Ep.7 S-3: "AR and Cool Stuff"

In episode 33, 7 of the 3rd Season, Carl and Travis Briefly recap KOTC, RPS Nats, talk more about AR bands and Chains, and talk about BarPath.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

It worked? It worked. It worked. The mouse works. Episode 33. Wouldn't wanna be me. Episode seven of the third season? Question mark? We gotta stop taking breaks. I fucked this up too much. Episode It's 33. You got it. It's definitely 33.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

Should I look on Spotify real quick?

SPEAKER_03 0:21

No. Okay. We're gonna roll with it. Shit. And all the things that have torn me apart, nothing has made me more whole, covering the good, the bad, and the shit that keeps us going, straight from the head refs table. I'm your host, Travis Papa Bear Rogers, and you are listening to a Forest Through the Trees, a Cave podcast, here with a man, the legend. Go ahead. I don't know. There's not a lot much to go ahead. Come on. The not qualified for the WPO. Alright. Carl the Master. Alright. Alright. Hey. 11 points, you know. 11 points. 11 points. And what did we find out that if you roughly did it without like accurately doing the calculator, it's like just shy of 10 times body weight. But that's that's only if you're like 198 to 220.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

If you're a small guy, yeah. If you're a small fry. Right. If you're like a bigger boy, like a 270, you don't get a 227.

SPEAKER_03 1:13

Yeah, it's got it's got favoritism. Favoritism. If you're thick, it'll do the trick.

SPEAKER_01 1:19

It'll get there quicker. It's classist, but like weight class. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alright, I like that.

SPEAKER_03 1:25

So last uh, I wasn't gonna say last week, we took a break because we hosted King of the Cave 6, our annual summer meet here. Uh Carl worked as a spotter and loader. Uh, my wife had off work, and we got to spend the best day with three of my boys that I coach. Uh, and I couldn't have asked for a better day and a better group, man. Um it was a good one. It was it was one of those days where like it really reminds you of why you still enjoy the sport despite all the shittiness surrounding us here lately.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Yeah, dude. It's been uh it's been a storm, dude.

SPEAKER_03 1:59

It's been a storm, been a shit. But we have ordered it. It's just instead of raining cats and dogs, it's just been raining turds, small and large. Yeah. Of different quantities. Mostly large turds. Yeah, mostly large turds, which equivalent to large shirts of people.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

About the size of like the Las Vegas sphere sized turds.

SPEAKER_03 2:17

About the size of a person. I can think of a couple in particular, yeah, turd-sized people. But um, it was a great day. Uh, shout out to Brad, DJ, and Kevin who totally just made my day and reminded me of why this sport is why I invest so much time, why I invest so much money, why I've spent so much time at the cave to make this a better place for us and for lifters and for training, and like it all just kind of comes together on days like that. So I'm very proud of those three. We had a really good day. Um, a couple of them didn't have exactly what they wanted, but again, when you're surrounded by guys who can consistently pick themselves up and pick those up around them, uh it makes for a good day no matter what. So I'm very proud of all three of those guys. Uh, and shout out to everyone that competed. We had a blast. Um, pretty smooth meet. No, no misloads, no. Of course there wasn't any misloads. Hey, it happens, it happens. Oh, not at our meets, that's what we're doing. But like I'm just saying, it happens. No, we had a great crew up there. Yeah, we had a really good crew. Shout out to Eddie, that was Eddie's first time um yeah, spotting and loading.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

Spotting and loading, and I was like, Eddie, you are the biggest person here. Get on the back.

SPEAKER_03 3:27

Yeah, yeah. So Eddie backspot for us, Carl was aside, Rachel was aside, and we had a volunteer, and then we also had uh who was on the other side? Sean. Sean Washburn. Yeah, yeah. Well, a guy I used to coach and very good friend of the cave. So we had a solid crew. Our new guy did great too. He did a really good job. And uh he reached out to me. Um, actually, he's down from Aaron's way with uh black flag.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

Shout out to Sky for hopping in.

SPEAKER_03 3:51

Yeah, yeah, man. Sky killed it, man. He was very polite, very uh just humbled to be here, and just an all-around good guy. So shout out to everyone who had a killer uh killer meet and also a killer staff crew. So how did your guys do? Um, what number meet is this for Brad? Do you know? Off the top of my head, no, because Brad's done two with me since he switched coaches and gotcha. I I didn't poach him. I didn't poach him. That's what it sounds like. That's what it sounds like.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

He came to you after me.

SPEAKER_03 4:18

He did after a meet. Yeah, after me, he came to me and was one or if I had spots. And actually, uh, when he gets back from their giant soccer vacation, they're watching the cup and everything. Um going out to a game like Luke. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, he texted me from a game the other night. Um, he's looking to do nutrition with me as well. So shed some some LBs and getting he said, it's not about the scale, man. I just want to look like I lift more. And I was like, that's you know what? That is fair. That is fair. Okay, cool. Yeah. And then I hit him with a nothing tastes good, it's looking good. And then he was like, You're an idiot. And I was like, Yeah. It's my Globo Jing quote of the day. It is. Um, but uh today we're gonna talk about um I it's kind of a smorgasbord of things, it's a multitude of things, possibly. Um, just because we had so much we didn't get to cover last week. Um, I do want to talk about nationals quick. Yeah. Can we talk about nationals quick? Throw it down. Um, just because I know that's not on the I mean it's sort of on the list. But um, nationals, we did RPS Nationals two weeks ago, right? We showed up.

SPEAKER_01 5:17

We didn't do it. We showed up.

SPEAKER_03 5:17

We didn't do it two weeks ago. Yeah, yeah. Um, coaching, my girl, um Elise Frazier absolutely murdered it um in multiply. We had hit 600 a couple times in training. We ended up with I think 583 on the platform. We did miss six. Um, we're definitely gonna work on some, I wouldn't say weaknesses, but better suit advantages. Like um, she doesn't use the straps to the most of her capabilities. And so yeah, that killed me too. When I saw how they set them, I was like, you gonna like set those, set those? You got no strap right now. Yeah, I was like, you you're basically just wearing two pairs of briefs, my guy.

SPEAKER_01 5:53

I uh I mean if she's made it work this long, yeah. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_03 5:56

I've seen her hit six the whole time. So like I think uh she's definitely good for like easily another 30, 40 pounds once we figure out the straps. So shout out to her, man. She absolutely killed it. Um, was a ball buster of a bench shirt. She was in a gray line overkill, terrified of that shirt. Had done really good in prep. I even got her to do a double touch in that same shirt, but got super nervous about it because she's never used that shirt in a meet, and it can kind of be very finicky depending on your weight fluctuation. Um, absolutely, absolutely killed it. Uh, first touch was super duper hard. Um, and we knew it was gonna be, but she held out for it and got the touch, and everything out uh besides that was just PRs on the way, man. Ended up with 360 pounds, which is more than she handled anytime it trained. Yeah, crazy bench, crazy bench. So 360 pound bench, and then ended up with a 419 pull. So the bench and 425 pull. Was it 25? She met the last one. It was a 25. It was uh so both a um bench PR and a squat PR. Um and I think we totaled PR by a smidge. It was like a it was it was it was a smidge just because of the missed squat. Right, but other than that, man, absolutely murdered it. Um very proud of her. And then after that, she asked me to do the logo for her meet because they just got approved at Invictus Barbell, and that is in Maine. No, I think it's Massachusetts. Massachusetts. Massachusetts. I knew it. Sorry about that. It's up there. You know, I'm I'm bad with geography. Um English teacher. I mean, dude, you've seen me with Google Max. I'm terrible. Actually, our last trip only missed one turn. That was pretty good. You're consistently missing one turn per trip, and it's fine. One turn per trip for me on average, that's really fun. I feel like that is fair.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Although I we did every single time we get an Airbnb, I have to double check the distance because it usually is like way too far away than we we'd like. Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_03 7:41

So that is fair. That is fair. I am surprised you leave me that in my hands to handle. I I'm always double checking it. I mean, you let like a micro-he's got this, but I'm gonna look. Yeah, it's like letting the lead out on a dog. Right, right, right. That that makes sense. That makes sense. You know what? That I can't even argue that it's fair. But um, so they just got approved for RPS as a full meet director, and she'll be doing her first full power meet, Battle Over the Bridge. Um, do you remember the date off the top of your head? I definitely don't.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

No, no, September something.

