Massenomics Podcast - Ep.26: The Highland Games

Episode Date: October 3, 2016

This week, we recap the 2016 Highland Games event that a few of our athletes (or is it Mass-letes?... or maybe Massholes? Massaholics? Mass-ters of the Universe??) competed in. The Highland Games is a very unique and developed sport that most people may not have heard of... We break it all down for you this week in typical Massenomics fashion: Powerfully! Don't forget to LIKE and SHARE this episode on Facebook... Make sure you LIKE the Massenomics Facebook page... If you don't already have a closet full of Massenomics gear, go to the MASSENOMICS STORE and load up on swag... Also, please CLICK THIS LINK TO GIVE US A 5 STAR RATING ON ITUNES... Click this text to follow Massenomics on Instagram... Vote Massenomics for President in 2016... Have your barber shave our logo into the side of your head.. Maybe get a Massenomics tattoo while you're at it.    Or you could sign up for our email newsletter at the bottom of this page. Stay Strong, M

M-M-M-M-M-M-M-Massanomics Welcome to Massanomics, the world's strongest podcast. Find us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at Massanomics. Make sure you go visit massanomics.com. There you'll find the rest of our powerful content. While you're there, check out our store and buy yourself some of that sweet, massive beer. All right, ladies and dudes and lady dudes. We are...

Lady boys. Whatever it takes. We are here in the aftermath of the Northeast South Dakota Highland Games. Is that correct? Or is it the Celtic Fair Highland Games. Is that correct? Or is it the Celtic Fair? End Games. Northeast South Dakota Celtic Fair End Games, I think is. That is a lot.

Yeah. That is a lot on one shirt. So you guys, tell me about the day yesterday. We had the Highland Games competition, and I didn't get to go. So as far as the listeners who don't know what that is,'ll be the good person to ask the questions that's perfect so there are there's a handful of events some of them are heavy some are light is that correct yeah there's like two handfuls of events so there's there's a lot of events yeah and maybe for people that don't know what a Celtic or Highland Games Celtic Faraday that is,

it is games with kind of an, is it Irish? Irish-Scottish. Irish-Scottish heritage to them. You are supposed to be wearing a kilt. There's a lot of traditions that go with it, but it's all these kind of historic, almost track and field type events. Less track, more like historic, kind of historic almost track and field type events you less less track

more like historic kind of like field throwing type events and i think like a lot of field throwing events evolved from that from highland games yeah these are older than track and you know track and field events themselves are old as shit old as shit and so i think that's what they told us if i remember correctly i believe in the opening ceremonies, these games, gentlemen, are old as shit. So please be respectful. But we do do this opening ceremony, opening prayer circle thing. And one of the classic jokes that gets put out every year is that it is the most fun that you can have with your clothes on. And we make a

point to talk about it how they're gonna say it and then we did we do this you know their kind of prayer circle that they do and they're like all right boys just just so everyone knows it's gonna be a great day and this is the most fun you can have with your clothes on and just and we all we all cheer because we're all waiting for we all know what's coming it's kind of like that's the one punchline that they use every year. Oh, yeah. Actually, there's like four. Some go-tos.

I'm sure that gets said at every event, through every country. They probably have the same jokes, but... Yeah. So then there's a lot of cheering. It's fun. But yeah, there is nine events, but three of those events have two versions, a lighter and a heavy version of that.

So really, there's kind of six different events. Gotcha. And then the other three are just redundant. And is there any, like, are those the same? I guess maybe we should say what the events are just really quickly. Yeah, can we run through them real quick? Yeah, we can say it in the order that we competed. There's no set order that you compete them in.

Is there ever a set order? No, I don't think so. I don't know. At least not in the three years that I've done them, no. Because you'll split up into multiple groups with multiple judges, so they just fill out the field however they can and rotate around whatever works out. And some of this stuff does sound almost kind of like strong man made up type things but it is actually standardized yeah it's pretty close it's

close to standardized like when we go through the events you'll see how some of it's maybe difficult for it to really be standardized but yeah within within a certain parameters it is but the first one we did was the sheaf toss and that, uh, you wield a pitch fork with that one. And, uh, it's like half the size of a square bale. It weighs about 20 pounds as the sheaf. Yeah. And you, the goal of it is, uh, you stand, uh, with the bar to your back and swing the pitch fork with the sheaf on the end of it and fling it up and try and see how high over the bar you can get it. It's a rising bar challenge. You get three attempts at every height,

then eventually once you've missed three at that height, you're out. Yeah, so with an event like that, it's not like a lot of track and field events where you scratch three times, you're done, or whatever it is. You get three attempts at every height. Every single one. You can strike out twice and then get it on the third on every single another yeah just keep going and uh so like part of the uh um i guess kind of the strategy of it is if you're someone that's

actually good and knows your limits um you can sit out while people you know are wasting energy and attempts on the the first lighter weights so you could just jump in at a higher height. And once you've jumped in, you have to stay in. Then you can't skip. You can't do 15 feet and then sit out 16. Once you're in, you're in. But we started at 10 feet or something, and everyone can get 10 feet. Except I did miss 10 feet on the first try. It was pretty embarrassing.

Everyone should be able to get 10 feet because you can almost just hold a pitchfork above your head and dump it over 10 feet. So, yeah, we did that one and it went quite a while. And we had five guys from Masonomics Gym competing on the day. And, oh, how did we do? Everyone broke 15 feet this year. We had 15 feet.

