Bert’s Lady Friend – Part One

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Editor’s Note: In 2012, Justin spent a majority of Mondays discussing female-specific topics. Eventually, he pretty much ran out of material and lately, they’ve trickled down a bit, though I believe they are still very popular. I hope to bring these back with a vengeance. Not only do I really enjoy coaching female Powerlifters (remember this article?), I also love the positive message that we, as a community, try to put out there for our female lifting friends. Readers, especially females, please send me your Monday posts and let’s do this.Today’s article is the first guest post by Bert, who recently coached his lady friend to her first PL meet. This week he discusses some of the experiences and difficulties they went through in her early training, and next week, we’ll get a full recap from her first meet. – Jacob

In October 2012, I met my new girlfriend. Unexpectedly, when she first set foot in my home gym, she immediately fell in love with it: the rings, the weights, the medicine balls, the kettlebells. I introduced her to the squat, press, chinup and deadlift, showed her a few training videos (powerlifting, weightlifting and Crossfit-type conditioning) and she knew what she wanted to do: powerlift.

Bert’s Home Gym

She was built to lift: 5’1″, with thick joints and a broad athletic background that ranged from equestrian vaulting (gymnastics on a horse ) to judo.

However, she had a few challenges:
Lower Back: falling from a horse caused her to crack a few vertebrae and suffer from lower back pain that impeded her from standing for prolonged periods of time or participate in most sports. Her physicians had her doing plenty of balancing, exactly what a girl who is able to stand on one leg on a galloping horse needs to recover (sarcasm). This, of course, did nothing.
Neck: a whiplash that was caused by a car crash, caused her neck pain, even though this crash occured six months earlier.
Digestion: due to eosinophilic gastroenteritis, her private and professional life was disturbed. She often suffered from intestinal attacks that caused heavy sweating, fever and intestinal drama and gassiness. Endoscopy and other allergenic tests revealed no gluten or lactose-intolerance, nor adverse reactions to any other food. She was, however, unable to eat most fruit, meat and vegetables without trouble. Instead she relied on pasta, bread and candy. The saddest part, for me, was that she stated that “she simply didn’t like eating.”
Weight gain: she had gained 10 kilos (22 pounds) from cortisone injections meant to deal with the intestinal inflammation. She stopped the treatment and was able to lose 5 kilos on her own so far, by running. The PCOS possibly also caused her to be slightly insulin-resistant.
Vitamin and Mineral Deficiencies: her gut didn’t produce ferritin (a protein that stores iron) and vitamin B12, forcing her to receive it intravenously via monthly visits to the hospital.

Diet Changes
After making sure that she was willing to go all out with this, I modified her diet by having her eat two to three meals a day. Since she didn’t like to eat breakfast, I had her skip it, conforming with the 16/8 intermittent fasting protocol. This reduced the bloating immensely. After some evaluation, it turned out that pasta (her former favourite food), first and foremost, caused the digestive attacks. Secondly, food that contained a high amount of gluten (most breads) and processed food were culprits.

After an adaptive period, she found out that she seldom suffered from the intestinal troubles and was even able to eat meat and fruits again, which she had missed dearly. Her skin also cleared up and some minor joint inflammation she had also disappeared, most likely due to reduced systemic inflammation.

Training Changes
I had her begin a simple routine, alternating A and B workouts three times a week. On the other days she ran with her dogs or went for a long walk. She used linear progression for the first two months with only minor modifications. I had her overhead pressing dumbbells at first, until she was strong enough to use a barbell.

A: Squat, OHP, RDL, Chins
B: Squat, Bench, Hip Thrust, Chins

Other assistance exercises included hyperextensions, (more) hip thrusts, rack pulls, and abdominal exercises.Since she had a very weak posterior chain (yet strong anterior chain), I had her do many lower back, glute and hamstring exercises. Deadlifting was at first impossible, as she was unable to hold the required back position throughout the movement, even with an empty bar. RDLs and Rack Pulls strengthened this back position. After two months she switched from conventional to sumo deadlifts, which suited her back and leverages (short arms and legs) much better.

