You Don’t Have To Be Big To Be Strong

It’s only normal to admire someone who was able to muster enough will and persistence to build big muscles and an overall great body. When it comes to strength, however, those beefed-up guys aren’t the role models you should be looking for.

Strength vs. Mass

We can’t say that it’s easy getting as big as a bodybuilder. Building your muscles to a certain size definitely requires a lot of hard work, but does it pay off in the long haul?

Science tells us that it doesn’t. A study conducted by a research team from Manchester Metropolitan University found that bodybuilders are gram-for-gram weaker than skinny, muscle-less guys.

The study’s lead author Professor Hans Degens talked to The Telegraph when he said: “It appears that excessive muscle growth may have detrimental effects on the quality of the muscle, and one may well be better off with normal-sized muscles than with metabolically expensive large muscles.”

In common terms, this means that the muscles on a bodybuilder have a lower power-gram ratio that those on a guy who prefers sitting at home writing an article like this one over hitting the weights.

That being said, it’s expected that men will start looking at muscle building in a different way. Remember, if you’re not the gym kind, chances are you’re probably stronger than an average bodybuilder with ‘abs of steel’ or a ‘walking gun show’. Talk about a confidence boost!