Wednesday Weblog for April 27, 2022 |
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Quote of the Week:
"We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort." --Jesse Owens
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Leading Off: A Different Kind of Cover Girl |
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The original version of this story first appeared in July 2020, and I called it 'Heavy Lifting.'
Since then, some interesting developments have taken place, among them is an opportunity for the focus of this story to appear on the cover of a popular fitness magazine as "Ms. Health & Fitness 2022"
In answer to your question, no, I am not a subscriber.
Additionally, the winner will take home $20,000 cash, and appear on the cover of Muscle and Fitness HERS, read by more than 500,000 fitness enthusiasts and professional athletes.
After reading this, please consider casting your vote for the woman highlighted in the story, a potential Olympian. There is a link here and at the end.
Your vote will make both the potential Olympian and my wife happy.
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Inspiration Squared, or
Heavy Lifting (Continued)
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Lifting weights has always scared me a little bit. They are so heavy! Someone who is into lifting weights has to love grunting, and that's not really my thing.
Lifters have to like the smell of chalk finding their nose. They have to be dedicated and daring and dynamic, I get it, but I would rather be that way without the callouses or I would rather watch someone throw a football with those characteristics.
I know someone dedicated to the sport, and without warning, she inspired me twice, a couple of years apart, and here are the details.
Heavy Lifting
We use the phrase ‘heavy lifting’ to refer to a workload or the toughest part of a job or project. A friend of ours is a real weightlifter, and uses that term to describe herself, not as a metaphor.
So, before the pandemic, we went to the Baystate Games at UMass Boston to watch the Massachusetts State Championship competition in Olympic-style weightlifting. Yes, I know I travel in diverse circles. I had no idea what to expect, and neither would you, probably.
In a hockey rink with boards covering the ice. Two platforms, side by side, red and blue, male and female. Lots of judges who were positioned 'American Idol' or 'America's Got Talent' style. Lots of weights. Lots of spandex. Lots of muscles. Lots of clanging.
I learned pretty early in my first experience with weightlifting competition that how you drop the barbell after an attempt is an important part of the 'style.' The cool kids dramatically drop it to maximize the clang effect. I know I personally would be better at clanging than lifting.
Being my first competition, I didn’t know what to expect, but I caught on quickly. In technical terms, and I'll go slow here, the complete process for lifting a barbell loaded with weights in a competition is: approach, pause, grunt, lift, clang. Approach, pause, grunt, lift, clang.
For about an hour we watched young lifters and older lifters (euphemistically called ‘masters’) approach the bar, pause in very deep thought, grunt from the gut, lift to the skies or in that general direction, and try to look cool while dropping the weights to finish with a clang. Some made the lifts, some didn’t. Some grunted once, some grunted twice. Some got high fives, some slumped away. All of them clanged.
At this stage of your weightlifting education, it doesn’t really matter if you know the difference between a ‘clean and jerk’ and a ‘snatch’: they are both elements of the competition that are incredibly hard to do right, and incredibly hard to do with a lot of weight, regardless of whether you are lifting kilos or pounds. (Plus, I'm not sure I remember which is which).
We were watching the first dozen participants on two platforms alternate lifts, with weights of 100 pounds or more. I was thinking the whole time about the dedication and hard work, and sore muscles it must take to be a top tier weightlifter.
All these folks down on the rink had to practice, overcome disappointment, and try again. In fact, the whole sport was based on individuals trying to do a personal best. (Regular readers can almost predict the last paragraph of this story now.)
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A Hush Fell Over the Arena
As our friend was announced and approached the bar, the entire arena hushed and most everyone stopped what they were doing. All eyes were on the red platform.
While the guy on the other platform was struggling to lift 100 pounds over his head, our friend’s weight attempt was announced over the PA system (do they still call it a PA system?), in kilos of course, at a weight I converted with my app and realized it was more than 200 pounds!
My mouth fell open: the weight was way more than that of any other competitor we’d seen on either platform so far. The announcement of the weight also hushed those who were not already hushed.
Our friend approached the bar, paused, grunted, lifted, and clanged. Missed on the first lift, but had a nicely dramatic 'clang' to end it. The second lift was successful at 200+ pounds.
Are you kidding me? Some of you may wonder why this experience was worth sharing and writing about because a lot of people can lift 200 pounds. A couple of reasons.
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The Inspiration
First, our friend goes by the name Tiffany, she is a nursing student, and she was 25 years old and weighed in at 121 pounds that day, or whatever that is in kilos, and she lifted more than any male competitor we observed. By a lot.
