I’ll use an example from one of the authors on this site. Cressey has pulled 600 at a body weight of 165. Maybe you don’t respect his physique, but a 600# pull is still pretty impressive- better than plenty of 250# guys.
[quote]jtrinsey wrote:
I’ll use an example from one of the authors on this site. Cressey has pulled 600 at a body weight of 165. Maybe you don’t respect his physique, but a 600# pull is still pretty impressive- better than plenty of 250# guys.[/quote]
But Cressey isn’t on this thread telling all the big guys that train to get big that they are a bunch of weak pussies.
You guys are using fuctional strength as every bit the excuse as the obese person uses ‘glandular’ problems for their flabby girth.
Go ahead and call it what it really is for most of the Functional Strength crowd of late: Manorexia.
Seriously man, who is out there saying that bodybuilders are weak? I challenge you to find one thread where I’ve said that, so don’t lump me in that group. I’ve definitly shown nothing but respect for guys who are fucking huge and throwing around some serious weight. However, I also have respect for the small guys who can still lift some great weights for their size. I also have respect for guys who can jump high, run fast, punch somebody’s lights out, etc. I even [gasp] respect guys who do triathalons or other endurance activities.
The bottom line is, if you can’t respect somebody who’s busting their ass to accomplish THEIR goals, and they are achieving THEIR goals, than you’re an idiot.
[quote]rainjack wrote:
jtrinsey wrote:
I’ll use an example from one of the authors on this site. Cressey has pulled 600 at a body weight of 165. Maybe you don’t respect his physique, but a 600# pull is still pretty impressive- better than plenty of 250# guys.
But Cressey isn’t on this thread telling all the big guys that train to get big that they are a bunch of weak pussies.
You guys are using fuctional strength as every bit the excuse as the obese person uses ‘glandular’ problems for their flabby girth.
Go ahead and call it what it really is for most of the Functional Strength crowd of late: Manorexia. [/quote]
Cressey is also a competitive powerlifter who DOES train for relative strength. And in his case it is important because it is applicable to his sport.
If a lifter is not an athlete and doesn’t compete, then why is relative strength even an issue. I just don’t get it. What are you lifting for? I mean really. (This is not directed to anyone in particular.) I really think the people that start bringing this up use it as an excuse for why they aren’t growing.
I powerlift and I compete in strongman. I do NOT excel at it. I do NOT plan on setting any records anytime soon. Maybe as I get stronger. That being said, relative strength is important to me, yet I still want to be big. I don’t care what weightclass I’m in right now. I compete more with myself than other competitors. I have put on size, and I will continue to grow until, and if I ever, reach a point where I think my size is a detriment to my strength. Hell, everytime I look at the “Favorite Bodybuilder Pics” thread, I want to give up competitive lifting and just get freakin’ huge.
[quote]jtrinsey wrote:
I’ll use an example from one of the authors on this site. Cressey has pulled 600 at a body weight of 165. Maybe you don’t respect his physique, but a 600# pull is still pretty impressive- better than plenty of 250# guys.[/quote]
And just to make myself clear, yes, I do think 600 is a fairly impressive pull.
In the big three – squat, bench, dead – I think that once you hit a certain poundage, regardless of bodyweight, it becomes a respectable lift and shows that you have put some time into your strength training. Off the top of my head I would say that those numbers would be 500, 400, 600, respectively. I mean, anyone can bench 3 plates with a little training. It does take some time and effort to get there, but most anyone can do it. It is a lot harder and takes a lot more effort to go from 3 plates to 4, than it does from 2 to 3.
[quote]malonetd wrote:
rainjack wrote:
jtrinsey wrote:
I’ll use an example from one of the authors on this site. Cressey has pulled 600 at a body weight of 165. Maybe you don’t respect his physique, but a 600# pull is still pretty impressive- better than plenty of 250# guys.
But Cressey isn’t on this thread telling all the big guys that train to get big that they are a bunch of weak pussies.
You guys are using fuctional strength as every bit the excuse as the obese person uses ‘glandular’ problems for their flabby girth.
Go ahead and call it what it really is for most of the Functional Strength crowd of late: Manorexia.
Cressey is also a competitive powerlifter who DOES train for relative strength. And in his case it is important because it is applicable to his sport.
If a lifter is not an athlete and doesn’t compete, then why is relative strength even an issue. I just don’t get it. What are you lifting for? I mean really. (This is not directed to anyone in particular.) I really think the people that start bringing this up use it as an excuse for why they aren’t growing.
