Why Raw is better

[UHCougar05]

cud u explain the term shirted...and raw please?
honest question..newbie

Shirted: Using a bench shirt when you bench
raw(aka RAAAAAAAWWWWWWWW): Benching with no bench shirt and little to no equipment (depending on the federation).

[phikappa]

(I LOVE THE SPORT POWERLIFTING BUT LETS FIX IT)

RAW POWERLIFTING is better because...

TRUE STORY

People at your gym know you can bench 445 pounds shirted. Your getting ready to start your workout in the gym, someone calls you out and says " I can bench more than you." Just a regular hard working gym rat. The shirted lifter says "OK" The raw guy proceeds to warmup then hits 295 for one rep (RAW) then goes to 305 for another...Makes it. People at the gym are pumped watching waiting for the 445 pound shirted lifter to answer the challange. He says " I forgot my bench shirt" The people in the gym say " F- that just do it without one! " The shirted lifter decides to go raw he warms and goes up to 265 hits it(BARELY) , then goes for 305...NOT EVEN CLOSE!! Regular people at the gym are like " WTF I thought he could do 445" Not only does this make the shirted lifter look stupid, but then another guy goes up to the bench and nails 305 for one rep (Touch and go style...RAW)

The morale of the story is that nobody cares what you bench with a shirt. At most gyms people want to see RAW strength! Football players lift Raw so do other college/Pro athletes and I bet they are more stronger tha many Elite Gear Powerlifters. I am not trying to disrespect the sport of powerlifting, but I feel that the sport is getting carried away with all the gear that is used. Whatever happend to just lifting. I bet that if some of the gear like TRIPLE POLY SUITS and other junk was eliminated the sport would be more mainstream like strongman (on ESPN) and olympic lifting (OLYMPICS).

What about doing a full ROM? Or lifting your butt off the bench?

[tatortotajigalo]

we just need a two sides of powerlifting, a raw and suited one.


raw vs. raw

and

sutied vs. suited

[frank at uwo]

i hate squat suits bc its impossible to compete against people wearing them and theres no raw meets around. when i can outdeadlift 90% of guys in only a singlet and they can all outsquat me substantially... well i guess it just makes me want to buy a suit.

oh and ya suits suck and raw lifterz 4 life equipment should burn etc etc raw raw raw yadda yadda

[Bty2047]

of Frankie, burn suits eh.. If you put on a suit i bet your lifts wouldn't go up at all because you have no idea how to put it on, let alone use it. i think that suited is fine, don't complain if somebody can out total you suited, put on a suit and try, I'm pretty sure they will still destroy you.

[Newbtime]

you would have to be half retarded not to get ANYTHING out of gear the first time you use it.

[JNo20]

I hate this thread and all threads like it..........


Raw lifting and geared lifting are two different things, period. Why do shirted benchers bench way more than their raw bench? Maybe because they TRAIN to improve their shirted bench, NOT their raw bench, by means of more lockout work and less full ROM work. Just a thought.

Did I mention I hate threads like these?

[gettnthere]

Right. The two are totally analagous.

wens the next usapl meet in pa?

[Kiknskreem]

wens the next usapl meet in pa?

http://www.purepowerlifting.com/rmeets.html

[Danimal]

i hate squat suits bc its impossible to compete against people wearing them and theres no raw meets around. when i can outdeadlift 90% of guys in only a singlet and they can all outsquat me substantially... well i guess it just makes me want to buy a suit.

oh and ya suits suck and raw lifterz 4 life equipment should burn etc etc raw raw raw yadda yadda

There are plenty of raw meets. I know that APF and APA now have raw only divisions. The last APF meet I did a few weeks ago had a bunch of raw lifters. AAU has raw divisions. NASA and WNPF have raw divisions.

The meets are out there. You just have to stop coming up with excuses and go find them.

[frank at uwo]

There are plenty of raw meets. I know that APF and APA now have raw only divisions. The last APF meet I did a few weeks ago had a bunch of raw lifters. AAU has raw divisions. NASA and WNPF have raw divisions.

The meets are out there. You just have to stop coming up with excuses and go find them.

American feds eh...

Sorry none in my country - canada

[tomeri]

(I LOVE THE SPORT POWERLIFTING BUT LETS FIX IT)

RAW POWERLIFTING is better because...

