Help with College Friend

Off Topic
1

I’m back to ask some quick questions/get some insight on what to do about a situation on my hands. It’s not a bad situation. Just not one I completely know how to handle. I will have been out of HS for one year this month on the 15th. Right after HS, I never went to college. But kept up well with one of my old football buddies. We lifted in the winter and spring from time to time. He made it playing for a D2 school that we went to school close to.

Kid is a monster, 225 6’0. Tons of natural ability. (I don’t really like the term, but it’s true), will be playing WR this year. In high school he never really did lift weights seriously until his last year or two, which wasn’t enough time for him to really get the feel for anything. I on the other hand LIVED in the weight room since I was 13. It was all I could do to keep up, lifted and trained all the time, every chance I got. Never missed an oppourtunity to get up and move. Sort of took on the stereotype of to Go-to guy for anything in the weight room.

Now he is coming to me to help train with him. I am months behind, havn’t lifed AT ALL since January. Work is too much to keep up with anything extra. I want to help him. He has questions, I don’t have the answers he needs, someone needs to help him get straightened out and help him learn what he needs to get better. He has the desire, I don’t know if I have the time or the inclination to learn. I want to help him, but I really don’t know where to point him. I never gave a fuck about anything in School unless it involved gaining weight and getting stronger/better lineman.

So I really have no idea how to help him. Should I just outright tell him he can’t depend on me as a training partner? Or should I just gut it out and go to work and help him and get myself back in shape where I can lift with him/keep up with him. I don’t know what sort of reading I should direct him to specifically, what articles to tell him to read, I don’t really know how to work the seasons to cycle a good program to be a good football player. All I ever did was perma-bulk and lift weights non-stop myself. So my approach is obsolete at best. Basically I know I will make a shitty partner and don’t know where to direct him. Any advice? And I really do wan’t to help him. He’s like a brother to me but I have a full plate and I’m afraid I’m going to let him down if he listens to me. What should I do?

2

Be his friend, lift weights and have fun.

It ain’t rocket surgery, and the school has professional staffing for the particulars of his actual training/coaching.

3

Work is too much? You’re nineteen years old! I work fifty hours a week have an apartment a pet a sick mom a five hour a week vollunteer commitment and tons of social obligations. I’m at the gym eight times a week. Get it together!

I now admit I did not read anymore after the “work is too hectic to keep up with anything else” statement.

4

you should email the following link to him: the T-Nation homepage. Duh.

6

If you are 19 and work is ‘too much’ you are either working yourself into the ground and need to re-prioritize OR you just perceive it to be too much because you waste too much time doing unnecessary shit and need to get a hold of yourself. Have you heard of abbreviated workouts?

I am sure there are ways you can recoup some time-less TV, less video games?

What is your schedule?

7

get stuck into it bro

8

Sit down with him and figure out what you BOTH wanna do. You’re adults man, you can figure things out for yourselves, and the pressure is coming from you, not from him. Stop putting it on yourself, it aint gooooood.

9

Shouldn’t he be taking this time to lift with his teammates? What are his coaches doing?

Tell him to stick to the team training and bond with his teammates.

10

What are his goals? There are a lot of good programs on this site, where he won’t need much guidance from you.

Not to be a 5/3/1 fanboy but I am loving it and it takes most of the guesswork out of it.

11

Sounds like a shitty football program if he went through a whole year and doesn’t know what he should be doing in the weightroom.

12

I don’t go to school so work is all I do and right now I’m working three jobs with day-work on the side from time to time. Some days are straight overload, 18 hour days. I may see up to seven of those a week with 3-4 being the norm. Right now my main source of income is at a job working across the state line so I have to wake up an hour early to make it to work so I wake @ 4 a.m. to be their around 6:10. No video games, no TV. Just the occaisonal T-Nation article. All of my jobs are labor jobs. Right now I work for a man that runs a crew that deals in cactus eradication on open range for raising beef-stock. So I have tools in my hands as the sun is coming up, namely a shovel, which stays in my hand the majority of the day.

DBCooper: read my mind, as soon as I hit “post”, I said to myself “you dumbass, just tell him about T-Nation”.

I will admit that on the days I have off, or only work part of the day, most of the time I’m too tired mentally/physically to lift. If I really WANTED to, I could, I could squeeze in an hour here and there. But really, apart from being at work. Work is on my mind nearly all day, I constantly think about it, how to make it better, how t be better at my job. I never just show up to work and say “Okay, time to go”

I’m thinking about it since I walk out of the house. Not bragging, it really is kind of a curse. Because in my mind, sometimes it won’t shut the fuck up. It makes lifting dificult because I can’t focus on it. I have terrible sessions because I’m not focused. But during the summer I am going to MAKE myself turn it off, and learn to have a balance.

