Muscle Mentorship Changed My Life - Here's How
A few times a year we host a week-long event called Muscle Mentorship. Muscle Mentorship is a week of 2-a-day training protocols, presentations, meals, and supplements. But you know what it really is?
A crucible that increases creativity, perspective, intellect, grit, and self-esteem. But not without sacrifice.
My name is Cody Romness, I’m a cofounder of Allegiate. I got a ticket to Muscle Mentorship in the first week of September to see what it was like. What you’re about to read is my first-person experience through the haunted house.
If this essay inspires you and you want to attend our next Muscle Mentorship, we have one coming December 28th - Jan 1st. There are less than 5 spots available. At the bottom of this essay, you can buy a ticket for a discount.
THE GHOST OF WHO I USED TO BE
It was our second workout in 4 hours on the first day of Muscle Mentorship. I’m hopped up on a cocktail of supplements: java stim, alpha GPC, fast brain, PA7, creatine, and Laterdays cold brew coffee. In the gym, there’s a flatscreen TV hung on a wall like a jumbotron. Currently, Blue Whales are swimming on it in slow motion. Trent Reznor’s soundtrack from the “Social Network” pumps from the soon-to-be blown-out speaker. There’s zero chance we can sustain this intensity.
We warm up with enough olympic lifts to flip your nervous system silly: a few warm up sets and then 20 reps of snatch and then 20 reps of clean. It’s a full workout on a regular day, but today it’s just the warm-up. The actual workout is 10 sets of 1 rep, fat grip chain-bench from the pins superset with 10 sets of 30kg weighted chin-ups. More than just a mouthful, this program’s designed to work speed on the bench press and our mission is to move the bar as fast as possible.
There are two things attached to the barbell that make this program unique: 1) 8 feet of industrial-weight chain designed for pulling 10-ton tractors in the midwest. But here, they increase resistance on the way up and decrease it on the way down. 2) A piece of technology that syncs to an iPad, displaying your explosiveness in real-time.
“Keep your speed above 1 meter/ second,” Coach says. “If you’re below that it means the weight’s too heavy and you should go down in weight until you’re in the sweet spot. Any questions, fellas?”
Sean and I look at each other wondering if we have any questions. With so much caffeine in our system we can’t vocalize thoughts, so we just shake our heads “no” in response. “Good,” Coach said. And he laid on the bench for his first set.
Coach on the bench for a set
Coach is a savant, artist, and meathead. He’s professionally spent the past two decades obsessed with strength & conditioning. He has bachelor’s degrees in both mathematics and movement science. And dual masters degrees in strength & conditioning and nutrition. He spent a decade as a strength coach at the elite levels of collegiate athletics and throughout his career, experimented on himself with programs & supplements. Interestingly, he’s also built a latticework of pop-culture references, obscure and mainstream, and consumes content like an algorithm: infinitely consuming, always retaining. Muscle Mentorship combines decades of all these things: it’s his Frankenstein.
When it comes to his bench press, Coach is a no-time-to-waste guy. Milliseconds after laying on the bench and putting his hands on the bar, he fires his pecs, the chains roar, and we go berserk. He racks it and we look at the iPad. 1.1 meters per second. Perfect weight selection and speed. Sean’s up next.
Sean’s the head strength and conditioning coach for the WWE’s talent development league: NXT. Prior to that, he was an NFL strength coach. Prior to that, a collegiate middle linebacker at Harvard. Currently, he has piercing blue eyes, muscles everywhere, and a black bandana around his shaved head as he gets under the bar to bench.
He rips his set, a motorcycle roars past outside, and he racks it. We look at the iPad. 1.3 meters per second. Smashed.
Sean Hayes ripping his set of chain bench from the pins.
Victorious, Coach and Sean move to the 30kg weighted chin-up station as I take some weight off the bar for my set. I lay on the bench, get mentally prepared, then strike the barbell. A scream explodes from a forgotten depth of my spirit and the tractor chains roar in my ears. I complete the rep and rack it. It felt a little slow, but clean. I sit up and look at the iPad but the iPad looked away – 0.3 m/s. Slow.
