I had my 2nd powerlifting meet this last weekend. My first meet was in December 2014 and I was 115lbs. I first started lifting sometime before last summer, probably May 2014. I wasn't really consistent until September when I signed up for my first meet, but that was mainly because I was out of the country all summer.
I ran Candito Six week strength program for both of my meets.
The last week is like 95% of your old 1RM for AMRAP to project you new max.
The last Monday squat session of the program went great (165x5), but it really beat the shit out of me physically. I felt physically terrible and had a terrible bench session Wednesday (90 x ?) and was still dying Friday for deadlifts (I did 220 for a single, then 220 for a terrible double, then had to give up). Saturday I knew I had to do something about my body cuz it wasn’t gonna get better by itself. In that rest week, I did nothing except get a deep tissue massage on Monday of rest week and Wednesday of rest week.
Cutting weight
I was on a 500 cal deficit since Jan 2015, with some weeks of real fuck ups. Went from like 117-105.
I planned on weighing in Friday at 9AM. I kept salt up and then tried to stay “normally hydrated” by drinking a bit more water than usual. On Wednesday, I cut sodium in half and cut down on carbs. On Thursday, I cut sodium as much as possible and ate almost no carbs. I only eat ~0.8g / lb BW of protein usually, and kept this up throughout my weight cut because protein and carbs both store more water than fat does. Also, I upped my calories to a bit over maintenance to prevent any ounce of muscle loss by adding like 5 tablespoons of olive oil. Here’s the MFP entries.
I finished said liquid meal/ “smoothie” at noon and also quit drinking water until the next morning at 9am.
I'll give gold to the next redditor who cuts water weight using my method.
I brought my scale from home with me out of curiosity. Turns out my home scale weighs people 0.5kg lighter than the official scale.
Weighed in with clothes on at 47.6kg, or 104.94lbs, for the 105.75lb weight class
Meet
Squat
155lbs – good lift
160lbs – good lift, I was not centered so it was pretty effing rough. Also the back spotter advised me to lower my rack height cuz I struggled on the first attempt too. I thought I just really sucked at racking and unracking so that was helpful to know.
170lbs – red lighted for downward movement.
I originally wanted to do 155 / 170 / 180 but taking 2 weeks off squatting (last last Monday was my last squat day), I really feel like I kind of forgot how the movement goes. It was probably too long of a break for me esp since I haven’t been lifting that long. I should’ve just done some light work or something, idk. I was surprised that 170 was hard at all because I did 165 x 5 with energy to spare on the last heavy squat day. I probably would’ve started pushing harder before the grinding point but I really did not think that this attempt would be that bad.
Bench
83.7lbs – good lift. I wanted to open with 85 cuz I can do 85 x 6 pretty easily but my max is like 90 lbs. But I can’t pick 85 in kg and the choice was 88lbs, which was too close to my max and I didn’t wanna bomb out
92.5 lbs – butt came off bench when beginning to push the bar off my chest. I mean it didn’t but I don’t have discernible glutes and they look like my hamstrings and etc etc also a lot of other people got called for butt off the bench so I’m not even mad about it
92.5 lbs- too weak
DL
My friends were all having shitty lift days and I was feeling kind of nervous in general because I wasn’t doing as well as I wanted to. Warm ups felt super heavy and I wanted to open with 210, then end with 235 (my max in December was 223) but I got scared cuz I didn’t want to bomb out. Lowered my opener from 210 to 195 lbs because I was scared as shit; also, I feel like I haven’t been lifting long enough to know what deadlift weight I can do “for a triple on a bad day”, esp with Candito’s 6 week strength program where I rarely do the actual deadlift (there’s a lot of deadlift variations so I did hella block pulls though).
I did something like
195
205 (wanted to move this attempt up after I gave it but they said you can only change your opener after you give it)
210 (just got scared and didn’t want to go higher)
Then after, turned up with alcohol and got annoyed I didn’t PR deadlift and pulled 225lbs 2 hours later in the basement gym of some new friends I made at the meet (non calibrated plates etc etc)
And I feel like I’m good for 235 or something so I am probably going to the gym to try it Tuesday or Wednesday lmaooo
Thoughts
I think I totaled similar to what I did in December at 115lbs except DL.
