The editor introduced it beforePrisonersFitness-The Book of True PowerIntroductionChapter 1, Part 1(Part 2), let’s take a look Paul WeedWhy did you learn Convict Fitness? How did you learn it?
I know a lot about"old school" gymnastics, maybe no one is as good as me nowKnow better. During the last days of my sentence, I was nicknamed "Entrenador", which is Spanish for "coach" because newbies would come to me to learn how to become strong in a short period of time. . As a result, I gained support from many people and received many benefits from them. I feel that I deserve it, because my method is effective and I can do 12 free one-arm handstand push-ups - I have never seen anyone else do it, not even athletes who have won Olympic gymnastics championships. Counted.
I have won the annual push-up/pull-up competition in Angola Prison for 6 consecutive years. This competition was started by a prisoner. Founded. In 1987, I also participated in the California Weightlifting Championships and won third place. In fact, I had never received weightlifting training. People only participate in the competition if they make a bet. I have been exercising my own way for many years, I can’t even remember how many years. However, this exercise method did make my body very strong. For 20 years I had to hang out with veterans, perverts, and lunatics alike. Due to the pressure of life, most of these guys work hard to exercise, but most of them are not as strong as me. In addition, some of the most accomplished athletes in the world were actually criminals, so you may not have seen their fitness methods described in fitness magazines.
While serving my sentence, I have been working hard to get stronger and stay in the best shape possible. Working out to the best of my ability became my only goal, except I wasn't in a comfortable gym—there were no chrome-plated exercise machines around, no tanned poseurs, and no charming women in spandex. . I also didn’t qualify as a trainer through a 3-week course like most personal trainers today. I definitely blame some fat writer who never spends a day sweating in his life, but yet he cobbles together a lot of books about health or fitness. I'm not a gifted athlete either. The first prison injury occurred three weeks after my 22nd birthday. At that time, I weighed 68 kilograms and was 186 centimeters tall. My arms were so long and thin that they looked like pipe pipes, not even as strong as pipe pipes. Following my early, dangerous experiences, I soon learned that bullying by prisoners was as common as breathing, and being intimidated was as commonplace as ever. I don’t want to be anyone’s “bitch.”
I realized that the safest and most effective way to avoid becoming someone else’s target is to make yourself stronger, and quickly. As luck would have it, within a few weeks of entering San Quentin, I was placed in a cell with a former Navy SEAL. I thinkTo make myself stronger, I will work hard to achieve this goal. I learned from everyone I could find, and among my fellow inmates were gymnasts, soldiers, weightlifters, martial arts practitioners, yoga practitioners, wrestlers, and even a few doctors.
Among my fellow inmates, there was a lifer named Joe Hartigen who was my mentor and helpful friend. When I met him, he was 71 years old and had spent more than 30 years in prison. He is old and has many injuries, but he still insists on exercising in the cell every morning. He's so strong that I've seen him do weighted pull-ups with just his two index fingers and one-arm push-ups with just one thumb, and he doesn't even break the sweat when doing them. He knows more about fitness than the so-called “experts.” His muscular body was built in the old gyms of the first half of the 20th century, a time when most people had never heard of barbells with interchangeable plates. Those guys mostly worked with their own body weight, and their exercises are now considered part of gymnastics rather than strength training. Of course, they also use "machines," but instead of lying on comfortable, adjustable seats, they have to pull large, irregular objects, such as loaded barrels, anvils, sandbags, or other people. Weight training like this involves many important factors related to strength - such as grip endurance, leg strength, speed, balance, coordination and stamina. , these have disappeared in modern gyms.
This kind of exercise can actually make the body of an old-timer so strong. In the 1930s, Joe worked out with "The Mighty Atom" (The Mighty Atom) in St. Louis. "Astro Boy" is the most famous athlete in history. One of the strongmenwho is only 163 cm tall and weighs about 64 kg. "Astro Boy" is a miracle, and his daily performances will make many modern bodybuilders cry and go to their mothers. He can break free from iron chains, drive large nails into pine boards with his bare hands, and bite small nails in half. In 1928, he successfully stopped a plane from taking off simply by pulling on a rope tied to it (he even You don’t have to use your hands, just tie the rope to your hair). Unlike modern gym rats, Astro Boy was strong everywhere in his bodyIncomparable, and he can prove it anywhere.