hand care for weightlifting

Yesterday during training my weightlifting coach asked one off his star lifters if she'd been doing proper hand care. Hand care? I know a lot of weightlifters use sandpaper to grind the calasus off their hands. But if that was the only thing we were supposed to do they'd simply call it sanding your hands. I asked coach Shane Miller, the guru of all things weightlifting, what things is important in hand care? These are the things he said:

- your hands should be completely smooth. If your skin is rough or lumpy, they are more likely to catch on the bar when you are lifting causing painful rips or tears. So shave your hands. The best time to do it is after you shower or  bathe.

-wash your hands after lifting to get all chalk off your hands. Leaving the chalk in will dry out your hands.

-use lotion on your hands to keep them from cracking or getting rough. it's especially important after washing your hands after lifting.

-use a small amount of chalk when you work out to keep your hands dry and help your grip. That will make you less likely to hold the bar too tight, which is a good thing as far as callus prevention.

- don't over-chalk. That may actually create more friction by having too much chalk on your hands.

- Use a towel to dry your hands between sets.

- weightlifting will make your hands tougher. The longer your a weightlifter, the better conditioned your hands will be, but it takes time.You will go through a period of time where no matter how careful you are, your hands will rip if you hit a high enough volume of exercise. Be patient and be careful and you will get through it. Your hands will come out tougher on the other side.

an amazing gift, weightlifting continues

Last week i posted on my blog that because of financial problems we had to pull my daughter out of gymnastics. I also posted i wouldn't be able to weightlift anymore because of the same reason. My post was overly emotion, full of self pity, and had some inappropriate  words in it so the next day i erased it. Apparently someone read it before i erased it. A couple days later i got a call from my weightlifting coach, Shane Miller. He asked if we could meet in person. When we met he told me there was an anonymous member at The Miller Gym who wanted to pay for my membership. My love and passion of weightlifting continues. Whoever you are, I'm speechless and touched beyond words. thank you so very much.

The upcoming John Davis memorial olympic weightlifting meet

The olympic weightlifting meet that I've been training for over a year, the meet that I'm hoping to break the New Mexico weightlifting state record by over a hundred pounds at, has a tentative name and date. As long as the name and date is approved by USA weightlifting it will be called the John Davis memorial and it will be held at The Miller gym here in Santa Fe. I'm excited that the meet I may be able to set the 105k+ 40-44 age group NM weightlifting record will be named after my favorite athlete, John Davis. John Davis died in Albuquerque NM on July 13, 1984 and is buried here in Santa Fe. He died alone and relatively forgotten. Weightlifters are the only family he has. He died without a spouse, children, or any living family at the time of his death.

Here's a little history on John Davis: John Davis was the most dominant weightlifter in history. He took 2nd place at nationals and competed in the world championships at only 16 years old. At that world championship, Davis literally shocked the weightlifting world by winning the 82.5 kg category in his first appearance on an international weightlifting platform. What amazed the world even more was that Davis won his championship at the tender age of 17. This win occurred in an era when there were no junior championships and when weightlifting was dominated by athletes in their 20s and 30s. John had made weightlifting history by becoming the youngest athlete ever to have won a world championship. It was a distinction he was to enjoy for nearly 50 years.

 Davis won the Nationals again in 1942 and 1943, but was prevented from competing in 1944 and 1945 by his war service. In 1946 he was back again to win the Nationals and to go on to win the first post-war World Championships in Paris. The following year, Davis won the Nationals and Worlds again (those World Championships were held in Philadelphia that year--the first time the US had hosted the Championships).  In 1948, he won the Olympic Games, and in 1949 and 1950 the World Championships. In 1951 he made his highest lifetime total of 1,063 lbs. at the inaugural Pan American Games. That same year, at the 1951 Nationals, he made weightlifting history once again by becoming the first lifter to C&J 400 pounds under official conditions (Charles Rigoulot, the great French professional strongman, had done this some years earlier but on a specially designed bar that would not have satisfied the rules that were in effect in Davis' day). Continuing his fantastic string, Davis went on to win the 1952 Olympics.  In 1953, John injured his leg, which hampered his training significantly. Although he won the Nationals, Davis was defeated at the World Championships by Doug Hepburn. The Canadian strongman had ended the longest undefeated streak in World Weightlifting history--a record that remains to this day.  All told, when his victory string ended in 1953, Davis had won 6 consecutive World Championships and 2 consecutive Olympic Games. Since that time, only two other weightlifters have ever duplicated Davis' achievement--Tommy Kono and Vasili Alexseev (Naim Sulemanaglou won more World Championships than this legendary trio and one more Olympic Games, but his victories were not consecutive, and Naim's record was set up 43 years after Davis'). One can on ly imagine how many championships Davis might have won had the war years not cut 7 years out of the prime of his career. He was undefeated for straight 16 years.