I reach for my water bottle, sip some creatine, and contemplate my options.
Alpha male sea lions are fighting each other on the jumbotron, a killer whale eats the winner, and Marilyn Manson’s blasting from the speaker. Under such outrageous circumstances, obviously I can’t go down in weight. And though 9 more reps at this weight is irresponsible, potentially physically impossible, I decide to keep the weight on the bar. No longer about trivial things like speed on a barbell, this is ego and self-exploration. So I forgo protocol and slip into the deep end in search of something darker.
Coach and Sean faded away but intuitively understood something was happening. I went into fight or flight, and when Fight extended her hand to me, I took it and followed her. For the next 9 rounds, instead of working speed, I maxed out on every rep of bench and 30 kg chin ups. Not knowing if I could get from rep 2 to rep 3. Or from rep 3 to rep 4. Set-by-set I crawled through the darkness in self-dependence and flow-state. I convulsed at set 7. Suffocated at 8. Blacked out at 9. And then I stepped toe-to-toe with set 10.
The killer whales were gone and Batman and Bane fought each other on the jumbotron. A Hans Zimmer score sang through the gymnasium. At 0.2 m/s – a full .8 m/s below the target speed – I finished my 10th rep on bench and stumbled to the chin up station.
The author doing a 30 kg weighted chin up.
I took a knee, clipped the 30 kilo belt around my waist, stood up, and sighed. Wrapping my hands around the chin up bar, I got into the full-hang position and initiated the slowest chin up of my career. I craned my neck and inched my chin over the bar and then lowered my shivering body to the Earth. I unclipped myself and crawled out of the weight belt. Soaked in cold sweat, I drifted to the nearest bench and sat down. I looked back at the chin up station to reflect.
Floating beneath the chin up bar with the weight belt at his feet was a ghost. It was the ghost of who I used to be. With a big chest and crazy eyes, he was staring at me – slowly beating his fist on his chest. We locked eyes and I returned his intensity. Bane taunted Batman on the jumbotron. The Hans Zimmer track crescendoed. My ghost was screaming. The sound deafened. His eyes widened. And then the power went out.
I looked around the gym. The lights were back on. A piano caressed from the speaker. I rubbed my eyes then opened them. No change. Coach and Sean were out on the turf, stretching and chatting so I got off the bench a little shook up and walked over. Sean gave me a high-five as I returned to the huddle.
“Take these,” Coach said, dumping pills into my hands. Stuffing the capsules into my mouth, I wondered if Coach and Sean saw what happened to me. But after we sat in shock for a few minutes, it was clear they’d had their own battles to focus on. Someone broke the silence and we talked about the madness we’d just been through together. Eventually it came time to get up so I peeled myself off the turf. I grabbed my gym bag and got ready to leave.
Walking toward the exit, I looked out the sliding glass doors. Record-setting wildfires in Northern California colored the sky apocalyptic yellow. The outside world looked like a fish tank, with civilians swimming around in cars and bumping into the glass. Ash fell from the sky, like fish food.
Stopping in the threshold of the door, I called over my shoulder, “See you tomorrow, fellas.”
Then I stepped out of the reality distortion field – knowing I’d be back tomorrow to do it again.
Muscle Mentorship changed my life. But only with hindsight and reflection did I realize that. If you’re reading this and wondering why the hell would somebody put themselves through this, it has to do with getting better at life. Putting yourself in scenarios where you’re stretched and the only person you can depend on is you.
What happens when you go past where you thought you could go? You realize you can go further. And though that realization is inspiring, it’s also scary. Because it reminds you that you’re capable of more. And that maybe in other areas of your life, you haven’t been giving it all you got.
“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself – and you are the easiest person to fool.” - Richard Feynman
Want to come to Muscle Mentorship?
It’s coming up: December 28th - Jan 1st. Right now tickets are 25% off for non-members. 50% off for members. There are only a few spots left and this event is close to being sold out. We also have a virtual option where you can get the prerecorded lectures.
Buy your ticket below. Or email tim@allegiategym.com if you have any questions.
For 25% off, use promo code: december
If you’re a member, email tim@allegiategym.com you want to attend and we’ll set you up.