Barbell Shrugged - 50- Talking Weightlifting with Attitude Nation Jon North at the Arnold

Episode Date: March 7, 2013

On this episode of the Barbell Shrugged podcast the gang travels to Columbus, OH to the 2013 Arnold Sports Festival and interviews weightlifting champ Jon North.  Don't miss this, our 50th episode, over 2 hours of content!

This week on Barbell Shrug, we travel to Columbus, Ohio to the Arnold Sports Festival and we get to podcast with the John North. Yo, this is CTP and you're listening to the Barbell Shrug Podcast, the number one strength and conditioning podcast for CrossFitter. If you want to check out the video version, which you should, go to Fitter.TV and watch that because it's way cooler than just listening. And how do you spell Fitter.TV there, Mr. Bledsoe? F-I-T-R.TV. He's a good speller. All right, while you're there, definitely go and sign up for the newsletter.

As part of signing up for the newsletter, you'll get a video that Mike made where he shows you the top seven snatch mistakes that you're probably making that are keeping you from hitting that next PR and lifting some big weight. Yeah, look at the seminars, tune into the show, and get ready to become a more awesomer version of you. We give you the tools you need to succeed. You become a tool. What's up, guys?

Mike Bledsoe here with Barbell Shrug. This week we're in Columbus, Ohio for the Arnold Sports Festival. Doug and I made it. Chris Moore had to stay behind. But we snagged somebody up for an awesome interview. Mr. John North. What's up, baby? We're going to obviously discuss weightlifting, but first I want to tell you to go to our fan page, hit our like button, go to iTunes account, give us five stars.

What else do we need? Yeah, dang. Am I dying dying you seem a little down oh yeah i've been coaching all day you haven't got any calories all day and i haven't eaten anything because i'm i'm trying i gotta weigh in tomorrow morning i'm too heavy i'm fat yep this is i'm wearing my iron man pajamas to ensure that i don't leave the house mike you're not fat when i walked in you were half naked and He did that on purpose. And on purpose, I think he planned it. I actually just got done putting a lot of lotion on.

It looked lotion-y, if that's a word. And it just, you look good, though. Appreciate it. I just want to make that statement. So later on tonight, I think Rich Froning might stop by. We're going to have a pose-off, the three of us. Well, that's the first thing I said when I walked in in my contract to be on the show. I had my chocolate-covered strawberries.

I thought it was chocolate-covered cherries. Cherries. Switch it on us. And then I had Miss Brown Eyes, of course, coffee. And then I said the third thing I want is a pose-off with Rich Froning. Or just a fight. Just a fight. Just a good old-fashioned fist fight.

I think that's a great idea. Just out in the parking lot. And that would make my dream come true. It would make my dream come true also because that would make fantastic YouTube video. Oh, yeah. For sure. Thank you guys for having me on. Bar shrugged i'm a huge fan it's an honor to be on the show with you guys i uh i don't miss an episode um just watch the uh the the drip episode the coffee yeah right i don't ever do drip anymore i do press john is a press. John is a press man. I'm a press man, baby. John North,

the champ. All I do is press now because of Mike Bledsoe and Barbell Shrugged. And Barbell Shrugged with a D on the end of it, not Shrug. So, I apologize now if this shows, if I'm going to try to see. I haven't figured out if I'm going to be

calm John North and laid back John North like we were talking about earlier. Or if I'm going to try to see. I haven't figured out if I'm going to be calm John North and laid back John North like we were talking about earlier or if I'm going to be just like cocky, arrogant, asshole John North. I don't know. I'm trying to figure out my mic stand. You figured that out. All right, for everyone that doesn't know, you go ahead and give us a little bit about on your background,

kind of your weightlifting history, and just talk about yourself for a minute. I'm the champ baby yeah national champion right yeah national champion two-time usa team member two-time arnold champion american open champion pw pwa record holders local meat legend is to start my career out um an american openness last year you got best lift yeah best male male lifter just you know putting these rookies into place so right now currently the number one ranked lifter in the country

and going out to Arnold to defend my title and get on this Pan Am team this year and make this world team excellent what do you weigh and what do you lift I'm a 94 kilo lifter so right now I'm about a kilo over which is good I weigh in tomorrow and my best snatch is 160 well So right now I'm about a kilo over, which is good. I weigh in tomorrow.

And my best snatch is 160. Well, my best competition snatch is 162. And then my best snatch in training is 166. Clean and jerk in a competition is 192. And in training, 195. What is all that in pounds for the rest of the American viewers? For you CrossFit son of a bitches, I have no idea. Get a calculator.

I'm bad at math. There's a reason why I dropped out of college. Because I was done with it. Doug's actually really good at math. So I won't attempt to make the conversion. What were your numbers again? You're 94. That's 207.

What was your snatch? 166. 166. Let's see. 160 is 352. Six kilos on top of that. So you're looking at 364. Don't even worry about it, bro. Isn't that impressive? A lot of steroids.

Lots of steroids. How was your clean? I'm kidding. I got you sought at my door every day. I walked home the other day, and they were in my living room watching Netflix. Oh, for real? Oh, man. They're flies

do they come by a lot oh do they come by i know them all by name i send them christmas cards every year you know they always say why is america doing bad you know why aren't they on the same level as these other countries are you kidding me because we have usada are you kidding me no excuse though we got to do better no. So other countries, they don't have organizations like USADA. They may have an organization that exists, but it probably isn't as aggressive. They have World Anti-Doping Agency. They have WADA, and that's it. Yeah.

Yeah. They do a good job. Well, you know, there's a lot of money in these other countries, and, you know, the government, you know, backs the teams, and, you know, these weightlifters are making big bucks out there. So there's just a lot, you know, anytime you get a money sport, you know, there's a lot more behind-the-scenes action going on, I should say, where weightlifting in America, you're kind of on your own.

Yeah. Not on your own, I should say. You have a good support structure, you know, I mean, you got your coaches and, you know, the American fans. Muscle Drivers are doing a pretty good job right now. Out of, like, all the organizations out there, they're probably one of the best at supporting the athletes.

Is that right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, Muscle Driver, man. It's a big breakthrough in American weightlifting, in my opinion. You know, the first team that's really paying lifters to slam bars and uh and kill prs so yeah salute to muscle driver my team and uh yeah it's an it's it's it's a pleasure and an honor to be on that team and it's awesome so when i first saw you today my first thought was you're looking very very tan and i was just thinking to myself uh it's it's march 1st

and you had moved from california to south carolina yeah months ago yeah it's been very sunny in carolina the last few months it's been about 100 degrees that's why i look so tan right now if you think that i've been tanning in a tanning bed and got my spray tan on, you're completely wrong. I actually heard people in the crowd talking about how they thought you were spray tanning. Um, look, people that didn't know you. Let me tell you something. I'm a big believer in look good, lift good. Not saying I went tan. Okay. I tan. Whatever, bro. It went silent. So I had to be honest i mean what so i tan come at me bro come at me right now i'm uh i'm actually i'm actually not faulting you i was talking to you early earlier and i was like i want to start doing some tanning as well because

my vitamin d levels were a little low even though i was supplementing so then uh my coach actually suggested that uh that i should jump in a tanning bed and i looked it up and the research says that it'll work that's why i do i do it i do it for the vitamin d it's honestly actually when you actually told me that i just agreed with you i've never heard that before so now i'm making myself to sound better by by saying the word i don't even know what vitamin d means to to be honest. It's in milk. I do know that. But look, honestly, to be dead honest with you, it's relaxing as hell. It really is.

And I mean, I fall asleep. You break a little sweat in there, you know, so you get the heartbeat. It's a good recovery, I guess. I don't have any scientific backing, you know. Plus, I'm a real pale guy, really pale. I'm a quarter Japanese. I learned that on the last show of Weightlifting Talk. Yeah, you would actually think that being a quarter Japanese,

that I would have some actual color to me. But it's funny. My dad's half Japanese. If you're not full Japanese and you don't tan, you don't get out in the sun a lot, you're actually extremely white. So whatever, bro. Okay. I learned something before the show that was interesting. We both have a common podcast that we both listen to.

Oh, yeah. I think we all listen to. Actually, this podcast is the Joe Rogan experience. That's what got us started doing the podcast in the first place. I don't miss an episode. What do you like about his show the most? I just like how he speaks the truth, man. i like how he just doesn't hold anything back i mean he's just an independent original mother trucker you know he doesn't categorize himself

in any sort of group or you know social acceptance uh he just he just says what is what's on his mind you know i like how the show is kind of a little all over. It might start here and end up here. He's just a bad dude, man. I just love the freedom that Joe Rogan has. I love how he's a free guy. He doesn't hold anything back. He doesn't try to make a certain group happy.

He doesn't try to impress people. He gets on a show, and he just speaks Joe Rogan. And that's what motivates me. That's why I did Weightlifting Talk, my show. And and that's cool to hear that's why you did it and i was like i want to be i want to be free like that you know because there's so much stuff i think some people have in their head that they want to get out and they want to talk about but some people i think are timid and they're like well what if i offend this group and you know what if people think i'm crazy and what happens if I lose friends?

And what happens if my family thinks I'm nuts? And there's all these things that hold them back. And, you know, I think just saying screw it and going for it, just like Barbell Shrugged and Weightlifting Talk and all that. And that's cool that you guys listen to the Rogan. Yeah, so all y'all out there, if you listen to Joe Rogan and you like it, what you ought to do is tweet at Joe so we can get Joe Rogan on Barbell Shrugged.

Oh my gosh. That's what I want to happen. I want Joe Rogan to come on the show. I also want to go on Joe's show. We had a bunch of people throw some tweets at him last night. He's in town tomorrow night to do a show. He's in Cincinnati tonight, I believe. I think Mike threw a tweet at him. we had a bunch of people follow up like,

oh my god, you gotta go on that show. Three or four or five people, but Joe's got a million followers, so there's no way he's looking at all of his tweets. When I was at dinner with Joe Rogan last night, we were talking. This coffee's great. It's excellent coffee, by the way. What kind of coffee is this?

Where did you guys get this? Pre-ground coffee that was already here when we got here. Maybe we should buy this girl some coffee. Is it her coffee? So our buddy James took a bunch of footage from you from last year at the Arnold and put together a rocking video, which maybe we can cut into this episode. We've got to talk to James and see if he'll let us he probably will oh my that way if he doesn't now he'll seem like a real jerk now that i said that hey salute to james man i but his video was cool james james cheney um if

you're listening thank you so much that was one of the coolest videos or the coolest video i've ever seen i just i just can't thank you enough. I really appreciate it. It gave me goosebumps. It was awesome. You all right, Mike? Chris Moore just sent me a text and said, you dudes need to start Facebooking and tweeting some content. Are you bored up there?

Get to it. The community is surely interested. Well, I was a little busy today coaching. We don't have any reception in that place. And the reception at the Arnold sucks balls. I'm going to take a picture and give it to Chris right now, right here on the show. I'm like, while I'm trying to fix my mic stand, I'm like destroying it. Like the knob just came off.

A thing just came off the bottom. I think we're on the last straw for these mic stands. So if anyone knows any good mic stand manufacturers let me know they're too big in my picture and they hurt but actually last year we came we came to the Arnold last year and we were at that was um that was both nationals and then that was also the Olympic trials for the ladies yeah uh but uh that's kind of like when I became a john north fan oh yeah i thank you true story i didn't really know who you were until we saw you left last year son of a bitch i knew your name you'd come up in conversations before you were always known as like you know oh that guy's kind of wild

you know he he causes a little bit of trouble and i was like oh i want to watch this guy lift and then uh i think it was james had had said hey I gotta get a lot of video of John because James James really likes your style and uh he he was telling me about you and I started watching some videos of you in the gym I was like man I like this guy so we uh we videoed all we got insane amount of video at Nationals last year. And, yeah, that's where James, I think, captured the majority of the footage that's in that video that Doug's talking about.

I've seen some of it pre-edited. I have not seen the edited version. When you asked me if I'd seen it this morning, I thought that maybe James had sent you something, but I didn't know that he had published it. So I've yet to see it. Yeah, I woke up to my phone blowing up, lighting up and stuff. And it said I had a message.

And I just checked it and clicked on the link he sent me. And I was blown away. It was awesome. How's that for motivation? I mean, you're about to compete this weekend. You're going to probably hit some— Well, I'm actually upset right now because I texted him, James, and I said, you son of a bitch. I'm trying to stay calm before the storm.

