NEENAH — Last weekend, the Neenah high school powerlifting team shined at the Varsity National Championships down in Myrtle Beach.
While there, they ended up with FOUR national championships:
They were named the the girls equipped national champions.
The girls raw national champions.
The boys raw national champions
The boys and girls combined national champions…
“For me, powerlifting gives the athlete an avenue to find out just what they’re capable of accomplishing,” said head coach Joe Lewis.
Joe Lewis began the Neenah powerlifting program back in 1988.
“We put them in positions where they do things where they’re going to want to quit, but we keep them going and they learn they’re capable of more,” he said.
Under Lewis the team has racked up accolade after accolade. 23 state and 14 national championships.
“There’s a sense of a legacy, there’s a sense of tradition,” said Lewis. “The success we have in the end is a byproduct of the way we train the kids, but also the way they believe in themselves. I’ve often believed if you set the right culture in a program, the winning will be a good byproduct.”
Safe to say, he has created that right culture. Every athlete speaks glowingly of Lewis and what he brings as a coach and a as person.
“He brings in so much love, support and compassion for every single one of us,” said sophomore Brianna Ankerson, who took home an individual national title. “If we have a bad lifting day, he just brings in just so much love to us and makes us regain our love for this sport.”
The big thing about powerlifting is it builds confidence.
“They come in and they feel a certain way about what they’re capable of doing and what they can accomplish,” Lewis said. “Through the sport, through their weights going up, their totals going up, they gain more confidence in their abilities.”
In turn that confidence reflects not only in life but when they get set to go under the bar.
“If I make the squat, my ego and confidence is really large and I just feel genuinely so happy,” Ankerson said.
“Your entire team can just be yelling at you” said senior Lukas Quinones, who took first in state and second in nationals. “When I walk up to the bar, I don;t even notice it. All I think about is getting under that bar and getting it up and down.”
And for his senior class, he was able to send most of them out with some hardware.
“It was really fun and awesome that we were able to do so well,” Quinones said. “I think it was a great way to end my senior year and powerlifting career.”
Which didn’t really sink in with Lewis until they were returning home on a bus ride that took 23 hours. That’s where he got a little emotional.
“You realize, we’ve just done our last competition with this group of seniors, but you wouldn’t trade for anything. It’s good memories,” he said.
