Urban legend or not?

[_William_]

Er...

Sometimes on the 'Net I come across people saying things like:

I'm sure you've heard the stories about the lady who was in a rollover accident, how her baby was trapped inside. With surprising strength, this 110-pound woman managed to shift the one ton vehicle and save her child.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/animalpak3.htm

Frankly, I've never read about any of this in the news, nor have I seen any valid references to any news articles that documented things like this. Is this just some stuff "newspapers" like the National Enquirer made up, or is there there some truth to this?

[PHILBERT]

It happens, adrenaline can do some weird stuff. My uncle moved a car off my cousin when he got run over. Then again, my uncle is 6'3" and looked like a body builder at the time.

[Former castleva]

I have to admit that I am not sure what you were after here.
Anyway,whether the story about a woman of size X lifting a car of size Z is true or not is not the case,there´s no doubt that someone could "push" their limits under such a situation,there are limits to it though (telling you something you do not know?)
It has to be kept in mind that tales,stories and "urban legends" pop up all the time,they may also grow in size as they get passed on.Such stories are seldom infallible.

[Surferdude]

Yea she moved it...what they didn't tell you was that the car had no engine in it!!!

[Crimson Phoenix]

I heard similar stories from very valid sources...

Also, most of us are not aware of the potential we all have in our muscles. People who would die in the past from tetanic crisis caused by the toxin had their muscles so tense they'd litterally crush and shatter their own bones...legs, thorax...

we are litterally powerhouses of muscular strenght, each of us. But most of the time this power is under strict control of nervous inhibitory mechanisms...

[joedoe]

The human body will surprise you when in a life threatening situation. For example, I am a pretty poor swimmer, but still managed to pull two of my sisters out of a rip once. I knew they were poor swimmers as well, and I knew I was stronger than them, so I had no choice but to dive in and help them.

When the adrenaline kicks in, and the prospect of losing a loved one looms, you can do extraordinary things.

[Serpent]

And with the car thing, what they don't tell you is about the ripped and torn tendons and ligaments and hyperextended joints that also occurred. It's not like you turn into superman for 5 seconds - there's some pretty serious repurcussions. However, the human body is a remarkable thing!

[Shaolin-Do]

I turned into super man for 5 minutes once... Dont have anything to show for it tho.

[Mr Punch]

One word:

snopes
.
.
.
****... that's three words...

[Ben Gash]

The thing that I find odd is that it's highly unusual to be trapped under the wheels of a car (and if you're trapped under a flipped car the story doesn't have a happy ending).

[Kristoffer]

"CHI"

[Ford Prefect]

Your strength can be magnified greatly when under adrenal stress. The adrenaline itself doesn't give your muscles super strength, but it uninhibits your nervous system which will then fire a greater percentage of muscle fibers than you normally could. (for your own safety, most not trained people will only fire 50-60% of potential fibers at once) It would be hard to imagine a 100 lbs woman having the potential strength to deadlift 1,000 lbs though.

[TonyM.]

These stories have been floating around since at least the midsixties when I first heard one. Very doughtfull.

[Christopher M]

You can isolate a muscle and shock it with enough electricity to cause maximal contraction - and find quite a sensible limit to it's strength.

[Budokan]

It's an urban legend. I expect a similar story was floating around the time of the Trojan War about a Grecian woman who flipped her chariot and had to pick it up to save her baby....

The fact these stories exist says more about human psychology than it does human anatomy....