Let’s begin this log with me stating that like that girl you met on Tinder that says I never did this before, I really never do this.

Also, I NEVER go on internet forums or use Facebook for anything other than business.

My Facebook usage consist of managing the gym page and one private group that I belong to.

Why?

Idiots that’s why.

Let me explain.

I see all kinds of drama from my friends and clients relating to stuff posted on Facebook. I don’t have time for drama. If I want to talk to someone, I call them or do it face to face. You can misread a lot from texts, Facebook posts and emails. It’s easy to read people most of the time by their voice and body language and this has worked for me in avoiding drama and not getting my panties in a bunch. I think the art of face to face conversation is slowly eroding.

Along these lines I really don’t care much for what people think of me. I value the opinions of many people that I respect and don’t care for the opinions of those who don’t have the courage to speak to me face to face.

I have no respect for the person who is hiding behind a keyboard.

OK  Murph, what are you talking about?

Well, I wasn’t going to address this but it’s been brought to my attention by quite a few people that there had been a lot of Facebook drama about me and TPS going on lately.
I was approached I the gym the other night by a person whose opinion I respect and they asked me if I saw the nonsense being talked about me and the gym on Facebook, and how someone was trying to recruit some of our lifters to go to his gym.

I told him that I did hear a little but didn’t want to hear any more since I don’t really care that someone is talking smack about me. It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last.
I listened because if they felt it was important enough to share the least I can do is listen and let them know their opinion is valid, and they were truly looking out for me.

Here is what happened in a nutshell:

Another gym owner posted a bunch of smack about how he has trained countless lifters from TPS who all had really bad form and they hate it here.

He also stated that his gym is the STRONGEST gym around and his lifters are all better than mine.

He said we need to stop saying that we were one of the best gyms in the USA and in Boston.

Further, he said that all of the smack talking that I do about his gym needs to come to an end.

Wow.

Like they say on Instagram, a lion does not concern himself with the opinions of sheep.

Now I am no lion, but I am also not a sheep. I do have a sheepish grin sometimes though.

Let me clarify a few things for the sake of the people who saw the posts:

1. I say we are one of the best gyms in the USA because Men’s Health claimed that not once but twice.

TPS won 20 Best Gyms in America. We also won Best of Boston by Boston Magazine and Best of 2013 by Women’s Health Magazine. I am only putting the word out about our accomplishments and accolades as any business owner would.
My claims can all be verified.

2. I say we are Boston’s Strongest for a few reasons.

One, it sounds really cool.

Two, if you look at the total number of gyms in the Greater Boston area, in Massachusetts and in New England and then look at the lifter population of each one TPS has more lifters in Strongman, Powerlifting and Weightlifting than most. We also have more lifters who compete in legitimate organizations like NAS, APF, IPF, USAPL, USAW, RPS and many other than just about all of the others.

Our lifters don’t compete in federations you never heard of like some of the internet trolls.

On another note, neither I nor TPS claims to be an owner, affiliate or president of a federation and then get called out by the actual owner of the federations saying we are lying as the trolls do.

We also are home to many National champions, State, National and World record holding lifters, nationally ranked competitors in strength sports and Elite ranked lifters. That simple FACT alone makes us Boston’s Strongest as a community.

If your self-esteem is so low that a hashtag offends you and forces you to go on a Facebook rampage then your problems run deep my friend.

3. I don’t recruit lifters from other teams or gyms.

Why?

I have respect for other people and their businesses. If you want to lift out of TPS we want you; if you are happy where you are, great. Those who want to be better will seek out a place where that will happen. If you think my gym is that place, great, if you don’t that is also great. Whatever works for you.

4. I will say arguably that none of his lifters are better than mine, but since I don’t know any of them because they don’t compete in any organizations that I have ever heard of I can’t objectively say so.

It’s my opinion.

It’s also the opinions of the judges at all of the events that our lifters have competed at.

A simple Google search shows you who lifted what and where they did it. I won’t tell you this guy’s name or the name of his gym, but if you run it through Google you have to go about 5 pages deep to see anything.

5. I need to stop talking smack about him.

Really?

I can’t remember ever bringing his name up except the time it was brought to my attention in this matter. Others have brought it up to me on very rare occasions and they did not say too many glowing things.

You need to be self-aware and if you think I have the energy, time or desire to talk about you, you are sadly mistaken. Those who know me personally know how I conduct myself and that is good enough for me.

6. Sure he may have had people from TPS go to his gym and he may have even trained them, but TPS is a gym that has been around for over 16 years and has had THOUSANDS of people come through the doors.

Most of them were not TRAINED by us, but trained here.

Could they have had bad form? Sure, but I doubt he knows what it looks like.

I’d also like to add that the Facebook post had about a zillion comments from friends, members and people not involved with TPS all defending us, and some were just insulting to the person that started this crap.

Thanks to all of you who defended us.

For all of you who brought this to my attention, this was for you. Going forward, I stay off of Facebook and forums because of this reason exactly. The time wasted on this could have been used doing something productive, but in this rare occasion, I felt an explanation and response was due to all of those who led the charge for us.

On to training:

So things have been getting better with my hip and as usual when the plan is working I change it.

I am on an RPE based program and I am using not only the weight on the bar for the RPE, but also how well my hip tolerates the weight. I do not want to get too aggressive and go off of strength. The weights I am using are not heavy; I shut it down when the hip starts talking back.

belt squat

I’ve been using the EliteFTS Belt Squat for a few weeks and it is going pretty good. Naturally I decided to do something different this week.

Since all has been good I decided to do Hatfield style squats with the EliteFTS Yoke bar and handles on the rack. This exercise was used heavily as I came back from my three knee surgeries and I had really good luck with it.

Murph Hatfield Squats

Why not see if it works now?

This style of squat has you holding onto handles in the power rack and squatting with a unique form. You want to try and maintain a 90 degree angle in the ankle, knee and hip. It places much less shear force on your knees and spine than other style of squats and has less hip involvement.

I figured that it might work and get me back to actually squatting.

The plan for Monday was 4 sets of 8 at an RPE 8. I warmed up and did tons of mobility like Bretzels, banded hip distractions and more nerdy stuff and then it was on to the bar.

I did my first set at 135 for 8. Super light and I figured that I would throw the RPE out the window and just do 4 sets of 8 at 135 and see how I felt in the next few days.

Good idea there because I am sore.

Bodybuilder sore.

Not the tendon and ligament powerlifter sore, more like the “I can’t sit on the toilet or go down stairs” sore.

I followed that up with some 20 rep leg presses, Single leg RDL’s and Keystone deadlifts.

Today was bench day and it went pretty good.

Don’t be blown away by the huge numbers I used. It was 3 sets of 2 at an RPE 9.

Remember I said I am using the hip as the RPE and the bench is the worst on the hip for me.

I hit an easy 255 for doubles. The weight was super easy to press, but my hip started to yell at me so I called it a day.

Floor presses with the axle super setted with axle rows were next. Shrugs and then triple drop swole style pushdowns on the cable stack after that.

Bodybuilding stuff kills me. I did sets of 200, 150, 70 on the pushdowns and hit reps for about 10, 10, 20 respectively on the drops.

I wanted to die from the pump in my triceps.

Pulls are up Friday. They have been going well and hopefully will continue.

I’ll get back to some programming stuff next time.

Thanks for reading and listening to my rant about trolls.

Ask me a question-Be sure and Type to Murph in the header

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Total Performance Sports

Vincere vel mori