[Tom Ryan]

Undoubtedly many weightlifters have some strange tales about their early training, including me.

Although I started training when I was 13, it wasn’t possible to train regularly when I was participating in other sports, especially when I was running my legs off on a basketball court. After the basketball season ended during my junior year in high school, Bill Shaw, Bob Dial, Don Hallman, and I started training in the basement of Bill’s house, with me supplying most of the weights. Bill, a senior, had been my basketball teammate and the other two were a year younger than me.

Even though I was very skinny at the end of the season (maybe a shade over 6-2 and 165 pounds), I had enough strength to shoulder 470 from squat stands, back out with it and do a set of quarter squats. One day Mike Boling, a 10th grader who supposedly had benched 250 weighing 150 (not too shabby in 1962!) came by to watch us train. My training partners had said my depth on the quarter squats had been less than before, and since we had somewhat of a celebrity bencher in attendance, I went down further than I had previously on my first quarter squat rep.

Well, I went down too far and kept going down. Real fast, like falling down an elevator shaft since the weight far exceeded what I could have handled in a full squat. It took only a few seconds so there wasn’t time for my life to flash before my eyes, but when Bob saw me going down, he said he thought that was going to be the end of me! The bar went flying over my head and crashed to the floor, with the force catapulting me a few feet backward and I landed on my butt.

Then Bill’s life almost flashed before his eyes when he saw the chip that had been knocked out of the floor and he thought about his father’s reaction when he came home from work. So a quick repair job was necessary!

That was performed and then we started thinking about building a power rack so as to prevent any more accidents. I would bet that power racks were few and far between in 1962. I’m not sure when York started selling theirs, but I would guess around 1959.

We made ours out of wood and it was easily transportable. I ended up with it when our training gang broke up. Over time I had to replace parts of the rack, but I believe I still had the original base in 1993. Then I moved to Australia in January, 1994, where I spent the next 2.5 years. Untreated wood cannot be taken into Australia, so I had to say goodbye to my rack, which was a bit shaky by then anyway. Upon arriving in Australia, I had a carpenter build me a rack, and that is the one that I still use today.

I haven’t seen Shaw, Dial, or Hallman in 47 years, but if I ran into one of them today, I wouldn’t be surprised if he said “Hello TR 470” because that was the nickname they gave me after my “near death” experience. 🙂

Tom

[Tom Ryan]

[b]Quote from dinoman on September 20, 2010, 16:40[/b]
I put up 5 videos from this past weekend’s Team Nationals on our YouTube Account. Make sure you check them out. We have several videos now on our YouTube Account (USAWAVideos). The number one video is Scott’s Campbells Steinborn Lift with 2669 views, followed by Chad Ullom’s Arthur Lift with 1108 views, and third is Kevin Fulton’s Jefferson Lift with 990 views. We are still far from some other YouTube Videos that exceed 10,000 views but things are improving. Give Scott a little more time of watching his own video over and over again and it will reach those heights of YouTube fame!! Al

10,000 views? There are more than a few YouTube videos with 3 or 4 MILLION views. Of course I would expect Barbra Streisand, Barry Gibb, The Carpenters, and Michael Buble’ to be just a tad more popular than you guys. 🙂

Among lifting videos, one of Derek Poundstone’s videos that I saved has over 100,000 views.

I have watched a live feed from Poland of the World Masters Weightlifting Championships for the past two nights. The time zone difference is messing up my sleep but it is fun to watch. Whenever I watch a competition like this, I get temporarily fired up, but my back won’t tolerate fast pulling movements anymore and snatches hurt my shoulders, so I regain my senses after a day or two. LOL

I don’t know if this was a mistake, but NOBODY was listed as being entered in the 105+ class in the 65-69 age group on the start list, that being my class.
But three lifters did compete, with two of them just barely over the 105 limit and the other one, Klaus Samer, a veteran of these competitions, weighing in at 115.

I’ve got to somehow get my body back together so I can do snatches and C&Js again. My best squat clean, accomplished at the age of 25, was an easy 315 but I had the pulling power to do 350-375. Just poor leverage caused by long thigh bones, as John Coffee mentioned to me 17 years ago during a training session at his gym. I’m simply not built for lifting! But the fire to do snatches and C&Js is still there! I was always an Olympic lifter and never dabbled in anything else when I was in my prime.

I observed a serious injury in the lifting I watched last night, as a lifter who was probably about my age crumbled to the platform as he was missing a jerk. Two lifters finally carried him off, after he was down for quite a while.

