Can I eat a very lean diet and continue to get stronger, even if only slowly? That would be awesome, I never really cared for size at all. Here's me at 10% bodyfat:
I look like I can bench around 200, but I can hit as much as 285 during a well-nourished period. I'm cut down from 180 to 165 right now, and my chest is definitely smaller but I am not weaker by any means.
Anyway, point of this thread is in the title. If I can get stronger without getting fatter, that would be a huge revelation. When I think strong, I think Daniel Day-Lewis, not Ahnuld.
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03-05-2008, 11:31 AM #1
Can you get stronger without actually adding muscle mass?
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03-05-2008, 11:33 AM #2
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03-05-2008, 11:33 AM #3
yes, it's called strength training. it promotes strength rather than muscle hypertrophy (basically what bodybuilders aim for). i don't know much about the science of it though. in fact i would suggest taking this info lightly because i don't know how accurate this is. supposedly it has a lot to do with nervous system adjusting to heavier weights and of course you can't really avoid not gaining muscle mass too. the only real difference i've noticed from strength vs. bodybuilding is the reps and types of lifts they do. not sure about the diet.
Fapping is the ultimate cardio.
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03-05-2008, 11:34 AM #4
with your answer, for the most part yes you can, however it will nto be very quickly and eventually you will peak and make little gains. You can train the muscles you have to adapt to heavier weights, but eventually they will be done adapting unless you put on more muscle. With that in mind, you will most likely gain small amounts of muscle when lifting heavy anyways.
Weight training is not just about muscles, it's about character, determination, dedication, control, and knowledge.
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03-05-2008, 11:56 AM #5
- Join Date: Feb 2008
- Location: Miami, Florida, United States
- Posts: 342
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Of course you can. Building strength is getting your body used to higher weight. You can do this without gaining muscle mass. Gaining weight is accomplished by eating really. If one trains for strength but doesn't eat enough for the mass, you will see that you get stronger but not bigger. That is exactly what strength athletes in sports that are restricted to weight classes do.
If you strive to be something, you must work for it. Pain is your friend, it shows you that you are still alive. Refuse to be common.
Make no god damn mistake, I'm in this for power and glory.
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03-05-2008, 11:58 AM #6
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03-05-2008, 12:15 PM #7
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03-05-2008, 12:24 PM #8
I was gonna mention bruce lee, but hey holding a 100lb barbell horizonal just means he has huge shoulders and a tiny legs
and i doubt he did that when he was 130lb's (he has been hevier much)
but yeah its completly possible to build more strength without gaining weight.
but we do have limits ^^LAZY ^^
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03-05-2008, 12:29 PM #9
actually he was big on kicking, he relied on his legs to make strong kicks, there's a movie clip on youtube of how he kicked a guy almost 10 feet in a fight and he said he felt like he got hit by a car.
he doesn't really have that huge shoulders, but he had like a 25" waist and 50" inch back. it was ridiculous.
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03-05-2008, 12:30 PM #10
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03-05-2008, 12:32 PM #11
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03-05-2008, 12:32 PM #12
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03-05-2008, 12:32 PM #13
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03-05-2008, 12:33 PM #14
Strength is a neurological adaptation--- how many muscle fibers you are able to recruit. Maximum recruitment is obtained through low rep training which teaches your brain to recruit all of the fibers that it has. So yes, you can get much stronger without adding muscle mass, because after you just added lets say 10lbs of muscle, chances are you are not very strong for your size anymore because your brain doesnt know how to use all of these fibers yet because in order to gain alot of mass you usually need to stay in the 8-12 rep range
This is why powerlifters are so much stronger then BBs.
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03-05-2008, 12:34 PM #15
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03-05-2008, 12:35 PM #16
no such thing as 'adding' muscle fibers. you are born with a finite number of muscle fibers and you cannot increase them. the fibers grow back thicker after you work out and you tear them.
an 150lb guy who has never worked out has the same number of muscle fibers as a guy who is 250lbs. the difference is the thickness of those fibers.
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03-05-2008, 12:42 PM #17
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03-05-2008, 12:49 PM #18
strength comes from the force exherted by the muscle fibers themselves.
if you are like Bruce Lee, his muscle fibers although thin, they are very DENSE when you look at them microscopically. they have many amino strands close together. therefore 1 of his muscle fibers even though it's thinner than a big bulky bodybuilder, it can exert more strength.
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03-05-2008, 12:50 PM #19
yes Force=Mass x Acceleration
thanks for pointing that out to everyone....
and i fail to see why you needed to tell me that. Did you take my "slight" to literally and had to be a jackass, why the **** do you think i put... "just sayin" at the end.
Oh and just so you know, there are studies showing hyperplasia might occur in humans... so your sort of off by saying "NO YOU CAN'T increase fiber count", when really you very well might be able to.
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03-05-2008, 12:52 PM #20
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03-05-2008, 12:55 PM #21
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05-11-2008, 01:57 AM #22
I think you can get stronger but it will be VERY slowly. I just read another case study of someone who shares the same question but from a different angle as he wish to get more muscle mass but his diet is wrong.
As this is a bb forum, I guess most of us won't see the benefit of not pumping it up.
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05-11-2008, 02:10 AM #23
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05-11-2008, 02:11 AM #24
- Join Date: Mar 2008
- Location: United Kingdom (Great Britain)
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Low reps = strength.
If you work on low reps without putting too many extra calories in your diet, you will get stronger.
You'll probably get a bit bigger too, though.THE BODY BUILDING IS A SERIOUS THING NOT FOR INTERNATIONAL MONOPOLYS OF STEROIDS AND SYNTETICAL ANABBOLIZANTS.....YOU RISK CANCER HEART DISEASES DEAD
Yes I am on steroids, thanks for asking.
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http://chat.bodybuilding.com/
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05-11-2008, 02:37 AM #25
mmmm I trained with plenty of 1st degrees and higher who had perfect form. But a lot of them never worked out outside the dojo/training center. And a good amount of them wouldn't last too long in a fight simply because they weren't too athletic/physically in shape.
Bruce Lee's skill wasn't the main reason he could kick a man so hard. Extremely fast-twitch muscle fibers that were able to recruit so much force from his muscle fibers in such a small amount of time. Explosive power.
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