Ashley Jones started training in 1979 and has coached athletes and general population alike. Forty-four years later, he shares some of his most poignant takeaways.
Travis Rogers shares his thoughts and insights after spending time with Dave Tate on a recent Table Talk.
After all, a black belt is a white belt who never quit. Beyond genetics and character, what do you have on the inside that keeps you going?
The ease and comfort of your couch and air-conditioned home will always be calling your name. Ignore the temptation for an easy life.
The moving parts behind the competition life are brutal. Go all in, and know when to get out.
Are you too easy or too hard on yourself? Are you loving or hateful? How do those around you influence these conversations?
Talk to any strength coach or trainer, and in some way, they have been influenced by Louie Simmons. Here are 7 ways he influenced me.
Lifting weights, pushing ourselves as hard as we possibly can, day in and day out, isn’t so different from life outside of the gym.
This attitude served me well for some time, but then it began to hold me back. Know when to use it and when to toss it.
Your time on this planet is limited. To make your mark, I challenge you to do the work and get ahold of your emotions.
As laborsome it is to destroy and bury your demons, it’s also vital to remember them.
The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, as the ubiquitous aphorism goes. Averting the zigzag requires one to suffer and succeed in silence.
This is certainly anti-quit training. Learning to be uncomfortable and not stop or run away is priceless in hard training.
2020 started out pretty well. Then all shit broke loose. Were you on Camp Complain or Camp Let’s Figure It Out? I quickly realized I had two options.
As I got into my 20s, I was dead set on making a living as a bouncer. I mean, if John Dalton could make a living bouncing at the Double Deuce kicking everyone’s ass while driving a Mercedes, I could do it.
I’m hoping that by the time this article gets published, things are on their way back to normal, but in the meantime (and even if they are), there are a few key tools I’ve given my clients to help them to mentally move forward (not just survive) when we feel a lack of control.
I want to make athletes better by getting them out of their heads. I want them to be able to focus, relax as needed, push through mental boundaries, deal with pain, learn self-control, and I’m sure there’s more that I can’t think of right now.
An inner narrative is currently running through the heads of millions of athletes who had their seasons – for some, careers – cut abruptly short. With the rigor of school days and workweeks in the rearview mirror, self-talk is in the driver’s seat.
Once you destroy your demons (part 1 of this reading series), it’s time to put that crucible six-feet under, slam a headstone on it, and go forth to enjoy your life.
Let’s travel back to 1995 at Maryland Athletic Club, where a 29-year-old man named Kirk Karwoski was heading into the gym to hit a 1000-pound squat for two.
Every day can be a battle when you are trying to change your habits. Here are some things to do when you really want to make a change.
We all have struggles, and at times we don’t want to do the things we need to do to get strong(er). In fact, I have never met a top athlete of any kind who did not have times where he or she struggled to keep doing what he or she needed to.
A crisis does not make the person, a crisis exposes the type of person one actually is. What type of person are you in these unsettling and uncertain times?
It WILL Pay Off: A Message for Those Struggling with Mental Illness, was a log post I wrote four years ago as I was battling depression, anxiety, insomnia, and OCD. Rather than edit my original post to reflect my current state of mind, I’m using this article as an update as I continue to evolve — a lot of things have changed.
The point of this article is not for me to tell my personal story about how tragic the accident was, how Kobe affected me growing up, or how big of a fan I was, etc. Instead, I would like to focus on the takeaways from Kobe’s life that can teach all of us how to pursue our own passions better.
A key part of being a strength and conditioning coach is something many people may not expect: networking. Be sure you’re not missing out on making important connections that online productions can’t imitate.
Just because you’re getting older, doesn’t mean that you can’t reach your fitness goals. It simply means your goals need to shift to suit your current state.
We are all faced with choices every day in life. When it comes to training, we choose whether we are going to put the time in at the gym, eat the right foods, and get the sleep we need to reach our goals.
No matter the area in life, you are bound to face setbacks. When it comes to powerlifting, you are the only one who can decide what is best for you and whether you will compete or not.
What can a retired Navy SEAL teach us about managing stress and fear in our lives? Robert O’Neill says carrying stress is like carrying around an unnecessary bag of bricks.
