Power Friday-Week two

In preparation for my first powerlifting meet, I give you Power Friday!

Welcome to week two. Training has been progressing nicely. Since starting last Tuesday, I have consistently added weight to my three lifts.

I will let you know how much I am doing on each lift so that you can see the progress I’m making. Please keep in mind that I have never trained for strength, necessarily. At least not since high school. And since I’ll be 41 in May, I am not putting up huge numbers. I’m ok with this though, so bare with me.

In addition, I train at home with no spotter. For this reason, I am intentionally being cautious with the amount of weight that I am using, and gaining for each lift. Slow and steady is the motto of my training.

All of the following numbers are for 5 sets of 5 repititions (hence the name of the program being 5×5). I started last week with my benchpress at 150 lbs., squats at 170 lbs., and deadlifts at 170 lbs. As of now, my benchpress is up to 160 lbs., squat is 195 lbs., and deadlift is 190 lbs.

In competition, I will only lift the weight for one rep (although I get three attempts). With this in mind, my one rep max for each lift calculates to 219 lbs in the squat, 180 lbs. in the benchpress, and 214 lbs. for the deadlift for a combined weight of 613 lbs. Not a bad place to start, in my opinion.

I used a one rep max (1RM) calculator online to find where to begin based on my previous training weights and reps. This isn’t an absolute, but it’s probably good enough for general knowledge.

I’m throwing in some change of scenery today. We’ll see how that works out. I’ll give you details next Friday.

Have a great weekend, and lift with the legs!

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