Freewheel’s Ramble

So, The NASA Reginal Powerlift meet in Des Moines yesterday went about as well as I could have hoped. Started by weighing in Friday night. I was much more carefull with my weight this time so I did not have to cut so much weight this last week. I woke up Friday and weighed myself at 182. Later in the day I spent 30 minutes on the cross trainer and 30 minutes in the sauna. When I hit the official scale at 7:00 pm I was at 180. Had a good meal that night and drank a half gallon of water.

Saturday morning I was at 183 and felt great. Had a good breakfast and headed to the meet. The turnout was a little smaller than last year I think. There were maybe 30 or 35 lifters. Saw some old friends and met a few new ones. Everything was running smooth and the lifting started at 10:30 am.

I opened with a 407 squat. I had been hitting 405 on a regular basis in the gym and knew I could make the lift easily. The plan was to hit it as deep as possible to impress the judges so if I had a lift later on that was close on depth, I would get the benefit of the doubt. I think it worked, when I racked the weight and backed out I heard one of the judges say "holy crap, I think his butt actually touched the floor!". I just smiled and walk off the platform.

Second squat was 435. I have hit this a couple of times in the gym but this would be a new meet PR for me. It felt light when I un-racked it and I made the lift easily, although I thought the depth may have been questionable. I did get three green lights.

Third attempt was 446. This was an all time PR for me. It felt good off the rack and I knew I had good depth. Just out of the hole I started to stall but threw my head back hard and drove through it. Three greens! First time I have gone three for three on squats. I was pumped!

Opened with a 264 bench. I have been practicing with 265 and a full two second pause in the gym. The head judge was calling a very fair pause. The bar had to stop but he was not making you camp out under it. I made the lift easily.

Second attempt was 275. I have been able to hit this in the gym but not consistantly. It went up slow but smooth.

Third attempt was 281. This would be a meet PR. I fought it through my sticking point just off my chest. I was glad the spotters were on their game as they let me fight through it and never touched the weight. After I got it moving I intentionaly took it to lockout very slow. I enjoyed listening to the crowd yelling. Three greens!

I am now 6 for 6. All I need to reach my goal of 1200 total is to make my opener on deadlift. The day so far is going better than I hoped. The only thing bothering me is an extremely tight lower back. The setup on my bench was so tight that my back is now starting to cramp. Spent the next 15 minutes stretching…

Opened the deadlift with 473. This is a meet PR and I smoked it, back was still tight but the weight felt good.

Second attempt was 490. This would be an all time PR. It broke off the floor slow but once I got it moving I accelerated through to lockout. Good lift & felt good. So now I have passed my 1200 goal by 17 pounds and am nearly 70 pounds above my last meet total. The only Thing I had left to do was get the 500 deadlift I have been working on. Oh, did I mention Jason Harris was there. He was not lifting but was helping out as a spotter. Of course he was egging me on again to go for the 500. I would have called it anyway, so third attempt would be 501.

So now comes the only low point of the day. I am convinced that it is just a mental barrier that is keeping me from pulling 500. I set up and was confident I could do it but I do not think it broke off the floor. I know my butt came up way too fast and I did not get my legs under it. Oh well I will keep working at it. In the last year I have put over 50 pounds on my deadlift so I know it is just around the corner.

Anyway, it was a great day. I am totally satisfied with how things went. I met some great people and learned a few things. Can’t ask for more than that!! The NASA crew did a great job as usual. These guys put on a great event and I want to give them a big Thank You. If you ever get a chance to attend a NASA event I would highly recomend it. AND rumor has it, the spring Iowa event will be a National event held at a major Des Moines venue. I have my fingers crossed!!

Wow, I can’t believe it has been 5 months since I last posted here. It has been a busy summer I guess. I have a powerlifting meet coming up next weekend. I am happy with the progress I have been making and I am very confident that I can hit the 1200 total I am looking for. I will post after the meet and give the results. Going to the gym today with my daughter. She is going to spot for me as this will be my last heavy bench day before the comp. I love working out with my kids. They are my biggest fans and supporters. I miss the days when they were still at home…..

Finaly have a few minutes to sit down & write about the show I attended last week. Went to the Natural Iowa & Central Midwest Bodybuilding Championships held in Des Moines. It was a fantastic show. I attended a few years back and there was no comparison to what it has now become. It was held at the old Hoyt Sherman Theater (very cool old place) and there were over 80 contestants. It ran very smooth with only a few glitches here and there.

What I wanted to mention is how impressed I am with all of the people who have the guts to compete in any contest like this. I am one of those people who hates being the center of attention and it just amazes me that people have the dedication and determination to get up on a stage and be judged on how well they have developed their bodies. My hats off to every single one of you who can step out on stage and thanks for putting on a great show..

