Massenomics Podcast - Ep. 334: Laura Phelps

Episode Date: August 29, 2022

Is Laura Phelps the greatest female powerlifter of all time? Probably. Is she the greatest equipped powerlifter of all time men or women? Probably. She’s also our guest this week. We talk Westside Barbell, CrossFit, Bob Evans, and reverse hypers! Juggernaut AI: juggernautai.app and use code MASSENOMICS to save 10% The Strength Co: https://www.thestrength.co/ BearFoot Shoes: https://bearfoot.store/ Swiss Link: https://www.swisslink.com and use code MASS to save 15% Spud Inc: https://www.spud-inc-straps.com/ Texas Power Bars: https://www.texaspowerbars.com/

You know, thanks for what you do with your podcasts and all the rest. You're doing a great job. Hope everybody keeps tuning in. You get a lot of good info, a lot of insights, understandings on how to get strong, how to stay strong, how to use your strength. You do a great job, dude. You make things better than they are in real life, I think.

If you don't follow Massanomics, y'all do it. Social media, website, everything. Massanomics! everything massonomics well tommy here we are for the hundredth time hand grenade pins in every line i think i've started with that you have multiple times before when you have a banger you can't let it go some people it's probably been like 100 episodes at this point so who knows uh this is episode 334 of the massonomics podcast lifting podcast about nothing and my name is tanner and my name is tommy it is blue shirt day once again i think we have the classics day today yeah funny thing though no but we've never discussed this but these are so this particular particular, talking about the Lyft shirt that I'm wearing.

That printing? Yeah, this printing. They're far been sold years from now, so we don't have to hide it in order to discourage people from buying them. But this, some people listening might have this exact Lyft shirt too. The difference is hard to notice maybe if you don't know what you're looking for, but if you know what you're looking for, but if you know what you're looking for, the blue print on this particular lift shirt,

it's more of a Royal blue versus a Navy, Navy blue, like the common typical lift shirt, blue print is Navy. This is more Royal. It was a misprint that we had like a few hundred of these, you know, maybe like three,

it's like we can describe it's it's I'm assuming this is how fine watch a misprint that we had like a few hundred of these uh you know maybe like three years ago we can describe it's it's i'm assuming this is how fine watch collectors like rolex people it's like you can tell that watch is from 1980 because of the lighter blue yeah and yeah we carry it over to t-shirts so if you're looking and you're wearing your lift shirt right now and you're looking down and the blueprint is is not navy brighter blue yeah i think that's from when we when we had our first booth at the Arnold, correct? It was. Yeah, I'm pretty sure.

Yep. Amazing. Yeah, I think we had 300 of them even. I think we got a discount on it because we said, hey, this is not right. The color's off. It was funny because we had a different printer at the time, and they had printed that shirt many, many times,

but for whatever reason that time, they decided to use a different blue. We did not sell them at a discount, though. So it was kind of a win-win for us, wasn't it? Because nobody ever said anything about it. I mean, there's nothing wrong with the shirt. No, it's just not. Historically, it didn't match to.

Right. But actually, at that point, we had even gone through a few different printers. And every single printer, the blue was slightly different. Right. That's true, too. So that's a little piece of interesting mass dynamics merchandise history i was just gonna well maybe we should read ads first but i was gonna say man after taking a week off i kind of feel like i don't know what i'm doing right now like i'm on edge i'm looking at my hands is that

is that recording is this recording is the discord working like there's a lot of things going on right now i know that's the mass the Maths and Homics podcast. What happens when you take time off? Well, I have a special announcement, Tanner. Oh, this actually is a special announcement. Special announcement. Yeah. Everyone, listen up.

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Yeah, I think we just unboxed yours on the last episode. Oh, yeah, that one, okay. You know, episode 333. We've had them for a little longer than that and since then we've got to use them a few times and i like them i really do yeah and uh someone asked in the discord is it barefoot or barefoot it's barefoot i guess it would help to it is barefoot like the animal yeah yeah like b-e-a-r oh i actually just forgot i thought before we should pull up that ad

i was going to pull up a youtube clip of a bear making a really good roaring sound like to lead into the background yeah so next time maybe we'll do that we'll get we'll get the effects going but yeah we've both been wearing them i really like them i um they're since we've got them it's the only shoe i've worn in the gym um and we're both coming from long time tr light wearers we are historically, if you've listened to the podcast, I mean, this is where repeatonomics will come into play here. They'll catch us saying probably like four years ago, we said something about how we would never wear any other shoes.

We might. Well, I think it would have until something came along with similar attributes. And I think this fits that. So they have that similar shape the wider toe box which i always liked but now it's a way more uh the super minimal yeah that's weird getting used to right right uh after you wear for wear it for a while they kind of it makes sense though doesn't it i've been um the zero drop heel is probably like the biggest part for me to get used to because I'm used to, because of the way shoes are designed,

that raised heel. Something with a little. Yeah. Like I'm more used to my toes being pretty close to the ground, but it's like the full foot. Yeah. And we're not talking about like wearing lifters, but just every shoe has a little,

the midsole has a bit of an incline to it. Exactly. And I'm really enjoying them and they took like a week and now they feel like more broken yeah and they do so yeah so speaking of i guess we're actually turning this ad into almost our quick review right right uh i would say they fit true to size i wear an 11 in basically everything now yeah nike adidas i wear 11 um i wore 11 in these and to me that's exactly the right size they you might say the toe box is maybe a little tight across the top just the way they're constructed you know it's not a it is a minimal shoe so it doesn't have a

lot of like structure built around it right but i do think that that quickly stretches out breaks into where you don't really notice that anymore so 11 was was the right size and yeah i've i've got to now have like five workouts in them and i have really enjoyed them i think they're quality construction um yeah and they're just they're good in the gym amen sweet uh someone big joey in the discord asks is there a There is not a code, but when you're ordering them, just make some comment that Masonomics sent you if you do get that far. Or just go to their website and tell them Masonomics sent you.

Just harass them and whatever. They respond to their Instagram DMs. Or go to their Instagram posts and just say Masonomics told us to come here. Something like that. They'll like that. And they also, if you didn't catch the episode where we talked about them,

they are our neighbors to the North. Uh, maybe we'll have to do a, go up there sometime and do a little tour. Pretty cool. Yeah. Right. You know,

it's possible we could be headed that way sometime soon here. Actually, we probably will be, won't, won't we? We might have to make it turns into a whole thing. Yeah. That could be cool though.

That's a good idea. Ideas. So once again, uh. Yeah. That could be cool, though. That's a good idea. Ideas. So, once again, thank you to Barefoot Shoes. www.barefoot, B-E-A-R-F-O-O-T, dot shoes to check out what they got going on. Excellent. And then I'm going to read you one more little song here. And this is from our friends at Swiss Link. In 1995, Maurice Bigmo Huffman founded Swiss Link.

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you can find classic military surplus uniforms, a great selection of military issue backpacks, tools, wool blankets, NATO fuel cans, gas masks, emergency food selection of military issue backpacks, tools, wool blankets, NATO fuel cans, gas masks, emergency food, first aid kits, survival packs, camping gear, and so much more. Swiss Link's unrivaled collection and dedication to quality customer service sets them apart from the rest. Treat yourself to the real thing with authentic military surplus and save 15% off your first order from Swisslink.com with the code mass at checkout that's m-a-s-s to save 15 thank you swisslink and you can check them out online at swisslink.com all right we do have a uh can sack segment to get to well i think we'll split that up because the

part of the sack is that would take us all the way up to our guest think we'll split that up because the part of the sack is, that would take us all the way up to our guest if we get into that now. Okay, okay. But maybe we want to do the can part of it. Okay, we can do that. So we can get into that. But first, you did have pretty exciting news this week, right?

Your bench press went pretty well. Actually, it's been a great week for a lot of that. We made that same joke when i had my first daughter like four or five years ago on the podcast that uh it might be really funny to look that up and find that one uh because we probably cracked yeah yes yes just some things never get old right yeah so on top of having just some great training with juggernaut which i i do want to talk about that we'll talk about it for the ad yeah we will but oh man juggernaut just working wonders but um yep i had a baby and by i had a baby i mean my wife had a baby but we now uh have two children

in our house yeah double double trouble uh no we have a healthy little baby girl and yeah life's good man the classic million dollar family are you familiar with that term before just from hearing you say it i i never so i didn't know that until we had our we had a son and when we had the girl someone said that and i remember having to google it i'm like what does that mean and that's what uh husband and wife with a boy and a girl. I guess. It's a million-dollar family. I never cared either way if we had boys or girls,

if we had all girls, all boys, whatever. And now we have one of each, and it's pretty cool. Girls are different than boys. There's been a little bit of learning process involved. I have noticed. There's been a few things I've picked up on over the years. Just a few, not many. But yeah, everyone's healthy. Everyone's doing good.

And Bernie's adjusting. The dog loves her. He wants to be right by her. He would not stop licking her. So we got to almost like get him away, which is weird because he doesn't lick us, but the baby, he just wants to lick the baby it's like he's the mother and this is one of his puppies or something yeah um and because long-time listeners would be are well aware of bernie from

over the years and would be concerned if bernie wasn't adjusting what you know yeah i mean he is protective of the house but it's only when you're around yeah i wonder he barks at me a little less than he used to a little less not i think not a lot there wasn't there one day he didn't kind of yeah there was like a two or three week stretch in there where you'd walk in the house and go like one bark and then he's done and that was it yeah i don't have time for anymore yeah and i don't now he's back to barking a fair amount okay so we're gonna do the can segment um this is should i not look here yeah don't look at the can you can just close your eyes uh i think we've had it before but you can still go through the guessing process because i

believe it's been a little while and this is a fan submission uh fun story about this this was not a mailed in fan submission like we so often hand delivered a hand delivered fan submission which we can talk a little bit more about that right maybe we'll try this can first i'm picking up sense of fruit here i'm picking up one of these massonomics koozies ah I know what this flavor it's cherry something right

it's got to be cherry something are you saying cherry of some sort cherry of some sort is there something else there it has to be cherry right cherry can i look yep cranberry lime yeah okay and i think the cranberry does taste a lot like cherry yeah it's like i was gonna say cherry lime but i know as far as i know there's no cherry limes but cranberry lime there we go so this was uh hand delivered by discord crew supporting member big alex big alex was making a little cross-country

voyage and he uh stopped at massonomics along the way i was pretty jealous so you didn't you didn't bug me rightfully so yeah because i had stuff going on yeah yes but i was pretty jealous when i saw that you had the picture posted with him and it said big alex and i'm just thinking is that big alex from the discord or some other big alex yeah but it was big alex from the discord and yeah i was i was jealous it was big alex we uh he he came to the gym um i was outside when he pulled up and i got there just before him and came and hung out at the gym for maybe an hour, hour and a half, something like that. We talked to a masonomics shop, old masonomics, new masonomics, grilled me on some of the insider masonomics info

that you only get to know if you make the trip to western, northeast, south Dakota. And there is that maybe even in person. Yeah, in person. If you get to meet in person you do get some inside yeah scoops on things yes yes so to spill the beans you know it's been been been said before that uh big eddie knows the story of the one member of mass dynamics gym that ever had to be kicked out big alex now also okay okay so see wasn't going to bring it up because I didn't know if, I didn't want him to maybe feel left out.

No, he also knows the story now too. So, all right, the legend's growing. I also let him in on the one, details on the one massonomic supplement that never was, that we've never really fully talked about. So just more incentive reasons to make the trip. For people to show up. To make the trip.

Yeah. It was a lot of fun, though, actually. It's always great when we have people that have been listening for years. You know, he knows the full back catalog. And really get what we're doing. Right, right. So it was a lot of fun.

So before you even said that, or before I even saw the picture that Big Alex was in the gym, I was going through Discord one day and I saw something I had to screenshot. And it actually happened to be from Big Alex. Okay. And I thought this was really good.

He wrote, so it was a funny coincidence that I screenshotted this. And I think it was maybe hours later I saw that picture so he had a something in there and he said want to talk about real jobs and responsibilities nah want to listen to a banker and a graphic designer talk about fizzy water and googling shit on their phones and it's the uh thing from rick and marty like yeah yep and man if that isn't like uh yeah what is it a banker and a graphic designer talking about fizzy water and googling things like if that's a that's honestly probably a better way to describe this podcast then yeah it's two guys talking about lifting like that is

that is a for sure more accurate description than two guys talking about lifting that's true we always describe it like two guys talk you were just on the barbend podcast this week you got to make a repeat appearance there and like always uh something like whenever either of us are in any podcast or something like that it's like describing what it is we do and stuff and that might be a better better description yeah but i think people might also get the wrong idea when they when they think banker and graphic designer. Yeah, yeah. We're not talking about.

