I don't think it's absolute weight that really matters...until you are very strong.
We would see hard cutoffs and there would be no gains for newbies at all if there was an need for some absolute load. But we do see gains with only the bar in many cases.
I just think that the new lifter just has "fake" %'s. He cannot recruit enough muscle stuff (the technical term BTW) for his 70% to be my 70%, much less your 70%.
I think the reality is just that newbies need higher %'s and that strong people are closer to the real tolerances of their body and need lower %'s on average because they will break shit otherwise.
This is an interesting point, but I don't think it negates what I wrote as much as speaks to the need for better research. Most beginners and novices are not only limited by their ability to produce a "true 70%," but also by the quality of the stimulus they can achieve because they're weak. They can't skip from 45 to 75 lbs, even though 75 is still light in absolute terms, in part because 45 isn't a very powerful stimulus, so it isn't potent enough to get you right to 75. Now it's also because of limitations of the body that doesn't typically adapt that massively all at once, but I think in part it's also because the quality of the 45 lb stimulus is enough, by virtue of their current weakness, to make them stronger, but is still objectively relatively low, so it will only get them a little higher. Which means absolute load matters.
The reason I think this is that I've seen some people actually increase the ease of their progression once they pass out of the really weak, early stage, presumably due to higher stimulus quality via heavier load - each initial 5 lb jump is more of a struggle than it is later on 3-4 weeks in, but then it slows down again when they get to the point where the quality of the stimulus is higher, but the body has reached its limit of rapid adaptations and takes more higher quality stimulus over time, to yield small physiological changes.
A 5lb jump is a higher % increase in the beginning than it is later, which makes me think it is simply a % game. A 5lb jump is a 10%+ increase for a noob pressing just the bar.
I think it may very well be the amount of human available to stimulate which is the issue/explanation.
The noob only has so much available to grow/adapt. So maybe the % of increase the person using objectively heavier weight and the one using objectively lighter ones is more on par with each other? This, to me explains why the honeymoon phase of an LP last longer for some too: the jumps are actually smaller than the strength gained from the adaptions made.
It makes more sense to me that adapting at a particular rate (measured by a % vs absolute growth) would lead to easier jumps if the jumps stayed the same. Even more so if, which seems to be the case, the adaptions are more frequent and likely happening at higher % in the beginning vs later.
But then all that repeated bout and genetic potential crap shows up and ruins everything anyway!
I don't think it's absolute weight that really matters...until you are very strong.
We would see hard cutoffs and there would be no gains for newbies at all if there was an need for some absolute load. But we do see gains with only the bar in many cases.
I just think that the new lifter just has "fake" %'s. He cannot recruit enough muscle stuff (the technical term BTW) for his 70% to be my 70%, much less your 70%.
I think the reality is just that newbies need higher %'s and that strong people are closer to the real tolerances of their body and need lower %'s on average because they will break shit otherwise.
This is an interesting point, but I don't think it negates what I wrote as much as speaks to the need for better research. Most beginners and novices are not only limited by their ability to produce a "true 70%," but also by the quality of the stimulus they can achieve because they're weak. They can't skip from 45 to 75 lbs, even though 75 is still light in absolute terms, in part because 45 isn't a very powerful stimulus, so it isn't potent enough to get you right to 75. Now it's also because of limitations of the body that doesn't typically adapt that massively all at once, but I think in part it's also because the quality of the 45 lb stimulus is enough, by virtue of their current weakness, to make them stronger, but is still objectively relatively low, so it will only get them a little higher. Which means absolute load matters.
The reason I think this is that I've seen some people actually increase the ease of their progression once they pass out of the really weak, early stage, presumably due to higher stimulus quality via heavier load - each initial 5 lb jump is more of a struggle than it is later on 3-4 weeks in, but then it slows down again when they get to the point where the quality of the stimulus is higher, but the body has reached its limit of rapid adaptations and takes more higher quality stimulus over time, to yield small physiological changes.
A 5lb jump is a higher % increase in the beginning than it is later, which makes me think it is simply a % game. A 5lb jump is a 10%+ increase for a noob pressing just the bar.
I think it may very well be the amount of human available to stimulate which is the issue/explanation.
The noob only has so much available to grow/adapt. So maybe the % of increase the person using objectively heavier weight and the one using objectively lighter ones is more on par with each other? This, to me explains why the honeymoon phase of an LP last longer for some too: the jumps are actually smaller than the strength gained from the adaptions made.
It makes more sense to me that adapting at a particular rate (measured by a % vs absolute growth) would lead to easier jumps if the jumps stayed the same. Even more so if, which seems to be the case, the adaptions are more frequent and likely happening at higher % in the beginning vs later.
But then all that repeated bout and genetic potential crap shows up and ruins everything anyway!