MUSCLE CHURCH: Our Father, the Iron

Not ashamed to be the worst and most infrequent blogger of all time. Life happens. My biggest problem is that deep down inside I don't like to brag or boast about things. My little accomplishments or things that I do well, eh, I tend to like to keep them to myself. People that know me would laugh at that because they see how much I like to make people laugh and how I'll puff my chest up and antagonize people. Guilty, guilty and guilty again. If I'm guilty of anything, it's that I like to make people laugh or I like to make them think. If I can ramble on about something and that makes someone think about their problem a bit differently, and it helps them, well that's time well spent. Otherwise, I don't care to talk much about myself-of at all, if I can help it. But, when there's an audience...oh man it there's a microphone...I just can't help myself! It's the ultimate dichotomy; I'm an introvert and an entertainer. I live and dream about b...

Well I guess funny things happen all the time right? So, as you may know from following me, I'm kind of on a half-rehab, half-diet thing now and I'm not doing any heavy training. Cardio. Stretching. Heavy bag. More cardio. Annnnnd the most dreaded two words in the world...light weights. I know, I know heavy training burns more calories yadda, yadda but you guys don't wake up with my knees and ankles everyday, a break is past due. Indeed. Time to take a step away from the heavy training... ...okay it's been 3 weeks, that's enough right? I can't put into words how miserable I feel right now. I've posted on here a lot about how the concept of 'muscle church' is something that transcends lifting weights or competing, it's something so close to my core that I haven't always been able to separate the workouts from the man. My identity is wrapped up in the iron and anytime I have to step back, even just a little bit, it's literally t...

So since around April of this year I have been training hard for some contests this year. I had the Minuteman Muscle Challenge in West Virginia in July, South Carolina's Strongest Man in September and in the preliminary stages of planning to toss my hat in the ring at the Lee Haney Classic in Atlanta in October. And then... Well I don't care for going to the doctor, like most guys. Doctors usually suck, they don't care for patients that know their bodies well and few understand the stress that training and competing take on the body. I trust my chiropractor and that's about it. So I visited him and he gave me the usual 'yeah you're falling apart but I can try to help you' and then I asked about this odd protrusion in my belly...well, long story short I spoke with him and then saw the doctor affiliated with him and they were of the opinion that I probably had a hernia and needed to pump the brakes on everything. Needless to say I was concerned and then refe...

Big Loz just practicing for carrying the groceries in! Oh look at you! Big strong man! Strongest man in Europe? Oh you mean The Mountain??? WRONG! Ha ha! Europe's Strongest Man came and went and while Eddie Hall's amazing world record deadlift stole the show, the real winner of the weekend was Laurence Shahlaei who came in spectacular fashion to win the contest and set a new record in the Car Carry. Laurence, or Big Loz, as he's known, is a hell of an athlete with quite a story. Just a few years ago he was sidelined with a host of injuries that took him out of the World's Strongest Man. He was seen famously laying on the doctor's table with ice packs on both torn biceps saying, "I think it's over for real now." Only to come back from that and tear his quad, in the process losing lots of size and sponsorships. Loz maintains a crazy positive attitude and through all of it he kept posting encouraging messages on social media and cheering on othe...

My first strongman contest was a learning experience every step of the way. I guess you want, or at the very least need, your first time doing something to be educational as much as you want it (or need it, remember that word) to be rewarding. I thought I had done everything I could to prepare for what was to face me on that cool West by God Virginia morning, but I forgot to bring one thing…my A game. I had studied the events and knew where my weaknesses laid and what my strengths were. I knew that the overhead press would be good and I tied for second, just like I knew the Atlas Stone could be disastrous and I failed to even lift it. I wound up coming in last place, by only a few points but still, LAST PLACE. Normally that would infuriate me and I’d write journal entries about how motivated I was to come back stronger and blah, blah, blah but in reality I took my picture with Phil Pfister (truly a large and silly man) and went to Ruby Tuesday and ate a little steak and some d...

I love the sled leg press. With a burning, intense passion! No shame in my game, I love it and as I have progressed in terms of strength over the years I’ve found it to be an indispensable part of my leg training routines. My latest trip to the sled leg press, 1288lbs for 9 reps. Now there are some among you, general the less hardcore or perhaps those nursing injuries, who sing the praises of the leg press over the back squat because it is easier on the knees…allegedly. On the other side of course you have the hardcore strength athletes who never met a machine they liked and think the leg press just takes away from your squat time. Well to be clear I’m not advocating ANYTHING over the back squat, which is the 2nd best exercise known to man, after the deadlift of course, but I am advocating for greater inclusion of the leg press to the hardcore lifters and perhaps a reevaluation of leg training for the squat-less. My focus these days is strongman and will be for the foreseea...

How's it going out there everybody??? I want to talk a bit today about specificity and why it's important to you as an athlete and how you communicate certain things to a non-athlete. It's important to make that distinction here because A) I don't know how many people come here who compete and who doesn't and B) I think sometimes we get tunnel vision when we talk to non-athletes and alienate people who would otherwise be interested in what we're doing. For instance, I give you the King of Exercises, the deadlift! And by 'deadlift' I mean 'Conventional Floor Pulls with A Standard Bar.' I posted on Facebook a few weeks ago (link is to your right, btw) that I failed at this weight which is 485 and why I thought that was and how I planned to not fail the next time I tried this exercise. Now, to the average person they might think I 'deadlift' every week, and they'd be right, but I won't be doing these again for a...

Dig, if you will, a picture...of iron and steel so cold! That was my terrible homage to Prince (RIP) while I welcome you to my inaugural post here and talk about things being HEAVY! Now that might sound a bit silly considering this blog is about weightlifting and bodybuilding, specifically my journey into the world of strongman, but allow me to elaborate... What you see below is a wee bit over 900 pounds situated on the wonderful Nautilus branded deadlifted platform. I love this machine when I'm getting ready for a contest because the handles mimic how one would deadlift a car and they are about mid-shin level, so not too low and not too high. The day this picture was taken I was working deadlifts, specifically THESE deadlifts. My goal that day was to work up to as much weight as possible. That's about as much programming as I do these days, but I digress... The most I'd ever done on this apparatus was about 630 I think, so this day, I wanted to push 700 ...