The Situation Escalates

After 10 rewarding months with a 45 pound slam ball, I now have had a 100 pound slam ball for 3 hours.

The 100-pounder is just slightly larger than the 45-pounder, which is about the size of a basketball. Both of them can go slightly non-round, because they're not fully inflated, so they don't bounce, not even when you slam them down to the floor with all your might, hence the term slam ball. Although, the heavier they get, the more common it is to call them dead balls rather than slam balls, and the less common it is to actually slam them. Slamming a ball expends much more energy than simply lifting it, and very few people actually slam dead balls which weigh as much as 100 pounds. Lifting them is plenty of work.

Lifting a 100 pound ball is much more difficult than lifting a 100 pound dumbbell. I have made many visits to a local used-sporting-goods store, looking for a good deal on a heavy ball, and they usually have 100 pound dumbbells, and I can lift them with no problem. Several reps with each hand of a 100 pound dumbbell row:

-- is not a big deal for me. Lifting this 100 pound ball with both hands has been a big deal. I can do it, but after doing it once, I put the ball down again very soon and really, really don't want to do it again. Several dumbell rows on each side leaves me feeling refreshed and energized and pleasantly tingly. Lifting the 100 pound ball off of the ground with both hands and holding it off of the ground for just a couple a seconds makes me hurt all over and want very badly to take a long nap.

This is good. This is how muscles get stronger.

I found the wooden box containing the ball standing on the sidewalk in front of my house in the pouring rain today. I don't know whether Fedex even tried to get it up into the porch. There are are only 2 small steps up from the sidewalk to to the porch.

At first I tried to get the box into the porch using a dolly, but one of the dolly's wheels fell off, so I just lifted it up and took a step or two and set it down inside the porch.

And that's been about the extent of my workout with this "beast." "Beast" is a very common term used appreciatively to describe dead balls which weigh 100 pounds or more -- or even 50 pounds. What I mean when I say that that's been about the extent of it, is that I've lifted it off of the ground several times, using the correct technique so that I lift with my legs and don't hurt my back. I haven't even tried yet to lift it higher than knee-level. I will do many more such low-level lifts, just getting the thing off of the ground, before I even try to get it to chest level. After chest level comes onto the shoulder. Then pressed overhead. Then maybe slamming, or maybe that would just really be an absurd thing to try. Anyway, it will be a while before I have to decide whether or not to slam a 100-pounder.

My readers: are you beginning to feel the awesomeness of this sort of fitness equipment? Or do you suspect that there may in fact be nothing awesome about balls as compared to dumbbells or barbells, and that I may be wrong to think otherwise? You know what? You may be right. Then again, maybe I'm right, and in any case, I'm having a lot of fun, and getting stronger. I strongly encourage you to see for yourself. Medicine balls can be had in every conceivable weight from 1/2 pound all the way up to 300 pounds. Compare a ball of any weight to a dumbbell or barbell of the same weight, and immediately you'll see what a huge difference the different shape makes.

Scenario For a Mockumentary About People Obsessed With Heavy Slam Balls

The first subject is a great big guy, about 6 foot 3, 300 pounds, who is constantly carrying a 45 lb slam ball -- much like this one --

-- around with him, as he putters around at home, as he socializes, as he shops for groceries -- and also as he mows his small lawn with a non-motorized push mower. He's not always able to carry the ball on one of his shoulders and push the mower at the same time, and he ends up dropping the ball, pushing the mower for a couple of paces, and then retrieving the ball, and repeating the whole process.

While the man walks down a sidewalk with the ball on a shoulder, the interviewer is off screen, but we hear his voice: "Why don't you just leave the ball at home when you do things?"

The big man acts surprised, as if the answer were obvious. He sputters for a while before getting the words out: "If I left it at home, I'd miss it!" He looks toward the offscreen interviewer, frowning and shaking his head as if the question had been completely bizarre.

Next we see a young woman carrying around a ball like this one --

-- around the office where she works. She's rather small and slender, but has some muscle tone from working with the ball. There's a montage of her carrying the ball around while she struggles to do other things which are more routine in office work. There is a fair amount of grunting, groaning and sweating. One of the woman's co-workers, a man, says that he could see how it would be difficult to carry around an 85 lb ball all day, but was it really this tough? The offscreen interviewer informs the man that the "85" on this particular ball does not refer to pounds, but to kilograms. This ball, the interviewer tells the man, weighs over 187 pounds. The man is silent. He looks both shocked, and sincerely sorry that he had made any disparaging remarks about how difficult it was to do what his coworker is doing.

Finally, there is a man standing on a large yard in front of a large house. The lawn is dotted with dozens, if not hundreds, of yellows balls like this:

Like the woman in the previous segment, this man is not large, but his muscles have become somewhat defined from working with theses balls. He explains to the offscreen interviewer that each one of these balls weighs 300 lbs.