I also just got a DEXA this morning to see where my body fat is at, I'll post it tomorrow once I get everything scanned.
more detailed post on the whole meet if you're interested in details here:
I ran Candito Six week strength program for both of my meets.
The last week is like 95% of your old 1RM for AMRAP to project you new max.
The last Monday squat session of the program went great (165x5), but it really beat the shit out of me physically. I felt physically terrible and had a terrible bench session Wednesday (90 x ?) and was still dying Friday for deadlifts (I did 220 for a single, then 220 for a terrible double, then had to give up). Saturday I knew I had to do something about my body cuz it wasn’t gonna get better by itself. In that rest week, I did nothing except get a deep tissue massage on Monday of rest week and Wednesday of rest week.
Cutting weight
I was on a 500 cal deficit since Jan 2015, with some weeks of real fuck ups. Went from like 117-105.
I planned on weighing in Friday at 9AM. I kept salt up and then tried to stay “normally hydrated” by drinking a bit more water than usual. On Wednesday, I cut sodium in half and cut down on carbs. On Thursday, I cut sodium as much as possible and ate almost no carbs. I only eat ~0.8g / lb BW of protein usually, and kept this up throughout my weight cut because protein and carbs both store more water than fat does. Also, I upped my calories to a bit over maintenance to prevent any ounce of muscle loss by adding like 5 tablespoons of olive oil. Here’s the MFP entries.
I finished said liquid meal/ “smoothie” at noon and also quit drinking water until the next morning at 9am.
I'll give gold to the next redditor who cuts water weight using my method.
I brought my scale from home with me out of curiosity. Turns out my home scale weighs people 0.5kg lighter than the official scale.
Weighed in with clothes on at 47.6kg, or 104.94lbs, for the 105.75lb weight class
Meet
Squat
155lbs – good lift
160lbs – good lift, I was not centered so it was pretty effing rough. Also the back spotter advised me to lower my rack height cuz I struggled on the first attempt too. I thought I just really sucked at racking and unracking so that was helpful to know.
170lbs – red lighted for downward movement.
I originally wanted to do 155 / 170 / 180 but taking 2 weeks off squatting (last last Monday was my last squat day), I really feel like I kind of forgot how the movement goes. It was probably too long of a break for me esp since I haven’t been lifting that long. I should’ve just done some light work or something, idk. I was surprised that 170 was hard at all because I did 165 x 5 with energy to spare on the last heavy squat day. I probably would’ve started pushing harder before the grinding point but I really did not think that this attempt would be that bad.
Bench
83.7lbs – good lift. I wanted to open with 85 cuz I can do 85 x 6 pretty easily but my max is like 90 lbs. But I can’t pick 85 in kg and the choice was 88lbs, which was too close to my max and I didn’t wanna bomb out
92.5 lbs – butt came off bench when beginning to push the bar off my chest. I mean it didn’t but I don’t have discernible glutes and they look like my hamstrings and etc etc also a lot of other people got called for butt off the bench so I’m not even mad about it
92.5 lbs- too weak
DL
My friends were all having shitty lift days and I was feeling kind of nervous in general because I wasn’t doing as well as I wanted to. Warm ups felt super heavy and I wanted to open with 210, then end with 235 (my max in December was 223) but I got scared cuz I didn’t want to bomb out. Lowered my opener from 210 to 195 lbs because I was scared as shit; also, I feel like I haven’t been lifting long enough to know what deadlift weight I can do “for a triple on a bad day”, esp with Candito’s 6 week strength program where I rarely do the actual deadlift (there’s a lot of deadlift variations so I did hella block pulls though).
I did something like
195
205 (wanted to move this attempt up after I gave it but they said you can only change your opener after you give it)
210 (just got scared and didn’t want to go higher)
Then after, turned up with alcohol and got annoyed I didn’t PR deadlift and pulled 225lbs 2 hours later in the basement gym of some new friends I made at the meet (non calibrated plates etc etc)
And I feel like I’m good for 235 or something so I am probably going to the gym to try it Tuesday or Wednesday lmaooo
Thoughts
I think I totaled similar to what I did in December at 115lbs except DL.
I also just got a DEXA this morning to see where my body fat is at, I'll post it tomorrow once I get everything scanned.
more detailed post on the whole meet if you're interested in details here:
