The USAWA National Meet was held Saturday 27 June 2026 in Columbia, MO. Besides our insufferable humidity and road construction, MO is the land of the University of Missouri, nice rolling terrain, Civil War History, the Katy Trail, Route 66, and delicious BBQ which we hope you enjoyed! We welcomed 19 lifters representing six USAWA clubs including our eastern and westernmost (Frank’s Barbell Club and High Country Vigour) and all points in-between (Ledaig Heavy Athletics, Dino Gym, KC Strongman, and of course the home team). Two teams featured lifting families, the Traub’s and the Wenzel’s. We hope you enjoyed the meet events and Missouri. Thank you all for the help tearing down after the meet. That was a huge help to us.
The meet results are posted below. There were four difficult lifts; Deadlift, No Thumbs, Overhand, Clean and Press, Heels Together, Lateral Raise, Lying, and the Jefferson Lift. Our meet director and gym leader, Bill Clark, made the day go smoothly and David DeForest was crucial for set-up, refereeing and loading. And a thank you to Our Lady of Lourdes Church and School for letting us use their gym. The venue was very nice. We’ve “sliced and diced” the results for each lifter and you can check how you placed as well as the number of records set. It was an all-around success with the exception of a “typo” in the score sheet. While normally these wouldn’t decide who wins – this time it did. And the meet scorekeeper apologizes for this.
The winners were:
Women’s Jr: Nevaeh Traub
Women’s Master: Christian Traub
Women’s Overall: Nevaeh Traub, Christian Traub, and Nisha Gupta
Men’s Jr: Jayden Traub
Men’s Master: Larry Traub
Men’s Overall: Larry Traub, Abe Smith, Jayden Traub
Teams: Ledaig Heavy Athletics 1 (1st), Clark’s Gym (2nd), High Country Vigour (3rd).
Additionally, the Records Page and all Records Tables are updated to include Nationals.
Three masters athletes made it to the Lebanon Valley Record day this year. We had a great day of lifting and talking about the days when we were much stronger. The lifters were Mike Locondro , 63, 95 KG.. CLASS, Barry Bryan, 68, 80 Kg. CLASS, and Denny Habecker, 83, 80 KG. CLASS.
Mike Locondro – 63 – BW=207 lbs – 95 KG Class
One Hand- 1″ Vertical Bar Lift- Right Hand – 216 lbs
Two Hand 1″ Vertical Bars Lift – 256 lbs
Deadlift – 2 Dumbbells – 264 lbs
Deadlift – No Thumb- Right Hand – 143 lbs
Deadlift – Fulton Bar- Right Hand – 121 lbs
Barry Bryan – 68 – BW=172.8 lbs – 80 KG Class
One Hand – 1″ Vertical Bar Lift – Right Hand – 161 lbs
On June 06 we had quite beautiful weather in Northern Colorado for the first ever Carnival in the Cul-de-Sac. The meet focused on classical/old timey lifts from sideshows, carnivals, and other similar displays from days past. In order to enhance the environment, fresh popped corn and festive old-timey mustaches were provided to competitors!
The primary lifts were:
Steinborn Squat
Dinnie Deadlift
Goerner Stroll
In addition, we had two exhibition lifts that followed a similar theme:
A modified dumbbell press using a Fulton dumbbell handle (similar to a “circus dumbbell”).
A nail-bending face-off.
Nails included were:
Der Fiegel – Ace Hardware 20D 4” Galvanized Box Nails (~29 lbs.).
El Jefe – Grip Rite 60D 6” Timber Ties (~53 lbs.).
The Centurion – Hillman Fas-n-Tite 6-in x 0.125-in 60d Hot-dipped galvanized Ring Shank Pole barn Nails (~63 lbs.).
The primary lifts went smoothly, with each lifter being humbled in their own way by the Goerner Stroll’s balancing act! While this lift proved technically difficult, the Steinborn lift and Dinnie both appeared to be comfortable for those involved, with the Dinnie allowing for some fairly significant deadlift numbers.
Lynch-adjusted overall scoring was:
Kim Wagner (465 lbs total, 1st place women’s).
Joshua Guerin (1083 lbs total, 1st place men’s).
Sanjiv Gupta (805 lbs total, 2nd place men’s).
Tony Lupo (813 lbs total, 3rd place men’s).
“Circus Dumbbell” Exhibition
The one-arm dumbbell and Fulton bars are no strangers to USAWA contests, so competitors were fairly confident going into the event. The event was selected based on the classical “circus dumbbell lift” from carnival and sideshow lore. While those events are often pictured with a globe-style dumbbell, a Fulton-style handle and large sleeve covers has become the norm. In order to ensure that more competitors had the equipment, a standard Fulton dumbbell handle was selected.
