Lane Johnson's Strongman Camp: 6 Power Lessons From NFL Linemen and the World's Strongest Man

Lane Johnson has spent more than a decade proving that an NFL offensive lineman can be enormous without moving like one. At 6-foot-6 and roughly 325 pounds, the Philadelphia Eagles tackle is strong enough to walk with a 705-pound yoke, athletic enough to sprint with much lighter men, and experienced enough to know that raw strength is only useful if you can apply it fast.

That was the point of the inaugural Open Lane Experience in Oklahoma: put NFL linemen, strongman athletes, CrossFit veterans and other high-level performers in the same training environment and see what transfers.

The guest list was ridiculous. Two-time Super Bowl champion Johnson trained alongside 2026 World's Strongest Man Mitchell Hooper, former CrossFit Games athlete Josh Bridges, NFL tackles Tristan Wirfs, Will Campbell and Dion Dawkins, plus other athletes and coaches. The result was less like a conventional bodybuilding camp and more like a laboratory for power, speed, movement and competitive effort.

The useful part for normal lifters is that the biggest lessons were not "lift 700 pounds" or "train like a professional lineman." They were principles that scale down surprisingly well: prepare your tissues, train opposing force patterns, throw things explosively, move heavy weights with intent, and occasionally let another person drag more effort out of you than you would produce alone.

Lesson 1: Being Strong Is Not Enough — Big Athletes Still Need Speed

One of the most striking parts of the camp was seeing 300-plus-pound NFL linemen sprint hard. Johnson, Wirfs and Campbell were not treating speed as something reserved for receivers and defensive backs. They were training the ability to generate force quickly.

That distinction matters because strength and power are related but not identical. Strength is your ability to produce force. Power is how quickly you can produce it. A slow, grinding deadlift can demonstrate huge strength. An offensive lineman has to turn that strength into force almost instantly when the ball is snapped.

The same idea applies outside football. If you want to jump higher, sprint faster, throw harder or simply feel more athletic, adding weight to the bar is only part of the job. You also need some work where speed is the goal.

For recreational lifters, that does not mean copying ten 100-yard sprints after a brutal gym session. A better translation might be:

• short hill sprints once per week
• low-volume jumps before lower-body training
• medicine-ball throws before upper-body work
• sled pushes with enough resistance to stay fast
• lighter sets performed with maximal acceleration intent

The biggest mistake is adding so much "athletic" work that it ruins your strength training. Power work tends to work best when quality stays high and fatigue stays relatively low.

Lesson 2: Recovery Work Should Prepare You to Perform, Not Become the Workout

Before some sessions, athletes at the camp used body tempering: heavy metal rollers were applied across the back, glutes and hamstrings in a more aggressive version of self-myofascial work.

This is where the difference between an elite-athlete environment and a normal gym matters.

Body tempering has become popular in certain strength and football circles, but the evidence base is far less established than it is for basic warm-ups, progressive loading and regular mobility work. The fact that a 325-pound lineman enjoys a heavy steel roller does not mean you need one.

The transferable principle is simpler: use recovery and mobility work to make the upcoming session better.

If your hips feel locked before squatting, a few minutes of hip mobility, light tissue work and warm-up sets may improve how you move. If your upper back feels stiff before pressing, some controlled rotation and scapular work may help. The goal is to arrive at the first real working set feeling more prepared—not exhausted from a 30-minute pre-workout ritual.

For most lifters, a practical warm-up can stay boring:

• 2–5 minutes of general movement
• one or two targeted mobility drills
• several progressively heavier warm-up sets
• optional light foam rolling if it genuinely helps you move better

The camp's body-tempering routine is interesting because it shows how seriously high-level athletes treat preparation. What you should copy is the intent, not necessarily the hardware.

Lesson 3: Train Push and Pull Together Sometimes

Johnson used a Sorinex X-Factor machine that lets one arm push while the other pulls. On the machine, he reportedly handled 360 total pounds for eight reps.

The load is impressive, but the movement pattern is the more useful lesson.

Most bodybuilding programs separate pushing and pulling into neat boxes: bench press on one day, row on another, chest here, back there. That is perfectly fine for building muscle. Sport and daily movement are messier. One side of the body may stabilize or pull while the other side pushes.

A simultaneous push-pull pattern makes the trunk resist rotation while both shoulders do different jobs. That creates a useful blend of upper-body strength and torso control.

You do not need the specialty machine. A dual-cable station works:

1. Stand between two cable stacks.
2. Hold one handle in front and the opposite handle behind or beside you.
3. Row with one arm as you press with the other.
4. Keep the ribcage and pelvis controlled instead of twisting wildly.
5. Switch sides.

Three controlled sets of 6–10 reps per side is plenty. This is accessory work, not a new main lift.

The broader point is valuable for anyone whose program has become too one-dimensional. Hypertrophy work builds the engine. Occasionally asking the body to coordinate multiple force directions teaches you to use it.

Lesson 4: Medicine-Ball Throws Are a Simple Bridge Between Strength and Power

Every day at the camp included medicine-ball throwing. One drill used a 20-pound ball in a kneeling catch-and-throw setup before upper-body lifting.

This is one of the easiest elite-training ideas to steal because the equipment is simple and the risk is relatively low when the drill is appropriate.

A bench press can be heavy, but the bar has to decelerate before the end of the rep so you do not launch it out of your hands. A medicine ball is different: you can keep accelerating because you are supposed to let go.

That makes throws useful for training intent. You are not trying to feel a slow burn. You are trying to produce force quickly.

