January/February workout plan

[Alan H]

I've followed X-Marks for quite a while and bought a few things here - but never bothered to check for an HG Athletics thread. Good stuff!

I started throwing just a little less than three years ago here in the midwest (Ohio) in hopes that competition would keep me focused on staying in shape.

A large number of us here in the GLSAA (Great Lakes Scottish Athletic Association) have gotten hooked on Westside - after a clinic with Kerry Overfelt and Mark Valenti. The combination of acceleration/speed (dynamic effort) and strength (max effort) really works well for Heavy Athletics. Given that Westside was developed by Lou Simmons primarly for the powerlifting game, a lot of us have our own "hybrid" forms. I've started blending in odd lifts (beer kegs and sand bags) mainly to help my caber and to keep my in some kind of form if someone runs a blended game of highland athletics and strongman.

At 43 years old - and never having been successful as any kind of athlete from the time I was 12 years old - following Westside has gotten me to just short of a 500 lb deadlift, 400 lb squat and 250 lb bench (best I ever benched in my life was 165 lbs when I was like 18 years old). And - I added 18 feet to my light hammer and almost 3 feet to my open stone this past year (hammer was helped by form, stone was all strength as I used to T&F shot put).

Richard

Throw hard and aim for the parking lot!

KO and MV are huge throwers and *Very* strong guys. Great stuff. I have not heard of the Westside program, I will absolutely go check it out.

Last year at Pleasanton the 50-59 class had our proverbial hindquarters handed to us by Mike Baab. The only person who was even close to Mike in anything was our local dude, Kel Mulrey in the hammer. They both went over 100 feet in the light hammer. Mike doesn't write about his workouts a lot, but he has given some big clues. Basically, he's said that prepping for setting a few 50-59 world records, he never lifted anything over 300 pounds....he plays basketball once a week, and he jumps around a lot.

Now Mike is a former NFL player, so he's gifted with a mess of natural talent. There's that indisputable fact... then again, since I will probably never squat over 300, and my incline bench max looks to be about 150 right now, I think that instead of going the "get seriously strong" route, I need to go the "get technically good, and be really quick" route. Thus the track intervals, bunny hops on stadium steps, pylo box jumps and jump rope.

Both will pay off with improvements in distance, for sure, though..

[Alan H]

Hi -IMy son (age 23)and I (age 55) are interested in the games but I can't seem to find any contacts here in Victoria, BC. I see several competitors here and wonder if you have any advice on who to get in touch with to see about training and competing?

Skipper1, not two weeks ago I responded to someone on X Marks who wanted to start throwing and they were from Victoria. I don't remember who it was, but search around the forum. There's a kindred soul here on X Marks, in your neighborhood.