LT referring to Ladainian Tomlinson. In a past magazine he said: "I don't focus on maxing out anymore," Tomlinson says. "Back in college, we were building ourselves up, so we had to max. Now I'm not trying to get big. I just want to feel strong."


Doesn't maxing out on your lifts do very little for your size, only strength?I I thought if you want to build size your reps should be in the 8-12 range.

bud_2005 said:

LT referring to Ladainian Tomlinson. In a past magazine he said: "I don't focus on maxing out anymore," Tomlinson says. "Back in college, we were building ourselves up, so we had to max. Now I'm not trying to get big. I just want to feel strong."


Doesn't maxing out on your lifts do very little for your size, only strength?I I thought if you want to build size your reps should be in the 8-12 range.

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Someone that can bench 350, and squat/dead in the 500s is def going to have muscle to go along with that.

Its also important to build a decent strength base so you can use a bigger weight for the 8-12/bodybuilding/etc style routine. If your maxing at 165lbs for bench that means if your doing 4x12 you'll be using around 80-115lbs @60-70% of the max versus maxing at 300lbs and doing your rep work at 180-210lbs. Same goes for the squats/deads. So basically being stronger allows you to lift heavier weights for the bodybuilding style rep ranges that build muscle and also building strength will build a good amount of muscle as well.

There are different types of size. Look up the two types of hypertrophy. One type is basically just swelling of the muscle (more fluids and such for endurance strength) and the other is the fibres growing thicker (lower rep training. - thicker rubber band is stronger).

This is where the saying that bodybuilders are "all show, no go" comes from. And why "powerbuilding" is all the rage now by basically blending strength and size into one routine.


And what effort said gets glossed over a lot. You can only build so much size before you need more strength. Does lifting a fork to your mouth 100 times build your biceps? Do you get rippling abs from 200 crunches? (no). No, there's a strength aspect.


Hypertrophy helps strength and strength helps hypertrophy.


I doubt Tomlinson even knows what he is talking about. He is a natural. Often the advanced bodybuilders say "do what i do" completely ignoring it doesn't work for everyone. It worked for them because they have the best genetics. It doesn't even occur to them and it's why the best players usually make terrible coaches, but often the best coaches were mediocre players who had to scratch and claw for every inch they got because they weren't that gifted.