The Saga of Zammar the Great #9: Candahar pt.6

Story Recap:

Riding on Zammar’s horse (Arion), Ren, Tristan, and Zammar arrived at The Blacklands' city of Candahar only hours before it was assaulted by an enormous horde of Und'kal. As the dark skinned people of the city took arms, Ren too swore herself to the cause. Even Tristan picked up a sword, making a promise to Ren that he would not hesitate to fight the aliens he had come to love.

Ren and Maria, the guide assigned to her by Chief Hirat, took station on top of the city’s walls. With her bow ready, Ren’s intentions were to lead the city’s boomerang throwers. Tristan found himself in the middle of the main army, forced to fight in deadly melee.

The fighting raged in a desert valley, but was soon halted when a large Und'kal, a “Kal Prime”, confronted Zammar. The two clashed in fierce combat that had both sides struggling to gain the upper hand. However, when Tristan attempted to intervene, the unguarded Zammar was caught by a merciless attack, an attack that may have proven fatal for the mighty man.

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Her arrows bounced uselessly off the giant creature's tough hide; still, Ren fired them one after another in desperation, ignoring the sting of the bowstring on her hand.

"It is no use, my Queen." Maria said sadly behind her - not for the first time. Ren loaded another arrow and let loose. It glanced off the writhing monster, flopping lazily to the ground at its feet; she threw down her bow in frustration.

"It's okay. He's fine..." She replied, reaching forward to grasp the sharp palisades of the wall with shaking hands. It's Zammar. Her gaze fell on the medical soldiers stationed directly in front of the wall. Like the rest of the army, their eyes had remained glued on the brawl as Zammar alone fought the Und'kal. None had raised their arms to aid in his melee, not even now when he most needed their help. The only person that had even tried was Tristan.

But look what happened because of him...Ren shook her head violently to clear the thought. She would have done the same, no matter how hopeless the gesture. After all, no one man but Zammar could stand against that thing. But there was the entire Candaharran army...Surely together they could take down the large Und'kal? Abejide and Hirat have probably already thought of that. Maybe they just didn't want to help him. The paranoid part of her said that Zammar's skin colour had something to do with it. Ren turned back to the vast desert, squinting her eyes against the strong sun. There had to be something, some way to defeat the beast.

She made to move towards the wooden stairs leading down to the city behind her. "I need to get down to the fight..."

"No, my Queen."  Maria's hand whipped out to grab Ren's arm. The tight grip startled her out of the focused state she was in. "You must not abandon your post, my Queen." The guide added sternly.

Ren was surprised, Maria hadn’t been strict with her before. "But...I need to talk to Abejide."

"Your battle is here, my Queen. Believe in your comrades." The dark girl pointed a long fingered hand. "Look, this enemy will not last much longer, already its life blood drains."

Ren stared at the girl for a moment before nodding; it would have taken too long to get to the chiefs. Not to mention that there was nothing she could do against any Und’kal with a sword - she’d learned that the hard way. At least with her bow she could be of some help.

"Yeah..." She whispered, turning back around to lean over the wall and gaze at the pillar of dust that was rising from where Zammar had smashed into the base of the hill. "I'll finish it off myself if I have to..." she muttered under her breath, ignoring the sharp sting of splinters on her hands as they squeezed the wood. Despite the pretense, Ren had never felt more helpless.

Training - 28th April 2014

Snatch: Upto 150x1, 135x3x2
Power Clean + Jerk: 165x4x(1+2)
Front Squat: Upto 205x3, 185x2x5
Bulgarian Split Squats: 40x3x6
Ab Wheel 3x

Hello!

I am back, sort of. I haven't updated any of the recent training sessions namely because they were unstructured and more or less a way to just keep moving. Now that the term is finally over though, I hope to be more consistent in maintaining the log.
I am living at home now, and will be lifting on my improvised platform in the garage (pics will be posted soon? Or just watch the videos! :P)

The plan for this week is to just work my way back in to the classicals before starting a more structured program next week (starting with work, to maintain a nice routine).

Weightlifters and Squatting

Squatting. Isn't that what weightlifting is all about? I mean intuitively, weightlifters have a tendency to find themselves in a squatted position with a bar either overhead or across their shoulders. So naturally, one would assume that an integral part of weightlifting is the stability and strength required to be in that position. If one was to make such an assumption, he would be correct! If this intelligent person then extrapolated to thinking about how to benefit the classical lifts (Snatch and Clean & Jerk), and came up with the idea of isolating this portion of the classicals to strengthen in training, he would be my hero!

Enter the Back and Front Squat!

This beautiful, hairy Russian man is responsible for one of the most iconic pictures in weightlifting, as well as the second highest recorded Clean and Jerk of all time! Also, moustache.

 For the uninitiated, the back squat involves the bar being loaded across the back of a lifter (usually from squat stands) before said lifter takes a deep breath, curses his existence and squats down to the ground and stands back up. It is one of the most commonly performed exercises in any gym, and for good reason. Honestly, nothing (except maybe a Clean and Jerk) would give an ordinary bro greater bang for buck than a Back Squat!

Front Squats on the other hand are a little bit more elusive. Loading the bar across the front deltoids results in a very different, but similar movement to the back squat. It also means you can lift less, are forced to keep strict form, and if you suck like me, have a tough time breathing :p

Everyone's favourite weightlifter - Dimitry Klokov performing a (really heavy) Paused Front Squat. Kind of looks similar to the position at the bottom of a Clean doesn't it?!

There are many different ways that people squat. In the end, any given person's squat position is dictated by his proportions, weaknesses/strengths, flexibility and intent.

As weightlifters, our aim when squatting is to directly aid the classical movements. As such, our intention is never to lift maximal weights, but to lift in a way with maximum transferability to the classicals. In other words, we want to strengthen our bodies in the same position that they would find themselves in when performing a classical.