Stonelifter

Another generation of raw strength.

Stevie Shanks is a drummer, weightlifter with multiple world records, and stonelifter.  Among his many accomplishments, he lifted the 733 lb granite Dinnie Stones.  His father, Jack Shanks, lifted the stones in the 1970s, the first such success in over 100 years.  Stevie carried on this proud tradition, both as a lifter and as a host to the annual Donald Dinnie Day celebration.  How did he do it?  He was kind enough to tell us:

Reflecting

Dad always said,

In order to gain great strength, you must use great strength.

I go as heavy as I can every session – this worked wonders for me. I understand where everyone else is coming from and the reasons for it – CNS, recovery etc. But there’s no feeling like an all-out effort for me and I wanted my training sessions to be as much fun as possible.

Training

I’m now retired from heavy lifting so not prepping for any competition. When I was preparing for a big lift, I always worked up to a max lift then dropped to around 50-60% and repped until failure which for the Shanks lift for example was normally around 15-20 reps at about 180kg. I found the drop sets very beneficial but hated doing them. I did love heavy ring lifting & trap bar and Kennedy lifts off blocks. So much so that no matter what other lifts I was training for I always got distracted and went back to the trap bar, Kennedy, or rings.

Fuelling

I stopped all supplements very early on in my training apart from Vitamin C. I wanted to achieve all my goals the same way dad did with just normal eating. My go to was always a good medium / rare steak. I would have happily eaten that at every meal, but my poor wife needed a bit of variety. Rice, spuds, and pasta were my go-to carbs and my proteins from steak and chicken. Plenty of veg and water to complete the picture.

Weirdest thing I ever tried was the vegan diet. After watching the ‘Game Changer’ documentary on Netflix, I tried it for a full 3 months and I have to say that I absolutely loved it. The food was varied and very tasty. My overall sense of well-being increased, my gut health was amazing, my cholesterol dropped from 5.5 to 4.2, my blood pressure dropped, and I was more alert and refreshed in the mornings. The only downside, and this was a showstopper, was that I could not get my strength levels up. For example, if I laid off deadlifting for a while, I’d start back at around 180 kg and work back up over 200 kg. On the vegan diet I couldn’t get past 180. I added in chicken to the diet and within 3 weeks I was pulling 205 kg.

Supplementing

Supplements were not a factor in my training other than Vitamin C. I don’t doubt the benefits and would advise that anyone considering supplements should do their homework first and link which supplements you need to take to your specific goals. I wanted to do it old school but have no doubt that the correct supplements would have sped the process up for me.

Measuring

Dad and I both agreed that the most important measurement was to listen to your body. If you do, you’ll last the distance. Constantly pushing too far and to extremes will in the short term give you amazing results but in the long term the damage can be significant.

Recovering

Extreme training will always leave you in a state of recovery which is how we get stronger but when training heavy I always waited until I felt I had achieved full recovery. This way I felt I got the most out of my sessions, which were brutal most of the time. I didn’t start heavy training until I was in my 50s so didn’t bounce back the same way I did when I was in my 20s and 30s. Now that I have achieved the goals, I set out to do my training has changed dramatically and I know my body will thank me for it long-term going into my old age.

Mentoring

Hands down it has always been and always will be my dad. His achievements were always amazing to me and to have been able to come close to some of his accomplishments is something I’m very proud of and his mentoring got me over the line every time. It was the training under his guidance that I enjoyed the most. The big lifts at the end were very nice and provided a full stop but the nights spent with dad in my freezing cold garage using his weights were priceless and something I’ll always remember with great affection.

Gathering

The thing that I’m most proud of now that I’ve stopped the heavy stuff is that Dad’s and my legacy will be The Gathering. I started it to give Dinnie lifters a chance to meet up and share their experiences and now it has grown into something that has its own legs and will hopefully live on long after dad and I are gone.