Paul Leonard 
As anyone who reads my work knows, I am a proud native of Massachusetts. When I was doing local meets in the late 80s in New England, I became aware of a fellow competitor who was my age, a fierce platform warrior, and a super nice gentleman off the wood. I left for California in …
I lifted weights when began playing high school football in 1983. I played my last HS game, as the starting right guard, on Thanksgiving Day 1985, as my Boston Latin Wolfpack defeated Boston English in the game’s 99th meeting. While playing football, my best bench was 250lbs and my squat was 275 for 5. I …
When I began training Westside style, I had very limited equipment options and a 1600lb total in 1994. One of the most important aspects of Westside Barbell System is the strengthening of your back. Louie Simmons agrees with the immortal Bill Kazmaier who said “a strong man has a strong back.” I trained in a …
Interview of Mike Westerling who trains many contest winning Strongman athletes in the U.S. Mike began his career at Golds Gym in Venice and currently trains all of his clients virtually. I met Mike at a local Strongman contest in Arizona and we realized we have a lot in common and mutual friends in physical …
I began training my squat via the Westside Barbell Box Squat training program in 1994. The staple in my program was the 12” box, which guaranteed that every repetition I did on the squat was below parallel. As Louie Simmons instructed, if every rep in training is below parallel, you will never have to ask …
Jon Cole is still revered by hard core strength training practitioners the world over for the feats he accomplished almost 50 years ago. Jon held the all time super-total record for over a quarter of a century, with the highest official combined powerlifting and Olympic lifting totals. Jon weighed 282 when he did his best …
I was able to watch JM Blakely bench press at the 1996 WPC Can Am Championships in Las Vegas. The Saturday night before the fulll Powerlifting meet, there was a bench only meet. A check of Open Powerlifting.Org confirmed that JM had a ten year bench press career which began in 1992. JM’s best shirted …
In 1992, when no one had a cellphone and the internet was in it’s infancy, Powerlifter Video Magazine debuted. This quarterly videotape series was the product of entrepreneur Ned Low. Advertised in Powerlifting USA and later many of the days muscle magazines, the product was a huge hit amongst hard core strength trainers. Eventually, Ned …
Joe “The Lad”Joe Ladnier burst onto the Powerlifting scene in 1983, when 19 years old, he won the U.S. Senior National Men’s Powerlifting Championships at 242 lbs with a squat of 832 a bench of 556 and a deadlift of 788. He beat such legends as Fred Hatfield and Jim Cash. In doing so, Joe …
I am a staunch proponent of having a garage or basement gym. I had one as a teenager and then a garage gym was the focus when I bought my first house in California, as well as every house I have bought there after. As the world was forced to stay in their homes during …