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Buns

May 25, 2005 09:26 AM

Young women love them in a man. Evolutionary psychology tells us they should. Strong and solid buttocks are a sign of health and power in a male. But, buns seem to be shrinking these days. I am struck by the lack of glutteal musculature in males these days. The pants just hang on a lot of the softball players I see.

A male can't be powerful unless he has developed buttocks. They are the foundation of mobility for almost all athletic moves and they are the prime movers in any rapid or powerful move. Heavy lifting, sprinting, hitting or throwing all move off the drive from the legs and gluts.

Why are buns shrinking?

1. Too much sitting. Sitting cuts off the blood supply to the gluts and they atrophy. They just waste away from a lack of blood flow. Go into a truck stop and you will see men that may have started driving as young, tough truck jockeys whose pants just hang straight down from their belt after 20 years in the cab. Office workers are just as vulnerable.

2. Too little full body exercise. Dead lifts, squats, splits, power cleans, and overhead moves engage the gluts. Sitting in a leg extension machine does not. Hack squats on those slanted racks were designed to avoid developing the glutes by body builders seeking a Steve Reeves look.

3. Not enough sprinting. Glutes are essential to a powerful and full leg drive. Jogging doesn't do it. Running at varying speed does to some degree. Long term joggers tend to have a tucked under pelvis, tilted forward from the base, probably to protect their lower back. This reduces engagement of the glutes.

4. Too much alcohol. Alcoholics have no glutes. Check it out. They do all of the above: sitting, not exercising, no sprinting. But, they have another problem. They are so malnourished, particularly in protein, that they consume their own muscle mass to maintain their overworked organs. Their organs are busy trying to detoxify their bodies and are overloaded.

One of the strangest sights I have ever seen was inside one of those bars that open at 6:30 in the morning. I was delivering beer kegs in one of my summer jobs and went into one of those bars to make a delivery. At 8:00 in the morning there were drinkers sitting at the bar. What strange creatures they seemed to my inexperienced eyes. They didn't speak, they croaked from free radical damage of smoke and alcohol to their vocal cords. They had flourid faces (blood vessel damage, again from ROS). They had bloated bellies from protein deprivation and liver damage. And, they had no glutes.

With the stench, dark, smokey air, and bar lighting, I felt like I was in another world populated with strange creatures. I have never forgotten it.

I know two famous economists who drank themselves to death

and a few who tried (high level economics is hard to do and economists are contentious, hard-headed people; economics seminars often are a blood sport). Out of respect, I won't mention their names.

In their decline, they manifested all the signs of these pitiful and strange people in the 6AM bar. Their flourid faces gave them a look of health, they almost looked tan. Their bellies made them look robust. But, their glutes always gave them away; they were dying alcoholics.

So, women are right. Buns are good. They are a very reliable sign of health and power in a male; good genes and provision to a female in the evolutionary environment where buns would have been a powerful clue.

Over nearly 40 years of university teaching I have been reviewed many times by students. I've had good ones and bad ones and always seemed to inspire a love/hate relationship with my students. One of my favorite student reviews came just a couple of years ago. I was walking out of an elevator and a young female student said "Buns" just as the elevator doors closed. Now, that was a good student review.

· Evolutionary Fitness

Comments

Posted by: Flower Online [TypeKey Profile Page] at September 12, 2006 5:43 AM

Um, I think you know.

Actually hip waist ratio seems to be a big thing, according to Singh's research.

Posted by: Arthur De Vany at May 26, 2005 1:09 PM

Sure. Ok. And so, men are attracted to nice female buns because of, um, what exactly?

Posted by: Fugate at May 26, 2005 11:15 AM

Dear Professor Art
Another good post.
As we've discussed I was trained the old way on squats.For a lean guy my buns are rather well developed and this wasn't genetics.Before I did
squats my legs looked like stilts.
The only time I suffered a bad back injury was when I was doing one of those "modern"machines.
As far as your discription of alcoholism you are again right on the mark.That is what I do for
a living,I'm an addiction therapist.I see the stuff you talk about every day.
I have written a book on the subject.It's called "Things that work a no nonsense guide to recovery."
Any one interested can check it out on amazon.com.
I hope you will pardon I know this is an add free
site.but alcoholism,as you know is such a big problem world wide that if one person can be helped then I feel it is worth it.
I learn something everyday when I log in here not
only about training and diet but about life.
thank you for the site.
sincerely
barry
ps.
What do you say to all these trainers some of them pro football trainers who say squats are bad for you because they compress your spine.?

Posted by: barry bocchieri at May 25, 2005 12:37 PM

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