The Masters Athlete Survival Guide
We explore thriving as an athlete after 40. Each episode, we’ll dive into tips, hacks, and inspiring stories from seasoned athletes and our personal experience. Whether you’re a weekend warrior or a competitive pro, this podcast is your playbook for staying fit, strong, and motivated
The Masters Athlete Survival Guide
Overcoming Health Hurdles and Forging Resilience with Riccardo Magni
Riccardo Magni's journey from the basketball court to the grip contest arena is nothing short of extraordinary. As president of Armlifting USA, he brings a wealth of experience and resilience to our discussion, sharing how he thrived in sports beyond 40 despite facing significant health challenges. From his early days as a track and field athlete to his remarkable discovery of passion in individual sports at the 2014 San Jose Fit Expo, Riccardo highlights the empowering nature of controlling one’s athletic destiny. His story of adaptability and tenacity serves as a beacon of inspiration for athletes of any age.
Riccardo’s tale is also one of immense personal resilience, showcasing his recovery from a major heart attack and stroke. Despite these setbacks, his unwavering spirit saw him through rehabilitation and an era of isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. This episode dives into the surprising phenomenon of angiogenesis and the contrasting medical opinions he faced, underscoring the mental fortitude necessary to overcome significant health challenges. Through gratitude, reflection, and perseverance, Riccardo's journey reframes adversity as an opportunity for growth, offering listeners a source of comfort and motivation in their own challenges.
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Welcome to the Master's Athlete Survival Guide, where we explore the secrets to thriving in sports after 40. I'm John Catalinas and, along with Scott Fyke, we'll dive into training tips, nutrition hacks and inspiring stories from seasoned athletes who defy age limits. Whether you're a weekend warrior or a competitive pro, this podcast is your playbook for staying fit, strong and motivated. Let's get started, and we're back. Today, we have a special guest with us, ricardo Magni. Ricardo is president of Arm Lifting USA, but it is not for anything grip related that we have him on the show, because there are shows that are much better at doing things grip related. So hello, ricardo Magni.
Speaker 2:Hey, john and Scott, how are you guys?
Speaker 3:We're doing great, ricardo. Thank you so very much for joining us today. We know that a little bit early for you out there. You're out in California and we truly, truly appreciate you taking some time to talk to us today. We do have some questions because you know, john, and I have known you for what? About three, four years now through armlifting, and that's a great story in and of itself and we hope to get to some of that a little bit later on. But one of the big things is we found out pretty early on when we met you about the incredible ordeal you went through health-wise and your recovery back to truly world-class level competitor in the sports that you love. So, without getting too much more of John and I talking about it, why don't we give you a chance to tell us a little bit about yourself and give us some of your athletic background please?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure. So I'm Ricardo Magni. I'm 50 years old. I was born in New York City. I grew up on Long Island.
Speaker 2:In high school I played basketball and baseball and I was the captain of a basketball team. In college I played basketball, but I found that I wasn't so good when I went to college. I wasn't so good when I went to college. Then I went to try track and field and when I did track I thought and meanwhile at this point, for the viewers at home that may know me or don't know me, I'm 6'3".
Speaker 2:At this time I was like 175 pounds, just a skinny basketball player, and I thought I would be a high jumper because I could jump pretty and I could dunk a basketball. I was like, all right, I'll be a high jumper because I could jump pretty and I could dunk a basketball. I was like, all right, I'll be a high jumper. But the coach said no, no, no, we got this Jamaican guy, noel Watson. He's a high jumper, you're going to be a shot putter and a discus thrower.
Speaker 2:I was like I didn't even know what that was and I was like I went to pick up, he sent me where to get the equipment. I was like I was a sophomore in college. I was like you know. So I was 19 and I was like, oh, where is this stuff? So I go get the shot. But I was like, oh, my god, I picked that up. I was like with two hands. I was like this thing is heavy, like I gotta throw this thing with one hand, like unbelievable. But. But I uh really liked uh how it went farther the more I practiced and it didn't go very far at first but I kept at it and I liked it so much I quit basketball and I was indoor and outdoor track in my junior year and by the time I was senior I was captain of the team, I was all-conference in the shot put and it didn't feel so heavy anymore.
Speaker 2:That's awesome, that was through a lot of work.
Speaker 1:From one shot putter to another.
Speaker 2:Usually, I competed in discus for a long time, but I was never good enough. I was good, but I wasn't good enough to make the US Nationals good enough. I was good, but I wasn't good. Never good enough to make like the U S nationals. I competed against a bunch of Olympians, but I was always, uh, definitely losing. And then, um, then I started power lifting when I got out here to California, and then, of course, I started strong man, and then I started Highland games and I did all those things and I was good, but I was never good until Ode Haugen uh, invited me to the 2014 San Jose fit expo, and then, uh, for his grip contest. And then I realized, oh, okay, this is what I'm the best at.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that speaks, speaks to, that, speaks to everything how I got to where I am now.
Speaker 2:So yeah, after that first grip contest I I canned all the other lifting and I focused on grip contests that I had mainly at the big fit expos out here in california no so that's the. That's the short background, I guess. Do you guys have any questions right now?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 2:Before I talk more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the first thing is that clearly and this is something that interests me just as I, you know our paths are similar, like I was a collegiate shot putter and Highland Games and all that jazz and love, arm lifting Do we self-select for these? You know these events where basically, we are in charge of our own destiny versus a team event Like did you find basketball less satisfying than you? Know things where you basically rely on yourself and your training.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Right. So basketball, I saw college basketball. I was so excited. You know, as a kid, you're growing up, you're watching the final Four. You're watching, you know in my case it was, and you guys are the same age more or less you know watching Larry Bird and Magic Johnson battle it out in the 80s. I mean those were some amazing, fun, super fun games, and it doesn't matter which one you're rooting for, the games were amazing. And you know, you think as a kid, kid, oh, I'm going to be part of that. And then you realize, after high school, or in high school, well, I'm not quite that good.
