Well Tuesday didn’t go at all well! Snatch practice was meant to be a simple matter of getting confident with my opening lifts, but it couldn’t have gone much worse. I dropped 3 out of 6 attempts at 65kg and dropped 2 out of 3 attempts at 70kg. Honestly, I should be getting every lift at these weights. I think months of training alone with no coaching is taking its toll. :-S
I still need to lose 5 lbs in the next 18 days so I finished up with a small Crossfit style metcon workout of my own devising. I included burpees as punishment for my failure at the Snatch, lol:
As for today (Wednesday), well that was a complete bust. I had felt a twinge in my hamstring doing deadlifts at the weekend, and so eased off. Well whilst I didn’t notice it at the time, I must have aggravated it on Tuesday, as it is slightly sore even to walk on at the moment. I think discretion is the better part of valour and so I’m going to take it easy. The last thing I need is a proper injury 2 weeks before the comp!
In other news, I’m working on a Crossfit post that has literally taken hours to put together. It’s probably the most useful Crossfit related post I’ve ever done on this blog, something I’ve been thinking of doing for ages and I can’t wait for it to be finished so that I can post it up! It’s even better than the Named Crossfit Workouts (the girls) post I did ages ago, that I still haven’t got round to updating yet. One day…
Anyway, this post will be ready in the next couple of days, it’s going to be awesome.
I’ve started seriously thinking about the BWLA British Masters Olympic Weightlifting Competition at Lilleshall (I came 2nd last year) at the end of March and how I’m going to prepare for it. For reasons I won’t bore you with, I’ve not done as much lifting as I should have done in preparation for this competition. It’s too close to the comp now to actually consider improving strength really, so I’m just going to focus on technique and get my confidence levels up for what I want my starting lifts to be.
The rules say that you must start within 15kg of the qualifying standard, which was 165kg for the 77kg M1 category. So starting at 150 would be an easy 60kg snatch and 90kg clean and jerk. I think I’m going to do a bit better than that and work towards 65kg and 90kg as starting weights, and see how it goes this month, I may up them both to 70kg snatch and 95gk C&J openers. I do need to be confident of getting a total though, so will err on the side of caution if training this month doesn’t go smoothly.
My aim for training is to not try anything that will cause me to drop a lift in the next 4 weeks. I want to go into the comp with utter confidence that I can lift my openers, then just increment each one by 5kg say on the day for the 2nd and 3rd lifts. That would mean if all goes perfectly (ha, when does that happen?!?) my current PB’s of 77kg and 100kg are in range.
With that in mind, my training this week was:
Tuesday
Hang Snatch and Snatch: 2×40, 2×45, 2×50, 2×55, 1×60
Snatch + 2 Over Head Squat: 2×60, 3×65
Snatch Pulls: 3×70, 3×75, 3×80
Then ½ the Crossfit.com WOD, which was 8 rounds (I did 4) of run 400, with 90 second rest between runs. I only did half as I’m not that used to a lot of running and I had brand new Evo Viva Barefoot running shoes and didn’t want to over do it first time out.
They are Vibram FiveFinger substitutes, as I don’t have the right shaped feet for Vibrams (boooo!). Certainly, they have not a lot of sole to speak of and you do feel a lot more of what you’re walking on. They’ll take a bit of getting used to, but should help the Pose running that’s for sure.
I followed this with a Crossfit WOD from a few days ago: Row 5k. I’ve never done a 5k row before, in fact the most I’ve ever rowed has been 2000m, and only once at that, so this was a bit daunting! In fact, it went better than I’d hoped. Each 1000m split was faster than the one before, and I had enough left to end with a bit of a sprint, finishing in a respectable (I thought) 20:28. Will have a go at beating 20mins next time.
Actually the biggest battle at the moment is making the 77kg (169lbs) weight category. I’m down from a portly 13st5 after Xmas to 12st7 as of this morning, so only 6 lbs and 3.5 weeks to go. Should be no problem, as long as I can continue to be good, hoho.