Probably think a guy in like a suit. Yeah. Like this really uptight guy in a suit. And then, I don't know, maybe some scrawny artist guy. Yeah. And also they kind of get that wrong. That one doesn't paint the best picture either there. No, no, it doesn't.

It's a cross between those two things, I guess. But for anyone that hasn't listened to that episode of the bar bend podcast, check it out. It's their most recent episode as of right now, at least I can't remember what the title of it was, but it's probably got your name in the title, right? Uh,

yeah, I think it said our lifters fun year or something like that. And there was a lot of good massonomics talk in there. A lot of massonomics talk. Yeah. I just gotta, I gotta assume when people listen to that episode that our regular listens, listeners of that show to be like,

what's the deal with this episode? The intro is even, we talked to the world's finest strength and conditioning coaches. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like to get you deeper knowledge. And then all of a sudden,

also mass and all of a sudden they're talking to me. It's like, man, that intro was not set up correctly for this, for this interview. Oh, they also did talking to me. It's like, man, that intro was not set up correctly for this interview. Oh, they also did say DeFee. Oh, did they? Well, he asked me to say my last name like three times.

Yeah. And I kept saying it. And he's like, oh, okay. I don't remember him saying it wrong the first time you were on there. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah. But that happens. I probably said so many names wrong.

I couldn't even keep count. I don't really care. But it was, I would just say again, it was really fun to have Big Alex there. And there is something else from him that we'll get to later. All right. It'll be quite interesting.

There's a lot of stuff that's gone on in the amount of time here that I did think maybe we should just touch on the shock classic quick since that uh that is kind of i mean it's already happened at this point you know it's it's kind of well in the past but there's just some noteworthy stuff there is about it i think and uh trey mitchell did win obviously friend of the podcast he's been on before other noticeable notable friends of the podcast big bobby thompson was in there he withdrew because of an injury and like halfway through but

trey won he beat brian it came down to the stones the very final stone run those two head-to-head whoever won was going to win the show trey beat him hooper mitchell got third alexei novikov fourth and on down the line luke stoltman withdrew. Jerry Pritchett couldn't do very many of the events. Zajurnas Vikas was 10th. And one of the marquee events, one of the marquee events for that competition this year was this leg press with a car on top of it. Yes, yeah, I did see.

That they'd been talking about. And it was very new. That they'd been talking about. And it was very new. Nobody's ever done it before. And from what I know and saw, it did not go well. Okay, I was very curious how the rules are enforced on that one at all. It didn't play out well. Okay.

Like there was a lot of people that, a lot of competitors that I don't think. Because that was the immediate first thing that I saw when I watched that. And I'm thinking, how the hell did they count this not just for one person but then consistently across the board for anyway because leg press is notorious yeah and there was supposed to be rules about like their back not leaving and stuff and i think it was really difficult to judge and the athletes weren't happy about it and it was really heavy and i don't know really a lot of the specific details but i just kind of know in summary that it probably didn't go that well. But maybe they could do it again and fine-tune, learn from what they missed on.

And then conspiracy theory. Shaw and Trey. Trey won two years in a row, and I think Shaw got second two years in a row now. It would look like the first year shaw won it was a much smaller deal it's grown this competition's grown a lot in the three years and it's kind of the heaviest show now is it really yeah everything's real i mean more than the arnold you could probably say either one's the heaviest show but they're like kind of the same but um it's always

events that brian shaw is good at like it's all the events that he's good at and i'm not even blaming you know i'm not yeah not saying anything there like so be it like i mean i've kind of of course it is you know like why is he gonna pick the yeah it's like super heavy yoke super heavy farmer's carry out log heavy log press a heavy hummer tire deadlift in particular you know like um circus dumbbell which he's been good at many years but that leg press like he's a guy that's always trained leg press and heavy leg press but that's not the conspiracy theory i think now that this event is getting prestigious and is one of the top

five three four whatever you want to say strongman events in the world I think now that this event is getting prestigious and is one of the top five, three, four, whatever you want to say, strongman events in the world, it would maybe look bad if he's getting first. Yeah, that's what, yeah. But it doesn't look too bad if he's getting second. So when it comes down to him and Trey on the stones at the end,

my theory is he might not, he's no dummy. I can't win this. Yeah, like I bet, I very well could picture him doing that and and trey may have just beat him anyways uh-huh but i bet there's a thought in shaw's mind that he's like i am going to get sacked i am not going to beat him on this because it yeah and it is a weird thing because of how big it is with sponsor money and all that right because he like

gives if he wins he gives his money to the other people and stuff you know yeah yeah and like he's the one putting up a lot of the money to begin with but there's still like it's a big event like there's a lot of stuff in yeah they have sponsors though don't they yeah but like a lot of i think shaw himself like the majority yeah i do think so sean then the people like the live stream sales and the you know the tick actual ticket sales because there's a bunch of people there there was actually like ticket revenue so i don't know how much they got from other like maybe like rogue and a couple of big ones but i think he as he's they're selling more tickets and so my point it's not necessarily bad even if he was doing that i get it yeah because he really is trying to get the athletes more money

like as more live stream sales are coming in he's increasing the winnings okay like as that happens yeah that's cool that's cool yeah um but couldn't you see would that not be a wouldn't be a crazy thought that he is like nah i'm not gonna win it's us two and i could have a shot at this yeah i don't think it's a crazy thought no because he's not a dummy and like it be like yeah second's respectable but like if i win every year like a point or something well also it's like yeah i get like third fourth or fifth that world's strongest man but then i win this competition every year yes yeah yeah like i the other ones i'm just not quite in the running but but here I'm one point away from winning the whole thing. Yeah, it's...

Well, whenever... That's my conspiracy theory. Yeah, but I don't even think it's bad. I'm not even saying that as like a... I mean, I'm just saying that's logical, kind of. I would... It is. And whenever he steps away in, I don't know,

whenever that might happen, five years, 20 in what I don't know whenever that might happen yeah five years 20 years I don't know what that is but one year then I guess he can really and that's why like he can't he has to do it now because him being in it is a big part of what's like absolutely yes he does like his name is such a huge draw right he needs to but like at some point in time no doubt his his goal is that he doesn't need to be competing for it to be a draw but yeah z can't be competitive with him now looked like uh um you know jerry has gone through some stuff and like currently at least he's not competitive in that same way that he used to be uh but some of the younger guys very strong in there so overall i think it was a good contest yeah cool that was my takeaway

from it i think we should do supporting our supporting members though i agree if you're are you still and then we well this might tie into it but we did have some uh some south dakota connections to the shot classic as well that's true this way and you are correct that will tie into it right here um if you're still into supporting our supporting members if that's still a thing you like to do it's a thing i very much okay and for anyone that doesn't know this is a relatively new segment that we do here on the podcast and it's our supporting members those that choose to monetarily support the massomics podcast uh supporting like members like you that make this show possible that can keep us pushing on that

run for 10 years i think we can make it 10 years without ever missing a week we're at like you're really putting you're really drawing a line yeah i think we're at uh six and a half god don't you think we could make it 10 years i mean why ever right right that would be insane though yeah what we need to make that happen is a few more supporting members i know there's at last time i checked i think there was three spots left so if three of you that have been on the fence if you could just choose that can almost guarantee three more years of that we could make it to 10 years of never missing that would really help yeah that inspire me if so just all we're asking we're not asking for every single one of you to sign up just three of you talk amongst yourselves draw straws whatever it takes just three of you sign up to become that's all we're asking three yes that's not

not that much to ask honestly um but we like to give some love back to these people each week so first thing on the list you talked about it big andrew montoya finished 10th in the shaw classic amateur they played out the amateur prior to the pro show and the amateurs were a very strong group of people in there we were lucky we knew a few people in there's a couple south dakota uh thai people one with north dakota's ties but big andrew montoya we've talked about him a few times over the last few weeks he got 10th yeah moving some big weight too yes he is i think he did 800 for three on the deadlift and i mean all the stuff is heavy they did the same stone series that the pros did oh did they yeah wow's impressive yes and uh other south dakota um

trevor big trevor i can't remember what place you get got then big jack from north dakota was in it too um another supporting member big austin turner competed this last weekend he finished eight for nine prs on all the lifts and notably broke the 500 pound deadlift barrier that he's been after. Nice. Congrats, Big Austin. Big Ryan Dozer. He competed in his first ever powerlifting meet and he hit two PRs. Good.

Good stuff. Very good. This one I thought was really, really cool. So big kudos on this one. Big Jeff appeared on local television station WJXT4. It appeared as if he was a speaker on the topic of cost-efficient ways to attend college. Nice. I didn't know what the...

I saw the screenshot in the Discord. I didn't know what the story on it was, but that's really cool. That's all I'm basing that off of. Okay, I don't know if maybe you saw a clip or something nope i just saw the screenshot so uh i didn't i should have actually looked it up actually yeah but uh yeah so check out big jeff on wjxt4 topic cost efficient ways to attend college congratulations big jeff did you say oh i've i've done this you just have to go into the military and sacrifice six years of your life. Yeah, it worked out great for me. Although, just to

get political, it sounds like they're going to forgive $10,000 of student loan debt to people. It does sound like it, yeah. Politics, huh? And was there one? That's all I had on my list but as we were talking there was one more thing I was going to bring up from a supporting member and now I'm forgetting it all right well maybe we should pull up the list of all of them we'll just go through them one by one I'm sure do we have something for you for you for you. So thank you, supporting members.

That's one of the many perks of becoming a supporting member is you can get on this segment. There's discount codes when you log in there. You get to get in our Discord. You can listen and watch the show early every week. And... You get to join this Discord. Yeah.

So sign up. Do it. i just thought of this right now do we have like a minute here yeah yeah i just thought of this right now because i saw big keith mentioned repeatonomics and repeatonomics is always hitting you know they're always firing on all cylinders over there and there's two things actually one was the other day my wife goes what's why am I tagged in this? Like, yeah, yeah,

yeah. She got tagged in. I can't remember what it was. It was in reference to like a wedding dance or something. Yeah. Yeah. And she got tagged in it and she was so confused. And then I was trying to explain it to her and she's like,

nah, I don't need it. She was like, I'm not going to try and follow here. But okay. So that was funny. But then I think, and I might be getting my stories mixed up here

but there someone asked a question about who was the professor and you go maybe repeatonomics can handle this yes and his summary was so funny yeah the professor was a character that appeared in the early days of massonomics um he was known for writing that is like he was a part owner yeah part owner known for writing like long form he was a part owner yeah part owner known for writing like long form content and i mean it was a very accurate yeah and it was like and then he also enjoyed uh like libertarianism and the second amendment and i'm like it's so funny because it's just so dumb but actually kind of accurate that is like about as accurate as you can get in in a condensed version there it's funny i actually hung out with professor sean's

you did this weekend about that too this weekend i we did a little drinking a little bit of drinking uh local county fair was going on i didn't even go to no strongman competition no i still get still got multiple questions this year about what time is the strongman show we haven't done it since 2018 everyone still wonders like what time forget no never forget uh but professor sean's we were sitting around and we actually talked about repeatonomics even and uh he was because he gets a kick out of it because whenever he gets tagged in it and i said yeah some people think it could even be you and he's like no no it's not me and some people think it could be us and it's not us it's not us no uh so we we did even talk about uh repeatonomics with professor sean's very funny

oh oh big keith also want to know who dropped off the cans in my garage uh like three four houses down from me there are two gym members two gym members yes and i think podcast listeners so it's the big wine Meisters. Yes. And they dropped off the can. We did figure it out. You figured out like the day or two later, they sent you a DM asking about it. Yes. And then I did,

I was, uh, what was I doing? Oh, I was riding my bike the other day and I, I saw him outside. He goes two and a half. And I said,

it wasn't good. Did you try it? Yeah. No, he didn't. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. It was terrible. Yeah He said, no, he didn't try it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Yes, it was terrible. Yeah. Mystery was solved, though. Came from the neighbors. Yes. But that was funny. Also, a lot of funny talk about how we just randomly open and drink bottles that get left with cryptic notes. There's a bottle of liquid here, but my name's on it.

