Author Archives: Justin

Origins of Thanksgiving, Eating Challenge

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Beard of the Day

The Origins of Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is an interesting holiday. It is a convoluted, weird interpretation of something that didn’t really happen in American history. It’s clear what has actually happened, and I will recount the sequence of events here.

70’s Big is an idea that started in early 2009 and developed into a website by September of the same year. Currently the site easily averages over 3,000 visitors a day. Instead of being concerned with number of readers, 70’s Big is more concerned with establishing a paradigm. Burly men and strong women go forth and take on risks and difficult challenges with fervor in their hearts. They learn this ability through the grueling battles with steel, iron, and gravity. Guts and courage are built through toil; they don’t simply appear at birth.

Alas! Food becomes an important part of this journey of self realization. It is fuel for the body so that the mind can push through each lesson. A man requires a hearty bounty, not egg whites and squash. And thus Thanksgiving was born.

“Bah! Thanksgiving hath endured for centuries; how hath 70’s Big birthed the Great Giving of Thanks?” A valid question, yet the reality is that Thanksgiving has not always existed. There was a time in an alternate universe in which Thanksgiving did not exist while all other things remained constant. The idea of 70’s Big was infectious upon the world as it grew into a dominant way of thinking. Society no longer bitched about being offended and the fame of celebrities waned to that of my big toe. It was a wonderful society that lived through the ages. Several millenia from now, the governing body decided to honor the inception of its way of thinking. Their solution: travel back in time and establish a holiday in which eating a hearty, complete meal was emphasized and glorified. The governing body sent their agents back in time to manipulate such a holiday. In a vain attempt to cloak their true identity, the time travelers showed up in black pilgrim costumes while others showed up as bare skinned Indians. The ruse worked to perfection because the public ate it up, and the Thanksgiving Feast was born.

Do you want to experience South Africa in a different way for your next Thanksgiving trip? Why not check out unforgettable South African rail adventures here.

70’s Big has been preceded by decades of proper eating, a testament to proper planning by the Time Travelers to ensure that skinny people have experienced good eating habits before starting their quest to 70’s Big. “Hard gainers” no longer have shitty excuses as to why they can’t gain weight, because they have done it correctly on at least one day of every year of their lives! Manliness is a choice, and Thanksgiving is as good a place as any to start.

The Thanksgiving Eating Challenge
Now that we have the origin of Thanksgiving out of the way, we can focus on the readers who have chosen Manliness over helplessness; Boldness over cowardliness; and strong over weak. I challenge all of you to an eating contest. We can’t really argue over subjective interpretations of how much you “actually ate”, so instead we’ll measure it by weight gained. You will need to weigh yourself before your feast, and then again after your feast (if you feast throughout the day, then weigh yourself at the end). You will also need to wear the same clothes throughout the day (i.e. wear the same stuff in your pre/post weighing). This would be a proper time to wear your 70’s Big shirt, since it’s our national holiday. Whoever gains the most weight will win a t-shirt. We are probably going to need video or picture evidence of your weigh-ins. This will cut back on cheating, even though it can still happen — don’t be a jackass. On Thanksgiving Day we’ll post our results to the comments.

Good luck to you all, and don’t forget to give thanks to the Time Travelers.

The Key to Longevity

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Beard of the Day

Uncle John says, \’And who\’s your lover?\’

Gerard sent me today’s beard and it was too amusing to ignore.

I’ve enclosed a photo of my wife’s Uncle John, a big, tough,pipe smoking, whiskey drinking Irish farmer. An eccentric, his opening line to strangers is always “And who’s your lover”?

The Key To Longevity

I’ve been fortunate enough to have worked with a lot of different people; young, old, big, little, fat, skinny, healthy, and various health problems or anatomical issues. I’m always impressed by folks who most young people consider “old”. This is anything above the age of 45, and especially over the age of 55 and 60. I honestly don’t consider my friends in this age range as “old” — mostly because when I’m that age I will refuse to consider myself old. Ever since I was younger I wanted to show that good eating and exercise/training habits would be the formula for longevity.

Because of this I’m infatuated with people who are outliers compared to old people. The norm of older adults consists of being out of shape, unhealthy, and taking plenty of medication. They can’t really enjoy the same activities they did when they were younger because “life got in the way”. I’m not chastising them; full-time jobs, families, and the government telling you how to eat and exercise is hard to overcome. Yet in spite of all of that, there are people who are in great shape, don’t ache constantly (or cite such aching for their immobility), and are active, healthy “old people”.

I like talking to these friends or acquaintances to see how they did it. I like to ask them how old they are, compliment them on their success, and most importantly, ask them what the constant has been in their lives. The answer is always slightly different, but it can be derived to the same idea; they have always been active. None of them have ever said, “I eat a specific diet,” or “I’m just lucky”. They always have been consistent with activity and exercise.

