From the perspective of someone who competed in bodybuilding in the 1970’s, '80’s, and '90’s, it’s the elephant in the room. OP is addressing maximizing muscle hypertrophy. I always looked to do that and maybe I went about it wrong.
But something happened after 1985 that marked the beginning of hypertrophy mass monsters, and I don’t mean 170+lb bodybuilders. The evidence began to be seen in 1990. There is an uncanny correlation of hypertrophy mass monsters and the use of HGH and insulin.
I competed as a heavyweight bodybuilder. Guys were getting huge.
So the entire time I am reading this thread, in the back of my mind is, “When are we going to address the elephant in the room?”
BTW, 1985 is when synthetic HGH became available. Imagine what Arnold could have looked like.
And once again when people can’t agree on definitions and words are used with multiple meanings we don’t actually get to anywhere. It breaks the first idea of any logical debate.
But that’s typical with internet.
It took me too long to understand that OP tried say that lower rep strength work is not great in building muscle. I have no problem agreeing on that. But it is not same as ”get strong to get big”, at least how I intrepret the mantra.
Because bodybuilding doesn’t exclusively own hypertrophy and strength athletes know how to manipulate for change from a high level of stimuli. And we also have many cases of success for powerlifters crossing the threshold, with Ronnie Coleman as the most prominent example, but not the other way around.
I suppose there is the exception of every rule. I witnessed the entire evolution of one of them.
Charles Bailey competed in a NPC National Qualifier. He placed 3rd (if I recall correctly) in the Middleweight Class (under 176lbs) in the 1990’s.
I got to know him when I switched gyms after rupturing my biceps. Several years later as he was in his early 40’s he asked me about Powerlifting, knowing that I had competed in a few meets. I told what I knew and he took it from there.
He completed in the 275lb Class usually weighing in the 260+lb range. His best total was a few pounds over 2,500lbs. He also squatted 1,100lbs once in a meet.
It is safe to say that Charles made an effective change from bodybuilder to Powerlifter. And I got to see the entire evolution. It was mind boggling the power he had attained.
Yea. I “cooked” all of my bodybuilding meals and I would never call myself a chef.
If chef is analogous to a bodybuilder, and cook is a person who lifted weights, the same reasoning would make anyone who lifted weights be a bodybuilder.
While chef is a subset of cook. Not all cooks are chefs.
Exactly. I do the big 3 in the gym. I lift for size in the gym. But I’ve never gotten on stage or done a meet, so until that happens, I’m just a guy who lifts.
Honestly, the conflating thing here is that bodybuilding pays WAY more money than powerlifitng such that, if you COULD be great at both: why would you?
Its like, there are dudes in the NFL that could probably be AWESOME rugby players…but why would they? Or hell, they could also be great powerlifters, but why?
Powerliftering is often a sport one ends up in, rather than shoots for right out the gate.
During the esoteric period of lifting weight, it was ripe with opportunity to continue to stay in shape and still make a “sport” out of it. Even if the sport was an imaginary goal to attain.
Few retired athletes took advantage until the movie Pumping Iron. Then the flood gates opened.
