Meet Prep Week 11 Day 3 (16 March 2017)

I overloaded my bench on this session. Wanted to get more than 1 set but my back couldn't take it no more. How I did it was, using my band, I looped it on my elbows across my chest like a pseudo slingshot. One day I'll get a slingshot when somebody brings in their product to Malaysia. Are you listening, fitness product retailers? Hmm, StrengthApparel, StandardIssueGears, anybody? Please. I've heard nothing but good things about this thing.

Squats (singles) 130kg @RPE 7.5, 135kg @RPE 8.5, 135kg @RPE 9, 135kg fail
- As usual I start the bench session with squats. I didn't bring my sleeves or wear my shoes designated for squats this time around as I wanted to train bench. Worked up to my opening weight of 135kg. Wanted to hit it 3 times but the 3rd set I misgrooved and failed the set. I think I dropped too low and I was pitched too far forward making me unable to recover. No big deal though it did make me rethink what my opening weight should be. I do not want to miss my opening squat, no sir. I might bump it down to 132.5kg.

Pseudo Slingshot Press 85kg x 1 x 3 @RPE 7.5, 90kg x 1 x 2 @RPE 8.5, 95kg x 1 x 1 @RPE 9.5
- Like I said above, I wanted to overload my bench press on this session and did a band bench press aka pseudo Slingshot press. 90kg is my current gym 1RM and this setup allowed me to hit it twice with at least 2 more reps in the tank. The I proceeded to hit a 95kg single with at least 1 more rep in the tank. This thing is amazing. Makes me wonder how well a actual Slingshot would work. Anyhow I hit what I wanted but couldn't go on because of my back. I've injured my back in the past by hyperextending in the deadlift, so now whenever I arch on the bench press, I get some pain in the soft tissue there. I need to get my lower back stronger which will be a prime focus next off season, along with bigger pecs and arms.

Cardio x 30 mins @ 140BPM
- I needed to wait for my GF to be done with her workout so decided to do some cardio. For once, my training session got done within 1 hour. I skipped accessories on this session as I was feeling really beat up. Cardio was good, was really relaxing. I sat on the seated bicycle machine and cycled 15 mins, then I went to the treadmill and walked for 15 mins. 140BPM is perfect as I can browse Reddit and Instagram with ease. Makes the time pass much quicker. The gym regulars were actually shocked to see me do cardio and threw some banters here and there about my weight and such. Haha.

Meet Prep Week 11 Day 4 (17 March 2017)

Training is done. I am finally finished with this cycle of training. It is time to rest up, deload and get my body ready to lift some heavy ass weight. 1 week out baby! Those of you who want to see what powerlifting is about, come watch us lift next week at Utropolis Marketplace in Glenmarie on 25th (morning to evening) and 26th March (morning to noon). I will be lifting in flight E on the 26th. It's free yo, just come and sit down on any of the chairs facing the stage where the lifts are gonna happen. Be prepared to hear a lot of shouting and cheering.

I think I did well in this peaking phase. I did flare up an old injury which is my hyperextended back, but it doesn't hurt or anything. Only hurts when I arch my back in the bench. It is most likely due to fatigue and the overreaching nature of a peaking phase, but we will see. I've kinda figured out my attempts as well, so here they are.

Squats
(1st) 135kg
(2nd) 140kg
(3rd) 145kg/147.5kg/150kg

Bench Press
(1st) 85kg
(2nd) 90kg
(3rd) 92.5kg/95kg/97.5kg

Deadlift
(1st) 160kg
(2nd) 170kg
(3rd) 175kg/177.5kg/180kg

If I manage to hit my YOLO numbers on all my 3rd attempts, best case scenario I will get a total of 427.5kg which will give me a Wilks score of 329.6. Potentially a 63.97 Wilks increase from my previous Wilks of 265.63 with total at 367.5kg. Woohoo! LET'S GO!

Alright, enough with the ramblings, onwards with the log.

Pseudo Slingshot Press 85kg x 1 x 3 @RPE 8, 90kg x 3 x 2 @RPE 9
- Despite my back nagging me, I decided to overload on the bench again today because overloading the squat or deadlift this close to the meet is generally a bad idea. I did my pseudo slingshot press again with the band and was able to get doubles on my current 1RM, for 3 sets. I think come meet day, I might have a shot at hitting 95kg or more depending on how well the day goes. Surprisingly though, I was able to self lift off with 90kg.. I really wanted to add in super heavy holds with 140kg, but I didn't have a way to do that safely. And besides, my back was really whining by this point I decided to call it a day. Overall, good session. I can't wait to test out my bench press. I have a long way to go before I can even stand toe to toe with some of the competitors in this federation, but I'm really happy with how much my bench press has improved. Potentially, I progressed 10-15kg on my bench press in a span of 7 months.