"It's strange," he says, "but each and every one of these balls was given to me, paid for and shipped to me by someone else, and in each case, the donor has been anonymous. It's strange, because, you know -- I'm a billionaire! These 300-pounders aren't cheap, but I could very easily have afforded to buy all of them for myself."

From offscreen comes the interviewer's voice, asking whether the man has donated any of these balls to gyms or other organization or individuals. The man is plainly shocked and appalled by the question: "Donated?!" he replied. "But -- these balls are mine, don't you see? I've bought plenty of other slams balls and given them away, but these ones are mine!" He stares in horror at the unseen interviewer, and asks, "Would you donate your pets or your children?"

We cut to another scene. The tension from the previous moment appears to have passed. From offscreen the interviewer asks whether the man can actually lift these 300 lb balls off of the ground. The man smiles at the question and exclaims, "I can certainly try!" He rushes over to the nearest ball, squats down next to it in the proper position for lifting something like this, or like an Atlas stone in a strongman competition: ball between his feet, bending with his legs until he can put both hands under the ball, holding his head up high and sticking his butt out to keep his spine braced. After a long moment of strain, during which the camera zooms in very close to the ball, daylight is clearly visible between the ball and the ground. The man splutters, "I got it off of the ground!"

And then suddenly he drops the ball and falls full length face down onto the lawn beside the ball. With his voice muffled because his face is pressed down into the lawn, the man says, "I think I may have injured myself."

Slammin'

This is my 45lb slam ball:

There are others like it, but this one is mine.

It arrived via the US Postal Service the day before yesterday. I had been wondering how they were going to deliver it. I didn't think they were going to send it by the usual carrier. Sure enough, a separate truck pulled up to my place. I came outside and said to the man who'd slid open the side panel of the truck: "You've got a heavy package for me, don't you?"

The man chuckled and said he did, indeed. Amazon had packed it in a box twice as wide as the ball and three times as long, which made it much easier to carry. (Leverage: it's what's for dinner.)

Yesterday, I took it outside and slammed it 5 times on the sidewalk. A slam is lifting the object high over your head and then throwing it straight down to the floor or ground as hard as you can. Some people -- a lot of people, to judge from what I've seen on YouTube so far -- keep their legs pretty much motionless with their knees bent and their feet flat on the ground when they slam, and just concentrate on doing reps as fast as they can. I, however, saw a YouTube video in which a personal trainer said that this was entirely wrong, and that what you want to do is extend the entire body before the slam: stand up on your toes, straighten your legs, stand up as tall as you can, reach up as high as you can with the ball in your hands, and THEN slam it down. This trainer says that this is the proper form for slamming, and that proper form is much more important, and gives you much bigger returns for your effort, than the very popular approach of doing as many slams as you can in a minute, or in 5 minutes or in some other given unit of time.

I have no idea whether this trainer is right about that and all those other people are wrong. But for now I'm acting as if he's right. In part because he's thin but very wiry and seems very strong, and I want to get thin and remain strong.

My slam ball did not immediately split open under its own great weight and become ruined upon being dropped to the sidewalk for the very first time, as I had irrationally feared. Irrationally, because it is made to be slammed thousands of times.

Yesterday, 5 slams left me wiped out, huffing and puffing. I didn't notice the ball making a sound yesterday when it hit the sidewalk, but that was because I was expecting a huge echoing slamming sound, like the sound of a basketball hitting a sidewalk, but magnified many times, and this huge echoing sound was entirely lacking.

Today I paid closer attention, and heard a distinct solid thud when the ball hit the sidewalk.

Today, just like yesterday, 5 slams wiped me out. But today I just took a couple of breaths and then kept going. I lost track of how many reps I did today, but it was at least 10, maybe 15 or more. Lifting the ball all the way up before the slam was very difficult after several reps. I feel it now in all 4 limbs and my shoulders and back. No doubt I will feel it more tomorrow: "the feeling of weakness leaving the body," as we lunks say. And the plan is to do a lot more than 15 reps tomorrow.

I'm Okay. Really

Yesterday, after writing a blog post about medicine balls, I ordered a 45-pound slam ball from Amazon. This particular brand of ball does not seem to have the best reputation for quality and endurance (nor the worst), but the 45-pound model was ridiculously cheap. So cheap, I have to wonder whether the price was a mistake. So cheap, I honestly wonder whether what I paid would even cover the cost of free 2-day shipping of an item that weighs 45 pounds.

I'm not on steroids. (I know: that's exactly what most steroid users say. But I'm not.) Just in case any of you were worried about that, or worried about me in general and my new enthusiasm for medicine balls. I'm aware that many or most or all of the people (besides me) who are genuinely interested in 300-lb medicine balls

are on steroids. I'm not interested in becoming even bigger than I already am. I'm not interested in competing in strongman competitions. What I want to do is become thinner. I want to use the medicine balls to burn off fat, more than I want to use them to pack on muscle. If some of my muscles get bigger in the process of burning off fat, that's okay with me, but it's not the main focus.

