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Hello everybody, Welcome back to another episode of the pile
lifters Den. I'm your host, Cam Smith, and
today I want to bring on a legend in the bench press.
Tiny why don't you introduce yourself?
I am tiny meeker. You want more than that?
Yes, Sir. Tell tell us a little bit about
yourself. 26 time bench press world champion, four time all
time world record holder, first man in history to bench press
8900 and a single ply first man do over 1000 tested and that's
8-9 and 1000 and 1st man ever to bench press 1100 lbs.
Did that in 2000. I'm alive.
Probably 12 or 13 and then had three car wrecks and 17.
Came back at 50 years old and broke it again to 11:25.
Yeah. So I think to get started,
obviously you're very well known for the bench press.
And to this day, besides Jimmy hitting over 11 in the single
ply, you're the only one to have done 1100 plus and multiply.
So before we kind of dive into that journey of getting up to
that point, maybe tell us about what first got you on to into
bench and kind of into competing?
I've always done bench press. I mean, I've been working out
since I was in elementary school, but I started competing
first in high school my sophomore year.
We basically had a choice of either do track or do
powerlifting and and incur too much of A track.
So when the powerlifting and actually end up loving a lot
more just because of the fact that it didn't matter what you
look like either you're stronger, you're not strong and
went by according to to weight classes and stuff.
As for the bench press, I've always had a really good bench.
I've always had really good strong legs and stuff.
But after I had my first kind of round of car wrecks years ago
and I had to tore my left I toward the right shoulder in
high school, I always had some kind of flexibility issues with
my shoulders and stuff. So as time went on, I couldn't
get under a bar to squat if I wanted to.
You know, if you start doing safety squat bars, maybe that'd
be a different story. So actually when I did my first
the the 1077 actually did look for the day too and did a, a raw
611 if I'm correct on the same day.
I've been 1077. But no bench has just always
been my thing. You know, after high school, I
kind of went into nightclubs. I bounced a bodyguard for 13
years and one of those years a guy ran into me at the gym, saw
me benching and asked me if I if I ever powerlifted and I kind of
joked. I was like, what's that?
You know, And and then took me to my first contest in, in the
state championship of Texas. I took second.
Then I went to the the state full meet, took second.
And after that it bam. It was first, first, first,
first, first. And probably one of the most
blessing names I can say in my lifting is if I'm correct, every
single time I've ever made a lift, actually made it to the
podium. That's awesome.
Yeah. And as far as kind of getting
into the shirt for the first time, like tell us about maybe
that first experience for you, because obviously I know that
being in the shirt is something that comes with time.
It takes a lot to master. And I would make the argument
that being a Poly benching is the hardest part of
powerlifting. Well, yeah, I remember I I
started when the first original shirts were around.
So we're the ones that were in the shirts that were sliced in
your armpits like a razor blade. So, you know, learning that at
first, as funny as this may sound, my bench actually went
down. I was benching 622, I mean, six,
six O 6 raw when I was when I was 22 years old.
So it was a few years after that when I actually started
competing again and went into a shirt immediately.
And at first I really didn't like them.
You know, it's like this sucks and I didn't like what I was
benching because I was unhappy. I was only bitching like 500
something and then what I learned it.
Boom, I was in the sixes again. And then I don't think I went
into the sevens until we went to denim and you know, but but it's
kind of funny, you know, when when I say I was the first to
8-9 hundred a single ply, some of those old school guys are
going to be kind of pissed. And well, it's a different shirt
and, and it's the same thing now.
I mean, yeah, a lot more 1000 LB benches now the the shirts are
different. There's I'm still not going to
sit there and say the shirt does all the work.
But now you got better benches, you got better bars.
I mean, you know, there's a lot of years where I was bombing
every meet because I couldn't touch and everyone's going, oh,
he has a super tight shirt. When the shirt was tight, I
could touch 600 lbs. The same shirt have benched over
1000. It was the bar was bending like
crazy and and I couldn't touch it was I mean you probably go
two more inches down just a touch.
Now we got some amazing bars out there.
I mean text fire bars make an amazing bar FAS making amazing
bars that really don't bend unless you have way over 1200 or
more or something like that on there, you know, So I mean it's
kind of change. As for learning a shirt, for me,
it wasn't too bad because my form of technique has always
been really, really good. I, I got blessed around to be
around some really good lifters at a very young age who didn't
flare the elbows, you know, talk to keep your wrist straight, how
to plant your feet, all those kind of things.
I learned later on even more how to get a better arch and stuff.
So once it went into the shirts, you know, the first shirts you
actually kind of had to flare. And that's what kind of hurt me.
I don't like flaring. And that same thing kind of
first happened when I got into band shirts, but then now you
can actually bring your elbows in.
So when we went to the denim also now I'm kind of getting my
more of a natural movement. And then of course, when the
phenom came out, man, it was like blessing completely for me.
But I think where I came even much better lifters when we went
to super lifting. And this is one thing that's
looking great for Jimmy Twos. I've always talked about when I
start doing reps that made me a completely different lifter,
especially when I do contest. Because you want to get it down
faster. You want to waste all the energy
trying to touch so you learn to drop it faster, pop it up
faster. And that's why I joke everyday.
Speed day. Yeah.
And for me, like being in the shirt, like something that I've
been getting really much better at, it's the descent, just
having a good path. And one of the big things for
that would be just being more aggressive with it, not kind of
just letting the weight bring it down.
It's kind of pulling it down. Obviously it's not like straight
up rolling it, but I found that when you're more aggressive with
it, you're getting, obviously you're reducing the time under
tension and that's going to help you with energy wise, but it
kind of helps you find that groove of the shirt a little bit
better than just like letting it float.
Well, there's always been a lesson I've, I've taught about
Ben shirts. If if you can't touch, but you
blow it up, you put more weight on the bar.
