EDITOR’S NOTE: Welcome to the athlete journal of Terry Hadlow. Terry got started in Olympic weightlifting in 1970 and is the only Canadian to have competed in senior nationals in five different decades – 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s. Follow Terry’s journal here to learn about his approach to training and competing.
Athlete Journal Entry 21- 3/17/2014
Monday: Snatch Day
Just two weeks left until the festival, so I have to spend training time doing singles or doubles with heavy weights to simulate competition stresses. Monday was the first step in that direction. I built confidence by doing sets made up of combo movements before I hit the heavier single reps. I started the process with snatches, doing 40kg, 50kg for five combo reps for two sets. The combo sequence I did was a pull, power snatch, snatch, pull, snatch. The next weights – 60kg, 70kg, 80kg and 90kg – were done for the same combo, but for only one set. I switched to single reps, doing 90kg for an easy starter then jumping to 100kg for two pathetic attempts. My legs were fried and the work done before the singles was enough to finish them off. I concluded the workout with two sets of clean pulls with 120kg for two sets of three reps.
Tuesday
Tuesday was a day off because I needed a rest and my work schedule was pretty packed.
Wednesday
Wednesday was the last heavy clean and jerk before the competition, so I figured I had better make the best of it. Again, I began with combo sets, doing 50kg and 70kg for sets of speed clean, clean, jerk, and clean and jerk. 90kg, 100kg, 110kg were done for one set of the five combo reps. Unlike Monday, my legs were feeling great, so I took 120kg for one set of clean and jerks, then went up to 130kg for two sets. The cleans with 130kg were good. I need to do a little more work on the jerks, but no surprise there. I finished the day off with two sets of clean pulls with 145kg and four reps each set.
Thursday
Thursday was supposed to be another snatch day, but my elbow was tender and pushing it this close to competition is not a wise option. So I switched to back squats, which should not stress my elbow. My groin was a little tender, but with an extended warm up the tension and pain went away. I did a warm up with the empty bar for five or six sets of six reps, just to make sure the tender area was ready to work. I jumped to 70kg for two sets of six reps and did the same with 100kg. My next jump was to 130kg for six reps, then 150kg for four reps. I took 160kg for one three-second stop squat. I dropped down to 110kg and planned on doing two sets of six speed squats, but the first set was easy so I did ten reps for the second set.
Friday
As usual, Friday was fitness day. I needed to be sure I had the energy for the key workouts and recovery for next weekend’s competition, so I did the circuit by only working every second station. The time for this week’s session was fifty minutes, but the total amount of work was 12.5 minutes. I should be able to fly through this session. I needed to make up for the missed snatch, so I figured I would give it a shot. I decided to do the same combo work as Sunday, but with hopefully better execution and more authority. I started with 40kg, 50kg, and 60kg for two sets of the five-rep combo. From there I made 10kg jumps, ending at 90kg and doing that weight for three sets of the five-rep combos. The session was good. I like double workouts and should try that more often (not).
Saturday
Saturday’s workout was canceled.
Sunday
Sunday’s workout was light and dynamic, doing both snatches and clean and jerks. I only got to 90kg for single snatches for four sets and 110kg for four sets of one. Overall it was a great week, even if my elbow is sore as hell.
