April 14

The Finale

Well, this will most likely be the final blog from me. I will be summarizing everything that has happened this past year and talk a little bit about my future plans. 

One thing that I never did mention this year at all was the fact that I am going to be playing college football next fall at Illinois College, located in Jacksonville, Illinois. My new Offensive Line coach graduated from Lincoln, so he’s got a good relationship with the coaches here. With him coming from Lincoln, he always tries his best to get more Lincoln kids to the next level. The funny thing is I remember the exact date when I texted the coach. It was Christmas Eve, I was on my way to a family Christmas. I am still undecided on my major. I’ve already been in contact with some of the other commits. One of the commits I actually played against him, it was our week 3 game against Jerseyville, me and him were going at all game long. I’m excited to start a new chapter in lifting and football at Illinois College. There’s a kid from Quincy Notre dame, 2 from Rochester, 1 from New Berlin, Jacksonville, Collinsville, I’m sure there are more.

My senior year has been pretty exciting I would say. I’m not going to go into depth with everything because I have already done that. I have done a lot of things to my body that I would have never thought of doing before. We finished our football season 4-5 again in back to back years, which is extremely frustrating. I will say this, I am ready to get out of this school. I’m ready to start something / somewhere fresh. A fresh start is always good

There have been multiple years where I would want to lose some weight but gain muscle, the start of 2023 was the first year where I actually decided to commit to it. After losing the weight I proceeded to lose a good amount of muscle in the process. With losing the muscle It really set me back a lot within my weight training. I went from almost benching 270 to barley benching 225. That is the most frustrating part about going through a cut.

I hope you enjoyed reading my Blogs, and I hope that you were able to learn a few things about me. Thank you for reading

Category: About me | LEAVE A COMMENT
February 21

Lifting competitions

A little over a week ago I got some good news. On February 25 and March 4 I have a lifting competition in Maroa-Forsyth and one in Taylorville. The good news is that seniors are being allowed to compete in them. 

Last year as a junior I went to the Taylorville lifting and easily won within my group. I didn’t go to the Maroa one, because I think the track season started but I’m not entirely sure. This year I have gotten a lot stronger compared to last year, so I really shouldn’t have a problem with winning it again. I know last year there was a Division 1 football player in Maroa who is ridiculously strong. He’s a senior this year so I don’t know if he’s going to be there. If he’s not there then I might have a very good chance of winning that one too. This kid is getting requited purely based off of his size he’s like 6 ‘7″, However though, he can’t really move very well at all like he is not athletic one bit. Luckily, These competitions have been happening right around my maxing weeks. Right now my maxes are 260 bench, 420 squat, and 235 hang clean. I want to hit at least 270 on the bench, I want to try and get like 435 on squat, and probably somewhere around 240-245 on hang clean. I wonder why we don’t hold lifting competitions. I think that it would be a pretty cool thing to do. I am not sure on the amount of people that we are taking, but I do know of at least 3 of the strongest players on the team are going. Me, Kani Carson, and Nicco sundeen us three put in easily the most work out of the whole team.

As a team though we probably won’t win it all because Taylorville brings their whole team. We are excited to compete and make new friends there just like what we did last year.

Category: Rods Lifting Adventure | LEAVE A COMMENT
January 20

Lifting Journey

Well, since the last time I had maxed it’s been 4 weeks. I normally max every 4 weeks into my program. After football seasons is when I started lifting again and I’ve been going almost every weekday for the past 12 weeks.

Normally, the week after I max i will take a rest week, the following week, for recovery. I haven’t been doing that lately because I’ve had somebody to lift with. This past week has been the hardest maxing week for me. I failed the bench at 265 two times this week, I jumped fifteen pounds on my squat max up to 420. I have stopped doing dead-lift just because it isn’t optimal training for athletes. I am attempting to hang clean today, I’m looking to get 235 10 pounds more than my previous personal record (pr). After not really gaining any muscle up in my chest I need to change up my chest workout because it clearly has not helped. After a while your body gets used to the workouts so it’s always good to change up the workouts. After my rest week, one of the trainers at Anytime offered to give me a few free sessions to build my chest back up. The amount of bonds that I have formed at that place makes it feel like a second home. I’m leaving for college in late July, I am really going to miss lifting in that environment.

Even though I am leaving in a few months, I have set some goals for myself before I leave. I would like to be the fastest and strongest version of myself entering a college weight room. My goals are: 300 bench, 500 squat, 250 hang clean. One way that I will become the fastest version is by doing speed and agility training during the spring and summer. Right now since it’s cold what I’ve been doing two things is either walk on a treadmill for about 10-15 minutes speed: 3 incline: 11, or I will hop on the Stair-Master for 10 minutes when I’m done with those I’ll finish it off with 200 jump ropes.

