I never really look in the off topic section but I feel kinda bad for all the times guys have asked me to chime in on something an I haven't. My bad!!
As far as strong athletes go, its very hard to grasp unless you've personally competed in or been apart of either bodybuilding, powerlifting or strongman. I have an advantage because when I first started weight training I had my eye on bodybuilding. I started training when I was 13 to get as big as humanly possible. As the years passed, I became interested in bodybuilding and began training more in that manner. As I reached my late teens, I decided that I didn't want to compete in a sport that is so subjective plus I wasn't to keen on standing on stage in a speedo. I then took up Powerlifting and after setting a few national records made the switch to strongman where I've set a few World Records. So I have an intimate understanding of each sport. Here's the best explanation of each sport and the functionality of their strength.
In bodybuilding, the goal is to overload the muscle and get it to grow as large as humanly possible. You will target certain muscles more then others to get a symetrical look and use a workout routing that will have you dong numerous exercises, sets and reps to try and force the muscle to grow. The type of training bodybuilders do makes them pretty good athletes and in some cases well conditioned. Bodybuilders are strong but if your looking for an athlete that can push or pull the most amount of weight, it would be a powerlifter. Guys now days are benching and deadlifting over 1000 lbs and squating over 1200 lbs!! This is with proper support gear! Super heavyweight Plers focus on getting their bodyweight as high as possible to help move this massive amount of weight while focusing on very basic excersises like squat, bench and deadlifts done in various different ways. No bodybuilder can come close to pushing the amount of weight top Plers are pushing. Having said that, Bodybuilders are more effecient athletes and in the course of a training session put a far greater load on each muscle. Think of it this way. A bodybuilder benching 300 lbs for 10 reps net a total work load of 3000 lbs for that one set. A powerlifter doing a triple with 400 lbs is only 1200 lbs. Plers will do more sets but their workload is still going to be far less.
Now the fun part, Strongman!! This is just my opinion but I feel Professional Strongman are the most powerfull athletes on the face of the earth, hands down. You see, we walk and move with weight that would crush most other athletes. In a typical day training, I will carry a weight of 300 - 400 lbs in each hand for a distance, carry a yoke on my back thats close to 1000 lbs for a distance, press a 300 - 350 lb log overhead for reps, load stones that weight up to 555 lbs. This type of training has crushed many! It took me a short time to adapt to a budybuilders type workout when I was younger. TO recover from a Pling type workout of competition took maybe a few days. A typical strongman contest takes me weeks to recover from!! Imagine if you will competing in 5 strongman events one day, then the next day competing in 5 more, then having one day off followed by a final with 7 events!! This is what we had to do for a competition in the Ukraine this year and in 06 and Worlds this year!! As a pro, 99% of SM contests are more then one day!! I cant describe to you how difficult it is to perform at the level we do lifting and moving with the weights we do for several days. Many have seen my video's but I'll post them up here for those that missed it. This will give you an idea about real functional strength!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOEggOiPPjc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mjgvgdz4Yu4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtNP_8Bz3EI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UokIiBvPlVc
