Weightlifting Comp Prep Week 2 Day 1

Over the last couple of years, I have worked on building a garage gym. This has been so much fun. I will write another post in the future all about building a garage gym. After about 4-5 months of training at my house, I decided to get an online program. As long as I have been training I still think it is important to have a coach or someone else write your program. I first tried doing a standard program from Garage Gym Athlete. This was an OK program, but not what I was looking for in my programming.

I decided to join Mash Elite Performance silver online team. I have currently been training with Mash Elite Performance for a little over 1 year. When I first started, I was a hybrid athlete. I wanted to work on my Super Total ( squat, bench, deadlift, clean and jerk, and snatch) and do Crossfit style workouts. Over this year, I did a few local Crossfit team competitions and hit the podium in two of three. (Team names: Dad Bod WOD, Hold my baby, Daddy has a comp, and Star spangled slammers )

Mash Elite Performance online team is great. My personal coach, Crystal McCollough is a bad ass power lifter (nationally ranked).  Her son, at age 15,  is a top youth weightlifter in the US.  She writes my programming, taking into account my goals, time, and equipment I have available. Secondly, I have access to other amazing coaches via the online Facebook group. In this group, I post videos of my lifts and get amazing feedback on technique.

At the beginning on 2019, I started a new cycle. This cycle, I changed my goals. I have decided to train for a USA weight lifting competition. This year I turn 35 yrs old, aka getting old, and I qualify to be a master's weightlifter.  The Annual Spring Open, will be my first weight lifting comp on April 6, 2019 in Woodstock GA, which just happens to my home town.  I hope to hit a total high enough to qualify for Master Nationals and hope to attend American Open 2 in Albuquerque NM in July. 

Now that I am getting a little older, I find that great train days are a little more rare, but I still put in the work to continue to improve. I am not great at weightlifting, and that is why I am focusing on it. It is a major area where I still have a lot of room to improve. 

What does my training look like?  Well below is what my coach had me doing today. 



5  Rep Max (RM) Hang Snatch with 4 sec eccentric below the knee then -10% for 2x5
Bar, 65, 85,95,105,115,120,125,115,115#

These are much harder than they seem on paper. It is all about time under tensions and the weights are lighter but with the eccentric it makes them difficult. 

5RM back squats with 4 sec eccentric and 2 sec pause in the bottom.
135, 185,225,265,295,315,285,285#

Squats are my jam.  Most days these feel great and my top weight today was 20# over last weeks work. That is a great jump.  

5RM Snatch grip Dead list with 5 sec eccentric.
 135,155,175#  😞 last week I worked up to 205#. 

I was shot on these, and I could not get my back set with a neutral spin. You can see in the video that my back is slightly rounded, therefore I called in a day.

Lastly, I did  3 x 40 yards Unilateral Farmers Carries at 105# for every set.

Today was programed with an optional condition workout of 10 rnds of 100 meter row sprints with 90 sec rest between rounds.  I did not have the time to complete this conditioning workout.

I hope to post other training days and track my progress over this cycle towards competing in weight lifting.