Chin up, mate. The vast majority of us could of done none of what you did, and you will do even better next time.
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I will echo
But I also understand the disappointment regardless.
What I admire is
Good luck! It seems that you’re mindset is in the right place
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Wow, that sandbag carry! And nice cheerleader
Looks like you at least gave it your all, and it sounds like you have some idea of what you need to change moving forward. That’s all you can do.
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I’m obviously not an authority on the matter, but, do you think having the deadlift precede the press took just enough out of you that it put that press weight out of reach? Way to stick through it despite the day not going your way man.
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Dude, I realize you expect a lot of yourself, and you should, given how much effort you put into your training, but I really think you’re being much, much too hard on yourself in calling this a desaster.
I’m sure you and Paul will figure the Press issue out. The one thing that stands out to me when looking at your overhead training is that the vast majority of it seems to be with leg drive and you also seem to get a lot out of your legs. Maybe it’s time to spend some more time on strict pressing so you’ve got a better chance of grinding a weight out when technique is off and you can’t get as much out of your leg drive as you’re used to? Idk, just an idea.
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Thanks people! Glad to have you all in my corner.
That always has to be the goal!
I think I am in a good place to make progress and use this experience as yet another step on my journey.
That was an awful event. Although I discovered this might actually be a strength of mine. Had I not stumbled, I would have had more in the tank to continue, while a lot of the guys were just going down because they were running out of gas.
No, I don’t really think so. I’ll get into what went wrong on the press below.
Probably, since only one event went much worse than expected. Nevertheless it was also the one I was the most excited about…
Maybe. Although I am a fair bit off of a 125 kg strict press at this point.
So obviously I have discussed with Paul what went wrong and have been going over it myself.
One thing that wasn’t ideal was being sick right before comp. Nothing anyone can do about that but missing those last few sessions might have taken just enough practice opportunity away to not be as stable in my power jerk technique. Paul said with a technical lift such as this, he would have had me train right up to comp for this exact reason.
Also I have been training the clean off of mats and not the floor (which I actually thought would be similar to the comp setup). No big deal but another detail.
Going forward we will also take the warm up situation into consideration and account for that to be more prepared to handle these kind of situations.
All in all Paul isn’t disappointed at all or not as much as I am. I will soon have the opportunity to train moving events again and with that strengthen my grip. We are overall in a pretty good spot to make progress and match the competition standards going forward. Of course the deadlift really is a problem and will be a top priority going forward.
Kinda ranting now:
There was also something else at the comp, that stood out to me more than ever before, although it isn’t unfamiliar. When we’re all meeting up, I don’t feel like I belong into that group. I don’t mean that in a social way. It’s just that I see all these huge men and in my head, they are much much bigger than how I perceive/ imagine myself to look. It’s kind of a tiny body dismorphia thing going on. In this particular case, I actually ended up being the lightest competitor in my weight class, as far as I know. There were a handful of u105ers but those guys were jacked and looked like they weighed 120 kg. A lot of the guys in my class exceeded the 130/40/50 mark. So even though I don’t feel as big or as muscular, looking at the comp. photos and videos I can’t help but think I look super fat and like I don’t even lift. Which again makes me want to prioritize weight loss.
I don’t really know where I’m going with this and I have tried to articulate it before and failed but I still wanted to note it somewhere. I think I need to work on my self esteem so that I can be in a better head space going into competition.
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Sounds like you got a lot in your head not only after but also during the comp.
Ah it’s not too bad. Just something I wanted to get out of my system.
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Just a thought
You’ve been focused on performance and competing for so maybe switching focus to aesthetics for a little bit might be a nice change in pace or at least a bit of a mental break
I will do a bit of body recomping over the winter. But at the end of the day I won’t do anything that jeopardizes my primary goal.
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Smart man. Plenty of time to do Cardio and eat salad when you’re old.
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Haha, ultimately I guess you’re right. There are a lot more thoughts I have on the whole body weight dilemma, that I’m just too lazy to convert into text atm. Most of them are revolving around self set limitations, steroids and the like. Maybe some other day.
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Question - after the car dead lift how much where you reliant on your press?
As in - did you over do it? I’ve had good events for me disappear. Once during show and once or twice during training with a group. I either get into head space where I’ve too desperate to do well and I fluff it up. Or I get over confident in the lift and don’t put in the right amount off effort.
Either way - things happen. Its not the end of the world. Learn and grow.
