# What is your idea of a normal/average physique?



## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Kudus to @Sylarz for inspiring this.

Given the normal different views that fat is badm skinny is bad, musclular is unrealistic, dadbod is good, blah, blah, blah. 

Lets just take it for granted that there is no pleasing everybody, what is your idea of a normal/acceptable physique. Seems easier than just complaining about what isnt.

I will start.

The image on the right. No this isnt me either, but closest I could find when doing a google image search using body fat.
Also no BMI mentions please, as this does not differentiate between muscle weight and fat weight:


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## Squirt (Jun 2, 2017)

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I apologize. I couldn't resist.


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## Veggie (May 22, 2011)

He looks fairly average in both imo tbh. I feel like if you aren't gonna go all in, you may as well just stay with the before (unless you're genuinely doing it for you and you're in it for the feel goods and blah blah). But that's just how my mind works. lol. 

I don't think that muscular is unrealistic either. I wouldn't peg him as particularly muscular. Decent abs though.


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## Veggie (May 22, 2011)

Also I think I'm confused about what you're asking exactly 

I mean, I'm not saying that either picture looks bad. Just that I don't see a large difference between the two. And I'm not entirely sure how that fits into the rest of the OP.


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## Red Panda (Aug 18, 2010)

Are you asking about ideal average physique, i.e. how people should be, or what you believe the average to be?


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## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Veggie said:


> Also I think I'm confused about what you're asking exactly
> 
> I mean, I'm not saying that either picture looks bad. Just that I don't see a large difference between the two. And I'm not entirely sure how that fits into the rest of the OP.


The one on the left is a fat (Im probably not quite as fat, but only just a bit less).

Not sure how to even word what Im asking (I know in my mind what Im after), just whenever someone (I will use @Sylarz as my example) mentions what their ideal look would be, there al;ways seems to be negitivity projected. So just wondering what these people would class as normal/ideal.


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## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Red Panda said:


> Are you asking about ideal average physique, i.e. how people should be, or what you believe the average to be?


What people believe it to be. Im not interested in status quo, more peoples own views.


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## Red Panda (Aug 18, 2010)

Caveman Dreams said:


> What people believe it to be. Im not interested in status quo, more peoples own views.


Ah, I see. So you believe the right one to be the average male body in your country, for example?


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## Veggie (May 22, 2011)

Caveman Dreams said:


> The one on the left is a fat (Im probably not quite as fat, but only just a bit less).
> 
> Not sure how to even word what Im asking (I know in my mind what Im after), just whenever someone (I will use @Sylarz as my example) mentions what their ideal look would be, there al;ways seems to be negitivity projected. So just wondering what these people would class as normal/ideal.


I feel like I was one of those who was maybe seen as projecting negativity. lol. So, there's usually a back story there, right? Haha. I've dated "meat heads" and I know a lot of work and specification goes into looking like that, so when I (felt I) saw, nah f those guys, but I basically want to be the male equivalent of a Victoria's Secret model (harder) and I think I can get there pretty easily by restricting my calories and fishing I just kinda went ehhhhhhhhhhh. It's not unrealistic as in you can't get there, but it is within that expectation I guess. Undermining it also sets unrealistic expectations for others and your views on how much energy they're expending to look the way that they do.


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## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Veggie said:


> I feel like I was one of those who was maybe seen as projecting negativity. lol. So, there's usually a back story there, right? Haha. I've dated "meat heads" and I know a lot of work and specification goes into looking like that, so when I (felt I) saw, nah f those guys, but I basically want to be the male equivalent of a Victoria's Secret model (harder) and I think I can get there pretty easily by restricting my calories and fishing I just kinda went ehhhhhhhhhhh. It's not unrealistic as in you can't get there, but it is within that expectation I guess. Undermining it also sets unrealistic expectations for others and your views on how much energy they're expending to look the way that they do.


It wasnt so much you in particular I was referring to. I agree with you on it isnt easy to get there. Sure there have to be sacrifices made, in my own case, TV, Alcohol (just a cut down, not T Total), healthier foods (no deserts and not much sweet food) and so on. But to me personally I class my health and fitness and my body as more important than those things I listed. But in regards to @Sylarz, after reading his journal, he seems to be putting in the effort and a goal is just that, something to aim for, not neccisarily judge oneself when comparing (different topic)


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## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Red Panda said:


> Ah, I see. So you believe the right one to be the average male body in your country, for example?


I wouldnt say average for my country, but I would personally class it as ideal and achievable.


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## Veggie (May 22, 2011)

Caveman Dreams said:


> he seems to be putting in the effort and a goal is just that, something to aim for, not neccisarily judge oneself when comparing (different topic)


That's wise and all in it's way but I have a hard time with that (getting better). I want to reach and really exceed it or I find it deflating. When I was younger someone told me that I come into something new and instantly compare myself to the best person in the room as criticism. lol.


