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Big House Coach Joe Kenn · The Best Experience

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You're listening to the best experience what the day con best before we begin today's
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That's Nick Best Coaching. Make sure you go check it out. Links
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are in the notes and let's get into today's show. All right, this
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is the Best Experience with your host Nick Best and the Angry Dad, and
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we have a special guest. We have coach Joe Ken the Voss but he's
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a vice president of Performance. It's Education, Dynamic, Fitness and Strength.
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He was a strength and conditioning coach for eight years in the NFL and he
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also happened to train and conditioned with one of the strongest men in the world,
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four time strong Man, Brian Shaw. And I've got actually met you
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twice. I met you in Sacramento and uh, we were done well here
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in Myrtle Beach this year, and like I said that, it was a
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great experience for me, you know what I'm saying, especially being around you
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know, the like elite people like yourself and and just seeing everything happening for
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all the strength and conditions that and you know, it's funny because when people,
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uh, you always accept acknowledge. But I don't care what anyone says
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when people, you try to stay as humble as you can. Button You're
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only as good as the people you surround yourself by. And and most of
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the time, the great a great coach, and he wouldn't call himself great,
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but he is a great athlete. To Judd Logan, who is a
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four time Olympian hammer thrower, worked with my son, and he said,
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great coaches are made by great athlete. There's only good coaches. And I
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think there's a little I think there's a little truth to that. And how
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do you separate yourself is I think the good coach puts him puts themselves in
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a position that they surround themselves with greatness and it elevates them. And you
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know, fortunately for me, I've been very, very, you know,
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blessed if you want to call it that, or fortunate to be in a
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position with the jobs that I've had, the people I've met, was able
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to hire, and then the people I've been able to meet that it just
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seems like all those degrees of separation and connection, we've all been high achievers.
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And for the last two years, you know, Brian and Kerry and
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the Shaws have given me an opportunity to work with one of the highest achievers
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ever in his particular sport. So I've got to really learn a lot about
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myself as a coach, as a person in this new world of online virtual
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coaching, which I still can't wrap my head around. It is the right
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title for it, because my definition of coaching is a little bit different.
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I think it's a it's a hands on posician and your hands off a lot.
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And the last two years, and Nick and I have had a couple
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of conversations because Nick and Brian are very close, there's a lot of things
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I thought last year I missed physically because I was still learning the space and
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I was still learning how to deal with someone who handles the loads that they
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handle, when in my world, a lot of that training is easy because
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in team sports, math means a lot in training. It's say, similar
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to powerlifting, math memes a lot when you're trying to factor in training loads.
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What I learned with elite level strong man, some of that can play
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off in the off season, but once it's time for the comp you gotta
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throw the math out because these guys go a lot on the autoregu regulation of
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it, and truly the highs and loads of handling that type of loads like
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it's amazing to me to watch these guys a lot of times on their YouTube
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channels where I had to study a lot where like, for example, I
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remember one one time I'm watching Martin Leasy's and he misses eight twenty five in
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the deadlifts. I'm like, wow, man, that was what's going on?
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Like then the next week he does it for five right like it's like
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And there was a couple of times where Brian would go, oh, I
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just think I need a cheesecake and I'm like, seriously, a cheesecakes to
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change all lot and that this year what I think I learned a lot too,
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is without being there was more the mental part of what a good coach
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can recognize. And I knew he had put a And again I don't want
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to speak for Brian. I never want to speak it's his story. But
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I knew he had put a lot on this one, the last one.
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And I really felt deep down in my heart because I wrote this in the
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debrief last year, because Nick and I know there were some contemplations last year
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what to do next, And I put down, can this athlete win the
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world's strongest man at forty one years old? I said yes, I said,
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I can this man podium at world's Strongest Man at forty one year?
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Yes, because I believe that going into this when he you know, I
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believed he can do it, especially when they gave the events out so early.
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Yeah, I mean it was such a better event lineup for him mentally,
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because here's what people don't understand. And I think Nick's done a great
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job job of this with how he trains. Obviously, Mark Felix does a
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great job of this, and guys like Brian, how do you control Because
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the older you get, the more cerebral you get, and the more you
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have deliberate intentions that you've got to focus and visualize on because you're going to
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succeed more on strategy than your overall capabilities. Because I say it all the
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time, we all are trying to beat the birth certificate. The birth certificates
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gonna win, But the question is how long can you maintain the fact that
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you can beat it? Right where Like, again, there were certain things
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that happened throughout the event right where psychologically the older athlete that's going to affect
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them more. Where ten years ago, I could you know that athlete could
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give two ships for the lack of a better term of Oh, they're gonna
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do this. I don't care. I'm the best. They're gonna do this.
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I don't care, I'm the best. Now it's they're gonna do this.
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Wait. I spent you know, an hour in my meditation and visualization
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process of this is how the day's gonna go. This is how I'm gonna
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hit. It be like a powerlifting where hey, man, today's my first
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time. I'm gonna squat eight hundred and you walk in and they go,
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hey, we're changing events. We're gonna deadlift first and squat last. Yeah.
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Man, that's it. You're not even deadlifting good. Yeah, not
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even deadlifting good. So I learned. I've said this, the best thing
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that I've learned in the two years of working with Brian is continuing to educate
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myself and know that people always say the no questions a stupid question, and
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I think there's a lot of merit to that. So I learned a lot
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about what my role was last year with Brian as far as the coach,
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and now this year I've learned more that dealing with individual athletes, you've got
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to continue to make sure that this is left like they're not putting additional stress
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where and you're looking at pass of who they were, you know. And
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again I listened to Laws a lot too. I like watching some of his
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stuff on YouTube, and he'll always bring up like, man, it's hard
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for me to believe that this is what I do when I did this,
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but that's who you are now, Like that's your hundred percent, like the
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different and that's and that's what you got to remember. Like for me,
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I know what my one hundred percent is. It's not what it was when
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I was twenty six. It's not what it was when I was thirty six.
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So I'm pushing the gauntlet of what's my one hundred percent now? And
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it's hard for the elite. See for me as a competitive powerlifter, I
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was always a class too lifters, so for me Joe average, But for
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the elite guys, that's so much harder for them to gravitate to because they've
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done things that are inhuman and it's hard for even them to come to that
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real as they in that I can't I can't really do these things anymore,
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and it crushes them and you know, so it's a different attack point,
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like how do you go about like like like Nick's personality fits what I think
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is why he's able to do it because he attacks things jovial there. I
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think he puts internal pressure on it, but it looks like there's just really
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just an opportunity to be there, be around people, and it's and and
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there's different people have different motivation goals. Like I laugh when someone said Brian
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is gonna do World over forty Brian Brian Shaw after the show A classic.
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I highly will. I bet all the money I ever made in coaching will
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never compete again. That guy competes to win the best of the best of
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the best. That's his mindset. There's a reason why fifteenth straight finals.
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I'm just talking to a good friend of mine that knows Brian from the Arizona
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State days and goes, I go, the guy went to fifteenth trade finals.
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None of these guys will last fifteen years. And that's nothing against them.
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Yeah, it's nothing against any of them. So you're sixty six percent
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of the time you were on the podium, you never finished lower than seventh,
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right, And I think where Brian's mentality is that, right, Like,
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if I can't win, I'm out. But then you see the other
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appreciation from another standpoint, Like look at Luke Stoltman, who's closing in on
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forty. I believe he's closing in on that infamous massive Yeah, like thirty
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eight or thirty nine. You see him make the finals and he's glory,
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like he's like, I've proven that I am one of the ten most strongest
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men in the world. You know, Like when you look at Mark Felix,
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Mark came in fourth in his group two years in a row, at
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fifty six and fifty seven years old. When you look at it from the
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standpoint of the entire group, that means that he's top twenty in the world
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for sure, if you want to look at it that way. Because every
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group has two guys that were fifth and sixth, that's ten people he's stopping.
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He's stopped twenty in the world at fifty seven. Yeah, that's pretty
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freaky. You know, are the things that you learn, and you learn
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a lot about the individualities of different people and how their persona has changed.
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Because that's the hard part with people that coach individual athletes are there's a tremendous
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amount of internal pressure to succeed because you can't hide behind anyone else. You
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know, football is easy. You have eleven people aside, and you hide
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under a helmet. Yeah, unless you get a penalty. Nobody knows I
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play offensive guard except my girlfriend or who's now my wife, and my dad
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who's watching me and not watching the ball. So you know when you're out
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there. And I was, And that was one of the reasons why when
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my when my kids were younger, I got him into powerlifting, not necessarily
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because I wanted them to be powerlifters. I wanted them to compete in the
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individual sports, so they understood the pressure of walking up there and looking around
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them there's no one else to be found. My older son excelled in team
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sports. They both did team sports, but my youngest son excelled as a
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thrower, and I think some of his ability to walk into the ring with
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a profound confidence and understanding I think was probably helped that I had him powerlifting
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as a teenager. So there's a lot of good things that happened from individual
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sports in the team sports. Team sports the individual I don't know, because
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there's very it's a very unique that would be an interesting thing to watch.
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We're seeing Tom Evans do it now in the strong man's space. But you
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don't see a lot of team sport guys converting the strong man there. And
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I've coached a lot of guys who could they win World's Strongest Man. I
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don't know that, but they could probably be pretty highly successful and get a
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chance to possibly get an invite, right, which, there's a lot of
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freak athletes in the NFL. I'm sure you've dealt with more than a few
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guys that can actually get there without a problem. Because that coach guys that
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weighed over four hundred pounds. Yeah, the freak that didn't help them,
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That didn't help them make an NFL roster. But and then look at some
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of these guys now like Dj Metteff and Tyreek Hill going to track meets and
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holding their own with world class athletes, And I know the way they got
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to train for football for them to run that's fast. I think they're legitimately
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fast. Like those dudes got something special. So again, it just comes
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to what you gravitate towards, right, And it's um, it's very unique.
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Like I'll be real interested and I'm sure Nick Nick would be too.
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Is where the strong man's space really changes now that the Brians and the Vicuses
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and the big and I know Tom Staultman would be considered one of the bigger
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guys. He fits that mold a little bit, but it's still young enough
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where he's athletic like Brian was. But most of these other guys are,
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you know. I told somebody, I said, if you're between six three
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and six five and way between three thirty and three forty, that's what a
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strong man's gonna win. That's the winning strong man combination right now. But
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the wear and tear of how many competitions these guys go to, how much
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you know, and again a lot of it is this is their job,
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so they got to show up to try to get on the podium. But
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it can wear you out. That was one thing where I know I always
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I told Brian and out to say this out loud. I told Brian,
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I said, you need to start Invalus in all these world's strongest man because
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they owe you a commission for all their YouTube channel because he's shown them how
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to be a true businessman and to monitor who they are. And it shows
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like there's a reason why strong man is what it is. Because the guy
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comes in seventh place and he stands on his feet for five hours afterwards signing
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autographs. He never sat down, and he addressed every single coach or excuse
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me, every single person in the eye and legitimately looks at him or her
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and hears their story. And then he comes back and does it the next
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night for five and a half hours. My question is to the World's Strongest
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Man community, and I'm talking about the people who run the show. Is
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I found it funny that no one from World is Strongest Man is smart enough
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to stick around and see the impact that this guy had. When we were
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there and Nick was there for quite a bit, the only ones left were
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the security guys, the security dogs and Team Shaw. Yeah, that was
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the only ones left at eight thirty that night. And then the next night
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was a private of event that we we got to run at a at a
17:02
local gym there and so that was more fine. But the night, but
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the night of the deal was something that I don't think World's Strongest Man understands,
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Like, if they have that thing at Myrtle Beach again, it'll have
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half the crowd and it'll still be a great event. Because it was a
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great venue, it was set up great he said about thirty thousand people.
