Scientific explanation needed: realworld/gym strength

[Skate67]

I was sitting down with a few buddies the other night and me and my one friend argued that "real world strength" cannot be gained by training in the gym (deadlifts/squats not included). IE a bodybuilder on the first day of the job would most likely not be able to keep up with drywallers or framers for the first month or so, all other things equal. But i didnt have any solid evidence to back it up other than my own experience.

Awhile (2+ years) back i posted this thread http://www.ironmagazineforums.com/training/51824-useless-gym-strength-job-site.html. Read it to see my experience with this issue. i didnt really get a specific explanation to this phenomenon. Is there even a reason why this difference exists?

Anyone know?

 

[Mista]

I would put it down to the fact that OTJ work is a new thing, like a new exercise. Also the amount of time you are holding the weight is considerably different, as well as the way its being held.

 

[maxpro2]

I think grip is a big factor. Weights in the gym are easy to hold--the barbell is easy to get your hands around. Go move some furniture and it is a completely different story-- you might be able to handle that weight easily, but the shape and size of the object affects your hand positioning and grip, and forces you to carry it in ways that you are not used to training.

 

[Witchblade]

The answers have been given in that other thread.

 

[P-funk]

gym strength is gym strength.

real world strength is real world strength.

They are not the same....however, if you enhance your gym strength and give yourself some time for skill transfer, then you can gain that real world strength. The powerlifter may be strong as an ox, but not have the aerobic capacity to continually lift things (even if they are sub maximal to him) for an 8 hour construction shift. But, if he does it for several weeks, he will eventually develop that work capacity and the adaptation will manfest itself.

That is skill transfer. Sprints get faster by doing squats and power cleans along with high quality technique work. They don't just get faster from continually running sprints.

 

[Skate67]

gym strength is gym strength.

real world strength is real world strength.

Why not though? youd think that by doing all these specific movements that are used to enhance your muscles would make you that much stronger in the real world... Is it due to some sort of muscle microfibers that are hit when you utilize real work muscle (as ridiculous as that sounds i know)? I still dont understand really... Perhaps there is no explanation at least not the kind im looking for...

 

[Double D]

Um....did you not read past what you quotted?

 

[KelJu]

I started the job at the antique dealer right about the same time I got back into weights at the gym. I pride myself as one of the best movers in in the state. I can one-arm a 100lb chandelier while on a ladder, and I can carry a 150lb piece of marble up 4 flights of stairs with ease, and I hoist a 250lb rug over my shoulder, and carry it through the shop like it ain't shit to it. There is nothing that I can't move. Just showing up for work everyday provides rea lworld training, while the gym gives me more strength to utilize while I'm at work.

Now, The owner hired two guys about a year ago that did MMa, and worked out in the gym. One guy had huge legs, so I know he could probably squat at least 400lbs. But, he and the other guy were the most pathetic movers I have ever seen. One guy hurt his back the first week, and the other guy couldn't lift a mirror to save his life. To his credit, the mirror did weigh about 300lbs, but for fucks sake, me and another guy, Kenny, could move that heavy all day, and Kenny never worked out a day in his life.

Short story is P is dead on. Gym strength does not equal real world strength, but there is skill transfer.

 

[BoneCrusher]

gym strength is gym strength.

real world strength is real world strength.

They are not the same....however, if you enhance your gym strength and give yourself some time for skill transfer, then you can gain that real world strength. The powerlifter may be strong as an ox, but not have the aerobic capacity to continually lift things (even if they are sub maximal to him) for an 8 hour construction shift. But, if he does it for several weeks, he will eventually develop that work capacity and the adaptation will manfest itself.

That is skill transfer. Sprints get faster by doing squats and power cleans along with high quality technique work. They don't just get faster from continually running sprints.

What's your thoughts on transferring that gym strength into real world strength with plyo's? It's worked for me pretty well, but I figure you are the well studied guru P. I've learned more from lurking in your journals then I have from anything else around here ... well, excluding my own mistakes that is.

