 So one of you motherfuckers said I wasn't gonna last. Someone said I wasn't even gonna last a week. Squatting every day. Yeah, I know, I said, bro. I said, bro, I've been lifting weights for 15 years, probably longer than some of you've been alive. Like, you don't think I can be able to squat every single day? Come on, bro. Welcome to YouTube, man. Salah Mike, be a part of something big of yourself. 3SB, 3SB.co, Third Street Barbell. I don't know what we're getting into, but I got a little front squatty and then trying to build my titers. No, no. We got like a consulting firm. You consult the, let's call it the Shredded Illuminati. So I go to the council or like Star Wars Episode One, Phantom Menace. You seen it? You seen it? I went to the council on Qui-Gon and I'm just checking with Yoda to make sure it's cool that I take Anakin, the chosen one, under my wing. Because I'm not part of the council. I didn't get invited. I'm a little bit of a rebel. That Qui-Gon's a little bit of a rebel. If you nerds are in it, don't go beyond me because my nerdiness stops here, but he's almost a gray Jedi. Do you know that? Today we're talking about why I'm never, ever, ever returning to the platform, ever. I'm just kidding. I don't really, yeah, I don't really talk indefinite like that, but we're gonna talk about why I don't compete, why powerlifting sucks, why it's not for me. Version is, I don't get fulfillment from competing on the platform. I went all after it. I went all in. You can't ever say I didn't give it a try. I went for like eight years. Competing at least once a year, if not twice. Multiple different meets, deadlift only, different federations, natty boys, unnatty boys. I was natty, but the unnatty fed. Now, I guess the long story of that is that to me, training's always been something I've enjoyed getting better at. The community aspect, the group aspect, the team aspect, the music, the day is in and the day is out. But for the platform itself, like to me, I've talked about it a little bit on the podcast in here, the idea of sacrificing for the unknown, like having some strategy about game day and things that you can manipulate and change that are more versatile or maybe variables than powerlifting. I'm not saying it's easier or harder, but something like basketball, which literally is my first and only love, there's so many things going on on game day that I can do to beat you. Some days I'm just better than you. I might just be faster. I might just be better. My team might just shoot better. But some days my shot's off. I'm feeling a little slow. I can go to the post. I can play better defense. I can pass for my team. I can call a play that I know can get me to switch and have a weak defender on me. There's a bunch of ways I can manipulate the game cerebrally that you can't outthink weight, man. I can't, you know, unless I'm Magneto, 700 pounds is gonna be 700 pounds and I'm gonna move that bitch. I'm not gonna move that bitch. And sure, there's some variability in how strong you're gonna be day of, peaking stuff, sleeping, nutrition. But you compare that to soccer, football, basketball and it's so negligible. If I hit 400 pounds for a triple in training, I should hit 425, 435, 445, meat day and go. For me, whether I hit 425 at the meat, it's like, oh, I was supposed to do that. I did all this work to do that. If I miss it, then I feel worse. We're basketball, I put up 1,000 shots a day. We practice hard and then game day, our first quarter's not going our way. We're down 10. How do I adjust on the fly to do something dope? I can't, I can't charm my way around a 800 pound squat. You can't finagle and that's why the competition itself just has never been for me. Reason number two is I've always considered myself a coach first, especially in here, like an educator and seeing how happy some people are to PR or even have a good set in the gym, let alone out of meat. I know, I'm gonna sound like a soulless man. I know I've never reached that level of happiness lifting weights and so that's how I know like, damn, they really love this shit. They love powerlifting and again, you can never fault me, man. I've hosted meats, I've spotted and loaded meats, I've judged meats, I've been a part of some of the biggest meats in history. I threw myself head first into the game. It's not me from the outside talking shit without experience and we're back in the game now. You know, we got our first meet in four weeks here at Third Street Barbell, if you wanna come and hang out and watch, it's gonna have a great time. We're gonna have food and some people chilling, couple secret guests and then fast forward about six months