SPEAKER_03 8:09

September, yeah, it was it was in a little while. But uh, if you are looking for that, you can find the link to that on my page for the artwork. It's the shark battling the kraken that I did up for her. And so uh if you're interested and you're out that way, or you want to fly out and experience, like obviously, I vibe very well with Elise. Um, not only is she a good athlete, I consider her a very good friend. And she runs her gym the same way I would probably run my gym here at the cave, man. She gives a shit about our lifters, and I know she gives a shit about our meat. So undoubtedly, I know that's gonna be roughly solid meat.

SPEAKER_01 8:41

Roughly right now, it's about 12 to 14 weeks out, I think. So, like if you're looking for a meat and you're around that area or you'd like traveling for one, there you go.

SPEAKER_03 8:48

So, shout out to her and her crew, everyone she brought that day too, was super kind, super nice. Uh, reminding me of Cave Away from the Cave, man. So uh I always love and enjoy seeing that outside of the cave. Um, but yeah, so nationals, our meet. We've done it uh two weeks back to back, and now we get a break this weekend, right? We be chilling. Big chill.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

I think so. I think so. I I hope so. I say I hope so. We have a squat. This is the last squat I'm taking in moderation after the second. Because this is week four for you. Right, right. This is the first full block since our deal.

SPEAKER_03 9:19

So like now that we can get past the squat, afterwards I'll start pushing numbers and we've been doing volume on volume, and of course, it wouldn't be summer uh officially if I wasn't hurt. So uh that that did indeed happen. Um This isn't serious though. It's it's not serious, but I you know, we it I was due. I was due. This is marginally less definitely less severe. Um so I had a small tear in one of my laps, uh, lats doing none other than pull-ups. The super cool movement that power lift is embarrassing, embarrassing. Uh third set of pull-ups, I felt something pop and move. And then uh I calmly stepped off the little box because me and Carl have to use a box because we're so short. And I stepped down and I said, Carl, I don't mean to alarm you, but I'm pretty sure I just tore something in my light. And he goes, No. And I said, Oh yeah, man, stick your finger here. And of course, there's like a little divot. And I'm like, Yeah, that's tender. And I said, I guess we'll know how bad within, you know, if it's real bad, you'll see blood in a week. You know, it takes if it's a deep tear, it takes a lot of time for the blood to come to the surface and pool. Sure enough, four days later, around I think it was like midnight, I took a picture and sent it to him, and there was blood in my armpit lining up exactly where he had touched.

SPEAKER_01 10:33

And I was like, Yep, that's definitely uh I think it was like a little something something right after it's like, okay, well, looks like our squat variation is gonna get it. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 10:41

So I I had to switch up squat variation, and obviously I have not deadlifted because I don't want to be in that full arm extended position with my lats engaged. Um, so I took a transformer bar and then the other last this past weekend I took a bully bar and was absolutely fine on either of those. So I think I'm gonna stick to those for at least another week or so. Um and then I got my first DEE bench in with you on a five by five yesterday, and that was fine.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

Yeah. If anything, it helps you, like because you're you know getting back to it and you're testing the waters and you're feeling good. It also showed me a really bad variational squad for me. So yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:16

Carl Carl's not a low bar transformer fan. Hated that. Hated that. Yeah, yeah. Not cool. You're strong, but the balance you were like, nah, son. It was not about that. And I was like, oh, I'll just take my shirt off. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

When you're hot, you take your shirt off, it makes it even worse.

SPEAKER_03 11:30

Yeah, it's terrible.

SPEAKER_01 11:31

Don't stand behind me, this might fall back.

SPEAKER_03 11:32

Well, that actually is a really good tie-in for what we're gonna be talking about today because we do have a lot of technical speed and AR, bands and chains, different kinds of technical bars we're gonna be talking about today. But I wanted to start this podcast off more so with um a conversational piece. Uh, me, Anthony, and Carl had at dinner on the day of weigh-ins before a meet. Um, and I've been talking back and forth through Anthony uh with text and phone calls. We did a phone call for dude. We video called like little girls for like 45 minutes. Gossiping. Yeah, gossiping and giggling and stuff. Talking about boys, talking about boys, getting getting all embarrassed and red. Um so yeah, we were we were talking and uh he used a term at dinner that I'd never thought of in a powerlifting perspective. And he he referred to me and him as one, and I had never heard it before. And he said, you know, we were talking about something, he said, you know, like us lifers. And I was like, lifer, man. I've never heard that in a powerlifting aspect. And so for me, I like to think on these things and like what does that mean to me? Um, because me and him think a lot alike, and that's why I enjoy talking to him so much. We've experienced a lot of the same events and stuff through our powerlifting career. Um but I I deemed it as someone who has given more than they ever really expected, and yet still how somehow manages to still be here. And that invokes time, money, health, relationships, and that it's not just a phase or like an insta-hustle or uh, you know, uh a smidge of clips for two years and then you're on your way out. It's like who you become and struggle to survive without that. Like you don't know where you situate your personality, your needs, your wants based on who you've become because of that. And that basically, you know, in a nutshell, to live and die by that. Right. You know, you you would go until like going is is physically and in reality like no longer an option. And not just saying like, oh, I'm getting too old for this, oh I'm getting too whatever, whatever for this, it's until like you you physically could not uh within any possibility do that anymore.

SPEAKER_01 13:57

Like getting buried underneath the monolith sort of thing.

SPEAKER_03 13:59

Like yeah, like uh so when I think of Lifer, um I think of just tons of people who I've like had it out with or had interactions with, both positive and negative, who are like, oh, I'm here to do something, I'm here to be the best, and then you know, and the same thing for negative connotations when I've had people like argue with me or give me a bunch of shit or like you know, talk trash on me, like all those people within two to three years like fucking disappeared. Right? People that swore they were that type of lither, that they were a lifer, that they were here for the long fucking haul, right? And then just like smoke an and vanish, trickle out, and fade away. You know? So I thought about it and it's like you can never really predict like who that's gonna be. Like I I I don't know if I in my own mind could like rightfully look at someone and know like that right there, that's a lifer. True. You know what I mean? I don't I don't really think there's like you don't think there's like a set time for that. There there isn't, man. Well there that physically there is not. If you're a lifer, it's for life. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like you can't just say, oh, I've been doing this for like X amount of years. Right. There's no stamp on it. Even if it's a majority of your life, you're you know, there's still time to dip out. Yeah, there's still time to give it up. And I mean, dude, I've known tons of people like that even before I had my first decade in. Like, I there's tons of people that I just saw disappear. Yeah. You've seen more people leave the sport than I've seen come into the sport. Dude, I I I a hundred percent agree with that statement. That is very well said. Ew. Yeah, ew. Yeah, that makes me makes me very sad. Yeah, but it's it's very true. Um, but I just want to put that word out there, and I think personally, uh me and Anthony joke all around about like making new t-shirts, and he's like, we can't make a lifer t-shirt because like that would defeat the purpose. Yeah, and a lot of people would buy it, and then it it would be like it'd be a bunch of posers, yeah, yeah. It would like, yeah, it would get played out really quick, and I was like, that's not what a lifer is, man. You can't you can't define that with a t-shirt, you can't define that with like a set number of meets or a set number of years. It's just like the the sickest part about that word and defining it is like you you could only rightfully say that when the person you're gonna say it to no longer lives. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:33

So would that mean like you're not a lifer yet? Yeah, I guess. Yeah. In in in my death of the yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I get you. No, yeah. Ever since I like in the beginning when I said buried another monolith, that's what I've been thinking of. That'd be so sad.