So, yeah, I guess I'll drink it. And before we kick the Discord crew off, I wanted to play something for them. Please do. You going yet there? For some reason. This is the strength. Oh, there we go.

Let me start over. This is the strength company. We've set out to build a better barbell plate on American soil. We ended up here at Wisconsin's legendary Wapaka Foundry. With over 60 years of ironworking experience, the foundry had the knowledge, technology, and processes to build our weights to our exact specifications. The Strength Company plates are slim but rugged,

smooth but easy to grip, and electro-coated for durability and to look great in your gym. This is the next generation of American Iron, only available from the Strength Company. Smooth but easy to grip. I also like to picture that segment of people not having the volume on and they're just wondering why we're just sitting there looking around

and not talking at all. Yeah, what are they doing for this minute? Yeah, go buy some strength co plates. We use them every day. They're the best. They are the best. Big Alex comes into the gym. He goes, the go-to plates he's like these are nice goes in was that the first time seeing them i think it was i think it was and he just the way that they look to see that reaction it's gotta be childlike wonder yeah the full sets on the double racks really it really pops on the

go-to plates when you look at it like that. There's no mistaking where you're at when you see that. No, no. Now should we kick off the Discord crew? Let's do it. All right. All right, should we get our guest on the horn? Mm-hmm. If I can figure out how to run this thing.

Dialed up over there. Crank in the crank. Crank in the crank. Laura, is that you? Might not have her here let's turn over and try again the first was prank call sometimes i think what happens is people use headphones and different things and then they like yeah it doesn't work like what you were

you know like how it should for some reason when it's like this or there's like a delay or something should we try it again yeah all right she's there i just got to get the audio down laura can you hear us we can just barely hear you there we can't hear anything though oh can you hear me yes now we can oh okay okay i don't know why i was doing that i was like don't tell me i have to hold my phone the whole time. It's coming in perfect now. Yeah, we don't need you getting a bicep cramp on us. Right, right. No, we're excited to get you on the Mastodonics podcast. I'm Tanner.

And I'm Tommy. Nice to meet you guys. Thanks for having me. Yeah, what were you just on recently? Was it, uh, either table talk or the West side barbell podcast? Uh, one of the, uh, the, yeah,

the West side barbell. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Uh, and have you been on with, on Dave before too? I haven't,

he's asked me to, I just, we haven't really coordinated that, but, um, but yeah, I guess I've been doing since louis passed away kind of working with tom um pretty closely on some stuff and i was just up there again to do another podcast and

some demo videos so i've just been kind of busy doing my own stuff and some stuff for for west side right now so do you live you live in ohio still then obviously yeah i live in cincinnati so it's it's not far it's like an hour a little less than an hour and a half to get up there to west side to Columbus so have even since you were got out of powerlifting have you stayed uh in pretty I mean made frequent trips to west side and stayed pretty close to the whole thing yeah yeah definitely like not as much as obviously when i was training up there but um louis and doris and i would meet like halfway like in wilmington to have breakfast sometimes

or lunch just to catch up on on stuff because for a while um we're teaching the crossfit power lifting course for uh louis because he originally was hired to do that and then didn't want to travel. So taught the CrossFit powerlifting course for several years and then, um, kind of have branched off on my own to do my own like smaller, uh, clinics. So, but we've always kept in touch and, uh, you know, I still talk to Doris all the time and see her as well. Okay. Yeah, that's cool. And you're touching on several things that we have that we want to talk about, you know, the CrossFit powerlifting course, one of them, obviously training at Westside, Louie, everything there.

But actually, before we get into it too much, we should probably, I don't know, how do you summarize your accomplishments in powerlifting? Because there's a whole bunch of them. So like if someone asks you and you know that they're kind of into lifting and kind of get it, what do you tell them? I mean, I competed for 10 years. I started in 2015

and my last competition was almost exactly eight years ago, at the end of 2014. And I kind of started off pretty quickly. i did my first meet in june of 2005 and then i did the wpo which was back and at that time in 2005 the wpo was like the pinnacle of powerlifting like you know most people competed equipped so you know i started powerlifting i got immediately into like squat suits and bench shirts and everything. Cause that was, you know, yeah, that's what everybody did. So, um, so that's what I did. And then, um, by, so June was my first meet and by September I had, I had kind of like kind of worked my force my way into the WPO and

the semifinals and showed the women were only guest lifters at the time. And they would only have like four or five women, uh, to compete. know i wasn't really competing against anybody but my numbers still would count like as far as record books would go and so i had my first all-time world record and um in that september so two months later in september i squatted the world record at the time was 611 and i squatted 683 at that meet um and got the all-time total record I can't remember exactly what the total was but I got the uh squat record and the total record and then um you know from there you know over the over the course of the next you know 10 years or so um managed to you know break 45 records you know, break 45 records, you know, sometimes they were my own breaking them, but 45,

uh, world records. And then I had held nine at one time and, you know, over the, over the years of the last eight years or so, they've kind of dwindled down to, um, a little bit here and there. So now I still hold five. Um, but yeah, I had, yeah, at one time I had four all-time world records and four different weight classes at one time and in the bench press. And, you know, I had the squat world record in two weight classes, the total world record in a couple of weight classes. You know, so over like four different weight classes throughout those 10 years. So you started breaking world records like immediately and didn't stop basically for 10 years. So you started breaking world records like immediately and didn't stop basically for 10 years. Right, right.

It was, I mean, I look back at it now and then just think like that was crazy how quickly it happened. But, you know, it's just something that I found that I really like. I had had a background in bodybuilding. I did competitive bodybuilding for a couple of years. So I had like a somewhat of a foundation. But I really, even in my bodybuilding. I did competitive bodybuilding for a couple of years. So I had like a somewhat

of a foundation. Um, but I really, even in my bodybuilding training, didn't do a lot of heavy squatting, especially, um, I did heavy bench press and, um, would do deadlift for reps, but I really didn't have much experience in the squat, which is funny considering that was my first all time world record. Um um but it just kind of came natural and i think part of that is my background in gymnastics growing up and you're having the flexibility because you know in in equipped lifting everything's wide stance like that's the way you're going to get the most out of the equipment so to me that just felt natural was to be in a wide stance and you know to have the mobility to do that and um you know not to mention like

just growing up doing gymnastics even though I didn't lift weights but doing gymnastics you gave me a lot of like body awareness and you know the the tendon strength that it kind of takes it was kind of like the perfect storm to set me up for power lifting yeah and like um you know to not beat around the bush a lot of people would say you're the best female powerlifter of all time. Would you agree with that or do you not like to say it like that? Right. I mean, I guess that's arguable because I mean, now brawl lifting is such a huge part of powerlifting. So people could argue that. They could say, well, I don't know because it's kind of like two

separate sports almost. And I guess if you took equipped powerlifting as one separate sport, then you could say that because, you know, overall the different formulas that they, you know, gloss Brenner and dots and everything, you know, I have the, the number one, um, by formula, you know? So I, I mean, I guess you could say it in that in that aspect for sure yeah probably you know we've had we've talked to Ed Cohn and people like that and some others and no nobody really you know I know it's like I guess you could say that it's weird to be like yeah right right well and it is uh different particularly in a sport where you know there's a lot of weight classes um i guess it's different in like your case and ed that's

part of though probably what puts you in that category is that you're so successful across so many different weight classes and for a long period of time because if someone came in and say set the highest dots Wilkes gloss spread or whatever formula and had like two meats even though they had the highest you know you probably did one class right right it's different than when you've done a bunch of classes for a bunch of years and yeah and all that yeah I had I remembered like when I first got into powerlifting breeding one of the powerlifting USA's like one of the articles that Louie wrote. And I remember him talking about, you know, kind of flash in the pan lifters, lifter,

you know, the brightest stars burn out the fastest. And I just, I just always stuck with me. I mean, I had no desire to stop powerlifting or anything like that. I loved it. I, you know, totally fell in love with it, but I was just like, I'm not going to be that person, you know, that, um, just kind of, you know, like comes onto the scene really quickly and then just fades out really fast. Well, so you, did you say your last meet was 2014? Yeah. So since then, um, have you ever considered wanting, like, have you ever had desire

to compete again? Because you were pretty young for your last meet. There's a lot of people that are continuing to power lift beyond. Because were you in your early 30s or something at that point? I was 34. I could have easily kept going. I just became really tired. As as like, just, just physically, emotionally tired, um, of just kind of being at that, you know, just kind of keeping myself

at that level of like competitiveness and training and whatnot. Um, because I had become more busy at that time with traveling to teach the seminars and coaching in person and remotely. I kind of started that in 2013. So I became more busy with that. And then we had more and more powerlifters joining the gym and more powerlifters, especially female powerlifters, coming in and joining my own training group. And I just kind of found myself more invested in what they were doing. And, you know, so I just, it just kind of felt like the right time to at least take a break. So that was my intention was to take a break.

And that break just got longer and longer. And next thing you know, I was just like, I didn't have that. And I just wasn't finding that fire to get back into meat prep mode, you know, and into that mindset. I just was like, I was more interested in like, you know, how I could, you know, build other people. Yeah, that makes sense. Had you ever, like, if you ever got the itch, would you ever consider lifting raw? Like, did that ever intrigue you as it became more you know kind of about the time you stopped you know i'd say around like 2015 and 2016 that's when it started to shift

where it became more popular like right coincidentally almost like right around that time like did that has that ever intrigued you that you're like oh i would like i wonder how i would have done there how i could do there i almost think that like having done a quip lifting for 10 years, like I would have had to like, I don't know that I, it would have been a hard transition. Although, I mean, with, you know, my background in conjugate, I like squat would have been the hardest because, you know, most of the time, no matter what, if it was dynamic effort or max effort,

I was at least wearing a pair of squat briefs and training out wide. All the things that are completely opposite of raw training or lifting. But most of the time when I was doing my bench press training, it was raw. I only really got into a bench press shirt once in a while. But most of the time, max effort and dynamic effort was all done raw. So that would have been, I, at one point I actually did think about doing a, at least a raw bench meet because I, um, I like in my, in my training, I was doing a lot of like rep work and whatnot. And, and at the time, like, I think the world record for the one 65 weight class for, uh,

the raw bench press, I think was three 14. And I had done 320 for like two or three reps. And so I was just like, I was like, I really want to do that. But I kind of, at the time I was just kind of worried about losing my sponsorship with Inzer. Cause they were, you know, there really wasn't like a whole lot of people that would dabble in both or anything like that you know well they probably probably wasn't like yeah go raw lifting like right do that so we don't need a not sell our bench exactly it was really touchy and i was just like it's not worth it to me but um i i do always wonder like that would have been cool to see um you know what could what i could have done because i did so much like heavy raw bench work, um, and deadlift. I mean, I did a lot of like conventional raw deadlifting and, um, not a whole lot of what, if I did pull sumo and training, it was with at least a pair of

briefs just to kind of save my hips a little bit. Um, but yeah, I do, I always kind of, I do kind of wonder that, but I, I, like I said, I do kind of think like it would almost had to have been in reverse order. Like, you know, I would have had to like kind of start with, with raw lifting or at least I've taken a really long time. And, you know, I don't know if I would have had the patience to do all that. And, you know, really like the knowledge at that time, like when I was getting out of like in 2014 to 2016, um, I don't feel like I would have the knowledge that I have now. Like, you know know if i were to kind of switch over to to raw lifting i've kind of like experimented with my own athletes and stuff over

the years that to kind of like figure out like the best way to to do conjugate with with raw lifters i'm still you know trying still kind of working with that and It varies by person. That makes sense. We've talked about West Side versus the world with a number of people over the years. You're obviously featured in there quite a bit. I'm guessing you've seen it. Yeah, definitely.

You could find the person out there that's like, I didn't watch that shit. I was in it. That's enough for me. I'm sure there's a few ah, I didn't watch that shit. I was in it. That was enough for me. Right. I'm sure there's a few people like that. I bet Louie hasn't even watched it. Right, right. He probably never watched it.

