I think you’re right, but the way SS is written in absolutes you’ve got to add 10 pounds to the bar over and over and over again and that linear growth gets you to looooong breaks between sets pretty fast.
Like mosdef said, it doesn’t take long before the weight gets heavy.
There is also a lot of associated time that’s not lifting per se. You’ve got to get to the gym and back, warm up, load plates, re-rack them when you’re done. It’s fine to not count that in the lifting time, but it’s still time that you need to set aside from the rest of your life.
For you guys who are big into the compound lifts, is there any noticeable functional benefit in your daily life from, let’s say getting from a 1.5x bodyweight squat to 2x? I guess I don’t think I really understand the benefits of trying to lift REALLY heavy, especially with the risk of injury going up.
I feel like there was this whole conversation that just took place about these “absolutes”.
About when do you think the average trainee hits that point? I was thinking probably two to three months, but then went and did the math. That progressive overload pumps quick.
I was strictly considering in the door at the gym to out the door at the gym as the hour. Warming up doesn’t take that long and the loading/rerack is just the conditioning work for your workout.
I really don’t know. I don’t think there is an “average trainee”. For 20 year old men they can probably sustain linear progression for a long time. 53 year old office body folks, not so much.
I believe this quote from Rip summarizes it well:
Now if we can ignore my troll attempt… Only speaking from my experience, but I was competing in Olympic weightlifting wherein the goal is to lift as much as possible so the benefits are self-evident. I quit competing and still did the lifts because I enjoyed the practice and competitiveness against myself.
Probably worth noting I think the vast majority of functional gains happen in the 0.5x → 1.5x bodyweight squat range, rather than 1.5x → 2x.
For me personally, if anything trying to go from 1.5x to 2x would have been a whole bunch of downside without any upside. Now keep in mind that I didn’t follow the programming and my form, while decent, wasn’t great.
I topped out at about 1.5x BW and at that point my back would always be a little sore and if I did anything else (e.g. 5K run) it would become very sore. Presumably if I gave a shit and followed a good program and tightened up my form, these were surmountable problems, but I just didn’t have the motivation.
But even if I was able to get from 1.5 to 2x without issues, I doubt it would have made any difference in my daily life (aesthetically, functionally, or anything else I can think of).
The most useful fitness ive had came when i was really smashing the indoor rower regularly.
Having a really high lactate threshold just felt awesome. You can climb stairs non stop, go up hills, ride bikes, play sports etc without your legs getting at all tired and feeling like you can go for ever.
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It just seems like a lot of diminishing returns for going really heavy. I mean I’ve never done 1 rep maxes, but I was doing maybe 1.3x squats for reps and never felt any real need to keep pushing past that. Doing intense cardio + weights (crossfitty type stuff) and getting into good running shape is what makes me feel the best overall and is very useful for any type of physical activity. Beasting it up in the gym is overrated imo.
Interesting, I’ve never really used the rower before, I might have to give it a shot
#Thisguy ruining every locker room where the hot showers and toilets share airspace for as long as gyms have existed.
Have had a rower since a few months into Covid, finally hopped back on today. Want to start tracking my times somewhere and figured this is as good a place as any.
7/30: 5000m - 20:50.4
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Nice work. Love the rower. Ive been off it for close to 6 months because of tendonitis (not caused by rowing fwiw) and i miss it. Hopefully can get back to it before the end of the year.
Yeah as a big and strong but still kinda fat guy the rower is really built for my advantages.
7/30: 5000m - 20:50.4
8/1: 5000m - 20:34.3
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7/30: 5000m - 20:50.4
8/1: 5000m - 20:34.3
8/3: 5000m - 20:19.1
Technique is def improving and I’m getting a better sense of how to pace myself over the full 20 minutes. I def like a combo of semi-sprinting for like 300-500m at a time followed by a more paced out period so getting a better feel for that.
Very nice - this trend has you traveling backwards in time by around Thanksgiving, which should be very cool.
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7/30: 5000m - 20:50.4
8/1: 5000m - 20:34.3
8/3: 5000m - 20:19.1
8/8: 5000m - 20:08.4
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