One of my friends in Texas is 65 years old and has a hobby of climbing mountains. He has always been a fan of hiking, running, and exercising. He lifts in Rippetoe’s WFAC, so he squats and deadlifts on a semi-regular basis (easily handling 225 for reps in both lifts), and has chiseled calves that most of you would buy if you could. I recently met another man, 59 years old, who has sculpted pecs and biceps that would put us all to shame and he has enjoyed running throughout his life. Another friend is around 63 and has always enjoyed cycling. Dr. Kilgore is in his early 50s and has always enjoyed lifting and has pretty good blood lipid levels (and has had a total of six months of endurance/conditioning training accumulated in his entire life). This small sample size of close friends lean towards endurance exercise, yet they all engage in weight training regularly.

As a person ages, their training will probably reflect that of a generalist approach. They should lift enough to maintain their strength (or improve it if it’s lacking) and do some kind of “cardio” related activity to maintain a baseline of cardiovascular and respiratory function. Focusing on one or the other may neglect some important health benefits, yet severely lacking in strength will cause problems into very old age. Common examples are getting off the toilet, carrying groceries, and maneuvering stairs and steps without struggle or injury. Full body loading will allow the muscles to continue applying force to move the body or external objects and keep structures like bones and tendons from injuring easily (which will avoid things like stepping off the curb and breaking a hip). Yet all of this is for naught if the older person tries to implement it when they are already old; taking the preventative measure will have that trim and healthy when they achieve oldness. The preventative measure is not taking a break from exercise and activity.

The only way to ensure that your body avoids adapting to a lack of activity (insert image of the unable sedentary person here) is to consistently exercise, train, and move. For those looking to challenge both body and mind, experiences like #labyrintoom offer a perfect opportunity to engage in stimulating puzzles and physical movement, providing a fun and effective way to strengthen both mental agility and physical fitness.

If you plan on being around when you’re older, this should put things in a different perspective. Failing that PR squat isn’t as traumatic because it’s a process. Thirty years from now, your failed PR will just be a training day. Training assumes that progress is the goal (otherwise it’s just working out), and the overall goal is to still be able to train when you’re 50, 60, or 70 years old. It’s hard to look at the big picture when you’re young, but the best thing you can do is commit to a life of exercise and activity, no matter what’s going on in your life. There are 24 hours in a day, and 96 segments of 15 minutes in that span. If you can’t take two of those 96 segments to train several days a week, then you won’t have to worry about being around when you’re old.

And since the CrossFit people are already considering it, nutrition doesn’t mean dick if you aren’t exercising. If the body isn’t experiencing an event that will make it perform better, then fuel or hormonal manipulation through diet is worthless (unless you’re doing a hardcore calorie deficit, but that’s just weird, and you’ll end up 90’s small and breaking a hip when you leave Wal-Mart’s senior citizen sale). Force your body to be more efficient through consistent exercise; it’s what fit older people have done.

PR Friday

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PR Friday

Submit your week’s personal records to the comments. Or say hi. Or update us on your training. Or talk about football. Especially talk about football, because Brent doesn’t like football (conversely, football doesn’t like Brent).

Beard of the Day

My lady took this picture of Glykon's Herakles



Update: Oops, stuff came up. Training, errands, and F-22 Raptor pilot graduation. I’m sorry I’m not sorry.

Doyle Kenady Is A Model Citizen

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903 pound WR deadlift by Doyal Kenady



Doyle Kenady weighed 305 pounds of, as you can see, grizzled muscle. Dr. Fred Hatfield (AKA Dr. Squat) pays tribute to Doyle (he gives him the honor of Dr. Deadlift) in this excellent article written in Powerlifting USA (November, 1986). The world record at the time was Bill Kazmaier’s 886. This may not seem like much nowadays since the 1,000 pound barrier has been breached and there are amazing deadlifters like Andy Bolton, Benedikt Magnusson, and Konstantin Konstantinovs. Yet it was still the world record, and Kazmaier was a powerlifting phenom before he transitioned to a career in strongman competitions.

Kenady’s performance in this meet is amazing. I’ll let Dr. Squat give you the recap:

Doyle’s lift will take a special place in the history of great lifts because he did his record buster after massive attempts in the squat and bench press only minutes before. His deadlift was done under the most trying of circumstances possible, under near crippling conditions of fatigue.

Moreover, it was his third attempt that cracked the 900 pound barrier. Imagine! Two attempts in the squat, one of which was over 900 pounds; three attempts in the bench press, all over 500 pounds; then two attempts over 830 pounds in the deadlift before pulling the heaviest, official record breaking deadlift of mankind to an erect standing position.

