Monster Garage Gym/Maroscher Coaching Log: By MGG owner, 2-Time WPC World Powerlifting Champion, Eric Maroscher. (Log number XXXIV).
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Are you training or just working out??? Putting it all together.
This coaching log features 2-Time APF Senior Nationals Champion, Top 50 ALL TIME American bencher (in two weight classes), and the current #2 ranked powerlifter via powerliftingwatch rankings, Mike Strom of the Monster Garage Gym. The purpose of this log is to give you a front row seat into a huge chunk of Mike Strom’s 12 week training cycle that led him to a second consecutive APF Senior Nationals title totaling 1962LB total at 181LBS bdw.
Powerlifters can lift and compete for many, many years, but the harsh reality, the brutal truth is, powerlifters within these competitive years have only a finite amount of “best years,” in the sport. Best years are those years when it all comes together for that lifter as they combine their health, or lack of injury, years under the bar with their programming, nutrition program, short-medium-long term goals, perfect technique and a work ethic and passion for their craft, the craft of powerlifting. Many lifters have good years, but only those who truly red-line the afore mentioned components have “best years” worthy of mention. The best year’s for those truly, in the zone powerlifters, means those years where when all of these facets come together, the lifter can be untouchable on the platform in his/her weight class as well as coefficient.
Here is the catch, one never knows how long they can sustain their best years, when they are at the top of the sport, as powerlifting is one of the most body-violent sports on the planet. Since my first powerlifting meet in 1989 I have been absolutely blessed to have been afforded the privilege of training alongside of some of the best powerlifters during their “best years,” and that is a very small but very distinguished list. I put Mike Strom on that very list.
Mike is on the precipice of the start of his “best years” and the clock starts once this window has been entered. Some like Ed Coan or Dave Ricks have best years that span decades, yet some are like flashes of lightning, gone in a blink as they put all their powerlifting eggs in one basket and then they disappear never to allow longevity to enrich their powerlifting prowess.
It is the powerlifter who knows he/she is in that window and train with calculated aggression that realize that it is not just the numbers, but the numbers plus longevity that make the lifter great, and the realization that they need to seize this time as “best years,” for every lifter, are, as is their nature, finite.
Mike is a cerebral lifter and as he has learned that he can only control his lifting and subsequently has learned leave the distractions of the meet environment and competitors’ worlds alone, his training is a success-product of that mentality, thus Mike wins, and improves, yet works to be strong while staying healthy and that is not an easy task.
Lastly, one of Mike’s training characteristics that separates him from 99% of the powerlifters out there is that he is focused for every rep of every set for an entire training cycle and even in “the office season” if there is such a thing. Not many powerlifters I know have that non-wavering focus. This focus is always there and that goes for the seemingly less important supplemental movements that never get the attention they deserve.
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uryy36luAQ]
This coaching log captures some of Mike’s training footage for his meet cycle leading up to the APF Senior Nationals. The entire cycle Mike trained through, and/or around a back issue (you will see the grimaces). If you are one of our coaching log followers (and thank you for that by the way, as we work hard to bring you substance with each log) who watches this entire video, you will be able to answer for yourself, “Are you really training, or are you just working out?” If you are working out, start training because “best years” are very different from “good years.” Keep in mind the words of Clint Darden from the EliteFTS PLE II, “If you are going to be in, be all the way in!!!!!”
*The training footage in this video (filmed in HD, let load to 720 or 1080 for HD quality). *Photo courtesy of Bent Nail Photography and Monster Garage Gym
We hope you find this video and log as a whole of use to you in your training. Please let us know by your comment(s) if these logs are useful to you and what we can do to make the better. If you like them, we would appreciate it if you would share them.
As always, thank you for following the Monster Garage Gym/Maroscher coaching log. We hope you found this log and our other prior logs of benefit to you. Ever Onward, Eric Maroscher.
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Followers of the MGG, please note: MONSTER GARAGE GYM and Monsterette shirts available at: http://shop.monstergaragegym.com/
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Monster Garage Gym/Maroscher coaching log by:
Eric Maroscher, 2-Time WPC World Powerlifting Champion, Columnist, Elitefts, Team Elitefts Member, Owner, Monster Garage Gym.
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