SPEAKER_03 16:47

I think I think that's that would be a in order to sum it all up, that would definitely be a lifer.

SPEAKER_01 16:53

Right. There are some people that you could say, like, oh yeah, they're most likely a lifer because they've been doing it forever and that's what I've done.

SPEAKER_03 17:00

Which is crazy because some of the talks me and Anthony have had about people that are like recently left, he was like, oh no, like I'm a good judge character. I was talking about Anthony. He was like, I was 100% like that's the guy. That's the guy forever. And it's not. You never know, dude. You never know, and that's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_01 17:18

Like, it's hard to judge that. People are always changing, man.

SPEAKER_03 17:21

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

As years go by, like, you're if you're staying the same, you're doing something wrong.

SPEAKER_03 17:27

You are, but there's also like this weird aspect of it, like you change, but like do you?

SPEAKER_01 17:35

There's something about like okay. You know, it's super hard. You can't put a pen on it. I know, I know. That's why I wanted to talk about this word.

SPEAKER_03 17:41

It's a good word, and that's why I it provoked so much thought for me when we had that conversation at dinner.

SPEAKER_01 17:47

Like, there's obviously things that continually draw you towards what we do here. Like, in in not just like here, but just like draw you to this lifestyle of like you know, being in the gym, uh powerlifting or whatever you do, like coaching, owning the gym. Yeah, and when you just mean life rains.

SPEAKER_03 18:11

And I think I don't think lifer encapsulates like just competing. You know what I mean? Right, no, totally. It's it's like your capacity within the sport. Because you could be old enough and still in the sport, but you don't know. And coaching and running meets and stuff, you know what I mean? When you're like shit was so busted you couldn't do it yet. But like you know what I mean? Like, is that what a lifer is? I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 18:33

My okay, my first thought.

SPEAKER_03 18:35

I feel like you, me, Anthony, and Roman could sit down and have an entire podcast about this one word.

SPEAKER_01 18:39

Yeah, maybe. My first thought goes to Dave Tate. Okay. He doesn't compete no more. He does not. He can barely do a lot of the movements that he'd like to, probably, because he's just so fucked up now. Yeah, like hurt injuries, you know, they all pile up over years. He still is very involved in the sport though.

SPEAKER_03 18:56

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so, like, you know, I I again, like, I don't think you could use just competing actively on the platform as a way to define a lifer, which is weird for me to say, because you know I'm a huge advocate about like, bro, you shouldn't do X, Y, and Z if your ass ain't been up there for X, Y, and Z. Right, right. You know what I mean? I'm very big on that. Like, I fucking hate that shit. Like, if you've done four meets, you better not be a fucking referee, you better not be a fucking meet director. Like, and I don't give a fuck who hears that. Like, I will say that till I'll die on that hill. Yeah, it's your face is blue. That's yeah, like I'm not about that shit. Like, if you have not earned your stripes and done your time in the sport on the platform, there is no fucking way you should be judging or holding outside of that.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

But there's just like something that feels weird about not calling somebody a lifer when you have seen them in the sport and around it for so long. But I guess by definition you can't.

SPEAKER_00 19:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:53

Or can you? I don't think so. Dude, it's hard. It's hard. I don't think so. I don't think so.

SPEAKER_03 19:57

I think this is a a a good conversational piece and word to inspire others to talk about this, and which is why I wanted it. But I I literally think it'd be super cool to have an episode with Roman and Anthony and talk about it.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

Yeah. There was a clip from um the West Side movie where Louis talks about like the only way to get your picture up on the wall is to die. And that's kind of like the same thing we're talking about here.

SPEAKER_03 20:20

Yeah, yeah. And that's but that's like instead of metaphorically and talking about the word, that's like a physical example of the city.

SPEAKER_01 20:26

That's a very physical example of what that entails. Yeah. Just different example.

SPEAKER_03 20:31

Yeah, well, I told you when I die, I want you I want to what? Go ahead. Were you just waiting for this? Yeah, yeah, go ahead, go ahead. I I want to be in the cave, but like have you seen the deer that like they'll mount the head in front through one wall and then like the ass and legs are through the other wall, and we have at least two walls in here. I and I'm on butt naked. No, butt naked. No, dude. No, no, no. But if you cut the middle, you can miss like top cheeks and balls. Because that's in the wall. It makes sense. It's like a sandwich. It's like, okay, it's like think about it like my body as a naked Oreo. No, I don't want to think about that.

SPEAKER_00 21:09

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 21:09

Think about Carl, think about my body as a naked tattooed Oreo. Okay? The top, right? The top part, the cookie part, right?

SPEAKER_01 21:17

Right, right, right.

SPEAKER_03 21:18

That's like arms to belly button, torso, right? The cream is all the good parts. We're gonna take those out because that's a wall.

SPEAKER_01 21:29

Is this a light stuffed Oreo or is this like double-stuffed Oreo?

SPEAKER_03 21:32

For me, don't they make the thin ones? They make the thins, too. I'm the thins. I'm the thins. No double stuffing over here. All right. And then the ass half is the bottom of the cookie, but that's on the other side of the wall. So I want like a Superman pose, or ooh, maybe an a rolling ab roll out, like with a wheel in my hand.

SPEAKER_01 21:51

Nah, dude. Like through the wall. I would definitely like ask the uh taxidermers to do some like stupid pose.

SPEAKER_03 21:58

Okay, well either way. When I go down as a lifer, that's what I want.

SPEAKER_01 22:02

Okay. You want to be taxed at her in your gym. Or uh dude, if they build the pole, the pole barn, I want my naked body in your pole bar. I thought you were about to say, if they could put me on a pole, like a pole dancer.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

I was about to be like, there's the corner in the corner of your barn, Carl. No. With a disco ball.

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Okay. Yeah, that's a hard, that's a hard ask. I don't know. It's your wishes, dude. It's your wishes.

SPEAKER_03 22:25

If I put it in my will.

SPEAKER_01 22:26

It's your wishes, man. I guess I guess I can't say no to that. Yeah, you can't.

SPEAKER_03 22:30

You can't. You can't.

SPEAKER_01 22:33

The things I do for you, man. Should we talk about some like real stuff? Yeah, we can. We can. Alright, fine. I mean, the lifer stuff was real. I think that was a good conversation. I definitely ruined it with the it's not real. It's not ended though.

SPEAKER_03 22:46

Like oh, the conversation about me naked, you want to keep going on? No, no, no, no. Okay, okay. All right. Um what else do you want to talk about?

SPEAKER_01 22:55

Is there is there more to the lifer aspect that you think we could cover?

SPEAKER_03 22:58

I there probably is, but I want to pause because I want I know Anthony's gonna hear this, and then I want to hear his thoughts on it, and then we can regroup.

SPEAKER_00 23:05

Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_03 23:05

So, speed and AR. We've we had this written down in some notes. We want to talk about it, about like what purpose does speed work slash accommodating resistance work have a place in your training, how it has a place in our training, and kind of what purposes and things they serve, and also, of course, like proper setup.

SPEAKER_01 23:24

Okay, I'm really glad you specified and you said speed work and AR work. Because they are not synonymous with each other, they are not the same, right? You can use AR and speed work, but speed work should be a separate thing all by itself.

SPEAKER_03 23:34

Agreed. And just because you are using AR does not mean you are a conjugate lifter. Yes, that's that is also not synonymous. A lot of people will see like somebody with bands or chains and automatically assume, like, oh, well, I don't want to do that because I'm not conjugate. That's not what conjugate means. Yeah, you see a lot of raw raw guys with um chains now that you didn't used to be like they do because they're learning of well, let's go ahead and talk about that one first since it's already on it. And it's applicable to raw lifters as well.

