Throwback Thursday

I have been meaning to do something a little bit different for you all in the Diesel Universe. I wanted to pull up something that was very cool and very special for you from the annals of the site, and I grabbed the videos from the Sorinex Summer Strong 2011 Get-Together.

Richard Sorin, owner of Sorinex and innovator of the Blob (left) and Me (right)

So many GREAT and HISTORIC Feats of Strength went down that day, I would be all day listing them. Some of the highlights include Rich Williams cleaning and pressing the Inch Dumbbell, Chad Woodall coming ever so close to nearly lifting 2 Old School York 45’s in each hand, a pull-up contest between Tex Henderson and Andrew Durniat, and much, much more.

See the original post here => Sorinex Summer Strong 2011

I hope you enjoyed today’s Throwback Thursday. If you want to see more, tell me by leaving a comment below. I can’t promise I will be able to do this every single week, but I can certainly do it from time to time.

Make sure you are subscribed to my newsletter to get future notifications whenever Throwback Thursday gets updated.

All the best in your training,

Jedd

Mighty Mitts 2012 – Part I

Preparing the Hands for Battle with the Inch Dumbbells (Photo: Bill Piche)

For my 2nd time in the last 3 years, I made the trip to Columbus Ohio and the Arnold Classic in order to compete in Mighty Mitts. Mighty Mitts was organized and held by Richard and Bert Sorin.

I can’t say enough about how well these gentleman, their company, and their crew supported us competitors this year. It was unbelievable. I felt like royalty. I can’t really put into words how nice everyone was.

Mighty Mitts is a huge opportunity for Grip Sport. The platform of the Arnold Classic and the chance to get events in front of so many people is amazing, and I hope it brings more people into the sport. I truly appreciate everything that Sorinex has done to help Grip grow.

Never a dull moment in my Grip life, the trip to Mighty Mitts started out an interesting one. I spent about 30 minutes on Wednesday cleaning out unnecessary junk, removing the baby seat, and loading it with everything I needed for the trip. All the while I was blasting the coolest Johnny Cash DVD that I bought recently at Dollar General, so it was an awesome time.

Unfortunately, I must have had the doors open, lights on, and music blaring for a little too long because when I tried to start up to get on the road, the battery was dead. Just my luck.

I called my fiancee and she came home from work to give me a jump start. While I was waiting for her, I figured I’d take a moment to check and fill the fluids, so I raised the hood up and got that done. I noticed there was some rust on the clamp-thing that holds the hood down, so I also grabbed some WD-40 and sprayed that to try to keep it moving right.

When I tried to clean of the excess oil, I activated the clamp and it closed down. I went back inside the vehicle and pulled the release to open it back up again, and I thought I saw it working, so I thought I was in good shape. Unfortunately, I was mistaken and after jumping my battery, I went to close the hood back down and I think I damaged the clamp-thing.

Unable to close the hood down, I was forced to move everything out of my car and into the fiancee’s car, forgetting my car charger, ibuprofen, and a bunch of other stuff that I had thrown into a plastic shopping bag (dramatic foreshadowing here)

Eventually I got on the road and 8 hours later, I was in Columbus and on the shuttle bus to go meet Arnold.

Yes, I said meet Arnold – the man himself. We actually got to site in a press-conference type of scenario and Arnold addressed us and the Strongman Crew. It was a crazy opportunity. I got a bunch of pics and there was even a big photo taken of our entire group with Arnold. Totally blew me away.

The next thing we did was check out the equipment and go over the rules for the Mighty Mitts events at the actual event center. It was good to see everything and get to put my hands on it to see how it felt and to have an idea of the difficulty. We were able to ask questions about the rules and then we were back to the hotel for nice dinner in the restaurant.

Left: Me with “The Iron Tamer” Dave Whitley. Right: Me with Mike “The Machine” Bruce

During dinner, I got to meet guys like Dave Whitley and Dennis Rogers again and even met Mike “The Machine” Bruce for the first time.

Day 1 Events

I knew going in that Day 1 was going to be the harder of the two days for me. With both of the events being thick bar, my nemesis, my work was cut out for me. At this point, I knew I had trained as absolutely hard as possible for these events and began focusing all of my thoughts on successful attempts.

