~Michele~’s BodyBlog

I miss being an athlete. Back when I used to snowboard, I remember the rush of dropping into the halfpipe, hitting the rails, and flying off the big kickers. My friends and I would hike a jump over and over, trying to perfect a 360 or a new grab. Sometimes I would land on my face and get a bloody nose or black eye, but that was just a part of the game. Watching someone else land an insane trick was motivation to try it too, and if you couldn’t land it the first time that just meant you would be trying it until you did!

I moved away from the mountains a few years ago, which is when I started competing in figure competitions. Figure was fun, but it didn’t have that same athletic spirit to it. Not that I am saying Figure isn’t athletic (it definately takes a true athlete to make it to the stage!!), but when you are on stage you don’t have to perform in the same regard. Instead you spend weeks and months dialing in your physique for the moment on stage to show off your hard work. The athletic part of figure occurs off-stage, in all of the preparations. After doing that for a few years, I started craving that spirit of competition where you get up for your turn, all eyes are on you, and you have to perform what you have been training so hard to do.

Soooo… Since I train at the best powerlifting gym in the country, and have access to the knowledge and help of the best coach, Rick Hussey, I decided that I wanted to take advantage of that and compete in a powerlifting meet. Most of the team are elite lifters, and many of them hold world record totals and world record lifts. I know that I can’t expect to be at that level, but the feeling of training for this type of competition is awesome! It’s very different from Figure training, but a nice change of pace.

My first meet is the APF Spring Open, held on March 21 in Omaha, NE. I am going to be doing push/pull (bench and deadlift) for this one, because Rick said jumping right into full power (bench, deadlift and squat) is going to be too much right off the bat. My starting lifts were 160 bench and 225 deadlift, so I am hoping to increase those a bunch by the time March gets here! I am so sore after every workout but as I like to say, "It hurts so good!"