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Thread: JoeLiftsWeights Competitively

  1. #331
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

  2. #332
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    Press 210x3x3
    Bench 245x5x5
    BW 238.6

    I am a firefighter. My work schedule is 24 on and 48 off. Due to this schedule I occasionally have to train at the firehouse in order to complete all of my workouts for the week. Training in the firehouse weight room can be difficult because workouts are frequently interrupted by 1 or 2 runs, but it is always a lot of fun. It’s good times to hang out and talk with the boys between sets, especially since I usually train in my garage gym with my 7 month old son these days. My boy is a great training partner, but he usually poops his pants, needs a bottle of milk, and has to be put down for nap before I can finish my volume squats. I am not saying that we don’t have these same issues at the firehouse, but at least Archibald can wipe his own ass, and Meat can toddle off to his bunk when he gets fussy.

    We have a good group of lifters at the fire station. I do my strength lifting, Carter is a Crossfitter, Meat is an Olympic weightlifter, and Chief Clark is a lifelong lifter, well versed in every training methodology from Starting Strength to 5/3/1 to Westside. Captain Sam exercises for health and general fitness. His workout consists of a sampling of the basic barbell lifts, bodybuilding, and Crossfit. Somehow we all manage to train and coexist in the same weight room. Each man trains however they like to train. The only goal is to be a strong capable member of the team. That being said, it is still fun to agitate one another, engage in epic gym bro discussions on training methodologies, and occasionally learn something from each other.

    I remember one afternoon Captain Sam and I were lifting together. I racked my last set of squats, sat down on the bench, took off my knee sleeves, and I was just fixing to get ready to do my presses when I noticed this odd rhythmical breathing coming from the direction of the dumbbell rack. To my great dismay, I looked up to see Cap waving a pair of 5 lb. dumbbells around like they were pompoms. Cap bore witness as my visage transitioned from a look of consternation to my signature head shake of exasperation. He asked me “What? What’s wrong?” I asked him, “Just what are you hoping to accomplish by waving those little 5 lb. weights around?” Sam went on to explain to me that he had injured his shoulder several years ago and that a physical therapist had given him a long list of stretches and exercises to perform with light weights in order rehabilitate and strengthen all of the little muscles of his shoulders. I in turn went on to explain to him that if I were him, seeing as he now had full range of motion with no pain in his shoulders, I would learn how to do strict barbell presses in order to get stronger and reduce the chances of future injury. I briefly summarized the concept of the stress, recovery, adaptation cycle and concluded by saying, “You can wave those little 5 lb. dumbbells around for 100s of reps in every possible direction, but that’s all those shoulders of yours will be able to lift.” In short, despite my blunt tactless effort to persuade him to another course of action, Cap was unmoved. He said that doing things his way was working just fine, I said OK, and we let it go at that.

    Now the very next morning we were all busy at work doing morning clean up (at the end of each 24 hour shift fire crews clean the station and trucks in preparation for the oncoming shift). I was mopping the kitchen floor when I heard a grunt of exertion coming from the direction of the kitchen pantry. I looked up from the task at hand and to my great delight I saw Cap standing there struggling to tear a heavy black garbage bag from its roll. I said, “Huh, that must be a 6 lb. test.” Cap proceeded to laugh his ass off and acknowledged that I just might have a point.

    Shortly after that little episode, Cap asked me to teach him the 4 main lifts. He is in his early 50s, 5’ 10” tall, weighs 190 lb. and is in good shape from doing CrossFit style exercise. I put him on a linear progression training every third day (he only lifts at work). I started him out with light weights and progressed more slowly than necessary entirely because he was deathly afraid of injuring his back. So he isn’t doing the program, but even when imperfectly applied, the program will yield results if you work hard. Last shift after benching 217.5x5x3, Sam marveled at the fact that he is stronger now than he has ever been. He has made tremendous progress. The same man that used to think that deadlifting 225 would cause his spinal vertebrae to spontaneously combust, was walking tall because he pulled 280x5. Cap asked me what just I thought about that. I said, “Well, my wife can deadlift 300x3x2. So you’re not quite fit to carry her sports bra just yet, but you’re doing alright. We’ll get you there.”

