Saturday was bench press day. That's my least favorite of the workouts because the strength gains have been much slower and more difficult to achieve, as opposed to squats and dead lifts. I'm always determined, though. :-)
I sailed without incident through the warmup set with the bar, then a set with 95 lbs, then another with 110 pounds. No problem. Then I decided to go to 125 since I had lifted 120 the week before and managed six reps. A five-pound increase should be no big deal, right? HA. The first rep was no problem, but then I took the bar down for the second rep and found myself struggling just to keep the bar from crushing my windpipe. Kimo, my spotter, was apparently as confident as I had been that I could get a couple more reps, so he had looked away for just a second. He jumped to lift the bar off as soon as he heard my squeaked, "help." I was prepared to be peeved about this, but Kimo just grinned and said, "that happens to people all the time."
"Really?" I asked incredulously.
"Yes," he replied. "Congratulations--you have just finally experienced 'lifting to failure'."
And it certainly was a spectacular failure. It's really my shoulders, particularly the right one that I partially dislocated a few years ago, that are holding me back from making better progress on bench. Or should I say - it's the posterior, anterior and lateral deltoids that need work. I see lots of military presses and lat raises in my future as I work on that.
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