'Wasting' Gains

Training Bodybuilding
101

[quote]pumped340 wrote:

Celtics: I don’t think I was talking about any limit on neck flexion, it was just an example. What I was saying is if you are on a cut and work your way up to 100lb, or whatever is close to your potential to lift, then you’ll be gaining less strength during the time that you’re actually putting on weight. I don’t know the answer, and I doubt anyone knows exactly, but that’s what I was talking about. [/quote]

This is the wrong mentality to have. Once you max out something such as the leg press for countless reps then you do single leg stuff. Regarding neck flexion - you won’t get close to doing 100 lbs for 12 reps without cheating in only a few months while on a cut. Honestly, that is the least thing you should be worrying about.

102

This is one lame thread FILLED to the brim with little guys pissed off because big guys get respected for being big.

No one here is trying to gain body fat. No one here with any amount of serious time under some serious weight confuses a fat 18" arm with a lean one. However, you have to reach the 18" arm in the first place BEFORE YOU WORRY ABOUT HOW LEAN IT IS. Anyone who doesn’t understand that needs to just quit posting in this forum.

No one gives a shit if a little guy stays little yet gets ripped. That is not and never has been bodybuilding unless the guy is very short and still relatively built compared to others.

103

finally some common sense

/thread

104

[quote]Professor X wrote:
This is one lame thread FILLED to the brim with little guys pissed off because big guys get respected for being big.

No one here is trying to gain body fat. No one here with any amount of serious time under some serious weight confuses a fat 18" arm with a lean one. However, you have to reach the 18" arm in the first place BEFORE YOU WORRY ABOUT HOW LEAN IT IS. Anyone who doesn’t understand that needs to just quit posting in this forum.

No one gives a shit if a little guy stays little yet gets ripped. That is not and never has been bodybuilding unless the guy is very short and still relatively built compared to others.[/quote]

Yea I really have no idea how this thread turned in that direction.

Celtics, I wasn’t saying you would reach a max during a cut, I was just saying for whatever strength was gained…my first example was 30lb

105

Another Hawt Abz post - awesome

I have a real quick remedy to all this BS.

If you aint Squating, Benching or Dling 1.5 X your bodyweight its probably a good idea to keep eating (a lot), reading, lifting and shutting the F up.

106

[quote]pumped340 wrote:
I had thought about this in the past, and it probably wouldn’t change much in what I do, but what do you guys think about the idea that some gains would be wasted during a cut, and therefore you might put off training something?

For instance, lets say you never worked legs before and then after a few years you decided to take a few months to lean down. Would it make sense to hold off on training legs for that time since they likely wouldn’t grow much while losing weight but would probably grow pretty rapidly when you began gaining again?

I mean you might get some growth during the cut but obviously nowhere near if you were gaining. At some point strength is going to be limited so maybe it would be better to wait until you can gain the most leg size from that first 50-100lb increase in squats than just not really going anywhere for a few months.

On a similar note, Thibs has mentioned how people shouldn’t do IBB during a cut. Part of that is the recovery issue but also there’s the fact that you just wouldn’t see as good of results that way. What do you guys think??

[/quote]

Highly individual.

Relates to alot of things.

  1. The main reason not to lift when cutting is to avoid injury. However this would relate to the intensity of the diet, cardio and the lifting.

  2. if your talking about someone who hasn’t lifted in several years, they would accomplish more by lifting first. If you haven’t lifted in several years your body already feels the muscle you have is useless, and when you decide to cut will eat that up alot faster. If your 300lbs with a bunch of old muscle from playing football 5 years ago then maybe you won’t mind losing muscle and you have enough to spare in order to lose the amount of fat you have.

  3. But if your 200 and decide to lose 10% while not lifting you will lose alot of muscle.

  4. Really successful bodybuilders accomplish their cuts with diet, which allows them to lift more than if they did it with cardio. If you have alot of discipline your much better off lifting you can maintain the muscle if not still make gains.

  5. Alot of people brag that they can do the same workout when cutting that they do when bulking. If that’s the case either they’re bound for a muscle strain or are not making maximum gains when bulking and could move to a better or more intense routine.

