Manta Ray

<Mark, would you tell us how you came to design the Manta Ray?>

It all came about because I didn't start lifting till I was in my early 30's (I'm 51 now, by the way). I always had jobs with a lot of physical labor, but during this period I owned a collision repair facility and my employees did most of the hands on stuff. I smoked, drank and ate lots of just about anything. I had always been a somewhat naturally muscular mesomorph body type, but my metabolism shifted gears around 30 and I gained 40 pounds of blubber. I was very busy, married, had young kids and was doing a great job of denying the way I looked until I saw a picture of myself in a T-shirt at an amusement park. In that pic I finally saw that I looked just like a water melon in a T-shirt and decided I wasn't going to live like that anymore!

I decided to change my ways and began research on diet and exercise. I went from 202, down to my high school weight of 160, by using a low fat and cardio approach (naturally), but I looked like a shell of my former self. At the time I realized that I had none of my previous muscularity, but didn't understand that I still had a lot of fat too.

I dug some rusty dumbbells out of the basement and added an instinctive freeweight training session in right after my daily Nordic Track workouts... and got bit. I was lucky and accidentally worked most of the opposing muscle groups. I made some great initial gains (as do most people when they first start out) and started watching SoloFlex commercials while on the Track. I borrowed a friends Soloflex and made one for myself - not a patent violation if only for your individual use :) - ordered the weight straps from the company and made resistance training my primary workout, while I moved the cardio on to simmer. I bought my first Muscle & Fitness about this time, because I wanted to know what the bodybuilders did to get cut up abs (I laid it on the counter upside down and covered it up with other stuff so no one would see it).

Anyway, I was deeper into biomechanical, metabolic research about this time and had been hearing that the squat was the best thing for knee rehab and releasing growth hormone (gh). And since gh made your body want to store lean tissue, rather than fat, I became more and more interested in that exercise. I'd also been reading that freeweight squats activated much more stabilizing musculature, thus releasing the maximum gh, so I built a squat rack.

As I moved up in weight the bar became more uncomfortable and I was having trouble keeping it on my back. I had plenty of padding around the shop (my growing gym was in a corner) and started wrapping it around the bar. By the time I got enough on to finally do some good the bar was out of the proper biomechanical position... Too high, too far rearward and it was impossible to use an upright posture without the bar rolling off my back. All this time I'd never been in a real gym, or even a fitness store (because I had someone else pick up an Olympic set for me). It was clear that padding just didn't work and it would require some kind of ridged load distribution device, so I went in search of one at the fitness stores and in the muscle mags... But, no luck.

I'm the kind of person who builds everything, if I can't find exactly what I want, so I built my own load distribution device and it just happened to look like the fish called the Manta Ray (I know it's not really in the fish family, so don't give me a hard time about that!). It didn't snap to the bar, or look as pretty, but it was painted blue and worked the same as the product today. If I had lifted weights earlier, in school, or where ever, I never would have thought to make a change. But, coming into weights as a mature adult, with no preconceived ideas, it was easy to think outside of the box. You still wouldn't know about the Manta Ray today, but for one more twist of fate.

My wife thought I looked a lot better, but still couldn't stand my workaholic ways, so she left me. After a few months I was still in a funk about the direction of my life... Tired of arguing with insurance companies to get enough money to properly repair someone's car... The parts guys... The temperamental body men, etc., so I shut the place down for two weeks and went on my first real vacation. When I got back someone had broken in and stolen everything I'd worked a dozen years for. Over $40,000 in the uninsured part of my tools and equipment. I laid off everyone and prepared to go out of business.

A few well meaning people brought in loaner tools and some others feeling guilty brought back stuff they had borrowed and never returned... and some of my better customers pleaded with me to fix their car before I closed down, so I ended up just doing enough to keep the lights on, but with no employees. I would make sure that no matter what, I would read and do research for at least 4 hours every day, but often 12, while I decided what I was going to do for a living. I knew I was going to work in fitness, but I had no idea what I would do. I figured that if I properly educated myself it would come to me.

During this period I met more and more lifters. When they tried my squat thing they always wanted me to make one for them. It took days and days to make mine, so there was no way they could afford it, even if I didn't mind making the same thing over and over. If my new career was going to be in fitness product development, I really wanted to work in a more popular area. You know, an area with more potential customers like ab products. But I love the squat so much that I finally decided I would just have to help more people see the benefit and try to get them off the leg press... The rest is history.

Mark Pittroff
Advanced Fitness, Inc.

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