Warped Fireside Chats

So my Grandfather, who was an iron worker for thirty something years, in addition to being an iron mover for most of his adult life, was an absolute brick house until the day he died at the age of 87. Indiscriminately stricken down with Alzheimer’s, this man who I admired greatly was not only a house built of carbide-tungsten steel, he had a mind-muscle that was as sharp as your local barbers sling blade!

Insert Sling Blade, reference: “Yep boy, I think I love ya!”

Note: If you haven’t seen Sling Blade the movie with Billy Bob Thornton, you owe it to yourself to rent this challenging and thought provoking movie. And Billy Bob, if you’re reading this, might you have a couple of bucks lying around that I could borrow?

Now, back to the words and stuff…..

It was sad to watch a brilliant man (my Grandfather), one who could engineer just about anything a person might dream of, wither away down to just a shell: Flesh, muscle and cognition of the moment only. With that, the one thing I will always remember about those last few days, was how tremendously muscular this man still was, even given the illness that was ravaging his mental and some physical functions.

I loved his stories about the good ol’ days, sitting up 90 stories in the sky, hanging out with his buds on break, in between hours of just flat-out moving some serious weight. They were old school iron workers. Screw the mechanics: Brawn reigned supreme. It was not about who could opt out of the most work (like much of today’s workforce), it was about who could work the hardest!

“Moving the iron my friend, moving the iron,” was the typical response they gave each other when asked how things were going. So, in part two of my five part homage to my Grandfather and his iron-working work-ethic I give you, a chest named, “En Fuego!”

Pre-workout note: In the same tradition as iron workers who started moving iron in the morning and finished up in the evening moving iron, with breaks being rarer than hen’s teeth, I suggest anyone attempting this workout, do so without break. The burn is the gauge by which your effort level will be measured.

Remember: High burn – High results! En Fuego baby! That’s what it is all about at the end of this workout…..

Continue at your own risk:

Warm-up set:
Dumbell flyes – 3 sets of 20 reps (C’mon now, do ‘em wide and feel the stretch)

1^st working plex (Superset)
Wide grip barbell flat bench press – 3 sets of 15

Knurl-bar close grip flat bench press – 3 sets until failure

2^nd working plex (Superset)
Incline barbell medium grip bench press – 3 sets of 15

Upper pulley cable crossovers - 3 sets until failure

3^rd working plex (Superset)

Wide grip barbell decline bench press - 3 sets of 15

Lower pulley cable crossovers - 3 sets until failure

NOTE: Your chest should be searing about now…..if not, a suggested upbeat in tempo, may assist with a higher PainFactor (PF).

HINT: Think iron worker: Throwing a ten pound sledge hammer around all day, carrying 200 lb. iron beams around on their shoulders all day…all at 900 feet above the ground while balancing on an 8-inch wide iron-girder.

The Fry plex or the closer (This should finish you off)

Hammer strength bench press – 3 sets to failure followed promptly by:

Seated chest press on machine with weight stack – 1 drop set till complete failure

My friends, remove all doubt: Push it like an iron worker, tonight!

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 22nd, 2008 at 8:37 pm and is filed under Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.