Strength is a side effect of hypertrophy, not a driver. All the strength I gained with muscle came along for the ride
Apples and oranges.
Training like a soldier makes you fit like a soldier, not a soldier, because being a soldier is a role, not just a training style. So no, if you ran on a treadmill with an assault rifle at the YMCA, it won’t make you a soldier.
Powerlifting, on the other hand, is defined by the training itself. The act is the identity.
If a person did nothing but CrossFit and signed up for a powerlifting meet, would they be a powerlifter?
As soon as he made his first squat attempt at a Powerlifting Meet he is a Powerlifter by definition.
4 Likes
For sure bodybuilding doesn’t own hypertrophy. You can get hypertrophy from working in construction. The distinction is that bodybuilding is the most efficient for hypertrophy. For example I’m not going to say that bodybuilding is the most efficient for powerlifting
Yes. 100%. Assuming they actually competed in it.
3 Likes
Then by that logic, no one’s a powerlifter until they compete even if they’ve spent years training the squat, bench, and deadlift specifically for strength with powerlifting methodology. Remember last time you mentioned 5/3/1 isn’t a powerlifting-style program because it includes the overhead press and I said how the overhead press was once a competition lift. And even though it was a competition lift for Olympic lifting and not powerlifting, it was before powerlifting existed and that powerlifting inherited that same tradition.
1 Like
Correct
3 Likes
I know a guy who did this.
He’s an beat up veteran powerlifter and he don’t train in PL style anymore. He mostly does WODs and calisthenics etc., because he’s too broken to do serious barbell training.
He did a PL meet last year and prepared with one workout where he squatted 5x100kg. He still did 205kg in the meet.
So then it would be more accurate to say that someone is a powerlifter if they either compete in powerlifting or train like a powerlifter. If you’re training for years using powerlifting methodology but never compete and have the potential to place 1st in a powerlifting meet, it wouldn’t necessarily mean that person is not a powerlifter.
Easiest way to put it.
So then let’s just say that you are a powerlifter if you either compete or train like one. That seems to be the most accurate and balanced explanation. I’m sure there’s people out there who train like powerlifters but have no intention on competing and would have the potential to beat other powerlifters who do compete. It would be an injustice to them to say that they aren’t a powerlifter
Good question if you asked why have you dedicated all your time and effort attempting to increase your squat, bench, and deadlift, yet never entered a Powerlifting meet? What are you afraid of? In fact, you are no Powerlifter!
2 Likes
How one trains like a powerlifter? Quite a broad spectrum.
With this definition a bodybuilder doing eights in the squat might be a powerlifter. Since getting better at eights does have some carryover to your 1RM.
Excactly. There’s a reason why gym PBs and meet PRs are often listed differently.
Doing a 1RM squat in the gym is not powerlifting.
1 Like
Here is an in-your-face analogy: If you individually train all aspects of training for football, yet never played a football game, are you a football player?
Competing in powerlifting makes you a competitive powerlifter, training like one makes you a powerlifter.
There are some freaks out there training in their basement who would smoke competitive powerlifters just like there’s freakish Russian bodybuilders like Andrey Smaev who never competed
1 Like
Or learn how to drive a race car, but never race.
1 Like
I think that’s more like apples and oranges. Being a football player usually implies participating in the game itself, because the sport requires actual gameplay to define the role. Powerlifting is different: the ‘sport’ is the lifts themselves. Training the squat, bench, and deadlift with intent and methodology is practicing the core of powerlifting, so you can be a powerlifter without competing.
Yeah, but that does not make them powerlifters.
It’s not a honorary title. It tells that you compete at the sport.
I’ll never call them a Powerlifter. Man up, or you are just lifting weights.
2 Likes