107

[quote]forlife wrote:

Weren’t you done with the thread? I’ll give you one last shot at having a real discussion.

Explain how benching 115s proves that every guy posting about his 17 inch arms can do the same? Why do you keep making this personal? I never said you were in the group I’m talking about, nor do I care what you think about my own lifts.

My point is that people can have big measurements without being able to do big lifts. Girth can be due to fat as much as muscle. Are you disagreeing with this? [/quote]

What “people” are you referring to? I hate when I hear this “some people” bullshit. Who exactly are you talking about? Let’s hear some names. I popped in the 17" arm thread and was putting up 115 lbs dumbells on a low incline back in Feb pre-surgery. I’m now 16.5" and doing 105’s.

I work out in a few different gyms. 90% of the time I see a guy smaller (yet more rippppped) than me put the same weight on the bench that I use, he’s going to do partial reps or his spotters going to have a nice upright row session. 90% of the time a noticeably bigger guy sets up on bench, he out-lifts me.

108

[quote]sam_sneed wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

Weren’t you done with the thread? I’ll give you one last shot at having a real discussion.

Explain how benching 115s proves that every guy posting about his 17 inch arms can do the same? Why do you keep making this personal? I never said you were in the group I’m talking about, nor do I care what you think about my own lifts.

My point is that people can have big measurements without being able to do big lifts. Girth can be due to fat as much as muscle. Are you disagreeing with this? [/quote]

What “people” are you referring to? I hate when I hear this “some people” bullshit. Who exactly are you talking about? Let’s hear some names. I popped in the 17" arm thread and was putting up 115 lbs dumbells on a low incline back in Feb pre-surgery. I’m now 16.5" and doing 105’s.

I work out in a few different gyms. 90% of the time I see a guy smaller (yet more rippppped) than me put the same weight on the bench that I use, he’s going to do partial reps or his spotters going to have a nice upright row session. 90% of the time a noticeably bigger guy sets up on bench, he out-lifts me.[/quote]

I would also like to see a video of a 15 inch arm curl the 75’s with “good form”

Not saying it isn’t possible, but it has been driving me nuts all weekend.

109

Maybe my gym is unusual, but I doubt it. I go to the downtown Dallas 24 Hour Fitness gym, and on a daily basis I see guys that fit this description. I lift in the top 5% of guys at my gym using the same form/reps, and I’m in the bottom 5% for height. Yet because my weight is lower than some on these boards would consider acceptable for a “real bodybuilder”, most would dismiss me as an intermediate lifter at best.

Which is ok :slight_smile: I’ve learned after participating on these boards for years that you can’t change people’s minds, and there’s no point in trying to do so.

Having the respect of an internet board is less important than having the respect of guys you lift with on a daily basis, which is less important than having respect for yourself.

110

[quote]pumped340 wrote:
Celtics: I don’t think I was talking about any limit on neck flexion, it was just an example. What I was saying is if you are on a cut and work your way up to 100lb, or whatever is close to your potential to lift, then you’ll be gaining less strength during the time that you’re actually putting on weight. I don’t know the answer, and I doubt anyone knows exactly, but that’s what I was talking about. [/quote]

This whole thread was allowed to get to where it was because you have a fundamental misunderstanding of lifting. You act like once you hit your “strength limit” or “potential to lift” (whatever the fuck that means) you can’t lift anymore. Might as well hang up the barbells and buy a bosuball.

Let me ask you a question: is reaching your “strength potential” (strongest you can possibly ever get) quickly a bad thing? No. If such a limit did exist (which it doesn’t), you would want to get there as quickly as possible so you could spend the most time working with that weight.

If your genetic potential is, say, 100 lbs, and you could either attain that in one year or one month, you would choose one month. Why? So you could spend the following 11 months using heavy ass weights!!! You would increase the tension you are subjecting your muscles to and inducing more growth.

Can we please stop discussing this now?

