(Riverton, WY) – World Champion, it has a nice ring to it, but it wasn’t a ring, or rings, but rather two golds and a silver in the three-event competition that led to a world championship powerlifting title for Riverton’s Travis Koehn.
Koehn competed in the M2 Division at the International Powerlifting Championships in Sun City, South Africa last week. He flew there with his wife Suzie and daughter Payton earlier this month.
In Masters Level Powerlifting, the divisions are based on age. M1 is 40 to 49, M2 50 to 59, with M3 and M4 for lifters in their 60s and 70s.
There are also weight classifications for each division.
Koehn competed in the 120 Kilogram class, for men up to 264 pounds.
The championships are divided into the squat, bench press and deadlift. Koehn took gold in the bench press with a lift of 496 pounds, and another gold in the squat with an impressive 700-pound effort. He won the silver in the deadlift at 617 pounds.
Koehn competed in the equipped category. There are two categories at IPF competitions, the first is raw, where a lifter wears just a standard t-shirt and shorts, and the second is “equipped,” where they compete wearing special single-ply singlets that aid in their lifts.
“I think it gave me an extra 60 pounds in the squat,” Koehn said. “In the bench, it was more like 120 pounds.”
Koehn, a 1992 Riverton High School graduate, lifted in school with Janice Bradley and the late Sherry Douglas as teachers.
“I wish I could let Ms. Douglas know how I did,” Koehn said. “I liked lifting for football in high school and lifting at home.”
He headed off to the University of Wyoming, and lifted while a student, but nothing competitively.
“I started lifting some more and missed the competition more than I thought I would,” Koehn said.
In 1997, he entered two powerlifting competitions, the first at the Cowboy State Games and the second in Colorado Springs. After that, there was a long gap.
“I went into powerlifting exile,” Koehn joked.
That exile lasted almost two decades.
“I entered my third powerlifting meet in 2017, after my second one in 1997,” Koehn said.
The spark was back. He began more designed workouts and paid more attention to nutrition.
“Protein is the key; you need to eat a gram of protein a day for every pound you weigh,” Koehn said.
In his case, that means around 255 grams of protein per day. That’s a lot of protein.
“I drink protein shakes at breakfast and keep fajita steaks in the freezer of my mini fridge for lunch,” Koehn said. “I tried chicken, but it didn’t microwave well.”
Koehn is a partner with Jay Reddon at Reddon, Koehn and Associates CPA PC in Riverton. Finding time to work out while busy as an accountant, especially in tax season is a challenge.
He began to compete around the state in powerlifting competitions with the goal of setting records.
“I was trying to break some state open records,” Koehn said. “It made me a pretty good masters level lifter.”
The 2023 IPF Championships were held in Ulan Bator, Mongolia.
“I looked at the results and thought I’d have a chance this year,” Koehn said.
IPF age divisions are based on the age you turn within the upcoming year and are set on January 1.
Koehn turned 50 in November of 2023.
He decided to compete in the 2024 championships in South Africa.
Training for powerlifting is much different than bodybuilding or in the type of sport specific weightlifting that football, track or wrestling demand.
Koehn works out four days a week, Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
Examples of his workout are: Sunday, heavy squats, variable dead lifts, leg curls, leg extensions and five sets of two or three repetitions in the dead lift; Tuesday, lifting in the bench shirt with variations of the bench press with emphasis on triceps and chest; Thursday, heavy dead lift, variations of squats and close grip bench presses; and Saturday, bench press.
“Keith Gantenbein came over a couple of times a week to help me with specific lifts,” Koehn said.
The IPF is strict about performance-enhancing drugs and conducts drug testing regularly on all competitors.
Creatine is an amino acid-based supplement used by athletes in a variety of sports and Koehn uses it as well. It is a legal supplement that aids muscles in recovering quicker from extreme workouts.
Koehn had three specific goals before getting on the plane in Denver for the trip to South Africa.
“I wanted to win. I wanted the best total of all the M2 lifters, and I wanted to be in the top three of all M2s,” he said.
He met his goal in winning the all-around title with two golds and a silver. He met the other two as well, tying for first in the best total for all M2 lifters.
He did a little better than his original goals though.
There were 442 competitors in all four age level groups and Koehn finished fifth among all of those, including against men 10 years younger.
In IPF competition you get three chances in each lift. You have to declare the weight you’ll attempt each time within 60 seconds of your first lift.
A little extra drama came in Koehn’s third event, the bench press.
He’d already won gold in the squat and silver in the dead lift and was leading the competition entering the bench press.
Three judges decide whether a lift is legal or not. After a lift is complete three white lights will pop up declaring a legal effort. If one is dark, it can be challenged and the lift overruled if two or three are dak its automatically a failed effort.
Koehn’s first lift had two white lights but was overruled as illegal. He lost control on his second attempt and didn’t complete the lift. That left just one lift remaining.
“I was in first place with one lift to go, but if I didn’t make it, I’d wash out of the competition,” Koehn said. “I had to attempt the same weight again; you can’t back up.”
On his third attempt, with 696 pounds on the bar, Koehn completed the lift, but one light went dark.
Like the NFL challenge rule, if someone else steps up to begin a lift, you can’t overrule the previous lift.
“My coach said, don’t look at them, keep walking,” Koehn said. “I did, and the next guy came up, and the lift was scored.”
The flight home, including a layover in Germany was uneventful, the flight to Johannesburg, was anything but that.
They flew with United Airlines and as the departure date approached decided to upgrade their seats on the non-stop flight from Newark, New Jersey to Johannesburg. A hacker somehow intercepted their itinerary and began sending messages that their flight had been cancelled and they needed to rebook. After a couple of incidents, Suzie called directly to United and discovered the hacker. They had to fly a day later than originally planned but weren’t scammed.
Once in South Africa it was a two-and-a-half-hour drive to Sun City. They had problems meeting the chartered bus to the competition side and ended up hiring a taxi for $250 to get them to Sun City.
“It was pitch black outside as we drove across the countryside; every now and then, we’d see someone beside the road in the middle of the night,” Travis said. “When we stopped, I’d grab Payton by the foot so no one could reach into the cab and grab her. On the way home we saw people living everywhere along the route.”
Travis plans to compete again. The 2025 IPF Championships will be in Chengdu, China.