Bolo

Yeah, I qualified for AO2 2018. The power of the beard. No, I just have a really good coach and they know how to put me into a position to succeed.

A few more days

Competing this weekend. I need to do well to qualify for the American Open Series. It's been a rough training cycle and the stress is starting to kick in. 

Come on now

Yeah, the last thing you want when you are jerking from the blocks at 90% is for your shoe to rip in the middle of your lift. Come on Adidas, bring back the wooden heal or get your shit together. 4 weeks until next comp and I have to break in new shoes? That just sucks.

There's no birthday party in here for me

Here is my paperwork from anti-doping last week. I'm like, "you want to test me? Have you not seen my numbers?' I'm good and having nothing to hide, it was just funny. And hitting that 90ml mark was some serious pressure.

Blah, blah, blah

So last week I competed in my first weightlifting competition. Yeah, I'm a weightlifter. I went 5/6, hit a PR on my final clean & jerk and by default had a PR with my competition total. I was only one kilo away from qualifying for the American Open Series. We were not trying to do that, we just went out to make lifts (and not freak out). It just kind of happened that way. So I might actually have a chance at the next competition to qualify. That's just crazy to me.

But two of my teammates, who also competed, were really the stars of the day. One went 5/6 and won the bronze in her weight class. And the other went, who had not competed in over a year, just crushed all of her lifts. She went 6/6 and hit a new competition PR total. It was quite the enjoyable day seeing your teammates succeed on the platform like that. Our coach clearly played us well.

Anyway, gasmask time.

photo by Emily Poole