Deadlift Opener 157.5kg x 3 x 1 @RPE 8
- I finished the day off with some deadlifts. I worked up to my opening weight and just did 3 singles on it. It felt pretty much like a warmup. My grip can definitely get better but for now I think it's ready to hold on to my planned attempts. Did a lot of technique analysis on this session as I ended up as an impromptu coach for somebody in gym. Apparently, I made a new friend. Shared my cues and my technique breakdown to this fella, which in turn allowed me to be critical to my own technique. Deadlift is feeling good. I'm definitely happy to say that I have effectively eliminated that habit of hyperextending at the top, which brought me this pain in my back in the first place. No pain whatsoever during this session.

Off topic post. I haven't trained the past few days to rest and recover, the most I've done the past couple of days are tyre flips, sled push and some cardio. So, I had time to browse other forums here. Man, I never knew such a vile and sickening place like Kopitiam exist. I really hope I never meet some of these people in real life. It's almost as terrible as /b in 4chan. I lost my cool last night. I'm probably banned there now. Maybe I'm banned sitewide, who knows.

Yeah, I don't think I can stand it there. Best avoid it I guess. Such a fucked up place. Even /b has some human decency.

Hey man, sure. I'm looking to cut about 4kg which is about 6% so pretty close to me as well. FYI, I'm weighing in on Saturday so plan accordingly. Also, I'm a small lifter so your needs might vary from mine. I started water loading since last Saturday so I'll list down what I'm doing from day to day. Protein and fat remain constant unless stated otherwise. This is what I did before and it works for me, so disclaimer, please proceed with caution. Water cut can be dangerous.

Saturday - 3 to 4 liters of water, 4 sachets of Oral Rehydration Salt (ORS). I use sachet unit as it's pretty standard anywhere. Food intake, normal. I quit keto since 2 weeks ago to make sure I can tap into glucose instead of fats as a main energy source by game day.

Sunday - 5 to 6 liters of water, 6 sachet of ORS, reduce carbs to about 75%

Monday - 6 to 8 liters of water, 8 sachet of ORS, reduce carbs to 50%

Tuesday - 7 to 9 liters or water, 8 sachet of ORS, carb maintain at 50%

Wednesday - 8 to 10 liters of water, 8 sachet of ORS, reduce carbs to 25%

Thursday - 4 to 6 liters of water, 3 sachet of ORS, cut carbs entirely

Friday - 1 liter of water, 1 sachet of ORS, last drink at 12pm, last meal at lunch, 0 carbs. At 6pm I will drink 1 bottle of light beer (or Guinness cos it's awesome) to further dehydrate myself. I should make weight by then. If not, I will sauna until I'm about 0.5-1kg above weigh in. No food till after weigh in.

Saturday - still no food or drinks until weigh in. Poop as much as I can before leaving the house. No shower before weigh in as well as it can increase my weight.

For more reading material, read up what Chris Duffin wrote about it. Google Kabuki Strength Water Cut. I think its the first entry.

Meet Prep Week 12 Deload (21 March 2017)

I went in on this session to practice some my setup and techniques, though I did skip bench press as my lower back is still recovering and I'd rather not aggravate it till game day. Come on lumbar, you got this, heal up. I also went and did some conditioning work to work up a sweat. I haven't train since Sunday (which I didn't log as all I did was cardio & conditioning) so I needed this to stay sane. The pre game jitters are here and I'm freaking out over every little nuance of my setup and technique.

Also, some weight update. I have pretty much plateaued in my weight loss. I'm at a constant 71.5kg at normal hydrated level. Right now I'm super saturated so I'm hovering at 72kg. The goal is 67.4kg when dehydrated like a prune. I still got today (Wednesday) and Thursday to water load then I'll cut water out on Friday. That water weight is coming off no matter what.

