A Secret, An Incredible Fall and Courage To Get Back Up

I hope this message finds you all blessed. I’m gonna let you in on a little secret. I wasn’t going to say anything, but it was such an interesting night the other night I had to tell this story. It illustrates an extremely important training point and an extremely important life point as well.

The secret is we’ve been filming footage of Scott Weech for a future squat video from him. If you don’t know who Scott is, if you follow the lifting world you will soon. Scott is the young lion of Super-Heavy weight powerlifting. In the next few years I believe he’ll be the dominant super-heavy in the world. I know Scott because he happened to begin training at the same gym I trained at. He was brought there by a guy I used to train. In fact on his first few sessions I helped him tweak his squat technique. He has since then gotten seriously into competitive powerlifting.

Now he uses a different style than I do. I have a well-publicized penchant for raw lifting and all around strength and endurance with a very wide focus. He trains raw a great majority of the time but he competes in a normal suit, wraps, and bench shirt powerlifitng style. But hear me folks…. He’s strong! Both raw and equipped. He trains hard and he’s articulate and smart. Hence, regardless of different styles the common bond of strength.

How strong? Well he’s 21, 310lbs, raw probably an 850 squat, 500 plus bench, 700 plus deadlift. (In fact we videotaped him pulling 705 for three raw singles after having done grip work earlier in the day). Equipped you’re looking at an 1,100 to 1,200lb squat, 700 plus bench and a 700 plus deadlift. He’s a little leaner, but built like me. There’s not much deadlift leverage there. Although I believe in the next couple of years he’ll pull over 800.

I say all that to tell you this story and to put you on the lookout for future articles and a DVD or more with Scott. Last night, even though I don’t regularly go to a gym anymore I went there with Scott to shoot footage and help spot. When you get into really heavy competitive squats you need multiple spotters who know what they’re doing and are strong enough to actually do it. These are very difficult to find and people used to do it for me therefore though I rarely have time anymore, when I can, I go and do it for others. In fact that’s one of the big reasons I went to the bottom position power rack style is the spotter problem.

So we’re at the gym taping and spotting and in the process of training for a meet with equipment, especially the new style of powerlifting equipment it is very much a “find your depth, groove, get everything right” kind of process. So Scott’s done multiple heavy sets already and he takes a set with 1175. That’s right 1175. He begins to squat down and is trying to stretch his suit so he can get all the way down to a passable competition depth. As he begins to get close to parallel the suit basically stops his movement downward. At this point he begins to force it to go a little lower and the suit bucks his hips forward instead of stretching straight down. This pops his shoulders backward which pops the bar off his back. It then slides directly down his back, catches on his belt, whips him backward causing him to head-butt his father who is the center spotter and knock his father down. The bar then pops over the belt, continues falling straight down and the combination of bar, suit and wraps shoots Scott straight forward into the wall directly in front of the squat rack.

When I say shoots him forward, I mean literally propelled him forward. It looked like one of those trampoline jumps where people put on velcro suits and jump onto a sticky wall. The difference being that he then slid down the wall like a Bugs Bunny cartoon.

The reason I know all this is because we were taping and watched in slow motion afterward. Again… and again…. And again. But there in-person this all happened in a split second. Way too fast for even experienced spotters to catch. Initially everyone in the room gasped and feared the worst. In fact, even for me it was one of the scarier looking drops I’ve ever witnessed. BUT after a quick inspection everybody was okay. Thank God.

Here is maybe the kicker of that whole night. We talked it around, there were many different opinions bandying around about what to do next. However we unloaded the bar, replaced it on the rack and Scott got up and did another set successfully with 1100. Not the prettiest set you’ve ever seen, but he overcame it and got it done. Very few people in the world will ever put a weight like that on their back. And it becomes a whole other level of feat to fall with a really heavy weight and takes another level of guts to get right back up and do it again.

There friends is the point of this. In your training life somewhere along the way you’ll fall with a weight. Maybe literally, maybe figuratively. As I stood around there immediately after that talking with about six other experienced competitive powerlifters everybody had at least one story about falling with one of their heaviest attempts. If you push hard enough to court your greatest success you also court failure. Failure is a stepping stone to your greatest success. The real secret is the guts to keep trying. To keep getting up, no matter how hard the obstacle or scary the fall. Get up and try again.

It’s the secret to every area in your life as well as in training. That same courage that you should be building through hard training is what will stand you in times of emotional and spiritual trouble and take you through to your physical goals. Build up your body, build up your courage and let nothing stop you. Always get back up.

If you want more information on how to train hard enough to effect your whole life not just your physical being then you should be looking at our books and DVDs. If you want to know about how to get your strongest squats and take hold of your muscular destiny then look at our “How To Squat 900lbs” book and DVD set.

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