It’s hard to start this post… without resorting to impolite expletives! This weekend’s weightlifting competition went about as wrong as it could have done, short of bombing (failing to get any lifts).
I could wax lyrical about my failures, but can’t quite face it to be honest. It was a shambles that’s soonest forgotten. The short version is, I got only 2 of my 6 lifts: 70kg Snatch and 95kg Clean & Jerk, for a 165 total. A mile away from the 182 total I was hoping for. Here’s the high def video, in all its embarrassing glory:
First the important stuff: I made the weight. For the last 5 days I’ve been at or under my target weight, which is the upper limit of the 77kg weight category (169 lbs, or 12 stone 1 in old money). On my more accurate scales, this morning, I weighed 76.5kg (168.8 lbs), happy days! Although not happy enough for me to be able to have any breakfast or indeed drink much in the next 4 hours till the official weigh in. See my previous post for how I tweaked the zone diet to loose the weight I needed in just 3 weeks. The zone diet comes through for me again. Here’s my weightloss graph for the last 3 weeks:
I was asked yesterday if I was ready. The answer is: I’m never ready! Well I never feel ready anyway. On the face of it that sounds bad, but think about it for a moment. If I felt ready, that is comfortably ready with the knowledge that I was perfectly able to lift the weight I wanted to, then wouldn’t I be trying below my potential? I don’t know, but I do know that I’m relying on that bit of adrenaline to out perform my previous best ever lifts, either in competition or training.
I’ve been nominally following a Hungarian weightlifting program, set weekly by my coach at Crossfit Manchester. It will be interesting to see whether I’ve progressed in the 2 months I’ve been doing it. I certainly think I have, but whether I can translate that into performance on the day, we’ll see.
Just to recap, the purpose of this comp is to qualify for the European Masters Weightlifting Championships in 2010. I’ve already qualified for the 2010 BWLA British Masters Championships. For this I need to improve on my current personal best total of 177kg, and lift the qualifying weight of 182 total. Here’s the game plan (and anyone who knows me, knows that A LOT of thought has gone into the following):
Snatch: Warm up to 70kg. Open with 75, then 78, and then 80. Current PB is 77, but I’ve only ever lifted over 75 twice ever. To be honest, opening with 75 is the big risk, just 2kg below my PB and whilst I know I can do it, I’ve not been consistent in training, dropping four 70kg snatches in a row only last week for example! There’s a significant chance I will bomb at 75 (fail to get any lifts).
Clean and Jerk: If I make the 80kg snatch, then I open with 97kg (current PB is 100), then I get 2 cracks at 102 which would give me the 182 total I need. If I get the 102, then 105 will be just for fun.
However if I get the 78kg snatch, then I’ll be starting the C&Js having just dropped a lift, so will start at a confidence building 95, then 100, and finish with 104 for my 182 total. There’s a temptation here to start higher, at 100 say, and potentially get 2 goes at 104. That will depend on how the C&J warm up has gone and how comfortable I feel.
If I only get the 75 snatch, I’m in real trouble and will need a massive PB increase; starting with 97, then 102, then the big 107.
Either way it’s PB territory or bust today! Now to stay busy and forget about my empty belly…
The competition at the weekend went very well. Interestingly, it didn’t feel like it went that well, considering I missed half the lifts. However the results speak for themselves. I had 3 goals, in descending order of importance:
Lift 165 total to qualify for the BWLA British Masters Weightlifting competition in 2010 (77kg body weight category)
Lift a body weight snatch for the first time ever.
Lift a 175 total to qualify for the 2010 British Masters in the 85kg category (in case I’m over weight come March).
