Height and Strength

Training
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I was just thinking about the size of people and how strong they are and wondering what the relationship is. That is, shorter guys seem to tend to be the top guys in sports like powerlifting and crossfit. It is my understanding that the majority of bodybuilders are under 6’ too. So, does that mean that shorter people are generally stronger (probably due to better leverages etc.). If they are, it seems like shorter people should be more dominant in other sports but it seems like American football, hockey, of course basketball and other sports are dominated by taller, larger athletes.

Now, I know mass is a factor. It is a lot better to have a 350 lb,6’6 lineman fall down on the line of scrimmage and basically provide a large obstacle due to his mass than, say, a 5’6 200 lb guy no matter how strong the littler guy is. But still, if the little guy can squat and push more than the bigger guy, I would expect that there would be more smaller super strong guys in pushing roles. Same thing for sumo wrestlers. I know they are supposed to be putting on mass but if you are 400 lbs but cant push as hard or explosively as a smaller guy it seems like you would be at a disadvantage as the smaller guy is surely more agile (although it would be easier to throw the smaller guy around so the larger sumo wrestler would not need to be as strong against him).

I dont know, just curious about this.

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Shorter powerlifters and olympic lifters aren’t necessarily the ones with the strongest muscles, but who have the better leverages for lifting a barbell in the competition lifts because they have a shorter range of motion. It’s easier to lift a weight 20" than 30". This doesn’t necessarily make them stronger in “sporting tasks”.

For Crossfit, don’t forget that in many movements you have to move your bodyweight, and as such being taller and heavier makes it harder on you. Few movements in Crossfit advantage the taller guys (wall ball and rope climbing for example). If you are tall, handstand push ups, dips, walking on your hands, pistols, front squats, thrusters for example are much harder. And obviously pull-ups are harder if you are heavier.

Bodybuilders tend to be shorter because it’s easier to look “full” when you are shorter, when you are taller it takes a lot more time and muscle to fill your frame.

I could also reply that there true strongest men in the world (those who compete in strongman competitions) tend to be very very tall. The top strongman right now are in the 6’6" to 6"10" range with a huge frame.

You also mentioned football players… while the 5’9" running back might have a equally impressive bench press than the 6’6" lineman, the later has a lot more strength on the field.

In fact a decade or so ago, Nebraska looked at results in the various tests they were using and performance on the field… the strongest bench pressers tended to be the 2nd or 3rd back-ups while the starters had lower results on the bench press. Were they weaker? No, they probably were taller with longer arms (which is better for football performance, but worse for bench pressing).

A “big” tall man (so who has a bigger frame) will tend to be stronger than a “big” short man especially in “real life” movements.

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Lol sucks to be short. Just focus obsessively on body comp and lever-advantaged strength stuff to compensate (:

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CT, thanks for the great answer! Very interesting!

I understand the leverage thing an that with longer limbs a muscle that is the same strength will appear weaker ie. will not be able to move as much weight. But, if the guy can’t move as much weight, then it seems to me that he is weaker (guess we could say “expressed strength” is lower or something like that).

Does “strength on the field” mean something like: moving your entire body to perform an action? So, even though a specific movement is weaker, when all of it is put together the combination is stronger? I would guess that the best athletes are not the best just because of their muscular strength, but also because of their ability to react, make decisions in split second situations, use their vision to take in the entire field etc.

I think I saw a program on PBS many many years (like 10 or more) ago that talked about the highest level soccer and football players. It said something about their ability to know exactly where everyone was on the field at any moment that was much different from how a normal person would take in a situation. They were very aware of where their bodies were in relation to everything.

So, it might make sense that the first string guys were weaker. Even super strong, if you can’t react well you will get out manuevered and thought by your opponent.

In high school and college I wrestled and, although I loved the sport, I was never better than mediocre. I was much stronger than the other guys at my weight class so I did well against the typical guys. But once I would get up against, say, the 6,7,8 best at a tournament I would always get outmaneuvered. They just always seemed to be able to pull a move a split second before I wound and I would get caught in a bad position.

