Monday/chest day, why wouldnt it be lol. 2 younger kids on the flat bench next to me. Both maybe Jr or Sr in HS and about 160lbs-175lbs both hitting 245lbs, I was impressed. I work my way up to 335 and out the corner of my eye I see the kids watching like I'm going to drop the weight on my chest lol. Go up to 365 and asked one of the kids to spot me, watching them spot each other I could tell they knew what they were doing. Tell him I'm only going for 3 reps, well those 3 came easy enough that I did 5. So in the meantime the kids are BSing with me and asking how old I was and how long I have been lifting. Told them I'm 45 and have been at it 6-7 years and I wish I had started when I was their age. One kid says, no disrespect, but I did not think you could lift that much as you dont look all cut up or jacked. Told them, never judge a book by its cover and dont ever lets someones physique fool you. So feeling good, said fuck it, shooting for 405 today. Asked the kid to spot me again and told him only shooting for 1. Other kid says "no homo, but can I record this" I literally busted out laughing and lost all my focus. Took me a few minutes to re-focus, wound up putting up 2 clean reps and the 3rd I stalled about a 3rd of the way up. Yes the kid recorded it.
Those are some serious weights I can only dream of, even the 245lbs.
As for being jacked, you're exactly right. I have a friend that is about 6' tall and was roughly 350lbs, most of it was fat hanging off of droopy muscles (his words). He went and a friend went on a liquid diet and started doing cardio and lifting. He got down to about 220lbs and looked so much better. They dropped the liquid diet and he ballooned up to close to 400lbs, but had continued to lift, so the new muscles were under all the fat. I had no idea of this history, as he would make self-deprecating fat jokes.
Back in 1994 or 1995 while at work my g/f stopped by for lunch. When leaving her tire was flat. Okay, no biggie, grab the jack and slap on the spare. Her brother had borrowed her car and took everything out of the trunk, including the spare and jack. Buddy says, "no problem, i'll lift the back of the car while you take the wheel off". What? Dude, it's a 1985 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera (the small one). He swore he could do it. Okay. I loosen the lug nuts and prep to get the wheel off and slap a block of wood under the rear hub to hold it up.
Sure enough he gets up against the bumper, grabs it, then deadlifts the back of the car up enough for me to get the wheel off. Fuck me. About a week later he was prepping his truck to put on a 8' Western plow. I'm at one end lifting with everything I have, dropping my nuts on the ground, and can't get it high enough for him to put the pins in. He walk over grabs it, and lifts it up like a puppy.
It was then he told me the history of his weight and lifting. Just couldn't believe how strong he was with all the extra weight of fat that he was carrying around. He finally quit smoking and started to eat healthy, following close to his nutritionist's orders but just couldn't drop the weight. Ended up peaking around 450-460lbs and had the lapro-band stomach surgery and got down to about 250lbs, but stresses from work put the weight back on. That was about 20 years ago, and he's walking around about 350lbs, but still watches what he eats, eased up on the drinking, and still no smoking. He can't believe he has lived this long.