Tyre Sled Push circuit with Tyre Flip 100kg x 3 x 10
- Conditioning, conditioning, conditioning. That's gonna be my goal the next season. I did a circuit like workout here. I pushed a small tyre on the turf for about 20 meters, rest for about 3 mins then flip a bigger tyre for 10 reps. I did this for 3 sets. Man, it was one heck of a workout. Didn't take much time either. I worked up a good sweat and my heart was pumping hard. Feelsgoodman.

Squats 100kg x 6 x 2 @RPE 7
- Nothing too serious on squats. I didn't bring my belt, chalk, knee sleeves or wrist wraps to prevent myself from going heavy. I wore my deadlift shoes as well. On this session I practiced my setup rituals as well as my walkout on this session. I try to complete my stance in 3 steps at the same width and the same angle every single walkout. I also practiced getting the bar tight and secure on my back. I think I did well. The squat itself was easy, I paused on some reps, I went fast on some.

Deadlifts 130kg x 5 x 1 @RPE 7
- The only reason this deadlift session is RPE 7 is because of my grip. It ain't easy to hold on to a bar with shitty knurling with no chalk. The pull itself was easy, it was flying up without much effort. I practiced my bar path and kept the bar as close to my shins as possible, might have lost some leg hair on this day. I actually have considered waxing my legs to reduce drag . Also practiced my setup from the grip all the way to the pull. I noticed that I'm a zen deadlifter but a very aggressive squatter. On squats I tend to grunt, scream and yell. On deadlifts, I setup very quietly and just pull without any show or sound. I wonder why is that. Side note, I discovered on this session that my erectors are pretty tight so I think the next few days I will work on getting those foam rolled and released. I have some knots on my hammies as well to address. I would really love to get some Active Release Therapy done on me right now.

Meet Prep Week 12 Deload (22 March 2017)

I didn't touch any weight on this session. I mentioned before about the tightness in my back, hammies, shoulder blades, and calves. Well, I rolled like a madman on this session. Busted out my foam roller and lacrosse ball and spent about 45 mins massaging myself. Got rid of a lot of knots, I'm sore as fuck today. But damn does it feel good though. Anterior pelvic tilt (APT) is noticeably reduced. Posture feels a lot better too.

After rolling myself to tears, I went ahead and did some low intensity steady state cardio (LISS) on the seated bike. Maintained heart rate about 140BPM for a good 25 minutes while watching youtube.

Some weight update as of this morning (23/3/17). I weighed in at 71.0kg this morning, while still in my super saturated state. This is the lowest I have ever weighed in recent memory. Water cut is actually going somewhere. Today I will cut out carbs, reduce salt by 50% and drink almost as much as yesterday (6-8 liters). By tomorrow evening I should be within range. If not, to the sauna it is. Final water load push today. Can't wait to get this over with.

Typing up a meet report as we speak sir. Haha. It's my first day back in the office and I'm kinda swamped with work. Catch you next time, no worries. How did your meet go?

MPA Championship 2017 Meet Report

TLDR; Didn't make weight, lifted anyway, got 8/9 lifts, 24/27 white lights, SBD results: 140kg/92.5kg/170kg for a total of 402.5kg and Wilks of 304.81 at 69.05kg bodyweight.

Alright, we're back. My meet was on Sunday (26th March 2017) and it was a blast. I did not make weight unfortunately, even though I did my very best to sweat out all the life out of me. Managed to weigh in at 69.05kg on Saturday weigh in. When I went to sauna again to try to lose some more, I really felt like dying already since I haven't drank or eaten anything at that point for more than 24 hours already. Symptoms of dehydration were showing up and I decided to throw in the towel to focus on recovering. The cut was a failure, no 2 ways about it. Might as well cut my losses then and focus on moving maximum amount of weight the day after.

On game day, I carbed up like hell in the morning and was feeling fresh as ever. Warmup felt good, body felt good. Everything moved smoothly and none of the usual stiffness was there, it was go time.

Squat

130kg - 3 white lights, good lift. I initially wanted to open with 135kg but decided to go a bit conservative to get a feel of the squat bar. 130kg is my usual final warmup single, so I decided to open with that. Easy lift, went up smoothly.

140kg - 3 white lights, good lift. 140kg is my current gym PR and I'm just glad to hit it at the meet to make it my new meet PR. Bar moved smoothly, albeit a bit slower than I expected. I let my GF who was my handler to select all my attempts based on how my openers and 2nd's look like, so from here she decided 150kg was a no go. I trust her judgement because if I went according to feel, it would have been like last meet.

