Technical Breakdown: The Clean

Hey guys this is a pretty basic breakdown of the clean.  I'm by no means an accomplished lifter or coach, but I have, through my own research and time spent working with weightlifters and weightlifting coaches, developed an understanding of basic technical principles of the clean and how to execute it.  Hopefully this will help you understand the different parts of the clean, and help you to improve your own lifting.  Each phase is broken down with a picture, and at the end of the article there is a full video.  Check it out and I hope it helps!

Phase 1—The Setup

The shoulders should be directly over the bar or slightly behind it.  Hips should be low, at the very least lower than the shoulders.  The back must be tight.  The chest should be up, the eyes should be straight ahead and up.  Feet should be less than shoulder width, with the toes pointed out.  Before you begin pulling, take a deep breath and hold it to brace the back and keep tension.

The Set Up

Phase 2—The First Pull

The first pull consists of the movement that it takes to move the bar from the floor to just below the knee.  It isn’t actually a pull; it’s a set up.  The first pull serves to put your body and the bar into an ideal position for the second pull and finish.  From the floor you must keep tension in the back, which allows you to keep your shoulders higher than your hips.  As you begin to pull the bar from the ground, the bar should be pulled back.  Everything in weightlifting is back.  The lifter’s heels should be firmly planted on the ground, and the weight should be kept back on the heels. 

As the bar is pulled off the ground and back into the lifter, the knees must be pushed back.  Remember, the bar should never come around the knees or legs.  The bar should always be moving back, so in order to make room for the bar, the knees should move back.  The shoulders should go out over the bar during the first pull as well.  THE HIPS MUST STAY BACK.

I will use the word “control” to describe the speed of the first pull.  Some coaches say “slow,” some say “fast,” I believe the best word is control.  If you pull too fast off the floor, you will lose positioning and make the rest of the lift impossible.  Go too slow, and you’ll have no momentum going into the next phase of the lift.  Lift the bar as fast as you can while maintaining proper positioning.  Remember, this is a set up, the first phase of the clean IS NOT EXPLOSIVE.

End of the 1st Pull

Phase 3—The Second Pull

The second pull begins just below the knee and ends when the bar makes contact with the upper thighs with the athletes back vertical and the hips still back.  While the first pull is a controlled movement, the second pull must be faster.  Throughout the clean, the speed of the bar should gradually increase, so that it moves the slowest off the floor, but only when compared to the finish which is the fastest and most explosive part of the clean.

In the second pull, the weight should remain on the heels, and the hips must remain back.  At the beginning, the shoulders should still be out over the bar.  As you accelerate the bar, the bar should be swept into the hips by contracting the lats and pulling the shoulders back.  At the same time, the knees, which were pushed back during the first pull, should still be slightly bent.  As the shoulders are pulled back, the hips should be driven down. 

While the bar is moved faster in the second pull than the first, the second pull is once again a set up for the finish.  At the end of the second pull, the knee should be slightly bent, the spine should be tight and vertical, the bar should be making contact with the top of the thigh, and most importantly…THE HIPS SHOULD BE BACK.

End of the 2nd Pull

Phase 4—The Finish

Everything you’ve done so far is a set up for the finish.  The bar should have accelerated throughout the first two pulls, and as you reach the finish or “third pull” the bar should be moving the fastest and most explosively.  The finish in the clean is one of the fastest and most violent movements in sports.

The finish only occurs once the bar as been pull back into the hips at the end of the second pull.  You must simultaneously extend the hips UP and THROUGH the bar violently.  Notice I didn’t say pull on the bar with your arms.  The finish should be a fast and violent explosion of the hips through the bar. 

At the same time you must move your feet.  This is the only time your weight should leave your heels during the clean.  Moving your feet quickly and precisely will get them in proper position to receive the bar.  You should not move forward or backwards, but slightly out, so that you can catch the bar in a full squat. 

Finally, you must pull yourself under the bar.  YOU DO NO USE YOUR ARMS OR SHOUDLERS TO PULL THE BAR UP.  YOU PULL YOURSELF UNDER THE BAR.

The moment you violently drive the hips through the bar, you should begin pulling your body down and under the bar.

The Finish

Phase 5—The Catch

The catch is fairly simple.  As you pull under the bar you must bring the elbows under the bar then quickly drive them up.  As you drive them up you must establish a solid rack position for the bar to rest on.  The cue for the catch is ELBOWS HIGH, BAR IN THE THROAT.  You cannot try to catch a heavy clean in your hands.  Have the courage to catch the bar in the pocket created as you drive your elbows up between your front delts and neck.  The bar must be caught deep in that pocket, up against the throat.

