Wonder Boy Hallucinates

Early last winter I engaged in a fiery squat workout that overloaded the legs sufficiently for a week. A good time to rest and repair, right? Well, in four days I was again up for my scheduled lower body routine and thought I'd toss a few sets of light squats around to stimulate the tired muscles, maintain my schedule and feed the neurosis. Third set, fifth rep something gurgled and rippled deep in the right quad. I looked in the mirror through slit eyes and asked myself a plausible question, "So, Wonder Boy, do you put the bar back where it belongs or are you going to do another rep to see if the ole thigh is really injured?" I don't know what possessed me at that moment, but I reluctantly racked the nasty thing and briefly pouted.

I nursed the self-diagnosed muscle tear with time and conservative thigh training. Partial leg presses of the light weight, high rep variety, cautious leg extensions, curls and calves half-heartedly comprised my lower body agenda. Occasionally, I sneaked under the Buffalo Bar for a set of 95 and 135 to check out the action, knowing that small tears become large tears with very little persuasion. A very touchy injury with no sense of humor greeted me predictably every time and a month ago I shrugged my shoulders and accepted that time and gravity are nuisances with which one must reckon wisely and courageously ... the dirty rats. Why add frustration and hazard to the abominable list of limiting factors? Growl, hiss...

Without squats I felt like a dog without his bark and no tail to wag; I lost my doggedness. Slow and deliberate leg presses with a pause at the bottom, going deeper with successive workouts, gave a shadow of pleasure to my leg training and I settled for the compromise. I missed two, three or four plates on each side of the bar, the tight reps, the exhilaration and the famous over-all body demand. What the heck.

Last week after returning from our short vacation I resumed my workouts with patient ease, allowing myself to enjoy the reviving movements, the cool pace and calculated form. Slow-rep warm-ups are very important in preparing the muscles and joints and insertions for hard work and are a valid representation of the training output, I observed. They count. There was a time when I regarded warming up with scorn: What a waste. Now they are absolutely necessary; they enable. A curious thought crossed my mind: Early last winter in an approach to shorten my leg program, conserve energy (an overtraining consideration) and eliminate pre-exhausting the quadriceps, I discontinued the decade-long practice of tri-setting leg extensions with curls and calves prior to my squatting - just about the same time I endured the tear to the thigh. Coincidence?

The tear is on the mend. I re-installed the pre-squat extension, curl, calf tri-set and today hung three and a half plates on the Buffalo Bar for reps. How long will it be before I load four and a half plates or return to the leg press only time and gravity can tell. In the meantime, I'm mean, barking and wagging my tail.

Might I trust that I have satisfactorily warmed you up, so to speak, and gained your confidence? Only with you fully on my side may I confront the topic before us. Last week we spoke candidly about the superior condition of the American's waistline. The subject is serious and delicate and, therefore, difficult to approach. How do I speak of man and woman's fatness without hurting, angering or demeaning the beholder while none of those notions are intended?

I pause, write, delete and pause again. I dare not mock, judge or patronize yet the message I choose to relate is hard and must be driven home hard. What good is it if the facts and figures are offered with kindness while the intended recipients are stroked and lulled and treated as if it's a common dilemma we should one day address? Give it our best shot. Exercise and diet... yuk. "Over-weightedness" is as kind as I will get and it's ruinous. Again, I halt, think, write and delete. My thoughts don't reach the page; I have no right to be so harsh.

Laree and I observed those around us as we meandered across the states on our recent get-away. We saw obesity with every focus of the eye. Wherever we looked, there it was; chubby, chunky, plump, big-bellied, great-bellied, pot-bellied, beer-bellied, well fed, over-stuffed: men, moms, cute girls, babies, boys too round to run. Trying to sit, trying to stand, working hard to get in and out of their car, hike to the restroom or play in the park.

In ten days we encountered one tall bodybuilder from the Twin Cities Gym, one eighteen-year-old stud from Gold's in Utah and three possibles from who knows where. Yes, I realize this is a cursory cross-section and not representative of the states or the globe; but I suspect it gets better in some regions and worse in others. I suspect our observations overall are reasonably accurate. Fatness rules big time.

Interestingly, this is not striking news. We all know about the existing circumstances. The media throws out some bones about obesity, exercise and diet, just enough to dilute the message, tame the beast or make big bucks on the problem. But no one (far too few to mention... you and I, perhaps) is alarmed, frightened or ashamed enough to act with deliberation, commitment and intelligence... with guts. Do we huddle together semi-passively, now a majority and assume that carrying some extra pounds can't be all that bad? After all, everyone else does. It's sort of normal. Are we fixed in place? Does misery truly love company? Do we deny, ignore? Are we oblivious, hopeless, apathetic, lethargic, lazy or complacent? Individuals stand up and answer these questions with boldness while they sweat and shake. The masses look tentatively at one another with dull eyes and crouch a little bit lower.

I applaud those who work extensively against the odds with hormonal and genetic disadvantages, those whose battle is bitter and on-going. You are the rare and devoted. God's speed. We've embarked on a long and formidable journey out of control at every turn. Where control is in your hands, don't let go. No problem for Bombers.

Sincerely, Dave

PS... I'm not done with the matter. Laree suggested I write a book to compel the willing and able to the land of the free-motivation, purpose, incentive, research and statistics, diet and exercise approaches for differing scenarios, encouragement and more encouragement stiffly yet compassionately offered. She's cute and is always thinking of ways to keep me busy and out of trouble. I love the idea but it has all the appeal of jumping off a cliff. Love the freefall but where the tail meets the turf... oh, boy...

WONDER BOY HALLUCINATES