lou was very strong . dont think otherwise . big boned man too .
Well, sure. When the man was gassed to the tits and got his bodyweight towards 300 ('70s) or OVER 300 (early '90s), yeah, he would have been strong as hell, almost by default.
However, again, there is a WORLD of difference between hitting several reps with, say, 405, and pressing
5-fuckin'-60! Arnold built a massive chest with
well under 500 pounds on the bench. The guy was lucky to hit a few good reps with four plates at his biggest and best.
In 2012, the very best bench pressers, raw but juiced heavily, move between 550 and 650, generally. There have been two guys who have officially done over seven ... and one of these, Scot Mendelson (715), hardly paused the bar, as is required for a lift to be truly legal. The press command came from Ed Coan and he says he was scared shitless for Scot so rushed the "press!".
Perhaps if Lou had specialized in the bench press all those years back he could have done upwards of 600 pounds; perhaps more. But he didn't and he never came close.