Powerlifting Meet
After two months, she had made a radical physical transformation: she had lost weight, gained muscle, improved her lifestyle (by not having to go to the restroom so often) and had regained her love for food. In addition, her confidence was soaring.
She now had her mind set on doing a powerlifting meet. Her routine wasn’t a typical powerlifting routine as I felt she still had much room to improve things like overhead strength and other physical qualities that would assist her powerlifts regardless.
She was now doing the following:

Monday: Squat, Bench, Sumo DL, Chins
Wednesday: Squat, OHP, Kettlebell DL, Chins
Friday: Squat, Bench, Rack Pull, Chins

Assistance work remained the same. She did conditioning with sprints or circuits once a week, on Saturdays.

Strength Increases and the Future
After three months of training, she was able to do the following, at a bodyweight of 55kgs (121lbs), with only weightlifting shoes, no belt:
Squat: 67.5 kg (148.5 lbs)
Paused Bench Press: 40 kg (88 lbs)
Sumo Deadlift: 65 kg (143 lbs)

In addition, she can do four strict chinups, after starting out with zero. She’s also able to run faster and longer, while training less. After being told to “live with” her conditions by many a doctor or physician and dietician, she was able to improve her jest for life, her appearance and her confidence. I hope she continues to improve and that others will be able to find inspiration in her journey, and join in.

 

Tune in next Monday for a recap of her first meet! 

Paleo For Lifters E-book Release

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In late 2007 I shifted my training focus from two years of  “bodybuilding style stuff” back to an emphasis on performance. In early 2008 I started doing CrossFit exclusively for several months. As I was studying Kinesiology material in school, I also soaked up training and nutrition information at home. I read Loren Cordain’s “The Paleo Diet” and implemented it immediately. I quickly found that lots of protein and fat with controlled carbs was not only optimal for performance, but also helped me gain almost ten pounds of lean body mass in a month even though I was doing CrossFit. I was meticulous. In the beginning of 2009 I focused on strength training and put an emphasis on low quality, yet high calorie foods in high quantities. I ate like this for 18 months and gained weight and got stronger, but I always felt a bit sluggish. Since the middle of 2010, I’ve steadily experimented and progressed my diet into something that uses the Paleo diet as a base, but provides enough calories, protein, carbohydrates, and fat to fuel strength and conditioning training.

I constantly aim to improve my knowledge and how I teach nutrition on 70sBig.com has evolved over time. It’s possible to consume enough macronutrients and calories to recover from training and do so with quality foods that make our bodies more efficient and healthy; increased efficiency improves training recovery.

The result is that I maintain a sub-10% body fat while hovering between 210 and 215 pounds and can perform the following any day of the week: squat 450 for reps, press 225, deadlift 500, snatch 125kg, and clean and jerk 155kg. I don’t like humble-bragging, but these methods are effective not only for me, but lifters and trainees I work with.

Paleo for Lifters is an e-book I’ve been writing off and on for months and is about 26,000 words and 60 pages. It surpasses the length of Texas Method: Part 1 by several thousand words but isn’t as big as The Texas Method: Advanced, which sits at about 35,000 words. While the TM books were riddled with figures, graphs, and images, Paleo for Lifters is mostly just old fashioned text and explanation. Those who have read my books in the past know that I don’t put out crappy e-books, and this book is chock-full of useful information.

Add to Cart

Table of Contents
Preface
1 —  Introduction
2 — Nutrition Basics
3 — Why Paleo?
4 — Implementation
5 — Tips and Such
6 — A Final Word

The early chapters explain the basics of nutrition physiology as well as how much food a lifter, athlete, or trainee needs. Chapter 3 explains why the Paleolithic Diet is a good foundation for quality food and how it can help reduce systemic inflammation and therefore improve training recovery. Chapter 4 teaches readers how to use the Paleo diet to get enough quantities of protein, carbs, and fat and even how to tweak it based on body type and goal. Section topics include questionable and acceptable food choices (that differ from Paleo zealot recommendations), supplements, types of trainees, and a step-by-step guide to improving food quality. Chapter 5 ties up loose ends by covering topics like how to effectively use “cheat meals” (a goofy term that I use for consistency’s sake), how to read food labels, cooking tips, eating on a budget, eating while traveling, timing food intake with training, and how to tweak carbs intake, and information on sleep and hydration.

There are no recipes in this book, though there is a section that gives information on learning how to cook.

PR Friday, 1 FEB 2013

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PR Friday: Post your training PR’s and updates to comments. This gives you chance to communicate with like-minded readers, get encouragement or tips, and to be a part of our community. I know there are a lot of lurkers because every time people meet me or message me they say, “I always read, but I never comment. I’ll have to start commenting.” Join in on the fun.