SPEAKER_00 24:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:02

So utilizing chains um at the top of either a bench, squat, or deadlift. Now, obviously, there's going to be different nuances and uses for each one, but in a nutshell, obviously, as you think about how gravity and load works, as the chains pile up towards the deloading and bottom of one of those motions, right? It picks up more off the floor at the top portion and your lockout of that movement, right? So at the bottom, lighter, at the top, heavier, hence giving you the ability to overload different portions of the lift. Yeah. So how do you want to talk about um let's let's talk about chains with squat first. Okay. Because you're you're pretty well versed in that. You think so?

SPEAKER_01 24:50

I mean I've been doing it for like a couple years now, but I don't know. Do you like it? Yes, yes, okay. I like it, I like it. Um I prefer chains in my squat rather than bands. Why's that? Um I think it helps me for one, it helps me get better with heavier picks. I think first and foremost, like uh chains are a great way you can overload the top end of your movement, and so I can get really strong picking heavier weights. And so that wouldn't be a problem once I'm taking like an actual third attempt. Like I've picked a hundred pounds more than this in chain weight. Like, I'm not worried about that.

SPEAKER_03 25:25

I totally understand that. I also think with heavy bands versus chains on a top pick of squats, I think realistically the load is better for you with the chains, like you said, you prefer the chains because the bands are actively pulling you back down and are quicker to simulate a different position of where the bar would actually be on your back.

SPEAKER_00 25:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:50

You know what I mean? Because it's pulling you in a direction versus just weight hanging in a direction.

SPEAKER_01 25:55

Now we used a lot of chains, or we used a lot of bands when I first started getting into like using AR in my training. And it got me really strong really fast. Oh, there's no doubt I would get you strong. So like bands work for that, but they beat you up more, they they kind of guide you.

SPEAKER_03 26:12

Um yeah, I would I would argue I I definitely agree with I feel like the bands have a more guiding motion, especially like say our monolith with the locked-in pegs, right? Like once you pick and those are parallel with each other, like you were you are going down and up, and it's gonna guide you in that position. Now with chains, I think unfortunately for you, you're in a shitty position where you need both, and I don't want to do both at the same time. It's true. Because like I don't want the bands on there to guide you, right? Right. But with the chain weight, you're experiencing the top pick, but as you unload it's lighter at the bottom, which I know you can already handle.

unknown 26:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:58

So you're not feeling the increased stability while maintaining a heavier load.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

See what I'm saying? I do. I do. Um, it's nothing we can't that can be achieved with just chains, though. It can be.

SPEAKER_03 27:12

You would have to really pay attention to the height of chains at where they are. Like it would take setups. We'd be out there with tape measures and shit. Yeah, like okay, this chain's like gotta be 24 inches. Right. It would be very 18 inches off the ground. It would be very like, you had to really look at it. Um, one of the other things we haven't played around with yet, even though we have a nice pair in here, is weight releasers. We have a set of weight releasers in here. Yeah, Mike has a pair in the other room in the orange monolith.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

They're really, really nice. I had no idea. Yeah, bro. They're collecting dust, dude. We gotta try that. Yeah, I'm down with that.

SPEAKER_01 27:47

Well, I learned something new today. Yeah, I'd know I'd love to try that.

SPEAKER_03 27:52

Besides the monolith. Wow. Cool. They're like inside the mono. Like, you know how the forward part has like some of this like strength equipment with the hand grips and stuff?

SPEAKER_02 28:00

Yeah, yeah. Look right under there. Yeah. More you know. You'll be like, hey. All right, cool. So there's a weight release. Well, we have some, all right. Yeah, and they're like super adjustable.

SPEAKER_01 28:08

Nice. Um what what of uh before we you know get off track? What's the difference between a weight releaser and like a regular uh AR?

SPEAKER_03 28:17

Okay, so the weight releaser where you're gonna experience uh either chains or bands of accommodating resistance throughout the duration of the movement, only one portion getting less tension with bands or lighter with more chain pile on the floor. A weight releaser is gonna carry the movement when you pick at the top, it'll carry the weight of the prescribed pick all the way down to the bottom of the motion, and then when you touch down those weight releasers, they will turn off the bar at an angle and then not be there at all on the way up. Right? So you're only experiencing that load, right? For half the movement. For half the movement. Okay. I think it's only the eccentric portion of the movement. Right, right, right. Would it like the concentric when you're pushing back to the top, you have no none of that weight on there anymore.

SPEAKER_01 29:10

Well then wouldn't that be a good thing to like uh Okay, so here's my thought process. Sure. You have chains as your uh regular AR. They're gonna like want to move on you, so you're gonna like want to balance. It works your you know balancing heavier loads. Weight releasers would also do that, considering they're not tied down to anything. I know where this is going. Continue. Would it not be beneficial to have weight releasers on the bar, but also a small amount of band tension on the concentric?

SPEAKER_03 29:42

Okay, that was that was better than I thought you were gonna do. What were you thinking of? I thought you were gonna try to add weight releasers with the chain, and then I'm gonna be like, Carl, if you can figure out a way to do that with the plates without them piling on top of the chains and the weight releasers releasing at different times, I'm like, this motherfucker wanna get hurt. Yeah, that wouldn't be too good.

SPEAKER_01 29:59

But bands, though, it's not gonna gather at the bottom.

SPEAKER_03 30:01

No, correct. I I think it's very obviously doable with bands. Um, now should we try that on our one month back from a meet? Probably not. Yes, yes, yes. Full kit. That that's a big jump, dude. From from volume in briefs to full kit weight releasers with bands on week. It's not gonna look good. No, it's gonna be terrible. You're gonna, you're gonna, again, you're gonna, it's gonna be your idea and you're not gonna like it. That's been a common theme the past month here. Yeah. I I worked very hard on a new program that incorporated not all, but many of Carl's ideas, and he has told me plenty of times in multiple different phrases and words to sum it up. He wasn't having very much fun. No, dude, it's been it's been I've been struggling, man.

SPEAKER_01 30:45

You've either seen me in the corner huffing and puffing, dripping in sweat, or just like laid up on the floor after like a hard lift or something like that, where I'm like, dude, I can't move.

SPEAKER_03 30:56

But we're getting there. We're getting there. Um, I think one of the biggest things to talk about too when you're talking about uh chains and bands set up for bench, is a lot of people make the mistake of, and I think we've briefly touched on this before, of not making what I call the octopus.

SPEAKER_00 31:13

Yeah, yeah, right?

SPEAKER_03 31:14

So you have the feeder chain, which is a smaller chain. You can purchase them at tractor supply, what have you, or you can use like easy straps or um almost like hammock straps you can buy from Amazon for cheap, anything like that that has a dual and multiple amounts of loops in order to hang chains from different heights. The key here is you're having the majority of the chain bunch at the bottom of the lift and then still have one or two lengths on the floor at the top or removal of the bar from a rack at the top of the lift, right? A lot of people will misinterpret that when they see chains for the first time and hang like one single heavy chain, and it'll have like three more feet of just that individual chain touching the floor for the entirety of the lift instead of doubling it up and allowing more chain weight to be used, right? Because that's gonna greatly skew how you utilize percentages with your AR, right? Because if you're tracking at like what 40 to 50 percent of bar weight plus AR, right? But you're only using a single chain and then half that chain's already on the floor, that's like negating it. It's like nothing, yeah, right? It's really not gonna make a difference for you versus where you're you you'll be like, man, this percent is so low, like 40 and 50 percent, that can't be right. It feels just like way too light, right? Because they're not utilizing the chains correctly.

SPEAKER_01 32:39

Is there a I don't know, is there a level of strength you gotta have before you start adding like a band to the bar or adding like some like one chain to the bar? I because say like somebody like uh you're coming here benching 95 pounds, right? What chain are you gonna use? You know? Typically it's like a 20 to 30 percent of AR.

SPEAKER_03 32:59

I honestly like I I think that's really hard to say, and I'm sure we could argue this tons of different ways, and other people will argue with us about this, but I mean like so for a guy, right? For a guy, I would I mean, unless they're in an insanely low weight class, like I would argue that like if you if you're just maxing out at like 225 on a bench, like you should you really shouldn't be using bands and chains yet. But the flip side of that is if a girl was, we would say, Oh yeah, you can use bands and chains, right? You know what I mean? So like I think it's very hard to have you never thought about it like that, right?