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Yeah, thirty to forty thousand wasn't down here in the local stuff. I'm
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really sure if they do that again, they could probably install actual grandstands ye
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to take the stages find out. I think they could have easily have done
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higher. They could have went at least twenty rows up on steel steel stages
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out there, you know, lesson learned. But yeah, you know,
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because I mean, I'll tell you what I'd like to have been the home
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depot that sold all those steps and they came out and drove the second day
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of qualifying. See twelve foot ladders out there. I know. So you
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know, that's that's my you know, that's to me. That's where me
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now, in the role I'm in now, I'm learning so much more about
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business. Like that's just like no brains, man, this is a guy
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like, this is the guy man like you can't keep patting him on the
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back and kudo and what he's done for world's strongest man and then not then
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when the events over, you're like, hey, man, yes, I
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should have been there with the camera the whole time, the whole time.
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Who it's all a media play anyway, So it was. You know,
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like I said, man, I've learned a lot. I've gotten to meet
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uh, you know again, my the coolest thing for me is to meet
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like I met. I've always loved Nick and Mark from Afar because that's my
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age and the fact that you get to meet them and again you could call
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you know, it's like here, you know, like you don't want to
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meet your heroes because sometimes they disappoint I've been I've been fortunate that most of
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the people that I admire have not disappointed. And just to watch the way
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they interact and just the things that they're accomplished is what so like. For
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those guys like that motivate me. I try to train hard for the guys
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who are more like me to say, hey, man, you know,
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I'm going to X beat up Division one college football player trying to fight the
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good fight. There's people like looking at me because I look at these guys,
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and I can understand because I've been around what that looks like for those
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levels. But there's a lot of people that look at me like, I
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can't do that. Yeah, but you can train hard enough anyway. It's
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not about what I'm doing, it's how hard I'm trying to do it and
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what I'm trying to accomplish to show that Hey man, it doesn't matter who
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you are, your levels, your level. Just understand that. And then
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you're trying to fight to beat that level. Yeah, just try to be
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the best you can at that level. So that's all you can really do
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it just in general, if you're always beating yourself, eventually you'll beat everybody
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else. And now if I go in the gym today and I do a
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new X your size, that's my best. That's my all time best.
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Fifth man, I keep losing you guys, Sorry about that. Okay,
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you're still fine on us? Yeah, okay, So yeah, it's been
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a it's been a cool journey. I've been very very fortunate to you know.
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I mean, like anything else, you know, people don't get enough
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credit. Everything revolves around my wife. I mean I get to do everything
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because uh, she always in the end knows that this is who I am,
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and I get to do some really cool stuff. And it's been,
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uh, it's been fun. I will, I will. It's been a
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lot different for us these last three years because I work from home, and
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for the first thirty years of our marriage, I was never home. How
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did that go? And all of a sudden you weren't there and then you're
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there. It was more, well, who's the bigger adjustment for you or
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me? Because I'm more I'm I'm very selfish with my time because just the
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way i'm and I'm kind of a I don't need to be around anybody person
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like I just need to know you're there, and I'm cool where the rest
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of my family are really close. They liked doing things together and like,
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hey, I'll stay home and then I get yelled at, then I wind
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up coming. But it was it was more of adjustment for me because I'm
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used to being very regimented and calling the shots, like through my entire career.
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My wife would always remember when I'd walk in the door and I remember,
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you're not at work with your subsidiaries, you're at home the house.
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But yeah, for well, for nine years at the Panthers, I actually
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lived in Charlotte and my wife lived here in Clemens, and I didn't see
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her really for nine years. We saw each other just hours a week,
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even though we were an hour and ten minutes away, because she was here
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taking care of the family. She was here helping my oldest son and his
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wife girlfriend at the time, with my two grandkids. So it was really
22:03
a unique situation. But what I think it proves is when you have the
22:08
right life partner, nothing gets in the way. And so now is a
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time where being here, I'm still trying to wrap my head around being a
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stay at home worker because that's been very unique. I'm a very good situation
22:29
with the company I work with because it is fitness related. So I really
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benefit from that because it allows me to do the stuff I do, you
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know, it allows me to go into these events and really I have a
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better platform to show my ability to provide to the coaches differently than when I'm
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locked into one specific university or team, because then you're you got to watch
22:56
how you hand yourself because you represent the logo. And in my position now
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and my title, me doing things like this represents the logo. Because there's
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a lot of NFL teams that won't let coaches do podcasts, they won't let
23:11
them speak at clinics. If they do speak at clinics, they can't they
23:15
can't be um promoted as the strength coach of the team, like there was
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several times I was a clinic where it's aid Joe kenn NFL strength coach.
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Yeah. Wow, yeah, So it's a it's always so big because they
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don't want I think a lot of it is there's some name image and likeness
23:36
marks too, as far as their logos and stuff. And I always said
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this anyway, they don't want you trading off their name. Oh yeah,
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but they're they're getting something from your name. Well a lot of times they
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don't think that way, you know, Yeah, I mean it is what
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it is. I mean, luckily for me, I was in a I
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was in a program m where the GM, the head coach, they were
24:03
they were very supportive, so I didn't have a lot of the uh kind
24:07
of nuances that some of the others did. But you know, that's there.
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You know, they're billionaires running billionaire businesses. They get to make their
24:15
decisions the way they want. So that that's um, that's a story for
24:21
another day. It was. It was a good run. Like people always
24:25
say, oh, do you miss it? Of course you miss it,
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right, But don't I always say, don't feel bad for me and my
24:30
coach nine years in the NFL. You know how hard that is, you
24:33
know, a coach I had one of thirty two jobs in the whole world.
24:37
I'm cool, like I got you know, I was at we didn't
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win the Super Bowl. I coaching the Super Bowl. I coached in London.
24:44
I coached in the Pro Bowl. I coached. Looks like I could
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probably have coached you know, four, four, possibly five Hall of famers
24:52
in the future. So and one of them. I really believe he's going
24:56
to get in Steve Smith out of coaching college and the pros. And that's
25:00
even going to be super cool. And I introduced him to his agent,
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So super cool if he gets in. So you know, and again I
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don't know. The biggest thing that you learn over time, and I think
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this goes with any profession, but really much gravitates towards sports is whether you're
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an athlete or a coach. And I think Nick's probably still chasing the success,
25:30
but he's at a point now where the significant impact that he makes on
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individuals in our age bracket who want to be competitive, his personality, in
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the style he presents himself, it makes a significant impact on motivating probably more
25:47
just like Brian finds out the amount of people that he's probably resignating with,
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you're never gonna know. And it's the same thing for me in my in
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my coaching world, like when you're when you're in sports, success task to
26:00
matter because you're judged on winning and losing. No one's judging these guys on
26:06
if they would have judged Brian on how well he trained. Nick knows compared
26:08
to last year, he'd have been on the podium and probably won. Yeah.
26:14
The way the way his training came into play this year, Well,
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the crazy thing about that was is what he went through. Yes, the
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beginning of it. I mean he almost lost his leg. Yeah, And
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again I would say like I didn't realize how bad it was till the video.
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I was like, Yo, held out on me, but I knew
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how bad it was. Yeah, I didn't. He didn't really give me
26:37
the whole Yeah, I've been through something similar. I was on an antibotics
26:44
IV for a week and I had to wear a little pump around with me
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when I went through this. Yeah, that's what I remember saying to him
26:49
because I knew what they put that pick line in. And then he said
26:53
he was going home and was going to jump in the room and I was
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like, Hey, did they pull up? Because I know my wife had
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pickline in and they said, you can't train with a pickline, so he
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made them pull it out. So yeah, so for me, you know,
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the success has always got to be there if you're a competitor, because
27:14
winning matters. But at some point in time, like what else more do
27:18
I have to accomplish for me to where you get to that point where I
27:22
just want to make a significant impact on my profession. And I see that
27:27
when I go to these conferences and the amount of coaches who will come up
27:33
and visit us at the booth and hey, you're you know your programming has
27:37
made this for me and oh the block, how would you do this?
27:40
And it's it's just about just building relationships. And that's what's helped me in
27:44
my role now is because I get to meet more of the people I've made
27:48
an impact on, because if I'm out of school or a university, I
27:52
don't get to do it. Like next week, I'll visit probably a visit
27:56
one or two colleges, and I'm going to for Bragg next week. The
28:00
week after that, I'll probably visit a couple of high schools and then then
28:03
I go to the national events and then you get the conglomerate of all that
28:07
stuff. So it's been it's been really good because it's helped me, like
28:12
anything else, stay relevant because you hate to say it. You know,
28:17
your kid, it's not supposed to be discrimination, but you're gonna age out
28:21
of athletics and you're gonna age out of coaching. And somebody made a great
28:25
point in their recap of the conference. I was just that coaches are getting
28:30
younger and younger, and there's more of them, especially in strength and conditioning,
28:36
because schools are paying more. They're investing more into the whole gauntlet of
28:41
student athlete health, ware, welfare, and development. They're crazy, they're
28:47
gonna have to because there's so much money to be made online trading for yourself
28:51
that unless they come with, you know, six figures, the guy can
28:57
sit in this computer and do it at home. Oh no, one not
29:00
have any of the any of the issues with going to the school and all
29:08
the different athletes and everything, all the hell that you guys go through getting
29:12
up at four o'clock in the morning and putting your workout in because that's something
29:17
people don't realize about you. You will do it first. Yeah, I
29:22
started towards the end of my career. I started because I started trading at
29:26
a local gym, but even then, because it was a twenty four hour
29:30
gal, most of the time I'm up at four getting my workout in before
29:37
the team comes in. For a lot of reasons. I know there was
29:40
several times in my NFL career where guys said they would walk through the gym
29:45
because you had to get through the weight room to get to the locker room
29:48
a lot of times, and guys are like, man, I just didn't
29:51
have it. And then I walk in and see you guys in their training
29:53
and they're like, oh, I'll get it through. Plus, when you
29:56
build that rapport with the guys, they also know that, hey, man,
30:00
I'm gonna I'm gonna take care of you. Like I'm I understand what
30:04
the real the real dynamics are you playing football on Sundays. And that's the
30:10
and that's the other thing that team sport coaches have to realize about dealing with.
30:15
Like everybody goes, what's the hardest thing about training the world's strongest man
30:18
competitor? Well, that shit matters. Like if my guy benches four hundred
30:22
one day and misses four hundred, he's still gonna get ten tackles on Sunday,
30:26
my guy misses a four hundred long that just cost him six points that
30:32
he's in the stone off, so he doesn't want to be you know.
30:34
It's like it's like just crazy stuff like that that people don't understand. And
30:40
that's why, like I'm very, very excited to watch Tom Evans progression in
30:45
strong Man. I think, you know, I don't ever want to limit
30:49
people, but as I watch how these strong Man events are trying to set
30:56
their own little specifics of what this means. Because again, when you really
31:02
start looking now at World's Strongest Man, if you compare the way it's now,
31:10
I think it's a durability It's a durability game World's Strongest Man. And
31:15
that's where guys at the age brackets of the Brians and the Luke Staltman's have
31:19
to get kudos to getting to the second event, the second competition. But
31:25
what you're seeing now is they've put so much to get to the second competition.
31:30
There's not an amazing between to get to the finish line of why you
31:36
really wanted to be there, right, And I'll put some of that on
31:38
World's Strongest Man because they they don't need that's stone off as cool as as
31:47
cool as it looks for TV, and as cool as it looks to watch
31:49
two guys go out there and sell themselves to the end. Maybe have that
31:55
in the finals. How about do that for the last event? That would
31:57
be something in arrest. It wouldn't because then it's over, it's done.
