Jdarty6173 Bending Log

[JDarty6173]

Well i figured I might as well start recording my bending sessions. Up till now I haven't so much as scribbled my bends on a sticky note. For a little background I am a powerlifter weighing in around 245-250. I have been bending on and off for the past 3 years or so, but never anything real serious until a couple months ago. One of my training partners is also into bending so I will likely be including his bends in here as well if he doesn't decide to open his own log.

So here we go:

October 30, 2008

2 - 60D Nails

2 - Grade 5 bolts 6" x 1/4"

10 - Grade 8 Bolts 6" x 1/4"

2 - Grade 8 Bolts 5" x 1/4" (PR Bends)

Half of these bends were done Reverse and half were done with some deformed DU style. I found out near the end after working Reverse style that I was able to just melt the grade 8s DU. And this was my first time bending this way. So thanks to Curt for turning me toward the DU. The 5" x 1/4" Grade 8s were my best bends to date. Those suckers were quite difficult.

[JDarty6173]

November 26, 2008

2 - 60D Nails

1 - Grade 8 6"x 1/4" Bolt

5 - Ironmind Red Nails (PR Bends)

2 - FBBC Square 6" x 1/4"

2 - Grade 8 6" x 1/4" Bolts

1 - Grade 2 6" x 5/16" Bolt

Well I finally picked up a Red a couple nights ago to see what i could do with it. This comes after 3 weeks of no bending. Well the first red I picked up took at least 10 minutes to finish. I just could not seem to get comfortable with the 7" bar. Shorter bars just feels better to me. Things clicked with the next Red and I finished it in about 20 seconds, along with 3 more right after it. So I was pretty happy with my first Red session. I was only hoping to bend 1 bar and ended up finishing 5 reds. So I feel quite please with my PR for the day.

[JDarty6173]

December 3, 2008

100 - 60D Nails (Volume PR)

Last night I went for a new volume PR bending 60D nails. My previous best was 62 a few weeks ago, so obviously my goal was 100. Since my DO form basically sucks I spent the session really focusing on getting the technique down and working to get the bar deep enough up into my neck.

As it turned out this new batch of 60D nails were the hardest I have ever seen. After about 50 of the nails I wrapped up a 6" x 1/4" grade 5 to compare the 2. And to my surprise i was able to both kink and crush the grade 5 easier than I could the 60D nails. Also, I cut all the heads off the nails, and when I cut the head off the grade 5 I found that it cut with less effort than the 60D's. Needless to say I am going to buy about 100 more pounds of this nail while they still have them.

In the end my time sucked for finishing the 100 nails. Right at 2 1/2 hours I'm afraid. So I certainly have a lot of work to do. My hands are pretty tore up right now so I will take about a week off from bending. For my next session I plan to bend some 6" Reds and various FBBC stuff I just received using both DO and DU styles.

[MalachiMcMullen]

Man, I remember Brad Manion used to do volume sessions like that with 60d's. I thought he was crazy, and I think your crazy! That's some serious bending! Kick ass man and as I said before, those 5" G8's are beastly

[JDarty6173]

Man, I remember Brad Manion used to do volume sessions like that with 60d's. I thought he was crazy, and I think your crazy! That's some serious bending! Kick ass man and as I said before, those 5" G8's are beastly

No kidding they were nasty. I found them to be considerably more difficult than the reds. But for that reason I bought 30 more of them For my next volume day in a few weeks I will likely go for another 100 bends, but this time with 5" 60D nails. Or maybe 100 grade 5 bolts. To be determined.

[bencrush]

Very nice bending man! You've got a ton of potential to roar up the lists in any style it sounds like.

[JDarty6173]

Very nice bending man! You've got a ton of potential to roar up the lists in any style it sounds like.

I appreciate the support. I really have a lot of form and flexibility issues to work out, but in the mean time I seem to still be getting stronger at bending.

[bencrush]

You know the old saying about everything works for a while. Even "bad form" bending, as I call most new guys (me definitely included in that description) and their awkward style, will build specific strength for later big bends.

Once you get past a certain point though, all that horsepower that you very obviously possess will be held back by flexibility and form issues. You sound very motivated though to get past those so I really do think you'll be helping rewrite the record lists. That's always pretty neat to see.

[JDarty6173]

12/08/2008

1 - 7" x 1/4" CRS

1 - 5" x 1/4" CRS

1 - Grade 5 6" x 1/4"

1 - Grade 8 6" x 1/4"

I decided to do a little light bending just to see how things felt after my volume session 5 days ago. And needless to say my hands and wrists are still pretty sore. The palms of my hands feel like they have some pretty deep bruises. After bench training tonight I will probably hit a couple pieces of the FBBC 1/4" square stuff and maybe a couple grade 8s. I am aiming to start bending at least in some form maybe 3 times per week with low volume for a while. With the occasional high volume and heavy max effort day thrown in. My focus is to really work on my DO form and improve my flexibility.