Now maybe we missed the real big lifters, we didn’t stay, they may have been coming later. And maybe she didn’t do as well as she wanted to with all her lifts that day, but here’s what she didn’t see from the platform.
She didn’t see how the whole arena stopped, frozen in time when she approached the bar. (You’ll see evidence of that when you get to the end of this story.). She didn’t feel the whole arena hoping she could do it. She didn’t realize that everyone in the building was hoping they were looking at a future Olympic champion when the bar peaked over her head.
She couldn’t know how many people thought she was crazy for trying, and how many left the building that day thinking about what they were afraid of trying. She didn't see or feel how inspirational her attempt was to those watching.
So, even though our friend didn’t break her personal best, and even though she was disappointed that she didn’t "snatch this" or "clean and jerk that", it didn’t matter to me.
She didn't get what she wanted but gave me something I wanted. I went simply to support but left with even more respect for her than I had when I walked in, plus I took away a little of that inspiration.
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Champions
- Champions don’t say, ‘I’m going to inspire that person’. They let their actions do most of the talking and supplement their actions with some appropriate words. Or, in the case of a weightlifter, appropriate grunts.
- Many times, champions aren’t even aware of who or what they are inspiring. She had no idea of the impact her lift had on me. If you push the metaphor to the edge of the driveway, don't Champions, in all walks, approach, pause, grunt, lift, clang? Approach the challenge, pause to gather themselves or their resources, inwardly grunt as they struggle with the hardest part of the challenge, and then go for it (and collapse with a nice glass of chardonnay, or a Bud Light or an ice cream cone or a jelly donut regardless of the outcome? The Clang.)
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Champions don't realize sometimes that how they inspire us is not just the attempt, but it's that we figure out quickly that they have a high standard for dedication and hard work. These are the same characteristics, maybe minus the sore muscles, it takes to be a top tier anything. The practicing, overcoming disappointment, and trying again are more or less core to champion-level performance.
When you stop to think about it the whole sport of weightlifting, is based on individuals trying to do their personal best, and that is where greatness begins in any field. It is based on individuals who aspire to be the best.
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If you spent any time around me, you know that 'aspire' is one of my all-time favorite words.
Original Ending
I may never attend another weightlifting competition. But sometimes, when I am a little bit frustrated at my inability to get done what needs to get done, a picture of a 121 pound ‘champion’, lifting 220 pounds over her head pops into my mind. And because I can’t get the picture out of my head, I’m going to share it with you, below.
And if you see Tiffany Beaupre on NBC walking into the Olympic stadium in Paris in 2024, or Los Angeles in 2028, we’ll both know she, like all those who made it there, did so with dedication, hard work and sore muscles while trying for a personal best, every day. They aspired.
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The Rest of the Story
If you are over 40, you remember Paul Harvey's daily broadcast he titled 'The Rest of the Story.' He'd share a story, and then reveal something unusual about the story that took readers or listeners by surprise. This is the rest of the Inspiration Squared/ Heavy Lifting story.
After my Boston Marathon finish in the fall of 2021, I personally lost a ton of motivation. I had metaphorically speaking, 'climbed the mountain,' and didn't know what was 'next' for me. I drifted for a couple of months and then decided to become...wait for it...a weightlifter.
I thought about how the requirement to be a competitive weightlifter was more than liking to grunt, it was about aspiring to be better. Never known for my upper body strength (always had great legs), I decided to aspire to be better. So I joined, are you ready for it: Aspire Athletic Performance, a gym about an hour from my house.
That's right, I'm into my sixth month of weight training. My goal is simple: I want to reach a personal best where I can enter one competition before I retire. My goal is to approach, pause, grunt, lift, clang.
Voting for Tiffany won't help me reach that goal, but it will help a champion reach hers.
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There's more. My coach is Tiffany's coach: Michael Craven, the owner of Aspire. And they are getting married in September. |
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To submit your advice simply reply to this email and send it in. There is no guarantee it will be published, but I'll do my best to get the best ideas included. Even if it is not published right away, keep looking for it. |
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From Mike from Puerto Rico
The best advice that I ever received was from my father when I was
around 21 or 22 years old and selecting a path to follow:
Do something in life that you really enjoy because
you will be doing it for a long time!
Truer words were never spoken, and I have thanked him in
my prayers ever since he passed away in 1998.
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Surprise Photos at the End: To Be Continued... |
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Joe's Positive Post of the Week |
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The Roll Call of states and countries where readers reside: Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Washington DC, Wisconsin plus Canada, Spain, Conch Republic, Australia and the United Kingdom |
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Ed Doherty
774-479-8831
www.ambroselanden.com
ed-doherty@outlook.com
Forgive any typos please.
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