Can’t Fly Without Wind Under Your Wings
May 19, 2003

Who, me? Toys? No, I don’t have any toys. I have a gym full of weights, but they’re not exactly toys. I have an old pickup truck, a major toy if I was 17, but not a toy today. I have a cool black cat named Mugsy, but he’s really a pet… there’s a difference. If he was stuffed I guess you could call him a toy, but he’s not stuffed. I have a house in the redwoods that looks like a kid’s fort, but, again, no toy by any stretch of the imagination. My battered power tools used to make furniture resemble toys, but 30 seconds on the maneuvering end of one of those noisy brutes and the fun is gone. My computer, a toy for the first 24 hours, turned into a tyrant demanding heaps of words and thoughts by the pile. And the TV broadcasts news for me to untangle, ascertaining that the world is not going too far in the wrong direction while I sleep -- it is not a movie box nor does it entertain me with ferocious video games and noisy situation comedies; it is not a toy.

No jet skis, ATV, target pistols, AK-47, speedboat or Harley. You might think I’m a very serious guy with no time for fun and games. However, if you recall, last month I devised a squatting apparatus that enables lifters with common shoulder limitations to squat free of shoulder pain. Could that, the Top Squat, be considered a toy? Makes squatting fun again.

The Top Squat eliminates the need to stabilize the bar with your arms extended unnaturally to the sides by offering two powerful handles to grasp directly before you as you perform your standard full squat. Isn’t that a chuckle? Next week you’ll see a picture of the TS on the web page that’ll have you in stitches and soon after that there’ll be the absolutely hysterical video-short staring a Red Skelton look-alike demonstrating the usage and virtues of the unit.

I’m really a wild and crazy guy. Last week I designed another useful and fun-filled gizmo I call the Fat Dog, a two-inch diameter heavy-duty plastic tube adapted to fit over an Olympic bar or Smith Press bar. It enables lifters with hand and wrist limitations to press more ably and pain-free. Does this qualify as a toy? Makes pressing fun again.

The Fat Dog converts the standard-diameter bar (1 1/32nd or 1 1/16th) to a thick bar (2¼) for the hand and wrist comfort and mechanical alterations the two-inch bar affords. The broad surface displaces the pressure on the hand and adds an interesting and effective change of groove -- hence, muscle recruitment -- to the common press.

I’m not alone in having hands that after years of lifting, pushing, twisting and turning are bruised, slightly mangled or arthritic. They work well; we love them, but they need and deserve special consideration. The Fat Dog, though it does not solve all the problems, adds dimension to hand utility and improves noticeably pain-free use.

It’s a simple solution to simple thick-bar applications, eliminating the need to purchase and store the Apollon Axle itself. Of course, the conversion is not by any means a replacement of the real deal. I improvised the unit as an addition to the Smith Press, an apparatus that serves me well with my shoulder gripes.

A 3/4-inch slice is removed from the length of 44 inches of ABS pipe. Four 3” by 4” thin rubber rectangles are glued within the tube at the ends and center points to prevent slippage and provide stability. There you have the Fat Dog, a mutt if you’re into pedigrees.

I can hear the hi-techsters scoffing now, “Sounds like a sloppy, poorly balanced goofy gadget to me.” Surprisingly not so. Besides, whatever happened to paint cans full of cement with pipes sticking out of the ends? It’s not the fancy cambered machines with progressively offset M-1 bearings and adjustable seats, back rests and arm rests or the compound hi-lo swivel cable devices with adjustable plate stacks that builds mighty bodies. It’s the favorite trick handles for the old pulley systems and blocks of wood under the bench and the milk crate against the wall that make the difference. The loop of rope, the short length of chain, the hooks, tire tube grips… these odds and ends account for the iron n’ steel finesse and the super training focus and involvement. The less sophisticated the gym, the more advanced the lifter. He depends on himself and his resources and not the excessive and dazzling gear around him.

Who has time for toys -- gadgets and gizmos? The whole world, the globe with all its resources is a great and wonderful plaything. Well, unless you and your camel live under a bridge in Baghdad or have your life savings in dinars. Even so, if your life is centered in that less-than-desirable community of old Babylon, things are getting better by the minute, pockmarked as the landscape may be during these days of restoration. All you need to do is put your hand out and grab at something, anything and make it work. Be patient, persevere and hope.