[JDarty6173]

12/09/2008

2 - 7" Reds

1 - 7" Bastard (PR Bend)

1 - 6" Huge Bastard (PR Bend)

1 - 6" Red (PR Bend)

1 - 5" Red (PR Bend)

After our bench session tonight I was felling pretty good and decided to attempt a PR bend despite the fact that my palms are still torn open from the high volume session last week. Well actually the plan to hit a PR didn't come about until I hit a couple easy 7" reds that both went down in around 15 seconds each.

I was actually surprised at how much harder the Bastard was than the red when I hit it. But it was done in around 45 seconds or so. I found the Huge bastard to be a little easier for me actually.. I am still not used to 7" bars yet, and my lack of flexibility makes it hard to get them up in place. Well the kink on the Huge Bastard was easy, but the crush was quite painful because I had torn my right hand back open during the bastard bend.

I decided to go back down a bit and hit a 6" red, which was like butter I thought compared to the Huge Bastard. Then I opted to finish the session off with yet another PR bend by going for a 5" Red. I had some difficulty with this one I'm afraid. I had to bandage up my hand to keep from bleeding all over the thing first of all. Thank god for super glue. Well the initial kink was easy, but after that my hand seems to keep hitting each other too early in the bend before the steel had a chance to move. So I played around with my hand placement for quite a while, and finally had my forefingers actually touching on the bar before I could find a good position to bend in. After it was over I think I spent about 20 minutes on the 5" Red before I had it down to about 1 2/3 inches.

So needless to say I was quite pleased with 4 PR bends in one night. Next session the Grand Bastard goes down, and maybe a 4 1/2 inch red.

[MalachiMcMullen]

J, holy crap!!! I don't care how much easier REDs are than Bastards, a 5" bend of 5/16 CRS from any manufacturer is a huge bend!!! Add in that you did all of what you did beforehand and it's just awesome. I still haven't bent 5"x5/16 stock, even the super easy stocks. I just can't get used to the length without putting much work into it.

[matthcarl]

:rock

I posted in the other thread, but I am just impressed with that 5" red...and on the same day you bent your first bastard??? Crazy. I hate short stock even more than Zach, but I can't even bend the 6" red, let alone a 5".

[JDarty6173]

:rock

I posted in the other thread, but I am just impressed with that 5" red...and on the same day you bent your first bastard??? Crazy. I hate short stock even more than Zach, but I can't even bend the 6" red, let alone a 5".

Thanks. I had no intention of actually attempting a 5" red anytime soon, but I was feeling good after my previous bends and decided to go ahead and finish off what energy i had left with another PR.

[JDarty6173]

12/10/2008

3 - 7" x 1/4" FBBC Square

1 - Grade 8 6" x 1/4"

Just hit a few bends this evening to work on form a bit. I have a hard time getting into position with the 7" stuff so I need as much practice as I can get with it. Hands are hurting pretty bad so need those to heal up a bit. Missing quite a bit of skin on my right hand, but the super glue is making an acceptable substitute.

[JDarty6173]

12/14/2008

1 - 5.5" Grand Bastard (PR Bend)

1 - 4.5" Red Nail (PR Bend)

1 - 7" x 5/16" HexaBastard

I went into a bit of detail in my forum post here: Sunday PRs - Grand bastard, 4.5" Red and More

It was a good session. Still only my 3rd bending day where I worked with the DO form. I was really hurting on flexibility especially with the 7" bar. it was taking me several attempts to get the bar up in place for each bend.

My goals now for next time are a Magnificent Bastard and hopefully a 4" Red. Then by my next bending day my Shiny stock should be here from FBBC and I'll be moving to mostly stainless from there on out. I also want to hit an edgin here sometime soon as well. So I will give one a tug here in the next couple weeks.

[JDarty6173]

12/18/208

1 - 6" x 1/4" FBBC Square

1 - 7" Red Nail

1 - 7" Bastard

Well last nights training certainly did not go as planned. My goal was to bend an Edgin then move on to a magnificent bastard. Well it didn't quite work out that way. We went to bend after our bench training tonight, which usually get my shoulder and everything loosened up to where I can get in better position for bending..

Well I picked up my edgin expecting to kill it, just to find out I could not even get it close to in position under my neck. I literally spent 15 minutes working to get the bar in place just so i could get a hit on it.. But I never could.. I was not able to get a single hit on it. Although somehow while trying to force the bar up into position I accidentally put I slight kink in the bar LOL... Not much but definitely noticeable when you sat in down.

