It wasn’t impossible because he was able to close it. He’s on their wall of fame and he’s also noted for several other things. I didn’t realize just how many until I went to his RKC page to snag his phone number in case I needed to call him about something en route. Here are a couple things he’s noted for.

EDUCATION
2004 : NSCA-Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist
2005 : Towson University – BS, Exercise Science
2006 : RKC Kettlebell Certification
2007 : AKC Kettlebell Certification
2008 : CK-FMS Functional Movement Certification

WORK EXPERIENCE
2003 : Personal Training
2004 : Founded Be-More Training, LLC
2005 : Fitness Instructor; Community Colleges of Baltimore County
2006 : Strength Coach; Baltimore County Public Schools
2006 : Senior Fitness Specialist; Erickson Retirement Communities
2007 : Assistant Strength & Conditioning Coach; Baltimore Ravens
2007 : Founded Baltimore Kettlebell Club, LLC
2010 : Assistant Instructor Philadelphia RKC

PERFORMANCES, DEMONSTRATIONS & SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
2005 : Night of Strength II
2006 : Night of Strength III
2006 : Pennsylvania State Strength & Conditioning Clinic
2007 : Association of Oldetime Barbell & Strongman dinner
2007 : Pennsylvania State Strength & Conditioning Clinic
2008 : St. Ursula Health Fair (Boy Scout Troop no 343)
2008 : Pennsylvania State Strength & Conditioning Clinic
2009 : Fox 45 Morning News
2009 : Family Fitness Night
2009 : Pennsylvania State Strength & Conditioning Clinic
2009 : Family Fun Day (C.R.E.A.T.E. Everyday Geniuses)
2009 : ABC 2 News Good Morning Maryland
2010 : Pennsylvania State Strength & Conditioning Clinic
2010 : Family Fun Day (C.R.E.A.T.E. Everyday Geniuses)
2010 : Kettlebells for Warriors (York Barbell)
2010 : Southwest Airlines Employee Expo
2010 : Association of Oldtime Barbell & Strongman dinner

CONTEST HISTORY
2003 : Fall Strongman Challenge (4th)
2004 : Mid-Atlantic Strongman Contest (3rd)
2004 : Maryland’s Strongest Man (2nd)
2004 : Global Grip Challenge (6th)
2005 : Mid-Atlantic Strongman Contest (1st)
2005 : Maryland’s Strongest Man (2st)
2005 : Global Grip Challenge (6th)
2005 : Anne Arundel Highland Games (1st B-class)
2006 : Mid-Atlantic Strongman Contest (2nd)
2006 : Tactical Strength Challenge (6th Men’s open)
2006 : Maryland’s Strongest Man (2nd)
2007 : Mid-Atlantic Strongman Contest (3rd)
2007 : Maryland’s Strongest Man (1st)
2007 : Tactical Strength Challenge (2nd Men’s elite)
2008 : Feats of Strength Contest (1st)
2008 : Mid-Atlantic Strongman Contest (5th)
2008 : Maryland’s Strongest Man (4th)

PERSONAL RECORDS

Powerlifts:
585 deadlift
405 squat

Kettlebells:
Single hand snatch – 24kg x 150
5 min snatch test – 24kg x 132, 32kg x 93
10 min snatch test – 24kg x 203

Strongman:
Farmers walk – 660lb x 20yds
Axle C&P – 250lb x 2
Atlas stones – 331 x 50″

Bodyweight:
Pull ups – 15 (225)
Push ups – 40 (225)
5k run – 26:30 (225)
10mi run – 2:04:01 (235)

Grip Feats:
#3 COC Gripper
IM Red Nail
50lb YORK Blob
Phonebooks & cards
Horseshoes, wrenches & frying pans

Now I cornered Dan and threatened to beat him up if he didn’t answer my questions in an orderly fashion…just kidding I asked him nicely on facebook for this interview and he agreed to it.

How did you get involved with strength training?

Initially I got involved as a teenager. My dad is a life long martial artist and we’ve had weights, punching bags and hand grippers for as long as I can remember. I worked out on and off throughout middle and high school but nothing with any real consistency.

Yeah I actually seem to remember you talking about stopping a fight just by grabbing him and hinting at the power you possess. That’s pretty cool btw. So what made you want to start strength training?

I got tired of being fat. I was about 2 years out of highschool when I got a stretch mark on my stomach. At 6′ 1″ I was an untrained 245lbs and didn’t like what I saw in the mirror. That’s when casual workouts stopped and training started. I made a goal to never stop working out. At first I was about bodybuilding, then powerlifting and weightlifting and then when grip became the weak link in my pulls I got involved in grip training and strongman. Somewhere along the line I simply became an enthusiast of all forms of strength.

