Weightlifting vs. Strongman: Who is the King of Strength?

On August 7, local time, Chinese athlete Li Fabin won the men's 61kg weightlifting competition at the Paris Olympics by breaking the Olympic record for snatch! Hou Zhihui won the gold medal in the women's 49kg weightlifting competition with a last-gasp comeback! Both athletes successfully defended their titles!

Weightlifting is one of the sports that best embodies the spirit of faster, higher, stronger. The action of lifting heavy objects has accompanied the process of human evolution, and when weightlifting evolved into a competitive game, it became one of the most technically demanding sports. However, for the general public, there are many misunderstandings about weightlifting, such as the belief that weightlifting training will affect growth. This sport seems to be simple in action, but it is actually very complex. The weight lifted depends not only on the size of the muscle strength, but also on the biomechanics of the sport to break the limit.

Written by | A string

Weightlifting is one of my country's Olympic advantage events and has long maintained a world-leading level. The Chinese national weightlifting team has always been known as the "Dream Team" and has performed well in previous Olympic Games. At the Tokyo Olympics, the Chinese weightlifting team created the best Olympic record for the Chinese weightlifting team with 7 gold medals and 1 silver medal among 8 contestants. As of the Tokyo Olympics, the Chinese weightlifting team has won a total of 38 Olympic gold medals, with remarkable achievements; it has also produced household-name star athletes such as Shi Zhiyong, Long Qingquan, and Li Wenwen.

Chinese weightlifters Shi Zhiyong (left) and Hou Zhihui (right).

Unlike previous Olympic Games which kicked off right at the start of the Games, the weightlifting events of this Paris Olympic Games will be scheduled for the second half of the Games, from August 7 to 11 in Hall 6 of the Paris South Arena.

The Basics of Weightlifting

Weightlifting events are divided into snatch and clean and jerk according to the type of movement. The total score of the competition is obtained by adding the highest scores of the snatch and clean and jerk. Each athlete has three snatch and clean and jerk opportunities. The validity of weightlifting results is very strict. For example, if the referee determines that there is leverage (for example, the legs are not straightened before the push-up), there is a pause in the process of lifting the barbell, and the barbell is put down before the referee gives a signal (usually 3 seconds), it will be judged as a weightlifting failure.

Athletes are divided into different weight classes according to their weight to ensure fairness in the competition. There are also slight differences in the weight classes for men and women. Weight classes are not set in stone. The last change in the weight class division by the International Weightlifting Federation took place in 2018. This adjustment cancelled the men's 56kg event, which directly led to the retirement of Long Qingquan, the two-time Olympic men's 56kg champion.

In this Paris Olympics, the Chinese weightlifting team will send 6 athletes to compete in the men's 61, 73, 102 kg and women's 49, 59 kg and over 81 kg categories.

Before the Paris Olympics, the world records in different weight classes for men in weightlifting (all created at the Tokyo Olympics because the International Weightlifting Federation changed the weight classes in 2018.)

Weightlifting vs. Strongman: Who is the King of Strength?

In terms of strength competition, in addition to weightlifting, there are also non-Olympic events - powerlifting and strongman events. On the surface, these three events are all based on lifting heavy objects as the measurement standard, but in fact they are completely different sports.

Compared to the complicated rules of weightlifting, the judging rules of strongman competitions are simple and straightforward: regardless of age or weight class, it depends on who can pull, lift or push the most weight. Strongman competitions usually include multiple events, such as deadlift, carrying heavy objects, holding heavy objects, pulling trucks, and tire flipping, which are very entertaining. Powerlifting, on the other hand, is about the three major events that fitness enthusiasts are familiar with, namely squats, deadlifts, and bench presses. (The bench press is a Paralympic event.)

Judging from the numbers alone, the current Olympic record for the men's clean and jerk is just over 260 kilograms, while the strongman event broke the half-ton mark as early as 2016, created by British strongman Eddie Hall at the 2016 World Deadlift Championships; it was subsequently broken in 2020 by Icelandic strongman Hafpor Julius Bjornsson ("The Mountain"), with a deadlift score of 501 kilograms.

Strongman Competition

Does this mean that weightlifters are not as good as strongmen? Of course not.

