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Previous Log 6/7 - Last big workout before the team meet I am happy to say we finished a long training cycle with no major injuries, and just a few bumps and bruises. You can always count on a meet to bring out the best (and worst) in all of us. Tempers, my own included, have been a little short-fused in the gym. But, we will all journey up to Georgia as a team. I have witnessed every person training for this meet make very good progress and am proud of everyone. We have 3 potential new 600 benchers, a few knocking on the 700 deadlift door (well, maybe that's a stretch), and of course everyone's squat moving up. How you prepare for a meet says a lot about your character. Are you there focusing on yourself or are you the first one in line to help another get his suit on or load another plate? Trust me, the eye of tampa barbell is watching. Are you getting enough sleep? Are you curtailing activities that may inhibit your performance in the gym? Are you paying attention to your diet? Are you making the extra workouts? Again, the eye is on you. We shed a few members this training cycle. The commitment and aches and pains can definitely overcome. But for those that make it through, there is a reward, and I continue to believe it's worth it, even after 20 years of lifting weights. That 5 lb meet PR is still as sweet as that first lay. (Well, close). See you in Georgia! 5/22 - squat It was a deload session for many of us. After a max-effort, it usually takes at least me a few weeks to pick my speed back up so today I just worked on the mastodon for some grinding slow triples. Of course, Mike deloaded too. He only went up to 960 on the squat. I think we are going to build a Schwanke-lift that is self-spotting so he can max out 4x per week. Afterwards was the drunk TBB pool party celebration for Nelson. That was some good shit. Pics to follow. 5/15 - Bench Disaster! So tonight, the 'A' bench consisted of those of us who all decided we would try new jacked up shirts. Well, the 'A' team whiffed 4 out of 5 times. Good thing Tom B, sticking to his trusty RageX hit a PR. We should all drive to the Sunshine skyway and kill ourselves. How many times this training cycle did I say "I'm sticking with my stock Rage?" Sometimes, you just can't buy a better bench (unless you are Mike Schwanke). 5/10 - Squat! Jo Jordan, John Land, and Rich Gregg came up from OBB to join us for some squat fun. There was some mayhem for sure. Jo took the crown today with a 970 box squat. I did, however, beat Mike. 950 to his 940. I think at least 2 of us will take a shot at 1G at the intramural meet. There was a lot of chaos on the other 2 monolifts. Since i was fully mummified in my squat gear and struggling just to breathe, I couldn't really step in. I'll just say this: someone (preferably the most experienced lifter (*cough* greg *cough*), needs to take ownership of the rack and direct the overflow onto the 3rd lift. People need to act more like dogs and run correctly with the pack.  5/6 Deadlift Night I was very excited about tonight as I was feeling super-toxic and excited to pull. I decided to issue the challenge that anyone who outpulled me conventional would get 3 free months membership. Not that this is a big feat, mind you, so i was sure everyone would jump on it... Free money, right? Well, it was a sad day for people at TBB. No one really stepped up. I heard things like the following: 1) it's my deload week 2) my back's sore 3) i have to pull sumo Blah, blah, blah. The only person who stepped up was Mike Schwanke, who did whine about the chains for awhile. So I said he could win the challenge if he did 900 total bar weight (700+200chain). What happened? Well, he took like one warmup and had pulled it before I even had my suit all the way up. Fuck, it's like challenging Albert Einstein to a math contest. I still had a PR despite the pussitude of the gym as a whole. Still feeling good for the squat challenge coming up on Saturday. We have to get Jo Jordan re-acquainted with a parallel box. :) 5/1 Updates We made a pilgrimage up to Team Sampson to learn the secrets of the bench press. Those guys have got it going on. They train out of Adam's gym, which is a big shed in his backyard. It is well stocked and has the most important requirement, dedicated people. We learned some tricks with setting up shirts, and the secret of the 3-man handoff. All in all a fun trip. Although I was the shittiest bencher of the group, I did indeed have the best bloat. I have decided to add a speed day back in for myself. It seems to be working well for Mike. We'll see if others follow. We have a max effort squat coming up in 2 weeks when Jo Jordan comes up from OBB. I think we will all put a grand on the bar and see what happens.  