 10. Like, subscribe, thumbs up, follow me, follow me, follow me. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome. So I'm Mike YouTube. Like, subscribe. Today I want to dig into a topic that we already kind of covered, but more of on a on the day emotional sense. I want to dig into what actually happened with my meat and my meat prep. And by digging into these things, I'm going to be more analytical and express what happened, good, bad, the otherwise. When we look into ourselves, when we become self aware, we have to start to distinguish reality from excuses, whining from what actually happened. And sometimes they get jumbled up. What may sound like an excuse is just me reasoning what happened. If I take it for what it is and allow it just to live, then it becomes an excuse. If I adjust or I learn from it, then in my opinion, it's more analytical and being more self aware. So that's kind of where we are today. Uh, you know, first thing, first things first, deal with the back issues for last three years, just to step back on the platform. Although I sounded negative and I sounded down on myself, it's because we filmed that meat right after it happened. And I didn't want to be too negative on camera, even though it was really negative on the inside, right? We always try to laugh things off. And when you're in the moment, especially with YouTube where it's, you know, yes, Connor works hard to edit this, but my life isn't edited. We're filming my real emotions, and I'm transparent as I can be. I'm not putting on an act. So when he's filming me in that moment, I'm just being as human as I can. And as humans, sometimes we put a cover on to not show our vulnerability of being sad or disappointed in ourselves or the event. So either we laugh about it, joke about it, act differently about it. And that's what I think came off on camera, which is real. That's 100% how I felt. I tried to joke it off or laugh it off, even though I was disappointed. Looking deeper into it, there are some things I'm proud of. I am proud of just to step back on the platform. I don't love powerlifting as a sport. As I've talked many times, I never got into this to step on the platform to be a world record holder. It's not what drives me. What drives me is getting better progress, coaching you guys, coaching myself, and just learning. So, but as part of that, because of the industry we're in and because the pressure from the outside and the pressure from inside myself, I feel there is a need to put myself on the line. If I expect you guys to work hard, if I expect my clients to work hard, if I expect Connor to work hard, if I expect all my employees for Kaizen, guys that helped me with Silent Mike, LLC, and everything I do, if I expect them to work hard, I have to work hard. If I expect my clients and my athletes to step on the platform and do the best they can, I have to step on the platform every now and again, put my shit on the line, walk the walk. And so I did. And that's my main reason for competing, because people ask, well, if you don't like competing, why compete? And that's why. I got to put my neck out there a little bit. I can't just coach from the lazy boy. That's not who I am. That's not who I am as an athlete. Even though it's not my favorite thing, sometimes you got to do things you don't like in life. And that's why I jumped in. I'm proud of myself for jumping in because I don't like it. I'm proud of myself for jumping in because I hurt my back the last three years and I haven't been able to get over the hump and be fully healed. I have better weeks, better months, better stretches of training, but it's still acting up right now. I just got through a little lower back workout and an error, excuse me, a leg workout. My lower back's a little tight. So we had a really good stretch of training for about four months where my back didn't hurt leading up to the meat. The training itself was a little inconsistent. My nutrition was up and down because I was trying to lose some weight. My motivation in the gym was low. Now, again, we're trying to be analytical and learn from these things. How can I fix those things? Well, hopefully you don't sign up for a meat when you're in a slump. That's going to help. But I think for me, and what I'm fixing right now to find my motivation is not sticking to a plan. And although I preach sticking to a plan over and over because that is the most optimal way to progress, sometimes going off book or off program can help and be fun mentally. So that's a little bit what we're doing with the content, a little bit what I'm doing with the gym. I'm just showing up and I'm putting in some work, getting the sweat on, getting a little pump and leaving. Trying to get my workouts done an hour. That's helping my motivation so far. So next prep, I will try to have a plan to peak properly because I want to compete optimally. But