In fact, the difference in numbers reflects the fact that weightlifting and strongman events have very different strength requirements for athletes: strongman events test muscle endurance under extremely heavy loads, while weightlifting places extremely high demands on the athlete's core strength and coordination, emphasizing the athlete's explosive power, and weightlifting movements require high technical skills.

American strongman Mark Henry is a good example. As an athlete who participated in both weightlifting and strongman events, this man, who was once known as the strongest man in the world, pulled two 55-ton trucks and set a world record of 430 kg in unequipped squats. When he participated in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics with great ambition, he only won the 10th place and missed the medal. (By the way, after participating in this Olympics, this legendary athlete turned to professional wrestling and won a WWE World Heavyweight Championship, a WWF European Championship and an ECW Championship, and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2018.)

Strongman Mark Henry

So it can be simply understood that weightlifting challenges the limits of human strength under prescribed movements, while strongman challenges the absolute limits of human strength.

There is also a question worth exploring here, what is the maximum weight that humans can lift? Some experts in exercise physiology believe that humans may still not reach the maximum potential of their muscles, and it is not clear what the limit of human strength is. One reason is that it is very difficult to measure someone's maximum muscle potential. Muscle strength can be assessed through electromyography (EMG). EMG works by recording the electrical signals generated in muscles (both nerve cells and contracting muscle fibers). However, this type of test can only be performed in a laboratory, and EMG can only be used to monitor local muscles, so EMG still cannot assess the potential of a person's entire body muscles.

Physiologically, a person's ability to lift weight depends on two proteins responsible for muscle contraction - actin and myosin. These proteins are arranged in different types of muscle fibers, including fast-twitch and slow-twitch fibers (commonly known as white muscle and red muscle). In general, people with more muscle mass can produce more force. Top weightlifters push themselves to the limit by continuously increasing muscle mass. However, as muscle mass continues to increase, the marginal effect of strength decreases, and eventually muscle mass reaches a limit. And sometimes, a lighter person can lift more weight than a heavier person.

Therefore, we can only rely on competition records to see where the limits of human beings are.

It's all about the details! The science behind weightlifting technique

When it comes to weightlifting, laymen watch the excitement, while experts watch the tricks. Don’t just look at the athletes on the stage roaring and lifting a barbell several times their own weight over their heads, and then think that they can do such a move just because they are strong. In fact, any strength project that can be completed in a short period of time (such as weightlifting and throwing projects) is not completed simply by relying on one's own strength, but requires quite complex and precise technical movements - these technologies are inseparable from the principles of physics.

Take the snatch as an example. The snatch requires the athlete to quickly pull the barbell from the ground to above the head. During this process, the barbell is in an overweight state. In other words, the weight of the barbell that the athlete actually feels is much greater than the weight of the barbell itself. In this process, the athlete can only lift the barbell to the waist by relying solely on his own strength. Therefore, during the process of lifting the barbell, the athlete must quickly complete the squatting action to ensure that the top of the head does not exceed the original waist height after squatting. Only in this way can the barbell that is several times his own weight be pulled up quickly.

Snatch process

Unlike the snatch, the clean and jerk requires the athlete to keep the barbell on the chest, so it can be roughly divided into two stages: lifting the barbell to the chest and pushing it up. The first stage is basically the same as the first half of the snatch. Because of this, the weight of the clean and jerk for the same athlete is greater than the weight of the snatch. Although the clean and jerk seems to have an extra "breathing moment" compared to the snatch, it is also extremely painful for the athlete to place the overweight barbell on the sternum.

The scientific analysis of the weightlifting process has attracted the interest of biomechanics experts, and the research subjects are active athletes. These research results can be used to guide athletes' daily targeted training and achieve breakthroughs in their performance on the field.

The biomechanical research of weightlifting has a relatively mature research paradigm: in terms of research methods, the two most commonly used methods are fixed-point fixed-focus photography and three-dimensional video analysis, followed by relevant parameter analysis. For example, for the clean and jerk, in order to conduct a more detailed study, domestic and foreign scholars have subdivided the lifting stage to the chest and the lifting stage into 12 stages based on the changes in the lower limb joint angles, the vertical height of the barbell, and the vertical speed of the barbell.

