Ken vs barnett

Highway99 said:
lol

Click to expand...


No way Ken benched 600. His memory already isn't the best, as he doesn't even remember his own fighting career at this point (he often talks about his Pancrase matches, including when he was on Rampage's podcast IIRC, and misremembers when he actually became champ and who he defended his belt against, and even how he beat his opponents: He'll often talk about defending his title against Fuke and winning by knocking him out with a knee, neither of which happened). That plus gym ego BS and he's no question adding at least a hundred pounds to the real number. For perspective, only 30 or 40 pro powerlifters have benched 600 in competition. I have a hard time believing that Ken at 220-230 pounds put up a number like that. He was ungodly strong on the mat, as literally everyone who has ever locked up with him has tried to explain - including even Frank in that podcast - but mat strength and gym strength aren't the same thing and a 600-lb bench is like a new blue belt showing up to a BJJ gym and talking about how they've won half a dozen gold medals at world submission wrestling competitions.
 
Bullitt68 said:
No way Ken benched 600. His memory already isn't the best, as he doesn't even remember his own fighting career at this point (he often talks about his Pancrase matches, including when he was on Rampage's podcast IIRC, and misremembers when he actually became champ and who he defended his belt against, and even how he beat his opponents: He'll often talk about defending his title against Fuke and winning by knocking him out with a knee, neither of which happened). That plus gym ego BS and he's no question adding at least a hundred pounds to the real number. For perspective, only 30 or 40 pro powerlifters have benched 600 in competition. I have a hard time believing that Ken at 220-230 pounds put up a number like that. He was ungodly strong on the mat, as literally everyone who has ever locked up with him has tried to explain - including even Frank in that podcast - but mat strength and gym strength aren't the same thing and a 600-lb bench is like a new blue belt showing up to a BJJ gym and talking about how they've won half a dozen gold medals at world submission wrestling competitions.
Click to expand...


I don't doubt Ken was strong af....I just thought it was a funny joke.
 
Bullitt68 said:
No way Ken benched 600. His memory already isn't the best, as he doesn't even remember his own fighting career at this point (he often talks about his Pancrase matches, including when he was on Rampage's podcast IIRC, and misremembers when he actually became champ and who he defended his belt against, and even how he beat his opponents: He'll often talk about defending his title against Fuke and winning by knocking him out with a knee, neither of which happened). That plus gym ego BS and he's no question adding at least a hundred pounds to the real number. For perspective, only 30 or 40 pro powerlifters have benched 600 in competition. I have a hard time believing that Ken at 220-230 pounds put up a number like that. He was ungodly strong on the mat, as literally everyone who has ever locked up with him has tried to explain - including even Frank in that podcast - but mat strength and gym strength aren't the same thing and a 600-lb bench is like a new blue belt showing up to a BJJ gym and talking about how they've won half a dozen gold medals at world submission wrestling competitions.
Click to expand...
Nice to see you on a rare occasion showing a little more perspective with regards Ken. However saying he has 'memory issues' for the lift claim is silly. Not remembering the details of the ins and outs of a long career spanning 47 pro MMA fights, hundreds of pro wrestling matches and who knows how many amateur wrestling, tough man and even Muay Thai bouts is one thing, but not remembering specific numbers for your peak lifts is something else.
Regards the lift claim if it is not true then you are saying he is straight up lying about it that is all or as you put it 'gym ego bs'. He says guys at a gym in North Carolina when he was working out in pro wrestling can confirm it though.



Frank says Ken never hit 500Ibs, his peak was about 475.

Interview With Frank Shamrock

Frank Shamrock is one of the world's top full contact fighers.
www.criticalbench.com
 
Last edited:
Highway99 said:
I don't doubt Ken was strong af....I just thought it was a funny joke.
Click to expand...

Oh, Tank's hilarious. He always was. He was great on the mics as a guest commentator back in the early SEG days. And Tank's never minced words. He's not always right, but sometimes he is, and he's right here. Back in the day, Vince McMahon used to actually promote "feats of strength" like this in the WWF...



...and the result was a lot of BS and fake numbers flying around. (Though I love in that vid how he talks shit about the liftoff while holding 700 pounds and even bouncing it up a bit before easily pressing it and pretending to struggle with it with bad WWF acting 😁) I've heard shit about Hogan and Goldberg benching 700 lbs raw, which is so silly that it'd be funny if it wasn't so insulting to powerlifters and strongmen. Mark Henry was legit and actually accomplished as a powerlifter and his bench PR was 601 in training and 581 in competition. The Rock has always been a freak but his bench wasn't anywhere near 600. There's strong and then there's world record superhuman strength. Very few have the latter. The 500-lb bench club is already super elite. Maybe Ken was in that club, though according to Frank he wasn't. But I wouldn't be too shocked if Ken claimed somewhere between 500-550. But if you listen to gym rats, the number of people who've benched 600+ lbs, squatted 800+ lbs, and deadlifted 900+ lbs is astronomical. It's not unlike the legions of bad ass kumite dudes or Shaolin monks who could "kill" pro MMA fighters with one punch or finger jab. There's plenty of bullshido in weightlifting, too, unfortunately.

