USAWA

Senior Lifters are age 20-39 and are referred to as ALL in the record books.  OPEN is Senior and Masters, but I will be using the term to refer to Senior only.

Senior Lifters (20-39) are often under-represented in All-Round weightlifting.  In scrolling through the records, I came across (204) athletes who have an ALL age class record, but no Junior or Master’s records.  (144) of those athletes have less than six records.  That goes to show you how difficult it is for 20-39 year old athletes to compete successfully in All-Round Weightlifting.

1. Riley Wenzel – 51
2. Bill Spayd – 31
3. Crystal Diggs – 29
4. Travis Luther – 27
5. Phil Anderson – 24
6. Jacqueline, Simonsen – 24
7. Nicholas Frieders – 23
8. Jera Kressly – 23
9. Kerry Clark – 22
10. Jacqueline Caron – 20

In the last twenty years only (6) senior athletes have won the overall National Championship.  The remainder have come from the Masters class. 

Nationals Senior & Overall Champions

• 2016 Joe Ciavattone Jr and Casie Morrison
• 2011 Amber Glasgow. 
• 2006 Al Myers and Amorkor Ollennnuking
• 2005 Mike McBride. 

By membership in 2025, Senior Members hailed from

• Canada – (11)
• Buffville/Kentucky – (4)
• Clark’s – (2)
• Frank’s – (1)
• Pennsylvania – (1)

The most obvious reason for few Senior lifters in the record book is that they must beat all of the Junior and Masters records to establish an ALL age record.

I have a few other theories as to why Senior lifters are not as prevalent in All-Round weightlifting records and hope there will be some discussion in the forum.  First, 20-39 are the prime strength years and athletes may choose to focus on Olympic Weightlifting or Powerlifting which have multiple federations and larger fields.  Second, Lynch, Age, and Gender adjustments tend to draw more Masters athletes.  Third, athletes are introduced to All-Round primarily through friends and family and in a mostly “old men” organization, new athletes tend to be other old men, wives of old men or children of old men.

A website article considered having a Senior record category rather than only allowing Seniors to set ALL age class records, but I did not see any details in the 2022 Annual General Meeting minutes. There was a good forum discussion as well.

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Deleted per authors request

While the year is not yet complete, I find myself with a little time on my hands and wanted to shout out some folks who have really knocked it out of the park in 2025.

Most Active Athletes:
The results of (39) events have been posted and making 20+ is quite an achievement. (24) other athletes were 10+, (13) athletes were in 5-9 events, the large majority of (84) athletes were in less than 5 events in 2025 so far.

• Tony Lupo – (28) events, (16) in person, (8) remote, (4) postal
• Allison Lupo – (24) events
• Sanjiv Gupta – (23) events
• Jeff Wenzel – (23) events
• Dave DeForest – (20) events)

Road Warriors:
How many athletes traveled out of state for more than one event?

• Denny Habecker – (4) IAWA Gold Cup, USAWA Nationals, IAWA Worlds, USAWA OTSM Championship
• Tony Lupo – (3) True North True Strength, USAWA Nationals, Bayou Beast Bash
• Chad Ullom – (3) IAWA Gold Cup, USAWA Nationals, USAWA OTSM Championship
• Dave Glasgow – (2) USAWA Nationals, USAWA OTSM Championship
• Clint Poore – (2) True North True Strength, Bayou Beast Bash
• Sanjiv Gupta – (2) USAWA Nationals, IAWA Worlds

Commitment:
No athletes participated in all (8) championships. Tony and Dave missed the Presidential Cup and Grip Championship. Nisha and Sanjiv missed the Presidential Cup, Heavy Lift and OTSM Championship.

• Tony Lupo – (6)
• Dave DeForest – (6)
• Nisha Gupta – (5)
• Sanjiv Gupta – (5)

Active Clubs:
I tried to tally up and rank 2025 entries to date. Clark’s Gym was by far the most active club hosting (12) events in 2025. Ranked in order of member event entries.

• Clark’s Gym – 221 entries by 26 athletes
• High Country Vigour – 71 entries by 6 athletes
• Frank’s Barbell Club – 68 entries by 10 athletes
• Canada – 51 entries by 25 athletes
• Habecker’s Gym – 45 entries by 8 athletes
• Buffville – 35 entries by 15 athletes
• KC Strongman – 23 entries by 7 athletes
• Dino Gym – 11 entries by 5 athletes
• No Club Listed – 9 entries by 6 athletes
• Ledaig Heavy Athletics – 8 entries by 2 athletes
• Iron Palace Podcast – 6 entries by 5 athletes
• Iron Throne – 5 entries by 3 athletes
• Iron Sharpens Iron – 4 entries by 2 athletes

Active Clubs:
Al Myers made a big push to promote all-round lifting clubs. It would be impossible for me to figure out due to the absence of online records, but there should be a century club for clubs that have hosted over (100) events. Aside from the $30 sanction fee per event, meet directors have to plan the meet; organize athletes, officials, spotters, loaders, announcers; distribute awards, results; and keep everyone safe. It is a tough job for small field events of less than (10) athletes and exponentially higher for (10+) athletes. There were (41) events sanctioned in 2025 and Clark’s Gym led the pack by an incredible margin.

• Clark’s Gym – (12) events
• High Country Vigour – (6) events
• Buffville – (4) events
• Habecker’s – (3) events
• Frank’s – (3) events
• KCSTRONGMAN – (2) events
• Iron Sharpens Iron – (1) event
• Ledaig – (1) event
• True North True Strength – (1) event
• Postal – (4) events
• IAWA – (4) events