The team of Ningbo University Sports College analyzed the key technologies of Shi Zhiyong, a national weightlifting team athlete, in his two world records of super clean and jerk, to provide scientific support for his preparation for the Tokyo Olympics. In this research paper, through a detailed data analysis of the kinematic parameters of Shi Zhiyong's weightlifting process, suggestions for further optimization of Shi Zhiyong were given from a technical perspective. Here is a brief introduction to the results of its kinematic analysis:

• It is generally believed that the linear relationship between the height of the athlete and the peak vertical height of the barbell during the push-up period under the maximum lift quality is: y=0.9343x-0.219. Although the study did not give the specific number of Shi Zhiyong's peak barbell height, the conclusion is that his push-up barbell height exceeds the predicted value (134.13m). This data shows that the athlete's clean and jerk performance still has room for improvement.

• When Shi Zhiyong lifted 199 kg, the wider grip was conducive to mobilizing the large muscles of the waist and abdomen to participate in the force of lifting the bell, but the excessive angle of the lower limb joints may not be conducive to the transmission of the force of lifting the bell, which is a big challenge to the athlete's squat support ability.

• The distance between the center of gravity of the barbell and the center of gravity of the human body on the Y axis is an important indicator for diagnosing stability during the clean and jerk. The peak value of the distance between the center of gravity of the barbell and the center of gravity of the human body should be 10~20 cm. The peak values ​​of the distance between the center of gravity of Shi Zhiyong in his two attempts were both too high (see the figure below: the distance between the center of gravity of the barbell in the 197kg clean and jerk was even close to 25cm). The distance between the center of gravity of the barbell directly affects the resistance arm between the center of gravity of the human body and the barbell, which is not conducive to improving performance. At the same time, it was also noted that when the weight of the barbell increased from 197kg to 199kg, the peak value of the distance between the center of gravity of the athlete became smaller, which shows that Shi Zhiyong performed more stably with a larger weight.

Since the peak value of the distance between the "two centers" appears at the end of the force, the barbell is in the inertial rising period at this time, which may be related to the excessive backward leaning of the upper body. This suggests that Shi Zhiyong's arm swinging and elbow raising technique may be insufficient.

In fact, the application of systematic scientific research in sports can be traced back to at least the middle of the last century. In particular, the development of various wearable devices in recent years has brought sports science to a new level. From sports physiology, sports biomechanics, sports psychology, to nutritional rehabilitation, etc., all aspects of sports reflect the power of modern science, and weightlifting is no exception - using finite element methods to model joint forces is a routine operation.

Lifting weights won’t make you taller? Rumor!

There is also a long-standing rumor about weightlifting: weightlifting will not make you grow taller.

The weightlifters we know are not really tall, for example, Long Qingquan's official height is only 1.56m. This gives people a stereotype: playing basketball makes you taller, and weightlifting makes you shorter.

There are many reasons for this misunderstanding. Xu Yongqiang, head coach of the weightlifting team of Hangzhou Chen Jinglun Sports School, attributed it to two aspects: first, when Chinese weightlifting achieved good results in the Olympics and World Championships in the early years, those athletes who won world championships were mainly from Guangdong and Guangxi regions, and they were relatively short in stature; second, when the weightlifting team is selecting seedlings, they generally choose those with strong bones, so the external image of athletes with strong physiques also gives people the impression that they are short.

Of course, there are deep physical reasons behind the weightlifting team's selection of short people as seeded players. When talking about the weightlifting rules above, it was mentioned that weightlifting requires athletes to lift the barbell from the ground over their heads. Therefore, short people need to overcome less gravitational potential energy at the same weight, which gives them a certain advantage. This advantage is gradually lost in large-kilogram events. In large-kilogram events, absolute strength is a more important factor, which requires athletes to have enough weight and muscle. China's traditional advantage projects are concentrated in small-weight projects, which further deepens the prejudice of the Chinese people.

In fact, weightlifting training will not reduce height, but will promote height growth. A study shows that 85% of weightlifters in my country are the tallest in their families. In summary, the height of weightlifters is not depressed by the barbell plates, but these athletes are carefully selected. It is precisely because of these short athletes that weightlifting has flourished.

Conclusion

After reading this article, I believe readers will have a deeper understanding of weight sports as a competitive sport.

In fact, for competitive sports, especially high-level competitive sports, in addition to strength, a good and positive attitude is also a factor that determines the results. I wish the Olympic athletes of the weightlifting team can relax, challenge themselves, and continue to achieve good results in this Olympic Games!

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