When receiving the bar, you MUST stay tight.  Your upper back, lower back, abs, etc. all must be tensed.  If you allow any of these links to be loose or weak, your catch position may crumble making it nearly impossible to stand up with the bar or make the bar crush you and miss the lift altogether. 

The only think that should remain relaxed in the catch is the legs.  Relax the legs; allow the bar to drive you deeper into the hole (squat position).  Once you’ve reached the bottom of the squat with the bar in the rack position and your upper body tense, it’s nothing but guts and strength to stand up.

The Catch

Auburn Skies

I brought my ‘94 T Bird to a slow stop at a light just out of sight of the mall.  I slid back in the driver’s seat, The Gaslight Anthem’s 59 Sound playing through the speakers over the low idling of the car.  My mind raced. 

I’m not going to be ready.  Why am I doing this?  If I had just retired I wouldn’t have to deal with this shit right now…

The last two weeks had been chaos.  Every time I finished and sent paperwork to my school, I thought the appeal process from hell was finally over.  Inevitably, time and time again, the call came, informing me that there was more to be done.  Sickle cell tests, physical therapy notes, Enrollment Services clearances, and more time spent in Staples’ scanning department then I would care to think about, had gotten to me, and I just didn’t think the frustration was worth the outcome. 

I was sick of paperwork.  I was sick of the stress.  I was angry with my coaches and the athletic office.  I was done with the preseason football baggage, and all I wanted was to be rid of it.

As this was running through my mind, I came back to consciousness, and looked up from the steering wheel that I had been staring at while my thoughts wandered.  Just past the roof of the mall, the sun was setting.  Even the tallest trees were already cast in shadow, the vibrant green of their leaves now a dark grey with gold trim in the waning daylight.  The sky was a deep blue; growing darker and darker the further you looked from the sun.  Clouds were scattered throughout the sky, dark grey plumes illuminated by streaks of pink, red, and purple.  Only half the sun was visible, as it slowly slid behind the tree line.  Beautiful stripes extended out from the sun’s auburn halo, bathing the world in fire.  The passenger side window of my car was open, and a crisp evening breeze gently swept over me…

Immediately I was transported to a brisk Friday night in October.  I stood, fully padded and dressed in uniform on the sideline, waiting for the loudspeaker.  The same crisp evening breeze that filled my car cooled the pregame sweat that drenched my uniform and beaded on my brow.  My teammates were already aligned up and down the sideline, a wall of maroon and navy.  I stepped to my place on the sideline, and looked to the scoreboard endzone.   Just past the short fence, a flagpole towered over the field, the stars and stripes gently waving.  The sky was a canvas of gold, auburn and purple, casting light over the darkening clouds.  The crescent moon hung high, becoming visibly sharper with the setting sun. 

My heart raced.  I bounced back and forth as the words of our National Anthem rang out over the stadium.  With each note my heart beat faster, adrenaline coursing through my body.  Though I mouthed the words, I didn’t hear them, only the beating of my heart and the flow of football notes rushing through my mind.  Like a dog on a leash, I couldn’t wait for “…the home of the brave” to release me.  With each exhale; a plume of vapor filled the air.  The stadium was silent, except for the voice of the singer; a final moment of calm before chaos.

As the final line of the Star Spangled Banner echoed over the airwaves I raised my helmet proudly above me as far as my arm would extend…

I looked up and the light was green.  I pushed the accelerator and the Thunderbird took off.  The sun was all but gone, leaving only an auburn and purple glow in one corner of the sky.  The tension and frustration was gone.  In its place was excitement and anticipation, for soon it would be a cool Friday night under an auburn sky, with my helmet raised above my head, and the roar of the stadium signaling one thing…

Kickoff.

What's Your Minimum?

Shankle

I wasn’t ready.  I knew it before my shoes even touched the warped wood that ran the length of the gym.  Weights that usually flew off the ground felt heavy.  My body was tired, my mind unfocused.  I wasn’t sore, but my muscles ached, and a general lethargy had overtaken my body.  I told myself to focus.  I willed myself to focus.  Yet, my mind wandered. 

Outside, the air was heavy with moisture, another hot and humid summer day in Jersey.  The light that leaked into the gym through the opening usually covered by a large aluminum garage door was silver, the sunlight muted by the clouds that had overtaken the sky. 

I had seen it coming, and had tried to ward off the freight train of exhaustion with three cups of black coffee, but it had done very little.  The week prior to this session had involved a great deal of volume at high percentages of my max lifts.  Though I had felt great throughout the week, the heavy training load had finally caught up to me.

