If North American lifting champion Holton Lowrie gives any tips at your nearby gym, should you listen or steer clear?

You could make the case for both.

The Longmont senior is written just like the success stories you’ve always heard. He’s a hard worker, disciplined and a quick learner — all of which was needed as he went from interested in the sport of Olympic weightlifting to a No. 1 national ranking in less than two years.

Lowrie is also wired differently than most.

When he had major surgery on his left shoulder in 2022, he was 15 at the time, and during the arduous months of physical therapy, he only became more serious in his pursuit to become a competitive lifter.

When he injured that shoulder, it was in the Trojans’ homecoming football game that fall. And it was only later that he found out he’d played the second half with a dislocated shoulder, torn labrum, fractured AC joint and strained rotator cuff. He said he realized there was an issue once he got home and couldn’t lift his arm.

“I would rather live with the pain of discipline and not the pain of regret,” he said.

He says things like that a lot. Lives them, too.

With his arm still in a sling from surgery, Lowrie would watch videos of Olympic lifters online. He loved their athleticism. Their obsession in technique. And their chase for perfection.

He’d fit right in.

Six months after he was cleared by doctors, Lowrie won his first of three major championships: the Arizona state championship in January of 2024, followed by the Colorado state championship in October and the North American Open under-age 17 title last month.

The sport’s two lifts are the snatch — where you lift the barbell from the ground to overhead in a continuous motion — and the clean and jerk — from the ground to the chest, then overhead and hold. Lowrie, who’d recently competed in the 96-kilogram weight class (211 pounds), said he has already cleared 117 kilos (258 lbs.) in the snatch and 138 kilos (305 lbs.) in the clean and jerk.

“There’s a quote that goes through my head often,” Lowrie said. “I heard it from Kobe Bryant, but he said he heard it from an English teacher in high school. It says, ‘Rest at the end. Not the middle.’ And that’s stuck with me.”

Stuck in his routine, too.

When Lowrie began weightlifting in May of 2023, he was self-taught.

It wasn’t until a little later he’d join an elite training program.

Today, he’s coached by former U.S. Olympic lifting coach Roger Nielsen and decorated lifting and sports performance coach Randy Hauer.

“When I started working with him, he was already strong and had great flexibility and mobility. He was really well-rounded,” said Hauer, who coaches out of Gym No. 5 in Boulder. “He just decided he wanted to try it back in 2023 and taught himself. And he generated an enthusiasm for it. And he discovered he could be pretty good at it if he applied himself.”

Last spring, while Lowrie rose up the national lifting ranks, he also competed in baseball and track and field at Longmont High School. His days started with lifting at 4:30 in the morning and he wouldn’t get home until around 8 at night.

By school’s end, he was named all-conference in shot put. And he kept his GPA above 4.0 while taking AP classes.

“He’s mentally tough. He’s competitive,” Hauer said. “He’s got, if not all the right stuff, a lot of it, right?”

Right.

Going forward, Lowrie’s schedule remains full.

The start of the new year moved Lowrie from the U17 weightlifting division to juniors (U21). He’s training for bigger tournaments later in the year.

In the spring, he plans on doing track and field again. And not just throws. He wants to compete in jumps and sprints, too.

“I’m always itching for another two kilos on the bar. Five kilos. One kilo,” he said. “Same thing (everywhere). … I don’t want to leave anything on the table.”