Afghani-grip

[bender]

The 3x3 cube is child’s play. : ) Average of 85 second solve time. I studied speed-cubing, but again, none of it is intuitive, and all involves memorizing patterns and algorithms.

In any case, I’m stuck on the 4x4 with the 4 center “faces” of the 4 sides. It seems like a black hole of logic after that. Again No, I’m not going to memorize algorithms. At least not yet…

For Tabata’s, just make sure you do 8 rounds. They’re fairly fun. I usually do them about 3 minutes after my last set of dead lifts. I feel it’s the perfect combo.

As for burning blood sugar, every thing burns blood sugar, but interval type training exhausts blood sugar, and then forces the body to recover before you exhaust your stores again. It’s why interval training like Crossfit, Tabata’s, and general High Intensity Interval Cardio all are ideal for fat burning.

Do they do them in the military? Heck no! They’re far too effective and are far too superior of a training technique for the military to use. They’d rather just let people belly-flop off a 15-foot platform on to gravel in the name of hardness, tradition and bad-Hooah, because that’s the way they did it for the last 100 years. Then, the ones that survive with out injury are all promoted to Sergeant Major. Little to nothing of our physical training makes any sense at all. It is changing though, just very slowly.

On the other hand, the Marine Corps and Special forces/Ranger guys are doing it. It’s called Crossfit at www.crossfit.com Check it out if your interested.

[Wes]

Crossfit rocks Lots o' good info on the boards there too

[bender]

Well… back from Afghanistan.

Herniated Disk has been healing very well. I do a series of stretches twice a day as well as back stability work. It has worked wonderfully. The initial injury, Incapacitation, and pain was horrible, but now I see how a full recovery is possible and a reality.

There’s still a nagging Hip injury that has been getting progressively worse, but that’s another story.

As for the Army? I become “Mr.” Godfrey on 15 May. After 7 years of service, I’m hanging up the beret for good. I have nothing but pride and good memories (the bad ones are repressed), but it’s time to move on…

…back to Afghanistan. I got a Job with a Military Contractor to go back and do a very similar job for about 3-times the pay. I can’t pass up this opportunity.

Grip has been good. No-set gripper work and light bending combined with block weights. Mostly just for fun right now. I did finally have the chance to do a “magic trick”.

I was in our TOC and found a pack of Cards. They were something like “Bee” cards, made in China. They felt like the weakest cards I’ve ever touched. So, I ask a guy if he likes magic tricks. He says “yes”, and a few more people start looking on. I shuffle the deck, and spread them out for him, and say the old line, “pick a card, any card”. He picks one out, I re-stack the deck, and then rip it in half. It tore like a single piece of card-board. Just perfect. The audience was a bit wide-eyed, so I continue in my dead-pan delivery: “Now put your card back in the deck”. The laughs begin. He puts the single full-card back into half a deck, and I try to shuffle the half deck with the one card sticking out. I take out his card, and then the final dead-pan delivery: “Is this your card?”. About 10 people were watching, and the room broke out in the greatest laughter.

[Wes]

Haven't seen you on here in a long time, good to hear you're alright.

Edited March 14, 2007 by Wes

[lifesnotfair]

Good to hear your fine! ... I still do the 3 min and 50 sec squats routine you once suggested, from time to time... and always remember your description of it (it trashes the thigs and burns a lot of blood sugar", heh.

Fun story about the deck!

[tspinillo]

Good too see things are going well! Thank you for your service and good luck with the new job!

[GatorGrip]

Now that is my kind of card trick- I don't see you getting invited to many poker games in the future.

[bender]

Still lurking on the gripboard.

Ended up BACK IN AFGHANISTAN!!! Dang… This time as a civilian. Security Contract for DoD.

INJURIES:

I wrote almost two years ago that I destroyed my back showing off by carrying a huge role of linoleum… I’m at about 98% now. It feels excellent.

1 Year ago my knees were aching around the clock, my hips prevented me from walking over ¾ a mile, my ankle was in severe pain, and my back prevented me from doing any serious weight lifting… and a rotator-cuff injury prevented me from any heavy pressing.