Speaker 2:You know, in high school I played against mark jackson's little brother, troy, who unfortunately is now dead, but he played his name is escalade in that end one basketball mixtape that came out in the early 90s. He's two years younger than me and I think he died when he was 39. Oh geez. And he got over 500 pounds. You can look it up, troy Jackson Escalade, but he was amazing. So as a 15-year-old, he was 6'10", 6'8", 6'10", 280 and very chubby 280, but extremely nimble. And so we were.
Speaker 2:We played them in an on league game my senior year at their place and we lost and they had a very good point guard, a 5'8 guy who could dunk really good and. But I played really hard against Troy Jackson and at one point I snuck in, got a couple offensive rebounds to put back and score and the guy the coach was like, hey, you gotta keep 45 off the glass. Then, when he wasn't kind of looking, I blocked one of his shots and then the coach was just he was getting really mad. So as he ran back up the court he was like Troy, I will buy you a cheeseburger if you score in the next possession. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:Got to know your athlete.
Speaker 2:I smiled at the coach as we walked back up and you know I was a good athlete but I mean, I was nowhere near as good as the guy, but I could do everything I could to pester him and a 15-year-old, he didn't have the mental game to kind of deal with this annoying white gnat who was pestering him. But yeah, when I got to college basketball, you know and a lot of it's the coaching, you know, the environment was terrible. The coach got fired after my sophomore year. He recruited, he told he he recruited. He told everyone that the most important person. You show up the first day of college and there's 10 freshmen Whoa, I thought it was the most important. And then you compare notes with some of the other guys and they're all the most important. Then you realize you were lied to and that just starts this negative spiral.
Speaker 2:You know, I actually got recruited to play at Penn University, the Ivy League school, but that coach was super honest. Yeah, I was actually a good student, surprisingly. And the Penn coach was like, look, I'm going to be honest, you're not that good. So you're super smart, you can get in without even me putting you on the list, he's like but here's the deal your first two years. You're not going to get off the bench unless the bus gets hit by a train and we have all the injuries. So, but junior year, I can see you playing after two years of proper coaching.
Speaker 1:I just thought to myself wow, are you up for that investment?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wasn't. I was not, and maybe today my whole life would have been different if if I had done that and I would have never seen shot put and I would have never lifted weights like this, and who knows. But yeah, I appreciated him and you know, um, at that point my dad was dead, my mom and dad neither one. They barely finished high school, my dad in Italy and my mom in Queens. So I was the guidance counselor piloting the ship for me to go to college. You know, I didn't have the luxury of having family members who'd ever been to college. So I was like, I told the coach, I was like hey, sir, you know, thank you for the call and the interest. I don't think that's the right fit for me. I think I can do something somewhere and make an impact. It might be on a much lesser uh, not division one scale, but I think I can play somewhere. Right away he goes. You can just find the right place.
Speaker 3:Good luck yeah, yeah that's great one of the things that you talked about the idea of team and that building mentality, and then you head into that individual sport mentality and John and I have talked about that a lot over the shows that we've done.
Speaker 3:What do you think about this idea of you went from a team being five, six guys, depending on the sport you're in, out in the field, to the team being the people that you're out there actually competing against. I mean, when we go to arm lifting events. One of the things that I know, john, and I really appreciate by the events that you run is that everybody likes everybody, everybody's there cheering everybody else on. So it's a team. But in a much broader sense and that's one of the things that we talk about quite often is that support network. I mean, what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know I have. I have a couple of thoughts on that. So number one it's really cool, right? So the arm lifting has attracted various people from various backgrounds. No one started doing arm lifting it's very rarely their first competitive endeavor but we all kind of ended up there by whatever means and I think everyone supports each other right now.
Speaker 2:For two reasons Number one because of the people that are involved, but number two because there's no real tangible prize at stake. I think, unfortunately, money changes a lot of things and if we had the Mr Olympia World Championships, which we do, coming up, I think if I had a $50,000 prize for every gold medal, I think you'd see a lot of people at $25,000 for silver and $10,000 for bronze. I think you'd see a different angle of people, right, greed would more, or reward, however you refer to it would be more motivated and people would be less supportive. So I think the medals are super cool, the status, the invites to other contests, it's all really cool, but it's not as tangible necessarily as money or this or that. So I think the lack of material things has allowed it to be more supportive of each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's definitely— I'll say that You've grown it organically, because it's very welcoming. And I think the way you handled it in Shaw is definitely a cool way to sort of progress, where you had the rock star pros kind of showcased in amongst the strong men and then the rest of us were competing, you know, in the expo, with a bunch of people still watching it. It felt like the best of both worlds, so it was very you thank you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, I talked to the pro guys about it and I said, because it wasn't ideal for them to have to do one event. And then they, they do one event and then they get in front of you know a couple, three, four hundred people, and then you do the second event six hours later in front of you know a couple, three, 400 people, and then you do the second event six hours later in front of 6,000 people. I mean, there's a different adrenaline amount that's given off.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So and I told them this is how it's going to be. So Brian and I Brian Shaw and I came up up with this idea and he was all about it. He thought you know what? It's really smart to get the pros mingling with the quote-unquote regular people, some of whom were very strong, who already are pros, and some of the strong men and women were quite good who competed. So it was a very positive environment and you know that they I saw luke reynolds taking pictures with a bunch of people and same with the other guys. So I I think it was very good for the development of future events. So it wasn't the greatest for the guys who were competing, the pros, to have to get amped up uh twice, but that's. It was not a surprise to them. They knew what was coming yeah, that's how it was.
Speaker 1:So again, just for my own personal edification, did you take? So the one thing that I talk about, I think almost on every episode, is that, like between 32 and 40, I did nothing except watch things from the couch. Were you an athlete continuously after college?
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely yeah. Yeah, damn you. When I came out here to California in 22, uh, in 1996, I was 22 and Nick best was the judge at my first powerlifting Cool yeah. So I met Nick and and and I didn't know who he was. And then, you know, we just had Powerlifting USA and I had recognized him from the results but he was like a drug-free powerlifting champ back then. He certainly was in all the records he's done since. So, yeah, I met people out here very quickly and I found the power lifting gym and and I was terrible. But I I saw that as I worked harder and as I listened to the people, I got stronger and you could measure it by a five pound PR, right. And so that, going back to what Scott said there before, that's what brought me to liking the individual sports more.
