Okay, so a more complete thought of what happened on Friday.

I showed up about an hour early for the meet, as I was quite nervous. I was pleased to find that there were other people in my weight class though. Sometimes lower weight classes have virtually no one.

Squat was the first part of the competition. This was what I found myself most worried about. I hit 315 off a set of parallel pins back at the end of August, but stopping on pins and pushing versus doing a free squat is quite different. Since August, I hadn't even come close to that anyhow.

For those not familiar with meets, you get three attempts at the lift, your best one counts. However, if you fail on a weight, for your next attempt you cannot go down in weight. You have to try it again.

My first attempt I hit 260 which felt relatively easy, it was a max of mine from the spring. My second I hit 285, something I was hoping I would get for my third attempt. So for my third attempt, I was in relatively unknown territory. I decided to try 305, and in the middle of the up portion I got stuck dead. I barked at the spotters not to touch the weight (if they do, the lift is over).

I broke through the midpoint, but my legs were pushing with such vigor that once I came to the top of my lift, I actually moved the weight up off my back and into the air about three or four inches. It stung a little coming back down on my neck.

Next, I went to bench and hit 195 for my first. My second attempt I put on 205 and just absolutely could not lock out the weight. I was pissed because I was hoping to hit 215. For my third attempt I had to do 205 again, but this time when I did it, I put a little more concentration into it and the bar came up a lot easier. Little miffed, could have done better.

By the time we got to deadlifts, I was starting to feel fatigued and hungry. I'd been there for an hour and a half. One of the problems is you cool down waiting to go for your next lift again.

I was a bit more cautious with my deadlift. Since being sick and having a bit of back ache, I was just hoping to get close to my gym max. I opened with 365 for my first lift, and on my second lift I hit 385 but it took a lot out of me. So much that I didn't even try for a third lift (I still have not yet hit 405).

Next closest guy to me in my weight class totaled in at 735, so that was a good surprise.