4/26 Updates Well, Mike managed to bench 700 an pull 800 at a meet. It was an APA meet, so we can only count it as a good workout, but if he can put it all together in Georgia, it will be huge. Videos will be in hi-res here shortly when i can figure out how to convert them. Meanwhile, they are linked on Critical Bench here at the end of Mike's interview. We've had a few people drop off at the gym lately. Powerlifting tends to chew people up and spit them out. It's either in your blood, or it's not. However, the rest of us are gearing up hard for the June intramural meet. There should be some excellent competition and for TBB to do well, everyone will have to execute. I wanted to take some time to say a word about discipline. We had a guy today who shall remain nameless who was complaining because he didn't get to squat on the main monolift. He felt he deserved it. He also managed to squeak out this gem "Man, i'm sure doing good for not training much, huh?" This attitude is reprehensible. You want to be on the A-Rack, get your fucking ass out of bed and get there early. If you do not prepare properly, you will fail at the meet no matter what gifts you are blessed with. Enough about that. We've had a lot of success with the Super Phenom shirt now. Mike will be pilgriming up to Team Sampson for a bench workout. I fear he will come back covered in plastic bags but with crazy ideas. By the way, another funny tidbit. There apparently is a prominent gym owner who gets a little pissy when his lifters go out and ask advice from others. Give me a fucking break. Do you honestly think you know everything? You have nothing to learn? Go out I say! Learn, and bring back the knowledge. The longer you are alive, the more you realize you don't know. Here is a little slideshow montage from recent days at TBB. 4/8 June meet prep and random musings This is shaping up to be a pretty brutal training cycle, at least for the squat. Since the Mastodon bar arrived, we have put 1000 on it 3 times. (by the way Schwanke lost the crown for the first time in a LONG time last week). Personally, I am walking around like the living dead. It will be nice just to survive the June meet. Schwanke gave birth to an ugly 800 mutated-pull last week. We are all having trouble getting our Super Phenoms to cooperate except of course for the people in the gym who don't own them. They work just fine for them. The deadlift bounty has seemed to motivate people. We have a couple of short-term contenders for the bounty. We will see. My money says it won't fall in June. Today, we hauled up a 300lb monstrous Metal Militia bench with all the fixings on it. Hope to get some film of it in action Thursday. We seemed to all have arrived at the consensus we are pretty beat up and are trying to shift our respective schedules to 1 on 1 off for all lifts. More later.... 2/23 OBB Meet Congratulations to Mike Schwanke for another outstanding performance. 930 Squat, 640 Bench, 785 Dead for a 2355 Total. This propels him to the #4 spot in the current all-time rankings. Also, Nelson Castellano hit a 600 bench in his last meet as a junior. Videos are on the site with more to come. 2/21 Tonight began operation 'murder by triples'. 7 of us worked the bench and we averaged 10 work set triples in about 2 hrs. I hope to bump the work capacity to 15 triples in that same time period. In our crew of 7, I predict 3 will go over 600 within the next 6 months. "Triples are the nectar of the gods" 2/19 Unbelievably, the schedule switch did not cause any grief. 1/2 the people started switching over and I felt a lot of excitement about a change in the monotony. We'll basically be following a template that came to me when i was high, so I am sure it will work properly for everyone. That and Sleep must be played for the first 30 minutes of every deadlift day. PRs for everyone are in the air. A story about why triples are good in the bench press: Once long ago, Blaine and I trained together in Chehalis. I had fucked up a nerve pretty badly and couldn't lock out even 315. Gradually, over a year and a half, the nerve began to repair itself. I slowly worked my way up doing triples in a RageX. I remember the first day I hit 500/3 again and I also remember hitting 575/3. That same day, I also hit a 675 bench in Chehalis. Well, shortly after I moved to Florida, whereupon I opened Tampa Barbell. I immediately starting doing tons of max effort singles. My first meet back, I hit 670, missing 700 at the lockout. That was -5 lbs in 4 months of time. Next, Blaine moves to Florida and we immediately begin redoubling our max effort work on the bench. I think I hit 700 about 5 times