Should have released it like tomorrow afternoon. Exactly. I'm trying to keep my head on straight and be focused and calm and take up all this built-up energy and frustration towards life and put it into the bar tomorrow. But after seeing that video, I'm ready to drink coffee on Barbell Shrugged and slam some bars like right now. So I don't even care, bro, to be honest with you. I'll lift any day. Let's max out right now.

Tell Rich Froning to hurry up so we can have a CrossFit competition outside. You did grace once. I did. How did that end for you? It was honestly the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, and I'll never do it again. Grace is 30 clean and jerks for time.

God, everyone talk about it. It was so awful. But it's only like 60 kilos. It was so hard. Yeah, 60, 62 kilos, something like that. It was so, so difficult. But I can't finish a CrossFit workout. I mean, one that doesn't

involve snatching clean and pressing jerk and everything you take that out of the picture um you know is there a video of you doing this of doing yeah you doing grace well i did one at uh i did one at a crossfit box like a few years ago i haven't seen that yeah yeah that's uh with um out there actually it was in carolina I live now. It's funny. Full circle. And then when I was on the team Cal Strength, we did one as a team. I saw that one. Just messing around and stuff. Having fun.

You know, having fun. And, you know, I honestly, this is going to sound, you know, I was like, I wanted to go after that record. Dan Bell has it at like 102. Bailey. Right. Or Dan Bailey, I'm sorry. Or is it Bell?

I'm learning all the CrossFit names. I'm trying to get all the crossfit lingo and the names and i'm actually not sure yeah but i said one i said 60 kilos i said get off me bro i'll do this in my sleep that's only like a third of your max i started drinking coffee i got really confident because i'm really insecure so that's people always ask me, you know, John's so cocky and arrogant and so energetic. What they don't understand is I'm really insecure. That's why I got to hype myself up, to be dead honest. If I don't get hyped up and I don't start, you know, slamming bars

and yelling and drinking coffee, you know, I have my head down thinking about, you know – Are you an introvert? No one likes me. I said something wrong. I mean, look, the Dark Orchestra. I write about it all the time, my blog. Are you like an introvert that has to act extrovert?

Is that kind of what that is? I don't even know right now. What does that mean? I'm a one-trick pony, Mike. I do snatch and clean and jerk. That's about it. That's what I say in the beginning of my seminars. I don't know anything else about life besides snatch, clean, and jerk.

Oh, it seems to be working pretty well for you. There you go. Chris Moore says hello. He wishes he could be here to talk shit. Oh. The guy that's usually on the show with us. Oh, tell him to get his bald ass out here. I don't know.

He would love to be here. I think you guys would have a great dynamic. What we talking about style wise we'll have to yeah we'll have to get you guys together at some point somehow please do i'm a big fan tell him you know tell him i'm a big fan of him man i you know i i don't miss your guys's show i'm telling you and when i find out that people have you know that don't watch your show on a consistent basis like i'll say you know in the weightlifting world. So I'm going to be like, barbell shrug. I'm going to be like, I want to punch him. I want to punch him in the face right in the jugular

and just say, hey, step your damn game up. Let's go. That's what I like to hear. I think my ADD kicked in. What were we talking about before I went off on my insecurity? Shit, I don't know. So I was going to make a final big point. Oh, finish a CrossFit workout.

Oh, that's right. I've tried a few times, but I can't finish a CrossFit workout at all. What does that mean you can't finish? A lot of people don't know this, but I can only do about, I think my max right now is seven pull-ups. The funny thing is I'm the weakest guy in the world. I'm literally the weakest person in the weakest guy in the world. Like I'm literally the weakest person in this room in the world. You get me off the platform off an Olympic weightlifting platform. You get me away from snatching, cleaning jerk. And I'm just, I'm just tits on a board.

I can do, I can barely do seven pull ups. I can't run cause I smoke. So I'll start throwing up. By the way, maybe we should clear that up since I think, I think some, I shouldn't run because I smoke, so I'll start throwing up. By the way, maybe we should clear that up. I shouldn't have mentioned it. I think some people might be confused. I think that you're smoking the reefer, but you're not because that would be against. Well, there's two reasons why. That's a bad drug. Well, yeah, there's two reasons why I don't smoke weed, and that's when I met cigarettes.

But, yeah, you're right. This is good that we cleared this up. Well, the first reason is because you saw it, and I'll get popped, and then I won't be able to represent this beautiful country. So that's a no-no. And the second reason is that if I took a hit of marijuana right now, I'd be in the corner crying. Oh, yeah? Real bad, man. The worst experience? the corner crying oh yeah real bad man the voice of experience really i mean i haven't done it

since you know i think you know my freshman year in college college days of course but uh just doesn't agree with you no not at all i'd rather do cocaine than weed you do sound like more of an uppers kind of guy i mean you're drinking like 64 ounces of coffee a day i drink a lot of coffee people don't know this i mean they think that I'm joking when I talk about coffee. I mean, it's an all-day adventure for me. So we attack coffee from the quality side, it seems. We got the French press going on. If I tried to match your coffee consumption, I would probably die.

No. I think I would have a heart attack. Well, it's like overtraining. It's impossible. Drinking too much coffee is like overtraining. It doesn't exist. People just like to make it up like it exists. Your body basically gets used to it, just like learning how to train hard.

Adding another training session to your schedule per week. Adding another hour to training. Over time, your body will just get used to it. It's been three years and I haven't gone one day without coffee. If it hits noon and I don't have coffee, I literally start to sweat and get the shakes. That's no joke.

Let's go down the other path for a second. What's your training schedule like right now? Hell. Is it hell? No, right now it's nice. That's why I love meets because we start to taper. And then, you know, I get to finally, like, breathe and enjoy life a little bit because, you know, we back off the volume. You know, we start to lighten up before a meet.

So two weeks from now, after this meet's over, what's it going to be like? Hell, hell, a lot of volume, a lot of lifting, not necessarily heavy. What does that mean? Well, when I say volume for you CrossFit and sons of bitches, I mean like a set of three is like a marathon. If coach has me do three hang snatches you know i'm putting on my track shoes um it's it's so a lot of just a lot of um variations to the lift a lot of accessory exercises you know we do a lot of just off the blocks hangs triples sets of five

uh you know big we just got off a huge squat cycle doing three sets of five for the last, you know, three, four months ever since the American Open. The closer we get to a meet, the more, I would say, Bulgarian we get. The more we stick close to the lifts, the snatch and clean and jerk, and we just really just max out every day. So the last two weeks, all I've done is maxed out. You know, I smoked smoked 60 90 just a few days ago in training um and that's always fun it's always fun but anytime we're far away from a big

meet we do just a lot of repetition a lot of lifts when you say all you do is max out you mean you max out like every day yeah i'm snatching clean and you're just just a single who can lift the most weight let's go what's the bill to max and then you're done for that session? Done. What's the last day you did that? Go eat, smoke a cigarette, drink some coffee, and do it again. So you're doing that. You're maxing out twice a day?

Oh, yeah. By a taper? Oh, yeah. Okay. What was the last day you maxed out? Three days ago. Oh, that was, what, Tuesday? Yeah.

Or Wednesday? No, it was actually Monday. Monday. So you maxed out three days ago so that was what tuesday yeah or wednesday uh no it was actually monday monday so you maxed out on monday what's training looked like since monday so you've been maxing out twice a day for like weeks on end uh you know two three weeks not every day not every day you know mostly like monday wednesday fridays and and saturday, you know, on Tuesdays, Thursdays, we take a lighter. We only have one training session that day. And then Sundays we get off, actually. We don't train on Sundays. I'm usually flying.

I do seminars on Sundays. So, you know, like on my one rest day I'm, you know, flying around. But I love it, though. I guess that's why you need all that coffee. Yeah, man. How do you teach? So you do seminars and glenn does seminars but you don't do seminars together well we used to you know and like i say i mean my seminars are a

melting pot of um you know so many different coaches that i've had over my six plus year career um you know teammates that i've had different programs i've been on i've you know i've done every technique you can imagine i've been on every program you can imagine. So my seminar is just a melting pot of everything combined with my own thoughts and inventions and way of doing things. And so, you know, I thank Glenn Penlay for taking me and putting him under my wing. I did a lot of Penlay seminars, but now we do our own now,

the Attitude Nation certification. We do certifications, and it's fun. But we're doing a PennLay tour. Me and my wife are going on the PennLay tour in Australia for a month out in August, so we're looking forward to that. So it'll be kind of fun to reunite with my coach and go on a seminar with him. But, you know, I've got gotta coach it his way and yeah you

know what i mean and we agree to disagree i coach very different than glenn i could well look i coach it very different than any coach in the world i don't know you're gonna have two coaches but that's the thing though every every coach teaches it different you know and i'm trying to break that from american weightlifting to be honest because it's things like you know everyone wants to just coach the same way and if you don't coach this certain way then you're just johnny cash you're just an outcast so when i first started doing these seminars and teaching with you know the way that i teach it's like you know you should see my hate mail are you kidding me you check my hate mail put up the laptop right now let's read a few what's different than and then any more coffee mike what what is different

about your style than maybe tradition like traditional american style weightlifting uh you know i i guess you can categorize it as more of a canapol style canapol am i saying that right sweetie i always mix up that word you always talk about that can it's not canapol it's canapol catapol catapult. It's catapult. Catapult. Catapult. That's my favorite part of the whole episode so far. You know, shout out to Dom McCauley. Shout out to Dom McCauley, Coach Dom McCauley. If you haven't taken a Dom McCauley seminar, take a Dom McCauley seminar. Take an everybody seminar.

Look, when I go to, when I do my seminar, I say, once this seminar is complete, book as many as you can. Book a Greg Evers seminar. You know what I'm saying? You know, book a John Coffey seminar. Book a Yasha Faye seminar. Book a Mike Bledsoe seminar. Outlaw Way. Book an Outlaw

Way seminar. Book anything because I just say, hey, this is just one way. This is just a way to get to the top. Is it the best way? Of course it is. My way of lifting and my way of teaching is the best is it the best way of course it is i mean my way my way of lifting and my way of teaching is the best in the world obviously i mean any coach that doesn't believe

that's you know not being the best coach they can i mean when you coach like you've been doing this weekend and you guys coach you believe the same thing i do you know what i mean so i get fired up about it man i love seeing people pr i love seeing people get better i love coaching i love the sport of weightlifting. You know, that's just the bottom line. You know what I mean? I really like what you were saying. You know, take your seminar, but then also do other people's seminars.

I personally, people ask me, like, who do I subscribe to the most when it comes to weightlifting coaches? I can't say that there's any one coach that's had a dominant force with me. Last fall, I spent a week in St. Louis, a week in California. I'm going back to California next month to spend with different weightlifting coaches. I'm going to come out and see you guys sometime this year. You're going to stay in the Attitude Nation compound. It's going to be awesome. I would love to have you guys come out.

Honestly, I'm going to roll out the red carpet for you. We're going to be in the new— Coffee, video games, and weightlifting. Oh, jacuzzi. Jacuzzi. You know, I don't drink anymore, so I found myself – now that I'm sober, I find myself doing a lot more activities. No, really, though. We went skydiving.

We went indoor skydiving. Oh, that's fun. We go to the amusement park. We go to the zoo. We went bumper car racing and stuff. It's interesting, though, because I used to think that the only way to went bumper car racing and stuff it's interesting though because i used to think that the only way to have fun was drinking and doing cocaine so you used to do yeah a good bit of drinking i was addicted to crystal meth and alcohol are you serious yeah

wow yeah so and and you know i lived a i lived a nightlife that was insane how long ago was this this was uh um through high school and about my – well, I would say senior, but I never got that far a year in college. But, you know, when I was about – when I first got in the sport at 22 and then it went on, I got into Vicodin pretty hard. It went into about 23, and then I got my act together with a good family and friend and my wife and weightlifting, support structure. I owe everything to weightlifting, everything.

That's why I'm so passionate on this mic right now. That's why I fly around the world not only competing but teaching because weightlifting has saved my life. But I find myself, now that I'm straight and sober, I find myself doing more activities. And you know what it is? I've actually learned how to have fun without booze. And I think for an alcoholic, and I hate even saying, you know, for a person that lived that life for so long,

it's like the only way you think you could have fun is by partying like that. You know what I mean? And I had to teach myself there are other ways to have fun. And it's one of the most difficult things I've had to overcome. So now, you know, now I have fun just hanging with my wife and hanging with you guys, and I don't need alcohol to have fun because I've tried so hard to be a social drinker. I try, man. You have no idea how hard it is.