 

[Scarface30]

P is right 100%. it's skill transfer.

when I look at my dad, hes about my height but a little heavier. working around the yard doing stuff he can really lift some heavy things, but if he were to go to the gym he'd have a problem doing heavy lifting there.

you lift 200lbs on the deadlift at the gym, but out working and you have to pick up a 200lb bag of cement mix, you're going to have a tough time doing it. give it sometime, then you're going to be able to do it.

 

[Duncans Donuts]

What's your thoughts on transferring that gym strength into real world strength with plyo's? It's worked for me pretty well, but I figure you are the well studied guru P. I've learned more from lurking in your journals then I have from anything else around here ... well, excluding my own mistakes that is.

Specific is specific.

Any type of progressive overload that results in a force production potential in the muscle (cross section increase) WHILE you are practicing a specific skill will enhance your ability at that skill.

If you get stronger doing Plyos while performing a skill, you will become more proficient at that skill. The same goes for doing squats or any other resistance training movement that increases muscular force in the muscles that are being used in the skill in question.

My understanding of neurophysiology is simply that specific means specific because of literally dozens of interdependent variables that create very exact motor programming codes, firing rates, and overall coordination of muscle groups for movements. Throwing a baseball and a football are dramatically different and quarterbacks are not going to necessarily be good pitchers. People who can power clean lots of weight do not step on a football field for the first time and out perform NFL players who use less weights.

 

[Duncans Donuts]

gym strength is gym strength.

real world strength is real world strength.

They are not the same....however, if you enhance your gym strength and give yourself some time for skill transfer, then you can gain that real world strength. The powerlifter may be strong as an ox, but not have the aerobic capacity to continually lift things (even if they are sub maximal to him) for an 8 hour construction shift. But, if he does it for several weeks, he will eventually develop that work capacity and the adaptation will manfest itself.

That is skill transfer. Sprints get faster by doing squats and power cleans along with high quality technique work. They don't just get faster from continually running sprints.

Yes, exactly.

 

[Hoglander]

I put the idea in my head that... moving this object or person is like this lift. After awhile it happens without thinking. It works. A lot of what your body does is in the mind until the muscles remember. When people see the results of what I'm saying and comment with "Wows"... well I blush and say, "It was nothing." Not true it's hours in the gym I think to myself. That plus I think I might be the Batman.

 

[P-funk]

What's your thoughts on transferring that gym strength into real world strength with plyo's? It's worked for me pretty well, but I figure you are the well studied guru P. I've learned more from lurking in your journals then I have from anything else around here ... well, excluding my own mistakes that is.

Like DD said, you have to learn the skill and develop the skill for any of this to transfer over.

Plyo's themselves are one part of the game. They can help teach us to land and decelerate and the re-accelerate and produce force. if you don't have the necessary strength to do this though, the plyometric training will be all for naught. Strength is the back drop to sports performance. If it isn't there.....good luck being fast. That is not saying that maximal strength is the most important thing however....being athletic requires many things on top of the fact that you need to be technically proficient in your skill.

 

[Skate67]

Um....did you not read past what you quotted?

I did read it and it wasnt what i was looking for. Thanks.

My understanding of neurophysiology is simply that specific means specific because of literally dozens of interdependent variables that create very exact motor programming codes, firing rates, and overall coordination of muscle groups for movements. Throwing a baseball and a football are dramatically different and quarterbacks are not going to necessarily be good pitchers. People who can power clean lots of weight do not step on a football field for the first time and out perform NFL players who use less weights.

Everyone is giving good examples but no one has really explained why there is a difference between the two except for the above which came the closest to what i was looking for . I must admit i am being picky on this one.

Excelent posts in here... And i agree with the skill aspect of it i didnt think about that which explains some of it.

 

[P-funk]

The reason there is a differnece between the two is because THEY ARE DIFFERENT!!!

How is deadlifting an implement the same as picking up an oddly shapped object on a construction site? It isn't!! They are different movements which require different motor patterns. An individual may be efficient at one motor pattern (through repetition) and not as efficient at another. But, strength is strenth. if the individual becomes proficient at the other skill, they can develop it.

Case in point:

Shane Hammon was an amazing powerlifter. Youngest guy to squat 1000lbs in fact. In his mid-late 20s he decided that he want to try his hand at olympic lifting. While he was strong, he still lacked the proper technique for the olympic lifting discipline. that was something that had to be trained and learned. Once he learned it, he was able to take the strength he developed in powerlifting, transfer it to olympic lifting, step on the world stage and break all the american records in the super heavy weight class.