If you can't touch and you can't pop it up, you need a bigger
shirt. The shirts too aggressive for
you, you can't handle it. So there's there's a lesson
learned. I mean, there's some people out
there don't like using boards. Boards to me is a comfort zone.
It's also a target, but the one thing about the older shirts and
that goes for all the polly's and and not not as much as band
because I don't know anyone who's blown up a band shirt yet.
And if there is, but I haven't heard about it.
But in the old days you really need to learn how to baby a
shirt and what I mean by that. So you might start off with a
four board. Can you go down as slow as you
can? Once you touch that board, you
pop it up as fast as you can, redo the set with the same
board, but this time go down smoother.
Pull that board out, redo it again and you keep on redoing
the process until you finally touch.
Once you finally done that, you can kind of get aggressive as
you want with the shirt. But if you rush it and you touch
too fast, that sure will never give you the rebound or reaction
you want to get out of it because the microfibers are so,
so, you know, small and, and what's the word I'm looking for?
Just you know, if you break too fast, it'll break and you'll
never though they won't stretch the way they want and give you
the reaction you want. You know, they're they're very
delicate. That's the word I was looking
for. It's very delicate.
And if you, if you're too fast with it, you just, it won't
work. As for bands, they're a little
different but but The thing is about the boards is once you
finally touch on your Poly shirts, it's best to work off A2
board or one board because 1 you kind of save that shirt up
because if you constantly go full range, you might stretch
out too much and then you'll never get what you want out of
the cost of it out of the out of the contest.
But you know in the old days when you could always get 2
shirts breaking in both of them. One you train in one you use for
the shows. Now As for the bands, you know,
bands were really difficult for me at first because at first
they were telling you the flare of the elbows and here I was
coming off 2 blown shoulders from the car wrecks, you know,
getting a lift off and it feels like you're holding the roll in
the weight raw. I mean it's, it was terrifying
to me. And until you start dropping it,
you didn't feel support. But once I started learning the
shirt more than I learned how to get under the bar, all of a
sudden you feel it, you know, settled on you and you feel
support. You go on your list, you just
had to learn the right sizing and all that kind of stuff.
You know, basically the same thing as the other shirts, but
still a big difference. Yeah.
And I know obviously we got to experience pretty much the full
range of shirts and obviously the the denim era was something
that was an interesting time and top powerlifting because they
were very stiff. And obviously we're more more
known to blow out and catastrophically.
I guess my question for you would be kind of that shift from
when it became denim into like that more Poly arrow.
Like what was the, I guess the environment like of like seeing
all these benches go up or like people trying to figure out the
new shit? Well, remember, it went from the
the original Polly's to denim first.
Some people might forget that they thought of me going to
rage, rage exes and all that. And also, you know, but it
didn't. It went to denims and and also
was there was no other shirts back then except for insert
stuff, because insert had a patent.
Well right after the denims when the rage or ejects came out, the
patent ended. Next thing you know Titans
making shirts. I think there was some couple
others and and I still remember also with the denims that went
from just like a kind of record blue Jean denim to a black
denim. Then they started grid stitching
it. Then it came a ultimate denim,
which was this maroon material that was super duper strong and
and almost, almost no one can touch it.
You know, it was very difficult. But again, we're going back to
the bar bend and stuff too. And then all of a sudden the
rage comes out and and I remember when I first got the
shirt and I took it out of the bag, I was like, what is this
going to do? You know, I'm thinking we're
going backwards now. And then I put it on and I was
like, holy cow, you know, but but you had to break it in
slowly or they would blow and and a lot of us, you know, we
were getting the shirts quick before a show.
And so you're kind of rushing it.
Then you get a shirt, you know, the Meads and be honest, I
thought the rage the original polys on that were blowing out a
lot more than the denim were, you know, and, and then all of a
sudden, I guess people start to learn how to break them in and
wet them down so they can stretch better.
All all these different other things.
And then also would it depend on it really depends on how what a
person looks like. And what I mean by that is if
you're a real hard body person, you know, just because you, you
may have a a stomach, but your upper body's pretty solid.
There's not much giving those shirts.
So you put on a super tight shirt, they would blow.
But some of these guys that were, you know, not as I'm not
going to say names, but didn't look as good or looked very
soft. They could put on the most
craziest tight shirt you could ever imagine.
And you you'd watch the guy get, you know, it'd be like the
original shirts that took two or three or four guys to put these
shirts on these guys. And then next, you know, they go
out there and they bench 5 or 600 lbs more than they've ever
taken bench in their lobby. It was crazy, you know, and then
now we're, we're in another different shirt, you know, so
that's that's all things change. And then also with with the with
the rage or regexes. I did, you know, my first 800
wasn't a rage. My first 900 wasn't a rage X.
And then my 948 on up was double plies and I never tried to
triple ply in those, but only went double s.
And then soon after that was of course, the phenom.
You know, another problem for me over the years was, you know,
I've lifted, I think I wrote down that I can remember.
I've lifted almost 20 federations there.
There there was, you know, different rules, different bars,
so many different things that but I was going to all these
different feds because back then we we didn't have necessary
social media. We had what do we have, you
know, the go heavy, the forms. Powerlifting watching that shit.
Oh man, the forms to me was fire.
It was, it was, it was I'm going to read this stuff to get myself
mad to go out there and want to kill.
And, and my feelings were I'm going to go to everyone's
federation because people didn't believe I was drug free.
So I'm going to go take everyone's freaking drug test.
I'm going to break all your stupid records and then I'm
going to leave, you know, then I'm going to go to another one
and do it again and again. And I think there's only three
federations that never made a lift in.
That was probably USPA whatever right sex federation was or XPC.
I didn't make one XPC that that was the 1200 twelve 150 LB miss
load if Arnold classic. And then there was maybe one
other one. But me and you know, I lived in
USAPL wobble for many years. NASA did all these other tests
AMPC where you had to take a 5 year polygraph.
