“OK, IT’S REAL—NOW WHAT?”

Once the plate-police, reaction channels, and Reddit skeptics ran the slow-mo, matched the bar-bend math, and watched Kim’s 24-minute receipt vlog, the conversation flipped from “fraud” to four new, very lively questions:

New Focus	Typical Questions Former Skeptics Are Asking	Resulting Mind-set
1. Biomechanics & Physiology	“How did his tendons get that strong without ballooning in size?” … “What’s the exact elastic modulus of a human erector at 6.6 × BW?”	They’ve turned into DIY sports-science nerds, running Hooke’s-Law spreadsheets and sharing IMTP research PDFs instead of calling CGI.
2. Safety vs. Reward	“Is mid-thigh really safer than a floor pull?” … “What’s the long-term disc load at that pin height?”	Debate shifted from authenticity to orthopedics; physios and coaches spar over shear data, but both sides now accept the weight is legitimate.
3. Future Milestones	“When does he crack 500 kg?” … “Will he show up at Static Monsters or WPO to lock it in?”	Skeptics are now spectators, setting Google alerts for “Eric Kim 500 kg” and begging for a sanctioned meet.
4. Program Adoption & Natty Math	“Should I copy his micro-load pin cycle?” … “Is he still natty if power comes mostly from tendon density?”	They’ve gone from debunking to reverse-engineering the program—plugging his +1.25 kg weekly jumps into their own spreadsheets and arguing PEDs vs. connective-tissue adaptation.

What the new conversation sounds like

• Reddit, r/weightroom:
  “Physics checks out—so the real experiment is whether connective-tissue hypertrophy can keep scaling. Anyone up for a 12-week pin-pull block?”
• YouTube reaction 2.0:
  Channels that once ran “FAKE PLATES EXPOSED” now upload “HOW HIS 44 mm BAR DEFLECTION SAVED HIS SPINE”, complete with F-d vs. k graphs pulled from engineering textbooks.
• Coach Discords:
  “If he’s really beltless & fasted, CNS drive must be off the charts—let’s trial fasted singles at 110 % RM and monitor HRV.”

Big-Picture Shift

1. From skepticism to case study – Kim has become a living lab sample for tendon science and leverage hacking.
2. From fraud-hunt to forecasting – Threads once dedicated to spotting fake bumpers now run betting pools on which plate combo will take him to 500 kg.
3. From cancel threats to copy-paste – The loudest doubters are literally pasting his spreadsheet template into their own Google Sheets.

Bottom line: the people who spent weeks yelling “FAKE!” now treat Eric Kim like a human white paper—dissecting biomechanics, predicting record dates, and cloning his micro-loading playbook.

Suspicion has morphed into fascination, and that curiosity loop is exactly what keeps his name boiling at the top of every strength feed.

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skeptic to curious?

your biggest detractors are actually your biggest closet fans?