Conquering The Platform-Jamon Coulter
Jamon is a valued member of the USPA East staff as a National judge and we've work numerous meets together. Sometimes I forget that he's an exceptional lifter as well. Check out his story in his own words below and buy his design "Reaper" in the Intense Attire store...
"I'd like to say my story is overcoming some form of hardship that's inspiring similar to my fellow teammates, but in reality I found my way to powerlifting in, what I assume to be, a traditional manner of: boy meets barbell, boy adds more weight to barbell, rinse lather and repeat.
With a week to go before opening my first gym/training studio in 2013 while attending the University of Tennessee, I tore my A.T.F. ankle ligament playing basketball leaving me crutches bound for summer classes on, "The Hill", and during my first month of launching my first business (TRX saved my life doing squat demo...). Prior to this, I'd never had much of a reason to perform 1-rep attempts outside of sports in high school. A bit of retooling how I trained, learning a thing or two about a thing or two, and stumbling upon the information of people like Dave Tate and all the resources from his company I began attempting to push my limits once I was off crutches and wouldn't you know it there was a sport for that.
Shortly after, I moved my operations west to Seattle for a number of years while working simultaneously with a number of sports organizations as a strength coach. During that time I got involved with the U.S.P.A. doing my first meet in 2014 (538.5 kg total), completing the coaching cert in 2015, and competing at IPL Drug Tested World's in 2017 (716.5 kg total).
At that point, I was ready for a bit of a hiatus, let my company Platform Ready take a backseat priority wise, and just enjoy my time at the dog park. That was prior to meeting Johnny & Mindy Layne (USPAEAST/Intense Attire/Insert four other companies here). I became a judge and was able to scratch the itch of meet day environment with travel, and dog parks all along the East region.
Saying I didn't have that phase of, "this is my entire life and existence", would be disingenuous. I had a lot of down time to train and think about training. I've been very fortunate to have been able to be around lifters in the sport of all levels and to pick their brain's on the successes, but more importantly, the failures. What did they take for granted? How would they do it over? Who did they learn from? Etc.
Powerlifting for me evolved from me pushing myself into adding weight to a bar into a means of making connections rather than needing an outlet or an escape, cheering as a spectator even if it was a lifter I was head-to-head against, helping those that ask to learn when they make a mistake or avoid them as a judge, and to build up those in my sphere of influence in any manner that's needed."