Diesel Crew - Muscle Building, Athletic Development, Strength Training, Grip Strength » hammer levering

Diesel Interview – Adam Glass

Jedd Johnson — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 05:59:30 +0000

One of the things we love doing at Diesel Crew is feats of strength, especially feats of grip strength. Tearing phone books, bending steel and ripping decks of cards is our Friday night.

Today, I would like to highlight one of the beast feat of strength performers that are out there today, Adam Glass.

A great steel bender and kettlebell practitioner, he has helped me out in many ways with my strength training. But also, Adam is an experienced veteran who has fought to protect our country – and for that I am most thankful to him.

So here is my salute to him.

Tell us about how you got into serious strength training?

Serious strength training started after reading Dinosaur training in high school. I knew I was missing something with my program at the time. Dinosaur training really elevated my concept of what is strength, what is fitness, and how does one get it. From there the turning point was reading and applying Pavel’s “Naked Warrior” and “Power to the People” which are easily two of the best strength books written in the last 20 years. In 2005, I found myself on the Diesel Crew website and I can say without hesitation- You and Smitty have a tremendous impact on my training. In 2009, you see a lot of people training in a similar way, and many of them are modeled very close to the Diesel Method. For many years you guys were the only ones telling people to hit more patterns, train with more implements and work the grip.

Many of the DieselCrew.com readers train for Grip strength. Do you have any Grip goals? Ever consider entering a contest?

For me, grip training is a core competency of my training routine. I have a wide range of goals within the realm of grip I am working towards such as pinching 45’s with either hand, two hands pinching 250lbs, finger lifting 500lbs with my middle finger and finger lifting 300lbs with my pinkie. I am close to each of these goals and it is only a matter of time.

What is the feat you are most proud of?

As a performing strongman, I do a variety of strongman feats of strength ranging from tearing cards and thick phone books, bending horseshoes, nails, long and short bars, breaking wrenches and pieces of chain, driving nails through boards, finger lifting, bent pressing, some Kettlebell feats and some impact/pain tolerance feats.

Things I am particularly happy with- I have been told by many people I am one of the best card tearers in the world as I am able to tear and quarter tough quality decks in literally 3-5 seconds, I am very strong in all styles of steel bending (3/8X7” CRS Double overhand, 5/16X6.5” Hex bar Double under, 5/16X6.25” reverse, grade 5 heslep style, Grade 8 Slim style, 60Ds barehanded) and I am happy with my progress this year with my pinch.

You train with a lot of Kettlebells. How often do you incorporate kettlebell training with your athletes?

Everyone I train, from youths, to people who seek fat loss, people who want to increase muscle mass, to elderly people who want to increase mobility uses kettlebells in their program. I believe the kettlebell is a superior tool for fitness and there are benefits for all who apply. The drills I include for every person is the goblet squat, Turkish get ups and swing. These drills can be scaled to every person’s fitness and mobility levels to produce a positive training effect.

What is missing in peoples training these days? What do you believe is the missing component in modern programming?

My primary observation is people want to move to advanced drills and techniques before ever establishing a solid baseline of strength, mobility, and stability in their primary movements. If its powerlifting, we see people doing a full blown WSB split before they ever reach a X2 BW squat and DL, before they even break a 1.5BW BP. In Kettlebells we see people who want to juggle and pull off the crazy lifts like double snatches and long cycle clean and jerk before they ever grasp the swing. I meet people who want to get in to grip and they are doing 10 different patterns before they ever get a single grip function strong.

If we look at the difference between a good athlete and a great one, we always see the great athlete has strong foundations with the basics of the sport, and they seek to improve their fundamental drills and weakness. If everyone trained this way we would see higher performance across the board.

What is your best overhead press?

My best barbell press has been 275@215lbs BW, best jerk was 300@200, best single arm press is 132lbs@210lbs, bottoms up pressing the 48kg (106lbs) kettlebell @ 212lbs BW. I press most often with kettlebells as barbell presses tend to aggravate a vertebra injury I suffered in 2002.

What other types of fitness training, besides weights, do you do? Running, jump rope, speed bag, etc.

Other methods of fitness training I enjoy are tire flipping, sledge hammer drills (beating the crap out of a tire is just plain fun) club swinging, body weight drills such as burpees and sprawl drills, and shot-put juggling.

Do you supplement with protein? When do you take your shakes?

I work on a carb rotation of 2/1 meaning I have two days with no carbs and on the third day I introduce carbs. I usually have a protein shake as soon as I wake up, one in the mid-day and one before bed. I use a single scope of protein which is usually 24g of protein. I am not a fan of overloading protein or very high protein as I have not seen a single advantage of such diet habits.