Speaker 2:I I competed out here in California against some very good shot putters like Adam Nelson. In fact, I threw my PR against him at a meet in Los Gatos and I actually beat him because he fouled on a 68 foot 10 inch shot put throw. But that's painful. Yeah, he fouled on a 68-foot 10-inch shot put throw. Oof, that's painful. Yeah, he fouled on all six of his throws that day and I threw my PR 49.3, which is obviously not quite as good as 68.10.
Speaker 2:A little shorter, yeah, yeah, a little shorter, but that's the best I ever produced. And there you go. So I was, um, you know, I was blessed to be able to, in san jose in the late 90s, compete in both track and lifting against some, uh, world, world-class people. So and I, I trained with them and I learned what they did and I had some ideas to keep going and, um, for me, the idea of going to practice because I'm a high school teacher, right, and I've been a high school coach on and off for the past 29 years For me the idea of going to practice every day is something that's important. So I do some athletic activity literally every day.
Speaker 3:Every day. Yeah, one of the things you talked about and you mentioned it and I absolutely love it every day yeah, one of the things you talked about and you mentioned it and absolutely love it, and we talked quite a bit about it is you listened to people to make yourself a better athlete, and that's really I mean we do a lot of, you know, interviewing, discussions, things like that about this idea of personal growth and what's best for us, and and listening to other people, because that's really the support network we deal with. So we've got a relatively decent understanding for our folks about what your background is and how you've sort of made yourself into the person you are today. And I mean that with all due respect, because you are just an incredible person that John and I really do, like what you do with the athletics, with with arm lifting and whatnot. But there's a story that a lot of people don't know, and that's the event.
Speaker 3:What is the event? Talk to us about what. You know, that that ordeal that you had to go through, unfortunately, but you made it true. So that's, that's a victory.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so let's go take a trip back in time. Yeah, okay, so let's go take a trip back in time December 31st 2019.
Speaker 1:I drove to my friend.
Speaker 2:Yeah, almost. I drove to my friend Carl Myers Coast House. I slept over, I slept on the living room floor on an air mattress and we hung out with him and his kids and his wife. And then we trained the next day, new Year's January 1st for Carl and I. I've never been into drinking drugs, any of those things, so I don't ever. So just keep that in the back of your mind as I explain these couple stories. So I trained with Carl and it did super well. We had great session, we lived for a couple hours, went out, had pizza and then I drove home the roughly four hours it is from carl's house to my house.
Speaker 2:So by the time I got in simi valley, which is about two hours and 15 minutes into the trip, I would say I wasn't feeling too hot. So I, I and I am a science teacher, I'm a biology teacher and environmental science teacher, so I think I know a thing or two about the human body. So I started feeling like a little bit of pain in my jaws, which is not normal, and then I started feeling like a little squeezing in my heart. You know, none of this is painful, by the way, right, and you know, and I've had been injured before. I've broken bones, I've had pendants detached, so I've had surgeries, so I know what it's like when something hurts, nothing hurts. So I have, uh, uh, and then I started feeling this pain going down my left arm and that's when I knew I was like all right, this, this is not good.
Speaker 2:So I pulled over at a target. Believe it or not, that's the place I the first stopping place. There was a target. That was a big target. This place was parking lot, was packed, but guess what, somehow the very first parking space next to the front door was open, just for me. I could go to any of the other target in the United States right now it wouldn't be open, but somehow, miraculously, that parking space was open.
Speaker 2:I parked my car. I get out. I'm like, ooh, I can't even walk that well. I put up my hand because I was feeling a little out of breath. I couldn't even walk across the street. I put up my hand to signal to the car coming that way, like, hey, bro, you got to hold up and wait for me. I limp across the street. Luckily the bathroom was not in the back of the store, it was right in the front of the store. I went in the bathroom and then the that squeezing my chest got a little harder and then what felt like hours but really was like 10 minutes. It all went away oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I tried to go to the bathroom, Couldn't, couldn't really go, and then I was like it all went away and then I felt fine. So I went and got a protein bar and, uh, went to this hospital in Santa Barbara called cottage hospital. Oprah had donated 10. She lives right next door in this rich town called the Montecito. So she donated just before, like I don't know a year or two before, $10 million to the hospital. Like you know, she wanted it ready for her when she needed it, Right.
Speaker 1:So thanks, Oprah.
Speaker 2:In all her benevolence, which her benevolence is quite extensive, she donated money to the hospital and it's in a very wealthy area, a very beautiful area of Santa Barbara. So I went there and I it was like another hour of driving but I was fine so I went in there and I said, hey. I walked right into the ER and I said, hey, look, I, uh, I may have just had a heart attack, so or I'm about to have one, I'm really not sure. And the attendant, who was like checking people in, was like absolutely floored. She was like do you have your insurance card? I said, sure, within 45 seconds they jam me into a wheelchair. They had an IV in my arm and they were checking for my blood for the signs of a heart attack. So there's this protein, troponin, that comes out when your heart cells are damaged, when you've had a heart attack, and I think the cutoff is 0.40 in your blood. When it's over 0.40, you have had a heart attack and mine was like 6.6.
Speaker 2:Oh, oh so yeah, they confirmed it was. They said it was a pretty major heart attack. So what happened was they gave me this medicine called Plavix. A huge dose of this Plavix, I remember the commercials If you're not familiar with that. What's that?
Speaker 1:I remember the commercials for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So if you're not familiar with it, it's prevents blood clots. Because they were worried, and rightfully so, that I would have a stroke. Oh so, um, that wasn't till later, as you'll find out, but um. So the problem with that is it's an extreme blood thinner, and because it is extreme blood thinner, once they got me in the room and they realized that I was stable, I couldn't have heart surgery for five days. Oh why? Because if they cut me, I would bleed to death.
Speaker 1:Oh, bleeding yeah.
Speaker 2:So I was stuck.
Speaker 1:I give you credit for going to the hospital. I think a lot of guys wouldn't have gone to the hospital. They've been like, oh, that's over. I went to target, I got protein. I'm going to go home and watch TV.
