Powerlifting Guides
Everything you need to understand the sport - from your first meet to federation rules, scoring formulas, weight class strategy, and competition day preparation.
Powerlifting Training for Beginners: Your First Year
A practical guide to training in your first year of powerlifting - choosing a program, understanding progression, building technique, and preparing for your first competition.
Attempt Selection Strategy for Powerlifting Meets
A deep dive into powerlifting attempt selection - how to choose your opener, second, and third attempts for maximum total, how to adjust in real time, and the strategy behind competing for different goals.
Understanding Powerlifting Strength Standards
What strength standards are, how they are calculated, what the classifications mean, and how to use them to set realistic competition goals and track your progress over time.
Competition Psychology: The Mental Side of Powerlifting
Mental preparation strategies for powerlifting competition - managing nerves, building confidence, developing pre-lift routines, handling missed lifts, and performing under pressure when it counts most.
Peak Week and Weight Cutting for Powerlifting
How to approach the final week before a powerlifting meet - managing weight, tapering training, and peaking performance. Includes safe weight cutting strategies and what to avoid.
Injury Recovery and Prevention for Powerlifters
How to manage common powerlifting injuries, train around pain without losing progress, return to competition after time off, and build resilient programming that reduces injury risk over the long term.
Raw vs Equipped Powerlifting: Understanding the Divisions
A clear breakdown of the differences between raw, classic raw, single-ply, and multi-ply powerlifting divisions - what gear is allowed, how it affects performance, and how to choose the right division for you.
Powerlifting Weight Classes: How to Find Your Best Division
Everything you need to know about powerlifting weight classes - how they work, current classes for all major federations, how to cut weight safely, and how to find the class where you'll compete best.
Powerlifting Equipment Guide: What to Buy and Why
A practical breakdown of every piece of equipment used in powerlifting - from mandatory competition gear to performance accessories - with buying advice and federation compliance notes.
Training Periodization for Powerlifters
How to structure your training across weeks, months, and years to keep making progress. Covers linear progression, block periodization, peaking phases, and programming principles for raw and equipped powerlifters.
Powerlifting Federations Guide: Where to Compete
A detailed breakdown of the major powerlifting federations worldwide - IPF, USAPL, USPA, WRPF, APF, and more. Covers drug testing policies, equipment rules, weight classes, and how to choose the right federation.
Nutrition for Powerlifting: Fueling Strength and Performance
A practical guide to eating for powerlifting - covering calorie targets, protein intake, weight class management, meet-day nutrition, and the most common dietary mistakes that cost lifters progress.
Meet Day Guide: Everything You Need to Know Before Competing
A complete walkthrough of powerlifting meet day - from weigh-ins and equipment checks to warm-up strategy, attempt selection, and reading the scoreboard. Know exactly what to expect.
How to Squat for Powerlifting: Complete Technique Guide
Master the competition squat from setup to lockout. This complete technique guide covers stance, bar placement, bracing, depth cues, common mistakes, and coaching cues for every phase of the lift.
How to Deadlift for Powerlifting: Complete Technique Guide
Master the conventional and sumo deadlift for powerlifting competition. This complete technique guide covers setup, the pull sequence, lockout, choosing your stance, and the five most common deadlift mistakes with targeted fixes.
How to Bench Press for Powerlifting: Complete Technique Guide
Master the competition bench press from setup to lockout. This complete technique guide covers arch, grip, leg drive, the diagonal bar path, pause timing, and fixes for the five most common bench press mistakes.
Powerlifting Scoring Explained: Wilks, DOTS, and IPF GL Points
A clear explanation of how Wilks, DOTS, and IPF GL Points work, why they exist, and which formula is used where. Includes worked examples and a comparison of how they rank different lifters.
The Complete Beginner's Guide to Powerlifting
New to powerlifting? This complete beginner's guide covers everything you need to know to start competing - from the three lifts and basic rules to equipment, training, and your first meet.
Learn Powerlifting from the Ground Up
Powerlifting has a steeper learning curve than it looks from the outside. The sport has its own vocabulary, rulebook, and culture that can feel overwhelming to a newcomer. These guides exist to flatten that curve. Written for competitive lifters at every level, they cover the topics that matter most: understanding the sport's structure, navigating the federation landscape, preparing for your first (or fiftieth) meet, and making sense of scoring systems that can seem needlessly complex until you understand what problem they solve.
Every guide on this page is informed by the OpenPowerlifting dataset - over 3.84 million competition entries from 1,000,000+ lifters across 100+ federations. Where we reference standards, benchmarks, or typical performance levels, the numbers come from real competition data, not generalised estimates. Use the tools on this site alongside the guides to put theory into practice: calculate your Wilks or DOTS score, see your percentile rank, model your attempt strategy, or compare federations side by side.