Geezer's Long March Toward the Elite Sneaking Up On the Finish Line

[Mark E. Hurling]

Bench Press: 210 for 7 singles followed by a backoff set of 6 reps. Felt heavy and hard.

Hammer Row: Sets of 5, 325-330-335. This, OTOH, was a breeze.

Cable Pressdowns; Sets of 12, 120-130-150.

Rolling and external rotator work.

Homeward journey along the Evergreen Park Reservoir to check up any green card Canada geese. Didn't see any of those, but I did see a pair of Bald Eagles soaring around. Which probably explains why there were no foreign national birds in evidence.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Training the Special Olympians John and Val tonight at Gold's in Marion. It was a deload week for them anyway, which coincided nicely with a big weekend of achievements for Team Lightning Bolt. The flag foot ball men's team won and Val is going to state in bowling. So an easy session was in order to let them recover a wee bit.

Since the squat rack was heavily engaged, we took things out of order and led off with the bench press, then the deadlift, and finally the squat. The squat makes most lifters nervous, and that includes me. It takes a fair amount of fortitude to get UNDER a bar on your back and stand up with it. Things can go wrong and really hurt your low back. So good weight selection and diligence on form is critical.

Both Val and John sped through the sets since they weren't demanding. A good job of recovery for both.

[Mark E. Hurling]

The last 18 hours have proven to be eventful.

After a few volleys of emails back and forth between myself and the Powers That Be in the USPA:

I FINALLY(!) got my account activated on their Coaching Register so I can post a photo and my credentials. That'll get done later this morning.

The planets have aligned for my birthday next year. After some questions, I got clarification from the Rules Committee about my total in Drug Tested Nationals in June of 2020. I qualified for Nationals in the Tulsa meet, and my total there can qualify me to compete in the USPA/IPL Drug Tested Worlds for 2020 in the 70 - 74 age class. I will be 69 in June of next year, but turn 70 before the Worlds in October. What's even better is that my total in the Tulsa meet already would qualify me for Worlds next year. Qualification total for 70+ is 813 and I totaled 814 while holding back on all three lifts. So I am virtually a shoe-in for next year.

This morning was more mundane in the realm of conditioning. Box jumps, speed bag, rowing, medicine ball slams, heavy bag. Polished off with rolling and external rotator work.

On the way out of the Rec Center I encountered a young guy (which is almost everyone these days) wearing a State of Jefferson sweat shirt. California has had a separatist movement even longer than Illinois has to split with the big cities on the coast. While we here want to get Chicago and Crook County out of our lives and our wallets. Jefferson was first proposed just before Pearl Harbor. Then it went to sleep again for a few decades. We both laughed about it a little.

Then I ran into Isaac, the Karate guy I watched compete in Cape Girardeau. We agreed we had to quit meeting like this and needed to sit down over some coffee.

Life has gotten really interesting.

[57bergstrm]

Thats a lot of good news [emoji106]
Congratulations to you.[emoji322]

[Mark E. Hurling]

Thanks Bergs. Fingers crossed on having the IPL Worlds in Stockholm next year. Skoot wants to see her cousins.

[57bergstrm]

[emoji1696]

[Mark E. Hurling]

The best day ever continues. When I took and passed the USPA coaching certification, we were told we would get a USPA black polo shirt with our name, the USPA logo, and Certified Coach embroidered on it. It arrived in the mail today.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Deadlifts: 325 for 7 singles followed by a backoff set of 250 for 5 reps.

Hip Belt Squats: Sets of 5, 195-200-205.

Swiss Bar Lockouts: Sets of 5, 125-130-135.

Crunches: 100 for 3 sets of 5.

Rolled and external rotator work.

A mixed bag for the daily aches and pains update. The bad news is my right finger was really hurting through the deadlifts this morning. I can't wait for the operation to fix that sucker on Friday. The good news was that my creaky back actually seems to have been fixed by those deadlifts this morning.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Ball Cap.jpg

After this invigorating session with the iron, DB and I took a nap early in the afternoon. Our sleep got disturbed last night by the Feline Marching Society who decided a few hikes across the bed would be fun. After I got up from this nap, I felt like I had been sprayed in cortisol. Which made a trip to the hot tub in the back yard a blessing to ease the transition to Jujitsu later.

Ken was there already and Gabriel and another new kid, DW as he said he wanted to be called showed up later. So it was start from scratch with DW. He proved to be the best listening boy I have encountered so far. He also picked up the completely unfamiliar movements much faster than most kids I've taught and seen taught. I had Ken teach tonight, and he was outstanding, especially in teaching the four blocks in the blocking set drill. He was so good, I not only complimented him afterward, but told him I would start teaching it the same way myself. He was very patient with them.

I spoke with DW's dad afterward also to let him know how well his son did. Dad has some boxing and wrestling in his background and wanted his son to have some practical self defense. I showed him some of the escapes from grabs his son would be learning. Hopefully this art will satisfy his desire to have his kid learn how to protect himself.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Woke up to a day straight out of Edgar Allan Poe, dark and rainy. Yuck.

But the gym calleth and respond I did. My legs and back, while not exactly hurting, were certainly feeling the effects of yesterday's follies. So I defaulted to mostly machines today. Speed bag, Jacob's Ladder, SciFit, elliptical, and rower.

Crowned by rolling and external rotator work.