You seem like a really intense guy. I think you're probably going to take just about anything to the extreme. That's the thing, man. I just can't have a few drinks and go to the ballgame, and I've tried. I used to have a six-beer cap, that you probably just kind of just imagine right now how that went yeah i mean well once you have more than three it's over it's over you know i'm sneaking shots in the bathroom so no one can see me i mean what's the point of doing i'm supposedly doing it for myself but i'm not so you know um i know my add is kicking in we're getting off track but

what i'm saying is come on out and we'll have fun. Excellent. You know what I mean? That sounds like it. Full circle. Look, the thing is with me is I'm an open book. I don't hide anything. That's why I love writing in my blog. If I can help anybody, I feel like if I just tell the truth and be me,

hopefully I can help somebody that was going through the same problems or is going through the same problems that I was in the past and hopefully they can hear me and and do better so it sounds like you learned from a lot of different coaches you know throughout the years like how has your technique changed over time oh yeah as you've gotten those new influences yeah that's a great question you know i used to do you know it's it's involved so much from I started out with a triple extension coach, you know, more of a, you know, high pole shrug, you know, and all that. Some more of a Bergener style you would call that? Maybe.

Well, no comment on that. Got to be nice here. Yeah. You know, but. Okay, so what does that mean the bar never touched my body i never did you know uh it never wasn't really like a catapult style way of lifting and i did i did okay i was going up the rankings and and i was doing really well because to be honest i'm a freak athlete so no matter what technique i use it's gonna be game over all right let me bring it back down i got i got i got insecure so i had to do that no but uh you know it's just the bar didn't even brush your thigh no no i just pulled straight up and went under shit i called the you

know pull and pray you know but look but let me tell you something i see that a lot in cross super common it is it is but let me just tell you something right now i didn't even know that was a taught style. I thought that was just you didn't know what you were doing. Yeah. Really? Yeah, same boat. Well, look, I'm just being vague about it a lot more.

It was a proper way. Look, there's no wrong way to lift weights. See, that's my biggest thing. There is no wrong way to lift weights. There's only just better ways for each individual and each individual coach or the sport of weightlifting is taking the barbell from the floor to overhead in one motion or in the second part of the sport two motions so however you do that if you're standing on your head and doing a jumping jack and whatever however you get the bar up who cares it's a it's a made lift that's the sport of weightlifting but you know other people like to uh um you know do other techniques to better themselves like me

so i just like i love that line everybody's like that's the wrong way to lift there's no wrong way to lift i mean there's better ways to lift in my opinion right but there's no wrong way to say something similar there's no best way there's only better ways there There's only better ways. So you start with triple extension. Then why did you change out of that style? What did you move on to? Just different coaches. I had a few different coaches out in Sacramento that were great. And that's the thing is that I don't regret all the different styles.

I used to be a big percentage guy. A lot of people don't know that. My thing is I ain't got time for percentages. I was very triple extension, a lot of percentage don't know that my thing is i ain't got time for percentages you know um i was very triple extension a lot of percentage workouts and it was great the i wouldn't change a thing you know what i mean but uh i moved on to a bulgarian coach i trained under donnie shanko i got on the team with cal strength this was before cal strength was known as cal strength before glenn penlay was there anything i could train under a bulgarian coach named alex kreichev so really just influenced the different coaches that taught,

you know, hit the bar with your body. Bar body contact, more of a catapult system, but they never really said that word. Look, pull under rather than up. How fast can you get under, not how high can you pull the bar? You know, but they never really necessarily – the funny thing is is that with these high- coaches you know these bulgarian coaches they don't really teach you how to lift weights that much no it's just grab the bar and go and if you miss the weight why'd you

miss but you what you do as an athlete is you see these other people lifting and you're like wait a minute i'm not doing that right there why Why does he look so different than me? Or why is he moving so fast? I'm moving totally different. You go to these international meets, you start just surrounding yourself with a new atmosphere, a new way of doing it, and then you're like, wait a minute, I look so different than these guys. I like the way that these guys are lifting. Yeah, some of the biggest changes I've ever made in my lifting was just because i was training with guys who are better than me not because i was actually

with a coach that was teaching me anything it was just other lifters were in the room they were you know the first time i realized what uh my coach was like you have to jerk faster and i was like okay i'm gonna jerk as fast as i can and then i get went to my first big meet, the American Open, years ago just to watch. And I was watching these guys go, oh, that's fast. I didn't realize what fast was until I saw whoever held the American record at the time do a clean and jerk in the warm-up area. And I was like, oh, okay. I get it now.

I get it now. So for those people, what is the difference what would you say the difference is between a triple extension and a catapult yeah just under just going under just just the speed under the uh when when do you go under so you would say maybe instead of shrugging up you shrug down yeah i i agree with that but i hate using the word shrug okay i'm sorry why that? Because I just think it's like the double knee bend or like, what foot do you jerk with forward? You never should have to think about it. The shrug that's taught, the word shrug should didn't even be in a weightlifter's vocabulary, in my opinion, because it's automatically going to happen. You're never going to have to think

about it. And in my opinion, the shrug does absolutely nothing. You know, the shrug used to be, that's the thing. A lot of people don't know that back before 1960, the bar was not allowed to touch your body. That was a rule. So to pull as high as you can and shrug up and, you know, full extension and jump up in the air and all this kind of stuff before you go under was the best way to do it. But all of a sudden people started cheating and they were starting to hit the bar with their body and getting under faster. People were scratching their head. What the hell is going on here? And with a lot of debate, they finally took the rule out.

So I feel like the technique has kind of evolved in the last 20, 30 years. Definitely overseas. Definitely. Look at these Russians. Look at these Europeans lifting. I think that the American weightlifters, they don't lift like me. Honestly. I mean, I'm not saying, look,

how can you tell Ferris, Kendrick Ferris, I'm not going to sit here and say Kendrick Ferris has bad technique. He's a two-time Olympian. I'm not going to sit here and say Matt Bruce should lift like me. Matt Bruce is a three-time national champion. You know, I mean, these guys are studs. I'm not saying lift like me. I'm just saying that

you know this works for me i like the way that this feels i lift the most weight on this kind of european style weight lifting this bar body contact the superman pull is what i call it i did not do good with pulling the bar up and then going under so i think that the main difference is a bar body contact uh-huh that's that's it mean, the bar should never touch you until it gets to the hips in the snatch, ever. You know what I mean? How hard can you hit the bar? I mean, the Cubans or the Brazilians in Pan Am, the games last year, they broke bars with their hips.

They call them the bar breaker. They bring bars out. Wow. Seeing these guys lift five feet from you is insane, right? And they make fun of American lifters. They pull up, they shrug up, you know. Why do you do this? You know, it's been 30 years, and hearing this, it's frustrating, you know.

But I'm not saying it's the wrong way. I'm just saying it works for me, and it's just the way I coach. What's the Superman pull? I've heard you talk about it a lot. The Superman pull is just the best pull in the world, baby. Can you show us an example? Look, the Superman pull is when do you start to finish? That's really the bottom line.

So what I teach is the Superman, the other nickname for the Superman pull, you should, look, Mike, pay $200 and go to a seminar. Come on now. What are you doing giving this free advice? No, I'm just kidding. The nickname for the Superman pull is Bob. The back over back is what Bob means. Okay.

And it mostly has to do with the shoulders. So I teach with that ass really, low off the off the floor yeah and the shoulders almost behind the bar okay so pretty extreme uh off the floor because the lift itself is extreme so bob means back shoulders back and then over means shoulders over how long can you keep your shoulders over the bar that's the question how straight can you get your knees that's the superman pull that's really the shoulders and the knees the two biggest difference between the more classic way of lifting and what i coach and how i lift my knees almost extend every single time I snatch. Sometimes they actually do extend. You're talking about during your first pull? I'm talking about double knee bend.

Am I being too loud? Lock out, I mean. So on your first pull, you get to a straight knee. I'm not really explaining it right. You guys are getting me off my rhythm right now. Are you locking out your knees on your first pull? So what's your definition of first pull? pull see that's the thing that some coaches i would say before you get to mid-thigh all right let me say i would say before you bend your knee first pull first pull is from the floor to your knees second pull from the knees to your

hips that's what i call first and second pull okay and then from there it's the arched angel tom brady on a white horse you lost me i know if i did a full seminar and i could start you know we don't watch football so yeah there you go look it's all about look i know i said never talk about this but it's all about double knee bend it's all about the hips coming through it's all about how much power can you put into the bar between with your hips in the bar Because what's going to happen after you hit the bar? The bar is not going up nor down. It just is. It's floating.

How much power can you put into the bar? And then what you're going to do is you're going to take that bar that might as well be connected to the wall, and then you're just going to pull yourself under. Once the bar gets to the hips, it's done. It's done. Game over. From there, it's under. But you have to finish. And when I mean by finish, you have to get in the arched angel hips coming through all right let me let me back up

here because you're getting me and you're getting me all over the place really the superman pull is this how far can you get your knees back how long can you keep your shoulders over before you finish i don't believe in just driving your shoulders back the whole time. I mean, there's a lot more stuff that goes into it, but honestly I got to stand up and I got to go through it step by step by step by step. So it's kind of hard right now on the microphone. Do a seminar to find out. Just don't pull back.

Go over. Keep the knees going back as far as possible. Because I like to say the pull doesn't matter. All the pull is is a setup. It's a setup for the finish. That's all it is. It's all about the finish. So how can you set up in the most powerful way possible for the finish?

That's it. And the finish is going to be getting under the bar. No, no. The finish is striking the bar. Okay. The finish is striking the bar in the hips, a.k.a. the arched angel, a.k.a. driving your hips, not just hitting the bar, but hitting your hips through the bar,

like Tiger Woods hitting a golf ball and following through. I'm going to screw up my lift tomorrow morning. You're overthinking it now. I'm talking to John North, best American lifter. I'm going to go to sleep tonight, and I'm going to be going, how can I make my lift more like his no don't do that and then i will i'll wake up tomorrow morning having thought about it all night my dreams and then i'm going to bomb no i'll tell you one thing i saw you lifting yesterday or no today

this morning it looked great oh thank you don't don't try to lift like me i mean like i say you know i always say there's a million different techniques in the world. Well, it would be subconscious. I'm not going to try to lift like you. Why would I do that? So you're telling me you're going to start tanning. I am going to start tanning next week. Look, I say there's a million different techniques in the world because there's a million weightlifters in the world,

and they all lift slightly different than the person next to them. You know what I mean? I mean, there's wiggle room with the Superman pull. There's wiggle room with the Archangel. Every athlete is going to be different. I did change something about my clean recently that actually I've seen a lot of you guys do in videos, and that is a little bit of an arm bend and pulling the bar into my hips. And I actually visited a few different gyms, and and pulling the bar into my hips um and i actually i visited a few

different gyms i noticed like the better lifters they were all kind of doing that to a degree yeah and uh and i started making that change it's a slow process i couldn't do it with a really heavy weight at first i was doing submaximal weights just because my arms weren't used to doing it uh with heavy weight and i started almost like rowing it into my hips and then i've noticed that my power clean wasn't going up at all but my clean i was able to like bottom out and really catch a nice smooth clean out of the bottom which i've always had a hard time uh catching the bottom uh catching in the bottom of a clean i would always catch in like a you know parallel or something like see that's that's a bad habit that uh seems to be common is catching it too high you know that's why i don't like the

word power uh squat clean and squat snatch because the weightlifting there's no squat in weightlifting you should catch it in the bottom position and then stand up that's why people always ask me they go john why do you squat with such a narrow position with narrow feet? Why do you front and back squat with such narrow feet? And I tell them because when I squat, I'm looking for strength for the pull. And that's how I pull. I don't ever try to get strong legs to stand up. How strong could I make my legs for the pull? Everybody wants to talk about strong legs to stand up. Screw that. What do you mean, stand up with what, a snatch?

I can stand up with a 166-kilo snatch any day of the week. Any lifter can. The snatch is easy. Compared to what you front and back squat, no one has a problem standing up with a snatch. You know, I mean, leg strength does come into play with the clean because it's a little heavier. But if you catch the bounce correctly, because you pull correctly and pull fast and pull confidently,

then you're going to be able to shoot up out of that clean like cheesecake. So I always coach, let's get strong legs for the pull, not for the stand-up portion. But, Mike, you're right. I'm a big believer in arm bend. I teach it. I talk about it. Well, I should say I don't teach it. In my seminars, I have people try it. Then then i tell them raise your hand if you like it some people

raise their hand some people don't and i said for the people that like it keep it and for the people that don't like it go back to straight arms you feel like that's an arm length no i'm never you know that's one thing about me is i am not a believer in body type at all everybody wants to talk about different techniques for different body types. I just disagree with that 110%. They say, oh, you know, hip clean where lifters hit the bar off their hips in the clean.