maybe sometimes I got to go off the book and have some fun in the gym as well. So I guess that's lesson number one. More analytical, which I already knew. The reason my pole was not, you know, sub par is in the perfect world. If I'm going to prep for a meat, I'm going, I'm going forward at 12 weeks, conventional poles to build up my back. Some kind of high bar squat or any squat, really, to really build up my quads. For me, as a sumo puller and the majority of sumo pullers, the stronger your quads are going to be, the better your sumo is going to be. When I pulled 705, my quads were the strongest they ever were. I was squatting almost every day, no back pain, crushing 500 pound squats left and right. This time, because of the back pain, all I had was this belt squat. And although I got some stimulus in my quads, they weren't even near where they're supposed to be. So from a pure programming standpoint, from a pure strength standpoint, my quads were my lack, were the weak link in this sumo deadlift competition that I just did. In the future, obviously, I'd love to squat. And I guess if I can't squat and deadlift in the same week, you know, maybe more belt squats leading up to it. A better off season. I didn't really have an off season. I went from two months, not deadlifting or squatting straight into this competition prep. Some lunges might have helped, some Bulgarians might have helped. But again, I wasn't that motivated, so I didn't spend much time in the gym or I didn't put that much effort into it. And that's just being honest. Again, these aren't excuses or whining. This is me being honest myself and it's what I'm going to fix in the future. If you fix in the future, it's adjustment. I needed to put more effort into the gym, into my accessories. I need to put more effort in the gym and making sure my back didn't hurt because that leaves us to number three. Something I didn't want to talk about before, even though I might have mentioned my back being tight, I retweaked my back pulling 625, eight days out from the meat. It definitely wasn't as bad. Let's just say, the worst my back ever felt was probably the six or seven out of 10. It hurt to tie my shoes, but I could tie my shoes. I wasn't going to go to the hospital. It's not exploding. Nothing's broken, but it hurt pretty bad. When I retweeted eight days before, I'd say it was probably like a five out of 10. So it definitely wasn't its worst, but I knew something was not good. Luckily, I think I have a shit bed. I think I have some kind of imbalances in my legs. The more I'm noticing, especially today on a leg press, I even noticed that one knee will lock out way earlier than the other. My left, I think my right leg is a little bit longer and that's causing some of these hip shifts or imbalances. Two, I think my glute med and the stability in my hip is not there and that's causing some low back pain. So we definitely have some things to look at in terms of my prehab or rehab going to the future, but retweaking my back the week out almost gave myself an excuse in a way and I led that all into the meat. I tried to play everything down and again, this isn't excuses. This is just fact now. I played it down because I didn't want to fail. I didn't want to set myself up for failure. So I guess next time I compete, I'm either going to be all in or not all in. This meat, I was all in in terms of I was going to sign up and do my best, but I wasn't out for blood. That's just the truth. I wanted to lay myself on the line, but I didn't really want to get after it because I have other priorities in my life and that's just where I am right now. The gym is a huge priority, but competing and dead lifting wasn't. I'm still eating as good as I can. I just busted my ass in this workout, one of the best workouts I had probably in a year or two, but it wasn't in my heart for there because I had so many other projects going on. So maybe when I settle down, we're house shopping right now. Me and Connor are going to get married to move in together and then my life will be a little more settled. So once I, once I be able to settle that, I will see what will happen. But for now, those are just more of my thoughts now that were a couple of weeks out after my meat, things I've been thinking about kind of just reflecting, trying to learn from everything we do. I always try to learn from sometimes I'm too self aware. I'm looking too deep inside myself and I overanalyze, but I think those are a couple of things that I can learn from myself. Hopefully it helps you guys with your prep for your deadlift competition or training in general. I do appreciate you guys. Again, five videos a week, vlogs, training, lifestyle, food, all that stuff. I appreciate all the support over the years, guys. More coming. We're heading to Texas. See you guys there. Subscribe, give that thing a thumbs up, sell the mic, we're out.