Arthur Saxon and CrossFit - 5 Lessons from one of the strongest men in history
Learning from the founding fathers of strength training, who operated in a time where there were no steroids to facilitate huge gains, is key to the way I look at strength and movement development. Arthur Saxon is one of the most well known strongmen from 100 years ago and he left a massive performance legacy that I believe no man alive today can equal. Arthur and his brothers introduced the world to extreme strength performances. They went to levels that few people in history have ever reached. Arthur is certified to have pressed with 1 arm more than 150kg many times and over 165kg as a personal record, at a bodyweight of around 92kg. This press was done with a side press method that’s been lost today. Very few people will ever hold this much weight over head with BOTH hands!
Saxon’s Amazing Feats Of Strength at a Weight of 200lbs:
One-Hand Snatch ......................................... 200 lbs.
Two-Hand Military Press ............................. 252 lbs.
Bent Press. .................................................... 371 lbs.
Two-Hands Anyhow .................................... 448 lbs.
Two-Jerk from Behind Neck .........………...311 lbs.
Toss from Hand to Hand at Arms Length .... 315 lbs.
One-Arm Military Press ............................... 126 lbs.
Two-Hands Clean and Jerk ...........…........... 342 lbs.
One-Hand Clean and Jerk .........………....... 247½ lbs.
What does his book "The Development Of Physical Power" offer? Arthur believed that you needed to have a strong constitution from birth, remember this was a different era, a time where a newborn baby might not be named for weeks, until it had a good chance of surviving, to save any unnecessary heartbreak if it didn’t make it. Arthur was strong and agile from early in life and felt his strength feats were a natural progression from a childhood full of outdoor adventures, in local forests and climbing trees. This ingrained physicality obviously carried over to what he would later achieve.
Key points
Arthur didn’t believe in light weights or much mobility work. He believed in heavy lifting and he performed it most days as a strength performer.
The Saxon brothers didn’t over-specialise. They wanted to be good at anything involving strength and practiced with many different kinds of barbells and dumbbells (most were fixed weight implements and non-standardised at that time.) They also did long distance bike riding and other endurance feats.
Arthur believed that strongman events should be back-to-back and varied to show who is the true strength athlete, not just with the ability for one big lift but to repeat quality efforts. Sounds a little like CrossFit Games.
Arthur was a champion wrestler despite not specialising in wrestling and without being overly technical. He was strong and he dominated many esteemed wrestlers.
The Saxon brother’s were famous for their big eating [though this was presented by Joe Weider who is known to be prone to exageration]. In the book Arthur simply talks about whole food and some hearty unpasteurised beer.
For breakfast they ate 24 eggs and 3 pounds of smoked bacon; porridge with cream, honey, marmalade and tea with plenty of sugar. At three o’clock they had dinner: ten pounds of meat was consumed with vegetables (but not much potatoes); sweet fruits, raw or cooked, sweet cakes, salads, sweet puddings, cocoa and whipped cream and very sweet tea. Supper, after the show, they had cold meat, smoked fish, much butter, cheese and beer. Following this they had a chat and at one o’clock went to bed. The Saxons did have a “health drink” which I presume they concocted themselves. The ingredients were dark lager beer (or Dublin stout) mixed with Holland gin, the yolk of an egg and plenty of sugar. “It is a very good but strong drink” was the Saxon opinion, “but, if you are not used to it you will get dizzy very quickly.” It seems to me that one would have to be a very strong man in the first place, in order to drink it. One thing Arthur Jones wrote which could easily have come from modern day Old-Style performer Bud Jeffries who I wrote about in a recent post is this one: The usual idea about strength–I mean the idea of the average reader of health magazines–is generally a wrong one. Although a weightlifter (and weightlifters are supposed to be very narrow-minded in their views on this subject), I hope that I, personally, am broad-minded enough to recognize that a man does not prove himself an all-round strong man just because he is able to lift a heavy weight, especially when the weight is lifted once only. The following is my diagnosis of real strength: Genuine strength should include not only momentary strength, as proved by the ability to lift a heavy weight once, but also the far more valuable kind of strength known as strength for endurance. This means the ability, if you are a cyclist, to jump on your machine and ride 100 miles at any time without undue fatigue; if a wrestler, to wrestle a hard bout for half an hour with a good man without a rest, yet without becoming exhausted and reaching the limit of your strength. Apart from sports, enduring strength means that the business man shall stand, without a break-down, business cares and worries, that he shall be capable, when necessary, of working morning, afternoon and night with unflagging energy, holding tightly in his grasp the reins of business, retaining all the while a clear mind and untiring energy, both of body and brain. The man who can miss a night’s rest or miss a meal or two without showing any ill effect or without losing any physical power, is better entitled to be considered a strong man than the man who is only apparently strong, being possessed of momentary strength, which is, after all, a muscle test pure and simple. In the latter case, where a man raises, once only, a heavy weight, all that he proves himself to possess is muscular control and great contractile power, but this does not guarantee sound internal organs, nor does it prove that a man would come out well in an endurance test. The man capable of long feats of endurance should live longest, and such a man will find his powers of more avail in every-day life than the man who has sacrificed vital strength for an extra few eighths of an inch of muscle, and perhaps the ability to raise a few pounds more in a certain position in a weightlifting test."
I think the above will cause some of my critics, perhaps, to admit that after all I have broad-minded views on this important question, i.e., “What is real strength?” therefore, if a weightlifting competition were held, I should like to see quite a number of lifts attempted, as is the method on the Continent, and to see each man go on with the lifting without too many opportunities for rest, so that we should not only ascertain who is possessed of greatest momentary strength but also who is possessed of the enduring strength as well, and it is a combination of these two which makes real strength. Keep doing your research, enjoying your training and adding weight to the bar like the old-timers did.