ANTAGONISTICALLY STRONG

Folks, I’ve come to terms with something: I’m a jerk.  I really am.  Twice this week, instances have reminded me of this.  And amazingly enough, it was RUNNING that inspired this instead of lifting.  As many of my regular readers know, I engage in the Murph Memorial workout each year in May, typically on or around Memorial Day.  This year, I’m doing it twice: I did it once on the 18th as part of a group workout my work was putting on, and I’ll be doing it again this Sunday with my wife, as she wanted to give it a try.  The group workout was put on by a local crossfit affiliate, and when I showed up, I discovered, much to my horror, that we were going to WARM UP before we did the workout.  As many of you know, my warm-ups are sparse, if at all existent, and the sheer notion of doing this before such a challenging workout was mind boggling to me.  The last thing I was going to do was change how I had been training on the DAY that I needed to perform.  When the group went for a 400m warm-up run, I stayed behind.  Someone asked me why, and I responded with “I’m not about to go run before I go run.”  The person took that response, said it made sense, and then went about with their warm-up.  Later that week, my work hosted a 5k run that I partook in.  Training for Murph got me into good running shape, and, in turn, I ended up coming in first.  Unbeknownst to me, among our group was a running analyst, whom I had passed at the end of the run.  This gave them time to analyze my gait from behind, and, in turn, they informed me that I have an awful running style, marred with poor form and technique.  My response, was once again simple: “I beat you, didn’t I?”

Perhaps it was my footwear affecting my stride

And it’s forced me to reflect a little bit here.  I AM a jerk, but my hand has also been forced in that regard, because I just simply cannot buy into so many of the things that are so cool and fun and popular and en vogue and party approved.  I’m now a 20 year veteran teenager, which means I’ve perfected counter-culturalism simply for the sake of not liking popular things, and it reflects in the things I obsess over.  But, in turn, I feel I’ve accomplished so many unique things that these folks that just do the same thing everyone else is doing haven’t, nor will ever, due to their approach.  I’ve written before about how you have to do abnormal things to get abnormal results, and the trend continues.  I’m honestly at the point now where, if I hear an idea being championed enough, I know it’s a bad one.  Or, if nothing else, it’s at least ineffective for my own goals.

I aim to be antagonistically strong.  That is to say, I am to be strong in spite of all the things out there that tell me that, by all accounts, I should NOT be strong.  I aim to be strong even though I use poor form, bad programming, the wrong nutrition, poor sleep hygiene, no mobility or stretching, etc etc.  Why?  Because I am proof of concept that people aren’t nearly as smart as they think they are, and that maybe we’re overcomplicating this whole thing a bit too much.  Maybe, just maybe, instead of foam rolling and cryobaths and 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep and perfect mobility patterns and not an ounce of scar tissue to be found, maybe the results can be realized simply through hard work over a long time.  Maybe, if you never warm-up, you’ll never NEED a warm-up. 

I'm always warmed up

And if you can’t be an example, you can be a warning, right?  Maybe it’s all going to come crashing down one day, like so many people predict it will.  Maybe I’ll get my due, and be broken and ruined.  Or maybe I’ll die TOO early to see the effects of my training, an accusation I recently saw levied against Konstantins Konstantinovs as something of the ultimate grasping at straws.  But hell, at least that’s SOMETHING different than the norm. 

Because man, I might get broken LATER, but some of you folks are already broken NOW.  Why do you need to spend 30 minutes warming up for a 60 minute workout?  Why not just warm-up for 5 and then you have 85 minutes to train?  What good is your expert running technique doing for you if you get beat by a guy missing 20% of his meniscus with an obese BMI?  Your prime is going to rapidly vanish at this rate, and you’ll spend so much of your life being OLD while you spent all of your youth living like you were already there.

