10/25/18

Training has been a struggle. I hate admitting that, but it’s absolutely been one of the most difficult challenges of my life to do what I’ve needed to actually heal. Heal as an athlete, heal as a man. For 15 years, training was my constant. I was able to forget everything, even when that meant self destruction in my personal life, to pour myself into the gym.

The roller coaster of injury, emotions, and pushing to be who people wanted me to be took its toll. I ended up a huge, strong, lifter but that shelled the struggling, insecure boy that never figured out what went wrong.

I’ll cover more on that in the coming blogs, and I apologize for starting, then changing direction, but as I type I realize that perfectly mirrors the last five years of my life. But if you care, and I assume you at least have some interest in my story if you’re reading this, but I hope this isn’t a medium that you use to put me on some type of pedestal. I hope you read this and somehow translate my mistakes, my triumphs, and use them to improve your life.

I want to share myself, but I don’t want a “look at me” over the top approach. To be honest I despise that in the sport I love. We all desire to be liked, and valued, but it seems to me that the sports of strength are no longer drawing in the masses so that they can attain paramount strength. The sport is growing, and it’s trendy, so people are finding ways to overcome the lack of platform performance with other means. “T&A” are the flavor of the day, and if that’s what you’re looking for here then you can stop now.

I love the gym, strength, and the feeling of seeing lifters overcome the bar. Watching a lifter that balances job, family, self, and the gym should be admired, and that’s what I’m interested in myself. Balance, but also adhering to my mentality expressed in my book “365STRONG” that we are only as strong as our weakest link, on our weakest day. Formerly that was all geared toward the gym, now I apply it to my life.

Here I will talk about my travels, my failures, my climbs. I will talk about the gym because it’s a part of my day to day, but I will talk about so much more. Because that’s who I am… I’m more than what you think, or expect, and I’m probably not what you think or expect. So this sets up an interesting dynamic. You will understand in time, just as I will too…

For now, training this morning was at 2:30am. I got 3.5 hours of sleep (horrible, but it was good sleep) and I am currently typing this as I sit on a runway, on a too old plane, beside a too old lady, that smells overwhelmingly like some mix of cigarettes, and an everything bagel. Exciting times.

I’m headed to San Diego to meet up with Matt Vincent, and some others on the Monster Energy Team of athletes. Should be a great weekend. But now:

Tabata is:

20 seconds work

10 seconds rest

8 rounds

4 minutes total

Round One

Two Handed Center Mass Bell (CMB) Swing

70lbs

Round Two

One Handed Clean CMB Switch every 30 Secs

45lbs

Round Three

Push Press

50lbs

Round Four

Snatch

50lbs

Row

Max Distance in 20 secs