By My number one fitness goal is to dead lift 100kg.
For a lot of people, this will probably be light weight – but when coming from a place where I was struck by injury & imbalances for many years (6 to be exact!), I had to give deadlifting and squatting a bit of a miss. This was quite hard, as you are all probably familiar with getting to a place in your training progression, where you just want to keep taking it to another level.. then it’s all got to stop (insert sad face here).
I want to point out that at this stage, I’m not out of the radar, anything can happen, but let me share a few insights I’ve had prior to finally getting back into the deadlifting and squatting crew again.
2 strategies I’ve used to abolish imbalances, joint pain and gain more muscle mass!
- The biggest factor was actually food! That’s not to say I was eating badly, or not as one who trains should – it’s actually the source of food, that was contributing to constant inflammation in the joints, tendons and setting my body into cortisol overload. What does this lead to? Non progression with training, inability to build strength because of the constant pain.
What was this source causing so much harm (you won’t like to hear this one) It’s actually red and white meat! I know, how detrimental is this when you’re trying to build muscle, get leaner? Well, taking this out of the picture has opened up a whole new world for me – in terms of muscular gains, strength and energy (not to mention the fact that I don’t get any pain anymore!). So to everyone eating heaps and heaps of meat – is it working for you? Just test it out and see, pay attention to your body’s response to it. This information was brought to my attention by the wonderful Dr R Gundry – an ex heart surgeon who now focus on food, it’s effects on the body, mind and our longevity. Please feel free to look him up and see if for yourselves.
- Fasting intermittently. I know a lot of people say this is detrimental to developing gains and strength – but I want to say it’s not at all! Fasting is not for everyone, and it all really depends on your goals. But if something works well for you, keep doing it, and share it because you never know who may also benefit from the same thing. In saying that, I’ve found no other lifestyle plan that gives me both energy to train, allows me to tap into HGH and use it to it’s fullest potential and actually increase my longevity.
So here I am, pushing myself every Saturday at 4am, lifting the weight off the ground that I never thought I’d get to again – and at the age I’m at as well (I’m 41). I wonder who else in the world is up at that time of the morning, motivated as anything to achieve their goals?
Please do share what you want to achieve for 2020, and know that you are in great company with a lot of motivated and enthusiastic lifters and athletes of all kind, each striving to become the best version of themselves.
These are just a few things I’ve done, which have helped me along the journey of being able to lift heavy weight again. I feel somewhat like an infant, learning how to start walking, and when I fall, just to keep getting up and trying again. Hopefully this has been useful to you. Do keep in touch via the usual mediums and let me know what your goals are – all my details are located above or you can just click here for my site and my two primary social media platforms right here. Please feel free to upvote this if you found it useful, and share with others also on the muscle building journey.