I powerlift and I compete in strongman. I do NOT excel at it. I do NOT plan on setting any records anytime soon. Maybe as I get stronger. That being said, relative strength is important to me, yet I still want to be big. I don’t care what weightclass I’m in right now. I compete more with myself than other competitors. I have put on size, and I will continue to grow until, and if I ever, reach a point where I think my size is a detriment to my strength. Hell, everytime I look at the “Favorite Bodybuilder Pics” thread, I want to give up competitive lifting and just get freakin’ huge.
[/quote]
…and that is the point they conveniently step right over. UNLESS YOU ARE A COMPETITIVE POWERLIFTER WHO HAS A SPECIFIC WEIGHT CLASS YOU ARE TRAINING IN, RELATIVE STRENGTH MEANS JACK SHIT FOR THE MOST PART.
This shit is being used as an excuse by guys who simply don’t train hard and/or don’t put much focus into food intake. If you have been training for years and no one can tell because you have made no physical progress, unless you compete in powerlifting, what the fuck is the excuse? The average guy using this term is not really “training for relatiuve strength”. They are simply making very little progress in the weight room and making themselves feel better through the use of this term.
I’m getting the t-shirt idea, how about a line of T-shirts?
Relative strength is just an excuse for being both smaller AND weaker!
Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift the damn weights!
I got all this from 35lb dumbells!
I lifted like a bodybuilder and all I got was this lousy XL t-shirt.
Functional Strength: It’s not the size of the weight, but how you use it!
Functional Strength is for Pussies!
No one asks me “Do you workout?”
Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
Your mom understands training for muscle size.
No one asks me “Do you workout?”
I’m this big because I was too functional to weigh 150!
Okay, maybe not the last one or two.
[quote]lucasa wrote:
Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
.[/quote]
Best one.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
lucasa wrote:
Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
.
Best one.[/quote]
Thanks.
[quote]Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
[/quote]when 19" do the same(or more) for less.
[quote]malonetd wrote:
If a lifter is not an athlete and doesn’t compete, then why is relative strength even an issue. I just don’t get it. What are you lifting for? I mean really. (This is not directed to anyone in particular.) I really think the people that start bringing this up use it as an excuse for why they aren’t growing.
[/quote]
Bingo. I couldn’t have said it better. Like Prof has said before, I lift for strength and eat for size. It’s really that simple.
[quote]lucasa wrote:
I’m getting the t-shirt idea, how about a line of T-shirts?
I lifted like a bodybuilder and all I got was this lousy XL t-shirt.
.[/quote]
This is my fav. Fucking great!
[quote]malonetd wrote:
Cressey is also a competitive powerlifter who DOES train for relative strength. And in his case it is important because it is applicable to his sport.
If a lifter is not an athlete and doesn’t compete, then WHY IS RELATIVE STRENGTH EVEN AN ISSUE. I just don’t get it. WHAT ARE YOU LIFTING FOR? I mean really. (This is not directed to anyone in particular.) I really think the people that start bringing this up use it as an excuse for why they aren’t growing.
[/quote]
[Emphasis above added by me for clarity.]
Malonetd,
How many guys on this forum who call themselves ‘bodybuilders’ actually plan on standing oiled up on stage? A lot of people on T-Nation are understandably put off by competitive bodybuilding: However strong Ronnie Coleman is, and he is very strong, the clown pants and the ‘YEEEEAHH BUDAAAAY! LightWEIGHT!!!’ do not represent how they want to look and conduct themselves. So why do they ‘bodybuild’? Because they like the idea of being a guy who is much bigger than everybody else and has the bite to match his bark. They do it to make themselves more like a certain image that they have in mind.
‘Relative strength’ guys are the same way. They like the idea of athletes that are really strong for their size, and the image they have is that of a guy who only looks somewhat larger than the average man, but who gets a lot of bang for his buck out of the muscle he has.
Without competition in either of these arenas, what makes ‘bodybuilding’ superior to training for strength to bodyweight ratio?
N.B.: I agree that if you really want to make any progress, you have to pick a sport and specialize, if only to give yourself the focus to improve and to have competitors and ideal performers to motivate you. I just think that non-competitive ‘bodybuilding’ is just as vulnerable to criticism on these grounds as ‘skinny strength’ [shudder].
[quote]lefthandedbrian wrote:
Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
when 19" do the same(or more) for less.
[/quote]
When my arms were 19", they were weaker than they are now. With that in mind, how did you come to the conclusion that my smaller arm did the same? It didn’t do the “the same or more”. What does “for less” mean?
[quote]Professor X wrote:
lefthandedbrian wrote:
Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
when 19" do the same(or more) for less.