32:01
The five guys that get into the stone Off for the most part, or
32:05
it's such a disadvantage, they're lucky if they'll break the top five. Well,
32:09
it's like and you know Nick back then, like even like even like
32:13
Brian said, and and last year when it was even a little different advantage
32:17
because he came in third, so it actually benefited him to have the stone
32:21
Off last year. But that's not to say that if they did what they
32:23
usually did and had an Atlas Stone run at the end of the events,
32:27
that he wouldn't have won his group on the stones. They've gotten to the
32:30
finals anyway, So right, the guys five stones, I think so I
32:35
think it's everybody just have some have six events and like you said, might
32:39
not need to be a stone. Just have six events in the freaking qualifiers
32:43
that everybody and everybody's got to run them, like just tell like, hey,
32:47
everybody's got to compete in all six. If a dog one, we're
32:52
penalizing you points. Well, that's the way it used to be. And
32:54
then they tried to do double points for Atlas stones. Just like, man,
32:59
that really didn't work. You got six, you got six events in
33:01
the prelimbs. Everybody does all six. Everybody does all six. That's just
33:07
And there's one thing like I and I know a law, and again I
33:12
just evaluate watching different people, and I think he brought it up. I
33:15
didn't listen for sure, but like everybody was looking at when Mitch Hooper went
33:22
out and did all the kettle the kettlebell throws, and everybody's like, what's
33:27
he doing? Well, one is, if you know his background, he
33:30
not worried about conditioning and recovery. Plus he's twenty eight and if you look
33:35
at his background, that dude. But I know this guy's cerebral enough to
33:38
know this. He doesn't have all the equipment in his house yet and he
33:43
hasn't done all the events. So for him in a less taxing movement,
33:46
he's like, I'm gonna run the Gautlant because I gotta learn how to do
33:50
this stuff. Yeah. And again it doesn't affect a twenty eight year old.
33:57
Yeah. Yeah, and he going to the stone off so he's like,
34:01
I'll take a run at it. Yeah. And then he's a marathoner.
34:06
Yeah. I mean, come on, the guy ran twenty six miles
34:08
and suffered for twenty six miles. He can be any play and if you
34:14
play golf, you're walking four and a half miles anyway doing that too.
34:17
That's it. And if he would have won that, he would have been
34:21
the first Strauman to ever win all his heats. You look at it that
34:25
way, and you see how world's strongest man is going to see to me,
34:30
it's almost the world's strongest athlete. Yeah, it's gotten that way again.
34:34
Yeah, and now you're looking at like but back to the minus days.
34:37
Yes, And then you got like the Arnold. Remember they created the
34:40
Arnold for for Zavikus the static monsters. Hey, let's do a nine thousand
34:45
pound yoke and only walk two feet, right, like crazy stuff like that.
34:51
Well, now you see what's the rogue invitation, what's the Shaw classic?
34:57
So you got this interesting component of how to deliver because I remember when
35:05
that thing started separating. It was like, okay, what do I do?
35:07
Like in Brian and half Door's case and Eddie Hall, do I boke
35:12
up to four fifty to win the Arnold? But that four fifty ain't helping
35:15
me win World's Strongest Man anymore? So it comes down to why I think
35:20
that that six three to six five three thirty five to three forty guy,
35:25
Like I knew Mitch Cooper would Witch Hooper would win World's Strongest Man last year.
35:31
I didn't know he'd win it right away, but he was gonna win
35:35
one within the next three years of him competing. And I'm gonna make my
35:38
I'll make my bold prediction on Your Guys's on Your Guys's podcast. It is
35:46
it? Pavlo Cordiaca, Yeah, I can say it. When he gains
35:51
thirty more pounds, watch out shootin' hi. He kills that frame out come
35:59
on like an NFL tight end with a shirt off. He shredded, shredded.
36:05
He puts on thirty more pounds to forty more pounds and gets into that
36:09
like one hundred and forty kilogram range or one hundred in between. He doesn't
36:15
need to be that much bigger. Than maybe one fifty. Yeah, I
36:19
think because he's so tall. Yeah, because he has the one thing that
36:24
Novacoff doesn't. He has height. Yeah. Yeah, Novakoff is slightly shorter
36:30
than me. And I know exactly how tall I was at my best.
36:35
And all these petitional guys who tell you they're six four, if I walk
36:38
by him and I'm taller than him, I can promise you they're not six
36:43
two. So that's where you look at stuff like that, and where I
36:49
see there's gonna be an interesting shift, because, let's face it, I'm
36:55
obviously I'm pulling for Brian to win the Shaw Classic, and however he if
37:00
he needs me, I'm there. If he doesn't meet me, doesn't matter.
37:05
I'm pulling for him to win the Shaw Classic. But the cool thing
37:07
now is when you look at the way this seasons are set up, you
37:12
literally have the Grand Slam of strong Man now, and Mitch Hooper can pull
37:16
it off. He could win the Arnold, the World's Strongest Man, the
37:22
Shaw Classic in the Rogue in a competitive calendar year. Yes, he can
37:25
do it because Brian was the first one to do the Arnold and from the
37:30
World's Strongest Man. But I'm now but and remember that was it. Now
37:34
there's four legitimate shows that I would put ahead of anything else. Here's your
37:40
Big four, and what now the question will be? And this is where
37:45
Nick could because because you know, Brian got when Brian figured it out,
37:51
Brian's going, I'm going it's like Tiger Woods. I only play in the
37:54
big ones. Yea. Now that there's four big ones and and the calendar
38:01
year spreads them out halfway decent, When does a guy like a Mitch Hooper
38:07
or someone in that type of competitive ability to podium a lot realize I'm just
38:14
going to the Big four. Yeah, but but but the attractiveness of some
38:19
of these other shows and who knows what appearance money they're getting on the back
38:22
end. I don't know that part of the game, but you know,
38:25
but like, look at it, but look at what it's doing to these
38:29
guys. Martine's Leasy's looks like to me, and I don't know him,
38:32
but if you look at what this last his last few years, looks like
38:37
he's gonna compete hard one year and take a year off to hard one year,
38:42
take a year off off. That's what he's going to do the last
38:45
I mean, so he's looking at it a totally different game than some of
38:49
these other guys where novacough again, And I don't those guys, they don't
38:54
train, They just compete year round, so they're always in comp mode like
39:00
it. Yeah, they pete compete. So the guys running the contests in
39:05
Europe, though the contests weren't excruciatingly heavy, they were just heavy, and
39:10
so he could use those contests as that's training. So let me ask you
39:15
this, Nick, because I just saw this one that Ivars wont and I
39:19
love Ivars. I guess that guy something. He just goes, he competes.
39:23
You could just tell he's just he just won this event. And it
39:29
was some kind of like speed event where they did five events in nineteen minutes
39:35
or something like that. That event, I thought, that's what it said.
39:37
Yeah, so what is that like? You just run from one event
39:40
to the other and whoever points, Yeah, try not to have a heart
39:45
attack in the process. Yeah. So, and that's the thing like when
39:49
you look at some of these older guys, and again in respect because they've
39:53
the real the durability and the longevity, is the world's strongest man is a
40:01
hard is a hard event when when you have to really look at who you
40:06
are. Where a two day event or even one of these one day events,
40:12
you have a chance to still be successful because you don't have to rely
40:15
on recovery as much. True true in the way of the sleep. Yeah,
40:21
in the way the show set up. Now, when I first did
40:24
World Strongest Man, we had three days to do the six events, so
40:30
that wasn't too bad. Or actually four days. We had four days to
40:34
do the six events. We had two one day, one the next day
40:36
two, and then one or some type of combination of that. It was
40:39
two one two one or you know, or one one one two two,
40:45
you know that type of stuff. And then you had four days off.
40:50
Yeah, and you stayed at the hotel. You had four days. You
40:52
can go get therapy, you could rest, you could recover, and then
40:55
you came back and you had three events one day, three events, the
40:59
next day and then done. And now it's three events one day, three
41:02
events, the next day, one day off, so you still got really
41:07
and that and that one day you're going to the bone yard to do testing
41:10
exactly, going to the bar to do testing, you're doing media, and
41:15
then you're trying to get some type of therapy or get rest or just clear
41:19
your head so you're really not left to rest or recover. Well, here's
41:24
the other one, Nick, and I know I don't and you'll shake it.
41:27
Hey when I say this, We're out to dinner with Brian after the
41:30
stone Off when he gets a text that says be ready at eight thirty to
41:35
go to the bone yard. Hey, come on, dude, we treating
41:39
Mitchell. We were with treating Mitchell when that happened. They were like like,
41:46
huh, Like it's like ten o'clock at night right now, everyone's barely
41:50
settling down, you know. So again and and to me, I think
41:54
even one more day where Brian could have settled down mentally and neural logically,
42:00
because I just showed a guy at the conference to his stone off took five
42:06
minutes and twenty seconds from when Ronald Heinler touched the stone. And just think
42:13
every rep the pressure that build mentally on each guy. Yeah, against a
42:17
guy that can deadlift well over a thousand. And that's what I told.
42:22
Somebody goes, well, well, why about the other guy that said here's
42:24
the difference. There was ten guys in the stone Off, and if you'd
42:28
ask any world class strong man rank them, they'd rank Brian one Ronald two.
42:32
They had to go against each other. Yea, you know so.
42:37
And you know, I, as much as I hate to say it,
42:42
you got to give Ronald credit because he probably knew I'm not gonna beat him.
42:47
But the fact that he went all in, I gotta give kudos because
42:51
that guy, because he was going all in to get to the finals himself,
42:54
held need to recognize that, like, get it hurt my guy from
42:59
a neurologically in recovery. Yeah, when you look at it now as a
43:02
coach and you got to really evaluate things, probably wasn't Probably would have been
43:07
nice to do three stones like Tom Saltman and go home. But on the
43:12
other end, let's let's give kudos to the competitive nature of that guy knowing,
43:16
hey man, this is probably gonna end on the wrong end of the
43:21
stick for me. But I'm not just gonna give it to the guy.
43:23
Yeah, well know. And the thing is, when you're competing in the
43:27
sport, anything can happen. Yeah, you don't know, but you just
43:32
took your look. You just keep going and pick the wrong taki, you
43:37
know, right, it happens. I mean it cost the guy third place
43:43
in the finals this year. Yeah, I mean so it's you know,
43:47
the guys, it's a it's an interesting dynamic. And like I said,
43:52
I'm just and I over Maybe people think sometimes about overdue, but I really
43:58
just I keep going back to I can't thank Brian enough for giving me an
44:00
opportunity to coach him, because, as Nick knows, he's had a lot
44:05
of people that have he'll rely on for information, but because of who he
44:10
is, he's never really brought somebody in to actually say I want some help.
44:16
And the fact that he trusted me, you know, and I do,
44:22
and I feel like I let him down a little bit because we didn't
44:24
accomplish his goals and because that's what he brought me in for it. And
44:29
as a coach, I'm always going to protect my guys. So in the
44:32
end, it's like, hey man, when he wins, he wins.
44:36
When he loses, it's on me. But again, I understand the whole
44:40
thing. It's just it's the way I live. I'll and I'll continue to
44:44
live that way because I want, I need to keep that guy in a
44:47
good in a good frame of mind, like hey man, this is the
44:51
way it goes and like I said, you live and learn, you continue
44:53
to ask questions. You know, It'll be really interesting to see how I
45:02
gave him some milon. Again, I want to say a lot. My
45:05
biggest thing is I want him to just enjoy this next training cycle. Do
45:08
not put anything like I gotta do ten reps in this event to win.
