Marilia’s Powerlifting Blog

Yesterday, our country lost one of its best lifters, whom I have nicknamed “Angel” – my angel. The athlete, the transcendent lifter who became a myth among the community, respected by all federations for his excellence in the sport and impeccable sportsman attitude, is dead. Along years of a conventional marriage to a sedentary house-wife who has always hated our sport, he has tried to compromise. Sometimes he would be defeated by her aggressive opposition and disappeared for a few years, but always came back. This time, things changed: he came back with too much enthusiasm, partly provided by his partnership with me. We developed a number of projects in the sport, we trained together, we explored new techniques, we won championships. And above all, we connected at a higher level. 

Yesterday he has given up resisting and conceded his wife his irreversible abandonment of the sport. He has quit. He will never lift again.

Angel is the most focused lifter I have known, and also the most generous. I owe him the best part of my recent improvement in performance. Angel taught me to focus. Angel has invented my white chair ritual. Angel has been my angel, protecting me from external hostility and from my own instability. I admired the athlete, the man and the human being. I loved him. For us, power-freaks, powerlifting is much more than a sport. It is a path to transcendence, it is fun itself, it is our life. No real powerlifter gives up powerlifting. Powerlifting can be only taken from us if life itself is taken as well. Angel is dead. In his place, a broken shadow of what once has been one of our best lifters. A ghost that will haunt his own dreams, but a sweet memory in the name of which I promise to keep going… forever… until the day my heart stops pumping blood through my triceps as I lift heavier and heavier weights, for him. 

I will dedicate each improved mark on my lifts to Angel; each new athlete drawn to powerlifting in this God-forsaken land will be partly his merit; each new step towards wisdom and excellence, I offer to the lifter and man I learned to admire. His loss, I will mourn forever. My opposition to the criminal hypocrisy in conventional marriage arrangements has only grown stronger, and my bitterness towards domination, harder. But the memory of the man that has once loved me so deeply and given me his best, will eventually erase these feelings. In the end, all that matters is this – love and lifting. 

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 1:40 pm and is filed under Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.