111

[quote]forlife wrote:
Maybe my gym is unusual, but I doubt it. I go to the downtown Dallas 24 Hour Fitness gym, and on a daily basis I see guys that fit this description. I lift in the top 5% of guys at my gym using the same form/reps, and I’m in the bottom 5% for height. Yet because my weight is lower than some on these boards would consider acceptable for a “real bodybuilder”, most would dismiss me as an intermediate lifter at best.

Which is ok :slight_smile: I’ve learned after participating on these boards for years that you can’t change people’s minds, and there’s no point in trying to do so.

Having the respect of an internet board is less important than having the respect of guys you lift with on a daily basis, which is less important than having respect for yourself.[/quote]

Do you have any video’s, pics, anything?

Because you are right, numbers are meaningless.

112

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]sam_sneed wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

Weren’t you done with the thread? I’ll give you one last shot at having a real discussion.

Explain how benching 115s proves that every guy posting about his 17 inch arms can do the same? Why do you keep making this personal? I never said you were in the group I’m talking about, nor do I care what you think about my own lifts.

My point is that people can have big measurements without being able to do big lifts. Girth can be due to fat as much as muscle. Are you disagreeing with this? [/quote]

What “people” are you referring to? I hate when I hear this “some people” bullshit. Who exactly are you talking about? Let’s hear some names. I popped in the 17" arm thread and was putting up 115 lbs dumbells on a low incline back in Feb pre-surgery. I’m now 16.5" and doing 105’s.

I work out in a few different gyms. 90% of the time I see a guy smaller (yet more rippppped) than me put the same weight on the bench that I use, he’s going to do partial reps or his spotters going to have a nice upright row session. 90% of the time a noticeably bigger guy sets up on bench, he out-lifts me.[/quote]

I would also like to see a video of a 15 inch arm curl the 75’s with “good form”

Not saying it isn’t possible, but it has been driving me nuts all weekend.[/quote]

I’ll go right ahead and say it - other than some sort of anomaly that shit isn’t happening. It takes big arms to curl 75s, I’m not even there yet (for reps) and my arms are a lot bigger than 15".

113

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]sam_sneed wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

Weren’t you done with the thread? I’ll give you one last shot at having a real discussion.

Explain how benching 115s proves that every guy posting about his 17 inch arms can do the same? Why do you keep making this personal? I never said you were in the group I’m talking about, nor do I care what you think about my own lifts.

My point is that people can have big measurements without being able to do big lifts. Girth can be due to fat as much as muscle. Are you disagreeing with this? [/quote]

What “people” are you referring to? I hate when I hear this “some people” bullshit. Who exactly are you talking about? Let’s hear some names. I popped in the 17" arm thread and was putting up 115 lbs dumbells on a low incline back in Feb pre-surgery. I’m now 16.5" and doing 105’s.

I work out in a few different gyms. 90% of the time I see a guy smaller (yet more rippppped) than me put the same weight on the bench that I use, he’s going to do partial reps or his spotters going to have a nice upright row session. 90% of the time a noticeably bigger guy sets up on bench, he out-lifts me.[/quote]

I would also like to see a video of a 15 inch arm curl the 75’s with “good form”

Not saying it isn’t possible, but it has been driving me nuts all weekend.[/quote]

I’ll go right ahead and say it - other than some sort of anomaly that shit isn’t happening. It takes big arms to curl 75s, I’m not even there yet (for reps) and my arms are a lot bigger than 15".[/quote]

Thank you

114

I apologize for my earlier post. My test is high and patience low.

What I said is applicable but I now question the delivery.

115

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:
I’ll go right ahead and say it - other than some sort of anomaly that shit isn’t happening. It takes big arms to curl 75s, I’m not even there yet (for reps) and my arms are a lot bigger than 15".[/quote]

I agree with you, and was using a hypothetical example to make a point. It’s not even a profound point, I don’t see why people are having such a hard time with it. If someone with smaller arms can curl more weight using the identical form as someone with larger arms, why would you choose to be more impressed by the guy with larger arms? Size doesn’t always translate to strength, or even to muscle. People can have large arms due to fat as well.