I am looking forward to seeing Fred Lowe lift tonight. There are very few U.S. lifters entered. David Meltzer of the Malone-Meltzer formula is one of the other U.S. lifters. He is an interesting guy and is a very good lifter at the age of 58. He and I had some spirited correspondence about 12 years ago when I was appointed to serve on a committee to evaluate the Malone-Meltzer formula.

At this years World Masters, they are playing an abbreviated version of the national anthem of the country represented by the world champion as each one is crowned. I worked as an expediter at the 1993 World Masters, being roped into that job (LOL), and David actually sang all of those anthems! That blew my mind! How many people have ever memorized dozens of national anthems? Unreal.

Tom

[Tom Ryan]

I was very impressed with the lifts that Ken made as a Master’s lifter during the 1980s. I think he is two years older than me and we would have been in the same class if he had competed in the 1986 National Master’s in Olympic lifting.
Fortunately for me he didn’t show up for that meet. I recall that he was snatching around 270 and C&Jing 350 or so during those years, which was very impressive for a Master’s lifter.

He was also good at other lifts, as has been noted. I watched a film of him pressing a pair of 120s with some to spare in a contest. That motivated someone, probably Clay Oliver, to say to Ken “They make them heavier”.

I think he should be 67 now and I haven’t seen his name in contest reports in many, many years. I hope he is doing well.

Tom

[Tom Ryan]

You don’t know what you’ve missed by not having competed in a Zercher Meet, Al. I competed in 6 of them, including 5 in a row. It would have been 7 in a row but Bill advised me not to make a plane reservation one year because it looked like the meet would be canceled due to lack of entries. (It wasn’t.)

After you have been “zerchered”, you body is pretty much useless as far as training is concerned for a week or so. Bill has always considered the Zercher Meet to be the most physically demanding meet in the country. I would not disagree. 🙂

[Tom Ryan]

Now that all of the votes seem to be in, I will cast my vote. At various times I have known Hirsch, Montini, and Schmidt and I still stay in regularly contact with Steve.

All three have outstanding records. Art was already about 60 when the USAWA was getting started, so we didn’t get to see him lift in his prime. But what he could do at his age was impressive enough! It was a bit embarrassing to be outlifted in certain lifts by someone who is almost a generation older than me and more than 100 pounds lighter!

When I met Bob Hirsch he acted like he was happy to meet me “having read a lot about me”. Huh? He was a far better lifter than I was!

I think Steve Schmidt is slightly head of the others simply because he is at the head of the class in various lifts and I believe he is the only USAWA lifter in the Guinness Book of World Records. We all know about his proficiency in the backlift, harness lift and teeth lift, but Steve has been good at almost every lift he has tried.

When he was in his prime and competed in the Zercher Meet, he was good for a heels-together military press with at least bodyweight at just about any time. (I believe his best official military press may have been 226, but I’m not sure of that.) Like Paul Anderson, he really didn’t use any technique. He just stood there and pressed! And his deadlifts had to be seen to be believed. I recall one Zercher Meet in which he did a heels-together deadlift with a weight that was almost certainly in the 540-560 range. That may not sound impressive but it was almost a stiff-legged deadlift! I was sitting beside the platform and after Steve completed the lift, I chuckled a bit and said to Bill Clark “That was just about an all-back deadlift”. That is simply the way that Steve did deadlifts. He just reached down and picked the weight up and was strong enough to do deadlifts that way.

So pound-for-pound he is one of the greatest back lifters and harness lifters of all time, he is in Guinness, and I have seen him do some impressive things in other lifts and feats, including repetition back lifting, with some of these feats performed when he was 50 or older. So I believe that Steve, who now stays busy as a professional, performing strongman in his mid-50s, is a shade better than Montini and Hirsch.

[Tom Ryan]

Okay, Al, I at first thought you must be referring to the person on the left, but you did say “behind”. Of course Bill isn’t directly behind Jim, either, but he is closer to being literally behind Jim than the person on the left. The caption for Jim’s picture stated that the picture showed the correct way to catch a clean. That is what motivated my comments. You know my reputation for catching mistakes and ambiguities, Al. Anyone in the world who makes a mistake could hear from me. LOL (I have also jumped on Bill Clark a time of two. He didn’t seem to enjoy it, though. LOL)

As for Bill’s legs, I would know them anywhere. LOL I first saw them when he weighed in at the Zercher Meet in 1987. I was somewhat astounded because his legs looked like they were carved out of stone and appeared to not have an ounce of fat on them. I had never seen anyone with legs like that!

I’m not sure who the person on the left is. He looks somewhat like John Carter but I don’t think it is him. Or is it? I have been out of general USAWA circulation for so long that I am not well acquainted with the current cast of characters.