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## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Veggie said:


> That's wise and all in it's way but I have a hard time with that (getting better). I want to reach and really exceed it or I find it deflating. When I was younger someone told me that I come into something new and instantly compare myself to the best person in the room as criticism. lol.


If I set a goal and I achieve it, thats when I lose momentum. Im guilty of the same thing, I still only compare myself to the best or those better than me, but if I start doing something (ie, fitness, martial arts) I do it to excel in, not just to be better than others. But I have had to learn not to judge myself, or at least not so harshly.


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## Queen of Cups (Feb 26, 2010)

When it came to setting my own fitness goals, I knew I had to keep it realistic. As much as I want to look like Kate Moss, that will never happen unless I have major surgery or make myself deathly ill and trying to achieve that look would only frustrate me.
So, I found people who were on all ends of the spectrum of my own body shape and looked for one I could work towards.


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## Sylarz (Sep 4, 2014)

Perhaps this post is overkill, but oh well.

I suppose there are two questions. And it pertains to male physiques.

Whenever I post an ideal physique I get push back from two sides. On the one hand, it's not ambitious enough, the ideal is too skinny. On the other hand, it's too ambitious, the ideal is too muscular. I suppose each side gets rustled for different reasons.

1. What is 'average' in your mind?

But what is average is useless because the average has become utterly horrible and it is a relative measure. I don't care about relative, I care about good. To understand how bad the average is today just consider that the average woman today weighs as much as the average man did in the 50s. Utterly degenerate.

What people consider 'normal, healthy and natural' is what I want to know. What are men supposed to look like? Or put more precisely.

2. What is a "*a realistic attractive and healthy looking physique for the average person if they tried without it taking over their whole lives*".

What do you think you could look like working out 7 hours a week and eating a good diet 90% of the time?

In my mind it's a body fat between 10% and 15%, with the muscular gains you could get in 2 years with a basic program (3 whole body lifting workouts per week, 1 hour each workout). Anything over 15% is getting sloppy. And having no muscle is just unacceptable in my mind for a man. You are _supposed _to have some. It's only an easy modern life that puts no strain on your muscles that is robbing you of the way you were designed by nature to look. Your body is not supposed to be indistinguishable from a woman's.

I think the idea that you need to workout a hell of a lot to be healthy and look good, ie. have muscle and be lean, keeps people complacent in their modern sloppiness, weak and fat. "If I wanted to look better, it'd take over my life. So it's not worth it." This is just one perverse idea that forms the overall structure of fat logic.

Leanness is all down to diet. You don't need to do 2 hours of cardio every day. If you burn the fat off, it's gone. It doesn't matter if you create a deficit through cardio or through restricting calories. If you had to workout hours a day to be slim, then why were people slim in the 50s?

Significant muscle mass is down to applying a growth stimulus and engaging in appropriate recovery (water, sleep, rest time, optimal protein intake), _consistently _week after week for 3 years at which time gains slow to a crawl. The science shows that you are practically_ wasting your time_ if you do more than 5 sets. And you get 90% of the growth with 3 sets. Total volume per week also follows a rate of diminishing return so insane amounts of volume per week is also _a waste of time._ Not only that, but natural lifters will burn out if they try to consistently workout beyond their ability to recover. I've been there and done that. I workout less these days because I know if I do more, I'm just going to burn out and be unable to perform by my next training session. Mentally, I'd workout hours every day if I knew it would make the process go faster, and if I could physically recover. In fact, I'm annoyed that working out more isn't the answer. Perhaps doing more cardio would increase my fat loss, but in reality it'll just make me hungrier. You can't trick the body like that. It knows it's in a deficit. Managing and controlling yourself through hunger will always be key. There's no way around it.

Growth stimulus can be maximized by optimizing the three major factors: volume, frequency and intensity. The often lauded "progressive overload" is just making sure that once you have adapted to a given load, you increase that load, by weight or volume, in order to readjust the intensity back to an optimal level, because the intensity will decrease as your ability to handle a given load increases.

Recovery can be maximized by optimizing protein, water and sleep.

All this comes down to the idea that* if you are lifting more than an hour and a half a day, you are probably wasting your time*. You'd get the same results. The body has a limited ability to change. And if you are _physically _able to lift more than that, you are a genetic freak or on the juice. I workout 3 to 6 times a week. Generally I workout 5 days a week. 3 lifting days, 2 cardio days. I do this not out of laziness but out of managing my ability to recover. My lifting sessions last about an hour. I could do more cardio but cardio never helps me lose weight. I do cardio for physical and mental health.

Herein ends my defense. For these reasons, I don't believe I am being unrealistic in how much time I need to spend to look my best (except maybe in absolute leanness).

I don't even think that Joe was overly muscular in the photo that I posted. _That _is why I chose it. There are other photos of Joe much more muscular, and I don't have any interest in being that big.

