Crazy Stone Workouts

[Eric Beseler]

Posted a few short videos of my stone loading on Youtube. Search by my name, Eric Beseler, and let me know what you think. And yes, my stones are colorful. They're an homage to mid-80's to mid-90's World's Strongest Man, and if I could lift 'em wearing parachute pants and with zinka ink on my nose, I would.

[Jim Duggan]

I just pick them up and shoulder them. At the end, I'll carry them back to wear I keep them ( gotta be neat.) That's about the extent of carrying them. Even so, one of them scraped my ear ( rough granite surface) While walking with it. Drew a small amount of blood, left a nice scab. A nice badge if honor.

[igor heren]

Today, in celebration of Thanksgiving tomorrow, I decided to do a Stone workout. I used my 145 Lb., and 180 Lb. Stones. I did 55 reps of each, Lifting the stone from ground and shouldering it. It went like this: First set 180 ×10, 145×1, then rest one minute. Next set, 180×9, 145×2. Each set consisted of 11 reps, with number of reps descending on the 180, while the reps ascended with 145. The last set was 180×1, 145×10. Total number of reps was 110 ( 55 for each stone.) While I didn't set a timer, the workout lasted a little over an hour. I'm sore, of course, but my forearms aren't chewed up because I wore a long-sleeve shirt ( temperature in the 40s.)
Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Interesting high rep workout.

Do you carry the stones?

[Jim Duggan]

Today, in celebration of Thanksgiving tomorrow, I decided to do a Stone workout. I used my 145 Lb., and 180 Lb. Stones. I did 55 reps of each, Lifting the stone from ground and shouldering it. It went like this: First set 180 ×10, 145×1, then rest one minute. Next set, 180×9, 145×2. Each set consisted of 11 reps, with number of reps descending on the 180, while the reps ascended with 145. The last set was 180×1, 145×10. Total number of reps was 110 ( 55 for each stone.) While I didn't set a timer, the workout lasted a little over an hour. I'm sore, of course, but my forearms aren't chewed up because I wore a long-sleeve shirt ( temperature in the 40s.)
Happy Thanksgiving to all!

[Steve Weiner]

100 pound granite sphere for 300 cleans and presses in 2 hours, 18 minutes and 53 seconds. This was one of the roughest workouts that I ever did in my life and if I did not pace myself like I did, I would have been destroyed long before I finished.

[Bill Crawford]

Hi Eric,
I was there last month and trained with Magnus. He said that red and black rubber Atlas stone weighs 100 kg.
On another note, I really think those would be a huge hit here in the US and other countries for that matter. Magnus vér and Andreas Guðmundsson would be happy to start shipping them here to the US. They make sizes 60 kg to 150 kg. Super tough and durable.
Hope that helps, Bill

[Eric Beseler]

So I was in Iceland for a week during December and made my way to Jakabol. I waited in the parking lot until a local fisherman whose name I couldn't repeat or spell if you paid me came by and allowed me to enter. Nice guy, had his two young daughters with him, and he joined me for some atlas stone work briefly before leaving me to my own designs in the gym. There were four wall mounted pipe 'platforms' for the stones. The second highest of which I'd guess was about 150 cm high. There were several hard rubber coated stones, each about 20 inches in diameter. The one I loaded onto the aforementioned platform was red on one half and black on the other. I have no idea how much it weighs. I'm used to the 18 inch stones that I make from Slater's stone moulds, and add weight for the heavier stones by pitching in some lead from a nearby scrapyard. At any rate, I loaded that red/black stone onto that presumably 150 cm high platform 50 times, and had my fair amount of drops along the way, as well as a little impromptu technique discussion with the fisherman. And no, the irony of loading atlas stones with a fisherman in Iceland is not lost on me. But is there anybody out there that knows how much that red/black stone weighs?

[Paul D Mouser]

Congrats Eric, that is a great display of strength and work capacity! Imagine having Eric on your logging or oilfield crew! Nicely done.

[Burr Patterson]

Great Eric, keep pushing!

[Ben Edwards]

So I have a 258 lb stone, and I loaded that onto the same 48 inch platform 50 times in 49 minutes and 50 seconds. Again, no tacky and no sleeves, just chalk. I'm going to Iceland in a few weeks, looking forward to visiting Jakabol. Kind of a pilgrimage. Anybody been?

You're about 4 months early. Your last post in April said you'd do the same workout a year later. Tremendous work, by the way!

[Eric Beseler]

So I have a 258 lb stone, and I loaded that onto the same 48 inch platform 50 times in 49 minutes and 50 seconds. Again, no tacky and no sleeves, just chalk. I'm going to Iceland in a few weeks, looking forward to visiting Jakabol. Kind of a pilgrimage. Anybody been?

[Paul D Mouser]

Eric that is some tremendous work; well done. Tacky free stone lifting is a beastly endeavor. Did Dave L ever get to Iceland to try the stone of legend?

[igor heren]

Which weights of stones do you have?

Interesting multi rep workout.

Keep us informed about your progress.

[Eric Beseler]

261.5 lb atlas stone, loaded onto a 48 inch platform 50 times in just over an hour at a bodyweight of 224 lbs. No tacky, no sleeves, but there was enough chalk on the table to make it look like the final scene in Scarface. Then I drove to the gym and did 5 sets of dips to failure with a minute's rest in between, and followed that with 5 sets of military presses to failure with a minute's rest as well, because all that pulling had to be followed with some pressing, for balance. The next time I do this workout, it will be with a 280 lb stone. That'll be a year from now.

[Steve Weiner]

Last night's stone fun:

100 pound granite sphere: 250 cleans and presses in one hour and 39 minutes. If I look at this another way, I moved the stone about 7 1/2 feet from the floor to overhead with each rep, totalling up to over 1/3 of a mile of vertical movement.

[Stephen Abramowitz]

More like insanity! I watched the human sacrifice workout.

[igor heren]

Last night's stone mayhem:

No tacky used.

312 pound natural stone- 20 singles to chest- took 35 minutes

5 minute rest

100 pound granite sphere- 101 cleans and presses- took 35 minutes

Pretty happy with that amount of work in 75 minutes.

I am going to be feeling this one for some time I believe.

Very interesting combination of stone loading and sphere overheads.

[Steve Weiner]

Last night's stone mayhem:

No tacky used.

312 pound natural stone- 20 singles to chest- took 35 minutes

5 minute rest

100 pound granite sphere- 101 cleans and presses- took 35 minutes

Pretty happy with that amount of work in 75 minutes.

I am going to be feeling this one for some time I believe.

[George Phipps]

408 pound stone lift
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzeu5z7vV8U

Dave,

Nice job on the big stone. I saw the 200 lbs. sandbag press. Great stuff!

George

[Karl Franzenburg]

Dave,

I have done a couple of stone workouts. The stones I use are pebbles compared to what others on this board use. Not knowing what to expect, I am easing into this. The first workout was about a 90lb stone that I lifted from the ground up to my chest and then pressed overhead. I did it about 53 times in 30 minutes. The next workout was with what feels like about a 200lb stone that I lifted to chest height about 10 times in 15 minutes. That was followed by flipping my 700lb tire about 15 times in 20-25 minutes. My lower back was really stiff for a few days. I like doing these workouts because of the overall effect they have. I plan on doing some kind of stone workout weekly from here on out.


Thanks for asking,

Karl