Speaker 2:Yeah, maybe they would have, but they wouldn't be alive.
Speaker 1:the next day.
Speaker 2:Um caution, yeah, so and and I'm sure there are people I mean you gotta be smart. I mean some people would have called an ambulance right there in target Some people, and maybe that would have been a better play, I don't know, but the heart attack happened either way. There was no preventing it Right. So I mean not in that moment. I mean, yes, there was ways to prevent it, which I'll go over at the end, but not that were readily apparent at the time. So it was kind of a purgatory the time. So, uh, it was kind of a purgatory. I was in for five days waiting and I I got every test they could muster, every single one like they. They tried to like go in through my leg to do something, and then all of them were futile. They realized they needed to.
Speaker 1:Saw my sternum open and oh, sorry, I'm I'm shivering at the thought.
Speaker 2:Yeah so they, they had decided that they just need to open me up and fix whatever needed to be fixed. So, after waiting the five days, which was very, very long, five days in the hospital I haven't told too many people this, but I'll tell you guys the doctor, the heart surgeon, came to me with me the night before the surgery and I asked him. I said, doc, hey, am I going to make it? And he goes yeah, you're going to make it. You're going to make it for three reasons. Number one you got that cross around it. You're going to make it for three reasons. Number one you got that cross around your neck. That's a good thing. Number two you got me. And number three you're in fantastic shape. If you weren't in the shape you're in, I might not go to option three, but you're in better shape than anyone in the hospital that I've seen. So you got those three things. You're going to make it.
Speaker 1:Well, there's the lesson baked in there, right, like you know, cause I mean, one of the things that all our master athlete friends worry about are the things you know, the, the target episode that you had. You know, and a lot of guys don't eat or take care of themselves nearly as well as you do.
Speaker 2:So Guys don't eat or take care of themselves nearly as well as you do. Well, here's the thing, right To survive this thing, you've got to get ready ahead of time. It's like the poor people in Florida that just had a hurricane If they were prepared with extra food and you know their flashlights and other stuff, they're more likely to survive the thing. If they're not prepared, it makes survival more difficult. It's never impossible, but it's just more difficult. Right, and I think that's the thing with these events as I'm going to describe If you're ready beforehand, it's easy to deal with the aftermath.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's a great. I mean, that's a great takeaway because I can think of plenty of my friends that are like, oh yeah, I should work out more. But boy, cheetos tastes good. Um, you know, I you know, half a bottle of bourbon is fine.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I get it.
Speaker 2:So, absolutely.
Speaker 1:There's a strong lesson right there.
Speaker 2:Now, and to that point I had gotten as heavy at 6'3" as 290 pounds, and in 2020, at that point, I was 220. So I had lost 70 pounds from 2014, when I turned 40, to 2018, because when I was 40 it's a separate story, but I was like I've had enough of this being fat. I don't like this. It's not good. So I lost 70 pounds.
Speaker 1:Nice so that's great. All right, I'll ask the question that people will ask How'd you do that All?
Speaker 2:right. Well, I started extreme calorie restriction so I didn't have, and I have a sweet tooth. I didn't have any ice cream. You know, I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't do any of those things. I never have, but ice cream is. I like ice cream.
Speaker 1:Ice cream is delicious.
Speaker 2:It is delicious, so I deleted ice cream. Ice cream is delicious, it is delicious, so I deleted ice cream. So that was gone. And then I had meat salads every day for lunch at school. I made all my own food from that point on Meat salads. So I had salad and meat and I barbecued meat and I put it in the salad and that was some dressing, but not like smothered in dressing. Right, dressing wasn't the first ingredient. And so I eliminated the processed foods, I eliminated the meat, I eliminated the processed foods and ice cream and I stuck to natural foods like meat and salad and fruits. No protein bars, none of that stuff. And I lost weight and I kept working out super hard and I worked out twice a day some days and yeah it's yeah that's how I did it.
Speaker 1:There's no secret, but it was like it was four years of that yeah, and I don't think people like hearing that there is no secret and it's really just the fact that you ate like an adult and were consistent, right, I mean that kind of is what it comes down to, which nobody wants, everybody wants the magic something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean there was no ozempic, then right, and that thing works apparently. I've seen some other teachers at school that have certainly lost weight. I don't know how healthy it is in the long term, but I'm not their doctor. Whatever, being fat in the long term is not healthy at all, so being less fat is a good thing. So yeah, I think and it can be done. It depends how bad you want it. So, going back to the heart attack, then I had the surgery. It was worse than they thought. I had a five artery bypass. They took an artery out of my left arm and I have a pretty big scar, a vein out of my leg. I have a small scar and they gave me new plumbing all the way through.
Speaker 1:Nice, you know. No, I have a question. My dad had quadruple bypass in the 80s and his surgery was like 35 hours and something and he never like. Part of the reason why I really want to talk about your story is my father owned a service garage. It was his own business, worked really hard, went through the heart attack, never really bounced back. He was immediately kind of enfeebled and never, never, could do anything like you did.
Speaker 2:So I applaud you for coming back from something like that well, thanks, um, it's been a lot of determination, um, but, to be honest, the next is worse than the heart attack. So, yeah, so, um, the yeah so. Time goes by and I started recovering and is six. Six months goes by and then I I picked up an inch dumbbell, um, so that was pretty good. At six months after the surgery, I was feeling good, like I was feeling good, and then July 12th 2020, right, so, seven months and a couple of days after the heart attack, I just finished training. I felt fine at the house I was living in at the time, the clothes washer and dryer were real low to the ground. They were the front loaders that were real low, so I was washing my clothes. During my workout, I sat down to switch the clothes from the washer to the dryer and I couldn't get back up.
Speaker 1:Oh geez.
Speaker 2:I didn't feel anything and I was like, well, this is kind of weird, like what is it? So then I kind of crawled over to my like reclining chair and I thought for a minute and I was like, and then I felt my eye right eye, drooping a little bit and I was like, and then I felt my my eye, right eye drooping a little bit and I was like, oh weird, maybe this is some Bell's palsy.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:But, but. But then my hand was a little numb, and why couldn't I stand up if it was Bell's palsy? So I I told my ex wife at the time hey, how about you turn on the car and let's drive to cottage hospital in Santa Barbara, an hour away again, I think.
