For more than 300 days, a man calling himself “The Crooked Man” has been doing something most trainers would advise against: repeatedly exercising only one trapezius muscle while leaving the rest of his body largely untouched. The result is a strikingly uneven physique, with one shoulder and upper back muscle ballooning far beyond the other, an outcome he says is entirely the point. The creator, who has documented the experiment on social media, frames it as a reaction to the viral TikTok trend known as “looksmaxxing”, where users obsessively try to optimise their appearance. His alternative, he says, is “looks minimising”.
‘I have the opposite problem’
Explaining his motivation in a video shared online, The Crooked Man said the idea came while scrolling through social media content promising improved attractiveness. “Why does the one trap guy work out one trap? It’s pretty simple,” he said. “I was scrolling TikToks in my Ferrari, and I kept getting these looksmaxing TikToks. “And they were like, ‘Do this, do that. You’ll look more attractive. You’ll get more women’, and it’s like, people have that problem? I have the opposite problem.” His solution, he said, was to deliberately chase asymmetry. “What was the best way to looksminimize? Become more asymmetrical,” he explained. “Work out one trap, it solved my problem. And man, it has worked like a charm.”
300 days of one-sided training
Since then, he has trained only one side of his trapezius muscle, the large muscle that runs from the neck down across the shoulders and upper back, day after day. After nearly a year, the physical difference is impossible to miss. One shoulder sits visibly higher and thicker, while the other remains comparatively undeveloped. Photos shared from before the experiment show a relatively balanced frame. Current images show a torso that still appears generally fit, but with a left arm and shoulder that are several magnitudes larger than the right, an extreme demonstration of how targeted resistance training can reshape muscle over time.
Before and after/ Image: Instagram/@thecrookedman10)
He has also detailed his daily diet, which he says is heavy on protein, including sardines, goat yoghurt, protein powder, ground beef and eggs, fuel aimed squarely at feeding hypertrophy on the side he trains.
Doctors warn of long-term risks
Medical professionals, however, have raised serious concerns about the approach. Speaking previously to LADbible, Dr Suhail Hussain said any short-term gains were likely to be outweighed by the long-term consequences. “There may be some short-term positives,” he said, “but there’s a clear musculoskeletal imbalance this man is developing.” Dr Hussain warned that extreme one-sided training could lead to “spinal misalignment, joint strain, compensatory injuries in surrounding muscles and even chronic pain”. “The body is designed for symmetry and balance,” he said. “Distorting that through disproportionate hypertrophy risks long-term orthopaedic problems.”
‘No real functional benefit’
While acknowledging that overtraining a single muscle might increase strength in that area, Dr Hussain said the trade-off made little sense. “As a doctor, I’d be concerned about the clear musculoskeletal imbalance this man is developing,” he said. “Overdeveloping one muscle group, especially to such an extreme degree, can lead to a range of health issues.” He added that there was “no real functional benefit” to overtraining one side of the trapezius muscle, noting that its primary role is support and stabilisation rather than isolated power. “Any benefits are unlikely to be worth it if the muscle is not being used in a way that justifies its size,” he said. Dr Hussain also warned that such imbalance could affect posture and gait over time, though for The Crooked Man, deliberately cultivating an uneven appearance appears to be the goal rather than a side effect. “Ultimately, balance and proportion are key in both health and aesthetics,” the doctor said. For now, The Crooked Man continues to post updates as he approaches a full year of one-sided training, a living counterpoint to the algorithms pushing symmetry, optimisation and perfection.