Hardcore: Part 1
By Chad Aichs
I happened to be scanning though some of the powerlifting forums, and
I read an interesting post. I usually don’t spend much time reading
forums because most of the people are just a bunch of bitches
complaining about squat depth, gear, drugs, and other judging problems.
Maybe if these people learned to appreciate all types of lifting and use
the internet as an educational tool, they could help the sport grow
instead of trying to kill it. This doesn’t go for everyone who posts,
but there are many idiots out there.
I’m getting off of the subject though. I’ll write about forums
another time…Anyway, I’ve never had the chance to meet this particular
poster in person—we’ll call him Ed—but I’ll usually read a post if I see
his name. He has been in this sport for a long time, and I usually agree
with most of what he says. Plus, he’s one funny SOB.
In this post, Ed said that my training wasn’t hardcore. He does say that
I’m a GREAT lifter (he capped great, not me), and I appreciate that. It
means a lot to hear that from him. I remember when I first started
competing in around 1999/2000, and he was competing with someone else in
the 308-lb weight class in all of the big meets. I looked up to those
guys and strived to be that strong some day. I’d say that Ed has walked
the walk and talks the talk, but I see myself as hardcore. I believe
that this time he’s wrong.
I don’t know if I could write down a definition of hardcore, but when I
was a kid, I remember looking up to all of the crazy lifter of the 1970s
and 1980s with their wild hair and beards. They acted like animals at
the competitions. I thought these guys were hardcore, and I wanted to be
one of them. So I started training when I was a freshman in high school.
I eventually built a gym in my basement by asking for equipment on every
birthday and at Christmas. I saved most of my money to get more
equipment. This stuff meant everything to me. I used to fight with my
brother because he wouldn’t put my dumbbells back in the right order. My
gym was always clean, and all equipment was used to the extreme but
respected.
Those early years were very intense, and I pushed it as hard as I
possibly could. I would often go through a squat routine, and when I was
done, I’d try to go upstairs. If I could walk up the stairs, I’d turn
around and go squat until I couldn’t make it up them. My workouts always
ended with me being soaked in sweat and completely exhausted. There were
many times that I’d fall asleep in my little gym because I couldn’t walk
to my room. Most of this time, I trained alone because I couldn’t find a
partner that shared my dedication. I even told my best friend that he
had to leave and couldn’t workout with me. We stayed best friends, but
we never trained together. He just didn’t push himself as hard as I
expected.
Once, I even got a lecture from my father about spending too much
time training. He told me there was more to life and said I needed to
find some balance. I used to turn down tickets to MLB games and concerts
because I hadn’t trained yet that day, even if it was my favorite band
or team. Training was my life.
I had this same drive in college. I went to the University of Nevada to
throw the shot-put. This was one of the first times that I got to train
with other serious athletes. I had a hard time in college because I
worked full-time, went to school full-time, and threw the shot-put.
Sometimes I wouldn’t get to throw until it was dark. So I’d have to
throw my shot over this 10-foot fence and then climb it to get to the
ring. I’d throw until very late into the night even though I had to be
up by 5:00 am to get to work. Sometimes my coach would be able to stay
late with me, which I really appreciated. There were a couple days a
week when I could throw with the rest of the team, but my schedule was
screwed up.
I always made time for the weight training though, and we had some
great guys. Ray East was one the first guys I ever saw rep out 700 plus
pounds. Then there was Kim Johanson from Sweden, and he was just pumped
in the weight room. He liked to work up a good sweat, sniff his armpit,
and scream in Swedish before heavy lifts. Kelly Harris always had a ton
of anger that he let out too. Ray and I would go stuff ourselves before
squat workouts and then go to the dungeon. We had a couple of gyms to
use, but the dungeon was this small, very dark, hot room in the basement
of the girls’ gymnasium. It was all cinderblock walls with no windows,
and it only had one bench, two platforms with rubber plates, and two
power racks. Many people bitched about it, but I loved it. It didn’t
have any foo foo shit, just hardcore equipment to lift heavy. We had
some great workouts there—people puking, sweating buckets, and the smell
of testosterone.
When I had to quit throwing because of my compartment syndrome, my
workouts definitely dropped down a notch. I still lifted heavy and was
way more intense than most people, but it wasn’t the same. I started
spending more time making money and trying to buy stuff. I just lifted
to stay in some sort of shape (I know that’s gay).
Sometime around 1997, I really started to get the hunger to compete. It
was always there but not as strong. So some friends talked me into doing
a meet were I benched 405 or 410 lbs raw. I was training somewhat heavy
for that show. This lit a huge fire in me, and for my first three lift
meet, I totaled 1700 lbs without changing my training very much. Like I
said, I always lifted heavy because I liked it, but the intensity wasn’t
the same as when I was competing in a sport. Now, I had a sport to
compete in again, and things were about to change.
I decided that this was what I wanted to do and that was all it took. I
started quitting jobs because they were screwing up my training
schedule. I had cut back to just 40 hours a week so I had more time to
train. This led to me not having as much money. I had to start selling
off my toys. This was ok though because I wanted to get bigger and
stronger. At one time, I had three awesome motorcycles and two very nice
cars. But I had to sell them all. I even had to sell my Hayabusa, which
I had gotten up to 197 mph, because I was getting too big to ride it and
money was getting really tight. That bike was one of my true loves, and
I promised myself that some day I’d have another one. I even moved back
in with my parents at one point because I needed money to compete in the
bigger meets that I was starting to do. I always managed to keep all my
bills paid, but my focus was to train. My ordinary life expenses had to
be cut to a bare minimum.