SPEAKER_01 33:34

No, I didn't think about that.

SPEAKER_03 33:35

Yeah, so like it's I wouldn't say the weight is very definitive. I personally think experience level is definitive.

SPEAKER_01 33:42

Because you would say, like, oh, if there's a dude benching 225, you're like, oh, you're not very proficient in the movement yet. But if you see a chick bench in two plates, you're like you're you're strong as fuck, yeah. Yeah, so I guess that's the like the divide right there.

SPEAKER_03 33:55

Yeah, so I mean I think, but again, like you look at those strength levels between those two different athletes, not only in gender, but also in like proficiency.

SPEAKER_01 34:04

That's yeah, yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 34:05

You know, for a female, the average bench is a lot less closer than two to two twenty five than for a male, you know what I mean? So like I think you're looking engaging those numbers uh based on I wouldn't say for lack of a better word, like strength stereotypes, but you know what I mean, like it's a numbers game, numbers don't lie, dude. Yeah, it's a numbers game, it really is. Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 34:31

That'd be uh that'd be fun to try to play around with like some of the like the lighter benches.

SPEAKER_03 34:34

You know who should talk to about that? Greeno. Yeah, what's he do? I'm just saying, Greeno, uh if you guys shout out, you know what? I'll shout out Greeno. Greeno deserves a shout out because he hooked me up. And Greeno is uh Greeno's like my favorite cartoon character. You gotta explain that one. Greeno is a personality. If you've ever seen Greeno, um Greeno is a guy that's always in a tracksuit, usually in the floppy hat, the Russian hat, whatever the yeah, the whatever Russian hat. Um at Meats standing very aloofly in photographs with his athletes. Uh hell of a coach. Uh also booed up with Hidi Hauer, um, who is also a hell of a coach and strength athlete. But his new program he is working on with a bunch of other people called Bar Path is absolutely insane. It is like um open powerlifting on methyltrin.

SPEAKER_04 35:24

Oh. That's a good way to do that. Yeah, you know what that is. It's a good way to see.

SPEAKER_03 35:27

You know what that is. Um, Carl. Everyone's like, what's Carl on? I'm like, I don't know, man. Methyltrend. Oreos. Sleeves of Oreos and Jell-O shooters. Jell O shooters imposter, right? That's your that's the secret from the last couple podcasts. Yeah, yeah, that's what it was. Um But Barpath has like the most insane, insane, like record stat store uh scorekeeping you could possibly imagine. All right. So I hit up greener the other night. I saw you can put your gym on there and it'll ping your location. I was like, hey man, uh, me and Carl have really been enjoying like looking at a lot of your stats, how you're organizing all this stuff, how he even has results faster than open powerlifting. Somehow. Yes. I don't get it. He scours like the scoreboards. Oh no, no, he uses lifting cast. It's all ported through lifting cast. He goes and gets it off the lifting cast because he had our APO meetup before APO did.

SPEAKER_01 36:16

I was so stoked to see that up there.

SPEAKER_03 36:18

I was like, how did you do that? And he was like, Oh, this is what I do. Um, but amazing, amazing program shows you graphs, your percentages on how much you missed your seconds versus your thirds, like your overall weight increase, how you fluctuated throughout the years up and down, every division of every meet you ever done. Um, if you're a gym owner, it you can add gym member profiles from open powerlifting and give you an average dot score of your gym. Like it is wild.

SPEAKER_01 36:45

You can pin yourself your profile up against another lifter.

SPEAKER_03 36:48

Yeah, like do head-to-head, like it's matchups too. How do you compare? It is absolutely insane, man. It is really, really cool. So uh shout out to Greeno for doing an insane job with that. Um, I I've literally just cracked the surface of looking into all that it's capable of. So um, I'll definitely shout probably him out some more as we get more a deeper dive into it.

SPEAKER_01 37:08

If you're like a video game nerd too, you might like it because they have like a whole like achievement, you know, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:13

You can it's basically like Xbox achievements. Yeah, you get you get like points or like do your first meet, have a decade in the sport, like all kinds of like different stuff.

SPEAKER_01 37:22

It's pretty cool. And there's some rare ones out there too. Like he gave one special one out for like if you did the final Cincinnati women's program, like you got that. Right, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:29

It was like a hard hard to get badge, yeah. Like if you've ever done nationals and like all kinds of like very meat-specific ones that are pretty cool. Um But anyway, what are we talking about? We're talking about bands of chains.

SPEAKER_01 37:42

We're talking about bands of chains and a bench. And we got into oh, I said something about like uh it was like the the lighter, like you using less chains, and you're like, oh, we gotta talk about Greeno because he uses like Oh, because he would be a great person to measure that idea against.

SPEAKER_03 37:55

Yeah, because he does like he's very into like tracking progressions, like arguing averages, like he does a lot of bar speed stuff, he does. He also works with bar speed. I was just thinking that too. Yeah, that's a little I think a lot of people haven't heard of that. It's like the little wire you attach to the bar that measures yeah, I think a OVR is a big cover for that effort output, right? Yeah, and it tracks right to your phone, so you can see like between sets, like all right, this set was faster, this one was not as proficient, this is actually how my bar path moved.

SPEAKER_01 38:22

Yeah, and it like takes into account like uh there's a like a whole chart of like okay, this is how many reps I've done, this is the meters per second, so this is my projected like top end of what I should be at today. So it's a great tool for like um any RPE-based stuff, too.

SPEAKER_03 38:36

Yeah, it's a really good for progressive overload too, because you can look back at like, hey, even though if I you know kept these the same, can I move up next week? Because all these matched, yeah, right? Like all these speeds were relatively the same, showcasing that like, hey, I'm getting faster and more technically sound. Maybe I can bump five pounds next week. So again, like you said, it can help uh you know equal out your decisions for that RPE.

SPEAKER_01 38:59

Yeah, it's a it's a great way to gauge fatigue without you being like the person that is feeling the fatigue. Like your coach can like, oh, obviously, like yeah, your meters per second has gone uh down by like you know 0.7 or 0.07. Uh 0.7 would be way too much, but either way, really cool tool. My phone died. Oh no. I don't know how long we've been going. No. Sorry, sorry, we'll just roll with it.

SPEAKER_03 39:26

Yeah, yeah. Um, another big thing we wouldn't really talk about, especially when it comes to AR, is never sacrificing speed. Or I'm sorry, never sacrificing technique at the cost of speed. And I that was something you wrote down and something I've definitely instilled in you.

SPEAKER_01 39:39

Yeah, yeah. Um I think it's really overlooked in a lot of like um equipped lifters training, but like having specific technique training behind everything.

SPEAKER_03 39:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:50

Like um, a lot of the speed work I see on the internet, and I'm not gonna bash anybody, it's just like something I noticed. Like a lot of the bars are just like flopping around and you're just moving about fast, but you're not doing anything with that speed.

SPEAKER_03 40:03

Yeah, you're you're doing the explosive part, but that's about it.

SPEAKER_01 40:06

Right. I think it's really important, like every single time you're under a bar, rather benching, squatting, if you're pulling, everything should be at a maximal speed. So you're always training that aspect, but you should also always be training the technique side of it too, because that's only going to carry over into a better output of speed.

SPEAKER_03 40:24

Yeah, like every video I watch, like the ones you're talking about, I'm like, cool, you're super explosive and fast in pretty much the wrong direction. Okay, like not following your normal bar path, right? So you're training yourself not only out of technique and out of your own bar path, but resembling something that you normally wouldn't do under a heavier load. So, like, what are you practicing?

SPEAKER_01 40:45

Yeah, like you can bench 135 really fast, but it's going up and out over top of you. And as soon as you put a shirt on and you have like five or six hundred pounds in your hands, as soon as it goes this direction, it's not gonna stay there.