I'd almost be more surprised if he did watch it, if he had watched it. From your take on that, living West Side and knowing all that stuff, anything in the movie everything was right or anything any big thing that was missed or you felt like uh it was a pretty accurate picture of what it was like around there i i mean i think it's pretty accurate um i definitely i wasn't you know there during the times like when they a lot of when like matt

jimmel was there and whatnot i came in after that but like later like later into the into the film when like greg penora all those guys that's when i was there and so it's definitely definitely accurate you know i think a lot of people the feedback that i got from people after it was over was that they were kind of bummed that the women weren't featured more like there because there were more women that that trained there over the years and i think they kind of you know kind of honed in on amy and me and um you know where they could have like really honestly what women of west side and i think they said it briefly in in the show was that like the women of west side really as far as world records and and whatnot like kind of were just as just as successful if not

more successful than right than the men over the years so they really could have like done a whole like a much bigger segment on on the women for sure yeah what what was it like as a woman woman there i mean i know there's obviously many of you training there do you did you get uh from louis or anyone else did you get treated any differently or was it no different than if, you know, Greg Panora walked in the building and was training there was where the women treated exactly like the men, uh, in a way. Yeah. But, um, but nicer, I guess I should say like, you know, like a lot of, a lot of like the crazy stories you would hear or whatever, like I never experienced that. It was always nothing but good.

Like I've never had, um, you know, nothing but help and, you know, people that were positive and like supportive and, and, uh, you know, so I, people ask that a lot. They're like, you know, they're kind of like waiting for some juicy stories or whatever. I'm like, actually, it was really good for me. At least I had so much support and Louie was always really great to me. I had a really, really great experience. I never really got to see anything wild and crazy. But like I said, I came in at a different time.

It was definitely a different time. That's when people started coming along that were college educated know, people that were college educated and, you know, and had careers and stuff like that, you know, so it was, it was a different kind of group that was kind of a transition period for sure. You know, it wasn't like that long ago when you were, yeah, I think, you know, people get a picture of Westside Barbell in their head of, you know, how it is like, I don't know, like a thug mentality. Oh, totally.

Yeah. Well, like the legend of the Shirley days. Right. Right. Right. I listened to these podcasts, like the ones that are coming out with, you know, the, they're kind of going in chronological order a little bit. So if you've listened to any of the more recent ones, um, prior to the one that I was assigned, you know, it's, it's crazy to hear those stories.

It's just like, man, that was really a different time, you know? Yeah. So you were talking about like, you're kind of working closely or working with them now, Westside Barbell.

Uh, what, um, I don't know how to say it, but what's it, what do you, cause Westside Barbell means a couple of things. It is a gym of course in Columbus, but like, I don't know how to say but what's it what do you because west side barbell means a couple things it is a gym of course in columbus but like i don't know west side barbell is a

little bit bigger than that you know it's not just a gym uh because of what louis kind of made it over the years it's you know people think of it as a training method and just like um many things like in the equipment right yeah yeah Yeah. Yeah. Like, like, uh, an idea factory or, you know, like a training methodology factory and all this, like, what is the future like for Westside barbell without Louie there? You know, what, uh, how is it different? Or maybe it is no different. I don't, I don't, we, we obviously don't know. Um, well, I think that like, it's going to continue in so many ways, like not much will be different, um, because he kind of set it up for, to be exactly what he wanted it to be, which was just education, you know?

So he had done all the, I mean, he's so well read, he's done all the research and all the experimentation to kind of create this thing. He's got the certification and all of the books that he's written, you know, so he kind of laid it out for people to kind of carry that on. So that's kind of what was important to him was to for people to carry it on as far as educating other people. I mean, when he passed away, like there weren't a ton of people as far as like lifters at the gym, there, there's a handful that are still training there. Um, but he had just kind of like gotten to a point where it was more about educating people, you know, via this, you know, the certificate certificates, um, and his books and seminars, you know, he, um, is like, like I said, I've just started doing like demo videos for them, like just more modern ways that, um, that people are educating, you know, you know, he, he doesn't even know he doesn't have a smartphone.

He didn't have like access to Instagram and stuff like that. He just kind of put the right people in place to take care of that for him and, you know, kind of keep up with the times and how they can keep educating the world about the conjugate methodology. So that'll keep continuing. And they've kind of set up the gym a little bit in the last few months to do that. Like, so they'll, they're kind of inviting people in to, to learn, they're going to start having seminars there. Anything they can to kind of keep, keep that education alive. Yeah. If anything, it's, it's the best it's ever been really.

I mean, they sell so many books and some, you know, obviously so many t-shirts and apparel and stuff like that. So recognizable, but yeah, yeah they're they're still doing podcasts you know everything like that yeah right right no and that's what it seemed like so far obviously with the podcast getting pumped out and everything else and it's still a um it's a destination that a lot of people want you know it's kind of like a bucket if you're a if you've been a serious power lifter for a long time it's almost like a bucket list to say that you've even you know walked through the doors before i would say right and that'll still be open they still you know welcome visitors to to me it seems more like a museum now like it's just gonna kind of like be preserved the way it is for people to still be able to experience.

Yeah. No, that's cool. Yeah. With you not competing, obviously you're still, I don't know if you use the word training when you're not training for a meet, but you're obviously still in the gym and doing a bunch of stuff. What is your kind of training look like now

that you're not powerlifting, but you're still doing something? So how would you describe your training now? I still, it's a little bit weird. Cause I do for upper body. I do everything like the stuff that I program for. Cause I have like a base program that like all the lifters at the gym follow, like with some variation, you know, with each person, but, um, I, I follow it to a T like I do the max at all the max. All right. Today I did max effort upper. I did everything on the program. Um, Saturday I'll do dynamic effort upper. I'll do everything on the program. Um, lower body is

a little different cause I, I, I don't know. I just, that's the only thing like I never really had an injury. I never broke a bone or never tore anything and had to get surgery so I I'm really thankful for that but you know it's you know I'm 42 now so I have aches and pains and whatnot and for the most part it's in my lower body like nothing bad but like nothing that keeps me from but I'm just not I just don't push it as hard with my lower body stuff I do I still do a lot of box squats. Um, it's more just functional. And I do a lot of box squats and all the accessory work, inverse girl, glute hand raises, reverse hypers, belt squat work. Um, but it's more about like just, you know, being more functional. I do a lot of, I, I haven't, I've gotten more into run prior to even bodybuilding or anything like that. When I was in college, I did a lot of running. Um, not good at it. I'm not like built to run or anything like that, but I enjoy it. Like just

the mental aspect of it. It's just peaceful to me. And it's like, I I'm around people all the time, like personal training and coaching with powerlifting and stuff. So sometimes like when I go run, I'm just literally by myself and can just zone out. So I do a lot of that, which, you know, also I know that like takes a toll on my lower body too. So as far as my lifting goes, it's kind of altered, it's kind of built around that staying healthy and, you know, focusing on posterior chain. That's kind of always been my thing is focusing on posterior chain. So that's kind of what my training looks like, um, focusing on posterior chain. So that's kind

of what my training looks like now, but I do a lot more conditioning and cardio obviously than I ever did when I was powerlifting. I do, you know, I've done a lot of CrossFit workouts and, you know, still do those, um, a few days a week. Um, but I, I, I have a much bigger emphasis on conditioning and cardio now, um, than I ever did before this, you know, cause I, I try to me, it's more about like health and longevity at this point than it is about like anything else. So, I mean, although longevity, like maximal strength is important for longevity. So I don't want to lose that aspect either. Are you still pretty strong? I mean, yeah, but not nearly as strong, not nearly as strong as I was before. And I think part of that is just like letting go of that

mentality. Like it's like, like deadlifting for 400 pounds is just not important to me. You know what I mean? Like, I think if I, I think if I was like, I want to deadlift 400 pounds and I totally changed everything about my lifestyle and my training, then I think, you know, I could get back to that, but it's not important to me right now. So like, um, you know, deadlifting 300 is fine for me, you know, that's totally fine. Was that hard for you to make that trans like, obviously now it sounds like it's not hard, but like, was there a point in time where that was tough where it's like, Oh,

I'm getting more, I'm getting, I'm feeling healthier, but it really sucks that I still don't still bench three 15. You know? Right. I like, I've had people ask me that,

like that were like thinking about retiring from powerlifting. Like, how did you do it? Like they were just, you can tell they're struggling with like pulling the trigger because you know, they're just going to miss it so much. And I, I don't even know what to say cause I'm literally like, I, I never felt that like it was fine for me. Like I, I was just like, I,

I did everything I wanted to do. I mean, there's always going to be more that I could say I wish I would have done, but I was, I felt satisfied with what I had done. And, um, and powerlifting was kind of taking, it was at that point where I was starting to take a different direction. And I was just, it was like, this is a good time for me to, this is like the perfect time for me to, to bow out rather than I didn't want, my last meet actually was not, it was not a good meet for me. Like, so it's not like I ended on a great meet. Um, it was not a good meet for me, but it was, it was, and I had had bad meets before. I tell people all the time, like people see, like, you know, I post a highlight reel and it looks all

like super successful career. And I'm like, I bombed out more times than I can even count. Like there were, yeah, there were plenty of meets that I did not do well, but, um, this one for some reason, like felt different. It was just like, I don't want to be that person that just like gets out of powerlifting after like a few years of just going downhill. I did not want that to be me. I was like, I just felt different. It just felt like I should probably like stop on the ahead, you know, and while things are good. And, um, cause to me at that point, like I also was, I never imagined prior, like in my earlier years of powerlifting, the powerlifting would somehow translate to, to a career.

Like I was, I was a personal trainer at the time, but, um, I didn't think that anything more could come of it. And at that time in 2014, like, you know, more could come of it and at that time in 2014 like you know more was coming from it like coaching other power lifters and doing remote training and stuff like that and i just was like i if i like i was like i need to kind of go out on top to be able to help my career as well you know yeah totally makes sense um we've got this little game we play with every guest that we have on called overrated, underrated,

and we have a special Laura Phelps set of overrated, underrated topics. So it's, it's your job just to decide if each one's overrated, underrated, you can elaborate it on, on it as much or as little as you want to, but you just have to remember that you can't ride the line.

You have to decide one or the other at the end of it. Okay. Oh my gosh. Everyone thinks it's going to be controversial, but it's, uh, yeah. Okay.

All right. First one over under, um, the reverse hyper. Underrated. For sure. It's like, hands down, one of the best pieces of equipment. I mean, it's like a must in any gym that I would have or suggest to people. So are you still a regular user of the reverse hyper? All the time. Yep. Definitely. Whether it's to warm up or like heavier for like strength building, I do a lot of different variations on it. And it's not just, you know, always just the standard like swing through reverse hyper. We'll do strict reverse hypers, bent knee reverse hypers, single leg reverse hypers, partial reps, so many different things, you know, so it doesn't only have to be used in one way.

so many different things, you know, so it doesn't only have to be used in one way. Um, it has a lot of different, a lot of different benefits for sure. But as far as like what it was actually made for originally, you know, which was to, for back rehab, I mean, it's, it's incredible. And part of that too, is like knowing how to do it correctly. Cause I've had people be like, well, it hurts when I do it. Um, you know, it's like, well, they're, you can usually pinpoint how they're doing it wrong. Like how they're, you know, just kind of letting go at the bottom and, you know, not controlling that swing through, um, or letting it swing through too much, using too much momentum, not, you know, hanging their hips off of down too low and not being up on top of that pad high enough. enough, not flexing their abs at the top.

There's a whole lot of things that you can do wrong with that for someone to say, well, I don't think it really works. I haven't really had many people say that. Yeah, so if you could only, for a posterior chain piece of equipment, if you could only have a, either you had your, you could only pick one, a reverse hyper or a GHD, GHR, it sounds like you would pick the reverse hyper or what would you do? That is really tough because they're so different. They're so different, but equally, equally important. Like, you know, I think if I had like a garage, I can only have a few things. It would be a safety squat bar and a straight bar, a power rack, a reverse hyper, a GHD, a sled.

Yeah, like in some dumbbells, you know. So that would be a tough call if I had to pick one or another. Because the GHD, you can do a lot of different things with it. Like whether it's, you know, not just a glute ham raise, you can do sit-ups with it. You can do, um, back extensions, you know, all different variations of a back extension, um, oblique crunches, so many different things in the GHG. So it's like, Ooh, that would be hard. I mean, you can, like when people don't have a reverse type and they have a GHG, you know, we can kind of rig up like a makeshift reverse hyper, but there's really nothing that you can do to makeshift or jerry-rig to simulate the actual, the pendulum on a reverse hyper, you know, the traction effect from it. Right. And you kind of answered this question, but this is a very important question on our podcast. And you said it a few times. This is something we've asked many people and we've talked about many times as the piece of equipment that you do glute ham raises on, you call it a GHD. Yeah.

