Halloween Strongman

[Dan C]

http://www.bemoretraining.com/blog/?p=22

[CF-OC_gal]

Hi Dan, is there a message that goes along with that link? Were you part of it?

[Dan C]

???

Was I part of it?

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Last year I was about 5 minutes into my workout when we got our first trick-or-treater. My wife was getting ready for work, so I was on candy duty for the evening. I was little upset. How dare those little candy grubbin’ kids interupt my workout!? I wasn’t about to let Halloween tradition stop my training session though!

There was a time when people actually did “tricks” for the TRICK-or-treaters. Well I decided that I’d revive that and display my strongman “tricks” for the kids! I usually work out in the yard anyway, only this time instead of the occassional jogger or dog walker, there’d be hundreds of passers-by! So I put my kilt on, dug out a few select “toys” and went to work. That night something special was born…

At one point in the night there was a crowd of people around me, taking pictures, applauding and asking questions. I decided then and there that I would make this a yearly thing, and do it right, with costumes, decorations, props and the whole works.

So this year I turned my front yard into a stage area, taped it off with “CAUTION” tape and equipped it with pumpkins, cornstalks and bails of hay. I had a strobe light, a fogger and all kinds of fun Halloween decor! Luke came over and we dressed in full Highlander/Strongman attire, accentuated with Be-More Training apparel. Come 7pm, it was show-time!

5 minutes til 7:00, there was about 3 teenagers hanging around. 4 minutes later, we had a crowd of about 30!

I kicked things off with one of the lesser impressive feats, card tearing. Since when did tearing a deck of cards become unimpressive? Maybe it’s because it’s become somewhat easy for me to tear cards but it was received kinda “ho-hum”.

Luke then rocked the house by bending a 1/2″ piece of re-bar over the bridge of his nose and scrolling it! The crowd loved it!

Up next, I went ahead and tore a “Greater Baltimore Area” phonebook. Big book, very tough, and it took a very long time! I had some encouragement from the onlookers and once finally in half, it brought cheers and comments of disbelief.

Luke then bent a shorter piece of re-bar over his leg and proceeded to fold it in half. A hand ful of the kids were actually chanting “bend steel”! They were loving it!

Next, totally spent from the phonebook, I brought some volunteers up from the crowd to perform my “human link” feat, one that I had yet to really test out. Basically, I had two 10ft ropes with handles attached to them and with one hand, I was to hold the handles together while the volunteers had a little tug-o-war. I wasn’t sure how many kids I could hold, and on the chance that they did break my grip, a steel handle would go flying and things could get ugly real quick! Better to overestimate on this one, so I had 8 kids come up. Four on each side and I could have held them forever! At this point, there was at least 50 people in our audience. This was by far the easiest feat of the night for me but the crowd still got a kick out of it!

Once all my volunteers were back in position, Luke introduced his next feat; a 72lb teeth lift combined with a 1/4″ carriage bolt bend. A simple stunt for him, an amazing feat for the audience.

Though I probably should have saved my best for last, everybody was getting antsy about what I was going to do with the stone. So I rolled out my 236lb concrete ball and introduced it to our spectators. I took the halved deck of cards that I tore earlier and put it into my mouth. I lifted the stone to my shoulder, rolled it around my head, contracted my traps and rested it on the back of my neck. By now I could hear the cheers and the cameras going off, though I wasn’t done, I still had the cards. I carefully removed the cards from my mouth, got my hands into position and quartered the deck… the crowd went wild! And I was happy to have gotten it on my first try.

Luke’s “abs of steel” finale feat was next. We had an 8ft ladder set up in the back of the stage that had been under question the entire night. I picked up the largest pumpkin we had, roughly 20lbs, climbed to the top of the ladder, and dropped it on Luke who laid below. Direct hit! That one brought a lot of “oooo’s and ahhhh’s” along with the clapping.

Finally, I performed a double lever feat with 12lb sledge hammers. Reverse pick-up, swung into a forward hold and brought down to my nose with a side lever. A visually impressive feat, especially considering that I had not practiced it for about 9 months and I was a little shakey. I was happy just to have pulled it off, I’m sure a lot of the kids would have liked to see the opposite, but I got a round of applause anyway.

When it was all said and done, I was pleased with the way everything went down. For the rest of the night we were the talk of the neighborhood. People were stopping by telling us how they had heard about the show and were sorry to have missed it. We obliged a few more requests as the night drew on, and we were sure to tell everyone to come by next year at the same time. We can do big things with this in the future! This is only the beginning…

[luke.w]

Originally Posted by Dan C

???
Though I probably should have saved my best for last, everybody was getting antsy about what I was going to do with the stone. So I rolled out my 236lb concrete ball and introduced it to our spectators. I took the halved deck of cards that I tore earlier and put it into my mouth. I lifted the stone to my shoulder, rolled it around my head, contracted my traps and rested it on the back of my neck. By now I could hear the cheers and the cameras going off, though I wasn’t done, I still had the cards. I carefully removed the cards from my mouth, got my hands into position and quartered the deck… the crowd went wild! And I was happy to have gotten it on my first try.

this feat was simply awsome, once you can get the stone off your neck better, that feat is up there with "those guys" you know who I'm talking about.

I'll def. get myself a higher ladder,for "abs of steel" that was nice and easy!

the steel bending I haven't done for awhile, that was tough stuff, those 24"ers that I finished off I rarely ever am able to do that in training, I usually need spectators on that one, and even then I struggle, I bent 3 in a row that night.

the next day I did some one-arm push-ups and ripped some "area" phonebooks (the 400 page ones), I found my style FINALLY I think, I'll have to show you dan, I ripped one of those in the neck bridge, it'll just take more time to get those bigger ones down maybe nextyear I'll tear-up some books, in the neck bridge also.

[Khaine]

^^ A neck bridge on two ladders...

This is definitely a terrific idea tho... Damn... it's the kinda show I intend to put on WHEN I eventually get this damn house...

Darn realters... Darn them all to heck...

[Blaze]

Man I wish I coulda seen all that stuff....

Okay screw that, I wish i could DO all that stuff!

[MostMuscle]

Very cool indeed.

[CF-OC_gal]

Thanks for elaborating! Awesome.

I just like a little teaser to go along with the link.

[Maxgain]

Thats really great, true strongman good for ye.

I bet a buch of those kids were trying out the card tearing and steel bending when they went home. Great job guys! : :