Good options include:

• chest passes into a wall
• overhead throws
• rotational throws
• scoop tosses
• kneeling explosive chest throws

Keep the reps low enough that each throw is fast. Three sets of three to five explosive reps is more useful for power than turning the drill into a 50-rep conditioning circuit.

This is also where bodybuilding and athletic training can complement each other. More muscle gives you greater force potential. Power drills teach you to express some of that force quickly.

Lesson 5: “Lift Fast” Means Intent — Not Sloppy Reps

Mitchell Hooper—who reclaimed the World's Strongest Man title in 2026—used explosive trap-bar reps at the camp. Other athletes applied the same idea to front squats and presses while coaches tracked bar speed.

This is probably the most useful lesson in the whole article, but it is also easy to misunderstand.

Trying to move a weight fast is not the same as letting technique fall apart.

A heavy squat may still look slow because the load is heavy. What matters is that you are attempting to accelerate through the concentric phase rather than deliberately grinding at half speed.

Research on rate of force development supports the value of high-speed training and explosive intent. Velocity-based training systems can also help athletes monitor fatigue and performance, although systematic reviews do not show that owning a bar-speed device automatically produces better strength gains than well-run traditional training.

For a normal lifter, the practical version is free:

• control the lowering phase
• stay technically solid
• then drive the weight up with aggressive intent

That applies to squats, presses, rows and many accessory movements. You do not need to make every rep ballistic. You simply stop confusing "controlled" with "intentionally slow."

For hypertrophy, slower reps can still build muscle. For power, the ability to produce force quickly needs some exposure to fast intent.

Lesson 6: Competition Can Unlock Effort You Do Not Reach Alone

The camp repeatedly paired athletes against each other. There were 100-yard sprints, short mirror-drill races and head-to-head assault-bike efforts.

In one challenge, Hooper reportedly hit 77 calories in 60 seconds on the bike. The Men's Health participant hit 50—his best output in years—and both described the competitive setup as part of the reason they pushed so hard.

You do not need to turn every gym session into a testosterone-fueled death match. In fact, that would be a great way to burn out.

But there is a real programming lesson here: some efforts are easier to access when another person is present.

A good training partner can improve focus, keep rest periods honest and create a little pressure to finish a hard set instead of mentally checking out early. Group conditioning can make an unpleasant interval more tolerable because everyone is suffering together.

The trick is choosing where competition helps rather than hurts.

Good places to compete:

• assault-bike calories
• sled pushes
• farmer's carries
• rowing intervals
• rep challenges with a safe submaximal load

Bad places to let ego take over:

• technical max-effort lifts
• exercises where your joints are already irritated
• movements you have not learned properly
• every single working set of every single workout

Use competition like seasoning. Enough can make training better. Too much ruins the meal.

What Lane Johnson's 705-Pound Yoke Tells Us About “Functional” Strength

Johnson's viral 705-pound yoke walk is a useful example because it combines several qualities at once: leg and back strength, bracing, grip, posture and the ability to keep moving under a huge load.

That is different from saying loaded carries are somehow superior to squats or deadlifts. They are not. They simply solve a different problem.

A machine or barbell lift makes it easier to overload a specific pattern. A carry forces you to maintain position while the load travels through space. Strongman training uses that difference constantly.

For recreational lifters, you can get most of the benefit with far less weight:

• farmer's walks with dumbbells or trap-bar handles
• front-rack kettlebell carries
• sandbag bear-hug carries
• sled drags

Start with a distance you can complete while staying tall and controlled. If posture collapses immediately, the weight is not making the movement more “functional.” It is simply too heavy.

A Simple “Open Lane” Power Session for Normal Lifters

You should not copy an NFL/strongman camp literally. You can copy the structure.

Here is a condensed version that keeps the main ideas without requiring professional-athlete recovery:

1. Warm up: 5 minutes easy movement plus two targeted mobility drills.
2. Power: 3×3 medicine-ball chest throws.
3. Main strength lift: 4×4 trap-bar deadlift or squat, driving every rep up with strong intent.
4. Push-pull accessory: 3×8 per side on a dual cable station.
5. Carry: 4×20–30 meters farmer's walk.
6. Competitive finisher: 3 rounds of 20 seconds hard / 100 seconds easy on a bike or rower.

That is enough. You do not also need 100-yard sprints, max carries, front squats, bench presses and another hour of conditioning.

The elite athletes at Johnson's camp can tolerate workloads that make terrible templates for regular people. What makes their training useful is not the volume. It is the clarity of the qualities being trained.

UIC Take: Train Like an Athlete Without Pretending You Are One

The best lesson from Lane Johnson's strongman-style camp is that elite strength is rarely one-dimensional.

Johnson does not carry 325 pounds around the NFL because he is merely good at one heavy lift. His job demands strength, acceleration, coordination, bracing, repeat effort and the ability to recover quickly enough to do it again.

Mitchell Hooper is not the World's Strongest Man because he can only move slowly under maximal weight. Modern strongman requires speed, conditioning and skill across multiple events.

That is why this style of camp is interesting for ordinary lifters. It exposes the gap between being strong in the gym and having a broader physical toolbox.

You do not need to abandon hypertrophy training, stop doing machines or start carrying refrigerators. Keep the movements that build muscle and strength reliably. Then add small doses of the qualities you are missing:

• throw something fast
• carry something heavy
• sprint occasionally if your body tolerates it
• accelerate your lifting reps with intent
• train with people who make you work harder

That is the realistic version of training like the strongest men on earth. Not copying their weights. Copying the reasons behind the work.

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