NSW CAPO State Championships:

On the 25^th of April the NSW Capo State Championships were held at Super Shape gym in Albury – PowerSports had 2 lifters from the gym Blake Hanson, Matt Middleton and also Luke Reynolds repping the gym from syd.

I got to Super Shape with Stuart, Justin and Kara at around 11am – just in time to see Taylor Young – one of the owners of Super Shape bench 110kg's at 60kg bodyweight.....the old world record was 65kgs!....Taylor is a hugely impressive lifter with a number of world records and she also won Mrs. Universe in 1999!

Up next was the men Blake was up 1^st being the lightest and youngest lifter in the mens div – we ended up getting Blake down to 63.7kgs for the comp – a week earlier he was sitting around 70kgs – Blake put in a massive effort to drop the weight and then re-gain it again before the comp on Sunday! His 1^st lift was a 100kg squat which he totally smoked, we then discussed and went for 120kg on his 2^nd attempt, he also got this lift – so as planned we went to 130kgs – unfortunately he missed his lift but was a great effort.

Matt Middleton was up after Blake...Matt had weighed in on the Saturday morning at 9am – I had a call from him about 8:30am to tell me how shit he felt and that he was driving to the gym so he could weigh in as soon as the clock hit 9 – Now 24 hours before Matt had weighted around 79-80kgs – we weighed in at 71.5kgs – 20 hours in the Sauna will do this! - Huge effort from Matt to drop the weight. Onto his squats – Matt opened with a easy 180, then went for 200 – smashed that out....then for his 3^rd did a nice 210.

Luke Reynolds was the 2^nd last lifter from memory – he was defiantly the biggest/tallest man at the comp – he is a good 6'6 and 148kg – I had been emailing Luke upto the comp and told him that weigh in was at 9am on the Saturday his response was – I am not bothered Iam a superheavy for life!. When he brought the bar out to squat he looked huge! - and I had a few people come up and say that they don't think the squat rack has ever gone that high because the numbers looked brand new! For a tall guy Luke had some great numbers for the squat – 220, 240 – great squating.

Bench was next and again Blake was the 1^st lifter up – he smashed through 75kg's with ease and then 90kg's – he only just missed 95kg – still a great effort and we will be looking to improve on this at the next comp!

Matt opened with a 120 bench which he had done for 5 not long before comp day in the gym, then moved onto a 130 – which he got fairly well. After his 130 there was abit of a discussion on where to go next – from 135-150 – he ended up going for a 140kg bench and only just missed it by an inch or 2, considering the speed it came off his chest I thought it was for sure going to be a good lift! – bring on the board pressing.

Big Luke's smashed out a 160, and then a 170, great benching from the big guy!

Deadlifts! - At every comp this is where it heats up. Blake opened with an easy 160, looked like a speed pull – he then went to 180 which was equal PB and again brought it up with ease. 3^rd attempt as planned was 190 – came up a little slower but still got it up for another good lift. We had discussed in the gym that if Blake got the 190 then he would go for 3x bodyweight or a 200kg dead – seeing as though Blake had cut some great weight the day before the comp he went for the 3x bodyweight – loaded up 192.5kgs on the bar – the speed off the floor was great but just couldn't lock it out! - A 190kg – 10 above PB deadlift was great and I was very proud of him.

Matt's opener was another speed pull at 220 – again he had done 5 @ 220kg at the gym in the weeks leading upto the comp. Moved to 240kg – and again smashed it up like it was nothing, 3^rd attempt 250, came up with good speed and a good lockout. For Matt's 4^th attempt again there was some discussion on what weight he should go to – he settled on 260 again abit slower than the last lifts but came out and locked it out – a 260kg deadlift at 71.5kg!

Luke was up next, he came up to me after his last bench and said he felt abit of a pain in his back and hope it didn't affected his deadlift – big Luke opened with a solid 260, moved to 280 brought that up and the moved onto the BIG 300kgs – the crowd got behind Luke and he brought the 300kg up, it was a fantastic lift and the 2^nd biggest deadlift of the day in the whole comp, big Dan Wright got the biggest deadlift – 310kgs - I don't think the pain in the back affected the big guy!

I honestly have to say that it was the best comp I have been to...ever...everyone got behind eachother, and supported eachother.

A HUGE thanks to Lauire Butler and Taylor Young the owners of Super Shape for running such a great comp and also CAPO.

There was 31 lifters at this comp which is a great turn out – and a comp I know will only be bigger and better next year.

Bring on the Nationals in August and also the CAPO Deadlift Comp in December at Super Shape.

Lastly a big thank you to all the PowerSports lifters – great work on the day guys, looking forward to working with you guys in the lead up to the nationals!

Joel.