DBs and Functional Strength?

they say db’s are better for functional strenght than barbells on a bench

if thats entirely so

  1. why, i know db has better rom, but its not like bb leaves part of your chest undeveloped.

  2. why don’t rippetoe, starr, defranco use db’s ad primary moves as opposed to supplement moves/not at all?

if your benching using 200lb dumbells does it really matter?

Because a barbell keeps both hands working in a fixed plane, whereas DBs track independently. Your limbs must work independently, just like they do in real life.

Rippetoe and DeFranco do advocate dumbbells. In fact, Rippetoe goes so far as to say that the DB bench is superior to the barbell bench for athletes. DeFranco advocates DB presses as assistance for the bench.

However, you will be able to impart a greater stimulus on your CNS when you use a barbell. The more limbs, joints, and muscles you can work at the same time, the higher the CNS stimulation. That is why ME moves are always double-limb moves (box squats and benches) while assistance lifts tend to be unilateral (DB bench or bulgarian split squat). Seems like an ideal combination to me.

By reading you’re question, one came to my mind;

Do you know what functionnal strenght really is ?

[quote]GuiYoM wrote:
Be reading you’re question, one came to my mind;

Do you know what functional strenght really is ?[/quote]

Does anyone?? :wink:

[quote]Hanley wrote:
GuiYoM wrote:
By reading you’re question, one came to my mind;

Do you know what functional strenght really is ?

Does anyone?? ;)[/quote]

Who know?

[quote]GuiYoM wrote:
Hanley wrote:
GuiYoM wrote:
By reading you’re question, one came to my mind;

Do you know what functional strenght really is ?

Does anyone?? :wink:

Who know?

[/quote]

You know?

well when is anyone holding 100 lbs objects in each hand, laying down, and above their face in any application in life besides the weight room?

Fuck, cause this hasn’t been discussed a trillion times.

I think this is why threads are getting hijacked so quickly these days… old timers of the forums just get bored.

[quote]Evolv wrote:
well when is anyone holding 100 lbs objects in each hand, laying down, and above their face in any application in life besides the weight room?[/quote]

holding 100lb dumb bells or applying 100lbs of force? don’t know what your doing and trying to fix a control arm the first time, it sure helps to be stronger.

[quote]eic wrote:
Because a barbell keeps both hands working in a fixed plane, whereas DBs track independently. Your limbs must work independently, just like they do in real life.

Rippetoe and DeFranco do advocate dumbbells. In fact, Rippetoe goes so far as to say that the DB bench is superior to the barbell bench for athletes. DeFranco advocates DB presses as assistance for the bench.

However, you will be able to impart a greater stimulus on your CNS when you use a barbell. The more limbs, joints, and muscles you can work at the same time, the higher the CNS stimulation. That is why ME moves are always double-limb moves (box squats and benches) while assistance lifts tend to be unilateral (DB bench or bulgarian split squat). Seems like an ideal combination to me.[/quote]

Exactly.

DB’s allow each limb to work independently, thus taking care of any left to right imbalances. Barbells allow you to handle a greater load.

irish you’re right… its out of boredom.
nothing against the poster, its a legit question that you’ll encounter on your journey learning the ‘iron’ but “functional” itself it just an ignorant notion.

Functional for what?
To do what?

I can make an argument for damn near every exercise not being functional… i fight… so i should never do back squats?

you sprint…so sport specific is running with ankle weights???

i dunno it all just gets dumb after a while.

basic exercises + get STRONGER= all you need

gain weight?

eat more

Lose weight?

eat less

there’s some shit you can tinker with but in the end thats all it really comes down to.

[quote]Xen Nova wrote:
irish you’re right… its out of boredom.
nothing against the poster, its a legit question that you’ll encounter on your journey learning the ‘iron’ but “functional” itself it just an ignorant notion.

Functional for what?
To do what?

I can make an argument for damn near every exercise not being functional… i fight… so i should never do back squats?

you sprint…so sport specific is running with ankle weights???

i dunno it all just gets dumb after a while.

basic exercises + get STRONGER= all you need

gain weight?

eat more

Lose weight?

eat less

there’s some shit you can tinker with but in the end thats all it really comes down to. [/quote]

Yet mos people don’t understand this or the whole “toneing” thing. It’s rediculous.

Functional strength is putting the work in the gym into a sport or activities. You train the body as an unit, not a sa single muscle or single-joint.

Coach recreat the stress of the activites in the gym, look for weakness. The muscle must be able to give all the power available in every position for the sport.

Right, but what makes an exercise functional.

throwing a weighted ball might recreate the exact stress of throwing a baseball and magnify it therefore increasing your strength in throwing a baseball…

sike.

it’ll just mess up your motor unit recruitment patter, fuck up your joints, and do nothing positive for you except put you on the bench.

same with punching with weights. and same with punching with tubing behind your arms.
just teaches you punch with your arms, its all bad.

