Science: Chris Duffin

This article isn’t meant to attack anyone, or be inconsiderate of challenges others face. What it is meant to do is to challenge the thought process of those that assume they know the privileges bestowed on others. What sparked this brief piece is being asked to reflect on my white male privilege and my elite lifter privilege before posting on social media. Specifically the elite lifter privileges of being able to train in the best facilities with the best tools, that others don’t have the advantage to use. It is this latter portion that I will address.

For the record I do indeed have these privileges. And they go beyond the training tools. Privileges I use to my competitive advantage whenever I can. I am able to interact with the best lifters in the world and owners of successful companies in the field. From them I glean knowledge and tips not available to others. Being able to learn from the best of the best in each minor discipline is invaluable. I am also able to secure the best care when I am injured with the network I have developed because of these privileges.

There is no argument to these privileges. But the better approach isn’t to ask me to consider these privileges before posting my accomplishments its to ask me WHERE these privileges came from.

It all began over 25 years ago in this house I posted on Instagram a couple months ago.

After a couple rough winters in central Oregon cooped up in a 16ft trailer in the mountains we got this ‘home’. It didn’t have electricity, running, water, or insulation. It was heated by wood and we read books by candle light at night. Once a week we would heat up water on the stove and step out the back door and poor it over your head while scrubbing down. At this time I started lifting. I bought a set of used ankle weights at goodwill and began running, doing air squats, and pushups till I couldn’t move anymore.

The next summer I began mowing lawns and chopping wood and using the money to purchase weightlifting equipment. The new lifters today have probably never seen the old plastic coated concrete weights and hollow tubular bars. But I was setup with those out back of our house.

Between that time and now there has only been a few brief breaks between either training in the gym or for sports. I was even training in the phase when I was working full-time, pursuing my degrees full-time, and had taken custody and was raising my three sisters. The latter half was due to the deteriorating environment at home that I couldn’t have continue.

Today I train in one of the best facilities available. This facility is something I started creating myself over a decade ago. To achieve what I wanted I knew I had to build it and did so from the ground up. In the first few years I designed and fabricated all the equipment myself and still do so today with when custom pieces are required. A friend and myself welded the first squat rack up in his dad’s garage, before moving it to his garage so we could train. I took on a huge financial burden to purchase or build all the equipment in our facility today. This risk was taken a step further about 5 years ago at the same time I was starting a family with my wife. A partner and myself took on a lease for a commercial building and opened Elite Performance Center to the public. All the while working my day job and raising my family.

Without a doubt there are privileges that I have from where I sit as a lifter today. But I have absolutely no reservations about using those privileges as they have been earned over the course of my life. I will use these privileges to advance myself further as a lifter and to pass that knowledge along the best I can as I do regularly. Moderation of this process, this natural way of things is detrimental to the way I chose to live…. to live, learn, and pass ala EliteFTS values.

November 5, 2015

Oftentimes I get questions about pieces of my training that show up on log, and many times I don’t answer these questions. What may surprise you is that I’m actually doing you a favor by not answering. It is human nature to get excited with new things, be they new toys or ideas. The “shiny object syndrome” is in all of us at varying levels. As a human being its important to recognize this and particularly if you’re an influencer of any sort in your field. Hell, I’ll argue in today’s social media age we all need to be aware of this. Just think if everyone had to wait a year before they could have posted about how awesome their Bullet-Proof coffee was. By now we have seen that the novelty has worn off and most no longer do it. My choice to intentionally delay stating an opinion, what I call the 6-Month Rule, would stop nearly fads in their tracks.

What would happen if everyone had to follow a simple validation process before posting, blogging, vlogging, or whatever about their new “shiny object or idea”? The habit of promoting untested ideas is incredibly pervasive in the fitness industry where everyone wants to make his or her mark by bringing or popularizing something new. It is something that should be detested by the industry, and if you’re an influencer you should be asking yourself if your part of the problem.

You should be embarrassed if you continually promote the next hot thing, and 6-months later that thing is not part of your own program. I know I would be. This is why I use a validation process. For me it involves incorporating the tool, method, or idea in my training for several months. At this point, I will then select a few coaches or key athletes at my facility and then share the approach with them. I ask them to report back to me in a couple months. Then, I do the most important part of the process…. I WAIT. If at 6 months it’s still not a priority in my training, then the idea is dead. The “shiny and new” effect has begun to fade and the idea must stand on its own. Does it work? Does it provide value? Is it enough of a priority to make time in my life to incorporate it? Only when the answer to these questions is, “Yes!” do I start to promote an idea.