Youth truly is wasted on the young

And with this approach of being antagonistically strong, you’ll never run out of motivation or goals.  So many people are out there putting limits on others and saying what’s impossible that it can easily trigger your “a-hole response” protocol.  Apparently, that’s in full effect on me, because as soon as I see someone saying something isn’t possible I’m quick to give it a try and prove that wrong.  At my Murph workout on Saturday, they taught us how to kip, because they said trying to do the full 100 pull ups with a weight vest strict would be too big of an undertaking.  I had already planned to do them strict, but this just drove it even more home.  Can’t gain on low carb?  Watch me.  Can’t make your running and lifting better at the same time?  I got this.  Need a coach if you wanna do cleans?  Nope.

So many trainees are lost, because they just see the same routines everyone else is doing and get hooked into the gameplan and, after a few months, ennui sets in and they wonder if this is some sort of life they’ve been doomed to.  Well here’s how you relight that spark: start becoming bigger, stronger, fitter and faster in spite of all that you do.  Be antagonistically strong and overcome the status quo.

STRONGER? DID YOU MEAN BIGGER?

Time for one of my rare academic type posts, but my slumming on forums has resulted in me having a dialogue with what was effectively my past self and it forced me to flesh out some ideas that I wanted to capture here.  For many of you, this will be rudimentary, but hopefully a fresh take on an old concept.

Since this blog’s creation, it’s been about “getting bigger and stronger”, and I felt like that was the simplest way to convey my goals, but upon further reflection, what I’ve written is redundant.  Bigger IS stronger.  And not simply in the sense that weight moves weight and the absolute weightclasses have the strongest competitors, but that, when one’s goal is to get stronger, this is a statement that one’s goal is to become bigger.  Why?  Because, all things being equal, a bigger muscle is a stronger muscle.  This is something we all know…yet somehow, there is still confusion regarding this topic.

Some of you nerds can't even tell just by looking at this photo that the Half-orc gets +2 to strength while the halfling is -2...

What is the issue?  As I’ve written about in the past, people employ incorrect heuristics in the discussion of training, and it leads toward incorrect conclusions.  You tell a trainee “to make a muscle stronger, you must make it bigger”, and they instinctively counter with “then how come powerlifters are stronger than bodybuilders?”  This question may seem genuine from the asker, but in truth, this is arguing in bad faith.  Why?  It presupposes that bodybuilding is the training of muscular size while powerlifting is the training of muscular strength.

These are SPORTS (I know, some folks are going to be upset that I called bodybuilding a sport, but stick with me), NOT training methods.  Size is important to the sport of bodybuilding, but it is not the SOLE factor.  Strength is important in the pursuit of powerlifting, but it is not the SOLE factor.  And it’s the inclusion of these confounding variables that makes the comparison of the sports as training modalities and proofs of concept non-viable.

Plus, good luck explaining this

What do I mean by the above?  That it’s ineffective to say something like “if making muscles bigger makes them stronger, then how come powerlifters don’t train like bodybuilder?”  Because the training of a bodybuilder is about training to be better at bodybuilding, NOT simply to make all muscle as big as possible.  If it were truly the latter, Markus Rhul and Greg Kovacs would have been the longest running Olympia champions the world has ever seen.  Instead, bodybuilding will always be about the ILLUSION of size moreso than just size itself, and this means emphasizing certain physical qualities and deemphasizing others to create a more striking appearance.  Why else are so many people upset about the current bloated stomachs seen in the mass monster arena?  If bodybuilding were TRULY the sport of maximizing size, wouldn’t the individual with the biggest abdomen be the winner, not the loser?

And the same to be said about powerlifters (and, by extension, strength athletes in general).  If being strong was truly the only thing that mattered in strongman, O. D. Wilson never would have lost to Jon Pal Sigmarson.  Mark Henry would have been the greatest everything forever.  Mariusz Pudzianowski would have been a ZERO time winner of WSM.  There’s more TO these things that JUST strength, and again, that is why the training will vary.  As funny as it sounds, a strongman or powerlifter who focuses ONLY on getting their muscles strong will lose to a competitor who is better at being a strongman or powerlifter.