Hatfield also recounts how Doyle called for a 4th attempt (allowed after setting a world record) and got it to just above his knees despite having to follow his own attempt. I’m sitting here in disbelief; breaking past 900 pounds — when it has never been done before — to set the world record without taking token squat and bench attempts is amazing. No wonder they called this guy “Sasquatch” and “Grizzly Bear” — two of the most bad ass nicknames ever.

Kenady was an amazing athlete, yes, but I want to point out that all of the people that met him or knew him said that he was a very laid back guy. He was kind, supportive, and helpful. Humble and amiable. Kenady had the look of a bad ass but was a genuine nice guy; what a man should be. In a time where athletes trash talk each other and want attention, I look up to Kenady for his “old school” personality. I look up to him as an athlete as well as a man; he is the epitome of a 70’s Big attitude.



Edit: Doyle is no longer living; apparently he died of heart disease. His training consisted of the three big lifts without much assistance work, and his schedule had more rest days than training days. Read Dr. Hatfield’s article and he tells a story of training with Kenady a few weeks before the meet — Doyle pulled 895 for a triple!

Dig Your Way Through

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Beard of the Day


Thanks to Stuart C. for the vid, who says it should be the 70’s Big theme

What have you…

I was listening to Colin Cowherd on ESPN Radio today, and he was addressing two things; that he was allegedly a contrarian, and that Mike Vick is an NFL MVP candidate. Cowherd is in his mid 40s and explained that our society is more “knee-jerk” for a variety of reasons (knee-jerk meaning we respond intensely to things immediately and change our minds collectively). We are a nation of young people; young adults have grown up in the technology era playing videogames, experiencing the boom of the internet, and now we’re in the “social media” age. Information can virally spread within minutes across the globe with Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. Our attention spans are much shorter and our actions are hasty. I know that I run out of things to look at on the internet quickly because I navigate it so fast. I type and click like the wind (it’s necessary for StarCraft).

Cowherd blamed this societal development for the knee-jerk reaction of campaigns flaring up for Vick as the Most Valuable Player in the NFL when he is 19th in the league in passing touchdowns, has only played in 6 of 9 games (and only played in half of one of those games), and his best stats come against mid-level or struggling teams (Redskins are strugglin’ like Brent trying to flex his biceps). The Vick argument aside, Cowherd has a point. There are knee-jerk reactions to everything. If you’ve looked in a “Muscle and Fitness” (or Fiction, as Kilgore likes to say) magazine, it is FILLED with one-time studies and over-generalizations. A study will show that something may be vaguely correlated, and those experts will immediately implement it into their advice (and may even draw up a 15 page article complete with 87 pictures of shaved dudes working out and flexing all the muscles that aren’t involved in the movement). M&F isn’t the only magazine that does this; any major magazine that has any kind of health section will list one research study (without even discussing whether it was a good study to begin with) and generalizing the results. And the general public reads this shit and Eats. It. Up. (to clarify: they don’t actually eat shit).

This is part of the reason why the fitness industry seems like it isn’t salvageable. So much crap has been fed to the layman for 30+ years, it’s hard to say that everyone should know better. The only constant among any of this is that progressive overload training with weights yields strength and muscle while intensity is a must for quality conditioning. Those ideals existed long before the aerobics hysteria and they continue their action today behind the scenes. Relevant research that supports the fundamental ideals is kinda shady since the industry as a whole is what drives research (and funding). It will be even harder to dig the layman out of the shit pile that they find themselves wallowing in. But I will continue wielding the shovel, gently displacing piles of poo until so that I can lead them from their cave of shadows (I wish I didn’t have to link my references although I didn’t link the “Of Mice and Men” reference yesterday).

Two things have to be in effect for the truth to sprout. First, the community that “gets it” — and understands how proper fitness works — shouldn’t look down on the unknowing. Plato couldn’t just bust in the cave and say, “Yo my peoples, yous have been checkin’ out da shadows your whole life, and yous is a bit thick,” (apparently Plato talks like Ali G). Instead we will respectfully lead them in the right direction by teaching them how it can benefit them. We aren’t going to scare them into believing (cough — religion, cough, cough) or coerce them into doing it (cough — tyranny, cough, cough). Secondly, we have to be more scientific about mainstream reporting on research studies that allegedly change medicine, exercise, or health. Find the original studies, determine whether or not it was a good study, and see if it can be generalizable to an entire population. Most often it can’t be — imagine trying to say that something applies to everyone in a world where a gothic teen is the same species as an NFL offensive lineman. Keep a clear head in spite of new fangled research, diets, and training methods. Maintain a commitment to the things that work over and over again, yet keep your mind open in light of development. Ask questions and learn all you can. It won’t make you popular (every time I ask questions at a workshop or seminar, people get angry and have even written nasty things on the internet about it), but it will help you learn.

Helping you learn is all I care about.