45:14
Just go out feat your butt off and you're good and you're good enough to
45:19
do what you want to accomplish in this meet. Yes, And it's hard,
45:22
and I get it when you're that guy, it's frigging hard because he
45:28
thinks he's letting everyone down. He does. I mean, people came out
45:34
to see me, he did, and then how many other people would do
45:39
what you just did under the circumstances that were presented to you in the form
45:45
of what happened. So it's um I'll be interested to see, Like I
45:51
said, how does World's Strongest Man itself grow? Strong Man's gonna grow because
45:58
if Brian's never gonna be not involved, and the fact that and Nick knows
46:01
this with his wife too, and the fact that his wife understands the sport
46:07
in the space so much and is so involved in the process that just gives
46:13
him more motivation to do what he wants to accomplish. So strong Man as
46:20
a sport is definitely going to be in the United States to continue to get
46:27
the recognition. And Brian's the type of guy who can go into a boardroom
46:30
and represent the strongman community and try, you know, like again, can
46:36
you get it back on ESPN live? Can can the show a classic go
46:39
live on ESPN even if it's ESPN two or ESPN Plus. Yeah, the
46:45
people have some type of stream, but that's turnkey for them. Yeah yeah,
46:49
I mean it's it's already set up turnkey for for a live television production
46:54
for the whole again, and you need the name recognition to accomplish that which
47:00
you know, And again it's at how other people like and I again Nick
47:05
and again Nick. Being in a professional strong man I look at certain things
47:08
like how can we as a country in the strong man's space get America's strongest
47:16
man with the same like worthiness of winning like Britain's strongest man. Like you
47:23
go overseas and you listen to those guys when they say, like look at
47:27
Thor for example, he was like ten times Iceland's strongest man, like did
47:32
it really mean that much to you to win that thing ten times when you're
47:37
placing on the podium every year world or like or like big Z. Now
47:39
Big Z's a nut job, Like he's just competing in that, but I
47:44
mean he looks Lithuania's strongest man how many years, or like how important it
47:49
is for like the Stoltman brothers to be Britain's strongest man or Europe's strongest man
47:53
or Nook cough and all those guys. Like uh, you know when like
47:58
when I first really dug in, like I knew about Kazmyer, Bruce Wilhelm,
48:01
Don Ryan how with Franco Colombo, you know, and all those guys.
48:06
But really when it started to get popular again in the US was when
48:09
Philippe and all you guys it started getting more involved, and when Mark was
48:15
Mark Mark being the strength coach at UNLV really started to jump things up.
48:21
Like Mark, myself and Chris Doyle who was at University of Utah at the
48:24
time, we inceptualized strong man in the college football training in that like ninety
48:30
five to ninety six area. Nobody was flipping tires and doing that stuff until
48:36
we did it. And we all had our different reasons and doing it Mark
48:38
being a competitor. He saw the value me. I saw the value in
48:43
that full body work and the fact that I was at boys he stayed at
48:46
the time with no budget, I could trade a tire guy who had to
48:50
pay to get his tires recycled. A dozen football T shirts and they dump
48:54
them all off at the football man. You gotta pay for these things to
49:00
get this first. You want him coming get are okay, man, here's
49:04
some T shirts. Let's go. So you know, I would like to
49:07
see that from a fan perspective, where where America's like Bobby Thompson was America's
49:14
Strongest Man. But yet I only heard that when they announced him. I
49:20
didn't hear it enough. American Knight thing, American log press record holder.
49:25
No, he's the American's strongest man. You hear Pablo kodiaka europe strongest Man.
49:31
There's a story behind this, you know that, right, No,
49:34
That's why I'm bringing it up. So deon whistles. Ordon Masters now Um
49:43
trademarked America's Strongest Man the day before t W I did I AMG the day
49:49
before and has won every lossuit with it, and in the process of them
49:57
going after each other. They've pretty much dynamite at the bridge because at one
50:02
point they were going to make America's Strongest Man, just like World Strongest Man
50:09
for American television. And the destructive think nature of what happened as great as
50:21
our country is, that's the thing. As there's the thing. It's just
50:24
like, it's just like powerlifting. Oh I don't like the rules. Now
50:29
I got the big house Powerlifting Association. It's like, you know, the
50:34
same thing, Like, well, look even us as strength and Conditioning coaches
50:37
as a as a unit that was a National Strength and Conditioning Association. When
50:42
they got too big and started really going outside of just the coaches, the
50:46
college coaches got upset and broke off. So now like this week, I'm
50:51
at the College Strength and Conditioning Coaches Association. Ten years later the National Strength
50:55
and Conditioning Coach Association. They don't learn anything. Pissed off the high school
51:01
coaches. Guess where I go in June the National High School Striking Coaches Association
51:07
deal. So it's just like sometimes we get in the middle of things and
51:14
don't realize what's best for the profession or what's best for the sport and it's
51:21
hard because, as you guys know, there's several amateur types of associations now
51:27
and you got to choose which one you want to compete in because it's affiliated
51:31
with something else. Like I'm just still learning that part where like if you
51:36
want to go to Giants Lives, you got to do official Strongman game stuff.
51:38
Yeah, why would I do anything else? Because Giant Slides gets me
51:44
the world's strongest man. So when you start connecting dots, I gotta be
51:49
in official strongman games if I want to get the Giants Live, which could
51:52
catapult me to World Strongest. So I mean, and it's the same thing
51:58
like back in the day, I want to be an IPF World Powerlift and
52:00
Champion. Well that used to be UFPF, then it was ADFPA slash USA
52:07
Powerlifting. So now I was part of the MGB on that. By the
52:10
way, Oh why are you I was in the national governing body from what
52:15
are you doing? You're part of the problem? Nick? Well, no,
52:19
no, they the IPF told us in the meeting that they're going to
52:23
kick the USPF out and then bring us in because they wanted to see it
52:29
become an Olympic sport. They completely utterly failed over the last twenty four years
52:35
to get that in and did not hold up. They're part of the bargain
52:37
and all they've done is destroy the drug testing that AFPA had back then.
52:44
Because the ADFPA, the judges could administer the direct test. Did you know
52:46
that? Oh yeah, I know. So I was an ADFPA judge.
52:53
My path somewhere up here on the walls. Yeah, I got a five
52:59
months Yeah there you go see it right up there. Yeah, I gotta
53:04
go get mine. I gotta see now, I gotta go get mine and
53:06
put mine in my gig. But it was funny is we could do and
53:14
you know, a two hour drug drug screen because they just pull the guys
53:17
randomly out. The judge can just come knock on your door and get your
53:21
drug test. You can't do and well and the other thing too is that
53:24
you knew most of the judges knew the athletes and even if they were allegedly
53:28
drug free, they knew which ones were actually drug free, and they'd pull
53:30
them so they wouldn't have any failed tests. Well, I don't know.
53:36
They tested me out of contest three different times. Yeah, yeah, I
53:40
mean the IPF would do that the IPF. The first year we got in,
53:45
I think Brad had to compete again, Brad Gillingham had to compete against
53:49
He got third that year and the super heavyweights and the top two guys had
53:53
just come off of drug suspensions and didn't get tested, but he did.
53:58
Yeah, you know these are things I remembers. Oh yeah, I mean,
54:00
well, and you know that it's and then as you know, I
54:04
think the athletes and their teams are always going to be smart enough to come
54:07
up with the thing, the next big drug that does it. And again
54:12
this is a Now we're digging into a little deeper deal, but that's where
54:15
I've always said we'll here. And again, this is a personal, not
54:19
a professional. This is just my personal. Everybody's got a choice. But
54:22
the one thing that I've had a hard time wrapping my head around was when
54:27
you hear about and again I could see both sides, But when you hear
54:31
so and so lost his medal because he got caught for a compound that wasn't
54:38
able to be tested twenty years ago. Oh yeah, well, I mean
54:44
you see some of that and you're like, yeah, man, that's they're
54:46
keeping the tech. First of all, they're keeping the stuff that long tells
54:50
you that, but it's like, man, that's a big that's a big
54:52
interesting fact to see how both people respond that the person who moves up to
54:58
get the metal and then the person who lose did the medal from and again
55:00
a lot of times we know overseas half those athletes didn't know what they were
55:05
getting. Yeah. I read a book. I read a book I don't
55:08
know where it is in one of my libraries called Fool's Gold about the East
55:13
German women swim team and the things that those young women didn't know what was
55:19
happening to them, and then the repercussions when they were adults. Yeah,
55:24
kind of scary, Like it's kind of scary. Yeah, it's crazy.
55:30
It's like that movie, that movie Icarus where they had to do all those
55:32
crazy things or yeah, you know what I'm saying, and it's just like
55:36
what you know, and they and the Olympics keep it that long and then
55:39
they exactly if they're gonna go back and do that now. I watched Bigger,
55:45
Stronger, Faster, did you guys? Yeah, of course when they
55:49
talked about the race and the Olympics were Carlois ends up getting the gold medal
55:57
and then they still have the samples and they retest it, and they said
56:00
everybody in that race but one guy would fail and it wasn't curl Is.
56:02
Yeah, I mean that really makes you question. So if you're gonna go
56:07
back and do that, then go back and do it for everything that you
56:10
have all the way back, or don't do it at all. That's all.
56:15
And again that's a you know, that's a lot of people have moral
56:19
dilemma with that. And and I guess for me being around sport as much
56:23
as I've been around, and again, I mean I Lyle als Ado went
56:30
to high school same high school as me. He was a couple of years
56:31
younger than my Yeah, I know Lyle. I trained with Lyle in high
56:38
school, and I you know, I know, you know, I'm not
56:43
stupid, man. I had a really good support system when I was in
56:45
high school. So I'm not an idiot. I know what's going on.
56:49
But I really believe that. And again, maybe this is more from a
56:55
personal standpoint. He doesn't get the credit he deserves for what he accomplished on
57:00
the football. Feel like they didn't keep sacks and record till he actually was
57:06
like two years after two years before he retired, but unofficially he has over
57:12
a hundred sacks in his career that nobody knows about. In some ways,
57:17
he's a legitimate ability to possibly be a Hall of Famer, But because he
57:23
said what he said out loud, and I totally disagree with his thought process
57:30
of this is why he was who he was, because when in high school
57:36
he was from his upbringing, he was always a fighter. He was always
57:40
pretty much a nut job. And you could say what you want about the
57:45
steroids and this and that, but the one thing that steroids don't change is
57:50
how hard you work. And when I saw that guy in the gym training
57:53
with me and my dad, you can't. Steroids don't make people work hard.
58:00
If anything, both guys who take steroids stop working hard because they think
58:04
they're gonna get the extra kick from from that. So it's a it's a
58:08
again, we're probably delving into things. It's an education thing for me,
58:15
and that's why sometimes I don't mind talking about it because it's an education thing.
58:20
I'm not recommending it. I'm not you know, I hate when I
58:24
hear these younger high school kids and you know, hell man, you don't
58:29
even need creating because you don't eat right, you don't sleep right, and
58:30
you don't work hard enough, and you don't and most of them don't know
58:35
how to lift with proper technique. So it's a crazy it's crazy to see
58:39
that. But what the one thing like when you watch these guys like like
58:44
an Alsado and they come out, I think some of it is their testimony
58:50
because they know and they're trying to Again, I think a lot of what
58:54
he was trying to do was be a deterrent to other athletes and trying to
59:01
put all of what he accomplished was on this and why he got sick,
59:07
he was on that because if you remember, he was retired and when he
59:09
made that comeback is up into that point. I don't think he ever experimented
59:15
with gh and when he started training with Hatfield and getting all into the appliometric
59:22
work in the really a totally different because he was just a banger. He
59:27
was an old school lift heaven, so now he's trying to catch up a
59:30
little bit because he's forty plus years old. I think he thought that that
59:36
was the reason why it occurred. But you know, I don't like anything
59:40
else. The hard part with everything that goes on is in anything, there's
59:45
use and abuse, and that's that's the critical factor. It's no different than
59:51
drinking alcohol, eating too much, not eating enough. Yeah, there's just
59:58
certain things that all come into play. But the one thing that I always
1:00:02
admired about Lyle was and this is why I was, regardless of what you
1:00:08
knew or didn't know, the dude worked like he was getting cut every day.
1:00:14
And that's something I took to myself, was I just gotta I'm not
1:00:17
as talented as these guys, I just gotta outwork them and hopefully that'll pay
1:00:22
off. And then the other thing was people don't realize how much he gave
1:00:28
back, Like if you if you know a lot of his story, he
1:00:31
always he always gave back to the kids always. I got coached by him,
1:00:37
the offense defense football camp, he did. He did a lot of
1:00:40
things when he was in Denver with Special Olympics, and I think a lot
1:00:45
of that was his way of being wholeheartedly because of the family situation. He
1:00:51
drove he grew up and was not that. It was quite the opposite.
