2022 LSU Gumbo - Book - Page 234
Ben
“After my last swim meet senior year, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do.
I had done swimming for five years as my exclusive extracurricular. I didn’t
have a background in any other sports, but the one thing we always did besides
swimming was lifting weights. So when I got to college, I just kept working out.
I had only been lifting weights for about nine months and I was weak. I didn’t
know what to do or what was going on. I had no exposure to powerlifting, but
when I went to the UREC for this all access event, someone mentioned to
me that I should tryout for the powerlifting team. I made it which was really
surprising. To me powerlifting still isn’t really my main interest. I just really
enjoy the science of exercise, but now I’m the President of the LSU Powerlifting
Team. It’s a rewarding experience being the president of any club sport, but it’s
also super challenging. You have to deal with people with drastically different
motivation levels competing at drastically different levels of competition. You
also have an allocated budget. There’s a lot of juggling of different people’s wants
and wishes. That’s the hardest thing, the human side of it. You want to make
everyone happy but you can’t. I’ve learned a lot about hierarchies, organization,
and structure working with all of these different factors. Things pop up and you
just have to deal with it. This happens outside of any sort of time span you’re on.
It’s completely random. One of our biggest challenges right now is that we have
very different skill levels on the team. They have different needs, and they are
equally valid. Some people are picking up a bar for the first time and for others
it’s an integral part of their lives. I am looking forward to continuing to be a part
of the team this year. I think we have a really good chance at placing in the top
five. I want people to follow us, and we’re going to have tryouts in the fall. A huge
way people can support us is by reaching out.”
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