Most do off the thigh like me. But people say, oh, well, you know, Donnie Shangle's a hip cleaner because of his arm's length and stuff and his torso and all this. They start throwing numbers out. No, Donnie Shangle's a hip cleaner because he was born a hip cleaner. It's a rhythm thing. It's like boxing. Why does Ali move his feet like that? It's a rhythm. It's in his DNA. You know what I mean? So I'm just a big believer than that. So I mean, look, I call my seminars my way of teaching street weightlifting. In my seminars,

I talk about things that actually happen in real life weightlifting that nobody talks about, in my opinion, especially USA Weightlifting. I mean, I coach USA Weightlifting courses. I'm a college dropout with no certifications. I know nothing about anything besides weightlifting, but I coach these USA Weightlifting certifications. And it's just insane, man. It's insane. It's basic. Stay on your heels. I mean, they don't talk about arm bend. You know, they don't talk about, you know, all these other little things that go into lifting big weights that so many elite lifters do that frustrate me. You know, dynamic start. I actually coach dynamic starts. I'm a big believer in dynamic starts before you, you know, moving

basically before you move. Right. And the advantages of gaining speed with that um and i talk about all the different dynamic starts i've had and it's part of your bob you were talking about earlier no you could do bob cold turkey you you know bob's actually during the pull you know where the dynamic start is moving basically before you begin the pull for momentum the bar comes off the ground yes yeah i mean i'm a weak lifter i mean with my weak legs i got to do everything possible and you're right i say the arm bend is like rowing the boat because you're taking that arm bend and you're bringing the bar back into you you're not pulling you're not using the arm bend to pull up my yeah that was that used to be my yeah that's what i used to think it was for the longest time I was like never arm bend or you know I we always

call it early arm bend yeah and uh I I don't know what I think it was about six months ago I started lifting with lifters that are better than me um when I was out of town and I started I don't know I just started experimenting and I started like rowing the bar and I I went from being a leg striker to a hip striker okay wow, wow. See, I envy you. I wish that I cleaned off my hips. I just can't. Yeah, I mean, I think I added 10 kilos in my clean pretty quickly, and it made it really quick.

I want to get back to a point you were making. You were talking about a lot of times people, they catch a clean at the bottom or low in a squat, right, and they have a hard time getting up. And you're saying it's because of their pull. Yes. And that's something I've been learning recently, too. I've noticed is usually if you're having a hard time standing up with a clean,

it has nothing to do with your squat. It has to do with the fact that you caught it in a shitty position. Your timing's all off. Right. And if you catch it in the bottom at the right time, you'll bounce out of the bottom and it should feel pretty good. And you're going to be pretty upright, too. You know, you see guys, they're almost getting folded over and they're fighting to get that cleanup. Yeah. You know that in, I couldn't agree with

you more. And there is such a thing as just a miss, you know, there is such a thing, even if you do everything correctly and time it, the weight is too heavy and he can't stand up. So it's not, you know, people kind of get mad at themselves and what did I do wrong? And I think some of the best coaching is basically just saying, you just missed. There is such a thing as just a miss. And I want to get that word out that it's not because you did something wrong. It's just the sport of weightlifting.

Look, I always say 90% of the sport is talent. 10% is all luck. It's all luck. All luck. When you're going under a bar in a big meet, like you guys know, you're crossing your fingers and praying to the weightlifting gods that things are going to stick. Sometimes when it does stick in the right position, you're shocked. You're like, wait a minute.

How the hell did that just happen? Is it time to stand up now? Okay, they're all cheering. The bar must still be up there. But there's sometimes where you miss it and you're like i did everything right what happened well the weight was just too heavy you missed it i can totally relate to that i haven't p.r. to snatch in fucking years but uh last time i did when i caught it i was like there's no way i thought i was gonna like lock out and and stand up with that weight it came off the ground i was like

i might as well just set it down but i tried anyway and i came lock out and stand up with that weight. It came off the ground, and I was like, I might as well just set it down. But I tried anyway, and I came locked out, and I couldn't believe it. Yeah. I'll say the better I've gotten at weightlifting, the more surprised I am that I'm catching the weight overhead consistently. Like, it feels heavy coming off the ground. And usually I find weightlifters are getting better and better. They're like, the weight is getting heavier.

I was like, of course it's getting heavier. But it's almost like you have to trick yourself into finishing the lift. Because, I mean, you're like, well, it's 160 kilos. You've got to force yourself underneath the bar. It's a bitch of a sport, and it's really mental too. It's scary going under that weight. There's a lot of times you just don't want to go under. And it just takes that slight hesitation and you're done so i talked a little bit about the clean and how um doing the arm bend with the the clean a little bit how does

that apply to the snatch and does it apply to the snatch yeah i mean i think it applies more to the snatch than the clean look the clean is more of a strength part of the sport. I mean, you can make 10 mistakes in the clean and still make it. It's more just brute strength. Where the snatch is just, you know, you make one mistake, you're done. Right. You know, it's more of a finesseful thing. It's ballet.

Ballet with a bar. So I think the arm bend is more important for the snatch because you gotta get the bar from your hips all the way over the head, and you need as much power as possible. So the arm bend just gives you more power. It gives you more power and more speed on the bar. If you're pulling the bar nice and fast right before it starts to get to the hips,

put a little arm bend in there, row the bar back into you, you're going to get that much more speed, that much more power, that much more momentum. And guess what? If you do have a weird body type and you're having trouble getting the bar into the hips and you don't want to take your grip out any further because you're already collar to collar, let's say, that arm bend will actually help get that bar in the crease of the hips, aka the power position, for you to whack, have those Tyson hips. Yeah. You know what I mean? So it's a position a position thing as well like look at all the top guys look at andre

around now youtube andre around now he's got phenomenal arm bend but if you talk about arm bend usa weightlifting is going to try to ban you from the sport again rowing it into you i love i love you're not arm bending it up you're rowing it and rowing it into you. I love that you're not arm bending it up. You're rowing it into your hips. No, rowing it into you. Mike, you could not be more right. Or, you know, I couldn't agree with you more. You know, I always tell my wife, I say, row your boat. Just like you're in a canoe and you're rowing the canoe.

It's the same exact thing. Look, at the top of the finish, which I call the arched angel, okay, your elbows should be back towards the wall, not up. If your straps broke at the finish, then you should fall back against the wall behind you. I don't teach the vertical finish. Now, if you emphasize the shrug under and teach, you know, emphasize the shrug and more of a vertical finish, that's fine. I mean, I know so many coaches that I'm very close friends with that teach that way, and it's a fine way to lift.

You can lift big weight that way. I'm not saying it's wrong. This is just the way I coach. That's it. That's all this is. It's just a way I lift and a way I coach. I know you say you squat with your feet pretty close together because you're focusing on getting stronger for the pull. He looks funny when he squats yeah oh yeah you son of a

bitch uh what about foot position are you a big like foot feet straight ahead or a toe down or toe down a lot where do you prefer where do you coach yeah i coach well that's that's a good question because i i the way that i coach that is that every athlete's going to be different it's really what's your comfort zone. It's like the arm bend. If you like the arm bend, keep it. If you don't, don't. I don't ever make athletes arm bend. Just like I don't ever make somebody have feet like I do.

But I do say, you know, in the seminars especially, I say at least let's try this. And if I have a one-on-one client, I'll have them do this. But I like to coach with my feet, heels almost touching, and toes out. The reason why toes out is in the pull, you can push your knees out to the side and not just back. If your toes are straight out, the knees aren't going to get out of the way as much. The further your

knees go back, the harder you can drive the bar back. That's another thing. I'm a big believer in bar back, not up. Paul Doherty, my first coach, said this is a melting pot. Everything in the sport of weightlifting bar back, not up. Paul Doherty, my first coach, said, you know, this is a melting pot. Everything in the sport of weightlifting is back, not up. Everything. And if you can understand that right off the bat, you're all good in the hood.

But the toes out brings the knees out. And that's what I love about the toes out. You see the Chinese lifters have that frog stance, some of them. It's insane. But, look, going underneath the bar, going underneath the weight, no matter how hard you try when your feet move they're slightly going to go out a little bit they just are here's the problem i was going to talk to mike about the biggest problem in weightlifting is what you think is low

on the catch is not low every seminar i go to i say now squat and i walk around and I say, lower, lower, lower, lower, lower. I'm yelling at these people. And they get way lower. They're actually finally all the way in that bottom position. And that's where you got to catch the ball. You got to get comfortable. You got to watch a movie down there. Grab a bag of popcorn.

Now, if your feet are wide on the pole, what are they going to do when they move? They're going to go out a little bit. Now you can't get lower. So now you can't get that low. Now, again, every athlete is different. I do know some freaks that could actually get lower with a wider stance. But in my opinion, it's uncommon, and for me it just doesn't work. So if you really want to get low, you got to have your feet closer together.

And if you're going to have your feet closer together, you got to pull with them really close to anticipate them coming out a little bit. You know what I mean? Plus, let's talk about the two bounce that you get with close feet is what I call it. The bounce from the stomach to the thighs. Your stomach is going to bounce off your thighs. This is a big Bulgarian trick that I learned a few years back. That's going to help you, A, in the squat and in the clean,

shoot up from that bottom position, especially the 105 pluses that have big bellies. Also, the second bounce is the butt to the calf. What about guys like me who are completely shredded? Shredded and jacked like you, you're done. You're over. But the double, the second bounce is the buttded and jacked like you, you're done. You're over. But the double, the second bounce is the butt to the calves to shoot you out of the hole.

And the closer your feet together, the more bounce you're going to have on both of those bounces. Again, the double bounce like I'm talking about, the arm bend, the dynamic start, all these things are just taking your Honda into the body shop or into the car shop and adding accessories to make your car faster. As all these things are, you don't have to do these things but they're going to help in my opinion so let's talk about them i think that's a lot of excellent points i think everyone who's listening if you're not already trying some of these things go back and experiment with some watch some of the

videos that they're posting on uh you guys post on you stream still yeah we do live we do the live stream still do the live stream on uh you stream team team md usa that's right it used to be cal strength and that's when uh for some reason i i don't see as much now are you guys not promoting as much well we're just not on the cal strength team anymore so we don't have anything to do with them. Should I not bring that up? No, no, no. I hate those guys.

I was going to get in that vibe too. No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to come off like that. I don't think I heard you two correctly. I didn't hear the question well, I guess. But, no, we're friends. It's all good in the hood. There's no um it's yeah

there's we just do our own thing they do their own thing so why'd you guys head out to what's the south carolina south carolina yeah yeah well you know a i just go where coach goes that's the bottom line you know coach moved out so i moved out plus they're paying me now so there you go following the money that helps you know you know so they they you know they said hey we're gonna pay you you know there's an a team a b team and a c team and obviously i'm on the a team and there's a c team can i get on the c team yeah man get on the c team so no i just go where coach goes so they said coach said let's go so i said okay did the c team get paid yeah oh i want to be on the c team yeah come on man

let's go you know but look you're in a good sport crossfit don't leave it i always say you know to crossfitters i go you know what are you doing don't don't get into weightlifting this is a bitch of a sport man this is a dark bitch of a sport, man. This is a dark bitch of a sport. Believe it or not. Stay in CrossFit, man. You got a team aspect. It's motivating. Obviously, it's fucking extremely hard, but you have a good –

there's a certain vibe and a certain energy that CrossFit gives off that I see. I'm not going to lie. That's made me a thought about doing it. Yeah. I love it. You know, I come from that football background. That's my background. And it's got that just same type of support structure, that same energy,

that same mentality that I find fascinating, that I just love. That's what is so great about crossfit you know and the nice thing about my situation the team muscle driver situation is that we have that in weightlifting you know guys like cal strength average bros gyms you know john coffee's gym hassle free with paul doherty you're seeing all these gyms now that are creating more of this team atmosphere and weightlifting, which is really cool. And I think CrossFit's helped that tremendously. But, you know, I'm not going to lie to you.

Don't worry. I lay at night sometimes looking at the fan after writing a deep blog, and I'm like, you know, how far could I go in CrossFit? You know, if I quit smoking and got a CrossFit coach and really gave it my all, you know, Rich Froning, where you at, bro? You know, I'm not saying I would do good. I'm just saying, you know, it would be fun to – I just like the team aspect.

Yeah. I mean, I think – I mean, you named off all the weightlifting teams that it's probably, you know, creates that same type of environment. Truth be told, I don't – I'm not as good at CrossFit as I am at weightlifting. So that's why I do more weightlifting. What are your best numbers in weightlifting? Snatch, 114, clean and jerk, 137.5. You've only been doing it for a little bit? I've been back and forth for six years.

