quote:

Originally posted by SigSauerP226:
Pretty ripped ....

But not to the degree of what I am referring to and how the term is described in the definitions I have found.

Thanks for a good example of what I would assume results from a strenuous—but healthy—lifestyle.

This, however, is closer to what I have in mind. But it’s still (evidently) a real man, not an AI-generated exaggeration of what ancient men looked like:



As I say, though, the knowledgeable responses we’ve gotten here have confirmed my assumptions about the YouTube images.

I used to be crazy about my physique. My natural bodyweight is 165# but I worked my wsy up to 205# with tons of food and 4 hours a day in the gym. The result was sore joints, a ripped body and feeling like crap most of the time. I got badly injured by a horse 3 years ago and could not workout for a year, the muscle evaporated faster than I could believe. Now I am back at 170# and although back in good shape, I feel better and have zero interest in putting my body through the required abuse. I still have an 8 pack of abs which my wife finds enjoyable. I focus now on muscular endurance as opposed to size. David Goggins puts out some excellent workouts for endurance.

Athletic or fit women such as dancers can have "six-pack abs" too. Dig Nichelle Nichols'.



This is more of a "toned/fit" look that comes naturally through exercise. I don't like the look where they try to emulate the men with the exaggerated muscles.

Virtually all of my uncles worked for Swifts meat packing in their youth. One uncle retired from Swifts. He was about 165lbs soaking wet and with his shirt off looked like a medical chart for musculature. Came from hauling two sides of beef around for about 15 years of the 39 years he was with them. The only thing he overate on was dill pickles. We'd meet for vacations and fishing in S.D. and he'd have a bulk box of jars of pickles. Another Uncle had his PHD in English and was a school principle. In the non-school year months he'd break molds for large cement drainage castings. Saw him gather up 3 oak dining room chairs in one hand and hold them out in front of him -seemingly without effort. There's a difference between work muscle and gym muscle.

You start with whatever genetics you have. Some guys are only a step or 2 away from that. Some will never be that. Others, freaks as they are known just exist like that no matter what they do.

Beyond that if you have the 2-3 steps away type guy, it requires strength training and athletics/cardio/calisthenics of some kind and depending duration.

Most people getting below 10% bodyfat is going to require a diet that is locked down clean at least 80% of the time. And the amount of strength training and "activity" to retain the muscle and exist like the guy with the green background.

The trick is to figure out how to fit your day to day life as close to hitting those benchmarks that will sustain the shape you are looking for.

This means knowing the right food choices, how much you can take, what your body likes etc. In combination with how hard to push physically and how often.

You shouldn't have to "try" so hard to get there or you won't exist that way long. You want to do things in a way you can dominate. There's a stress/ cortisol component as well that seems to point to enjoying what you are doing matters too. Or at least not hating it all the time. When this lifestyle lines up stuff like your sleep and hormones will just fall in line and is a critical piece as well.

People who were around like this years ago had good genetics and lived a day to day life, like the farmer, soldier, surfer, etc that resulted in it would be my take.

How's that for rambling.

AI.

One of the biggest jokes people don't realize is how unhealthy professional bodybuilding and fighters cutting weight is. Dr. Chris Raynor might be Canadian, but he's an orthopedic surgeon and also has a fascinating YouTube channel taking deep dives into subject. Here's two that pop into mind on this subject.

quote:

Originally posted by DanH:
Dr. Chris Raynor might be Canadian...

Well, how do we go about finding out?

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:

quote:

Originally posted by DanH:
Dr. Chris Raynor might be Canadian...

Well, how do we go about finding out?

By reading on any of his YouTube videos that he is a licensed doctor in Canada and doesn't always have a good opinion on the US medical system or gun laws even though he does have a Gun Permit in Canada.

Steroids and sometimes diuretics is how you achieve the leanness of the green guy and keep a lot more mass if you want to. Cartoon character stuff. It never appealed to me because the second you stop it melts away. (yeah keep some gains crap blah blah blah whatever, not usually.) And bodybuilders are dropping like flies these days. Messing with insulin and stuff is no joke. Max their organs out too.

Even TRT doses assist greatly in total body condition.

Bodybuilding in general from my perspective is ludicrous. Unhealthy physically and mentally if we are talking about the sport proper. Natural guys can stave some of that off, but the competing side to me still, subjective.

But OP wasn't implying bodybuilding just being lean. You don't need weight cutting or bodybuilding to get that way, although they are an option (a poor one IMO.)

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:
"Six-pack abs" and other aspects of bodybuilding are for looks, not actual strength or stamina. Boxers and especially weightlifters don't have them, not to that extent.

Everybody has six pack abs. Most of us just have a layer of insulation over them.

A) in general, Body builders are weak.

They have to maintain an artificial musculature for points - can’t develop the proper stabilizing muscles etc. Older era standards were different - the old physique competitors who had to do handstands etc were strong.

B) In strongman, 12% was usually the target. Below that, and people could run out of glycogen.

(That is a fuzzy memory, and I can’t remember how it was measured. I think by immersion tank.)

I do remember one, very strong, lighter weight fellow who kept failing toward the end of every event, because he decided to cut to about 8% going in to the show. (Strongman didn’t have weight classes back then, so it was very foolish/maybe he was more focused on looking pretty.)