Does that make sense?

 

[Blooming Lotus]

Are we sure it doesn't have to do with the different muscle fibres and energy systems being used differently in the two?
Plyos I can see would help because pending reps and rom and total consecutive exercise time, it would take the exercise into deep fibres and feed off endurance energy systems.
When you lift for max weight, of course you are strong to that weight and can pick that weight up again elsewhere. Butt to do that at say a workplace where you might have to do it for a full shift or hrs pon hrs, it's not just strength fibres youre asking your body for but also endurance. Two totally different energy systems and muscle fibres.
The same is thenn true in reverse.
For example,.. For yrs now I have weighed around 44 - 6 kilos and fairly short ( 169 cm). I 'm fml. 32 and have trained for 12 hrs a day for 6 mth periods usually without a full days break for years. When I lift, I have experienced better pound for pound strength than most people i encounter..
but for at least 15 yrs I've not focused on big resistance training so much as mega rep bwe and cardio and plyo and flexibilty and so forth.
When I took a temporary position in a major department store while I was transititioning into something better for me long term, I ended up on the receiving dock. Some of the stock we were moving weighed up past 100 kgs.. sometimes we might move 200 +.. alone but on a trolley which we had to pull around corners and on carpet and had to load and unload alone. Some of our shifts were up to 12 hrs long and doing that only stacking stock to all different heights and of different shapes and weights.
AS much as knew I was working, I found it quite easy , butt it nearly killed me because I believe of what current science says in that we have 10-12 weeks of training both of those factors - endurance and strength- at max before we loose strength and slip into overtraining. I worked my ass off bthough because i really needed the job. It was christmas and i 'm a single mum . Just couldn't be helped for that period .
I think if I had done less hrs for so many yrs prior and had done more heavy lifting and went slower than my usual zippy pace that I might've assed my way into an extra several weeks because of the diffrence in how my base muscle fibre structure would then have been set.
There are some really good articles about on muscle fibres and how they work in conjunction with which energy system. I highly recommend the read to anyone interested because I think it would likely revolutionise the way you understand that your body is working and whaat you are working how.
When training with weapons in martial arts, there too you might learn how different shape objects being moved by yourself in what appears to be the same fashion iis actually differnt and how the distribution on different levers and planes will create that variation in motor pattern and what it means to you.

Experiment at home with a few different things if you really want to get it. Or find an article because as I said, google is your friend and there are loads of them.

Blooming tianshi lotus.

 

[Duncans Donuts]

Obviously energy systems come into play to some extent. This is why there is enough endurance activity in practicing for sports like football - running a 4.4 at the beginning of the game is great, but if you are running a 5.4 at the end (when it is arguably more important), there is a conditioning issue as well. This is why so many levels of SPECIFIC interaction has to be coordinated to develop a proficient athlete.

It isn't just strength training, or pliometrics, or endurance, or speed, or agility, it's developmental compromise; working to develop these things in the right proportions.

For example, you WILL give up some level of outright speed if you are working hard on every play to where you are requiring more endurance. Intensity and volume are usually related inversely. You can't develop ALL of your time to speed and agility, because then some of your strength and endurance will suffer. And so forth. Athletic development, in my experience, is about understanding priority and compromise (as well as having coaches that understand when to pull you out and how long to rest you).

However, movement patterns are specific, need to be learned and practiced independent of weight room strength training - but that's not to say they don't correlate in the end to produce better athletes.

 

[Blooming Lotus]

God. I must be mad even commenting anymore from here because I'm in the shit here as it is.. butt .. it's not speed you'd give up with endurance.. i can prOmise you thaat for what it's worth.. in fact when i was training so hard at 11 and 12 hr training days I reeally souly relied on that in real world defense and in eying off the heavy weight world title belt when i was only 45kgs against 80 something.. aand I fought men much bigger and heavier and lived and snotted their proficiency.
it's strength.. but if youre fast enough and dont need to pick up and drop the biggest rock on someone then it doesn't matter.
I do like what you're saying and how you're thinking though... good start.