Double Inch Dumbbell Farmer’s Walk

In my training, I had worked up to taking several steps with two Inch Dumbbells, but these were dumbbells with rather rough handles on them. Whenever I tried picking up my slicker-handled Inch, it gave me problems. In fact, I was only able to deadlift my slicker Inch dumbbell one time. That was several weeks prior to the contest, so at the time I thought I was seeing some gains, but it wasn’t meant to be as I failed to lift them on the Mighty Mitts stage.

I put a tremendous amount of effort into this event. Some would say that it was all a waste, since in 2010 I was not able to deadlift them either, but I don’t see it that way, exactly, because during the time I worked so hard on the inches, my Axle numbers improved greatly. I have some plans in mind for modifying my training in order to get some better results on the Inch Dumbbell, after speaking with my Mighty Mitts roommate, Chad Woodall, so I am looking ahead, and not looking back.

Sorinex Monster Bell Deadlift

Squeezing as hard as I could and my eyes are nearly popping out. (Photo: Sorinex Facebook Page)

The Sorinex Monster Bell is a 500-lb Axle Bar. The handle region is well knurled over the majority of the gripping surface, which helps with the grip a bit, but the sheer weight of 500-lbs combined with the fact that the globe heads of the dumbbell act very similarly to the Inch Dumbbell made the event very challenging for me.

Although this year I felt I had much better control of the Monster Bell, I still did not complete any full repetitions. Whereas two years ago, as soon as I began lifting up on the barbell it seemed to pop right out of my hand, this year, I was able to pull it to my knee height before dropping it to the floor again.

As you can see in the video above, I tried primarily the sumo stance, as this is the stance I used in training. I did try one repetition with the conventional stance, but that did not go so well, so I went back to the sumo position in order to try to muster up enough strength for a full repetition. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t meant to be.

At the end of Day 1, I found myself at the very bottom of the standings, with a lot of work ahead of me and a great distance to overcome in order to reach the leaders.

I was so upset, that even thought I had just met Mike Bruce, I slapped a sleeper on him and put him down for the count.

There’s no extinguishing the power of Napalm’s Sleeper Hold

In truth, the image above was staged by Mike himself and I was not upset either. Although I would have been happier with better performances on the day’s events, I knew that the Day 2 events were my events, and I looked forward to the challenge.

Stay tuned, because Part II will be up as soon as I can get it finished.

All the best in your training,

Jedd

Hello everybody. Today, I am covering an Iron Master nomination that I put in myself.

This one is for Richard Sorin, owner of Sorinex (Sorinex.com), and famed Grip Strength Legend who innovated The Blob and became the first person to close the #3 Gripper.

Iron Master – Richard Sorin

I first heard of Richard Sorin in 2002 when I first learned about Grip Training.

I quickly found out that essentially the name Sorin and the term Grip Strength were synonymous.

While not the first to train for Grip Strength, Richard has been cited by John Brookfield and many others as a pioneer in the focused development of World Class Grip Strength.

As you’ll see, Richard has been messing around with odd objects and Grip Training challenge pieces for decades!

Richard Sorin, Anvil Lifting

I salute Richard Sorin for many reasons. No doubt, Richard’s interest in Grip Strength is one of the primary reasons I train for Grip Strength, and plan to do so for decades to come as well.

But also Richard has had a bigger effect on me. Richard inspired me a few years ago to always continue to train hard regardless of what challenges I have going on in my life.

This is because Richard is indeed a Cancer survivor and shortly after battling the disease he was right back to training doing unbelievable feats, including pulling large vehicles with the strength of his neck, using a head harness, shown below.

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I asked Richard to write a few words about how he got started in strength training, and I figured that he would say something like High School or College Sports got him into training, but in reality it started out far, far, far before that. Check this out…

My mind spins trying to say where it all started… I loved strength from my earliest times. I hauled my Billard Jr. Champmaker Barbell into show and tell in 5 year old kindergarten (my most prized posession at that time).


Years went by with my backyard gyms, a huge cellar gym with full size platforms at “The Cedar St. Boys” and monthly trips to compete in Olympic weightlifting contests in New York City at Lost Battalion Hall.



I represented the Keasby Eagles lifting club along with famed Olympian Phil Grippaldi. Trips to York starting at age 13, the York picnics, Saturday training at the York gym, eating with the “greats” at the York diner all moulded me.

Richard on his college years and further exploration of the world of strength training…

Later, when strong enough to acquire a scholarship at U of South Carolina I competed in track, throwing the discus and shotput. I was only 215 bodyweight but summer spent at home during the college years at the Elizabeth YMCA gave me the power and drive to do well.


