Discuss your choice below!!

I would have to say Positive. Some of the stuff (shirts, suits etc.)is above my head. Knee wraps and wrist wraps and anything that keeps a joint from "exploding" is pretty much mandatory, as is a belt once you get above 400 lbs. or so.

Man, here it comes, another heated debate on lifting with gear vs raw.

I'd like to think it will be an intelligent and informed debate. Most likely it won't.

Unless you've lifted in a full meet or bench only competition your opinion doesn't mean shit.

Lifting raw is the equivalent of sending out the NFL squads without helmets and pads. Sure, one day in the distant past, they didn't have the helmets they have today - but who the Hell cares?

Ultimately, it's the lifters decision. Hey, if lifting raw does it for you- Hats off to ya. For me, I'll take every pound of carry over today's gear can provide.

nobody makes any real money powerlifting...

that being the case people should lift with the gear and the organizations that they enjoy competing in...

I think that one of the things that gets people all rialed up is the ALL-TIME greatest lifts list that doesn't take differing circumstances into consideration...

something that has become important to me is being strong in the gear as well as strong out of the gear and I have adjusted my training accordingly...

I think it's kind of corny to watch someone struggle with 315 for one rep on the bench plop on a high tech bench shirt and bench 500 lbs...

on one hand I give the guy props for spending the time to mastering his gear, but on the other hand it just seems kind of silly...

I guess I'm a bit conflicted by the issue...

to each his own...

It seems difficult for sports to keep people's attention unless there are new records to be broken. If you didn't have the extra gear, the weights would continue to increase but not at the rate they have recently.

Not that PL lifting has mass media appeal but I think there would be even less interest if records didn't get continuously broken.

If you are lifting for competitive reasons (i.e.training for one etc) the yeah, go for it.

For asthetic/personal or any bloody other reason, then "no, no, no".

This could also be extended to lifting for sport (except lifting sports). You don't have your weight belt on when yor in the ring or playing rugby, do you.

Why is the debate between geared and non-geared lifters so heated? It's a personal preference. If you compete in powerlifting (excluding RAW events) then you pretty much need the gear to compete. If you just lift for aesthetic purposes or for bodybuilding it's not as necessary. Yes, modern equipment is improving vastly. I have a single ply Phenom that I can't touch the chest unless the bar is loaded with around 500. I wear a HardCore suit from Inzer that always takes about 600 to break parallel. So yes it is extreme to the help gear give you. Powerlifters not only train to get stronger, but they train to get stronger in there gear. Its part of their sport; they choose to wear gear. For those people who don't wear gear, so what? It's your preferance not to do so.

Mike,

I was a little hot coming out of the gate. This topic has brought out some poor threads in the strength forum. It looks like the mods may be helping us out.

Your post is articulate and well thought out.

I don't know about Mash beating Coan and which one is better. Today's gear is no doubt better, so you make a strong case.

For me, powerlifting is about setting a PR and nothing more.

Atredies-fair enough. Sorry for the dick comment about your statement being not well thought out. You have to understand that I am a huge fan of ed coan and dave p. I also looked up to kaz alot. I remember I was around 7 years old watching kaz compete in a worlds strongest man contest. It hooked me on to lifting-he looked like a real life superman without the fake plastic muscles. Not much later I believe that he benched 661 in a t-shirt. Then he lifted the thomas inch dumbbell. He did all this while being a world class powerlifter. Who ever says powerlifters are not athletes, could have never seen kaz lift!
Dave P-whom most people don't know of, was one of the greatest athletes I have ever remembered seeing. A really smart guy who was squating well into a grand when other guys weren't even close. He would have been the icon of the sport next to kaz, if a tragic car accident had not cut his bright future short.
so please understand that I come hot out the gate when people compare the modern day lifts to the aforementioned icons. I believe it is an unfair, undeserving ego boost to these guys and it pisses me off that more lifters don't openly pay respect to the giants like pasenella who made the sport what it is today.

I don't powerlift... I am a bodybuilder, but when I think of powerlifting gear, suits, straps, talc, wraps, etc... it makes me think about synthol and bodybuilding, sorta. If the gear helps the lifter keep from getting injured (like knee wraps, which I use occasionally), then I think they're benefical and necessary. If it's just used to add pounds to the lift, then it's no different than synthol in a bodybuilder. Like Gregg Valentino, he's got 25" arms, but is that real muscle? Powerlifter X can bench 900 in a triple ply shirt, but is he doing all that work himself? It's the same idea. Knee wraps, chalk, and belts are important, I think, b/c they will probably help keep the athlete healthy, but the extras are just excessive, I think. Sure, in bodybuilding it just matters how you look, but synthol looks as stupid as it is. Same thing in powerlifting... or if somebody had a height contest to see who was the tallest, I'd sure as heck beat everybody if I stood on a tall chair! But am I really that tall? Think about it, it's the same idea.

Maybe I'm wrong, I've never used a suit, so maybe I don't really know. But I do know how they work, and if the goal isn't injury prevention and just adding pounds to a lift, I think that's just ridiculous.

