The First Academy boys weightlifters eye future numbers after winning district title

The First Academy boys weightlifting team’s first district championship title since 2023 wasn’t luck. 

Most of the Royals 23 lifters who competed had to make individual sacrifices for the team’s success. To win districts, guys had to change their weights to score points in every single weight class.

Senior Alex Weaver cut six pounds in about two weeks to meet the 129-pound group. Senior Jackson Jones said they had another teammate who was running in the parking lot before districts to lose enough to make his weight class, and Jones has been cutting down from 183 to 169 since December. 

But it was worth it.  

Weaver and Jones both won first-place in olympic and second in traditional. Their success and their teammates’ other three gold, six silver and three bronze medals contributed to the team’s overall win in olympic with 60 points and second in traditional with 43 to claim the Class 1A, Region 6 District 11 Championship Wednesday, April 8. 

“Definitely very rewarding because there’s a lot that goes into it that people don’t see, with working out, and with form and technique,” Jones said of the win. “Coach Trey (Tyler) says you gotta walk the walk if you’re going to talk and act like you’re going to win. You need to show that. So it was really cool to see, OK, we were talking about it. We expected this. Now we actually went and executed.” 

The team executed off Tyler’s “crazy coaching.”

The entire season, he is crunching numbers and within 20 pounds, he knows what the qualifying weight should be for states through his color-coded spreadsheet. He does this to know — within 5 or 10 pounds — what it will take for his lifters to move on and win. 

“I like numbers,” he said. “I like to over prepare. I don’t like to go into something not knowing enough. … I tell my kids, ‘We don’t chase people. We chase numbers.’ Chasing people gets you in trouble, because emotions hype the atmosphere and can push a kid or pull a kid back. But if you find a number and you aim for that, the number doesn’t change.” 

Two weeks before districts, Tyler allowed the lifters to push themselves to get comfortable with their heaviest weight, but the week leading up to it and to regionals or states, they backed off the numbers. The day before, he had athletes lift 80% to prime their muscles to do a similar lift the next day. 

Jones said Tyler uses bar velocity trackers, which measure how fast a lifter pushes a bar. It turns red if it’s too slow and the lifter should decrease the weight, or green if the push is fast enough. That tool helped Jones understand it’s not only about lifting the weight but also about pushing himself harder than he wanted. 

It’s part of why Jones and Weaver both qualified for states last season. 

RETURN TO STATES

Weaver began weightlifting last season. At districts last year, he was warming up and accidentally went up 20 pounds, which set a personal record, and he did it again at regionals. In two weeks, he advanced from 150 pounds to 194, and that’s the sole reason why he made states. 

“I had to go tell my coach that all my numbers needed to be changed,” he said. “So instead of hitting 150 for the third rep, I’d hit 170. It’s fun watching my coach, for the second time in a row, kind of freaked out over jumping again on this.” 

Jones’ journey slowly built over time. He has been on the weightlifting team for four years, and as a freshman, Tyler watched Jones try to clean and jerk but actually deadlift at regionals. Then two years later, he went to states. 

“We went to states last year, and I asked (Jones), ‘How does it feel to go from someone who just deadlift in their last attempt to someone competing at the state level?’” Tyler said. “He’s like, ‘I’m not done.’ So this year, our goal is to get him on the podium.”

This year brings the first season with a one-week gap between districts, regionals and states. 

TFA will send 17 lifters to compete in the Class 1A, Region 6 Regionals Thursday, April 23, at Frostproof High. Each of those athletes will lift for a shot to make it to states Friday, May 8. 

But the additional time between each of the meets comes with its positives and negatives. It means Weaver has to maintain his weight of 129 for four weeks, which he said definitely will be a challenge. Tyler said it also presents more opportunities for fatigue and injury to his lifters who also play other sports, such as Jones playing lacrosse. 

It also means there’s another week for the athletes to increase their strength and maintain form. 

“Everything we do is for God’s glory,” Tyler said. “Your talents come from God. So more important, you should push that talent to the furthest ability it can go. We’re not all going to be state champions. … For these guys (who) come in every day, they know that. They know their talent is a gift and they have to maximize that as much as they can in here.”