I planned to do these lifts:
Snatch 1 = 70kg
Snatch 2 = 76kg (body weight)
Snatch 3 = 80kg
Clean & Jerk 1 = 90kg
Clean & Jerk 2 = 95kg
Clean & Jerk 3 = 100kg
As you will see in the video below, I got my first snatch and the 76kg body weight snatch on the 3rd snatch. The 90kg C&J then gave me the 165 total I needed, so I went up to 99kg C&J in order to have 2 goes at getting a 175 total. Well, why don’t you watch the video and you’ll see what happened. Click through to YouTube if you want to see it in HD:
As you can see, a scrappy affair really. The Snatches never felt really comfortable. To be honest I messed up the warm up, for both Snatch and Clean and Jerks, I warmed up too soon and then had to stretch them out. Things I need to work on:
Snatch – I still need to get the bar landing consistently over head.
Clean – I’m still hitting the bar too low down on my thighs, which is shooting the bar forward instead of up.
Jerk – Dipping too low is sending the bar forward and also not getting my hips under the bar, as I showed in the freeze frame.
Despite the 3 drops and the poor form shown, I still managed to qualify for the BWLA British Masters next year, and get a body weight snatch which is a milestone I’ve been working towards ever since I started snatching (and level 3 on the Athletic Skill Levels, if you’re interested). So it was a successful day.
Whilst it looks like it wasn’t going that well, I was actually quite pleased. Since getting 77kg in March, I haven’t felt capable of even attempting more than 70kg, but the warm up to 70kg went very well so I pressed on. If you watch carefully, I’m trying a new starting position where I’m leaning a little further back. You can see me adjust backwards just before the pull.
This has made a difference, but I think I need to sit back more. It’s all about getting the bar to land right over my centre of gravity when it’s over head. You see that every time I lose it, I lose it forward, which means that I’m still not getting it right. Whilst I didn’t get it, I was pleased to have 3 good goes at 77.5kg which would have been a PB by 0.5kg, lol.
That body weight snatch is within my grasp I think, it’s only a matter of time.
This is a video of a training session at Crossfit Manchester. I posted my training Snatches last week, so this is the Clean and Jerk vid. This time I’ve included one’s that didn’t go quite according to plan! I was trying to get 5 lifts at 95% of my personal best, so at 95kg (209 lbs), for reference I weigh 80ish kg, but am trying to lose weight to get into the 77kg body weight category.
It turned out that 5 x 95% lifts was beyond me. In the end I got 3 (only 2 of which are shown, I forgot to tape the first one) but I was still well knackered by the end! You can see that my main issue is still consistency. When it goes right, it’s nice and stable, it just doesn’t go right often enough.
I’ve finally got round to doing the video of me lifts at the 2009 BWLA British Masters Weightlifting Championships. For the record, I was lifting in M1 (Males age 35-39) in the 85kg category: I weighed in at 80.3kg (177 lbs / 12 stone 9).
I’ve posted before about my attempts to lift the 175kg qualifying total, e.g. at the BWLA Northern Masters a couple of months ago. In brief, despite not having made the 175kg qualifying total (adding together the best Snatch and best Clean & Jerk) I was allowed to enter the competition. As a result, my aim was to lift 175kg on the day, basically to justify my presence at the tournament. This is how I did:
Yesterday was my best lifting event yet, by far. To say I’m extremely pleased, is a major understatement. The goal of the day was to lift the 175kg qualifying total, as much as anything, to justify my attendance there. (This is because they let me go, even though I hadn’t managed to lift the 175 qualifying weight before.)
To do this I needed something like a 75kg snatch and a 100kg clean and jerk. Considering my personal best for Snatch was 70kg and I’ve only ever got 100kg on the C&J once before, that was always going to be tough. My recent terrible form hasn’t helped (getting 70kg snatch only 3 times in the last 35ish attempts!) nor was doing my shoulder in last week. On top of that, apparently the rules are that you have to start within 10kg of the qualifying weight, so I had to start at 70kg and 95kg. It entered my mind that I might actually bomb out (miss all 3 lifts) of the snatch!
Still, fortune favours the bold and all that, so after getting up at 5am for the 3 hour drive up to Lilleshall National Sports centre, near Newport, Shropshire I arrived for the 8:30 weigh in and weighed in at 80.3kg. Bang in the middle of the 85kg category (77 – 85kg).