From what I can tell you excel in all forms of strength.

Who have been your biggest influences?

Arthur Jones really had an impact on my training early on and got me training harder instead of longer. I think everyone should read his Nautilus Bulletins at least once. Brooks Kubik got me started thinking “outside of the gym” with odd object lifting, thick bars and the like. I think Dinosaur Training is where I learned about the Captians of Crush grippers. Mark Keshishian, Graham Bartholemew and the “Garage Gang” all influenced my training as a competitive strongman. Mark was the judge for my #3 gripper certification and had a “strongman playground” in his yard. Graham was the American Strongman Association state chairman for MD and we had some serious training sessions in his garage over the years. Steve Justa’s “Rock Iron Steel” got me thinking about work and labor as training, and something that could be done day in and day out. Pavel introduced me to kettlebells and the RKC has been very influential shaping me as a trainer. Dennis Rogers taught me how to become a performing strongman, and The Mighty Atom and Slim The Hammerman have both been inspirations to do so.

The things those guys do are incredible. Holding planes back, bending stuff that wasn’t meant to be bent. It’s an unbelievable form of entertainment that I am very happy to witness just because it’s so darn cool. I know for me the study of strongman type stuff started with the kettlebell which I just happened to bump into in a bookstore one day after someone had shown me one. How did you find your way to using kettlebells?

I came across an article by some Russian military guy in a muscle mag. He was talking about kettlebells, one leg squats and rope climbing. Shortly after I met the author at the Arnold in 2003 and got a much more thorough explanation of how and why. I had it in my head to buy a set but hadn’t figured out how to justify another several hundred dollars worth of equipment to my wife. Then we went to the AOBS dinner and saw a demonstration by Max Kettlebells. After the demo, my wife said she wanted a kettlebell for her birthday. We had a complete set by the end of the week.

Am I thinking the same bald Russian guy?

If you are thinking of Pavel, yes

Seems there is a lot of that going around amongst strong dudes. I had read about something called muscle control and for whatever reason you keep popping up whenever I do a bit o research about it. Can you tell us a little bit about muscle control?

http://bemoretraining.blogspot.com/2010/04/muscle-control.html (excerpted from his website)
Muscle Control (MC) is the targeted action of specific muscles that are under your voluntary control. It is a series of isolated contractions usually performed as an isometric. In other words, it is the ability to flex individual muscles while keeping others relaxed.My first introduction to Muscle Control (MC) was when I stumbled across a picture of someone performing “the rope” an abdominal control where a stomach vacuum is held while the rectus abs (6 pack) is contracted. I was amazed that someone could differentiate between abdominal muscles and control them independently from one another. I had never seen any such thing and thought the guy performing it to be some “freak of nature.”

That picture led me to a book entitled Muscle Control by a guy named Maxick. The quick and dirty on Maxick is that he was born in 1882 as a sickly child who was so weak he was unable to walk until the age of 5. Under the advice of the doctor and the enforcement of his parents, he spent most of his youth avoiding anything strenuous. In his desire to become stronger he crafted himself a dumbbell, which when his father found, he destroyed, not wanting his son to overexert himself. It was then when Maxick began developing his system of MC. For more information on Maxick or MC visit www.superstrengthbooks.com

I find muscle control to be difficult to really get down. As you saw when we were discussing this down in Baltimore I can contract my shoulder muscle…but not nearly with the intensity that you were recommending and not without it spilling over to other muscle groups. It’s something I still continue to work at. Any ideas where to go from there (I already read Maxick’s book)?

All I can say is to keep practicing. The deltoids are one of the hardest muscles to control in isolation. You might want to try doing muscle control after a shoulder workout. Do a few lateral or front raises and immediately try doing your controls then. Sometimes after working the muscle in a weighted movement it seems easier to contract it isometrically.

Hmmm. It always seemed to be something I only practiced when I was bored. Not normally “with” the training session. Perhaps I can get some cross innervation like Paul Anderson did by slow supersetting squats with good mornings. If you had to recommend one book for strength training what would it be?

That’s a tough one and my answer would probably be different depending on who was asking. I’m going to go with the Nautilus Bulletins though. I am tempted to say why I would recommend them but I’ll let people answer that themselves, after they’ve read them.

http://www.arthurjonesexercise.com/Bulletin1/Bulletin1.html

http://www.arthurjonesexercise.com/Bulletin2/Bulletin2.html

I definitely plan to read up on those if it means I get to break chains with my hands too What is your favorite feat of strength that you have done?

