CJ Cummings, a dominant -73kg athlete on Team USA Weightlifting, just floored us all with his insane walkout into a 205kg overhead squat.
Cummings has had an impressive year to say the least for USA Weightlifting, and is trying to position himself for a final roster spot heading into the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. This year already he’s broken 15 records at the 2019 Pan American Weightlifting Championships, and also won his fourth IWF Junior World Weightlifting Championship.
Cummings shared the overhead squat on his Instagram page, and captioned it “Slow and Steady.” Considering just how much weight he had locked out over his head, 205kg or 451.9 lbs, we don’t think this looks particularly slow. Many athletes would lose the bar if it wobbled this much when overhead, but this walk out is a testament to the superb stability that Cummings has built over his career.
Check out his big lift below,
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1ZEMRgF4ym/
This is the most we’ve seen Cummings overhead squat before, but this is definitely an exercise he’s been training frequently. Last week he posted a video of him overhead squatting 200 kg, although that one didn’t include the walkout. Training the overhead squat is a key exercise to help build strength for other movements like snatches and jerks, especially if, like Cummings, you do squat jerks instead of split jerks.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B088ahZFQw3/
Cummings is preparing for the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) World Championships coming up next month. The IWF World Championships runs from September 18 through September 27th in Pattaya, Thailand and is a gold-level qualifying event for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. Cummings was named to USA Weightlifting’s 24-athlete roster earlier this month, and will be looking to extend his dominance in the -73kg weight class.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1H1tpmHjNR/
We’re excited to see what Cummings’ prep continues to look like ahead of Worlds, and if he decides to keep up with this overhead squat video session once a week, we’re even more pumped to see his next walkout.
Featured image from @cj__cummings Instagram page.
