
Joe Kenn: There Are No Absolutes in Strength Training (Full Episode)
From Westside Barbell by Westside Barbell
May 12, 2026 · 1h 50m · Episode 110
About this episode
Joe Kenn discusses his extensive coaching career and insights into strength training at elite levels.
Joe "Big House" Kenn coached strength in the NFL for nearly a decade. He sits down with Tom Barry for four decades of lessons.From a guard at Wake Forest to leading strength programs at Boise State, Utah, Arizona State, and Louisville, Joe Kenn has built one of the most decorated coaching careers in the NSCA. He created the Tier System, served as head strength and conditioning coach for the Carolina Panthers from 2011 to 2019, and is the only coach to have won both the NSCA Collegiate Strength Coach of the Year and the NFL Strength and Conditioning Coach of the Year. He now runs Big House Power and works with elite strongman athletes including Brian Shaw and Tom Evans.In this episode, Joe and Tom dig into how strong is strong enough at the highest levels, how NIL and the transfer portal have rewired strength coaching, how Joe interpreted Louie Simmons rather than copying him, practice-based evidence vs evidence-based practice, why he stopped programming power cleans for three years at Arizona State, peak velocity over average velocity, and why the strength coach often has to be the sacrificial lamb in a team sport setting.TOPICS COVERED00:00 What the public misunderstands about…
People in this episode
Host: Tom Barry
Guest: Joe Kenn
Topics covered
- strength training
- coaching
- NFL
- NIL
- transfer portal
- performance metrics
- programming
Keywords
- strength coaching
- Tier System
- power cleans
- dynamic effort
- compensatory acceleration
- peak velocity
- NIL
- transfer portal
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Westside Barbell, Carolina Panthers, NSCA, Boise State, Utah, Arizona State, Louisville
Places: Wake Forest
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