145kg - 3 red lights, no lift. I failed this weight because of technical issue, not because it was heavy. No excuses though, I still missed the lift. I went too deep and lost my bounce and balance at the bottom making it impossible to recover. My old habit of ass to grass squatting is still haunting me till this day. Next off season will be all about rectifying this problem. I might widen my stance a bit more to maximize the amount of bounce I get at the bottom from stretch and to prevent myself from going too deep.

Bench Press

80kg - 3 white lights, good lift. Again, I opened with a warmup number. 80kg felt really light. Went up fast and easy. However, I pulled the shit out of my lats on this attempt. Getting tight as I set up caused me to cramp up. I have a feeling this might have been caused by my hydration level and/or improper warmup.

90kg - 3 white lights, good lift. My handler chose 90kg for my 2nd. This matched my gym PR and made it an official meet PR. It felt like death. The bar moved so excruciatingly slow and my lats cramped up again, worse this time. But I made it nonetheless.

92.5kg - 3 white lights, good lift. This is why having a handler choose your attempts is important. If it was up to me I would have called off my 3rd attempt because my 2nd was horrid. My handler instead chose 92.5kg and I sucked it up and did the lift. It was even more difficult than my 2nd. At one point the bar actually stopped but I managed to keep grinding all the way up. I was underneath the bar for at least 5 seconds. It was such a relief though when I stood up and saw those 3 white lights. New PR right there.

Deadlift

155kg - 3 white lights, good lift. Opened with a warmup number again to get used to the deadlift bar. This bar is actually thinner and whips a lot. At this weight the whip is not that wild but it did mess up with my usual lift initiation. Hit it nicely nonetheless albeit a bit slow. I noticed I went 100% a bit too early, before all the slack is pulled out of the bar so I kept that in mind for the next attempt.

165kg - 3 white lights, good lift. This time I really really pulled the slack out before pressing with my legs to initiate the lift, and it worked. The bar went up flying really fast and easily. The thinner bar and the more aggressive knurling also allowed me to grip better. I was ready for my last attempt.

170kg - 3 white lights, good lift. My handler chose 170kg and it felt really good. No shaking, no slowing down, it just flew up slowly and constantly. My grip was rock solid too, unlike the last time I attempted this weight in the gym. This matched my gym PR and made it an official meet PR. I personally felt like I left some weight on the platform, as in I could have gone heavier but that will be for next time. My handler selected very spot on attempts and made sure I could get this one for a good meet PR. 180kg will be mine in the next meet.

Take Away, Lessons Learned and Immediate Future Plans

Well, first and foremost, I'm weak as fuck. Like seriously weak, like just about to leave noob status weak. I need to get stronger. Much much stronger. A 500kg total will not win the U67.5kg class, or even the U60kg class. There are a lot of really strong people all around me. This motivates me so much to get back to the grind and put up even bigger numbers.

Secondly, I need to keep cutting. I still have a bunch of fat around my waist which will not help me move any weight. The next goal is to cut down even further to get to 63kg-65kg and compete in U60kg. Currently I'm sitting at 72kg, so I got probably another 3-4 months of cutting ahead of me. Also, I need to be way more disciplined when water cutting next time. I have to admit the water cut failed because I cheated once or twice. The protocol works, a fellow forummer here used it to lose 4kg easily. Shoutout to you Andrew, still waiting for those pictures.

Thirdly, I need to stop squatting too damn fucking low. I need to dial in my form better and just get stronger in the squat, that's it.

Overall this was a really fun meet to prep for. I learned a lot about programming, about how my body reacts to certain things, and lots more. I managed to get a 402.5kg total, a 35kg progress from my previous meet total of 367.5kg. My Wilks score this time is 304.81, my very first above 300 Wilks score. I aim to get at least 450kg next meet and Wilks score of at least 350. Either way, I feel pretty good with my progress and I hope to continue this trend upwards for as long as I can. Jeremy Steven, I'm coming for your records! Gimme 3 years and I'll get there.

The immediate plan for now is to do a few cycles of hypertrophy and conditioning before beginning another meet prep cycle if I decide to compete again in August. All while cutting slowly about 2kg a month. But for now, I'm just gonna chill and bro it out at the gym. I'll see you guys when I begin my new training cycle, which is probably next week.

It's always a good day when you don't bomb out, no worries. Did you select an opener that was too heavy?

Anyway, did you manage to make weight? I hope the water cut protocol helped.