Category: Rods Lifting Adventure | LEAVE A COMMENT
January 6

Winter Lifting

It’s been a while since I have posted, the last time I talked about lifting was right after the football season ended. I have maxed at least once after the last post. I usually lift by myself, but since one of my older cousins, Jake Benninger, is on winter break from college so we have been lifting.

I have a plan that I normally stick with, but these past few weeks with him being home we’ve been doing a hybrid of my workouts and his workouts. Both workouts are intense, but he pushes me more than I can push myself. It’s always to lift with a partner for a few different reasons: you feel more motivated with them, more adventurous and try new things, and they help you be more consistent. With him being in town I was doing a lot of different stuff, I wasn’t used to it and it has helped a lot with muscle gain. The week before Christmas I maxed with Jake, I hit a 255 lbs bench press, 405 lbs squat, 435 lbs dead lift, and a 225 lbs hang clean. 3 out of 4 of these lifts are really good for my sport dead lift is really the only one that is really like not needed for football. Bench press is really good for pressing guys off of you, you need to squat to have strong legs to move other guys, and hang clean is just really good for exploding out of your stance.

I am maxing again in two weeks, I am really excited to see what I do there and how far my maxes increase. My body was so used to sticking to my program that i was starting to plateau, with mixing things up is really going to help to reach more weight. After I max this time I am going to take a week of rest to help my body recover and feel more energized when I lift again.

Category: Rods Lifting Adventure | LEAVE A COMMENT
December 2

Post Season Lifting

Now with football officially over you may be wondering what an offensive lineman does in the off season. Well, as I have stated previously I took a week off for recovery purposes. I’m on a 4 week program where I put in good solid lifts all week for three weeks then on the fourth week I will max.

Normally I will only max on the bench press, squat, and dead lifts, but this time around I’ve Incorporated hang clean. Cleans are really good for athletic training I also do other explosive stuff along with the cleans. My goal for the hang clean was 185 pounds, when I went for the max I hit the weight and I was like “That was too easy”. So I decided to go up in weight and eventually hit 200. That was my goal weight to hit before Christmas and I hit it before Thanksgiving which was huge. My Bench press got up to 250. We had maxed during the school day for PE, but I was in-season when I maxed and I didn’t know what my true one rep max was. I got my squat all the way up to 385 which was well over what my goal was. Before the season I had maxed and hit 365, so going into this max i was planning on just seeing if I could even hit 360. Now my dead-lift there really isn’t anything special about it because i hit what i wanted to hit which was 415.

I lift at a place called Anytime Fitness, I really do enjoy it there. Anytime is a commercial gym, the one we have here is kinda small. I like the fact that it’s not very big, but at the same time there’s a downside to that is that there isn’t very much room to do extra stuff.

Category: Rods Lifting Adventure | LEAVE A COMMENT
November 21

Final Game of my High School Career and Post Season Lifting

Well, this was it I have officially played my final high school football game. We played a pretty solid Triad Knights team, they were very big and a very physical team. I will say they were pretty nice on the defensive side of the ball, to the point where we were able to make jokes.

We started off hot, we were running the ball all of them we were just having our way with them for the first drive. The drive ended with an interception deep in their own territory. After that interception, we weren’t able to get anything rolling on offense. Our defense stepped up huge this game after the first quarter the score was 6-0. Pretty much the same story for the 2nd quarter going into half time the score was 21-0. We got the ball right after half time and we were moving it down the field, we got all the way down within the 5 yard line a could not get the ball into the end-zone, after the third quarter the score was still 21-0. One of my college recruiters were there from Mckendree University, once the fourth quarter started I saw him and I got the nerves again. The final score of the game was 28-0 ending our playoff hopes (I got all of the score updates from MaxPreps ). I am getting back into lifting now that the season is over.

Usually I don’t like heavy serious lifts, I primarily just do maintenance lifts to help keep my strength. I decided to take a week off for rest and to get my body back before I tear it up again while lifting. before the season I was taking more of a power lifting style just to get stronger, now after the season I have started to incorporate more Athlete styles as well. I will do my max lifts every 4 weeks and this week is that time, I am maxing on Bench, Hang clean, Dead lift, and Back Squat. My goals are: Bench-245, Hang clean – 185, Squat- 385, and Dead lift – 415.

Category: Football | LEAVE A COMMENT
October 21

Last High School Home Games

Weeks 7 and 8 were my final high school football games at home. Week 7 we played the Effingham Flaming Hearts for our Pink Out game. Every year we do a game where the cheerleaders and everyone dresses out in pink even the players wear pink accessories.

This game was my second to last game, on 10/7 we played a solid Effingham team that we could’ve competed with more, than what we did the final score was 47-0 Effingham. I will say that they were a very good team up front like where all of the linemen and linebackers are. They had the ability to do multiple defensive moves all within the same play. We like to say that they had a bag of moves.

