Adding muscle mass makes you slower?

[Darkroman]

How would you explain to someone that adding muscle mass doesn't actually make you slower?

[MBasic]

Nfl.

[Simon Rest]

How would you explain to someone that adding muscle mass doesn't actually make you slower?

at running? or in general?

Rip used to say "a bigger engine doesn't make the car slower" but that's not always applicable (like a big upper body won't contribute to your running speed, etc)

in general I try to explain it as:

the stronger you are, the lower a percentage of your maximum capacity each stride/strike/stroke becomes. as each stride/stroke becomes easier and easier, you are able to repeat faster, and/or can undertake additional repetitions before tiring

[Darkroman]

at running? or in general?

Rip used to say "a bigger engine doesn't make the car slower" but that's not always applicable (like a big upper body won't contribute to your running speed, etc)

in general I try to explain it as:

the stronger you are, the lower a percentage of your maximum capacity each stride/strike/stroke becomes. as each stride/stroke becomes easier and easier, you are able to repeat faster, and/or can undertake additional repetitions before tiring

In general. And yeah, all good answers. I try to explain to people that the poundage you increase on your lifts increase a lot faster than the overall mass gained. If you lift 60 more pounds on the bench press, squat 100 more pounds, deadlift 150 more pounds, and overhead press 40 more pounds and you gained 25lbs of lean body mass all around, how would that make you slower? If you wanna just concentrate on arms: If you curl and tricep extend 20lbs more, and your arms gained 2lbs of muscle mass, how would that make you slower?

Rip used to say "a bigger engine doesn't make the car slower" but that's not always applicable (like a big upper body won't contribute to your running speed, etc)

And yes, generally a heavier upper body is not optimal for running, and a heavier lower body might not be optimal for gymnastics, but that's beside the point.

[Simon Rest]

In general. And yeah, all good answers. I try to explain to people that the poundage you increase on your lifts increase a lot faster than the overall mass gained. If you lift 60 more pounds on the bench press, squat 100 more pounds, deadlift 150 more pounds, and overhead press 40 more pounds and you gained 25lbs of lean body mass all around, how would that make you slower? If you wanna just concentrate on arms: If you curl and tricep extend 20lbs more, and your arms gained 2lbs of muscle mass, how would that make you slower?



And yes, generally a heavier upper body is not optimal for running, and a heavier lower body might not be optimal for gymnastics, but that's beside the point.

If the conversation is in the context of someone starting strength training you can also say that they'll probably gain a heap of strength through practice and accustomisation without too much weight gain at first, unless they are super skinny. (Caveat: this is going on what I've read in logs here, not personal experience. Individual experience may vary. See your dealer about increased weight gain)

[Darkroman]

If the conversation is in the context of someone starting strength training you can also say that they'll probably gain a heap of strength through practice and accustomisation without too much weight gain at first, unless they are super skinny. (Caveat: this is going on what I've read in logs here, not personal experience. Individual experience may vary. See your dealer about increased weight gain)

You're talking about neuromuscular motor unit recruitment efficiency? That might fly over some people's heads.

[Darkroman]

double post....

[John Hanley]

Someone needs to light the Savs signal.

Using work-energy theorem, & knowing

A) How much force is produced per unit muscle cross sectional area
B) Mass of muscle per unit cross sectional area*,

I'm pretty sure you can get a ballpark proxy for "speed" (vertical jump is easiest) plugging in different numbers for body weight & muscle mass.

* I know I've encountered commonly used approximations for both force produced per cm^2 and mass. But I don't feel like googling right now. (The force produced per unit muscle csa would vary quite a bit by gender & training level).

When I get more time, I might actually fuck with this a little.

EDIT: the dodgy part is trying to figure out how much muscle mass contributes to the jump (our speed proxy).

[Elephant]

Compare 100m sprinters to 10k or marathon runners. If nothing else, the former group all look like they believe more muscle mass makes them faster. The latter group seem more convinced there's a tradeoff and it would likely take more than a bit of effort to convince them to try to add a substantial amount of muscle mass.

[B-MoreBeast]

Ben Johnson who is possibly the fastest man of all time was tremendously strong and built. He went from being the slowest 100m man at the facility with Charlie Francis to the fastest and at his peak was reported to squat over 600lbs and bench press over 400lbs. The validity of those numbers we will never know now that Francis is dead but he wasn't exactly the type to exaggerate either. Google "Ben Johnson squat" and you should find a treasure trove of information.