Tommy got 17. Tommy's brother, Ryan, got 17. Big Larry legend. Actually, this weekend, we started calling him Lair Bud. Just like, Air Bud, only Lair Bud. I heard that going on, and I just assumed that maybe that had always existed. No, I think Ryan made that up. Oh, yeah, he just said it, and no one really made a big deal about it.

So I just assumed everyone kind of knew that name and somehow I'd missed it through all the years, but yeah, the layer bud was good. So I'm pretty sure Tommy had 17 feet. That was, I think that was probably a PR for you over last year. So yeah. And then I did 25 and that was a one foot PR for me over. And you got, did you get in first? Yeah, I did. I, me and one other guy both hit 25, and that was a one-foot PR for me. Did you get in first? Yeah, I did.

Me and one other guy both hit 25, but the way the scoring works, I got it on my first attempt, and he missed one or something. So that's how you break the tie on that. Gotcha. So then what did we do? The weight over bar, or weight for height, I guess is the right word. Weight for height, yeah yeah which is i i think one of the funnest events actually we started with the sheath toss is really fun uh just because

physically it doesn't take a lot out of you and it is just kind of fun to do yeah and then the weight for height is also i think one where just raw power converts pretty there is definitely a certain amount of technique but uh just being strong as well it's one you can really muscle through yeah big time and those are those are my favorite too also most of all of us what does that look like what are you throwing over the bar it's a 56 pound weight and it's about the size of what just pretty much imagine just a 56 pound kettlebell yeah and then um instead of the handle being fixed to it the handle's on a chain and so so you have probably what? A little whip. Yeah, probably two links of chain between the handle.

Yeah, that's what it is, is two links of chain. So if you don't keep constant even tension on it, it'll get like a lot of whip. That's weird. Yeah, way more than you want. That's the thing of what I recognized from last year being my first time handling any of this stuff to this year is that just even spending one that, um, you know, just even spending one afternoon with it. You understand of once you get that concept of keeping tension on the chain

and not, you know, kinking it or getting any slack into it. Um, you're, you're much more efficient thrower and all of those things. Yeah. Yeah.

And how layer bud got 10 foot, uh, you and Ryan, Tommy and Ryan both got 11, both Ryan's got 11. Um um i did 14 and that was it and it was over really fast so then we were done with those two fun events and uh those are my favorite two and then it's kind of sad that we have those over right away and then have to go to some of the ones that aren't quite as fun it is you kind of swing the weight to your side and then bring

it up in front of you swing it between your legs and from there it is almost just like a clean like you're just bringing your hips through and throwing it right back behind you right yeah yeah and really you throw it straight up in the air and it just kind of magically goes behind you i don't you you stand almost directly underneath the bar that's over your head like if if you tilt your head back and look up the bar is almost exactly over your head. Okay. And it just, yeah, it feels like you're just throwing it upward, but it just goes back just enough to clear the bar. Huh.

And now is that standalone or is there a light or heavy for that? So that one is just the heavy. That's just heavy. And we're all in the above 200-pound male, under 40-year-old class. So we have the heaviest implements. If you're over 40 years old, you get lighter implements. If you weigh less than 200 pounds, you get lighter implements. So everything that we do is the heaviest version of what they have. Gotcha.

And 56 pounds is pretty heavy. When you're swinging that, and you hold it with one hand, that's a lot on one hand really that is only a one hand throw yeah okay yeah yeah really everything you do is one yeah everything's one-handed so yeah if you're right-handed that right side of the body takes a lot of so the others can hold a drink yeah yeah what did we move to after that i believe the caber yeah we went to the caber after that and that to me is probably the always the most iconic event yeah it's kind of the signature event i would say

yeah if people have seen something from uh highland games or celtic fair games before that's probably what they've pictured i would imagine and the caber is a large really the best way to think about it is take a telephone pole. Just taper to one end. Yep. And someone walks it up to you. And then as the competitor, you bend over. You pick it up off the ground. So you're holding this pole.

And then you kind of take off running. And you flip it in the air. And I know before I had ever seen it, I remember before I ever competed, I remember seeing it and thinking like, oh, you're judged on how far you can throw this thing or something like that. But you really are just judged completely on how straight you can flip it. So a perfect throw would be a 12 o'clock. It's by direction of the clock, how it lands after it flips. And if you get 12 o'clock, that's a perfect score for that caber.

And there's multiple cabers. So if you flip a caberer you get to go to the next one the next hardest uh and it's not just by weight or by length that they're measured in difficulty it also has to do with uh where the balance point lands yeah so so as yeah so as you're going up this this ladder of cabers you could say yeah they get bigger or they get longer they get heavier and the the balance is moving too. Yeah, the balance would get farther away from you. So there's like a weighted spot on there where there's a –

It's more just how it's constructed. Yeah, it's just the way – like how much of a taper it has or – yeah, some of them are more natural logs too. And then I guess it's just a little more random. But these were more fabricated, man-made. And to start with, they're kind of giving people a practice thrower, too. And there's a few guys that had never done it before, and they're explaining how to do it. And Ryan goes up in the first one. He flips it, does a perfect flip over, and it just cracks, like, basically right in half.

