Why did you start lifting?

Test?

I am not seeing my last post displayed???

i wanto be able to tip over a car. not really sure why. btw, any numbers on that? how much must i be able to deadlift/squat to make it?

I started because we did weight traing during the winter when I trained track. The first I ever did was squat!! I guess I’m one of the very few who didn’t start with bencpress:)

To you guys who started so you could kick ass… Bad news, getting bigger won’t make you a better fighter…

If you’re a bad fighter to start with the only thing you’ll be is a strong bad fighter!!

Heh StrongBad Fighter…

I was a couple months out from graduating high school at 6’0" and 137#. I put on 20 before graduation in about ten weeks. Gotta love beginner gains :stuck_out_tongue: It’s been up and down the last couple years being most my jobs are physical. I put on another 15 or so last year in three months. And that was from reading T-mag :slight_smile:

Nathan

Randman answered it for me. Just to look and feel better.

I was tired of being chubby all my life. When I found out that lifting weights & building muscle could reaise your metablosim, which would help to burn fat, I started lifting.

So, I did it to try to lose fat. That’s why I get mad when people give me s— for wanting to be lean.

I also thought it would help me to find women. So, far it has not helped.

It was sixth grade, and I was starting Junior High football. My coach was a firm believer in lifting to be strong, and we did everything my football coached asked. He was sort of a father figure to most of us boys. Anyway, I lifted and played football, basketball, and participated in track & field until I started college. I played intramural sports in college, but I quit lifting for almost six years. Then I was just fat (216 LBS with about 20% fat). I joined a gym and haven?t looked back. 19 years with a six year hiatus in the middle there. Somehow, I?m still about 206 LBS, but only 9% fat. :wink:

I think I probably started lifting to look better when I was in HS. Now I just want to get Ogre strong. I want to be the bastard who almost breaks your hand when I shake it. Still have a very long way to go but the journey will be fun i’m sure.

because it gives me a boner!

Mine is a similar story to Merlin’s. When I graduated high school I weighed in at a monstrous 122 at 5’-9" tall. I just got sick of being so damn lanky. I touched my first barbell when I started going to FSU and now, 4 years later, I’m about 30 lbs. heavier and still going. Currently I’m trying to gain another 30 lbs, this time by the end of summer… we’ll see how it goes.

To get better at sports.

PE Class, Eighth Grade.

My choices were, as I remember them:

Weight training, Archery, and Field Sports

or

Tennis, Bowling, and Golf.

It was something like that. I managed to time the six or eight weeks of weight training with a growth spurt. I started out at about 5’6 and 130, and when I went to 9th grade in high school, I was 5’10 and 180. I attributed this directly to weight training. I remember being able to do crazy things: every session, I would increase weight AND reps. I started out, I think, with sets of eight, and by the end I had doubled my weight on some exercises and was doing sets of 25.

I won a PE award for that semester, as I recall. The coach was trying to get me to play football, but I moved.

Why do I keep training? I don’t do it for the ladies (if you’re doing it for the ladies, don’t mean to burst your bubble, but they’re probably reacting more to your confidence level than your muscles. Though if you deadlift, you get a nice ass, and that’s never bad). I don’t do it for the awards or recognition. There aren’t any. I don’t even do it for sports performance, because I don’t play any sports right now.

So why?

I like the feeling of the weight in my hands. I like the feeling of being able to do something I’ve never done before. I like the feeling of growing weaker instead of stronger–reverse aging.

And so I can get a nice ass, since that’s never bad.

Dan “Actually did that first class for Archery, not weight training” McVicker

I’m 48 and started lifting about 3 years ago. I saw that my peers were turning into fat lazy bastards. That’s not for me.

To get more strength (for my martial arts)

(Hey, getting more looks from females is just a side benefit).

In all seriousness, I don’t know. I just knew that I should.

I started lifting early on in H.S. so I could compete in football. It worked. I definitely could not have played football in H.S. without it.

It’s never been about the chicks for me. I don’t think most chicks in my age range (42) care. They’re more into the bling, nice cars, houses, etc. So, I keep training because I love doing it. I don’t think I’m headed for the Olympia anytime soon, but I’d really hate myself if I turned into a fourtysomething piece of shit with no body at all.

My attitude is “Keep It Going Baby!”.

I have also always for some primitive reason desired the ability to tip over a vehicle…but primarily it is the fact that if I am ever put in the situation in which I must defend myself, someone I love, or simply a complete stranger who is not strong enough to protect themselves I could do so. Strength does not make a warrior, but it is a great advantage.

I started lifting before 9th grade as a member of the football team. I did it off and on through high school, mostly in the summers. Then I went to college and played football for a year and lifted with those guys.

But then I quit football and put on about 30lbs. I got pretty out of shape and started getting stretch marks again for the wrong reasons. It was not good.

Went to Italy and lost 20lbs. Loved the way everyone complimented me, so I joined a gym (read health club really) and began lifting again. I didn’t get serious until I signed up for a (okay, now the ripping can begin) body-for-life modeled program. After doing the program, I kept going and got more serious.

Now that I’m finally done with the job which had me traveling for months straight and I can go to the gym on a regular basis, I’m getting back to (and soon surpassing) my previous best levels.