President's Message



The last two months have been exciting ones for "getting USAPL on track." The Executive Committee mandate at the National Governing Body meeting in July was to: 1) investigate ways to increase the membership of the federation, 2) strengthen drug testing, and 3) to look for ways to market our products. That is, drug free powerlifting with a legitimate international affiliation.

Youth Program

One of the ways we want to expand is in terms of the audience that we attract to powerlifting. As was mentioned in the NGB meeting, encouraging youth to participate, so that they may develop sound training and competition strategies, as well as to give them, and their families the opportunity to participate on our platform. The USAPL youth program will extend our lower age down to 10 years of age starting the 21st of September. There will be a 10 - 11 age group, and a 12 - 13 age group. It is our goal to help these young athletes prepare for successful competition through competition rules that suit their young bodies, and which acknowledge the need for them to learn proper technique and form. Accordingly, the 10 - 11 year old division will have use a different scoring system that all of our other age groups. The lifters will be scored on six total attempts, two from each lift. This will insure that the premium is on made attempts rather than maximum poundage. The 12 - 13 age group will be scored, as is all other divisions, on the best lift of each in each of the three disciplines, squat, bench press, and deadlift. If a lifter in either age group does not get a successful attempt in one discipline, they will be allowed to continue in the meet, so that they will gain experience. They will not, however, be allowed to achieve a total for placing.

The weight classes are being adjusted for these young competitors as well, starting with a 30 kg. division (66 lbs.). Please see the program description, under Coaching for a complete list of weight classes. American records will be established for these athletes, and divisions for them will be added to Women's Nationals (girls), and Teen/Jr. Nationals (boys). Membership fees will be $15 annually.

USAPL Marketing

Another mandate from the NGB meeting was to investigate better marketing for USAPL. In line with this, we have just initiated a contract with a marketing firm in the Virginia area which will include development of a marketing plan, as well as looking specific strategies for publicizing aspects of our programming, such as merchandising, news media relations, etc.

Project Teams

In my previous newsletter, I mentioned project teams to address specific areas in which growth or improvement is needed. These teams work outside the regular committee structure. Their mandates are to bring to the E.C. concrete proposals which can be implemented within specific time frames.

Meet Promotion Project Team

The meet promotion project team is looking at ways to improve the efficiency and friendliness of hosting a USAPL competition. They are revisiting the Meet Promoter's Guide, and synopsizing it in a series of succinct checklist for organizers.

OMT Project Team

The Out of Meet Testing Project team is reviewing our protocols, tightening up procedures, and making suggestions as to collector networks and OMT pool designation. This team has set an ambitious goal of 50+ OMT's by the end of the year. Consistent with this, USAPL has solicited a proposal for limited third party testing, to start slow, but to augment our collector network. We are working on finalization of the pilot project related to the doping control passport for use by international traveling teams and, perhaps, within the country. The OMT Project Team is looking at development of our lifter database to include those tested, date, location, etc. This has been tracked by hand in the past, which has made for a significant workload in terms of statistics and reports.

Training Camps

For the past several years, the idea of holding training camps for our athletes and coaches has been kicked around. Several USAPL members have lead the way by holding training camps, with more to come in the near future. Paul Fletcher and his crew in Baton Rouge recently hosted a mini-camp for high school athletes. Johnny Graham has offered a workshop on coaching strategies to high school coaches in Texas. A three-day camp is being planned in Washington focusing on higher level athletes, including meet preparation strategies and use of equipment. I'm sure I've missed some of the developing plans, but these are representative of the work that is being initiated. Please consider hosting one of these events in your area. You'll be surprised at the interest, and the willingness of USAPL athletes and coaches to help out.

Technical Rules

I would be remiss if I didn't touch on issues of judging and technical rules. As you are aware, the NGB adopted IPF Technical Rules of competition this summer. That means that portions of the USAPL rulebook will be obsolete. It is currently being revised, and will be returned shortly, to the USAPL website. IPF rules are fairly straightforward, and are available on the web, at www.powerlifting-ipf.com. Please check the "Technical Rules menu for downloadable rule books, and the "Technical Newsletter" for current rule interpretations. We will be reminding all USAPL referees of these resources in the near future.

I would like to close by thanking all of you, again, for your hard work to make USAPL a better, stronger, and larger organization, and to wish the best of luck to our competitors traveling overseas to compete in the next few months.

Larry