Oh wow, it was it was it was crazy stuff you had to do.
And then of course, the equipment was always different
and that was the other bigger problem was I was always
changing the shirts and until I said, you know, screw this.
I really I'm going to focus on one shirt and I'm going to go
out for the record. And that's when I finally went
to the Super duper and when I flared, because when I first
found those, the Phenom, I was actually wearing more what was
legal for Wabble, which was called a Phenom 2, which was a
close back and stuff. And.
And then John started putting on these, what was it called the
where we had to do the reps show.
Well, once we did that, that's why I went to super and that's
when I really started learning the shirt and how to touch.
That's what I was talking about earlier, super lifting.
We did the Olympia and all that stuff.
And then after that I finally went to a triple ply and that's
I went for kills. Yeah, so for the the the Phenom
and the Super duper Phenom, what was the kind of biggest
difference between those shirts between which 2 the the original
Phenom and SDP? Well, the original Phenom is
Night Day. Original Phenom to me is more
like your original blast shirts and stuff.
They kind of, they kind of fit the same.
There's no, there's no, I mean complete difference of what the
original is and what the Super is.
The the cuts different, the the necklines different, just
completely different night and day.
Plus you have a stretchy back or you have an open back.
So even the phenom two it was you had to wear a partial
clothes back for wobble. So your top half would be
covered. Then the bottom half you should
trap it down and stuff. But they were still kind of cut
like a super, just not as aggressive.
The collar couldn't be as aggressive either.
But then when you went to the Super, of course now you can
kind of bring the collar down more.
All those things earning dramatically changed.
Yeah. So in the SCPI guess kind of
when or maybe when you were going to get for your first 1100
or maybe just something you've figured out through the years,
like kind of walk us through how you'd set your shirt during a
meet. You know, funny part about how
my shirt is I knew when I put it on how much give I could feel
without holding anything where I needed the neckline to be.
So, you know, and that's it. It's an interesting question.
You know, I think what really changed things for me was also
learn how to change my warmups. Warm up was a difference.
You know, if you go back in the old days when me Caneli Ryan,
right, check all everyone was lifting back in those days.
Most time you go in the warm up room.
I can't speak the same for Gene because the only time I ever saw
Gina the Mead, he actually decided not to live because he
didn't like the equipment. And that was in Florida,
Orlando, which I think he was being pretty smart, to be
honest. But everyone would warm up to
almost 600 lbs raw, go put a shirt on and we might be lucky
to bitch 700 lbs, you know. And then when I started going to
the Arnolds and stuff, I was watching Andy, Andy from, you
know, from the England doing his dead lifts and other lifters,
Gary Frank doing a full meet. But I was watching the warm up
for the other lifts, not the bench, just how they would do
squats for their dealer, whatever.
You know, Gary Frank was all around lifter and and I compete
against Gary once at the biggest mention the river and that was
the first time that someone that's over 7 there.
But we're sitting there warming up and Gary's not doing
anything. I mean, we're lists are getting
higher. This is the denim base and all
of a sudden they put I think 585 on the bar and then Gary stands
up and I'm thinking, oh hell no. And he he like does his little
jump skip thing and goes over to the bench and he benched 585
were all and it was ugly, but he did it.
That was his first warm up and I'm like what the freak?
Then he puts a shirt on. He goes 675 and again, it was
kind of ugly. So we're sitting back there.
Everyone goes outside because the the meets outdoors on the
stage. It's just me and Gary and Gary's
like, you know, I never feel good these bitch only meets.
And I have like the double an Angel pop up.
Have the double I have the Angel pop up goes maybe you should
tell me more about more and the double S over here going no,
don't say shit, Let them bomb. Yeah, I love Gary.
Nothing is Gary but Gary bomb. Do you know?
And then I went on and got my first 700 there at that show,
not my first 7 and over, but for the for the baddest, biggest
bench of the river. And then the next year I did 8
and a 900 and 1000 and so on. But but anyway, when I watched
him do his full meets and he was squatting, same thing.
It was huge warm up and they were just such big jumps.
And then I watched, you know, Andy from England do his
deadlifts. It was all these singles, very
fast, very explosive. And I started thinking, I think
I'm going to change my warm up on bench.
So I always start off at 1:35 no matter what my bench is.
Now I actually start up a little bit lighter to warm my shoulders
up more. And I got 135 for two sets of,
you know, 810, whatever, jump to 225, I'll do 6:00 or 8:00.
Then I jump to 315. I'll do a single double.
And then I would jump to 900 lbs.
And the first time I did it, everybody's like, you're doing
what, 900? You're jumping to 900 lbs.
Yeah, jump 900. And the first time I did my
training, even some of my team members, like, I think this
didn't ever change anything. Yeah, but I know what I'm doing.
So I jumped to 9 and then I jumped straight to 1000 and you
know actually my first level O2, it actually shows the entire
warm up of that day. It was kilos.
So it may have been 937 then it may have been either 1003 or
something that might open up with 810 eighty for the record
at the time. And then I missed 11 O2.
Then I came back and hit eleven O 2.
Then I missed 11:35. But you get what I learned is.
You don't need to do a whole bunch of heavyweight to get
warm. You have to warm up movement And
if you're wasting your time and your energy doing all these
lifts, that's why what Gary was talking about when he does the
full meats, even with these high school kids, you're already warm
after you squat. You don't need to do a bunch of
warming up on the bench press. I mean, some of them don't even
really warm up on men. So they put their shirt on and
go to work. But I, my kids don't want to be
just a little bit, but not much. So even if you can do what you
what you normally do, take just take out one like so like I just
said, I do 2 sets 135 two sets 285.
I'd only do one set of each one. Put shirt on, go do your last
warm up. Go do your open.
So that that's what I've learned and and it dramatically change
everything for me. Yeah.
