The elusive Quarter Ton!!!

[benchmonster]

Another great Okie Training Sunday!!!

bigokie and Screwball came to the dungeon, and speaking for myself, the dungeon handed out some serious pain yesterday. Screwball took a ton of pics, and hopefully will be able to get them up here before long.

We decided to see how we were doing in our shirts for full presses to get a good idea of our attempts in 3 weeks. Bigokie is holding off on competing for a little while, and if you knew about is impressive list of injuries you would understand why, so just Screwball and benchmonster going for it in shirts this Sunday.

Warmed up to mid 300's before donning shirts, nothing particularly unusual, except that everything I lifted felt pretty light, despite having a cough and a runny nose.

Put on shirt for 1st attempt at 475, and the damn thing would not touch!!! I smoked this in the same shirt 5 weeks ago at a meet, and it would not touch for anything. So like a dumbass, I dumped it on my belly, causing it to touch, and manhandled it back up, horribly out of groove, and slammed into the j-hooks on the very ugly ride back up. Upset at the miss, but happy to get this much weight back up after being horribly misgrooved.

Then on to 495. Touched just fine, and locked out just fine. Butt stayed on the bench. Most I ever did for a full rep without coming off the bench. Pretty happy at this point.

Pulled shirt way down, because I don't have my tight one in from Karin yet, and went for what I thought was 530 but later realized was 525. Shirt was pulled down too far, and I could not get 525 to touch!!! Could not beleive this much would not touch. Too much to manhandle, so smartly (IMHO) chose to dump it back on the pins. Pissed as Hell at this point, but feeling like I could have made it. Also a bit tired, but they don't call it max effort day so you can puss around with it, so. . .

Adjusted shirt a bit higher up the neck, and went for 525 again. . . and got it. Very excited about this. 3 weeks out, in what will hopefully be my looser shirt, and got a huge (for me) P.R.!!!! 1st time in my life I have ever missed a weight and come back and got it. Used to, if I missed, that was just it, call it a day. Nice to know I am mentally and physically strong enough to come back after a miss and nail a weight.

Now make no mistake, this was not a blazing bar speed type of lift, and I don't think there was a whole lot left in the tank, but good for me nonetheless.

We then went on to do 5 board close grips for triceps, and everyone did very well on these and the other accessories. I will let the other guys tell you about how they did, and maybe post some pics, but I could not sit on this one much more.

I want to personally thank Cubanito for suggesting that I focus greatly on boards going into this meet. I feel that following up on his suggestion as well as some great private advice and assistance from my good friend PowerlifterJay, along with the exceptional support of the board and especially the Okie Crew has made this possible. In 11 months, I have gone from a 355 bench to over 500. I am about as fired up as I can get. A year ago, I would have said, maybe someday, after 5 or 10 years of training, I will get 500, but never in my wildest dreams would I have guessed I would get there in less than one year.

Thanks again to all.

B.

 

[k1401]

Awesome Lift!
Congrats and the huge lift and I know you'll top it at your upcoming meet!
Your on your way to 6!

 

[IrishPower]

Hey Benchmonster:

That is awesome!!! congrats. I would like to post the pictures on my site as soon as you get em up here.

Are you wearing you shirt open back style? I am not sure I understand by you pulling the shirt way down if not.

Also, if I were you, I would keep Karin's shirt for the next meet. If you wash this shirt, it will get a little snugger, you know you know what you can bench with it, and you will not burn yourself out taking to many MAX singles before the meet.

You haven't hit 500 in a meet, right? Well, go to the meet with this shirt, get 525 and be happy! I think if you go through another week messing with another shirt, it's just going to fuck you up and make you overtrain.

If you want more shirted practice for this meet, try doing lighter (or same) weight and add a doubled mini. That way you can get another workout with a shirt in, but not totally burn yourself out with the same movement.

Just a suggestion.

Good luck! You will be approaching 600 before you know it!

/irish

 

[Deciever]

wow ,great job on the PR, impressive shit. Good luck in your meet in a few weeks.

 

[bigokie]

Irish,
Benchmonster uses an open back Inzer that Karin's has modified. He also added a little piece of denim to the rear that is very loose, this will allow it to be legal at some of the Oklahoma meets that require a full neck shirt.

It was another good training day at the Dungeon. My elbows were sore, again, so I didn't try to put on a shirt or anything, just went with about 4-5 sets of speed benches with 185 bar weight and a couple with 205. Speed was pretty good but elbows really didn't like this.

We then moved on to 5 board close grip. Both Benchmonster and Screwball worked up to 405, then they dropped back down to 315 and Benchmonster got 12 reps and Screwball got 11. Both were a nice shade of purple when they finished the reps. I worked up to 315 and got it about 1 out of 4 lifts. I was trying to keep the bar lower and to not roll my wrists back. I have to work on keeping the bar out towards my stomach.