Have you noticed or is it just me: The whole world is wearing an ugly puss lately. The economy isn’t doing too good and not all the nations are getting along. There’s the war, threats of wars, terrorists and just plain old sick people in the neighborhoods shooting each other for reasons known only to them. Freedom of speech has become freedom to curse, slander and be immoral. Historians and scholars say it’s been like this, more or less, since the beginning of time: disease, poverty, concentration of wealth, gluttony and famine, corruption, immorality and the endless battles with tempestuous, tremulous and fiery Mother Nature. Looks like a planet full of grief if you stare too long at the blemishes, runny sores and broken bones, listen only to the gasping, and smell only the rot and cordite above all the other smells.

But, like you, I’m ever the optimist. I see the pain, feel it, measure it and go about attending my own backyard, often cheerfully. Keep it clean and tidy, this place that runs alongside my neighbors, honest, alive and friendly. Yeah, patches of weeds sprout up when I rest from pruning and raking -- you know how it goes -- but I get to them in time before they bear thistle and thorn. We’re not perfect, thank God.

Isn’t it incredible? How can life be such a mess and be so beautiful at the same time?

I suspect the answer, if you’re looking for one, has to do with hope. Have you ever noticed… muscle makers and the health conscious are a hopeful bunch. Some appear to be humble to the point of self-deprecation (an old bodybuilding trick), but secretly they are looking up and full of promise. No one grabs cold, heavy and hard pig iron and lifts it over his or her head without an uncommon investment in hope. Moving loads of metal by the arms full repeatedly to no place in particular is just not the thing one does automatically, out of impulse or out of need, for basic survival or for obvious delight, for wage, food or shelter. Weight lifting is undertaken for the purpose of self-improvement, and self-improvement is undertaken only with hope.

Hope is at the foundations of the discipline and perseverance applied to the repetitious forcing of iron and steel in various directions to achieve muscle and strength, yesterday, today and tomorrow. The same hope prevents you and me from eating senselessly and without limitations -- pizza and ice cream and chocolate and soda and cookies in endless supply. Hope of a lean body, healthy and vigorous, directs us toward roasted chicken and steamed vegetables, grilled fish and salads, fresh fruit and yogurt and cottage cheese and cool, clear water. Hope is self-starting, self-propelled, perpetual.

Like a polished ray of sun through a once-dark cloud, like the gravity of a footfall, hope, the grand promise, the great expectation, has substance. Yet, you can’t hold hope in the palm of your hand anymore than you can hold joy or sadness or the shadow of a smile. Neither can you release your grip of the power it holds. Hope restores the soul, refreshes the mind, rejuvenates the spirit and invigorates the body.

It is certain: We grow up when we hope, bombers; we grow old when we do not. It’s a bad day when your craft stalls and the wings buckle and a shudder goes through the fuselage like a cold winter’s storm.

Check your gauge marked “Hope.” If you’re running on bleak, add this hope-filled, promise-packed, expectation-laden exercise combination to your bi-tri arsenal. Put some old fashioned dynamite under the wings.

THE BIG BANG

This is not a blockbuster, but an effective blast for the forearms and biceps from an unusual vantage point followed by a full triceps pump and burn. You’ll like how the chest and front delt get worked up in the action of the curls and the torso tightens under the strain of the triceps pulley action. Take advantage of the all the extras you can… they serve your mind and body and spirits well.

Low-incline lying thumbs-up dumbbell curls (4 setsx6-8 reps)

End of the bench is raised 15” on one end Lay on the bench with feet up, allowing arms to hang fully, palms inward to the starting position. With little assistance of secret body motion, pull dumbbells upward to a position just above the chest (plate ends near touching) and lower with deliberate resistance to complete arm extension. The complete extension assures total biceps recruitment and the high above-the-chest target position increases the contraction on the bis and brings in the front delts and pecs to noticeable degree -- a reminder that life is tough and there are no free lunches.

…supersetted with overhead pulley triceps extensions (4x10-12)…

Typical movement: back to the plate stack, grasp your favorite handle from the overhead pulley, lean forward like an athlete and with the appropriate triceps action, push, man, push. Moderate and rhythmic pace, heavy contraction and purposeful eccentric resistance -- choose a weight that allows control and nice form for eight pumping repetitions, and then requires a sprinkle of authentic body thrust for the final burning four.

…supersetted with standing pulley triceps extensions (4x 4-6)…

Typical movement: this is sort of an extension of the extension. Spin around without releasing the handle and continue your set of triceps extensions from the front. A little persuasion and lots of burning might and guts and determination and insistence should be enlisted for the performance of these serious, over-the-top six repetitions. It’s not the exercise that makes the difference, it’s you -- who you are, what you’ve got, where you’re at, what you’re willing to settle for and what more you can demand of yourself.

Say a prayer. Pour it on. DD

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