Probably either bending a #4 draft horseshoe or a triple phonebook tear.

That’s insane! Ok just one more…I used to joke about starting a heavy metal band called Steel Garden (well I actually do plan to start that up at some point, but this is what I would plant in the steel garden) but where on Earth did you get the idea for the Iron Bonsais?

John Brookfield. He used to sell them back in the day. I always wanted to get one but never had the money. When I did my first scroll, I knew instantly that I wanted to make them. I thought about other names but nothing sounded as cool Iron Bonsai. Instead of ripping Brookfield off like so many people do, I simply called the man and asked him if I could use the name. He thanked me for the respect and gave me his blessing. I’ve been making Iron Bonsai for a couple years now. I’ve always had an artistic side to me but never really did anything with it. These sculptures not only provide a creative outlet but make me stronger too.

Where art meets strength. Anyways I really appreciate this interview Dan and you gave a lot of high quality advice. I’m sure my readers will appreciate it too.

If you are in the Baltimore area and want to become strong and awesome I highly suggest you check him out at BeMoreTraining.com and IronBonsai.com

Well back to the story about how the rumor got started about me not wearing a shirt it was him and another dude named Joe Sansalone who said “I didn’t recognize you with your shirt on.” I just started laughing and ran with it. It’s funny because it’s true.

Unfortunately this method of thinking is a lot more common then you might think. How many people do you know that claim to be on a fat loss program and yet what they say is going on and what is actually going on are two completely different things. I was just talking to someone who told me they were trying to lose weight when I advised him to snack on almonds and he told me he was going to get a turkey sandwich from the local store (on white bread with multiple types of cheese). This my friend is an example of how art imitates life and vice versa.

Another way I’ve also seen this done is when people head off to a McDonald’s and order a meal complete with a Diet Coke. Someone close to me couldn’t understand why their cholesterol was so high claiming they eat healthy because they filled their house with fat free this and fat free that. I picked up one of that fat free that’s and pointed at the extensive ingredient list and said, “What’s that ingredient for?” to which she did not know the answer. If you don’t know what an ingredient is for then chances are you don’t know how it will effect your body and you don’t know if you are eating healthy. My knowledge of nutrition astounds her and I’ll be the first to admit that there are a lot of people a lot smarter then me when it comes to nutritional science.

Do you know what those do? Me either.

Now out of chaos can come order. I propose a simple set of guidelines to live by that you can use to live a healthy lifestyle.

1 ) Diet works and exercise works but diet AND exercise works better the the sum of it’s parts.
2 ) Fat loss has to be a concentrated effort. Notice that Kettlebell Burn and Xtreme Fat Loss Diet are programs with time lines and you won’t be on it year round. Who the hell wants to spend an entire year trying to lose a couple pounds anyways?
3 ) Lapses happen, dealt with it. If you skip a workout or slip and have an unscheduled cheat meal it isn’t the end of the program. It’s just a set back. Get the hell up and continue on your way.
4 ) Don’t neglect your strength. It is far more useful then having “good cardio” alone.
5 ) 5 ingredients or less most of the time. 5 ingredients doesn’t allow for a lot of room to start injecting crap into your food.
6 ) Balance everything. Maybe it’s because I am a Libra but I think you need to balance yourself. Charging with a head full of steam is awesome to do just don’t neglect other areas of your life or you’ll crash and burn.
7 ) There is no magic pill. Supplements may help fill in the gaps left over from incomplete nutrition but that is all they do. Fiber rocks.
8 ) There is no magical equipment. Even my favorite piece of equipment the kettlebell is just a tool to load movement with. Your body doesn’t give a crap if a kettlebell, barbell, dumbbell, sandbag, or inverted body provides resistance. Resistance is resistance plain and simple. Having said that the shakeweight and perfect situp are crap designed to separate you from your money.
9 ) Listen to your body. Even if a program calls for an exercise but doing said exercise brings a shooting pain up the you know where then maybe you shouldn’t do that.
10 ) Figure out a better way of doing things. Millions flock to the treadmill when better methods are out there. Having said that action begins change, not thought.
11 ) Sleep. Quit doing so much reading and sleep.

So I know that I have a couple people that get their info from multiple sources that read my blog and I would love to hear some of your guidelines to keep it simple. Let us all hear it.