Oh, really? Yeah. After they just gave us the talk, I'd be careful with them because these things take a long time to make and yeah they don't like it was it was a total accident you know it is possible if you do a bad throw you can wreck them but ryan flipped it over a flip fine once it flipped it bounced once bounces back down and snaps really kind of a freak thing it's by far out of all the events we do it's the most dangerous yeah like there's definitely some sketchy things that can go on when you've got when you're holding that if if you're not gonna flip it if you have to drop it uh-huh because it really bounces up and down off the

ground so if it's like between your legs yeah you're probably gonna get caught a lot of energy the one guy it bounced uh it bounced on his shoulder it looked pretty painful that sounds awful yeah they're about what was the one we figured probably what 18 feet tall The one guy, it bounced on his shoulder. It looked pretty painful. That sounds awful. Yeah. What was the one we figured? Probably, what, 18 feet tall? Yeah.

According to this, about 17 is what it says. So the biggest one is like 17 foot long? The biggest one they had. We didn't make the biggest one. None of us flipped the second to the biggest one. So none of us made it to the largest one that they have. I've got a video of this pulled up now. Is this what this looks like? Yeah, this is the pick.

When you're just initially getting off the ground, you have to clasp it in your hands and shimmy it up and get your fingers under it. And we're watching a video, and that guy just did it. He made it look easy, and it's not always that easy. But even this year, once you understand, because you burn all of your energy in that pick. If you have a bad pick,

because then it's just all of that leverage of the weight being on the top pulling you over and you got to do everything you can to stabilize yourself. So if you can get a good pick, I mean, you could go, you could bang it out all day, but a a good pick i mean you could go you could bang it out all day but a couple bad picks and you're just gassed from it yeah the the the pick this this is the first year where i finally was able to to do it pretty properly and it saves you so much work if you just pick it up and grab it and you're ready to go right away because you'll see a lot when they muscle it for like 30 seconds.

By that time, you have no energy left to try and flip it. Is it common to lose it? Because it looks like they're picking it up. Imagine people listening, a telephone pole just sitting there straight up and down. And you just have to get your hands underneath it and stand up with it. Yeah, it happens quite a bit that people end up dropping it. And is that like you're done? Yes.

Even on the pick, as soon as you pick it it off the ground if it touches again you're done yeah you get three attempts at that yeah at each one yeah no wonder the thing that event takes for this competition takes forever how long were you guys there yesterday oh i think we competed for eight hours holy shit yeah and those those first three events would competition start at nine and those first three events we weren't done with until like 12 30 yeah so those three those three are the longest ones yeah so you really you have to just totally give up on the idea of staying warm and oh yeah it's like well you did we did stay warm because it was so hot zero we were just sweating all day but it's tough to stay loose and limber all that time.

Or to stay mentally focused for that long. Yeah, you get tired. It is fun, though, when we had a group. What was there, six of us from the gym? Yeah. So we could joke around a lot and be stupid. Yeah, there's a lot of screwing around that's involved in these. Yeah.

Which is probably very well received amongst the types that probably take things a little too seriously that inevitably show up at those types of things yep um well what did we have next then oh after the well we ate lunch after we haven't had a great lunch to get into that a great a great traditional irish lunch of walking tacos and roast beef. Just like the Scottish. The Scottish traditional dinner of walking tacos and roast beef. It was really good though. Yeah. The roast beef had the full like,

you know, cabbage and everything with it. Yeah. But it was an odd combination, which was better. I think last year was subway. So yeah, I think the traditional,

I think it was a step Subway. So I think... The traditional Celtic. I think it was a step up. It was good. And then when we came back from lunch, we went to the Hammers, I think. I believe so. Now we get all the rest of the events, there's two versions of this, a lighter and a heavier.

And I don't know why. I'm kind of curious why it's like that. Like, I don't think you need to throw two different... You're doing the exact same thing, just with the lighter version and the heavier version. And each one is a full event. So you go through one all the way, and then you go to the next one, and you get three throws of each one. But we started with the heavy hammer, which weighed 22 pounds. And it's basically, how this one is built is, it really is almost like a PVC pipe.

A flexible PVC. i don't know if there's a different name yeah no that's what that is like a flexible pvc pipe with a dumbbell and head dumbbell head on the end oh okay so it's like i know when a lot of times people say hammer they probably think of like the track and field style hammer which is more like a that's the wire that's the wire hammer is what the track and field one is called yeah so this really is if you haven't seen it is almost just like a sledgehammer is yeah what it kind of is modeling yeah and you stand in place and spin that around you got to you got to remain stationary with your feet yeah that's different from the college version of the hammer throw they spin in college hammer and highland games hammer

you you can't move your feet and so with this year you're planted with your back to kind of the field and you just start spinning and you let that thing go behind you and um see how year you're planted with your back to kind of the field and you just start spinning and you let that thing go behind you and um see how far you fly and this is where there was actually a couple a couple guys from the local uh college in town that were throwers for track and field and this is where they really started to shine just fucking yeah this is you know the other the other events they didn't do bad on. No. But it was about, like, I mean, you would expect, you know,

anyone with an athletic background to probably do. But there was, like, the events here. The one guy, he was a shot putter. And it was the hammer throw. He made it look effortless. And it was, like, dominating. Seriously, effortless, yeah. Like, it didn't look like he was hardly spinning it.