Typical Validation Process

Phase 1 – Test on myself for months and refine (typically 1-2 months)

Phase 2 – Test on select athletes & coaches who can give critical insight (typically 1 month)

Phase 3 – Review feedback, make adjustments and retest if needed (Varies from 0-3 months)

Phase 4 – Test across larger population in gym (typically 1-2 months)

Phase 5 – Reflect on importance and prioritization in training (1-2 months)

As an athlete, coach, and innovator in the sport, I am an experiment. I’m constantly trying new ideas or approaches. This honestly isn’t the best from my personal athletic perspective. But my priority is the impact I have on people in the field of strength training, so I make this compromise. In this process I am often excited about the new method, idea, or tool, but I hold to the process as I know human nature and find that most ideas simply don’t pan out as priorities in the long run.

Every article I have written or product I have produced has gone through this process. As shown in the validation process above, 6-months is the absolute minimum and it often takes closer to a year. A lot of items or ideas I have produced have been key principals in our facility for 5+ years by the time they reach publication and production phases.

Be proud of your work now and when you reflect on it years later. You can avoid being part of one of the biggest problems in the fitness industry by using a simple validation process. A process with the most important step being, the WAITING game. Yes, this means you will have a lot less new ideas to write about. And it means a lot of other people will have the opportunity to write about those ideas before you do. But it also means you won’t lose your credibility over time. And most importantly people will respect your work, including yourself.

November 21, 2015

Who are you and what defines your identity? It is not your past, a sum of your experiences or your environment. YOU define who you are.

You have the power to define ‘who you are’ and what you will be in the future. None of your past experiences define you unless you let them, or want them to. You can create the vision for who you choose to be in life and then work to become that.

To many people let past experiences or external factors define them. It can be productive and instructive to acknowledge and honestly evaluate your past, but when you let your past define your present and future self, it puts a shackle around your ankle limiting your potential for growth. Great men never allow themselves to be limited in this way. Extraordinary things have never resulted from this approach. Visionaries shape the world we live in and you can be the visionary who shapes your life.

I’ve referred to my own past experiences occasionally in recent articles, interviews, or podcast. But this story has nothing to do with what I’ve chosen to become and who I am today. Let me repeat that, NOTHING. I share my story to inspire others, not to wallow in the past. To me it feels like the story of someone else’s life at this point, almost like fiction, compared to my life today.

My upbringing living in abject poverty did not create me. We poached animals, put water out in the sun in gallon jugs to shower, and met a lot of unsavory people through the years. I don’t remember how many winters we spent with a family of 5 living in 16-foot trailer “down by the river.” We moved every 2 weeks after the forest service questioned us so we appeared to be camping. When we had homes they were often without electricity or power and occasionally condemned.

In my first few years of school I was held back and told I was a slow learner. Then I buried myself in books, which was easy to do without TV or other modern day distractions. It also helped that I didn’t have many friends at that time and didn’t like talking to people. I became the nerdy straight-A student by the time I entered high school. Then I decided to do sports and lift to become strong both mentally and physically. After high school I challenged myself with a career in leadership which was probably the farthest thing from my introverted and non-social childhood.

I made choices that helped me overcome my circumstances even early in my life, and these choices created opportunities to make more choices that allowed me to take control of my own life and create my own future. My brother, who I love dearly, chose to let those circumstances impact who he became. Things that happened in our early years destroyed him mentally because he let those experiences define his identity. Today we live dramatically different lives. He still lives the one I left behind, refuses to change, and has probably become even worse.

During my senior year in high school, my wrestling coach approached me and asked me for my thoughts about the upcoming district meet. I told him that I was going to win and go onto the State Championships. A few years later he confided with me that prior to that conversation he didn’t think I was going to make State because I had already been bested by three guys that season.. But my response was so matter of fact, unwavering and certain that he didn’t know what to do but believe me. I went on to win districts and went all the way to the final match at the State Championships without having a single offensive point scored against me the whole time.

I could have told you in my late teens I would be a world-class strength athlete. At my first management job, I looked around and decided that I would be General Manager of large production plants within 10 years. I decided that I would be in the position shaping the vision and direction of the companies I worked for. I also knew I didn’t have the credibility to say these things without being laughed at.

Instead of expressing my vision I began to get a tattoo. It took a few years to finish but the eagle that covers my stomach and the eagle that covers my back are actually shackled by chains that run all the way down to my ankle. The tattoo represents the idea that “you can fly to whatever heights you can envision in life if you realize that the only thing holding you back is yourself.”

I am now in the process of tattooing over the eagle on my back, because it doesn’t matter any more. I have proved what I knew when I was younger — that I could determine my own future and become my vision by letting go of the past. That understanding is so much a part of who I am today that I don’t need to be reminded of it at all. There is no shackle…only the eagle. Only the symbol of my vision. Only victory and self-directed growth.

You have the power to control and shape your life, to become the best possible version of yourself. Release yourself from the shackles of your past, of negative experiences and missteps. Let your vision of victory define your present and future, and look back only to see how far you have come.

Victory!

Check out Our Victory Line with Shirts and 64oz Protein Growlers