Fitness Goals: Reasonable versus Marketable

Be mindful of how you frame your New Years fitness goals. You may simply want to lose X pounds (not the greatest goal), complete a 5K run, or be able to perform pull-ups (better). But if you want something other than the typical January gusto and March fizzle, you should probably nudge the goals down by a notch or three.

Try to imagine long-term behavior changes that are helpful in a truly holistic sense. Various facets of life pose a challenge to achieving and maintaining health and fitness. Expect a struggle. Maintaining your priorities in life while changing wasteful habits happens only with careful thought and intent.

Here are a few important considerations.

Minding your diet is necessary.

But don't be unreasonable. Avoid cleanses, detoxes, intermittent fasting, nonintermittant fasting, and other plans that sound like fantastic extraordinary ideas. I often wonder why people resort to such foolishness when they haven't given simple, common sense changes a solid effort. Perhaps there is some psychological trick that extreme type diets provide. But they work against you in the long run when they fail to produce practical lifestyle changes.

Eating healthy does not help your brain, joints, and muscles to function in better posture and alignment. A healthy diet does not make you move with grace and efficiency.

Suppose that you manage to follow through with a highly restrictive diet and overzealous exercise plan. Your likely reward, at best, will be a short time of goal achievement followed by dropping out as "normal life" gets in the way. The body adapts to what it perceives as hard times and adjusts your baseline calorie needs.  You will find yourself tired and eating skimpy salads at every meal in order to avoid getting soft around the middle.

You don't have to be unreasonable with your diet when your physical activity level is somewhat on track.

Exercise is necessary.

But you don’t have to go crazy, especially if your diet is somewhat on track.

Without a proper foundation of flexibility and stability, and minding the details of HOW your body moves, the Insanity DVD, the mind numbing cardio, the epic full throttle heavy weight sessions, the Spartan Training, and competitive WODs, are all likely to cause more harm than good. And it's no fun to brag about Achilles tendonitis or lumbar radiculopathy on Facebook.

You workouts do not
need to look like this.

Suppose that you manage to remain uninjured in the extreme fitness plans. All the time and torture is rarely necessary. They are possibly beneficial for forging more elite fitness when you already possess elite fitness. But the 99% of us who have families, work, houses to maintain, and hobbies other than fitness will do much better with a more reasonable and structured exercise plan.

In the past I've watched TV preachers and wondered how they act in their personal lives. "Does that guy really behave that way as he goes about his day?" Recently I realized that the same critical eye should be applied to the high energy fitness DVD personalities.

Do your family, employer, and friends enjoy the version of you that must eat low carb, organic, etc. etc free every three hours and exercise 6 days per week? Some things are more important than...even deadlifts! Don’t imagine that what's best for a pro athlete or a fit 20 year- old living under their parents roof will be the best training plan for you.

Exercise is not an efficient means of achieving calorie control, a means that most of us legitimately do not have time for. Instead of merely burning calories, exercise to have fun being active with friends and family. Exercise to build strength, balance, and improve how your body moves, so that you feel willing and able to get involved with living away from the screen.

Perspective

Longevity definitely wins in the health and fitness game. But considering what you will look and feel like in a year doesn't sell nearly as well as the 6 Weeks to Slim program.

Shameless PT PLUG: You may want to take that amount of time to work on your nagging shoulder and irritable lower back before going for it in the gym!

Prioritize your health and don't take it for granted. Be fit, look good, and measure the costs. Sleep well, recover well, and manage the stress in your life. These are the unmarketable and completely relevant components of achieving what you really need out of a diet and fitness plan.

Get Fit and Stay That Way

What comes to mind when you think of getting fit? Eating well and exercising is a great place to start. There's a mountain of evidence that sustainability is a major problem. Over half of those who begin some type of diet or exercise program will quit within the first six months.  The percentage of dropouts only goes up from there, and this is not to mention the vast majority of the population who remain sedentary.


Most people are well aware of the numerous physical and psychological benefits of eating well and exercising. There are various theories as to why people stop despite having the best of intentions. Rather than making specific recommendations, here I hope to provide some perspective on how physical activity can work for you as an integral part of life.





