My "iron path" (short version)

Well, I guess it's time to finally introduce myself. My name's Ivan, and the reason I created this blog is so that I can have an online training log. Plus, I do often really want to just think to myself and have an alternative way to reflect on my thoughts (i.e. read the blog).

Not everyone gets to become an ethusiast to do something regularly for over ten years. I started partaking in "physical culture" around the time when I was 12 - doing some pullups, pushups, a lot of cheat bicepc curls with a 27 kg ez bar that my father bought for himself. Between 13 and 16 I frequently visited a boxing section on one of my local gyms (there was mostly kids there, but I did have a couple sparring partners of my age). At 16 I became a fan of Bruce Lee (a very typical one), and, besides side-kicking the air, I also enjoyed a lot of grip work - mostly hanging and a lot of tennis ball squeezing. Some time around that I came across a community on the internet - Iron Grip ( vk.com/irongrip ), and that's when I started learning more about strength work. I read a lot of "true" strength and bodybuilding-oriented authors (mostly John McCallum, Peary Rader and Brooks Cubik) and some time in september 2010 I decided to abandon training under regulations on a gym instructor and do it my own way. Then first thing I did, of course, was a 90 kg *20 squat (probably looked more like a quartersquat back then).

I became a part of the Iron Grip community and started visiting their regular meets in 2010. My first competition had grippers, dynamometry, pinch grip and ironmind rolling thunder. I think I squeezed Captain of Crush №2 (credit card set) and showed something like 70 kg in dynamometry.

In 2011 I deadlifted around 200 kg and pushpressed 90, and did a lot of grip work. I 2012 I competed in David Horne's pancontinental World's Strongest Hands tournament and took 4th place in under 93 kg class. If I was at least one place higher, I would have been mentioned on an ironmind website (lol). We (my friends and I) had a lot of grip tourneys and some people certified for CoC and Red Nail. I was never too much into bending, but I did ruin one of the red nails by trying to give it an initial bend in the "reverse" style (i.e. the "cool" style that puts a lot of strain on the wrists and doesn't require much shoulder mobility, unlike overhand style). I should really spend some more time on one of those grip forums. I think I like David Horne's site the best, maybe I'll try to log in there once again.

Some time later, in 2013, after I made some gains, I got really into strongman. I was really motivated by Svend Karlsen and Magnus Samuelsson's documentaries. I started watching old and new strongman competitions and pretty much memorizing them and all the small trivia. I was deadlifting around 240 and doing 100 kgs in the standing press. I wanted to compete in one of the amateur tournaments that was announced online, and signed up for it. Too bad this tourney had a sumo wrestling event - it knocked me out from the competition even before it started - I asked my friend to help me train it and once I stepped on my toe and twisted my knee, giving my ACL a mighty good tear. Well, I disregarded it and continued walking on a bent leg for a couple weeks, doing only short range DLs, light weight squats etc. Actually, it was a pretty nice time for me, cause I developed a lot of 18 inch DL power. My knee was kind of ok. 

In 2014 I took a second place in the Bonebreaker event, setting WRs in pickaxe front lever for max and hold (wrist strength feats). It really inspired me to train my wrists more, and hopefully, some time soon I might be able to show my results in a tournament.

In 2015 I made some more gains, my best DL was 250 kg *5 touch and go (softly), best pushpress at 140 kgs, squat at 220 kgs with submaximal effort, and my best ever floor-to-overhead lift was 128 kg axle. And 115 kg olympic-style overhead press (from the rack).

In early 2015 I competed in two amateur strongman meets, both times taking 5th place (and tying for points with the 4th place). My best achievement was coming third in atlas stones, after I did 120kg x5. I have a video of that tourney somewhere (here) - 

In 2015 I decided to join the army so it could replace me some education (lol). After two okay months I got pneumonia and knee pain, so I got operated in the army hospital (a very good one). Didn't want to get discharged, so I asked to be kept in the hospital as an orderly. They also let me spend a month at home after the surgery - I could barely walk. After coming home in 2016 everything was pretty much shit, for the lack of the better word. My leg (as I mentioned before in the older post) was much weaker after I haven't been bending it for 10 months, I didn't even realise it. My training was rather poor, I turned into more of a stimulus addict rather than an "easygainer" that I percieved myself to be before.

Took part in a couple grip meets, but it wasn't the same anymore, since some of my friends left and didn't care too much about organizing or competing. I guess it might be my turn to try to organise and rent a gym or something like that. Too bad we've got pandemic now, can't do that.

I really must ask the gentle reader to forgive me for my overly simplistic style of narration, I'm not always in control of that. I believe it's better to write when you want to write, even if you're not in your sharpest state of mind.

Anyway, 2017-2018 were depressing years for me - I did some good things for myself in life, but not really in the gym, sticking to the usual wed/sat split between DL and squat/overhead lifts. The only two things that were ok were the press and grip strength. 2019 was more depressing to me in life, but better in the gym - my garage gym. I overhead pressed 112 in august 2019 at a BW around 97 kg (not that me being a featherweight matters that great much (lol)). 2020, so far, is not a sad year, since it started out with me breaking my old "actual PR" by 300 grams. Here's the video - 

    And, well, 2020 hasn't really been too eventful. I planned to take sort of a "vacation" and possibly lost some weight in july, and I wrote about how I noticeably changed up my overall training style, and how well it works so far for over a month (exactly a month today, actually) - instead of training for 4 hours two times a week I do 1-1.5 hours four times a week, and it feels rather great. That was the short version of my "iron path", and I think I'll revisit some themes in the future, hopefully. I plan to write about some stuff outside of the "iron game", since my interests broadened quite nicely this year. Anyway, bye for now, wish you all the best/