Speaker 1:I need to go and they have a good track record, so that's where I would go to. Yeah, yeah, we're one out of one with Ricardo Magni at least.
Speaker 2:So, sure enough, I had a stroke and it was much worse than I anticipated. So I was totally paralyzed on the right side of my body, from my foot to my eye. Geez, yeah, at first. But then after, and they tried to do interventions and they were worried and and then they did some scans and of all of my upper body and my brain and this and that, and they determined I had a stroke and they determined that it was in one of the arteries in my neck. This had been brewing for a while. So in fact, my neck and I just had another scan of it in January. So this, this current day today, is September. So in January of this year I had a scan and what the neck showed is that my body had angiogenesis, that they grew blood vessels around where the clot is in the neck artery. Just I made my own bypass.
Speaker 1:Oh nice Congratulations.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's an added bonus. So they said we don't see it too often, but you got it.
Speaker 1:Now, were you? Were you still on Plavix at this point? Like, were you on any long-term medications before the stroke, Between the heart attack and the stroke?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was on blood pressure medicine, but my blood pressure has never been a major issue. I was on blood pressure medicine, but my blood pressure has never been a major issue. Yeah, I was on Plavix on and off, but then after the stroke, yeah, so I'll handle the medicines in a second. Yeah, sure, but yeah, so I was in, and this is during COVID, by the way.
Speaker 1:Of course, that made it easier.
Speaker 2:Yeah, maybe. So I was on. I was on in isolation because they were worried about me getting COVID. And then then, you know, and they're still trying to figure out why it happened. So all these people are telling me all these things of why I'm, you know, about to die and this and that, and I was like, hey, let me get. And then I had this doctor and he was another Italian guy and he was great. And then he got into a fight with my cardiologist right in front of me and I was before I went to the rehab station oh because well, I'm gonna get there.
Speaker 2:So they went into a fight. They got into a fight like a freaking yelling match and this is what it was about my the cardiologist, who is a non-athletic guy. He said well, you need to stop all weight lifting, all fitness, you need to just moderate all activities. Consider changing your course of life. Maybe you should take a medical retirement from teaching. It's too much pressure. Blah, blah, blah, yep. And then before I could even respond and my eye had come back now and my foot could kind of work, so, and I'll get to that, but I was doing a little better. This is after four or five days in the hospital and I could move my arm. It wasn't great. My hand was totally numb. Like asking me to pick up a number two pencil with my right hand would have been I may as well, would have moved the mountain.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:Oh, it was numb. There are still some days I can't pick up a number two pencil off the floor with my right hand now, four and a half years later. But anyway, the neurologist he was like look, you don't understand what you're talking to here. This guy and this is the exact words he used, this is not me embellishing it he said this guy is a machine. If you take away the weightlifting from this guy, you are going to create a whole other household, a whole other host of problems. He's probably going to become some kind of addict because he's going to create a whole other household, a whole other host of problems. He's probably going to become some kind of addict because he's going to be miserable. Yeah, this is not a guy who you say no to. You don't want to do that. That is going to kill him faster than if he has another stroke. And then he looks right at me, he goes. And if you died of a stroke when you're lifting, would it really be that bad?
Speaker 1:and I smiled and I said, no, if I'm gonna go.
Speaker 2:That's why I want to go well, the neurologist understood me well enough after a couple talks that I couldn't be placed in little glass box for the rest of my life and that if I'm going to beat this thing I'm going to beat it by fighting, not by waiting and hoping hoping.
Speaker 1:I think that's one of the problems, like the argument between your two doctors, I think is a reflection of the bigger thing, between which doctor you get Cause I have had both. I have had doctors that are like you know, you're over 30. You might want to start taking it easy. And then I have had doctors that are like oh, you're still training and you know going after goals.
Speaker 3:That's great, you see, and I've been lucky because the doctor that I the doctors I've gone to through my life have said stay off the couch, do something, move, lift weights, play pickleball, do whatever, just keep going yeah, but doctors that want you to stop are not uncommon, yeah oh, no, no, not, not at all.
Speaker 2:I mean, they expect everyone to fit in some little uh photocopy of a medical journal. Oh, your cholesterol? Is this? Your this? Is this, this is this? Well, let's you know, stop everything. Yeah, so here. So getting back to the stroke story real quick and then I'll go over the medicine.
Speaker 2:So the stroke I went to sleepover rehab for eight days. After spending five days in the hospital and in sleepover rehab, I had to learn how to write my name. I had to do memory games. Now I have a very, very good memory, but like I started with. I have a very, very good memory, but like I started with like simple Sudoku puzzles at first, and I couldn't do them at first because my brain was broken Wow, right, it was damaged Like a bunch of my brain is dead so.
Speaker 2:But I worked on making the new pathways and that's the key. I didn't forget like my family or I didn't forget anything like that. That wasn't the part of my brain that was affected. The part of my brain that was affected specifically was in the left side of my brain. That controlled my right side, right. So my right hand, which you know. I've closed the number three gripper for like five reps. So if you know what that means, it's pretty good. I couldn't pick up a number two pencil right. I had to pick it with my left hand, place the pencil into my right hand and then learn how to write, which was a horrible looking handwriting at first. So those things like we take a lot of that for granted. And then I think the number one takeaway message is and it doesn't matter if two people hear this or two million people listen to this the number one takeaway message is I met with the neurologist one more time before I got discharged from the sleepaway rehab.
Speaker 2:And you know, in the sleepaway rehab, walking at first right, I had to walk with one of those old people, four-pronged walkers, with the two tennis balls in the front yep, because I couldn't walk. And the lady was like the nurse that they were really worried about me walking and I was like I gotta walk sooner or later. So we're starting now. And she's like well, uh, then they called the doctor. They, they asked, they called him and they asked him can he start walking? And the doctor said what did he say he wants to do? He said he wants to walk, he goes, you get out of his way.
