Dabbling in Powerlifting

This year has been pretty rocky in terms of programming for my personal nutrition and training. I’m still relatively new to the fitness industry with less than two years under my belt, but have such a strong passion for it that I want to experience all it has to offer as quickly as I can.

What ends up happening to people like me is that we enter a competition blind, thinking we can win with our hearts, and end up being blown out of the water by people who have the time and experience under their belts.

I was fully cognizant of this when I decided a few weeks ago to submit my late application for the USPA SoCal Open Powerlifting meet that was held this past weekend at Metroflex in Long Beach.

It was an extremely tough 10 days leading up to the meet.

My shaky programming had me coming out of a 20 pound weight gain, so I needed to diet down hard to make it into the 148 (67.5 kilo) weight class. I used carb, water, and sodium manipulation to shed those 10 pounds. Oh, and a sauna. That definitely helped too. I felt like absolute hell every minute I was in there, but as soon as I made weight, 10 lbs in 10 days didn’t seem to matter anymore.

The day of the meet, I was greeted by an influx of conflicting emotions. I wasn’t nervous, just incredibly unprepared for what the day would bring. Confusion, excitement, disappointment, exhaustion, and elation were just a few of the many sentiments I experienced in the 12 hours that I was at Metroflex.

The highlight of my day was meeting all of the incredible people there who share my passion. It was such a positive, supportive environment, and you cannot help but feel uplifted from being around so many great athletes who are so committed to their sport, and determined to be better every single day.

I’ve learned so much from my experience this past weekend, and I can’t wait to start training for my next meet. I definitely would advise anyone to go ahead and at the very least watch a meet and see how all of these amazing athletes interact with one another, and how supportive and positive everyone is. It’s truly infectious.

Congratulations to all of the amazing ladies and gentlemen who hit PRs and broke records. I admire everyone who made it out there on Saturday, and I am very thankful for Steve Denison and the USPA for hosting these events.

Until next time.