My Story pt.2

After high school, I took time off and just did nothing, cried and just got very depressed and being at home with my dad wasnt making life any easier. He kept pushing me to get a job when I knew i wasnt up for it and not because I didnt want one, I wanted to just be myself and break myself from this depression and anxiety so I left my dads and moved a few miles to live with my mom. I needed the change and this was the only place where I felt safe and get my anger out and create new things for myself.

In september of '03 I went to a small community college in Aptos, CA about 10 miles from where I lived and went to classes for a week and told myself "this isnt you and things wont get easier later on" so I left college to do weightlifting full-time. I signed up for a 2 year application and went to the gym. I lifted around 3 times a week sometimes 6 and had my ups and downs. Tried every routine in the book and all I wanted to do was lift heavy weights and just wanted to powerful as hell, I let out my inner hulk and just blasted everything that was near me. I went as far as to passing out from doing a circuit and just didnt realize where I was and just fainted.

I lost weight, gained weight, lost and gained again and this went on for two years and at a certain point I was around 260 pounds and it wasnt all that much muscle either. I did protein shakes, ate the bars, lift whatever the advanced bodybuilder was doing and just didnt get anywhere yet kept going. I ended up hurting my right knee more and pulled hams, bum elbow, bad wrists and I was in no way of getting "hardcore" looking abs. I just didnt have the mentality but the fire to keep going.

I lost the weight and wanted to try out powerlifting cause I thought I was pretty good at nearly 1500 total pounds in the three lifts plus i can go all day doing 600 pound leg presses so I thought i'd try. 2 days after my last run at the gym I went to the beach with some girls and had a little picnic with them and wanted to jump off this 25ft cliff that was directly above us. Me and a girl went up (i've jumped off this several times prior to this day) and she jumped of the right side and i jumped on the left (very stupid) and something terribly went wrong with the landing.

I landed so hard on the sand that my ankles just broke and I was in excrusiating pain, I lifted up my left leg as much i can muster and it looked pale and like a little broken slinky it rocked side to side. As much as I was in pain I wanted to get out of the water and so with everything I had I used my upper body to crawl to shore and it was only 15ft but felt like a mile. One woman told me to get up and I thought I was gonna whack her cause everyone there knew i couldnt just get up. A couple guys pulled me in and the girl I went with called the ambulence while I was laying in the sun trying not to be in pain and think positively when no one in their right mind would at a time like this. The paramedics came and asked me all the dumb questions you get asked and answered everyone of them without even blinking. Got rolled up on the girney and was strapped in and carried me up the cliff on the other side.

At the hospital this where I just lost it and thought I would never walk again. I wanted to see everyone I knew and just be with them. I was covered in sand from head to toe and was freezing my ass off. After they ran some tests on me I found out the bad news. I shattered my left tibia-fibula in half as well broke almost all the bones in both my ankles and there was no chance in hell i'd walk within the next year. I had surgery that night and ended staying in the hospital for 5 days and hatting every minute of it.

I was told right from there I needed a 6-8 month recovery if I didnt want to put a rod in there and if I did it be a little quicker but a much better chance of getting it infected. As a stubborn ass I chose the rod cause I told everyone I was gonna beat this and get stronger without too much help. I was so fired up that one day when I first learned to get into a wheel chair, they asked me to use the pull-up handle at the top of the bed and use 2 hands plus 2 other people to help me. I ended up doing a one-arm pull-up and jumped into the chair lol. I thought those guys were gonna die from shock. I never did a pull-up in my life until then. That was my first sign of bodyweight training. Anyway I learned how to use the wheel chair and went home a couple days later getting a hospital bed for the living room.

It was aggrevating cause I had a cast on that covered my entire left and couldnt move very well. I started making up lifting routines for my recovery and for some odd reason I kept throwing them away cause I knew there was something missing in that picture. So for weeks and weeks having a second surgery and in and out of hospitals I started researching for rehabing leg injuries and I came across this site that only focused on Bodyweight Training and was just fasinated by it. 2 weeks before my last surgery I ordered this guys book and was just in awe of what it had in it. I told myself this is the program for my rehab, no physical therapy just plain old school bodyweight training. I got so fasinated by it I started checking out other sites on the subject and I came across this site called Bronze Bow.

