What do you guys think of weight lifting?

A load lift is not necessarily a load lift. What comes into play is the grip. On a deadlift for example the lifter conveniently has a bar to firmly grab onto. When lifting a water heater for example there is no place to grab. Just a big cylinder. For example.

Doesn't necessarily have to be a construction site. Certain aspects of manual labor jobs are what I'm referencing.

 

That doesn’t just change the main muscles used to pick it up off the ground. You’re still using your hips and legs to move it once you manage to hug it hard enough without it slipping. If grip is a limiting factor then it’s not a strength deficit that is the issue, it’s a coordination/technique issue.
If a guy comes on site who can deadlift 300kg, and there’s another experienced guy on site who could only lift 120kg if he went to the gym.. guy A doesn’t know the technique for lifting a cyclinder and he struggles, guy B shows him how to do it. As soon as guy A learns what to do he is going to have a much easier time of it than guy B ever has. That’s because his hips and legs can generate a higher level of force, due to the convenience of training with a bar while using straps so the limiting factor is the strength in the hips and the legs rather than grip strength.
Strongmen lift boulders etc. in their sport, but they still use the main lifts to develop maximal strength. Strength is a foundational quality that underpins what you do, when you move to a sport or a physical profession you still need to learn how to move and how to become skilled before you can apply that strength to whatever it is that you’re doing. That doesn’t mean there are different types of strength, it just means you need to learn to transfer that strength to your specific task. Grip strength is also highly correlated to upper body strength. A deadlift is using basically all the muscles in your whole body, if you’ve got a strong deadlift you’re going to be strong doing anything. You’d make a hell of a furniture removalist.

 

Grip is strength.

 

He's referring to the way the load is lifted, not grip strength, hence coordination/technique issue.

If I'm understanding you correctly, you're implying that if somebody is ridiculously strong in the 3 main lifts (which are a good indicator of total body strength which is why these lifts are used) there would be little to no carry-over to a manual labor job? If that's what you're saying you're incredibly ignorant. I can tell you from experience you are 100% incorrect.

Put Brian Shaw on a constructiion site and watch him toy with everything you put infront of him. Point proven.

 

That, or the worlds strongest man is actually a labourer. *sigh*

 

I think Mr.DagoWop is thinking more from a beginner/low level strength point of view, as in the average laborer using his whole body versus a kid who goes to the gym occasionally to gain some beach muscles.

 

Agreed.

 

Hold up, so because you say he would toy with everything that makes it automatically proven? That's not science at all. That's terrible logic too. You're essentially coming up with a hypothesis and if it doesn't sound to far fetched in your head then it's proven.

 

The point I was making flew completely over your head apparently. I'm pretty much arguing functional strength vs gym strength. Look at the most elite powerlifters in the sport, take Jim Wendler for example. He himself said that at his peak he couldn't do much more than squat, deadlift, and bench press. Many of those jacked 300 lb guys can't even tie their own shoes and you expect them to be able to do manual labor like its nothing!

Gym strength and functional strength will always be two not entirely separate concepts. Sure weight lifting won't hurt your functional strength but it's not going to make you significantly strong in a functional lift like it would in a traditional lift.

Doing functional **** over and over will get you strong at functional ****. It's insanely common to see someone who can lift heavy **** on the job site but not lift anything significant in the gym if they have never worked out before.

 

Absolute nonsense. There is nothing as all round ‘functional’ as a deadlift. Functional is a fitness buzzword that means nothing, I don’t know how you are defining it.
If you can lift heavy things off the ground at a construction site then you’re going to have a decent deadlift the first time you do it, and vice versa.
I was giving you the benefit of the doubt and trying to give some credit and justification to what you were arguing. It turns out you are just actually completely clueless and talking rubbish.

 

Welcome to last year...

 

Functional strength vs gym strength? What in the **** are you yapping on about?

After a bit of digging it seems this "functional strength" idea came from Crossfit as a way to sell their product. In reality it's complete shite. It means nothing.

 

Do you even know who I'm referring to? Do some research or do you actually think one of the strongest men on the planet would struggle on a construction site?

 

Actual application has disproven you.

 

I know exactly who you are referring to. Do you think only a select few people know who Brian Shaw is?

It's one thing to say that you don't think Shaw would struggle on a construction site but it's another thing entirely to claim "Point proven" as if it was dead set and irreversable. As if you had actual physical observation of Brian Shaw on a construction site.

Somehow this entire argument got turned from the debate between "why do squat, deadlift, and bench press determine the strongest man in the world?" to "How would elite strongmen perform on a construction site?"

Probably because the opposition have no plausible answers to my original argument.