Lifting Heavy Weights Makes You Slower
Lifting weights is one of my favorite ways to exercise. I have had some success with it and after almost 25 years, it comes fairly naturally. The sense of strength it provides is unparalleled to any other form of exercise that I have consistently performed in the past. In fact, even during marathon training I never felt the capacity that I did when I lifted heavy weights often. Despite the performance boost of powerlifting, when I did eventually get back to running, I was slow.
Strength and conditioning as well as physical therapy are often focused on strength. This is a nebulous term that is poorly defined, but ultimately comes down to how much force you can produce. Force production is valuable to a point, eventually it has diminishing returns.
Take a youth athlete as an example. They may benefit from a resistance training program. The question becomes, how strong is strong enough? If their exercise program continues to progress, they put on muscle mass and their force production levels increase does that carry over to the field? At some point in time, that training model can fail them. The fact that they are lifting heavier and heavier weights will actually slow them down. A hit to the gap in right field may be reduced to a double when it could have been a triple.
Imagine the heaviest deadlift you have ever lifted, nearly one hundred percent effort, one more pound added to the bar would have resulted in a failed lift. How fast was that movement? It was a slow grind, so slow it was almost as if the bar was not even moving. The closer athletes and clients get to this level of effort, the slower their movements become. They are now training for slowness. This may be useful; it may be interference. Context is critical. Every athlete, client or patient deserves to have an exercise prescription that is intentional and aligns with their desired activity. Consistent measurements and efforts to track progress in a meaningful way will often set you apart from the crowd that is solely focused on bigger numbers.
Austin Ulrich, Physical Therapist
