WAG Could doing Olympic lifts cause too much bulk for gymnastics?

[NinjaMeals]

I am a former gymnast who was hoping to return to the sport and start adult competitions. However, I have recently begun Olympic lifting. Is there the risk that cross-training would lead to too much bulk for gymnastics?

 

[GymnastMomX2]

Doubtful. It’s HARD to bulk up, you have to follow specific lifting plans and eat a TON of calories. You have nothing to worry about.

 

[HopefulGymnast]

Even if you bulk up, I think strength gained will generally help. So long as you don't just go for aesthetic muscles but actually focus on building strength, I think it would benefit your gymnastics.

See also:

Gymnastics and Lifting Weights: Don't Fear Plates, Kettlebells, and Barbells.

This is an extremely controversial topic in gymnastics: should gymnasts use external weights and barbell work for strength. This “elephant in the room” concept is way too big of an issue to address in one blog post, but I still want to open the door with some thoughts. My opinion is that there...

shiftmovementscience.com

What's important though is that you don't just rely on olympic weight lifting for your strength. Gymnastics uses a lot of surprising little muscles that are used less in olympic weight lifting, so you'll need to train those too.

As for worrying about bulk, I've seen gymnasts of all kinds of sizes. I think so long as your body is healthy and suits you, you don't need to worry. (Healthy = you function well at this amount of muscle mass, fat mass, etc. You're not constantly tired or out of breath or hungry or overly full).
Unfortunately I can't share any clips of the different body types I see in gymnastics because it would feel a bit disrespectful to label people. However, as a bonus have a video of a non gymnast strongman doing a backflip:

 

[kecks]

I am a former gymnast who was hoping to return to the sport and start adult competitions. However, I have recently begun Olympic lifting. Is there the risk that cross-training would lead to too much bulk for gymnastics?

No. Not if you do not abuse steroids. Stay away from Kreatin too. The rest will sort itself out (body type, nutrition). Olympic weightlifting never causes "bulk", it is not power lifting let alone Bodybuilding. Completely different sports. Anyways as an adult gymnasts you will need all the strength and explosive and speed stuff you can get for which olympic weightlifting is perfect. That requires some muscle mass. This is fine. Keep it up!

 

[JBS]

I have several athletes that weight train… they have shown huge performance gains in gymnastics since they started this a couple of years ago.

 

[GymDadWA]

The Olympic lifts are suppose to be explosive as in as quick as possible, typically if you were body building to put on size you want the opposite (time under tension), so if you are doing the Olympic lifts correctly they should actually help you become more explosive and not really develop any bulk.