I've been lifting for six years, but I lifted for a couple years, did CrossFit for a couple years, I weight lifted for six months, did CrossFit for six months, just back and forth. So I've been kind of like, I've been average.

Basically, I've been switching sports too frequently to get really good at either one. There's nothing wrong with that. I mean, you love both. Yeah, I think that's why people like, and I like CrossFit is because I have that ADD mentality. It's hard for me to stick with any one sport for very long. And CrossFit kind of does a really good job of that. Well, I think that's great, actually. I mean, you're doing two things, not only one thing that you that you love doing yeah and you have a podcast that talks about both things i

mean in my opinion you guys are just more well-rounded than most sure yeah i mean you have more knowledge you have you have more knowledge because of it so i mean i feel like you're killing two birds with one stone yeah i. I love coaching CrossFit. I love coaching weightlifting. I like participating in both. It's a lot of fun. You move good. Thank you. I saw you this morning.

Thank you. You got some Tyson hips. I'd like to mess with you a little bit, but don't worry about it. That's why I want to come out and train. I'd like to throw a Superman pull on you a little bit. Teach you my crazy madness. Maybe I'll hit some more PRs. No.

You're doing fine. Don't listen to me, man. You're going to screw me up. No. I'm going to come out and train. I'm going to play around with Superman pulls. I'm a big believer, though, if it's not broke, don't fix it. If you're smashing weights and going to these big national meets

this weekend and you're doing good, well, keep it. Just get stronger. Is there anything uh let's see i'll start with doug yeah so i can let you think about it so we're gonna wrap this up oh i can go all night man i know you can do i mean i'm out of coffee and i'm still going this is uh this is a special occasion that's why I'm keeping the vibe going right now. Let's just go five hours straight. We're going to do like a marathon podcast, Barbell Shrug. That would be great.

An all-night podcast. We should do a fundraiser at some point for something. For something. I got a fundraiser idea. It'll be giving me money. Okay. Just so I can have it Let's do it, I'm in

And then what we'll do is We'll just see how long we can podcast And people will call in and donate the money That's right Well, have you seen that movie I think it's called Where the first porn site was made No

Sounds awesome We're all interested though Yeah, I think it's like matchman it's talking about porn let's get let's keep this podcast going yeah the very first porn website these guys put it up and charge people like a monthly membership it's never been done before if they had a whole movie on i forgot what it's called maybe my wife's a documentary or no it's a movie it's a great movie great actors great movie and they sat there and every time someone rang uh paid for it a subscription a little bell rang and it was like three days of no bells ringing then all of a sudden one bell just went ding ding ding and they

were like ran to the computer these guys are broke they're in their robes in a shitty apartment and then all of a sudden another bell rang ding ding ding ding ding and then ding ding ding and then ding ding ding and then for like two weeks straight the bell just wouldn't stop ringing and then over and over and over and over because the money was just flowing in and then they got like became billionaires that's the story of barbell shrugged so we got to find that thing that's better than porn. Okay. That people can access on the internet and we can charge a membership for. So what is it? Weightlifting talk. Weightlifting talk and barbell shrugged at the same time.

Oh, my God. That's actually a genius idea, to be honest, because I'm having you on my show on Sunday. That's right. Weightlifting Talk. What time are you all shooting for? And Doug. And the whole crew. I told the whole crew.

You're like a rapper, dude. Wherever you and Doug go, the crew goes. CTP will be there. CTP in the house, baby. And then maybe we can bring some weightlifters. We're going to do the show in the middle of the hallway at the Arnold. So when people walk by, we're just going to start grabbing people. Sit down, you son of a bitch.

Let's talk weightlifting. We need to grab some people that don't weightlift or probably don't even know what it is. I think that'll be fun. You guys do a lot of weightlifting talk. I've missed a few episodes, but you guys do about both. You guys do a lot of dietlifting talk i've missed a few episodes but you guys do you guys do about both you guys do a lot of uh diet uh a lot of nutrition nutrition stuff which i find interesting because i don't know a lot about that so i actually learn a bunch i mean if people if people aren't familiar like i mean our backgrounds are more from originally weightlifting oriented more strength and conditioning we weren't like originally crossitters, so that's kind of why we're probably a little strength biased on our show.

We actually learned about CrossFit at weightlifting practice when we were only competing in weightlifting. I had never heard of CrossFit before. I didn't know this. I thought you guys came from CrossFit. No, I did my undergrad, my senior project was on the biomechanics of snatching, and then I came to Memphis to work with Dr. Fry and Dr. Schilling, who had done a ton of weightlifting research.

So I came to Memphis to go to graduate school to study weightlifting. Oh, wow. And then competed all through graduate school and then had a shoulder surgery. So I don't compete anymore. But then we started the gym. And so we've had a heavy emphasis on weightlifting at our CrossFit gym just because that's just what we know. We're super lucky that that happens to be what we know about. Yeah, actually, originally. That's the most needed part. We're super lucky that that happens to be what we know about. Yeah, actually, originally.

That's the most needed part in the sport. Right. Yeah, I originally wanted to open a weightlifting gym, and then I discovered CrossFit, and I was like, how successful can a weightlifting gym really be? You know what I mean? I'm going to open up. There's no weightlifting in Memphis.

I'll open up a weightlifting gym. We would have been out of business a month later. I think so. weightlifting in Memphis, I'll open up a weightlifting gym. We would have been out of business a month later. And I didn't open up CrossFit just because I knew it would be successful. At the time, I was doing a lot of CrossFit, and I was having a lot of fun with it. And I was like, I actually thought there was a CrossFit gym in Memphis. I'm like, surely there's one already here.

And there wasn't. And then that's when we were like, all right, we'll open up a CrossFit gym, and we'll have weightlifting too. See, I think that's smart. And I think that's the way to open up a CrossFit gym and we'll have weightlifting too. See, I think that's smart. And I think that's the way to go is to have a CrossFit gym with a weightlifting team. With a CrossFit team and a weightlifting team if you want. Weightlifting gyms are tough. There's just less weightlifters than there are CrossFit.

So where are you going to make the money if you've only got like 15-20 weightlifters You're not going to They're each paying what $100-$200 a month that's not going to pay any bills Well I tell you if I ever open up My own gym it's going to be I'm going to have a CrossFit team And a weightlifting team I'm going to do both I'm not going to do

Just weightlifting I mean obviously I'm going to Hire a full CrossFit coaching staff and try to recruit people and then do the same. Well, I'll probably be the weightlifting coach, but get the CrossFitters in there as well. So just have both. I mean, why not? Yeah, I mean, that's one thing we pride ourselves on. Fuck it. I'll get a powerlifting team.

Yeah. I mean, why not? Well, powerlifters. What do you mean by that? Are we not cool with powerlifters? No, we're cool with powerlifters. I love powerlifters. We had a powerlifting team in our facility and a strongman.

They were powerlifting strongman for a while. Now I got to just say all the Iron Games. There was no bodybuilding. Everybody get in the corner and pose off. Let's go. Three o'clock. You're on. You know. No, we had powerlifting and strongman team at some point, but they seem to be the most

emotional people in the world. Oh, really? And the powerlifters and strongman listening right now, I know you're crying. You're like, oh, I can't believe Mike said that about me. But it's true. Really? See, I- Or raging.

Yeah. Now, why do you see? I know nothing about powerlifting. I've never been around powerlifters. I've never been in that world. Wasn't Glenn a powerlifter for a long time? Yeah, world champion. Yeah.

Back in the dark ages. Yeah, so... Yeah, won worlds. Back when there was only two federations, too, which I have to give it to him. Oh, well, there you go. Yeah, now there's like 50. Well, that's the one thing that I don't understand,

why there's so many federations. I just don't get it. I don't either. Why not just have one and who could be the best? They don't really want to know who's the best, I don't think. Oh. Well, I was thinking about taking a powerlifting seminar. From who?

I don't know. Just, you know. Go to Louie Simmons, I guess. Well, let me tell you something that's difficult for me. Because I pride myself on being a one-trick pony. And that's why I think I'm a good weightlifting coach. Like, you know, when I coach somebody, I say, look, you know, all I know is weightlifting. So let's get good at it. And I like not having any influences.

Like, when I go to seminars and they try to explain the CrossFit thing or powerlifting, a part of me is almost kind of like, actually, I'd rather not even know because I like to go into these seminars blind because everybody in the seminar is just weightlifters to me. But it's hard because I agree with that side. I like being blind, but now I kind of want to open my horizons and learning about powerlifting and strongman

and maybe more about CrossFit and stuff. I just don't want that to necessarily change the way I coach weightlifting. I like the way I coach now, and I don't know if that would have any influences on my… I don't think it would. I think, you know… I don't want to start. I think, you know... I don't want to start teaching the low bar squad all of a sudden.

Uh-oh, I said it. Am I going to get in trouble on the show? Absolutely not. I'm actually... I'm anti... I wouldn't say I'm anti-low bar. I'm very pro-high bar. Especially if you're...

And this is where you're probably going to disagree with me. Especially if you're and this is where you're probably gonna disagree with me especially if you're built for it you know if if your levers are more friendly to a high bar um i like low bar for people with longer legs and people who have maybe bad ankle mobility and stuff like that that makes sense yeah so i like low. I always, my default is high bar. And then if there's a problem with someone doing a high bar, then we go to low bar. But there's absolutely nobody in our facility weightlifting and then doing low bar back squats.

That doesn't make any sense to me. I see. And then for the competitive CrossFitters too, we may low bar back squat way way away from season but crossfit is a sport that's going to benefit from high bar squatting because it's it's practically half of its weight lifting you know your overhead squatting your front squatting back squatting or you know squatting period you know the fastest way to get up and down is more of a high bar style anyway if you're low bar you know power lifting squatting you're low bar, you know, power lifting, squatting,

I think that you're probably, you know, wasting some energy. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. I know you go on some rants about low bar. Well, I'm on your show, so I won't. No, go for it. I want to hear it. No, this will cause some good controversy because we actually have had guests on before

that were very pro-Lobar. I mean, I'm not going to, like, get in an argument with you. It's your – But I want people to hear your opinion. Well, I told myself before I came on the show, I was like, you know, I got to, you know, be calm. I don't want to bring the show down here. People – You've been being calm the whole time?

Oh. This is calm, John. This is calm, John. This is calm, humble, John. So what – I want to hear your opinion about Lobar. No, it's – okay, I. This is calm, John. This is calm, humble, John. So what? I want to hear your opinion about low bar. It's okay. I'll just say it right now.

It's really, it's really simple. I, I believe that as weightlifters or what you CrossFit sons of guns call them, only lifting you board short motherfuckers. What you got to own some board shorts? Five finger shoes. Tribal tattoos. When I get into CrossFit, I'm getting geeked out and all that too, by the way. Come by, see my guy. We'll get you tatted up.

Oh, dude. It's going to be game over. You know, look good, feel good. That's right. I just think that for weightlifters, you should high bar. I think that low bar ruins careers. There's nothing worse than you could do than to low bar squat. Yeah.

It'll ruin your career weightlifting. It teaches you the worst habits ever. There's no carryover, in my opinion. It's a disaster. I've seen people just trying to get somebody to snap out of that low bar. Because what happens, you start low bar and it carries over. You start snatching and clean and jerking like a low bar squat, and then it's just death.

Right. But what I always say, though, is that if low bar squats work great for CrossFit because I don't know then great low bar squat could be the best exercise for a CrossFit athlete in the world great, do low bar squats I'll even campaign for that do a low bar squat 9 times a day then obviously for powerlifters because that's the sport

for most of them I think they do low bar so obviously low bar, if you're trying to get strong i don't know anything about the strength conditioning world but if you're trying to get strong for football and be a better football player then do low bar back squats it's probably great for you so i'm very pro low bar that's what a lot of people don't get but i'm just not pro for weightlifters just in just specifically for in the sport of weightlifting, in my opinion, you should always high bar. And that's it. For other sports, low bar.

And if you do low bar for weightlifting, we're still friends. That was not nearly as controversial as I was hoping for. You know, I'm good tonight. I'm laying back. Me and Donnie Shankle have went on some crazy low bar rants and early shows of weightlifting talks.

So I think I got it out of my system on those. Oh, my God. Did I get a lot of bad feedback, though? Wow. There are people out there that I found out firsthand that if you diss the low bar squat, you are in big time trouble. You know what's funny is Chris, who's normally on the show, he's a former power lifter. Okay. And if anyone's going to support the low bar, it's going to be that guy.