116

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Do you have any video’s, pics, anything?

Because you are right, numbers are meaningless.
[/quote]

Yes, I have pics that I use to track my progress. I’ve posted pics and stats in the past, but what is the point? I’m not here to prove anything to anyone. I don’t care whether or not you believe the lifts that I say I can do.

For what it’s worth, you have me beat on flat dumbbell benching. Chest is not my strong suit, and I can only do 100s at the moment. That said, this morning I did 115/side on the Hammerstrength press and last Friday I did 225/side on Hammerstrength decline press. I know my decline is disportionately high compared to my other presses, so people don’t need to point that out yet again.

Feel free to disbelieve me if you want, since apparently it’s impossible for a guy my height and weight to do the lifts I say I can do, using decent form. I actually take it as a compliment in a way.

117

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:
I’ll go right ahead and say it - other than some sort of anomaly that shit isn’t happening. It takes big arms to curl 75s, I’m not even there yet (for reps) and my arms are a lot bigger than 15".[/quote]

I agree with you, and was using a hypothetical example to make a point. It’s not even a profound point, I don’t see why people are having such a hard time with it. If someone with smaller arms can curl more weight using the identical form as someone with larger arms, why would you choose to be more impressed by the guy with larger arms? Size doesn’t always translate to strength, or even to muscle. People can have large arms due to fat as well.[/quote]

I just don’t get the point you’re trying to make. I’m impressed by whoever has more muscle. Period.

However, we’re on a bodybuilding forum so you should be able to see why people use measurements to gauge progress. Anyone worth their weight in salt on these boards knows the difference between a 15 inch ripped arm and an 18 inch fat arm, theres no need to make harp on it any longer.

118

The original point was actually made by BantamRunner:

119

[quote]forlife wrote:
The original point was actually made by BantamRunner:

No. I would not be impressed with a guy who’s 5’8 and 150 lbs on stage no matter what bodyfat % he is at.

120

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Do you have any video’s, pics, anything?

Because you are right, numbers are meaningless.
[/quote]

Yes, I have pics that I use to track my progress. I’ve posted pics and stats in the past, but what is the point? I’m not here to prove anything to anyone. I don’t care whether or not you believe the lifts that I say I can do.

For what it’s worth, you have me beat on flat dumbbell benching. Chest is not my strong suit, and I can only do 100s at the moment. That said, this morning I did 115/side on the Hammerstrength press and last Friday I did 225/side on Hammerstrength decline press. I know my decline is disportionately high compared to my other presses, so people don’t need to point that out yet again.

Feel free to disbelieve me if you want, since apparently it’s impossible for a guy my height and weight to do the lifts I say I can do, using decent form. I actually take it as a compliment in a way.[/quote]

It’s not you that I’m taking exception to, but rather your claim you are noticeably stronger than everyone bigger than you, and you refuse to except that when we say ‘big’ we mean lean mass not fucking fat. I take exception to you saying “I’m stronger than everyone bigger than me” when you really mean “I’m strong that fat people.” And are refusing to see that you are coming off like you are trying to take a jab at bodybuilders to everyone else.

Dude, no one applauds fat gain, but sometimes it is necessary. So in that vein, we don’t put it down, because you shouldn’t have to wait until you look like Stu in contest shape to be happy about your progress.

You keep talking about a small arm and how strong it is compared to a fat arm. Honestly, it is totally irrelevant, and why I stopped with this thread. (Which I will also if you go back to harping on the same shit again.)

No one here gives a fuck about fat people, we don’t, sorry. SO please, in the context of lean mass, explain how in the world a bigger arm isn’t more impressive in bodybuilding and in life? I know who curls more, the bigger one. 18 inch arm > than 15 inch arm, 18 inch arm stronger than 15 inch arm… People with more muscle than you, are in fact, stronger than you. End of story.

Now talk about how a fat 18 inch arm isn’t impressive again, and how you are stronger than fat people so I can go back to ignoring this thread now that we have established no fucking 15 inch arm is curling a 75lbs dumbbell.