Are top powerlifters ever at 100% when then compete?

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0:56 How often are professional powerlifters, which is an a thing physical health. I feel like I'm always battling some sort of strain or injury and discomfort. So it is unrealistic think that one should be competing at one hundred percent all the time. Oh are you kidding? We're all hurt, but they're lying. Huh, they're all lying? Oh my god, ask a. I won't name names A powerlift physical enough physical no physical therapists who works with a bunch of powerlifters because they the ones that are um working with powerlifters just know that they're also high level lifters because well they need to invest in physical therapy.

1:40 Good. But um, it's funny when I heard from the physical therapist I've worked with that there are people who are competing at these high level meets like Worlds or IP for whatever, um, who are injured, but they'll talk about on social media as if they're not. Yeah, a little bit of a little bit of gamemanship, which I don't mind. Strategy, it's self convincing. Right, you can't walk around all day and be like my ankle, my ankle, my ankle, because then you're gonna be a fucked well right, you got to push through. There's a time in place obviously to fix it. And then I think a big part of that too is the group is like split half and half to me of people that like had played sports and know what being beat up is and then people that they're like almost many hypochondriacts. It happens in the gym all the time. All the time. People are asking me like, hey, Mike, what do you do with the slip disc. I said, well, everyone has a slip disc. How do you know you have one? He's like, my down, I have back pain. I'm like okay, well, like do you have back pain or do you have back discomfort? Or does something not feel normal because you just try to lift four hundred pounds off the ground for the first yeah, right, like, yes, you're going to have discomfort.

2:43 They're finally challenging themselves at something and they think that everything is wrong when they're uncomfortable. And I was telling I mean I have some back pain right now or whatever. Oh, here we go, I know right. Well, I was just talking about it, like, oh, it's been bothering from more than two weeks. You just want to get it checked to see what the issue is. Even what you just said there is wise though, is it the I pain? And then what is that pain scale on one to ten? And has it lasted two to three weeks? How consistent is it? And yeah, if it's above like a five to ten on the pain scale and it's been over two or three weeks, it's not getting better. Let's try to look at it. And it's beyond muscle soreness, yes, yeah, And if it's below a five or even longer. If any of those factors don't make lifting, Yeah, I'm still I'm still lifting every time I get hurt or there's some pain or discomfort them dealing with. And my coach has kind of taught me this too. It's like, we are going to continue to train as specific as we can without exacerbating it, but there can be some uncomfortability and we've got to work through some sort of it.

3:38 We're not looking for zero at all. It never happened. We will work through these movements and kind of like part of it is training your brain to like go through these ranges of motion and be like, oh, we are safe in this range. There is some uncomfortability and that's okay. You don't want it to exceed maybe a pain score of a four, you know, like you don't want to push it too hard, but you do want to continue moving. Yep. I mentioned the uncomfortability in my back and then one of the kids are like, oh, you might have a herniated disk. I'm like, why are you telling me this? Yeah, what the do you know? Like, what the fuck do you know? And like you he immediately some X rays don't even pick it up right, And but he that's he immediately went to that like extreme and even that's not that extreme, right, I think that. I think in America year olds, fifty percent of people will have a disc out of place pretty much. Anybody who goes in and gets like a comprehensive scan, like a big MR or whatever, you're gonna see all kind of shit that's gonna show I didn't want to see, never felt, you know. Yeah, and if you know about it, then suddenly it's in your head and I'm trying to work through it.

4:41 No, that's good advice. That's a good advice. I think that's the biggest thing. Is the other thing too, with these two groups that I have in my head, And obviously it's generalization, but like there's a huge difference between having pain, feeling discomfort and having an injury. An injury is going to prevent you from doing something, and in a real injury, even your back, I wouldn't say it's an injury. He means you probably do have to take time off. Yes, did do you have do you have a fracture? Do you have a something strained? And everyone's saying, oh, I have a strain to this and that strain. Things are have to be diagnosed. You don't just walk around say you got the beatus. You got to be diagnosed with diabetes. Yes, I had a I schedule an employment. She just meet the doctor to see what mostly emotionally and mentally yeah, yeah, and then um, she was asking me questions about the pain and she was like, UM, how long? What does it feel like?

5:30 Is is there an injury? And I said, I don't know. I don't know what this is. This might be an injury, but I didn't say yes. I could have been like yeah, I'm definitely injured right now, but I don't mean yeah, I don't know that for sure. I don't. I don't think this is a pain because I've been able to Um, it isn't affecting on a daily basis. I still walks it like sleep fine. So they're just I don't know, don't over exaggerate things. And the discomfort is honestly less than if you're on the couch all day for a year. Your back's gonna hurt more doing that, Like yeah, things just shoving steel into your traps, lifting weight you've never lifted before, but once you will like feel these um types of pains. They don't want to move the number one thing you probably should do. They want to freeze.

6:12 Yeah, it's kind of a disincentive when you when you have pain. It's like that's why you use use pain for you know, training, I don't know, psychological psyops kind of stuff where you you don't want somebody to think about something or you want them to do overgular thing you're using, you know, pain, water boarding, Yeah, or water boarding. Yes, wasn't really going to go to waterboarding on a Friday morning, but that's fine. You're talking about getting information out of people. Yeah, water boarding. Okay, well you can just ask me took a dark turn. Well, speaking of dark turns, throw out one more thing though, like how often are top competitors um one hundred percent mentally going into a meet competitors more likely?

