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Bernie has trained at the Kaiwaka Fitness Centre since 2005 and won his first competition in 2014.
Kaiwaka’s Bernie Hall is chasing his personal powerlifting best of 270kgs, and is eyeing the world record for his age group of 275kgs. He will have two opportunities.
Hall will compete in both the national masters powerlifting competition on July 17 and the national open on August 28, which are both affiliated with the Global Powerlifting Committee (GPC).
Hall recently qualified after lifting 260kgs at a competition in Avondale in Auckland.
He has managed once to lift 270kgs, two years ago, and is looking to replicate that success, despite being a little older at 45.
Hall says achieving a world record is not easy because GPC competitions do not test for performance enhancing drugs. Competitors are up against athletes from other parts of the world where doping is not as frowned upon, but Hall refuses to use steroids.
Lifting weights in a competition is also much harder than when working out in the gym. Competitions require athletes to follow the movement prompts of adjudicators and lift using clean form. They have to lift a barbell from the ground in a clean vertical line, until the knees and back are straight, without “hitching” or jerking the bar, otherwise the lift doesn’t count.
At these weights, lifts also have to be executed with technical precision to avoid injury.
“A fellow competitor of mine curled the bar with his bicep and the muscle just tore off and he had to have surgery.”
Hall says when attempting to lift a weight that heavy, athletes have to enter an adrenalin-fuelled fight or flight response in order to accomplish it.
He uses a common mental technique among lifters, imagining that he is lifting a car off his daughter.
Top level lifters undergo hypnotherapy to achieve this mental state.
“You can’t calmly attempt to lift hundreds of kgs – it just won’t happen. You have to feel the aggression.”
Hall is a level 6 qualified massage therapist with the New Zealand College of Massage, but training has taken him away from this work.
“I’ve developed too many callouses to be able to comfortably give massages.”
Fortunately, he is the Kaiwaka Fitness Centre’s first ever sponsored athlete and has been assisted with competition entry, training and gear.
Hall is training three to five days a week but is only able to train powerlifting once a week to allow his body to recover from the strenuous lifts.
His diet consists of three egg whites with porridge in the morning, three meals a day with rice and tuna or rice and steak, a protein shake after a workout, snacks throughout the day and finally two whole eggs before bed.
