Bro Science Hall of Fame
Bro Science legend Anthony Schlegel demonstrates his unconventional approach to stadium security.
Mark was a biker, landscaper and Vietnam veteran who trained at our YMCA in skin tight jeans and a wife beater. When he wasn’t telling war stories about Vietnam, he loved talking about bodybuilding. A lot of people called him white trash behind his back, but he taught me more about psychology than any textbook or NLP certification ever could.
At 50, Mark entered a natural bodybuilding show. One afternoon, my friend Adam’s dad, Noah benShea, picked us up from the YMCA. Mark cornered him and started talking about the show.
Noah asked, “Do you train the bench press?”
Without hesitation, Mark answered, “You don’t build a chest like this without the bench press.”
Adam and I laughed the entire ride home because Mark’s chest wasn’t particularly impressive. Then he competed and somehow finished second.
Afterward, he brought pictures into the gym and said, “Look at these guys. They’re more muscular than me, and they’re leaner than me. But when I step onstage, I own the poses. I’m that confident.”
Mark applied that same confidence to women. For lack of a better term, he was a womanizer. He looked like he had fallen out of the ugly tree and hit every damn branch on the way down. He wasn’t rolling in dough, and it certainly wasn’t his smooth game carrying him.
It didn’t matter. He approached every woman in that YMCA with the confidence of Don Juan DeMarco. Younger, better looking men with cash couldn’t get the time of day from aerobics instructors who fawned over Mark.
After going out with a local newscaster, Mark explained his philosophy. Be irrationally confident. Whatever your station in life, walk through the world like you belong there. Never apologize for who you are or explain why you deserve a seat at the table.
Psychology trumps physiology, and ultimately drives it. Mark was the ultimate bro scientist, but he wasn’t the only one.
For this edition of the Bro Science Hall of Fame, I asked strength athletes and coaches for the best advice they ever received in the gym. No scientific studies or rehearsed answers. Just things they heard somewhere along the way that actually worked.
John Welbourn
Strength Coach, Former NFL Player and Host of the Legendary Power Athlete Podcast
“Don’t lift weights like old people have sex. Slow and careful. Break those motherfuckers. Be violent.”
John heard that from George Zangas of Marathon Nutrition when he was 16 years old. George talked about Fred Hatfield, Louie Simmons, Bill Kazmaier and all the greats. He would shame them when they didn’t attack the weights and explained compensatory acceleration to John when he was still a young lad.
John isn’t sure he would have had the same career if he had been some dipshit kid who wasn’t paying attention. His only regret is not having George on his podcast before he passed!
Anthony Schlegel
Ohio State Strength and Conditioning Coach and Former NFL Player
“Feel the steel.”
Anthony was about 17 and preparing to deadlift 600 pounds at Metroflex Gym. Big Greg walked over wearing jeans and a wife beater, kicked the squat rack with his shin so hard the rack moved, slapped Anthony and told him to feel the steel.
Anthony went on to feel the steel and pulled a 600 pound PR. I don’t know what the research says about having a large man in denim kick the squat rack before a maximal deadlift, but it worked.
Steve Coyne
Multidiscipline Strength Athlete and Strength Coach
“If the weight doesn’t scare you, it’s not heavy enough.”
That was Steve’s gut answer. Nothing else needed.
Craig Bongelli
Legendary Strength Coach and Strength Athlete
Louie Simmons once told Craig, “You’re doing everything right. You just need to keep doing it.”
Sometimes there isn’t anything to fix or some new thing you need to do. You need to put in the time and keep pushing forward.
Craig also remembers me telling him, “Time to put the war hat on.” Kind of the same idea. Sometimes the only right answer is to bite down, get aggressive and go on the offensive.
Joe Mackey
World’s Strongest Bodybuilder
“I always visualized what I was going to do ahead of time before I did it. I would see it. I would tell others what I’m going to do, not what I think or hope I can do.”