So for me, yeah. So for me, I usually go, I'll
take the bar, I'll take the plates for some reps and I'll go
2 plates, usually a few few reps And then I'll usually either
take a single at three plates or just 285 or whatever, depends
how I'm feeling that day. And then I usually go, I throw
the shirt on, don't do anything to it, and I'll usually take
like 3 1/4. So I mean my best in the gym
right now is five. So I guess for me, do you think
I. Right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So so if you if your first set
with a shirt is how much? 375.
Man, I, I would even, I would even I had to go do 225 and go
put the shirt on and go do your go do that.
That's that's how I would change things because like, you know, I
got a lot of kids training in my gym, high schoolers and I'll
watch them, They'll come in and first thing they do, they'll put
135 lbs on the bar and I'll walk up and say, hey, how much do you
Max out? And they they might some say
185, some say 200 something. I said, wow.
I go, you know what's funny? They go, what's that?
I go, I've mentioned almost 1200 and that's my first warm up.
Yeah, I said you also start with the bar and, and 1:35.
But the whole thing is now that was good what you said for the
first part, but you're still going too high in my opinion.
Raw, you could actually stop at 2:25 for a double single, put
that shirt on. So up to maybe what are you
trying to get? You trying to get 5 right?
Yeah, I'm trying to hit mid fives upcoming meet.
So you can put the shirt on, go do a three board to A2 board
with 365, then go to A2 board up to 455.
Then you open up £500. Yes, I mean, yeah.
And I guess another struggle that I have, I'm I'm blessed and
cursed with the long arm syndrome.
So I guess, well, that was going to be my next question is
someone who does have a very long like range of motion, what
are some of the things that can be done to kind of make their
bench not suck? Well, I work with a lot of, I
work with some guys going into Columbine, their offensive
lineman. It can be 6 foot 8 and all that.
The, the biggest thing is you, you learn how to pinch your
shoulder blades as much as possible where you're sitting
the bench down on the lats and you're bitching off your lats
and your triceps, not your pecs and shoulders.
Because we're doing your pecs and shoulders.
Your range is going to be a lot further up.
And if you, you know, you're here and then, and then if you
drop a pinch that, that, that, that can shorten it the distance
4 plus inches just on that. But also what you got to be
careful of is, is the lift off. Because if your lift off person
pulls you up high and he takes you out of the groove,
especially when you got a shirt on and the weight, you'll never
be able to get back in that position again because you were,
you were too high. So I hate kind of bringing up,
but it's, it's, it's, it's the same thing for bench.
You know, I don't know if you saw the video, the horrible
video of the old lady that got killed squatting recently.
The biggest? Mistake is the rack height was
too high. So when she got out of the rack,
she was stumbling already and everyone could blame the
spotters. All that.
Dude, bad things happened in gyms.
Bad things happened in meets fast.
You're messed with heavyweight. I mean, I was almost 600 lbs for
that girl, which is crazy. Yeah, but if she would have had
the rack height low. So what I hate was a lot of
young lifters, they want to come out of the rack and go right?
Just start stepping back. Well, if the rack height is low,
he could stand up, hold it for a second, let your body absorb it,
step back, step, step, take your breath, go on your lift.
Well, the same things for the bench.
The rack height's too high. You're never going to be able to
come out and bring it down unless you have a really,
really, really good three man lift off.
You know, so just mad you're trying to do over 1000 lbs.
I think it's going to be a lot more difficult, but have the
rack height where it it's just going to kind of clear the, the,
you know, the hooks a little bit, not by far, but just a
little bit. So when he comes out, it's it's
already on your lats. You sit there, hold it for a
second, take your breath, boom, going to your lift that that
will dramatically change everything.
But if you get the lift off and you fill in on the shoulders,
you need to go throw it back in the rack to regroup.
Yeah, and as. Far as the actual training side
of being in the shirt, maybe over the years, what was kind of
the frequency you'd be in the shirt as well as some of the
maybe variations and movements that you kind of would circle
back to that you found you got the most out of?
Well, how I train and, and how I train me and my people and all
that. I let the body, my body tell me
what what I'm going to do. I have a plan and same date as
my lifters. If they come in, they don't feel
right. They need to let me know.
So I do a lot of overloading and when I don't do overloading, I'm
backing off, working on speed. Speak it also be in a shirt.
Speak it also be raw. It can be with bandage, chains,
whatever you mixed up, whatever you want.
But the one thing I do is I'm constantly letting my body
recover. So I've been preaching forever.
I only bench one day a week. I've been like that forever for
my 38 plus years doing this. I've only bench one day a week.
I do back one day a week. I do legs one day a week.
I can do cardio every single day if I want to.
People go, what about your forearms, all that?
I mean, that's back day, you know, I mean, you just mix it
up. But you get to the point if you
start, if you start over training, you're done.
You know, in the old days when we read power from USA
magazines, you'd read these articles and these guys would
go, oh, I got hurt a couple months for the show.
I couldn't work out. And for whatever reason, I said,
I'm going to go do the meeting anyway.
And then they go to the meeting. They had the best living in
their entire life. What it really was is they
finally let themselves rest. And he'll, you know what I mean?
So it's, it's hard for me to tell you how I how I do things.
That's why I don't write stuff down.
People want me to do online training and sometimes some part
of me kind of wants to do it, but most of it's because I'm a
hands on person. I like.
There's so many things I look at when a person benches.
I'm very detailed on technique and form.
You know, I take Jimmy right now.
Jimmy's technique is flawless. Yeah, if, if I got a guy working
on me right now, we can fix my arm issue.
I mean, I did AI did AI, did a trap bar deadlift the other day.
Easy sell, over 600 lbs. Now to watch the video.
My left arm is just completely bent extremely bad and I'm
thinking of flexing my tricep. I can't.
I can barely touch my face on someday or get to my head but I
can't straighten the arm out so we're working on that really
bad. I don't know if it's part from
my tear from tear in the front delt outer delt outer shoulder
from the car wreck but no one be able to figure it out yet.