7:01 Yeah, yeah, I think so, because if you're at the actual top, I think there's some that are just physically gifted and just rise up there. But most people have grind pretty good, like even Russ. You know, everyone looks at as like the golden Boy, like Russ is genetically very gifted, but he's done this longer than most people at the top two years and he's been training his whole life, so he's been through the ups and downs. And even Abby's starting to get there. She's still on the edge of new right like four or five years and she's pushing to the top. Yeah where even last week I heard you talk about like being frustrated with how the weights are moving and stuff. But she's used to that by now, so she knows that Friday is going to be better, Monday might be good, and it's going to go that way. So I think it gets worse when you're at the top because you're more eyes on you. I'm no longer the underdog because now like I kind of stepped out into maybe some light after last year's Nationals, Like more people know about me. But I don't like that because if it's pressure on me, expectation when things aren't going well, it's like for me, I used to be like, oh, it's okay, whatever, doesn't really matter, no one's expecting anything of me. But now people are, and so it almost um, even though I don't want to think of it this way, like it makes me feel worse about it.

8:16 Um, like I'm going to fail what people are expecting to point people when things aren't going well and it's not just about me anymore. It's about me doing this for others in the community and people who do believe in me. So it expands into that. You know what, what do they say, pressures of privilege? Yeah, um, so it almost hurts more when things aren't good. Yeah, but it really does. That doesn't mean like your mentals are worse. That just means that there's more on the line. It feels like. But I think I think you know, the more that comes with that, it'll divide the power comes shut up, Uncle Ben, be like when they Yeah, but because if you be gone, those those people that still time Mike, those people that come to that road, they'll quit, they'll fall off, or they'll perform worse. You've already proven that you're here and you've performed better. Like you said, I'm still I'm still early on you are you are? It's still time for me. But people break on the way up. I think, you know, if it's an act, if you're actually the elite, yeah, yeah, maybe so.

9:24 Yeah, I've never I've never dealt with an elite athlete in any sport. Not that doesn't mean that they're fucking rocks, solid contents. They don't don't constantly question. It's the issue of can you perform after you've questioned on the day. On the day they do it, because if if, if do it. Yeah, we're not talking about them, right, that's true. Yeah, they're not top anymore. Not that they don't have elite or negative days, negative mindset, negative talk. That's all one hundred percent there, But it's maybe even actually more there. It's it's about resilience, and it's how they react to it. They react to it by working harder, where other people react to it by it. It's really cliche, but I've learned now firsthand. Not just like because people say, um, when you quit, that's when you lose, but that's really like how it feels because you've been hanging out with the champion off. No, it's because I've wanted to quit so many times, like I and then I want to cry. I mean I do cry. I cry about it, and I want to complain and everything. But then then you show up tomorrow and then I show it when and I literally tell myself, I don't have an option, Like you're gonna do it anyway. You're either elite or you're insane. Yeah, it doesn't Yeah, It doesn't matter how I feel about it right now. I could I could hate doing this, but I know I'm gonna I'm going to put in the work regardless on the days that I need to. Um.

10:37 So, yeah, you really do lose when is that? It's a it's a long game because people will quit along the way. You just the out, I'll last him, me last man standing. Yeah, and even not the elite. You know, going back to the question, wrap it up, you're gonna feel a little beat up going into a meat. Something's not gonna feel a hundred percent. You're RASD, you're back, you're hammy, you're adduct or something. How you Yeah, yeah, something's gonna up. It is. And then again going to that extreme if you if you're five to six, seven, eight out of ten out of pain for two or three weeks, yeah, maybe that's when we don't compete or go to a PT or something. And I think too that, um, this is purely anecdotal, but the number of people that I have seen and I felt this myself, where you had a great training cycle and you go into the ask meat and you just don't even know why, but it's it's it seems relatively common. It's like you didn't face adversity during the during the training cycle.

11:31 Over Overly confidently confident going into the meat, not even necessarily with a tempt selection, just like overly confident on the whole day. Is performance focused or locked in? I mean that's also another thing that keeps you elite, elite and not right. If you're up ten one in a baseball game, you start slacking off, throwing seventy miles per hour, about to get rocked quick, for sure, but the elite guys are still throwing daggers. Yeah. Training psychology, it's a very interesting topic. Yeah, it's very new too. Um. Where can people find you on Instagram at Abby dot Lou twenty ten Third Street, Sacramento, California, nine five eight one eight if you want training or to send Abby po boxes and maybe some Friday episodes will open packages from your team po box stuff. Yeah, send your favorite team member and we'll open better. I don't know about all that candy umps. Please jump in a new episodes Wednesday and Friday. Appreciate you good company. Discore dot com south like where you want to find me through sb dot cl for your apparel needs. I am at the Jim mcdan allo social media. This show is fifty percent Facts. W percent is a word in fifty is just number. Fifty percent Facts is a Spreaker Prime podcast in association with I Heart Meat, Obscure Celebted Network on scal Next Time