Some people call it, what is it? Is it a GHD or a GHR? Because we've gone back and forth with many people on that before. I think, I don't know if I say GHD because of my extensive background in CrossFit too. Right. They always call it GHD. So I just always think of it as a glute ham developer. GHR, I mean glute ham raise. That to me, GHR to me mean, glute ham raise that to me, GHR, like, to me stands for glute ham raise, like that means like one specific exercise, you know, where the GHG is a glute ham developer,

that to me represents the machine itself, you know, the piece of equipment itself. Well, that's the logic that most people tell us. And it totally makes sense. But for some reason, we just, we were always around people that would call it a ghr so we always go back and call it a ghr well and it depends like a lot of people will say yeah that is a crossfit thing calling it the ghd it is i always like there's a few points of reference for the ghr and we know that this is kind of a silly conversation but that's what we that's what we like to do and if you go go to elite fts everyone on their website is called a ghr but if you go to rogue fitness everyone on their website the piece of equipment is called right it's kind of funny no closure that is i know i know i mean ghr sounds to me like it's a glute ham raise that's the exercise that's not the piece of equipment, you know?

Yeah, the counterpoint to that is a lat pull-down. Someone would say a lat pull-down is the exercise. Is the exercise, yeah. What's that damn machine called? Yeah, what would you call it? Right, right. Right. That's a good point.

That's a good point. I guess the mystery continues on this one. We'll have to ask several more people to get to the bottom of it then. So you didn't really solve it for us today, I guess. No. I'm going with THD, though. Okay. Okay.

On the record. Okay. We talked about this a little bit in some ways, but overrated or underrated CrossFit? I mean, I'm kind of in the middle of that, but if I had to pick one, I'd say underrated. I mean, I've had a lot of I've been around it for so long, since the early days. 2009 is when CrossFit hired Louis to teach a CrossFit

powerlifting course. I remember he asked us to come up there and help him with it. And I was like, I really didn't know anything about CrossFit. It was so like kind of new. And now looking back, it was like that was a test run that they did. And they had all the top CrossFitters at the time, including Katie Henniger, who's the owner of Rogue. She had just won the CrossFit Games and she was there to try out the seminar. And, you know, so I just had been around it for so long, and then, you know, was a part owner of a CrossFit gym, and, you know, so, and doing CrossFit myself, you know, for many years after

I did powerlifting, it just, I've seen it a lot lot and I've seen what it does for people. I've seen how it's brought a lot of people to, to powerlifting, you know, just, just I've watched it firsthand, watch people join across the gym, find out that they love doing strength stuff and not so much doing the wads. And so they end up like gravitating towards powerlifting. So it's brought a lot of people to powerlifting. So for that, I'm grateful. And it's also kind of made strength cool, you know, um, even to like, to women, especially like that would, you know, join and, you know, they, they get their great cardio workout, but next thing you know, like, cause, cause our CrossFit gym is very conjugate

base is literally called CrossFit conjugate. And, um And we would do everything sort of like the whole conjugate template in a week. So you have all of your normal members, not competitive CrossFitters, that were coming in and doing max effort lower on Monday. And that could be a dead level of change or something, stuff that they would never dream that they would ever do, but then ended up falling in love with it. And they're tracking their PRs and they're getting really into like, into, you know, being strong. So it's done, it's just done a lot, I think for the, for the strength community and in a, in a, in a, you know, in a, in a different kind of way. And so, and it's really just stuck around. It's really not lost any momentum. I think it's,'s you know still just as popular as it was

um you know five ten years ago so i i if i had to pick one i'd say underrated you know it's not for me but like it's it's still it's still pretty awesome and it it really is a test of it's like it's essentially we always called it like that's like conjugate like it's they're just doing everything right you know i mean it's literally right it's kind of right it's gpp to the max so um so for that i think it's pretty cool and it's you know made people do things that they probably never would have been exposed to i think that's true and like on the point of the women's side of it, even in particular, like it's gotten a lot of women like super strong. Yeah.

Some crazy athletes. Well, like the, I think it was the CrossFit games here. Not too long ago. Like the event I kept seeing was the sandbag to shoulder and like, we've got a bunch of guys at the gym that are,

you know, relatively strong that like, aren't just casually going to shoulder a 250. two pounds sandbag and we like we've got a bunch of guys at the gym that are you know relatively strong that like aren't just casually going to shoulder a 250 and it's not like that was the one event they did and that was it like yeah exactly it is unbelievable the amount of volume that they do and i was there because i um do a woman that i train with that literally like we do i i would always do like my CrossFit workouts with her. I mean, she's a good friend of mine. She's actually, she's 66 and she qualified for the CrossFit Games. So I came out there to coach her. She, and she ended up placing second,

like the highest age category goes 65 plus. So she was in 65 plus category. And, you know, so I'm with this group of, at that point, once you make it to the games in 65 plus category and you know so i'm with this group of at that point once you make it to the games in your age category there's only 10 so it starts with the open and there's thousands of people and then there's two other i think two other um stages you know there's like the semi-finals or quarterfinals and the semifinals and then from there they weed it down to 10 people in the world and so you know she was one of 10 that qualified in the 65 plus. And I'm there and I'm just like the whole week with this group of men and women that are in the higher age categories. And just watching these women.

There's a woman that was 72 years old. 72 years old and they are climbing 20 foot ropes doing handstand push-ups doing pool sprints and jumping out and getting on the skier um just an unbelievable amount of stuff for anyone much less someone over 65 yeah that kind of makes me feel like a real piece of shit oh my god it was it was unbelievable i'm just like these these are grandmas like there were there were women walking around their grandkids are coming up and hugging them and i'm just like this is crazy i mean when growing up my i my grandparents were not doing that you know so it's pretty cool so and for so for that aspect too that's pretty amazing like how how cool is that how much is that going to change those grandkids lives to see their grandma or

grandpa do it? You know, like I said, climbing a 20 foot rope or getting into a handstand and doing handstand pushups and doing all these crazy events. It's like, I mean, that's, that's life changing. That'll totally change their, their aspect, their outlook on what they can do in the future. It makes you be like, well, 60, I guess, isn't old or 70 isn't old. Right. Right. No, not at all. Yeah. All right. Good answer. Overrated or underrated Michael Phelps.

Underrated. I would say that too. I mean, he's, I mean the best, he's the greatest of all time and there's just no, I mean his accomplishments, I don't know how anybody could say overrated. Cause I mean, they're, they're undisputable. They're like, he did. It's not like an opinion that he was great. He literally like proved that he was the best of all time. Yeah. I can't argue with metals. Yeah, I know. I mean like no matter what you think of him as i don't know if if there's any i really haven't kept up with him as a person like

after his career or anything so i don't know if like i think that's like a controversial thing or i think there's a picture of him with a body i think you smoked pot once, so that's pretty terrible. Oh, okay. That's all right. Throw those records away. Definitely not going to judge him on that. No, none of us are. Right. But not a long-lost cousin. No, people ask that a lot. And whenever I have to spell my name say it

over the phone right if i have to say it if i just like speak it into the like a phone or something like that people for some reason cannot like understand what i'm saying and i'm like like michael phelps like and then they're like oh okay okay yeah yeah i always say that all right uh this is the last one and it's kind of the most important one usually so your performance on this one determines your performance on the entire show today a lot riding on this. Right, right. Overrated or

underrated Bob Evans? Overrated. Yeah. I have to say I actually know I mean I it's just not my favorite like I hate saying that because you know that was like of Louie's favorite restaurants and that's where he would meet every morning for breakfast. And so, I mean, I ate there plenty of times and I actually worked there in college. I went to Ohio state and I worked at Bob Evans and actually when I waited on Bob before he died, he was one of my tables. So I met him. I have a lot of experience at Bobette. I mean, I worked there.

You met Bob, and that's like the full thing. I met Bob. I met Bob. I met Bob. He'd be rolling over in his grave if he knew you were saying overrated. I know. I know. My former employee. Right.

Sorry. I mean, it was great. It got me plenty of spending money through college. But as far as like their food, I mean, their banana bread is the best. But other than that, like I, I love food. I love eating. Like I came, my family, it's all food. My mom had a bakery.

My uncle has a restaurant. It's definitely, we're all about food. And my mom is a great cook. So it's hard for me to be like, oh, Bob Evans is so good. Because I a restaurant um it's definitely we're all about food and my mom is a great cook so it's hard for me to be like oh bob evans is so good because i'm like it's not like it's not that's fair and one bonus topic since you said ohio state overrated or underrated is it the horseshoe is that where they play football that's what they play yeah so i i assume you've probably been there before so overrated oh my gosh yeah totally underrated it's it's incredible it's way too expensive to try to

attend a game but it's definitely underrated it's it's awesome i mean just to be in there you know with that many hundred and some thousand people um it's i mean i try to get to a game every year i i don't think i didn't make one last year but um my husband i try to go to a game every year. I didn't make one last year, but my husband and I try to go every year. I'm definitely a proud alumni. An annoying Ohio State Buckeye fan.

That's okay. We can say that because we're from South Dakota and we don't have we don't have any teams on that level so I thought you were going to say you're from Michigan no that's what I wanted to clarify

we're not like some Nebraska fans Minnesota maybe yeah we're not from Alabama or something like that either so yeah okay good news it looks like you passed overrated Minnesota maybe. Yeah, we're not from Alabama or something like that either. Yeah. Okay, good news. It looks like you passed overrated and underrated.

So congratulations. I'm glad I got one overrated thing in there. Yeah, you don't want to come across 100% on all the same side. No, no. It's balance. Yes, yes. No, we really appreciate appreciate that we're glad to have you on i guess if is there anything uh it looked like maybe you were running like a bigger women's power we'd seen something just recently about you setting up a bigger women's power lifting me but

anything like that or i don't know yeah coaching or anything like that that people should know about. Yeah, we are hosting the Women's Pro-Am. This will be my 11th year hosting it. And it's, I mean, I know it's not like there's, that's another thing that's changed over time. You know, in my experience, I've run a lot of meets. You know, I run other meets throughout the year, but the Women's Pro-Am is kind of the biggest meet that I host every year. And so, like I said, I've been doing it for, you know, this actually, we missed a year because of COVID. So this would have been the 12th year coming up. But it's grown to me. It's like huge, but I know that like, there's so many enormous raw powerlifting meets now that are like so high

profile. But to me, like this, it's really important to me and to the people that attend that come each year it's I mean it's just such an experience like I can't even describe it like it's it's it's incredible like with it being all women and we have an amateur day there's you know usually 70 lifters and then a pro day and we usually have um you know 40 to 50 lifters on pro day you know so just to me it's just like just a sign of progress, like that we are at a place that we can have a competition where there's 110 to 120 women. You know, when I remember when I would compete in meets and I was most of the time was I was the only female competing at a meet or maybe there was a couple other, you know, so I mean, I have been around a lot long enough to know what it was like prior to that. So, you know, so that's why this is so special to me is because it's just like, like I said, it's just like, it shows the progress that we've made, um, with women's power lifting to be able to do that and to be able to create an atmosphere that people, I mean, it's, it's

like, it's so intense in that room during that meet. Like the women are just so the camaraderie is unreal. Like they're screaming for each other. They're, you know, it's, it's, it's pretty awesome. So I know, like I said, I know it's not like a big high profile. We do, we are like giving a lot, a lot of prize money and it grows every year. So it's pretty cool. And We got a new venue this year, so it's bigger. And, um, you know, so each year we get bigger and better in some way, you know, most of the time it's more prize money or, you know, we had a really awesome live stream last year. So yeah, it's pretty cool. So I have that coming up and that's an April, um, registration for that will open up in November. Um, for that. So people kind of

always like countdown, like they have a countdown to registration cause it sells out really quick. Okay. Um, that's cool. Yeah. Yeah. But other than that, yeah, I do coaching. I have a subscription on train heroic. Um, it's team QBP, uh, like queen bee power. So team QBP on train heroic. And then I also do a lot of like individual remote um coaching as well for people that are you know getting into a meet or something like that but a lot of my stuff is conjugate based you know um but a little bit more modern conjugate um i guess you should say so i can you know because i've had to like with the change in the times of power lifting and having raw power lifting you know it's taken me a while to kind of, to blend that.

