Great-Grandpa's Record Still Stands

On Thanksgiving Day, I had another go at the 50lb scale weight on Grandma's farm. Somehow it looked bigger than I remembered it... I tried to hold it like a kettlebell and realized, with it's sharp edges that it would NOT be held that way. Basically, to press it, you have two choices - bottoms up, or hold it like a kettlebell, but with the wrist bent way back. I went with the second option and, with my uncle counting but distracted by birds in a nearby tree, managed 20 (two reps shy of my great-grandfather's number) with a 4 second lockout on the final rep.

I was a little irritated by my failure (and failure to train for the attempt), but after hearing more tales of my great-grandfather's strength was consoled, a little... It was fun to listen to my uncles talk about the things they saw on the farm growing up - tales of guys doing pinkie lifts and presses with scale weights like this one, rafter pullups, lifting pairs of full 5 gallon buckets over fences all day, etc. It makes you wonder how strong you might be if you had grown up w. hard manual labor. I'm certainly not complaining that the hardest physical thing I did growing up was "practice", but it does makes you wonder...

As a gift, my grandmother gave me the scale-weight. It now sits in my garage, but I plan to make all "official" attempts at Grandma's farm.

I hope everyone had a Thanksgiving as good as mine.