My friend Mike Hom (you’ll remember him from this video montage) has a goal of deadlifting 405×20. This may be daunting for most lifters, but Hom only weighs 190. But when you remember that he has pulled 505×5, it seems reasonable. Well, he’s almost there.
Note the shirt as he pulls 405×16.
That was a PR for Mike, and he wants to get 20 reps by September. If you’ve got any Personal Records then bust them out in the comments on this glorious PR Friday.
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Here is a very cool video of David Rigert mostly preparing for a 210kg clean and jerk (he was a 90kg lifter).
Note: There’ll be a new Saturday post that announces the “Comment of the Week” and some other kind of nonsense.
I’ve ran this site since last September — for free. I don’t know if yous guys know that. In the past nine months, this website has consumed more of my time than anything else. I bet I spent more time working on it than I did training. Sometimes it’s painstakingly hard to think of something to post when it’s 10:00 PM the night before, but some how I’ve managed to pull something out of my ass on a regular basis.
I like to think that I’ve had a nice blend of humor and entertainment. The only thing I really care about it is teaching people to get stronger and subsequently healthier (among other things). That’s the whole purpose of this site. So if I have to put up a YouTube video of my friends or me dancing like fools to get you to read some of the serious/helpful stuff, then I’ll do it (I have more of these videos, by the way).
Anyway, with that being said, here is my shameless plug for some new services that are available, Online Programming, Programming Consultations, and 70’s Big Workshops. You can read about them here, or click on the Services tab at the top of the page.
The Online Programming will net you a new best friend (me) and a training program. I will not sing you lullabies. The Consultations are those who don’t want a new best friend, but want to talk on the phone once t hash out a program. The Workshops are a traveling whacky inflatable sideshow and educate people on all kinds of things about training. You can read about them in more depth on the Servicespage.
Now that that’s settled, here is an obligatory European techno/electro/dance video that includes half of a 70’s Big guy with a sick beard. Warning: intense flexing and confusing images ahead. Watch the whole thing if you really want to be confused.
What I want you all to focus on, aside from how awesome the old guy was in the video, is that he apparently is in his 50’s (maybe 60’s, I can’t tell because the words are lost in his beard). I mean, he looks like he’s at least 72, but that’s not the point. He lifted that fridge overhead like a man should, much to the approval of his wife. And he didn’t need the tailgate down.
Wouldn’t it be nice to do that at 50 years old? I don’t know about any of you, but I’d like to still compete in weightlifting at that age. My friend, Lon Kilgore, started competing when he was 11 and still competes into his early 50’s. That’s awesome. If that’s gonna happen, then we need to address a few things.
The only person that has been on this site that is in danger of doing something spectacular as a world class athlete is Kendrick Farris. The rest of us lift because it is a glorified hobby. Some readers may do it because it helps them do their job as a law enforcement officer or military personnel, but for those of us that will compete in things that probably won’t get us killed, we are simply hobbyists.
We have goals and should train hard, but we need to be mindful of not completely breaking down in the process. Strength is incredibly important for longevity and overall health, so let’s not let our pursuit of it turn everything into an unhealthy endeavor. Keep in mind I’m not saying that Skinny Guy needs to have a pristine diet. No, that little bastard needs to eat everything so that we don’t have to call him Skinny Guy anymore. Eventually he won’t be skinny, and he’ll learn how to eat correctly for the maintenance of lean body mass, and we’ll have a delightfully productive human male among us.
But make sure you’re doing all of the little things correctly, like warming up properly, handling injuries and set backs correctly, and taking rest when you need it. And next time you make an AC Jump on your weight, remember Bill Starr’s old adage:
Patience + Persistence = Strength
A Request For Experienced Lifters
I’d like to ask any experienced lifters and competitors to share what they have learned they need to do in order to keep training, whether it be training for competition or maintenance, as well as anything they wish they would have done differently when they were younger. I shouldn’t have to say this, but “experienced lifter” would probably mean you’re at least in your thirties if you’ve been training consistently, and I’d like to hear from much older guys. I’m gonna send this link around to pull in some good feedback, and you should do the same.
Note: If you get lost with some of the terms in this post, then a good read-through of Practical Programming is in order. If you are serious about getting stronger or preparing for any kind of competitive event, it is well worth the money.
When you train hard by lifting weights, you disrupt homeostasis in your body. The disruption occurs at a general and a local level. If you are going to continue getting stronger and you aren’t using “medication”, then you need ample recovery for this “metabolic and structural fatigue” to subside.
There is a point in the linear progression when an appropriate body weight is reached (that is variable to the individual, but mostly dependent on height and frame) and recovery processes will start to ebb. This is the diminishing returns aspect of the linear progression; you cannot make five pound jumps on your squat every day forever.
