Strength talk without the polish.
Dave Tate's Table Talk sits close to the barbell world, where equipped bench details, strongman carries, coaching habits, and training mistakes get examined without polish. The show suits lifters who want practical gym talk more than trend-friendly fitness advice.
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Dave Tate's Table Talk is a strength-sports conversation show with its feet planted in real gyms, competitive lifting, and coaching rooms. It is not built around beginner-friendly slogans. It favors long answers, specific examples, and direct debate about what actually helps people get stronger. Equipped benching gets treated as a skill with details that matter, including the handoff, setup, shirt selection, and the value of growing into gear over time. Strongman training appears through stories about yokes, football preparation, conscious lifting, and the difference between general athletic work and event-specific strength. Coaching is another major thread. Episodes with strength and conditioning coaches move through athlete buy-in, college environments, private-sector expectations, program testing, and the reality of training people with little training age. The show also spends time on longevity and pain, including sled work, slant-board loading, knees, and older systems of strength training. It can be blunt. It is also more reflective than its rough edges suggest. A reaction episode on fake naturals, unusual physiques, and gym-fail culture becomes a broader argument about social media, work ethic, generational claims, and the difference between what people see online and what is happening in the sport. Crew-cast material turns inward, with training sins, yearly reflection, and the habits lifters neglect outside the main workout. The pacing is conversational rather than tidy. Some episodes wander through stories before landing on a coaching point, but the show's best moments come from that looseness: a guest's background, a technical disagreement, or a practical problem opens into a larger philosophy of strength. Dave Tate's Table Talk is for listeners who already know the gym language and want the longer version.
Made for: Best for powerlifters, strongman fans, strength coaches, and serious gym regulars who want specific training discussion, not broad wellness content. It also fits listeners interested in coaching philosophy and strength-sport culture.
What sets it apart: The show pairs insider-level lifting details with lived coaching stories, moving from small technical cues to bigger questions about consistency, longevity, and competitive culture. Its value is the table-level honesty around what works, what gets exaggerated, and what gets skipped.
Are you sick of "fitness influencers," training fads, and crappy advice that barely applies inside the gym or on the field? Then sit down with elitefts CEO Dave Tate as he interviews the strongest & smartest minds across the strength sports community to talk real, hardcore training, business, life, and more. If you're looking for real, applicable information on all things training, join the crew.
Based on 4 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Table Talk turns strength-sport experience into specific lessons about technique, coaching, preparation, and the decisions behind better performance.
Dave Tate builds Table Talk around the questions serious strength training produces once broad advice stops being useful. Guest conversations move between competitive experience, coaching decisions, and the mechanics of lifting, with Tate repeatedly pressing for the detail…
That handoff before an equipped bench press? You may start treating it like part of the lift.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Roskowski discusses dancing, football preparation, and a coach who changed his approach to lifting.
Adam Roskowski spent 11 years dancing, including international competition and time on Poland's national team. Here he traces his move toward football preparation and his interest in strongman.
Uncomfortable questions, a bedside machine and heavy work made to look easy.
Dave's turn begins with community questions the hosts say are meant to make him uncomfortable. They bring out a Dulux color chart, but his account of a bedside machine he travels with takes the conversation somewhere more personal.
Nick Benerakis talks equipped bench handoffs, bench shirts, and arranging training partners.
Nick Benerakis puts the handoff at the center of equipped bench pressing. In his view, lifters often try to do too much as the bar comes out, and the handoff is the most important part of an equipped bench.
Coaching athletes who develop unevenly, struggle in play or stall despite a change in training.
When athletes on the same team develop at different speeds, how far should the group move ahead? Some are ready for complex combinations while others still need to practice basic techniques.
Bill Simmons debates NBA tanking, MVP races, and movies with Zach Lowe and friends.
Big Cat and PFT Commenter cover the NFL, March Madness, and NHL for laughs.
Dave Tate opens Table Talk by saying the "handoff process is the most important part for a quick bench," then Nick Benerakis argues that setup matters less than the handoff on a fast bench.
Tim Ingram and the Texas Boys discuss the underrated key to strength, emphasizing coachability over weight on the bar.
Bradley Bechel discusses building a foundation for collegiate powerlifting through youth sports and transitioning it from a hobby to a concrete sport.
Dan Green debunks common myths about raw lifting and shares insights on effective strength training techniques.
Dave Tate and Mike Israetel build a sport-training model around three layers: basic techniques, combinations, and live training.
Strongman Adam Roszkowski discusses his transition from 11 years of ballroom dancing to competing in the Arnold Pro-Am, including his performance in events like the max axle deadlift and frame carry.
Nick Benerakis discusses the importance of the handoff process in equipped bench pressing and shares the origin of his nickname Benny.
Dave Tate reacts to a list of fitness-related videos curated by Noah, starting with Jeff Nippard's top exercise recommendation.
This episode discusses the seven deadly sins of training that prevent strength gains, with housekeeping about a lifetime crew membership.
Ben Patrick discusses his knee issues and the integration of Westside Barbell and KneesOverToes methods for longevity.
Strength coaches Colton Razo and Michael Silbernagel discuss their first meeting as athlete and coach, and the differences between coaching in private sector versus college athletics.
Craig Foster discusses his training philosophy of not lifting heavy despite achieving a 2300lb total in powerlifting.
Dave Tate tells Dave T.