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Meet Recap - Scott McDermott USAPL Titan Tundra 12/8/24
- Eric Andrews
- Dec 12, 2024
- 6 min read
Weigh-In, Goals and Performance
Let me start off by saying…man what a fun journey this has been! Scott and I started working together earlier this year in March. Scott had been going to the gym, doing some squatting, benching and deadlifting but not really focused on the sport of powerlifting but wanted to try and take it seriously. He came to visit LFOD with some of his friends, asked me a few questions, and Claire said why don’t you try out coaching (thanks Claire!) and the rest is history! During our first block together Scott’s estimated maxes were around 300 squat, 285 bench and 385 deadlift. In the last 9 months we’ve made huge progress on not just his one rep max numbers, but also his technique, learning more about powerlifting training and competitions, and building confidence in and out of the gym. Scott is one of the more detailed and analytical people I’ve coached and working with him has been a blast.
This being Scott’s first meet our goals were pretty simple - follow the rules, learn the lay of the land and hit some PRs over the gym lifts. In terms of weighing in, we were not too concerned which class Scott would fall in, and we ended up just over the 100kg class at 103.4kg putting him in the 110kg class. And with not much fuss, we’re weighed in, openers are in and the games can begin!
Squat
I say this every time and I am still not sure the best way to combat this but…squat is always nerve wracking! I know we say trust the training, train to the standard but man once you get out on the platform it’s a different ball game! With this being Scott’s first meet, I wanted to do my best to make sure the stress was as low as possible. Warm ups went great, especially with the help of a few other experienced coaches in the warm up room. We were organized and rotated through the lifters in ascending order based on our openers and it was honestly one of the smoothest warm up experiences I’ve been a part of. Mark made fun of me (jokingly) for my color coded spreadsheet but we persevered. We took 5 warmups, leaving us with a 10kg jump to the opener of 157.5kg. This moved great as an opener, Scott listened to all the commands and we got 3 whites and we were on the board! It moved well so we went with another 10kg jump to 167.5kg which is a 5lb PR from the gym one week prior. Yes yes, we #trainedintothemeet with a minor taper in the last week of training and it as expected, paid off. The 5lb PR moved great and we elected for a smaller 7.5kg jump to 175kg to finish squats 3/3 and have a 20lb PR over his gym PR of 365. So for the attempt, only a minor scare during this one! Depth is great, commands are good, on the way up however the front of the plates hit the right side of the uprights where the bench hooks are and made him bobble ever so slightly but seriously powered through it and locking it out! He did get one red (blue) for this due to some maybe up and down movement (can we get rid of that rule please?) but did go 2-1 and secured the 385lb PR on the day.
Bench
Bench I would say is Scott’s second strongest lift, although he is quite a nice well rounded lifter! We did have a little hiccup during training, in July Scott was benching and the bar slipped out of his hands and landed on his chest with 215. I recall the note in the spreadsheet said “I had an ouchie” and would definitely agree! This affected training overall for all the lifts but obviously hit the bench the most. We had to take a few weeks off of bench training which unfortunately threw off our momentum, as we were planning to take a PR on bench at the end of this block as well! So learning to train through a bit of pain and discomfort and restarting the progress a bit was a learning experience however Scott is a champ and took everything in stride. We rebuilt up to a 300 single at the beginning of October and missed a 315 attempt. But it did look pretty good, and I had faith that with a solid peak for bench it would be there on meet day. So into the meet, warmups as expected were moving well and our opener at 125kg was an easy, reliable weight for Scott. The commands for bench can definitely be overwhelming so starting out lighter on bench is never a bad option. This flew and helped our confidence. Scott does have a little wider of a foot position for bench and expressed that his hip was bothering him a bit but really didn’t affect his top end strength so we pushed on. Next attempt was 132.5kg, about 8lbs shy of his gym PR and this absolutely flew. Before I put in his final attempt, I knew we had two options. Play it safe and stick with the 7.5kg jump & chip the gym PR or like I said to him “want to have some fun?” and load 142.5kg for the redemption lift. We elected for the fun lift and it paid off! The 315 attempt went pretty well, a little sticky through the middle but he stuck with it and grinded it out for a solid end to bench. 6/6 so far, 15lb PR on bench and a proud member of the 3 plate bench club! Scott is the second person I’ve taken to a 3 plate bench, an incredible feeling!
Deadlift
And last but not least the deadlift. Scott’s best lift and if you have ever watched his training I am assuming at least once you have said “wow that was easy” because that’s what I say every time he sends me a PR deadlift video! Deadlift training I would say was pretty straightforward for us - secondary day being paused deadlifts up until the last block before the meet, and some RDLs and hamstring curls on day 2 or 3 and primary day just progressing through triples, doubles and singles with varying RPE. Nothing too fancy was needed as Scott responded well to this type of training and we ended up with a 440lb PR a little less than 2 weeks out which moved very well considering it was at a commercial gym with no chalk. I knew we would be in a good spot at the meet given the right circumstances. For deadlift warmups we did have a small change to the plan as we both forgot to put deadlift socks on so we skipped a warmup and lowered the last warmup to 175kg from 180kg to give a little extra rest before the opener. Having a plan for warmups is great, but if you can’t be flexible, that is a coaching problem! You should be able to react quickly to change and adjust on the fly as needed. Scott handled this with grace as usual and we had no issues with his last warm up or opening attempt at 190kg. We went with our moderate jump plan to 200kg, tying his gym PR on the second attempt. This ended up being faster than his gym lift, I think due to the excitement of the meet, the taper week, & as well as being able to use chalk! We then closed out the day with another 10kg jump to 210kg, another PR and to close the day going 9/9. This was 23lbs over his best and I was making sure to hype him up and tell him to give it all he’s got, the last lift of the day. Scott was focused and went out there and did the thing, blowing away this PR attempt with ease. I think Scott probably had another 5-10kg on the day, but we’ll be back for even more before you know it.
Closing Thoughts & The Future
Wrapping up I am reminded about our goals for the meet, where we started 9 months ago and the journey we’ve had. Scott put together a total of 527.5kg which is 58lbs above his best gym lifts with more in the tank. Looking back at where we started is pretty crazy. Sometimes it’s hard to look back and see all the growth or progress you’ve made…but this is not one of those cases. I’m incredibly proud of Scott for trying out a new sport, committing to the training style, and now looking ahead to our next competition together. We’ll be hitting the ground running into our next meet prep and Scott will be back on the platform before we know it and I am so excited to see what we’re able to put together next time! Until then…#TheRisingTide
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