Weaker with smaller weight set?

[FHSwarrior17]

Hello, i have a question about being able to lift more on a normal 45 lb bar than a cheap home 10 lb bar. At home with my cheap weight set, i can barely max bench 95 lbs (mind you im only 5'10 120ish) but when i use my friends olympic weight set I was able to hit 95 for a few reps and maxed at 125. Why is this? Is it because the 45 lb barbell is longer and makes it easier to lift or...?

[KeithTheSnake]

If your friend has an olympic set from a department store, his bar probably doesn't weigh a full 45 pounds, and his plates may not be accurate according to their stated weight.

Sometimes we train heavier with partners than alone.

There's a couple of explanations. Good luck.

[Stasher1]

Have you actually weighed both bars or are you just assuming his is 45 lb and yours is 10 lb? I had 7' oly bar for a while that only weighed 37 lbs., and it's fairly common for inexpensive plates to be off quite a bit from their stated weight. There are also other factors that can have an effect on your 1RM, such as the thickness of the bar, the width/height/stability of your bench, accuracy of your plates, etc.

[urbanlifter]

Got to love this topic, same thing happened to me before I learned the difference between quality equipment and cheap "Made in China" plates. Worked my bench up to 210lbs for reps, and then once I got a decent set of York plates and a York bar it dropped back down to struggling with 185lbs for reps. It was a punch in the gut, you always pay for what you get when it comes to this stuff....

[FHSwarrior17]

Got to love this topic, same thing happened to me before I learned the difference between quality equipment and cheap "Made in China" plates. Worked my bench up to 210lbs for reps, and then once I got a decent set of York plates and a York bar it dropped back down to struggling with 185lbs for reps. It was a punch in the gut, you always pay for what you get when it comes to this stuff....

Idk what the hell i have lol i bought it off my friend and its old and rusty. The olympic weight set of his which i lifted heavier was bought at Sears from $300ish if i remember correctly

[BloodType3R]

Have you actually weighed both bars or are you just assuming his is 45 lb and yours is 10 lb? I had 7' oly bar for a while that only weighed 37 lbs., and it's fairly common for inexpensive plates to be off quite a bit from their stated weight. There are also other factors that can have an effect on your 1RM, such as the thickness of the bar, the width/height/stability of your bench, accuracy of your plates, etc.

/thread

[KBKB]

Hello, i have a question about being able to lift more on a normal 45 lb bar than a cheap home 10 lb bar. At home with my cheap weight set, i can barely max bench 95 lbs (mind you im only 5'10 120ish) but when i use my friends olympic weight set I was able to hit 95 for a few reps and maxed at 125. Why is this? Is it because the 45 lb barbell is longer and makes it easier to lift or...?

Does your cheap bar or the rack used to hold it place constraints on where you can place your hands? It may be that your home equipment is forcing you to use a less than optimal hand spacing than you used when lifting with your friend's olypmic bar.

But as others have noted, there are a lot of other possibilities too.

[FHSwarrior17]

Spot on! The damn rack is too close together. But even then, the bar is obviously way smaller than the olympic bar

[FHSwarrior17]

Have you actually weighed both bars or are you just assuming his is 45 lb and yours is 10 lb? I had 7' oly bar for a while that only weighed 37 lbs., and it's fairly common for inexpensive plates to be off quite a bit from their stated weight. There are also other factors that can have an effect on your 1RM, such as the thickness of the bar, the width/height/stability of your bench, accuracy of your plates, etc.

Maybe his is lighter than the 45, but really need to compare his olympic bar to the bar i have at home. The one i use is way lighter and smaller

[trimble006]

There could also be gravitational issues in play here. I always carry around the same perfectly aerodynamic stone(so I have the same consistent weight) along with a calibrated stopwatch wherever I lift. I start the timer when I drop the stone, and stop it when it hits the floor. I have an extensive charted system of time vs height which tells me about the gravitational forces surround me in which I will battle that day as I lift.

It helps to to dress up and pretend like you're fighting the evil forces of Graviton while you lift too. I find it inspires me to lift heavier, plus I just feel cool in a mask and cape. Pretend the onlookers are concerned citizens. (They really are)

Hope this helps.

[Detrus]

I have a 7' 45 lb Rogue bar and quality olympic plates. And I have a cheap 17 lb Hampton standard 5' bar. Did some exercises with both at the same time, up to 100 lbs and the 5' bar felt heavier. Now 100 lbs is not near my max in anything so hard to say, but it certainly felt heavier. I don't think my standard plates are heavier than they're supposed to be, probably lighter, but can't weigh them accurately.

Another lifter here said he deadlifted with a 5' standard bar and it felt very different, took ~60 lbs of his ~500 lb deadlift.

