Ty Roberts - 355 axle press

This month's feature athlete is Ty Roberts. Ty first started competing in April of 2006 an has been going strong ever since! Ty's competition highlights are:

• In 2016 he placed 2nd at ASC Masters Nationals, and 2nd in California's Strongest Man Open middleweight division.
• In 2017 He won 1st place at ASC Masters Nationals with an invite to WSM under 105kg open division
• In 2018 he won 1st place at USS Masters Nationals with an invite to Masters Worlds.

Ty is an incredible strength athlete who has competed in 60 competitions since he started in 2006.

Not only is Ty a great athlete, he is a great guy! He is humble in all his accomplishments, and will always give you that welcoming Ty Roberts smile. He also has an amazing athletic family. His wife Jody Roberts (who is equally amazing, strong, and has such a warm welcoming personality that makes you feel like family)  also competes at strongwoman and won her group at ASC Masters Nationals in 2017. Their son Chase holds several world records with the AAU Feats of Strength for 8-9 year olds that includes Bench Press for reps, Deadlift for Reps, Conans Wheel and Duck Walk. So keep an eye out for him as he gets older! He will be a force to be reckoned with!

Ty says that competing in strongman has been one of the best things he has ever done. It's an amazing, supportive community and he has found that having a contest to train for, and continuing to have competitive goals as he gets older is the key to staying healthy both physically and mentally.
Thanks for stopping by! -Jolene Westerling

Thoughts from Coach Mike:
This is a great video to watch if you are struggling with axle press. You can see as he takes the axle out of the rack it “hovers” a good inch above his shoulders. Ideally the axle would rest squarely on the top of the deltoids, so the full leg drive could be transferred through the athletes skeleton into the bar in the straightest vertical path possible. However, due to his limb length and minor flexibility issues that are common in lots of strength athletes, he doesn't quite have it racked perfectly here. However, if you watch closely as he goes into his dip; the weight and momentum of the bar going down push it down onto the top of his chest so when he drives up with his legs the bar is against his body, and the full leg drive is transferred into the bar. If the bar had continued to hover, the arms and shoulders would actually act like shock absorbers and absorb some of the drive he exerted with his legs instead of allowing it to go into the upward momentum of the bar. You can also see as he reverses direction at the bottom of the dip, the axle moves into it’s final position resting on his chest. This position is a bit more forward than it would be if it could have rested in the ideal position on the top of his shoulders. So when he drives out of the dip and gets full momentum, he has to move his body forward to get under the bar. He lands the jerk with a perfectly vertical forward shin and his hips, shoulders and elbows are in line under the bar. You may have to slow down the video or go through frame by frame to see what I’m talking about as he tends to recover the jerk and move through the whole thing and get right to the end of the lift quickly. Ty is a great example of an athlete that finds the best positions and techniques to get the most out of his personal body mechanics while still hitting the most important technical aspects of a lift.

For The Axle Clean and Split Jerk the most important points to remember:

1. Rack bar squarely on shoulders (Ty modifies this by getting it firmly against his chest by the time he reverses the dip)
2. Go into the dip with hips and spine in line and not allowing hips to travel forward. 
3. Push knees out to minimize forward knee travel. 
4. Drive up with hips and legs. 
5. Fully extend body into the bar getting full drive and momentum from legs before driving with arms. (If racking bar on top of shoulders you can shrug into the bar as a cue to achieve full extension)
6. Drop body down into split moving body as needed so elbows, shoulders and hips line up under bar. 
7. Forward foot should land flat pointing straight ahead with weight on outside edge of foot. 
8. Forward shin should be vertical upon landing to ensure a wide split and limit force on forward knee.  
9. Back leg should be close to straight and back foot solid on ground. (can be flat or on toes)

Here is the 8 week press program I wrote for Ty to hit a lifetime PR on split jerk as a masters athlete. 

Week 1 Log Clean and Push Press (clean first rep of each set only) 7 set of 3 at 70% of 1RM.

Week 2 Axle Split Jerk (out of rack or off boxes) 10 singles at 80%of 1RM.

Week 3 Log Clean and Push Press (clean first rep of each set only) 8 sets of 2 at 75% of 1RM.

Week 4 Axle Split Jerk  (out of rack or off boxes) 10 singles at 85% of 1RM.

Week 5 Log Clean and Push Press (clean first rep of each set only) 10 sets of 1 at 80%. of 1RM.

Week 6 Axle Split Jerk (out of rack or off boxes) 5 singles at 90% of 1RM. 

Week 7  Log Clean and Push Press (clean first rep of each set only) 7 sets of 3 at 75% of 1RM.

Week 8  Axle Split Jerk (out of rack or off boxes) Work up to a new 1RM. 

The log clean and push press was trained as an assistance lift to work on leg drive and lockout because the log rests firmly on the chest and can be brought down and racked more safely for multiple reps. Together the two lifts compliment each other nicely.