The newly opened Starting Strength gym in Memphis is the place to go! But the most important part are the people who make it work. I met Scott Acosta and John Haun this past Saturday and things began to click immediately. I suspected my form had begun to drift off the model I had learned in a Starting Strength seminar in Costa Mesa, CA, back in 2010. Unsurprisingly, that is exactly what had taken place.

These are just the highlights of what Scott accomplished in a mere two hours. He painstakingly coached me back into a better semblance of good order fixing my flaws one step at a time. But altogether, Scott did a great deal more in cleaning up how I was stumbling my way through the lifts.

Scott began from the platform up fixing my feet. Fixing full and neutral balance on the balls and heels of my feet in the squat was the first thing that needed to be squared away. It seems I’d developed a tendency to be too far forward on the balls of my feet over time. He saw that I was leading up with my chest instead of my hips from the bottom of the squat. Add to that a persistent tendency to be left of center on the bar while taking it off the rack. All remedied in short order.

I thought I had the bench press down reasonably well. Not so, Scott first having me get my feet repositioned so I could better lock in my hips and stabilize on the bench. The bench was an unpadded Starting Strength design and Scott and John offered me a pad if I thought I might need or prefer one. I gave the wood bench a shot to see how it felt, and nope, no pad needed. Scott got me reacquainted with how to set the scapulae properly and went on to get me using leg drive effectively.

The deadlift was what I thought I needed the most work with. Not only did Scott correct me from standing too close to the bar, but also correcting my hips being too high at the start of the pull. This was the first time I had used a Starting Strength bar and found the knurling a good fit between needle sharp and too smooth to hang on to. He caught me having my hand placement too close together with my knees interfering with my arms during the first stage of the pull. Then he taught me how to engage the lats in the pull, something that had become a mystery to me prior to this session.

Altogether a really great session with great coach who I am confident has set me back on the right road to getting a better total in competition. It was a 240-mile drive from home to get to Memphis and more than worth it.