I always liked the schwartz formula . I thought it was more accurate than the wilks. It was used in the uspf years ago when they were ipf .
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
Wilks does take this into account. I’m not as familiar with the other formulas, but I’m sure they do as well.
shit…i’m just happy if i can lift a little more than i did in my last meet.
Most people who need to talk about relative strength to explain how they are strong are wasting too many calories talking about their relative strength.
Relative Strength is unpredictable and there is about zero relationship between size and its application to describing any aspect of strength in the real world. I have pulled 760 at 229 (209 wilkes) then a few months later pulled 810 at 253 (213 wilkes). The difference? It is not relative. My absolute strength increased. I will think coefficients aren’t stupid once there is one that explains Relative Strength and takes into account:
1.Increases in strength from one point in time to another
2.Local acceleration of gravity
3.Absolute Strength
4.Bonus points for number of people that don’t bitch about imaginary strength index’s (i.e. Relative Strength)
Notice how body size is not one of my criteria
[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
shit…i’m just happy if i can lift a little more than i did in my last meet. [/quote]
^^This^^
The only person I compete against is myself. I could care less how I compare to others or whether or not I get an award at a meet.
[quote]reddog6376 wrote:
[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
shit…i’m just happy if i can lift a little more than i did in my last meet. [/quote]
^^This^^
The only person I compete against is myself. I could care less how I compare to others or whether or not I get an award at a meet.[/quote]
exactly… i could care less about formulas or some cheap ass trophy. i have my hands full just trying to get a little bit stronger each time i compete.
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
[quote]
A creature’s legs (human or otherwise) are similar to the columns which hold up Greek temples. Their strength is directly proportional to their cross-sectional area. This, in turn, is proportional to the square of the radius of the column, according to the equation:
A = pr2
Hence, the strength of legs scales up (or down) with the square of the scaling factor. For instance, suppose we scale up an ant by a factor of 1000. This increases the ant’s length from 1/8 inch to about 10.5 feet It increases the strength of the ant’s legs by a factor of 1000 squared, or 1 million. This sounds very reassuring until we look at the ant’s increase in mass and weight.
Each segment of the ant’s body is roughly similar to a sphere whose weight is proportional to its volume given by the equation:
V = (4/3)pr3
With constant density, the weight therefore increases with the cube of the scaling factor. Hence, weight increases by a factor of 1000 cubed, or 1 billion. This means weight increases 1000 times faster than leg strength. In other words, the ant would probably collapse under its own weight.
The ant’s mass, and hence inertia, also increase about 1000 times faster than muscle strength. So, if the ant could still stand, it would barely be able to move.
[/quote][/quote]
Actually, strength generally does not scale proportional to cross section. Generally increasing cross section decreases relative strength.
Think of building 2 pillars out of legos using the same blocks. One 10 times the proportions of the other.
The larger one will be made of 100 times the number of parts in cross section and 1000 times the number in volume.
What this means is that being proportionally the same and made of the same material makes the physical structure very different. Relative roughness of the 2 will be different, fracture mechanics will be different. Any surface properties will affect the 2 differently because they will be different percentages or cross sectional area.
Think about it, the large pillar has 1000 times as many places for a crack do start and to propagate.
Think about doing 3 point bending on the pillars. The distance from the neutral axis is increased on the larger pillar, but the bond between legos is the same in both. Bending with the same moment in both pillars will result in higher tension forces in the outside legos but the resisting lego bond isnâ??t any stronger.
The real truth is that nothing in nature can truly be scaled completely proportionally, because that would require re-sizing everything all the way down to sub-atomic particles.
[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
[quote]reddog6376 wrote:
[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
shit…i’m just happy if i can lift a little more than i did in my last meet. [/quote]
^^This^^
The only person I compete against is myself. I could care less how I compare to others or whether or not I get an award at a meet.[/quote]
exactly… i could care less about formulas or some cheap ass trophy. i have my hands full just trying to get a little bit stronger each time i compete.
[/quote]
Cheap ass trophy maybe not. I got a sword once and it kicks ass; a replica of a katana. I may have slept with it the night I got it.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
I think you may have mis-understood what I wrote.
I said “strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area” not “relative strength increases…”. Relative strength goes down since the mass increases far more rapidly than the cross-sectional area.
To use your lego example, the 2nd pillar should support roughly 100 times more weight but is of course 1000 times heavier. Stronger in the absolute sense, but weaker in the relative sense.
From what I can tell, we’re saying the same thing.
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
I think you may have mis-understood what I wrote.
I said “strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area” not “relative strength increases…”. Relative strength goes down since the mass increases far more rapidly than the cross-sectional area.
