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Can hypertrophy be non-functional?


Neal Winkler
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Interesting, I have seen groups gains muscle but little to no added strength in studies.

I could imagine this from the theories listed in that link. But many studies I see are quite flawed, I wish they would bother to let people know what they plan on doing and get constructive criticism before doing the tests. e.g. the article made a good point.

If you take a bodybuilder who regularly does sets of 15-20 reps and a powerlifter who regularlly does sets of 1-3 the bodybuilder will have a hard time matching the powerlifteron low reps sets but the powerlifter will likely have a hard time matching the bodybuilder on high rep sets.

In most studies I see they test the strength at the end of the study using a 1RM, so if trying to see who got stronger between doing say 15rep vs 3reps I would expect the 3rep guys to appear stronger at 1RM, but if they tested 25RM the 15rep guys might be better.

Many studies are done using previously trained individuals, if a guy used to 3 rep training did a study using 20reps for a while his lean body mass might increase, and these studies usually equate this with muscle increase -though from that article it might be additional water & glycogen in the muscles, if they were fully dehyrdated they could well have less mass. So if after doing 6 months of 20reps the guy went back and tested a 1RM he might be just as strong or weaker than his 1RM when it was tested at the start of the study when he was doing 3rep training. But his 20RM could have increased hugely.

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Example?

One of them was a Russian study done with vitamin D. I believe they found that vitamin D cause increased mass without and increase in strength. I would have to find it. They could have mean't that they (vitamin D + training) increased mass over the control group (weighlifting only), with no real difference in strength.

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Chris Hansen

I have no science but here's my thought.

If you had two similar people and one had bigger muscles but they both had the same level of strength then what purpose does the extra muscle mass serve?

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Joshua Naterman

The person with greater mass may have less advantageous tendon attachments, lever lengths, or both. In other words, they may have been born with less mechanical advantage when compared to the smaller person of the same strength.

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Chris Hansen
The person with greater mass may have less advantageous tendon attachments, lever lengths, or both. In other words, they may have been born with less mechanical advantage when compared to the smaller person of the same strength.

It's true that people are all different but I'm thinking of two similar people (identical twins perhaps?) whose only difference is the way they train.

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Joshua Naterman

If they do happen to be physiologically and genetically identical, the extra mass would be sarcoplasm.

The Sarcoplasm of a muscle fiber is comparable to the cytoplasm of other cells, but it houses unusually large amounts of glycosomes (granules of stored glycogen) and significant amounts of myoglobin, an oxygen binding protein.

The larger person would have most likely been working through the glycolysis energy system, burning local muscle glycogen in the process. This triggers the muscle to store more. The only way it can do that is by growing more sarcoplasm, and to do that it must get bigger since liquids are essentially non-compressible. This extra sarcoplasm does nothing to enhance strength, it is purely an energy storage structure. By training the glycogen system more during strength training compared to the other subject he/she has caused his/her muscles to adapt by creating more space in which to store glycogen.

Of course they could also just be taking Arginine supplements so they stay pumped! :lol:

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Chris Hansen
If they do happen to be physiologically and genetically identical, the extra mass would be sarcoplasm.

The Sarcoplasm of a muscle fiber is comparable to the cytoplasm of other cells, but it houses unusually large amounts of glycosomes (granules of stored glycogen) and significant amounts of myoglobin, an oxygen binding protein.

The larger person would have most likely been working through the glycolysis energy system, burning local muscle glycogen in the process. This triggers the muscle to store more. The only way it can do that is by growing more sarcoplasm, and to do that it must get bigger since liquids are essentially non-compressible. This extra sarcoplasm does nothing to enhance strength, it is purely an energy storage structure. By training the glycogen system more during strength training compared to the other subject he/she has caused his/her muscles to adapt by creating more space in which to store glycogen.

Of course they could also just be taking Arginine supplements so they stay pumped! :lol:

Wow.

So the bigger person might be able to better sustain effort through certain rep ranges?

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Joshua Naterman

Yes. The disadvantage would be that they would have more bodyweight to move around, which would not be good for anyone who has to perform low leverage movements. For some athletes, like American football players, this can be something of an advantage, though I don't think it'd be as good as having the extra size due to extra strength. But again, once you get to a certain level of maximal strength it becomes more important to develop explosiveness and strength endurance or even other abilities like reactive strength. It just depends on the sport.

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Example?

One of them was a Russian study done with vitamin D. I believe they found that vitamin D cause increased mass without and increase in strength. I would have to find it. They could have mean't that they (vitamin D + training) increased mass over the control group (weighlifting only), with no real difference in strength.

