Orion Edwards – Professional Bobsledder Strength Training Success

Chapter Overview:

0:00 Who is Orion Edwards
0:07 How did he get into Bobsled
0:44 What are his life aspirations
0:57 How he started training at LPS Athletic
1:10 What is the hardest obstactle he faced as an athlete
1:46 What sacrifices he made as an athlete
2:18 Who inspired him growing up
3:22 What is the training like at LPS for him
3:50 What results did he get at LPS
4:21 What Dominate means for him
4:50 What advise can he give to other athletes

In-game photo of Orion Edwards as he hop right into action

My name’s Ryan Edwards. I’m a Bobsled Canada athlete and I compete all over the world. Most of my competitions have been in North America so far.

My name’s Ryan Edwards. I’m a Bobsled Canada athlete and I compete all over the world. Most of my competitions have been in North America so far.

So who got me into the sport of Bobsled? Funny story is actually my sister. After I tore my ACL, we’re sitting there that night after surgery. We watched cool runnings again and she encouraged me to pursue Bobsled after I was done playing football.

After I was done playing football, she reminded me of that little tidbit of that movie and it was a wrap from there. Some of my aspirations and dreams in sport. I dream of becoming an Olympian. My goal is to make it to the 2026 Olympics and dominate there and go to the 2030 Olympics as well.

Aspirations in life. I just wanna be the best man that God called me to be. I recently got married. Be the best husband I can be. And then, you know, eventually, hopefully I’ll be blessed with kids and be the best father I can be.

I heard about LPS through Bobsled recruiter named Esther, and she saw that I was struggling with my Power Clean and my Olympic lifts. She encouraged me to come to LPS and said a lot of great things about coach Clance and his team here.

So one of the hardest things I had to go through, especially as an athlete was I tore my ACL back in college when I was in the summer of 2016, leading into my senior season. That was hard. But you know, each day I attacked to each day, I took time to do my physio exercises and get back to where I needed to be.

I think in the recent years, I think making the transition from Bobsled push athlete to Bobsled pilot has been a pretty hard transition, but it’s been exciting and exhilarating transition at the same time. There was just a huge learning curve.

So some of the sacrifices I had to make as an athlete is, you know, I actually moved to Calgary this summer and, you know, it was a big sacrifice for myself, but I think it’s a bigger sacrifice for my wife. You know, she left everything she knew here. She had family here, friends here, and she went into the unknown with me to start a new life in Calgary. So that’s a huge sacrifice for my part, but that’s something that I always will cherish. So she sacrificed for me and for my goals, and pursue it together.

So who inspired me growing up, I”m really inspired by my grandma. She was a Jamaican immigrant and she came here in the 70s and she came here with pretty much nothing. She worked extremely hard to make sure that not only her kids, but her kids’ kids, which would be my generation could have a life that we have now. That I actually have opportunity to pursue dreams, to be a Canadian on the Olympic team for team Canada. So that she inspires me quite a bit.

Where I was training before. I was training in Seattle. I trained at my university at Guelph. When I went there and that other performance areas, there, like it didn’t… Like being at LPS, we preached like full range of motion. There like I did squats, but it would be little bit past 90. It wasn’t actually fully all the way to the ground.

You know, we’d work a little bit more core exercises and stuff like that, but, you know, Olympic weightlifting and squatting and cleans and all that, that is your core. And that builds up the core that you need for functional sports like Bobsled or football or soccer, whatever it may be.

So my experience at LPS has been nothing but amazing. The mindset has been crazy. The intensity has been crazy. My, I was able to increase my strength, my speed, my size, decreased my body fat percentage from being here. Where I was training at before I was training at other places. And like, they’re great too, but nothing has been like this environment. Nothing has been like, be able to push me as far as I have so far. And, I love it here. This is home.

So the results I seen through training so far was, I all around got stronger and more powerful. Each season I’ve been here, I was able to put 10 Kg on my power clean. I started out at 125 Kg max power clean. I went to 135 and this off-season went 145 Kg power clean.

I got a lot stronger in my back squat. I got way more flexible. I’m able to sit at the bottom of my snatches and all my cleans. And more importantly, I got faster. I got faster on the track and faster on the ice with pushing the bobsled.

So what does dominate mean to mean? So to me dominate means like, just don’t give up, just keep pushing, keep pushing no matter how hard it is. Keep going every single day. Consistency is key. What dominate means in this environment at LPS is that, you know, every single day, you’re trying to be like 1% better than you were before.

You know, we’re encouraged to put more weight on the bar. We’re encouraged to attack every single workout. And that’s what dominate means here. It’s a lifestyle.

So one piece of advice I give to my younger self and my younger athletes would be that, you know, keep going. I have this phrase that I tell myself and tell other people is that “chopwood”. You know, you take a swing outta ax, you swing with the ax at a tree. The first chop is not gonna knock it down, but you keep going at it. It’s going knock down that tree. Don’t stop. Keep going.

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