SPEAKER_03 40:58

Right, yeah. So it's like you're training things in a different manner. Like uh, I always think about that too, with like, okay, I'll use myself for an example. I used to have this problem with deadlifts, okay, right? And I I arguably I probably still do. Um, so like Matt would and Jess would always hound me for like on lighter weights, like anything from like 225 to 405. I would rag doll it and it was almost like I was shrugging it at the top.

SPEAKER_01 41:24

Oh, yeah, I've definitely seen it.

SPEAKER_03 41:26

Right, you've seen me do that, right? And it was because I was pushing so hard through the floor, which is great because again, like we look at our DU work. Oh yeah, I'm explosive. Maximal speed output. Right, maximal speed output. But am I gonna shrug a 700-pound? No.

SPEAKER_01 41:41

I'm sure you'll try.

SPEAKER_03 41:42

I mean, I'll try, but it'll probably tear my bicep, yeah, right, because you're getting you know, you're getting that extra movement and stuff through. So, like, yeah, it's important to move fast and utilize your technique cues, but like at the speed, like what is it sacrificing, right? That could easily be teaching me to like not pay attention to my lockout, pushing so fast that my knees unlock and unlock. You know what I mean? Like, what are you practicing? How do you fix something like that? Ironically, in speed work, you slow it down a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 42:14

That's what I was thinking.

SPEAKER_03 42:14

I know it's it sounds weird insane. It's counterintuitive to what you think speed work should be, but if your technique is dog shit, like you're not doing anything worth doing anyway.

SPEAKER_01 42:26

But when if you say slow down, we're not really I I think that would have slow enough to get it right. I think that it gives the wrong message. I think if if you pay enough attention, like if okay, you're pulling deadlift and you're going way too fast and it's going up and over you, you're shrugging it. I would say that lands more on like your quads. Because if you're like, oh, it's going way too fast, and I don't I I heard it, I heard that your quads are like what slow you down when you're running. Alright. So if you're running and you want to slow down, you're flexing your quads more to slow yourself down. So if you're deadlifter going too fast, flex your quads, it'll be a better lockout, and you're not gonna have the inertia you know, throw it up and over you.

SPEAKER_03 43:09

Depending on where you're pushing your hips through, yeah. Meaning what? Like if you're if you're like gas pedaling at a certain point and you're driving your quads that way, I mean I flex my quads every time when I do that, but I go faster. Because then you're generating power from your hips at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 43:29

Right. I don't know, you just would be better at Olympic lifting, I think. You should be able to do that.

SPEAKER_03 43:34

I I beg to differ. I would not be good at Olympic lifting, girl.

SPEAKER_01 43:39

You should I don't know, we should start incorporating a lot of snatch and yes, that would be you know to say the least.

SPEAKER_03 43:46

Um but fast and wrong is definitely not better than slowly slower and dialed in, right? Like when you're especially, I mean, the most common one we see is bench. Actually, I saw it. There wasn't any AR on the bar, but I saw an absolute. Absolutely awful, awful, awful squat. Uh example of this by like a pretty popular coach. Okay. Um, I think he's in Australia, maybe. Okay. But dude, it was fucking ugly.

SPEAKER_01 44:10

What, like speed squats?

SPEAKER_03 44:11

He was just doing yeah, like speed squats, but like the way he was moving his neck and shit like that. I was like, bro, that ain't it, my guy. Yeah. He was like, come work out with me and make me do these squats crazy fast. And then I'm like, yeah, they were fast, but like, dude, like the technique was just so ugly and awful.

SPEAKER_01 44:30

There's also an aspect of it, like, if you're doing box squats, like you don't want to catch that whip and then cause yourself to like if you're using the whip to get off the box faster and take some of the load off your off your back.

SPEAKER_03 44:42

Are you talking about like letting loose at the bottom and you're you're talking about the rock on the box?

SPEAKER_01 44:46

Not even that. Like uh if you're if you're taking your descent way too fast, you hit the box, yes, you rock on it because you're going back too fast, but then the bar kind of flexes and then shoots back up and you shoot up with that. Oh, you're losing the timing, timing aspect of it. Yeah, for sure. You're losing that part of that part of the speed work because you're not handling any load in that aspect of getting off the box.

SPEAKER_03 45:07

Very true. Um, also, like, I think we've had we've we haven't talked a lot about this, but I think it'd be a good place to work this in. Uh, we talk a lot about like we use a lot of boxes in our training, like high boxes, like to depth boxes, like all kinds of stuff. But um, a lot of people ask me, like, we don't typically like we're not boxing. I would call it the West Side Rock.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

We're not yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We're not box squatting, we're squatting to a box.

SPEAKER_03 45:31

Correct. Yeah, that's a very good way to put it. Right. You know what I mean? Um, because what we use the box for is to have a slow and controlled approach towards the bottom of the squat where we would emulate where your suit's gonna tighten up and give you that extra like stability and tightness in the hole, right? Versus like going to a box, getting loose, rocking back, and using that momentum to come off the box, right? I always found like the other way helped me more in a suit because like there's no circumstance, obviously they both have you know their proper place and time, but for me, training in suits and briefs, like there was no time I'd ever needed to like move like that in order to make the suit work properly.

SPEAKER_01 46:20

Right. I think the confusion in that though is the box squat is training the flex off of it. Right. So from a release position. And what you're saying is like you're not ever gonna release in the bottom of a movement.

SPEAKER_03 46:34

Correct.

SPEAKER_01 46:36

However, are you not released at the top of a deadlift before you go down and then flex into it?

SPEAKER_03 46:42

Right, but that's what I'm saying. Each one has its own time and place because now you're you're doing one movement that's trading for a different movement.

SPEAKER_01 46:49

Yeah, okay. You know what I mean? I hear you.

SPEAKER_03 46:51

Because then you do get crossover for sure.

SPEAKER_01 46:53

Yeah. We just don't train the typical box squats because like well, we've always we've always just squatted to a box. I don't think we've ever had any waves where we did an actual box squat.

SPEAKER_03 47:05

No, and like uh for me, a lot of times, like a lot of lifters will get really sloppy with that too. Like in the rock, they'll fold in the torso a lot.

SPEAKER_01 47:14

Oh, it's it's hard to it's hard to lose.

SPEAKER_03 47:15

Right, but like I see a lot of that too, and like rather than like lowering the weight and like correcting that, they'll just like take it as like, well, that's part of the approach.

SPEAKER_01 47:25

Yeah, it's also super dangerous if you don't know what you're doing because if you do decide to like release on the bottom of the box and then come out to it and you shoot your you know whole self forward, then it turns into a good morning, you know. Yeah, and you're just trying to exactly well, especially arch your back out of it.

SPEAKER_03 47:39

Well, especially considering what bar you might be using too. Like if you do that with a SSB or you did that with a bully, like bro, you're fold like a taco. Yeah, you're in bad news based. Yeah, yeah. You're gonna be using a lot of back strength you don't want to use. It's true. Um, a product recommendation, uh, shout out to uh Havoc. Um, I've been friends with these guys for probably like three or four years now. Um, so me and Carl, I usually get questions on my Instagram too. Like, they'll see us using these big metal hooks that have holes drilled in the side of them. They are called Havoc hooks. You can buy them from Havoc. Um, dude, they are awesome because the holes allow you to attach carabiners to do band to do chains. Uh the top part of the actual hooks, you can fold bands over top of them. Um, there's two different height adjustments. Obviously, with the carabiners, you can lower and adjust as well. It's very functionable for people who are going to utilize AR lot and especially use AR lot in groups of people that need things changed in a fast, rotating set manner.

SPEAKER_01 48:36

Yeah. Great example for us is like we have some taller people that train with us, and what we'll do is we'll take chains off of the havoc that are like, you know, clipped over top of the floor. Closer to the floor for us because of our height. Exactly. And we can move that per lifter.

