Anyone who lifts knows how much it sucks to stay natty. Like for real I can bench press 100 kilos for 5 reps but it took me like 10 years of lifting weights on an off to get there. Feelsbadman when u compare urself to the tiktok sarm goblins and realize u could have a 405 bench by now if u just blasted off years ago. Oh well tho. I want to blast off so bad I just don’t have the money for it right now.
I mean from my personal experience it seems more like your programming sucks getting to 100kg for 5 shouldn’t take you 10 years it took me 2 years of just being consistent and as far as natty goes, I’m natty and stronger than a few people that I know take PEDs but just suck at working out. I think you overestimate how much you can gain from test because the general rule for strength athletes is adding 10-15% to your performance which for those competitions is of course huge but it would ‘only’ mean 200kg squat vs 220kg
DNA and nature matters though, so I wouldn’t put down the OP’s experience.
For a 100kg bench for reps it really doesn’t, unless they have a chronic illness or disability the speed of progression is abnormally slow, which leads me to believe that they didn’t put in enough effort or that their programming just sucked, not being able to put in a lot of time in the gym or not knowing a good lifting program is nothing to be ashamed off, but I really want to push against the “I lift 100kg and this guy that must be on steroids bench twice as much as me” idea because I’ve had weirdos harass me in the gym asking me about steroids or accusing me of taking test just based on the fact that I’m a lot stronger than them and this post comes across in that same vein.
I’m gonna respectfully disagree here. 100 Kilo bench is stronger than 90% of all humans walking around.
https://www.muscleandstrength.com/articles/strong-strength-standards-raw-natural-lifters
This is a good article that puts strength levels into perspective. And people on PEDs gain more muscle just sitting on the couch, than natties actually working out… That 15% to strength performance is if the lean bodyweight remains the same. PEDs allow you to slap muscle on to your frame which means that 10-15% is now based on the extra muscle that they have.
So yeah, drugs increase hypertrophy more than strength, but each pound of muscle pushes that 10-15% further away from their natty counterparts…
Anything people engage in you’ll be better than those that don’t if you are the bloodiest of beginner rockclimbers you’ll still be better than all the people that don’t rockclimb so just by being able to go up a wall you’ll be better than 99% of all people, but that’s not how those things are measured whenever you engage in a thing it’s better to compare yourself to those that also engage in that activity, that can be sports, hobbies etc.
As for the people on PEDs gaining muscle on the couch it’s literally the placebo effect, there’s literally a study from 1974 where they told some student athletes “Hey we are going to give you legal steroids” gave them placebos and they even so still saw increases in strength pretty massive increases as well.
In just 4 weeks, they put a combined total of ~100 pounds on those same four lifts. 100 pounds instead of 22, in 4 weeks instead of 7. Simply because they THOUGHT they were on steroids.
This is pretty well understood and and I can cite more stuff if you want but I’d rather watch GDQ than argue broscience if I’m being honest.
It’s not broscience…
Placebo works on strength, sure. Mentally you can gain some by just being dialed in and we know this. But I’m talking about the study where they literally sat on their ass, got injected with exogenous hormones, and gained more muscle than naturals who actually trained.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199607043350101
No amount of placebo is going to gain you muscle with NO exercise whatsoever. But testosterone does that quite handily…
When boys go through puberty, they gain muscle size and bone JUST by hormones, whether they exercise or not…it’s obvious that an increase in testosterone will grow muscle even if you do nothing else…
Drugs + Exercise > Drugs only > Natural + exercise > Natural and doing nothing…
No amount of placebo is going to get you within 85% of the muscle of Ronnie Coleman or Phil Heath or whoever is Mr. Olympia now. Sorry, drugs increase muscle growth to a large degree, and the more muscle you have, the more your potential strength and speed. That’s why athletes and even non-athletes use them.
