Seriously, stop that shit. It’s embarrassing
to your fellow humans. I know it happens to all of us from time to time because
it’s impossible to know everything about everything that’s discussed on a
regular basis through our various social mediums, BUT when you’re talking to
someone who’s put countless hours into knowing exactly what he knows, you’ve
put all of a whopping 20 minutes into it looking at Wikipedia articles, and he
happens to disagree with you on something in that category, you can bet your
ass that you’re wrong. Thus, you need to shut the fuck up and listen to your
superior.
The above image is unfortunately correct and in our society filled with misinformation and misdirection, there are many fools running around blabbing their stupid mouths. It has been proven that in a disagreement, regardless of the height of the walls of evidence presented against someone, that person’s stress hormone levels will rise and their minds will become narrower than a virgin’s vagina. The harder the evidence is forced at them, the harder they’ll push back, employing more logical fallacies and insults than a butthurt teen on a message board. That said, take a deep breath and open up your minds, my good people, so that I may shit on everything you think you know.
Misconception #1: You
are somehow exempt from human biology and the law of conservation of energy.
Being the 220 lb sexy motherfucker
that I am with the strength to back it up, I get asked for advice on lifting
and diet on a regular basis. People come up to me like “hey man, I’m having
trouble putting on mass. I’m trying to get big like you.” When I tell them all
they need to do is lift heavy and eat more, they say they’re already eating a
lot already and it’s not working. If you were eating enough to gain weight, you
would gain weight, and if you’re lifting heavy, most of that weight will be
muscle. There is no other way to go about it. If you’re a little 145 lb dude
with a fast metabolism and you think eating 4 cheeseburgers from McDonald’s a
few times a week on top of your normal intake is “enough”, and you’re not
gaining weight…guess what. You’re not eating enough. If you’re getting 21000
calories a week (on average 3000 a day), increase it to 22000. Still not gaining weight?
Increase it to 23000. I guarantee you will start packing on the pounds.
Increased it too much and you’re getting fat? Decrease it down to 22500. It’s simple
addition and subtraction my friends. Of course if you want to break it down
into specific macronutrients and hormonal responses it can get pretty
complicated, however, phrases like “don’t sweat the small stuff” and “keep it
simple, stupid” apply here, since we're not elite athletes.
Misconception #2:
Women will get bulky from lifting weights.
This is
the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard and it’s an outright insult to every male who’s
ever struggled for years to put on some quality mass. Women are so far from becoming
bulky it’s not even funny. They don’t have the testosterone production to
achieve the level of muscularity that men can and the only way they do this is
by injecting test into themselves and lifting for hours every day.
 |
| Not a woman. |
Squatting is
the king of all exercises for the lower body and will accentuate everything
that a woman should have. It will also allow them to be better lays by having
more strength to support themselves while on top. The strict press will allow
them to pull boxes off shelves without killing themselves (I’ve witnessed this
before…very sad, very scary) and give them an improved shoulder to waist ratio,
making them appear slimmer. Doing any row or pull movement will improve posture
so they don’t look like sloth creatures and if they have large boobs, it’ll
help them support those puppies so they won’t even have to consider breast reduction
surgery. And benching firms up the chest and arms and may even tighten up those
saggy breasts a bit. Overall, the slight increase in muscle mass women will
achieve through lifting will improve their metabolism, allowing them to burn
off those love handles and wherever else fat is ruining their self esteem. All
of these positives are without getting too bulky to fit through a door, which,
I assure you, will never happen.
Another
thing I hear from women in regards to lifting is that even the small increase
in muscle mass will make them too manly and they will somehow lose all femininity.
All I can do here is point them to Jessica Biel. She lifts like an athlete,
does sprints, and looks pretty damn hot.
 |
| Not manly. At all. |
Misconception #3: You
can elongate your muscles
What in
the holy fuck does that mean? This is somewhat related to misconception #1 in
that people think they are in a realm outside established scientific laws as
well as misconception #2 in that women are just plain wrong about a lot of
things. Women who prefer to walk at a brisk pace on treadmills and do yoga tell
me elongation is their goal and they want to avoid becoming “short and squat”
which is caused by weight lifting. Once again, what the fuck. I am 6’1”, have
been lifting for 5 years and I don’t look nor have I become “short and squat”.
