CENTER TWP — Simpler can be better.

Moniteau graduate Jason Beck demonstrated that as a powerlifter and has wound up in the Pennsylvania Powerlifting Hall of Fame as a result.

“He’s an incredible talent,” said Travis Werner, a former football teammate of Beck’s at Moniteau and a fellow lifter. “I know he’s shown me a thing or two.”

Werner is a year older than Beck and actually started training him when the latter was 15. Both were in the gym lifting, looking to get stronger for football.

“We were best friends growing up,” Beck said. “We wound up going our separate ways, but never lost contact with each other.”

Beck went on to Slippery Rock University, where he started and coached a collegiate powerlifting team. Werner went to Southern Louisiana and did likewise at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette.

Their respective teams actually met each other at the 2002 Collegiate National Championships, where Beck’s SRU teams prevailed.

While Werner continued to coach at Louisiana-Lafayette, Beck joined the military and served a 15-month tour in Afghanistan in 2003-04.Werner told Beck of his complex and advanced training techniques at the time.

All Beck had was a makeshift gym set up by the Army — a dirt floor and some barbells so he could practice his squat, bench press and deadlift.

“We didn’t have much equipment, so everything I did was repetitive, just the same lifts all the time, over and over,” Beck recalled.

Less than two months after returning to the states, Beck decided to enter the 2005 USAPL National Championships.

“I thought he was nuts, that he was going to embarrass himself,” Werner said.

To the contrary, Beck became national champion at 198 pounds. He went on to win multiple national championships in the sport, placed second in the Open World Meet and set national records of 837 pounds in the squat, 584 in the bench and 777 in the dead-lift.

Werner decided to simplify the training methods for his college powerlifting team and the program became a national power. And Beck was recently inducted into the Pa. Powerlifting HOF during the Pennsylvania State Championships in Philadelphia.

“This whole thing started out as just a hobby for me,” Beck said. “Then I got to compete in world championships, go overseas and stay competitive at a high level for a long time.

“It was really fun. I got more out of the sport than I ever could have imagined.”

Beck, 40, won collegiate nationals in 2001. He won Open Nationals four successive years from 2004-07. He was a two-time silver medalist at the world championships.

He hasn’t competed in five years now.

A resident of Center Township, Beck works in the maintenance department at A-K Steel.

“I still train, but I don’t compete anymore,” he said.

“Jason was highly competitive for a long time,” Werner said. “He had three things that keyed his success: super genetics, extreme discipline and great collegiate training.

“He’s so deserving of the Hall of Fame. He’s one of the best.”