Thanks for the discussion. Informative and interesting.

quote:

Originally posted by DanH:

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:

quote:

Originally posted by DanH:
Dr. Chris Raynor might be Canadian...

Well, how do we go about finding out?

By reading on any of his YouTube videos that he is a licensed doctor in Canada...

It's a joke, man.

quote:

Originally posted by Aglifter:
A) in general, Body builders are weak.

They have to maintain an artificial musculature for points - can’t develop the proper stabilizing muscles etc. Older era standards were different - the old physique competitors who had to do handstands etc were strong.

B) In strongman, 12% was usually the target. Below that, and people could run out of glycogen.

(That is a fuzzy memory, and I can’t remember how it was measured. I think by immersion tank.)

I do remember one, very strong, lighter weight fellow who kept failing toward the end of every event, because he decided to cut to about 8% going in to the show. (Strongman didn’t have weight classes back then, so it was very foolish/maybe he was more focused on looking pretty.)

I wouldn’t necessarily call bodybuilders weak. Body weight to weight lift ability, they are going to be less than a strongman or powerlifter. That said, they aren’t weak. Ronnie Coleman was squatting 800 lbs. that’s not an easy task and not one a weak person could do.

When I was much younger, I worked out every day aside of Sunday. My goal was to be a bodybuilder, until I came to the realization of just how detrimental to my health it would be. I spent hours in the gym. I was taking around 1000mg/week of various steroids. I was eating between 8000-10000 calories a day. It was a fucking chore to eat. I went up to 190 lbs which is pretty damn big for my small frame. I kept my body fat around 8-10% and didn’t dehydrate. I didn’t look “ripped” like some of the guys we are speaking of, but I looked “ripped” to most people. I was pretty big. To put it into perspective, I just turned 50 and I weigh 155-160 lbs. I still have around 12-15% body fat (naturally lean) and I don’t looks small. I use an InBody scanner for my statistics. Add 35 lbs of muscle and it’s pretty big.
The weight I could lift back then was a lot. I was squatting reps around 450, bench pressing reps at 225 and maxing around 275. I was able to do pull-ups (palms away) endlessly, to the point I crushed the record at the marine pull-up bar at the Washington’s State Fair. I was pretty damn strong.
Back in June I was under a lot, and I mean a lot of stress. I lost a fair amount of weight. I was at 145-150. My body fat was 8% and I did look pretty ripped. I felt like I was dying though, everyday. It was super unhealthy. So yeah, the guys who shed all their fat and water to look great, I can see how it would lead to hallucinations. I was hydrated and low on fat and stressed and felt like I was dancing with the reaper.

This picture was 31 years ago. I was about 180 in that picture. Arms were 17” at the bicep/tricep. I added another 10 lbs before I backed off the steroids/diet/weights.

I have more to say, but my wife is ushering me out of the house to go on a walk.

Bodybuilders vs Firemen, everybody is ripped, but the difference is in the work the Firemen do to be able to perform their tasks.

Skip to 4 min to see the ladder climb where the bodybuilder is smoked...

Younger members may recall his 1990s juice maker infomercials. This is from his 1960s TV show.



Not a particularly large or "ripped" guy, he still performed feats of strength and endurance.

Every bodybuilder mentions Coleman.

Here are his real lifts. (Other stuff is never to be trusted, for anyone. Too much money involved in making people into mythic endorsers of product X)

https://www.openpowerlifting.org/u/ronniecoleman

Lelaine was from the old Physique days. He was very impressive.

quote:

Originally posted by Aglifter:
Every bodybuilder mentions Coleman.

Here are his real lifts. (Other stuff is never to be trusted, for anyone. Too much money involved in making people into mythic endorsers of product X)

https://www.openpowerlifting.org/u/ronniecoleman

I worked out at Metroflex in Arlington, Ronnie’s home gym (Brian owns it), in the late 90’s, when Ronnie was winning all the Olympias. Brian would blare heavy metal the whole week, unless Ronnie was in there, and he’d play hip hop. The “legends” are true. Ronnie would go do lunges in the parking lot, winter, 100 degree summer, either way, he’d do it. He would scream (light weight, yeah buddy, etc) half the time. He was on the typical drugs, but most of that was just natural. Ronnie remains a genetic freak of nature. Amazing what I saw and the fact Ronnie did all that with a fucked up back from playing football in high school and college. A lot of the weight, etc, people talk about, that he did, I’m not talking the maxing out stuff, just typical workouts, I saw it. It was unreal. We just got used to it when he was in there. Sometimes he’d use up all the plates and you’d have to switch exercises due to it. As in Ronnie is using all the 45 lb plates, so I’ll use a machine or a dumbbell.

As far getting “ripped”. It can be done, and anyone can do it. Just depends on how willing you are to work and be consistent. And it’s 75% diet, 25% gym. And as already stated, what severity or degree you can do, will come down to your own genetics. The stuff OP is talking about, we call “paper think skin” which means the photo, the movie shoot, whatever, they dropped all the water out of their body and that bs is for looks, not health. Take Ronnie at a Mr. Olympia. Well he wouldn’t look like that 99% of the time because that’s contest shape where leading up to the contest he’d cutting all that water out. Dehydrating his body for a few days to get paper thin skin. That’s not healthy. He’d literally be down to 0% body fat. But that’s only for 1-2 days.