How to carry more than your own bodyweight (2025)

This reminds me of a trip to Guilin when I was an athletic 22-year-old. We'd booked a hotel on top of a mountain that was only reachable by hiking up a trail. At the trailhead, a five-foot-tall grandma offered to carry my luggage to the top. I thought it was funny — and a bit insulting — so I refused. About a quarter of the way up, I gave up and let her take it. She carried it all the way up without breaking a sweat. It was more a feat of endurance than pure strength, but still incredibly impressive.

One thing I always found a bit of a puzzle: it's widely understood, and scientifically backed up afaik, that strength training is healthy and good for longevity. Yet, if you look at people whose everyday jobs look a lot like functional strength training, eg construction workers, my general impression is that their bodies (age 50+) are in worse condition than the average population (who's not in great shape already), and far worse than people with sedentary jobs who do fitness training.

I get that there can be too much of a good thing etc, but I still find it curious. If it's generally said to be good for you, shouldn't the effects be a bit more robust than that?

This is very common in Indian villages too. As small kids we used to carry 30-40 kgs of green grass bundles on our heads in the mornings. Girls definitely carried more than their body weight. People carried a stack of pots on their heads with full of water. Carrying two equal weights hung from the two ends of a bamboo bar (kaavidi) on your shoulder is extremely common. There was even a folk story of a boy who carried his two parents on a kaavidi wherever he went.

But none of that farm work was seen as something special. It's just a routine thing. Media and academic research makes things look special and interesting. Samething goes for romanticism, mystery, fiction as well.

Carrying things on your head/shoulders is surprisingly efficient. Many people can unrack a barbell with double their body weight and just stand there for a bit without having done any strength training at all. The trouble is getting the load into that convenient orientation. Taking something from the ground and putting it over your own head is where all the bad stuff happens. Once it's up there it's not as big a deal.

You can make yourself bulletproof to most forms of hard physical labor by practicing the clean & jerk. This movement is entirely about "get heavy thing off ground and above head" as efficiently and safely as possible. There are advanced movements that can be even more efficient but you trade some injury risk for screwing up. That is to say, the actual amount of wear on your body is even lower if you really know what you're doing.

I once carried a log that weighed about double my body weight and carried it 100ft. My back has never been the same, I really don't recommend it unless you know what you're doing.

Here's how to actually train for it.

https://uphillathlete.com/aerobic-training/vertical-beast-mo...

Reminds me of slovakian mountain carriers https://regiontatry.sk/en/mountain-load-bearers/

>But jumping straight into lifting heavy weights is not recommended. Instead, experts recommend focusing on technique and starting with loads that can be comfortably lifted before progressively increasing the training.

I'm not sure if its because I'm in the 'advanced' category of lifting, but I have recently been going against this common advice.

I recommend people get to heavy weights as quick as possible. Adding a minimum of 5lbs each time they lift, but more often 10+. At some point the weight becomes too heavy and you compensate with bad form. Wait wait wait before you downvote, I have a rational here:

Your auxiliary muscles that allowed you to do bad form are tired now. Lower the weight and 'clean them up' with good form.

I'm not alone in this mindset, but it goes against conventional wisdom.

People forget that muscles are being used even when we do bad form.

Just don't get injured. Pain = stop right away.

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Invent the wheel.

No, I don't think I will