A realistic ideal look in my mind is Nick Bateman (prebulked).








(In the second photo he's more a bit more muscular, and is even better imo)

Edit: If you google Nick Bateman, you will see he's a fair bit bigger now. For this discussion, I'm talking about him like he is in the photos I'm posting, not the way he is now.

Some people would say he looks like he doesn't even lift. Other people would say he's unrealistically fit and it would be a lot of work to look like it.

He's just lean with a little muscle. He looks better with a little bit more muscle, but it's not a lot. I see no reason why most guys can't achieve this level of muscular development. Perhaps with a higher body fat, rather than 8%, more like 12-15%.

If you look at the Kitavan man I posted in my thread. He is about the level of leanness I consider normal, realistic, absolutely bare minimum standard.









This level of leanness (I'm guessing 15%) seems bare minimum standard to me along with Nick's level of muscular development.

Perhaps the closest photo I can find without long searches is this male ballet dancer.








Lean, flat stomach, but not ripped, with basic muscular development. In fact, yeah damn, I'd be happy with that.


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## Caveman Dreams (Nov 3, 2015)

Sylarz said:


> Perhaps this post is overkill, but oh well.
> 
> I suppose there are two questions. And it pertains to male physiques.
> 
> ...


Im beginning to wish I hadn't used the word "average", due to this reason. On average people appear to not care about their looks as apparently looks do not define them at all. If someone wants to be "average" then its simple, do nothing.

Anyway I have stopped caring about the health and fitness of the general population, if they dont care about themselves, why should I. Its a lost cause.



> 2. What is a "*a realistic attractive and healthy looking physique for the average person if they tried without it taking over their whole lives*".
> 
> What do you think you could look like working out 7 hours a week and eating a good diet 90% of the time?


I have had that comment made about me, about fitness has taken over my life (its funny going from the status quo of not caring to caring). Firstly an average of 40 minutes every 2 days in a gym is not "fitness taking over my life", bearing in mind I do not have a particularly physically active job so there has to be sacrifice made somewhere, its unavoidable. 

Secondly, as far as objectification and unrealistic goals go, if someone cannot take care of their own body and be disciplined enough to have a regime and stick to it (I dont class 40min in the gym on average as horrofic) then that speaks volumes about that persons view on life and how they will treat others and potentially how much of a shit they would give about potential children.


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## Not that guy (Feb 26, 2015)

And with my best school boy Monty Python accent I ask "American or European?"


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## Sylarz (Sep 4, 2014)

Caveman Dreams said:


> Im beginning to wish I hadn't used the word "average", due to this reason. On average people appear to not care about their looks as apparently looks do not define them at all. If someone wants to be "average" then its simple, do nothing.
> 
> Anyway I have stopped caring about the health and fitness of the general population, if they dont care about themselves, why should I. Its a lost cause.
> 
> ...


Right. To some people, working out at all is an amazing feat. 

Maybe some people consider even 45 minutes to an hour a day working out as 'taking over their lives'. Perhaps the extra preparation needed to cook some chicken or make a protein smoothie is 'taking over their lives'. Perhaps not eating out is 'taking over their lives'. I find 1 hour a day to look and feel your best to be a pretty basic standard of self care.

In fact, I'm starting to look at the photos I posted, and I'm thinking... is that too _unambitious_? Do I not already have arms around there? It's just how lean they are that sets me apart really. I bet I'd look roughly like that if I were that lean.

I'm not sure but I'd guess my arms are around there already, just with my pitiful regime, and I consider my gains pretty pathetic. I probably just need to get _that _lean.









Maybe his arms are bigger. But I'm not that far off. And girls swoon over this dude. Because he's _lean_.

Edit: OK, he also has a face sculpted by the gods, but let's ignore that.


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## shameless (Apr 21, 2014)

Sylarz said:


> Right. To some people, working out at all is an amazing feat.
> 
> Maybe some people consider even 45 minutes to an hour a day working out as 'taking over their lives'. Perhaps the extra preparation needed to cook some chicken or make a protein smoothie is 'taking over their lives'. Perhaps not eating out is 'taking over their lives'. I find 1 hour a day to look and feel your best to be a pretty basic standard of self care.
> 
> ...


His groin is sculpted. I wasn't even looking at the dudes face.


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## Red Panda (Aug 18, 2010)

Perhaps I'm kinda biased in this as I am in healthcare with a BSc in dietetics. I just think healthy is the most important so anything within healthy limits is acceptable. Body fat %, waist circumference, etc. Working out to have a healthy, flexible body, some strength and endurance are enough for me and most than what people do anyway. People who focus on aesthetics and strive for those, I've find are quite unattractive to me. I've met a few colleagues who were like that and they were incredibly vain, often emotionally unstable, like the stereotypical teen girl who diets all the time and cries herself to sleep after binging image. Gotta have a healthy mindset.


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