Well I decided to just work on getting a red in position by giving it a reverse grip pre-kink of about 30 degrees. Even that took me some time to get into a decent position to bend. Then I tried a shorter piece of square with slightly better results.. Then I finished it off by going for a bastard. by this time I guess I had loosened up some, because I got it in ok position in about 5 tries LOL.

I think I have been focusing to much on just hitting shorter and shorter bends lately that I am losing my flexibility for the 7" stuff. So I will be hitting multiple 7" pieces every bending day from now on. My stainless should be here soon so I will stick strictly with the 7" pieces for a couple sessions. But for now I need some time off. I have a lot of soreness/pain in my wrists and forearms that has been getting progressively worse each bending day. So I am going to take at least 1 week off. 2 if I can force myself to do it.

[JDarty6173]

12/28/2008

1 - 6.5" Triangle Edgin (PR Bend)

1 - 5" Magnificent Bastard (PR Bend)

Well I finally went after my first Edgin tonight. I decided to skip bending a 7" Edgin and went ahead and cut it down to 6.5". It was one of the triangle Edgins that I got from FBBC. I guess it took me just under 5 minutes to complete. It would have been faster but I was having flexibility issues and had trouble getting the bar into position. The kink on this thing was quite easy, but it got kinda nasty towards the crush. But all in all a pretty easy bend.

I moved onto a 5" Mag Bastard which really gave me a tough time. The kink was easy enough, and the crush I had handled... But the area in between was killer. It was considerably more difficult that the 5" Red I had bent, and I think even harder than the 4.5" Red I bent. I think I may need to work some volume with 5" and 4.5" Grade 8s. My hands just seem to keep getting in the way with this short crap.

I think for my next session I will go for a 6" Edgin and hopefully some of my FBBC Stainless if it has arrived.. We shall see.....

[JDarty6173]

12/30/2008

2 - 7" Red Nails

1 - 7" Bastard

I just wanted to get in a few bends on some longer bars tonight. I really suck at the 7" stuff because of my lack of flexibility, so I am going to be making it a higher priority that the short bends. At least for a couple weeks. It literally took me 20 minutes before I could even try to hit the bastard. I just could never get it up in position. And when I finally did bend it it was still not pinned against my chest. Oh well.. Back to some frequent stretching.....

[JDarty6173]

01/01/2008

1 - 60D

3 - 7" x 1/4" fbbc Square

1 - 7" HexaBastard

1 - 6" Triangle Edgin (PR Bend)

3 - 7" x 5/16" Fastenal 304 Stainless

1 - 8" x 5/16" Fastenal 304 Stainless

Fun stuff but the 6" Edgin sucked. It finally died after about a 20 minute fight. Easy kink, terribly hard crush...Nuff said...Oh and 8" Bends blow, and blow hard.........

[JDarty6173]

1/08/2008

1 - Huge Shiny

1 - 7" Shiny

1 - 11/32" x 7" O-1 Drill Rod (PR BEND)

My first time to touch a shiny. Not at all a tough bend in either 7" or 6". The 11/32" Drill Rod, however, a much different story LOL

[JDarty6173]

1/18/2009

1 - 5.5" Grand Bastard

And the video:

1/08/2008

1 - Huge Shiny

1 - 7" Shiny

1 - 11/32" x 7" O-1 Drill Rod (PR BEND)

My first time to touch a shiny. Not at all a tough bend in either 7" or 6". The 11/32" Drill Rod, however, a much different story LOL

Nice work bro . I've heard the 11/32" d-rod is a real bear. Especially on the crush

Well actually I found the initial kink to be harder than the crush. But then again I have trouble getting the 7" stock into position to hit it.

[JDarty6173]

2/01/2009

1 - 7" Shiny

1 - Mag Shiny off center to 3 2/3"

1 - Mag Shiny off Center to < 90 Degrees

1 - Slight Wobble in a KOAB (1 Short Hit)

[gazza]

Just read your workout log bro thats some serious bending your doing there both short,long.thick and endurance style

"NO LIMITS" mate.

[JDarty6173]

3/08/2008

1 - 7" Shiny

1 - 7" Brutal Hex

2 - 6.5" Edgins

Well I've been away from bending for some time now. Just the occasional odd bend here and there.. I am still trying to recover from some injuries which make bending uncomfortable to say the least. All of these bends were quite easy thankfully so I should be able to put up something decent for another cert video soon.

I also made a couple hits on a FBBC 5/16" Square bar last night.. First time I have touched one of these. I got maybe a 15 degree kink in it, then stopped because I was having some pain from a couple injuries as well as my previous bending session... I think I can finish that bar off next time though...

[MalachiMcMullen]

Good to see you're still in it man! Heal up quick because those brutal KOABs are calling your name