"the Jody" invitational weightlifting meet Santa Fe NM November 9, 2014

Today I competed in "the Jody" weightlifting competition at The Miller gym in Santa Fe NM. This was my third weightlifting competition. My previous one was in July. Since the weightlifting tournament in July I've been struggling. My technical lifts hadn't gone up at all. Today I felt sure I wasn't going to be able to lift as much as I had at the last meet, which was a 76k snatch, 100k clean and jerk, a 176k total. My coach Shane Miller gave me a great motivational talk before my third and final snatch attempt. He told me to attempt a 79k snatch. 79k was higher than anything I'd accomplished in training, and MUCH greater than I felt I could make today. But if there's one thing I've learned in almost a year of Olympic weightlifting is ALWAYS trust Shane Miller. Shane is ALWAYS right. I nailed the 79k snatch which was a PR! After that I felt strong and confident and went 3 for 3 on my clean and jerks setting a lifetime personal best of 103k!

My next competition will be in January. If all continues to progress as it has been under Shane's tutelage I'll break the105k+ 40-44 age group New Mexico state record by over 100lbs.

The upcoming "The Jody" weightlifting competition and creatine monohydrate

On my last post I stated I was getting weaker even though I was training hard. I started taking creatine monohydrate. Less than two weeks later I had added 2k onto my snatch and 9k onto my clean and jerk, setting a PR on both. Creatine is amazing. I love that stuff.

I started making gains again just in time, tomorrow is the "the Jody", weightlifting competition at The Miller gym here in Santa Fe NM. I was so busy today I didn't eat or drink well all day. Not the smartest thing to do the day before a weightlifting competition. I'll post how I do tomorrow here on my blog..

"The Kevin" weightlifting competition July 26th 2014 (with video)

On July 26th 2014 I competed in "The Kevin" olympic weightlifting competition at Miller weightlifting in Santa Fe New Mexico. I took Friday night off from work to be sure I'd be well rested and ready to lift. I'd already blogged about the morning of my competition, if your interested read the post before this one.

I was broken hearted at the weigh in. I weighed in at 133k, which is 294 pounds. I had been losing weight for about a week, but that went to crap, obviously. As of this morning I weighed more than I ever have in my life. I'm not ok with that.

I didn't feel nervous at all before this event, which was progress. At my 1st weightlifting competition 8 weeks ago I was a nervous wreck. Rise Miller worked with another athlete by the name of  Danny and myself. He put us through all our warm ups and corrected any bad form we had. He did an amazing job, especially considering he's only 15 years old.

I made all 6 of my lifts. For the snatch I started at 66k, which is amazing because my opening lift was higher than my best lift at the New Mexico games 8 weeks ago. I ended up getting to a competition best snatch of 76 k, which was only 2k away from my lifetime best.

For the clean and jerk my opening lift was 90k, which was higher than my best lift at the New Mexico games. After my 2nd lift my coach, Shane Miller of Miller weightlifting knew I was having a great day of lifting. Coming into this competition my lifetime best clean and jerk was 98k, which I did a couple weeks ago, and it took me 6 tries to get it. So you could imagine how surprised I was when Shane asked if I wanted to try 100k for my final lift of the competition. I felt there was no way I could make that lift, but I didn't want to seem like a sissy to my coach so when he asked I said ok. It must have been all force of will, but I made the lift setting a new lifetime PR!!!

My best lift total so far had been 154k. At this competition, just 8 weeks later I crushed my old best putting up a 176k, 22k more! My total is now only 31k away from qualifying for the masters PanAm championships!!!