Like, he was putting, it just, it looked so easy. It would just looks so easy just fly it would i think he probably won that event by yeah oh yeah he won that pretty pretty well uh i guess on the caber i i would i would have said how we did but the score i can't even explain yeah i don't know we all did pretty good but But the heavy hammer, yeah, that college track athlete threw it about 73 feet. And then the rest of us were throwing it between 60 and 40 feet. Yeah. You know, somewhere in there. He pretty much shellacked everything. Yeah.

And it was obvious when you'd watch, too. It was like, whoa, that's going a lot farther than everyone else's. Yeah, you could definitely tell the difference. And then after that, we moved to the light hammer, and that's 16 pounds instead of 22. But it makes a huge difference. You can tell that six pounds feels like more than a six-pound difference when you're spinning that thing.

Same way that guy, he threw it 92 feet, and the rest of us were between 75 and 55 feet in that area. Jesus. Yeah, he let that thing soar. Yeah, he let her fly. Let it buck. Then after that, we threw the weights for distance, I think, didn't we? Yeah, yeah, weight for distance. And then there's the heavyweight and the lightweight.

The heavyweight is 56 pounds, and the lightweight is 28. And that's kind of the same style it's almost like a kettlebell but really similar implement or object to what we're using for the weight for height is yeah this is just like around i don't know about the size of a dinner plate maybe 56 pound weight with the same thing a two link chain connecting to the handle and this one's one of those ones where you'd watch it. It's like, oh, that throw looked pretty cool. And it would go like, what, 15 feet? It's just really anticlimactic because you try to do this windup

and let it go, and it just doesn't really go anywhere. And then the people that, it's like, oh, that looked really good. And it's, well, because they have better form. And then they measure it, and it wasn't very you you just there'd be a lot of throws you it looks cool and then you would see that yeah it we it wasn't very good no but i i think we all kind of struggled equally on that one same thing though the those college throwers had a lot of yeah they've got the advantage on that one too but those so those marks are all between like 15 and 20 feet so like a it'd be like a good one is 20 and a bad one is 15 maybe and they look exactly

the same when you're watching them so you can't tell the difference and then the the light the light weight is half the half the weight and that one's a little more fun yeah it doesn't just throw you around so you can get a little more, you look prettier doing it, I guess. Yeah, you just don't feel like such an idiot. Because the other one, you get off a little bit, and you basically just have to bail out, and it goes five feet, and you just feel like it.

So the light one, Tommy threw 42.48 inches, and I threw it 42.68 inches. So I was 42.8? 42.48. Oh, yeah. And I was 42.68 inches. So I was 42.8? 42.48. And I was 42.68. Inches? Yeah. I think.

A decimal system of inches. It was weird. I didn't understand the tape measure because it was feet, but it would only go to 10. Like it didn't go to 12. Yeah. 42. .48 inches, I guess. I don't know what that means yeah but yeah you edged me out on that one that was for the first time doing that one it felt good like last year felt terrible

everyone was not that good feeling but here i actually kind of felt like i was getting the hang of it a little bit yeah so the only ones we had left after that were the toss and the stones. And same way with there, there's two different weights. There's a 25-pounder and a 17-pounder. The 25-pounder is called the Braymar stone. And these stones are literally just rocks that you would pick up out of a field. Yeah. Okay.

So that's one of those things talking about the standardization of the events. They're supposed to be within like a cert a couple pound variance these stones but they could still look like the shape can be whatever yeah okay yeah so the braymar stone and this is just shot put yeah yeah this is the shot put yeah exactly it's just shot putting with stones from your yard but the braymar stone the heavier one you don't get a lead up you know you can't shuffle or glide or spin or anything you just have to stand with your foot yeah and just it's i guess a power throw is what you'd call it and then uh the lighter one you can do whatever you want whatever a track person would do you know spinning or gliding okay with the stone and it

was fun for me because i had to take off early for a wedding and i really wanted to get a score on the board for all this stuff so we finished up the weights for distance and i told the official that i had to get going he goes well okay well we'll just let you do all your throws quick so i ran got the stones i threw the 16 foot stone ran to get get it back ran back threw it again ran back it's like i was playing fetch with. And then I did the same thing with the big one, took three throws, throw it, run back and get it, throw it. And then after like four throws, he's like, you know, you can just take a break for a second. So I stood there, kind of caught my breath, throw it, run, get it, throw it, run, get it. And I guess I, I completed the games with that,

which at least I got a score on the board. But. Yeah. But yeah, the, uh, I wasn't there to see the other one, so I can't really comment on anything. Yeah. Anything happened. We, uh. You missed out on all the best stuff. I'm going to assume something really crazy happened. I did, uh, beat the college shot, but thrower in the stone throw both of them. Uh, let me see.

I know I beat him in the heavy one because that's even less technique. You know, it's just you're just standing in place and throwing it. Yeah. So that kind of takes out some of his advantage of knowing what the hell he's doing. Yeah. And so then the lighter one, he edged me out. Both of the college throwers edged me out on that one a little bit because they get to use all their fancy technique

all their skills i think they even tried recruiting ryan for a brief moment ryan ryan does have some track and field eligibility and he's he was hanging with these guys pretty good and have for having zero training and then ryan kind of had to flip it and say well if i competed would i have to go to practice like yeah and also would i have to go to school well he technically is in school still okay but um but a couple months yeah but then he would also you know we we realized that it would interfere with lifting and so it would just it was off the table yeah that would not work now so is that does that take us all the way through all the events? That takes us through the eight hours of events.