It was basically me and Mark Beck lifting together at the start, and we pretty much took it in turns. I warmed up to two 65kg snatches, and didn’t dare try a 70 in the warm up for fear of missing it and trashing my already shaky confidence. I wanted to go out at least having made all my warm up lifts. I was pleased with the fact that the warm up wasn’t bothering my shoulder at all, so whatever I’ve done to it (it hurts to press the buttons my car radio for example), it wasn’t weightlifting!
Cutting a long story short, I got the 70kg snatch fine, which was a major surprise to me. Sadly my remote control of the camera failed and I didn’t get it on tape. Whilst Mark was doing his 75kg snatch, I ran round to reset the camera and trotted back in time to go out for the big one, my 2nd lift and first go at the elusive 75kg, something I’ve missed twice before in competitions: at the Yorkshire and NE Counties Open, and at the Northern Masters.
I was nervous as hell for the 75kg snatch, but was determined and very pleased when it shot up no problem. New PB, woot! The issue for me has been getting the bar to stop in the right position over my head, so that it’s over my centre of gravity and I can stand up. This time it did and up I popped. I was very pleased. Suddenly however, I was being asked what my next weight was going to be…. I hadn’t given it any thought, the idea that I’d get both my first 2 opening lifts had never crossed my mind! I opted for 77kg, which seemed like the right thing to do.
I can’t wait to get the video uploaded, cos I can tell you, the 77kg was the best snatch I’ve ever done, it was perfect. The bar stopped in just the right place and I got extremely low under it. 77kg, another personal best, and a 10% jump to boot. 28 hours later, I’m still smiling!
After trying to sabotage myself in the warm up for the clean and jerk, by hitting myself in the neck with a 50kg bar, the C&Js actually went very well as well. My opening 95kg was sound and the big 100kg was really great to get up. I failed a 103, but I was past caring by then, I’d beaten my target of 175, instead getting 177kg and was (and am) very pleased with the day’s events. Sadly, the camera failed completely and I missed all the clean & jerks. I’m hoping to get some footage off other peoples flip videos next weekend.
In a final bonus, I was expecting to come 3rd of 3, in the face of competition from a Scottish champion and a Northern Ireland champ. As it turned out, the NI guy came in over weight and so was bumped up to the next category up. The Scottish guy (a very nice fella by the name of Ian Robertson) has been lifting since he was 14 (that’s 25 years) so it’s no real surprise that be won by a large margin. Still, it meant I was 2nd (out of 2, lol) and have another nice trophy to show for it. I’ll get whatever videos etc uploaded when I can.
It was also great to see Pat Atteridge again, as well as the 4 very impressive lifters from his London weightlifting club at Bethnal Green. And last bu not least, it was a pleasure to lift with Mark and see him qualify for the British Seniors, an immensely impressive performance for a 39 year old!
There’s nothing quite so effective at whiling away your precious life, as spending time watching crash compilations on the internet. So without further ado, I present for your Friday Fun pleasure: the luckiest helmetless motorcyclist ever:
The motorbike mate you *don’t* want to go out riding with:
And finally a selection of race crashes. Some really good one’s in here (I have no idea if anyone was seriously hurt, I hope not, but fess up, the only reason anyone watches motorsports, is to see the crashes):
In separate news, I’m looking forward to the BWLA Masters on Saturday, though my shoulder is still far from fixed. I couldn’t quite go 10 days before a competition without any training, that would not put me in good shape, so I did a typical Crossfit style blast tonight on the rear decking, with just the aid of a skipping rope:
As Many Rounds As Possible (AMRAP) in 10 minutes of:
5 press up
10 double unders
15 squats
I was pleased with the 9 rounds I managed. It was suitably hard and blowy, but also should have stressed me too much for the comp in 36 hours. Just enough to get the blood flowing and to remind my legs and arms that they’ll have work to do soon.