Thanks for sending me this video of my 1st ever 100k clean and jerk Kim!

going low carb and olympic weightlifting

I've been trying to drop weight the old fashion way, calorie counting. I've been failing miserably. I've never really been able to lose weight by counting calories. Back when I used to compete in triathlons I was able to lose weight going low carb, and then maintain my weight by counting calories. I asked my Olympic weightlifting coach Shane Miller if he thought I could still be successful in olympic weightlifting while going  low carb, he said ok but that he'd want me to eat carbs before and after my intense weightlifting days on Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays. I have a weightlifting competition this Saturday at Miller weightlifting and I don't want to mess up my performance so I won't start the new diet until Sunday. I tried to google low carb and olympic weightlifting and there wasn't any information online. What info there was had to do with bodybuilding which isn't applicable to olympic weightlifting. I also tried looking up some info on low carb on some olympic weightlifting web sties, again there was no info at all. So when I do start the diet I'll post how I feel and how my strength is doing with the low carb diet. It'll be an interesting experiment.

rebound day

I had a stressful weekend, then on on Monday I had a horrible day of lifting thanks to stress and binge eating. I didn't pray once all weekend. I felt like I hit rock bottom this weekend. I've been eating well since then, eating a few hundred calories below my metabolic rate. I hope I can continue to eat well and continue to keep the Lord in my life even during stressful times. Perhaps I'll even be able to get down to my short term goal weight of 235lbs, eventually getting down the 205lbs.

Today I showed up at Miller weightlifting for clean and jerk day. I felt tentative at best. If I struggled on Monday's snatch day, with snatches being my strength, then what would today be like? Coach Shane Miller had seen I'd struggled horribly during my last workout so he spent some extra time coaching me, telling what to focus on, dealing with bad lifting days and self doubt, and how to make today's lifts. It worked perfectly. I missed my first 2 heavy lifts, but nailed my last two with perfect form setting a lifetime best clean and jerk. It's amazing the difference having a knowledgeable and passionate coach makes.

greater totals and greater goals

This week was a great week for lifting! On Monday I lifted a new snatch PR of 75k. Today I lifted a new lifetime PR of 95k in the clean and jerk. I'm foaming at the mouth thinking about hitting a 100k clean and jerk! My next competition is the last Saturday of this month at Miller weightlifting in Santa Fe NM. If my weights continue to increase it's possible I'll lift 20k more than I did in May at the New Mexico games. That's a big increase in only a couple months. In January I age up to the 40-44 AG, and I'm currently lifting 132 pounds above the New Mexico 40-44 AG 105k+ total state record.

I'm having so much fun with the sport of olympic weightlifting. The next big mile stone I'm shooting for is a 400lb total, which is 181.4k. I'm currently 11k away. I'm really loving this.

strength gains at Miller weightlifting

Back in the late 1990's I did nothing but strength training. I was semi-strong and looked good, but the strength gains I ended up attaining took SO LONG to get! The gains came so slowly I finally gave up and swore off weightlifting forever.

Here's a picture of me after I lifted my bench PR of 270 lbs in 1999. I weighed somewhere around 210 then, I still had low body fat, and hair- at least a little hair.... more than I have now that's for sure! As you can tell I've been posting a lot of pictures from when I was still in shape. Even though all other aspects of my life are doing great, better then back then even, I have a hard time being content when I'm as overweight as I am now.

 

15 years later (last November) I decided to try olympic weightlifting. But this time I hired a weightlifting coach rather than struggle on my own again. It's amazing the difference having a coach makes. Coach Shane Miller of Miller weightlifting has been training me for only 5 months now and I'm already at a 265lb bench, 5 pounds away from matching my lifetime PR. All my other lifts are already greater than they had ever been.  I've developed a love for weightlifting I never had before. Now if I could just lose some weight so I'd feel better about myself and so that I'm not lifting in the super heavy weight division. I think the 94k weight class would be best for my body type.

wife now at Miller weightlifting too!

Just when I thought marriage couldn't get any more fun, my wife started training with me at Miller weightlifting. This week we had so much fun working out together. Now on our down time she and I talk olympic weightlifting and training. Can life get any better than Olympic style weightlifting with your spouse? I think not.