The thing that I think we all got most from this was that we could really check our form. Benchmonster has a video set up every time we lift and this time we went back to it to watch some of the lifting. Specifically we watched as Screwball took 12 or so seconds to do a lift. We told him to lower the bar faster and he thought he was until we watched the tape. I think we all got a lot from the training tape. Definitely gonna have to try this back at home from now on.

I'm pretty sure that Screwball will be close to 475-495 in July and that Benchmonster will be up around 530-540.

 

[benchmonster]

Irish,

bigokie was correct, I have a double denim open back radical cut that has been severely modified both by Karin and myself. It technically fits the definition of a closed neck shirt, but retains all the benefits of a completely open back. I don't know if I could compete at the WABDL world's with it as they are pretty particular about the open back thing, but for Oklahoma meets it will be fine.

Good idea on holding off on the other shirt. I mainly ordered it because I have been having nightmares about my baby blowing out on a first attempt or last warmup or something and then be fucked after all this training. If I do any reps with the new shirt at all, it will be some board work next Sunday, which will be 2 weeks before the meet, just to get an idea of how it compares to my current shirt as far as how much it will take to touch.

I have felt lately like anything I can hold in the groove and get to my chest I can press. Unfortunately anything I don't keep in the groove does not result in a good press at all, and the margin for error in double denim is very very slim.

I am very excited about this meet. If I hit 530, which has been my planned 3rd attempt, I will have an official 175 lb gain from July 7 last year to July 6 this year in the same meet with the same judges. My last meet made a 120 lb gain official, and the 505 went up, but was red lighted which would have made it 150 lbs officially.

I think I will stick with my original plan of 480, 505, 530, and hope for the best.

Irish, I just mailed you and Okie highlight tape. When Screwball gets home he will get the pics up from Sunday. I will send you a video tape every couple of months or so for your archives. Also, my ring pushup setup is posted on the board if you want that for the archives as well.

B.

 

[powerlifterjay]

Dam man your getting stronger by the week! NO shit! It feels good to handle weight in the gym and get that confidence. But be careful to not over train. I know in a meet when i have done toomuch shirting, my forearms hurt when i lower the bar. Your at 500 like i am with 600. I can hit 625 in the gym and more sometimes, but inmeets i skipped right over 600 to go for the big one. BUt after realizing i need to nail 600. Make sure to seal the deal in the 500 club. Get 500lbs. Then on your last go to what ever you want. Dont get caught up in the mood and say" hell with it 530 for the second"! Get in the elusive quarter ton club! Good luck man sounds like everything is going together great.

Big Okie dont push too hard. If your inured let it heal. I am skipping bench today cause i am nursing achs. Nothing serious but needed to lay off. Be careful. You will hit yoru numbers quicker staying healthy, then making slow gains hurt.

Okie Crew is a becoming a big force to reckon with!

 

[Screwball]

Lost most of the mother fuckin' pics... FUCK! Fuckin' piece of shit camera, fuckin' quit working. Fuckety, fuck, fuck, fuck! I took about 6 pics with the good digital camera and ran out of memory so I took 18 more on my fuckin', shitty digital camera and it quit working. FUCK! If I were taking Halo now I would probably be destroying everything I own. FUCK! Those were the best pics. SHIT FUCK!

I'll send the few pics I have to Deciever to post but they are just pics of us warming up.

The training was great. With the use of the video camera and Benchmonsters & BigOkie's input I discovered that my technique sucks. I thought I was lowering the bar fairly quickly but my perception was not reality. It takes me forever to set the weight and get the bar down to my upper abs. I need to lower the bar in 1 - 2 seconds and it takes me 5-8 seconds. Way too long. I also need to move my feet out further from the bench and try to get my knee angle closer to 90* (drive from the heels). I also need to raise my head as I lower the weight so that I can watch the bar touch. This will also allow me to throw my head and shoulders back into the bench for a much better drive off of the bottom. I have a lot of technique problems to address.

I think with the weight loss my shirt is getting too lose. I don't have to struggle much to get 450 to touch and it leaves hardly any battle scars. I may have to get it altered if I drop any more weight.

Basically the workout went like this:

Competition Bench - warmups raw and then shirted maximal attempts

5-board Presses - Worked up to a heavy triple at 405 lbs.

Wide-grip Pulldowns - Worked up to 2-3 sets of 8-10 reps at close to 200 lbs.

Suspended Ring Dips (feet on bench) - 3 sets of 10 reps

Various rotator work using bands

Thazzit.

Thanks to benchmonster and his family for allowing us to train. Lunch was great.

 

[p03t1c]

screwball: i had a similar experience with video tape. when i filmed my workout i noticed that i looked like absolute shit. i felt like i was doing everything correctly, but to my dismay it was hell. taping really shows you what you're doing. it's so hard to tell what you're doing wrong without it.

 

[Deciever]

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