As far as his goals are concerned, he is afraid of what to do with his size. Almost all of the other WR weigh less than him, and are quicker, have better feet/hands, better coordinated. So he is focusing on getting faster, learning the game, stronger, leaner (I really don’t know why he wants to get much leaner, he seems fine to me, I don’t even think getting leaner would have much function. but he stated it as a goal) And he is looking to stay motivated to lift during the summer while he works. We are lifting tomorrow evening after we get done working. For right now I think I will just start with him on his college program and we can do it together, and then when I get back in shape I can pick up where I left off on my own program I built after school. And do my own lifting, then, show up with him to help him with his. He asks for a lot of advice from me on diet, what stuff “works” and doesn’t work. What he should do for meals. I really am just going to start doing some basic research then, reccommend my good friend TN and me and him will get to lifting heavy stuff. If schedule works out.

13

Stick it in his pooper.

14

[quote]KEO wrote:
All of my jobs are labor jobs. Right now I work for a man that runs a crew that deals in cactus eradication on open range for raising beef-stock. So I have tools in my hands as the sun is coming up, namely a shovel, which stays in my hand the majority of the day.

I will admit that on the days I have off, or only work part of the day, most of the time I’m too tired mentally/physically to lift. If I really WANTED to, I could, I could squeeze in an hour here and there. But really, apart from being at work. Work is on my mind nearly all day, I constantly think about it, how to make it better, how t be better at my job. I never just show up to work and say “Okay, time to go”

I’m thinking about it since I walk out of the house. Not bragging, it really is kind of a curse. Because in my mind, sometimes it won’t shut the fuck up. It makes lifting dificult because I can’t focus on it. I have terrible sessions because I’m not focused. But during the summer I am going to MAKE myself turn it off, and learn to have a balance.
[/quote]

I’m not knocking what you do for a living at all, but how does labor stress you out this much when you are not doing it?
Any laborious job I’ve ever had has been bliss compared to office settings with take-home work.
What are pondering on your time off that is of so much importance?
From what you have described about your one job, you kill cacti.
You think about how to be better at that?
I’m sure there are ways you could be better at it, but does it benefit you to be better at killing them in an efficient manner?
Are you going to be a cactus slayer for the rest of your life?
Tell your brain to go fuck itself and get yourself to the gym.
Then go out and socialize with female humans.
You are young…get on with it.

15

Yeah, I do overthink work from time to time. Even cacti killing. But I’m already off to a bad start with this kid. We squatted the other day, did some Romanians and some other stuff off of his college Summer workout plan. And shit is bad guys, real bad… Well, anyway, I guess you have answered all of my questions though. Also, today at the truck stop I winked at pretty hot looking girl, much taller than me walking in. She ignored. So I hit her. Not really. But I did wink. That’s more action than normal so I’m in a good mood. We are lifting tonight. Maybe I’ll start a log.

That will make it easier for some of you to look at. I will copy his stuff tonight if all goes well.

16

[quote]gavinhenson wrote:
get stuck into it bro[/quote]

You have no room to give advice. You can’t even sit your lazy ass down to study.

17

Honestly, if this guy is 6’0" 225lbs and he’s playing Div. II football instead of at least Div. I AA he must be slow as shit with hands like a brick wall. I’d tell him as much too.

Be honest, say “look, you play DII football at some piece of shit program no one’s heard of. You have the size to be a DI WR and possibly the size to grow into a DI TE or maybe even a pass-catching fullback like Tom Rathman. It’s your football ability that has you wallowing in some shithole in the middle of nowhere playing DII football instead of PAC-10 or Big Ten or at least even MAC or WAC football. You need to work on your football skills, NOT your strength and conditioning. Lift weights and all that, but simply follow the team’s program and keep that aspect of your training simple. Put all of your extra resources and time into improving your route-running and pass-catching abilities because that is clearly what has held you back thus far.”

I mean really, dude. The guy is athletic enough to play a skill position like WR at his size and yet he plays DII ball? He needs to concentrate on foot speed and flat-out sprinting speed. If you really feel like you need to hand him a program or start working out with him, everything should be centered on the clean/press, the snatch (both of which should be performed off of blocks or from the hanging position with half your 1rm, maybe up to 65% of your 1rm), lots and lots of sled and sprint work and about two weeks worth of plyometric- and ballistic-focused work every few weeks or so. And if he wants to continue playing WR, he might benefit from losing a little weight to help quicken up a bit. Either that or gain some more weight and switch positions.

18

[quote]Hallowed wrote:
Work is too much? You’re nineteen years old! I work fifty hours a week have an apartment a pet a sick mom a five hour a week vollunteer commitment and tons of social obligations. I’m at the gym eight times a week. Get it together!

I now admit I did not read anymore after the “work is too hectic to keep up with anything else” statement.[/quote]

Haters gonna hate and quitters gonna quit. Whatever.

19

225 & 6’0 WR at DII…bullshit, what is he armless?