Upon learning there was something of a concerted (and long over due) effort in the works to revisit and resurrect the public legacy of Dr. John Ziegler, which has been so callously and unjustly trashed over the past few decades, my participation was mandatory. The Dr. Ziegler I rubbed shoulders with during my competitive lifting heyday was 180 degrees opposite of the one so negatively portrayed by writers.
Moreover, due to my deep abiding respect for the doctor
and his memory, which has only grown since his passing, and because my name has
been so historically linked to his, I feel compelled to recount on-the-record
my cherished association with Dr. Ziegler.
Thanks to performing well enough to impress Bob Hoffman
as a last minute replacement for Dave Ashman at a public lifting demonstration,
I was invited to train at the York Barbell gym on Ridge Avenue during the
latter part of 1959. Roughly three months thereafter, when I went in for a
Monday workout, I was instructed to go upstairs for a meeting with John Grimek,
John Terpak and Bob Hoffman.
The trio informed me that York Barbell was working with a
doctor located in Olney, MD who was looking for subjects to test out a new form
of strength acquisition, and they were wondering if I would be interested. To
be perfectly honest, in those days I would have eaten horseflop had I been
convinced it would have made me stronger. So, of course, I told the threesome
that I would be interested.
Soon a meeting was set up between Dr. Ziegler and myself
at his home in Olney. During this initial visit, we mostly talked about weight
training in general, but it was clear that one of Dr. Zielger's priorities was
my ability to follow his instructions consistently and without deviation.
Of course, on this occasion he also dictated the actual
course plan of action regarding the isometric regimen. In a nutshell, I was
told to perform one press, one squat and one pull position in a power rack
every day from Mondays through Thursdays, rest Fridays, and total out at
Saturday training sessions. Of course, those rack positions varied from day to
day—low, middle, high/lockout-- per each individual movement, and the three
Olympic lifts were practiced only on Saturdays.
So, every week day morning Dick Smith, who I had asked to
function as my trainer, and I drove to Dr. Zielger's in Olney where I did a 12
second static hold in one press, one pull and one squat position on the power
rack in Doc's personal home gym. Yes, that was it. Essentially, we drove the
110 miles to the Ziegler home and office every day so I could receive 36 total
seconds of exercise! Luckily, the Saturday sessions could be carried out at the
York gym.
While I gave my best available effort daily to these
static holds, I, frankly, did not like them, being very skeptical of their
effectiveness or carry over to the actual Olympic lifts. So, after a few weeks
of my skepticism, Dr. Ziegler came up with a version of isometric contraction
which encompassed moving maximum poundages for very short distances off pins
and held for time. Actually, I also referred to this revised form of isometrics
as my “overload power system”.
Still, in the early stages of this isometric experiment I
never thought it was going to work. Never! Then a fairly sudden 20-pound gain
in my Olympic lift total prompted my attitude to turn a corner. In retrospect,
other factors may have also contributed to some degree, and those “other
factors” will be addressed during the course of this article.
Getting back to my overload power system, my standard
training pattern was to work in 6-8 week blocs (I think today the commonly used
term is “cycles”) which usually culminated in a lifting contest, although I
would total out pretty close to my limit on those Saturday sessions in-between
contests.
Actually, my workouts were planned a year in advance. For
example, if a rack workout or a total session fell on Christmas day , I was
doing that workout on Christmas day! Meticulous records of my workouts were
logged daily. Unfortunately, those records fell by the wayside with the passage
of time. Otherwise, I would be sharing them.
One more point I would like to make regarding the
overload power system in the power rack: I never plateaued in terms of being
able to get stronger from cycle to cycle. Put another way, I never hit
poundages in any of the positions beyond which I could not progress.