1:00:55
So it was interesting because I remember when he got traded to the Raiders,
1:01:00
we were playing intramural softball at PS number two. He drives up in his
1:01:06
at that time it was that two seat Mercedes SL convertible and he pulls me
1:01:12
over and says, I just got traded to the Raiders, and he was
1:01:15
upset. I was like, that's a hubble lot better than the Browns.
1:01:19
And he went on to winning Super Bowl and get Comeback Player of the Year
1:01:23
and things like that. So it's it's just funny how you remember certain stories
1:01:29
and how things resonate, because it all starts with just having good support systems
1:01:34
across and trying to figure out ways to do things and and learning life's lessons.
1:01:40
And that's why I think, you know, sports can help enhance that
1:01:46
if you're if you're somebody who's a sporting athlete or somebody who's promote sports,
1:01:52
or your kids are in sports, I think you can learn more and you
1:01:55
always, like anything else, right, once it's over, you really find
1:01:59
out how much that stuff helps you. Like I watch my oldest son and
1:02:04
how his journey in life is has been, and there's a lot of things
1:02:07
that I can see now that he was listening. Yeah, it like it
1:02:17
like and then and then my youngest son totally different, totally different journeys.
1:02:22
So again, you just uh, like anything else, man, you just
1:02:25
try to go out there every day and figure out what's right and be humble
1:02:30
enough to know that you're not perfect and can you can you look in the
1:02:32
mirror and do a pretty good job of self self criticism because that's hard too,
1:02:40
and to know what your faults and weaknesses are. And if you're willing
1:02:45
to, we're willing to progress. And you know, and just be authentic.
1:02:50
I mean, I'm like, that's one thing that you just gotta be
1:02:53
upfront and authentic because what you see now in this day and age of showtime
1:03:00
versus go time versus no time, is with the way people are. It's
1:03:05
interesting to watch their expressions. Right if I see somebody on social media doing
1:03:13
these outrageous things, well when I meet you in person behind closed doors,
1:03:17
you better be outrageous. Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean,
1:03:21
right, Like, h don't be that guy who oh it's time for me
1:03:24
to shoot social media. Let me pop some high high energy drinks and go
1:03:30
out there and go psycho. And then ten minutes after that, you're worn
1:03:32
out sleeping on the couch. Just if you if you are. If you're
1:03:37
a go if you a go timer, then be go time twenty four to
1:03:40
seven. If you're a no timer, then be a no timer twenty four
1:03:44
to seven. They're nothing wrong with that, And we're we're in that we're
1:03:47
in that age where people are looking for that personal recognition. Yeah, and
1:03:55
I've always said I've been very, very like said, honored with the personal
1:04:00
recognitions I've achieved. But all of that achievement is based off of the work
1:04:08
and the abilities of the staff I've had and the athletes I coached. If
1:04:13
I'm doing this stuff by myself, there is no personal achievement. There is
1:04:16
no meeting Brian Shaw when he's a young kid at a college who says he
1:04:21
wants to be a strength coach to find out, you know, six and
1:04:25
a half months later, that he's got a different dream. And he was
1:04:30
smart enough and cerebral enough even at that age to really realize that if he
1:04:36
was going to pursue this thing that he couldn't get out of his head,
1:04:42
that the hours and commitment of the career he was looking to get in at
1:04:46
some point it wasn't You're going to have to make a choice. And that
1:04:49
was one of the discussions that Tom and I had because Tom's in a very
1:04:56
He's in a tough profession to succeed if it's not an ideal situation. And
1:05:01
the great thing for Tom is he has a coach that coached him in college
1:05:09
understands and as me and Tom discussed, he's still at a point now where
1:05:14
he's an assistant, so it's not all. It doesn't fall on his shoulders.
1:05:19
So at some point in time, like another friend of mine, another
1:05:24
colleague, and another it seems like I've had well he didn't make but I've
1:05:28
coached with four guys. Two wound him getting as well. You know one
1:05:31
of them, uh, Corey Saint Clair. He was an internal mine and
1:05:35
all my power lefton team at Boise State, so he wound him get his
1:05:41
pro card when he was doing those Super Series with Ode and those guys in
1:05:45
the ten. Yeah, so he still has When we wished to go down
1:05:50
to the river and pick up stones for the weight room, he still has
1:05:54
the original two hundred and eighteen pounds stone. He can't he's the one who
1:05:58
took it and he still So it's kind of cool. But when you see
1:06:01
these guys, it's like you got it's a diversity. It's when do you
1:06:05
make this break? And so with Brian realized the commitment as an intern let
1:06:12
alone. Now I'm going to promote you to graduate assistant. So now there's
1:06:16
more more entails at and then if you keep working up, if I wind
1:06:23
up being a head guy, there ain't a whole lot of sport coach.
1:06:27
Like, if you're in the football game, ain't no if you're a head
1:06:30
strength coach, you ain't going up to in September twentieth and saying coach in
1:06:35
October fifteenth is the Rogue Invitational. I'm not gonna be here for that weekend's
1:06:41
game. Well you might as well pack up for the rogue and stay at
1:06:43
the rogue, you know. So in Tom's case, he's in a really
1:06:46
good situation. And my buddy John Heck who chose to go to coaching round
1:06:51
and took an NFL job, But when he was in college, the coach
1:06:56
that he worked for, Coach Hesse, understood what his goals and aspirations were.
1:07:00
And because he was an assistant. Yeah, if you need to compete,
1:07:03
will work it out and go. But when you have to get to
1:07:09
that point where now you gotta choose. It's gonna be h It's hard and
1:07:15
and luckily for me, and like meeting Tom. And again, I didn't
1:07:18
know Tom till the Shan Classic last year, but obviously he knew who I
1:07:21
was, and so we hit it off right away. And and I don't
1:07:26
I don't want to say I'm a mentor, but if I'm somebody because I
1:07:29
understand the situation that him and his wife can reach out to and get my
1:07:33
opinion, I feel like you know that I'm cool. I like, I
1:07:39
think that's cool, right, Like you, there's somebody out there that he
1:07:43
knows understands exactly what I'm going through because he saw it, I can give
1:07:47
me a perspective that a lot of people can. And that's what you that's
1:07:51
what you hope to do by building their relationships. But I, like I
1:07:56
said, like in Tom gonna be interested to see because he has athleticism because
1:08:01
obviously he played football. Yeah, but when I watch him and I look
1:08:05
at where his potential could be because he's still young, does he fit the
1:08:11
podium of world's Strongest man better than the Shaw Classic, the Rogue, or
1:08:15
the or the Arnold? Right now, I'm like, well, those events
1:08:20
there. I can see him podium on Yeah, if they continue to go
1:08:25
athletic. Nothing. I'm not saying he couldn't, but right now that would
1:08:30
be my challenge to him. I know you're gonna podium in the strong events.
1:08:33
Yeah, I think if he doesn't gain any weight. Yeah, that's
1:08:38
what I'm thinking, leans that down and works on speed, does some jumping
1:08:44
rope stuff like that. We are feeder fast, you know. Well,
1:08:48
that's what we worked with Brian the last two years was footwork. We're bringing
1:08:54
up six inch miny hurdles and just working on pivots and how can we even
1:08:58
be more efficient in playing and pivots And he and again especially showed up this
1:09:02
year. A lot of things we worked on last year showed up this year.
1:09:05
He's he he's getting closer and closer to the Brian Shaw deadl if we
1:09:11
know, and his footwork and his conditioning at that at that body weight,
1:09:16
ye, pretty press, It's it's nuts. And I don't I don't think.
1:09:26
I think a couple of the events getting thrown into different spots like the
1:09:31
first one. Oh yeah, yeah and again if you because everybody had to
1:09:39
go through it right like, But like we said, the older athletes,
1:09:43
the cerebral, deliberate, deliberateness of what they're doing and how they're prepping is
1:09:48
different than the twenty six year old athlete who's like, oh, it's raining
1:09:54
big deal or and then again, and they're not thinking about it, like,
1:09:58
well, that didn't live up to my expectations. Now I got to
1:10:01
chase this an event two, Well that didn't go to cost. Now I
1:10:05
really got to bring it in event three. Well that didn't go to cost.
1:10:09
Now I've lost. Now I can't make up enough points in day two.
1:10:14
And then it just keeps ding. It's like you're just getting jabbed in
1:10:19
the head, jabbed in the head, and now you can't shut it off.
1:10:23
And that's he and I and I'm one hundred percent like that myself.
1:10:26
Like the other day, man, I'm at this conference. I wake up
1:10:29
at three in the morning, and I'm thinking about what's going on, and
1:10:31
I didn't need to get up till five thirty. Well, I'm up at
1:10:34
three, and you know, you're trying to lay around get back to sleep
1:10:38
before you know, you're like, just get up starting the day, right.
1:10:42
So I'm down in the pool at four o'clock doing mobility work in the
1:10:45
pool and stretching on the deal and off you go. And that's the that's
1:10:49
a tough part for the the older athlete who's continuing to chase greatness at the
1:10:55
highest levels. It's it's something to really learn. And hopefully individuals who continue
1:11:01
to get into the high levels that start getting into what I call the submaster's
1:11:06
age of thirty five plus start to realize how much more the mental comes into
1:11:12
play. And then forty forty five, fifty fifty five it really starts to
1:11:18
you know, really hit you. It's um again. These are just continue
1:11:25
to learn, man, and you have to be willing to accept certain things.
1:11:30
Yes, like you know Nick, like again, what you're doing in
1:11:34
the and the ability to maintain how you're doing is is exceptional, like like
1:11:40
in like in Brian's case, I used to go back like with the deadlift.
1:11:43
Everybody's like, is Brian ever gonna deadlift like he used to? Well,
1:11:46
when you've deadlifted a thousand pounds as many times as he has, that
1:11:50
catches up to you. It's like it's like Eddie Khne said, and I
1:11:54
always go back to it. You only got so many max effort lifts.
1:11:58
In your life save them. And the problem is when you're in World's Strongest
1:12:03
Man, you can't save him because because for every one rep max you do,
1:12:11
there's a tax. But then for every competitive adventure in that has a
1:12:15
repetition max, that adds up accumulation too. Like again, I thought repetitions
1:12:21
was beneficial to Brian at this point in his career. Then a pure one
1:12:26
rep max in this in the World's Strongest Man set up, Yeah, and
1:12:30
it did. He had his two of his best the two best events he
1:12:32
had overall. With the two deadlists, I know he didn't really he was
1:12:36
a little disappointed with the number in the finals, but compared to everybody else,
1:12:42
it was a very good number. Yeah, it was a great number,
1:12:44
you know. So but to me, I felt like that was a
1:12:49
better situation than if he would have had to have done a max because for
1:12:55
any other reason is everybody else is a really good deadlifter, and now nine
1:13:00
hundred two thousand, everybody does that. You kind of shrug your shoulders,
1:13:04
but you know, do you remember when eighty was? You know that,
1:13:10
Oh oh my god, someone deadlifted nine hundred. Yeah, Now, if
1:13:13
you don't deadlift nine hundred you're in trouble, like you're coming in, you're
1:13:17
losing megamegapoints. Yeah, if you're not pulling probably ninety nine fifty now from
1:13:26
the floor, Yeah, you're going to give up enough points where you're not
1:13:30
gonna build and make maybe not even make the podium, but you won't win.
1:13:33
See and then like for me, that's why I like going into the
1:13:35
Shaw Classic. I think Brian, based off of where he's at deadlift wise,
1:13:43
I think he will be very very happy with the number he pulls this
1:13:46
year because he's such in a better place mentally, physically, technically. I
1:13:54
mean again, when you get older, injuries they may be corrected, but
1:13:59
they always link or in the back of your heads, the rep that's gonna
1:14:02
go again? Is this the rep that's gonna go again? Is this the
1:14:04
rep that's gonna go again? And then you gotta shake it off real quick,
1:14:08
like, hey, you can't think like that your hands are strapped in.