Then great. But he doesn't. He's all for high bar. He does high bar now. Oh, really? Yeah, like he's using high bar to fix his mobility problems. Here's the thing about low bar that frustrates me, and to go a little more in depth with it, maybe I'll start ranting,

but I don't know how much time we have left.'m sorry if i keep rambling because it doesn't matter i don't know what's happening youtube will let us post up to what three hours 10 hours now there's just there's just there's just no i think that you should the way you should squat that's why i have narrow feet in my squatting the way you should squat is the way you should lift, snatch and clean and jerk. The way you pull, the way you do pulls should be exactly the way you snatch and clean. You know, the way you jerk off blocks, the way you even do push presses, you know, driving that head through. It should all have carryover. And the low bar squat doesn't have any carryover carryover for weightlifting you're

not practicing a movement you're gonna you're not practicing look everybody says but john you're gonna get strong no no let me tell you something okay all right let me tell you something you let me tell you something you sons of bitches out there you're gonna get strong in low bar back squatting that's where you're gonna to get strong. You're going to get strong tackling somebody in football. You're going to get strong powerlifting. You're going to get strong in CrossFit, if that's true. I don't know if that's true or not. But you're not going to get strong in the snatch and the clean because it's two completely different sports. Powerlifting and weightlifting could not be further apart from each other. It's like golf and poker. Poker's a sport. I think poker's a sport in my opinion i just

hate when people collide power lifting and weight lifting together like they have all these similar as um antiges is that a word i don't even know where i came up with that we're gonna start using it now hashtag antiges antiges how are we gonnaegies. How are we going to spell this? The John North Barber for sure will have the Antegies on the back. Do you want to spell or do you want me to spell it? Do you know what I'm trying to say though?

It doesn't matter. No, it doesn't matter. Screw it. I just get frustrated because I love my sports so much. When people try to come in with all these different sports and they relate

these different sports, I'm like, get out of here. It's two completely different worlds. Yes, it's the Iron Game. It's part of the Iron Game. It'm like, get out of here. It's two completely different worlds. Yes, it's the iron game. It's part of the iron game. It's, yes, we both involved weight. It's just like asking, why doesn't a powerlifter train high bar?

Do they? Am I wrong? I don't think they do. They don't because they don't high bar squat. A powerlifter does not high bar squat because he low bar squats so why would a weight lifter that why would a weight lifter low bar squat when he doesn't low bar squat in the clean injury in the snare it just so the argument the argument that i've heard and go please go and fight back with me please debate with me i'm gonna i'm gonna play devil's advocate because because i already

have my own go retort to this but that's a real word. Maybe that's what I was... No, that wasn't what I was looking for. No, anyways. Retork? Actually, I don't know if I use that word properly. I like your pajamas, by the way. Thanks, Iron Man. They say you get more posterior chain engagement with a low bar squat.

Okay. I don't know what that means. I don't. I've heard it so many times. What is that, posterior chain? Posterior chain engagement. I don't know. Now I have to define it.

No, don't. No, no, no. Now it's a challenge. Yeah. I mean, you could, I guess, change my mind maybe. No, no, no. I mean, the argument is it's going to engage your backside, all the muscles that are involved, your glutes, hamstrings, lower back,

all those things that there's a lot of talk in the strength conditioning world. Some CrossFit coaches talk about posterior chain engagement. Posterior chain engagement is a really popular thing. It's said in powerlifting, actually. Okay. And so the argument is posterior chain engagement. You're not getting that fully with a high bar

box squat, but you will a low bar. So what I tell people... But do you get that in a clean and a snatch? You do. That's what I tell people. If you're pulling off the floor, you are. If you're pulling off the floor properly, you are. And if you do good mornings, there you go. That's very, very similar. I think we beat that shit to death. And if you do good mornings, there you go.

I see. That's very, very similar. I think we beat that shit to death. What do you think about deadlifting for weightlifters? Oh, yeah. That's a good one. Heavy deads as opposed to clean or snatch deads or just heavy pulls? I don't know.

Do you deadlift? Do you do them? No. And that's the thing. My six-plus-year career, I've never, ever been on a team that ever did deadlifts for training. So I'm not saying that I don't believe in them, but I'm not saying I do. I've just never have done deadlifts.

I've never, ever done deadlifts. I have no idea how much I could just pull. But you do clean pulls and snatch pulls. And do you do a- Very rarely do we do clean pulls and snatch pulls. Oh, really? And if we do, it's definitely not like, how much can you do clean pulls and and snatch pulls and do you do a barely very rarely do we do clean pulls and snatch pulls and if we do it's definitely not like how much can you do it's for triples and then you end off on like a hang snatch you do like a it's all you do percentages based off of your lifts percentages ish i say right we just kind of rough ballpark percentages you know and not

really even just you go like oh we're gonna go 105 we we we max that's what i what i say we max out every day people get it confused sometimes like we just snatch clean jerk max out like if we're doing like what we'll do is we'll do two pulls two snatch pulls and then lower the bar and do a hang snatch so that's a triple so we're doing our pulls but we're ending we're sticking close to the snatch or the clean. And we'll basically max out in that. So obviously it's going to be far away from your single max. So you do like two snatch pulls and then you do a hang snatch? Yeah.

So obviously we're able to snatch pull more. But the reason why we're not is because we've got to lower it and then do a hang snatch. Okay. What prevents us to pull more weight. So that's what I mean by we stick close to the lifts. We might do some funky stuff, but either the first rep, somewhere in the middle, or the last rep, we always end off on a snatch clean and jerk in some way possible. So a coach has never said, how much can you clean pull? Let's go.

Or clean deadlift or whatever. I mean, I don't know how to do a deadlift properly like a powerlifter. No one's ever taught me. When we do heavy pulls, it's like a clean pull. But i've never maxed out in it so i don't know but uh i mean if it works it's great i don't know maybe we should do more i have no idea not really a subject i'm too uh um i'm looking for a big word keen keen keen yeah that's a good one what about other assistance like uh you said earlier you can only do seven pull-ups. Do you guys do pull-ups once a week, twice a week at all?

Y'all do a lot of rowing, though. Barbell rows? No. No? No. Why did I get that? Why was I thinking that? You guys just snatch, clean, jerk, front squat, go home,

and then subtle variations there? You don't do anything else. You never do bench or do just regular overhead pressing? Oh, yeah. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, sometimes we'll do some push presses. But it's like volume. It's like three sets of five push presses, either from the front or the back. Sometimes it's just military press.

No leg use. Never like glute ham raises or ab stuff that that is all up to the individual athlete so a lot of my teammates do do that but i don't because i'm very it's funny when i step off the platform i'm very injury prone if i do some some ab work like like my abs tighten up and i get like an ab spasm. Or if I do low, if I do some back extensions, my back will tweak. If I do some like rows and stuff that I used to love doing actually, um, some like bent over rows, you know, like I'll just get a weird like hamstring, um, tweak. So the minute I get away from the platform, I'm just a disaster, so I stick to the platform, 100%. I mean, you'll see some videos. I like to do a lot of warm-ups before training and even

some cool-down exercises. I do a lot of jump roping. I think the jump roping is the best warm-up you could do for weightlifting, and I like to get on the rower. When you're coming in all sore from yesterday's training, you're trying to loosen up and get the blood flowing. There's no better exercise to do than some rows. So, yeah, not a lot of – I don't do anything. And never any conditioning at all? Never. Push a prowler, run a hill sprint on a weekend?

No. See, that's the thing. I haven't ran in six years, honestly. You haven't done a jog? I haven't done an ab workout in six years. I do go on some jogs. I wrote a blog on that, actually. I love jogs.

I go on a night jog. But we're talking 10 minutes. We're talking a 15-minute, like almost a speed walk. I mean, just move around just to stay fresh and loose for the next day. That's why I take a lot of hot water baths. I take three hot baths a day. You swim in the morning and take hot baths in the day? I do contrast.

I'm a big contrast believer. I'll do laps in the cold pool before training, and then I'll switch and I'll go in the hot tub, and then I'll do a lap, and then I'll sit in the hot tub. Where's this pool at? I always end on hot water. You have a pool at your house? Yeah.

No, no, no. I used to in the hot tub. Where's this pool at? I always end on hot water. You have a pool at your house? Yeah. No, no, no. I used to with the apartment. That's what kind of sucks right now is that we don't have access to that anymore. So I'm trying to get like a YMCA or a 24-hour fitness membership to go do that again. But I always end on hot to stay loose. And at night I end up on cold before bed uh for training so but i'm a big believer in hot water so i mean hot water jump roping some rows you know really the only thing i do i mean sometimes i'll get my curls on for you know to look good what about any other leg work you guys

ever do any lunges of any type or step ups or anything like that any single leg work pistols no crossfitters would do no any of that no we you know coach got us on something where we did uh jerk ladders there's a video out there on youtube um if you type in john north the jerk ladder which is one of the hard besides doing that grace workout was definitely one of the hardest things that were done and you keep the weight over your head in the jerk and then you basically um lunge into the jerk and you just go down a full ladder and it's very hard you the the leg that you bring forward is always the the leg you jerk with so you don't alternate legs yeah um we used to do a lot of those but besides that no so there's glimpses

there's glimpses especially when we're far out from a meet there's glimpses. There's glimpses, especially when we're far out from a meet. There's glimpses of funky stuff we do like that. We'll get doing some funky stuff. No one knows what they do or what they are, but we do them. It doesn't last long, and then we're back to the platform. But we never leave the platform, ever. Ever. So I don't know i mean to be honest with you you know if if i i'm not anti any of it i just i'm never been really around a lot of that kind of stuff i mean i come from a really big bulgarian

background i mean i've trained with bulgarians for many years and you know if anybody knows about weightlifting bulgarians believe in two things in life, snatch, clean and jerk. And then I met Coach, and he has a lot of Bulgarian tendencies as well. So I always wonder, though. I sit in bed some nights and think, what happens if I was on this kind of program? I mean, I was on a percentage program, like I said. We did a lot of other exercises. I was training like two to three times a week, but it was so early in my career.

You know, I was so young and weightlifting that I don't know what it really did. I wonder if I was on a program like that now. Honestly, I mean, would that help me or would it not help me? I don't know. That's the thing. I'm not a program coach. That's the first thing I say when I do a seminar. This is a seminar and a question a q a a question and answer seminar and a in a in a let's lift and max out seminar and have fun seminar uh but as far as programming goes i can i can answer as best as i can but it's

just not my specialty and i that's one thing i pride myself in is saying i don't know a lot of people don't pride themselves in that. Yeah. Do you train typically twice a day, morning, afternoon? Yeah, we train two to three times a day. Leading up to this meet, we trained three times a day for quite a while. So our training sessions will go anywhere from like two to three hours. So you're training two to three times a day, and each session is two to three hours.

Yeah, each session. We're training like to three times a day, and each session is two to three hours. Yeah, each session. We're training like six hours a day plus. Yeah, Tuesdays and Thursdays we'll have one training session only. They only last a few hours, which is really good, and then we get to go home. And then Sundays are off, like I said, which is great. Well, sometimes we have to train on Sundays. You're a professional athlete. I mean, this is something other people just couldn't do.

But you dedicate all your time to this? One of the hardest things I've had to learn in weightlifting is learning how to train. That's the hardest thing, is learning how to push my body to adapt to this type of training. Because, you know, before I started training like this, I came from a three-day-a-week, one-hour percentage-style program, which was great. But teaching my body to lift like this is probably one of the hardest things I had to overcome besides becoming sober. How's that been on your body joint-wise, injury-wise, recovery-wise? Can we take a break? I'm only bringing this up because I'm concerned that YouTube is going to screw up our video on YouTube.

They're not going to hear music. Yeah, it's been playing the whole damn time. Actually, it's so funny because the band that's playing right now, I just bought their album a few weeks. What, Mumford & Sons or something? Yeah, they're great. They won an Academy Award. I can hear them. I think a local radio station is playing in the background.

Like, yo, Brett, I don't hear it. I think it's... Hey, guys, this is Rich Vroning, and you're listening to Barbell Shrugged. For the video version, go to fitter.tv. All right, we're back. We still have annoying music in our headphones, but you can't hear it at home. And that's all right. Doug, you were going to get to a point, but you don't remember?

I have no idea what I was about to say, actually. I bet we could just let John talk, and he could come up with something to say. He has been a good guest. He's very talkative. Very energetic. I feel like I'm too talkative. Very talkative. See, after the show, I'm going to sit in my empty hotel room and beat myself up for talking too much.

