OK, you were slept thru math, geometry, and physics because you didnt think they had anything to do with real life - wrong!
Physics has everything to do with bodybuilding! Because of their ignorance of physics, many bodybuilders just fool
themselves into thinking they are making gains when they are not. You need to know your physics so you realize when you
are cheating, and when you are doing an honest lift.
Lets take the most common example that we have all seen in the gym, that of
someone doing standing bicep curls with dumbbells. They alternate arms so they can get a real swing going and
swing the weight straight-armed and when the dumbbell reaches the high point of the swing, they quickly jerk it
in toward their shoulder. This is a perfect example of using momentum. Doing biceps curls in this fashion you
can lift incredible amounts of weight without even using your biceps. If you are doing this without realizing it
then you are only fooling yourself. If you use momentum wisely you can use it intentionally to 'cheat' that last
rep up so you can do negatives on the way down. The point is that you need to know when you are cheating and how
to cheat.
For those of you who dont like math, let me teach you a trick about physics that you can use to get the right answer
without ever using a calculator. Its called exaggeration. Lets take an example. Two
identical twins are on stairmasters
using level 12, one has his hands resting on the arm rests and the other has his hands hung freely by his side. Who burns
the most calories in 10 minutes? Can you guess? Do they burn the same amount of calories since they are both on level 12?
Exaggeration is the way to solve this problem. Lets exaggerate this to the ridiculous extreme, the twin with his hands on
the rests is actually pushing down so hard with his hands that his feet no longer touch the treads - he is hanging in
mid air. Now imagine the twin hanging in mid air, how much work is he doing? None!!! OK, he is moving the air around
a little by thrashing his legs but thats it. So by using exaggeration we see that the twin with his hands by his sides
is burning more calories because the twin who has his hands on the rests is lessening the work his legs do. Now we could
get into some exciting calculations about work and how work=force X distance and calculate it for each twin but its not
necessary to know the answer!
Lets take another example, bent over olympic bar rows. You place one end of an olympic bar against the wall and load
plates on the other end then proceed to do lat rows. You are using 130lbs of weights, two 45lb plates and two 10lb plates. Does it
matter how they are put on the bar? Are the rows easier when placed on in a certain order? Hmmmm? Whats your
answer? Is 130lbs the same no matter how you slice it? Lets use exaggeration to solve this problem. Lets take this
to the ridiculous extreme. Imagine that the olympic bar is not 6' long but 600' long, now imagine that the 130lbs is
at the end of the 600' pole. You are still standing 5' from the wall grasping the pole that extends 595' further
out and their is 130lbs at the end of the pole, do you have any hope of doing lat rows like this? Not a chance! This
is an example of leverage working against you. So the answer to our problem is that the lat rows are easiest when
we put the 45s on first with the 10s on last. Remember this when you do exercises where the weight can be at different
distances from the pivot, when the weight is further from the pivot, it is more work!
OK, since we are having so much fun lets do another example. Here is one that most people have trouble with. Chest
workout time and we are doing dumbbell flys, does it matter what position the elbows are in? If you bend your elbows
90 degrees, are you getting the same workout you are if your elbows are locked? Once again, lets avoid the math
and just use the mind game of exaggeration to solve the problem. Imagine you are on the bench in position to do
dumbbell 40lb dumbbell flys but instead of holding the weights we take a role of duct tape and tape a
15' pole to each arm and at the end of each pole we duct tape the 40lb weight that you were just holding easily in
your hand - what will happen? The weights will go crashing to the floor! Once again our enemy leverage works against
us. Once again in this exercise we need to be mindful of leverage as it is much easier to do dumbbell flys with the
weights held close (that is, with elbows bent) than it is to do with the weights fully extended. If you bend your
elbows doing this exercise, just realize that you are not getting as tough a workout as you would if your arms
were fully extended.
More physics fun later! Should we do the math? I didnt want to scare people off
because physics is FUN!
