June 2005 Meet Recap by Chuck Deluxe
From: Chuck Miller
Sent: Jun 27, 2005 12:54 PM
To: Marty Gallagher
Subject: meet
Marty,
Thanks for everything. Food was great. Coaching was great. Really appreciate it. Saw your write-up this morning too. Very cool, though I hope people don't start bugging me to do sax concerts.
I posted quick impressions on a discussion board Jon and I frequent. Didn't have time to put much thought into it, but thought you might get a kick out of reading it. Here you go:
Meet – ADAU Hagerstown Challenge
BW – 217.5 (220 class)
Gear – Belt only
I usually just go to these meets to attempt PRs and don’t worry about the competition at all. They’re either so far ahead of me that their lifts are irrelevant to me, or they’re too new to competition to actually be competitive. The meet this weekend was a little different, as I ran into 2 other lifters almost exactly at my level.
Squat
217.5 – 479.5
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232.5 – 512.6
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245 – 540.1
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First was the worst, and I even got a red light from the center judge for hitting my elbows on my thighs. I didn’t get any assistance from it, but he had a good eye and was right to give me the red. I tried to cock my elbows back a little to correct this on the next 2 and didn’t receive any more reds, but I thought I felt 1 of them brush on another attempt.
Last was the best, for a 15-pound meet PR. I was very happy with this, though I thought I was tentative on the descent with all of them. If I attack harder, I’ll make 550 next meet. I was also a little surprised to have been outdone in my best lift by 2 other 220’s. One who didn’t look like much (more on him later) did 247.5 and a very strong looking master lifter (about Mike’s thickness) did 250. An interesting day was off to a good start.
Bench
155 – 341.7
165 – 363.8
170 – 374.8 – MISS (close)
Shit. I paused 380 in the gym. What can I say? Bench was just off. I rode it hard and didn’t miss by much, but I missed and it would come back to bite me. To update the standings, I managed to out bench the 247.5 squatter by 5 kilos, so now I was up on him by 2.5 and figured he’d fade in the dead. The master lifter managed to put a little more distance between us but not much. He wasn’t as strong a bencher as he looked and only did the 170 I missed to go up by 10 kilos. It would all come down to deads, but wouldn’t unfold quite as I expected…
Deadlift
This one deserves a little more narrative. I was planning to open with a measly 529 to assure myself a total. Deadlift training hasn’t been all that great since that damned suited meet a few weeks ago. I think I lost a little off the floor training for that, and 550 raw felt heavy in the gym. When they posted opening attempts in the warm-up area, I knew immediately that the competition had changed dramatically. The master lifter was only opening with a little over 500, so unless he was sandbagging, he was no longer the one to worry about. The “guy who didn’t look like much” was opening with my planned 3rd of 584. Oh shit, guess I better bump that opener.
So I amble over to consult Marty, and he says, “If you can’t pull 550, you deserve to bomb out, and we’ll make your ass walk home.” Mike thought this was just fucking hilarious, and I had to admit it was true. So now I’d open with 550 and see how things unfolded from there. It went well, but the other dude absolutely smoked 584. My best shot was to put my 2nd in for that and hope for him to take some huge jump and miss. I made a surprisingly smooth 584 on my 2nd, but he went 606 with no problem.
I was now down 7.5 kilos, but I had him on bodyweight. At this point, I was pretty much backed into a corner and had to call 600, make the damned thing, and hope for him to miss his third to give it to me on bodyweight. As Mike struggled to tighten my belt for my final lift of the day he muttered, “This ole belt’s seen better days.” At this point on a humid afternoon, I felt like replying, “So has this ole Chuck,” but I trudged out and gave it what I had, which wasn’t much. Damn bar didn’t even move; may as well have been bolted to the floor. It was little consolation to see my competitor miss 617 just shy of lockout. I knew I had been beaten by the better puller and can only hope to lock horns with him again on another day.
Bye-bye elusive best lifter trophy. Maybe you’ll be mine another day. For today, second place will have to do.
Here are the exact numbers on my dead and total.
Deadlift
250 – 551.2
265 – 584.2
272.5 – 600.8 – MISS (not close)
Total
675 – 1488.1
Besides seeing Mike, other highlights of the day included lifting with my good friend Geoff, who had a bit of a rough day but did squat a very nice 512; lifting with the P&B’s own zebulondragonslayer, who made an awesome 40-pound squat PR; and chowing down at Marty’s kick-ass post-meet BBQ with several of the lifters. I’ll try to post a few photos later.
Minor disappointment aside, any day with liftin’, eatin’, and no significant injuries is a great day in my book!