Here are three common and legitimate barriers to staying fit.

We want what we want.

Many people set themselves up for failure right out of the gate by focusing on their goal rather than the process of getting there. We're naturally motivated by wanting to improve our health, appearance, or performance. But scientists have discovered that this type of motivation ebbs and flows and does little to effect long-term change.


Seriously not helpful.

Most people think that achieving their goals is a matter of "wanting it bad enough," having willpower or passion. Authentic and meaningful change always demands time and effort. Successful people feel the same distractions and lack of motivation, but they don't allow daily emotions to determine their actions. They commit to the daily practice of winning small victories and they find a way to enjoy the process. They keep an eye on big-picture goals, but they lean on routine and habit (rather than, say, watching motivational videos or visualizing the end) to work through the barriers.

We get busy and bored

On popular TV shows like The Biggest Loser, an unfit person has a team of trainers, doctors, and coaches who focus on them for twelve weeks in front of a national audience. Reality is not like that.

There is stress of work and family and keeping house and environmental and social pressures, all of which last for more than 12 weeks. It is not practical for a good spouse or parent or boss or employee to focus on themselves around the clock. There are limited minutes in the day, and we're just plain tired. Is it any wonder that we cannot bear the thought of driving to the gym to do time on an elliptical machine, and we're not in the mood for an hour standing in front of a peppy DVD coach?

Exercise merely for the sake of burning calories is tedium that has little staying power. Research has shown that we all greatly over-estimate the number of calories that we burn during formal exercise.

Remember that time when you strained and dripped sweat on some exercise contraption for thirty minutes? Your face dropped when it reported that you burned 350 (or so) calories. You stepped down questioning the validity of a machines ability to estimate your effort.

The bad news is that the machines estimate was probably fairly accurate. Your body would have used almost one third of that to simply maintain itself on the couch. So all you profited from the disciplined effort was a measly 250 calories. It's often the case that half of the 250 calorie deficit is wasted on an afternoon energy drink and eating a few purple tootsie rolls on the way out of the gym.

Will you spend thirty of your limited minutes on this earth, plus preparing and driving to and from the gym, all for 150 calories? Is droning on a machine wise use of the precious time that you allot to yourself?

"There is nobody who has time for that."

    -paraphrase, famous quote

Without getting into the details, a diet of high volume, nutrient dense foods is clearly the most efficient and effective way to achieve the energy balance required get in shape. Most studies find that people who are told to cut calories lose more weight than those who are told to exercise more, though a mix of diet and exercise is usually best. Also, exercise does make you hungry, although this seems to vary greatly among individuals.

If you enjoy the gym scene, have at it. The claim here is that for most people, exercise is relatively unimportant  for the purposes of energy balance. You do need to exercise for many reasons, but weight loss is not one of them.  And I believe that people seeing exercise as merely a way to burn calories is one of the reasons for all the burn-out.

We get injured.

Those who muster the diligence to power through these major barriers are rewarded with injury.

You can have too much of a good thing. Mechanical wear and tear on the body accelerates as we exercise with greater intensity and duration. At around three months into an exercise program, the body often begins to break down. Even gentle activities such as walking commonly cause foot and knee problems when applied for too long, too often. This is especially the case for those who often use a repetitive physical activity and lack awareness of their poor movement patterns.

Many people are also unaware of what a reasonable and sustainable fitness program would look like. Those who want results yesterday dive into the self proclaimed extreme diet and exercise regimens. Some of these require six, sixty-minute sessions of intense activity per week. I've made the claim that most people will improve drastically by starting a reasonable diet and playing horseshoes (or nearly any activity) that many days per week. Insanity soon becomes drudgery, and the solution is not the next 12-week program.

What the glamorous and extreme formulas promise in the short-term they lack in sustainability. While a home based fitness DVD program called "Reasonable" would likely not sell nearly as well as P90X or Insanity, it should. How will you look and feel not 12 weeks, but 12 months or 12 years from now?

