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Opinion on the Smith Machine
- Thread starter blueta2
- Start date
blueta2 said:
It eliminates your bodies need to balance the weight. Causeing unbalance strenght of your stablizer muscles.
Just try to stay away from it. Honestly. I dont know if its "unsafe" but it itsnt optimal for anything.
Think about it. Benching, you have to balance the bar or else that shit falls on you, with the smith, all you need to do is push
blueta2
New member
BiggT said:
Ok but tell me why and not just state your opinion.
I am curious!!!
You say crap, some say great!
I personally use it to squat (sometimes) cause I have a hard time sqatting (Well cept when I am drinking in a filthy bar and need to squat to pee), but I have done this for 8 yrs and have had no harmfull effects.
s8nlilhlpr
Banned
The smith is horrible for squatting, because it allows you to put your knees at unnatural angles, and still push the bar up. You need to learn to center the weight on your self, and balance with it. I've seen tons of people at my gym with their feet 2' in front of the machine, basically backing into it to lift the weight.
BiggT
New member
blueta2 said:
Alright. Where to start, lol. For one, it takes stabilizers out of the equation. Having strong muscles + weak attachments makes you an injury waiting to happen when doing any fuctional activity, whether you're a professional athlete, or helping a friend move into a new apartment or playing softball in a beer league.
The bar is in a fixed and unnatural plane of motion, so the Smith is not even a good way to 'teach form to beginners' since no free weight movement is even executed in such a manner.
Those are the reasons the Smith is bad for both bodybuilders and recreational trainees and not just bad for athletes. So, overall it is a worthless peice of crap. In almost 14 years of training, I can proudly say the only thing I have ever used the Smith for is to stretch out on the frame after my workout. It would make a good spot to dump your gym bag, but too many people use it.
In my opinion, the world truly would be a better place if Smith Machines were never invented.
blueta2
New member
BiggT said:
Thanks for your insight. You're not alone. I have heard this before from many other folks.
I see the trainers at my gym training newbies on the Smith. I was also trained on the Smith. I like it only for squat. I would not use it for anything else. I do free squat with DB's.
But you also have to consider, most machines in the gym use a fixed range of motion like the Smith. Why would they be any different?
BiggT
New member
blueta2 said:
They are no different, they are all crap in my opinion, and all they do is take up space in commercial gyms. None of them build ANY functional strength that translates into ANY real life activity. The only thing lifting on a particular machine prepares one to do is lift on that particular machine.
You may have zero interest in functional strength, and while that's fine, the same problem I see with the Smith, I see with other machines......Will training on machines exclusively lead directly to serious injury?? Most likely not, but they do not in any way build any sort of functional strength or 'teach' anybody the first thing about correct form. And, the fixed plane of motion that doesn't allow your body to make natural adjustments under the weight can aggrivate things. I know a lot more people with knee problems from machine hack squats than I know of people with knee problems from correctly performed ATF squats.
Honestly, take the time to learn to free weight squat, even if you can only squat with your bodyweight and no bar etc, that, to me, is much more beneficial than machine work.
