I believe that there is nothing in life quite like the thrill of competition. It draws a stimulus like no other, and puts you in unexpected situations found only in your wildest dreams. Competition also ... Continue Reading
How to Plan Group Training for Strongman (and Why It’s Important for Your Progress)
While not a team sport, every strongman benefits greatly from a group training day. Weekday training is often done under the supervision of a coach or with a committed training partner and Sundays are ... Continue Reading
Watch the Barbell Complex that Inspired a Thousand Klokov Imitators
It's been more than four years since Dmitry Klokov unleashed this beast of a barbell complex on the world, and it's still showing up in gym workouts and on the Instagram accounts of aspiring lifters ... Continue Reading
The 1977 World’s Strongest Man Is the Greatest Thing Since Sliced SPAM
When things are decidedly a little FUBAR in my life, like when there's 25 days before I blindly travel around the world for a year with a bunch of strangers and yet I still haven't packed, I find that the ... Continue Reading
Sohrab Moradi Unofficially Breaks Clean & Jerk World Record (234kg at 94kg Bodyweight)
Iranian weightlifter Sohrab Moradi may not be a household name among Western fans of the sport, but he's currently one of the world's best 94kg lifters — and perhaps the frontrunner heading into the 2016 ... Continue Reading
What Counts As a Sport?
Editors note: Katie Rose Hejtmanek, Ph.D. is a cultural anthropologist conducting research on the culture of strength sports in the United States. This is the fourth of an in-depth series introducing ... Continue Reading
Find Your Feet: Understanding the Most Overused Cue in Weightlifting
Editors note: This article is an op-ed. The views expressed herein are the authors and don’t necessarily reflect the views of BarBend. Claims, assertions, opinions, and quotes have been sourced exclusively ... Continue Reading
Sara Sigmundsdóttir Does 50 Clean & Jerks at 90 Kilos, Pushes the Envelope of Pain
Sara Sigmundsdottir is on a mission, and after winning the Meridian Super Regional, the Icelandic athlete looked stronger than ever headed into the 2016 CrossFit Games. Of course, she looked even stronger ... Continue Reading
Dmitry Klokov Announces Second Annual “Power Weekend” in Moscow
2008 Olympic Silver Medalist and everyone's favorite weightlifting ham Dmitry Klokov has announced his second annual "Power Weekend," and the event is already shaping up to be a strength sport fan's dream. ... Continue Reading
The Glory of the Soviet Union Belonged to Weightlifter Vasily Alekseyev
If the Soviet Union could be exemplified in one human, that human would be weightlifter Vasily Alekseyev. With his accomplishments, attitude, and sheer size and strength, Alekseyev embodied all that the ... Continue Reading
We Can’t Stop Watching This Weightlifter’s Missed Clean-into-Face Slap
Travis Elliott is a member of coach Travis Mash's seemingly endless team of up-and-coming American weightlifters. And while he's not doing some of the crazy numbers as Mash's other weightlifters — yet ... Continue Reading
Why the Movie “Bigger, Stronger, Faster*” Is More Important Than Ever
It's been eight years since Chris Bell released his first feature-length film, but "Bigger, Stronger, Faster*" remains the best look into the strength athlete's temptations, challenges, and goals ever ... Continue Reading
7 Feats of Strength and Balance That Are As Impressive As They Are Head Scratching
Before we get into this, lets get one unavoidable comment out of the way: aaaaaaaand THIS is why people hate on CrossFit. There. It's done. Let's all move on now, okay? The point of this ... Continue Reading
Over 700 Youth Lifters Competed in Austin. Here’s What that Means for USA Weightlifting
It is a hell of a time to be associated with youth weightlifting in America. In the preamble to CJ Cummings’ record breaking championship at this year’s Junior World Championships, Austin, Texas, played ... Continue Reading
An Introduction to Programming for Strongman (Part 1 of 3)
Without a doubt, Strongman is the most difficult weight discipline to program correctly. There are so many variations on a theme that you can never be fully prepared for every event at any given time. The ... Continue Reading
Brian Shaw Out of World Deadlift Championships, Will Focus on August’s World’s Strongest Man
In an announcement posted on his YouTube channel (below), strongman competitor Brian Shaw has announced that he will no longer be competing in the upcoming World Deadlift Championships in Leeds, ... Continue Reading
2016 Junior World Weightlifting Championships Results
The 2016 IWF Junior Worlds are underway in Tbilisi, Georgia, and already the world's best young weightlifters have produced some outstanding results. In the men's 69kg category, the USA's CJ Cummings ... Continue Reading
A Spork In the Road: Falling In, Out, and Back In Like with CrossFit
After three and a half years of CrossFit, I’ve come to a spork in my training. Yes, a spork. Not a fork. A “fork in the road” implies that there are three or more clear paths. As it relates to ... Continue Reading
Watch the 2016 Junior World Weightlifting Championships Live!
The 2016 Junior World Championships in weightlifting are underway in Tbilisi, Georgia ("Republic of" as opposed to southern U.S. state, just to clarify). It's an event poised to witness some big lifts from ... Continue Reading
Apparently Choreographed Barbell “Dancing” Is a Thing Now
Alright fitness people, here's a little something we never thought we'd be reporting on: a choreographed barbell "dance" complete with very serious head hair tosses and eight count thrusters. At a ... Continue Reading
IWF Awards 2018 Junior Worlds to North Korea. Don’t Jump to Conclusions Just Yet
On June 23rd, a few days before the kickoff of the 2016 Junior World Championships in Tbilisi, Georgia, the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) announced they had awarded the 2018 Juniors to ... Continue Reading
As CrossFit Evolves, Games Success Will Require a Longer Term Plan
In the grand scheme of sports, CrossFit is barely out of its infancy. Though Greg Glassman began piecing together the parts of the methodology back in the 1970s, when he accidentally invented “Fran” ... Continue Reading
How to Match Training and Nutrition for Year-Long Goals
I’m writing this article from 30,000 feet in the air, on my way back from the beautiful Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas. Sun, sand, beaches, water parks, and yes - gorgeous bodies in very little ... Continue Reading
IWF Votes on Olympic Reallocation, Redistributes Spots to These Countries
In another update from the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) Executive Board meetings in Tblisi, Georgia, the Olympic spots rescinded from countries with multiple doping violations have been ... Continue Reading