November 16th, 2012, 06:24 | #11 |
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I remember reading that although men typically genetically have more upper body strength than women, that both were equal in regards to lower body strength. The only difference would be that men tend to do more physical activities (playing sports, physically intense jobs, etc.) and develop stronger legs than women as a result.
But nowadays we see a lot more women involved in sports, taking previously male dominated jobs, serving in the military, and performing other tasks they normally wouldn't. So I think it's fair to say a woman performing the same tasks as a man throughout their life would become just as strong. I don't know if what I read was completely true, but in my own experiences I have no reason to doubt it. If the content in this forum isn't proof, I don't know what is. |
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November 16th, 2012, 07:32 | #12 |
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I'd like to see a source for the original statistics. My experience says they're completely inaccurate. Firstly, when a man and woman are the same weight the woman, in my experience, is the stronger.
It's true that most women are weaker than most men but again in my experience a smaller athletic woman or dancer can be freakishly strong. I've been pleasantly surprised and overpowered a number of times. |
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November 17th, 2012, 07:10 | #13 |
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source for statistics:
1. on weight of man and women i googled to find average male and female weight in the US and i also did find a crossfit link which had the avg male and female crossfit bodyweight. they both end up around 75% 2. on the body strength. i searched records for powerlifting and weightlifting rankings of men and women of the same weight classes. men would get 2x the bench press of women at same weight and squats 1.5x more. thats the average of many different records. The crossfit data i mentioned for weight also had squat and upper body lifts for men and women and when you controlled for weight difference it also averaged at the same as the other strenght competitions for upper and lower body. Anyone wanting to disprove me just find and post: 1. avg weights of men and women of different nations 2. strength competition lift record (after all we do like LIFT and carry) if preferable of the same weight category for both genders. happy hunting |
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November 17th, 2012, 08:36 | #14 |
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I think people at the peak of their abilities are a different case than everyday people. Women tend to be lighter and smaller than males so if a woman is the same weight as a man she tends to have either more fat or muscle, either of which increases her strength.
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November 25th, 2012, 14:41 | #15 | |
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Thank you for your very elaborate post. I just have one point to discuss here concerning the typology of Lift & Carry. For me there are 4 types (MM, MF, FM, FF) which just come from the combinations of the letters F and M. The forum here is about FM (females carry males) and FF (females carry females) with also two specific threads dedicated to MF (males carry females). The presence of FF in this forum is not a mistake or a misunderstanding, it is coming from historical reasons. In 2009 our old forum was deleted along with Perun’s FF forum. We offered Perun to shelter him in our new forum and he accepted this offer. From this time my definition of FF is as follows: “FF is what Perun says it is”. As for my own feeling, I am not sure that the FF interest is focused on the girl who is doing the carrying. I believe that the focus is on both girls. VK |
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November 25th, 2012, 16:06 | #16 |
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The important issue with men/women strength comparison is that women are generally smaller in size. A better comparison can be made by compensating the strength with the size.
Let’s assume that an average woman (A) carries an average man (B) and then this average man carries a large man (C). Common sense tells us that (B) will have harder time than (A). But let’s look at it more precisely. At this point we consider that (A) (B) and (C) are similarly shaped, neither thin nor fat, just average. Said in other terms, (B) just looks as a reduction of (C). Also (A) looks as reduction of (B) except that she is a female. Now let’s go further and assume that (B) is 1,15 times taller than (A) and that (C) is 1,15 times taller than (B). For instance (A) is 150 cm, (B) is 1,15 x 150 cm = 172 cm and (C) is 1,15 x 1,15 x 150 cm = 198 cm. Now let’s compare the strength of (A) (B) (C), assuming that each of them has reasonable capacities compared to their sizes. Strength depends on the number of fibers in muscle sections so it can be calculated as a surface. For instance if (A) has 1000 fibers (B) will have 1,15 x 1,15 x 1000 = 1322 fibers and (C) will have 1,15 x 1,15 x 1,5 x 1,5 x 1000 = 1749 fibers (or maybe 1000 fibers but each of them 1,749 times larger in section). How about weights now? Weight can be compared with a volume so here we go : (A) is 40 kg, (B) is 1,15 x 1,15 x 1,15 x 40 = 60,8 kg and (C) is 1,15 x 1,15 x 1,15 x 1,15 x 1,15 x 1,15 x 40 = 92,5 kg. Now (A) has got 1000 fibers to hold 60,8 kg which means an effort of 60,8 grams per fiber. As for (B) he has got 1322 fibers to hold 92,5 kg which means 73,7 grams per fiber. So definitely the task is easier for (A). That’s why your girl friends can carry you so easily: scalability, the old Galileo’s trick. Ants also know that. An ant can carry the weight of 50 ants. But an elephant will never carry the weight of 50 elephants. |
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December 3rd, 2012, 14:46 | #17 |
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please can somebody advise me
Hi as everybody can see i am a huge fan of lift & carry
but i find it very hard to approach ladies regarding sessions due to my cerebral palsy please can you advise me on how to do this |
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December 8th, 2012, 00:54 | #18 |
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This is an issue I have investigated quite a bit. I must say that both winniethebeer and vk got their numbers almost right. It is certainly a very interesting issue for a L&C fan (at least it is for me, hehe).