In a word: my lifting-life sucked. : (

Today, my knees are tender, I can’t run or anything and certainly can’t play basketball, but I’m squatting again with minimal pain. It feels awesome. I squatted 155 2x10 a few days back for the first time in two years. My knees and back could handle it and I feel excellent! I get giddy thinking about 225 2x10, or getting 315 for a double or triple. Just have to take it easy… work back into it… take my time… be smart about it…

The Shoulder is at 95% and so is the Ankle. The hips only bother me if I neglect to do my physical therapy.

Now, I’m back on a solid weight-lifting routine and getting stronger. My strength is moving back up to where it used to be (should be), and around August my work outs are scheduled to be using weights that were at or above my old maxes. It feels great.

In a word: my lifting-life is excellent. : )

This time I’m taking things nice and slow with a solid focus on fundamentals. No stupid stuff this time. None. I wish I understood all of this about 15 years ago… Oh well. The US Infantry is not the best place for “taking it slow and staying with-in your limits”.

HAND STRENGTH:

Besides that, I’m playing with grippers. Getting the IM 2.5 with a no-set with my right hand. Very difficult. Only closed it a few times on good days. I’d like to close a 2007 IM 3 with my right, no-set. That compared to my 2003 certification with a nice set… they’re too different feats of hand strength.

And sadly… I gave up high-end nail bending. Too many finger injuries. I’ll bend 60D’s for show for the rest of my life, but my quests to bend bigger and better nails is seeming less and less conducive to having happy and healthy hands. Especially compared to my injuries above, I really don’t want to be injured ever again.

Besides that, all is well. Getting strong WITH OUT pain, and it feels great. Keeping my hands strong, WITH OUT pain. Everything is good.

AFGHAN FEATS OF STRENGTH:

Oh! I found a group of 30+ laborers and got out the grippers, 60Ds and sledge hammer and did a performance for them. They loved it, as usual. I’ve also been researching Afghan feats of strength. The most common is a form of wrestling, but the other two are GRIP feats of strength!

1). Crouch down low, support fore-arm on your same-side thigh, and grasp the end of a shovel. Lever it up past parallel. Add a brick, try again. Add two bricks.. it gets difficult. I learned this as I did my sledge levering. All of the laborers tried to lever the sledge using the technique described above. I asked around and learned that it’s been a feat of strength ever since shovels have been around: forever.

2). Grab a small tree down low, and pull it out of the ground. V-bar style dead-lift. This is no longer very popular in Afghanistan after the Russians decimated the landscape. Right now, you can get fined for cutting down a tree with out a city permit. When developing this information, I heard stories about a legendary wrestler from Hirat, Afghanistan, who was able to up-root small trees with one hand, at will, V-bar style.

[Alawadhi]

Nice to see you back Eric Your site is one of the best ever on training Hope you'll be injury-free soon.

[bender]

Cool, thanks. Some of my injuries are permenant, (knees, hips) but I can train back up with in my limits this time and come back stronger, even with injuries. Mobility and flexibility are the two things that won't be the same.

I made it to Dubai a few times with a multi-day layover. Not too shabby of a town. People just don't understand Dubai until they've been there.

[lifesnotfair]

Nice to see you writing here! Hope you don't take such long layoffs this time and keep us entertained with the cool stuff you experience on that side of the world!

[Alawadhi]

Cool, thanks. Some of my injuries are permenant, (knees, hips) but I can train back up with in my limits this time and come back stronger, even with injuries. Mobility and flexibility are the two things that won't be the same.

I made it to Dubai a few times with a multi-day layover. Not too shabby of a town. People just don't understand Dubai until they've been there.

Thanks One question I forgot to ask. How well did the Afghani people did on sledge? Since you told us about there anceit sport and I heard they are naturally strong people, I guess some of them did at least a 12LB sledge lever?

[bender]

None of them levered it. 12lbs is too much for an average human to do like that. I tried to train that way for a while, but the position is not the strongest. It's very difficult. I had to choke up on the hammer about 60% of the way to get a lever. Difficult… very difficult.