Blooming tianshi lotus.

 

[Witchblade]

The reason there is a differnece between the two is because THEY ARE DIFFERENT!!!

I don't see the difficulty here either.

 

[Duncans Donuts]

God. I must be mad even commenting anymore from here because I'm in the shit here as it is.. butt .. it's not speed you'd give up with endurance.. i can prOmise you thaat for what it's worth.. in fact when i was training so hard at 11 and 12 hr training days I reeally souly relied on that in real world defense and in eying off the heavy weight world title belt when i was only 45kgs against 80 something.. aand I fought men much bigger and heavier and lived and snotted their proficiency.
it's strength.. but if youre fast enough and dont need to pick up and drop the biggest rock on someone then it doesn't matter.
I do like what you're saying and how you're thinking though... good start.

Blooming tianshi lotus.

Given your logic, long distance runners are faster than sprinters. Need to study the SAID principle, your body can't optimize levels of speed and endurance together, the nature of the energy systems and tissue involved make it impossible.

Anyone who understands engineering concepts understands that there is no perfect design; rather, no design that can accomplish everything. "perfect" design is full of compromises, look at the human spine. It's not so rigid as to prevent mobility but rigid enough to maintain verticality as where as a variety of impact forces without coming apart.

Anyway, thank you for the last condescending "good start" remark.

 

[Blooming Lotus]

. thx for picking it up.

Exactly! I do get what you're saying there and I agree , and i would suggest aswell that there needs to be an adaption period but imagine if a long distance runner could condense all those MUs and recruitment into that shorter sprint burst..

My dad used to be an olympic qualifier in long distance running.. crazy miler or something or other.. and his best friend was likewise for sprints. They were both in the army and trained and fed off each other since they were 5.
Just for giggles sometimes they used to do each others programme ..His best mate could nevver ever beat him yet when hee changed to sprint focus he could beat him.
I don't think it's not doable but because the endurance is comprimised by the strength of a sprinter on fast twitch fibres, whiilst the strength is still somewhat comprised by the length of the strength burst , I think it 's easier for a muscluar endurance performer to adjust quicker with better results than the rvs. .. and ditto for lifting.
I don't really want to loose context here in light of the initial question or overcomplicate so I hope that helps at least explain my perspective a bit anyway .

Blooming tianshi lotus.

 

[Hoglander]

Scientific answer aside.....

Working out gives confidence. And dammit, you learn to push yourself. Do NOT limit yourself. Kick ass in whatever you want and take F'ing names!!

Batman

P.S. People on roids don't count here

 

[P-funk]

endurance and speed are not the same thing.

lots of endurance work will kill a fast athlete....physiologically and biomechanically, they are two totally different animals.

 

[Hoglander]

Speed is natural and you can ruin it. That's a given. Why you would want to ruin it with over training, I don't know. You can earn strength and that's why most of us are here. Can you enhance speed... well that depends on what you want to add to it. Take away if you want. Again I don't know why you would suggest that.

 

[Witchblade]

Of course you can enhance speed.

And I'm with P and DD, you can't train properly for strength and endurance at the same time. Your body will prioritize either and adapt its energy systems, muscle fiber upmake etc. accordingly.

 

[Duncans Donuts]

Speed is natural and you can ruin it. That's a given. Why you would want to ruin it with over training, I don't know. You can earn strength and that's why most of us are here. Can you enhance speed... well that depends on what you want to add to it. Take away if you want. Again I don't know why you would suggest that.

What is speed? Speed is influenced primarily by the factor of time; raw speed is about power. Power is dependant on force. Force is what muscles produce. More force will result in more strength.

Okay, this is almost ludicrously oversimplified, but it's true.

So strengthening muscles while practicing a specific skill will increase speed. What doesn't make sense here?

 

[P-funk]

So strengthening muscles while practicing a specific skill will increase speed. What doesn't make sense here?

that is the key right there. strength is the underlying quality. enhance strength and develop skill/technique in your sport and you will be on your way.

 

[AKIRA]

I always like it when DD joins a convo.

 

[Duncans Donuts]

I always like it when DD joins a convo.

Me too. I love these threads. Very entertaining.