Holy shit. You guys really know how to argue like women about stuff that you supposedly don’t care about. Anyway…
Extrapolating what a raw or single ply gear guy would do in more gear is completely bogus. (Going back to the Ed Coan bullshit guestimates and other comments.) We have several lifters who get zero out of their double denim shirts, and others who get around 200. Same with squat suits. You honestly don’t know what you’d get until you put on the equipment and train for it (the training is different, so asking a geared guy to step out of his gear and do well is just like asking a raw guy to throw on max gear and have a good attempt at it.)
For similar reasons, extrapolating what a geared lifter can do without their gear is impossible. All one can say is that it is probably less than what they do in the gear. We have a guy that used a bench shirt in his last meet and benched 500. Within a month, he came in and benched 500 raw. We have another lifter who has benched 688 in competition in a double denim shirt. Some people probably think he barely benches 500, but he does well over 600 raw. This dude is competing at the top levels of powerlifting and still does not get as much out of his equipment as I, a novice lifter, do. Same with squatting. Perhaps people are getting 400 pounds out of gear - perhaps not. You just don’t know until these guys train for and do a raw meet.
After two plies of gear, the plies don’t really help. You would see more triple ply bench shirts in the APF if this were the case. As it stands now, they’re pretty rare. The material, cut, and fit of the shirt are much more important than the number of plies. For evidence, look at the Rage X in the IPF. A single ply shirt that guys can’t touch 700 in in a meet. The IPF is a joke now because of equipment like that. When people are getting more out of their single ply gear than the average guy gets out of his double ply gear, any purity has been destroyed.
As far as the Olympics go, there are people who really do not care at all about the Olympics. I’m sorry if this hurts anybody’s feelings, but some people don’t give a rat’s ass about that “movement”. And it’s not because they couldn’t compete under those conditions. We have a lifter who totaled 2500+ without ever having used steroids, who can squat 800-900 in just a belt, bench 650 raw, and pull 800+ in just a belt. He doesn’t give a flying fuck about the Olympics or the IPF; right now he just wants to lift massive weight. Never mind the fact that he can get paid for his lifting in the WPO.
The WPO is hands-down more exciting than the IPF. That is why there is not more interest in the IPF. If you doubt this, go to a WPO meet and feel the electricity along with the camraderie. And saying that the IPF is more “pure” than other feds is disgusting. Note 700 not touching on bench attempts and people BEATING drug tests. Outside of the US, lifters can use all year long, then just go off long enough to pass the drug tests, and that’s ignoring any kind of masking agents. To call that drug-free is ridiculous. This is why a lot of the big boys go to play in the WPO. Which is a shame to me, as I’d rather see the top guys of both feds go at it.
