Is muscle memory actually a thing?

From what Ive read yes it's a thing.
Essentially muscle fibers are actually long cells with multiple nuclei and when they grow they just add additional nuclei. when you stop working out the fiber shrinks but you retain the nuclei and when you start again you already have extras for your current size

interestingly enough this is why a small run of test is so effective because it stimulates the extra growth in the cells. You guys are free to correct and thing I got wrong, me being a retarded layman and all.

>>42134708
Yeah this, it's more the building blocks are already there just kinda "dormant"

How long did you train before you got injured?

>>42134708
this, look up "myonuclear domain theory"

>>42134616
Yes it is, but it's got more to do with your nerves than with your actual muscles. When you perform certain actions, the nerves responsible for those actions get strengthened, and can fire faster and better. This is how fighters like Anderson Silva and Muhammad Ali can dodge shots so quickly. They're not consciously reacting to the shots, their nervous system already fired by the time they realize.

>>42134708
isnt it just like fat?
the fat cells stay there, they just deflate

>>42135481
Yeah exactly.

>>42135436
i disagree, in fighting if you were subconciously dodging you would form a pattern and people would take advantage of that

>>42135436
What this guy says about nerves is actually correct. Idk about the fighters.

>>42134616
Yes. Once you've built the muscle and neural connections your body will remember it always.
It's why being a fat sedentary out of shape dyel kid almost always equals a fat weak sick adult unless a serious life change and or drugs are involved.

>>42135436
this is not what "muscle memory" is referring to in the context of lifting weights and regaining lost size and strength, you are confusing it with the much more common usage of "muscle memory" referring to actions you have trained a whole lot

in the context of lifting, muscle memory means that due to additional nuclei produced in your muscle cells when you were lifting, you will get back to your previous level of size and strength faster after not having trained for some time

>Your muscles are composed of muscle fibers. Each fiber is a single cell. These cells have multiple nuclei (not just one like most cells of your body). Each myonucleus (nucleus of a muscle fiber) can only support a specific amount of sarcoplasm (the stuff inside a muscle fiber) via coding for the necessary proteins etc. To make a muscle bigger, satellite cells (cells floating around your muscle fibers) donate their nucleus to the muscle fiber. That extra nucleus can support a bit of extra sarcoplasm. Congratulations, your muscle just grew. When you gain muscle mass, you are gaining myonuclei for your muscle fibers to support the extra sarcoplasm in each fiber. When you restrict calories and lose muscle, the amount of myonuclei basically remains constant (unless you’re essentially under famine conditions). You can catabolize fibers themselves if you literally starve yourself, but otherwise you don’t really lose myonuclei.

from https://www.strongerbyscience.com/a-bit-of-everything/