Zach Update

[Mark Rippetoe]

Okay, this has just gotten out of hand. I have a problem with several of Lyle's statements today, and although this is only the internet, I am not going to allow my intelligence, experience, and integrity to be called into question in this manner.

"If you guys believe that zach did in fact
a. gain 33 lbs of muscle
b. increase in squat in good form in that time frame

More power to you. Perhaps Starting Strength is better than anabolics in terms of hte gains it can generate. But I doubt it. Just imagine if you stacked it with Anaconda."

Zach gained ~45 lbs. of muscle. His squats are posted below. And a novice linear progression is far better than anabolic steroids, for a NOVICE.

"Perhaps Zach did make strength gains pretty much no human has ever made before without having technique fall apart. It's possible. But that doesn't make it likely."

It happens all the time when people train this way. I have been in this business since 1978, 32 years now, and during this period of time I have trained a couple of people every year that got this accomplished. This is not unusual. What is unusual is finding a kid that will do the program. I’m telling you that this happens every time a person the right age eats and trains the right way, and there are hundreds of guys reading this board right now that can attest to this fact. Some of them are even squatting more than they deadlift, although not by very much; some people are not gifted anthropometrically for the deadlift.

Lyle’s argument is that since it is impossible, it obviously didn’t occur. It reminds me of the guy from Eleiko who told me that since Eleiko bars do not bend, what I have here cannot be a bent Eleiko bar. He proceeds from a false assumption because it is not within his experience. It is within mine, and has been for decades.

Without video, it's all guessing and I'll simply say again: I love being proven wrong, video is easy, so why haven't we seen it? You can keep making apologist excuses but that's the ultimate question. Why haven't we seen proof of this squat? Because, I tell you what: if I had a success story like that, I'd put up video on every page of this site to show how awesome I am.

It would be trivial to show this awesome squat and we haven't seen it? Why not?

Because I hadn’t thought my word and my professional observation would be questioned in this manner, and I didn’t realize it would be necessary.

Because I've been on the internet a LONG time and seen a lot of claims. And somehow the more absurd ones never seem to get proven.

Perhaps you don’t realize what you’re saying here, Lyle. You are calling my “claim” absurd, and thus calling me a liar or a fool. You’re saying that this kid, who’s been working his ass off for 7 months without missing a single workout, has not accomplished what he most certainly has. I’ve been in the gym business more than twice as long as you’ve been “in gyms” and on the internet. I am squatting tonight in a pair of shoes that are 15 years old. If I react poorly to this statement and it surprises you, then you perhaps suffer from a lack of interpersonal skill. At least when I decide to insult someone, I know I’m doing so. I am not doing so now – I am merely correcting your false assertion.

Instead you get a lot of verbiage a lot of excuses for why someone can't get a video, can't upload it, can't seem to prove their claim.

So, let’s get this over with. Two views of all five sets:
http://vimeo.com/10055310
http://vimeo.com/10054667


There is 320 on the bar, and all 25 of these reps are deep – not just parallel – in any federation. At a bodyweight of probably 237.5, in the middle of mid-terms, at a training time he’s not used to (10:30pm) because I asked him to come in a day early to put this silly bullshit to bed.

I can say factually that the claimed LBM gains are false. He might have gained more than six lbs but he didn't gain 33 lbs. PERIOD. The squat, show me video or stop making excuses or assuming that b/c he's at WF it must be a certain way. I've been in gyms for 15 years and seen what really goes on in gyms even under 'good' coaches. What they say and what you see don't always mesh.

You haven’t been in this gym, and again it was about 45 lbs. And by what logical means can you state categorically that something you have never observed is false when your basis for this statement is merely that you haven’t seen it done? What physical law does this violate? This is a matter of physiological adaptation, and the human ability to adapt or respond physiologically is so highly variable that very goddamn few things about it can be stated with this level of certainty.

The fact is that Lyle never asked me to show him a video. I don’t read out on the web because I don’t have time, and most people know this. He knows my e-mail address, my phone number, and my street address. In fact, he was coming here for an interview tomorrow, which I cancelled tonight because this pisses me off, and I don’t do interviews with people that question my integrity and piss me off. So I hereby apologize publicly to him for this inconvenience. Any money I owe him for his trouble will be paid.

I have never said anything at all disparaging about Lyle McDonald on this or any other forum. I don’t know why he decided to address this matter in this particular way. I’m sorry he did.

[GreenDog]

Awesome.

Q.E.D.

[Brenden]

Surprisingly (or not), now that there is likely to be a video produced and that someone dug up evidence from just one meet of several lifters having inferior deadlifts to squats (this was a big sticking point for him), Lyle has closed the topic on his forum and threatened to delete/ban any posts/users that mention it

The funny part to me (I was the guy who posted records of a couple raw lifters with higher DLs than squats) was that I literally just looked at the results from the one PL meet I've attended. I didn't have to spend any real effort to find them. But I can't tell him that since he locked the thread.

It's one thing to state that it's rare/unusual for someone to have a better squat than DL. It's another thing altogether to say it's impossible:

And none of that changes this simple fact: no apologism or excuses change the reality that NOBODY deads less than they squat UNLESS the squat is high.

[anchor]

thanks, zach and rip. not only for putting up, but also for the class..

[Mark Rippetoe]

It's one thing to state that it's rare/unusual for someone to have a better squat than DL. It's another thing altogether to say it's impossible:

It is normal to pull more than you squat, especially at first. But this is no longer "at first", and Zach is not a good deadlifter. We are working on that. It is common at PL meets to squat more than you deadlift because of the suit and wraps, so don't take that as evidence for a trend across all strength training.

[mstrofbass]

Fucking LOL at going to drink some milk right after.

[stronger]

he really moved that weight up fast and hard, with very short rest between reps. That was impressive. Keep it up Zach.

[LaHabra]

Fuck yeah! Nice sets Zach! And well done Rip.

[fluxboy]

Outstanding.

Zach, it's one thing to have a few shots of before and after pics, or random testimonials from unknowns on the internet. It's altogether different to put your face online, and subject yourself to the scrutiny of every keyboard jockey in the world.

You single-handedly destroyed the Hardgainer Myth. And with it, every excuse for every scrawny ass not to get big and strong.

Thank you.

You've just made the world stronger.

Best,
Flux

[Professional]

And since we'll never see the Zach squat video anyhow, this is now over.

Whoops.

That's unfortunate, because to me such a petulant dismissal calls into question his competence as a researcher.

I'm not even talking about his character judgment, which given the fact that he's been around awhile, is so weird it's borderline autistic (did he really expect Rip to lie or back out?).

I mean that he didn't just dismiss the evidence, he dismissed the POSSIBILITY of evidence. To him, his beliefs aren't even falsifiable. That's the opposite of science.