Starting Strength Coach
Another olympic lifting example
Another pretty cool video of one of the girls I coach. The pull is a little bit off, but she starts with a pretty good high hip start position. Just another example of a lifter following Starting Strength principles and having success (she low bars, deadlifts, benches, presses, etc). The caption for the video says a lot...low bar paying off quite nicely in a years time:
"Cecily Basques (-63kg) cleaning 110kg on her final attempt at the 2014 University Worlds where she went 85/107/192 to post the highest non-Geralee total this year by a 63kg lifter. Basques recently dropped down from -69kg and she also managed to improve her lifts. For some reference, at -69kg, she did 79/98/177 at the 2013 Nationals and she did 83/108/191 at the 2014 Nationals -- so she is making dramatic and substantial progress by upping her total 15kg (when it was already top 10 at Nationals) and dropping a weight class all in the span of a little over a year. It should be interesting to see where she can go from here!"
Here's the video link:
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=739043402817153
Also, this total that Cecily did at University Nationals was enough to put her on the Senior World Team competing in Kazakhstan in November, but due to a discrepancy in the USAW Handbook regarding qualifying events for the World Championships, her total from University Nationals did not count towards qualifying her on the team. Next year!
On a positive note, her University Nationals performance put her as the 3rd ranked overall female on the University World Team. She elected not to compete though because it is self funded and costs upwards of $3000.
Starting Strength works, people. Olympic lifters included! It really has made all the difference for my lifters. I'll post a log and some stuff about training soon in the Testimonials section. I just have to get around to doing it.
TMPHBITEU
What was the discrepancy in the USAW materials? Why, I'd like to think that our NGB wouldn't make errors like this. I would hope that it wasn't the fault of the National Office. It would seem that our sport's representative to the IWF would be better at their jobs than this.
Member
Tom, would love to see an example training log. I've been following Cecily since her Midtown days... great to see her doing so well.
Member
Originally Posted by Tom DiStasio
I certainly don't have 3k, but if there were a kick starter I would be glad to contribute. If there were some other kind of fund raiser, like a "send this strong girl to the world championships" t-shirt sale, I'd again be glad to contribute.
It would be awesome to see a SS athlete on the world stage!
Member
There's been a lot of BS with some USAW rules recently. There was a lot of drama over who won the men's team title at nationals because one of the teams added lifters right at the deadline and the other teams weren't notified until after the competition was over, or something like that. Weren't notified as in it wasn't even updated on the scoresheet or the starting list until after the competition.
DRLVEGAS
Great suggestion--you could probably raise that just from this board.
Member
I primarily lurk and I would contribute to this. If nothing else, to reward hard work and dedication.
Starting Strength Coach
Holy crap. She upped her total 15 kg while dropping a weight class?! That's nuts. She was a really good lifter before, too. So, that's really, really good evidence that what you're (we're) doing works Tom. How long have you been coaching her? Did this improvement occur after she came to you (i.e. after she stopped high-bar squatting, etc.)?
Starting Strength Coach
Cecily started lifting with me in August of 2013 (just after the 2013 National Championships). She had been lifting for about two years with another local club coach and had totaled 79/98 at the 2013 National Championships as a 69kg lifter. When I got her, we worked a lot on her Olympic lifting technique, but I didn't change her to LBBS at that point. Truthfully, I wanted to experiment with her and see how LBBS would affect her Olympic lifting.
So it took about a year to iron out her technique to where I would say she has good enough technique to be considered somewhat technically proficient (still has a lot to work on). She had been High Bar Back Squatting up until then, but with the technical fixes that we had made, she was able to total 83/108 at the 2014 National Championships.
From the time of the 2014 National Championships (7/18/14) to the 2014 University National Championships (9/27/14), a little over two months, I introduced her to LBBS and linear progressed her for the entirety of this training cycle. She was able to improve on her previous squat numbers, doing her old 1RM for a pretty hard 5x3. With this, she was cutting down a weight class (going from a 69kg to a 63kg lifter with the hopes of qualifying for the World Team...) and then was able to go 85/107 at the 2014 University National Championships.
My other girl who I coach has had the exact same experience. HBBS until progress stalls, introduce LBBS and then within a couple months big PR's and much better lifting. The trend continues as their squat numbers continue to rise. I wouldn't call it a linear correlation between squat PR's and snatch/C&J PR's, but I'll be damned if its not close.
Starting Strength Coach
That's great work Tom. It's great to see/hear about these examples.
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