Zack Telander: Weightlifting Vs. CrossFit (and Lifting in America)

Here’s one from the archives, originally recorded in 2020: Weightlifter, coach, and YouTuber Zack Telander joins us to talk about transitioning back and forth between CrossFit and weightlifting. Zack also talks about setting realistic goals for weightlifting athletes, along with changing the paradigm of which sports are "worth it" in American culture. Zack also gives his thoughts on dealing with weightlifting data and the most underrated coach in American weightlifting.

In this episode of The BarBend Podcast, guest Zack Telander and host David Thomas Tao discuss:

• Zack’s background in strength sports and finding weightlifting (1:50)
• Taking weightlifting to YouTube (3:30)
• Sharing an alma mater with multi-time CrossFit Games Champion Mat Fraser (4:05)
• The benefit of having weightlifting as a background in CrossFit (6:20)
• Zack’s current weightlifting goals — and setting realistic aspirations (7:30)
• "The sacrifice becomes greater and greater…putting on an additional 10 kilos, that’s more and more sacrifice to my free time, to actually coaching people really well" (9:50)
• What Zack has learned about weightlifting through content production (11:00)
• The amazing amount of nuance in weightlifting training and technique (12:32)
• Early feedback from followers online — and a lot of hard-to-swallow pills (16:00)
• Deleting all his CrossFit vlogs (17:00)
• What weightlifting demands beyond technical skill (20:00)
• CrossFit’s impact on other strength sports moving forward (22:00)
• Changing the paradigm of which sports are "worth it" (27:30)
• What Zack would change about weightlifting and changing the "back end" of weightlifting data (28:12)
• The most underrated coach in American weightlifting (30:02)

Relevant links and further reading

• Read Zack Telander’s full bio on BarBend
• Follow Zack on YouTube and Instagram
• Follow David Thomas Tao on Instagram and Twitter