Yesterday I did a moderately heavy workout of snatch, clean and jerk, and went heavy on squats. I set a new 5 rep best on squat. It was a good day. Today I was scheduled for cardio and an easy strength day. I started with a 5X5 bench press at 75% and realized my body was very fatigued. So I stopped my workout and went home. Today is now a recovery day, I'll also take Sunday completely off from any training too. I'm only a few weeks into supplementing my workouts with cardio and the cardio I do is high intensity, thus very draining. My body hasn't acclimated to the extra work load. I'm trying to take the slow and steady rout rather than do what I used to do which was push myself as hard as possible until I got sick and/or burned out. So far that mentality is working. I'm getting close to doubling my max snatch in the last 5 months and I've put 35 pounds on my bench press in the last 6 weeks. I'll take the gains and be happy while taking an occasional rest.

clean and jerk day!

Today was my 2nd favorite day, clean and jerk day, 2nd only to snatch day! I can now get 2 very good reps of the clean and jerk at 5 kilos above the New Mexico clean and jerk state record for the super-heavy weight 40-44 age group. So far there's no sign of my strength gains slowing down. I've set a new personal best clean and jerk AND snatch every week for the last 5 months. My coaches Shane Miller (who's athletes owns over 450 world and national records), Jodi Stumbo (holds numerous world records), and Linda Tetrault (multiple national and PanAm champion) of Miller weightlifting are amazing. With them in my corner I can accomplish anything! Today they helped me clean up my jerk, which has always been a weakness of mine. It's not much of a weakness anymore though!

I'm also getting close to breaking my lifetime PR in the squat which I set last year and bench press which I set way back in 1999! Even better news.... tomorrow is snatch day!!!!

another 3 PR's!

Today I was barely able to wake myself up in time to make it to Miller weightlifting. I need a day of rest and recovery. An entire 24 hours where I can do nothing but sleep and veg out on the couch. I've been working WAY to much and I'm SO TIRED! But all that fatigue disappeared once I started lifting. The gym was virtually empty today. It was just Faith, me, and some kick butt music jamin' out from the Zia CrossFit side of the gym. It was the perfect environment and perfect company to throw some weight around. Faith A is a hero of mine. She's one of the strongest, fittest, fastest, and most humble athletes I've ever met. Virtually everyday someone says something along the lines of, "I wanna be Faith when I grow up." Ya, she's that awesome. Apparently all the conditions were right because I set PR's in the snatch, front squat, and dead lift. I completed 2 reps of my snatch PR, which happens to be a state record baby for the super heavy weight 40-44 division!

More good news, I didn't binge eat yesterday. That's rare now-a-days. Any day I don't binge eat is a good day.

blog update and Miller weightlifting

It's been a LONG time since I've posted. Anytime I stop posting on my blog it usually means I've fallen off the diet wagon and I'd rather not post at all than admit how badly and how much I'm eating. Emotional eating is my biggest problem. It's my way of hiding from emotions and punishing myself. It's a good thing I'm addicted to food and not alcohol because if I binge drank like I binge eat I'd have killed myself a long time ago. I've gained 20 pounds in the last 6 weeks. I'm back up to 280. This is the 2nd heaviest I've ever weighed. I'm trying to convince myself my weight doesn't define who I am. So far I'm not convinced..

When I was 12 my Dad's girlfriend told him him he had to choose between her or me. He chose her. A few years ago I tracked him down. He lives in Truth or Consequences NM, just a few hours from where I've lived since 1989. 6 weeks ago my grandpa (my Dad's Dad) died. Thankfully a cousin tracked me down to tell me, otherwise I'd never have known, my Dad didn't care enough to tell me.. My wife kids and I drove to southern Texas for the funeral. My natural father was there, along with his entire family. It was extremely uncomfortable. Everyone kept asking where I'd been, why haven't they seen me since I was a kid? I had no idea what to say without trashing my Dad to his brothers, Aunts, etc. It was very awkward.