In front of me, about 10 yards away, sat my enemy.  The lone bar on the platform that morning, loaded with two thick blue plates on each side.  100 kilos was a weight that just months before would have been a max effort lift, yet now, it sat in front of me as a weight that I had expected to snatch easily before moving on to break a personal record.  My hopes for the day looked bleak in that moment, as I questioned if I’d even be able to snatch 100 kg with how beat down my body and mind felt. 

I began my walk to the bar.  With each labored step my legs begged me to turn around.  My heart was racing as I set me grip, I needed to make this lift.  I had to make this lift.  The bar felt heavy as I pulled it off the ground, but I kept pulling.  I didn’t hit the ideal spot, but I kept pulling.  As I pulled under the bar expecting the weight to come crashing down on me like a wrecking ball, putting the final touch on the snatch session from hell, I moved my feet and locked my upper body into place…

I made that 100 kg snatch, and went on to make a PR at 110 kg that day.  This was significant because it meant that in the past week, I’d attempted to snatch 100 kg from the floor four times, and all four times I’d made the weight easily.  The knowledge that I could make 100 kg four out of four times on four different days in four very different conditions gave me confidence.  

No matter what your goals, if you lift weights someone has undoubtedly asked you what your max is.  How much can you bench, (hate that one)?  How much can you squat?  What’s your best clean & jerk?  Or my personal favorite, how much can you lift? 

Anytime someone discusses how much weight they can move on a particular exercise, they refer to their maximum or personal best lift.  But here’s a question I’d like you to consider.  What’s your minimum?  What weight can you handle on any given day, regardless of how tired or sore you are?  What weight can you handle when you’re having a bad day, or when you’re struggling with stressors outside the gym?

About a month ago I was listening to Jon North’s podcast known as “Weightlifting Talk.”  At the time the show was recorded, Donny Shankle, another legend of the sport of weightlifting, was Jon’s co-host.  He brought up the topic of minimums.  The concept is, what is the heaviest weight you can handle any day no matter how unfavorable the circumstances may be.  Donny made the point that your minimum is more important than you’re max, because if you can increase your minimum then on any given day you can count on that weight being there.

In the case of inexperienced lifters, establishing and increasing your minimum is of the utmost importance.  Your minimum is one measure of consistency.  If you can train your body and mind in a way that makes heavy weight automatic, then you can concentrate on pushing your mind and body to the limits with max weights.  Just as you must establish your own style of lifting as well as proper positions and technique, you must establish consistency with heavy weight. 

The higher the percentage of your PR your perceived minimum (obviously your minimum is not an absolute) is, the higher you will be able to push your max lifts, and the more successful you will be as a lifter.

Establishing consistency is simple:  practice the lifts.  People forget that strength is a skill, and the more frequently you are able to do a particular lift, the more you will improve at it.  One style of training that I learned through listening to Jon North and Donny Shankle that can help improve a lifter’s consistency is called “Every Minute On the Minute” training. 

To perform an E.M.O.M workout, begin with 60-70% of your max on a particular lift, depending on your experience level, and perform one rep each minute, on the minute for a period of time.  This type of training is best used on lifts that require a great deal of technique, such as the snatch, clean, jerk, or clean & jerk.  The goal is to be consistent with your technique when you are tired, and unable to fully recover between sets.  You should gradually increase the weight between reps, but never increase the weight before making a weight at least twice in a row.

For example, begin with 70% of your clean and jerk max.  Every minute on the minute for 15 minutes, perform a clean and jerk.  Every time you make two c  According to Jon and Donny, if you are missing in the first third of the workout, you started too heavy.  If you don’t miss at all, you didn’t go heavy enough. 

lean and jerks in a row, increase the weight.

If you want to be successful, be consistent.  Ask yourself, on my worst day, what can I lift?  What’s my minimum?

A Tribute To Jon North

It’s been almost a week since Jon North retired as an athlete from the sport of weightlifting.  When I first found out that he was leaving the sport at age 27, seemingly at the peak of his athletic career, I was dumbfounded.  Having watched him lift and followed his career for years, and listened to him speak with such passion about the sport of weightlifting, I couldn’t believe that he was calling it quits, with so much athletic ability and so many goals left.  Now, about a week removed from reading his blog post that made his retirement official, I’ve been able to put his retirement into perspective, and I’ve come to a realization:  Jon North has been one of the greatest if not the greatest professional athlete, role model, and influence I’ve come across in my life. 