Eight hours of events in about 20 minutes. Was there any type of award showing or anything after that? Yeah, we ran down, you know, and then the way they score you overall is you get, you know, each event, it doesn't necessarily matter if you get first, you know, there's not an even distribution of points between first place, second place, third place, fourth place. It's like, uh, take the weight over bar or weight for height. For example, you get 60 points for every foot that you throw it high. So 10, 10 feet would be 600 points. 11 feet would be 660 points now is some of those well isn't it like relative to how that's how they determine the scale like that's how so they're

i think they're trying to get to to around where a thousand points is like a really really uh high end completion of that event you know a really high end mark yeah um so every event has that like the uh stone throw you get 25 points for every foot that you throw that but anyways so you could get get uh first place in an event versus the guy that gets second place and there could be a really big difference of points or it could be a really tight margin of points between the two but then they add all of them up and they divide it by the number of nine events and that's kind of your end score for the day so do you know then because all this is kind of standardized do you know then after you finish an event like this about where you would rank as far as the world. Yeah, it's kind of cool.

The people that run the event, they don't put it in immediately, but eventually they get the scores put into the website. Because it is kind of like a standardized sort of federation. Yeah, for sure. And I wish I could remember the website. I'll think of it later, and maybe with this podcast we can attach the link or something like that but um yeah they put it in there and you can see exactly where you line up it's for a calendar year so where your scores are at relative to everyone

else in the world for that calendar year and even like the professionals you can see where you rank against them and you're just like right nipping at their heels yeah pretty much like they'll probably be knocking on all of our doors i suppose sponsorship contract is just i bet now yeah how does that are there sponsored highland games athletes the the professional highland games athletes they have like a way better system figured out than power lifting or some other things they actually make a living yeah doing highland games and because it's one thing like it's kind of a lot easier to like move that one thing forward instead of having a whole bunch of fragmented shit right and there's the kind of the whole culture thing that goes with it too where there was a lot of people at this thing that probably don't care really about uh you know field events and lifting and things like that,

but the fact that they like Scottish heritage things, and so people show up to this, and you get a lot of people that are just kind of like looking for a place to listen to music and drink beer, and this offers that too. So it does have kind of the total atmosphere, which really helps it out. For sure, for sure. And you guys did get, for competing, you guys got some pretty sweet chalices we did i was pleasantly surprised by those yeah they're even better they

they were better every year we've gotten those and they were this year was the best one i think this one was a yeah it was sweet and like a it was big and black like a little skull yeah it was kind of badass yeah it's badass. Ryan wouldn't give me his last night. Dick. I asked. So really though, where do you fall? Give me some numbers, like roughly where you land as far as... Well, like for... And just to be clear here, Tanner did win the whole thing.

Yes, Tanner did win. Yep. And that's the... For your first... See, there's a beginner class the first year. So the first year that I did the beginner class, me and another guy that we left together, we got first and second. And actually right now, I can't remember if he got, it was Keith, big Keith. And I can't remember if he got first and

I got second or we were, we were close, but we kind of won the beginner class. But after the first year, you're not really in that class anymore then you're against at you know the the field of competitors at that point and uh so this is the first time that i've i won against like the legitimate field of competitors but so i was pretty proud like so with some of the numbers though like let's say yeah say say with power lifting you know like what you deadlift yeah but you then you you i hear some of these things where i i'm like oh well i'm a total pussy it's like so people are dead lifting 980 pounds yeah that way 50 pounds less than exactly yeah so so what are what are some of the things that are... Yeah, like I'll pick out...

I'm good at... Relative to them, there's some events that I'm pretty good at. And then there's some that it's like insanely far apart. So first I'll take one of the good ones. And I'll... Actually, that's all I'll talk about. First and only. Weight for height is one that we all do pretty well at.

Like as being people that lift and just being kind of strong yeah half lord bjornson has the world record for uh wait for height and it's so here it's only because he's tall everybody knows i can't remember what the disc what what the height is but i think it's like 25 feet which would be just insane to imagine after having tried it that he could do that but so i threw it 14 feet and uh we had someone else from the gym last year that threw it 14 feet and that's a pretty good uh pretty good score because like i was saying they try to the way it seems to work is a thousand points would be a a really legit score on any event and that 14 foot is an 840 okay like out of all the events of you know that any we did

that 840 is the highest uh so that's one that puts you closest to like yeah like hanging yeah like uh it would be up there with like the lowest level guys that do it like professionally okay you know like say the guys where that's not their best event you know where maybe they're really good at the caber and a couple other things and that's not their best thing it would be probably in the ballpark with them so how are you gonna hang another 11 feet on that which that like don't i mean after having tried that doesn't that even seem ridiculous that doesn't seem. To see anyone make that thing fly that high in the air? Even the idea of 20, because it's not like we're getting it up there, but we weren't quite getting it over the bar or our technique was off.

It's just like you can't physically throw it higher. No, yeah. Like there's no way. Yeah, or it wasn't, because with these things too, the bar, it's not like in track and field or like high jumper pole vault where the bar sits on you know it's whatever it's resting on and if it bumps and falls off you lose this thing it's just a bar attached to a string you can hit it and bang it as much as you want yeah it can hit it on the way up the way down bounce off it as long as it goes over that bar you're good so it's not like oh man i had that but i bumped the bar and it didn't count it's like no i couldn't throw that thing any higher if I needed to.