When I was 18 yo I had a friend, a 17 yo girl who used to piggyback me every now and then (good old times...). She was 50 kg and I was 69 kg at the time. I used to fantasize about how heavy a person should be if I wanted to lift a person doing the same effort as my friend. I did my calculations just based on weight proportions, but that's not how it works. As vk said, smaller people are able to lift proportionally to their weight more weight than the bigger people. You can check the marks of the professional weightlifters, those support these facts. On the other hand, investigating the differences between male and female strength I found a paper, a study from the US Army that was comparing female and male strenght and athletic in different situations (trained and untrained soldiers, etc). It was very technical but quite a find for me. There was some dispersion of the values (gaussian distribution of strenght) and of course some overlap: the strongest girls were stronger than the weakest men. I also remember that men had much stronger upper body strength and still stronger lower body strength even at the same weight. However, this is true in part because women have less muscle per kg than men, they have usually more body fat. I agree with Slevin that these facts are not depressing, it's not that hard for an average woman to lift an average man. I'm not an athletic guy, not big and not very strong but I can piggyback guys much bigger than me. I know I'm certainly stronger than most girls, to me it's very easy to carry someone that weights the same as me. There is this general misconception that an average person should not be able to carry someone heavier, but that's just not true: an average man is more than able to do that and most average women are capable of that as well. There is a huge difference in being able to piggyback someone for 30 seconds and to lift someone over your head, of course. In my experience, a physically active girl (I'm not saying an athlete, just someone who practice some kind of sport regularly or just goes to the gym 2 or 3 times a week) is very capable of carrying a man up to 80 kg, even 90. Of course, I'm talking about easy lifts and not for long time. Some tall or bigger girls are extremely strong and can do more than that, but they are the exception, not the norm. Also, there are a good number of girls that aren't capable of lifting anyone bigger than them. I've experienced this, many girls have not been able to piggyback me weighting between 75 and 82 kg (depending on the year...) Another thing regarding strenght, it depends mainly on three factors: - Density of muscular fibers in a cross section of the muscle. You can build more fibers with training and proper nutrition. - Ability of these fibers (to elongate, etc), this can be improved with training as well. - A neurological factor that implies somehow the coordination of all the fibers to perform the same movement at the same time. This is usually genetic but training may improve. I can't remember where I read those factors exactly, but they explain why people that don't look strong are really strong and other people that may look stronger aren't that strong. To summarize, in my experience asking girls to lift, and taking into account that I don't like big girls: - Most (if not all) physically active girls can carry an average man (75-85 kg) with no much trouble, performing easy lifts for not a very long time. A few (very sportive or just naturally strong) can perform hard lifts or do long lifts. - A few physically active girls have a hard time lifting an average man. Those usually just engage in not very demanding sports. - Some not sportive girls are capable of lifting men with relative ease. I would say about 20%. The rest, usually struggle a lot or are just not capable. There are of course other factors, as someone said if a girl really wants to lift you she may overcome her physical limitations (to an extent...). I have also noticed some girls faking their inabiliity to lift me, maybe because they don't wanted to look "masculine" or it seemed weird to them... who knows. Sorry for this long rant, I could talk about this for hours, hehe you know this is not the typical topic you talk about with your friends in a bar (at least not for some time without getting it weird). |
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December 17th, 2012, 04:44 | #19 |
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My girlfriend weighs 130 pounds and I weigh 185 and she tried to give me a piggyback once and she couldn't move. She held me for about three seconds.
My ex-girlfriend was 230 pounds and she was able to carry me nearly a quarter of a mile, or up steep hills, or stairs before I got too sore to keep riding. Last edited by some12like; December 17th, 2012 at 04:46. |
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January 6th, 2013, 09:06 | #20 | |
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It depends sometimes, if a guy appears to be lighter it can be a tad bit less intimidating. I'm usually lighter so i have an easier time. I try to keep my weight down specifically for lift and carry |
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