The Train Your @ss Off with Dave Tate event was not only a life-changing experience; it was also truly something I will remember forever. It has made me a better coach, a better training partner, and a better overall human because it helped me figure out what is truly important in my life.
You only have as much potential as you allow yourself to have. Josh Bryant takes a dive into what it means to have a growth mindset and how you can start cultivating one today.
Why wait until the start of a new year to start working towards your goals?
Have you considered that you may be the reason you’re not reaching your goals? It’s time to reevaluate what is really holding you back.
Powerlifting benefits all ages, from young to mature. No matter your age, results won’t come without motivation and motivation won’t come without discipline. What are your 2020 goals and how will you achieve them?
The journey of being a strength and conditioning coach is different for everyone. However, there’s something to be gained from sharing what you’ve learned along the way.
It’s not enough to simply declare a goal. In order to stay realistic and successful, make sure your goals are SMART.
Relationships aren’t always a walk in the park. It’s all too easy to avoid talking about issues because they make us uncomfortable. However, when we face the discomfort, we become stronger.
Your 2020 goals won’t be achieved in a day. It takes time to build new habits and make lasting changes. See how 75HARD made a difference in Erik Eggers’ goal execution.
To me, greatness is a journey, not a destination. The next few articles I write are going to talk about the path to greatness and the key things that I think are necessary for ultimately reaching that goal. The first thing is tension.
It took time and a whole lot of failures for me to learn these core principles of leading others. But they are what helped me grow my business to over 160 members and a team of four others working alongside me… which brings me to these 7 lessons of leadership.
One might act a certain way at a concert Saturday night but act entirely different at church Sunday morning… and of course, one might lift a certain way for the sake of Instafamousness and socialookatmedia versus how they should lift and train for the pending meet or competition.
Here, in this article, you will find the answer to why accomplished coaches and athletes I’ve been fortunate enough to know gravitate toward the iron and have made it a core element of their life.
When you think of “investment,” you usually think of money. For this article, think about other types of investments: time, effort, and energy. Now, answer this question: What are you investing in?
Even after 47 years of life, I continue to realize there are crossover lessons between powerlifting and life. Case in point: modifying a new Jeep for desert driving.
I recently wrote down things I’ve learned that helped me change my life, and I hope this list of those lessons helps you break through whatever you feel is holding you back and achieve optimal health, wellness, strength, success, freedom, and happiness.
In my last article, I went over 2 of the 5 dysfunctions of a team. Here, I’ll cover the remaining 3 and how to bring the team closer together.
Growing up in the ‘80s, Brian Alsruhe found strength in Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, and He-Man. The one thing these people (and cartoon character) had was muscles; therefore, he’d need muscles to be strong. That brought him to martial arts, forming a strong mindset, and eventually, to strongman.
I read about the loss of bodybuilding legend, powerlifter, and two-time Mr. Olympia, Dr. Franco Columbu. I hardly need to go into the impact he had on bodybuilding. His life was a life well-lived, one with a deeply personal and meaningful purpose.
I used the book The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team to help bring my athletes closer together, especially when there was a major shift in the team. These exercises helped bring us closer together and improved performance and morale.
The things that gym owners and coaches love to do are destroying them. Find what you love to do without it taking too much of a toll on your health, both mental and physical. #BeThe1ToAsk others if they need help.
It’s said a person is only one injury away from ending your sports career. When dealing with that kind of injury, we often neglect how it affects our minds, which are almost just as easy to break as our bodies.
The legendary Frantz Gym was the place where the top powerlifters trained, where the collective whole was greater than the sum of its parts. “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts” can often be tossed around, but that was a large part of the magic that was Frantz Gym.
As I close in on turning 50 this next March, I admit that death has had a much more profound impact on me, to the point of almost making me dwell on it… and taking a 3,000-mile-long trip to spend time with my mother-in-law who has stage-4 cancer didn’t really help much, either.
I hope my story encourages you to realize that your past does not hold you back, no matter the story. There is always a way to use negative experiences for good and help others. It is also at that point you are no longer pushed by pain, but otherwise, pulled by purpose.