To use your lego example, the 2nd pillar should support roughly 100 times more weight but is of course 1000 times heavier. Stronger in the absolute sense, but weaker in the relative sense.
From what I can tell, we’re saying the same thing.[/quote]
I wasn’t contradicting that part of your statement about volume vs cross section. I was actually noting that the degradation is greater than that.
This is not actually correct:
“strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area”
Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume.
[quote]ouroboro_s wrote:
[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
[quote]reddog6376 wrote:
[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
shit…i’m just happy if i can lift a little more than i did in my last meet. [/quote]
^^This^^
The only person I compete against is myself. I could care less how I compare to others or whether or not I get an award at a meet.[/quote]
exactly… i could care less about formulas or some cheap ass trophy. i have my hands full just trying to get a little bit stronger each time i compete.
[/quote]
Cheap ass trophy maybe not. I got a sword once and it kicks ass; a replica of a katana. I may have slept with it the night I got it.[/quote]
i hate you… there have been two separate times i entered meets and they advertised that they were giving aways either a broad sword or katana just to get there and they just had some corny trophy. most of the time i leave the damn thing for them to give to someone next time.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
I think you may have mis-understood what I wrote.
I said “strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area” not “relative strength increases…”. Relative strength goes down since the mass increases far more rapidly than the cross-sectional area.
To use your lego example, the 2nd pillar should support roughly 100 times more weight but is of course 1000 times heavier. Stronger in the absolute sense, but weaker in the relative sense.
From what I can tell, we’re saying the same thing.[/quote]
I wasn’t contradicting that part of your statement about volume vs cross section. I was actually noting that the degradation is greater than that.
This is not actually correct:
“strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area”
Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume.[/quote]
Well then we do disagree. The abiltiy of a pillar to support a load is roughly proportional to the cross sectional area. Yes the degredation could be slightly greater than that (hence the use of the word “roughly”).
The website I quoted actually (written by a mechanical engineer) uses the term “directly” instead of “roughly”.
Your second statement
[quote]Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume. [/quote] is simply wrong. Relative strength is the relation between strength and weight. Weight is a function of volume, not area.
A pillar that is has 100cm radius and is 1cm tall will be lighter and support a greater load than a pillar that has 10cm radius and is 1000cm tall.
Reading this shit is making me dumb(er).
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
I think you may have mis-understood what I wrote.
I said “strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area” not “relative strength increases…”. Relative strength goes down since the mass increases far more rapidly than the cross-sectional area.
To use your lego example, the 2nd pillar should support roughly 100 times more weight but is of course 1000 times heavier. Stronger in the absolute sense, but weaker in the relative sense.
From what I can tell, we’re saying the same thing.[/quote]
I wasn’t contradicting that part of your statement about volume vs cross section. I was actually noting that the degradation is greater than that.
This is not actually correct:
“strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area”
Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume.[/quote]
Well then we do disagree. The abiltiy of a pillar to support a load is roughly proportional to the cross sectional area. Yes the degredation could be slightly greater than that (hence the use of the word “roughly”).
The website I quoted actually (written by a mechanical engineer) uses the term “directly” instead of “roughly”.
Your second statement
[quote]Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume. [/quote] is simply wrong. Relative strength is the relation between strength and weight. Weight is a function of volume, not area.
A pillar that is has 100cm radius and is 1cm tall will be lighter and support a greater load than a pillar that has 10cm radius and is 1000cm tall.[/quote]
No, relative strength can be in relation to anything. There is relative strength loss in relation to area excluding volume and weight.
And I am a mechanical engineer too.
A cross section twice as big is less than twice as strong.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
I think you may have mis-understood what I wrote.
I said “strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area” not “relative strength increases…”. Relative strength goes down since the mass increases far more rapidly than the cross-sectional area.
To use your lego example, the 2nd pillar should support roughly 100 times more weight but is of course 1000 times heavier. Stronger in the absolute sense, but weaker in the relative sense.
From what I can tell, we’re saying the same thing.[/quote]
I wasn’t contradicting that part of your statement about volume vs cross section. I was actually noting that the degradation is greater than that.
This is not actually correct:
“strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area”
Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume.[/quote]
Well then we do disagree. The abiltiy of a pillar to support a load is roughly proportional to the cross sectional area. Yes the degredation could be slightly greater than that (hence the use of the word “roughly”).
The website I quoted actually (written by a mechanical engineer) uses the term “directly” instead of “roughly”.
Your second statement
[quote]Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume. [/quote] is simply wrong. Relative strength is the relation between strength and weight. Weight is a function of volume, not area.