TRUE STORY

People at your gym know you can bench 445 pounds shirted. Your getting ready to start your workout in the gym, someone calls you out and says " I can bench more than you." Just a regular hard working gym rat. The shirted lifter says "OK" The raw guy proceeds to warmup then hits 295 for one rep (RAW) then goes to 305 for another...Makes it. People at the gym are pumped watching waiting for the 445 pound shirted lifter to answer the challange. He says " I forgot my bench shirt" The people in the gym say " F- that just do it without one! " The shirted lifter decides to go raw he warms and goes up to 265 hits it(BARELY) , then goes for 305...NOT EVEN CLOSE!! Regular people at the gym are like " WTF I thought he could do 445" Not only does this make the shirted lifter look stupid, but then another guy goes up to the bench and nails 305 for one rep (Touch and go style...RAW)

The morale of the story is that nobody cares what you bench with a shirt. At most gyms people want to see RAW strength! Football players lift Raw so do other college/Pro athletes and I bet they are more stronger tha many Elite Gear Powerlifters. I am not trying to disrespect the sport of powerlifting, but I feel that the sport is getting carried away with all the gear that is used. Whatever happend to just lifting. I bet that if some of the gear like TRIPLE POLY SUITS and other junk was eliminated the sport would be more mainstream like strongman (on ESPN) and olympic lifting (OLYMPICS).

I think we can compare this issue to...bodybuilding.
is it not the same when people get shredded and huge because they're on juice? can you not consider it "cheating" when a raw powerlifter uses steroids and other enhancing drugs? shirts are the same - they allow you to reach a bigger goal. i think that being able to bench with a shirt more than you can without it, will make you stronger (only if you're not dumb enough to bench only shirted). if you combine the two you'll get better gains. and that is what a lot of powerlifters do - they don't train only with a shirt. Also, if a person who almost always benches shirted and then goes heavy raw, he would fail in most cases at the bottom of the movement because he isn't used to that kind of pressure at that point(the shirt helps at the bottom the most).

[Mateo_66]

yea shirts and suits are gay as hell... why the hell do i wanna see sumone with assistance lifting when i know they really cant do that,...

I might as well buy myself a shirt and suit to squat in at weight trainign at school so i can say im the stongest in there lol.

Doubtful at 132 pounds you would be the strongest in there with gear. Maybe you should try gaining some weight.

[Mateo_66]

Put a Tshirt on and touch your chest...and bench.

End of story.

Anything else is parlor trickery.

Not really. Only if I wear a Bench shirt and try to pass it off as a t shirt is it your parlor trickery you speak of. So STFU.

[Mateo_66]

why not just use a forklift then since its still an even playing field


weighlifting in general is about finding out what the HUMAN BODY is capable of, adding a shirt is just eliminating the whole point of testing the human body...

so if you use a shirt you might as well be using a forklift IMO

This is ridiculious............. I dont even know what to say? When using gear you are still using muscles. WHen using a forklift no muscles involved only hydraulics. Is this sinking into your skull????

[Mateo_66]

Well Mike Miller was getting about 400lbs+ from his suit. Apparently in training mendalson just benched over 1100lbs his raw max is 715

Miller did the meet on a whim not much training for it. You cant just jump from geared to raw and be a world champion same with raw to gear.

[power44]

Miller did the meet on a whim not much training for it. You cant just jump from geared to raw and be a world champion same with raw to gear.

BS!! Miller weighs like 375 pounds and cant even squat double his bodyweight raw. Not to mention that 1220 lift was an all gear lift( Didn't even go low). He made a fool of himself at the NE Record Breakers last year. Miller is a cool guy I have met him in person but come on, I dont consider him one of the top squatters in the world.

[James456]

Miller did the meet on a whim not much training for it. You cant just jump from geared to raw and be a world champion same with raw to gear.

You would still expect him to put up 800lbs through let alone taking 2 attempts to get 600. With hindsight it doen t surprise that he failed 800lb squat I mean he only had a 700 lb deadlift. Now if bolton decided to go raw do you think he would fail 800lbs. Personally I would bet big money on him blasting it up easily.

[sborg]

American feds eh...

Sorry none in my country - canada

Dammit, who keeps letting canucks on these boards?

[power44]

Miler only hit a 600 pound squat at the NE Record Breakers last year. He hit 1220 with gear. Thats a 620 pound carry over.

[UHCougar05]

This thread =

[Newbtime]

Miler only hit a 600 pound squat at the NE Record Breakers last year. He hit 1220 with gear. Thats a 620 pound carry over.

thats the highest he squatted, not the most he could of.. your a idiot.

[mochi]

There are plenty of raw meets. I know that APF and APA now have raw only divisions. The last APF meet I did a few weeks ago had a bunch of raw lifters. AAU has raw divisions. NASA and WNPF have raw divisions.

