Progression Takes Time

Today was another day of trying yet another gym with a good friend ? @leonietodd_

I’m loving training at different gyms, it has given me my mojo back & my love for training which I will admit I had lost a little with competing last year, having to be quite, no very, selfish with my training, concentrating on ‘me’ and ‘my’ goals for the year.

Hard to believe but I’d even fallen out of love with training legs, due to breaking my big toe, which resulted in me screwing my entire back up.

So today was leg day and I was super pumped for it, still no lifting belt (aka my comfort blanket). Each lift felt good and solid even to the last lift PB at 80kg x 8 @62kg BW, pretty feckin’ buzzing with it, heaviest I’ve ever lifted (without a belt) ?

This got me thinking about my previous lifts and what I was lifting this time last year, how was my form, technique etc, as I have spent a good few months regressing the load on my squats in order to hit depth, with good form and technique, which is certainly paying off!
??

I log all my sessions for the very reason to be able to look back at how the session felt, what weight for how many reps/sets I did etc. This is a great tool for being able to see your progression over the weeks, month and even years in my case ?

I had videoed ? my squats from last year 26/2/17 (again another great thing to do to analyse your lifts as sometimes they feel better than they look), it was fantastic to see how much progress I’ve made in a year. Scroll below ?? to see video from last year 67.25kg x10 @63kg BW

Now I know I squat low and not everyone can but if you can, do, I have seen and felt amazing muscle activation in my gluteus/hamstrings and quads so much more with getting full ROM.

I have also learnt to engage my core fully, here’s hoping I’m creating abs of steel ?

If you struggle to get full ROM when squatting try taking back the load and see how you get on, then work the load slowly back up!

I can honestly say I’ve progressed incredibly over this last year with help from my coach @joeparish who has had to deal with me weekly ?

Happy Squatting ????? (thanks to my double spotters too ??)