But I do have 8 hernia disc that could be part of it too.
Oh geez, the. Blaster.
But we did was. Kind of good.
But what I was getting at is I was telling the therapist, I go,
man, we get to the point where I could turn my elbows around and
where you can see my hands completely turned around, like
you want to give me some change or don't fall on my hand.
I said if you're able to. Do that I'll be Superman again.
But if if we can't fix it, I'm done.
And and for Jimmy, people sit there and go.
He has short arms. He's short.
Well, if that was true, I don't know what we're supposed to call
little people these days, but they would be the strongest
people in the world. You know what I mean?
It's it's it's about how his lines are you look at cranes,
how they pick things up. It's all about the lines.
His technique is flawless. You know, that's why he's able
to do so many reps with a certain weight.
It's, it's just, it is, it's one, it's down, it's up.
It's a perfect line. It doesn't, it doesn't break the
lines. And, and that's what people
should really do is focus on your form and technique first.
Make sure you're not turning the wrist back.
Make sure your elbows aren't flaring out, you know,
especially on the raw stuff. But you want to see a straight
line. So your wrist and the bar is a
straight line going up and down. You don't want this.
You don't want this and you don't want it going too far in
either. You know, you fixed all that.
That's when you start seeing your numbers junk.
Yeah. And for me it like.
What the the bar path down, like I was saying earlier, that's
something that I've it's starting like you watch some
video like, Oh, that's great. But when I go to return it I I
don't know if I'm still like jamming it out like a raw bench,
but I just can't seem to find that same path that I take it
down in. Is you got to give me some
filming and look at your line and and the guy who's spotting
you, they have to be honest too. That's the other big thing I
preach about is you can't just surround yourself with a bunch
of yes people. You got to run your yourself
around people that aren't that aren't going to lie to you.
They got to tell you the truth, whether it's good or bad.
If you're not locking out, they need to tell you're not locking
out. If they're helping, they damn
sure need to tell you they're helping because then you go to
the meeting. You're like, Oh my God, that
still was heavy. It's like maybe I could have
been told you I was pulling the whole time and training, you
know, Oh, that was great head on on Christmas, Christmas Eve of
2023 and the the rag messed me up.
But in my opinion, the treatment later messed me up 10 times
worse. And like I'm huffing right now.
And what that's problem is they injected me with they swore up
and down and want to be cortisone.
And I was like, don't give me cortisone.
Yeah, I'm gonna be cortisone. Swore up and down end up being a
cortisone. And ever since then it blew me
up from the three teens to 365. And if my body weight gets
around 3:40, it's like I'm full here, so it's hard to breathe.
But I'm thinking dandelion routine to try to get the fluid
out of me. And the one thing that's really
helped dramatically for me is water fasting.
So. Which I'm probably going to do
again pretty soon, but I'm going to try to get it down under 300
lbs. So I don't feel like this
anymore. Yeah, and.
I was kind of want to dive into that a little bit more.
Obviously, you kind of came back from a injury and stuff and
that's something that's kind of just part of pile of thing
whether you get hurt on the platform or outside the
platform. So maybe tell us about coming
back from that. Well, unfortunately for me.
If all my injuries have been from car wrecks.
I mean I just all injuries suck regardless.
Many years ago I got hit from behind, but in 2017 I got hit
from mine twice and T-bone once. All in three months.
But Jesus, five months, sorry, five months.
But the first one kind of did the most damage for my labrum
had a tear on my, my knee and, and just, you know, really achy
and sore. And it took all the way till
2020 before I was able to start lifting again.
And when I started kind of lifting again, I had Fred, Fred
Fisher from the IPA trying to ask me, you know, what can we do
to get tiny lifting in? I was like, I don't know if
that's going to happen anytime soon.
And he was like, well, if we put a money show together and I was
like, and I started thinking and I knew what I was doing in
training. I just didn't want the people
that really know yet. But then I started, I started
doing really good on my lifting. And at the time I was sponsored
by someone else and we were we were trying out some new shirts
because everyone was in these bands and I was thinking, you
know, may come back. So I I came up with this idea
when things started looking pretty good.
Hey, how about I get all the top guys that ever mentioned 1000
lbs together. And, you know, let's do this.
Let's, let's do the baddest venture on the planet.
That's how I kind of him across. But I was feeling really good,
you know, but in the process of trying to get ready for the
meat, every time I was getting shirts from the certain person,
they kept changing and changing and everything I'd say to try to
do that, it came out to be a different type of shirt.
And it got to the point where I just felt like, Hey, are you
trying to sabotage me? And, and, and man, when it all
ended, it was like being having the greatest marriage of your
life for 2025 years and all of a sudden you got divorced because
you forgot to take out the garbage.
It was just, I mean, we laughed, but dude, it was I it, it hit me
that hard. And I happen to pick up Rob
Pharrell during this process and we're only months away from the
show. And I asked Rob, I said, hey,
Rob, I know you don't really know me too well, but I really
appreciate you getting all these guys in my meet.
I go, if I give you a booth, would you mind making a shirt
for me? And he kind of giggled.
He goes, well, tiny, I didn't, I didn't start making shirts for
1000 people to wear my shirts. I made it for freaks like you
would do some big ass weight. I'd be honored to make your
shirt. And then from that point on, you
know, was with Rob and and then later on aside with Ken
Anderson, with Anderson powerlifting because they all
work together. And it was been a good family
after that. Only problem then is couple
years after that, boom, another wreck.
Yeah. Yeah, and Rob's awesome because
my friend Jon Rupo's, he's their spot.
He's sponsored by F8 and like we went down there, it's Robin,
Tiff and Denise are great and that's the shirt I use
currently. I'm using.
I'm not using a banter. I'm using their their spade
Polly and honestly, I've I've been loving it so far.
They just something about what they can do with gear.