Speaker 1:You let him walk yeah, and just for for people who don't know ricardo and are just listening to the story, I needed to give him a little backstory. Um, ricardo is a fantastic pro level arm lifting athlete as of today. So he has gone from what you're hearing of worried about not being able to walk and not being able to remember numbers between one and nine to really the like if you met Ricardo today, you would not know this story. Not at all.
Speaker 2:Not at all. Well, thanks, but I'll get to why. Maybe that is in part. So I started walking the first day with the walker, yep. And then the next day the nurse came back same same nurse and she was like all right, I go, we don't need that walker today. And she goes well, yeah, we do. And I said, no, we don't, we're not using that today. And she goes well, what are you going to do? I'm going to hold on to the side of the wall that there's like a handrail there, right? So I'm going to hold on side wall. She was one of your fall. I'll pull myself back up. She goes no, you won't. I said watch me.
Speaker 2:So I think at that point I was fighting, not for my life, because I was reasonably sure I was alive, but I was fighting for everything else. Yeah, like, going to the bathroom was not easy. Like you're fighting to stay alive Talk about fight or flight, right? Yeah? So we'll speed up the story. I got released eight days.
Speaker 2:The doctor said look, this is the deal. You can do all the lifting as you're ready to do it. You can't squat anymore. I don't want a ball by your neck. That's going to raise the blood pressure to your head, any of the deadlift stuff. If you get dizzy you drop it and I've never to this day I've never really gotten dizzy from deadlift ever, like post-stroke right. So it's not going to kill me the lifting, at least to cause another stroke or heart attack. So I never got dizzy. My blood pressure is totally good. But anyway, he goes. But I don't want to squat and I used to love to squat. I don't. No squatting, no more. You figure it out. You do something else, but no squatting. You hold in your hands or your waist. It's good you do bench pressing. It works if it's dizzy, you don't do it.
Speaker 2:You do incline when your head is higher, so I want to get less dizzy. I don't get dizzy, so but that's what my restriction is, he goes. Oh, and, by the way, you really might want to think about eating meat. How about you delete meat because it's got too many animal fats? You add new plumbing in your heart. You don't need more animal fats.
Speaker 1:So I became a vegetarian.
Speaker 2:Are you still a vegetarian After a couple weeks? Oh yeah, oh yeah. I haven't had meat in four years.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I'll stop bringing you beef jerky to all the events, then you can bring it for you and Scott.
Speaker 2:Yeah basically yeah, then you can bring it for you.
Speaker 3:And scott, yeah, basically, um, yeah, but it took a while to like really decide the vegetarian, like two weeks, but I did it and I did a cold turkey and I never looked back now, ricardo, let me jump in here because first time I went to the arnold was the covid year and if I'm remembering correctly and my timeline is right, that must have been the first Arnold after. You know both of these events and I got to tell you when I went in, and you know we were able to compete for the first time. I I never would have known. So the kudos that we give you for the recovery that you've made, I just can't give you enough, because it was absolutely phenomenal.
Speaker 1:Well, the key to the, I think the thing and I think Ricardo is even too close to it, to, I mean, I know he knows it, but he didn't give up. I'm going to lift. Oh, I have to change my diet. Okay, I'm going to change my diet right now and I, I applaud you because, yes, you could have probably lived sitting in a chair knitting for the rest of your life which which wouldn't have felt like living to you, right? Because that's just hell, no that's not who you are.
Speaker 1:Right so no. So the fact that you made sort of those definitive choices is again part of the reason why we asked you on the podcast, because it's amazing yeah, well then I still went to rehab for both mental and physical, for like six or nine months, okay, afterwards, after the stroke.
Speaker 2:By the way, between the two episodes, I only missed eight days of school. Oh, holy shit, I know right. Yeah, so I didn't miss a single day for the stroke because we're on the pandemic, we're on zoom. Oh, so I didn't miss a single day for the stroke because we're on the pandemic, we're on Zoom. So I didn't miss a single day, true. And then with the heart attack, I missed some days. I actually came into school I think it was five or six days after the open heart surgery to meet with my student teacher who took over the class for two weeks while I was recuperating.
Speaker 1:Right, wow. So you've had many opportunities to sort of just bail and sit on the couch and wax poetic in the good old days, and you've chosen absolutely none of them. That's outstanding.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, and even in the sleep, in the regular rehab that I drove to and I was a couple times a week at first they said you're making remarkable progress. And I had a. I had three rehab. I had a mental rehab slash psychologist who was great. I had a hand rehab who I fired the first lady because she wasn't good, like she was not doing, she was worrying about me buttoning my dress shirts. I was like I can practice that at home, yeah, I want to do other stuff. So we got it, we, we got her fired, I got another one and she was great.
Speaker 2:And then my guy was my leg rehab guy and the the hand rehab guy made she, she girl, she girl, she. She said something. She was like I can't believe we've never had a patient come through as bad as you started to as good as you are, even after just a month. And then, even though he wasn't working with me at the time because I go to the leg rehab, it was like Monday, wednesday, friday brain Monday hand Wednesday, friday, legs Right, like like. That was like a typical week of rehab. That was like 25 minutes away from my house, the leg rehab guy was working with some older person. He pipes up and he goes. That's because, whatever we tell him to do, he probably does it two more times at home and she goes, she goes. Wait a minute. You mean the whole hour and I smiled and I said three times. So whatever they told me to do, oh, do three sets of 10 of this. I would do nine sets or 12 sets of 10. Just space it throughout the day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that industry is a little hardwired for the fragile 70-year-old like that.
Speaker 2:So many of my colleagues in the rehab were yeah, they were. They were very old and they were very immobile, yep, and they had a very low quality of life before they went into the rehab, before their stroke or heart attack or hip fracture or whatever happened to them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know, no matter how mobile you were when you were 20, I really feel and this is not a scientific, just my own opinion you lose mobility At our age. You're not getting it back easily.
Speaker 2:I mean it's a thing. Oh no, you got to fight and claw, yeah.