[Tom Ryan]

That looks like Bill Clark seated behind Jim. Now about Jim’s form, Al. 🙂 Either he had an elbow touch when he performed that lift or else he came as close to having one as possible without committing the violation. He caught the bar on straight wrists and his elbows are too low, perhaps caused by the bar being too far forward when he pulled it in. His wrist flexibility might also be lacking. I always did a wrist stretching movement before I did squat cleans, picking that up from an article on Tony Garcy in S&H circa 1963.

[Tom Ryan]

Since Thom has got us thinking about the formula issue again with his interesting article today, I’ll chime in with my thoughts on the subject.

I have a lot of experience in this area, starting from 1993. The World Masters (Olympic lifting) was held in Newnan, GA in 1993 and there was a preliminary meeting to discuss the fact that the Malone-Meltzer formula had been been put forth by David Meltzer as a competitor to the Sinclair Formula.

I was invited to participate in that meeting. I don’t recall everyone in attendance, but in addition to me, Sinclair, and Meltzer, Gary Glass was there and I recall that Roger Sadecki sat in on the meeting.

There was some dissatisfaction with the Sinclair Formula because when it declared “Lifter X” to be the best lifter, experienced lifters would say “Now I know that Lifter X is not better than Lifter Y”.

Eventually a committee was appointed by Walter Imahara to study the issue and to report to him. The committee was chaired by Donald Buchanan of Canada. I was on that committee and I believe that Gary Glass, PhD, and David Pursley, MD, were also on the committee, in addition to perhaps one or two other people.

The committee received correspondence from Meltzer and Sinclair, each giving their “sales pitch”, in addition to Jack Lano (strongly) stating that such formulas cannot be used to rank athletes! Jack sent us an article or two in support of his position. (Jack is a trip. I believe his business card says something like “Talks a lot; doesn’t say much”. LOL But he is a CPA and a graduate of Ohio State, so he is no dummy!)

I had some long correspondence with Meltzer, which he indicated caused him to think deeper about the Malone-Meltzer formula. (Meltzer, btw, is a bright guy, a college professor who can sing the national anthem of dozens of countries. Quite a feat!)

We completed our committee work in 1996 or 1997 and admittedly I don’t recall what we decided. I’m not sure if we came to any definitive conclusion.

I don’t recall exactly when I did so, but I put together a formula that I sent to Bill Clark, for possible use in the USAWA/IAWA. This was many years ago. He presented it to the British at an IAWA meeting on their soil, and Bill told me that they didn’t understand it. So that was the end of that.

It has been so long that I don’t recall what I did, but I believe it was similar in spirit to what Adrian Blindt devised. (Incidentally, Adrian was, pound for pound, an outstanding lifter, a contender for best lifter honors in virtually any competition that he entered. I believe he is also a rather bright guy.)

As an admittedly extreme example, let’s say we have a competition with two lifts, rectangular fix and back lift, and two lifters. One of the competitors is world class in the rectangular fix and the other lifter is Steve Schmidt. Assume that Steve Schmidt makes one of his typical back lifts and the other guy does a 140 rectangular fix — a world class lift. If we just add the two lifts together, the other guy is probably going to get killed. I’ve never seen Steve do a rectangular fix but I’ve heard him say what he can do. I’ll let that remain a secret — to protect the innocent, etc. LOL If the other guy is at least average in the back lift, the competition should be close with a statistically justifiable scoring scheme, and there is a good chance that he would win.

Without trying to get too technical, one logical scoring system would be to compute a “z-score” for each lifter in each lift that is contested in a competition, and then add the z-scores together over the lifts for each lifter. The lifter with the highest sum of z-scores could be declared the winner of the competition, and/or with age and bodyweight coefficients then applied to determine the best lifter. (A z-score measures the difference in standard deviation units that a lift is above or below the average.) Since there probably wouldn’t be enough data within each (age class, bodyweight class) combination, it could be necessary to merge the data for age and bodyweight so as to obtain an overall average and standard deviation, then apply the age and bodyweight coefficients after the z-scores have been computed.

Might work. There is obviously not a simple way to do it.

Of course if we wanted to get really sophisticated, we would recognize that age and bodyweight do not affect each lift the same way (Weaver stick and rectangular fix versus push press, for example), but then things would become extremely complicated!

Regarding bodyweight coefficients for lifters well over 300 pounds, there isn’t an obvious way to do that, either. Certain assumptions would have to be made and it would be difficult to test the assumptions without sufficient data.

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