It's just incredible, but not only on the bench shirts, but
even their briefs and everything and actually.
That's the funny part about Rob is even before he is where he is
now, Rob would take everyone's shirts no matter where they come
from and he'd repair them and stuff and didn't care.
He was cool about it. I'm like, man, but the other
person stopped doing repairs. And if and if you know, if you
don't, if you don't know what the heck you're doing.
I mean, here was my thing. I go you're doing, you're not
doing repairs, you're not doing alterations.
I mean, believe it or not, for a phenom super duper phenom shirt,
the only alteration I would ever do on any shirt was I would
shorten my sleeves. Other than that, I didn't care.
It was perfect. They wouldn't even do that for
me. And I was like, so if I go to
some whoever to sew the sleeves up and they explode, you think
they're going to go, man, that alteration place really did tiny
wrong? No, they're going to say you did
tiny wrong. You made a crappy shirt.
And I couldn't believe they just, and that's what I'm saying
is just everything changed. And I don't know why it changed,
but I'm very happy now that I've made the change.
You know what I mean? But you know, the greatest thing
for me was to put that shirt on for Rob and break the record
again because one, it was a big thank you to him, and it was a
big something else to someone else.
Yeah, exactly. It was a perfect, perfect, I
don't know the word for it, but as far as kind of over the years
in terms of not just only the competition, obviously the totem
pole keeps moving and moving, but you're 11 O2 is something
that has yet to been chipped. I know Tony Carlino is trying to
look at that, try to see if he can get to that.
But as far as kind of the culture goes, what are some of
the things that you've seen for the positive as well as the
negative? Well, you know, I got to, I'm
laughing because at the same time I got to be one of those
guys that, you know, to me it's like I almost feel like my
records always there no matter what.
Because now the bars are changing the yeah, changing.
I mean, I haven't got to feel what one of Rob's Polly shirts
are like. I'd be very interested because
to be honest, I love the feel of the full support from the get go
of the lift off and everything. Things are dramatically
different. And he's to say if I get
healthy, you never know that that might be something I would
love to do. But man, at the other time, I
got to be a fan, you know, it's fun to watch.
I love the heart of Tony. You know, if anyone's going to
break it, I would love it to be either him or Jimmy anyway, you
know, both good guys and and, and it's fun.
I, I love seeing Mindy every once a while, you know, go do
what he does in training because man, people don't understand
something, man, you know, and, and what I'm going to say is no
disrespect to Scott, you know, you watch some of the training
videos. It may not look like the best
lift in the world, but so freaking what man, It's what we
love to do. And, and man, I don't think
anyone understands when you when you finally reach that level and
you reach what you finally want to reach.
But the but the other part is, is that's the thing we love to
do is just to feel that way. So when I've gone through
injuries and shit, you know, Scott's had his car wrecks too,
where he lost, he had an ankle. I think his ankle was removed
and all these other stuff. I mean, Scott's been through
hell and some of his wrecks and I think he had another one not
too long after the baddest venture.
I think he had another one too. I could be wrong on that, but
what people are seeing is when we finally got back to where you
can put 1000 lbs on the bar and you put in your hands and it
goes down and no matter how it goes up, man, it's like it's
like the greatest feeling you ever had Again.
It's like y'all understand when when, when you're having a hard
time. I mean, I preach this on a lot
of my stuff. You know, as a personal trainer,
personal training is the number one thing you'll ever do for
your physical and mental health. So if you're going through a lot
of shit you can't work out, it freaking sucks, especially when
that's what you've always done. And then and then to feel the
crazy way, that's, that is your, your therapy.
And then all of a sudden that day comes and you can do it
again. I don't care what anyone says.
I'm like, thank you, God. But then there'll be some
Jackass on the on the on the Internet.
We'll put what's the boards for? Oh my God, do without the
boards. Why can't you do without this?
Why can't you without that? Why is his hands on the bar?
It's freaking training. Yeah.
Exactly. It's so.
Goddamn contest. Yeah.
But hey, hey, now that now, man, you just, you just hit it now.
But So here's my only thing about what I don't like about
lifting right now. And I really mean this.
If you look at most of my list before the 1125, the only reason
1125 was done the way it was done.
That's the rules of the Federation.
I don't like having five or seven spotters around the place.
I hate it and I damn sure don't like a guy stand over a person's
face when he's doing the weight. It's like a board.
If a board is there, if a guy's hands are over the bar a little
time, you feel safer, you're going to push harder.
Everything else. The worst problem is there's
videos out there now. I have no clue if anyone's
touching that bar or touching touching, you know, or helping
whatever in in in my ears lifting and I and I don't want
to get into a big tested, non tested thing.
But what I what I'm saying is this.
I didn't care if I went to a test or non test to meet.
It was my choice. If that person was dirty and
they beat me, never would ever become my mouth.
All the only ones because they're on drugs.
I don't give a shit less. That was my decision to go lift
there. OK, but I can lift even with the
guys that would lift their asses off the bench 3 or 4 inches.
I can kind of deal with that sometimes, but it's still really
pissed me off, especially if they won because that's clear
cheating. You could clearly see it.
But I can't compete against a whole freaking team.
And I think it's bullshit because I know there's lifts out
there right now and I've seen them because some people will
post a different angle of the lift and the spotters are
touching that bar. And, and I've even seen the
lifts back in the old days when we did the magazines everything
and the lift was taken away because someone saw something.
They said, oh, the lift was taken away because the spotter
touched the bar. You can't touch the bar and and
everyone wants to sit there and go what about the lift your
safety? Well, there's a video of me
dropping 1200 lbs mini a few years back and it's on my bench
that was custom made by Tyler Hobson who makes an outstanding
bench. And what came out of my hands,
which I hope it never ever happens again.
And I'll never forget the sound. It went the bar's fun, ripped
the hole in my thumb, and it just.
