Guest Blogger Post for December 30, 2012
A Rant and Tip from a competitive Strong Man
I had the pleasure of training with Jasen at Cutting Edge Sport Science, a training facility in Albany NY, at cutting edge they train athletes of all ages for all sports, not just powerlifting and strongman competitions. Many a professional athlete has trained there under the tutelage of Dyke Naughton.
Jasen's Post
As an
athlete and athletic director I’ve met my fair share of folks involved in the
strength game. This year alone I can recall competing in a Powerlifting Meet, 3
Strongman shows, a Highlander and 9
Highland Games including the LW World Championships in Ventura (finished 8th
in the World this year).
Also ran the
Albany Games and Heavy for the Holidays NAS Strongman show. So that’s a lot of faces over the course of
the year, all with similar goals. Lift Heavier, get faster and throw farther.
Common themes, easy stuff. One other
common thread within all these events is the event chatter. Catching up on
training, new PR’s and why there are no Highland Games groupies. Through all of this, one thing I’ve never
heard, “I feel awesome. I have no injuries. Everything is great”. It’s just not
something that happens.
As
brothers (and sisters) in iron, there is a constant push to improve lifts and
tweaks abound. One thing I don’t understand is how athletes will drop out of
competitions because of conditions that aren’t perfect for them. Very rarely in
the course of any athlete’s career does the perfect situation arise to perform
at 100%. The best we can do is to take the opportunities we chose to compete
and make the best of them. Training, diet and a solid taper is ultimately as
good as we’re going to get to hitting those perfect marks. I’ve been through numerous competitions and
all I can remember is the love of grinding out the reps, the chalky man hugs
and the smiles. I can’t look back at one single competition and remember it as
the one I went into with a hangnail, so my stone over bar suffers.
What I’m getting at, is how I take it
personal when my peers drop out of contests last minute due to asinine
reasoning, or even worse, fail to compete at all. We toil weekly with the iron.
We grunt. We moan. Why not take opportunity to test yourself once in awhile?
Show everyone why you put in these hours.
Step on the platform. Gear up and get it done. Everyone started
somewhere and no one dominates like Ilya Ilin their first time out. Regret is a
horrible emotion and I know that after all the years of competing I’m sure to
have a few injuries, and hopefully an even larger trophy case. But, one thing I
won’t have is regret. Regardless of where I’m at in my training, if I’m healthy
enough I’ll be competing.
Tip: When you do decide to compete, keep in mind you are doing this for your own well being. Definitely attempt a personal best at the meet, but also be prepared to not hit the numbers you have hit in the gym. It does happen both ways though. There have been numbers that I hit in the meet that I never hit in the gym and numbers I hit in the gym I have yet to hit in a meet. So I have two PR categories. A meet number and a gym number. For me the meet number is the number I want to improve the most.
Well said Jason, The only thing that keeps me in the gym and off the couch is competition. I'm 54 and do the highland thing as you know and pain is part of the game at this age. Getting out with your peers and throwing heavy stuff that normal people can't is a pump that no gym can offer. Without competition whats the point.
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