For those of you who have no idea who Jon North is, he was a Pan Am games team member representing the USA, former National Champion, two-time Arnold Classic Championship member, American Open Championship member, and Olympic hopeful in the sport of weightlifting.  As a 94 kg weightlifter he has trained under one of the most respected coaches in the United States in Glenn Pendlay.  He has pushed to the brink of the American record in his weight class in the snatch, and clean and jerked over 400 pounds.  Recently, he opened his own gym called “The Attitude Nation,” where he lifted and coached before finishing his career this year as a gold medalist in the clean and jerk at the National Championship of weightlifting. 

First and foremost I want to make this clear, I’ve never interacted with Jon on any level.  I don’t know him and he doesn’t know me.  But even so, just doing what he does has influenced me in everything I do to such a great extent that I think it deserves recognition.

I remember vividly the first time I saw Jon lift.  Sometime in 2011, I was scrolling through my newsfeed when I saw a video that someone had shared entitled, “No Crying…Inspiration from Cal Strength.”  I was curious, so I clicked on it, for the next three minutes, I watched three guys lift immense barbells from the ground overhead in the most badass display of strength and athleticism I had ever seen.  At the time I knew nothing about Olympic weightlifting, so my mind was absolutely blown.  How the hell were these three guys, who I later found out were Jon North, Donny Shankle, and Spencer Moorman of California Strength Weightlifting, putting three and four hundred pounds over their head?  In that moment I knew I had to learn more about this and try it out myself, and right then and there, my love for what I now know is the sport of weightlifting, was born.

I quickly realized that Cal Strength had an expansive library of weightlifting videos on Youtube, and began to go through each an every one, while simultaneously taking my interest to the gym.  I would stay late after morning football lifts and come back for second sessions to work on my snatch and clean and jerk, and receive tips and coaching from the weightlifters and coaches at FDU.  Though I was just starting out I was a quick learner and already very strong from years of lifting for football.  I fell in love with the challenge of weightlifting, and soon came to admire the combination of speed, strength, and technical mastery that was required to be successful. 

Though Jon was a superior lifter who initially drew me into his career with blazing speed and technical mastery, his actions and personality off the platform may have been even more influential.  Jon is a controversial figure in the sport of weightlifting.  As a loud, outgoing, often borderline cocky athlete, he earned as much negative attention as he did praise for his antics on the platform.  However, the one thing that no one can argue about Jon is that he demands attention.  Realizing this, he has parlayed his success in weightlifting into a blog viewed by hundreds of thousands of people, a podcast named “Weightlifting Talk,” and his own gym and brand name, “The Attitude Nation.” 

In recent months, it has been his blog and podcast that have affected and inspired me the most.  As an athlete with a blog myself, I have come to realize that I have an unbelievable opportunity to say what I want and express myself through my blog.  Sure, the basis of the blog is weightlifting and strength and conditioning, but lately I have broadened the blog topics.  I have expressed myself, written more literary pieces, and even a couple short stories that try to capture moments in time, placing the reader in the shoes of an athlete. 

Additionally, following his retirement, Jon has talked on his podcast about giving up the sport of weightlifting in the prime of his career.  He states that it was not due to injury or lack of passion.  It had nothing to do with feeling he was too old or unable to compete at a level that he wanted to anymore.  He left the sport as an athlete because he wants to devote himself full-time to his passion:  coaching and helping others achieve their dreams and enhance their lives as his coaches did for him throughout his career.  His message spoke to me, and made me realize that coaching is so much more than technique and programming.  It means having a genuine passion and concern for the lives of your athletes.  You have to truly care about their success, and desire to do everything in your power to help them succeed. 

For the last couple years I have been solely focused on my own success.  That’s perfectly fine.  As a football player and aspiring weightlifter, it’s important to care about how well my training is going.  However, as an aspiring coach, Jon has taught me a great deal about what it means to impact the lives of others.  He is doing with “The Attitude Nation” exactly what I want to achieve with JMSB.  He has brought together a community of like-minded people and inspired them to work hard, lift heavy, and pass their love and knowledge on to the people around him. 

Jon has also shown me that if you truly believe in and want something, you should never let anyone stop you.  Jon’s rise to the top of American weightlifting is a remarkable story.  He has family issues, at one point was addicted to drugs including Meth, and was arrested for DUI among other problems that he could have let destroy his life.  He came from the bottom, but after finding the sport of weightlifting, he got his life back on track.  Now, after achieving success in the form of victory in weightlifting, he travels the world, holding seminars, writing blogs, creating radio talk shows, as well as owning and operating his own performance gym.  Along the way, there have been numerous people who have doubted him, hated on him, and tried to drag him down.  Yet he has paid them no mind, forging his own path to success and achieving his dreams.

