Hello Bio-Blog readers,

As is usual, this blog is a long time coming. Lots of been happening in my life so we'll get right into it. I just finished up my final experiment for my PhD research and it seems to have gone very well. The data thus far looks down right remarkable! I can't wait to get it all worked up and published! I am probably about 6 months away from FINALLY finishing up my PhD! There were times I thought I wouldn't make it and times that I wanted to just give up, but I stuck it out and I must say, it's the most difficult, most rewarding thing I've ever done in my life other than marrying my wife.

Training wise things are also going extremely well. I just did my second powerlifting meet on September 19th, the APA Indiana States Power in Wheatfield, IN and won my division hitting a 570 lb raw squat, 275 lb raw bench (a token bench press as I was not ready to test my repaired pec yet), and a 690 lb raw deadlift, which set the new APA world record for raw 220 lb class deadlift! I definitely feel like I have 700 lbs in me, but I was very fatigued and my back felt a bit of a tweak on 690 and I did not want to risk doing 700 lbs if I didn't feel 100%. Still I was very happy with my effort and most importantly I had a lot of fun. I plan to do one more meet this year on December 12th where I will likely attempt 700+ lbs! Be sure to keep watching the new Inside the Life episodes coming out soon as they will be documenting my powerlifting training and will have footage from the meet!

Business wise things are booming, Team Norton is doing extremely well; better than I could have ever possibly imagined. It is a true testimate to the people involved with us, I owe all my success to them! The DVD is damn near sold out! We have less than 50 copies left. It's a real feather in the cap of natural bodybuilding to see a natural bodybuilding DVD do so well and I think it will open doors for other natural bodybuilders to have more success with these sorts of projects!

We have lots of events coming up and you can catch me in the following places this fall:
-September 25-26: Mr. Olympia Expo in Las Vegas working with bodybuilding.com and helping them with interviews
-October 24: NANBF USAs in University Park, IL
-November 21: OCB Midwest States in Dekalb, IL



Hope to see some of you this fall!

-Layne