Less than a month later my uncle died and we drove to Kansas for that funeral too. Same side of the family, same questions. It unburied a lot of my resentment and anger. I came so close to telling them the truth. That my Dad abandoned me when I was a kid and when I needed him most, that because he disappeared from my life even though he knew my Mom was unstable and abusive I ended up living on the streets, alone, a homeless teenager.

Because of the 2 funerals in less than a month, the loss of work, and the cost of travel I'm back to working 80 hours every 6 days. I'm tired. I'm burned out. I am so sick and tired of working in a prison. In the last month I've developed TMJ because the entire time I'm at work I'm so stressed I clench my jaws. It's causing migraines and a myriad of other irritating problems. I'm eligible to retire next year. 242 days left. I can't wait. It's so unhealthy and stressful in a prison for both staff and inmates, such an unhealthy place.

Because of current financial struggles I'm going to have to miss the NASA strength competition in Gallup NM in late April. I have to admit, that hurts. I wanted to compete in that so badly!

On the flip side, even though I've been stressed, eating like crap, working WAY to much, and not sleeping enough, my strength is shooting through the roof! In the last 3 days I've set 7 PR's, one of which tied the state record for the clean and jerk in the super heavyweight division 40-44 age group!!! Shane Miller of Miller weightlifting is a genius. I'm accomplishing things I never dreamed I'd be able to accomplish!

Barry Schroeder at Miller weightlifting

I'm going to eat a healthy snack then take a nap so that I'm fully rested and recovered for tomorrow. What happens tomorrow you ask? Barry Schroeder is going to workout with me at Miller weightlifting. This will be my first time seeing him in action. Barry Schroeder owns every state Olympic Olympic weightlifting record in both the 94k and 105k weight classes in my age group of 35-39. I posted an article about him, what he's done, and how it affects me. Click on the link below to read more about it:

https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=7284817641207555818#editor/target=post;postID=580449116031509380;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=26;src=postname

Olympic weight lifting motivation while sick

Today I tried to go back to the gym and train for  the first time since I got sick. Even during my warm up I was out of breath, coughing, sweating profusely, and light headed. I decided I was going to do a few sets of light clean and jerk to practice form, then go crawl back into bed. After only a couple sets I was contemplating going home. Rise miller who is only 14 years old and is the coaches son told me when your sick or unmotivated that's an opportunity to teach yourself to push through adversity. He said, "your feeling crappy right now, but if your able to put your mind in the right place, focus, and train through it now, then there will be nothing that can happen to you during a competition that could be anywhere as bad as this." Rise then told me about how Michael Phelps swimming coach had stepped on his swimming goggles on purpose during a meet once so that his goggles would fill with water while he was swimming to teach Michael to continue to push hard and stay focused on the task at hand even when things aren't going your way. Rise was right. Me being sick wasn't a problem, it was an opportunity. If I could stay focused on the weights and form at that moment, then anything I faced at a meet would be easy in comparison. I finished 5 sets of jerk, and 5 sets of clean and jerk. Lesson learned. Thanks Rise.

sick and training

So far after 6 weeks of Olympic weightlifting I've built up to a 53k power snatch. A 53k snatch is much much weaker than I was hoping for, but I'm still much better at Olympic weightlifting after 6 weeks of training than I was after many many months of triathlon training, and I eventually became an excellent triathlete.    

My Olympic weightlifting coach Shane Miller of Miller weightlifting says my biggest attribute is my enthusiasm and effort. It was the same way with triathlon. I had the worst body type for triathlon, but my dedication and willingness to push myself harder and train more made me an excellent triathlete. I'm hoping my determination and willingness to work hard will make me as successful at Olympic weightlifting as I was at multisport. So far after 6 weeks of hard training I was feeling sluggish, fatigued, and ended up getting sick. Getting sick is a good sign in regards of my training. It means I was pushing myself to my bodies limit. I used to get sick every few months when I was training for triathlon and I was an endurance beast! I'm spending this week lifting light weights to recover, next week I'll come back stronger.

"Success is often nothing more than moving from one failure to the next with undiminished enthusiasm."
-Winston Churchill

I'm currently 260 pounds. 20 pounds lost so far in 6 weeks of Olympic weightlifting.

