Starting Strength

Mark Rippetoe :: Starting Strength :: Getting Started :: Using this Website

Mark Rippetoe

is the author of Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training, Practical Programming for Strength Training 2nd edition, Strong Enough?, Mean Ol' Mr. Gravity, and numerous journal, magazine and internet articles. He has worked in the fitness industry since 1978, and has been the owner of the Wichita Falls Athletic Club since 1984. He graduated from Midwestern State University in 1983 with a Bachelor of Science in geology and a minor in anthropology. He was in the first group certified by the National Strength and Conditioning Association as a CSCS in 1985, and the first to formally relinquish that credential in 2009. Rip was a competitive powerlifter for ten years. He won the 198-pound weight class at the Greater Texas Classic in 1982, and placed in state- and regional-level meets for the next 6 years, retiring from competition in 1988. For the next 10 years Rip announced most of the powerlifting meets in North Texas, including the 1995 APF Nationals in Dallas. He retired from powerlifting altogether in 1997, to focus more on Olympic weightlifting.

Rip acquired a solid background in coaching the Olympic lifts as a result of his coach, Bill Starr, using them in his powerlifting training. Further experience with the Olympic lifts came with exposure to the coaching of Tommy Suggs, Jim Moser, Dr. Lon Kilgore, Angel Spassov, Istvan Javorek, Harvey Newton, Mike Conroy, John Thrush, and many fellow lifters. Rip obtained his USWF Level III certification in 1988 at the USOC’s Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs with Mike Stone, Harvey Newton, and Angel Spassov on faculty. His USAW Senior Coach certification was achieved in 1999 at the OTC with Lyn Jones, John Thrush, and Mike Conroy. He was invited, as an Olympic weightlifting coach, to the Olympic Solidarity course at the OTC in 2000. He taught both the USAW Club Coach course and the Sports Performance Coach course with Dr. Kilgore from 1999 through 2005. Rip served as the president of the North Texas Local Weightlifting Committee of USAW from 2004-2011. He coached and participated in the coaching of James Moser, Glenn Pendlay, Dr. Kilgore, Josh Wells (Junior World Team 2004) most of the national and international-level athletes on the Wichita Falls Weightlifting team, which was hosted and coached at WFAC from 1999 through 2006, as well as the collegiate weightlifting team from Midwestern State University through 2010. Rip still actively coaches the sport on a daily basis at WFAC, and the power clean and power snatch at our seminars around the country every month.

The Starting Strength method

of training novices is a distillation of Rip’s experiences over three and a half decades as a competitive powerlifter, Olympic weightlifting coach, and gym owner. From its inception in 1984, every new member at WFAC was taught the basic barbell lifts as a part of their membership at the gym, and the application of the basics of powerlifting and Olympic weightlifting to efficiently meet the needs of the general public form the basis of the Starting Strength method, as detailed in Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training and Practical Programming for Strength Training.

Getting Started

• Essential : Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training, 3rd edition – Comprehensive theory of barbell training and instructions and corrections on each lift.
• Recommended : Key articles on this site for new trainees = The Novice Effect, Active Hip 2.0, A Clarification
• Optional : Starting Strength DVD The DVD is intended as a supplement to the book. The DVD goes through teaching and initial coaching with several different trainees. It is especially useful for those getting started without a coach or training partner, especially for those who learn well from watching and copying others.

Practical Programming can be useful starting out for those who are highly motivated and interested in why, but becomes far more valuable as you continue to train. Strong Enough and Mean Ol' Mr Gravity are supplemental books. Both have useful information, but they can also be saved for later.

Using this Website

• Resources
• Article library – Articles are organized by author. Scan through or use the Search box on the upper right to look for specific topics.
• Video library – Videos are grouped by type: Starting Strength Series (interviews and lectures), Platform (practical instruction), and Discussion.
• Coaching – Look here for opportunities to get coaching, from instruction from Rip at a Starting Strength Seminar to working with Starting Strength Coaches.
• The Forums – Please make sure to read the Forum Information to get an idea of what to expect in each Forum category (Announcements) and for a handy way (FAQ) to get answers to common questions. Most of the forums are unmoderated. This means that they can be very rude and rough while at the same time exposing you to questionable advice from anywhere in the Universe.
• Products – One page that will lead you to our publishing company and retail store website.

Other Websites : Other websites with official content are WFAC and The Aasgaard Company. Associated services include the Starting Strength Twitter, Facebook, Vimeo channel and YouTube channel (under construction). Sites outside these are not officially associated with us or produced by us and we cannot vouch for the accuracy of their content.