Speaker 1:It is much easier to keep it and try to maintain it than it is to have to try to build it.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely, absolutely, which has been the whole problem with my right hand. I mean my right hand before you know, in 2019. You know I I'm not trying to brag by saying this and you guys get it because you know the humans that I'm going to talk about, but in 2019 I beat devin lee brown at the LA Fed Expo. Now, those people who don't know Devin Lee is, I actually talked to him on the phone this morning because I want to call them to see if he was okay because of the hurricane there in Tampa. But the man is a jujitsu. He could be a pro skateboarder if you wanted to, and he has hands the size of a baseball mitt and he's super strong. So I beat him in the LA FedEx.
Speaker 3:Bowl 2019.
Speaker 2:Three months later, at the Arnold, I beat Eric Racine, who's arguably the greatest arm lifter of all time. So you know my right hand was cooking. It was in good shape, and then it was very, very, very, very, very, very humbling to get sent back to picking up the number two pencil off the floor I bet no.
Speaker 1:So scott and I, several times in this, have said that we would. If you didn't know you, you wouldn't know any of this. But as far as you, who knows you pretty well? Um, are you back 100, would you say? Do you have limitations?
Speaker 2:oh, I'm never gonna be 100. Well, um, I I yeah. I have limitations. My handwriting on the whiteboard at school is crappy because my shoulder is is not strong enough in the way of writing on the board it's. It doesn't have the same mobility. Yeah, I can just.
Speaker 2:I can now finally bench press 225 again, but how much of it is my left arm versus my right arm, we'll never know. I can now finally bench press 225 again, but how much of it is my left arm versus my right arm, we'll never know. But I can do that any time now. I mean, if you ask me bench press 225, I can do it in 10 minutes. A bar, 135, 185, 225, I can pause on my chest and bench at any time. So my upper body is getting stronger. In the beginning I could only do pushups, hundreds of pushups, but it's a growth process and it's rebuilding and when you understand that it's easy, you know maybe this time next year I'll tell you I benched 315. It won't surprise me. So, um, my all time best bench raw is 400 pounds. So we've got a ways to go before we get there. But I'm not keeping it off the. It's not off the table. It's just not a goal right now, because that's a lot of weight and I'm not that strong anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you just highlighted something that Scott and I Scott and I did an episode that's not out yet on goals, or maybe it is, I can't remember. I'm sorry, um, but you, I sort of personalize the fact that it's not. There's not really a goal, right, there's a, a goal that then it has to move to the next bigger goal or series. Yeah, or you get nowhere and you clearly have, like you know, that low Hill in front of you, but there's also the mountain that you're not losing sight of. So that's, again, is an impressive part of your story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, I just think it's. It's the way I have evolved as an adult. Right, I want to be successful. I. I understand everyone's limited by something in money, time, athletic ability, whatever it may be, I get it, everyone's limited. But there, but within those limitations, you can be a slightly better, incremental, better version of yourself today than you were yesterday, yeah, and tomorrow you can be slightly better than you were today yeah, and if that wasn't the case, life would be very, very depressing for me, but people are, yeah, again, I'm glad you tacked on for me, because there's plenty of people that just want the status quo.
Speaker 1:And, oh, woe is me, and this is the best I'm ever going to be. So I applaud that. Well, you know what? That's what they're, and oh, woe is me, and this is the best.
Speaker 2:I'm ever going to be. So I applaud that. Well, you know what. That's what they're going to get. They're going to get out of it what they put into it. That's very true.
Speaker 2:And just some psychological messages I learned from working with my therapist after the stroke to recover from all that stuff. You know, I got divorced a year and eight days after the stroke because, oh absolutely Because I realized that I'm a winner in my whole life, except on being married to my first wife. That was not a winning proposition and the reason it wasn't is I was always set up to fail. It was never going to be a win. And that might be a hard thing to say. It may sound mean and insensitive, but from my perspective, I've earned the right to call it what it is, and it was not good.
Speaker 2:And so, in that vein, or in that line of thinking, if you can't take care of yourself, how can you take care of your kids? How can you take care of your coworkers? How can you take care of anyone? You can't. You know you've got to be, you've got to be healthy, you've got to be able to earn an income Like you can't take care of anything if you're not healthy and you can't take care of yourself.
Speaker 2:So if you're sitting there with a 12 pack of natty light on the couch watching football and that might not be the best investment in your health, now that doesn't mean don't go drink a, go drink beer or do whatever you want to do. But for every action there's an equal opposite reaction and I think, um, I am feel fortunate that I was inspired to always stay in shape, even though I was 70 pounds overweight at one point. I was still doing stuff at the time and it made it easier to get not 70 pounds overweight, not 70 pounds overweight, and I think everyone can improve, and I think, if they don't, it's going to be even harder to come back if you get one of the things I had, let alone two.
Speaker 3:You know, ricardo, one of the things you hit on just within the last 30 seconds or so is there's an equal and opposite reaction to every action you take, and I think that's really the gist of what our podcast is is giving athletes that opportunity to think about it. What are the tools that you have? And you talked about this mental fortitude that you had. No, I'm not going to, we're not going to use that walker today. What happens if you fall? Well, then I pick myself up and I go again. That never say die, that never stop. And that's a lot of what the Masters athletes really should be relying on, because, no, we're not our 20 year old selves anymore. However, what we do have is that mental experience that the 20 year old or the 30 year old might not have, and that fortitude that you're talking about is just that tool in and of itself.
Speaker 3:You know, with one, let alone both of the things that you went through so freaking close together, in my mind, that's what your secret weapon was, was that you just use that that sort of. I will not fail, I will not stop. This is what's going to happen and that's what we talk about with people. You know what, if you're, like you said, 70 pounds overweight. Okay, get off the couch, walk for five minutes. That's what John and I tell our friends. You know you've never done anything. Okay, get off the couch, take a 10 minute walk, take a five minute walk. Just be consistent. Don't let your brain tell you otherwise, because if you do well, then tell you otherwise, because if you do well, then you're fighting yourself, and that's the hardest victory to win.
Speaker 1:I, I think I mean ricardo. I think the lesson I've learned from talking to you today is you may be the most self-aware athlete I've ever, or just human I've ever met. Like you. I love the way you frame challenges not as necessarily problems, just just as challenges Like I have this. I need to do that, and it it seems very black and white, which to some people comes across, as you know, too restrictive, too harsh, whatever, but it has served you incredibly well, for sure.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks, um, you know, when you're half dead sitting on a hospital bed, you have a lot of time to reflect. Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 3:All right so.