1:14:11
That'll be one of the that is I'll say this now, that is
1:14:14
one of the hardest things to get out of your head. Um when you
1:14:20
go to grab a hole of the bar, Like after tearing my lad off,
1:14:25
Um, it took some mental will, and then you just at some
1:14:30
point you have to go, Okay, I know it's solid. I've been
1:14:33
doing block poles with over a thousand. It's still there. So I'm gonna
1:14:39
I'm just gonna pull from the ground. Ye, and I'm just gonna pull
1:14:42
on. It took it, but it took you how many times of pulling
1:14:45
block poles to feel like, okay, my mind's right? I can probably
1:14:48
four months, Yeah, probably three or four months. It's hard, man,
1:14:53
It's just you know, and then now it's gonna be the same thing
1:14:56
with my abdomen coming back from the kidney thing is. I pulled for eighty
1:15:00
five for twenty last week, which was great. I said, once I
1:15:03
get to five hundred for twenty, I'll start pulling singles. I think forty
1:15:08
five is close enough. Yeah, so I'll probably go up and pull like
1:15:11
six hundred for three this week, just to start getting used to that.
1:15:15
And now I'm going to throw them the block poles every week. I did
1:15:17
seven hundred in the first rep. I was like really nervous pulling at it.
1:15:24
I didn't grab that thing of pull with everything I had. I pulled
1:15:26
enough to get the bar moving and then just kept waiting to feel anything,
1:15:30
and when I got to the top and didn't feel anything, then I just
1:15:31
went okay and then did nine more. Right, Yeah, so well,
1:15:35
I know, I mean one thirty five on the deadlift, So did I
1:15:39
go in. I'm like, all right, dude, you better lock in
1:15:41
because a lot more people get hurt and the warm up waves rather than backs
1:15:45
left. Yeah. So for me, it's like and and I'm like,
1:15:49
if you watched me on a squat, like one thirty five and four or
1:15:53
five, they looked exactly the same. Because I'm taking that thing. I'm
1:15:57
like a super he sent trickly concentrated guy because I got to make sure it
1:16:03
is on, even on dynamic effort. I tell people my dynamic effort scores
1:16:09
on a velocity based training device will always be slower because I won't negate an
1:16:15
eccentric focus because I know, like my whole process on a squad is I
1:16:20
got a five count decent before I'm going, and I don't care what weight
1:16:27
it is. I don't care if it's to a box or not. That's
1:16:30
just my thought because I know if I can maintain that eccentric strength, I
1:16:35
know when I get to the time for transition, it's coming up like I'm
1:16:39
not getting stuck right. Well. The other thing though, is how much
1:16:42
researchers are done on the fact that if you're going down fast, to stop
1:16:46
that and get it going back the other way, you're multiplying the weight times
1:16:50
the speed, So at the bottom you can have to push out with nine
1:16:56
pounds on eight hundred pounds squad. Oh yeah, there's a lot of that,
1:17:00
you know, that's overcoming eccentrics yep, and that slow and then explode
1:17:04
out. You're only stoppings at the bottom. And again in powerlifting, although
1:17:10
you know a lot of people talk about you know, the explosiveness and the
1:17:14
maximum you know, concentric acceleration and all the stuff with Louis, with the
1:17:18
circumax phase, with the because you know a lot of you know, it's
1:17:23
a little bit different than like jump, like the faster counter movement you're having
1:17:27
to jump the higher you're going to jump, And there's some relationship to like
1:17:30
on dynamic effort, the faster you go down, the faster you go down
1:17:38
allegedly the faster you'll come up. But that's a totally different component than to
1:17:45
me of maintaining a sturdy upright posture because a lot of times we forget that.
1:17:56
To me, it's about focus, like focusing on tech technique and a
1:18:00
lot of times you you have technique breaks when you over emphasize speed of movement
1:18:08
on the east centric in a strength lift. And again I'm I don't want
1:18:12
to talk and get myself out educated by somebody who listens. But the only
1:18:17
athlete that I ever saw a squad that didn't break form who was extremely fast
1:18:25
on the way down on the way up, and it translated to when he
1:18:29
went over to Olympic lifting with Shane Hammond. I never saw a guy go
1:18:33
down that fast with that kind of load and maintain technique through the whole thing.
1:18:40
That guy that it almost looked people called it the dive bomb technique.
1:18:44
That guy I bombed a thousand and came up like it was a dynamic effort.
1:18:47
And I used to laugh because the old Olympic when he went into the
1:18:51
Olympic weightlifting ground and they would show him clips are doing like seven oh five
1:18:57
for like five by five and it looked like two twenty five and people were
1:19:02
just amazed. And I was like, you got to remember that seventy percent
1:19:05
of his max number one, and that's the reason why he was able to
1:19:10
and back then that was a little different because and I don't know how much
1:19:15
it's changed in the USA, but they used to do all their squats and
1:19:18
accessory work based off percentages of max of their competition lifts, so like and
1:19:25
again this number should be fairly close to correct, but like you would never
1:19:30
really you would set your training max on a back squat, like off of
1:19:33
one hundred and twenty percent of your cleaning jerk. So if you had really
1:19:38
or front something in that note note non but if you look at it from
1:19:43
guys like Shane Hammond, that would have been under fifty percent of his max.
1:19:46
And I think that's one of the things where if you guys know Travis
1:19:50
mash what he's done with his guys and his women in on his team was
1:19:57
he took some of those components of powerlifting and brought it into his weightlifting team.
1:20:02
And if you watch a lot of his weightlifters now, I do think
1:20:05
in that sport there is a point of no return where if you continue to
1:20:10
get stronger in the squat, it's not really going to make a difference.
1:20:13
And we saw that with one of his one of his athletes who was a
1:20:15
really good squatter. He's now with a different coach, but I've watched him
1:20:20
continue to evolve where he squats Jerry one hundred pounds less than what he usually
1:20:25
does in training, but he's the second rated American. Is probably gonna go
1:20:30
to the twenty twenty four Olympics, which his competitive lifts are up. So
1:20:34
that's where you have to play the game. But I felt like when Travis
1:20:40
kind of broke that mold of we still got to be strong, like his
1:20:45
guys always came out of the whole explosive in the front squad. Like I
1:20:48
would say a high percentage of Travis matches. Athletes will never miss a clean.
1:20:53
They may miss a jerk for various reasons, but if they catch it,
1:20:57
if they catch a clean, there's a there's a high percentage they're coming
1:21:00
out same thing with a snatch. So I think there's a lot of approach.
1:21:04
And that's why I like when people used to get on Louis for bash
1:21:09
and weightlifting. I think he had some realistic components. When you studied the
1:21:14
weightlifting in US USA trained, they really didn't train Max's effort work. They
1:21:21
were very very good in technique, They were very very good in training the
1:21:26
movement, but the accessory stuff. And I believe this to be true and
1:21:30
I'm not And I've delved a little bit into the weightlifting world early in my
1:21:32
career with some state level competitors. Is yeah, we don't. We're not
1:21:39
strong enough to do what we need to do to get to the numbers.
1:21:42
These other company, these other organizations and federations across the world are doing,
1:21:46
you know, and it's just like everybody tries to replicate stuff. I saw
1:21:48
a really good American coach and he played college football tim swords. He was
1:21:54
dissecting Lash's technique into cleaning Jerk and Lasha. If you look at him fundamentally
1:22:00
based off of what it should look like, he's got several minor flaws.
1:22:03
His upper body, his upper backs, thoracic is a little bit rounded more
1:22:10
than should he's got a little bit more elbow bend. And everybody's teaching the
1:22:14
Losher poll because this guy's the greatest lifter right now in the world. There's
1:22:18
a reason why, because he's got other genetic factors that make him. Plus
1:22:24
he's you know, four hundred pounds, so you know, one hundred and
1:22:27
thirty two pound person shouldn't be learning the Losher pool and really no one should
1:22:30
be learning the Loshi poll. It's just like Brian Shaw's deadlift. Any strong
1:22:34
man who mimics Brian Shaw's deadlift technique if he's not six eight, four hundred
1:22:41
plus pounds with the same hit with as Brian Shaw, and the rule state
1:22:45
you have to do a conventional style deadlift. You shouldn't deadlift like Brian Shaw
1:22:49
because when you really look at it, and me and Brian have talked like
1:22:54
this, it's almost a modified sumo without being a but you can't put your
1:22:59
hands in between your eggs. Yeah, I mean you know, and and
1:23:02
again as and if you watch as he got wider and wider and wider,
1:23:08
he had to find natural positions. So that's one thing that we had to
1:23:14
learn when when we were when I first got hired, whatever you want to
1:23:18
say, when I first got brought onto the team, the big thing was
1:23:21
we got to get this guy's confidence up and get this hamstring thing cleaned up.
1:23:27
And Nick, you were out there early. He's doing hip thrust,
1:23:30
he's doing revert I mean r DL's off the vert pool. I mean he's
1:23:34
doing stuff that he sumo deadlifts, Like everybody's like what, because we had
1:23:40
to build all these muscles that he never activated because he's doing the same thing.
1:23:45
So for as long as he'd been lifting, we're exposing him to exercises
1:23:49
he's never done before. That takes time. It's like I tell people,
1:23:55
you don't mess with greatness even if the technique doesn't look bi mechanically correct.
1:24:00
And that's what we found out. We had improved so much stuff that Brian's
1:24:04
technique could actually improve to a point where it wasn't efficient for who Brian Shaw
1:24:10
was. He would pull himself into position and you'd be like, holy shit,
1:24:14
that looks like a textbook problem was it wasn't good for his mechanics.
1:24:18
So we had to get him into the perfect Brian Shaw technique, which a
1:24:25
year later it was good to go. And that's where you look at certain
1:24:32
things and we were fortunate that we had you know, what we would call
1:24:35
prep, I call developmental phases because Brian doesn't compete like these other guys.
1:24:41
If Brian would compete like these other guys, I don't know if we're able
1:24:45
to do that type of rebuild right because we wouldn't have had enough time to
1:24:49
invest legitimate training time for those responses to elicit the necessary improvements that he needed.
1:24:57
And that's the great part about training. Like now, it'll be interested
1:25:00
to see how some of these other guys, like like I watched some of
1:25:04
these other guys and I know they got coaches. And believe me, I'm
1:25:09
not proposing myself as a strongman coach. I'm a strength and conditioning coach that
1:25:14
can help strong man and that's what I've learned with Brian. Like this year,
1:25:18
it's like anything else. I believe without a strength and conditioning coach with
1:25:21
my experience definitely has a niss and a role training a high level strongman competitor.
1:25:30
But there is also a need for an event coach. It's like a
1:25:34
position coach or something, and like so for me, and and you have
1:25:41
to know your athlete enough and you have to be confident in your own ability
1:25:45
to tell your coach. Like last year, I thought Brian was too coachable.
1:25:49
He didn't give me enough information after the after the competition and his debrief.
