Bigger Straws

I don't own a camel.

I've heard that you can pile straw on them, and when you put finally one too many straws on, the camel's back breaks.

I doubt that you can get a Human to stand there while you try the same thing, and I don't care about static loading anyway; I care about squatting.  I'm sure that if I tried to squat straw for a one rep max adding one at a time, I'd quit through fatigue and boredom before I got to a reasonable warm up weight.

Realistically a straw for squatting Humans is probably five pounds.  Yes I know there are fractional plates, but they're rarely used, so you slap a 2.5 pound plate on each side, you have five pounds, and that's probably a straw.  If 100 pounds causes discomfort or even better fear, then 105 might very well break your back.

I know entirely too well that five pounds is real.  On a linear progression like I've been doing the last two months or so, I use an additional five pounds each session.  Over weeks and months it's relentless.  My working weight for sets of five has gone up 100 pounds over the last ten weeks.  Yes, five pounds is real.

So five pounds is real but five reps is not.  I'm looking for a 1rm, and that in competition.

Without giving numbers, I plan to open the August 25th meet with my current meet PR.  Barring injury I'm next going to put another twenty pounds on the bar, and depending on what happens there, I might very well next put another twenty or twenty-five pounds on.

I'm not playing this time.

I know that if I fail, the failure will have been a physical, technical, or mental problem.

 I'm quite sure I have adequate strength for what I'm attempting.  My training loads have been higher than ever, yes even higher than before surgery.

In the last months I've uncovered some technical problems, and I'll work full time on fixing those after the meet.  For now I have to dance with who I brought so to speak, and while she's not the prom queen, I wouldn't kick her out of the gym for tipping a chalk bucket over.

Following surgery I've lost a lot of my former fear.  I'm all full of titanium and synthetic mesh, and my intestines are not going to spill on the floor.  My mental game is much improved, but there is still the fear of a back break.

I'm trying to PR by 20-45 pounds.

I've decided a straw must weigh 50.