My consistent approach was pretty simple: I would start a
new 6-8 week training stretch conservatively with regard to rack poundages,
ramping them up as best I could over the course of that time frame, at the end
of which was typically a contest. Upon resuming training after the contest, I
would drop back the rack poundages in the various positions by 40-50% and start
ramping them up again over the next 6-8 weeks of training, and then enter
another contest. As I said, I NEVER failed to surpass the rack poundages I had topped
out at in the cycle before.
For the sake of the curious, my best poundages (with a 6
second hold) were as follows: low pull/deadlift (from mid-shin to below the
knees) 615; middle pull (above knees) 645; top pull (above waist, arms bent
& on toes) 380; low press (shoulders to nose) 505; middle press (eye level
to top of head) 470; lockout press (top of head to lockout) 750, and 1/4 squat,
1750. Eventually, my low squat position was done outside of a power rack,
taking 405 or so off of a squat rack, sitting in the bottom position for 5 or 6
seconds and then standing up.
Two other perhaps subtle points which also contributed to
my overall success as a lifter were: Even on those Saturdays when I was just
totalling out in the York Gym, the motivation was always high due to the
presence of so many other accomplished lifters, in addition to the big influx
of spectators who came to watch the Saturday workouts. You can't appreciate the
quality of that York gym aura back then unless you were a part of it.
One final ancillary observation associated with my power
rack training: As I denoted, Dr. Ziegler had me start out at 12 second
contractions per position. Over time, he began to suspect this duration was too
long for maximum exertion, so progressively contraction times were lowered to
six seconds, and this did seem to foster better results.
Dr. Ziegler's seemingly boundless inquisitiveness about
muscular contraction and the operation of the human body also brought the
Isotron electronic muscle stimulator into our relationship, and fairly early
on. The version of the Isotron the doctor had when I first began going to him
reminded me of a cross between one of those old, huge Philco radios with the
big dials (you have to be of a certain age to know what I am talking about!),
and some sort of sci-fi round thing! And, yes, there was regular mixing of
isometric rack workouts and Isotron workouts. If an Isotron workout followed a
rack session, it was most often on Mondays and Wednesdays.
However, this is not to imply that changing situations or
circumstances could not have altered the timing or blending of the voluntary
and involuntary contractions. If in Doc's discretion, I could benefit from an
Isotron workout on a Thursday or my typical rest day, Friday, I took one.
Likewise, there was the rare occasion when he advised me to cease the rack work
for a brief period and rely only on Isotron treatments. At one point I had
incurred a nagging injury to one of my thighs and was told to soft-pedal the
rack work for the week. However, to hasten the healing, Doc administered
repeated ultra sound treatments with some kind of liquid medication, in
addition to treatments on the Isotron, and the injury disappeared within a few
days. In fact, he told me to do my normal Saturday workout at the end of that
week. And I did... with positive results and no recurrence of the injury.
Keeping in mind that considerable of the acquired trust
accumulated in my relationship with Dr. Ziegler was based on my willingness to explicitly follow his recommendations. And because he liked to tinker with
variables, very occasionally, his recommendations could be significant
departures. For example, there was one four or five month period when he had me
abstain from all isometric rack work whatsoever. During that period I received
only Isotron treatments on the weekdays and would do my usual Saturday total
session
Without question, the usage and development of the
Isotron for athletic purposes was an offshoot of his initial interest in
isometric training for strength. And its been pointed out as well, that he also
found eye-opening medical uses for it.
But my personal experiences with it were quite positive.
At the bottom line of getting stronger is coaxing the body's nerves and muscles
to produce stronger and progressively more powerful contractions. Forcefully
pursued, the type of short range and hold rack work I did encourages that
scenario. Of course, the next upward step in that picture would be to eclipse
the body's limitations by the use of involuntary muscle contractions, which is
what the Isotron did.
But beyond that, the Isotron gave tremendous analytical feedback as to the on-going operational quality of the body's recovery
mechanisms, both individual muscles and the system as a whole. The process of
getting stronger goes nowhere with inefficient recovery.