SPEAKER_03 48:49

Right, and move them up so they get the amount of chains they need for that. Same thing goes with bands. Like you and me will go red and blue, and then some people in our group can only do the red, so we'll slip off the blues, but leave the blues on the mono, then we just reattach when it becomes our set again. Right. So really cool tools you can look at as far as like havoc hooks, easy, easy loader straps for both deadlift and squat and bench. Um, they sell those on Elite FTS. The Havoc hooks are exclusive to Havoc on their website. Um, but all really good things, and also for our deadlift, I get asked a lot too. How do we get our band our chain set up so good?

SPEAKER_01 49:23

Oh, yeah. We can set up chains for deadlift really good. Right, right, right. We talked about this one before. You can get your hammock.

SPEAKER_03 49:28

Amazon, buy a 500-pound Amazon rated uh hammock strap, cut it to the length you need, and then burn the ends of it so the nylon doesn't come undone. And then like you're set, dude. Just buy like two heavy-duty carabiners, you're good to go, man.

SPEAKER_01 49:45

The length that you got it at right now is perfect because you can like you drag the tr the chains up to it, wrap it over, and then like cross-wrap to the other side. Yeah, and then one of them just slips right in the middle there. Yeah, yeah. So it stays pretty stuck.

SPEAKER_03 49:56

Yeah, I've practiced it. But now the thing with that is too, you don't want to wrap it too many times around the bar because then it grabs the bar and it won't allow the bar to rotate when you lift it. So it will actively like obviously when you're working with chains and stuff, there's gonna be a an extra grip dynamic to it anyway, but this will like actively roll the bar out of your hands, which isn't that conducive for training.

SPEAKER_01 50:19

As a conventional pooler, though, you do have to watch where your chains are uh set up at because the way we have it, like half the chains are linked to the forward side of it and half of them are linked to the back. So you can like split it between yourself. That way, like a suma puller is not gonna have a problem because your feet are so far out and the chains are gonna sit between you. But a conventional pooler, if the chains are in the front and back and not like hanging on the sides, you can it's not gonna affect where you place your feet, even for uh that narrow stance.

SPEAKER_03 50:45

Now, one of the things I always talk about too when I talk about AR and we look at bands and chains, is like when is like too much AR, too much AR. You know what I mean? Like, you'll see a guy with like two plates on the bar, and then they'll have like four bands on each side of the bar, and I'm like, but why?

SPEAKER_01 51:05

See, we I think we're gonna disagree on this one because I think it's fun and I always want to try it. Well, like, okay, so so I know it's a okay, no, I know it's a bad idea, but I want to try it just to see like a lot of things.

SPEAKER_03 51:15

Okay, so like that here's here's my thing. Like, I don't disagree with you. I'm just saying, like, is there a methodology, like a method behind it, or or is it simply like you said, well, I just want to do it because it's fun.

SPEAKER_01 51:28

Yeah, no, I don't think there is a method behind it. Yeah, right, like you're deloading way too much at the bottom. I saw videos of like AJ Roberts like from like 20 years ago doing uh one plate or just the bar, and he'll put like a blue and then like a second blue, third blue, purples, purple, you know, so he tells he had like 800 pounds of bands on there. 900 pounds of bands. Right, like so like I don't I don't know. I've never seen any any reason behind it. It was used for a while, but I don't think I think it's been phased out because of there being no reason to continue doing it, or just like a higher risk to what it produces.

SPEAKER_03 52:06

Right, versus like, I mean, like what do we work with? You know, medium to heavy bands, one or two bands, plus like anywhere between 40 to 60 percent lighter days, maybe 70% of the weight.

SPEAKER_01 52:19

We might have I don't measure, I don't know what they would even eat.

SPEAKER_03 52:23

We probably go up to 200 bands tops, like 200. Yeah, you think three?

SPEAKER_01 52:27

I think it's three.

SPEAKER_03 52:28

Okay, but we definitely don't go over that. No, no, and rarely do we go to three. Yeah, yeah. I'd say most of the time we're situated around like 200. Right, right, totally. On squats, 200. On deadlifts, we're probably situated closer to like 100 and 150.

SPEAKER_01 52:42

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't handle any more bands than that on deadlifts.

SPEAKER_03 52:45

Right. So again, that's what I'm saying. Like here, if we're using like that idea, like why wouldn't I make Carl just strip all the way down to one plate and just keep adding bands on you? Hold on.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

Maybe there's uh a hidden gem right there. Maybe uh crazy band tension on deadlifts is a great grip trainer, but not a deadlift trainer.

SPEAKER_03 53:08

True. I can see how that's possible. Um, that would also be like have you seen the people that will load a barbell in a rack and set the pin safeties like two inches above the bar and then pull an empty bar into the rack and just exert as much force into the rack as humanly possible. I have seen that and hold that for like 10 seconds, right? That's a good one. Like a static load pull. I feel like that would kill me, but yeah, I I think any of the ideas we've said out loud, you say out loud, oh, this sounds fun, but I guarantee if I program it, you are gonna have zero fun.

SPEAKER_01 53:40

We just gotta do a really high pin pull with like 600 pounds of bands and see what happens. Woof.

SPEAKER_03 53:49

Yeah, I don't I don't know if that's a great idea. You know what? Let's I think the first week to check my lat and make sure it's good, we should probably do that. It's a good benchmark. I think it'll be if it holds up, we know we're good. Yeah, we're probably fine. I see no flaws. I think it's a great idea. I think I think that sounds super safe, man. I see no flaws in that. Yeah, I think it sounds super fake. I think we got time for like one or two more. Okay. Um reverse band.

SPEAKER_01 54:11

Yes. Okay. Oh, that's a great topic. Because we took it away from you. We did. I took it away from you for this prep. And even when we had it in, it's not what people would think when they think reverse band.

SPEAKER_03 54:21

Yeah, because we use for well for both squat and dead, we use very light bands.

SPEAKER_01 54:25

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 54:26

Like we've had other people do reverse band workouts with us and say, like, what the hell are you guys doing? Yeah, like this is barely helping you. And we were like, Yeah, that's the idea. Kind of the point. Yeah, like we want enough to experience a little bit of help and have the load in your hands, but not enough to be like, yeah, I bullied that, bro. Like, that was all me. It's not gonna give you unrealistic expectations, right? And so we use it more to gauge third attempts appropriately.

SPEAKER_01 54:50

Yes, typically in preps, once we get to the towards the end, like the circa max three-week three week uh squat, we're gonna put a micro band around the top, and really it's just like to help stabilize in the bottom where it's loaded up on the band the most, right? But it's not really taking much of the weight off of you.

SPEAKER_03 55:07

No, no. And uh, I took that out this time for this prep go around for APO because Carl can Carl's strong enough to pick it, Carl's strong enough to squat it. Sometimes he's not strong enough to balance it, and if there's bands on it, it's gonna help him with that balance and defeat the purpose.

SPEAKER_01 55:23

Yeah, yeah. So prime example was not last meet, but the one before when I was losing squats at the bottom was like 825, and then we take the reverse band away and I squat 30 pounds over that. So clear example. Hey, this was a problem, we adjusted it. This is why we moved away from it, and here's the result.

SPEAKER_03 55:47

Yeah. Um, another big thing we did for you this uh this go-around was SSB work for the bottom of the squat. Oh yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was a fun one.

SPEAKER_01 55:55

Because Carl discovered he's not that great at SSP. No, well, I I think I'm not great at it because I never use it. That's true. Um and as soon as I I I I think it was one of the I think it was New Year's. New Year's New Year's Eve when I took my first SSB squat in like a year and a half, maybe two years. And um it beat the shit out of me. And I was like, okay, I can work with this. Yeah, like that. This is clearly something I need to work with. Let's keep this rolling. Like typically my my DE squats, I'll have like four plates, maybe a a dime on top of that. And then I had like 300 total in place with the bandwidth. So you were you were hurting. What is this? This is not what I'm used to.

SPEAKER_03 56:36

Unfortunately, I can't use the SSB anymore like I used to. Uh, there's like some nerve it sticks on my back, and even with like I mean, I dude, I've experienced it with even like 95 pounds on the bar.

