Back in the 70's, long before cell phones and Instagram, in Newark, Ohio, a buddy of mine called me up on the telephone and told me to come on over and try out this new strength training device he'd purchased. Mitch Mann was prepping for a starting quarterback role at the small Ohio high school football power, Newark Catholic High School, which was coached by legend and Ohio High School Hall of Fame Coach J.D. Graham. Newark Catholic was the winningest program in all of central Ohio in the 1970's where Coach Graham compiled a 91-13 record. But then, in the 1980's the Newark Catholic Greenwave became even better as they steamrolled to a 115-14 record, bolstered by players like future Ohio State All-American offensive lineman and Miami Dolphin Jeff Uhlenhake. The 90's, with athletes like my nephew, Joe Correll, the boys from Newark rolled with 89 wins and 33 losses.
Anyway, in high school, I'd been working out at "N.C." on the bench presses and the Universal "Gladiator" machines that were just beyond Coach Graham's gym office. In addition, I'd had a few workouts at a new place down the street that was a Nautlilus training center loaded with all the latest equipment. This particular day, Mitch Mann had just gotten back from Sears or the Arro Department Store in Heath, and he was the first guy anybody knew who had the new "BULLWORKER" isometric strength building device! I jumped into my 1971 Volkswagon Beetle and went over to check out the new tool. Summer break was approaching and I wanted to pack on some mass to be able to attempt to jack a long ball over the left center field wall at Levin Park fields. We were assembling a team of young all-stars to try and dethrone a veteran perennial softball team that played there, and we were counting on Mitch to hit for power while being the Cincinnati Reds' Davey Concepcion of our infield. We also stacked our team with a few college football players like Jeff Buchanan, a monstrous looking athlete who played for the Miami 
Redskins, who at the time was one of the top programs in the USA. They were pounding teams like Purdue, South Carolina, Cincinnati, and the Florida Gators!, Needless to say, we expected "Buck" to bolster some offensive production. So anyway, I scrambled over to Mitch's house. Never did get the ball over that fence at Levin, but I'd have to say that was most likely about hitting mechanics.
2021: Forty-six years later the Bullworker is making a resurgence. Isometric training has always been around and has been being implemented into training workouts without even knowing it. Many programs utilize certain forms of it in present day training. I've witnessed Ohio State Football training, supervised by Coach Mickey Marotti and the aforementioned Jeff Uhlenhake (then, assistant strength coach), perform brutal sets of wall sits with stacks of 45's and other assorted weights on top of their thighs. Louisville Basketball Strength Coach Andy Kettler had his guys stack about 100 pounds on their legs and wall sit for a timed five minute hold! Coach Mike Joseph, WVU Strength & Conditioning had his West Virginia Mountaineers performing some serious upper body weighted freezes. They had some dudes there as well. So, isometrics are definitely something that a coach should take more than a casual glance at and take on a more serious perspective about the benefits to be earned.
Newark Catholic,Ohio State, Miami Dolphins,NFL
The NFL's first full time paid strength and conditioning coach Kim Wood, who spent 30 years with the Cincinnati Bengals was a proponent of hard, intense training and made sure that the message stayed in the family as well as with the Bengals. By the way, the Bengals actually went to two Super Bowls while Coach Wood was there. Interestingly, Coach Kim Wood has a son, John Wood who is a huge strength training aficionado and hand/forearm strength training webmaster. John also has coursework on isometric training through his The Iron League training website
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www.bullworker.com
And, here's a tip from Bullowrker company president, Chrisman Hughes, for getting started: "The Bullworker will target your connective tissue, specifically tendons and ligaments. So best to start slow, focus on form and time under tension, and progress from there."