In my opinion, Dr. Ziegler was the ultimate in an
athletic trainer back then, and could still very probably more than hold his
own against the elite athletic trainers of today...if not show them a couple of
things!
Moving on to the topic most readers hoped I would address
candidly, but assumed that I would not...in that aforementioned meeting which
took place in the offices at York Barbell, in addition to the mention of testing
“a new form of exercise” there was also mention of “pills” being part of the
picture as well. No specifics, just a reference to “pills”.
Yes, on those early trips to Dr. Ziegler's I was given a
Dianabol pill along with the 36 seconds of exercise. Candidly, I never took
more than 10 milligrams a day...EVER...and there were periods during which I
took nothing. Yet, I continued to follow my rack training, and/or augmentation
with the Isotron, but still registered progress in terms of getting stronger.
Sure, some of my comparatively meteoric surge in the
lifting world can rightly be attributed to Dianabol, but to totally disregard
and deride the clear role that rack work and even the Isotron played in my
ultimate success is categorically wrong and myopic. I can assert that with
confidence because there were up-and-coming young lifters at the time who
sought out and received my continuing guidance on rack training...and who were
not on any steroid...who made progress strength-wise. Sam Bigler would be a case-in-point.
Looking back, it is ironic that my name has become
attached to a lingering image problem involving athletics. From the moment I
became involved with weightlifting, it was obvious to me that the sport needed
all of the positive PR that it could get. Hence, I made it my business to give
free time and knowledge about lifting or general weight training to literally
anyone who seemed interested in resistance exercise. Similarly, on Saturdays I
would often attend lifting contests in which I was not competing in order to be
fan-friendly and a good representative of the York Barbell Club.
My involvement in all of this lifting-related activity
was what it was, and I harbor no regrets. Further, I would like to point out
regarding the Dianabol issue that its usage at the time was neither illegal or
even frowned upon by authorities. And I was engaged in its usage under the
auspices of a licensed practicing physician of considerable credentials, who
took the necessary medical precautions to monitor my on-going health. To
reiterate, it was what it was!
One aspect of Dr. Ziegler's motivation for working with
lifters like myself,Bob Bednarski, Bill St. John and others that seems to have
been lost in the shuffle was the accumulation of physical data which yielded
insights that he could employ to better understand and treat seriously impaired
or injured medical patients. The refinement of the Isotron over time would be a
fine example. Early on Ziegler searched for improved conducting solutions to
lessen or prevent skin irritation or shock. He figured it out, but along the
way determined that rain-induced mineral buildup in his well water was the
cause, and that substituting distilled water in the conducting solution solved
the problem and improved the quality of the contractions!Discoveries of that
nature.
I also wish it be known that my athletic activities back
in the 1960s were not confined to just competitive weightlifting. In terms of a
time commitment, I played considerably more basketball at the local YMCA than I
spent working out. While it was not publicized in S&H, my usual post
workout tendency was to go to the Y for an hour or two of pick-up basketball.
In the same vein, for several years I also played on a
local semi-pro football team in the fall. As much as I was into lifting, I did
not turn my sporting life over completely to lifting. At my peak, this pursued
combination of strength training and athletics allowed me the ability to
perform a standing high jump of 5 feet, as well as be able to dunk a basketball
at a bodyweight of 205.
A final word about my relationship with Dr. John Ziegler:
My contemporary Bill Starr looked upon him as an exemplary scientific
researcher, and that the doctor was. Like Starr, I also viewed Dr. Ziegler as
an exemplary human being,eccentricities and all.
The bottom line is that decades ago I put my lifting and
athletic careers, not to mention my health and welfare, in Doc's
extraordinarily capable hands, and I was lastingly the better for it. I had
supreme trust in any recommendation he forwarded, and was very secure in the
knowledge that he would never do anything to harm me. And because of my good
fortune to be a recipient of his superlative guidance and knowledge, it is a
fact that I went places and met people I never would have otherwise.
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