A pillar that is has 100cm radius and is 1cm tall will be lighter and support a greater load than a pillar that has 10cm radius and is 1000cm tall.[/quote]
No, relative strength can be in relation to anything. There is relative strength loss in relation to area excluding volume and weight.
And I am a mechanical engineer too.
A cross section twice as big is less than twice as strong.[/quote]
Relative strength in the context of PL coefficients can’t be in relation to anything. Its relative to weight.
But, I still think we’re arguing over mainly semantics.
The ultimate point is that as people get bigger, relative strength decreases.
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]OBoile wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]kpsnap wrote:
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
You relative strength people need to take into account that strength does not scale linearly with increased bodyweight.[/quote]
So isn’t there a coefficient that takes this into account? It would seem that an algorithm could be easily developed. I thought that’s what wilks did. But I’m hearing people say that it’s not a good measure. And where’s the dropoff? For example, I know there are people in the lowest weight classes (I’m a 114-er) who can manage three times BW on lifts. But that’s rarely seen in the higher weight classes. I’ve often wondered if the reason for this is because many of these lifters carry a serious amount of fat, which I would think would only help them in moving more weight up to a point.
Personally, I’ve always been interested in that sweet spot where individuals have the highest strength-to-weight ratio. It’s always impressive to me when people cut weight/weight classes and can still lift the same amount. Don’t get me wrong. No one loves to see the huge weights more than I. And strongman competitions are the perfect example of brute strength. But I’m often most impressed with the smaller lifters moving huge amounts of weight as a percentage of their BW. Jennifer Thompson is a great example of this. She’s a showstopper and only a 132er.[/quote]
The reason for the strength drop off is physics. If you were to take an individual and scale them up, keep everything else the same, their relative strength will decrease.
Ant is as strong as it is because of its small size. If you were to make a human sized copy of an ant, it’s legs would collapse under it’s own weight.
A large part of this is that while the size of the organism is changing, the materials (building blocks) its made of are not. A drop of water behaves differently than an ocean.
You can actually take a material like copper and role it into different diameter wire, using the exact same process, and the smaller the wire the higher the relative strength, using the same starting material and the same manufacturing process. Which is why large structural cables (on bridges and stuff) are mad up of many smaller diameter cables.
It’s an interesting phenomenon.
[/quote]
A big reason for the decrease in relative strength when something is scaled up is that the the strength (of muscle, bone [structural strength] or a pillar) is usually proportional to the cross section of its diameter (i.e. its area looking at it from above) while mass is proportional to the volume.
When you double the size of someone or something (i.e. make a persion twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick) its strength increases by a factor of 4 (muscles and bones get twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2) while mass would increase by a factor of 8 (twice as tall, twice as wide and twice as thick - so 2x2x2) and relative strength decreases by 50%.
As you say, an ant is only strong because it is small. Its also why a horse can’t have a leg amputated while a dog can (the horse can’t effective support itself on three legs as they aren’t strong enough). Its also why you don’t see elephants move around with much agility.
http://serghei.net/docs/articles/interesting/stupid_physics_in_movies.html discusses the scaling issue with better wording than I use.
I think you may have mis-understood what I wrote.
I said “strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area” not “relative strength increases…”. Relative strength goes down since the mass increases far more rapidly than the cross-sectional area.
To use your lego example, the 2nd pillar should support roughly 100 times more weight but is of course 1000 times heavier. Stronger in the absolute sense, but weaker in the relative sense.
From what I can tell, we’re saying the same thing.[/quote]
I wasn’t contradicting that part of your statement about volume vs cross section. I was actually noting that the degradation is greater than that.
This is not actually correct:
“strength increases roughly proportional to the cross sectional area”
Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume.[/quote]
Well then we do disagree. The abiltiy of a pillar to support a load is roughly proportional to the cross sectional area. Yes the degredation could be slightly greater than that (hence the use of the word “roughly”).
The website I quoted actually (written by a mechanical engineer) uses the term “directly” instead of “roughly”.
Your second statement
[quote]Relative strength decreases in relation to the area as well as the volume. [/quote] is simply wrong. Relative strength is the relation between strength and weight. Weight is a function of volume, not area.
A pillar that is has 100cm radius and is 1cm tall will be lighter and support a greater load than a pillar that has 10cm radius and is 1000cm tall.[/quote]
No, relative strength can be in relation to anything. There is relative strength loss in relation to area excluding volume and weight.
And I am a mechanical engineer too.
A cross section twice as big is less than twice as strong.[/quote]
Relative strength in the context of PL coefficients can’t be in relation to anything. Its relative to weight.
But, I still think we’re arguing over mainly semantics.
The ultimate point is that as people get bigger, relative strength decreases.[/quote]
Unless you actually get stronger… like with real weights. Not relatively.