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I remember reading about a study (sounds like an urban myth, right? I'm too lazy to look for confirmation) about a year ago.
They took two groups and measured the amount they could bench press.
One group then went on to do a workout for six months that included free weight bench pressing. The second group went on to do a workout for six months that included using a machine for bench pressing.
After six months, the groups had their bench press measured again.
The results showed that the free weight and machine groups had comparable results with what they were using -- the free weight group increased their free weight bench press by about 10%, on average, and the machine group increased their machine bench press by 10%, on average.
However, the machine group's free weight bench press actually went down -- I want to say 20%, but could be wrong about this.
The point is, free weights use stabilizer muscles that a machine won't stress at all. If those stabilizer muscles atrophy, even if the "working" muscles improve, your real strength (as opposed to what you can move on a machine) effectively goes down.
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