With the conclusion of this weekend, we can now wave goodbye to one of the most hyped up powerlifting meets of the year, and like always, it did not disappoint. On Friday and Saturday, the WRPF Boss of Bosses V powerlifting meet went down at Dan Green’s Boss Barbell Club in Mountain View, California.
Whether you’re plugged into the powerlifting world or you’re just a recreational lifter, then there’s a good chance you saw at least some of the lifts that took place at this meet. It had a ton of big names in both the male and female weight classes. Arguably the biggest performance from the weekend came from Hybrid Performance Method athlete Stefi Cohen. She continues to pave new ground for powerlifting athletes everywhere and hit more than one world record shattering strength feat, but more on the below.
Cohen competed in the 56kg/123 lb raw (with sleeves) weight class, and weighed in for the meet at 121.4 lbs. To kick off the meet, Cohen opened with a 182.5kg/402 lb squat, which she moved with ease and was only 2.5kg shy of her current all-time world record. For her second squat, she jumped to 190kg/419 lbs. This was a feat that sealed her with a new all-time world record.
On her third attempt, Cohen went for 195kg/429 lbs, but closely missed. This feat would have smoked her previous world record heading into the meet by 10kg. Side note, Cohen actually squatted this weight about two weeks before hitting the platform, so the strength for 195kg/429 lbs is definitely there.
At this point, momentum was at Cohen’s back. On the bench press, she opened with 95kg/209 lb press and then moved to 100kg/220 lbs for her second (a 2.5kg PR). For her third bench press, Cohen jumped up to 105kg/231 lbs and hit a clean press, which was a 7.5kg PR.
To kick off her deadlifts, Cohen opened with a 215kg/473 lb pull, and she made it look like a warm-up. On her second, she moved to 225k/496 lbs, which was enough to seal her an all-time world record total.
Finally, the third attempt 230kg/507 lb deadlift, aka a lift that made Cohen’s performance one of the best in raw powerlifting history. After a slow start off the ground, Cohen breezed through the pull and locked it out to not only push the total all-time world record further to 524kg/1,157 lbs, but to earn the highest ever Wilks Score for raw (sleeved) competition with a huge 628.29.
If you tuned into the meet live, then they actually mislabeled Cohen’s deadlift for a hot second on the screen, and wrote that the 230kg/507 lb pull was an all-time world record deadlift. But recall, Cohen hit 235kg/518 lbs at the Kern US Open, and the pull at Boss of Bosses V was for an all-time world record total and all-time highest ever Wilks Score.
As of right now, there are only four athletes who have ever scored a 600+ Wilks Score in sleeves (per openpowerlifting.org), and now Cohen sits among the top of them. This feat tops Chakera Holcomb’s recent Wilks Score shattering performance from early June.
Feature image from @steficohen Instagram page.
