Douglas Seamans

Taking drugs and PED’s may get you to your goals faster

My story started back in 2006 when I moved from New York down to North Carolina…the land of fried food and sweet tea. I moved to be with my girlfriend. After a year of partying and eating like shit, I had to go back up to New York for a friends wedding where several of my friends mentioned my weight gain. I knew I had to make some changes.

When I got back to North Carolina I joined a gym and got into lifting. A few months later, one of my workout partners got me into a boxing and MMA classes, and I really started dropping weight. I got into Muay Thai and continued dropping more weight. When I started training for fights I stopped drinking alcohol, my last two beers were on my birthday in April of 2009. This was also when I decided to get my personal trainers certification. Since I was in the gym every day I decided that I wanted to make the gym and training my career, so I could help people lose weight like I did. Almost ten years later I am still helping people and am enjoying it.

There are no shortcuts. Taking drugs and PED’s may get you to your goals faster, but you will pay the price eventually, and that price is both physical and mental.

Name: Douglas Seamans
Age: 38
Specialty: Long Cycle
Nationality: American
Weight: I compete in the 95kg weight class but I am usually 90-92kg
Height: 6’3” (1.905m)
Personal best:
LC-24kg-80 reps
LC-28kg-57 reps
LC-32kg-37 reps

Hi, my name is Doug! I have been a kettlebell sport athlete since 2012. I am coached by Igor Morozov. Since 2009 I own a gym called Pride Conditioning in Charlotte North Carolina. Outside of kettlebell sport and the gym, I enjoy hiking, camping, hot rods and classic cars (I own a 1966 Ford Galaxie), movies, history, shooting, and spending time with my wife and dogs.

“The only thing stopping you from achieving success…is you!”

In 2012 one of my good friends and training partners brought in a training manual from Jeff Neupert about training with double kettlebells for strength and power. We started doing workouts and complexes after watching them on YouTube. Then we started seeing grainy videos from Russia and Europe of guys doing 10:00 minute Long cycle sets on 32kg and thought it was superhuman and impossible! Haha! We then heard about a couple of local competitions here in the United States in 2013 and signed up. We started competing in 2014.

Since my first competition on 20kg long cycle back in 2014 I have competed 30 times. I have been on team USA for 4 years now and preparing to go to my 4th IUKL world championship. I have competed in Russia, Ireland, Kazakhstan, and South Korea.

My wife also trained with us for a couple of years and developed an amazing technique, but she had to have surgery to fix a degenerative shoulder condition and that ended her GS career. Since then she has switched over to powerlifting.

I coach several athletes for kettlebell sport, and watching them succeed is something that truly brings me joy.

Since dedicating myself to this sport I have made an effort to promote the sport and convince people they can compete. I have written, talked, and put out several videos about lineage, who your coach is and who they learned from, just like they do in martial arts.

I’m a drug-free athlete, and I am an advocate for more drug testing in the sport or separating the sport into tested and untested classes like powerlifting. In addition to openly being against drug use, I am also very open about my disdain for other methods of cheating in the sport such as resting elbows on the belt and using a shoddy technique to try and get away with fooling the judges.

I truly love this sport, I love competing, the rush and satisfaction of completing a set in front of my friends and other spectators are amazing. I am one of the super hopeful people that believe we will eventually get kettlebell sport into the Olympics. I will do anything I can to help make that happen.

After five years of training and competing, I moved up to the professional class to compete on 32kg. While it has been a challenge and I know going to world championships in Latvia that I will be at the bottom of the pro class. I am just happy to have finally reached this level to compete on the same stage as I first saw in those videos that I watched in awe five years ago. I could not have made this journey without the support of my wife, my gym, my coach, and all my friends.

Do you take any pre-workout supplements before competitions?

No supplements, ever, well, not the things people normally consider supplements like creatine, protein, BCAA, or any other pre-workout garbage. I do take vitamins, fish oil, glucosamine, and some herbal recovery supplements. Before the competition, I just eat a ton of carbs. Before my last competition, being my first comp on 32kg, I ate an entire bag of oatmeal raisin cookies, and four brownies covered in almond butter!

What does your daily diet consist of?

Eggs, beef, turkey, chicken, a lot of white rice, and oatmeal. I also have a classic peanut butter, jelly, and banana sandwich before a workout.

Your sports achievements?

  • Several AKA national 1st and 2nd place
  • 2015 IUKL European Championships – 24kg long cycle – 1st place
  • 2015 IUKL world championships – 24kg long cycle – 5th place
  • 2016 IUKL world championships – 24kg long cycle – 3rd place
  • 2017 IUKL world championships – 24kg long cycle – 2nd place

What are your future goals?

MS (master of sport)

What drives you to keep enthusiastic with KB Sport?

Seeing progress. You have to step back and look at the bigger picture, kettlebell sport and powerlifting is a game of inches, it is a war of attrition, it’s not about making fast gains today, tomorrow, or next week, it’s about months and years. I see where I am at right now on 32’s, it’s where I was a year ago on 28, and it’s where I was three years ago on 24’s. Seeing progress over the years is what keeps me motivated to keep grinding.

Do you ever have any bad training days when the KB’s are just too heavy? How do you deal with that?

I have several friends in the sport who I talk to frequently and have helped me learn about being stoic in my training; there are no good days or bad days, there is no feeling or emotion, it is just training. Not good training or bad training, just training. Any time under the bells is money in the bank and over time it adds up, that is all that matters, time under the bells. Yes I have days where the bells feel heavy and I am tired and slow, those days are not fun and it is tough mentally to stay positive about my progress, but it is what it is, you just have to move on and put that session in the bank without any emotion or feelings of failure.

What is your favorite lift and why?

Long cycle, I think it is the most difficult lift.

If you could give one top performance tip to somebody, what would it be?

Spend more time on recovery and mobility, and stay focused on technique.

What mental advice can you give a novice going into their first comp?

Have fun! Don’t be nervous, you’ll do fine, you will feel amazing afterward, just go lift and have fun!

The one thing you would say to someone who needs to make a change but struggles?

I would tell them to focus on their goal, every day they need to think about their goal and they need to think about what it will take to reach that goal. Sitting on your ass isn’t going to get you there!

What don’t people know about you?

For a couple years I was training as a Muay Thai fighter and training for kettlebell sport at the same time, but I tore my MCL and could no longer kick or block kicks, so my Muay Thai “career” was over and I decided to focus 100% on GS.

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