Click bait-ish but since you're here now, give it a read.
I remember leaving football and starting my journey into the powerlifting world at the beautiful ripe age of thirty. I dug into the internet like I probably should have in school in search for any and all information I could come across. I took a particular liking to Jim Wendler, so I decided 531 was for me. After all, I kept hearing it was the easiest "program" to follow, and let's be honest I'm not fucking good will hunting ova hea (I hope my attempt at my Boston accent showed via text).
Anywho I started reading and checking out YouTube videos of other lifters running 531. Ben Seath being one of the more memorable, he also stuck out because he was a 308 I believe and that's where I was then, with my pitiful 650 squat, 445 bench, and 700 lb deadlift which started off better than it would end up the following years.
I remember being able to relate, he was a white male, who wore camo shorts- and talked about things like whiskey, heavy metal, and preached about not being a vag and living life. Sure go ahead say it I had a bromance idgaf, the point I'm trying to get to before I get carpal tunnel is this.
One line he said and I may have it a little different these days, but it said something along the lines of "if you ever want to ask somebody for help at a gym ask the guy with fucked up hands and shins" cool right? Ask the "bad ass dude" who just looks the part. I assumed that's what he was referring to.
Now this was a time five or six years back before the Internet was for people who trained for ten weeks did a small meet to impress their Co-workers, family, and friends- now I'm going to jump around a bit in typical JP Carroll having an a.d.d. Fit fashion.
I shook a guys hand one day, and he pipes up working man's hands-"Union"? I laugh almost embarrassed and reply "Nah, I work in an office Monday through Friday." He looked perplexed, and said, "hey whatever pays the bills right?" I agree and go about my way when I was driving home later that night- that Wendler line hit me. I looked down at my shins, and sure enough, my shins are scared to shit- my quad has permanent bar burn- and hands are torn up.
I smirked because five or six years later it finally clicked- like the time I realized getting a Speedway rewards card let me get free shit, fuck Jp focus. He wasn't saying that the guy was a hard ass or hardcore, I created the image out of my assumption, maybe projected it via me wanting to be a "badass" who knows, the guy could be sweet as birthday cake what does it matter. All he meant was ask the guy who had spent a lot of time, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades on the bar.
That's it, nothing more than saying the person who put a lot of time on the bar will know some shit. Everybody is an expert, a savage, did this, or did that these days- nowadays competing on a couple of occasions makes you a board member for the Internet Coaches Association, and their all faker than diet pop. ... nobody earns their spot any more in this bullshit, high school popularity contest. Look at your hands- look at your shins, do you have the right to suggest shit to anyone but yourself?