Frustrated. I must admit that this is how I felt for about a month. The weight on my overhead press had stopped moving, and this frustration spilled over to my other lifts as well. When I went to bench I noticed that my form felt off, and I started to think, “The grinding in my shoulder is getting progressively louder and worse each day - this is probably telling me that something *BAD* is going to happen if I don’t fix this soon.” Every time I benched my shoulder would hurt for two days afterwards. I spoke with several coaches about the other aspects of my training. My squat and deadlift each had their own idiosyncrasies that began to cause me problems. Everyone confirmed that I was sleeping enough, eating enough, and taking small enough jumps to not warrant this big of a plateau on several of my lifts. Each coach told me that I needed to get my form checked out. I finally decided to get help on my lifts.

I am very fortunate that I live within driving distance of Andy Baker at Kingwood Strength and Conditioning, and I was able to schedule a one-on-one private coaching session to go over the main lifts. I spent two hours working with Andy one afternoon, and he quickly and efficiently found the errors in my squat, overhead press, deadlift, and bench press. Andy provided confirmation and feedback on the portions of a lift that I was doing correctly. On the segments of a lift that needed improvement, Andy gave me solid cues to get me into the correct position and explained why I would benefit from completing the lift in his suggested manner. Finally, on each lift we established a new working weight to start from, now that my lifts had been corrected, and the appropriate jumps to get me back to my previous working weights as efficiently and safely as possible.

Working with Andy has been a great privilege, and he has given me the tools to get back on the path of success in the weight room. Andy has worked with a diverse client base, from professional athletes to soccer moms. He has the ability to help lifters at all points in their lifting career, and I wholeheartedly recommend Andy Baker for coaching you on your lifts, or for program design. If you have any questions please feel free to ask here, or pm me.