Cause it is different, you know, like what Louie had kind of figured out for equipped power lifting is, you know, it was hard to kind of like, you know, adjust it a little bit, but stay within the parameters of conjugate. That's important to me. Right. the parameters of conjugate. That's important to me. Um, so yeah, I, I work with a lot of raw lifters and equipped lifters, men, women, um, for summary, I think because the women's pro-am and just being that I was a female power lifter, I definitely have a much bigger percentage of, of female power lifters that I coach. I love, I love coaching female power lifters. All right. Good stuff. Well, we really appreciate it. We're glad to get you on uh you've been on our list for a long time so um i really appreciate i was i was excited when you guys contacted me i

was like oh this is fun well you don't have to lie like that i'm serious i was like i was on a wednesday night really i'd like to stay up two hours past my bedtime. We always catch the people on Eastern Time Zone. They're like, I guess we'll do it. I'll stay up and sleep in tomorrow. This is great. We appreciate it. Thank you.

Thanks a lot, Laura. Thank you so much. See you. Bye. Cool beans. Cool beans. Beans. Cool beans. Of course you got the cool you got her gave her the double cool beans and shit not just one serving but double two double trouble speaking of uh equipped

power lifters um wanted to tell you about uh little friend of mine spud do you remember spud from spud oh yes i do yeah so spud ink spud dash ink dash straps.com and i want to tell you about their all-new pillow belt squat belt ah i actually just saw this recently yeah they might have seen if you're on their email subscription list you might have seen it or uh even maybe within the discord i think there was something shared on it but the pillow belt squat belt is a multi-size

adjustment belt squat belt i read that right yeah it's a multi-size adjustment belt squat belt made for the comfort level of any lifter from the complete novice to the seasoned old school lifter with what we would say almost no discomfort level while training and that's important if you want to have it because we've used makeshift belt squat belts before that are uncomfortable yeah but you do not have that with the pillow belt squat belt do you uh works on any type of belt squat apparatus you can think of the multi-loop system is taken from the squat max adjustable hip belt design and blessed by Brian Hensley, former NFL running back inventor of the SquatMax MD.

Well, okay, how much more of an endorsement do people need? That's exactly right. Come on. The back pad is made with their soft but super durable spud ink, K-A-I-J-U, Kaiju? Kaiju material. exotic yeah so the spudding performance level level is never compromised and exactly what you would expect built to last um check it out last i mean spudding that goes on saying yeah and then of course they've got all done to say that yeah

why even yeah you already said it was spudding we know that it's built to last. You dummies. Quit telling me the same thing over and over again. What are you going to tell me? Their colors are black and yellow next? We get it. Check them out at spud. What are you going to tell me? Their website is spud-ink-desktraps.com.

That's exactly right. And they've got a lot of other stuff on, obviously, as you know. What are you going to tell me? They've got knee sleeves and elbow sleeves? And a rucksack sled of some kind? Is that what you're going to tell me they got? What are you going to tell me? They got the sleeves and elbow sleeves. And a rucksack sled of some kind. Is that what you're going to tell me they got? What are you going to tell me?

They got the bow tie? Yeah, what are you going to tell me? They got bow ties in formal and casual settings in multiple sizes for any lifter? That is exactly what we're going to tell you. Is that what you're going to tell me? Yes. Okay. Check them out at spud-ink-straps.com.

Oh. We have so many things on our list that we're not going to get to today. I know. I'm curious what does and doesn't make the cut here. Because there's a few things that I want to know about that are written down and I'm not going to get to find these out. I think we just have to go

into the sack segment. The second part of our game segment. And we might not get to anything else besides this i'm thinking so we talked about big alex he made his uh pilgrimage is what i would call it to the mecca the motherland western northeast south dakota to visit massonomics gym he took advantage finally someone taking advantage of that free day pass yeah i also for his troubles i gave him a calendar the last did you the last 2022 calendar that i found had her out of my locker i didn't know if you were talking about no not the dog calendar dog calendar not the like 20 because that's quite no that would be

to get the massonomics that kind of auction for hundreds. The Masonomics topless men calendar. The Masonomics topless men collaboration with the local like humane society thing. What year was that? Like 2018 or? Maybe even around there. Got to be around there. Maybe a little earlier. Maybe 2017. I don't think it was 2019.

I don't know. But maybe we did it in 2017 for the, you know, because we would have done it. Yeah. You know. Yeah. That's usually how calendars work. Yeah. I don't know. But maybe we did it in 2017 for, you know, because we would have done it. Oh, that might be it. Yeah. You know. Yeah. That's usually how calendars work. Yeah.

I usually try to get them out before the. But I'm like, I gave Alex a calendar that had about four good months left in it. Yeah. So. The single sheet tear off ones. Yeah. And Alex gave us a little something. All right.

So this isn't a can. I'm seeing a brown bag here. Yeah. Yep. You're going to. I think you're going to like this. All right. So this isn't a can. I'm seeing a brown bag here. Yeah. Yep. I think you're going to like this one. All right. Okay. What's your appetite level right now?

I mean, it could be pretty high. Do you have any idea what's in here? No, no clue. I don't know if it's edible or if it's something memorabilia. Oh, it's edible, if you know what I mean. Wink, wink. Little Michael Phelps. What is it?

What is it? That's for you right there. And here's one for me. Okay. Okay. So I have an MRE. So it says menu 19. Is that actually, are they numbered?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, you have menu 19. I have menu 19. Mine is the, are they numbered? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, you have menu 19. I have menu 19. Mine is the beef patty jalapeno pepper jack. And mine is menu two, pizza slice cheese, trunch de pizza, fromage. Steak hache. MRE.

Have you ever had it? I've never had an MRE, ever. I have had a decent number of MREs, but it has been a long while since I've had it. From Cincinnati, Ohio here. Oh. Laura's neck in the woods. It all comes full circle, doesn't it? She was involved with us all the time.

He didn't sell these to you, did he? Because that's unlawful. No, I will. Wink, wink. He didn't sell them to me. I have never had this one. This one's new. This package is telling me that ration heaters are prohibited on commercial airlines.

Oh, yeah. You can't heat this up on an airline? And it's funny. Yours is different, actually. Oh, yeah, it is. Does these have a date on them? Yeah, mine has some soldiers sitting around. Mine feels older.

I hope it's not expired. Wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Okay, so when was the last time you had an MRE? Oh, it probably would have been 2012, I think. We just pull this right open, huh? Yeah, just peel it apart. It should pop open if I remember right. And what I'll tell you, I don't think we're going to want to do the heater.

I mean, the heater is part of the experience for sure. I can't even open mine. I think if you just get a little gap in there, it should kind of peel from the center. Nope, can't even open it. First problem, I'm starving. I'm starving. I'm dying of hunger on the battlefield.

Open that for me, Tanner. Maybe it's the different packaging. I already failed me, Tanner. Maybe you already failed. It's a different packaging. I already failed the first test. Okay, so it's not totally just me. I can't even help my battle buddy. I got a knife here, too. Yeah, we might need the knife.

That's rule number two of the battlefield is you bring a knife, right? Oh, he got it. Okay. That one was really sealed up. You got to be a super soldier to get that thing open. I mean, it is the beef patty.

You don't want any of the freshness to leak out. So this is the heater. Wow. Surprising number of packaging in here. Yeah, for anyone that has... Yeah, there's a lot of parts to an MRV. This is like an unboxing here. I kind of thought there was going to be like a patty. This is the heater. Oh. I don't think we'll want to do

it because... Whoa. Okay. I didn't know that was a thing either. Yeah. So what you do, your main course you use in the heater. The main course should be in something, you know, one of these. So it gives you the directions, but you rip off the heater uh the main course should be in something you know one of these so it gives you the directions but you you rip off the top you pop it in there and then you fill it with water and then up to right there and then what's the two lines it gets super hot there's like it has some reaction yeah yeah there's like like a chemical but it kind of smells a little bit so

we won't do it in your basement okay i mean it doesn't it's not awful but like it's better to be done my wife might wonder what's going on down here so we're gonna whatever i have a hot beverage bag too what's that well you might you not everyone has hot beverage so you must have cocoa i would assume something like that or maybe a coffee oh damn there's a cookie in here too okay but i don't know if you remember what what we say about the mres the sides are more important than the main course so tell us what all yours is yeah all right so i'm just taking all right i'll take full inventory starting from the bottom of the list here tortillas plain okay then i have a cardboard sleeve it looks like

the rs for optimal recovery okay with some tips with some tips replenishing energy okay we'll get we'll get to that in a second i have the hot beverage bag i have oatmeal chocolate chunk cookie sounds pretty good what is this algratin pot that's probably like gravy or something i don't know must be um then okay this is my heater bag here is that what you said it is yeah that's the heater okay and then uh oh, another sleeve. What's with all these? What are these for? These like cardboard sleeves.

I don't ever remember having one of these. Like mine's a pizza slice. So I assume it's kind of like to set the. Oh, is it kind of like the pizza pocket holder? Right, right. Okay. So I have two cardboard sleeves. I have cheese spread with bacon.

I got a spoon. Oh, just a straight-up package of M&Ms? Yeah, so there you go. That's key. Okay, that's a thing? Yeah. So remember if you said, I told you sometimes they have Skittles and it's like some different things.

Oh, I just still thought it was like an unbranded. No, but so what you know now is menu number 19 has the peanut m&ms and everyone knows that yeah and they are like those that want that are like yes i want many yeah well okay and then we have the beef patty jalapeno pepper jack and then we have a packet of barbecue sauce fat-free mayonnaise and then this little thing which is just yeah this is all the goodies you've got your no this is the gum do you remember last when we talked about it i said the most the common thing around this gum everyone says it's a laxative gum oh i looked it up though after that episode i'm like is that a laxative gum or not and they say that is myth busted it is not a laxative okay but you'll You'll have your salts and your peppers

and your sugars and stuff. Is this just in every single one? Yeah, I think these are pretty standard. There's a moist towelette in there, which that's worth his weight in gold. You want the moist towelette. Is there coffee in some of these things? Yeah.

Actually, it might even be in. It might even be in here. Like what's the brown package here? Or that is that the creamer? I got sugar, zero calorie sweetener. I can't see the other ones. Yeah, the big brown ones, the creamer. All right. So I guess where do I start here?

There's so many things. Well, that's dealer's choice, really. So and I'll say what I have. Well, but I kind of feel like mine. Some of these are supposed to go to okay obviously the m&ms get saved for last um i have cashews jalapeno actually so you're telling me i get m&ms and a cookie that's so that's a high value menu item okay yeah you know all right so read yeah what you got here so i have cheese pizza with sauce i'm not i've never

had this and it's like it feels like a little somewhat mushy rectangle in here. Maybe it's good, but it doesn't seem that good from that part of it. This is what I really like. This would be a coveted item for me is the peanut butter and crackers. Oh, oh, the crackers. Is it one big cracker? There's two in there.

It's like two giant saltines kind of is what that's yeah it should be like and then this i remember these i forgot about this until i just yeah first strike yeah it's a like a protein bar but i'm curious what the actual ingredients like um how much sugar is in it whoa three grams of protein in this thing is all so it is just energy nine grams of fat 18 sugars okay well it's not really a whole lot of anything but i think these are okay okay from what i remember and then i said the cheese pizza and then uh the cashews jalapeno flavored cashews those are probably good yeah that can't i mean these aren't bad sides yeah i don't remember how what the first strike bar really tasted like so that's okay oh and i also have applesauce wow um i'm oh okay i have algratin potatoes i think we would refer to those as scalp potatoes wouldn't

we yeah so those got to taste kind of weird when they're cold, right? And actually the applesauce is applesauce enhanced with maltodextrin. Okay. I have my beef patty here. So just eat the beef patty plain. Is that the idea? Okay. Here's the potatoes. All right. That makes, it's making more sense now that I know it's potatoes. Usually I wouldn't get too cute with it probably, you know, with with the mixing and like somebody just kind of eat it right out of the package is that yeah you you probably would heat heat up the beef patty somewhat cheese spread with bacon how the hell do you put the spread on the stuff you rip open oh yeah okay the cheese spreads for the potatoes yeah so that goes in tortillas i'm so confused doesn't this seem like an odd mix of things yeah so you're all your stuff is probably supposed to go.

