Three lift Seminar–excruciating detail
10 October 2006If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
On Saturday we ventured down to the Big City to put on a seminar. Karwoski and I would verbally improvise talking about each of the three powerlifts for three hours: quite ambitious in hindsight. Optimally we would Vulcan mind-meld with the audience. Each major lift, the squat, bench press and deadlift would be allotted a full hour during which the two of us would say whatever came into our thick heads at that moment. We’d take turns talking, one of us would start riffing on a particular detail of the lift being discussed and the other would pick up on the thread, boring deeper into the specific topic until we exhausted our cumulative knowledge on that particular infinitesimal detail. It was a data-dump of anything we’d ever learned about the three root-core progressive resistance exercises. Cumulatively we’ve been doing these lifts for 70-years. Kirk just turned 40, training with a barbell since age 10. Moses was one of my first training partners. Kirk’s been retired for eleven years and still holds the IPF world squat record in the 275-pound class at a staggering 1003-pounds. Two years ago this December he squatted 826 weighing a shredded 242-pounds using no supportive gear. Look up the word squat in the dictionary and there’s a picture of him. I taught him when he was coming up just I was taught by my power elder, world champ Hugh Cassidy. I gleaned copious knowledge from my pals, continually picking the brains of old friends like Ed Coan and Doug Furnas. Mark Challiet showed me how to really deadlift. We were training partners and closer than brothers for six years.
Our talk was interspersed with lifting demos. The two of us might demo a technique and we would call on audience members to take a turn lifting while we critiqued. To demonstrate a point, I would pick out at random member of the audience and say – “Could you please come up and show us your squat?” We had them do the various lifts in whatever method they currently used. Then we tried to show them how to make it better, technically speaking. We’d critique them hard but never maliciously. Krishnamurti has a philosophic theory that you can get to the truth of any issue faster by examining flawed and imperfect lines of reasoning. In order to come to what is factual and true, often flawed examples serve as the best teaching tools. It might seem to the uninitiated that we were mindlessly deconstructing the technical flaws of the demonstrator but that would be inaccurate: a picture is worth a thousand words and how much easier to show a group of people what knees traveling forward past the toes looks like and how to avoid it by thrusting the butt rearward. Show proper technique by converting bad technique to better technique on the spot. “Check it out!” Kirk might say while watching a lifter from the audience squat in real time, “Look how his knees are traveling out over the toes – keep your knees back and positioned over the ankles on both the descent and ascent.” The person squatting would be told what to do. Suddenly, just by thinking about it and being aware of it, those knees would miraculously retreat rearward. Suddenly the squat went from looking awkward and disjointed to smooth and professional looking. Good technique keeps a body safe. Then the hour would be over and suddenly it was time to move on to the next lift. I talked more in three hours than I normally do in a week. Then the three hours was up and it was over.
The seminar was held in downtown Washington DC and the trip was a study in contrasts for Stacy and I. Alise Frye has been a friend for many years and had been kind enough to offer us the use of a private room in the gym of her posh condo building. The complex had a fulltime security desk man and after showing us around her lovely, tastefully appointed two bedroom apartment, she walked us up to the 10th floor roof deck. Dozens of chairs, tiled floor, two monster propane grills, a grass area for sunbathers, all open 24-hour a day for use by the inhabitants. The roof deck was huge and had crystal clear views of the Washington Monument, the Capitol, and Crystal City - all the way on the other side of the Potomac River. 360-degree views of the city, no skyscrapers to block the view, what a perfect place for watching 4th of July fireworks: the Mall fireworks are shot off on the Washington Monument grounds, maybe a mile away. We ventured across the street to Crème, a chic little hip bistro for dinner Saturday. We actually passed on reservations at Anthony Bourdain’s La Halle, preferring to avoid cabs and hassle. We simply walked across the street from the condo. The owner and chef were old friends of Alise and both made time to talk with her, asking about Rob. We got some great bar seats so as to wit-a-size with the bartenders. The Irish guy understood me. The food was retro-southern with the clever urbane twists. Quite good actually; and the joint had great gregarious ambiance. They didn’t have Guineas but offered me the hipster micro-brew equivalent: Oatmeal Stout. Sorry but I can’t really say I’ll ever order that again.
The seminar was held in the spotless yoga/Pilates/step aerobic mirror-glass-and polished hardwood floor room. Perfect actually. The gym itself was next to the condo’s “billiard Room” in which a huge plasma TV sat over the marble fireplace before thick, deep leather couches and plush chairs. A marble bar was in one corner and an adjacent room housed the pool table – no one ever was in lounge the four times I ducked in during my stay. The next morning Kirk showed up. We set it up and took it down. To me time and space folded and the three hours flew by. Afterwards a dozen or so tired participants headed across the street for food and drink. Over post-seminar cocktails, Tall Mark tried unsuccessfully to convince me he had conquered the Rubik’s Cube of making tender, smoked flank steak…might as well have tried to convince me he could fly. I was skeptical, dubious, doubtful and told him as much…so some sort of throw-down is in the offing up here at the Compound. Stacy and I thanked our hostess for her incredible hospitality then rode home in 90-minutes. We slept like babies. We taped 2/3rds of it – squat and deadlift – before the battery died.
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