For Ken, I'm sure he's mixing facts and fantasy. (Remember, Ken also claims that some dude who trained with Tyson told him that he hits as hard as if not harder than Tyson...maybe Ken believed/believes that, but come on :rolleyes:) That tends to happen with people who (a) did have legit accomplishments but who (b) are older now and no longer have a firm grasp on their history. "Superstar" Billy Graham did an interview about his World's Strongest Man appearance - he finished seventh and hurt himself in the process - and he couldn't even remember what year it was held. I take most of what old athletes claim with a generous helping of salt considering the unreliability of their memories and the unreliability of their egos. Tank's right to emphasize the importance of videotaping himself benching 600 pounds, and he trained consistently and maintained that power to bench 600 consistently over years. You don't just plop down on the bench and start throwing around six or seven plates. It's just not reality.
 
Bullitt68 said:
Oh, Tank's hilarious. He always was. He was great on the mics as a guest commentator back in the early SEG days. And Tank's never minced words. He's not always right, but sometimes he is, and he's right here. Back in the day, Vince McMahon used to actually promote "feats of strength" like this in the WWF...



...and the result was a lot of BS and fake numbers flying around. (Though I love in that vid how he talks shit about the liftoff while holding 700 pounds and even bouncing it up a bit before easily pressing it and pretending to struggle with it with bad WWF acting 😁) I've heard shit about Hogan and Goldberg benching 700 lbs raw, which is so silly that it'd be funny if it wasn't so insulting to powerlifters and strongmen. Mark Henry was legit and actually accomplished as a powerlifter and his bench PR was 601 in training and 581 in competition. The Rock has always been a freak but his bench wasn't anywhere near 600. There's strong and then there's world record superhuman strength. Very few have the latter. The 500-lb bench club is already super elite. Maybe Ken was in that club, though according to Frank he wasn't. But I wouldn't be too shocked if Ken claimed somewhere between 500-550. But if you listen to gym rats, the number of people who've benched 600+ lbs, squatted 800+ lbs, and deadlifted 900+ lbs is astronomical. It's not unlike the legions of bad ass kumite dudes or Shaolin monks who could "kill" pro MMA fighters with one punch or finger jab. There's plenty of bullshido in weightlifting, too, unfortunately.

For Ken, I'm sure he's mixing facts and fantasy. (Remember, Ken also claims that some dude who trained with Tyson told him that he hits as hard as if not harder than Tyson...maybe Ken believed/believes that, but come on :rolleyes:) That tends to happen with people who (a) did have legit accomplishments but who (b) are older now and no longer have a firm grasp on their history. "Superstar" Billy Graham did an interview about his World's Strongest Man appearance - he finished seventh and hurt himself in the process - and he couldn't even remember what year it was held. I take most of what old athletes claim with a generous helping of salt considering the unreliability of their memories and the unreliability of their egos. Tank's right to emphasize the importance of videotaping himself benching 600 pounds, and he trained consistently and maintained that power to bench 600 consistently over years. You don't just plop down on the bench and start throwing around six or seven plates. It's just not reality.
Click to expand...



Yeah those WWF feats of strength stuff was always great.

From Bob Backlund doing the Harvard step test: (another guy influenced by Gotch's conditioning)




To Iron Sheik and his Persian Club Challenge:

(A young Ultimate Warrior fails the challenge)




And yeah, Mark Henry was about as strong as anyone that has ever lived. Perhaps the only person to clean and press the Inch dumbbell with one hand other than Thomas Inch himself:

 
Last edited:
Ken was great and definitely a pioneer of American submission wrestling but Barnett showed us a lot more great grappling through his MMA career. I don’t think Shamrock could hang with Big Nog for two fights without getting submitted.
 
B0l0joe said:
Ken was great and definitely a pioneer of American submission wrestling but Barnett showed us a lot more great grappling through his MMA career. I don’t think Shamrock could hang with Big Nog for two fights without getting submitted.
Click to expand...

Or maybe Ken kneebars him the way that Ricco did and Barnett almost did.

<thisgonbegood>

Seriously, though, that would've been cool to see. Ken's shutdown game was impressive, but Nog literally never stopped moving on the bottom, constantly looking for sweeps and submissions. Manabu Yamada was one of those slick guys who was always looking for shit and Ken shut him down completely for 20 minutes, but Nog grappled differently off his back and was a true HW. Definitely would've been cool to see.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Forum statistics

Threads
1,280,658
Messages
58,308,958
Members
175,998
Latest member
joshvegas

Share this page

Back
Top