My last surgery was July 29th, exactly 2 and a half months after my accident I had the oppertunity to start walking again. I didnt hesitate that 2 days after my surgery my first job was to start training and strengthen those suckers. Since I got other books off this guys site I got another book that had the title Pushing Yourself To Power. Got it at a local borders in my hometown and started reading it. Loved the exercises and got hooked.

5 months after learning how to walk again and training to strengthen them, I was put to another gruelling test. I went to Lake Tahoe in January of last year with the family and just wanted to have some fun, went through a rough time about a girl and nobody was liking what I did for training and watching and studying conditioning dvds, I challenged myself to one of the most brutal workouts at one of the highest altitudes in the world. It was called the Karl Gotch Bible where you take a deck of cards and whatever number comes up you do that many push-ups or squats. Being crazy and stubborn I wanted to beat the deck and just have some fun with it. I had my dad flip the cards and tell me what number it was and what type of push-ups i would do, I kept the squats naturally. After about 25 min. I looked at my dad and he said "Ben, you just did an entire deck of cards, you are one crazy bastard" and my stepmom told me how high up we were in the mountains and I think she said around 15,000ft and told me a small few of world class athletes can pull off something to what I just did and they're jaws stayed dropped for god knows how long.

Over the next year I just started amping up by adding a few feats of strength to my regimen and train whatver I can and push myself when I need to and its kept me happy. I'm apart of one of the best forums on the planet and its founder has helped me reach goals I never thought possible and his encouragement and wisdom has inspired me and I feel like I have a new family to look up to. There are a few people I want to thank for pushing me and encouraging me to be my best and shoot whatever i want to achieve new goals and new feats:

Tyler Bramlett

Logan Christopher

Matt Furey

Brooks Kubik

John Wood

And last but not least: John Peterson. I wanted to save the best for last and although we've only talked and chatted a few times I still feel my guardian angel wanted me to contact you and be apart of your forum. You have giving me a new hope for building super strength and conventional wisdom and knowledge and I believe you and I were meant to speak to each other and meet one another and its giving me a whole new blessing. Thank you my friend and I hope in the near future i'll join the Bronze Bow Team as an author and teacher to all. Best wishes and hope to talk to you soon my brother.


If any of you guys need a place to go to to get great info on fitness and look for people that you want advise from Bronze Bow is the place to go. You won't regret it. Hope all who reads this understand that what you want in life it wont come to you on a silver platter, take it and never let it go. Never feel you're too old to do anything you want. Believe in yourself and you will go far.


Yours in Power & Might

Ben

email me at bronzebowpublishing.com or at Wrestlenerd84@yahoo.com and tell me what you thought of this story.

My Story pt.1

I was born July 28th, 1984 in Santa Clara, CA at 5:30 pm. Born 6 pounds 8 ounces and as healthy as you can get. Well over a year later, around 14 months I became ill and my parents didnt know what to do. I was rushed to the hospital where I was born and had taken many tests to find out I had Spinal Menengitis a germ that goes directly from the spinal cord to the brain and made switches in my bodily functions so everything went the oppisite way. There were 2 things supposedly were going to happen to me that the doctors told my family: Either I was gonna die from this disease or if I lived I wouldnt have the brain of more then a ten year old.

I lived and had to learn everything all over again, I was more right sided then so everything shifted and had to learn how to use my left side since my right became weaker. Over the years I was in speech therapy, taking tests to see how sociable my lifestyle and attitudes differ from othr people and if I can co-exist in a normal setting. Learning speech patterns, taking physical therapy in order to strengthen my entire right side and use my left side in the least possible ways. At the age of 3 I couldnt pick up a clothes pin with my right hand cause it was so bad.

I started being in the Special Education programs for the next 15-16 years, learning how to do certain tasks and social skills and reading patterns. I hated it, every minute of it, I just wanted to be a normal kid and play ball and be with normal friends but it wasnt all meant to be. I got picked on on a constant basis and just didnt have the best times around other children and such and didnt always have the best times at home.