off various board heights and probably didn't do a single triple the entire training cycle, up until the point where I tore the bicep tendon in my shoulder. As a side note, Blaine did not complete a single meet as a Tampa Barbell resident. Bottom line: singles are bad. Triples are good. Don't be lazy. 2/16 Today was a deload day for a few at TBB as they prepare for the OBB meet. I am very excited to see old friends and to watch my guys as they prepare to do battle. Everyone looks well prepared this time. This week even saw one of our junior members man-up and do upper back with some animal-like intensity. I was gonna rest my back but Mean Gene wanted to do some shrugging. That is like offering heroin to a drug-addict for me. I could not refuse. Apparently, the Georgia trip was the fountain of youth. All my injuries seem to be receding and I am able to train almost how I'd like. I picked up the Cavalera Conspiracy... If you were a fan of Sepultura, you MUST purchase this. I haven't felt adrenaline like that in a long time. I wanted to murder during the training and afterwards driving on the highway. Jon Grove and I chatted and decided that based on the success and fun of the Georgia road trip, we are going to hold an intra-gym and special invite powerlifting meet sometime in May or June. Buddy Mckee, you better sit that one out. 1/2 squats not allowed. hehehe. Just kidding my Alabama friend. I know your heart is in the right place for the sport. My feeling is you just need to check your ego at the door and follow the rules. When you squat 900, you can tell them "...even Tommy Fannon gave me a white light. " Bonus: What should my box height be? 2/9 The Georgia road trip was a blast. Whenever I visit a sister barbell club my spirits are lifted. As long as they exist, the pussification of america will at least be delayed somewhat in my mind. Atlanta without a doubt has some fine gentlemen's establishments. The big news from the trip was a chaotic but intense squat workout which lasted 4 hrs, followed by 30 minutes of deadlifting. It's great to see some things don't change anywhere. We forced Schwanke to listen to 8 hrs of Sleep's Dopesmoker and he is now claiming it was the greatest album ever made. I agree Mike. Gearman fell in love at least 4 times on the trip. I expect he will make it back up again soon. I also saw some crazy, very unsanitary shit while i was there that i will not publish. Let's just say our paramedic was appalled. I have tons of pictures and film, but these will have to wait for another day as a work deadline approaches. 2/2 Some friends have requested more blogging and videos. I am flattered and amused. In light of all the ChuckV/Louie drama, I will try and add some drama of our own if i can manufacture it. Today was of course squat day. People who bench on the weekends suck and are not powerlifters. I finally found someone who likes to train upper back ridiculously heavy. I can guarantee some very poor form rows and monster trap development over the next few months. It's great to have you Gene! I don't believe anyone else at TBB believes in upper back development. Also, the poor bastard from our gym who 'came off' scared the crap out of me. Blotron's tip of the day: Never come off, and if you do, bench by yourself and don't be seen in public without a really baggy sweatshirt on. Coming soon: i will produce a diatribe on why singles suck and if you are not too lazy, triples are the answer. But, a nap and some fat milk are calling. 1/26 Unfortunately i have to comment on a not-so-good day at Tampa Barbell. I think we went 1/10 on tries for deadlift PRs. The highlight of the day was really one of our members doing a rack-pull with one of our last remaining long squat bars. I began to have a complete shit-fit, then realized if i threw him out of the gym, we would lose two members in one month so he got a stay of execution. deadlifting with a squat bar is officially more gay than bicep curls in the powerrack. 1/5 Happy New Year everyone. We kicked off this New Year's squatting by me laying a beatdown on Mike in the Good Morning. Mike, who has also earned the nickname of Nancy (as in Kerrigan) sulked out of the gym. Hopefully he doesn't go home and kick his parrot around. We have lots of competitions coming up and some new members eager to test their new gear-whoring skillz. Also, Santa gave me a new digital camcorder for Christmas so make sure you head over to the Gallery section each week. As luck would have it, we did not get to film Mike's brutal beating. However, you will get to see him do a pretty amazing 700 + blues on the cambered bar of suffering in his newly acquired Leviathon. |
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