Probably, hopefully, maybe and try aren’t part of Joey’s vocabulary. If you’re around him talking that way, he’ll probably distance himself from you. The mind is a powerful weapon. Like any weapon, it can be aimed toward creation or destruction. Joe makes damn sure his is aimed at the target!
Andrzej Wodyn Roszkowski
Polish Bench Press Champion and Strength Coach
Andrzej shared one of mine:
“Psychology trumps physiology. Belief changes the body. Your mind can be a stronger drug than anything in the pharmacy. If you believe it, you achieve it.”
Andrew Wright
Texas Tech Basketball Strength Coach
“The first five reps are only there so the second five can do their job. Growth doesn’t come from easy reps.”
Coach Wight also said, “To grow, either add weight or reps. If you hit your reps and it wasn’t hard enough, just add reps before racking. Don’t waste the effort of the set without getting to the hard reps.”
Darl Bauer
TCU Strength Coach
Coach Bauer believes in taking manual resistance exercises to absolute failure. He sees a great benefit from a muscular growth standpoint, but that’s only part of it. It also teaches athletes how to strain through reps and learn something about themselves.
People really show you who they are on the reps past failure. Darl learned that from legendary Michigan strength coach Mike Gittleson.
Hjalte Froholdt
Arizona Cardinals Starting Center
After hurting his shoulder, Hjalte got his muscle back using a pretty straightforward formula: the more reps, the better.
He crushed the volume, and when something got easy, he increased the weight. There wasn’t a perfect progression or much science to it. He did it for six months, came back with an insanely strong back and shoulders, and somehow his bench became the strongest it had ever been.
Reps, reps, reps.
Joey Lucero
Legendary Strength Athlete and Strength Coach
Joey remembers something I told him while he was at the cable machines trying to lift explosively instead of intentionally:
“You’ve gotta lift heavy, and you’ve gotta lift hard. But not every movement has to be heavy.”
Heavy compound movements were the catalyst for growth. Then the accessory work challenged him through positioning, tempo, tension and exhaustion. Basically, quit trying to launch the cable stack into the ceiling and make the right muscles work.
Ed Brown
IFBB Pro Bodybuilder
Ed remembers me telling him, “You can get bigger without getting stronger, but you can’t get stronger without getting bigger.”
Put in the time to build a strength base, write everything down and use periodization. Ed also credits Lee Priest, Ed Coan and Fred Hatfield as major influences.
Paul Leonard
Multidisciplinary Strength Athlete, Strength Coach and Gym Owner
“You can squat with twice the volume and intensity you can handle on the deadlift.”
Anybody who tries to train the deadlift exactly like the squat will eventually understand what Paul means.
Thomas Finn
Strength Athlete, Gym Owner and All Around Badass
“Pick up your big toe while benching to increase your leg drive.”
That’s it. Try it.
Jordan Betz
Tactical Strength Coach, Gym Owner and Strength Athlete
Jordan learned his lesson from a mentor who taught school when paddling was still considered an acceptable method of behavior modification.
The man had played college football, competed in powerlifting and eventually became the school’s designated paddler. First time offenders could keep their toes pointed outward. Repeat offenders had to point their toes inward while facing a mirror so they could watch their own faces when they realized they couldn’t flex their glutes nearly as hard.
The bro science takeaway was to point your toes out if you want to maximally recruit and flex your glutes.
People can debate the merits of corporal punishment, but they rarely account for the groundbreaking glute biomechanics discovered along the way.
What Bro Science Actually Is
Some bro science gets mocked because plenty of it is wrong. That’s fair. The gym has produced some ridiculous theories over the years.
But dismissing all of it is stupid too.
Before researchers studied a method, somebody had to try it. Before information traveled through journals, it traveled between sets. Lifters figured things out, passed them along and sometimes couldn’t explain why they worked.
A lot of these lessons are crude. Some contradict each other. A few probably fall apart if you examine them too closely.
That’s part of it.
Listen to the people who have lived under the bar. They may not always know the scientific terminology, but sometimes they know exactly what the hell they’re talking about.
Ready to put this bro science to work? Pick a JoshStrength program, follow the damn plan and get stronger.