If you want to be functional the most you can get is to train joint expressions…or how a movement is expressed over the joints and the antagonistic motion (because obviously you’re doing a lot of the former, so strengthening the latter will stop your golgi complex from inhibiting your strength).

for example punching starts at your feet (big toe really) and is expressed through your hands at the end of the motion…notably one hand.

sort of like a dumbbell thruster or a 1 arm overhead jerk or a 1 arm snatch…

likewise the opposing motion is a mixture of pullups and rows… the legs are going through extension similar to deadlifts and front squats great for protagonistic motion and antagonistic… but because the motion is exploding forwards the best exercise for it is sprints.

Or better yet.

Just get fucking strong on the basics!!!

Bench, Row, Deadlift, Squat, Pullups, Dips, Overhead presses, lunges.

Use dumbbells if you want, kettlebells, barbells, what the fuck ever just get stronger.

Then you train the FUCK out of your technique for your chosen sport and implement your newfound strength in/on/around someone’s face. There are plenty of strong guys who hit like bitches till they get their technique right then their strength comes into play. likewise there are guys like joe lauzon who admitted that he can’t even bench 135 but he knocked out jens pulver. His mechanics are right. It takes a GREAT deal of strength to overcome bad mechanics but just a dose of good mechanics to overcome weakness… if you can get best of both worlds you’re a G.

everyone wants to jump into odd implement training and shit like that or specialized stuff when they’re not even strong yet. (1 arm snatches with 35lb dumbbell is bitch weight…get stronger)

very few of us are fucking beasts that need anything outside of the basics before we start worrying about

“what’s functional”

and all that bullshit.

GuiYoM are you inhaling co2 from that metabolic cart in your avatar?

well said hanley

[quote]adarqui wrote:

By reading you’re question, one came to my mind;

Do you know what functionnal strenght really is ?

GuiYoM are you inhaling co2 from that metabolic cart in your avatar?
[/quote]

Yes, How did you know?

[quote]Xen Nova wrote:
Right, but what makes an exercise functional.

throwing a weighted ball might recreate the exact stress of throwing a baseball and magnify it therefore increasing your strength in throwing a baseball…

sike.

it’ll just mess up your motor unit recruitment patter, fuck up your joints, and do nothing positive for you except put you on the bench.

same with punching with weights. and same with punching with tubing behind your arms.
just teaches you punch with your arms, its all bad.

If you want to be functional the most you can get is to train joint expressions…or how a movement is expressed over the joints and the antagonistic motion (because obviously you’re doing a lot of the former, so strengthening the latter will stop your golgi complex from inhibiting your strength).

for example punching starts at your feet (big toe really) and is expressed through your hands at the end of the motion…notably one hand.

sort of like a dumbbell thruster or a 1 arm overhead jerk or a 1 arm snatch…

likewise the opposing motion is a mixture of pullups and rows… the legs are going through extension similar to deadlifts and front squats great for protagonistic motion and antagonistic… but because the motion is exploding forwards the best exercise for it is sprints.

Or better yet.

Just get fucking strong on the basics!!!

Bench, Row, Deadlift, Squat, Pullups, Dips, Overhead presses, lunges.

Use dumbbells if you want, kettlebells, barbells, what the fuck ever just get stronger.

Then you train the FUCK out of your technique for your chosen sport and implement your newfound strength in/on/around someone’s face. There are plenty of strong guys who hit like bitches till they get their technique right then their strength comes into play. likewise there are guys like joe lauzon who admitted that he can’t even bench 135 but he knocked out jens pulver. His mechanics are right. It takes a GREAT deal of strength to overcome bad mechanics but just a dose of good mechanics to overcome weakness… if you can get best of both worlds you’re a G.

everyone wants to jump into odd implement training and shit like that or specialized stuff when they’re not even strong yet. (1 arm snatches with 35lb dumbbell is bitch weight…get stronger)

very few of us are fucking beasts that need anything outside of the basics before we start worrying about

“what’s functional”

and all that bullshit.
[/quote]

Yes, exactly.

The only thing I’d like to add is that people seem to think of “functional” as a doorway; that is, an exercise either is or is not functional. Rather, I think it might help to think of things as a spectrum.

Say I am a wrestler. I could spend time outside of practice deadlifting in the Hammer Strength shrug machine, doing barbell deadlifts, or picking up a heavy sandbag. I would say the Hammer Strength machine is the least “functional” exercise for this appliction and the sandbag the most “functional.” Obviously a barbell lies between the two.

OTOH, if I got bloody freaking strong at the barbell deadlift as Xen says, then that would be time well spent and would have a carry over to many, many aspects of wrestling, apart from simply picking one’s opponent up. Moreover, there is no need to choose one or the other; you can do many exercises.

[quote]eic wrote:
Because a barbell keeps both hands working in a fixed plane, whereas DBs track independently. Your limbs must work independently, just like they do in real life.

Rippetoe and DeFranco do advocate dumbbells. In fact, Rippetoe goes so far as to say that the DB bench is superior to the barbell bench for athletes. DeFranco advocates DB presses as assistance for the bench.

However, you will be able to impart a greater stimulus on your CNS when you use a barbell. The more limbs, joints, and muscles you can work at the same time, the higher the CNS stimulation. That is why ME moves are always double-limb moves (box squats and benches) while assistance lifts tend to be unilateral (DB bench or bulgarian split squat). Seems like an ideal combination to me.[/quote]

Ding Ding Ding…winner!

Couldn’t have said it any better.