Speaker 2:I, I didn't put on judge Judy reruns. I, I thought to myself what am I going to do to? How can I make this better? Right now? Because, honestly, you know, and I read a lot of like I like, like the USA versus Russia mystery and spy books. Right, that's my escape. Right, I like to read those kind of, you know, tom Clancy type but there's plenty of other authors besides Tom Clancy because I read all those when I was in high school but I like those kind of books and you know, you always hear about the American that's behind the enemy lines in russia and they're held hostage and they're trying to think of ways to to get out or to escape. Yeah, you have a stroke. You're trying to think of ways to escape, not being able to move, literally. Wow, that's.
Speaker 1:That's a great way to frame that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so I think you're not going to get back to square one in a day, a month, a year, in my case, four years. But and this is another important lesson, you know, before the doctor released me, my neurologist, before he released me to go back to what a regular life and to go back to my house, he was like look, hey, you had these two events. You know you're not going to recover from a third. What do you have to do different? And I told him, without a, without a batting an eye, I was like get divorced, that's what I have to do. Because there was just so much stress Some of it was financial and some of it was just relationship stress. After you know, 22 years, it just changed to different people. No, I get you, I have an ex-wife.
Speaker 1:I get you. I have an ex-wife, I get it. And I get it in a way that I think a lot of people that don't have an ex-wife don't completely understand that the glacial pressure on you in the throes of it can really be. It can be a lot worse than some of your health stuff on some levels.
Speaker 2:Well, exactly, and you know I haven't gotten into it on this thing but financially, besides being a high school teacher and she's also a high school teacher but besides being high school teachers, I was a university professor part time. I did summer work part time, I founded a summer science institute for kids. Part-time I coached. So I tried to maximize many revenue streams to try to get us better off than we were, but in my particular case, it was never enough. Whatever I did was never enough and I did more than any person I've ever met in my whole life. It was not possible to do more and my body fought back.
Speaker 2:And so in version two of my life. I'm not going to let those things happen again and I felt like I didn't get it from, even though this sounds absolutely ridiculous, guys.
Speaker 1:I feel like the heart attack didn't teach me all the lessons I needed to learn. No, I get you. Like I said, I don't think, knowing just through this conversation, what I know about you now, that you're ever going to feel completely satisfied with your life, and I don't mean that in a bad way, it's just you enjoy the striving, for there's always, you can always be better, which I think is a great educational lesson. And I got to say and I don't know anything about this part of your life, but I suspect there's a student or a dozen out there that have been completely positively influenced by your attitude, just by osmosis and just watching you, so that that's awesome too.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks, yeah, I, I see the kids, you know, having lived in this town now for 24 years. I see my former students all over, including one of my all time favorites is teaching in the classroom behind me Nice, science, nice. So I think we've got about 10 or 12 of the hundred and sixty teachers here have been my former students, and some of the other ones are elsewhere throughout the district. You know, some of my other former students are doing great things. I'm I'm always happy to have a positive impact on anyone, but I think I really needed to reframe what life was for me, because otherwise I wouldn't be alive right now no, that that that is amazing and I and I applaud you.
Speaker 1:My, my girlfriend is a retired english teacher and I think while she was in the trenches as an actual teacher, she felt overwhelmed, underappreciated and everything. But you know we, we still live where uh, you know where she taught and she runs into students and parents of students all the time and they praise her. And she gets praise from kids that she thought either didn't know she existed or didn't like her, and to a person they're like, in this age of not pushing us, you pushed us and it made all the difference. So, again, you've probably influenced a lot of kids, both directly and indirectly, and that's awesome.
Speaker 2:Thanks, john, appreciate it and like everything else, you know. And if I can close with one message, you know and again I'm only talking about myself, but someone else if they hear this, this might work for them. You know, every night I never have a problem going to bed, ever. Because when I hit the pillow, I ask myself the same question every night Did I do my best today? And that's not just a lifting, and not just a teaching, and not just as being a parent or a new husband, in my case, or whatever. I ask myself did I do my best today? And the answer is yes, every single day.
Speaker 2:And I think if more people answer that question, ask that question and then, even if they say, no, I didn't do my best today, but tomorrow I am going to do better on X, I think the world would be a much better place. And that may sound hokey, but I really think it's true.
Speaker 3:No, and Ricardo, I you said something again. I just I know I've been very verbal in this, this discussion we've had, and a lot of it is just me thinking about a lot of the things you've said and one thing that you said you do, a practice that I do as well. At the end of the day, I reflect, I look at what did I do Right, what did I do wrong, what would I do differently? You know, and like you, I didn't have a health event that happened, but I mean, without going into it, you know that I had an incredibly traumatic event that happened with me and it does cause you to reframe.
Speaker 3:And I think that you know, as we sort of finish off for today, I think if we take that opportunity and we all look at our lives and what do we want? Is it the whole thing, is it part of it? Is it whatever part of it? What do we want to reframe? And then how do we reflect daily on it? What are those little things, those little victories that we had that really helped us to be successful? So, as we sort of wind down, I want to say, you know, for both John and myself, number one, thank you for introducing us, I guess, to arm lifting and welcoming us into that family.
Speaker 3:And number two you know the friendship that we've developed over these last couple of years. Number three, the incredible story that you shared today and the messages that have come out of it. So, for both of us and all the folks that we know, thank you so very much for joining us today. And, as always, I'm Scott, I'm still John, he's still John, and we'd like to again thank Ricardo Magni, president of Arm Lifting USA, for joining us today.
Speaker 2:Thanks, Well, thanks guys for listening and caring, and I appreciate this, and if me talking to you two helps one other person, it was time well spent. So thanks for allowing me the platform to tell my story.
Speaker 1:Most definitely. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others, post it on your social media or leave a review. To catch all the latest from us, you can follow us on Instagram at masters athlete survival guide. Thanks again. Now get off our lawn, you damn kids.