    Disclaimer: the names of the individuals portrayed in this story have been changed in order to protect the guilty, but they know who they are and what they did.

  3. #333
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

  4. #334
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    Bench 292.5x3x3
    Press 180x5x5

  5. #335
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

  6. #336
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    Press 212.5x3x3
    Bench 247.5x5x5

  7. #337
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    Squat 460x3x3
    Deadlift 432.5x5x3
    BW 236.9

    When I was 13 years old I lost a fight at school. I hate losing. You show me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser. Furthermore, you show me someone that is happy with a tie and I’ll show you someone that knows that they couldn’t win. That being said, I lost a fight and by God that was enough. Thus I began my never ending journey on the path of voluntary hardship by joining the wrestling team my freshman year of high school.

    As the great Dan Gable has said, “Once you’ve wrestled, everything else in life is easy.” I loved wrestling. I loved the challenge that the sport presented. The wrestler is forged in the fires of pure competition. Wrestling is an individual sport in that the wrestler steps out on the mat alone and owns every victory and defeat. Wrestling is also a team sport because the wrestler’s performance can only be elevated by consistently training, drilling, and competing with their teammates. There isn’t any favoritism. The coach doesn’t put you in the big game because he liked what he saw you do in practice that week. You have to earn the right to represent the team. Challenge matches were held every week during the season to determine the varsity line up for the dual match that Thursday and for the subsequent tournament that weekend. You want to be varsity? Then step into the ring and fight for it. In wrestling the strongest survive.

    I was not a natural athlete in any sense of the word. In the beginning I got my ass kicked a lot, and I mean an embarrassing number of times. In public. While wearing a sheer wrestling singlet. I learned not to be afraid of failure. Years later my Mom told me that she had wanted to beg me to quit, but my Dad had told her to “leave the boy alone. This is going to make him a man” (There’s a lesson in parenting that a lot of folks could use). Luckily success is “made of sweat, determination, and a hard to find alloy called guts” (Gable).

    I completely immersed myself in the sport. I spent hours on the mat drilling a handful of basic movements. I read and watched all of Dan Gable’s technique books and videos. I attended training camps hosted by the Oklahoma State Wrestling team. Eventually, as the team captain, I was responsible for teaching the incoming freshmen the fundamentals and I got firsthand experience of how when one teaches, two learn. I did my best to educate myself on nutrition and weight training (unfortunately Starting Strength had not been written yet, but I managed to get fairly strong in spite of my strict adherence to the programs detailed in Arnold’s Education of a Bodybuilder). After 4 years of perseverance, I was the first men’s district champion in my new high school’s very short history. An accomplishment that is not much of an accolade in the grand scheme of things, let alone athletics, but it was an accomplishment that changed my life.

    I believe in doing hard work that is worth doing because of how it improves an individual’s character and how its meaningful achievement instills the confidence within them to be their authentic self. My experience on the wrestling team is not unique. Jim Wendler has written a great article about his experience as a walk on to his college football team. There is an outstanding documentary on amazon prime called The Barkley Marathons that I recommend to everyone. Coaches Rip, Reynolds, and Hambrick have all demonstrated time and again that the Starting Strength Method not only trains the body to be stronger, but it also trains the mind to do hard things. If you go down the path of a discipline in pursuit of mastery, you will find that the arduous work of accomplishing long term goals in any worthwhile endeavor follows the same basic blueprint: burning desire, deliberate practice, education, networking, and competition. Once learned in one discipline, the skill set of knowing how to do hard things can be applied to any other discipline. Success begets success.

    I am sure that everyone on this forum that has bothered to read this attempt to put my thoughts to paper is well aware of these truths, but in today’s social media culture I think that it is worth reiterating the following, even if it is only to serve as reminder for myself: the good is in the doing, not in the talking about the doing. Life is action.

  8. #338
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    Bench 295x3x3
    Press 182.5x5x5

  9. #339
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    Deadlift 510x3x3
    Squat 390x5x5
    BW 235.1

  10. #340
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Location
    New Braunfels, Texas
    Posts
    610

    Default

    starting strength coach development program
    Press 215x3x3
    Bench 250x5x5

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