As he hoisted the bar for the first time, Jerry Flatterich knew that it wasn't going to be his best day as a competitor.

Sure, he raised 350 pounds off the bench, but his foot moved, so it didn't count. More important, his cranky left shoulder was acting up again.

"I was ... working out maybe three weeks out, and it kind of tweaked a little bit," Flatterich recalled. "It kind of comes and goes. It just depends."

Yet no part of him wanted to quit, either.

"I was going to keep going," Flatterich said. "You know what? I was there. I had already paid. You're not going to get your money back."

Flatterich, a 40-year-old Joint Base Lewis-McChord firefighter, pressed on. Ignoring the pain in his shoulder through three lifts, he won the bench press in the 242-pound class of the police and fire category Feb. 28 at the USA Powerlifting Washington State Championships at the Valley Athletic Club in Tumwater.

After a clean lift of 350 pounds on his second attempt, Flatterich won the competition by pushing 365 pounds on his third and final lift.

"I played it real conservative," Flatterich said. "I could have pushed another - I don't know - 15, 20 pounds. There's no reason to try to hurt myself to do it."

A year ago, Flatterich had established police and fire state records of 363.8 pounds in the 220-pound division and 390.5 pounds in the 242-pound class. He went on to place third in the 2009 Police and Fire World Games in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Fortunately, Flatterich didn't need a Herculean effort this time around.

"I just went with what I had and hoped for the best," Flatterich said. "The outcome was still good."