Strength Training Is Love

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When the 70s big gang went to USAPL Raw Nationals earlier this year, I met a girl there named Becca. She was a pretty lady lifting in the women’s session, and I was paying a lot of attention to her pretty much as soon as she entered my field of vision. I was paying so much attention to her that Justin had to remind me, “You realize you’re currently at a meet, right?” as he was pacing me through my squat warm ups.



Many of you won’t be surprised at my response – “Irrelevant, I can squat 200k in my sleep. First attempt will be ez pz.”



“It is a chore to be your friend,” Justin said.



Justin would use that line a lot throughout the weekend, like when he asked me how he could get my adrenaline going before my third attempt lifts:



“Just tell me I’ll never see her again.”



“Thin ice, Brent Kim. Thin ice.”



To add to the fact that this chick was pretty, she was also a competent lifter with some solid mechanics. I asked her what she finished with after her squats, and she told me that she didn’t know – her parental units, who were handling her, wouldn’t tell her what she was lifting on the platform because she has a habit of over thinking the weight. But when she went in blind, and just methodically repeated what she did in the warm up room, she performed well. I knew instantly that I loved everything about her. She finished with a 286lbs squat, 171lbs bench, and 303lbs deadlift in the women’s 181lbs class. I was sold. Didn’t think I could ask for digits because she was with her parental units, but Justin encouraged me to tell her about 70s big – “Do it or I’ll do it for you” – and I would try to stalk her on facebook. I would ultimately fail, and feel that I would never see her again, but she ended up finding me and after a month or two of chatting decided we should hang out.



We’re a pretty typical, gross couple now, i.e. holding hands in public, which I think is awesome, and we decided it’d be a pretty cool date if I came to lift in Maryland’s state powerlifting meet with her.



I ended up not being able to lift with her because of the 60 lifter cap, and I was a guest lifter so in-state lifter entries take priority over mine, but I still went to see her and help out at the meet.



I loaded and spotted for probably a third of the meet, which was a fair amount of work, partially because a lot of state records were being broken at this meet and there was a fairly strong talent pool present, but pretty satisfying at the end of the day when it was all over. This is the first meet I’ve ever been to in which I did not lift. Met quite a few people from 70sbig, and you can hear all about their exploits in the comment threads of previous posts. Most notable was something that JMOvechkin said to me as I was passing by, “Spotting isn’t a sport,” which I thought was FUCKING awesome.



His brother also asked me if he should take his third deadlift attempt, after rating his second attempt at 501lbs to be a 9/10 difficulty.



“You’re asking me if you should just stop at your second attempt?”



“Yeah.”



“Uhhh I’m never going to tell you to not take a third attempt, but I’m reckless. Quitting isn’t a sport.”



“Yeah,” he answered, “And I’m not a quitter.”



Boom? Boom.



He ended up pulling 507lbs for his final attempt of the meet.



Becca, who was the main motivation for me being at the meet, also produced a strong performance despite not making weight by 2lbs. She dropped 11lbs in about a week, but started cutting too late. Throw in about a hundred other factors that would screw with her preparation in the final days leading up to the meet, and things didn’t look good. She ended up lifting as an extra, but would break some PRs despite horrendous rest and recovery.



I asked her to type a write up for her meet experience, but she declined and asked me to do it instead, so –



She went 9 for 9, and squatted 281lbs pretty easily. Her squats were iffy in the weeks leading up to the meet so her step-dad and coach was conservative here, but she PRed by 11lbs in the bench press with 182lbs, and 17lbs in the deadlift with 320lbs. I loaded and spotted all of her attempts and it was pretty sweet to watch my girlfriend wreck shit. She brought some intensity into her third attempts, which is apparently rare – Becca says that she’s never made noises when she lifted, but she was pretty fierce, especially with her third attempt bench and deadlift. Her efforts would earn her best lifter. I’m pretty proud of her, and seeing her commit to every single lift reaffirmed that I like everything about her. Watching her on the platform reminded me why my heart yearned for her in the beginning. You can tell a lot about a girl from how she performs under the bar at a meet.



It would have been a lot cooler if I was lifting at this meet, but can’t really complain that I still got to help with keeping the meet operational. “Giving back to the sport” is pretty pretentious and sentimental, and Brent Kim doesn’t really do sentimental, but generally speaking, raw powerlifting and Olympic weightlifting wouldn’t survive in the US without a lot of volunteer effort. Running meets is a lot of work, and in Olympic weightlifting it’s pretty common that meet organizers lose money with the event. But the athletes need to compete, and someone has to put in the money and hours and not expect to get very much in return. It was a good experience to be on the other side of things, “the strength training community” means a lot more when a bunch of powerlifters work together to run a meet.



In short, strength training is love, quitting isn’t a sport, and help your fellow man.



Delta Command out. (When I called Justin to let him know I would be writing an article for the site, I told him, “Hunter Two-One this is Delta Command, we’ll be taking over operations on the battlefield until the situation’s been brought under control.”)

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.

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.