ORWELL'S DOUBLESPEAK, REVISITED.

The language police are back in town.

Kidding aside, I believe it is important to get our semantics right in order to communicate effectively with each other.

In today's world where just anyone can claim to be an 'expert' on basically anything (as long as it looks fashionable), I have recently struggled to understand what the term 'strength' actually means, what the factors are that constitute it, and why all of a sudden any form of exercise seems to be classed as 'strength training'.

In fact, though, I haven't struggled to understand it, and I want to use to use this article to clarify a few things.

First of all, strength, according to Mark Rippetoe, founder of Starting Strength, is '...the ability to produce force against an external resistance.' The more force you are able to apply against an object through the means of muscular contractions, the stronger you are. Hard to argue with, isn't it?

Likewise, this makes someone who can deadlift 200kg strong than someone who can deadlift 100kg. Equally hard to argue with, right?

I am, indeed, starting to wonder what Thor, Eddie Hall, or Ronnie Coleman would be classified as in today's view of the 'new fitness wave' fanatics - if not the strongest people the planet has ever witnessed? Aren't they the epitome of human physical strength?

Well, maybe they're not. Because somewhere, someone is arriving to their pilates class, in their brand-new gear, barefoot (or in grip socks), claiming to be training for...'strength'.

I honestly do not have an issue with anyone doing what they're doing. How dare I anyway? It's a free will world. Go make yourself happy.

What requires a healthy dose of reflection though is the nonsense and untruths which, in most cases, some practitioners of these and other practices are spurting.

"Stretch. Elongate. Relax. Re-connect. Get flexible. Work your core...." - and - "GET STRONGER!" - all in one breath.

Hmm. Not so fast.

Let's break it down.

What constitutes strength?

The answer to this question is that there are two driving factors behind why and how you get stronger. That is, a) an increase in muscle mass, and b) a more efficient nervous system.

Let's dive deeper.

An increase in muscle mass is the equivalent of an increase in cross-sectional area (CSA), which means that the body has laid down a greater amount of contractile proteins, and has therefore increased the diameter of its muscle fibers. This is what we call muscular hypertrophy. Resultantly, 'more mass can move more mass', as a greater cross-sectional area has the potential to produce greater amounts of force than a smaller one.

The stimulus for an increase in muscle mass is a product of the tension generated by a muscle.

Guess where this tension is coming from?

Exactly. The weight on the bar.

Now do you think that a 100kg squat or a 50kg squat produces greater tension in the muscles performing it?

Check.

The nervous system part of the strength equation behaves in a similar way. That is, it is also based on survival. If you expose your body to heavier loads in the long run as done with barbell training (in contrast to pilates), how do you think the nervous system will react?

The answer is that it will recruit more of the Type 2, high-threshold motor units which produce a high amount of force. The 'survival' adaptation in this case is that the body brings more of these motor units into play to get the job of lifting a heavy weight done. In order...not to get crushed by it.

So guess what your nervous system figures out if you take your deadlift from 50kg to 150kg?

The answer is obvious.

Which makes me want to be enlightened on how practices such as pilates fulfill the criteria of building greater amounts of muscle mass, or improving one's capacity to produce force against an external resistance in the long run - knowing that there is no long-term possibility to increase the external resistance the body has to work against?

Is this also why anyone doing pilates (you can also insert the word 'yoga' here) hasn't increased their muscle mass and body shape quite visibly beyond baseline?

And why is it that people doing barbell training report that their positions in pilates/yoga/etc. have started to feel stronger and easier? While the opposite never seems to be case?

Does anyone seriously think that a 350kg deadlift can be taken to 360kg by doing 3 sets of 20 on weighted planks?

Let's carry on.

"I need to stretch. Flexibility is important!"

Really?

Why?

Did some 'expert' tell you that being flexible is important for you - such as, for reducing pain, or avoiding it all together?

Which of course is total baloney.

The reason why we hurt, or why we would get injured, is influenced by a multitude of factors, such as genetics, injury history, diet, sleep, as well as by how resilient your tissue is to forces that would exceed their capacity to handle them. Being flexible, I'm afraid, has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Let's go further.

What about bones?

Frail bones, so to speak. The thing which pretty much any woman beyond the age of 50 wants to avoid.

Are they going to be sold the lie that doing pilates will make their bones denser and more resilient against fractures?

Are they going to be told the nonsense that doing pilates will reduce their risk of becoming sarcopenic - which is a driving factor for weak and brittle bones?

How does it occur that women who have struggled to increase their bone density all their life despite thinking they have done the 'right form of exercise' now find out that if they get their strength and muscle mass up, their diagnosis of being osteoporotic disappears ?

Let's keep on going further.

What about connective tissue?

Did you know that heavy, slow strength training done with a prolonged eccentric phase is the most evidence-based form of training we have to strengthen weak and degenerated tendons?

Because tendon cells start re-producing collagen only when the resistance is high enough to give them a reason to do so. What's the point, the tendon will ask, if all you expose me to is low-load exercises?

It is baffling for me to see and hear how we are telling people that you need to lift weights to make your muscles and bones stronger - yet somehow there is a different type of exercise that would make exactly this kind of tissue (and no other) stronger in some other separate way?

If we summarise the above and close the circle, do we see the commonality of having to lift heavy enough weights to trigger the physiological adaptations required to actually get stronger ?

In contrast, let me give you another example.

If you are so insisting on having 'good mobility' in your joints, then I can tell you that a) a correctly-performed squat under load will give you all the hip mobility you'll ever need, and b) heavy lifting done through what we call the full range of motion enhances mobility in a more effective way than holding a bodyweight position for five minutes will ever do, as you are also developing strength in that full range which the external load pushes you into. And strength is required to obtain joint stability in end-range positions - something which 'mobility experts' seem to fail to understand.

So to most people's disbelief, barbell training actually improves 'true' mobility. But I am not going to run around and tell the world that they should sign up for a mobility class with me - only to find out that they'll be doing sets of five in the squat and deadlift that day. That would seem a bit odd, wouldn't it?

In the same vein, we can cover the 'cardio' aspect of weight training here.

A heavy set of five of any compound lift will get your heart beating properly. In a way, heavy lifting is high-intensity interval training (or HIIT).

Would I promote it as 'Get cardio-fit with my new amazing HIIT workout!' - only for participants to find out that they won't be sweating very much doing sets of five on the press and deadlift that day?

No.

Because they only thing I am claiming is that I am helping people get stronger - with all the 'side effects' of this process revealing themselves naturally.

So perhaps stay in your lane is a good idea in all of this - reverting back to our own little biased bubbles we live in?

I still wonder what Thor thinks of all of this.

#strengthtraining #getsrong #hamptonwick #teddington