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What is that, precisely? I mean I think I know what it is in general terms, but not sure I remember reading something specific you have said.
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This is a problem I struggle with, myself. Now, I am quite a bit smaller than you, just over 200 lb at 5’7", but I look in the mirror or compare myself to other ‘big’ or ‘jacked’ people and think I look small. but then, I look at an average person and their arms look like pencils, so I know it’s all in my head. Of course, it’s easy to tell yourself that, but not so much to convince yourself. Body Dysmorphia comes in many flavors…
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07.09.
1 oh squats
3 x 6 @ 60 kg
2 axle wsm squats
3 x 3 @ 183,5 kg
3 viking press
3 x 8 @ 124,5 kg
4 sandbag carry
3 x 35m @ 125 kg
5 hollow rocks
3 x 20
Notes:
- definitely felt the competition in my body. Still, a productive but fatigued session
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Read your comp feedback but life has been a little hectic and I didn’t have proper time to respond. Firstly I wanted to say well done. Just getting to a comp is difficult for most of us. being unwell a few weeks before but pushing through and getting to the start line is not easy and you should be proud of the effort you put in to get there. Secondly well done for giving it everything you had on the day. When I watched that sand bag carry I thought you had blacked out from exertion. It is very motivating to watch someone give everything they have, so thanks for sharing the vids. OK so It didn’t go as planned or maybe I should say it didn’t go as you had hoped (lets face it nothing really ever goes as planned). But you know what that is part of why we do this, we put ourselves through a whole bunch of training to get as prepared as we can and then we test ourselves. What ever result we get doesn’t matter, what matters is that we try and we give it everything we have. Just doing this makes us different from 99% of people.
So don’t feel down my friend, feel proud and celebrate the fact that you are different. You are prepared to try and fail, you are prepared to give it everything regardless of the results. You are special mate. Well done.
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I’m so sorry, guys. I’ve been swamped, but I’ll answer everyone tomorrow.
Operating on 2 hours of sleep today. Still feeling the comp and intense DOMS in triceps, quads and back.
Fuck me.
1 deadlift
4 @ 205 kg
3 @ 205 kg
2 @ 205 kg
2 @ 205 kg
I was shot and this was way heavier than I would have liked. Instead of grinding stuff out too much, I did an additional double (plan was 3 x 4)
2 strict viking press
2 x 10 @ 89,5 kg
1 x 9
3 seated box jumps
5 x 3
4 sandbag carry
1 x 80 m @ 100 kg
5 incline db row
3 x 12 @ 27.5 kg
Notes:
- on paper not the best workout but I’ll acknowledge the fact that the setting for this was hard. So I’m kind of satisfied.
- pulled my right adductor
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I think this could be true. I really needed and wanted this to go well. I was very reliant on it both for competition’s sake and for my own.
I am pretty realistic with most of my goals (maybe too much so). I have an idea of how long I have left realistically to achieve them and I know the limitations I have set up for myself.
Without naming numbers, my goal is to get more competitive at the current level I compete at. I want to do lots of competitions and the aim to just get a little better each time. I compare myself mainly with myself but obviously if you do comps, you’re going to want to perform well in comparison to the other guys.
Self set limitations:
- Weight. I would arguably be better off weighing more. This comp has once again shown me that most guys in my class are significantly heavier than me or carry more muscle while being of similar weight. I however do not want to gain significantly more weight than I am carrying right now. I wouldn’t feel good and be (more) unsatisfied with my looks and also for health reasons.
- Which kind of brings us to point two: Steroids. I am going to be honest here and admit that I am at a point at which I absolutely understand my peers decisions. Just said that to a friend of mine this weekend. I am more tempted than ever but at the same time, I just know I’m never going to do it. I respect the individual choice but for a number of reasons, it’s not gonna be for me.
Agreed… The comparison game does me no good here. If I compare myself to an average (not super skinny person) I feel like I am so far out of the norm, just generally speaking. If I compare myself to other lifters I either think I’m not jacked enough or nitpick at something else. At this point I’m looking forward to my diet actually because I think it might help establish some new confidence.
@simo74 Thank you my friend! That was truly motivating and a great read! I definitely agree with what you’re saying (just need to apply it to myself as well, haha).
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Adduktor isn’t bad whatsoever. However I had another night of two hours sleep. Which makes 4 hours total after two nights. That is exhausting. I don’t actually feel too tired since I am very stressed at the moment, which is just pushing me right through. Not an ideal situation but I’m sure it’s going to get better.