Small means strong?

[Eye of the Tiger]

I beleive Jack told me about this, where small people are stronger due to pound for pound Anyway does anyone know anything about this pound for pound thing?

 

THX in return

 

 

[KickChick]

Strength is conditioning your body to fire more and more muscle fibers on command–and is basically working with a speed variable... work = force x distance; power = (force x distance) / time. A simple example is the difference between squatting fifty pounds ten times and squatting 500 pounds once. Workwise, it's the same. But, lifting that 500 pounds once might take all of 3 seconds for a very powerful person but moving that quarter ton, over ten reps might take thirty seconds for someone else.

 

Mass is the foundation for absolute power. A skinny teen can probably squat 50 pounds ten times, but probably wouldn't get 500 pounds off the rack. Added bodymass allows for more muscle. Bigger muscles contract more forcefully. Overall size provides greater support for any given load.

 

Olympic lifters are usually large people. But, since power is primarily neural in nature, size isn't always necessary. There are small Olympic lifters, too, who pound for pound–weight lifted relative to bodyweight is greater–may be more powerful than the super heavyweights.

 

Take Tiger Woods for an example....a slim guy who easily drives a golf ball over 300 yards is powerful because of technique and speed. Tiger has programmed his neural system to sequentially uncoil his body, quickly, to smack the daylights out of a small white ball.

 

Need we have to mention Bruce Lee here? ....

 

 

[Jack]

I meant what Deby just explained although I am no expert on this myself at all. Also, there's a certain advantage in leverage.

 

Take a 4 foot person and a 6 foot person, both of great strength. Make them each squat 300lbs, and the 4 foot person would do it easier because he has to move the weight over less distance.

 

Also compare Bodybuilders to Powerlifters - the Powerlifters are smaller but also stronger due to the way they train.

 

Oh yes, and Bruce Lee is a great example.

 

 

[CTpizzaboy]

I need to emphasize a point Kickchick(Deby) brought up. I can weightlift, get stronger, but never hit a golf ball as far as Tiger Woods can. Why? Technique. How does that apply to the martial arts? Technique matters.

[Don Gwinn]

All neat stuff, but what he wanted was simple definition of pound for pound, right?

 

This just means how much weight you move in the chosen test as a ratio of your bodyweight. In Olympic weightlifting, for instance, bodyweight measurements are very carefully taken. If three athletes all snatch, say, 100 kilos, then the top place goes to the one with the lightest bodyweight. The reasoning is that he lifted more pounds per pound of bodyweight. Thus, "pound for pound" he is stronger.

 

This is NOT an automatic strength advantage for smaller people, and it has nothing to do with the actual amount of weight moved. If you weigh 100 kilos and can squat 200 kilos, you lifted 2kg per kg of bodyweight. If I weigh 150 kilos and can squat 250 kilos, then clearly you have lifted more "pound for pound." In the real world, however, I moved more weight in absolute terms.

[Taikudo-ka]

Ants...

 

 

[DeeLovesKarate]

People look at me and go, " You're small." I dunno if I should thank them or clobber them. I may be small, but I am strong and muscular. The best thing about it, is that if u go up against someone small, then you think, oh they can't be too strong I'll go easy on 'em. WRONG!! You'll get beaten so fast. You shouldn't decide how light or hard to go until u see how light or hard they go. Otherwise, you're writing your own obituatry.

 

Grrrrrr,

 

Dee

 

 

[Taikudo-ka]

I don't now about strength in people vs their size, but I know that pound for pound we are the weakest of the great apes. A 150 pound chimpanzee will knock the stuffing out of a 150 pound man.