As a young teen it became even tougher to deal with other kids and teachers and family cause at one point during that time around 13 I really wanted to do drugs and wanted to be with the popular crowd who was doing them and knew it too. I got beat up a lot around this time mentally and physically and even been in big fights with my best friend at the time. It was hell as you can imagine. The only thing that didnt feel like it could hurt me was my school work. Even wanting to play around a lot I got some good grades and became an honor student with a 3.6 GPA in junior high, I just wanted to be out of school just by getting good grades. I was a fat kid around this time as well at 5'4 180 pounds with no muscle tone whatsoever and got beat for that as well. during 7th grade p.e we started doing weight training and it got me into lifting. Slow start but I got hooked.

After I graduated and went to high school, I got a bit shyer but not as bad as it used to be. I started just wanting to go to classes and just work my ass off to be good at whatever I was taking and it was fun at times but horrifying the next. I did a little weightlifting around my sophmore year and I was hooked on training since then but it wasnt easy. As teens we all developed all those hormones and such that I got angry a lot and I always took it out in the weight room and started developing this natural strength for heavy lifting and I never trained on a routine I just did what was there or added up to it.

At 17 I started to notice that I was good at weights so I challenged a few guys a time or 2 and got beat and won but my greatest achievment was I was challenged to a squat duel lol with a buddy of mine and see how much we can lift, he warmed up I just stood there and started psycing myself up and he wanted me to go first so I put on somewhat 400 pounds on bar (it was a 65 pound bar so less plates were added) and got 3 reps, he got 6. So I wasnt the one who was into losing so we added 100 pounds on my expense and I got the same amount of reps and he tied me. Like I said I wanted to just get this over with so we ended up putting most of the plates in the rack on the bar and it was at I think 615-620 and even though we were screwing around I just wanted to win so I went first and by this time the entire class was watching and some other kids from the track heard us and came in so it was around 40 people. So I closed my eyes and started screaming with everything I had and didnt think anything of it it was just a number to me and hit 2 full reps while yelling and in agonizing pain and came up and put the bar on the rack and the guy who challenged me just flat out went "f*ck that you're crazy" and I was told that by the entire class.

Anywho weights was the thing then and I partcipated in Track & Field for 2 seasons and enjoyed every minute of it and even though I sucked lol it was fun while it lasted. I stopped wanting to do the Special Ed program around my junior year in the last semester and just felt like I can do these things and I wanted to do them. During my senior year I wanted to wrestle but ended up hurting my knee so I stopped and focused on school. Later on before my last semester my stepfather passed away and it couldnt have come at a worse time. I was miserable, angry and just became depressed.

I wanted to hurt somebody everytime they talked or touched me and I cried at least 3 times everyday for most of the year. No one understood and they tried whatever they did and I didnt budge I just didnt want anybody around. He meant the world to me, he was my best friend and he got me through so much even though he was far worse having diebetes and hardly if ever taking his insulin. I just lost it and thought that was it what can I do now that he isnt here anymore.


I will write pt. 2 either tonight or tomorrow so be prepared. You never know what will happen.

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

The Chest Expander

One of the best training equipment is not one thats on weights or kettlebells but rubber cables. The Chest Expander is considered the cable equipment to train the shoulders/arms/back. Once you use over a period of time and using heavier type cables it'll make your upper body have the strength of male gorilla (slight exaggeration) but you know what i'm getting at. At one time during the golden age of physical culture it was used in competitions in europe to determine who was the strongest strand puller (thats what they called it then).

Now unlike weights where you have to switch to a different weight and that can be a bit of a hassel considering people in gyms using the equipment, with the cables take a couple of em and add on either lighter or heavier cables, very simple. When stretched out it works the shoulders from angles you cant get from either weights or bodyweight exercises. It not only builds great strength but you're building tremendous flexibility and that alone works well into sports like fighting, gymnastics, football pretty every sport you do. Also like weightlifting you have choices to do major alternative lifts for the expander like the Clean & Jerk, Military Press, Bicep Curls, Upright Rows and many others.

Now I believe there are 10 different set of cables for the expander these ranging from pink to the blue and the blue cables are the toughest of them. I havent heard a person doing the Clean & Jerk with all three cables so the equivilant is around 275-330 pounds of resistance. This little peice of equipment can give your upper body animal-like strength cause when pull or lift the cables, your body is shaking so that tells you you're working major muscle groups and your using it from many angles so you're getting the benefit of working from a different prespective. I have used this device to aid in feats of strength and i'll tell ya it got me there so it should never be neglected in any regimen whether its weightlifting, kettlebell training, bodyweight ect. Give it a try and you'll see your strength skyrocket into a whole demension.