When my arms were 19", they were weaker than they are now. With that in mind, how did you come to the conclusion that my smaller arm did the same? It didn’t do the “the same or more”. What does “for less” mean?[/quote]
I’d like to hear that explanation too.
[quote]Ross Hunt wrote:
Without competition in either of these arenas, what makes ‘bodybuilding’ superior to training for strength to bodyweight ratio?
[/quote]
I am only asking where the people are “en mass” who are stronger yet MUCH smaller than me without someone pointing out the rarity of an Olympic Lifter or someone who DOES compete in powerlifting.
[quote]
N.B.: I agree that if you really want to make any progress, you have to pick a sport and specialize, if only to give yourself the focus to improve and to have competitors and ideal performers to motivate you. I just think that non-competitive ‘bodybuilding’ is just as vulnerable to criticism on these grounds as ‘skinny strength’ [shudder].[/quote]
Bodybuilding is very open to criticism. However, you can easily look at someone and tell when they have been half assin’ it in the gym for years. Am I to honestly believe that the majority (or even a large group of the minority) are all strong as hell even though they don’t look like they lift? What are the honest chances of that being the case?
[quote]lefthandedbrian wrote:
Exactly how non-functional are 22" arms?
when 19" do the same(or more) for less.
[/quote]
That’s less functional not non-functional.
First off, one needs to look at the composition of the “hypertrophy”. As you probably know, bber hypertrophy is ussually different than say for a o-lifter. That said every trainee has a level of lbm where gains in terms of physical performance are not only diminishing, but turn to losses.
Therefore if an idividual can perform a task with 19" arms as well as they could with 22", they are saving a bunch by not having to do with maintaining the extra 3".Look at the word TRAIN, what does it mean?? It means to teach, right??? An athlete is trying to teach their body (and mind) to perform tasks with more and more efficiency. Hypertrophy, plays a small part in that.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Ross Hunt wrote:
Without competition in either of these arenas, what makes ‘bodybuilding’ superior to training for strength to bodyweight ratio?
I am only asking where the people are “en mass” who are stronger yet MUCH smaller than me without someone pointing out the rarity of an Olympic Lifter or someone who DOES compete in powerlifting.
N.B.: I agree that if you really want to make any progress, you have to pick a sport and specialize, if only to give yourself the focus to improve and to have competitors and ideal performers to motivate you. I just think that non-competitive ‘bodybuilding’ is just as vulnerable to criticism on these grounds as ‘skinny strength’ [shudder].
Bodybuilding is very open to criticism. However, you can easily look at someone and tell when they have been half assin’ it in the gym for years. Am I to honestly believe that the majority (or even a large group of the minority) are all strong as hell even though they don’t look like they lift? What are the honest chances of that being the case?[/quote]
Prof X,
I think you’re right about everything you’ve said here. These days, in the states, anyway, if someone isn’t big, the odds that he secretly snatches double bodyweight are pretty low.
However, I wonder whether this might not be a consequence of the way people train now.
To hear Dan John and others talk about ‘the old days,’ there was more of a focus on strength back then. Gymnastics and GPP were part of PE; even my mother, who isn’t that old, remembers having to climb rope, run a mile for time, and do pull-ups and push-ups as part of the Presidential Fitness Challenge. People did oly lifting variations, clean-and-pressing and power snatching, and the US owned the podium year after year in international weightlifting competitions. In such an environment I imagine that it might not be surprising to find a bunch of guys who are stronger than they look…
But when bodybuilding and aerobic training came into vogue, all of this went down the tubes and the more easily measurable criteria (putting weight overhead, running a mile, being able to beat up the guy who kicked sand in your face) were replaced by subjective criteria. Now most people train only with high reps, and train for size, so is it surprising that there aren’t many people with a good strength:bodyweight ratio, or that the U.S.'s status in international weightlifting has suffered a rather embarassing decline?
The ‘skinny-strong epidemic’ could very well be understood as a predictable degeneration consequent upon the domination of american weight training by bodybuilding: When all that is desired from weight training is to look good, it’s pretty easy to just change the aesthetic standards so that looking good doesn’t require anything but margianally low bodyfat.
Prof X.,
I definitly see your point. I guess I am coming from the perspective that you have to respect anybody who’s busting their ass to excel in their field. As an college athlete, I deal a lot more with “relative strength” and that sort of thing than guys who are just looking to get huge. I think everybody can see from all of my posts that I have nothing but respect for guys who have put years of training in to get huge, but I also have the same respect for guys who are putting in the same training for other goals.