That's the introvert. That makes you an introvert. Honestly, man. It's a big problem in my life, to be honest. It's bad,vert that makes you an introvert honestly man it's a big problem in my life to be honest it's bad do you do that a lot i mean i do that a lot like i i'll go out and i'll be at a party or something like that or i'll give a speech or a talk or you know like oh i can't believe i said that thing and then like for a week it'll bother me and there's like there's been some things that like

bother me for years do you have that oh yeah every day that's what i like about listening that's why i like listening to the joe rogan show really to get back on that yeah just because it reminds me it's like hey just be you you know if you talk too much you're going on a rant too long or you might say something controversial that'll offend some people you know i beat myself up and i second guess myself a lot but then i think wait a minute you know this makes me me this is me and uh i got a lot of support and support out there with the dark orchestra and stuff so just keep going and uh that's another reason why i like the show yeah i don't feel like joe has those thoughts. I feel like Joe just speaks his mind and he doesn't think about it afterward.

Like, I shouldn't have said that. Yeah, I'm trying to work on it. I wish I could. It's like social drinking. It's hard. You're trying not to worry about the things you say more? Or are you just trying not to say regrettable things as often? No, not necessarily regrettable things.

Just, you know, I don't know what it is. It's just crazy. Yeah. I mean, you obviously talk more than most people do, as do I. And that's probably why we do podcasts. We're like, oh, I feel like I've got stuff to say. And then you look back sometimes and you're like, oh, you know, maybe I shouldn't have said that one thing.

It's not, and a lot of times it's like, that's really how I feel, but you start wondering about who you may have offended or whatever. Yeah, that's the hard part. God, I got so much to say. That's the problem, though. It's just there's so much shit in my head

I want to just yell on top of them out and about constantly, you know, that I want to share with people. You know, I really do. I want to share my failures. I want to share with people. You know, I really do. I want to share my failures. I want to share my successes. I want to share my experiences and what I've been through and stuff. And, you know, but then sometimes there's something on my right shoulder that's saying like, yeah, you know, you went too far, John. You know, you're being too personal. You're

opening up too much. You're, you know, why are you writing blogs about, you know too far, John. You're being too personal. You're opening up too much. Why are you writing blogs about meth and your issues with your dad? Why are you on Barbell Shrug talking about Vicodin and stuff like that? Stuff I'll probably lay in the bed tonight looking at the ceiling regretting. Not regretting, but going over. That's why I don't smoke weed. It's like, gosh, it's something I'm working on, to be honest. I think everyone's going to really appreciate your honesty, though.

I feel like people are going to listen to this, and they're going to really go, hey, you know what? I feel the same way. I've done the same things. You've become very accomplished, and you've also had some weird things in your past, and you've been weird. You've had some heavy stuff in your past and you being weird um you've been had some heavy stuff in your past and i think you know being very honest about that is going to

do a lot of people a lot of favors well and that's you know that's why i get so jacked up in meets and in training and people think a lot of some people think it's like a show uh you know why does he do that you know he's he's arrogant's cocky. He's an asshole. But what people don't realize is that I have to do that. If I don't do that, I'll start thinking. The barbell will get in my head. I'll start thinking about my dad. I'll start thinking about how good vodka would taste right now.

I'll start thinking about the pressure of the success I've already had and about letting people down. And all these things go through my head if I'm calm. When I'm calm and quiet, bad things happen. So when I slam bars and yell out Arnold and yell out Shankle and get hyped up and get the crowd onto it, it gives me a certain high that elevates me to lift big weight and not to think about, not to think really, just to lift, just to react, just to go on stage and just get the crowd into it and just react, not to think at all. And that's taken six years to learn. You know, I've bombed out at more meets than I've won. Everybody I've beat in the sport I've lost to. And the reason for the bomb outs and the losing, I don't personally think is my athletic ability, but it's my head. I've tried to go into meets and be calm because people's hate mail got to me, so I said maybe

I should try it, and it's just a disaster. It's kind of funny. I actually, it's pretty much like I live in my own jail cell. I'm a prisoner of John North, to be honest with you, because there are times where I wish I was calm and I wish I could just be relaxed and chill, but I just can't. I gotta just go crazy all the time. So you do those big celebrations in training too, not just on stage during the meet? Yeah, I do those all the time, almost. You know, there's some days where I get in this weird zone. See, I have three different methods to lifting weights.

A is get really jacked up and be excited and energetic. B, mad. Mad lifting. Like American Open when I won gold a few months ago i was mad were you mad the entire time or you got angry i was mad the entire time because this guy from another country thought he could come in and talk shit and beat me and i put him in his place hard so i had to let i had to let him know this is the USA. Hell yeah. And I took one for the fucking team. And I wanted to fight.

And then the third is just this weird zone that Donnie Shankle taught me where I just don't say or like almost a mummy. And I get this weird thing in training. I don't really do it in the meet just because the crowd just like breaks me out of it. You know, like in the back room I'll get like this. But right when I start to walk up on stage, I just lose it. crowd just like breaks me out of it i you know like in the back room i'll get like this but right when i start to walk up on stage i just lose it but i just weird feeling of just like no emotion no talking i'm not mad but i'm not excited i'm just focused i might sound corny i'm just focused that only works in training though because the crowd snaps me out of it but what do you think

is the most beneficial way of training and then obviously i mean we know what happens yeah finding a middle ground because there's it's a double-edged sword when i get too jacked up i lose my breath i get tired and the third attempt is heavy because i'm you know right i'm a little winded uh you know i try not to expand too much energy expend too much energy so finding that middle ground is so difficult. Have I found it? No, I haven't found it yet. I'm always working on it. I don't think it's something that any athlete will find. Well, if you win gold in the Olympics, you found it. If you, if you win the Superbowl and football, you found it, you know, but I haven't found it yet. I got to work on it. You know, what is the perfect way to do it? I want to get jacked up, but at the

same time, I can't be too calm. So it's really that middle ground that's so difficult to find. I've gotten into it a few times where I get in this weird zone where everything's perfect, but it's hard to get back. It's like technique. You know how to lift weights. You have good technique, but no matter who you are and how efficient you are, you sometimes get out of the rhythm. You sometimes just lose it and you gotta like what the hell's going on here it doesn't feel right yeah it's just like the mental aspect of going into a meet you ever heard the book flow no i like the movie hustle and flow though terrence howard's one of my favorite actors

well what's tangent number 49 what's flow it's a book uh flow is a book written by a psychologist it's just about finding the zone yeah so oh wow i should i i want to do they have it on tape book on tape probably it's a it's a really old book yeah is it chicks and me high me hi me hi chicks my high i can't say it i gotta check it out i do the books on tape i don't even know where he's from. I have trouble reading, to be honest. Yeah, I do a lot of audio books. Yeah, I do audio books.

There's certain types of books I really like to read, and then there's other books I really like to listen to. A lot of times there are books that, you know, they're good one and not the other, you know. You can't read them or you can't listen to them. But, you know, they're great the other way around. Yeah. I like audio books as a screening process

for reading the real book. It's like I'm audiobooking it in two days and then I know if I actually want to spend however many, I don't know, six weeks reading a book. I don't get much time to sit down and read. You guys watch a lot of movies? What's your favorite movie? Fuck, I never watch movies.

Oh. No. Dog. I don't, man, I don't. We got to have a bromance date and What's your favorite movie? Fuck, I never watch movies. Oh. No. Dog. I don't, man. I don't. We got to have a bromance date and go out to a movie. Yeah. House on Flo.

DVD player right behind those doors. The last three times I was at the movies, you were with me. What movie did you see? What did we see last? We saw Winston 10. 10? Ted was funny. Ted was funny.

Ted was pretty funny. Yeah, I did see Django Unchained. That shit was good. We saw that the other day. That was good. Ted was funny. Ted was pretty funny. Yeah, I did see Django Unchained. That shit was good. We saw that the other day. That was good. That was great. I was mad it didn't win the Academy Award. We saw Argo.

I thought Argo was a good movie. I really did, but the Academy Award, come on now, bro. Get off me. I never saw it. I don't see movies in the theater very often. Maybe twice a year. That's the only time I watch movies. Watching at home, no way.

The hard thing about the theater is the people eat popcorn loud and they sit behind you and they open the candy. You eat candy? When I go to a theater, I go hard in the paint. I'm talking popcorn, Twizzlers, we're talking Skittles. I wish they still did Red Vines. I'm old school.

We call it pop out in Oregon. California people call it soda. You guys call it pop? No. I grew up in Oregon, Washington. You call it pop? I called it pop out in oregon you know california people call it weirdos you guys call it pop no i grew up in oregon washington so yeah you call it pop i called it pop growing up you called soda you're you're no actually uh when i lived in arizona i think we called it pop i'm trying to remember i think so and then when i moved to the south everyone called it coke and we made fun of them for it coke and then now i i call it coke out out and donnie shingle out in louisiana they call it cold drink. Oh, for real?

Cold drink. Give me some of that cold drink. What's up with Donnie Shangle? Where's he been? Donnie Shangle rips heads off lions. Donnie Shangle made me a man, I'm not going to lie. Yeah. Dead honest with you.

Donnie Shangle was my first coach at Cal Strength. He had me squatting 13 times a day. Snatching, cleaning, jerking like nine times a day broke me down i didn't get strong he just broke me down he would always say i want to break you down to build you up well he broke me down physically but he never built me up i'll tell you what he did build i'll tell you what he did build me up in though and that's the mental aspect yeah best thing that ever happened to me was that one month of donnie yeah nine times a day what does that mean snatched and clean jerk to max they go go take a 20 minute nap eat do it again just all day smoke a cigarette drink some coffee have a beer

yeah i was a troubled kid before donnie and he snapped me and you know he he slapped me in the face he would he would tell me to get the fuck out of his gym get out get out if you can't handle i don't want you here you don't want to be a champion you don't want to be a national champion you don't want that title you know so i stuck with him i said i do want the title because at that time i was a college dropout i had nothing i was flipping burgers you know i was living homeless i lived homeless for about six months in my car so i said look this is it this is all i got i gotta do i want to win the national title so four years later i did so what do you I know you don't talk about nutrition too much on your podcast and we do on occasion and crossers

are super big into the paleo model eating clean all the time you know for for getting strong and being a weightlifter what do you guys recommend or do you just say fuck it just eat whatever you want uh it you know I think that in the weightlifting world it's you know every athlete's different i i'm on the everything diet i eat anything you know i actually don't like eating i'm the exact opposite of somebody that is trying to lose weight i always say the day that i retire from the sport of weightlifting is the day i'm gonna weigh 100 pounds because every time i eat it's because i have to. I'm not hungry. There's only a few times in the month where I actually eat when I'm hungry,

and I can't eat that healthy because I lose so much weight. Coach takes me to the pizza buffet every Sunday or every Saturday if I'm low on weight and just has me eat literally until I throw up. It's no joke. I don't enjoy it. I wish I could be paleo. I really do. I wish I could eat healthy, but I just can't. My numbers go way down.

I get weak. And for the amount of training that I do, the amount of one rep max training I do, that's the thing that I can get away with that. Unlike CrossFit. If I ate like this in CrossFit, it would be a disaster. But the amount of one rep max lifting I do, I have to eat the way that I do, and especially for recovery. And, I mean, look, I eat. It's not like I eat bad.

I have a very weird outlook on food. I have no scientific backing on it. I mean, I eat a lot of red meat. I mean, I eat healthy, I guess. But I think sugar is great for athletes. I think fat and calories is a must to a certain extent obviously caffeine is good for you um i think i'm just i guess i'm just a big believer in everything in moderation i eat a lot of candy i eat a lot of cheesecake i love that

well i feel like in moderation I ate a lot of candy. I know. That didn't make any sense. I feel that having a well-balanced, maybe not well, but a balanced diet is important. Like if you're going to eat a Snickers bar, eat a piece of meat. Right. If you're going to eat a slice of pizza, have some fruit. Have like a big grapefruit eater.

Have some grapefruit. If you're going to have three slices of cheesecake for dessert, you know, you better eat a really nutritious meal. Don't just have a shitty meal and then eat cheesecake. So I try to do my best on balancing getting my sugar, getting my calories, getting my carbs or fat or whatever with healthier meals. So I don't have any scientific backing. I'm probably completely wrong. You guys are the pros. When I do retire from the sport, I'm going to eat clean because when I have, well, first of all, when I have kids, I'm going to quit smoking. Okay. That's a goal of mine. Not a goal. I will do it. And I'm going to eat clean, you know, because I want my kids to eat clean. And because I don't need to not eat clean because

I'm not an athlete anymore. So think that athletes are are different human beings than regular as i call them civilians and that goes for everything including diet now i could be totally wrong guys you're the pros this is totally just my opinion and what works for me so for all the listeners out there don't listen to what i'm saying yeah i think a lot of times for for athletes who are the best in their field where the do the you know you're not the best because of your nutrition you know you're the best because of all these other things that you're doing and you're in your drive and all this kind of stuff and uh sometimes when i look at someone like michael phelps and they talk about what he ate, I'm like, well, or what he eats.