This was an all natural drug free show so there were no "Mass Freaks" there but if you want to see what the future of bodybuilding should look like check out Jessie Godderz. This guy has an amazing build and is a true embassadore of the sport. Judging being subjective as it is, Jessie won the Natural Mr. Iowa but did not win the Central Midwest Championship on this night but he owned the stage and I think his future is bright in this sport. John Barnhill won the Central Midwest Championship. I guess the judges thought his huge stature was just too much to overcome by the other athletes.

Life has returned to normal and everything is good. I was both happy and disapointed with my performance at the Iowa championships but it sure was a fun day all around. I want to start with a big thanks and great job to Jason Harris. He helped with hand offs to me on the bench and had a great day of lifting. Setting PRs and hitting his goal of a 1275 total. My day did not go quite as smooth. Started off hitting my squat opener easy at 407. I jumped to 430 for a new PR and got red lighted for depth. This was a first for me as I normaly hit my squats with plenty of depth. I do have to say though that the judging was very tough. Not complaining, just stating fact. If there was any question at all you were not going to get the lift. Very tough but consistent. My third attempt I called for 430 again and was sure to sink it  deep enough but lost balance out of the hole and tilted forward, ended up doing a 430 good morning. I got the lift by majority but have been paying the price with a sore back ever since.

 I called a 252 opener for bench to be safe because my bench training had been so iffy the last few weeks. My shoulder was not bothering me at all and I hoped I could still pull out at least a 280 bench. 252 was easy so called for a 276 second attempt and got absolutly burried! The judge I drew for my flight was requiring a very long pause. much longer than I had been practicing. I stayed at 276 for my last attempt and had the same result. It just as well had been a 400 attempt. At least I was smart enough to start with a low opener so I was still in it.

Opened with a 430 deadlift that felt very easy even with a tweeked back. Second attempt was 462 for a new PR. Smoked it! So now I am thinking wow, I know I won’t get my 1200 total because of the failed bench but I just may be able to pull off a 500 deadlift to cross off that goal. OK, so I call for a 501 third lift. Of course Jason is egging me on to do it! LOL…. I set up, saw it in my mind, stayed tight, and FAILED!!! I am not sure I even broke it off the floor, if I did it was only by a few inches.

Oh well, I ended the day with a PR in squat, deadlift and total of 1149. I know I have to concentrate on fixing my bench. I got first in Masters 2 at 181. Like I said, all in all it was a good day. So back to the gym.. I am planning on spending most of my effort the next few weeks working on bench and then doing the bench contest at the Iowa Games. Hope to have a much better showing then. The other thing I need to work on is keeping my weight down. I had to cut pretty hard the last few days before this comp to make 181 and I know that hurts my lifts a lot. I am going to try to maintain around 185 while training & see how that goes…..

WOW!, What a day. I was up at 4:00 am and the moon was shining bright, it was warm (relative, 50ish) and I was ready to go find me a turkey! I got to the woods just before it started getting light and started the hike in to my favorite spot. It is nearly a mile hike through some rough terrain. When I got to the top of the ridge overlooking the valley it had started to get light, so I stopped to rest and listen for any love sick Toms calling to their hens. It was quiet with only a couple of gobbles way off in the distance. I made it to the base of a giant burr oak that I have spent countless hours sitting under over the years. From this spot I have gotten no less than 7 turkeys over the years. I spent the next hour calling and listening but to no avail. I finaly decided to move over to the next ridge and look down into that valley to see if there was any activity there. Just as I got to the top of the ridge, from about 200 yards in front of me came a thunderous gobble! I quickly set up next to a fallen tree and started calling back. To my surprise and delight came not one response but two. I love it when two Toms think they are competing for a lonely hen. For quite some time it was a standoff, I would call and they would gobble back but were not getting any closer. Finaly I tried a trick that has worked before, I started calling softer and softer each time, trying to give the impression that I was no longer interested and was moving away. That did it, within minutes I spotted the first bird moving through the forest towards me. I then spotted the second…and then the third! I had stopped calling and all three were stretching their necks looking for the hen they knew had to be close. They would look, then puff up and start strutting, spin a couple of times and then stretch up to look again. This is why I love turkey hunting…to be honest, and I know I will catch a load of crap over this, they remind me of bodybuilders in a posedown. Each trying to outdo the other.

So needless to say, I now have a turkey in the freezer and I am looking forward to a wonderful meal and enjoying the memories of a great hunt…

I did make it to the gym today. This will be my last deadlift workout before next saturday. I did some easy warmups and then worked up to my opening weight of 425. It felt good but for some reason my back and hips were very tight and hurt a little between sets. I think it is from all the hiking I have been doing. I will need to spend the rest of the week stretching and just doing some body weight stuff like squats and pushups. My weight was 185 this morning so that is right on track. I should have no trouble making the 181 weigh in by friday.