1:25:56
Well I used to do that. I said, Man, if you
1:25:58
would have told me that, I'll work for you. What we got I'll
1:26:02
write it in. That's my job. So this year we really did a
1:26:06
better job of that. Like, all right, Brian, I'm the strength
1:26:09
conditioning coach, you're the head coaching event coach. I help with the volumes
1:26:14
and the loadings and things based on what you tell me or and I'll give
1:26:17
you my feedback and you got to agree on it. Don't If I give
1:26:21
you the script and you don't agree with it, then tell me now,
1:26:24
I can't do that. Yeah, that's where I thought happened a little bit
1:26:28
Year one was he had I don't almost like he respected who I was and
1:26:33
what my role was too much. But if you know Brian, that makes
1:26:36
sense. So we cleared that up right away and it was, like I
1:26:41
said, it really worked out and that allowed me to learn more from the
1:26:45
technique like the one the one event. Now I feel like I can be
1:26:49
very helpful for the high level strong man competitive definitely Novice, Like I really
1:26:56
feel confident in training and Novice coming up because there was approvements are not gonna
1:27:00
because of me, They're gonna be just because Jarrett Novice coming up. But
1:27:04
with the high level guys, I think I have enough information now where I
1:27:08
can provide valuable feedback. The one, the one, the one that I
1:27:13
still really got to wrap my head around, is the circus dumbell because it's
1:27:16
so much like an Olympic lift that it doesn't matter if it's one hundred pounds
1:27:23
or four hundred pounds. It's technique, it's it's it's it's bar path,
1:27:29
it's it's so it could be the difference of is the circus dumbell round?
1:27:35
Is it square? Plate loaded? It's the size of the grip. I
1:27:41
was even with me, like I messed around with it. So like for
1:27:44
me, I start going out because I got York circus dumbells, Well I
1:27:48
put fat grips around them, and I'm trying to you know. And again
1:27:53
for me, I'm just playing, you know, I got fifty six to
1:27:55
seventy eighty pounds, and I'm like, this is an FT up. You
1:27:59
got to really like it's if you got it's all, where does it fit.
1:28:06
It's a different triset movement. And so what I'd like studying the overhead
1:28:12
press work, I don't. I'd be interested to sit down with the guys
1:28:16
who if you got it, you got it. It doesn't matter how you
1:28:20
train, but there's some uniqueness to the log and the overhead press and strong
1:28:27
Man where I'd like to see how some of these guys do direct triset work
1:28:30
and what exercises they they script at different time. That was one of the
1:28:33
things that I was really trying to dial in with this this cycle with Brian
1:28:39
and then training. It looked like a lot of things we did from the
1:28:42
tricet specific work tied in and again in the the display. I'm not disappointed
1:28:51
in the display of work because it when you when you when you're afte says
1:28:56
I that's all I had, that's all you got. That's just the way
1:28:59
it is. If you tell me you went out there and man, I
1:29:02
just didn't I could have gone harder. Now I'm pissed, you know what
1:29:09
I'm saying, Like, hey, man, if you've got if you gave
1:29:11
me everything you can and your best was tenth, so we were tenth Pelace
1:29:15
in that event, That's just the way it is, like, you know,
1:29:18
and again you could kick yourself and ask and you know, I didn't
1:29:21
have my breath right or I didn't do this. The only thing is did
1:29:25
you give it the best you had? Right? Because that's all you can
1:29:28
ask for me, because the other stuff you can learn. You know,
1:29:30
if it's technique, that's just a way it goes. Sometimes you miss a
1:29:33
lift on technique. How many guys get their first attempt in the squad three
1:29:38
reds because they tried to cut it or something happened because they were nervous.
1:29:42
It was the first attempt of the meat, and then they still come back
1:29:44
and squat one hundred pounds more because they dial it in. The problem is
1:29:47
on certain events and strong man, you're not getting a repeat. Yeah,
1:29:50
that's very true. You know what I'm saying. You're not going out hell
1:29:54
you know, you know we had a little hiccup in the Conan's wheel.
1:29:57
Oh we're gonna get a second attempt. No you're not. You're done.
1:30:00
You come in fifth out of sixth game over onto the next event. So
1:30:04
yeah, I just again, I keep going back if there's the things that
1:30:09
I want to resonate with coaches or just remember what your role is like and
1:30:14
this is no. Everybody's got their reasonings. Like for me, I like
1:30:17
being in the background, like I want to be around, but I know
1:30:23
if I'm not around every day, I can't be around every every minute of
1:30:27
the day during game day. Yeah, that makes sense. Like you gotta
1:30:30
let the people who are there, I want to touch you, make sure
1:30:35
you're cool, hang around a little bit and get away. Now, if
1:30:39
I was in the room every day like James was, or like or is
1:30:44
into twice a week Steve and them guys, maybe I would find myself being
1:30:47
more involved. And that's where I have to that's the night. That's the
1:30:50
real tough thing for you. For a high level coach, working with high
1:30:56
level athletes from from a TV screen is true. You can't put more pressure
1:31:01
on the guy in competition by now, all of a sudden, you're feeding
1:31:04
him with stuff that you're not feeding him five days a week, Like Nick
1:31:08
knows how I coach Brian virtually a couple of times a week. I'm going
1:31:12
to get on, but I'm only on for the one thing I want to
1:31:15
watch. We talk, see you have a great workout, because I don't
1:31:21
need to see the other stuff. Well I should, but I shouldn't,
1:31:24
But I just talk. Yeah, I know what events I want to see
1:31:29
on Saturday. I know I want to watch a deadlift, all the accessory
1:31:32
stuff. Tell me your feedback. Tell me what you think, make adjustments
1:31:36
and on the fly, so I cannot be there for every minute of the
1:31:42
day in competition. And now this guy's like, because I don't know what
1:31:44
he's thinking, fucking house. Now all of a sudden, he's here all
1:31:46
the time. You know, I don't need to walk out to the event
1:31:49
with you. I don't. I don't mind being where I'm at, but
1:31:54
I also want to know that I do have the opportunity where I got to
1:31:58
go make sure this guy's all right and then get you out of there,
1:32:00
which and that's where I think some people on coaching staffs, and this is
1:32:08
for coaches who and again this is not to criticize, I think these are
1:32:13
learning opportunities for this new age of coaching. When you're coaching from afar and
1:32:18
then you show up at an event to handle or be there to support your
1:32:24
athlete, how you coached him or her for those sixteen weeks of prep is
1:32:30
how you have to be available for those days of competition. And that's why
1:32:35
again, like the one thing I really said last year was and I can't
1:32:41
remember how it all came about, and I don't know if I approached Brian
1:32:45
first or whatever because I didn't know how they do coaches, passes and family.
1:32:50
I didn't know any of that. And I was very very upfront and
1:32:56
said, look, man, I'm not there with you every day. I
1:32:59
don't need to be. I said, if whether it's James or Kerry,
1:33:04
whoever needs that, be there and handle you and understands that I don't need
1:33:09
to be a rookie trying to figure out how to get you handled on these
1:33:14
events. And that's when obviously James being with him as long as he has
1:33:17
James does a great job. He knows exactly how Brian's temperament is. He
1:33:21
knows when to get the gay and rate. He knows when to get the
1:33:24
tachi, knows when to do this. I'm still learning that. That's a
1:33:27
learning process for me. So that's their role. My role is be there
1:33:31
afterwards for a quick debrief, give him the mental support, make sure to
1:33:35
keep it positive, talk a little bit about what he's thinking going in the
1:33:40
day one, and then see you late again. It's just here, here's
1:33:46
what it is. This is what I learned for the parents with Ron Rivera.
1:33:49
A lot of cool stuff I've learned from coach. Know your role,
1:33:54
manager, expectations. If you aren't, if you aren't in the room sixteen
1:34:00
straight weeks every single day, you don't need to be out out in the
1:34:05
forefront. Everybody knows who coached them. And again, I wonder a lot
1:34:13
of times how the athlete, now a younger athlete, might not give a
1:34:15
shit. Other athletes be like, hey man, I know you're my coach.
1:34:19
Book Now all of a sudden, you want to be on TV with
1:34:21
me. Yeah, again, that's me. I'm not speaking or I'm not
1:34:30
disregarding anybody's thought process and how they coach their athletes. I just know that
1:34:36
it's something for people to be aware of. It's how you, you know,
1:34:41
how you want these athletes to build their relationships with you, Because as
1:34:47
social media grows, I don't care what anyone says. Sometimes these athletes like,
1:34:53
oh now you want Now you're piggybacking me. See what I'm saying for
1:34:58
sure, like, hey man, you aren't with me for sixteen weeks.
1:35:02
I'm glad you're here and you're but I don't yet I hold in my hand
1:35:09
right now. I think the experience athletes, though, will say that you
1:35:14
know, it's the inexperienced ones that it's going to get in their head and
1:35:16
mess up that won't. Yeah, because I've had people come in and help
1:35:21
me at powerty meets that don't normally train with me and stuff like that,
1:35:25
and for the most part, I'm like guys, I'm pretty easy to deal
1:35:28
with. It's just if I turn around and need something from you, just
1:35:30
be there. Other than that, if you know, I'll turn and ask
1:35:34
you a direct question if I feel I need something. If you see me
1:35:38
doing something fatally wrong, open your mouth if it's not, and it's what
1:35:43
I've been doing and it's going to get through everything, We're good to go.
1:35:46
Just when I turn and needs you, just be there. That's all
1:35:49
I can ask for. But I think too, in this day and age
1:35:53
of conflict and people not liking conflict, sometimes people are thinking that and don't
1:35:59
understand that they should tell the individual, this is what I need from me.
1:36:03
Yeah, I just like, because I got that's one thing I know.
1:36:08
Yeah, this is what I mean from you. Let's go And again
1:36:12
I just well, and like me and you Nick we've talked to. Like,
1:36:15
I mean, it would be real hard for me to coach multiple high
1:36:19
level competitors in the same competition. Oh yeah, because you can't focus on
1:36:26
I mean, it's would be really really hard for those who do it.
1:36:29
Kudos. I don't know how you separate who you're pulling for versus who you
1:36:33
are. Two guys in the finals, what do you do? Yeah,
1:36:39
I means yeah, you know. And again I know there's a lot of
1:36:44
guys that do that. More power to them. I know that I've kind
1:36:49
of I talked to Steve Foshan about this about different ways. A lot of
1:36:55
it would be when you started with them, Like if someone like you know
1:37:01
again after Shaw Classic at somebody at the high level set house, I'd like
1:37:05
you to work for me. That would be easy. If Brian continues to
1:37:13
go and wants me part of the team, I can't work with anybody now.
1:37:16
I have no problem with throwing some hey what do you think? But
1:37:21
I can't be a part because that's who I am as a coach. I'm
1:37:24
always going to try to help. I don't have an issue with that.
1:37:28
But then the other thing is, okay, say now I start coaching three
1:37:31
or four up and comers, and now they're climbing the ladder together, they
1:37:36
train with me the whole nine yards, right, there where like this.
1:37:43
Well, now me, my thought has already been Okay, if I got
1:37:46
these dudes or women, doesn't matter. If I got there and they're climbing
1:37:50
and it looks like they're gonna all three of these dudes could be in the
1:37:56
show at the same time, I already know what I'm doing. I'm gonna
1:38:00
find or hopefully I'll have three people on my staff. Okay, you're assigned
1:38:04
to Nick, You're assigned the angry dad, You're assigned the house, and
1:38:11
all make it to the show. You're his coach. Because I'm in the
1:38:15
stands, I'm just there. I'm not talking to anyone at all because I
1:38:21
have to remove myself from the situation and let them guys know that I love
1:38:27
all you, but for these four days, that's your coach. That's it,
1:38:32
right. I'm rooting for all of you because if you all make the
1:38:38
podium, man, I live really, really good. But in the end,
1:38:42
these are the guys who are going to handle you. These are the
1:38:45
guys you debrief with. These are guys, and then those three guys I
1:38:48
would talk to. Yeah, I would debrief with the coaching staff because at
1:38:53
that point in time, I'm coaching the coaches. Yeah, you know that.
1:38:58
And that's one thing that again, Um, that's my that's my cerebral
1:39:03
that that makes sense to me. That could be coaches right now saying that
1:39:09
guy's full of it. That's right. I'm full of it to you because
1:39:12
you got your opinion, you got your style, and it's worked for you.
1:39:14
That's it for me. I just know. And it's like team sports.
1:39:18
I got talked a couple of my buddies with the XFL. They all
1:39:21
coach two teams each. Well how that works? Like when I talked to
1:39:26
the one and the one said, well, I've got different assistance for both.
