repeat after me: It's ok to lift light weights, it's ok to lift light weights. . .

A young Corporal Williams in April of 2002. Starving/shaving/tanning/flexing to impress a girl who later cheated on me with a short, fat, bald Navy reject. One of these days I'll get it right.

When a client comes to me and says "I'm injured" I send them to their physician, and also to MY chiropractor, a guy who has extended my training career by about 20 years. When they come back and say "I can train again, but using light weights only" I give them an OOH RAH, a thumbs up, and train them accordingly. When they look at me with the hunger of the wolf in their eye and say "I am ready for something heavier", I make them wait another week, and then drop a kilo upgrade on them. I am cautious, patient, and in tune with what my clients bodies are going through. I can help everyone but myself. I can hear every one's bodies' talking save for my own. I can FORCE people to listen to me (I'm big and scary), and extend their trainee career by about 20 years, but up until this morning I could not accept what I have been told time and again by my man, Joel Stutzman DC, which is that working out is fine, but with light weights. This young, fit, and talented doc doesn't know that I interpret "light" as 24 or 28 kilogram kettlebells or 185 lbs. on a barbell. He says light, I say roger that, and go snatch for 30 minutes with a standard issue 24kg. Why? I tell you why in bullet point fashion.

A 275 lb. man shouldn't be using anything lighter than 24kg
Only pussies lift light weight
If I stay tight, hydrated, and stretch after the lift, I won't get knotted up and sore.
The foam roller is my new friend, and it helps.
I am tough, I can handle pain.
I am tough, I can handle pain.
I am tough, I can handle pain.
Etc. etc., etc. . . ..

So now I know that thinking like that has been what has kept me away from bells for over 10 days. As soon as I made the commitment to lose weight and take a physical for possible re-entry into the USMC, I started training hard. With 24kg and 32kg bells. And what happened? After the Dropkick Murphy's concert, two nights of Interpol, too much "diet coke" and not enough rest, I fizzled out. And I'll be god damned if it isn't just the same shit over and over again. I get motivated, I go too hard, I get hurt, I miss two weeks of training. It is hard enough for me to drop body fat, that when you subtract working out from my regular schedule, the belly just hangs there and does not get smaller. But no more damn it! I vow, to myself, my clients (who also lose time when I am down), and to you, the reader, that today I will swing a 20kg bell, perform double presses with a pair of wimpy wimpy wimpy 16kg bells, and stay away from the "diet coke". But oh how I love some heavy bells. Snapping into a heavy double clean, trapping the air in my belly, squeezing my frame into a bullet proof level of tension and then HOOTIE HOO, pressing like I'm on display. I've tried high rep, high volume, high this low that moderation this and excess that, every time I bust. Something must be out there for me. I am my own client, I gotta get this shit right and tight. If I drop this weight, and the USMC accepts me I could be, if the sun shines on this dog's ass, back in CA on Pendleton by January. In the field all week, up at Trusty's on the weekend, maybe deployed by this time next year. Iraq isn't going anywhere. And neither is my gut unless I do something. Last time I trained I hit 3 miles Marine Corps style in under 27:00, nice leisurely pace. Fuck it. 300 swings, 100 double C&P, jump rope for 15, that is my mission today.