Plains teen takes bench press trophy

A Plains resident muscled her way to a championship after pressing out 185 pounds in Bill's Bad-Ass Bench Press Meet at Pocatello, Idaho, last month.

Barbara Stewart took first place in the women's 148-pound weight class, her fourth bench press trophy in the last two years. The 19-year-old Stewart, who graduated from Plains High School in 2006, benched 185 pounds on her first attempt.

Nearly a dozen women competed in the five weight classes at Fitness Inc., which was also the site of the Idaho State Open Powerlifting Championships.

Stewart said she had no trouble lifting 185, so she decided to try it with 10 more pounds of weight. Stewart was about one inch of locking out her arms when the judge called it a bad press. She believes the problem was because the judge paused too long when the bar was across her chest. When a person competes at the bench press, he or she takes the weights down to the chest, but must wait for the judge to give the command to lift before taking it back up. The purpose of the pause is to stop a person from bouncing the bar off the chest. She and her father, Jesse Stewart, were surprised that the judge waited so long before telling her to lift. Jesse said the judge waited almost three seconds. "I felt he made me hold it down forever," said Barbara Stewart. "It made me take my mind off the bench; I felt like I was holding it forever."

Stewart tried 195 pounds a second time, but said she was by then too exhausted by then and couldn't complete the lift. She nevertheless took first place with her 185 lift.

She's been training for the Pocatello meet for about two months and had successfully lifted 200 pounds at home about two weeks before the meet. Stewart said she may try 200 at the next meet. She's been training with her father and her brother, Dane Stewart.

She claimed bench press titles in February 2006 at the John Tomich Memorial Bench Press in Butte and in June of the same year she nabbed the Montana State High School Bench Press championship by lifting 170 pounds in the 132-pound weight class. She also captured the women's division trophy of the Wallace High School Iron Man Bench Press Contest in Wallace, Idaho, two years ago. Wallace was her first weightlifting competition.

Stewart started lifting weights as a sophomore in high school as part of her track and field training. The Plains teen routinely finished at the top in running competitions, including cross country. Last year, she was Plains High School's cross country head coach.

When she's not training with weights, she's lifting rocks at her father's company, Stewart Slate and Stone in Plains. "She's my best worker — she outdoes all the boys," he said.

However, she plans to attend college at the University of Montana in January.