If I were seriously interesting in developing huge muscles, I would be starting an exercise program centered primarily around lifting barbells and dumbbells -- and around taking steroids and HGH and things like that. But I don't want the huge muscles. I want to get smaller. I want MORE of a neck, not less of one. I don't even know very much about steroids and HGH and other things used by -- well, apparently by top athletes in every single sport where it's not specifically banned and rigourously tested, as well as a lot of the top athletes in sports where it is specifically banned and rigourously tested. I don't know very much about the banned substances, but I get the distinct impression that they're dangerous in various ways. Some people insist they're not, but those people seem to me to be either using steroids (etc), and in denial -- or selling steroids (etc).

I hear that steroids (etc) are expensive, too, so even if I were convinced that they were safe as milk, even if I wanted to take them, I couldn't afford to. (I don't even drink milk, because of health concerns. I don't pour milk on my cereal or oatmeal. If I'm in the mood for a beverage which resembles milk, it's almond milk for me.)

I'm not planning a lot of barbell and dumbbell lifting. Just calisthenics and and cardio and medicine balls. And the medicine balls are mainly intended to intensify the effects of the calisthenics and cardio: burning fat, strengthening my heart and lungs, lowering my blood pressure and resting pulse rate.

HEALTHY stuff. Before my surgery back in August, I said to myself that if I survived, I would make a stronger commitment to my physical health. And that's exactly what I'm doing. And my blood pressure and pulse rate have been coming down -- not dramatically yet, but that's okay. I'm taking small steps in the right direction.

You know, some day I will meet a beautiful woman who is into heavy slam balls and mechanical watches and the Latin language and languages in general and healthy, steroid-free living and quantum theory and Moleskine notebooks and almond milk and kitties, and sparks will fly.

I'm Still Pure Mental About Medicine Balls

More specifically: about slam balls, because, as far as I can see, medicines balls over 20 pounds are all or almost all slam balls.

I'm getting very good results from working out at home with my 8 pound medicine ball and my 5 kilogram ball and my 20 pound ball. But I want to go heavier.

The guy behind the gun counter at the big sporting-goods store said they could get medicine balls as big as 12 or even 15 pounds. The fact that they sell guns and do not sell big medicine balls (big from my point of view) are only two of the things that make me uncomfortable about the place. Going there again after several years reminded me that I had already told myself I probably wouldn't need to go there again. Ever. In my life.

Of course, I can buy slam balls as big as 300 lbs from Amazon. I have actually been having wildly irresponsible thoughts about doing exactly that. Once a 300-lb ball was delivered, would I be able to get it as far as from the sidewalk up onto the front porch? Interesting question. Then again, I don't see what would be so bad about leaving it outside -- who would steal it? Very likely no-one who wasn't using a forklift. It might stay right there on the ground outside for a very long time, looking like a spherical yellow lawn ornament.

I have actually been more seriously thinking about buying a slam ball which weighs 45 lbs or more.

A more responsible thought is joining a gym which has huge heavy slam balls. Which gyms have what size balls? I don't know. After looking in at the above-mentioned sporting goods store today, I spotted a nearby gym. But it's still under construction.

The first gym I telephoned about this told me that their slam balls are usually locked up. They're only taken out for classes. No lone-wolf slam-balling at any old time for them! Which is disappointing, but I guess I can see their point, which -- I'm guessing -- is safety. And far be it from me to denigrate safety. Seriously.

Seems like a LOT of local gyms don't even answer their phones on Saturday afternoons. What, are they all CLOSED on weekends? Sigh. Most of them would probably be out of my budget range, too, unless I can arrange to get a free gym membership because I'm poor, which some people actually seem to think I can do.

It may be that I am kind of crazy to to build my fitness plans around slam balls to such an extent, but you know what? I don't particularly care if it is crazy, it could still work. I know somebody who lost an amazing amount of weight on a cabbage-soup diet, and who very enthusiastically preaches the Gospel of Health through Cabbage Soup. Which is crazy, but, much more importantly, it actually worked for him, so who's crazy now, huh? I think that a huge variety of approaches to diet and exercise would each work well for some people. Would, and do. It may very well be that focusing to such an extent on heavy slam balls would be crazy for most people but brilliant for me, because I'm just built that way. (And there's also the possibility that I've stumbled across fitness gold here and am far, far ahead of my time.)

There's an Australian company called Iron Edge which makes fitness equipment, including slam balls as heavy as 85 kilograms. That's over 187 pounds.