Week In Review: “Women Allowed In Combat Arms“, “Paleo for Lifters“, “Never Miss A Chance to Get Better“, and “Lessons From Lifting“.

The Super Duper Bowl

The NFL championship game is this Sunday and it has turned into big media frenzy. I’ve personally avoided anything about the game since the media hype can produce a huge let down on Super Bowl Sunday. But, more importantly, do you give a shit about this game? I love football, grew up playing and watching it, and I’ll be watching this Sunday, but the celebrity frenzy can be laborious.

What about pro athletes? Do you really give a damn about them? Are they clowns paid to perform for you? Do you care that Raven’s linebacker Ray Lewis possibly murdered or witnessed a murder on the weekend of Super Bowl 34? Does a different set of ethics apply to famous people?

If a white trash chick skipped trial 20 times, violated probation, then made some shit up about not showing up to court and everyone found out she was lying, and then was not sent to jail, how would you feel? Cause that’s the life of Lindsey Lohan.

And more importantly, do you care if Beyonce lip-syncs the national anthem?

Who wins the game?

These are the questions America needs to know!

 

 

 

Lessons From Lifting

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Along with opening the site to reader submissions, I’ve asked various friends to contribute. Aaron is a PJ, or pararescue jumper, a Special Operations job in the Air Force where operatives are tasked with recovery and medical treatment of personnel in humanitarian and combat environments. His experience, attitude, and humor are unique and he can squat over 405. –Justin

I’ve been in the military for 11 years. I joined the Air Force after spending some time bouncing around Ohio where I grew up. I was always good enough at sports to make the varsity team – I swam and played water polo – but I wasn’t good enough to pay for school or to make a living out of it. I wasn’t challenged enough by college to care to keep going. For about 8 months in the start of 2001, I talked to recruiters, asked what they could offer me, took some placement tests, and scored well enough to get my pick of jobs. I wasn’t sure I wanted to go in despite coming from a family heavily entrenched in military and civil service. I wasted a lot of time that year. Then September 11, 2001 came and went, and like so many other young men and women I was gone a month later.

I chose the Air Force to try out for Pararescue, or PJ – a special operations job in the Air Force where operatives are tasked with recovery and medical treatment of personnel in humanitarian and combat environments. It’s arguably the hardest Special Operations job in the United States military. I was attracted by the difficulty, the attrition rate (more than 90% fail), and the mission. Saving lives, bringing home fallen Eagles, no matter the cost. “That others may live” is the motto. Small teams are asked to do impossible things only to succeed time and time again. It’s mentally challenging, physically demanding, and packed full of the world’s best training opportunities. It took all of 5 seconds for my recruiter to tell me about the job before I wanted to sign papers.

This is usually the point in the story where I tell you how I completed selection, realize my dreams, but it’s not. I failed the selection course for Pararescue, called “The Indoctrination Course”, or colloquially “INDOC”. I did not have the maturity, physical skills or mental preparedness needed to be a PJ, and I found that out in the harshest way over the course of my first year in the military. I love the saying, “failure is not an option.” I assure you, it most certainly is an option.

I spent 5 years in Washington, D.C. working a very cool but very “desk” job. I excelled, made a couple stripes, and was well set up for a very “easy” career in the Air Force. I loved the people I worked with, I loved the Air Force, and I loved my life. I even got married, had a baby – the whole deal.

At 3 a.m., on the night I graduated from Basic Army Airborne School, my wife looked at me as she held my then-three-week-old daughter, and said the one thing that changed all of our lives.

“It made you want to go back, didn’t it? Did jump school make you want to try INDOC again?”

I responded with some really pansy type, “Uh, babe, you know…”

“Shut up” was the only response from my wife. “Put the packet in. Let’s go back. But I am changing the locks on the doors, and you aren’t coming home to this family unless you pass. You can get your new keys at graduation. You are gambling on our lives here, and I won’t bet on anything but a sure bet. Let’s do this.”

Fast forward to now. 8 years after that conversation, I am a PJ with multiple combat deployments, and international SOF experience. I just returned from a deployment, and I am getting ready for the next one, as usual.

But now the question: why did I spend 300 words telling you this, and what does it have to do with 70’s Big?

Well, it has everything to do with it. Along my journey, a couple resounding truths kept my head right and kept me on the right track.