1:39:30
So the one assistants on one sideline, the one assistants on the other
1:39:32
side, and he's kind of like walking back and forth. I'd be like,
1:39:35
hell, I'd be in the box. Yeah I had that situation.
1:39:39
Ye's got earpieces and tell me what's going on. I'd be in the press
1:39:42
box because that that's a real interesting dynamic there. Yeah. Coaching is uh,
1:39:47
you know, coach, you know, knowing everybody needs a coach.
1:39:50
Yeah, coaches can't coach themselves, Like even me, I I I wish
1:39:56
I had I trained by myself. And but like when I really need help,
1:40:01
I know who I can lean on. Jesse Burdick. You guys know
1:40:05
Jesse. Jesse someone that I lean on a lot. He's always helped me
1:40:11
technically on some stuff and just a really good guy. He would be one
1:40:17
for sure that I've got. I used my buddy Big John, because John's
1:40:20
watching me train for a lot of times where I can get some good feedback
1:40:25
from him, and he's stronger than me, so he knows. Back in
1:40:28
the day, I mean, Dave Kate helped me out a lot, a
1:40:30
lot. Jim Wendler, I mean Dave. It doesn't sound like a lot,
1:40:34
but Dave helped write and design the program that got me to squat my
1:40:39
best ever squat in competition six fifty. And he had and I told my
1:40:45
tricep on that too, So that's kind of funny how that works. But
1:40:51
I don't even know, Like the crazy thing is is uh did that?
1:40:58
Yeah? Yeah, I don't know. I mean, all I know is
1:41:00
about three quarters way up, I hear this pack of firecrackers go up in
1:41:03
my tricep and the first thing I'm thinking is, do not take your bar
1:41:08
arm off this bar. You will not get credit for this lift ye,
1:41:12
and then I wound up having to state then it was like I don't even
1:41:16
know if I can bench press, and now I'm not going to get credit
1:41:19
for the meet, and I won't get credit for the lift, so I
1:41:23
wind up benching the bar in the call. So fifty five pounds, No,
1:41:30
that's fifty five So it's twenty five kilograms, right, that's all I
1:41:33
could bench And literally it was this tricep and you know, you can't uneven
1:41:39
it. I'm literally benching like this to walk out the bar. And then
1:41:45
by the time we got to Dadists, I was d d mso up by
1:41:50
the time I started pulling, But I got through and I got my credit.
1:41:54
So it is what it is. But you just learned from people and
1:41:59
and you know, Nick, I mean, you got some partners that coming
1:42:01
to you, but you pretty much trained solo. It's hard. He motivated
1:42:06
to get in there and set that routine up of okay, man, I
1:42:10
gotta go and nobody's here today. That was why I like for Brian.
1:42:14
This was the first time he had a couple of guys training with him consistently.
1:42:19
And what really I knew we were really in a good spot because on
1:42:21
his last training deadlift for the knack deadlift, we were smart. We set
1:42:30
it up as close we could to a non traditional deadlift were a lot of
1:42:34
guys were training, and again the younger guys, that doesn't matter, they
1:42:36
were training traditional plates. We had a little rig We rigged it up and
1:42:43
it worked out well. And what I really liked about that day was he
1:42:45
hit the number we needed little arousal and he had no partners that day,
1:42:51
so I knew mentally he was in a really focused spot. Because that's one
1:42:58
thing that I think people need to really work on and concentrate on, is
1:43:02
the arousalness of training. There's some guys who just get so hyped up and
1:43:08
it's like after a while, man, that's gonna shut you down. Like
1:43:12
you don't if you're if you're a nine hundred pound deadlifter, you don't need
1:43:15
smelling salt at three fifteen. I mean, just that's something I just look,
1:43:24
you need to be able to do it with music without music, and
1:43:26
this is the with a lot of zato thing comes in by the way.
1:43:30
You just need to be able to turn it on and turn it off,
1:43:33
yep. Because and you have to practice that. You have to practice because
1:43:39
I'll get quiet and I don't want anybody talking to me. It's just I'm
1:43:45
wrapping. I'm doing my thing. It's time to go turn around. All
1:43:48
zaim is focus on what I'm doing. I load the spring and just load
1:43:53
the spring and then it splode out. And then once they're put the brakes
1:43:57
on and set it back down in the rack. And then yeah, I
1:44:00
remember it was Jesse. Well the one guy too was it was it Dave
1:44:04
Hoff when he jacked up Louis in that deal. But even like Jesse,
1:44:09
one time somebody slapped him and he wasn't one of those guys who wanted to
1:44:13
get slapped in the back, and he went around and just jacked us fool.
1:44:17
But that's how me like people go. Now. They I was,
1:44:19
I was visiting a high school and they were I don't know what rapper was
1:44:24
on, and they go, coach, you listen to this music when you
1:44:26
train, I said, I used to. I said, I'm at a
1:44:28
point in my life where my music of choice is sports radio radio and I
1:44:33
trade. I was listening to Barton han Uh one day and I posted,
1:44:40
um, I think I did a max effort like Wagon wheeled dead lift for
1:44:45
me, and I posted something about on hey uh just to the max music
1:44:50
of choice, Barton Han. I don't think I wonder if they'll I wonder
1:44:55
if they'll retweet this. And bart Han actually retweeted it, and it contacted
1:45:00
me and sent me a jersey in shorts from the Barton Han Show. I
1:45:04
got a basketball jersey hanging in my gymn So everybody's like, well, I
1:45:11
was like, hey man, I cannot not listen to Barton Han. Man
1:45:14
it me up. Yeah, I think a lot of things are. The
1:45:19
camaraderie of strength sports is very unique. It's more so than football because it
1:45:25
ties all the genres together, Like you meet different people from powerlifting, strong
1:45:30
man, weightlifting, body building, and now even cross fit. It just
1:45:34
seems like it's a everybody just knows, like they understand what you're what you're
1:45:40
going through, you might be a different modality. So it's been a,
1:45:45
like I said, from a fans' perspective of really just growing to love all
1:45:50
those different genres of being strong and different manners, to actually get to be
1:45:57
behind the scenes and and it, Like I said, I just can't be
1:46:02
more thankful to Brian for giving me that opportunity because it's something that at this
1:46:09
point in my career, it's a cool almost. I don't know if I
1:46:14
would have considered it a bucket list item, but it's definitely something that's up
1:46:17
there, like coaching and the World's Strongest Man is like going to the super
1:46:20
Bowl. That's what people need to understand in that world coaching it being on
1:46:27
the sidelines a World's Strongest Man. He's like being on the sidelines for a
1:46:30
super Bowl. And I'm very, very honored to say I've been able to
1:46:34
do both man's and as you know, realizing that we've almost did two hours
1:46:40
without even trying, you know what I'm saying it, Oh man, we
1:46:45
really kicked this in and we covered an awful lot. Was definitely an honor.
1:46:50
Well, I appreciate y'all having me. Like I said, I got
1:46:53
the utmost respect for Nick and what he does, and I mean, I
1:46:57
just love it, man. I just uh, he motivated without motivating,
1:47:00
And that's the best part of the truth. I mean, that's if you
1:47:03
want to look at it from a from that aspect, like it's just cool,
1:47:08
like I said, And then you know, meeting Mark Felix and and
1:47:12
just watching these guys do it at such a high level. And the fact,
1:47:15
like you know, Nick's continuing to press the limits of what goals he
1:47:18
has set for him in the powerlifting were all match just you know, and
1:47:23
again and the exposure that I've gotten to have, the facts that I get
1:47:26
to now know these guys and consider them friends and and things like that.
1:47:30
That's the That's what strikes That's what sports is all about, is building relationships
1:47:35
and fostering those relationships and hopefully one day you you can pay something, you
1:47:40
can pay it forward, like somewhere or somehow, how do you continue to
1:47:44
pay it forward to the people who are interested in what you are and like
1:47:47
minded subjects. So you know, my honor has been mine for you guys
1:47:50
having me. I mean, I think it's cool what you guys are doing.
1:47:55
Uh. I was talking to somebody the other actually yesterday we were talking
1:48:00
and they're like, man, how you got to do a podcast? I
1:48:01
said, you're right. Everybody tell me that I've been on over one hundred
1:48:04
podcasts as a guest, and I'm like, man, I'm giving out all
1:48:09
this and as you guys can tell, I don't need to bring on a
1:48:12
guest. I could just do the podcast by myself and say, hey,
1:48:16
what do you want to hear me talk about today and blow be blow minded
1:48:19
for forty five minutes to an hour so down the road my wifeman begging me,
1:48:24
so maybe you gotta do it. Out'll be and if you need a
1:48:28
little help you, you know, let me know I can. I can
1:48:30
definitely assist you in. That's pretty good. That yeah, I'm being pretty
1:48:34
good. Well, yeah, man, you're the angry dad, which is
1:48:36
a great tagline. Yeah, everybody gets a little angry sometimes. Well again,
1:48:45
if there's anything I can ever do for y'all, and then anybody who's
1:48:47
listening, just reach out. And the crazy thing is I still had about
1:48:51
four or five things I wanted to talk to you about. We didn't get
1:48:55
too Oh yeah, because we're gonna definitely have to get you on here again
1:48:58
soon. Except for like a bathroom break, I don't have to really go.
1:49:02
I've I've been on the road for three days and today's jusy recovery and
1:49:06
get my debrief notes. Like I said, I'll type my report up for
1:49:11
a corporate and then restructure my week for the rest of the week. But
1:49:15
yeah, thanks guys, I'd love to come back. And like I said,
1:49:17
if there's anything I can ever do for any of you, just reach
1:49:20
out and I'll put I'll put his Lenk Tree in the note. So you
1:49:24
guys, if you want to get a hold the coach can you can You
1:49:27
can easily get hold. I will say this if you're in the Raley,
1:49:30
I'm gonna give a selfish plug you're in the Raleigh Durham area, or if
1:49:33
you're anywhere in that North Carolina area. July twenty eighth and twenty ninth,
1:49:38
myself and Steve Olsen are a host in our first seminar and we've got a
1:49:44
terrific lineup with Mike Young, Nick Terminello, Adam Barber, Travis Mass,
1:49:51
Steve, who else am I missing somebody big? Oh, Mike Buelly,
1:49:57
And then I'm gonna go the last three hours so nice. It'll be a
1:50:01
good two day event. It's a Friday afternoon, it's at an all day
1:50:05
Saturday. It's at Steve's one of Steve's gym. We're gonna have two open
1:50:10
gyms. We've got a food sponsor, We've got a supplement sponsor lined up,
1:50:15
so it'll be a really good day and we're gonna talk business and training.
1:50:17
So thanks for letting me sneak that in. Oh yeah, thank you
1:50:21
so much. Yeah, man, I appreciate I Man, I'm glad I
1:50:25
got to see you guys, and I got to come to my side of
1:50:27
the country. I can't wait till you come out here because I know sweating.
1:50:32
The question is am I gonna be in a sling or am I still
1:50:35
gonna be free, free flowing around? If? If I'm free flowing,
1:50:40
I can definitely train in your gym. If i'm not. You said you're
1:50:42
gonna get me in the pool. Yeah, we'll get you in the pool.
1:50:45
And then there's also things you can do as well. I know what
1:50:48
I can do. I can sit at a poker table because I'm good at
1:50:53
that. We have lots of that around here right now, you cause you
1:50:57
know, like two miles in the house, so than you can head over
1:51:00
there. All right, well, guys, enjoying the rest of the day
1:51:01
and have a great weekend, and thanks you again. Now, thank you,
1:51:04
thank you, all right, hit him with those famous words as we
1:51:10
sign out. All right, everybody, thanks for watching today. Thank you,
1:51:14
Joe. I can't appreciate this enough. House. I mean, it's
1:51:16
just been an amazing show. And Ben, thank you and for everybody.
1:51:21
Train hard, train smart, and be the absolute best you can do.
1:51:26
Thank you your rest experience. What you think of that