So some of the college track guys and stuff, some of these scores will be good enough in our open classes, not the professionals, the amateurs, to get in the top 100 in the world, something like that. Wild. Not like there's tons of people that do this you know i mean it's like about as obscure as a you know of you can find like you you find like a narrow enough pool of people doing something and you can like you're not good yeah you have to just get more and more obscure until you're like all right finally i'm good at this and i i think it's funny too you know you talk about it there's there's the under 200 pound class there's men's c b and a there's masters there's women so it is segmented out a lot too

on top of yeah and yeah no one there in the men's open was competing in a no there was there have been before and so that i don't i don't even completely understand how they segregate that because because when i i won b and c this year i won there was no a so i won the amateurs and they're like oh you won the amateurs that means you have to be a next year but let's let's like on scouts honor or something yeah let's just say that then next year you'll just win the a because you'll be the only yeah i would have yeah i would have won the a and so it's like yeah i don't know what it doesn't really make a difference or matter and it isn't like you blew everyone out no no it was really close yeah and i've seen other guys that have

won b before that still compete in b and so i don know how they, I don't really know why there's A, B, and C. Maybe at a really big competition it makes a difference. Now, do you think, how many reps of each of these lifts did you get in between last year's competition and this year's competition? A lot of mental reps. Mentally a lot, yeah. Sleepless nights. Physically zero reps were done between last year and this year's competition? A lot of mental reps. Mentally, a lot. Sleepless nights. Physically, zero reps were done between last year and this year, which having twice as many reps, going into this year,

I have that many more reps to draw on, which it did actually make events way easier than they were last year. Our practice is just the previous year having competed. Then it's like, all right, practice up. It's like every four years you just show up to the Olympicslympics like i'm fucking i'm gonna do this because i did it four years ago so i kind of got it down now it was kind of helpful and then between them like the guys that are kind of reffing it and officiating it will be always giving you tips and everything yeah there was even a couple times where some of the guy the track and field guys

um would be like well if you kind of like open your feet here and point them here a little bit, that should help you. And then you do it, and it's like, oh, yeah, that actually did help a lot. It is nice having track and field competitors around with some of those events, because they know things, and we don't know things. Yeah, it's not unusual on some of those events. For us, assuming you're not scratching the hammer throws

to over the course of three throws, get like 20 feet better on your scoreline. That happens to almost every one of us. Why would we even consider to practice in the offseason? Imagine. At the rate I'm going with three more throws, I'd be really good. That is seriously the truth, too. You could almost watch every one of us.

Each throw would get farther and farther. It is funny because we do have like a gym and like an outside space in which this could be practiced maybe twice before like and i'm looking at some of these implements here on the computer and i i can't imagine any of these are like prohibitively expensive you know what i mean right yeah like the the rocks would be an easy one to practice and the weights for distance would be easy to practice the the weights for distance would be an easy one to practice. The weight for height would be easy. It's just the tough part is getting a bar to actually throw it. Yeah, it's supposed to move.

You just have to practice throwing it high. Even just the technique would help a lot too because I know for a fact like that, what did I lose on 11 feet? Yeah, you got 11 feet. 12, I think I hit it once or twice going up. My technique, I wasn't in the right spot. I wasn't quite throwing it behind me the way I needed to.

Yeah, which that's something if we knew what we were doing. It's probably very similar to the strongman stuff in that if you have five more reps of it before you go in to do it, like under your belt, you're a mile better than if you had one or two. It's funny to watch our measurements or the attempts because you'll see like a 25 increase on every on every attempt you get it's like tanner's really getting the hang of this event yeah but then there is a as far as the competition goes there is the master's pool is always surprisingly legit i don't know where those guys come there was a guy there that was a three-time world champion yeah and you'd watch him go, and he doesn't really look athletic in any way. But then you watch him, and he just has the technique down big time.

A lot of that stuff is super technique. And it doesn't help that he was probably, what, 6'5", 6'6", and about 280. Just being big. It seems like the good guys are just big. Yeah, anytime you're hucking around 50 pounds, when you have more body weight to offset that, it always you at an advantage and for sure all of those guys that were in the masters division though they were all solid 250 yeah they all had a pretty decent belly on them too yeah but those guys were all they're the type of their their kilts had some like serious

wear on yeah yeah but they were throwing those guys were doing cabers that we couldn't get oh yeah yeah they did yeah most of them actually made it farther than we could and i would think we have well you know in the traditional like power in our sense we have more strength than them but for sure um they they just have the technique and the whatever they can do to haul that weight and because the like the caber especially like just being able to practice that you'd be so much better at it i mean like they obviously have or do or have done it long enough that they've got enough reps of it that i i mean i can just even tell year to year when it's like oh man this is this is easier than last year for for no other reason other than just doing it three times the prior year yep well that's our

uh that's our highland games wrap-up, guys. Congrats, Tanner. Now we have to go back to calling him champ. I was called champ. I had it for two weeks, and he goes and wins something. Yeah, but you didn't do this one. That's the only reason that you won. The important thing is that we kept it in the Mastonomics family. And that's the key there. There hasn't been a lot of titles that have slipped our grasp.

Now, in other news, I don't know if you guys saw it. Our boy Jonah Leo was out at IPF Nationals out on the – where was that at even? I don't even remember. Out west somewhere. Yeah, I can't remember where it was either. And anyway, he attempted a 900-pound bench, missed it, but I think he hit, what did he end up hitting?