A lot of times people just eat the cheese spread on the tortilla. Okay. I think it's something like that or whatever your bacon spread. Because sometimes you get like a fake, a little piece of bread. Okay, so cheese spread with bacon goes on that. Yeah, that's what I would say. And then I have barbecue sauce. That's probably for the patty.

For the beef patty, yeah. And what's the mayonnaise for? The beef patty again? I guess. I don't know what that would really be i don't like mayonnaise enough that i have i mean i like mayonnaise is fine but i don't know if i like it enough that i need to have it just on a beef patty okay and then the brown spoon of course all right right okay so i'm just yeah you just yeah be careful in there yeah so i'll squeeze it down here so what are you opening there? I'm going to start with the potatoes. Okay.

See what we're working with. Okay, yep, already there's a little sauce. I'm going to look into this First Strike energy bar. I got to save my desserts for last because I have a feeling those shouldn't be bad at least. Yeah, the M&Ms at least there's not much surprise there. You shouldn't be able to mess those up. I completely forgot about the First Strike energy bar. Some of this isn't going to make it.

It just looks like straight up just a package of cold scalloped potatoes. Yeah, yeah. Do you want to try a rip-off a piece of that? Because I probably might not need to eat the whole thing. Oh, it's like taffy. Okay. I'll come back to that.

Yeah. These potatoes are totally edible. I could, if these were warm. Oh yeah. I'd almost even say they're good. Yeah. They're not bad,

but no, they look good. Cold potatoes are in the first strike. Nutritious energy bar is good chocolate flavored and i would eat that okay so yeah potatoes are totally i'm not gonna eat the whole package but potatoes are totally fine i'm gonna check out my cashews that are jalapeno flavored i can see how a day of romping through the fields with the guys, sit down with a warm thing of potatoes.

Oh, I'd be set there. Okay. The cashews are good. Oh, yeah, they're cashew. Nuts shouldn't be bad, right? No, the jalapeno flavoring is good on there. Oh, yeah. I'd take pleasure in eating that

did we stop at the gas station right before we got here right oh yeah that's good okay well then i guess my main course is the jalapeno pepper beef patty yeah i'll try my mine is the cheese pizza with sauce couldn't they just make a pepperoni pizza out of little... Just some... Spice it up a little bit. There is just something about taking a beef patty out of a... Like, the fact that beef patty doesn't need to be kept cold. I mean, yeah, it has a pizza smell but this pizza there's something about meat though that

doesn't need to be kept chilled that always is a little suspect you know yeah i can already tell from what i remember this pizza thing is this is the bread like when you got you normally get a piece of bread yeah it looks just like this and it just kind of has like red sauce and some i don't know what do you mean this is the bread well like sometimes instead of crackers you get like a bread oh you do okay and this it's just like this thing right here okay so yeah my beef patty just a rectangular patty does that look like something you've ever had before in these yeah okay for sure it's probably all right actually it's very uh well processed yeah you know like in like it can exist inside of a yeah like it's warm package yeah like it's like crumbly but kind of dried but at the same time it's wet you know

there's a lot of things going weird it's going a lot of different directions like the pizza is not bad i would eat that yeah just flavor wise it's fine it's just the texture is what's really yeah this weird compressed crumbly patty thing kind of like i imagine what dog food is like yeah see these are, these are the crackers, just like giant saltines. Did you want any of this? No. No. I've had that.

It looks like a McRib from McDonald's, kind of. Kind of, yeah. And I don't like those. Okay, so you think, what do you think you put on the... I think you use your cheese spread on the tortillas. I mean, it's whatever you want. I'm losing track of my items here. That's what I think I would do.

Tortillas plain. Okay. And you've been around these a time or two. So I think you're... This is a little trip down memory lane though. Yeah. But this is what I would do with the crackers here and the peanut butter.

The tortillas seem as much like tortillas as they possibly could. Like, I was not expecting them to actually seem this much like tortillas. Hmm. I'll just give it a plain taste here. The peanut butter and crackers is good. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean, that's a straight up tortilla. But I got to try it all i guess so

cheese spread with bacon here we come tear it do you know are these all roughly the same calorically i would guess so yeah like it doesn't make sense that they would have one we have total one that's a thousand and one that's like my pizza slice is 260 calories but i guessing my these are over a calorie meals, I'm pretty sure. My beef patty is only 140 calories. But I make up for it, I think, with all my extra stuff here. Yeah, maybe I'm being a little over shooting with 1,000, but I think mine probably gets close to 1,000. My protein bar has more calories than my main course.

That's 270 calories. It is good, though. All right, I got to get this thing open. Everything else has opened very easily so far until I get to this tube of cheesy spread with bacon. I'm not going to try my... applesauce. I'm not huge on applesauce.

Can you open that? I'd just be starving out here, Tanner. I wouldn't make it anywhere. Okay, if it's hard, then I'm just going to bite it open. Yeah, you might have to. That's what she said. It says tear at corner, which makes me think, oh, it should open so easy.

There we go. Okay. A little processed cheese. There's a smell coming out of this thing. There's something about bacon, though, especially when it's really trying to be bacon. Right, right. especially when it's really trying to be bacon I don't eat a lot of cheese

from tubes of it's kind of similar to when you make the shells with cheese and it comes in the little package of cheese I mean it's fine yeah overall it actually does taste like bacon yeah yeah like if someone gave this to me if i was hungry and my wife went and got this and came back i'd be like oh okay thanks yeah right overall if you were hungry. You didn't want any of it, did you?

No. And you got this as a meal. You'd probably be like, I can eat this and be not hungry. I'm going to eat these cashews. Okay. So on to the good stuff here. So one more time, what's the name of the bar? First Strike Nutritious Energy Bar.

Nutritious might be a generous word it's a good though yeah it's good yeah these cashews are a little spicy yeah it's just a chewy kind of chocolatey like some puffed rice in there. Yep. Okay. That one I approve. Have you sampled mostly everything then? No, I got two left. Oh, what do you got left, Sal?

Shit, those cashews are spicier than I bargained for. I got the oatmeal chocolate chunk cookie. Oh. Only 19 grams of sugar in this bad boy. All right. Open her up. Oh, and it looks like a cookie. Oh, very crumbly.

Holy. And that's what flavor? Oatmeal? Mm-hmm. I'll try a good i mean it's dry and crumbly but kind of tastes like a giant chips ahoy yeah yeah i could totally it is good though yeah it is unnecessary it feels like that comes with that m and m&m's doesn't it like do i need two desserts in this meal well so you get a 290 calorie cookie and 250 calories of m&m's over 500 calories of your desserts

i don't need to open the unless you want some m&ms i don't know i do not find out calories of M&M's. Over 500 calories of your desserts. I don't need to open the... Unless you want some M&M's. No, I do not. You can save those. I had some M&M's in my day. Overall, we got to give it... You got to give your menu 19. What is menu 19 again called? The beef patty?

Beef patty. Jalapeno pepper jack. beef patty jalapeno pepper jack yep out of five out of five potential jd power and associates awards god it's hard because i want to grade it on the scale of like good food how these well it's like do i grade it on the scale of food or do i grade it on the scale of how i think maybe these other things might taste because i have no uh i have nothing to base this on, you know? Yeah. I want to think that this is probably one of the better ones. So if we have an MRE, JD power ratings,

I got to think that this is probably like in that three and a half to four territory. I think it probably is. Yeah. Just the sides alone are pretty damn good. The potatoes are good. The tortilla and the cheese is good the uh cookies and m&ms are both good yeah like as long as you don't have a problem with the texture of the beef patty because the beef patty the flavor is fine it's just the textures got that you know right uh dehydrated crumbly taste but yeah that's i would think this has to be probably

this actually as far as memories this has to be like a four i would think it could be a four i think yeah i can't imagine there's a whole lot how many are there do you know i don't know i'm not sure how many different choices there are 30 of them ah there could be i don't really know that seems like a lot maybe there is just like 20 i have a hard time believing there's like six that taste better than this one yeah i bet it's a four yeah i think it is what about yours overall pretty good if i was stuck in the field for a week and someone threw me this i'd be like well i cannot be starving now because of this like the actual pizza part of it not that great but not terrible i'm curious what other people's take is on this

pizza one i've never had that before but i've had worse things it's it's a thousand times better than the veggie omelet um the idea that now sounds are really gross yeah the sides are pretty decent though with the first strike yeah that bar is not bad and this one does have peanut butter and i like that and it has the jalapeno cashews and applesauce. Not bad. Actually, all the sides were pretty good in yours, weren't they? Yeah. I'd probably give this one a three and a half tiptoeing towards the four.

Yeah. I could see that. So, okay, because I don't know how this works. Like, was there ever periods of time where you were eating these for like many days in a row? Yeah. Where like at least one of your meals is the, is one of these every day, but not where everyone,

even though there's probably some people where that's true, but for me, usually like they'd, but so here's the thing. If you're out in the field, like Sergeant Anderson, he just went to do a little whatever yeah they're like a couple weeks training and usually they were in the field quite a bit and a lot of times when you're in the

field what they'll do is bring you one or two hot meals a day like either breakfast or supper they'll bring it out and like i don't know if you've been in the army you know like these giant green containers that they throw in the back of the humvees and bring out to the field and they set up a little makeshift lunch line and you go through there and they'll do that once or twice a day and for your other meals you'll eat these so for like lunch you'll almost always have this because you're just kind of like working through lunch or like not working half the time anyways but you're just stuck there so like it's it's an experience for the so then is it killing time like everyone get bust out their mre and you're like it's like christmas like yeah yeah right right is it like a superior

just like throws one to you and you get what you get or is there so there that might like in basic training that's for sure what happens but like and in some scenarios that's what happens because maybe there's not time to sit but like a lot of times like i'm thinking of my late you know latter years it was like you dig around and find okay so there's a big tote or whatever and like you'd have things stashed and stuff like that yeah could you ever cardboard boxes of like 20 a pack okay in the pack could you ever let's say you eat one and you're hungry Could you ever cardboard boxes of like 20 up pack in the pack? Could you ever, let's say you eat one and you're hungry. Could you ever get a second one? I no doubt did that at times for sure,

but also like, they're not that good either. So you're never like, I really want a lot more of these. It's just kind of like, it is just like sus. Like, it's like,

yeah, it's something it is like, but the thing is the, those, the hot meals that they would bring out like not c rations that's an older term but i can't think of the term but uh they're not good they're actually really bad like a lot of times it's like you it's you're getting trying to find the least offensive yeah you're getting like a really chintzy sectioned off styrofoam plate.

And in one of the sections, it's a salad, which is just like lettuce with like the carrot strips on it. Like an awful salad. Yeah. The one section is green beans. There's a pretty shitty dessert, like some like brownie. And then the main course is something meat you know it's gonna be like kind of like that beef patty thing only a little less processed but maybe barely less processed but it is hot so like those meals were almost worse than this okay but it was like a change

of pace i suppose is the bigger thing where you're like oh at least i don't have to eat mre right now for this. So that's my experience. I mean, I suppose experiences may vary, but that's how it was for me in most of my time. All right. I got to just open this to see what's all in here. This kind of the extras packet. Yep.

Oh, now that my hands are open. Are you going to try the laxative? You should try a piece of laxative gum. Let's see if I can poop. Actually, I might use the moist towelette. My hand's a little sticky. Yeah, I was going to say my hand's so greasy I'm having trouble opening it. That cookie was good.

I got to give the cookie credit. Is that what this is right here? I think that's just a dry towel. Oh, a dry towelette. All right. So we have creamer, non-dairy don't need any creamer we have zero calorie sweetener we have oh bill's brew there you go freeze dried coffee yep there it is back at the that time i never drank coffee so i never even messed with that but now if i was

if it was me now i probably would just for for something to do. Allow water just chemically purified to stand 30 minutes before adding coffee. Add coffee to six ounces, quarter canteen cup of hot or cold water and stir. All right. And then we have regular sugar, a little bit of salt. Dry towel, moist towel. Well, really really this I think if memory serves me possibly correctly

you know this could serve as some toilet paper in a pinch this one right here if there's no YMCA yeah yeah that's kind of what

we're dealing with here is maybe some makeshift toilet paper if it'd be is that the idea behind it I think so honestly like I'm

that's what I it says on the package it says if you chew gum use this yes yes you're gonna need it okay i'm all about that moist towel that though get my sticky fingers gone that did help but now my fingers are all wet i'm trying to open up this little package of gum oh that's better so you did give yours a four i'm gonna go officially three and a half we've probably got about 18 menu items left to rate on the show and i don't know for how long this takes if we want to do an mre opening but this was a special occasion it was it was a very special one um this moist towelette comes in handy for trying to clean the crap out of my mustache.

