Hail to the Dinosaurs!
If you’ve been thinking about ordering Gray Hair and Black iron, today’s a good day to do so.
And I’ll tell you why.
Today is November 1. A friend and fellow lifter named Mike Rinaldi was born on this day – back in 1947.
Mike was a lifelong weightlifter and lifting fan – and one of the original Dinosaurs. You may remember him from old posts on the training forum I had with my very first Dinosaur Training website (back in 1996) – and you may remember his articles and letters in the original Dinosaur Files newsletter which ran from August 1997 through August, 2002) – from his letters and articles in Milo magazine – and from his hilarious and often wonderfully wicked posts on the Go Heavy Olympic Weightlifting forum.
Like Harry Paschall before him, Mike Rinaldi was an aficionado of the Olympic lift we call the snatch – and this led him to adopt the internet moniker of Mr. Snatchural.
Mike was active in Masters weightlifting, and one of his dreams was to be a USA Master’s champion. He placed high on several occasions, but he never won that elusive national championship.
I never met Mike in person, but we corresponded by email for many years. We talked a lot about weightlifting and strength training for older lifters, since that describes both of us. And we talked a lot about how to keep training and how to stay at it as you move up in years.
And then, as they say, Life happened. I was terribly busy at work and had little time for anything – I was newly remarried and had suddenly acquired three stepchildren, two cats and a mother-in-law who lived with us – and I didn’t do as much as I should have done to stay in touch with Mike and other email buddies.
And then I started working on a book about strength training for older lifters—and it turned out to take a really long time to write. I started and stopped and struggled so many times. I would get 50 or 100 pages into the manuscript and then realize that it just wasn’t working – that somehow, it just wasn’t RIGHT. So I’d tear it up and start all over again.
I used the MIKE TEST.
Would Mike like it?
If the answer was NO – then I’d start all over again.
Several years passed, and I still was nowhere near finishing the book.
So one Holiday weekend, when Trudi and the kids were out of town and I had no work at the office e and perfect freedom to chain myself to the keyboard and write – I started all over, doing something new and different – and the words poured out, and everything flowed, and it all worked very well.
I kept at it, working nights and weekends and early in the morning – and after several months of hard work, I had a new manuscript.
I applied the MIKE TEST.
And passed with flying colors.
Yes, this was definitely a book that Mike Rinaldi would like.
There was only one problem.
Mike had passed away the previous summer. We lost him on June 22, 2008.
If you have a copy of Gray hair and Black Iron, turn to the dedication page at the front of the book.
You’ll see that it’s dedicated to Mike Rinaldi. And now, you know why.
I’ll always regret not having finished Gray Hair and Black Iron while Mike was still with us – because I know he would have enjoyed the little monster – and I really wanted to send it to him, and get a great big “WELL DONE!” email from my friend in New Jersey, the one and only – Mr. Snatchural.
As always, thanks for reading, have a great day – and if you train today, make it an extra good one in honor of our lifting buddy, Mike Rinaldi.
Yours in strength,
Brooks Kubik
