What We Believe
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Strength
There is a truth in strength. Strength doesn’t come from easy. Strength doesn’t just get handed to us. We have to earn our strength and it’s the process of trying to get stronger that makes us who we are. Learning a new skill will always reveal who we really are. The best part is that it reveals our best selves! I remember my days in the Fire Academy, learning the basics to what is the ART OF FIREFIGHTING. Learning the skills that will help me do my job. One of the main reasons besides wanting to help people was that I wanted a job where I had the opportunity to use my body, to push myself, to test my mettle.
We are movers and we like to move well! Having a mind body connection and feeling our muscles work well leads us back to PRIMAL MOVEMENT!
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Mobility
I always trained with weights and still do, but if I continued to train with just weights I would have lost my mobility. Between fighting fires and weight lifting and getting older I was burning the candle at both ends. I was falling into a slump and I had a feeling of having no one to turn to, a sort of disconnect. When all else fails you do anything out of desperation. I picked up a mace. Quickly I found the mace helped me in so many ways, for starters I can still train with weights because of the mace. Its important to weight train because it’s important to be big and strong and have muscle. This goes for anybody, regardless of what your career choice is. But certainly for firefighting you have to be strong, have good cardio and be able to move well. Adding in the mace keeps me moving well. On the fireground I can swing an axe, stretch a hoseline and climb a ladder with a 50 lb air tank on my back. After 16 years I am moving better and do it all and quickly recover. I am ready to go for more work and the best part is I feel solid, durable and resilient and injury free. -
Brotherhood/Sisterhood
Whether you are on the fire department or military or police or any first responder or you are a modern day Viking you understand the importance of the tribe, the brotherhood or the sisterhood. You understand the TRUTH IN OUR STRENGTH. This isn’t about having a six pack or being able to deadlift 800 lbs. although if that’s something you want you can definitely have that, This is about being part of a culture of strength. Both physical and mental strength. We can get lost in debate over what true strength is so let us instead consider what weakness is. Not acting when in Fear is weakness. Lack of compassion and empathy is weakness. Getting lost in bad habits that hurt us is weakness. If We find our strength and our cause by finding our purpose then the fear of acting disappears. So do the bad habits. In our struggle to find our purpose we learn humility and compassion. We grow in both body and mind, For some they will grow spiritually as well.
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The Mace
There are many ways to use a mace to develop your fitness. I have enjoyed using them all. I started introducing mace and clubs into my clients training anywhere I could. Warming up with flow, hitting the dumbbells for some solid hypertrophy work and then finishing off with metabolic training doing ballistic movements with a mace at heavy weight. Clients doing 360s after a bench press session turned into a normal and expected thing! The feeling of all that tightness slipping away as they make rhythmic swings.
Your training isn’t fixed in one place either, it’s dynamic. The mace may be a part of your training or it may be ALL of your training it’s entirely up to you!
Grow & Improve
So here we are and the community continues to grow and you are part of this physical culture. The passion I feel keeps growing. I want to do more. With the launch of the new website I have my sights raised for really bringing the community up higher than ever. While everyone continues to do their part I continue to do mine, inspired by how hard everyone is working to get this type of training VALIDATED!
Even I am continually working hard to GROW & IMPROVE and I have a little secret. I know that stepping up even when you are unsure of how to do it is a sure fire way to break out of your comfort zone and keep your growth going. I have found that when I record the follow along workout videos that members can access in the members section, that I really work my tail off! Knowing that you will be following along and training with me really puts my training on another level. It’s raw and it’s real and it’s fantastic!
The same goes for the SMN Podcast. I know that when I speak I better know what I am saying but what is the most amazing thing about the podcast is that when I don’t know then I have to be humble and say it… I DON’T KNOW…. but I will learn with you as we explore this world.
The purpose of The Steel Mace Nation is to empower and unite coaches, personal trainers, group instructors, artists, practitioners, athletes, TACTICAL ATHLETES and students to use the mace safely and effectively as part of their movement practice.
As head coach and founder of this program, I have sought out the finest mace coaches available in the United States and parts of the rest of the world and received instruction from them at workshops and certifications, as well as formed ongoing relationships with them to ensure I was receiving the most cutting-edge information and continuing the best practices in regards to instructing others.
Furthermore, I started the Steel Mace Nation podcast in June of 2019 and have interviewed these coaches and experts as well as many others. These podcasts are WORTH THEIR WEIGHT IN GOLD and available on YouTube, iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play and many other platforms. Everyone is welcome to jump in and become part of the conversation as we extensively discuss steel mace training.
As humans we all need a cause to get behind. When I started the SMN podcast my WHY was simple, to bring our voices to the forefront and put together an ongoing discussion about (fitness?). I was amazed with the depth of the mindset toward strength and simplicity that the steel mace user had. That’s because I quickly learned that those who train hard with the primal movements do so with conviction and with purpose. The mace, kettlebell,clubs, sandbags, heavy stone lifting anything that would be unconventional all contain powerful proponents that are universal.