Jon has inspired me to ignore the naysayers, and to surround myself with people who believe in me and who share my passion.  I will continue to write my blog, improve myself as a coach, improve myself as a lifter, and expand “JMSB” with the dream of one day owning my own gym, and establishing a community just as Jon has. 

The point I hope to make by writing this is to not only educate people about Jon, who has influenced my life so positively, but to illustrate to people that in a day and age where you can’t turn on the TV without seeing a professional athlete breaking the rules or acting selfishly,  there are top-level athletes out there that care about helping others and having a positive influence on people’s lives.  Without Jon, I may never have been exposed to the great sport of weightlifting, which has already given me so much joy, and will continue to long after my football career is over.  But more importantly, I may never have seen the opportunity to influence and inspire others with my passion, and the platform I’ve created.

Even though I may never get the opportunity to thank Jon, I hope that this can hit home to those who read it, and that they may derive inspiration from Jon’s career and message that I have.  I will continue to push JMSB and build a community of hard working, committed, passionate people, and it would never have happened if it hadn’t been for Jon North.

“Attitude Nation salute!”

The Mental Game Part II: Stop thinking, Start Lifting

At some point, the lines were blurred, and the world became covered in grey.  Everything in today’s society is over-analyzed and complex, with people spending more time thinking, researching, and talking than acting.  There is one place though, that a black and white approach is still relevant.  The gym.  The weight never lies, and if you want to pack on muscle, strength, and in general, just lift more weight toward whatever goals you have, the answer may be simple:  Pick up heavy shit.

Sometimes it’s as black and white as loading up the bar with some heavy ass weight and lifting it with violent intentions.  So often in weightlifting, and just about any other sport for that matter, people get bogged down in the details, and it stops them from reaching their goals. 

The fact is, the reason that people are constantly looking for the next gimmick, the perfectly designed program, the magic bullet that will give them the success they’re looking for is that it’s much easier to spend your time searching for the easiest and simplest means to an end then to admit to yourself that simple hard work and commitment will yield the best results. 

I hear it all the time.  People will come up to me and tell me they’re starting a new program, or they’re going to combine some of my programming with something else they want to do, or they found a program on the Internet that’s going to change their life.  Program jumping is the bane of the success of so many regular gym goers and athletes alike.  An athlete who is completely dedicated to a terrible program will be more successful then an athlete who jumps from program to program. 

This is especially relevant to people who are inexperienced or relatively new to training.  When you are first starting out, it really doesn’t matter what you do.  As long as you are going in the gym working hard and lifting heavy, you will see results.  Programming becomes more important the longer you train, as your body requires more specific training concepts in order to fix weaknesses and break through plateaus.  The reality is, that at the point that you are a serious and seasoned lifter; you have learned through experience what works for you as a lifter and what doesn’t.

I once heard Donny Shankle say, “Forget the program, there is no program.  Snatch and clean and jerk, that’s the program.”  He was speaking specifically about young weightlifters, but the sentiment can be applied to almost any aspect of training. 

Unless you have been training for years there is no reason to stress about programming.  Pick a program, one that you can stick to, and work it.  I mean really work the damn thing.  Get in the gym and bust your ass.  Move heavy weight, progressively pushing your limits and breaking personal records in reps, volume, intensity, etc.  With hard work and commitment, anyone can achieve results.  This is a case where paralysis by analysis is real, and I see it far too often.

Have the courage and mental fortitude to face the truth:  If you want results you have to pay the price.  Heavy weight and hard work builds strong successful athletes, not programming. 

Stop thinking, start lifting.  

The Mental Game Part I: Understanding the Athlete

I once heard Jim Wendler, the creator of the “5/3/1” program, say that as a coach, it’s not his job to motivate his lifters.  If you didn’t want to lift, or didn’t want to be in the gym, then get the hell out because it wasn’t his job to motivate you.  I whole-heartedly disagree with this stance.

In this first installment of “The Mental Game” I want to address the coach/athlete relationship and one of the marks of a great coach.  This is a story my dad told me about his days training in martial arts that illuminated an attribute that I believe all great coaches must possess:  an intimate knowledge of their athletes.

In any sport where technique is of the utmost importance, there will come a time where an athlete questions what he/she is doing.  Any hesitation or loss of confidence can be the difference between success and failure.

In martial arts, just as in weightlifting, an athlete must blend speed, power, and precise technique to achieve success.  To earn his green belt in Tae Kwon Doe, my dad was required to pass a series of tests demonstrating his mastery of the skills he had been taught at that level his martial arts training.  One of the tests that day was to break two wood boards with a single spinning straight back kick. 

