A record-breaking performance at the Canadian Powerlifting Nationals was an uplifting experience for Daniel Schneider.
The winner of the 100 kilogram 18- to 19-year-old and 100-kg open weight classes was also competing in his first powerlifting event.
“My expectations were met but I obviously wanted a little more because I’m greedy that way,” said Schneider, 19, a serious lifter for less than a year.
“I’ve been a very extremely skinny guy all throughout high school. In my senior year I think I weighed 150 pounds so I kind of got into bodybuilding a little bit and then one of the guys in the fitness industry with kind of the same background story as me was into powerlifting, so I kind of got into it around December and I started really focusing on heavy lifts and it became a lot of fun.”
The six-foot-one, 210-pound Schneider established age-group records of 461 pounds in squat, 300 pounds in pause bench and 544 pounds in deadlift at the recent Canadian Powerlifting League sanctioned event in Red Deer.
“Unfortunately I didn't hit all the numbers I wanted to but it was still good. It was a really good experience,” said the Bellerose high school grad. “I chose this certain (powerlifting) organization because the judges are internationally renowned and it’s a really nice community. It’s more of a welcoming environment.”
The feats of strength competition consisted of about 60 lifters.
“It’s a very niche sport, not a lot of people get into it,” Schneider said. ”There were a lot of massive, massive guys that have obviously been juicing it a little bit but it was really cool.”
Schneider flexed his muscles despite not up to par lifting wise.
“I was not feeling very good the week before. I kind of felt a little sick and training was really off so I kind of messed up my taper cycle,” said Schneider, who also suffered an injury right off the bat at the CPL nationals. “I was trying to squat 500 pounds, but I hurt my knee the very first attempt. I kind of pulled my quad a little bit and it really messed up the entire meet unfortunately and then I further injured it attempting a 570-pound deadlift as my second attempt. My quad completely pulled and gave out so I’m still rehabbing that injury right now. It sucks.”
Schneider’s 461-pound squat surpassed the previous best mark of 450.
“I didn’t get to depth (when your butt goes below your hip crease) on my first attempt. They only give you three attempts to hit a lift that you want so I missed depth on the first one and then I did a 440-pound squat and I got that, and then I just went up to 461 for the last one,” he said. “The squat definitely is my best lift.”
His 300-pound pause bench was three pounds more than the old record.
“That’s like a four out of 10 effort for me. I could’ve easily done way more weight on that but I just wanted to same my energy for my deadlift, which is my best lift.”
Schneider settled for 540 pounds on the deadlift, surpassing the 515 record, after his right quad made it difficult to pick the loaded bar off the floor and lock the knees while standing up with it.
“I was really disappointed with my deadlift. It didn’t go the way I wanted it to. I was actually supposed to deadlift 583 pounds but with a torn quad you can’t do much.”
Schneider continues to focus on heavy lifts to put on muscle mass while training six days a week for two hours per session.
“Leg day, push day then pull day,” said the Goodlife Fitness regular. “My focus is to get as strong as I possibly can.”
Schneider also bulks up on a sports reporter’s diet of 4,300 calories per day.
“It’s not the cleanest eating. I don’t eat chicken breasts, I actually eat an extremely dirty diet because I just don't gain weight at all unless I eat extremely high calorie meals, like McDonald’s, a lot of pasta, a lot of Kraft Dinner and spaghetti. A lot of calories just goes down really well.”
Schneider recently caught the attention of United States-based fitness coach Elliot Atwell, who works with powerlifter and fitness model David Laid, who is roughly the same age, height and weight size as the first-year paramedic student at NAIT.
“He is an extremely well renowned coach,” Schneider said. “I’m going to be following his direction and try and improve.”
It was through Schneider’s two-year fitness transformation YouTube video, featuring a series of pictures of the 150-pound 17-year-old turning into a sculptured 220-pounder at age 19, that caught Atwell’s attention. It garnered 2,000 views in five days.
“I’m super happy about that,” said the former Olympian Club swimmer, lifeguard and swim coach. “I wanted to get a viewer base and look for sponsors in the future.”
Schneider is proud of his accomplishment.
“I gained 70 pounds of lean muscle. A lot of progress was made and I worked extremely hard doing it.”
