Why do I do this to myself?
OK, so I know I said I'd go easy on the max effort conventional pulling this cycle, but the guys had decided on a deficit pull off of 4 mats and God-dammit, I hate feeling left out, so I went along with it.
Not my best decision.
Contrary to popular belief, I don't hate deadlifting. I actually like it, but it's just done so much damage to my back in the last few years, I've gotten pretty gun-shy about it. I really wanted to work up with everyone, but I'm still just not there yet.
Long story short I worked up to 405, and missed with 455. Not only was I embarrassingly weak, but my back was fucked up for most of the week after. I really hate not being able to do what the rest of the crew does, and I feel like a wuss when I have to bow out of exercises like this, but I really do need to be smarter about this stuff going forward.
I've got to stick to the plan and limit my conventional pulling to secondary movements and save the heavy stuff for sumo. Whatever strength I feel like I gain from exercises like this seems to be negated by how much abuse I take while doing it. I need to remember that as a sumo puller, my conventional numbers are irrelevant, especially if chasing a conventional pull hurts my meet pull.
Some exercises just take more than they give, and I'm starting to believe that heavy conventional deadlift are just one of those exercises for me.
Lie and learn.