The circus dumbbell event was taken overall by Tony Lupo, with an impressive 90 lb left-arm lift. Overall these were followed by Joshua, Kim, and Sanjiv in terms of Lynch-adjusted weight. This puts Tony and Kim as male and female winners of the exhibition lift, congrats!
The lift seemed to go smoothly, and appeared to be enjoyed by the competitors involved. Given the inclusion of other Fulton dumbbell handles and existing dumbbell presses, perhaps the Fulton overhead press could be considered for inclusion as an official event.
Nail Bending Exhibition
Nail bending was new to most lifters, with Joshua giving a short training seminar at a previous High Country Vigour contest. Despite the lifters being relatively new to the event, the exhibition ended up being a fun surprise for everyone involved! Most importantly, everyone who participated bent not just one, but multiple nails in their category.
Due to the nature of the event, nails were judged first on category (with harder nails beating any number of correctly bent nails in previous categories) then on the total number of nails bent to break ties. All nails were judged based on a 2-inch maximum inner distance. Kim, Sanjiv, and Joshua all participated in Greeley.
Joshua took first in the event total, with 3 Centurion nails. This was followed by Sanjiv who bent 4 Der Fiegel’s, and Kim who had two Der Fiegel blends. This has Joshua and Kim as the top benders in the men’s and women’s categories, respectively. This puts Kim Wagner in the impressive position of having the leading lynch-adjusted score across the divisions, and had her ranked highest overall for the day, and sees her taking home awards in the women’s category the primary contest as well as both exhibition lifts.
COMPLETE RESULTS:
Carnival in the Cul-de-Sac Greeley, Colorado June 6, 2026 Meet Director: Joshua Guerin Scorekeeper: Joshua Guerin
Officials: (1-official system) Sanjiv Gupta, Kim Van Wagner, Allison Lupo
Last weekend the 2nd For Women Only Meet and record day was held here in Columbia, MO and remotely. This meet featured five events, the Bench Press – Feet Up, Swing – Dumbbell, One Hand, the Hack Lift, the Deadlift Barbell, One Hand, and the Push Press from the Rack. Two gyms and four lifters participated in the competition and record day.
The competition was tight onsite, but the winner this year was Jessica Hopps from Frank’s Barbell Club. Jessica was first overall with a total over 500 lbs raw weight and Lynch adjusted points. She won four of the five events and set two age and weight records as well as ALL records for her weight class. Her lifts included impressive efforts in the Hack Lift and Push Press from the Rack. The onsite competition was very close as two familiar lifters, Allison Lupo and Janet Thompson squared off. Allison’s lifts totaled over 400 lb, and she edged Janet by 0.27 Lynch adjusted points for 2nd overall. Allison set four new age and weight records including the Deadlift, One Hand which was the best effort of the competition in that event. Janet’s third place effort was very strong as she was close to personal bests in spite of not being at 100% strength for the meet. Young Dylan Wenzel competed as well and just one week after competing in the Stars of Tomorrow Meet. Again, she challenged my ability to model her Lynch factor, and under the guidance of her dad, completed the competition. She set five new age and weight records and ALL records in her weight class, including finishing 2nd in the Press from the Rack, when age and weight were taken into account. Congratulations to all the lifters! Please check out the record lifts as well. There were five individual record setters and one familiar set of team lifters that did some good lifting.
Last weekend was the 3rd Annual Stars of Tomorrow meet and Record Day. It was a busy weekend in town with the end of the school year and graduations and all. The meet this year attracted only two young lifters who are so young they might better be characterized as the stars of the day after tomorrow. But both showed some grit in learning how to do the lifts, and both had a familiar last name. The lifts were Bench Press Feet Up, Jerk from the Rack, Anderson Squat, Clean and Press – Heels Together, and Deadlift – Heels Together.
The two lifters, Dylan and Logan Wenzel, the youngest of the Wenzel family came in with Dad and the gym was ‘alive with the sound of ….iron’. Ok, so I’m not going to replace Steven Colbert. But, young Dylan, the lone Women’s contender did well setting age / weight records and ALL records in the five events. At 24.5 kg, she tested my mathematical skills in modelling the lynch function and extrapolating down below 25 kg. Dylan showed she was a quick study in performing the lifts very well technically under the guidance of her dad, a USAWA champion. Logan was the only contender on the Men’s side and he contributed two age / weight and ALL records in a new weight class. Those lifts were among his personal best. Congratulations to the two young lifters! Hopefully we’ll see a few more next year.
There were a few record seekers that lifted as well and Jeff Wenzel and Dave DeForest did some impressive work. Tony and Allison Lupo did another team lift. Check out the results below.
