Topic: Knowing when to retire

[Shaun Le Conte]

Here's a question for the group: when will you know when it's time to retire from active competition? Or what made you decide?

Some retire as juniors when they attend university and find it necessary to forsake their sporting interests for their education, others take on more adult responsibilities and no longer have the time. Then of course injuries take their toll. Still others continue to train and compete into their old age.

My weightlifting history is a series of spurts dating back as long ago as 1989 (2 months), 1992-4, 1998-2004, and 2007 - current. Sometimes I was still active during the off years, though from 2005-2007 I was close to completely sedentary. It sad, thinking about how I wasted so many of my junior years-  prime time to have developed into a better lifter. It's also a source of anguish - I believe I have really tried to understand weightlifting technique and training starting when I was 15, when I bought the entire set of Sportivny Press texts and couldn't even drive over to Bud's to pick them up myself (an hour away). To have not done anything meaninful on the platform is a serious disappointment. So I am still at it now with the same goals in mind - winning a Canadian Championship in my weight class and owning the provincial records for my category (they aren't much). I think these goals are achievable though winning Nationals depends a lot on getting lucky. Had I done this in my early 20s I could easily imagine being retired from sport already, and focusing either on coaching, or more likely, my career. The number of opportunities I have turned away this year due to worrying about weightlifting astounds me. I think it's very immature, what I have done. So the end is near - I will stick with it 3-4 years at the very most, and end it sooner if I see very little improvement from my previous PRs.

What plans do you have before you retire, and how will (or did) you know when it's time to hang up your singlet?

[Matt Foreman]

I've been lifting for 22 years, competing for 19.  I've never retired and I don't think I ever will.

Attend university and have to get a degree?  Yeah, done that.

Take on adult responsibilities (marriage, mortgages, career, etc.)?  Done that.

Injuries and lack of progress?  Done plenty of that.

Lifted past your prime and had to move on to older lifting with modified, age-appropriate goals?  Done that.

None of these are good reasons to retire from weightlifting, in my opinion.

The only reason, and I mean the absolute only reason I think you should quit weightlifting, is if you take a serious, prolonged, honest look inside your soul and discover that you simply don't want to be a weightlifter anymore.  If that's the case, move on and find something else that makes you happy.  But if there's still hunger, interest, or any kind of desire left in you, keep lifting.  If you walk away when you still have some fire in your belly, you'll regret it one day.   

[Ryan Lapadat]

There will always be some one saying you can't do something because of this or that. That is life. But when you start to believe it, that is when you start to limit yourself in your own mind, and those limitations become a reality. do you think George Foreman told himself he would never win the Heavyweight boxing Championship of the world at 45? Do you think Randy Couture told himself he would never win the Heavyweight UFC Championship at 43?

Do you know how harsh those sports are on the body? Before George Foreman the oldest man to win the heavyweight title was only 37!!!!

You just set your goals and do it. Its not immature. Not feel sorry for a guy who has a dream to chase, feel sorry for the guy who has no dream to chase.

Unlikely underdog stories happen all the time. It is what is beautiful with sports.

[Matt Erdman]

I like Ryan's post.

I think most people's idea of maturity is more than a little bit twisted. The idea that you have to sell your soul to a job is ridiculous. Success is viewed by how much you make and how many hours you work. No one cares about an actual, tangible accomplishment. Get a good director to do a movie about someone who sacrifices greatly to be a champion weightlifter, and everyone would be greatly moved. However if you tell people you want to make great sacrifices to become a champion, before the fact, then they think you are nuts.

Like you mentioned, Shaun, there is also much at stake in regards to your own satisfaction. You do need to decide this, because you cannot give anything less than 100% to weightlifting if you want to make a difference. You can't just try, and see what happens. You have to set your goals and do everything necessary to achieve them.

[Tom Weary]

I lifted as a teenager in the mid to late 70's.  My last meet as a JO lifter was the 1979 Nationals the summer after my freshman year in college.  Marriage, career, kids, moving around the world, divorce, remarriage - all of these things got in the way of lifting.  Mostly though, I think it was a lack of access to bumper plates and a place to train as an Olympic lifter.  I would lift and run, but never train in the Olympic lifts.  But in my heart I have always identified as an Olympic lifter.  Four years ago, after reading an article in a trade magazine where I was described as a "former" state champion, there was something about the term "former" that I could not stand.  So I decided to return to the sport that I love.  I went to the USA Weightlifting website, found that there was a team based out of nearby UCLA, hooked up with a great coach, and have been training like a maniac ever since.  I have competed in the 2005 World Masters Games and got the silver medal at this year's Pan Am Masters.  I have had a few minor injuries and was even slowed down by a double hernia repair, but I plan to lift and compete until I drop dead.  It is who I am.  Just look at the results of the survey on this website about what you would be if you weren't an Olympic lifter.  I picked the most common response - dead!  You have to adjust your training and goals to your age, but you can keep going.

[Mehmet Ege]

There is also the other side of the coin, the weightlifting legends. The options are very narrow for them. I remember Naim saying: "At this point if you don't win the Gold medal, you are nothing" in an interview. Sadly the choice of retirement is rather forced on those guys. Nobody wants to see their national heroes lose. Also, those guys are so used to being number one anything else won't satisfy them. I always wondered if they enjoyed doing what they do at all, so much pressure, so much expectation...

[Scott Tusic]

  While attending the Arnold Classic, I met "Chris Dariotis". I asked him what keeps him going and motivated. His response, "I will keep lifting until I cannot lift anymore !" That was all I needed to keep training and competing, whether in P/L or W/L. Legendary "Gary Deal" still competes to this day and moves some darn heavy poundage. That puts a fire under my behind. Just to know that if one trains smart and knows how long his/her body takes to recover, will keep us in the iron game for ??? years. 68 year old Hall of Famer P/Ler, "Ernie Nagy" once told me the first thing to go on a man is his legs. As long as my legs stay strong, I still have the chance to compete. Thanks Chris, Gary, & Ernie. People like you keep us other folks motivated.

[Shaun Le Conte]

The way I see it, competing in sport is about improving upon my all-time personal bests. For me there is no masters division (no offence to anyone). I want to give myself one last chance to achieve my potential so after a few years of training (at the most) if I can't do better than I did when I was 25 years old (and what I did then wasn't much) then its time to retire from competition.

I feel this way for two reasons. Firstly, I don't think that competitive weightlifting is healthy for the body. It's destructive, really. I believe a small amount of olympic lifts can be good for the body, but training for health and fitness is hardly the same as training to lift the most weight possible.

Secondly, I am finding that my love of weightlifting considerably limits my sense of freedom to live and work in many different places. It's only a matter of time before this conflict is resolved in favour of optimum employment, regardless of lifting conditions.