Power rack training started in its early development with my training partner Anthony Dittillo and Dezo Ban, my Hungarian mentor, and we grew strong. Track was a passion but lifting was my love and rarely did (at least in my mind) the two overlap. I had mechanical skills and wherever I went, school, teaching, coaching, whatever, I always tried to build the better mousetrap as far as exercise and strength equipment was concerned.



My teaching years ended in the realization there was more for me to do. I started my business and though my offerings were heavy, black, and ugly all said “it lasts forever.” That was 30 years ago and still now at 60 my thirst and love of iron persists.

Richard on why he remains involved in Grip and other sporting endeavors…

I feel as part of giving back to so many that took their time to inspire and help me, (I try) to help with events that bring new blood into the sport: Our yearly Summer Strong Day of Strength, our open door, open house daily policy, being involved in creating the events and equipment at the Arnold’s Classic Strongman and now “Mighty Mitts” has brought my life full circle.

I asked Richard what he felt were some of his greatest accomplishments in Grip and the World of Strength…

My greatest accomplishments were in part touched by the “impossible” strength rooms designed and built for colleges and pro teams that won State, National championships, Superbowls and through a bit of what I did became stronger men.


Richard's son, Bert, as a young lifter

My greatest accomplishment is taking the gifts God gave me and having the opportunity to do something with them in the presence of the joy of my life my son Bert. A father always wants his child to be more than he was…I have my wish answered in him.

I asked Richard what some of his numbers are and what his training routine involves these days, and here is what he said…

I still lift 3-4 days per week and don’t understand what taking an easy workout is. My overall strength for a skinny guy was good in my earlier years with a 290 snatch 714 deadlift, and 675 squat, cheat curl 238X10 etc.


Pinching a Monster Block Weight

My real strength, whether I realized it or not, was in my hands. I always toyed with my grip but in the late 80’s I began doing bouts of grip work where some personal bests rivaled the top recorded efforts. I tried to vary my training and devised tools of grip to test and build my strength in the three aspects that grip strength is measured (crush, pinch, support).


Lifting the Blob

I took a simple chunk of pesky broken York dumbbell and after mastering lifting it, it slowly became a world standard for grip manhood “the Blob.”


The First to Close the #3

I was in the early years of spring gripper interest and again lucky to set a world standard level by being the first to close a #3 Ironmind gripper, a feat that I was proud to repeat officially 17 years later at age 58.



Richard Re-Certifies on the #3

Note from Jedd: Richard has been one of a very few who has actually re-certified on the #3 after the rule change was implemented in 2005, mandating the use of a credit card to establish legal set depth…)



Closing the #3 Gripper with 2 Fingers

My strongest feats seem like they all revolved around my strength in my first two fingers,

• Deadlifts of 552 on a 1″ bar
• 530 on a 2″ bar
• 675 lockout
• and a #3 gripper close

These were all done with just those two fingers of each hand.

My supporting power was also good with a non strap assisted lockout with 1331lbs. If anything good came of this hard work was to see the interest in Grip grow a hundredfold and still be able in my own way to help things along.

I can’t say life has been easy but the guiding light of strength has sustained and has given me memories that indeed has given me a “wealthy soul”.

Your friend in strength,

Richard Sorin

It’s been my pleasure to feature Richard Sorin this week in the Diesel Iron Masters. Now check out some of the other pics that were sent over by Kevin and Jeff at Sorinex who helped me out with this recognition.

John Brookfield & Richard Sorin

Richard Sorin & Bill Kazmaier

If you would like to nominate someone for Iron Masters, please contact me at my email address. Put “Iron Masters Nomination” in the subject. From there, include the name of the recipient along with the information you’d like to provide.

Remember, the person needs to be at least 40 years old, they have to be an avid strength trainer, and they have to have had a profound effect on you, inspired you, or in some other way motivated you to train in order to follow in their foot-steps. They HAVE to be a GOOD EXAMPLE.

You can NOT nominate yourself, however…

To give you an idea of other Diesel Iron Master recipients, check out the links below:

• Iron Master Bruce Eckrote
• Iron Master LTC Nathan Acree
• Iron Master Graham Bartholomew

I look forward to receiving your nominations. Thanks and all the best in your training.

Jedd

Get Certified on the #3 = > The Grip Authority

Start Melting Steel = > Nail Bending DVD

Christmas Grip Shirt = > Merry Gripmas