There’s no free lunch, not in biology, not in physics, and not in life. In this vid I cover some of those realities with additional text/thoughts below the vid and offer some possible resources and additional thoughts.
8 time Mr Olympia Ronnie Coleman can hardly walk and is going through extensive rehab after multiples surgeries. PL legend Ed Cohen had double hip replacement a few years back ( and squatted 688×3 @ 50+ years old raw after his rehab!) which does not seem to have gotten much attention in the strength world. A bunch of strength athletes have needed various surgeries to repair extensive damage.
But if you ask Ronnie, or Ed, would they change anything? According to them no. Lesson here is, pushing the human body to its very edges of performance and tolerances can and often does come with a price. There’s fair amount people can do to reduce the risks, and or minimize the damage, but the human body will only take so much for some long. As Ronnie said on via his Intragram account:
“So you guy’s still wanna be like me, you still want to have the same work ethic as I had? Well as you can see I’m 8 X Mr Olympia and I can’t walk. I endured an 11 hour major back surgery last Tuesday.”
But:
“Do I have any regrets? If I had a chance to do it all over again would I change anything? Yes if I had a chance to do it all over again I would change one thing. That is when I squatted that 800lbs I would do 4 reps instead of 2, that is my only regret in my career. Those 2 reps I did still haunts me today because I know I had 4 in me but the coward in me only did 2. That is my only regret.”
Here’s Ed discussing his surgery with Ryan Spencer:
Will Brink is the owner of the Brinkzone Blog. Will has over 30 years experience as a respected author, columnist and consultant, to the supplement, fitness, bodybuilding, and weight loss industry and has been extensively published. Will graduated from Harvard University with a concentration in the natural sciences, and is a consultant to major supplement, dairy, and pharmaceutical companies.
His often ground breaking articles can be found in publications such as Lets Live, Muscle Media 2000, MuscleMag International, The Life Extension Magazine, Muscle n Fitness, Inside Karate, Exercise For Men Only, Body International, Power, Oxygen, Penthouse, Women’s World and The Townsend Letter For Doctors.
He’s also been published in peer reviewed journals.
Will is the author of the popular e-books, both accompanied by private members forum access , Bodybuilding Revealed & Fat Loss Revealed.
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Another great little article by Will Brink. I should take cognizance of this, especially as I’m 71 years old and still training like the devil, but nothing has started falling off yet! Thanks Will.
Drive on Howard!
Hi Will, good reminder for everyone to do a personal reality check. I just had rotator cuff surgery for an injury while grappling. It may have been prompted by my doing 2-3 classes/night for 5 days in a row, rolling and sparring every night. While I may have been able to do that when I was younger, at 62 I don’t recover as quickly so I’ll have to reassess that as I rehab. When I first started lifting in at a karate club in the late 70‘s, we had the early Naulitus machines with pre-exhaust at every station. After a few months of that with very good gains, I hit a plateau so I switched to free weights and followed Mike Mentzer’s heavy Duty program. He also incorporated pre-exhaust, which I have stuck with because it works very well for me. As I aged, I grew to appreciate how it allows a muscle to be thoroughly worked using a lighter weight on the 2nd compound exercise and thus, is easier on the joints. Most of my injuries have come when I didn’t warm up sufficiently so going forward, when I am pressed for time, I will shorten the meat of the workout but not the warm up. I will also incorporate a lot more accessory and stabilizer training. Thanks again.
Thanks for the vid Will. Luckily I’ll hit 60 this year with very few issues, but I can see where this could be a big issue for some.