Same here.

This is a great article. I feel like not enough people know about how great bands are. I always take a few with me when I travel. I like the suitcase deadlift idea a lot - had not seen or thought of that before. Some other exercises you can do with bands (with some of these you will need a good place to attach the…

You asked if there’s utility in stopping before failure. My first sentences addressed that - you will plateau. Stopping prior to failure prevents that in that in prevents fatigue and CNS burnout. May I ask how old you are, how long you’ve been training, and what your best lifts are?

Stiff leg deadlifts are a hamstring exercise. Any work the back and traps get is very minimal, especially since you shouldn’t be loading nearly as heavily with the SLDL as you would with a regular deadlift. Your hips are not engaged in the squat in nearly the same way they are engaged in the sumo pull, unless you’re…

What about the lower back, traps, and erectors? Not to mention hips if you’re pulling sumo.

That kind of training works well for a while, but you plateau after a while. Most strength training/powerlifting programs rely upon a steady increase of intensity (RPE/percentage of 1RM) with a corresponding decrease in volume (fewer sets, reps), with the goal of peaking towards a new 1 rep max.

Well, since you called me a clown, I’ll wade back in. My joke obviously whooshed straight over your head. I wasn’t trying to “invalidate” your opinion. An opinion is inherently personal and not subject to invalidation. An argument, on the other hand, can be invalidated. Anyway, your opinion was that of a crusty old…

So, are you voting for Cruz or Trump?

That makes sense, but I’m sort of large and inflexible, so I always felt leaning on one cheek was more comfortable. I agree, the danger of a shifting seat is real, but I always give the seat a little test to make sure it can handle a shift. Otherwise, I do elevate a little off the seat and use the same basic technique…

Yeah, that’s the assumption I made as well.

No reaching into the bowl. You just roll onto the opposite cheek (i.e. left cheek if you’re right handed) and lift the cheek of the dominant/wipe hand off the bowl.

Agreed. I have a 3.5 month old and I’m not sure if it’s some kind of dad immunity or whether baby poop at that stage is so unlike actual poop that I don’t make the association, but my kid’s poop doesn’t bother me at all, including the couple times he’s sprayed shit all over my hand.

I have a few acquaintances that do strongman, but I’ve never seen an amateur comp - just the WSM and the Arnold. The only squat I recall seeing is the one with the fixed bar and the massive weights on each side. I don’t remember a back spotter on those.

let’s not forget using the bar pad and a loose belt

Agreed. I don’t think it was ever his intention to bail in this fashion.

He probably is pretty strong, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a complete moron.

Nothing and no.

Agreed on the use of clips. When I used to go to a commercial gym, I would never use clips on a bench press, for this exact reason, but i would on the squat, only b/c the cheap bars were so bent that the plates would slide off the second i started walking out of the rack.

What was the PR? Walking it out of the rack?

At PL competitions, you definitely have three spotters. Oly there are no spotters and I’m not sure about strongman, as it’s rare that strongmen do a straight squat. Also, in PL comps, you have a better bar that won’t bend like that and more concentrated weight plates (whether that be calibrated plates that are super…