When I approached the mid 400s on my linear progression, things became difficult. If I put any additional work load on my body, then I wouldn’t recover for the next workout regardless of how much I was eating. My comprehensive recovery processes were maxed out and soon would not be able to continue working. I survived a workout of 465x5x3…barely. I knew that it was time to switch over to the Texas Method. That point in which you cannot recover from the work load on a daily basis and must switch over to a program that allows you to adapt on a weekly basis is the conversion from “novice” to “intermediate”.
Linear progression days
Olympic weightlifting soon became my focus, and for different reasons, I went back and forth between a Texas Method program and an Olympic weightlifting program (that included the strength lifts). I began competing in the sport of Olympic weightlifting having performances that ranged from success to failure. Every time I got through a competition, I was eager to start training for the NEXT one. I always identified ways I could improve, and wanted to get started on them immediately.
Not so fast my friends…
It was Dr. Kilgore that gave me the proverbial slap in the face after I qualified for nationals in March. He told me to take a week off and I couldn’t understand it. I had been injured before that meet, I had gotten weaker, and I wanted/needed to be stronger. I didn’t want to hesitate – I only had 14 weeks to get ready for nationals, and I wanted to use every second of it!
He kept explaining to me matter-of-factly things that needed reminding. In the same way that there is a hormonal fluctuation for a novice, the same happens in the long-term for a more advanced lifter. If you are truly peaking for a meet, you change programming variables like volume intensity so that you give your body a chance to supercompensate for that meet. As Rippetoe has written, you don’t get stronger from lifting weights, you get stronger by recovering from lifting weights. The same concept holds true for a taper and peak; you stop doing as much work so that your body doesn’t have as much to recover from, and then your body will be in an optimal state to produce more force at the meet.
At a meet you pummel your body with maximal attempts (which you may or may not be adapted to) and your body may still be limping along from your previous training cycle. The best thing to do (for a non-drugged or non-elite lifter) is to take some time off to let the body get back to an appropriate homeostasis before the next training cycle begins. By trying to blow through your peak into heavy training, you are only reducing your effectiveness.
Recovery is the most important aspect of improvement. If you cannot recover from what you’re doing, then you won’t progress. Ensuring that recovery is fully complete before the next training cycle will help reset your body and your mind. You’ll know that you are starting with a clean slate for the next training cycle. When Kilgore was patiently explaining this to me, he referenced how the Russians of old would have a week of “play”. They’d play racquetball and get outside for a change. A “week of play” would would be a perfect opportunity to partake in activities you may have cut out before the meet so that it didn’t interfere with recovery or prevent injury. Get on a bike, play volletyball, or chase the dog – just do something that isn’t lifting for a week.
Brent told me last night that Dmitry Klokov, a 105kg Russian weightlifter, didn’t lift after the 2004 Olympics until the beginning of the next year. He apparently just swam, and when he came into the Arnold Classic in 2005, he was weighing around 96kg or so. This is an example of an elite athlete needing time off in order to rest his body, and probably more so his mind.
I’ve seen lots of people get overtrained unnecessarily, and they are always worse off for it. Gant has always said, “I have never rested too much.” As much as the “don’t be a pussy” attitude has permeated through strength training culture, it is still best to treat your body right. After you compete, take some time off, relax, and enjoy your plunder. Your body and mind will thank me.
AC has Heracles-esque strength, and I’ve known this for a while. This is why I befriended him long ago; so that I could keep him close as a friend in preparation of when he was a foe. Secretly I know that he is my nemesis (don’t tell AC this), and one day we will battle to the death…
But in the mean time we are best friends, and as Brent would say, “His strength is ill.” He recently pressed 245 for a triple at a body weight of 216. Yeah. I know. Edit: Sorry for the quality, it’s a cell phone vid.
AC and Brent were talking about this video (sheeeeeit, everybody is talking about it), and on AC’s last rep, he yells “YEAH KENT!” to the guy holding the camera. I don’t think this Kent actually “exists”, but Brent thought this was pretty cool (I don’t know why). Being the chivalrous nemesis guy that he is, AC said he’d dedicate his next bench workout to Brent, which was to be 365 for a triple. This pleased Brent, because he is easily pleased by such things, so he decided to dedicate one of his own sets to AC (AKA Ace McGonague). Brent squats 410×5 (he did three sets at this weight) at a body weight around 177.
You’ll notice my other besties with testies, Chris and Mike spotting Brent in the video (we’ve come full circle). To complete this roundhouse kick, here is AC’s final contribution, the video of him squatting 525×2 and benching 365×3 (with a surprise appearance by Taylor, another one of my friends).
So, as you can see, I have proved many points today. I have proved that my friends are stronger than your friends. I have proved that one day, I will destroy Arin W. C********. I have proved that my friends are more amusing than yours. And I also proved that 70’s Big is the way of the chainsawed warrior. Need proof?
QED.
On a side note, doesn’t AC look way more awesome (obligatory no homo because I know I’d get comments on it) with longer hair? Vote on it, for this is the poll to end all polls.