I have been powerlifting for 7 years now. Haven't been in a meet since high school but am still training for max strength. In first getting into the sport I hated the gear as every year I would do first meet without gear, total maybe near 1050-1100 in 165lbclass and lose to all the guys with gear. I always bought new gear for the regional and state meets and total would skyrocket, bringing me near 1200 total, and I would easily place top 3.
I think belts and knee/wrist wraps are necessary for safety on max lifts even if they help a little. I don't particularly hate gear as it makes me feel stronger and I am stronger while lifting in it but if it was ever banned I wouldn't complain. I have recently moved more into olympic lifting though because of what I feel is overboard reliance on gear for lifting. Like I said I have been powerlifting for quite a few years now but feel that all the gear may even detract a lot of publicity from powerlifting as it would be much more impressive to lift without gear and people are quick to call it cheating. I think it is a solution to just have each association do what they want and make rules they want but I think that the sport might be more popular if there were a consensus on this issue and all playing fields were even. I personally don't wanna know how much you can lift with a extra layer of denim skin on but how much you can lift by yourself. With gear today, there is no way to tell how strong someone really is in many cases. Powerlifting now reminds me of drag racing,or at least my uninformed opinion about it, the driver doesn't matter as much as the car he's in. I say get rid of the gear or at least nothing over single ply.

I did a few meets app. 20 years ago so maybe my ideas counts ;-)

At the moment I only compete with myself so I don't use any gear, exceps straps.

If I was competing, would I use gear?? You bet, it's competition, every kilo counts. The more the better.

If Tiger woods takes his new custom Nike driver and hits a ball 300 yards, who got that distance? I can not hit that ball that distance with the same driver, yet Tiger would come close (but maybe not there) with any driver, even if it happens to be 20 years old.

Every sport has its equipment and in all sports the only goal is performance enhancement.

Why is this accepted in baseball etc, but not in PL?

Fair point. Performance enhancment in any sport, though has legislation around it has its place. In F1, Cars now have harder tyres, smaller air intakes and many other limiting factors to ensure a safety margin that is acceptable.

Whilst cars are safer now, is that because of all the limitations?

Just imagine if they had left "down force" in, or had turbos still (30 yrs ago, BMW williams had an engine capable of 1500 bhp) Cars would lap, and corner at incredible speeds.

Can anyone see this analogy in place for PL, and should a Standard be placed, and reviewed as technlogy refines round this, or is it a null point with PL?

Some surprisingly good ideas already stated like Gear is like a Golf Club, like playing football without pads, and needing to be strong out of gear as well as in gear.

Most top end guys are working both raw and in gear to get strong and technically smooth. You need both. If you want to lift raw, lift in the AAU, if you want to lift single ply with a "drug test", USAPL/IPF, if you want to play with the big boys in the best gear go IPA/APF/WPO.

The key is to make your choices and then wisely work your ass off to be the best you can. It is also fun to be better than your competition in the rules you choose to lift in!

Gear can also be a big help to a bodybuilder if used correctly.

jack

While I have much respect for top powerlifters, it does make you wonder when the bench shirt is so tight that they have to pull the bar down to their chests. They're strong no doubt, but a bench like that just isn't as 'real' as a raw bench. This is no longer safety gear - it's assistance gear, so that does pose a problem. Maybe standards would help.

Better quality golf clubs are one thing, but rocket propelled golf balls is quite another.

I'd like to see top powerlifters making some real money in their sport. As long as they have the gear (and the attitude that only "internet keyboard jockeys" care about raw lifting) powerlifting will stay a fringe sport with no money in it.

A meaningful analogy to baseball would be if expensive shirts that took half an hour to put on were designed to help you swing and throw 30% harder.

A meaningful analogy to golf would be about exactly how it is where you better have 1000 dollars to throw around or you're going to hit the ball 75 yards shorter.

A meaningful analogy to tennis would be that you better be able to get multiple rackets restrung for every single match (which would cost maybe 50 bucks to do) or otherwise you will not compete at the pro level.

I hate to see powerlifting being more like golf than say basketball or wrestling.

You guys in the US should count yourselves lucky.

At least you have PL clubs and have this choice.

The UK is crap for it, I live in the middle, and the nearest i have found is 1.5 hours, and on UK roads thats no fun.

I need to start my own, after i get strong

Oh, and this is a good thread, some reasonableideas being thrown around (maybe highly modded?)

definitely need stuff to support the elbows and knees joints.

what bothers me is that there is no equal playing field as what is worn within a given organization during competition day.

also the comment made by someone on another thread about certain lifters missing lifts because the bar would not hit the chest during the bench press is alarming.

just to throw a bone: some oly lifters don't even wear belts. laters pk

As I and others have said before (especially in the bench record thread), i do believe that the extent to which gear is assisting lifters takes away from the legitimacy of the numbers for comparative purposes. I also agree with others that there should be choice, but it should be acknowledged, for instance, that a bench in a 2-ply shirt is significantly different from a raw bench or a bench in a less assistive shirt, and records should be seperated accordingly.

On another note, though, one thing that I don't understand is the IPF's refusal to allow a monolift to be used for the squat. From what I can gather, the monolift doesn't do any of the lifting for you, it just eliminates the need to
walk the weight out, which would seem both safer and actually MORE legitimate
(we're testing the squat here, not the walkout-and-squat). Can anyone explain this?