teh Forum

It's been officiated!!! Teh l2icks0r! is now teh WABDL Class 1 men 220lb Washington state champion dead-lifter bastard!!! I now officially hold two state records - the other was for the Class 1 men 181lb class I set a year ago.

What is kind of crazy is out of all the dead lifters that broke the 600lb barrier I was the lightest guy - I didn't strip down when I weighed in so it was off by 2lbs at least. There were only 8 of us and there were four the lifted more than me. So out of the entire compeitition only four guys for all weight classes lifted more than I did - w00t!

Jeffery Place weighed in at 331.6lbs and lifted 600.7lbs
Cody Ratliff weighed in at 212.6lbs and lifted 600.7lbs
Joe Mikelson weighed in at 308.0lbs and lifted 601.8lbs
Teh l2icks0r! wieghed in at 214.6lbs(fully clothed) and lifted 602.9lbs
Cliff Sandberg, 232.4lbs - lifted 622.7lbs
Steve Smith, 255.4 - lifted 633.7
Kris Jensen 263.4 - lifted 650.2
Jerame Linnell 240.6 - lifted 651.3

I should be able to hit 650+ by next year weighing less than 220lbs - I'm jacked! Jacked I say!!! w00t!

It is teh drunken one!!! Long time no posten! The La Fin Du Monde still seems to have it's magical effects on said l2icks0r!. What to say about all of this...I dunno being a competative powerlifter has to be one of the most difficult things I have ever done both mentally and physically. A few years ago I thought people that spent time in the gym were totally lame - like it was one of the most boring things you could do because it was weight training. The emphasis being on training - training for some other sport where you would be outside but I had no idea that the lifts themselves could be a sport in itself. I had no idea that as the weight increased the lift would change, the lift would become something different where you would have to change or revisit your technique because it was no longer adequate to support moving the weight. This happened to me three times now with the bench press. From 0-270lbs no problem - it was easy. But after 270lbs the lift became something new where I had to grip the bar with a total death grip in order to reinforce my wrists from buckling. After incorporating the death grip I was fine up to about 380lbs then the lift changed again and I found that it wasn't only about having enough strength to push the bar up but more about being able to stabilize the weight while I pushed it up. This is exactly why the Pasco judges did not count my last attempt at 418lbs because I couldn't "balance" the weight as I pushed it up and it went out of the groove. This is the same reason why you can do more weight using a straight bar versus using dumbells - dumbells are much more difficult because they require much more stabilzation strength. I have much to learn when it comes to benching at the 400+ level but I can definitely foresee a dramatic improvement in my near future where 450+lbs will not be a problem - in fact I'd most certainly have to say that I'll hit that in the next six months.

Ah the bench press - heh...it is by far the most standardized or really one of the most popularized of benchmarks for measuring physical strength amoung many people because everyone and their mom can bench press. I mean think about it - you get to lie down and relax on a nice cushioned backrest and have the wieght handed to you by someone that lifts the wieght off of the rack and if you can't lift the wieght a spotter is there to pull it off for you. You don't even need to have legs in order to bench press. And really most people don't even need to have the weight lifted off for them because most people don't get to the point where the wieght becomes so heavy that it's totally awkward to lift the weight off the rack by themselves. When I started power lifting I only trained in the bench press but I was much more suited biomechanically for the dead lift.

To me the dead lift is the no holds barred measurment of absolute brute strength - it is truly hardcore. Everyone wants to know how much you bench press but hardly anyone, except for the hardcore, would ask or even care to know how much you dead lift. The dead lift in a way is almost like combining both the squat and the bench press into one movement because you have to utilize your entire body to complete the movement.. The only muscle group I don't beleive you need to really develop that much for the dead lift is your calf muscles - but you still need them. You need more than just muscular strength to dead lift as well - you need a certain level of mental toughness. I don't really know any other way to really put it. I suppose you could also interpret it as just general toughness because dead lifting is painful. If I don't tape my shins up I bleed every time I work out. I bruise the top of my knees when I lower the bar. If I eat too much before working out I feel like throwing up. My blood pressure will shoot up so high I feel like passing out somtimes. If I'm not hydrated enough I'll see stars after my first heavy set. My lower back will get so tight it's hard to stand up straight. And all of this will happen before I even get to my final last couple sets which are the most difficult because the are the heaviest. But I've been here before, and I guess I am used to it - even after injuring my lower back from pulling a muscle which made it difficult to stand or walk or move basically for about three months. And the fucked up part of those three months is I didn't quit working out. I kept lifting in absoulte extreme pain. Looking back now I don't really know what to think about that time. I guess I have mixed feelings about it because in order to work out in such extreme pain week after week after week I had to be either totally fucking brain dead stupid or extremely tough - but I'm not stupid. To be able to endure such a period then only gives me more strength now because no matter how tough the training gets today it will never compare to that time where I questioned why in the hell I ever kept going to the gym week after week when I was so hurt. I guess each week when I started to get better it was like a miniature triumph and so I got into it and wanted to see how much better I did the following week - which really was no different from the time when I wasn't hurt. It's like playing Diablo - you keep playing and playing and getting more experience for your character and he/she keeps getting stronger and more powerful and so it motivates you even more to keep on playing. The same is true for me and power-lifting although power-lifting is a tiny bit more extreme but it's the same thing though you just want to keep getting more powerful.

I think a lot of people think they have a good idea about what weight lifting is all about even though they haven't really spent that much time in the gym. I was definitely one of those people - I really honestly thought I knew what it was all about and that the people who chose to lift weights were just boring because they were training for nothing if they didn't have another main sport whereby utilizing weight lifting to augment their performance for that sport. I started lifting weights because I had three broken bones and was trying to rehabilitate myself from my involvement with my "main sport" of bmx. I got an extremely rare chance to train with someone who had 30+ years of experience and I eventually rationalized competing simply because I could. If someone were to ask me now why I compete my answer is simply because I can.

Because of power lifting I know the difference between being hurt and being injured - before power lifting I thought they were the same thing. I can work out hurt, I can keep going, I can endure the pain. For your average person, or maybe I should say for your average intelligent person, their priorities are different. They place pain avoidance as a top priority so anything that causes pain is to be avoided - I don't do that anymore. I put physical discomfort at a much lower priority now - not necessarily because I want to but because I have to in order to lift at the level I am at. This isn't a unique story, it's the same for anyone who gets this far - it hurts. However sometimes it doesn't hurt - sometimes it's just weird. Recently I've realized that my capacity for physical output is a function of how much I want to do it. It's like a certain level of bodily control where it's similar to the stories you hear about mothers lifting cars to save her trapped child - although now it's as if I can employ that level of control at will. For smaller muscles it's very apparent - I can employ my biceps so much now that it's a question of how much I want to hurt my ligaments/tendons. I feel like if I wanted to I can injure myself at will by utilizing more strength than I can physically endure without damage. I think this is how you can get stronger without getting bigger - your body lets your mind tell it to do more and more even if it is more than it should be doing. It's like the 10% of the brain thing - you know about how you hear that humans only use 10% of their brain? Well when it comes to the brain controlling the body it's really like being able to use more of my brain to control my body. Ok...Kind of feeling like passing out now...

Did you feel the pump?

I felt it when I posed out in front of 5000 people.

How much posing HAVE you been doing Rixler?

Nice work there rixler, champion of the deadlift!

Congrats!

Is there an actual crown? I bet it's heavy.

I think it should be a big fat golden belt!