They were just superior to me in speed and being able to take in the situation and quickly take advantage to pull a move. But, we are talking about strength here. I am sure that I was stronger than 95% of those dudes. I was wresting at 152 lbs and benching 315 x 3. Now, I know that is not great compared to a lot of people on here but it definitely was for the competition that I was facing.

I didnt know that about the strong men. Cool stuff!

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“Strength on the field” referred specifically about physically dominating an opponent. In sports, especially a contact sport like football, physical confrontations are won by a combination of “lifting strength” (if you want to call it that), the use of your physique and skill.

A shorter guy will always be at a disadvantage during physical confrontations with a larger opponent because he is starting “from a deficit”. Now, if he is amazingly strong he might be able to overcome that deficit, but it’s the exception rather than the rule.

I’d like to say that it’s not the case. After all…

  1. I’m a strength coach… when training athletes my role is to make them stronger and my argument is that making them stronger will help them on the field. So I’d like to be able to say that getting super strong can compensate from a small structure… in most cases it can’t

  2. I’m kinda short myself, so it’s not like I have something against short guys! But objectively being shorter was always a disadvantage when I played sports.

Of course in weight class sports it is different. After all, when you wrestle at 152, everybody has to be 152. So there can’t be physical dominance involved. In that case, yes, strength can make a huge difference (weight classes limit the significance of the physique in performance, leaving only skill and strength as the difference makers).

But if you look at football (or hockey, rugby and even basketball) body size plays a BIG role because there are no weight classes on the field. For example, if you are a 190lbs runningback trying to overpower a 300lbs nose tackle it would kinda be like your 152lbs self wresting against a 260lbs wrestler. See if you are stronger than he is! You might even have better gym lifts than he does, but when you go man on man he will overpower you.

That’s what I mean by real-world strength.

Now, shorter/smaller athletes of equal levels will have a higher relative strength (strength to bodyweight ratio). For example there are plenty of lighter guys snatching twice bodyweight, but no superheavyweight lifter can do that. You have plenty of smaller lifters who have accomplished a 3x bodyweight clean & jerk, but not many superheavyweights ever did 2x their bodyweight.

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Got you. So, basically size may limit your strength relitively but you probably will be able to get stronger overall just because you can keep adding mass to your frame. Also, because you are bigger the smaller guy just has a lot more to deal with no matter how strong you are (within reason). Also, it is much more likely that the 350 lb guy can lift up a 190 lb guy as the big guy is lugging that weight around all day.

The smaller guy may be able to pick up the 350 lb guy but it is going to probably be at around the limits of his strength and probably beyond if the 350 lb guy has got momentum and inertia working for him. Likewise, the smaller guy is going to have to hit the bigger guy with much more speed to overcome the intertial forces of the bigger mass and get it moving. Like a train hitting a car. The train can be moving 1 mph but that car is going to move the way the train is going no matter what it does. If the train is moving faster, the car isnt even a road bump.

Thanks for the great response!

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[quote]irfhdah wrote:
Got you. So, basically size may limit your strength relitively but you probably will be able to get stronger overall just because you can keep adding mass to your frame. Also, because you are bigger the smaller guy just has a lot more to deal with no matter how strong you are (within reason). Also, it is much more likely that the 350 lb guy can lift up a 190 lb guy as the big guy is lugging that weight around all day. The smaller guy may be able to pick up the 350 lb guy but it is going to probably be at around the limits of his strength and probably beyond if the 350 lb guy has got momentum and inertia working for him. Likewise, the smaller guy is going to have to hit the bigger guy with much more speed to overcome the intertial forces of the bigger mass and get it moving. Like a train hitting a car. The train can be moving 1 mph but that car is going to move the way the train is going no matter what it does. If the train is moving faster, the car isnt even a road bump.

Thanks for the great response![/quote]

That’s pretty much it, yeah

There is always olympic lifting, Crossfit, bodybuilding, powerlifting, gymnastics and weight class sports for shorter fellows.

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