Well I finished my last heavy work out Friday. Did bench and actualy felt pretty good. The shoulder is feeling much better. I think I finaly figured out what was causing the problem. I have been working hard at retracting my shoulder blades hard when I set up. After talking to one of the guys at the gym I believe what I was doing was pulling my shoulder blades together and UP, activating more traps than lats. Today I pulled down and tried to get more lats involved. Felt very strong with more tri involvement. It is much easier to keep the elbows in and best of all my shoulder did not hurt.

I started with squats today and did a lot of warm up stuff. Then moved on to some heavier doubles and then tried my opening weight for next weekend. 400, felt way good and hit it easy with plenty of depth. I finished up squats with some speed work concentrating on exploding out of the hole. I then moved on to bench and worked up to my opener of 250. Again felt very good and easy. Finished up with some speed work on bench also. This is the first workout that has actualy been fun in a long time! I am looking forward to next weekend as I know I should easily beat my previous best total and hopefully get the 1200 total I am working towards. Also looking forward to backing off after the comp and going back to having fun workouts.

On another note, I did get out turkey hunting this morning…..Did not see a thing but had a great time being out and got a good cardio workout hiking up and down the Des Moines river valley. If it doesn’t rain may try & go again in the morning. Also need to get the Harley out and serviced so I can start riding it back and forth to work. It gets a lot better milage than my truck and this $3.35 gas is killing me!!

Later all…

I am so glad I am nearly done with this training cycle! I am in week seven of my competition prep and I just finished my last heavy deadlift work out. I just hurt all over. I shouldn’t complain as I have made great progress though. I have hit PR’s in both my deadlift and squat the last couple of workouts. I have one more heavy bench day on friday and then I can kick back and spend a week in recovery mode before the meet. I am looking forward to that, just hope I am giving myself enough time to recover and be at full strength. Time will tell. I still need to lose some weight if I want to lift in the 181 but I don’t think that will be a problem. I am close enough now I could probably just dehydrate the day prior then weigh in that night. Then I would have 12 hours to rehydrate I load up on carbs & be ready to go. I need to spend some time now deciding what my opening lifts will be.

Here is an ongoing problem I have. You see, my wife is a fantastic cook. Now she knows I work hard to keep my weight down. She also knows that I have a contest coming up and still need to drop about 10 pounds in the next 2 weeks. So tonight for supper she fixes linguinie with fresh sea scallops and a crab meat and mushroom sauce. Now what kind of support is that? And then to add insult to injury for desert she brings me a chocolate cake with cream frosting under a big scoop of ice cream. I just do not know what to do with this woman!! I just find it hard to believe she treats me so badly..:o(

I have been struggling the last few weeks with my bench workouts because of shoulder pain. I think it is an inpingement issue with my left shoulder. So, tonight I did all of my bench work with one board to limit the range of motion. I do think it helped as I was not having as much pain during the workout. It is pretty sore right now so I am icing it. Will see how it feels in the morning to know if using the board helped.

I am exactly two weeks out from my next contest, the NASA Iowa State Championships. I am happy with the progress I have made over the last 8 weeks. I should be abe to beat my previous best lifts with the exception of bench due to the shoulder thing. This next week I will be doing one last heavy workout in each of the three lifts and then I will start resting up and practicing my opening lifts. Plan on opening with a 250 bench, 400 squat, and 450 deadlift. If all goes well I am hoping I can get a 280 bench, 425 squat, and 500 deadlift. That would put me 5 pounds over my 1200 total that I have set as a goal for this year. I gotta think that is pretty good for an old man like me!

Be sure to check out Jason2459’s blog. He is getting ready for the same meet and has some humorous workout notes.

Ok, so it went pretty well tonight. I felt worn out after work and had been hitting the Dayquil bottle during the day, but I knew I had to get some form of deads in. while starting to warm up I actualy felt like I was getting my second wind so I thought "what the hell, might as well hit it hard." I increased the weight on all of my sets by 5 to 20 pounds. Was going good until I got to the last heavy single of 460. This would have been a new PR but when I tried to pull it, it just as well have been welded to the floor. I did get it moving but at less than knee high it stalled. I took a good long break and hit it again with the same results. Oh well, all in all it was still a good workout.

I did get a kick out of watching a couple of goofy teenage kids trying to bench. They had stacked several 10 pound plates on the bar and were not using collars. When the one with the string bean build tried to lift it, he tillted to one side and dumped off one plate. Of course then the bar tipped the other way and dumped a plate from the other side. He then over corrected and rocked back the other way again. This continued until he had unloaded the bar. He was then able to get the bar racked and they made a quick exit…