  1. You have to stand up, do the work, and grind out every day of your life. Some say, “Half of life is just showing up,” but the other half is putting out, and getting the work done. 50% is a failing score in real life; just showing up isn’t enough.
  2. The second you lose sight of item 1, someone will call you on it and you will pay a penalty. In my line of work, that could conceivably mean a serious injury or death – or the worst possible scenario, that I would be unable to answer the call when it comes. It seems as if I got those two consequences in the wrong order. Trust me, I didn’t.

These lessons were taught to me at the gym. Not during some “cool guy” combat scenario or during a movie-type scene; I learned these things under a bar. Trying to find a way to push into a max-effort set; showing up an hour early to make sure I get my mobility work in; getting up hours before the sun because I don’t have enough time in my day; or refusing to miss a weight or a progression. These lessons were taught to me in the most unforgiving fashion possible. The weight is constant and the entry in your journal for that day is a pass/fail event. Would you like to skip today’s workout, or mail it in and only do 75% of what you had programmed that day? That’s fine. Just realize you will not be strong and you’ve increased your chance of failing. If you are ok with that, well, I’m not sure we are going to get along.

Throughout my career I’ve loved learning and passing knowledge on. Long ago I saw the value of strength training and have never looked back. Three years ago I found my way to 70’s Big and saw a community of like-minded individuals and have been an avid follower since. When I was presented the opportunity to contribute in any way, I was amped.

So, here we are. Hopefully, I can contribute some quality articles. I want to bring my military and Special Operations experience as well as my experience coaching athletes of all shapes and sizes – males, females, special operators, intel officers, housewives and grandparents. Hopefully my experience can help make 70’s Big readers better.

If not, at least I “showed up”, and that’s at least worth half credit.

 

Aaron is a Pararescueman (PJ), a special operations job in the Air Force where operatives are tasked with recovery and medical treatment of personnel in humanitarian and combat environments. He spends his free time eating meat and repetitively moving heavy things. 

Never Miss A Chance To Get Better

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70’s Big started as a joke six months before the site launched in September of 2009. After coining the phrase, our group of friends saw 70’s Big in everything we did. Eating a one pound burger was 70’s Big. Getting eight hours of sleep was 70’s Big. Air guitaring was 70’s Big. Anything that pushed us towards the goal of being stronger and bigger was 70’s Big.

The attitude of 70’s Big has been in my life for almost four years, but the mentality has been around longer. Shouting the phrase, “Never miss a chance to get better!” and following it with impromptu exercise was one of my favorite public jokes. See two chairs together? Get a few dips in. See a sidewalk? Get some walking lunges. Never miss a chance to get better.

I distinctly remember shouting the phrase outside a bar on Halloween in 2008 when AC and I dressed up as speed walkers. I drunkenly shouted the phrase, jumped on an awning, and started doing pull-ups. When I landed, I looked down to see blood seeping out of a gash on my hand. “Never missing a chance” has its consequences, but this didn’t stop me from speed walking up and down the bar or doing jumping jacks in the corner.

This pic was taken a few minutes after the hand gash incident (I hold a napkin to stop the bleeding). Friends Brock and Taylor (gorilla) pose with AC and I.

This “joke” is a derivative of a long-time belief I established at an early age: people should not only never plateau in life, but they should never be satisfied with plateauing. The very idea should make them vomit.

Some people hang their hat on past accomplishments as if it gives them the right to complacency. “Success” is not something that a person ever qualifies for, but a state of mind that results from honestly striving for it. 

Personally, I don’t think anything I’ve done is impressive. Graduating college, coaching people, or establishing this website — to me these are byproducts of the work I’ve put in. I don’t ever focus on what I’ve achieved, but focus on what I could have done better. And there’s a lot that I could have done better. I don’t dwell or fester on the  bad, but use it as a tool to improve. Just like in lifting, if something goes wrong, figure out why, and then work towards rectifying the problem. Everyone has good traits that clash with flaws, yet it’s overcoming the flaws that allow us to show our quality while working towards success.

My intention with this website has always been to educate and subsequently motivate. If that means I have to act like a fuck-head to get your attention, then that’s something I’m willing to do. If you get nothing else from 70’s Big, I hope it’s the motivation to bust your ass in training, but it’s my sincerest hope that this rubs off into the rest of your life. Attack your life goals with the same intensity you use during a 3RM squat attempt. Train your mind, speak foreign languages, study history, understand philosophy, play musical instruments — independently think and actively learn to better yourself. It’s no different than training your body and equally important.

Above all…never miss a chance to get better.