Many of you know by now that starting today on the weightlifting side, the first movement in your training regiment was not a squat. We are currently in week 13 of 18. What that means is we made a shift from the primary focus being the squat. As we’ve completed the 12 week squat cycle our new focus is split up into two three-week meso-cycles before completing maximal effort work leading into our competition peak on October 11. For the next three weeks our primary focus will be the jerk as we work on some of the small technical errors in the jerk as well as getting used to a heavy load overhead. Our secondary focus will be basic overhead and upper back mobility. Added to that we will make a shift away from the complex work at 80% and move to more full lifts at or above 90%. Furthermore, every Friday will be a max effort lifting day. The reason for this is twofold. First, because around the world weightlifters lift heavy on Friday. Second, and probably the more logical reason, is because we need to begin to get your system adapted to heavy loads in prep for the Bulgarian style meso-cycle in three weeks. What that means is we will still be doing a lot of volume overhead over the next three weeks but we will still max on Friday. Don’t expect a PR this week, though it may happen because you have spent so many weeks without maxing.
What you should begin to develop are “minimums.” Minimums are a basic snatch weight or clean and jerk weight that you create as the bare minimum weight you have to hit every time you max. Your goal should be each Friday to increase that minimum so that when we hit the Bulgarian cycle in three weeks that minimum is the weight that you absolutely have to hit every week, day in and day out for three weeks. Increasing your minimums ultimately will increase your consistency on the competition platform and allow you to make lifts in competition or on max day on October 11.
Expect a lot of shoulder fatigue and overhead fatigue over the next three weeks and prepare accordingly. That means a lot of mobility work as well as a lot of stretching and trigger point work on your upper back and posterior and anterior deltoids. Keep your shoulders healthy as it’s only three weeks.
For those of you following the competition program I will release some details for your programming either late this week or early next week as you make a shift inside of your program as well. Suffice it to say that we will be working on completing maximal strength style work over the next six weeks as we begin our shift to Open training. My goal is for you competition folks to be in full Open training by the beginning of October.