Starting Strength Coach
Oftentimes you can’t. But I’ve gotten a little mileage out of: “At one time, the most brilliant minds in the world believed that the sun revolved around the earth. These brilliant minds stuck to that view even well after Copernicus died. Then Kepler came up with a better idea, and after trying it out for a while, the most brilliant minds realized that Kepler actually worked better. Athletic skills are like that, just on a less technical level. The best high jumpers in the world all went straight over the bar, until Dirk Fosbury decided to try something different. He was ridiculed in his college days because his jumping looked funny and no one who set world record or earned Olympic medals did it. Until Fosbury himself set the record and got the medals, and now everyone does it his way. So you see, young grasshopper, sometimes even the best in the world don’t do things correctly, just because they haven’t tried out or discovered the correct way.”Originally Posted by Mark Rippetoe
Member
I considered posting this but he didn't really make an argument to counter so I didn't think it was worth posting.
I don't think he was trying to come off as a guru though, it was a very casual chat and I think he mostly meant he doesn't see the point in doing them himself because he gets hurt.
The fact that he's prescribing dynamic moves in their place makes me think his deadlift form is probably not great if he's hurting himself so much doing them.
Member
Oberst is wrong, of course, but I wonder if his reasoning makes a certain amount of sense FOR HIM. Think about it: novices can squat a 5rm thrice weekly because they are untrained and weak. Very large, very heavy, very strong advanced lifters like Oberst need yearly programming cycles in order for their strength to advance. I wonder if his Strongman competitions, wherein he deadlifts to a PR weight for PR reps, provides him with enough of a training stimulus in the deadlift? I assume he competes several times per year, so every 4 months he works up to a PR, albeit it in a competition environment, rather than a more quotidian training one. The rest of his training must provide him with enough of a (westside style conjugate) training environment so that he doesn't lose any strength and stays fresh.
So although he is dead nuts wrong about the deadlift, I can almost understand why he might feel that way. He is a great example of why outliers and great athletes so rarely make great coaches.
Member
Speaking of Westside, haven't Louie Simmons and Dave Tate (among others) basically said that Westside guys almost never, ever deadlift? That they only need to do box squats and good mornings and safety squat bar squats to increase their deadlift?
Westside guys are a different breed, but different strokes for different folks I guess. (BTW, the Louie Simmons documentary that came out recently was pretty damn good. Watch it if you can).
Member
He simply makes use of a logical fallacy that 99% of people, including academics wrongly believe is true. He asserts an appeal to authority logical fallacy. His claim is that the people in the NFL weightrooms and academia know what's best, therefore we should trust them.
I could see Oberst winning WSM sometime in the future. By his own admission, he has not trained hard or smart compared to any of the other competitors. He just has the natural ability that allows him to succeed in strongman, even if his training quality is poor.
TMPHBITEU
You must have us confused with a powerlifting board. Why do we give a shit what anybody at Westside does for any reason?
Member
Some may care about powerlifting because sometimes, success leaves clues, which contradicts my earlier post, I agree.
To further contradict myself, if you go back and look at some of the numbers from the heyday of geared powerlifting and Westside, Westside lifters werent great at deadlifts. The squats were geared and high, but the deadlifts were pretty meh. Maybe they dont have much success to leave clues with?
TMPHBITEU
Yeah, I forgot to mention that.
Member
This is an odd statement to make. There have been dozens (hundreds?) of comments made about powerlifting and powerlifters on this board for years and years. I don't recall you ever saying, in any response to any of those threads, "You must have us confused with a powerlifting board." Furthermore, is this a strongman board? Why, when this thread was started, did you not say, "You must have us confused with a strongman board"? Why only now have your panties gotten bunched up?
First, I didn't realize you were the spokesman for everybody on here and what they do or do not "give a shit about".
Second, with respect to you personally, you must care a little about Westside because you wrote about them in Starting Strength. Indeed, you specifically mentioned Louie, calling him "amazing" and "ingenious".
I would also add that you SEEM to care about (or at least you used to seem to care) about all strength sports, and people who have achieved excellence regardless of whether you agreed with their methods or methodology. Perhaps you have changed and now you only care about yourself and your methods. I don't know. In any event, even if you do not care, I am quite certain that at least one other person on here might care--at least a tad--about one of the greatest powerlifters of all time, and one of the greatest powerlifting gyms of all time.
As a side note, I sometimes wonder whether you are trying to consciously adopt an on-line persona that is markedly different from how you act in person. Having met you in person twice (once at a weightlifting meet in Plano over a decade ago, and once at WFAC), you didn't come across at all like you do on here sometimes. Weird.
✓ Member
I think you are taking this a little too much to heart. Also, this board isn't the communal property of its posters.
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