I'll update it in the first post when it's ready. I'm planning to giant set everything and still do a simple DUP style training.

Ah, you might be right. Glad you managed to make weight though.

I train in Cyberjaya. I can PM you the name of the gym if you want to. I'd rather not disclose that info out here in public.

Yeah man, I'll keep that in mind. Thanks!

Fuckarounditis Week Day 1 (30 March 2017)

First day back in the gym and boy am I out of shape. My goal for this session was to just get the body moving and play around with form and such. Did not bring any equipment with me to prevent myself from going heavy on anything.

Bench Press 60kg x 4 x 5
- I think I did 4 sets, or was it 5. I don't know. My lower back is still complaining when I arch so I did a whole bunch of different variations. Feet up, Larsen press, bodybuilding style flared press, narrow grip, everything. Again, nothing too heavy, just playing around. I'm gonna lay off of the arch for now and focus on getting my lower back and my entire core stronger, so I'm seeing a lot of reverse hypers and abwheel rollout in the near future.

Squats 80kg x 5 x 5
- On squats I experimented a lot on my form. I really want to dig deep and find the optimal form for myself this off season so a lot of experimentation will be done. I tried widening my stance a lot but this in turn caused my butt to wink and forced my erectors to work extra hard, so no go on the wide stance. The back pump was a killer. Next session I will try narrower stance and see how I feel. Nothing too difficult as well, just playing. But man, my rear delts still hurt. The squat bar used at the meet is super sharp, it's like I have mini wounds on my rear delts.

Tyre Flips 100kg x 3 x 10
- I can't get enough of tyre flips. Makes me sweat a whole bunch, gives a great forearm pump, and it's just so fun when you do it for time. Definitely my go to conditioning exercise. I just wish the gym had a bigger tyre.

Barbell Rows 60kg x 1 x 10, 70kg x 1 x 10, 90kg x 1 x 5
- Ended my session with some rows. My grip is still limiting me on these so I'm gonna wear straps from now on. Not fun to row when your grip is always slipping. No chalk made it even worse. I'm pretty sure some of the boys there must have thought my rowing form sucked balls. Haha. I admit, I like to cheat when I row. But hey, it works for me. I can row more than I can bench so it's definitely working.

Yo, check out the first post. I got my next program posted, quite excited to get back to the grind again next week. Even more volume than the hypertrophy phase of my meet prep, so I'm looking forward to being sore all the damn time. Also has a conditioning exercise programmed daily, which means I can start eating more now. Anybody wanna run it, please, feel free.

Fuckarounditis Week Day 2 (31 March 2017)

Everything was sore, everything moved weird, it was as if I've lost all my strength and forgot how to do any of the powerlifting movements. It's just one of those bad days, it happens. On the flip side, morning weight has been a consistent 71.3kg, but I'm not too sure how to feel about it. I mean I want to lose some weight but at the same time I feel like I'm wasting away.

Squat 100kg x 3 x 5, 50kg x 5 x 5
- Again I'm not entirely sure how many squats I did, I kinda lost track. Not that it matters anyway, it's nothing too serious. I worked up to a 100kg, all without sleeves and belt. I also experimented with a much narrower stance, which from video and reviews from others, is a horrible stance for me. I was pitched way forward and had to rely on back strength a lot to get out of the hole, even though my quads were worked more. I might actually have really long femurs, which would explain the deadlift and squat gap I have. I don't know. Never actually measured. And I gave the new stance a good shot too, I kept going till the end of the session. I ended up limping home as my right knee tendon got inflamed and my right butt cheek cramped up. I think this stance just might not be for me. It better than the super wide stance I tried the day before but not an improvement over my current form, so it only make sense to go back to my old stance. I'll probably play around with toe angle and knee flaring for now and see what works better.

Deadlift T&G 110kg x 3 x 6, 142.5kg x 2 x 3, 142.5kg x 2 x 1
- I seem to have forgotten how to deadlift as well. My bracing wasn't as tight as usual and boy was 142.5kg heavy as fuck. I didn't wanna go too heavy so I ended it there. Not much to say actually. Deadlift is deadlift, it either goes up or it stays on the floor.

Seated Bicycle Cardio x 10 mins @ 120BPM
- Finished off the session with some light cardio. My knee tendon was in pain and I didn't want to stand, so I sat my fat ass on the bike.

I quit lowyat. Ask darklight for anything and everything. He has all the answers. Goodbye.