shot at a provincial record in this fed.
After seeing a lot of the newer guys obsess over weight class and talking to more experienced guys, I was initially planning on just focusing on building steady gains until being in a place where I could cut down to a lean 83kg and just maintain that weight, focus on building good numbers, and not worry about weight class until I’m at the point where I might be winning/setting records.
That point may have potentially come sooner than expected…
Good strategy to just keep the status quo, maybe with a little more emphasis on posterior chain work, and try some heavy singles sometime soon and see how those feel?
[quote]KBCThird wrote:
Is it a 24 hour weigh in, or day of?
My initial feeling is to say don’t cut, especially as you dont know for a fact that you can break it - high rep sets like you live really dont mean jack. BUT given that this is your last year as a junior, and 10 lbs is really not a difficult cut, it’s not out of the question[/quote]
That’s why I was kind of unsure.
@Reed: I may have a shot at a provincial record in this fed.
After seeing a lot of the newer guys obsess over weight class and talking to more experienced guys, I was initially planning on just focusing on building steady gains until being in a place where I could cut down to a lean 83kg and just maintain that weight, focus on building good numbers, and not worry about weight class until I’m at the point where I might be winning/setting records.
That point may have potentially come sooner than expected…
Good strategy to just keep the status quo, maybe with a little more emphasis on posterior chain work, and try some heavy singles sometime soon and see how those feel?
If you have a shot at a record honestly and you believe you can hit it then do wht you have to to get that weight class and get the record but, other wise just have fun man.
Thinking about it more I may have changed my mind. We work our asses off for years, mostly just with the goal of getting stronger but a comp is always that fun light at the end of the tunnel.
If you cut down to the weight class and it causes you to suck on your first comp day, is that the worst thing in the world? You’ll have plenty of other meets (good health allowing it of course) and you’d learn from it. If the chance to set a record means more to you than going in and hitting 9 strong lifts, by all means go for it. A much better story to tell anyways to your kids years from now.
Good luck either way man. Enjoy it and let us know how it goes. Sorry to pull a John Kerry on ya here.
[quote]Rock978 wrote:
Thinking about it more I may have changed my mind. We work our asses off for years, mostly just with the goal of getting stronger but a comp is always that fun light at the end of the tunnel.
If you cut down to the weight class and it causes you to suck on your first comp day, is that the worst thing in the world? You’ll have plenty of other meets (good health allowing it of course) and you’d learn from it. If the chance to set a record means more to you than going in and hitting 9 strong lifts, by all means go for it. A much better story to tell anyways to your kids years from now.
Good luck either way man. Enjoy it and let us know how it goes. Sorry to pull a John Kerry on ya here.[/quote]
You may not have plenty of other meets though. Bombing out of a meet your first time is going to leave a sour taste in your mouth, and may turn people off from the sport. It’s not a guarantee, but the chances are far greater doing this when playing with a weight cut and a first meet.
Perhaps my view is different, because my first meet I just weighed in at my walk around weight and ended up setting state records in my bench and deadlift without knowing that’s what they were, but I also know that the first time I cut weight for a meet, my bench was killed and I only made my opener, which was a lesson that I was glad I learned when I wasn’t trying to figure out what the hell a powerlifting meet was.
How soft are you now at 88.5kg? How clean do you eat the average week?
If you eat rather clean and are pretty lean, forget about cutting. Otherwise, it might be something to think about.
[quote]infinite_shore wrote:
How soft are you now at 88.5kg? How clean do you eat the average week?
If you eat rather clean and are pretty lean, forget about cutting. Otherwise, it might be something to think about.
[/quote]
Regular people would probably consider me to fall within a “normal” level of leanness. Most of the BBers on here (and the ones I know) would consider me too fat. I have no idea what my BF% is, though I would guess upper teens (hard to say, though, since I store fat well), but it doesn’t really matter because communicating BF% on the net is a pretty futile endeavor anyway LOL.
Dietwise, I normally eat cleaner than most PLers, but have been getting pretty bad the past few months in order to adjust to getting in enough cals to bust a slight weight gain plateau I had been having. Hence my new avi.
I definitely would not consider it at all if I didn’t have enough blubber to make it a fairly easy cut.
EDIT: Also, forgot to say thanks to all the experienced voices weighing in on this. Much appreciated!