I talk about this here:

http://www.eatmoveimprove.com/2009/10/a ... vitamin-d/

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from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition

ORIGINAL RESEARCH COMMUNICATION

Consumption of fat-free fluid milk after resistance exercise promotes greater lean mass accretion than does consumption of soy or carbohydrate in young, novice, male weightlifters1,2,3

Joseph W Hartman, Jason E Tang, Sarah B Wilkinson, Mark A Tarnopolsky, Randa L Lawrence, Amy V Fullerton and Stuart M Phillips

1 From the Exercise Metabolism Research Group, Department of Kinesiology, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada (JWH, JET, SBW, RLL, AVF, and SMP), and Pediatrics and Medicine, McMaster University Medical Centre, Hamilton, ON, Canada (MAT)

Background: Acute consumption of fat-free fluid milk after resistance exercise promotes a greater positive protein balance than does soy protein.

Objective: We aimed to determine the long-term consequences of milk or soy protein or equivalent energy consumption on training-induced lean mass accretion.

Design: We recruited 56 healthy young men who trained 5 d/wk for 12 wk on a rotating split-body resistance exercise program in a parallel 3-group longitudinal design. Subjects were randomly assigned to consume drinks immediately and again 1 h after exercise: fat-free milk (Milk; n = 18); fat-free soy protein (Soy; n = 19) that was isoenergetic, isonitrogenous, and macronutrient ratio matched to Milk; or maltodextrin that was isoenergetic with Milk and Soy (control group; n = 19).

Results: Muscle fiber size, maximal strength, and body composition by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) were measured before and after training. No between-group differences were seen in strength. Type II muscle fiber area increased in all groups with training, but with greater increases in the Milk group than in both the Soy and control groups (P < 0.05). Type I muscle fiber area increased after training only in the Milk and Soy groups, with the increase in the Milk group being greater than that in the control group (P < 0.05). DXA-measured fat- and bone-free mass increased in all groups, with a greater increase in the Milk group than in both the Soy and control groups (P < 0.05).

Conclusion: We conclude that chronic postexercise consumption of milk promotes greater hypertrophy during the early stages of resistance training in novice weightlifters when compared with isoenergetic soy or carbohydrate consumption.

Maybe this was the study. I thought there was another, though.

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Also the whole milk vs the isocaloric skim vs. skim (in the vitamin D article I linked on previous page).

Whole milk and/or whole choco milk tends to dominate most everything... even many of the supposed good post workout shakes/mixes/etc.

If you wanna gain mass start drinking milk before the workout... continue drinking it during the workout, and drink more after the workout. Then eat a lot of food. GOMAD really does work (if you go that route).

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Joshua Naterman

I remember posting a long time ago that there was a 5 year study from Harvard Medical that found 1% chocolate milk to be the ultimate mass gainer, with better results than the leading supplements.

It's interesting that there was no strength difference. I wish there were 6 or 12 month studies on this to see if the lack of greater strength increase was just a short term thing or not.

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I still can't believe that this term is around. Do people seriously think that there are these 230 lbs lean individuals who are weak that are walking around? Strength is a very specific skill to rep ranges, joint angle and so on. Ofcourse there are guys that are 160 lbs that can deadlift more than a bodybuilder that is much bigger but the bigger guy doesn't spend the frequency that the powerlifter does or the rep ranges.

All things being equal a bigger individual is usually stronger that a smaller one, if you seriously doubt that than why are there weight classes in every absolute strength sport. Because when people train with the same goal in mind absolutely strength is greatly set by weight, ofcourse things like body types muscle insertions come in as well. Some are also just way more gifted for certain strength moves that others.

Gymnastic skills are an even better example of this people that are about the same weight and some are greater at pulling exercises others at pressing and even withing pulling some can do an iron cross much better than a front lever others backwards.

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Joshua Naterman

All things being equal a bigger individual is usually stronger that a smaller one,

If all things are equal, there can be no difference in strength. Sorry, I couldn't resist. :lol:

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Very interesting article. I particularly liked this quote:

'It's also worth noting that weight training is only one way of taxing muscular energy stores and stimulating increased glycogen storage. Anyone engaged in more than a few hours of exercise per week, especially a sport incorporating some form of running, is likely already stimulating these adaptations'.

Suggesting that cardio has the same effect in glycogen reserves and therefore muscle thickness when in combination with strength training. I'll be interested to see if my hold times make any significant jumps compared to normal at the end of my SSC since I started cardio this month.

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Joshua Naterman

That's taking a basic fact and blowing it far, far out of proportion. No matter how you train you will get a mix of the training effects. Your intensity/frequency/volume modulation will determine which of these effects is emphasized the most.

You will not get hypertrophy that is even a shadow of what a bodybuilder gets. There will always be some, because aerobic respiration involves both aerobic glycolyis and aerobic lipolysis. Furthermore, because it is low(er) intensity work even at the professional marathon level, your body will deplete both the muscles throughout the body AND the liver glycogen stores if you go long enough.

Don't be a fool and think that running a few times a week will replace squats lol! Or that rowing a few times a week will replace FL rows.

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