Tell us about your website

I started my blog, AdamTGlass.Blogspot.com to document my training. I wanted something I could use to look back and reflect upon to spot trends and record Highs and Lows. As time went on, I used it to push articles, training ideas I had, and show results of different experiments. My number of page views has gone up every single month for 2 years now and I see a wide range of visitors from all backgrounds. Many people contact me on a monthly basis and tell me they find the work inspiring, so I continue to post different things to show people that you can push yourself harder, and go farther. I maintain a list of other sites I endorse as well as some key products I want people to know about such as the Diesel Crew Nail Bending Ebook, the Card Tearing Ebook, Escalating Density training, and Combat Core. These represent in my opinion some of the best training resources on the web and I want people to know I think they are great for their progress.

Any products? Tell us about them.

This Fall I will launch a new site which is collaboration between a team of very strong coaches, who will be named upon release. We will cover a lot of material which is not available anywhere else. Readers will recognize the team immediately and you can count on it that we will push the very best information on the internet for strength, mobility, programming and injury prevention/pain reduction. The site will be a pay to enter subscription and we will make the price affordable for all trainees.

For readers located in the Northern United States there will be several all day workshops this Fall and Winter with Brad Nelson and Myself, a return to our Grip N’ Rip Workshop which yielded tremendous gains to all who attended in January 2009. For anyone in North Dakota, my gym Unbreakable Fitness features daily Ass kicking and monthly workshops.

So there you have it, my friends. Adam Glass is a very smart and strong strength specialist and i am proud to call him a good friend!

If you have a question for Adam, leave a comment below!

Thanks,

-Jedd-

P.S. Perform Kettlebell feats of strength like Adam does – check out our Advanced Kettlebell Training Techniques eBooks. Click here ===> Kettlebell Feats and Advanced Training TechniquesSimilar Posts:

Jedd’s Training Update – Fire Walk with Me

Jedd Johnson — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 02:55:21 +0000

A couple weeks back I blogged about how I was going to start taping my workouts and posting them to YouTube so that I could get help from you all and so that I could spread the word about Grip and Strongman training.

If you missed that post, you can read about it here: ===> Training my Ass off in my Garage – Fire Walk with Me. I have had a lot of fun putting these together and my workouts have just gotten better and better.

So I had to let you all know that I was able to accomplish something HUGE in my Grip training last night.

For the first time ever, I was able to lever my 16-lb hammer, free standing, from the vertical position, down to my face, and back up again. I did it very strictly, meaning I didn’t bounce it around or anything. My hand dropped a bit which makes it easier, but I was very happy to be able to get it back to the vertical position, regardless.

Sledge hammer levering is great for strengthening the wrists for nail bending and card tearing.

I must warn you, levering a heavy sledge hammer is not a walk in the park. Dominating a lighter hammer for multiple can make you think you are ready to jump up a couple pounds, but once that hammer head starts moving downward, it can feel totally different.

If you try sledge levering, watch your lips. The moment that hammer gets near parallel, it starts picking up speed in hurry, and you can’t just call time out and stop it.

The Hardest Block Weight I Ever Saw

I was also able to get some good work in on my GIGANTIC half 115-lb block weight.

If you’re not familiar with block weights, the most common type is half of a dumbbell, Block weights are great for hand strength because they force you to generate strength in an open hand position, training you to engage your finger tips and your palm.

Anyway, back to the half 115-lb hex block weight.

In like 2004, a very strong grip dude named Shane Larson from North Dakota sent out 3 of these half 115-lb block weights. He sent them to 3 of the top block weight lifters at the time – Sean Dockery, Heath Sexton, and me.

These half 115′s are freakin’ HUGE, my friends! The slope on these things is over 7 inches across, meaning from the end of one side slope to the end of the opposite side slope is over 7 inches. I have a hard time even getting a purchase on the vertical sides of this hunk of iron and my hands are pretty damn big.

I’ve had this thing for 5 years and have only broken it off the ground a handful of times and I was able to do more than that last night.

In fact, nobody in the world has ever lifted one of these block weights to a full deadlift!

So check this video out.

This one is my bench workout and my Grip stuff.

This one is just my grip stuff – it’s the same video, just I auto-started it after all the bench footage.

Right at the end of the video is when I start ramping it up for this killer half 115-lb block weight. Wait for it, it’s worth it.

-Jedd-Similar Posts:

New Article for Wrist Strength

Jedd Johnson — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 11:24:04 +0000

Just posted a new article on StraightToTheBar.com – Hammering Strength into the Wrists Part Two. Sledge hammers are awesome for working the hands, wrists, and overall lower arms. Believe me, there are some exercises in this article that are going to give you indestructible wrists. I shot the footage several days ago, and I am still feeling it.

If you think you are tough enough to try these exercises out, then click here.

I also show you one of the exercises we have used here at Diesel to keep us injury free for years, so get over there and check it out right now.

All the best in your training,

-Jedd-

These exercises are great additions for your Card Tearing and Nail Bending training.

Levering a Giant Hammer

Jedd Johnson — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 14:19:40 +0000

Several athletes gave it a try levering the giant wooden hammer that Scott George built from a hammer handle and a huge block of wood (felt like half a tree) following the Gripmas Carol Grip Contest.

Check out The Grip Authority to learn how to lever giant hammers and bend nails bolts and steel stock like a madman.

-Jedd-Similar Posts: