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Allison progressing as a powerlifter

Local coming off strong provincials performance
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He's got the power Jake Allison (left) accepts his trophy after earning the top junior title at the B.C. Powerlifting Association provincial meet last month. Photo by Bob Allison

For someone who recently set new provincial records in all three of his events and, by virtue of that, the overall record for his age category, powerlifter Jake Allison was fairly nonchalant."It didn't really mean too much because I knew I had the provincial record since I lifted more than them last meet I did," he said. "You (used to have) to pay $50 to make them official, but they took that rule away now, so now they're official. I was expecting to get the provincial record.

"My main goal was to get the best overall junior lifter, which I was pretty happy about."

Allison set the new marks and was the top junior lifter at the B.C. Powerlifting Association provincial meet in Surrey on June 25 and 26.

The event wasn't without its challenges, as Allison had to quickly cut enough weight to compete in the under-66 kilogram division. He made the cutoff, and while the process left him a bit unlike himself in the immediate aftermath, he recovered in time for his lifts.

"The meet went pretty well, but I was getting kind of tired and I was feeling kind of out-of-it going in because I had to water-cut seven pounds to make weight. I ended up puking half-an-hour before I had to lift because I tried to rehydrate too quickly," he said.

"I felt better and better as the boost went on from the sugar and caffeine high I had from rehydrating," Allison added with a chuckle.

Allison, who works part-time at Whistler Core, noted it was only the second time he'd ever had to cut weight to this degree, but added the timeframes allow competitors to get back to where they need to be before their final attempts in each category, as only the best lift of three is counted.

"It's not too, too bad because you have two hours to rehydrate. That's a pretty short weigh-in time, but if you can rehydrate and get all the water back on that you took out of you, you generally feel pretty well back to normal for the week," he said. "It's two hours until the opener, so that means you have three hours until you do your third squat and six hours until you do your third dead lift."

His weight preparation actually began well before the meet, roughly three months out, as he had to rid himself of some body fat to get to where he needed to be.

Allison, who just finished his third year of engineering at the University of Calgary, keeps his training consistent until a couple weeks before a meet, where he begins to focus on the single lifts he performs on competition day.

And although engineering is a labour-intensive program, proper time management allows him to be successful in both.

"With school, there's a lot of work but your schedule is also pretty flexible. You can work time into that without too many difficulties," he said. "It's not usually more than five hours (of classes) in a day."