MAXstyrka

I ran an outdoor swimming club for thirteen years before such things got popular. It was Sunday, Monday and Wednesday in the lake, two other days at an indoor pool and it was a hub of ambitions. We had a few English Channel Swimmers, lake challengers, some of us were extreme cold enthusiasts. The committee […]

My dad had an arc welder in his workshop when I was a kid and it was a thing of wonder. It made a buzzing sound like the black and white Flash Gordon spaceships on Saturday morning television and of course the warning not to look anywhere near it when he was using it was […]

I inherited a pile of archive materials which included an innocuous local newsletter from the early 1970’s. In one small a column a contributor lamented the beginning of mass car ownership noting that commuters taking short cuts across the estate were reducing safety for children playing in the streets. Where would it end? Perhaps there […]

Driving through Anglesey many times on the way to the Ireland ferry I’d often thought to visit the island properly. I did last week. The rocky north coast proved to be the place for adventure. Max and I had ambitions to build David Horne style stone thrones which we did in locations we named Monarchs […]

“Have you ever done a triathlon Dan?” In life’s top trumps I have a few cards to play and in answering that enquiry, yes I once did the London to Paris relay. Four of us ran from London to Dover in 1 hour rotations, took turns swimming to France followed by a cycle ride to […]

My mind is like a tour bus on a day trip to the seaside with noisy passengers. There are expectations, a route and a destination. Circumstances might dictate a detour and delays. Questions arise. Who decides which way to go? The passengers have opinions, the driver decides which gear to use and to steer left […]

Are you influenced by advertising? If you’re not actively resisting, you are. My late friend Fred Barnfield was an artist who spent a lot of time considering such things. His library was full of self help/get rich quick/win friends and influence people books, highbrow tomes on economics, autobiographies of people like PT BARNUM, and titles […]

A rare weekend of no action engulfed me with the start of it being breakfast at the sailing club with Angel who, like me is a veteran of the cold water rescue team. It was a perfect day to launch the rowboat – not much wind, strong sunshine – but Angel had to work later […]

Chopper and I met in the seaside town of Westward Ho! (the only UK town with an exclamation mark in its name.) I’d been here in ‘80 and ‘81 so recounted fond memories as we walked the cliffs to a deserted rocky beach. A few years ago Strongman David Horne built an elaborate Conan the […]

I never got to see the Camberwell Werewolf, despite travelling in that vicinity regularly for a few years, mostly after dark. It was a vague preposterous tale, a throwback of a bygone age that appeared in a national newspaper’s weird news section. I’m not saying I believe it, but I like the possibility. I’ve always […]

I read the Saga of Grettir the Strong around twenty-eight years ago. I was an aspiring strongman with a love of mythology. I’d been injured badly when I was 13, recovered and was still on the up with plenty of hope and ambition. It’s no spoiler to reveal that Grettir wasn’t the easiest to get […]

What else to do when fuel prices spiral upwards daily than take your friends on a long road trip? Odin and Chopper drove 325km to meet me, and continued 455km as passengers. Atom Bomb had been on night shift and decided to meet us there and ride back. It being a holiday weekend, traffic was […]

Cooking was not something that I thought highly of when I was a child. Eating, that was another matter but the corelation between the two was not obvious to me until later. I spent many Saturday mornings at my Nan’s house marvelling at the food she produced. Better than any restaurant then or since. Conversely, […]

Dragging the lump of tree through the woods was hard enough but brambles and briars pulling at my ankles gave some extra hinderance. My general strategy for manual labour is to move slowly with a big load, rather than make several smaller journeys. Another tug at the ankle made me think of dark horror movies […]

Twenty-seven years ago I was having fun in the heats of the UK Strongest Man competition where I was strong enough to move the kit about but never near to qualifying for the afternoon sessions. The best battled for a place in the finals to be held elsewhere. Britains Strongest Man on at the same […]

I listened to some smooth Jazz on the solitary drive North to Preston for a regional armwrestling warzone tournament which was just as well given the time spent stuck in traffic. How do the people who listen to death metal feel under similar circumstances? I imagine it would be stressful. Dave Brubeck, Paul Desmond and […]

We met at 0610 for the first stage of our roadtrip. Three road warriors – Max, Stevo and l (Dan) set off to take our chances alongside 918 others at the Danish open judo cup in Odense. There was some uncertainty despite resolve as between the three of us we have a fractured shoulder, broken […]

Before the age of eleven I cycled a lot with my Dad. Mum was unimpressed. “How far are you taking that boy?” He’d answer: “Never more than 11km.” It wasn’t really a lie. In later years retracing the routes I can confirm we had not been further than 11km in a straight line from home […]

The endless road led me back to the Grip Factory for a steel bending masterclass. Multi time world record holder and organiser David Horne is legendary in the world of grip and is dedicated to keeping alive strength traditions from an age some have forgotten existed. In the UK (and maybe many other places) strongmen […]

One of the weekly sessions I used to do through the winter several years ago involved very little effort. I was training to swim the English Channel and every Wednesday evening I would make a simple immersion on a boat slipway of a lake. My friends and I would sit or stand in the dark, […]