The final Home game of the year was senior night obviously, we played our final Apollo conference game and we came out on top 52-19 on 10/14, we were also on live T.V. The game was a part of the Friday Night Rivals Series. Coming into the game we knew that we were going to win, we scored pretty easily on our first drive. Taylorville responded with a touchdown of their own, and they missed the PAT it brought the score 7-6. After they scored that really opened our eyes so they won’t just give us the win we had to go take it. after the 1st quarter ended the score was 21-6 us. Pretty much throughout the whole game we were having our way with them. It was senior night so there were some tears that were shed, it just shows how passionate we are as a team. The four captains have been playing with each other since we were all in 2nd grade, my dad was our coach for most of those years so I am definitely going to miss playing with these guys.

we have all been playing together for out whole lives. Photo Creds: My Mom

Category: Football | LEAVE A COMMENT
October 11

Weeks 5 and 6

We played a solid Mt. Zion team. Going into week 5 we were pretty confident that we were going to be able to pull off the win, but we did not. This game brought our overall record to 2-3. We should’ve easily won this game we missed so many different opportunities to make plays and we just didn’t do that. We started the game off hot and scored on our very first offensive drive. We were very in the game going into half time the score was 21-14 Mt. Zion. We just couldn’t get anything rolling on offense we couldn’t stop anything that they were doing in the 2nd half, the final score of the game was 41-14. The next week we were able to get back into the win column with a huge win over the Mattoon Greenwave 27-7.

After a rough 3 weeks of losing we were able to finally bring home a win again. Both teams started off very slow and we both punted on our first drives. When Mattoon got the ball back they went down and scored. We responded very well by scoring a couple of touchdowns at the end of the half going up 13-7. We turned up the intensity in the second and controlled the ball pretty much all half and won the game 27-7. our defense stepped up big this week and responded with not allowing anymore points.

Category: Football | LEAVE A COMMENT
September 23

Senior Year Football Weeks 3 and 4

As we come back to the blog, we are now 2-2. We had a few rough weeks, clearly after starting 2-0. The 2 teams that we have played that we lost to were both big and physical kids. We played a non-conference game against Jerseyville, we had the ability to wear some sweet camo jerseys. On week 4 it was our homecoming game, we played Mahomet-Seymour, they are the best team in the conference.

This Jerseyville team wasn’t a terrible team, but they were mean and physical. Not saying that we aren’t a physical team just saying that they really do spend a lot of time lifting, I may not get all of the details because I try and forget about the losses that we get, I will do my best though! Jerseyville was a very beatable team, we came out hot and scored on one of the very first few plays of the game. Our defense does a really good job of stopping them and allowing us to get the ball back. Neither one of us really scored up until late into the 2nd quarter bringing it to 7-7 at halftime. We are on defense to the second half, we get a turnover, then we go down and score bringing it to 14-7 us. Nothing much goes on until about late in the 3rd quarter when they scored, bringing the game to 14-14 at the start of the 4th. in the 4th quarter our defense ran out of gas and they started to run all over us and scored several times before the end of the game, the final score was 26-14. My coach always talks about opportunity, “If you have an opportunity to make a play make the play” – Coach Silky. The amount of missed opportunities that we missed in that game caused us to lose. The next week we take on Mahomet-Seymour for our homecoming game.

This game was a joke, they were easily the better team. They easily won with a score of 63–14. They are a top 10 team in the state for their class. They rare a very pass heavy team, which we are not we are a run first team, they run a lot of screen passes all over the field. they had some buff human beings. You could tell that they spend most of their off time lifting. Even though we didn’t come away with the victory I was still pleased with how we played. The Saturday after the game was the Homecoming dance, but before the dance I had a Game day invite at Eureka college.

Category: Football | LEAVE A COMMENT
September 9

The first few weeks of my senior season.

Captains walking out for the coin flip. I’m #65

If you enjoy reading about a high school football team’s road to the playoffs, then you came to the right blog. This post is about our first 2 weeks of the season. This season is really important for not only the team, but for our community as well.

The first few weeks of my senior football season have been going pretty well and smoothly. We started the season 2-0 for the second year in a row, we are getting ready to play our week 3 game. The team that we are playing is a pretty solid team. They are 1-1 so it is going to be a pretty tough game for us to win, but I think we can upset them and pull off the win . Historically our football team has not been very good, but this year we have all the right pieces to advance into the playoffs. In Illinois in order to make the playoffs teams have to win a minimum of 5 games throughout the regular season, and 5 games doesn’t guarantee anything.

The first game of the year we came out with a big win 28-0. We were able to move the ball up and down the field. We had a game plan coming into the game, to run the ball sideline to sideline to get their linemen tired. by us getting them tired we were able to hit more of our inside runs up the middle. the only reason that started to work was because of us spreading out their defense. The second game of the year we also had a really good game plan we were able to execute and come away with another shut out victory 20-0. We game into that game with a few injuries to some key players, but we came in a lot more aggressive and was able to get a good victory in.

Category: Football | LEAVE A COMMENT