You are right, SOME of them are grotesquely strong. (many of them are quite small) I was in Khost and talked with an older individual whose tendon thickness and musculature was disturbing, if not freakish. Cords all around his neck the thickness of nickels, thick sinewy hands and forearms, and traps that popped up along side of his neck like a comic book character. He claimed to have been the best wrestler in his village when he was younger, but he’s never trained for anything, in any way. He just did labor for 40 years.

That’s not to say this is normal and natural for Afghanistan. Many of the people don’t have a complete diet, are in below peak health, and are rather thin.

I also met an “Uzbek” from Northern Afghanistan while doing my job. He was about 6’3”, but had the thickest chest I’ve ever seen on a man, in person. Big. Like a barrel with arms and legs. Just large. Massive hands, and an even more massive beard. He tilted his head back and glanced down at me (“only” 5’11”), and smiled slightly. He had a deep DEEP voice, and when I asked him questions he’d sometimes laugh in his deep bass voice and wave a thick sausage-finger back and forth to indicate “No”. He was also one of the most calm and laid back people I’ve talked to. Large. And I come from a Norwegian family with some Thick Barrel Chested dudes…

Ah… Stories… I work with a number of people now that expose me to a wide variety of Afghans. A few of my acquaintances now are in the Hirat, Afghanistan Bodybuilding scene. One of them just placed First in a Juniors competition.

I asked him about it because how horrible his acne was, and how not-normal his muscles looked. Puffy and inflated, bulging out like balloons. There are very few laws in Afghanistan controlling medicine, so they can go to a “pharmacy” fully stocked with Chinas Best (meaning: cheapest for export for profit) and can take what ever they want. He said drugs were just part of body building. I didn’t go into detail to find what he was on, but I’m really worried about his knowledge of post-cycle-therapy. Who knows. It’s all kind of sad.

Besides that, the younger Afghan’s I work around all lift weights. Curls and Bench Presses. Swelled up chests and arms, with nothing else. They get American Magazines and want to look like the guys on the covers. Fairly soon when my strength recovers, I’m going to go to an Afghan Gym and try to throw up a 225 Clean and Press, 315 bench press, and 495 deadlift. I’m looking forward to it. It should be fun, IF it happens. Again, most of them are well muscled, but small. Not a well-fed American with Northern European heritage…

[bender]

After dealing with a 1-year-long shoulder injury, and an L5 hernia, I finally got healthy enough to squat again. Feeling strong, I set up a three phase program which would peak around 31 October. This week I demolished my old PR’s in the Bench and Squat, with out back, knee or shoulder pain.

Squat = 405.

Bench = 315.

Nice, round numbers. It was excellent. I’ve been so happy I’ve been floating around. I’ve wanted to do each of these since I started lifting, but College and The Army had other plans for me.

The odd part is I don’t want to stop. I feel excellent for making such a long time goal, but now I want 500 and 365. Patience. This time I’ll have patience…

Grip has been minimal, though club-bell training is excellent.

Club Bells = Wrist Strength.

(after 2.5 years in Afghanistan, I'm going to be back in the USA For Ever, starting Thanksgiving. That's 30 more days...)

[knyaz]

Squat = 405.

Bench = 315.

thats great Bender those are very solid numbers for anybody, I got that same goal right now the Bench will take a while though I know that

Club Bells = Wrist Strength.

I gotta look into Club Bells as Wrist strength is what Im looking to gain right now , I wish I could find some good ones for cheaper, everywhere I look the Club bels are just so expensive

also Welcome back to US!!!! your site is great by the way , awesome stories and everything you should post some more articles on there its really good stuff

[Griffin]

Congratulations, Eric. Glad you'll be home soon. We would love to have you down to Texas for a workout, if you're ever in the DFW area. Also, love your website, it has really helped me along the way.

[bender]

Thanks! It feels good. To go through such a series of life altering injuries, and to come back and squat 405… it just feels wonderful. If you ever know some one with an L5 hernia, let him know a full recovery is possible!

I also added a massive write up of my lifting life. No grip stuff, but just how I got started, what I went through, and a long, sad list of injuries. (it's under "About Me")

DFW… I think I’m just up the road (I-35) from you. Only 1,500 miles up the road. : )

-Eric