If you feel you want to add a different kind of strength and flexibility in your training, John Hinds will take care of you my brother and never fall short of becoming super strong.

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

The Power Of The Mind

No matter what we do in life, we all begin with a thought and end with a thought. Some of us human beings have forgotten how powerful we can really be if we just focused on what we really wanted and how we could achieve a certain goal. When it comes to fitness, most of us today believe if we went on a diet or trained to gain weight that what routine or what we exercise will automatically happen. Anybody who thinks that is way off and full on ignorant for thinking that. If we just trained and ate and figured things will start to go according to that specific idea we'd all be in trouble one way or another and we blame the idea instead of ourselves. When I did weightlifting all I cared about was lifting heavy and being big and eventually I was at nearly 265 pounds, sadly no matter what I ate or lifted I got a little fatter and blown out every time cause I figured if I lifted hard and ate hard i'd be a machine. Far from it brother.

By the time I started reading Combat Conditioning, Pushing Yourself To Power and as recently Powerflex, I started to understand that in order to achieve what you want you have to set your mind to it and make yourself believe that what you picture and what you do for yourself you will achieve great heights for yourself. After to converting to bodyweight exercises and feats of strength I wanted to stay big and strong but be able to go for long periods of time and only one thing led me there was the power of my thoughts and the mental pictures I made.

No matter what your goal is whether its fitness or business or anything else, picture in your mind what you want and go after it with passion and fire and sooner or later its going to happen but if you fail you can't blame anybody or anything else cause of your mistakes. You're the problem so fix it and bring yourself back to that picture, that goal, that door that opens to your imagination. Believe in yourself and believe what you want to achieve can and will happen and you my friend will go far and block out anything negetive and disbeliefs by others cause even one person who doesnt believe in you can make you stop from dreaming and stop you from achieving your goal. Block all that out and know that what you want you will grab and never let it go, go beyond. The power isnt in the outer portion of physical abilities but the power inside yourself and what you create makes you that person and that my friend will make you far stronger and more powerful then anything else. Believe in the mind and the mind will believe in you.

If you want to learn how to develop a greater mind then go here and you'll find what you're looking for whether its fitness or whatever you choose.

www.bronzebowpublishing.com

or

www.mattfurey.com

Ripping a Phonebook

This to me is one of the most impressive feats in all of strength. Most people today rip a book by either pushing down on the binding and break the book or sqeeze the pages together and "pop" the book which eventually tear in half but for me I like to tear the book like the old-time strongman and just use pure Grip strength. Now what I mentioned earlier on popping the book thats the cheating way to break the book and thats ok if thats what people want to do but its not nessecarly the only way. Ripping a phonebook is just plain awesome to do and the thing I like is that no matter where you are in the U.S they're usually free to grab in the area you live in.

The best way to get better at ripping phonebooks is just by progessing up to thicker books and as a novice for now my best book is 700 pages, I believe the world record is around 3000 so I have some work to do lol. I learned a technique to rip a book by the best pound for pound strongmen of all-time Dennis Rogers and the way he showed it on his DVD is so simple that any person willing to try and work up to a certain book can do it no matter what their size or age they are. When I first started all I did was fight the book with all the power I had and ended up hurting my thumb and it went numb for weeks just on that first day. After watching the dvd and practicing without any trouble I tore the hell out of the book, small but hey i'm learning here dude.

Eventually after practicing with many phonebooks small and slightly thick I got better and my grip strength skyrocketed. After watching the video he shows you certain exercises to do to help increase your chances in tearing thicker books and theres one exercise that he shows that takes your tearing to a whole new level and its very simple to make in your home and turn you into a ripping machine. I worked on this one exercise alone and my best time on a phonebook (mind you 700+ pages) was only less then 20 seconds. Now wouldnt that be awesome in itself to learn how to rip a phonebook, i'd take that any day of the week brother.

If your serious into learning how to tear phonebooks with ease heres the man to look for.

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

www.dennisrogers.net.