They have some YouTube videos featuring a young man who is very thin, but wiry, who actually picks up the 85kg balls and carries them around and throws them and such, and also makes comments about the balls which I find humorous. I don't know how much he's cracking up his Australian target audience, and how many of things which crack me are just things Australians say. Like when he describes some amazing feat which Derek Boyer, Fijian-Australian strongman legend and Iron Edge spokesman, has performed with the heavy slam balls in training, and then dryly adds something like "[...] which, in my opinion, is pure mental."

Besides being funny, the fact that this fellow is so thin and can still carry and toss an 85-kg slam ball makes me confident that I can carry a 300-pound ball. Eventually. If I work very, very hard. Probably not today.

And it may actually be very tricky to even find a slam ball as heavy as 85 kilograms, let alone 300 pounds. (And I've said in this blog, and I stand by it: they should make them even bigger than 300 lbs.) I don't know yet how common they are in gyms. Maybe they're all over the place, and it's just a matter of hooking up with a gym.

Or maybe, to most fitness enthusiasts, the very thought of slam balls as heavy as 85 kilograms, never mind 300 pounds, let alone even bigger, is still pure mental -- either because it really is pure mental, or because I am from the future.

Okay, Okay, I Admit It --

I'm COMPLETELY obsessed with 300-lb medicine balls!

Furthermore, it ANGERS me that so far I have only found one company, D-Ball, which makes medicines balls that big. This is a 300-pounder from D-Ball:

It's 15 inches, which is a lot bigger than, say, a basketball, but also a lot smaller than some other medicine balls which are much lighter.

(A d-ball, or dead ball, also known as a slam ball, is different from a traditional medicine ball in that it does not bounce, so that you can slam it straight down into the floor or ground or point-blank against a wall without having to worry about it bouncing all over the place and injuring people.)

And more recently it has begun to anger me that there are -- as far as I know -- no medicine balls which are larger than 300lbs. The next-biggest I've found so far are 85-kilogram slam balls from an Australian company called Iron Edge:

85 kilograms equals about 187 pounds.

There are people running around loose out there, purporting to be experts on such things, who say that slam balls only go up to 150 pounds.

The 300-pounders are used, among other uses, to train for strong-man competitions in which one has to pick up a stone or a keg which may weigh as much as 450 lbs, and then either set it down on a shelf around shoulder or eye-height, depending upon the strong man, or carry it for a distance before putting it down on such a shelf. How, I recently asked, are you going to train for that if there are no medicine balls bigger than 300 pounds?

Turns out they have an answer for that: they just train with stones or kegs, with the same objects which are used in the competitions. Here are some people training with the stones:

And I have an answer for THAT: they should use medicine balls in the competitions. The heavier ones may be sand or steel shot or other things on the inside, but they're rubber on the outside, and that's the way to go. No discussion, I'm right, everyone else is wrong. Rubber, AND SPHERICAL, is the way to go. Yes, the Atlas stones are spherical, but there are also kegs used in competitions, and sandbags used for training, which are not.

Spherical is the way to go because it's most difficult shape to lift and to keep steady. Barbells and dumbbells have handles specifically shaped to fit your hands, to make lifting easier, and to make it easier to keep them steady once they've been lifted. Nautilus-type machines make it even easier, because zero energy is required to stabilize the load: you just go straight up and come straight back down.

Well, what are you there to do: lift the maximum amount of weight off of the ground, or get the maximum effort into your workout? A sphere, a ball, requires the maximum effort to be lifted by a human, and the maximum effort to stabilize it, to keep from dropping it. And in return for that maximum effort, it returns the maximum reward in building strength. Right now, having used medicine balls which weigh much less than 300 pounds, I can feel muscles all over my body which have been woken up and stimulated. (In a good way.) Including some muscles which I can't recall ever having felt before at all.

There are some medicine balls which have indentations in them, sort of looking like the Death Star, and in those indentations are handles. Talk about completely missing the point of what you're making.

Okay, I admit, I don't know all of the biological science, and maybe there are plenty of good reasons to use barbells and dumbbells and Nautilus-type machines, and maybe I'm totally wrong to say that medicine balls are always the way to go. Maybe saying that only proved that I'm a total noob at the entire subject of lifting and throwing weighted objects. I suppose it's even possible that I'm completely wrong about the Death Star-medicine balls. But that's not my point right now. My point is that medicine balls are way cool and that I love them almost as much as kitties.

Rubber is the way to go because stone can scuff up your skin really badly and you don't need that. Also because you don't want to go around throwing either stone balls or barbells or dumbbells, generally speaking. Generally speaking, I think it's safe to say, throwing stone balls and dumbbells and barbells is a bad idea. And throwing Nautilus-type machines, of course, would just be much worse.

But you can throw the medicine balls and slam balls. They're designed to be thrown. You can throw them in more ways than the shot from the shot put. The shot is also way cool, but that's for another post.