The 2009 Strength and Fitness Extravaganza!!!!
As told through the eyes of Brian Bott…
This past weekend two members of The Training Studio Family, Jonathon Cancro and Louis Sica aka HEY LEWWWEY, took part in the the 2009 Strength and Fitness Expo in Atlantic City NJ. It was an action packed weekend filled with any and all types of strength and fitness events you can think of. There was arm wrestling, strongman competitions, bodybuilding, figure competitors, mixed martial artists, and last but not least Powerlifting. This was both Jon and Lou’s first ever powerlifting competition and I have to give them a lot of credit it, to perform your first ever meet at such a big venue like the Atlantic City Convention Center must have been gut-wrenching. So now to the competition. The goal of anybody’s first powerlifting meet is to go out there and get a feel of how meets are run and to just get some numbers to work off of going forward.
Jon took his opening squat of 295 fairly easy, however was forced to take his second and third attempts within a matter of 5 minutes of his first lift. Just to give you an idea, normally in powerlifting there about 10-12 lifters in a flight which allows at least 10 minutes in between attempts. In Jon’s flight there were only 2 or 3 so no sooner did he sit down did he have to be right back out on the platform to squat again. Next came the bench where Jon again made his opener pretty easily but missed his second and third attempts. It is usually very difficult for lifters in the beginning to become accustomed to the press command that is given once the judge determines the bar to be motionless on the lifters chest. Jon turned his meet around though pulling 3 strong deadlifts and finishing up with a 395 pull.
Now on to Lou Dawgs. Lou did very well in his first meet, and got to see first hand how much you need to calm your nerves before you attempt to lift on the platform. In the squat Lou, after some complications with the commands from the judges got his opener squat in of 275lbs. Moving on to the bench, Lou was more fired up than ever to wreak havoc on the platform. After smoking his first two attempts he came just short of locking out his 3rd attempt of 215. Finally to the Deadlift. Again Lou moved his first two deadlifts from point A to point B with no pause in between and called in a personal best for his 3rd attempt. He gave it all he had, some may say twice what he had, but just wasn’t able to get it moving. Looking back Lou had an excellent meet under a lot of adversity and learning the flow of a meet in one of the most strict powerlifting federations in the land.
As far as the future goes, I think both Lou and Jon look to continue what they started and if I am not mistaken have already chosen another meet in December to compete in. We wish them the best of luck moving forward and hope to see them both breaking PRs in the gym and on the platform in the near future!
Now a side note……
As I mentioned above this weekend was a hodgepodge of different types of competitive fitness sports. During one break we had a couple of us noticed some Samurai demonstrations going on and started to check it out….these guys were intense they were all over the place and doing some real legit fighting. Suddenly…an announcement is made that if anyone would like to give it a shot to come on over. So Jon andI thought it would be fun to go over and fight each other. Within 30seconds of approaching the mat, I was approached by a middle-aged Samurai and was informed that I would have to spar against him. So now I figure I’ve got no chance against this guy I saw him whooping up on some other people just 5 minutes ago. Suddenly the whole arena was just quiet to me and I was ready to go. Tumbleweeds were blowing by and people began to gather around for the big showdown. I don’t know what came over me but, just like George in that episode of Seinfeld where he became a Marine Biologist, in that moment….I was a samurai… If you’d like to see the outcome of this gruelling battle….. let’s go to the video tape!!! Not only was I able to defeat this Samurai warrior, but Jon, after an entire powerlifitng meet, dug deep down and came back from being down 3-1 I believe to win his match 5-4 as well!! Even more impressive! I don’t know how we did it and I can’t speak for Jon, but I think the 3 Redlines that we bought from their little sample booth may have played a role.
Overall it was a great weekend and everyone had a great time, which is what it’s really all about!
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