from now, no announcements yet, but there's gonna be a party here at Third Street again and we're gonna slowly elevate and give back to the sport as much as I can. You can like really like the sport and respect the sport and give to the sport without being like the love of my life and that's the difference. I'm just not built for the platform. It's not what I enjoy, especially now in my schedule, man, I'm juggling three or four businesses. I'm enjoying that process and I'm enjoying the process of just training with the boys, seeing Seabass and Avelia and some of our young lifters, Martin, really get after and dip their toes deeper and deeper into the sport. I enjoy that, man. I'm already, I ain't got no kids and I ain't got no wifeies, so these are my little ducklings and I'm just pop a mode in the corner when they need me, you know? No, this is where you are. Proper positioning is like this. No, just spread your ankles. You can do straight leg, there you go. You can do straight leg or not. There's, there's variations to meat head pilates. Yeah, this is really good for gut health. If you got a tummy ache and you got to do a toot toot. Look at the shot, Terry, look at the shot. I lift weights. I don't want to get negative but we're going to have one negative segment here. There are other reasons. These are all reasons about me and why I don't step on the platform before. Now it's just like the issues with powerlifting and besides like the culture changes in like different federations and this cold mentality and identity of what you're doing, which I think is a bigger issue in our entire country. We don't have to dig into that but being so tightly identified with your beliefs is fine but you can have your morals and beliefs and still be open minded and see other people's pictures rather than just push them out or not even want to hear things that get stuck in your echo chamber. Same with religion, same with politics and same with lifting weights, sadly. So we can't even agree on like a barbell on the standard of things we're going to lift. That fucking sucks. It makes me not want to help as much. Trust me, I'm going to help. We're working on things, but still it makes me not want to. The other thing is this next generation of lifters that's so pretentious about everything they've done. I played basically semi-professional basketball for 15 years and never once did I show up to an open gym and one of these nasty fucking really good players never say like, I'm not going to play with this ball. This isn't the spaulding. Shut the fuck up and fucking lift the weights. Like you're so lucky to have a barbell that ain't bent things that aren't giving you a tetanus and a gym to train it. Like we don't obviously have that much of an issue here. I've got the most insane plates I can. We've got a full Aleco kid, the Aleco barbell, but online and even here sometimes like people are complaining about the amount of equipment, the style of equipment not being able to deadlift without a certain bar let alone the certain deadlift bar, the certain power bar, the certain plates, kilos versus pounds versus calibrated. Like one of my favorite lifters all time is Yuri Belkin and that dude's arguably going to go down to top 10 all-time power lifters, maybe even top five. Smash weights, technical proficiency, lifts weights way beyond his weight class and is really proficient. He's known as a deadlifter but he's insanely good at squats and bench and that dude in his Instagram videos looks like he's deadlifting on some Walmart-ass plastic plates and then he's going to meet and pull a 900. Meanwhile, you deadlift 405 and you're bitching about not having the proper Aleco plates and collars. Like, man, it's just so frustrating. Like weight is a weight and I understand, trust me, I'm a gym owner, I've done this for over a decade. I know that some metal plates don't weigh what they say. It says 45, summer 43, summer 47. Get the fuck over it. Get the fuck over it. I'm gonna finish out, catch the pump, man. Those are some of the reasons that I don't compete anymore and then I'm sorry about that negative rant. Back to being positive, back to we over me. Appreciate you guys, man, 3sb.co. If you didn't act by now, we might be sold out. Apologize, we're out of a lot of sizes but that's how it goes around here, man. Power lifting meat, what? Yeah, they're coming but you better act fast then too because it might come out. So power lifting meat, September 10th and 11th weekend. Open gym here at Third Street. We'll be in Santa Clara, the PowerFest Expo, August 13th and 14th. Salah Mike, everyone, we wanna find me, man. Appreciate you, catch you soon.