Yeah. This too. Oh. We made fettuccine alfredo tonight. And that's one of those things. Like dairy based things. To me, when they get just on the facial hair. Yeah.

Like corn on the cob. Do you do corn on the cob, Tanner? I have several times this year. It's been pretty good. Does it feel like the butter is just permanently a part of you yeah kind of like like until i like take a shower even and even then it's always like where corn on the cob's been good this year though tell you what i've had some good crop of corn on the cob um how's the gum gum's good yeah it's like uh like big red it's like cinnamon like a fireball you know is this like is this what chewing five gum feels like i'd imagine

gum's better than i thought it would be you know for this little white chiclet thing right right right i kind of always expected to be something shitty but and now you got peanut m&ms to and i got peanut m&ms still yeah we'll probably say this for mom my boy loves m&ms he'll be a he'll be jacked to see these um would you got full if you would eat in that whole meal or well um so i skipped on a potatoes a little bit of little tortilla shell and a little beef patty. I don't know. If I would eat all that and the whole bag of M&M's,

I'd be full at that point. If you would have eaten everything. If you would have eaten everything. And M&M's. If I didn't eat all the sugar, I definitely would not have been full. Right. That's the thing though. Boy, I don't want every one of my meals to be finishing with a giant cookie,

a bag of peanut M&M's. Like almost 600 calories of just sugar. But I guess if you're active, then you just need calories. Right. That's true, too. Calories are calories at some point. Right. So thank you, Big Alex.

Yeah, that was a really cool experience. I don't know what the audio experience was for people. We tried to take you with on a journey. I almost kind of forget we're even doing it on that one since it's so out of the norm. It was just like just recording or we're just sitting here eating this. That was fun though. I really liked that. That's a fun

way to finish an episode. I was also... I gotta spit my gum out or I'm just gonna chomp on your gum. It's good though. Good laxative gum. Yeah. I gotta spit my gum out or I'm just going to chomp on your gum. It's good though. Good laxative gum. Yeah. I got to spit my gum out or else I'm just going to shit my pants right here. I feel it coming.

You know what you could do with all those calories though? What? You could go turn them into muscle by training with Juggernaut AI. Come with me for this ad if you want to lift. That's the Arnold Schwarzenegger impersonation. So Juggernaut AI, we've both been using it for many, many, many weeks now. Roughly 20 to be roughly exact. Yeah, and they are obviously a paid sponsor of the

podcast but we legitimately just kind of talk about juggernaut ai training and how it's going and we have so many people at the gym that are using it it's just like i almost don't go to the gym and like find out something about how someone is utilizing the juggernaut ai app for their training yeah and i'm at the point now where my bench my rp9 ish 10 because that's how juggernaut ai app for their training yeah and i'm at the point now where my bench my rp nine ish ten because that's a juggernaut works it usually has a uh um a rp goal range or something shooting for every block has a has a a 10 a 10 there's one in there yeah you're trying to go for and as of right now my rp 10 day just goes up 10 pounds every month. So if that keeps going, that means my bench will go 500.

Uh, no, it'll go up 120 pounds in a year. So that, which isn't bad. I just keep riding that way forever. I think, you know,

that's how it is. So three years from now, my bench will be up 360 pounds, but right now it is going. It is. It goes up. And I, there's been a few times where i've gotten a true

rp10 like oh i for sure did not have another one and i'm like four weeks yeah that's not going up and it does yeah and there's been times where like i do what i think should be an rp10 throw another 10 pounds on and another rep and it still is an rp10 like i just can't quite get it which is such an awesome feeling you know in training when you think you're overshooting and you're still not actually overshooting yeah and someone uh here's a i'll paint you a picture of a person that i think juggernaut ai is the like an ideal person to try this say uh it works for a number of different people but someone i picture in my mind you've been training for a little while maybe six months a year could be five years or 10 years and what you've done is uh you kind of know about training a little bit at this point and you've done some different programs and you've run

some different templates you've maxed out yeah you've maxed out you've had you've had working sets yeah you you've you've done different excel spread you know spreadsheets and stuff and you you kind of get that but you haven't really taken it to the next level in your training like you're kind of limited to just like oh i've done this program like i printed out this program i did that program and i went good so this i'm gonna run the program again but i'll just put all my maxes in at like 10 pounds heavier yes i really feel like this is a level beyond that absolutely and it's at a price that is extremely reasonable for what you're getting in our opinion in my opinion for sure if you use code mass that'll save you 10 off the lifetime of

that membership uh so go to the website on your web browser it could be on your phone but go through the browser don't necessarily go through the app store go to juggernaut ai get signed up there use discount code massonomics m-a-s-s-e-n-o-m-i-c-s save you 10 ends up costing you about 30 bucks a month and there's no like commitment or anything it's like a dollar a day that's actually as far as training sessions go i mean it depends if like me and you train three days a week or some of the guys in the gym train five days a week yeah but the more you train i guess technically the cheaper it is per training session that's true so 30 bucks a month that's like three cups of coffee from starbucks maybe not even because i remember on the uh old like two burgers from mcdonald's

on the old like um like animal helping animals things or like helping children in like starving countries oh yeah on the commercials it was always like for the price of uh yes it's like yeah for the price of like two starbucks trips you could afford this every month yeah it's dumb not to you know if you put pencil to paper this is like really if you're thinking right now financially can i make this work i'll do this if your options are okay we'll say on one hand you have juggernaut that that's your choice okay you have a budget and on the other hand you have some combination of protein creatine other things for sure go with the training yeah yeah that's the smarter thing well and you're even saying protein creatine you're saying like the smart the smartest possible choices yeah even how about like not those even like yeah crazy yeah bcaa about anything that's not protein

creatine or potentially caffeine like anything that's not those especially i'm just saying if you're really pinching pennies right right right um like this but you even said the most yes the most sensical ones. But yeah. Or yeah, this is the smartest. I think if you're going to spend any money on anything. Eat some food. Yeah. Get some rest.

Do that part first. Get this training. Get this. And then if that's all in line, then you can supplement it with supplements. I agree. Yes. But that is only if you've taken care of steps one and two. Yeah. Actually steps one, two, and three, which and three which are eating sleeping proper training uh uh planning then you can look at supplements then you're

allowed to spend money there if there's money left in your budget that's i think makes a lot of sense and like we're kind of being goofy but i'm no that's 100 serious if you're not doing in that order you are messing up right right like pre-workout is not like not having pre-workout is not the thing that's stopping you from achieving your goals. No, especially, well, especially if your goal is to get stronger over the long term. Yeah. Maybe your goal is to just be buzzed off caffeine and like max out every other week and not really make progress. If that's your goal, then that's probably the way. Then you're fine.

But if you're like, I would like to actually do this and get stronger. Yeah. The proper training through something like Juggernaut ai would be far ahead yeah you'd be off yeah so get signed up we're sold out of jorts completely no jorts left we're looking at options for like uh maybe someday we'll have jorts again but for some type of for some type of jorts tailored yep yep um but we did sell every single pair of jorts that we had they were a very hot commodity they were the smalls hung on or just a little bit yeah but they went yep yep um what did you did you have something do i yeah i don't know did we do that no we haven't done this one yet okay i don't think we have okay unless we did no i don't think we did either or did we i wasn't that one over there uh today's show is also brought to you by texas power bars

buddy caps first started lifting weights in the late 60s and began power lifting in the mid 70s at the time he was working for Image Barbell, building gym equipment around... Burping up cookie here. I've got a lot of the... It's not me, it's the MRE talking. What's the bar? The Hua Bar.

Oh, that's what we used to call them, like a Hua Bar. I wonder if that's changed. What was that, like a nickname? Or was that actually called? I think that's what it was called, the Hua... That just subconsciously came to me it's like the whoo bar because like in our in as a marine i think you say hoorah hoorah but in the army we we said i've said this before i know but like if you know the drill sergeant asked you a question the response to

the group it's whoo and like I do it exaggerated because over the years I just thought it was so ridiculous. I would just be like, huh? We're all doing this right now? But I think it was called the Huh Bar. Huh. Huh. You look into that. Give us some follow-up.

I'm actually going to look into it. Around 1976, a local machine shop started making Olympic bars for them calling at the image bar in 1977 image barbell became champion barbell it was then that buddy started looking at the bars with an intent of changing them for the better in 1979 buddy bought his first laid to begin addressing the known issues in 1980 his passion drive and purpose now had a greater mission but he set out on his own to make what he believed was the greatest bar he'd ever seen and trained with, and the Texas Power Bar was born.

It was strong as a house with the best knurling and was maintenance-free. Hundreds of state, national, international, world, and massonomics powerlifting records have been and continue to be set and broken on the Texas Power Bar. To learn more about Texas Power Bars and buy one of their legendary bars, visit TexasPowerBars.com. Speaking of bars, okay, so you see that? Yeah. Just look at the, I just want you to see the labeling.

Chocolate flavor, first strike, nutritious energy. Yeah. Here's what it was. They did change it. It was the Hua Bar. It kind of almost looks like this is like a knockoff of this thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I wonder if Hua has fallen out of favor.

You know, it's less utilized. Yeah. Interesting. Is that okay if I snap a little piece of this? Yeah, yeah. Go ahead. I'm kind of grossed out by it. I'm good on the Hua Bar for several more years.

Got to see what it's about one more time. Well, still not bad. I want to know if the Army still says Hua. I don't know. To be continued. Someone else can just fill me in on that. I'm not going to do any research. Does the Army still say Hua?

Because they got rid of the Hua bar in favor of a first strike bar. So that tells me something. Maybe they'll just say first strike. Yeah, that's... Because it's the exact same thing. They just changed the name. I was talking about apparel of ours.

Get out and get you some. We are out of Lyft jorts but we do have are just a fresh restock of the original mesh lift shorts the one that started at all the granddaddy of them all check out lift shorts we still have pretty good stock of lift shorts three uh now that lift jorts are sold out they are are currently our most expensive pair of shorts in our store. So if you're looking to spend a lot of money, get the Lift Shorts 3. That's a good place to start. Tees, we recently restocked the Classics.

We're wearing them, actually. The Lift and Bench Heavy, we restocked some of the Classics. The Ouch Tee recently was restocked. We got that back in. The High Bar Lifting Club was restocked. For all you people in the high bar club it's been a shirt folding machine at my house getting all these restocks um ready but uh and then we still have some of our all go no show teas from this last drop as well as patches and koozies buy all that stuff if you don't want to do that please consider becoming a supporting member

of the podcast. So you can listen to us eat more meals on air. Yeah, we're going to start eating every meal on the podcast. We're just going to have dinner. Tanner's just going to come to my house. Can you pass the salt? Yeah. Yeah, it's pretty good.

Yeah. Like far less conversation. We're going to act like there's not a podcast even going on to not like plates, clanging and forks scratching on things. Yeah. Um, is that about it?

I think that's probably about it. I don't really know how to end this one. It's just, it seems like it's just going on and on. Yeah. I don't either. If you're less, maybe you're,

uh, God, I wish they could figure out how to, yeah, you're, you're, you're watching your time go down on your. Wrap it up.

Like I thought it was going to be over. What are they still talking about? They ran that juggernaut ad somehow took five minutes. Don't even know who's an ad or an endorsement. That's that's the thing. We blur the lines of an ad and the rest of the show. So it's like when you're reading a magazine and it looks like you're reading an article

but then on the bottom it says this is an advertisement or like our local newspaper where almost the entire thing is that and you're like wait there's no news articles in here it's all ads for weird prescription drugs yeah Tommy where do they find you? you can find me at Tomahawk underscore D

you can find me at Tanner underscore Baird but nobody cares about that just make sure to follow Mastonomics at Mastonomics See ya