Powerlifting

By. Kuan Lee

Mar. 11, 2019

My introduction to powerlifting began with my feeble football career. Being a bigger kid, I had to be stronger than everyone else. Working out and hitting the gym started to become a routine. I was soon taught the three main compound lifts, squat, deadlift, and bench. They had become essential if I wanted to start for the team. I loved every minute of grinding it out at the gym and feeling sore the next day. Running gassers and 30 yard speed drills, not so much. My passion for football started to dwindle and I was deciding on quitting the team. However, I still loved lifting. I wanted to do it at a competitive level. Pretty soon, I found out about powerlifting. Powerlifting is quite simple, the athlete has to perform the three main lifts (deadlift, squat, and bench), while being judged by a panel of fellow powerlifters to make sure the athlete are using proper form. My favorite part of powerlifting is the lack of cardiovascular exercises. When I started, I showed a lot of potential. My max deadlift was at 375 lbs. my max squat at 275 lbs. and my max bench was at 205 lbs. However, I was young and inexperienced. I was “ego lifting” and the consequences started to get serious. Ego lifting is when an athlete is lifting with their ego and when they cannot actually handle the weight. I started this trend of squatting weight I could not do. It led to the first actual football practice of the year and my back has been hurting for a week due to my arrogance. My mentality for the pain is to walk it off. That day, I had a training buddy, Mikey Levine. We started the day with squats—the workload started light but eventually we worked our way to 275. I knew I cannot do the weight at my current state, but the head coach, Coach Craig, was watching and I wanted to show him what I can do. I went down for not one, but two reps— utterly destroying my back. I continued on the rest of practice in sheer pain. That was basically the end of my football career. I quit the team after that day and stopped lifting due to my back pain. Fast forward to November 2018. My back pain has finally gone away. Two of my friends recently signed up for my old gym and asked me to join them. I was hesitant but I agreed. I wanted to start lifting again. However, this time, I did my homework. My new workout routine was part of an actual program established by professional powerlifters. The program I followed is named the Smolov Bench. I benched four days a week on top of working out other body parts. Each day consists of at least 30 total bench reps. Mid December is when I really starting following and doing the program. I started off really light, not wanting to make the same mistake as last time. I wanted to make sure my form was down for every single rep. I started off doing just 135 compared to my previous 205 during the summer. Towards the end of January, I was repping 185 and then in early February, I got back to repping 205. End of February, I hit a PR (personal record) of 225. That PR was huge for me. It was a great feeling knowing I was getting stronger than before. Through my first three months of training, I attempted to squat twice and did not even attempt deadlift. I was so scared mentally to hurt my back again that I didn't even try these two lifts. However, after hitting a 225 bench, I started to regain confidence. I started to deadlift again, with my max currently being at 275. That is a 100 pound decrease compared to my previous deadlift. My max squat is currently at 225, which is a 50 pound decrease. However, I know I can hit all these numbers again with proper training this time. I have began looking for powerlifting meets I can sign up for. My friends and I want to sign up for one around summer, which gives us plenty of time to train. The numbers I want to hit at the meet is a 275 bench, a 335 squat and a 405 deadlift. The total number would be at 1015 pounds. Powerlifting gave me character. I was forced to train through the good days and the bad days. Powerlifting became therapeutic— nothing can stress me out at the gym. I love the fact that the only thing that can prevent me from my goals was myself. Powerlifting as cliche as it sounds, literally changed me for the better.