June 12th, 2012: Scratched out another pound. Standing/walking/sitting/breathing etc. as a 256-pound guy today. That may even be too light to play on the offensive line for an NFL team, which was always kind of secret quasi-goal (to not weigh that much). I hate weighing more than guys who could easily outrun me. I’m in linebacker country now.
Speaking of that, an interesting fact is that I played middle-linebacker on my college football team, at 185 lbs. I was smaller than all but one starting defensive back. I didn’t ever start any games, that’s just a little too little to anchor a Division 1 defense, but I held my own when I had the chance. I just played scared and angry and fast. I also played strong-safety sometimes, but for that I was too mean and not fast enough – so my favorite move was sometimes referred to by referees as “pass interference”.
Oh how I wish I could go back and do it all over again, but with the motivation and education I have now. I just went through the motions as far as strength and conditioning. I did the same with boxing in my first iteration as a fighter. And wrestling. And rodeo. And baseball. And as a student. I just wanted to play so bad that I would blow off the fundamentals and the detail of effort required to seriously make it anywhere.
Oh well, it was still fun, and I’d probably have a lot fewer interesting stories.
June 12th, 2020: I really wouldn’t want to go back. I may be somewhere else today – professionally; I may have been better-off financially; I may have a few less scars and stretch-marks, but I may also have missed the dance, and that would be unacceptable
So yes, I did squander much of my opportunities to become physically, um, above average, I guess would be the term. Here I had some of the best coaches, trainers, time, and equipment at my immediate disposal, but all I cared about was the field, the court, the ring, or the arena. I just wanted to play.
It would be fun to go back temporarily to those old days, as long as I could bring with me my experiences to go with my younger and more flexible body. Things I would change are the amount of alcohol I would drink, the use of tobacco, the amount of pizza I would eat, the non-existence of stretching/warm-up/cool-down routines, and the absence of core work (i.e., abs).
I once smoked a cigarette in the moments leading up to the annual 1.5-mile qualification run for the fire crew. The night before that run I can’t even remember how many cigarettes I smoked or how many beers I drank. I even had had shots of tequila. And I still passed the test.
I guess my point to any younger people who read this is that you probably don’t want to miss opportunities to improve your physical ability in the training room because you think having fun on your own time is more important. There is plenty of fun to be had in this world, but you can spread it out over your lifetime and don’t have to pack it all into the years of your life before you’re even old enough to buy alcohol. If you decide to attack for real when you’re in your late 30’s and 40’s, you’ll end up like me and have to pole-vault out of bed every morning and then be sore for most of the rest of the day.
Of course, you don’t have to be like I am now either, you can wake up without being sore – just avoid the gym and don’t bother with all this exercise nonsense. But it may not be too many mornings before you wake up dead. It’s never too late to start training, just do it right and try to make it fun.