It was like 830 or 840 was what he hit. Yeah, something less than his. Less than his last one, but then jumped all the way to nine. I'm sure his goal was nine and everything else was just setting him up for nine. And he had already won. Yeah. But that's fucking terrifying. 900 pounds on the bench.

Yeah. So congrats to Jonah on the win. I assume he'll be headed to Worlds. And if he hits that nine, that's going to be pretty sweet. Yep. Single ply, that's impressive. I'm assuming the first thing he'll do is give a shout out to Massanomics. I'm guessing so. I would guess. I'd be surprised if that wasn't the first thing he'll do is give a shout out to Massanomics. I'm guessing so.

I'd be surprised if that wasn't the first thing on his mind. Jonah's listening, and I assume that that's what he's going to do. I'm sure he's probably actually in the process of writing a letter to say sorry for letting us down for not hitting that 900. That was probably the first thing that crossed his mind when he failed. He's like, man, those guys are going to be really disappointed. And also, we did want to make sure we take this opportunity uh we were talking last night and tommy we're going to have a little bit of an intervention you've been going to too many weddings god i'm done now i'm done

actually that was the last one i had to go to as far as i know for a long time so yeah a few more years and you can just start rooting for your friends to get divorced that's where i'm at i'm like why are you two still together the last thing i want to do is like get a hotel room and find a babysitter luckily this is in town and i don't have to worry about too much but there's always i think everybody has like two summers in their life that are completely consumed by going to weddings before i don't think the weddings dry up because everyone else has cousins and you know i think you just harden the fuck up and you're like you just you start really drawing lines in the sand like i am not you're not even actually that

i really feel like before i want to say about two ago, I think in my entire life I'd been to like three weddings. And then now it's, you know, you kind of hit your mid to late twenties and people just start getting married and it turns into a lot. That sounds awful. And then when you have a partner that has friends that are also in that age group, it doubles your likelihood of getting caught on those. that has friends that are also in that age group it doubles your likelihood of getting caught and you're not married right now so you can't uh you can't do like i do which is just be like yeah i we're not going to that you don't quite you don't quite have that leverage of the ring yet yeah don't get me wrong i have fun at them afterwards and everything yeah you know when it's when it's messing with lifting things you know that's a problem think of how many feet that cost you rushing those reps yeah it was pretty uh i did set up

getting ready pr for myself though and the fact that i left the celtic fair at 320 and i showered and got ready for the wedding and was ready by 335 i don't know how it's possible that's pretty good me in 15 minutes is very very good I did it. I don't know how I did it. The key is, I think, is to at least commit yourself to only the reception from here on out. That's a starting point. If I'm going to go, I'm definitely not going to church for an hour and then fucking around for an hour in between and then going to the reception. I'll go when the drinking starts. And the food.

And the food. And the food. Yeah, the food was top-notch too. I got fed twice yesterday. Both times it was really good. Props to Subway Catering. So what else do we have to cover today, guys? That was all I had. Well, speaking of big lifts,

so Joan Alio attempted that 900. I did see Optimus Prime, Rayiams is it ray williams yeah yeah hit that thousand pound squat in training and just sleeves which as far as i know that's the first that's the only person to ever squat that in just sleeves just sleeves i don't think that might be i don't think anyone's ever squatted even 950 plus in in sleeves not in wraps yeah so that was pretty sweet to watch situations where like half of the power lifter haters would be like ah but it was in a monolith that doesn't fucking he walked it out he's an ipf guy so yeah it's uh yeah wild but he's huge i mean if you wanted

to make an excuse i guess that's the only one he's just so big he's got good genetics he weighs close to probably 400 pounds so i mean it probably is only one he's just so big he's got good genetics he weighs close to probably 400 pounds so i mean it probably is only two and a half times body weight now in related news the defay brothers were yeah that's crushing some shit this week yeah big big deadlift prs yeah which actually you know i hit 515 which um the deadlift for me has always been an exercise that i just always feel like i suck at and it's finally coming around a little bit and when i say coming around a little bit um it's like i put what 60 pounds on it in probably the last three months that's it that's

coming around yeah which are good no shining up nice which is which is good and i think i can keep that progress up for a little while still uh because i feel like my technique's really getting dialed in but so i mean at this rate you'll have a 700 pound deadlift in like a year you know yeah i don't know what's stopping why would we slow it down just keep doing what i'm doing but uh even so what was it monday night had a pr set felt really good um you know we got to use the new deadlift bar the evanco 50 kilo plates it's really fun when you're deadlifting like four whatever we were doing for sets and you have like two plates on the bar because between the 100 pound plates and all that it's there's like nothing on there but um yeah it had a pr set

and then after that tanner goes gonna go for a single now and i was like yeah i'll probably just wait till next week maybe and i'm like ah go to a wedding i'm gonna party i'm not gonna be in any any condition to hit a single on Monday. So I kind of just went for it then and hit the 515 felt really good. After doing two sets of five at? Like 455 or something. Which would be a PR. Which was a PR, yeah, PR sets.