SPEAKER_00 56:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:47

So that's the whole reason you see me and Carl squatting on either the Transformer or the Mars bar so often because I wanted something that had some of the stability work and simulation of an SSB, but sat a little lower so it didn't pressure that nerve in my neck and back.

SPEAKER_01 57:01

I also think, and this isn't nothing new, but I think that using the SSB throughout this the rotation that we did helped push my deadlift into once we got to peak, and I was able to handle more of the 600s in that peak.

SPEAKER_03 57:13

Yeah. No, you you had a great deadlift prep, this prep.

SPEAKER_01 57:17

I think it's because of the SSB block that I ran, to be honest.

SPEAKER_03 57:21

I I will probably stick with Mars bar. Or I honestly I should make us both stick with Transformer. Yeah. There's just no low bar, please. Transformer was killed. We'll we'll switch it to the we'll go one up. I'll allow you one up. That'll I think that'll be what I need. I will meet you in the middle and we'll go one up. So it's a it's a high bar setting on it, which isn't that high, but it's only one pin up. It's only one pin up. But it might make a difference for you. Very cool bar. I haven't used that one too much. Yeah, it's pretty wild. It's fun. I actually won that from uh Garage Gym.

SPEAKER_01 57:51

Hell of a prize.

SPEAKER_03 57:52

Yeah, yeah, it was hell of a prize. Um, and let's talk about the last thing we worked on. What did we switch up for your lockout? On which movement? Bench. So remember, we took your dynamic work closer. Right. So we changed your dynamic work uh uh grip width in closer to work more tricep.

SPEAKER_01 58:14

Typically, all of my um bench workouts have been max legal grip, which is index on the ring. Right. Um I don't know what the inches are, you can tell me but exactly. It's not inches centimeters, whatever. Millimeters, I don't know. Um we took all of my secondary bench days, whether it be uh rep work or speed work, into index finger on ring. And I mean, I saw it almost instantly, the results. Not only did it maybe took some pressure off my shoulders and gave that more time to recover, but it also hammered my triceps a lot more. Go figure, you know, it's a close grip. Um and just that alone like got me handling 30 to 40 more pounds on a lockout than I was previously.

SPEAKER_03 59:09

And we also prescribed a secondary auxiliary tricep movement, which was the handles removed on the SSB bar, JM press some JM presses.

SPEAKER_01 59:18

Some JM presses. Which I think I hadn't touched those in like two years.

SPEAKER_03 59:22

Yeah, and we're still continuing continuing to do those right now.

SPEAKER_01 59:26

Yeah, but we're not taking them super heavy. We're taking that. We're talking like sets of 15. Sets of 15, which is I feel like not typical to the usual uh auxiliary movement.

SPEAKER_03 59:35

Well, I mean, it's not typical for me because when I used to do them prominently, I was very heavyweight and I was standing like reps of like six to eight.

SPEAKER_01 59:42

I think if I did that, it would snap my shit off.

SPEAKER_03 59:44

Yeah, I think I think you're both our elbows will be barking.

SPEAKER_01 59:47

I need to be conditioned before I really dive into it.

SPEAKER_03 59:50

I I think you need to be conditioned for more than just the JM right now, Carl.

SPEAKER_01 59:54

Yeah. But the JM is what I want, though. That is that is very fair. That's very fair. Yes, we we added a secondary movement of JM presses after the speed worker, after the rep rep work, uh all you know, raw stuff, of course. And um I don't know, it's paid off tenfold. Yeah, I like it a lot, and uh it's it's working, so we're gonna continue doing it.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:15

So we're we're kind of scoping around looking at some meats right now. We're kind of waiting for some news and see if this WPO thing is gonna happen.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:22

Um, so we're kind of trying to plan out our meet we want to do before the end of the year based on that, and if we're going to uh you know York Barbell in October or not.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:33

So um I'm not gonna get an invite, but I'm gonna be there to help out whoever's gonna be there.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:38

Yeah. Which is weird because that violates my one rule for WPO, which I said I would never uh I would never go do WPO without Carl. Um but he is very adamant about if I get this invite that I need to go do it. Yeah, dude. You don't got many years left in this, man. You gotta enjoy what you did.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:56

No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I think it'd be nice to go there, like uh talking from my perspective, like I'm going there first time to see you all do it, and it's not gonna be super stressful for me the first time.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:06

I think that's a good and I like it's definitely one on my bucket list, like that's something I want to do. Yeah, especially someone who came from a raw background to like go to WPO Worlds as like an equipped lifter, like when I used to only predominantly do raw. Like that's that's like you kind of made it in both fields, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 1:01:21

So like that is definitely on my bucket list for me. Who who who in the sport still has done the Kern and the W? That's true. That's true. Maybe Phil.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:30

Maybe I think Phil.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:31

Actually, yeah, I think Phil probably plants in that category. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:36

Probably only on it. Weird on the uh the greenho stats on Barpath, like because of course I was bullshitting and checking out. Dude, my raw scores are still like stupid high. Well, yeah, you're like probably top 1% still. Yeah, it was wild. I thought for sure, like, I mean, just because like look at look at Instagram, like you see new younger guys like in 98s and 220s that are like absolute freaks coming up, and I'm like, oh, dude, I'm I'm pushed way back. And I I was surprisingly I wasn't.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:01

Yeah. So that's cool to see. It was cool. I uh you know, just doubling back to the Barpath stuff, like that, those stats are sick, they're cool to watch. Um, I think it's got a really big future in like how open powerlifting is like people know open powerlift and be like, oh, that's where you get your stats. Yeah, I think Barpath has a really good chance.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:19

Right, I do too, to replace that eventually. And I also think like, especially for like um meet directors for like bigger meets like WPO, like you know, America Pro, like these, I think that's a way better way to look at an accurate list of athletes to send invites to. Why is that? Uh, just because of the scale it covers and possible pittings against people, you know. I mean, like you can look at how like, hey, how close are these two people we're gonna be inviting? You know, and as you look at our sports, start to push more like you know, quote unquote rivalries, right? Yeah, like how can you play that up to like a bigger standard in the sport? Like a lot of people are big on advertising. Totally. Like, I don't give a fuck, and we've talked about that and laughed at that, but like that seems to be like where a lot of bigger meets are heading. Like they want those like head-to-head, like UFC style posters with like fake beefs and stuff like that. It grows the sport, you know, you know, if it grows the sport, it grows the sport. But like I was saying, I think that's a really good way to like, hey, how could we see who could possibly be on a really good lineup in that same day? Yeah, who would who would actually give us a show and to have a tight race?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:26

Long story short, it's a very cool tool, and it's got a lot more like versatility than uh you would think it does from face value from like an athlete and a coach's perspective.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:35

Yeah, because I'm actually gonna finish uploading our logo and get some more members of the gym added to it and stuff. So trying to do that tomorrow.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:42

I think it was a cool point I saw on there. When you have the gym, like you can go on the the gym's page, there's a uh fake board on there for like records. Oh, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:53

You can keep uh you can keep like an active records board of all the members in the gym and see how they pit against each other.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:58

Yeah, and it's just like a chalkboard they have on the web. It's it's sick, it's a very cool thing. It's a nice little addition that he added.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:04

Now, do they have that available as an app yet, or is it just a full website?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:07

I only know of the website, so I can't speak on if there's an app being developed or not. Greeno, if you got an app, let me know if I misspoke. That'd be cool to have. Also, it's like really cool that he's doing that. So just you know, shout out to him. Yeah, yeah. Shout out to him.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:21

But guys, we're unfortunately out of time. Uh, I know we covered a lot of randomness here, but it's good to be back on the podcast. It's been too long and it's summer, so we're gonna try to make this a little more regular again. So uh, Carl, any closing remarks?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:33

No, I think that's it. We covered all that uh we talked about, so cool.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:36

We'll tune in next week. We'll be back uh with love and grumpy paws. We out