My Experience: Part Three - Powerlifting
Part three of this four-part series is all about my experience with powerlifting! This story is a little similar to the weightlifting one because my dad is the one that wanted me to try out a powerlifting meet. His reasoning was because I was naturally strong at the three lifts (bench, squat, deadlift) anyway without even having to train specifically for them. I didn't bench a whole lot because we don't bench a lot in CrossFit and especially during weightlifting I wasn't benching very much at all.
The first meet I ever did was with the AAU federation and I don't exactly remember my full total but I know that I lifted at 60kg and squatted 128kg for an American record. My deadlift was around 132kg I think and I got red lighted on my 70kg bench for foot movement.
My next meet was with the USAPL federation because I wanted to qualify for Nationals in the fall, therefore I needed to have a total under my belt. The weight classes can vary between federations. There was no 60kg weight class, so I competed in the 63s. I believe I had a 68kg bench, 135kg deadlift, and maybe a 130kg squat..? I honestly can't remember, lol. I do remember meeting Meg Gallagher at this meet, though. Mostly known as Meg Squats.. and this was before she got SUPER popular in the strength scene, so I'll always remember that. :)
I qualified for Nationals at that previous meet and was going to lift as a junior in the T-3 category. Nationals was held in Scranton, PA in October 2015 and I lifted in the 63kg class. I was looking to go there and break a squat record and I did just that at 128kg! I came third in the section I was lifting in which to me was an honor because the ladies ahead of me are SUPER strong. The girl that won has been world champion multiple times! I also got to meet Krissy Cagney there for the first time and I met Meg again!
Competing in powerlifting was fun and all, because being strong is cool, BUT the one thing I didn't really like is the time between attempts. I'm not used to waiting 12-15min in between heavy squat singles. I do CrossFit.. we do EMOMs and stuff like that.. not every fifteen minute on the minute hahaha. It was a great experience. I just wasn't passionate about it so I didn't continue to pursue it. Pretty simple! The good part about my time doing powerlifting is that I never had to do a water cut which was definitely a plus.
This is definitely one of the shorter ones as my powerlifting "career" (lol) was short. Soooo stay tuned next week (or the week after, because this one was late too. whoops) for the last part of this four part blog series!
xoxo
Ashleigh
