This should have been posted a month ago, but I've been reluctant since I wasn't fond of the results and it was the worst training cycle I can remember ever having. I was battling SI pain the entire 14 weeks and had to skip multiple training days due to it. Around week 8 I was barely able to get out of bed after squatting and my wife wanted to take me to the hospital. I even spoke to Allen Pilley about dropping out of the meet, but we both came to the conclusion that that's not me.
I took two full weeks off leading into the meet which helped more than I expected and I was pain free on meet day. Even though I didn't feel great, I had hope that the day was going to be a good one.
Warm ups went as planned for the squat and my gear was fitting well so we set up and waited for my name to be called for the opener. I opened at 925 and it went without a hitch so I was in the meet. I went to 975 for my second, but the bar rolled on me as I picked it and I'd already gotten the squat command so I just re-racked it. I didn't want the bar to roll off of me and put myself and the spotters in a bad situation. I took 975 on my third and this time it went well and the lift was good. 975 was way off from what my goal for the day was, but I was still in the meet.
On to benching. On the day of the meet I was 9 months post-op after having my supraspinatus reattched in my right shoulder. The goal was to bench over 600 and I was confident that was going to happen after my warm-ups. My elbow wasn't painful and the bar was moving well enough. I opened with 523 to make sure I was in the meet, didn't struggle with touching or pain issues and got a good lift. I went to 573 on my second and pressed the weight relatively "easy", but forgot to tell the judges that my left elbow did not straighten out so it was a no lift. Took 573 on my third, but this time things didn't go well and I couldn't lock the weight out. Jo was not a happy camper and went off to throw a tantrum as he left a trail of gear on his way.
Now we are having to deadlift. Enough people from flight C and D had bombed out that they combined the two so warm-ups went a little quicker. I was not looking forward to deadlifting at all. During training so many things had gone wrong on deadlift days as far as pain and shitty technique that I was dreading walking out there. I even tried to lower my opener to 585 from 605 since warm-ups looked like shit, but I was too late. I ended up getting the 605 and went to 655 for my second after speaking with the all seeing Mike Francis. I was skeptical and worried since 615 was the heaviest I'd pulled in training and it was a max effort pull that day. I ended up getting the 655, but was pretty sure I had reached my limit. Mike was too, but I had to speak to the wife before I tried to pass on my third. Kim was not keen on the idea of me passing on my 3rd even after I put my forehead on hers and said, "but that was so heavy...". She said to put 15-20 more pounds on the bar and figure it out so I went to 672 on my third. The bar never left the floor, but I did reaggravate my SI on the attempt so Yay Me!
I finished with a 2155 total which is the lowest total I've had in years. Even lower than the meet I did after being in the hospital for 4 days with pancreatitis. I didn't get a squat PR which was the primary goal, didn't bench over 600, but I did survive the day and got to see some damn impressive lifting from my counterparts. It was a good day regardless of what I wrote above and I hope to be able to do it again next year. The only thing I didn't like was that infernal ramp we had to walk down in full gear to get to the monolift. I was seriously out of breath and thought I was going to fall face first down the damn thing.
The plan is to try and compete at the XPC's in March at the Arnold, but that depends on how my body heals up in the next month or so.
On to the next one.