I'm like, well, maybe if he ate this other stuff he could do even a little better. You know what I mean? But the athlete who wins gold, like why would they change anything? You know what I mean? Well, let me tell you something. Why fix something that ain't broke? I pride myself to be open-minded, and I've actually thought about getting a nutritionist coach.

I want to do better with food. And I think that if I ate better and ate more smart, not even necessarily a.k.a. healthy, whatever that means, but just better, that I could be a better athlete. So I'm not going to sit here and say, oh, I got it nailed. Because guess what? I haven't won the pan ams i haven't won worlds and i haven't brought home the united states a gold medal yet so obviously i can that's something you're looking to do in 16 change my diet no to go to the olympics yes absolutely i'll die trying you're on you're on track for that right now yeah i, I'm on the Pan Am team right now,

and then I'll get my ass on the world team this year. You know, I look at the Olympics different than some. I mean, is it my number one goal? No. The Olympics is not my number one goal. My number one goal is to represent my country. And if that is a national meet here in the States, then good. If that is Pan Ams, then I'm representing my country.

I got USA on my sling. With the world championships, I'm representing my country. When I go to a seminar overseas, I'm representing my country. And obviously the Olympics, you're representing your country. So of course it's like right there. It's my one and number two biggest goal. But it's not just the Olympics. People always talk the Olympics, the Olympics, the Olympics, the Olympics, you're representing your country. So of course, it's like right there. It's my one and number two biggest goal. But it's not just the Olympics. People always talk the Olympics, the Olympics, the Olympics, the Olympics, the Olympics. What about Pan Ams? What about worlds?

What about meets here in the United States? What about the Khalid? What about junior worlds? The juniors? What about Matt? What about the Masters division? What about our 60 year old guys and weightlifting? They're going to the Masters Pan Ams and representing this great country. No one gives them crap for attention because everybody wants to talk about the damn Olympics and how we're going to do better in the Olympics. Well, that's a great discussion. Well, how about we freaking give credit to our Master Lifters and our Junior Lifters and our Collegiate Lifters that are putting USA on their chest and representing this great country? You know what I mean?

Nobody wants to talk about that. It's all, let's prepare. Not even, that's the crazy thing. Let's not even prepare for 16. Let's prepare. Let's talk. Let's think about 220. Let's think about 224.

Let's get these eight year olds and prepare them, which is great. But how about now as well? Let's talk about right now. Ever since I got in the sport of weightlifting, six and a half years ago, all I've ever heard is the future. That's all I've ever heard is three years from now, four years from now, six years from now, two years from now. Never right now.

What about the athlete? What about the 26, 27-year-old athletes right now, like Phil Sabatini and et cetera, that are lifting? Well, he's retired now. that's probably a bad thing but you know some some guys that were like you know my age right yeah that are putting themselves out there and trying you know represent the country let's let's talk about right now i guess i'm getting on a rant right now but let's talk about right now so what is the biggest thing we could do right now but that's a good question to answer your question yes he's like i have no fucking idea no i don't know the olympics yes of course i'm

gonna die trying i'm gonna die trying i'm gonna die trying i guess my overall point was is that i just i guess world championships the pan ams the olympics in my opinion all kind of wrap up and just the same home run so someone would think if you are the number one weightlifter in your weight class then you would just be automatically going to the olympics but how does that work how does how do you actually get to well actually i'll tell you right now right now i'm not number one are you not i was number one the past three four months but ian wilson my competitor the 94 kilo lifter yeah actually beat me by a kilo at junior nationals a few weeks ago i totaled 348 in americans and

he went to junior nationals and totaled 349 so i'm actually the number two weightlifter in the country number 294 doesn't sit well that's why tomorrow i'm gonna go smoke them what are you gonna tell tomorrow but you're oh well 350 i'm a big believer in winning i'm not a big believer in um other any other goal than that do i want the american snatch record yes do i want to total 360 yes but i'll tell you one thing i want to do more than anything and that's win and if it's by a half kilo a kilo or whatever i'll take it um that's something most people have never really thought about is how to kind of structure and call out your weights to, you know, they're calling out a weight and then you're calling out a weight and then you're changing your weights. And, like, how does that whole game work in the back there when you're trying to figure out how to get a half kilo above somebody?

Well, to answer your first question that has the same thing to do with that is that just because you're the number 194 in your weight class doesn't mean you're going to the Olympics. Now, let's say this was Olympic year and I was the number one overall. Then that's what it's all about is the overall. It's all done on like a St. Clair format. Explain what that is for people that don't know. So just because, like let's say there's a 69-kilo lifter, a guy that's three weight classes below me. Obviously, I'm lifting more weight than him because I'm a heavier competitor, but for what he's lifting in his weight class is better than me.

Let's put, you know, as an example. So he would obviously go and I wouldn't, we got to send our best athlete. It's not about how much you can lift. It's about how good you are in your individual weight class. So it's all done on the St.

Clair formula. A lot of the St. Clair formula. A lot of the St. Clair formula stuff is really complicated, and it's a little over my head. And I think it's complicated for a lot of people, actually, to kind of exactly figure it out. I mean, to figure out the ranking system and who's ahead of who and who's going to make this team, you see coaches, like, with calculators. Yeah, the actual formula is extremely complicated. It's extremely complicated it really

is that's why as an athlete you got to just go lift you got to react yeah and the second question was uh oh yeah in the back room and that's where a good coach comes in like mike's been doing all weekend is counting attempts setting up the athlete and competition to win and it's a chess game because you're right they're playing it's a it's a mind fuck in the back room man so what's that process look like everyone calls their their first lift yeah right and then then people start playing games and start well everybody puts their first attempt in the snatch on paper on a on a table in the back room so the the the judges in the weightlifting meet knows the order, but you have three attempts to change each attempt you put on the card. So just because I'm opening up at 150 in the snatch doesn't mean I am and doesn't mean my competitor is opening up at 154.

You get at the last minute, change it. And if he changes it, guess what? I'm going to change it because I want to open up a kilo more than him. Or if I see he's going to make a big jump and open up too high in our opinion, I'll stay where I'm at. Make him miss his opener, hit my opener, go up on my second, make it. Then he just ends up on a second attempt with it. And then all of a sudden now he's got to be forced to make one lift and win on the third so opening high or opening too low i mean it's just at the level that i'm competing at it's all about other competitors it's not about yourself anymore like yes it's great to get prs but at the same it's it's more

about winning and what my competitors are doing honestly if i had a competitor come in here tomorrow and hit 40-70, I'd go 41-71. I don't do it for myself anymore. I do it to win. And I do it to win to make national teams to represent my country because that's all it's about. At this point, I don't care what's on the bar. How does that play into your warm-up sets, knowing there's going to be a bunch of changes and stuff? How do you do your warm-up, getting ready to go out for your first attempt it's all coach it's all coach i wish he was here to talk about it um and it's something i'm learning every day is to be a

competition and a program coach every day i'm learning every day i have questions because when i retire from the sport that's what i want to do but i'm not going to sit on this mic and act like i know it all now technique i technique, I go all day. I'm the best technician in the world. But this is something I've got to learn. But, you know, you warm up just like you do in practice. You take the same jumps, pop, pop, pop, that you're used to. Because that's what weightlifting is, is adapting.

Unlike CrossFit where it's like you've got to be ready for anything. So you just adapt. You just do what your body knows best. You get to that you know around that opener and then you just ask coach you know are we going to go up are we staying here and look sometimes you've got to do things for the opener that move around a little bit because the competitors that get you out of your comfort zone and that's why i'm a big believer in when you train, don't mix it up. When you're resting, sometimes only rest for 30 seconds. Sometimes rest for five minutes between sets.

Sit somewhere else. Listen to music you don't like to listen to. Force yourself to pull on the bar faster than other times. I mean, yes, the sport is about adapting, but at the same time you got to prepare to get a curveball thrown at you and if you're if you're a good competitor you'll know how to adapt to that so she's like to sit and relax in between attempts yeah always sit always rest the legs if you know let the heartbeat slow down rest the legs and get ready for your next one so you

know the weightlifters bench is what they call it. You know, but I know lifters that don't sit. But, you know, it's very rare. Very rare. All right. Yeah. I'm going to shut it down with that. Yeah, let's wrap this up.

Want some good content? Yeah, for sure. I think all of our listeners have got a lot of things to ponder and practice and try and probably go to your website. I'm going to let Doug go first. That way you can kind of get your thoughts together, which I don't think are going to be a problem. But, Doug, go ahead with your plugs. Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and plug Simple Strength for our good friend Chris Moore, who unfortunately isn't here right now.

So Chris has put a very cool video up on the Simple Strength product page where he talks about how to warm up for a 1RM attempt, kind of like we were just talking about, you know, how to do your warm-up sets, you know, how to kind of mentally prepare for a big heavy set. So that's a new bonus that's a part of the Simple Strength product. So if you're interested in Simple Strength and learn how to get stronger and how to approach your 1RM max attempts, you can go to barbershark., click on the shop, and click on seminars, and the name of the product is Simple Strength. John, what do you got? I'll go to my website, theattitudenation.com, and sign up for a seminar near you.

We're all over. Buy some cool product. And check out my blog, The Dark Orchestra, johnnorth.blogspot.com. Follow me on Twitter at Attitude Nation. And save the whales and love life. All right. Yeah, we tweet back and forth a decent amount, so you should have no problem finding John. Sign up on my YouTube channel.

Subscribe to John's YouTube channel. Subscribe to my YouTube channel at Attitude Nation. You got a fan page? I'm trying to figure out what else I have. You got a Facebook fan page? I don't do the fan page. You need to do one. I don't know.

I got a personal page. Facebook me at just John North, but I'm about to hit the limit, so I got to switch something up and get a new page. Probably either a business page or a fan. I don't know. Do a fan page for the Attitude Nation. Attitude Nation. I think we do, actually. I don't use it that much. We have a new page. Probably either the business page or a fan, I don't know. Do a fan page for the Attitude Nation. Attitude Nation.

I think we do actually. I don't use it that much. We have a business page. That's what you should do. Just hit me up on John North. J-O-N-O-H. Ask to be his friend. Just be my friend,

you know. But I just want to say thank you guys so much for having me on. I'm a huge fan, like I said earlier. Just thank you. It's an honor to be here.

Shout out to all your fans and just just thanks for listening to me uh ramble on yeah thanks for coming on this has been a great interview uh go to yeah make sure to go check out weightlifting talk yeah we yeah they should be able to find that on itunes and that's mostly you and glenn just going back and forth and arguing about yeah half of it yeah exactly we argue a lot half of it we should you know any weightlifting coaches not arguing with each other something's wrong but half the shows have been with donnie and half with glenn because donnie left for australia um yeah itunes if you go to blogtalkradio.com and type in weightlifting talk you'll find all the episodes we just recently switched to a new program that has better quality. And it's Spreaker.com.

S-P-R-E-A-K-E-R.com. And just type in Weightlifting Talk. We've only done one episode. But we're going to do the next episode, hopefully with you guys, this Sunday live at the Arnold. Excellent. And if we want to go to Spreaker.com or if we want to listen to Weightlifting Talk, we just need to go to speaker.com and then search weightlifting talk. Yeah, just type in weightlifting talk on the search button, and it will pop right up there, and you can just push play.

We're in the process right now. It's a brand-new thing. We're in the process of getting all those on iTunes as well. But we were talking about this before. Look, you can get all these episodes for free. Just let me just mention that. But on our website, we are coming out with a DVD package of all the weightlifting talk episodes out there, all on a nice DVD. You could just purchase right on our site. So for all the people like me that don't want to go out

and buy a burnt CDs and, um, you know, that's bad at technology and doesn't know how to download them. They'll be available in the next few weeks on our website, theattitudenation.com. Excellent. All right, guys, make sure to go to our website, theattitudenation.com. Excellent. All right, guys, make sure to go to barbellshrug.com and sign up for our newsletter. We're going to inform you

of any time we have really cool interviews just like this, any new seminars we put out, new technique wads, any of that kind of stuff. So, hope you enjoyed this segment.

It was fun for us and hopefully we'll do it again. See you next time. Ooh. Man, that was fun. That was a good one.