Not strong enough for WSM?  Are you serious?

Acknowledging this, we understand that we cannot analyze the training of these athletes as the established standards of training for size vs training for strength.  Where to start?  Analyze the off season methods, where weaknesses are brought up.  What is the solution FOR these athletes across the spectrum?  Volume and specificity.  The weak muscle is singled out, targeted, and hammered.  Why?  To make it GROW!  And why?  BECAUSE SIZE IS STRENGTH.  Written in all caps because it’s stronger, BECAUSE WE GET THAT.  Humanity totally gets this on an instinctive level, primarily because nature has conveyed this reality to us consistently through our history, but it’s only recently that the internet has tried to convince us otherwise. 

Look at Westside Barbell’s approach to conjugate.  80% of the workload is repetition effort.  Why?  Because when you make muscles bigger, you make them stronger.  Max Effort is about learning how to strain, Dynamic Effort is about learning how to be fast, and RE is about getting strong (by getting big).  Basic Western Periodization?  You have an accumulation block at the beginning, so you can get stronger by making the muscle bigger, and then you start intensifying so that you can get better at moving heavier weights for low reps.  The leader phases in 5/3/1 are higher volume to get you bigger and make you stronger in time for the anchors.  This pattern persists CONSTANTLY in the world of getting stronger: you have to make the muscle BIGGER.  That’s the “secret”! 

Ever stop and notice how the HULK gets bigger when he gets stronger?

You want some bro-science?  How about we understand that increases the muscular cross sectional area is what generates more strength potential?  Because more cross sectional area=more available fibers=greater ability to pull from said fibers.  Yes, it’s true that size doesn’t immediately result in improved ABILITY to move a heavier weight, but it certainly improves the potential to do so.  A realization process is required in order to benefit from this improved size, but this isn’t a new concept in the world in the slightest.  If I have a 10 gallon gas tank, then buy a 20 gallon tank but only fill it with 10 gallons, this doesn’t negate the fact that I have a bigger gas tank: it just means I’m not maximizing its potential. But at the same time, if I have a 10 gallon tank, attempt to fill it up with 12 gallons, and then spill 2 of them, I didn’t somehow make my 10 gallon tank a 12 gallon tank.  …that metaphor got weird on me, but I think you still get it.  Peaking strength isn’t building it, and building strength doesn’t necessarily peak it, but if your goal is to GET stronger, you want to get bigger, not peak strength.

The big takeaway here is that the folks getting wrapped around the axle about “training for size vs training for strength” need to take a BIG stepback and realize that these are the same things.  The processes that make muscles bigger will necessarily make the same muscles stronger, because you’ve increased that muscle’s potential for strength.  To be stronger in a specific movement requires specialization of training, and that is where vectoring toward something like powerlifting or strongman can come into play.  But if you legit just want to get muscles to be stronger, you need to focus on making them bigger.  And, as a bonus, you may actually look like you lift, which is always cool.      

AND THEN?

I tend to have something even greater than a 30,000 foot view, more along the lines of a 30,000 mile view, as my propensity to engage in nihilism/stoicism/absurdism tends to make me not appreciate the present at all as I’m already living in the era where I’ve been dead so long that not even the memory of the memory of my memory even exists.  But goddamn if some of you folks need to learn how to have at least a 3 foot view.  I swear some of you folks can’t see 2 hours into the future, let alone weeks, months and years, and it’s severely hamstringing your ability to progress and grow.  When you can’t see the future, not only can you not plan for your success, but you also are unable to truly realize the significance of your failure.  Specifically, just how INSIGNIFICANT your failure will be.  When discussing the immediate future, you must never forget to ask yourself the follow-up "and then?”

Do people still get this reference?