On his first two attempts, he failed to break the boards.  With only one attempt remaining and his confidence in shambles, he felt there was little hope he would be able to change the outcome with his final kick. 

His sensei, or coach, “Mr. Pat,” walked over to him with another board.  He ordered the third board added for his final attempt.  The decision was puzzling for my father, but he did as his coach ordered and prepared to try to break the boards.  He succeeded, and with one precise kick, broke through all three boards.

As my father said to me later of Mr. Pat, who at the time was only in his mid twenties, “he knew something that I didn’t.”

Only Mr. Pat knows exactly what triggered him to increase the difficulty of the test despite the fact that his athlete had already failed twice.  Whatever his own motivation was, the effect was a boost in confidence to an athlete that was struggling with the mental game.  The adversity my father faced had shaken his confidence on that day.  By adding another board, Mr. Pat gave my father a vote of confidence.  His coach’s belief in his abilities brought back my father’s own self-assurance, which allowed him to free his mind of the doubt and stress over technique that was plaguing him following his first two attempts.  He had trained for this moment.  He was prepared for this moment.  It was time to let go and simply act.

Mr. Pat, though he was young, understood this.  One mark of a great coach is the ability to truly empathize his/her athletes, to truly step into their shoes and recognize what they're thinking and feelign, and be able to adjust on the fly to tailor his/her coaching to meet their needs.  The coach must be able to watch the athlete’s body language, and diagnose when they are tired, when they feel defeated, and conversely, when they are “on.”  An action as simple as adding another board during a martial arts test or telling an athlete to increase the weight on the bar even though he/she missed the last rep can boost the athlete’s confidence.  Genuine confidence in his or her preparation is paramount to an athlete’s success. 

The key is to pay attention to the details, and understand what makes each unique athlete tick.  What drives them?  What motivates them?  How do they respond to adversity and failure?  Do they tend to think too much?  Do they tend to rush?  Do they shut down when you speak to them sternly or do they need a kick in the ass?  Do they fold when the odds are stacked against them, or do they perform to the best of their abilities under pressure?

No two athletes approach their sport in the same way.  Great coaches understand that, and are able to help their athletes achieve the state of mind that will yield optimal results for them.  

The Locker Room

All around there is chaos.  Some pace and back and forth in the bathroom, clad from head to toe in navy and white.  Few stop by the mirror, fixing their jerseys, drawing black lines under their eyes, and bouncing to the music playing through their earphones.  Coaches stand on the opposite end of the room, and walk through the locker room, whispering to some and smacking the pads of others.  Some sit quietly while others scream and holler.  Music blares through a CD player on a locker just behind my head.  Lockers ring loudly as helmets crash into metal.  The air smells of sweat, but the sense of anticipation is overpowering.  All around me there is chaos.  All around me, men prepare for battle.

10 minutes.

I sit alone, at the back of the room, on a light blue bench in front of my locker.  Sweat beads across my brow like morning dew on a blade of grass.  The air is heavy, thick with humidity on this early September night.  My shirt, tattered and torn from five years of violence, clings to my body.  My blue pants with an embroidered devil head on my left quad are already soaked with sweat, but they feel comfortable, allowing my body to move naturally.  I lean forward and pick up my shoulder pads; a navy jersey with the number 63 draped over them.  I slide them over my head, the buckles clanking against my back.  I reach behind and begin connecting each buckle to the front of my pads, the equipment slowly pressing in on my chest as each strap locks into place.  I pull my jersey down over my abdomen, exposing “FDU” and “63” across my chest.

5 minutes.

Music blares loudly in my ears, but I hear nothing, bobbing and moving naturally to the beat.  My cleats tap the concrete floor in rhythm.  The tape on my hands struggles to hold together, already drenched in sweat and blood.  My heart thumps; pounding against my chest from the inside so hard I swear it will burst.  I force myself to breathe deeply, trying to control the rush of blood that pumps through my veins as the minutes pass.  I place my iPod next to me on the bench, and reach forward into my locker.  I lift the scarlet helmet from the hook in the left corner of the locker and hold it in my hands in front of my face.  I stare into it, a portal to the skeletons in my closet, and the inspiration that has brought me here.

I play for my family.

I play for my friends.

I play for my school.

I play for everyone who has believed in me and for those who have doubted me.

I play for the brothers that line up next to me everyday.

I play for me.

I put the helmet down between my feet and slowly pulled the buds from my ears.  The controlled chaos of my little world gives way to the anticipation and excitement around me.  I stand, sliding my helmet down over my head, the straps hanging to the sides as I adjust the headgear. 