So, I mean, I was a little burnt out from that. But, yeah, the 515 felt really good. And I was like, well, I'll try 535. And that wasn't there but i i would i think fresh that's that's there yeah yeah usually don't attempt pr sets and then a pr single after it so yeah and that's the first time in my life i've ever even done that so that was exciting and then ryan hit 550 yeah 545 and then 550s he got both uh so 550 ended up being a 25 pound pr then also for him yeah so it was uh it was a solid day there no shit and then even um just with the way my training worked week eight

you kind of hit some heavy weights our week eight of the program and um also hit a pr on bench at 325 which felt pretty good and uh then we had some a pr set of squats on Friday too. So it was a week of PRs. And then Ryan finished it up with hitting a 450 squat. 445. 445, which is a 40-pound PR for him. That's crazy. That's coming along nicely, you could say. Yeah, Ryan's kind of been on a roll.

Yeah, big time. He's also getting, like even in the last few months, Ryan is just getting thicker. Yeah. I don't think he's really putting on a whole lot of weight. I think he's just building a little more muscle. Yeah. And that 6'5", or whatever, it takes a little while.

It does, yeah. You can just keep hanging it on and hanging it on. Yeah, like you can get to 270 in no time when you're 6'5". Yeah. He weighs like 250 or 250. Yeah, he's somewhere between 250 and 260, I know. And he's getting really strong, but you wouldn't look at him and be like, well, geez, that guy's huge.

That guy's got to weigh 260 plus. He can probably gain 20 more pounds still. Yeah, he still looks pretty proportional for his size. Also, we were talking to Ethan about his weight this week earlier, too. And he was like, yeah, you look like you're getting a little bigger when he does. But he's a young – how old is he now? I don't know if he's 21 yet or not. I think he is right in there.

Ethan's a guy that goes to the gym. I'm not sure if he'd lifted any weights in his life before going to Massanomics. Maybe just like a couple times in high school he kind of started showing up as that really skinny kid that's larry's nephew and looked really young yeah that was about six months ago yeah close to a year it was like last yeah i'd say it's probably eight or nine months ago now that he's been coming he just started lifting nine months ago then basically yeah it just kind of finally hit everyone like you know ethan is starting to look a lot bigger and didn't you tell him to hop on the scale yeah i was like because uh he got like a kind of a big badass

arm sleeve tattoo and he used to always wear long baggy long sleeve shirts but now he's got that tat and he's wearing like uh regular t-shirts to the gym and he got like a buzz haircut and he i was like geez you kind of look like a badass now and then i was looking i was like you look like you're way bigger you know you can like i said you like tommy said he was kind of like a skinny younger looking kid before and now he's got kind of like ripped arms and you can see his size and i had him get on the scale and he said he hadn't really weighed himself since he just which is super weird yeah i wear myself every day but it but i guess if you're like kind of like a skinny person your whole life it's never something that yeah you

don't even care so he's gained uh 25 pounds he's up to like 192 and he said. And he's not, yeah, it's not fat. No. No. I bet he is pretty shredded. I said, if I, I'm not, like, I don't want to weigh 25 pounds more than what I weigh now. But if I could make sure that that's 25 pounds of muscle, I would pay a lot of money for that. Yeah. And I guarantee his is like almost all muscle. Yeah.

Because he's not any softer. No. He's fucking getting big. To me, I was amazed when you said 190, whatever it was, because because if i had to guess i would still say 175 because he looks so lean yeah yeah yeah that's crazy so that's the hashtag massonomics effect that's that's like the epitome of the hashtag massonomics exactly yep and it's same thing with him too though is his his lifts just keep going up yeah all the time yeah he had a rough what 420 deadlift i think something a while back a couple months back but uh that's a pretty big pull for

a guy that hasn't been lifted very long yeah not even a year kind of a light body weight yeah yeah crazy so anything else guys well with the celtic fair being done you know i was kind of looking out ahead and that kind of finishes up a lot of competitions, doesn't it? This has probably been like four out of our last five episodes. There's just competitions going on at all times. Yeah. It'll be a, there's going to be a lull on that for now. The only other thing I can even think of on the horizon would be,

there's usually some type of push pull like in December in Sioux Falls. Yeah. But even that, you know, none of us have really done it before, and that's even still a ways out. So we could be going through a bit of a contest drought here. God, we're going to get so fat. It's time to rebuild now. It's building time. So, well, that'll do it for us today, guys.

Make sure you go to the Mastinomics page on Facebook and like the page. Go to iTunes. Give us a five-star review. Go to Mastinomics.com. Check out the store. Buy some clothes, hats, banners, all sorts of good stuff. Scroll to the bottom of the page. Sign up for our email newsletter.

Make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel. Tyler, you can find me on Instagram at Tyler F. N. Stone. That's Tyler E-F-F-I-N Stone. Tanner? Tanner on Instagram at Tyler F. and Stone. That's Tyler EFFIN Stone. Tanner? Tanner on Instagram at Massonomics. And I didn't prepare anything else. Tanner does have

a JDate account. He just hasn't quite, isn't ready to open it up to the public yet. Right, right. And I'll think of something better for next episode. Broke your screen. And Tommy, what do you got? You can find me on Instagram at Tomahawk underscore D.

All right, well, that'll do it today. Thanks for listening, guys. Stay strong. You just heard the Masanomics podcast. With your ears, you're welcome. Check us out on Facebook. Find us on Instagram at Masanomics and make sure you visit Masanamics.com and buy some of that sweet Masanamics gear. From your friends at Masanamics Studio, home of the world's strongest podcast, stay strong. Outro Music