Apparently I'm Freakishly Strong? Huh. page 2

[AdamC29]

It all clicked when you said gymnast.

that is freakishly strong! 275 lb bench at your weight is bordering on weightlifter.

well done

[Coach Palfrey]

Sorry to be a party-pooper but a 275 deadlift when you can bench 275 is quite a bit out of whack - I'd expect it to be closer to the 400+ mark.

[not on the rug]

the exrx.net standards that dirlot linked are pretty much what i've always gone by. your bench is almost to the "elite" category (which is awwesome), but your dead is about 200lbs off. so in that regard, you're not freakishly strong. you're chest dominant. which can lead to terrible shoulder and posture issues down the road, if they haven't already. if i were you, i'd spend some time deadlifting. where does your squat fall?

[Mr. Anthony]

the exrx.net standards that dirlot linked are pretty much what i've always gone by. your bench is almost to the "elite" category (which is awwesome), but your dead is about 200lbs off. so in that regard, you're not freakishly strong. you're chest dominant. which can lead to terrible shoulder and posture issues down the road, if they haven't already. if i were you, i'd spend some time deadlifting. where does your squat fall?

I almost never do 1-rep maxes (like once every couple years). I dunno why--maybe I just feel like the risk of injury is too high, or because I usually work out solo and maxing out seems unsafe on my own. I don't know what my current 1RM is on most of my lifts right now, but I fall in the Intermediate to Advanced category.

275 isn't my max deadlift; that's just what I loaded up to have him check my form. I'll typically pull 325 a few times on heavy deadlift days.

Squats are definitely my weakness, since I hate them and just do them because I know I need to. A typical squat workout I'll do my heavy sets of 3-4 reps at 205lbs or so (all the way to the ground). I've made a goal fairly recently to start focusing on squats and DL more and trying to up my lifts on those. We'll see how motivated I stay on those...

[not on the rug]

I almost never do 1-rep maxes (like once every couple years). I dunno why--maybe I just feel like the risk of injury is too high, or because I usually work out solo and maxing out seems unsafe on my own. I don't know what my current 1RM is on most of my lifts right now, but I fall in the Intermediate to Advanced category.

275 isn't my max deadlift; that's just what I loaded up to have him check my form. I'll typically pull 325 a few times on heavy deadlift days.

Squats are definitely my weakness, since I hate them and just do them because I know I need to. A typical squat workout I'll do my heavy sets of 3-4 reps at 205lbs or so (all the way to the ground). I've made a goal fairly recently to start focusing on squats and DL more and trying to up my lifts on those. We'll see how motivated I stay on those...

i used to do 1RMs when i was 22-23-24-25, but when i started dealing with repeated bouts of shoulder tendonitis, creaky knees, and bad discs from a car accident, i stopped that. nowadays, i tend to work out anywhere in the 4-8 rep range for strength training. for shoulders and squats, i stay around the 8rep range. for bench, i will go down as low as 4 reps. and for deads i'll get down to 3-4 rep sets.

[Mr. Anthony]

i used to do 1RMs when i was 22-23-24-25, but when i started dealing with repeated bouts of shoulder tendonitis, creaky knees, and bad discs from a car accident, i stopped that. nowadays, i tend to work out anywhere in the 4-8 rep range for strength training. for shoulders and squats, i stay around the 8rep range. for bench, i will go down as low as 4 reps. and for deads i'll get down to 3-4 rep sets.

Yeah, I hear you. I've been lifting forever, so I vary my workouts to avoid boredom at this point. I go through cycles where I'll go strict add weight protocols, then I'll do reverse pyramids or whatever, then some slow training, then more bodyweight stuff...I dunno, every 6 months to a year my workouts change a pretty good amount.

At this point in my life I'm way less concerned with getting huge muscles, and much more concerned with just having legit strength. I'm not actively working on bulking up, or really even with getting stronger, besides DL and squats currently. Oh, and avoiding injury. I've gotten so much better about not abusing my body nearly as much over the last few years. I have a lot of hard miles on my body from before I realized I'm not 100% invulnerable. Now I just think I'm 75% invulnerable.

[not on the rug]

I have a lot of hard miles on my body from before I realized I'm not 100% invulnerable. Now I just think I'm 75% invulnerable.

that is 100% signature-worthy right there. story of my life.

in fact, i just added it to my sig. thanks...

[EyeOfRound]

Interestingly, I'm one of the stronger women at my gym, but I feel like my deadlift SUCKS. My max (haven't done it since the summer, tho) is 195 lbs, which is less than 1.5x my bodyweight. There are women at my gym who lift about the same as me on the shoulder/bench press and squat about the same, but their deadlift is almost double mine. I also struggle with high-rep DL workouts - I burn out very quickly even on low weights - other chicks will lift much more weight in way less time. I don't know what the deal is. Yet I checked that WL standards chart and I'm intermediate-advanced or advanced on everything, including the deadlift. HALP?

[dgreenwood]

According to that... for me (at my current weight - too heavy lol) I should be able to deadlift 275 to be elite! And I'm like... 4'11" and female haha. As it is... I currently deadlift about 125 (but that's not 1 rep max... that's whatever we did at CrossFit... I have no idea what my 1 rep max is).

Anyway, it's sometimes funny to see how strong some people can be! They really surprise you!! I aim to one day be surprising . (Well I am to "normal" people... as in... I have surprised many people by how much I can lift... but I think I'm just generally underestimated because I'm so short, which isn't really fair).

If you open that link you'll see a link at the bottom to a one rep max calculator. You enter a weight and how many reps you can do and it will estimate your one rep max. It's just an estimate but I thought I'd mention it since you said you have no idea what your max is.

[Kingofturtles]

Today was deadlift day. I've never been a huge deadlift fan, but they're necessary and I admit they've grown on me over the years. Anyway, I've decided lately I want to up my deadlift weight a bit. No good reason why, just want to add maybe 50 pounds to it eventually.

I figured I needed to have someone watch my form before I start beefing up the weights, just to make sure I'm not going to kill myself, so I asked one of the trainers I know at the gym if he could watch me pull a couple and tell me if he saw anything bad. I'm pretty sure I have great form, but I've gotten way better about not taking risks with my body the last couple years.

The trainer walked over and watched me lift 275 a couple of times. This isn't a huge weight for me, but it's challenging enough that it would trigger a form break if I was going to have one (for reference, I'm 5'9", maybe 5'10", and somewhere between 150 and 155 right now. Very lean, not bulky, but good muscle).

He said my form looked great, and then said "Holy crap, that's a lot of weight for a guy your size!"

I was like..."Really? Because I feel like I should be able to deadlift substantially more than I can bench."

He said "Wait, you bench 275?"

"Yeah, I can put that up for a couple of sets of 4 or 5. I don't really like to try much heavier with my janky shoulder..."

At this point a huge dude near us jumped in with "I weigh 220 and no way I'd deadlift 275. That's heavy. You seriously bench that much, too? Holy balls."

I was seriously confused. I mean, 275 doesn't seem like a lot of weight for a deadlift, or bench, really. Am I wrong here? I dunno, maybe I'm freakishly strong. I can do 1-arm pullups, so I guess that's an indicator, but I think that's mainly because I'm also pretty light and grew up a gymnast.

Well...that's it. Cool story, bro.

What your address? Ill mail you a medal for being so good at stuff.