Konstantin Konstantinovs is 6’4”, deadlifts over 900 lbs, and does not look
short or squat. Perhaps they’re talking about the appearance of being “short
and squat” attained through a bulkier frame but as I said above, women can’t
put on enough muscle mass to come close to this look without ample testosterone
supplementation.
 |
| Gimli was short and squat before he ever lifted his axe. |
As for
elongation, I’d like to see someone who started out a certain height, did yoga,
balet, or whatever else they claim causes this alleged muscle elongation, and
grew several inches in height, gaining Mr. Fantastic’s abilities in the process.
Because surely the bones would have to compensate for the muscles being longer
and they’d grow as well, right? Otherwise you’d have muscles stretched well
beyond their insertion points and they would be sagging right off the bones. Neither
of those things sound useful or attractive and they are definitely completely
impossible.
 |
| True muscle elongation. |
Misconception #4: Once
you sustain injury, you have to live with it for the rest of your life
This
one isn’t discussed in the form of a “how can I fix this” question because
people generally assume they’re stuck with it forever. It comes up when
detailing exercises to a beginner and they tell me that movement x hurts so
they can’t do it. My response is "Ok, so what are you doing to recover?" The
usual response is a deer-in-the-headlights blank stare. Come on, people, if you
pulled some part of your rotator cuff playing high school football, twisted
your ankle falling down the stairs 3 years ago, or your knee has never been the
same since that rollerblading incident, you need to take steps to rehabilitate
the injury and prevent re-injury. This can be done with a periodized approach
similar to any strength program or project plan. Obviously, your best bet is to
see a specialist with experience rehabbing athletes but if you’d rather do it
on your own due to financial restrictions, lack of insurance, or whatever the
case may be, you’ve got to implement a plan that involves the following:
1)
First, study everything you can about that area
of the body. You have to learn about every last muscle, its origin(s), its
insertion(s), its actions on the joint, etc. You have to learn the location of all
the cartilage, ligaments, and tendons in the area. You have to learn how the
area is affected by the movement of adjacent joints/muscle groups.
2)
Next, you learn about as many ailments that can
afflict that area as you can that are similar to what you’re experiencing with
similar causes.
3)
At this point you should have a strong enough
understanding to make a good guess as to what the problem is. Now starts the
rehab. Learn about all the common techniques used to strengthen surrounding
musculature, improve bloodflow to the area, break up scar tissue preventing
proper recovery, and become a useful human being again.
4)
Test the movement that caused pain before. If
there’s still pain, you either guessed wrong or you need more rehab time. Be
patient; this could take months but the end goal is well worth it. If there is
no pain, congratulations! You’ve successfully rehabilitated your injury.
Obviously, start light and ramp up slowly and always pay attention to what your
body is telling you.
See? It wasn’t that difficult. You only have 1 body. Life is
better if you take care of it, fix what’s broken, and strengthen what’s not.
Misconception #5:
Athletes are getting better.
No , fuckers, they are not. I was listening to a broadcast
on NPR this morning and they were interviewing some woman working for Speedo whose
job it was to create better swim suits for Olympic swimmers. She spent years
researching shark skin and developing a suit that replicated the minimized drag
created by the complex ridges and whatnot in the shark’s hide. The elite
swimmers who tested these suits felt an immediate difference from their
previous suits and were able to shave precious fractions of a second off of
their times. She also worked with the suits of Olympic skiers, the helmets of
cyclists, and the shoes of Olympic sprinters. It’s the same with the majority
of sports where records are being broken by tiny margins these days. It’s not
about how much the athletes are improving, it’s how much the gear is improving
so that countries can win gold medals at the Olympics. The sport with the most
notable impact made by improved gear is powerlifting. This is a sport where
records are being broken by greater margins than all the others. It’s because
the bench shirts and squat suits and organizations with lenient rules allow it
to happen. If we look at raw records from the 1970s and compare them to today,
we’ll see that we’re right around the same level of strength, if not weaker. Some
raw records have been stricken from the records due to shuffling of weight
classes and evolving rules, however some of these lifts have not been matched
to this day. An example being Jon Cole’s massive 2363 raw total made up of a
901 squat, a 580 bench, and an 882 deadlift. While those individual lifts may
have been exceeded, his total stands the test of time. He also was apparently a
beast at Olympic lifting, being only 100 lbs off the best total at the time in
that sport without specializing in it.
That concludes the first installment in the misconception
series. Due to the extreme miseducation of the public regarding athletics,
strength, diet, etc, you can rest assured there will be more of these in the
coming months.
Questions? Complaints? Thoughts? Accusations? Post a comment below.
Questions? Complaints? Thoughts? Accusations? Post a comment below.
T'was a good read. My Saturday morning was fun-filled.
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