Everyone has there bias but this trend strikes me as a good thing IMHO. I wonder how much of this trend has been driven by Starting Strength and the principles it's promulgating? Here's hoping it continues to gain momentum.
✓ Member
Raw Lifting is Becoming Quite Popular
I would direct your attention to USAPL's qualifying totals for Raw Nationals this year. Note that for almost all of the women and lightweight men, the total you need to lift to go to Raw Nationals exceeds the total required to go to the normal USAPL Nationals, which is equipped.
National Qualifying Totals | USA Powerlifting
That you could qualify for Nationals wearing a single-ply suit, wraps, and a bench shirt, yet not qualify for Raw Nationals, which forbids the use of those pieces of assistive gear, is pretty damn interesting.
Member
Everyone has there bias but this trend strikes me as a good thing IMHO. I wonder how much of this trend has been driven by Starting Strength and the principles it's promulgating? Here's hoping it continues to gain momentum.
Starting Strength Coach
Interesting indeed.
Member
It looks like equipped lifting and raw lifting have switched places, and equipped is now the weird fringe of an already fringe sport. Personally, I'm looking forward to having to work my ass off just to qualify this year in the 163's, as opposed to last year, where I competed (poorly) in a qualifying meet in the 148's and still made the cut for every weight class up to the 220's.
Member
Honestly I think it is more a result of things like crossfit and the general health movement. I'd even venture to say that that's a lot of SS's success, or at least some.Originally Posted by Pekingman
The thing is that people saw crossfit after a period of just cardio and DVD workouts, and they thought 'now THIS is training!' They were wrong of course, but the acrobatic goofy aspects of CF/fit culture got a lot of people active who weren't before. Then they run into SS and realize that 'oh shit... THIS is really training. Maybe it ruffles feathers to say SS owes anything to crossfit, but its at least fair to say that barbell training culture is happy to absorb the skeptics who quit crossfit in search of something more true.
I think lifting gear was probably a result of the sport's isolation in the first place... you have to REALLY have a specialized interest to masturbate a strength sport into a move-the-weight sport. No sport with high visibility would likely be able to add that much equipment dependency.. Look at strongman even.. if those guys got into robot-suits I don't think people would be blown away by their strength. The suits and stuff are a result of the sport being driven exclusively by the athletes, who are driven by the numbers. They are strong, of course... its just that with an average person that can wrap their heads around barbell training, if you tell them to use rubberband clothes to store energy to make the weight go up easier, they're going to see that as something like cheating.
Starting Strength Coach
Last year was the first year for qualifying totals so they deliberately kept them low (a little too low perhaps). I think the increase this year is both fair and challenging so I'm with you as far as having to work for a qualifying spot.
Next, USAPL needs to get rid of the sumo deadlift. Doubt that will ever happen. Although, If the IOC wants the IPF to eliminate sumo I'm willing to bet USAPL follows. That's a little off topic so I'll leave it at that.
Callador
I read somewhere they wanted to increase the raw qualifying totals just to the meet wouldn't be so large like in 2015. But I agree that across the board geared lifting is now taking a back seat to raw lifting, even though it is still really new. At meets that have both options, like the last one I competed in, I think out of the 120 lifters, maybe 4-6 were competing in gear. This makes sense though, because newer lifters can get into raw powerlifting and not spend so much money (belt, wraps and/or sleeves). A big bench shirt alone could run you $300 alone. And then you need a crew of people to lift with, since you really can't even get into the thing by yourself. :-)
✓ Member
You would get no argument from us on that point. A quote from Rip is appropriate here:
From his T-Nation article on CrossFitCrossFit is the greatest thing that has ever happened to barbell training, bar none, unequivocally and absolutely.
✓ Member
This is very true. It still is funny that you can qualify in gear for Nationals and not qualify for Raw Nationals.
Member
but not the micro-ROM "Bench Press?"
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