The meets are out there. You just have to stop coming up with excuses and go find them.

i wish i could just drive to another state, but only wabdl runs here and they don't do raw ..and i wanna SQUAT too!!..

back to the dead horse thread at hand....

[Doc Iron]

This is ridiculious............. I dont even know what to say? When using gear you are still using muscles. WHen using a forklift no muscles involved only hydraulics. Is this sinking into your skull????

Actually Mateo, that's not necessarily true.

A bench shirt is a simple machine, it does PART of the work for you (in Mendelson's case, for instance, it seems to be doing about 400 pounds for work for him, Mendy is doing the other 700ish).

You could easily set up a fork lift to do the same thing. Load up a bar with 2000 pounds of weight. Get the forklift to exert, say, 1300 pounds of force on the bar ... then Mendy lifts the rest. Assuming he can move 700 pounds himself the bar will go up ... bingo, 2000 pound "equipped" bench ... just using a different kind of equipment.

[Doc Iron]

thats the highest he squatted, not the most he could of.. your a idiot.

True enough that Mike Miller is not getting 600+ pounds out of his squat suit.

However, when a guy who holds the world geared record at 1220 takes two attempts to put up 600, and then fails at 800, you have to admit that makes geared power lifting look very, very bad.

[Newbtime]

he didn't take two attempts to get 600, he blasted 600 up the first time but it was red lighted, so he did it again, if it was actually hard for him he would not have jumped 200 lbs, use your head.

[Buildandrun]

I honestly don't find the shirt helping me that much..I raw bench 225 and shirted bench 250. Not that much of a difference..but it gives me the extra points for comp.

[Doc Iron]

The bottom line to this dead-horse debate is this:

For me (and for most strength athletics purists) the entire beauty and appeal of this sport is it's simplicity. He (or she) who can move the greatest amount of weight using the power of his (or her) own body is the best.

Period. That's it, nothing else is required.

Kinda like a really fine, aged Scotch ... you don't have to pour water, or Coca Cola, or lime juice, or anything else into it to make it good, it's best exactly the way it comes out of the bottle: pure and unspoiled.

Unfortunately, somewhere along the line, the majority of the powerlifting community decided that fine, aged Scotch by itself wasn't good enough ... and they started adding $hit.

At first, maybe it was just a little splash of water (i.e. early shirts and Supersuits). To make the Scotch a bit smoother (i.e. to make the lifts a bit safer).

Today, however, people are pouring water, Coke, lemon, lime, turpentine, old motor oil, maple syrup and monkey pi$$ into the Scotch (i.e. Modern gear which lifts as much as 40% of the weight for you) and saying:

"Hey, we like it this way ... it's just a different way to drink Scotch, who are you to tell us it's wrong!"

So OK, if you like drinking your Scotch this way (i.e. lifting in multiply gear) I guess go ahead. Who am I to tell you how to drink?

But don't be surprised when us old Scotch drinkers don't get too excited about this new elixir you've created (i.e. your 1200+ pound squats and 1000+ pound benches). To us, it basically looks and tastes like Dog vomit ... and has absolutely nothing to do with Scotch.

Also don't be surprised when the general public looks at the mixture you've made and says: "Umm, well, even though I'm not really a Scotch guy ... I can tell you ... that thing you've made isn't Scotch ... Scotch is the pure stuff that comes out of the bottle." (i.e. When people outside the powerlifting community ridicule you when they find out that you're claiming a 700 pound bench but struggle to put up 500 without your shirt).

Also don't be surprised if any organization that concerns itself with the consumption of fine spirits (i.e. the Olympics) doesn't take you seriously. The mixture you've created is no longer even remotely related to a fine spirit.

But so long as you're happy making, and drinking it, amongst yourselves (i.e. developing generation after generation of gear and competing in it against yourselves in the Federations you've created) ... all the power to you.

Bottoms up.

[powerlifter70]

Why does any of this matter? I compete both raw and with gear and put up good numbers in both. All I care about is doing better at each meet. You see...MOST people who come in here and start these pointless threads do not even compete in powerlifting.

[Doc Iron]

he didn't take two attempts to get 600, he blasted 600 up the first time but it was red lighted, so he did it again, if it was actually hard for him he would not have jumped 200 lbs, use your head.

Your argument would make sense if he jumped 200 lds and made it ... but in case your memory is failing you in your old age, he didn't.

Many "elite" powerlifters make these huge jumps in order to preserve their egos (it sounds a lot better to fail on a big number than to top out at a smaller one).

That's why there's an epidemic of bombing in powerlifting these days.

I know this isn't pleasant stuff to hear, but until people start being honest and calling bull$hit, bull$hit, things are never going to improve.