My training was very extreme in the beginning. The workouts were like
the ones from my high school years. I was again training by myself and
would push it to the very edge. My neighbors must have thought I was
some kind of freak with all of the yelling and screaming coming out of
the garage. I even dragged the sled up and down the neighborhood. I
think it was around 2002 when I finally started training in a commercial
gym. I had started training with my brother by this time. He does many
things that I don’t like, but I can’t say that he isn’t intense.
We trained very hard no matter what. If I was sore, which I often
was, that wasn’t an excuse. I trained. I wouldn’t sleep for days, but I
never missed a workout. If I had one of my terrible headaches, I’d worry
about it after the workout. I even trained when I was sick. When it was
a scheduled day to train, I trained. There was one point during this
time that I worked five days a week with the county and worked the other
two building decks with my brother. The county would switch my shifts so
that my sleep was really screwed up. Then, I did physical labor on the
weekends. I got almost no sleep, but I never missed a workout.
Money was very short so I had to make some extra with my brother, and
I quit that county job when they told me I couldn’t have the time off
for a meet. I have plenty of stories of spewing blood all over the floor
and training until I was dizzy. For a while, I rented a condo on a
concrete slab. I moved all of my weightlifting equipment into the living
room. The furniture got squished into the kitchen and dining area. I
don’t mean for a little while either. That was how I lived. One time I
was doing heavy rack pulls, and when I finished, I turned around to see
my brother laughing at me right before I passed out. He could see it
coming, and I wedged myself in between the rack and the wall. When I
came to and got myself up, we had a great laugh about it. My neighbors
there probably hated me too.
Even my personal life and friendships have been affected by my
dedication to powerlifting. I used to take these great motorcycle
vacations with my family, and that hasn’t happened, it seems, since I
got into powerlifting. In fact, all of my vacation time is spent on
meets. My friendships have definitely suffered. Most of the people I
hangout with now are on the team. I still have some good friends that
aren’t into lifting, but I don’t get to spend much time with them. I’m
lucky because most of them want to see me more but understand and
respect what I’m doing. A serious relationship with a girl is almost out
of the question. I don’t even try that hard anymore. Lifting will almost
always come first, and I don’t think it would be fair to them. Plus,
most girls don’t understand why I do this and would want more of my
time.
I trained this way for a long time, but at some point, I discovered that
in order to keep getting stronger, I had to cut back. My body had
learned to recruit more neurons and muscle fibers. So I was able to push
my body further with less work. I’d also gotten so strong that in order
to push myself in training, I was lifting huge weights all of the time.
Now, I could have kept up with the intense long training schedule, but I
got into this to be like the hardcore guy from the 1970s. I didn’t know
how they trained, but I knew they kicked ass at the meets. So I adapted
my training so that I could kick ass at the meets and continue to get
stronger. Anyone who has seen me lift knows that I give everything I
have at the meet, and I’m well aware of the results of that. It’s no
sleep that night followed by the headaches and full body pain the next
few days. If you haven’t seen me compete, please visit
www.chadaichs.com
and watch some videos. You’ll see the effort that I put into my meets.
Ed says that the guys who don’t appear to train hard have “God given”
strength and not “work given” strength. In some cases, this may be true
or maybe these guys have learned something that we haven’t. In my case,
my strength is work given, and I’m damn proud of that. I was never the
strongest or the best athlete. I worked my ass off for what I’ve
achieved. My high school lifting numbers are nothing impressive, and
those were with insane dedication. The only so called God given gift
that I’ve received is the stubbornness that I have. I have a “never give
up,” positive attitude.
So what is hardcore and am I hardcore? In the end, it doesn’t really
matter if anyone thinks I’m hardcore because I know what I’ve given up
to achieve what I have and how hard I’ve worked to do it. What does
matter is that people understand my idea of hardcore. It’s to give
everything you can and push yourself beyond what you thought you could.
It’s way harder to back off and not train as much. For me, going to the
gym and going crazy is easy. I always go to the gym to help my partners
even if I’m not training that day. That is one of the hardest things in
the world.
The other day Larry and Scott were maxing out on rack pulls, and I
wasn’t supposed to workout. That sucked ass, and it was insanely hard
not to workout. Doing the best I can do means going to the meet and
putting up the best numbers possible. Ed mentions that he would give his
small (his description) testicles to be as strong as some of the lifters
out there. Maybe if he would learn to back off and let his body recover
more, he could still do numbers like that. I think training is a
progression where you have to train like a mad man early on and get a
good base, but then it must lessen as you get stronger. Maybe that’s the
best way for it to be.
I spent much time training and missed out on lots of stuff. Now, in
order to keep getting stronger, I have to train much less. This leaves
me with more time to do some of the things that I missed out on. I now
have more time to attack the business end of lifting, ride my quad and
motorcycle, practice photography, and who knows, maybe even find a
girlfriend. This is kind of like a reward for all of my hard work.
In closing, I’d like to thank Ed again for saying that I’m a great
lifter, and I really don’t have any hard feelings toward him. I look
forward to the day when we get to meet in person, and I hope he gets to
read this long-winded article sometime. I think the theories of hardcore
are great to talk about, and hopefully, it will make people think a
little more. I just want everyone to improve their training skills and
get as strong as possible, even if this means competition for me. If my
training theories are wrong, I hope we can at least learn from them.
Chad Aichs is a WPO competitor in the SHW division. He began
training seriously for powerlifting in 1999. In six years, Chad has
proven to be one of the strongest lifters in the world. He now has an
1102 lb squat, an 810 lb bench press, and a 722 lb deadlift. His best
total is 2623 lbs, and he has a lot left to prove. Chad holds the AWPC
world records in all three lifts and holds the WPO three-lift bench
press record. Chad currently trains at American Iron Gym in Sparks,
Nevada.
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