I’m gonna start with what originally prompted this post today, and something that shouldn’t shock my regular readers: injuries.  Oh my god do I lose my mind when trainees talk about these, because they absolutely do NOT exercise “and then?”  “If I do that, I might get injured!”  Ok, great…and then?  Your story does not end with an injury.  It’s not like you get injured and then fade to black.  This isn’t a goddamn movie.  LIFE GOES ON.  What is the “and then?” of your injury?  Will it be the kind of injury where you just shut down the workout for the day, go home and ice yourself and come back tomorrow?  Will you be out for a week?  Are you going to need surgery?  Physical therapy?  And guess what: those are RECOVERABLE!  Your “and then” is that you get injured…and then you heal, and then you continue to get stronger.

But these folks aren’t thinking in the future, where they’ll be healed, big and strong again.  No, most these people are so in the immediate that their only fear of the injury is simply the PAIN they’ll experience as a result of the injury.  They don’t want to get injured because, for one incredibly brief moment in their existence, they’ll experience a moment of pain.  This is why people will terrifyingly BEG internet strangers to tell them how to know when they’re close to failure on squats, because they don’t ever want to run the risk of failing a set and having to dump the bar.  What if the knurling scrapes their skin!?  What if they conk themselves in the back of the head?!  Christ folks, live like 15 minutes in the future at least, when they owie no longer smarts and you’ve already stripped the plates off the bar.

and fired your coach

And this phenomenon continues to exist outside of this realm of my personal annoyance: it bleeds into training in general.  So many trainees exist in the absolute and most immediate present that they have zero ability to appreciate the future and working towards it.  Trainees want PRs NOW, rather than building toward something much MUCH greater in the future.  And so they’ll constantly be grinding away at max weights, setting tons of Instagram PRs and ultimately making zero REAL growth over the span of weeks, months and years, all because their ego can’t handle the idea of taking some weight off the bar, accumulating some serious volume and building up to something insane.

I know I’ve become a Deep Water zealot as of recently, but it’s been a great example of long term thinking in effect.  I was handling weights that were around 60% of my 1rm for 12 weeks: a situation that would drive so many internet denizens absolutely bananas since they NEED those PRs NOW.  However, once I completed the program and transitioned to something with greater intensity, I started absolutely crushing some old PRs, to include ones I had set prior to blowing out my ACL.  I became stronger than I had ever been before, and it was because my plan included an “and then”.  “I’m going to run Deep Water, and then I’m going to make use of that volume to hit an intensification phase and set PRs” vs “I’m going to set a bunch of PRs in training and then…I don’t know.”

Seems like a good plan

The “and then” is always present, and it’s incumbent upon you to ask the question and provide an answer.  If you don’t, the future is going to catch you flat footed, and you’ll have to REACT rather than be proactive.  Don’t be at the mercy of the future: decide your own fate IN ADVANCE.  Know how things are going to play out and already have a plan in place.  And when there are multiple paths, have multiple plans.  Have a plan for how you’re going to succeed if you succeed and how you’re going to succeed if you fail.  If your “and then” results in you getting injured, have an “and then” that is how you’re going to train and recover from that injury.  If your “and then” is that you’ll soon have a compressed training schedule, have an “and then” that is HOW you’re going to get all of your training done with less time.  Don’t be at the mercy of an unpredictable future: go SUPER big picture and recognize just how potential is out there.    

WESTSIDE VS THE WORLD REVIEW

As I’ve written about previously in this blog, I backed the kickstarted for the movie “Westside Vs the World”.  For those completely unaware, this was an independent film chronicling the history of the Westside Barbell powerlifting club.  Also for those unaware, the release of this film was mired in as much drama as anything powerlifting related could be, to include having its release date pushed back indefinitely after one of the developers of the film split from the production crew, stole all the kickstarter funds, used the money to buy drugs with intent to sell before getting arrested, resulting in the original film creator having to sue that individual to get back the kickstarter funds along with screenings of the film held in gyms all over the country in order to help replenish lost funds.  A good amount of us backing the film had pretty much resigned ourselves to the fact that we’d never actually get our copies, and many disparing things were said about the film and its creators.  I myself equated it to the “Duke Nuke ‘em Forever” of powerlifting.  But then, finally, the day had arrived and I got my early release digital copy of the film.  I have sense watched it, and wanted to share an advanced screening review with you to help you decide if it’s something worth spending your $10 on (if you pre-order).