And I needed and everybody's screaming and I wish the camera
kept rolling because I'm like, I'm fine, fine, let's get the
bar. And then I'm pissed off.
I was like, because I thought I was going to blow that 1200 up
right then I was going to be the 1st 1200 LB pitcher ever.
And then next week Jimmy destroyed it.
He has 12 or something and then he has 13.
So I was like, God damn, Jimmy could have stopped somewhere.
But anyway, I regress. But, but I, I if you can't have
the proper equipment to do the lift where everyone can see
what's going on, then they should go do something else, You
know, because I'm, I'm trying to design something.
If I ever, if I ever get the new sponsors, the new baddest
venture, I want something done where you get a lift off and
everyone gets the hell out of the way.
Yeah. You.
Know, I mean if it falls, it's going to get caught.
It won't be like a monolith. I'll do something different.
But I have a great, great idea for this thing because when we
could, you could see everything. That's when everyone's going to
want to watch it again. Because when you can't see it,
what the hell they do. Yeah, I.
Totally agree, I think that's something that obviously the
Internet trolls are annoying as hell and they will never stop
coming to multiply comment sections.
But something that I don't like seeing is like you said, just
like when you see bench videos and you can't even see the bench
or you can't see the bar, you can't see anything.
You're like one with their soft elbows.
What the hell is he doing? Like how much is actually being
touched? If it's a like backyard me
quote, UN quote, like there's just so much that makes it to
when it looks on the Internet where they're like, oh, this is
bullshit essentially. Well, you know, Jimmy does
something really cool. Jimmy does like 3 or 4 different
angles videos of when he does his record list, which I think
is fantastic and I hope he never stops doing it like that.
But but you know, just like you were talking about that too.
Another problem it was years ago was people's elbows.
You know the sleeve going way past the past the elbow a little
bit. He had guys with some of these
band shirts that that bands halfway up the forearm.
How do you miss that? Yeah, you know, so so those are
things that other sport I I dislike other than that man, I I
love seeing the crazy numbers. It's fun.
I mean, some of these girls now are doing some crazy weight too.
Texas high school now, I think we just had the second guy bench
700 lbs here. Now, the one thing I don't like
about Texas high school is I wish the man's shirts were never
allowed there. Because once they get out of
high school, they go to college. You can't wear that.
And just what happened to your bench?
Yeah, yeah. Now they're in a single ply and
it's like, oh shit. Yeah.
As far as SO. I guess my question to you,
obviously you've had experience and everything, what are those
some of the biggest gripes you have with the banter in general?
I for me personally, I I think the banter is a great.
I think they're fun to watch, but I think a lot of people hop
into them. I guess early in my opinion,
whether that I think everyone should get experience in the
Poly kind of have to go through that.
And that's just my opinion, but I kind of want to hear what you
had to say. Man, that's a hard one kind of,
you know, personally, I think when it comes to young kids, I
think they should all start off at the Poly range and and move
your way up. That's why I wish they would
wouldn't have it in high school because the reaction on some of
those lifts are so fast and you know, we were just about
spotting and stuff. Go watch the Texas high school
power for me and spotting exactly the greatest you know,
you, you've been in some of these meets where the Potters
weren't good. Go watch a high school or the
high stores kind of stay around. Their hands are down by the
side. They're they're not prepared for
what's about to happen. They'll go help the person do a
3 minute lift off and they're coming up like this and the kids
still going to lift. I mean, it's, it's crazy.
I don't think that really makes a difference what shirt they
wear. But the reaction of how fast
these bars fly off the chest now that's where it gets kind of
scary. You, you see the arms fly out.
I think people have actually broken their arms too.
So I, I just think lifters really should, to me, in such a
rush, they really should learn. But unfortunately, because of
the sport, they are getting thrown into the fire quickly.
Most of these high school coaches, I don't want to say
most, but there's a lot of Texas high school coaches just do not
know powerlifting at all. That's their weekend job and
they go do what they do. But a lot of just they, they're
clueless. And I, I love helping those
kids. I'm a ghost when they go to
their school because no one needs to know I'm helping them.
And, and, and that coach will look fantastic.
That's great. I I applaud it.
But don't hate on me if I'm making your kid look great.
Yeah, but, but I don't know, man, sometimes I think maybe
there should be an age requirement on some that could
be. Yeah, But there's.
But there's a lot of kids out there that did what they did and
they do great. Just like there's adult lifters
that can do great in these shirts and there's some that
can't do nothing in the shirts. You know, I mean, it's all about
are you coachable or not? Yeah.
And I I. Think I.
Yeah, I definitely agree. With your sentiment on it, like
I said, I think my opinion on the shirts are forever changing.
I think it's inevitable that that's the direction of sport
going. Like if you look on open
powerlifting, if you look at how many people did unlimited versus
multiply last year, the numbers are actually insanely different.
Well, I think another thing about open powerlifting is this,
have you got a record lift that goes off on that board and
there's no video of it? It shouldn't be on that damn
board because there's some other, you know, when when I was
picking people to do this show, there's people had 1100 comp
mentions that there's no video of that lift at all.
Yeah, and you can sit there. Well, the meat was turned in.
But this day and age, you're going to tell me there's no
video. It just sounds wishy washy.
And and then again, of course, you see that same person with
some other lists. And then you'll wonder why.
You'll probably know why there wasn't a video because you saw
some of their lists that. Oh, that's probably why I didn't
make a video. Yeah, that's.
True, I mean. So that those are the things
about the sport that I I wish there was better at.
I mean, if you're going to record a list, especially all
time records and all that, they should be done a certain way.
I wouldn't care if there was, if there was, you know, has to
replay, just a replay. I mean, that goes into a whole
nother thing. Yeah, you know, but I still
think there should be a video of a lift it that if there's
nothing, how do we know whatever really didn't happen?
Yeah, I think. That that's a, that's
interesting thing to think about.