Josh Koscheck

You see none of this stuff I invented. I may have taken a little of this and little of that or a lot of this and a little of that or mixed and matched different things to learn about how and why they work but in the end I just wanted to learn how to cook rather then to follow a recipe. That is just how I work and since I do this for a living and as a hobby at the same time I enjoy learning different things to accomplish an end.

Now this is all fun and good if you have time to burn. If you don’t then you need to find a system and stick to it until you have reached your goal or until time runs out. If I had a trained cage fighter that wanted to beat my ass and to ensure that doesn’t happen I had to beat his first I would listen to people that are smarter then me and do what they wanted as closely as I possibly can. I wouldn’t try to explore it on my own because there is no time for that…not with the threat of a beatdown on the horizon

If you are in this to try and lose some of the unwanted extra that you have floating around your midsection you can try and figure this out on your own and bumble about and possibly run around in circles or you can use an already proven program. Do this program, follow it as closely as possible, get lean very very quickly. If you don’t have time to waste or don’t care to waste time that would be the best action for you. If you want to try to do a little of this and a bit of that to try and learn that’s ok too.

In my kettlebell fat loss classes I scrapped my old system and have now adopted Geoff Neupert’s Kettlebell Burn program as my new system because in a side by side test it proved to me to be the better one (40lbs lost in 7 weeks using three 45 minute workouts…I can’t compete with that). I felt guilty when I started them on it but since they got phenomenal results I am glad I did it and am now able to keep my blade sharp.

I know I am a bit scatter brained here but the point is that you can try and build a better mousetrap and you might be able to but if you have a mouse to kill perhaps you should just take one that is already existing. The mousetrap just has to get the job done. Basically find a program that suits your goals, stick to it till you have achieved the desired goals of the program. Mix and match when you have more time on your hands.

I even had a running series on this here blog about everything I thought they were doing wrong. If I were the trainer on the Biggest Loser you bet I would do things way way different. It would be a lot more conservative, very boring and wouldn’t make good tv (maybe that’s why I am not making the big bucks but hey, I’ve kept my soul). Boring but I haven’t killed anybody yet and I plan on keeping a good track record.

DO NOT DO THE SWING THROUGH WHATEVER YOU DO

Well anyways the whole thing with that show is it would be laughable if it wasn’t so sad. The fat loss and fitness industry is littered with snake oil salesmen and she isn’t exactly helping the cause. She goes and says that all you need is diet and exercise (good on her!), and then goes and promotes some kind of piece of crap diet pills (bad on her). The thing is a lot of these overweight people are victim’s of false advertising and unscrupulous people who would lend their name to anything that can make them a quick buck. She’s been sued for it before.

But now she has entered the realm of my precious kettlebell, my favorite training tool.

Here is where the defense part comes in.

In the LA Times article about her dvd he goes and attacks the claim on the package where in the advertising it says you can drop 5lbs a week. He goes and breaks down how many calories are in a pound of fat (3500kcals btw) and points out that you can’t possibly lose 5lbs a week, and that’s actually the point I take issue with because it isn’t true.

From the article

“Part of this massive caloric deficit can result from dietary restriction — but not too much or it could cause her metabolism to slow down and she would experience intense hunger. A minimum intake for our hypothetical woman is around 1,400 calories a day, which is about 500 less than her typical weight-maintenance diet. Over the course of a week, she could lose 1 pound this way. So just 4 pounds — or 14,000 calories — left to account for.”

You want to pick on her form then fine because it’s dangerous and it makes it more difficult for me to convince people that this is safe and effective. If you read my last post I interviewed Geoff Neupert Master RKC and in it I asked him what kind of results his clients were getting from Kettlebell Burn. One of his clients dropped 40lbs in 7 weeks from his Kettlebell Burn program, and their metabolism was soaring.

If you itemize it so to speak then 40lbs divided by 7 weeks = 5.7lbs per week which is actually even higher then what Jillian Micheals’ dvd claimed. Now admittedly not every user is going to get that kind of results that that dude got but at least you can see that it is in fact possible to do it and to do it using kettlebells (safely too I might add) and I think one of the big factors is that Geoff’s Kettlebell Burn program also contains a section regarding nutrition where Jillian’s doesn’t. My test group though only followed the training portion and had a different source for their nutrition so to me it’s the actual training in this case that counts.

I guess in the end I am not actually defending her but I am defending our system of kettlebell training (which is very different from hers because it is uhm how shall I say this…safe and effective.

I guess that’s it for now but I would love to hear your thoughts.