 Question is from Derek McMullen of the three major power lifting lifts Which one did you have to work the hardest on to get stronger and which one was the easiest cool question? Yeah So we're probably all different here, too. Yeah, I think so. What were your what were your top lifts in each of the three lifts? What if what in your life? What are the thoughts? Let's start with that because I think that's a cool thing to okay So Bench Bench 375 squat 420 and Deadlift 550 mm. Those are all those are all top numbers on on that I did 355 on bench was the most I ever did for squat was 405 deadlift was 600 What about you Justin? I'm trying to think of my deadlift because that was the weakest I think it was only like 425 or something like that and squat squat actually like I got up to 475 and then for kicks for bench I did I got up to 405. Yeah, yeah Yeah, so the one that I worked on the first Was bench press and the reason why I worked on bench press first was because when I was a kid That was the lift. Yeah, like a bench was king. Yeah, nobody cared like if they didn't ask you What was your day? What's your deadlift with your squad was always like how much can you bench? So because there was so much importance placed on that. Mm-hmm. That was the lift that I focused on First and focused on it the most The deadlift came very natural to me. I'd say the the probably the first time I really started deadlifting. I Was maybe 16 and three plates was fast. I don't remember how long it took me to get three plates but it wasn't long at all and then four plates came pretty quick after that and then Five plates happened in my 20s and then in my 30s when I hit six that one was really easy squats We're all so difficult, but my legs Forget even though I have mobility issues in my hips my legs get really big and strong And so I got pretty good at the squat In terms of weight it was the bench press that took me a long time and then eventually I think it's what the bet always focusing on bench press I think it's one of the reasons why I eventually had shoulder surgery and now I never Push heavy on the bench press. I have my AC joint Had to get operated on and now I just I rarely ever go above 225 on the bench press That's probably as heavy as I'll go ever again. Yeah, we're all a little bit different, right? We're I'm where were you and I are the same Deadlifts just came real natural to me. I remember When I first started deadlifting I was doing like, you know, 135 like figuring it out like mine I mean it was one of those exercises like we've never done a deadlift. It takes a while to learn the mechanics Mm-hmm as soon as I figured the mechanics out like it's when it started when when it started to feel smooth Quickly I went from like one plate to two plate to three plate to four plate to the eventually five plate It didn't take me long to really to really push the numbers and deadlift it just felt very natural for me and The opposite is true with squatting squatting has been a grind my whole life and even though my squad is okay And and my bench isn't isn't that strong. I mean I got a long limb. So at the end of the day I don't think I was ever built to be a really really strong power lifter in in these big lifts But I I moved the needle pretty far on my my bench Especially when I was competing like that that a chest obviously your chest is a major focal point for competitors so it was an area of emphasis for me and I Remember really starting to notice a big difference when I started building my and I also so when I hit 375 I could hit that on a flat and I could hit that on an incline So that's probably them the most impressive thing about my bench was I made a point to be as strong in the incline Press as I was the flat which is not normal most guys can lift Significantly more on their flat than they can incline I had a pretty well developed chest both an incline and flat bench and it didn't take as much effort early on as a kid Chest was really hard for me and bench was hard for me because my mechanics were off And then that's why I stressed that even with the deadlift and all these things and the end squat too Like a lot of times when you really struggle with a lift More often than not it's you're still learning the mechanics down and and for me I had from all my sports that I had played You know and I'm left-handed. I had a little bit of a this kind of forward shoulder And it was very very subtle the average eye would not be able to see it and tell I didn't even know and didn't put Piece together until later as a trainer But I had like one side of my chest my opposite side was more developed than my dominant Throwing side because I had this kind of roll forward shoulder. So when I bench pressed My shoulder and my triceps took over the load on that one side on the opposite side I had better mechanics and so my chest was uneven for a long time So it took me a really long time to actually level that out and when I when I learned that saw the importance of it I also had to stop ego lifting because as a young 17 18 19-year-old kid lifting I was always trying to just keep up with my buddies that were way stronger than me on the bench press I was weak as fuck and my chest wasn't developed right because I wasn't doing it correctly When I figured out how to get the mechanics right and fix my imbalance that took about a year or two of Really lightweight control learning form and technique once that all came together and like I really understood how to chest press Then it then it kind of took off and it was doing great The hardest thing has been squat and I think I was just sharing with you guys You know, that's a recent one for you. Yeah, it's it's recently Finally came together and again back to the form technique thing is I'd never really addressed The the mobility thing for me. I never worked on my hips. I never worked on my ankle mobility I had a really ugly squat Even when I worked at it for a long time and got kind of strong in it Like 315 was just like crippling for me for a very long time It wasn't until I really started to address the hips the ankles get better at squatting and then and then now I'm actually I'm getting close to you know, some of my peak numbers I could probably squat 375 380 right now I feel pretty confident about in 420 is like my record record and when I was doing that I was actually on anabolic. So when I was 420 squatting 420 I was at the peak of my bodybuilding career. So I'm actually really excited about that But it's been a grind to get a good squat. It's been a grind for me. Yeah, I think for me I Was under the impression based off of all the coaches that I've had and like the programming that I was exposed to through athletics that We pretty much avoided like the deadlift. It was kind of a lot like what you heard out of Robert Oberst and his sort of mentality towards that with with athletes That's the kind of dogma that was thrown at me quite a bit going through, you know training and so We did do Power cleans and I really honed in on power cleans. So that was like my jam. Like I got up to like 350 You know power cleaning so I could do a decent. That's funny. You could power clean 350 Yeah, I'm serious and it has to be a lot of that's technique, right and of course I was completely like to be to be completely transparent probably the last few years is only the time I've even put