luka

Well-known member
Monstah Gymwear

Monstah Gymwear 1 year ago (edited)

Mr.Tom Platz is the man I looked up to when I was Growing up as a kid. I remembered growing up on the caribbean island of St.Maarten at 18 years old and walked into a gym in shorts. The owner of the gym ask me a question that I will never forget. He ask me why did I come to the gym in shorts with those skinny legs? I was crushed guys. I quit the gym and started reading articles of how to get big legs. Back then we would have to wait for the bodybuilding magazines to come out. I had over 500 magazines. While reading I came across an article of Tom Platz on how to build huge legs. Guys I built a squat rack at the back of my moms house and squated 7 DAYS A WEEK. my legs grew like a weed. Mind you there were no supplements involved. We could barley afford to eat. My legs grew so much that the next year I competed. The same gym owner came to the show and when he saw me he could'nt believe his eyes. I told him thank you for inspiring me. Today I'm 49 and still squat. THANK YOU SO MUCH TOM PLATZ FOR SHOWING ME THE WAY http://bigpetetraining.com http://monstahgymwear.com

 

DannyL

Wild Horses
Really interesting post Rich. Something I knew about you but it's interesting to read you expound it at length, and I do think it points to a big difference between us though I wouldn't put it down to my maturity or inner zen. It's more just life history. I am basically a nerd who was shit at sport at school, got picked last for football, didn't enjoy it and ended up reading a book at playtimes rather than joining in football. Only being 6 foot plus since the age of about 9 saved me from much more of a regular shoeing. And all the sports or physical things I've got into have been solo pursuits. The nerd's path(s) to physical fitness. Running, swimming, weights, martial arts. These are all things you can do largely on your own or practice solo. They have a competitive edge at the top end but you can largely ignore that as an everyday punter.

Martial arts would seem different of course, what could be more competitive than learning to beat someone up? But lots of martial arts training isn't like this and is about instead hitting bags and the perfection of forms (kata). My training was very much like this and the one on one work I did wasn't focused on brute competition which was probably why I was drawn to it and stuck with it. My training has an emphasis on the meditative side of things rather than training for a tournament or some such.

Just as you say building bigger biceps is a bit of an alien desire for you, I feel the same about the competitive urge around sports and fitness.It's just not something that's present for me. Not for reasons of my advanced spiritual state, just 'cos it doesn't naturally occur to me and I'm not drawn to it.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
I'd add Rich I think you've probably got a bit of natural skill and capacity that I just don't have, certainly around sports that involve hand eye coordination. You seem to have a quickness there which I just don't have. Liam is another person similar, at the head of the queue when athletic gifts were handed out where I was close to the back. Or perhaps the middling portion but compounded by lack of any practice in the formative years.

I had to work really hard to develop any skill at all in my martial arts practice. I was even more of an uncordinated mess when I started. I'm pleased with my achievements here - just as I'm pleased with my achievements lifting weights lately - but it strikes me that I'm using a very different personalised metric to measure things. If I were to place myself in a more competitive framework, my self assessment might be a bit different.
 
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IdleRich

IdleRich
There can be a kind of competitiveness with your self of course. Even within competitive sports that exists and is distinct from a desire to compete and win, but a desire simply to improve. Not always easy to separate the two and tell which is which.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
My brother sent me a video proving that he'd used lockdown to perfect a football trick called - we think - hocus-pocus, something like a reverse flip-flap anyway... I was quite impressed but I didn't let it show.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
There can be a kind of competitiveness with your self of course. Even within competitive sports that exists and is distinct from a desire to compete and win, but a desire simply to improve. Not always easy to separate the two and tell which is which.
I think it's a different vibe from going against someone else though. Unlikely you're going to lose for one thing!
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
I think it's a different vibe from going against someone else though. Unlikely you're going to lose for one thing!
I think I didn't say that well. I mean I was playing my friend Jorge and he said "I still keep losing" and I was like yeah you've only played three times, his target shouldn't be to win but to improve personally - return one he couldn't return before or whatever - so even in a one v one competitive game you can concentrate on just self-improvement and almost disregard the actual competition.
 