WHAT IS THE FILM ABOUT?

Pretty much just this guy

The actual “Westside vs The World” film is about the history of the Westside Barbell Powerlifting Club, which, in turn, means it’s primarily a story about Louie Simmons, as there is no Westside without Louie.  It starts off discussing Louie’s youth, his discovery of the Culver City Westside Barbell club, his journey into powerlifting and his accomplishments.  You find out that Louie was (and really, still is) a badass, and definitely earned his place in the sport.  Not much time is spent discussing the methods of Westside, but really more the stuff that most people wanna hear about: the drama.  You hear stories of some big names in the bygone era of powerlifting before youtube, where most info read about in Powerlifting USA or through stories passed on in clubs.  If you follow the sport, it’s cool to hear some indepth stories about these legends.  If you’re new to it, it’s great to get acquainted with the forefathers.  The film tracks Westside all the way to its current form, detailing its domination through the 90s and early 2000s to its relative obscurity in the raw era of powerlifting. 

This film REALLY could have been better understood to be “Louie Simmons vs the World”, because he is the key and central focus of the film here.  Other folks get interviewed, and you hear some perspective from current and former Westsiders, but Louie IS the show of this film.  However, you do get to hear a few cool things regarding the evolution of the methods, why Louie did what he did, and his thought process.

THE GOOD

- Ron Perlman is a delightful narrator, and allows the story to flow through very naturally.

- As stated above, you get to hear some cool stories about lifters from yesteryear.  I was familiar with what an accomplished lifter Matt Dimel was, but I had no idea how psychotic he was in and out of the gym.  Hearing more about Chuck V is always worthwhile too.  Many of these guys had larger than life myths about them, and getting to see behind the scenes is awesome for fans of the sport.

- Pacing is solid.  I didn’t find myself wanting to break away from the film out of boredom at any point. 

- Louie provides a fantastic role model of a total force of nature as it relates to getting and making people stronger.  The interviews completely solidify this.  As well, you get a peek at what was going on behind the scenes at Westside, and discover that the rumors were all true.  You also get some interesting perspectives as well.  For as much as Brandon Lilly talked about being a “Westside Lifter”, I never realized he only trained at the gym for a year before being kicked out.

THE BAD

- This film simply cannot live up to its own hype.  And that’s an unfortunate problem created by its production, but kickstarters have been waiting since Jan 2018 (when it was originally promised to be released).  During that time, we’ve seen the updates over e-mail, promises, rave reviews at screenings across the US, and just tons and tons of drama as the movie FINALLY was released in digital form…all for what is, by all accounts, simply a good movie.  This would readily find a solid place in Netlfix’s bin of decent documentaries on fringe sports.

- I would have enjoyed more time spent focusing on the actual methods of the gym.  How they came about, why, static they faced for introducing them, etc.  Kickstarter backers are supposed to get physical DVDs that go into how to implement the conjugate method, and I’ll review them once I get them, but still, this was primarily a dramapiece, which isn’t shocking for powerlifting.

- No subtitle option from what I can tell.  Louie only has 13 teeth and speaks in a jumble many times, and I had to go back a few times and try to hear what he was saying.  The music occasionally makes this an issue too.

SHOULD YOU BUY IT?

If you are an old fan of powerlifting, I’d say it’s worth the current $10 pricetag.  If you followed the sport during the WPO era, you know all these names, heard these stories, and will most likely get something out of it.  If you just joined in during the raw era, I honestly can’t imagine you’ll find much of this terribly interesting.  If you don’t know the sport at all, I’m not too sure how much appeal it will have for you.  You could spend 90 minutes doing something worse than watching this film, but I can’t imagine it will appeal to anyone but the most hardcore of powerlifting nerds.