2012 Progress Thread

[BendtheBar]

As we're drawing to a close on another great year, I thought it would be fun to hear about all you've accomplished during the year.

Tell us about your successes, the major milestones you hit, any special changes you made to reach these goals, and what your gretest victory was.

[Hunterace]

Biggest accomplishment/ victory is pushing through my chronic headache pain to get anything done! Constant battle that I honestly don't always win.
Stuff I've done this year....
Lost 70lbs so far.
Made great strides in improving my form on all my lifts.
Went from lifting in April (after i found out about low test) to now...
Squating poorly at 165 to 315 with pretty good form,
Deadlifting with aweful form at 185 to a 405 pull with Steve's help,
Benching wrong at 135 to correct at 265
Not being able to do any pull ups, to doing 8 with 50lb weight vest, or 21 at body weight
Fitting into smaller clothing
May sound dumb, but meeting Steve was very cool for me! I still have a lot of work to do, and many goals to meet and crush!!!

[Kuytrider]

Biggest victory was training more frequently and vigourously. Yet I've not been all that smart with my training and have been guilty of seeking progress at too rapid a rate. The result has been fairly patchy progression. Barring my deadlift which increased from 150kg to 185kg, the rest of my lifts have been okay at best. At the start of 2012 I didn't squat parallel and I do now so I guess that's a victory too.
Finally losing some weight was a good decision and one that will help me progress in 2013 as I can add some decent size and muscle without fear of getting too fat.

[Off Road]

This year was a mixed bag; my squat and conditioning went up, but everything else stayed about the same.

[BendtheBar]

One of my successes was the UPA National meet in April. It was the payoff for a long year of focused training, and everything came together. At that meet I hit a 600 pound raw squat which I never thought possible.

My other major successes this year came in the dungeon:

315 strict seated overhead press.
700x2 deadlift off 2" blocks.
450 Slingshot bench press.

My biggest success was in training others. It was by far one of the best experiences of my life. The joy that comes from seeing folks succeed after they work hard can't be described.

Thanks to everyone who put their trust in me in 2012.

[EliteDreams]

It wasn't until the spring I had any clue of what I was doing.
Bad squat with 350 to good squat with 340x2 (350 will fall this month)
Bad bench with 220,good bench with 260
Gained probably 20lbs,havnt kept track of anything else. 2013 will be more focused.

[Fazc]

Looking back retrospectively, just staying healthy was the biggest thing to have come out of this past year. It was my first year back in competition after a 6 year hiatus due to serious injury. So that kind of 'come back' really was the biggest victory regardless of the lifts I hit.

Onwards from here now, time to beat some all-time PR's now. It's been a long time coming.