jenks

thread death
I think what Rich says is interesting- I thought I wasn’t competitive but as I’ve improved as a cyclist over the years I’ve noticed I am very much aware of others’ abilities and ranking myself against them. Cycling is odd because it is, on the one hand, utterly individual but in a group it’s essential to work together - something new riders find very hard to do. That balance of knowing your own strengths but also not over estimating your own abilities is subtle.
I’ve been time trialling for a few years now and that is all about training specifically- lots of work going in to your position on the bike, holding back on the power and squeezing every last drop out. As others have said, when it works there is a perfect kind of mindfulness about it all.
 

muser

Well-known member
You should get into climbing DannyL if you haven't tried it, you sound like a prime candidate. They're mostly geeks who weren't good at team sports in school. , Everyone has to leave their ego out at the door a bit (in a similar way I've heard people talk about jujitsu), you can't really be that competitive about it. Has a very clear feeling of progression and you work to your own goals, I always felt pretty uncoordinated, especially with football but get on on ok with climbing. bouldering gyms are popping up all the over the place these days.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
I'd love to try it sometime. Have you ever done any big ascents? Much as with cycling, part of the pleasure must be about the scenery.

Jenks - I only learnt to ride a bike a few years ago (told you all I was shit at sports). I found it amazingly liberating, on several fronts - overcoming a old inability but also just being able to get around the city with so much ease. I've followed the tour a few years, and yeah, the dynamic of the peleton is fascinating. Watched a couple of the films about Eddie Mercx who is bloody mindblowing.
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
Kind of guilty pleasure is watching Joe Delany videos on Youtube. I find all the science of cutting weights stuff weirdly fascinating though I'm never going to do it, I like the self-helpy aspect of his videos, and I also like watching the footage of him and his missus swimming in the sea in exotic locales. I never watch reality TV so maybe this is part of the appeal. Probably not freakish enough for Luka.

 

version

Well-known member
You should get into climbing DannyL if you haven't tried it, you sound like a prime candidate. They're mostly geeks who weren't good at team sports in school. , Everyone has to leave their ego out at the door a bit (in a similar way I've heard people talk about jujitsu), you can't really be that competitive about it. Has a very clear feeling of progression and you work to your own goals, I always felt pretty uncoordinated, especially with football but get on on ok with climbing. bouldering gyms are popping up all the over the place these days.
I was disqualified from a school climbing competition for using the light over a fire exit as a foothold.
 

version

Well-known member
My dad used to take me scrambling and bouldering and it was good fun. The only really shit time I had was when I inadvertently disturbed a bunch of ants and they bit my hand.
 

muser

Well-known member
I'd love to try it sometime. Have you ever done any big ascents? Much as with cycling, part of the pleasure must be about the scenery.

I haven't done any big wall climbing like you see in Yosemite or anything! I'd love to one day. Mostly single pitches (around 50 meters max) and bouldering.

But it's true the nice thing about climbing is you can just do stuff that isn't challenging and still have a lot of fun because it's beautiful locations.

The other side to it is totally about movement, balance, specific strength and that is addictive too, trying something over and over and then something suddenly clicks and you manage to get it, feels great. You can get that feeling indoors too but slightly less of the feeling of achievement because the routes are regularly changed so it's not this permanent monolith you got to conquer. The upside is they can force all kinds of crazy movements and combinations that would rarely be necessary outdoors like below



 

DannyL

Wild Horses
The videos are great. I admire that first guy's persistence.

trying something over and over and then something suddenly clicks and you manage to get it, feels great.

I used to get this with martial arts forms. One very odd effect I noted was I'd sometimes become worse at a given move, for a whole training session and the next day, I could just do it. Almost like the neural pathway was being renovated and rebuilt overnight.
 

muser

Well-known member
Yea totally, I'm sure it happens with loads of things like this, I've had that countless times, constantly failing and then you'll do it pretty much first go the next day
 

version

Well-known member
There was a neuroscientist from Stanford on Rogan recently talking about brain plasticity in adults and how best to learn new things and he said what you had to do was focus intently whilst doing whatever it was then ensure you got good, deep sleep and that there was some sort of chemical process going on, so if he wasn't talking out of his arse, what you're describing would make sense.


 

version

Well-known member
Rogan being Rogan obviously interrupts him to push some supplement and waffle about ice tanks...

:cautious:
 

version

Well-known member
There's a documentary called The Dawn Wall which is well worth a watch. Follows Tommy Caldwel and Kevin Jorgeson's attempt to free climb El Cap's "Dawn Wall"; Caldwell's story's absolutely insane.

 
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