That is true. At one time I was doing a bunch of HIIT conditioning with a prowler (I no longer have a good place to use it) and I could do a ton of volume, but strength gains were slow and I was much weaker than I am now. It’s a good way to build work capacity, but how much that actually carries over to strength is another story.
I think that’s the coolest thing about Bands and Chains (accommodating resistance), if you can ever get that shit set up right, you push the bar “fast” but during the lift it feels like you’re right on the edge of a grindy, slow rep. It’s like you keep pushing harder without the bar having to slow down to grinding speed.
my take on why a 400 lbs max bench presser is not experiencing the same thing as an 800 lbs bench press when they are at similar percentages of their max:
It seems like most of you guys are discussing this in terms of muscle fibers, and nothing else. I think that’s a bad approach to understanding the body, as it relates to weightlifting. I think that one’s nervous system, skeletal system, and circulatory system all play a role in how the body responds to training when we get bigger and stronger. Muscles are going to adapt and grow under heavier loads much more than bones will adapt, for instance. Your skeletal structure will essentially remain the same as you progress to bigger and bigger bench presses. Connective tissue may not grow or repair proportionately. Etc. I think if you’re just thinking in terms of ‘a max is a max, it’s the same for everyone’, you’re ignoring the total picture of what happens in the body. We are far more complicated than that.
Interesting point, and recent research suggests that the skeletal structure plays a far more significant role in the body than previously thought, its certainly not just for physical structure. Feedback from stress on bones appears to impact hormone levels at the least.
I’m under the impression bone density increases with sufficient overloading stimulus and nutrition over time. Strength athlete bone density is crazy high compared to general population, bone density is directly related to force/energy tolerance to failure and dunno if it is capped. Do you mean a different kind of adaption?
Dont want to speak for him but I think its just the point that the adaptations arent directly proportional. Once your muscle can output twice the force, your bones wont be twice as dense.
exactly. even if bone density gets ‘crazy’ high, it may still not be sufficient for the heaviest lifts. Competitively speaking, you’ll see a lot more bone breaks/major injuries at heavier weights than light weights. That alone tells me the stress on the body is different.
When I blew out my ACL on a yoke, one of the other injuries I accumulated was a fractured patella.
My surgeon thought I had been in a car accident based off the MRI. He couldn’t fathom how lifting something heavy could cause that sort of trauma.
Bones are stupid.
605 X 9 (not a typo)
U reckon a compression top on a guy his size gives him an extra 10kg lol
Yeah, well I bet he sucks at pull ups!
(This is of course satire. Benching 600lb once is strong. Nine times is almost beyond comprehension)
Inb4 WR 1 arm chin up
I still think if kirill really pushed himself back in the day he could beat this set quite easily.
These guys are incredibly strong. But I can’t help but notice that most phenomenal benchers have fairly shorts arms, as you would expect. Just curious, are there any great benchers out there with long arms? Not taking anything away from Maddox or Spoto or any of the others, but if someone out there with arms that hang down to mid-thigh are moving these kinds of poundages, that would be even more remarkable!
He’s 6’3 - his arms are plenty long. They’re made to look shorter by his enormous body and the fact that they rest out at like 45 degree angles. But they’re plenty long. I’m just amazed his heart doesn’t explode every time he sits up.
Also Woolam is a built deadlifter but his bench is competitive at 500 odd against other full power lifters in his weight class. If anything his squat is the lagging lift
Lol look at this guy. Benchs more than he squats. Skip leg day much?
Looks like 500 ish
https://www.instagram.com/p/CCmthTegRjg/?igshid=178hx4pcjc9zg
Are there any 4’ tall slam dunk champions?
Like, don’t get me wrong: Jordan was great, but he was like 6’6. I am sure we can all agree it’s more impressive when a 4’ tall dude gets a dunk!