Sunday

Last Sunday, 2/24/13, I went with Audrey Burgio to the USA Kettlebell Lifting Bolt competition in Denver.  I went only in the role of spectator and cheerleader because Audrey doesn't need my coaching with the kettlebell.

I would have had a great time just watching, but it was even better because Audrey won her division.

After driving back to Longmont along a very slushy I-25, we decided post competition eating was in order.  We kept it paleo until dessert when Audrey decided to get a Jack Daniels whiskey cake.  After forty minutes of work with kettlebells, I figured Audrey would be okay loading some dirty carbs.  I couldn't really justify the half cake I ate, but I did it anyway.

Audrey was back in the gym working Monday, but that shit went straight to my hips.

Where I'm Going

As will happen sometimes, I was asked recently how much I squat, and I gave the only answer that makes any sense, "ask me in August."  If that's not a good enough answer, I would estimate I can probably do between 400 and 480 now.

I'm competing next at the NASA World Cup of Power August 3rd and 4th in Denver, Colorado, and I will answer all relevant questions then.

By the way, the only relevant questions are: how much I can squat; how much I can bench; how much I can dead lift; and most importantly, how much does all that add up to?


Fitness has been given many definitions, and that is largely so that more people can sell more stuff that will give you "fitness."  The definition I use for fitness is the ability to do a task.  So yes, zumba and ecstasy will assuredly give one the ability to rave all night, and under some circumstances that may be fitness worth paying for.

There are some people preparing for the unknown and unknowable.  That certainly is a laudable goal, but when I meet these people they seem to actually be obsessed with a zombie apocalypse  and it seems that their prepared response is to distract the zombies with a jump rope demonstration.

Look, I'm not making fun of the zombie apocalypse.  I also have an inner twelve year old comic book reading fat kid that knows said apocalypse is inevitable.

I'm just choosing to prepare by getting lifts judged in competition and recorded forever in Internet land.  Those real, verifiable numbers are what the zombies mine when they compile their list of People You don't Want to Fuck With.

So then, I'm training hard and regularly, making actual gains in the parameters I monitor, and getting on that fucking list.

You too can go wherever you want.

How I Got There

In my last blog I detailed, briefly, how I hit a huge squat PR last November.

It occurred to me that probably no one will derive any real pleasure from walking around talking about how they know the guy who got a big PR, but there is a small though real chance some readers would like to do it themselves.

I had succeeded in August in overcoming the psychological block at the 400 pound level, and I did that simply by assiduously following a basic beginners' linear progression.  In theory I was not a beginner, but I had had a two month lay off due to injury, and I thought a linear progression would allow me to build both strength and confidence in my repaired body.  I suppose it's possible that it should not have worked, but it did.

Following a linear progression to near death allowed me to squat 407 in August, but I knew that my gains on simple programming had dried up.



Once you get past the bullshit, and the bullshit is the stuff promulgated by skinny-fat geeks asking primarily for money, there are two broad schools of lifting.

There is the Old School which has been around forever and has been deeply studied for over a century, and there is the Eastern Bloc School which has been around for decades and has been studied deeply enough to attract both geniuses and skinny jackasses whose main goal is to post to facebook about accommodating resistance and rate of force development.

Okay.  It's my blog so I'll admit that I have flashes of genius, but I can't sustain it.  I also hate facebook more everyday since it is mainly used by weak jackasses who post incessantly about their genius training.  They usually leave out any data about any results they might get though.



So, while having great respect for the few but brilliant Eastern Bloc guys, I decided to be an Old School guy.


I used an intelligently modified 5x5 program which is popular with the Old School guys at 70's Big.  As with most or all 5x5 programs, this one had a medium day, a light day, and a heavy day.  I simply worked this program so hard that within a few weeks I had a horrible day, a fun day, and a terrifying day.

The secret then was as any non-jackass will tell you, hard consistent work.  I worked through a revolving cast of characters and weather that varied from lake of sweat on the floor to hands frozen on bar.

And that was it.

One horrible day, one fun day, and one terrifying day made a week.  Four weeks made a month, and so on.