To the last whistle.

I walk to the door; my senses numb, and exit through the double doors into the balmy fall evening.  A cool breeze hits me as I’m released from the locker room.  The locker room was my cage, my prison, now I am free.  I push past my teammates to the front of the line, a place I’ve earned through years of perseverance and dedication.  I look down upon the stadium, the sun perched just above the home stands.  Streaks of fire split the clouds as the sun sets.  Great streaks of crimson, orange, yellow, purple and pink illuminate the darkening sky.  The stadium lights look down upon the field, blanketing it in white light.

To the last whistle.

My stomach turns.  This moment is the culmination of thousands of hours in the gym, hundreds of practices, and years of pain, injury, and persistence.  It all comes down to this, and the pressure builds with each step that I take towards the field.  I look back at my teammates, the sun reflecting off the sea of scarlet helmets behind me.  I look into their eyes; focused, determined, hungry.  In that moment I allow myself to believe that the night is ours.

For the man next to you…to the last whistle.

I bounce back and forth, ringing my arms out, not for the purpose of warming up, but simply to alleviate the mounting pressure.  I take my place in line next to my brother, and we lock hands as the rest of the team does behind us, two-by-two.  We begin the walk down the hill, across the street, over the parking lot, and through the gates of Robert T. Shields Field.  It’s a walk that I’ve made everyday for five years.  It’s a walk that’s all too familiar to me, but on this night it’s different.  It feels like an eternity, as we pass parents, friends, and family who clap and shout encouragement.  I hear their voices, but I can’t make out what they’re saying or who’s saying it.  My eyes are locked on the field as it comes closer and closer, and all I hear is the click clack of our cleats.

Click clack.  Click clack.  For the man next to you…to the last whistle.

The hill begins to steepen, and for a brief moment we break our ranks and move in pairs to the right of the pathway.  I reach out and touch the boulder.  A great rock sits in a bed of soil, surrounded by small stones.  On the face of the great boulder, a bronze plaque is bolted in honor and memory of Robert T. Shields.  My fingers brush across the rock, cool and smooth.  Quickly, I change directions and skip back to the center of the path as each of my teammates takes their turn to engage in the FDU tradition.  At the end of the hill, the gates to the field open to a vast sea of green turf, facing the home stands, which glow red with plastic devil horns as the public address announcer booms over the loudspeakers.

 

Click Clack.  Click Clack.  For the man next to you…to the last whistle.

My walk grows to a slow trot, and I release my teammate’s hand.  The nerves are gone and my mind no longer races.  The fear that tormented me all day leading up to this moment is gone, the coaching points I’ve been going over and over in my head forgotten as instincts take control.  I break into a full sprint as my cleats pierce the turf…

It’s game time.  

In Time

In time my joints will ache as the first clouds assemble long before raindrops begin to fall.  In time my muscles will shrink and my strength will diminish.  In time my mind and body will slow, the years taking their terrible toll on something that was once vibrant, athletic, and potent.  In time I will regret what I did in my youth, as my body fails me.

In time my passion will diminish, my love for hard work and training slowly leaving me day by day, stealing my youth with them.  In time my iron will will be broken, as a rock erodes, crumbled through the repeated crashing of the surf.

In time I will know the pain of love and loss, as I watch one soul after another enter and part from my life.  In time I will be a lonesome man, jagged and frustrated with the world.

In time I will know the stress of a career.  In time I will have to provide for a family.  In time my soul will be crushed by the relentless onslaught of responsibility and reality that inevitably comes for every man. 

In time I will look back on football and weightlifting with longing, a simpler and better time in my life that can never be duplicated again.  In time, work, family, and exhaustion will force me to leave everything I once loved behind.  In time it will be impossible for me to hold onto the passion that I cultivated as a young man; strong, vital, fearless. 

In time my youthful dreams will be nothing more than fantasies, as I’m forced to embark on a career of moderate success to pay for a minivan and support my mundane lifestyle.  In time I will dream of what could have been.

In time I will become just like everyone else, as I succumb to the destiny of living a life I never wanted.

They tell me in time all of these things will happen.  They tell me in time I’ll see.

But that time is not today.  So while those people wallow in their misery and warn others of impending doom, I will live with passion, strength, and an indomitable will.  I will fight like hell for everything I desire and believe in, with no apprehension or fear for what the future holds. 

While so many live lives of trepidation, perpetually scared of what time will bring them, I will embrace the opportunity, for time is only an enemy if you allow it to be.