into deadlifting I've never even really tried to put effort towards maxing on deadlift So I have no idea, you know, if there's any potential there or not, but it's not something that I really focused on Squatting came natural to me. That was something that like it felt like getting the groove of it, you know, pretty pretty seamlessly There was something that like felt like immediately. Oh, yeah, I get this like my body gets this I could I could do well with this and that actually like I was putting up some good numbers right out of the gates And like I was immediately jumping they got they had groups for Like I started out with like the running backs the the linebackers the corners and all that and then kind of jumped up into the linemen Real fast because like, you know, I could I could hang with all them in terms of their numbers For squat and their numbers for bench and bench was another one that came naturally to me But yeah, it was really like the posterior chain like I was in terms of like deadlifts and Like I was like any kind of pulling move was a little more difficult for me and pull-ups and all that Was very challenging for me. So yeah, I felt like I like pushing and You know in those type of mechanics like I could I could like seamlessly get into that It's funny because really really good dead lifters tend to Some of them are good at squats most of them are bad at bench press It's like the things that make you really good at dead lifting the long arms and the long levers tend to make That's what I appreciate a bit. I appreciate that about powerlifting. Yeah, they consider that and it's like the You know your grand total of all of those you have to you know somewhat do well in all of them I remember when I pieced together because I valued strength a lot in lifting weights I know you at Adam you probably placed more of an emphasis on aesthetics longer term than I did Oh for sure I know Justin was very performance oriented like I was like for me I liked the building muscle, but I liked the strength of it and I remember when I figured out That you know if I trained with the lower rep ranges But frequently where I was practicing two or three reps, but I was doing it three three days a week or four days a week I remember piecing that together and then my numbers just Going to the roof and I loved it and that was in my in my early 20s That's when I would stop the single body part You know one body part of time type training Like you know if I practice bench press a few days a week Let's see what happens and I got I got my numbers. I I trained for at least 10 years And never knew my pr in any of those. Oh, I tested my pr first day. I worked out 10 years 10 years I trained and could not if somebody asked that question first of all that question was it was rarely ever asked 10 years ago It's since the the birth of crossfit. It's a very common thing because they test PR was not a thing It was bench press was bench press was how much do you max? Yeah, that was that was nobody was talking about Nobody was talking about their pr and anything else. No, no nothing and even then I again I didn't I I did not believe in maxing out like I just didn't I wasn't a strength I didn't value strength the same way. I was all about aesthetics And I had learned early on that I could build a pretty good-looking physique and never in my life max out And I knew that when I was teaching clients that was always the safest route So I was the trainer who kind of actually avoided it with this chip on my shoulder a little bit Like you max out that's stupid. What's your goal? Yeah, are you are you a powerlifter? Oh, you're not a powerlifter. Why the fuck are you doing? I remember you just all all show no go I was just like what like I didn't even compute with me. Why would you why would you brag about that? Like no girl ever asked you in the room in the bedroom what your pr is That's exactly what I used to say And and and honestly most people that go to the gym, you know most people there, of course There's exceptions the rule they're listening right now, but most people are going there to change their aesthetics They want to they want to lose their fat. They want to build a little bit of muscle They want to look better. They want to feel better. They want to feel sexy and what I Pieced together early on was you know what? None of that you you do not have to ever train like a strength or a powerlifting athlete to achieve that There's very little value to it for the average person I mean, I can I can make a case for some value, but reality you're 100 well What I'll make the case for and what breaking beyond that happened for me and we've shared this a little bit on the podcast is I have a different looking physique today than what I did eight years ago. Um, and and it's due to Lifting heavy weight like I've built it. It's it's so hard to explain. It's density. Yes Obviously somebody who's who's been here and done both understand it's really hard for me to articulate this to a new lifter but When and when I went from being the guy who only trained like hypertrophy type training for For a decade and then I went into strength training and incorporated strength training I built a different looking muscle on my body and and the best way that I could describe it is My hypertrophy that I had was man when I would get in the gym and I would lift and I get all aired up I'd look great I would look like and I used to always say that man if I could just look more like what I look like All pumped up and aired up which I know everybody can relate to but I would really deflate after that And sure I looked kind of fit but nowhere near what I looked like inside the gym When I started lifting really really heavy I saw less of a pump You know from the workouts But I started to build like this solid muscle and I started to notice that You know just my arms hanging by my side. You could see my tricep Which you would only see that if I got them all aired up in the past And so and the same thing goes for my legs and goes for my like all of a sudden I built this muscle that didn't need to be aired up To look solid and big and that's the best way I can describe that to people and the value of what Strength training and heavy lifting did for my body and physique, but you absolutely could build it without it Totally. Do you guys have a lift that like a special lift that if you're if you want to like work out with someone And you just know you'll crush them at you have like this one lift that Well, dead lifting is there's not you're probably one of the few people that in our circle that can you know Other than fucking our like power lifting buddies like been pulled up the average gym goer There's not there's definitely nobody in my men's physique Group that I hung out with that could out dead No, I have I have a I have a lift There's one lift that I could that I did and I don't even exercise this anymore But I knew I could whoever I was working out with I would freak them out But the amount of weight I could use and that was a reverse grip Uh reverse curl for whatever reason it's like the dumbest exercise ever But I put a 45 on the plan that worked on yeah, I put a 45 on the bars Get them on just a simple That's all right, that's like my mace belt thing, you know I'll take the heaviest mace ball you could possibly give me and I'll fucking Who cares