Okay, everyone--I'm going to do my best to do a complete meet report.
First, the weight cut:
I actually thought the cut went very well. I've been training up at ~160 for most of this cycle, and I was able to drop a lot of weight with my water load. When I dropped my sodium on the third day, my weight plummeted, to the point that I was 155 lbs. before bed. I woke up at 152, rehydrated up to 154ish, then cut fluids 22 hours from weigh-ins. I fasted on that day and had to cut two pounds in the sauna the evening before weigh-ins, but I made it at 147 lbs.
Over the next day, I ballooned up to 163 lbs. I was very methodical in my approach, but I still didn't feel great. I had been cramping up a lot over the course of that week, and I felt stiff, lethargic, and sick. My weight was back, but I didn't feel super. I generally don't feel super at meets, but this time it wasn't just a matter of feeling bloated. I felt off.
Next, the meet itself, starting with squats:
My squat warm-ups were pretty lousy. Everything felt heavy, and 315 felt like a million pounds. I tried to brush it off, but I could tell my strength was down a bit. Again, my weight was back up, but I was still concerned, so I started pounding gatorade before my first attempt.
Attempt #1: 479. This went GREAT. In fact, it was probably my best lift of the entire meet. I came right up with it and felt real strong doing so. It was one of those lifts that I hit just right, and it was a relief, because I had visions of a bomb-out playing in my head as I got set up. This got me in the meet with a 33-lb. increase over my July squat.
Attempt #2: 507. Now that I had handled 479 well, I thought I would take care of 507. I was wrong, because 507 just about pancaked me on this second attempt. Honestly, I was too slow dropping into the hole, and I quit on the lift way too early. I didn't grind it out, and the only excuse I can give is that I wasn't willing to fight through it.
Attempt #3: 507. I knew 507 would really help my meet total out, so I wanted it bad, and missing it put the fear of God in me. I was able to grind it up this time, but honestly, it felt really heavy, and I just about couldn't stand up with it; my legs started shaking at the end and I just prayed the spotters would re-rack it and I'd get credited for a good lift. Thankfully, I was able to stabilize it enough to get the good-lift call, but it was a shaky one.
For my bench, warm-ups felt a lot better than on squat. I didn't blow everything away, but I felt strong. Even 275, my final warm-up, went well, but I had a weird hiccup in my press at around the transition point that felt weird. I hadn't benched much in the last few weeks due to tendonitis, and while my strength had held well with floor presses, I felt a little out of my groove.
Attempt #1: 297. This went about as well as 297 could be expected to go. It was a good, clean lift, and it was pretty fast. I felt very confident going into 308, but I knew I had to take it seriously, because I didn't blow 297 away.
Attempt #2: 308. I failed this one on a two-to-one call for my butt leaving the bench. It was very slight, but it happened, and the judges made the correct call by catching it. I could feel it come up as I was lowering the weight, and so I tried to get it down, but I was too greedy with my hovering and it cost me. I didn't need to do this to make the lift.
Attempt #3: 308. I was determined not to fail 308 on a judges' call again, so I kept my butt planted on this one and decided to press it without leg drive. This actually flew up, but I again got caught up in this weird hiccup, and the bar swayed on me. I pressed it without much difficulty and racked it, and when I looked at the lights, I thought I made the lift (I had two whites to one red).
Later, I was told that the head judge had overruled my bench press because of a dip down in the bar (the hiccup I'm talking about). I watched the video and he was right--it was slight, but it was there. I asked for clarification later and he told me that he indeed overruled it, so I ended up with my opener of 297. I didn't expect to miss 308 twice due to judges' calls, as I've never been red-lighted for a lift before, and this made deadlifting that much more difficult. I now knew I needed 601 for a 1404-lb. total.
For deadlifts, my warm-ups felt pretty great. Everything up to 495 moved really fast; 495 moved well, but not fantastic. My opener was set at 573, and this would give me a 1377-lb. total; that's a meet PR for me.
Attempt #1: 573. This moved pretty fast, but I felt like I got forward on it near my lockout. In general, my lockout just didn't feel as smooth at it had at the last meet. I almost lost my grip on this pull, but the judge's down command saved my ass. This wasn't the cleanest 573 ever, but I was encouraged because it moved fast, particularly off the floor (and this has been a recent issue for me). After this, I called for 601.
Attempt #2: 601. Ugh. So goddamn close. I got good speed off the floor but just could not get my hips to lock out. After this, I knew it was over, because I can count on one hand the number of times I've seen somebody miss a hard deadlift and then come back to get it.
Attempt #3: 601. Out of desperation, I tried taking a really wide stance on this one, hoping it would make the lockout easy enough for me to gut it out. At this point, I was really just trying to find a way to get the lift, so I did something I had never tried before; I figured I was in a no-lose situation. Of course, it didn't work, and I missed it just past my knees. I was spent at this point.
So, overall, it's a 1377-lb. total, +22 on my best meet, with a small PR on squat. It's probably the best four-for-nine I'll ever have as a powerlifter. It will probably be relegated to #2 at 148 very soon (another guy just did a monster 1415-lb. total), but it is still currently #10 all time, so I moved into the top ten there.
I'm happy--I called an aggressive meet, performed OK, and got my PR total. I didn't hit the big total, but I made progress. I feel like the aggressiveness paid off for me.
I have a lot more to say, but I'll be short. I had a lot of people be very supportive of me leading up to this, and so it felt wonderful to fail in front of all of them.
lol
I'll get over it. Eventually, I'll put it all together. After RUM, I might just need to take a break from competing for a good 9-12 months so that I can really work on my lifting. We'll see what happens there.
Thanks, everybody.