So yea, 5' standards and 7' olympics will feel different. Hard to say if it's the length of the bar, different distribution of weight. People often use 10-25lb standard plates and 45 lb olympic plates. To load oly bar to 100 lbs you use a lot less plates because the bar is heavier. I saw some vid where a guy was comparing bars and said the thin 0.5" inner collar of Eleiko felt noticeably different from the normal 1.5-2" thick inner collar of Ivanko and most bars. But that's probably with 400 lb lifts.

[Wildtim]

ANother reason the standard bar is harder to lift is that it is narrower in diameter. An Olympic bar is roughly 1 and a quarter inches where a standard bar is usually sevan eighths to one max. That narrower bar makes it hurt more to push against, all of my lifts made significant jumps when I got an Olympic set and all of my pulls jumped again when I got a bar with quality knurling.

[Accutron]

Hello, i have a question about being able to lift more on a normal 45 lb bar than a cheap home 10 lb bar. At home with my cheap weight set, i can barely max bench 95 lbs (mind you im only 5'10 120ish) but when i use my friends olympic weight set I was able to hit 95 for a few reps and maxed at 125. Why is this? Is it because the 45 lb barbell is longer and makes it easier to lift or...?

Its either psycho****tic (mental) or most likely the weights are different weights...or as WT wrote, maybe a different set-up...

[jackbravo]

Another lifter here said he deadlifted with a 5' standard bar and it felt very different, took ~60 lbs of his ~500 lb deadlift.

I bet this is related to the size of the standard plates being smaller than the 45lb olympic plates, causing him to do a "deficit" lift

[Detrus]

I bet this is related to the size of the standard plates being smaller than the 45lb olympic plates, causing him to do a "deficit" lift

If you just lift with a 5' bar it will feel different. People with regular trap bars say rackable ones feel different. The plates are at a different distance from you. He also said the standard bar was stiff and dead. At ~500 lbs that's noticeable.

[jackbravo]

I believe that a stiffer bar would probably be harder. But I'll tell ya, I went to the Arnold last year and they had a strong man type booth with a deadlift. The bar was around 5ft, standard width, with two jugs acting as weight. I deadlifted it, and it weighed 450lbs. My pr at that time was 405 with an oly bar. I didn't feel a difference in stiffness at that weight. The lift was easier I think because the standard bar was narrow/easier to grip and the jugs were taller than the 45 lb plates.

[daniel327]

There could also be gravitational issues in play here. I always carry around the same perfectly aerodynamic stone(so I have the same consistent weight) along with a calibrated stopwatch wherever I lift. I start the timer when I drop the stone, and stop it when it hits the floor. I have an extensive charted system of time vs height which tells me about the gravitational forces surround me in which I will battle that day as I lift.

It helps to to dress up and pretend like you're fighting the evil forces of Graviton while you lift too. I find it inspires me to lift heavier, plus I just feel cool in a mask and cape. Pretend the onlookers are concerned citizens. (They really are)

Hope this helps.

Have you had your dosage reviewed recently?

[AttyGuy]

It helps to to dress up and pretend like you're fighting the evil forces of Graviton while you lift too. I find it inspires me to lift heavier, plus I just feel cool in a mask and cape. Pretend the onlookers are concerned citizens. (They really are)

Hope this helps.

Brilliant. Just tell me you have on the unitard as well when you lift with mask and cape. They'll throw you out of the superhero club if they hear you're free-ballin' it.

[Detrus]

I believe that a stiffer bar would probably be harder. But I'll tell ya, I went to the Arnold last year and they had a strong man type booth with a deadlift. The bar was around 5ft, standard width, with two jugs acting as weight. I deadlifted it, and it weighed 450lbs. My pr at that time was 405 with an oly bar. I didn't feel a difference in stiffness at that weight. The lift was easier I think because the standard bar was narrow/easier to grip and the jugs were taller than the 45 lb plates.

Well the difference might go either way, but there is one. When I was comparing 5' standard to 7' oly I was only doing 100 lbs which is far from max in anything so cleans, curls, overhead press, rows. And I felt a difference. The Rogue oly bar felt very smooth, there was some resistance but barely. The standard bar felt crappy. The plates on it spin but with a 25mm sleeve there is extra slop and you can feel that with eccentric part of curl, at the top of the clean, etc. Haven't tried spinlock lately, I imagine it's annoying because if you secure the collars and the plates don't spin at all, it's not smooth, it wants to spin in your hand.

So I'm not surprised that different equipment gives you different numbers. Smooth spinning oly sleeves do make a lot of moves easier, they're supposed to.

[AttyGuy]

I believe that a stiffer bar would probably be harder.

And thicker too.