And I've seen that nobody likes the hard, sustained work secret.

So I have another secret.

I tried so hard to squat 440 when it was impossible that when it was possible it became easy.

Where I Was

It's been so long since I've blogged that even I noticed.  I didn't overly care, but a few people who are smart enough to know told me I should be writing, so I thought I'd give a brief account of October until now.


I trained hard, and like I set out to do a long time ago, I squatted 200 kg / 440 lbs.

Change You can Believe in

One hundred is something, and anything less than one hundred is change.  I'm going to find 40 pounds of change and squat 440, which is 200 kilos and thus two somethings.

Today I'd like to share this video with the few dozen people scattered about the US who like me believe that true change happens in the state powerlifting record books and that putting political bumper stickers on your car is as stupid as shooting yourself in the head with rubber bullets.

One remembers too that as my good friend Goethe said, "es irrt der Mensch solange er strebt."  The next best thing to squatting 200k is actually not jerking off to campaign ads no matter how homo-erotic, but rather getting crushed under 195.

Like this or like that.

95,268 Pounds

Yes, I have not written lately.

Sometimes the problem with being an author is the implicit claim of authority, and sometimes I don't think I know anything that hasn't been in the public domain for decades.  I study, I practice, and I learn, but still there is nothing new under the sun.

Usually what's happening when I don't write  is that I'm working hard, and I'm too much of a generally helpful and not profit-motivated guy to make up stories about how supplements and shoes solve everyone's insane lust for a painless and pleasant short cut.


I've finished my first month with the International Million Pound Lifting Association, the brainchild of Defy! CrossFit's Jonathan Sabar.  There are some rules in the Association about what counts towards totalling a million, but I don't know what they are.  I simply count working, not warm up, sets on the Big Four - squat, bench, press, and dead.

In  four weeks I totaled 95,268 pounds.

I don't have much to say other than it seems to be working.

Field Trips & Reality

My friend and honorary TwinFreak Barney recently asked me to help him with his deadlift.  He only deadlifts every other Sunday, so I agreed to meet him today.  We could have met at TwinFreaks CrossFit of course, but Barney trains at Fucktime Fitness, and I wanted to go in there and look around.

I did eventually succeed in changing Barney's starting position which we both think will help him, but it ended up being something of an ordeal because I couldn't stop laughing the whole time I was in there.


I saw some impressive cheat curls, some exemplary partial range of motion benches, and finally some serious leg work.

Leg day is every fourth February, right?

You with the clipboard, you don't read my blog do you?

Good man! You'll be fine when you're 80 as long as you get a recumbent toilet.

I really wasn't sure how to handle all this, so I took off my shirt and pretended to do curls in the squat rack.

I enjoyed my ninety or so minutes in Fucktime Fitness thoroughly.  At $20 a month I could go in there for an hour and a half three or four times a week, and I'd save serious money compared to going to the movies.  I want to go back there, but I figure I'd probably get kicked out, so next time I won't be so nice; no, I'll steal all those dweeb's girlfriends.


I have to admit I got quite an ego boost from being in Fucktime Fitness.  I momentarily wondered if perhaps I'm a genetic freak or if I'd been taking D-Bol and forgot about it.  I remembered, though, that I train at TwinFreaks CrossFit and that I'm making a serious push to hit a state record squat.

I guess I more or less accidentally ended up looking good while I was doing this last week.  I didn't have to towel any sweat off the chrome machines when I was done either.

Monday Squats
(working sets only)
5 x 275
5 x 285
5 x 295
5 x 305
5 x 315

Wednesday Squats
2 x 5 x 225

Friday Squats
5 x 355
Friday Deads
6 x 325 (conventional)

That is largely how my training will go for the November NASA meet.  I know that Monday will change to 5 x 5 x 315, and on Friday I'll drop the set of five and go first to two heavy triples and as the meet gets closer, I'll push for a new 3rm every week.  Deadlifts will alternate between conventional and heavier sumo every week.

Eight weeks of that and I think I might even look in the mirror again.

Fucking kids these days.