New 4-Hour World Record – Joe Ceklovsky 7 Comments

Written by Tim Ferriss Topics: Physical Performance, The 4-Hour Body, The Book - 4HWW

The 4-hour lifestyle is about getting more from less in all areas of life. I just returned last night from South by Southwest (SXSW), where I presented a few fundamentals of The 4-Hour Workweek. Much more to come on the interesting after-effects of that later.

In my inbox this morning was an e-mail from Joe Ceklovsky, one of a dozen or so powerlifters I’ve worked with, primarily as related to neural acceleration. He just set a new World Powerlifting Organization (WPO) world record in the 148-lb. class with a 503-lb. benchpress. To put this in perspective, that is 3.4 times his bodyweight, so if you weigh 180 lbs., you would need to press 612 lbs. to match him, which is more than six 45-lb. plates on either side of the bar. The best part? Joe trains benchpress once per week for less than one hour and has a full-time job outside of this passion.

Remember: more with less. Smarter is better than harder. See his latest record here. His all-time competition record of 525 lbs. is presented below to amaze. If you have trouble viewing it, go here. I formally predict here that he will hit 551 in his next competition. Congratulations, Joe! (Update on Jan. 20, 2008: Joe has now benched 600 lbs. at 148, 4.06x his bodyweight)

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/czsGl4CmKf4" height="350" width="425" /]

Posted on March 15th, 2007

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7 Responses to “New 4-Hour World Record – Joe Ceklovsky”

Joseph Marino
March 22nd, 2007
11:58 pm

Good lord. I spend 2 hours per day at the gym and bench a respectable 285 at 180 lbs… and I’m not even at double bodyweight!

I shudder to think how I’m mispending my time (and supplement money).
Steve Yakoban
April 27th, 2007
1:44 pm

Impressive – no doubt. I do think Joe has some unique genetics though.
anthony
June 4th, 2007
2:50 pm

pretty cool

what are you referring too by neural acceleration? are you talking about a physiological mechanism to recruit more fibers or a training method, or a supplement?
David
July 12th, 2007
6:46 pm

I would be interested to know what Joe benches raw without that bench shirt? I would guess about 350-400lbs which at 148lbs weight class is still world class but if the weigh-ins are 24 hours before instead of 2 hours then he probably weighed closer to 160-165lbs when he actually lifted? I’ve seen a shirt add 300lbs to a superheavyweight’s bench. Also, the rules are very lax in the WPO. So, people comparing themselves to this should know that though phenomenal it isn’t as unattainable as it first seems.
I’ve lifted for 28 years total and powerlifting for about 23 of those years. We don’t call benchers only powerlifters. They’re bench press specialist. Try squatting heavy before the bench and deadlifting after and you’ll know the difference.
Jake
November 6th, 2007
9:26 am

That’s dedication to be willing to lift so much that you tear blood. (O_o)
Jesse
February 2nd, 2010
10:58 am

So none of those links worked to the video.

Also, where do we find his workout description for his 1x bench per week workout?
Jason Gruner
February 7th, 2010
8:46 pm

Tim,
Had a question about recovery after an intense physical competition. Whether it be powerlifting, MMA or a rugby match, what would you suggest as a remedy to combat the soreness and stiffness that is generally present the next couple days and typically limits athletes from getting right back to the training table.

Long time reader of your stuff and thought you’d have a quick answer for something like this.

Thanks,