Nike Romaleos 2

For the last 6 weeks I've been saving up for a pair of Olympic weightlifting shoes. I finally horded enough to buy them!  I bought a pair of Nike Romaleos 2. They were expensive but everyone at Miller weightlifting agreed that a good pair of Olympic weightlifting shoes will last years, so I figured I should buy a pair I'd enjoy. I'll post later what I think of them.

 

Until now my Olympic weightlifting coach Shane Miller has been letting me use his Olympic weightlifting shoes. How cool is that?

The 2013 Nutcracker triathlon race report

After virtually no swimming. cycling, or running training for over 2 years I decided to sign up for the 2013 Nutcracker triathlon. This was my 86th multisport race and was the 4th time I've raced The Nutcracker triathlon. The Nutcracker triathlon used to be called the Jingle Bell triathlon, but due to a copy right problem with another race they changed the name.

The Nutcracker triathlon is RD’d by Mark Mico of Trisportcoaching.com  Every time I race a multisport event put on by Mark Mico I’m amazed. His events are always extremely well organized and stress free events. The race results were posted online by the evening of the race. He always hands out the nicest age group awards of any local sprint. This year each and every athlete who placed top 3 in their AG received a wood plaque that had “The Nutcracker triathlon 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place division” on it. The registration fees of his events are always much cheaper than any other sprint distance races.

It was a Run-Bike-Swim at the Rio Rancho Aquatic Center. The bike course was an out-and-back (moderately hilly) 20K. The run was a hilly loop 5K course. The swim was a serpentine 400 meter swim, up/down one lane at a time.

Because of my lack of endurance training and because of my current weight my run was horrible. I'm slow and to be honest I was humiliated by my physique and performance. I finished the 5k in 38:34.

The bike course was shortened this year to a 20k. I felt a little stronger cycling than I did running. I passed a bunch of people and only got passed once, but I was still sad. I was mourning for the athlete I used to be. For over 2 years I finished almost every triathlon I entered in the top 10 overall. I was mourning for the way I used to look. I used to have a 6 pack, now I weigh 265 pounds. It's been so long since I was in shape and looked good I forgot how great it felt until I saw the top triathletes speed by me on their bikes in their aero position. That used to be me...... But today the bike took me 61 minutes.

I've always been a natural swimmer. I had a great swim passing many more athletes and even swimming over a few.

I finished in 1 hour 50 minutes, took 72nd out of 100 athletes, and 1st place Clydesdale.

Even though I was sore it felt great to show up on Monday at Miller weightlifting. It felt good because I was taking another step to being the top notch athlete I used to be, but in a completely new sport of Olympic weightlifting. Even though my body was fatigued from the Nutcracker triathlon yesterday I threw up some of my biggest weight yet. I'll be a great athlete again. I'll look good again. It'll take awhile, and a lot of effort, but I will. And some day I plan on outlifting my current golden carrot Barry Schroeder of CrossFit Sandstorm in Bernalillo NM

2nd week of Olympic weightlifting

I'm in my 2nd week of Olympic weightlifting. I'm really enjoying it. My coach, Shane Miller of Miller weightlifting is awesome. His athletes have over 450 national records.

I'm starting to build up a lot of excitement and starting to dream big. Partly for fun and partly for motivation I looked up the New Mexico Olympic weightlifting records for my age and weight divisions I eventually want to drop down to.

I was only scheduled for 3 workouts this week but I was so motivated I threw an extra one in one Sunday.

Age 35-39 105k+ (232 lbs+)
Snatch- Richard Kahl- 105k (231lbs)
CJ- Richard Kahl- 135k (297lbs)
Total- Richard Kahl- 240k- 529 lbs

Age 35-39 105k (206-231 lbs)
S- Barry Schroeder- 94k (207 lbs)
CJ- Barry Schroeder- 116k (255 lbs)
T- Barry Schroeder- 210k (462 lbs)

Age 35-39 94k (187-206 lbs)
S- Barry Schroeder- 93k (204lbs)
CJ- Barry Schroeder- 109k (240lbs)
T- Barry Schroeder- 202k (445 lbs)

Age 35-39 85k (169-187lbs)
S- Eric Johnson- 108k (238lbs)
CJ- Eric Johnson- 130k (286lbs)
T- Eric Johnson- 238k (524lbs)