Strength books, DVD's etc you've found useful?

Which strength books have you found most useful.
In terms of books I've found
George Hackenschimt "The way to live" pretty good (VERY old time wrestler/physical cultural guy for the late 19th/early 20th century)
Bill Pearl "Keys to the inner universe" the veggie bodybuilder who's book has more exercises than you'll ever need
Coach Dos "Power training" you've got to support those vegan coaches!
Dave Draper "Brother Iron, sister steel" I like the way he writes
Steve Reeves "Building the classic physique-the natural way"
Ed Spielman "The spiritual journey of Joseph L. Greenstein" bio of the mighty atom
Tom Thurston "Strongman-the doug hepburn story" became one of the strongest guys ever to live, suffered addiction, mental illness etc, then went veggie & became about the strongest older guy you're ever likely to hear about
John McCallum "The complete keys to progress" a classic collection of articles that ran from 1965-1972 in strength & health magazine
Mark H Berry "Physical training simplified" another old time physical culture classic
Steve Justa "Rock Iron steel" About the craziest lifter around today (in my view!)
Paul Kelso "Kelso shrug book" Everything you ever wanted to know about shrug variations and more
I could go on all day I've got a whole bookcase filled with quality reads about training dating from old time physical culture to the latest hi tech training ideas

DVD's

Gray cook all the FMS stuff
Stuart McGill He knows more about backs than anyone (I'm not sure I believe everything he says about back flexion etc, but the guy has brains that's for sure!)
Skip La Cour Max OT
Bigger faster stronger
Pumping Iron (the original, not the sanitised remake Arnie brought out-YES you were smoking a joint!)
Roger LaPointe "Tendon & Ligament strength training course"
Jason Wojo "DC training"
Charles Glass "Weight training" well known bodybuilding trainer
Scott Abel 5 day MET training"
Mike Robertson, Bill Hartman "The 2008 Indianapolis performance enhancement seminar"
DeFranco "Strong movie"
Serge Nubret "Entrainment"
Bill Pearl, Dave Draper seminar
oh yea I can't forget
Mike Robertson "Bulletproof knees" any knee issues then go buy it!

All the above books & DVD's are a random selection grabbed from the shelf randomly (a handful from the book shelf & from the DVD shelf). I try to buy as much as I afford (sometimes more than I can afford ) in terms of training & diet stuff. I've found that whatever I've bought I found something of interest &/or useful to forwarding my understanding, from the most technical stuff to the most basic training videos they've all offered insights I might have missed without watching them.
So what have you found useful or interesting?

Just reread:
"PYGOD - Cheating nature without steroids...Basic training & heavy eating"
Well, it's written by a guy named Pygod & it's about..um well basic training & heavy eating.

The book is for strongman competitors wanting to grow huge on food & basics lifts (no supplements at all, no not even protein powder)

I think I can sum it up in a paragraph or 2, hold-on:

train once a week (only one work set, the rest are warm-ups-except farmers walk):
1/ Power squat 4x5
2/ Deadlift 4x5
3/ Clean & jerk 5x3
4/ Dumbbell holds or farmers walk (2 sets to failure)
Start easy, get the form right, then add weight as you can

Do no cardio, period.

Eating: As much as possible focus on quality food, any junk, puddings & extras is fine, but get the refuel in with proper food, then have any of that as extras after.

You can tell the guys first language isn't English by the awful way the book is written (I'm guessing as he's from Canada he's a French speaker?)

1 thing I found a little different was he recommends soya milk as a superior alternative to milk (the guy has no vegan leanings mind you), the only supplements he recommends are glucosamine & omega 3 pills, & possibly the odd meal replacement shake if you are just in need of a refuel & no solid food is in sight.
That's the book in a nutshell. It's a basic book with no great shocks or surprises. Just get as heavy as possible in the above exercises over several years & eat like a madman & you'll get big & strong but it does give you a fair bit of motivation, even if your goal isn't to be a fairly fat strongman & have no cardiovascular fitness it's an ok read (unless bad spelling & grammar make you mad).

BOOK: Ken Patera story

Ken was a US International level shotputter, weightlifter & one of first entrants in the world strongest man contest. He may be better known to you as a wrestler (if you're over a certain age). Although probably best known during his wrestling career his first love was actually lifting.


Here's a couple of routines he used I'll include the longest one I've can find included & a shorter one (all in pounds):

Usually the 3 Olympic lifts where done on Saturdays (the 3 lifts: clean and press, snatch, clean & jerk - this is before they dropped the press)

Mon Feb 10 1969

Power clean w/pushpress 235x3, 305x3, 330x3, 360x3
Slow jerk pulls 400x2, 450x2x2x2
Fast jerk pulls 355x3x3
Light snatch 235x2x2x2
Incline press (45°) 280x5, 325x3, 370x3x3
Front squat 325x3, 375x3, 425x3, 475x3

Wednesday
Rack press 230x3, 300x2, 330x2, 350x2, 370x2, 390x1
Back squat 330x5, 420x3, 510x3, 600x2, 650x1, 550x3x3
Snatch pulls 300x2, 330x2, 350x2, 320x2x2x2

Here's a few of his best lifts:

Official lifts in contest:

Clean & press 505.5
Snatch 386.5
Clean & Jerk 505.5
Total 1,397.5

Training lifts

Press off rack 535x1, 509x3
Incline press 485
Press behind neck 418.75
Power clean 501.5
Squat clean 507
clean grip high pull 585x2
Snatch high pull 462.75x2
Front squat 625x3, 655x1
Back squat 820
Goodmorning 574
Hyperextension 130x10
Roman chair sit-up 50 pounds for reps
Overhead squat with snatch grip 440.75
Clean grip deadlift with shrug at the top 740x2, 780x1
Bench press 555

Look at those lifts again, the guy was around 315 pound. Looking at the era he probably wasn't a drug-free athlete (it was legal then), but still those lifts are pretty awesome. The book shows the guy had incredible natural talent & given a different environment might have gone even further than he managed to.
One surprising fact was how quickly he could come back after a lay-off, in a few weeks he'd be hitting weights us normal folk dream about achieving in a lifetime. The gift of genetics (yes he probably took drugs, but even so if I gave you every modern 21st century aid you'd not get the lifts this guy did in the same timeframe, you & me just aren't built like that, that's a special gift).
The book was a little dry, but interesting if you like to read about how truly strong people have worked & trained then you might want to read it.