It'd be kind of interesting to see how that could be
incorporated into a rule book. But I guess one of my last
question for you is kind of maybe just looking ahead, what
are some of the goals you have maybe as a coach or as a lifter
this upcoming year? Man, my first goal is get
healthy. I mean I hate the huffing part
from all this fluid in me and stuff.
I hate the aches and pains. Like I have really good days
where I feel fantastic and then I'll have weeks where I'm in so
much pain all over my body and it's and then you're just you
look at the body weight flew up as much of fluid.
And if I get that maintained to get it down, you know, my, my
real ultimate goal is I want to get down to 262-6270 And, and if
I could still do some lifting there, maybe I'll go do some
lifting. But other than that, I'm always
going to lift for fun and then lift ready for fun.
I would love to find some new sponsors to put on the continue
the baddest venture. But you know, I've had two
ultimate goals in the sport. One I achieved, which was we
have an all time world record in York bar ball Hall of Fame was
another one that blew my mind and and once I got there, that
was the big anyone that said I didn't do whatever I did.
It was that. But the the one goal that I
really feel like I haven't done yet.
I got us on ESPN, but my my honest to God goal was I wanted
to really bring real money to the sport.
It kills me. I mean, it kills me and I'm I'm
always post under. Why can strong men guys get
100,000 plus for deadlift and 1100 lbs?
I said Jimmy should get 250,000 or 500,000 for pressing 1500.
I mean, where are the world daredevils if something goes
wrong on their deadlift? What they do let go of the bar.
Yeah. Oh, there's another hand hit the
ground. Where are we going to drop it?
You know, and and and I just don't understand.
And you can sit there and go, well, it's equipment.
What the hell you think they're wearing?
You know, they got traps. They said.
I mean, I can't say what happened at the Arnold Arnold's
a different show, but when, when, when, what's the name?
Did the the 11 O2? He had a belt.
He had one of those strongman belts with a belt, probably over
it wearing a a deadlift suit underneath his T-shirt.
And also it doesn't look like he's wearing a deadlift suit.
But hell, when he was about to about to die, they're ripping
this things down so he could breathe again.
But what's the difference of what we're wearing?
I mean, hell, I guarantee our venture weighs lighter.
Well, I don't know the venture it's pretty heavy, but the
policies that was a lot lighter than those, those those deadlift
suits, you know, so the, the goal I wish I still get
accomplished is really bring money to the sport, not just to
make some money, but life changing money.
So if you want to show, you know, it's life changing, you
know, it's not just like we we won 5010 thousand.
I mean, that's that's nice money, but you know, and I know
this day and age, that money probably last a couple months or
so and it's gone. You know, I mean, I mean, hell
travel these days just to get to a shows over 1000 bucks.
You know, you're paying 500 something plus to fly.
Then you get your hotel. It's almost 200 bucks a nine.
I mean, if you're doing Arnold, think about that.
Then there's your food and everything else.
So it'd be nice if we could find a good sponsor that they could
pay that kind of money. I still got some ideas.
But same thing for me is I got to feel healthy enough to want
to go put the show on. Because my last two shows, I
actually thought I was going to be good to put a show on.
Then I started feeling horrible and I'm like, I can't move
equipment feeling like this. Yeah.
So. I think that's something that
would be great for this boy. That's something that I hope to
see in the future. It's something that even with my
meat, just even if it's small, the meat I ran last week, that
even if it's small with a prize pool, Is it something that I
want to build up to over years and years and kind of be able to
get to that point where you can give away thousands of dollars
and have someone actually be a career pal.
If they're that's not just based off of like sponsors or just
having to coach or own their own gym, just like can actually just
be a competitor. Well, you know the other.
Crazy part is for me, who is, there's so many federations now,
especially down here in Texas too, that I was putting on
meats, thinking about scholarships to kids, cash
scholarships, you can do whatever you want that cash.
And it was going to the biggest lifts, pound for pound lifts
first place. I mean, I I was giving out lots
of money and I don't even think we had fifty people to meet.
And yet if. You go to a Texas high school
power for me, especially the state championship, there's like
15 to 17 platforms. That's just the state meet.
That's the one who made it there, you know, and and I'm
sort of thinking we can't get 200 kids in there to win all
this money. It was just mind boggling to me.
You know, good for the ones that lifted they they won the money,
but there were some other ones out there that possibly could
have even a bigger chance of winning, but for whatever
reason, they didn't struggle. Yeah.
Yeah, for. Sure.
And I think we can kind of wrap things up here.
So I'll ask you my final question.
If you could give a new lifter or someone going into their
first meet a word of advice, what would you tell them?
Well, before you go to your first meet, you know one thing I
always tell people when when they go about lifting, they want
to know what the records are. Don't worry about records, get
your feet wet. So the first thing you want to
do is make sure you understand the form and technique, you
know, get all that down. If you're going to equipment,
know your know your equipment. And then next thing, more
importantly, know the rules. Know that you're going to get a
press command, know if you're going to get a start command,
know all those rules. You know, know if you can't move
a foot or lift a hill, don't put a hill.
You know, all those little things.
Every federation has different rules.
You got to you got to know your rules.
So that that would be mine. But most importantly, have fun.
Just enjoy it. I mean my lift here is when
we've got paraded for the regionals.
I said, dude, get in the meeting, go deepest on your
squad and then after that go kill people get in the damn
meet, because I don't care how long you been in a sport and
this is the honest country. You can be in this for 30
freaking years. You missed your opener.
It's a head game. Yep, you're going to be sitting
on what did I do wrong? Oh my God, that sure doesn't
feel the same. It's, you know, did I have the
neck right that you know, all those things will come.
So go in, have fun on your opener, make sure you at least
do it two or three reps before you go do it.
Yep, couldn't agree. More.
Well, I wanted to thank you again for taking the time to
come on. It was my pleasure.
All right. Man, I appreciate it.
Man. It was it was good talks and God
knows I can talk a lot.