JMSB Mission Statement and Inspiration

I want to share something that I experienced yesterday that I think will help illuminate exactly what I want to accomplish with this blog, the videos I post, and the workouts I write.  I often get the sense that some people see what I do and what I put out as a cry for attention by a meathead who wants to showoff.  Hey, if you’re sitting there reading this right now and you agree with that statement, good on you, you are entitled to that opinion.  It’s completely incorrect and if that’s your point of view I don’t give a shit what you think anyway because I don’t need that negativity in my life, but as I said, it’s your opinion.

The truth is, first and foremost, this is my passion.  Everything I do and everything I produce, whether it is a blog post, a video, a workout, or something I do on the football field I do because I love it more than I could possible explain.  When I talk about weightlifting and strength and conditioning training I get excited.  My adrenaline starts pumping and all I want to do is get after it and throw heavy ass weight over my head.  I want to share that passion with friends, family, and people I don’t even know.  I want people to see how much I love what I do and follow me and experience the same happiness that I do by hopefully finding what they’re passionate about.  I don’t care if that passion is in weightlifting or Crossfit or music or whatever it is you’re into.  I want people to see the discipline, the love, and the desire that I have and bring to everything I do, and I want them to be inspired to have the same.

The other reason I do this is to make myself and those around me better.  When I was younger, I had people who pushed me, who helped me get better in athletics and in training.  Some I knew.  I had friends and family who guided me towards success.  They taught me about commitment, hard work, and persistence, and perseverance, while others who I don’t even know personally were willing to put videos and articles online to share their knowledge and passion with the world.  I’ve learned so much from just going online and finding people who are much better and much more knowledgeable than I am, and watching and listening to everything they say and do. 

Now that I am able to look back and see how important those people were to my development as a man and an athlete, I want to give some of that back.  When I train, and push my mind and body to the limits, I hope others will watch me and find inspiration in what I do.  In turn, they’ll go out and kick ass and inspire me to continue to improve myself.

That’s what “JMSB” is all about in the end.  A community of people who love training of all kinds and desperately pursue self-improvement on a daily basis while simultaneously helping others who share their passion.

Today I woke up and my teammate Rich Vazzano wrote a status on Facebook about hitting a PR push press set of 105 kg.  This record came six months after having his shoulder reconstructed.  I have no idea if he’s been following my programming at all, but I hope that I helped inspire him in some small way to push himself to get better and to train harder than the ordinary athlete.

Then, hours later while I was at work, I received a text from my good buddy and quarterback Mike Baby Toes Santos telling me he hit a huge squat of 365 pounds for 2 reps and a 45 inch box jump.  I’ve known Toes for years and he has always heard me preach about training hard, the power of squats, and that the legs make the man.  While he’s always trained hard himself, on his own and at a performance gym, I again hope that I have been able to positively influence his training and even more importantly his mindset on training in the nearly four years I’ve known him.

Finally, one of my closest friends and teammate Mike Mancino texted me and told me he cleaned 178 pounds for 5 from the hang.  Mike is one of the hardest workers and most gifted football players I’ve ever come across.  But for years he loved the bodybuilding workouts and hated squatting, cleaning, and using the legs in training.  I have tried for so long to get him to forget the bodybuilding bullshit and train like a man and athlete.  Now, he not only embraces it, but we laugh and joke about the morons in the gym doing cheat curls and thousands of chest exercises, while we share stories about big cleans, technique, hard work and heavy weight. 

After hearing about these guys working hard and conquering their training today, I knew there was no way I could wallow in self-pity about having to work six hours before rushing to the gym to lift for the last 35 minutes it would be open.  I was so hyped all day thinking about my workout from a combination of Jon North’s weightlifting talk and the inspiration I derived from my brothers sharing their training with me that when it came time to tape up and move heavy weight I couldn’t be stopped.  Just two months after having my fourth and fifth knee surgeries I SMOKED a 135 kg (297 lb) split jerk from the rack even after not having practiced the split jerk in about four months.

Experiences like this remind me exactly why I put myself out there day in and day out.  Physically my body is beat up, but I push through the pain for my own gain, and because I remember that there are others out there who might be watching, looking for guidance or inspiration.  Mentally, when I want to quit or I don’t feel like writing a workout late on a Sunday night, I remember moments like this, when the guys around me pushed me and inspired me to get better, and I fight through.  Without the support of my teammates, my family, and everyone else out there that wakes up each day with a passion and relentlessly pursues exactly what they want, it wouldn’t be possible. 

  

Join us or get the hell out of our way.  If this sounds like something you want to be a part of, let me know, otherwise take your negativity and cheat curls somewhere else.