A New Way to View Fitness

With those barriers in mind, here are three practical suggestions to help you stay in the game. Rather than relying on extreme exercise programs, meal plans, and restrictive diets, we benefit far more from periodically reflecting on what drives our beneficial and harmful patterns of behavior. This is essential because committing to a long-term active lifestyle is different and far more challenging than "getting in shape for swimsuit season" or any of the typical quick fixes. Your personal priorities, preferences, obligations, peers and environment are all far beyond any "four weeks to fit" exercise template.

     1. Informal Exercise

Seek out activities that you find enjoyable or productive. Strive to do something active every day. Just move! It doesn't have to be high in intensity or effort. This can be nearly anything that does not involve a chair or electronic device. Calories are burned, for sure, but that's not the primary intent. Get lost in the garden or on the bike trail. Find a dog that needs walked, join a soccer league, Frisbee golf, Zumba, play with the kids, or pick up trash along the roadway. Finding time for activity is so much easier when there is purpose and meaning beyond building the body or burning calories. If your daily work involves a lot of physical labor, you can probably afford to skip the informal exercise.


 “My own prescription for health is less paperwork and more running barefoot through the grass”          
          ~Leslie Grimutter

    

     2. Formal Exercise

Settle in to a consistent formal exercise routine that supports the demands of your life at work and play. Again, calories will fly, but formal exercise is primarily for one to three days per week of body maintenance and prevention. This type of exercise is a type of prescription. It's like eating spinach and teeth flossing: you do not necessarily enjoy it but you follow through because it's good for you.

Mindless "cardio," laying on the floor doing crunches, and sitting on various exercise contraptions do not count for much. Think of targeted flexibility, strength, and balance activities that keep your body functioning well. Movement quality is of utmost important, and this is where you may want to consult a movement specialist to obtain a specific flexibility and strength program that's based upon your individual goals, body movement, and activity demands.

     3. Goals Edit

Think through and create fitness goals that are based on what you do rather than something you are. For example, rather than "get in shape," you may want to be able to do a full pull-up or run a 5K in less than 30 minutes. If you want to lost 10 or 20 pounds, make a goal of scheduling 60 minutes, 6 days per week for informal or formal activity. Instead of falling for an extreme diet, create small daily habits like "eating a healthy breakfast and not snacking before dinner."

     4. Set yourself up for success.

What refreshes you? Will the camaraderie and accountability of a partner or group help you stay the course? Some people thrive off the social aspect of fitness while others prefer having space to breath and think. Whether or not you exercise with someone, share your goals with a trusted friend.

If you take the time to exercise and eat well, it's likely that some other part of your life will have to go. Think through this ahead of time and set up a three month schedule that reflects your top priorities.

Do what you need to do to stay active, because it truly is that important.

“Those who think they have no time for exercise will sooner or later find time for illness.”
  
       ~Edward Stanley


  - - - - - - - - - -

REFERENCES

Poor compliance and high drop out of those who begin a fitness routine:

Huberty, J.L., et al. 2008. Explaining long-term exercise adherence in women who complete a structured exercise program. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 79 (3), 374–84.

http://www.phcfm.org/index.php/phcfm/article/v

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3670684/

Trost, S.G., et al. 2002. Correlates of adults’ participation in physical activity: Review and update. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 34 (12), 1996–2001.

Extrinsic motivation does not last:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24944133

Different ways that people deal with a lack of motivation:

Whaley, D.E., & Schrider, A.F. 2005. The process of adult exercise adherence: Self-perceptions and competence. The Sport Psychologist, 19, 148–63.

Wilson, K., & Brookfield, D. 2009. Effect of goal setting on motivation and adherence in a six-week exercise program. International Journal of Sport and Exercise Physiology, 6, 89–100.

Better results from exercise plus diet rather than exercise alone:

Obesity 22; 325, 2014 PLos One 2014, doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0109849

Intermittent exercise is better maintained than sustained exercise:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3181282/

you are what you eat [and do]

Unpacking the proverb.  

For year, nutritionists and trainers have explained that a person cannot achieve their health and fitness goals by exercise alone. "You can't out-train a poor diet." I stand by this advice, and I've said it myself. A 30-minute run burns approximately 300 calories above and beyond resting metabolic rate. Most people can take in that many calories in 5 seconds. (Well, I can). Hey, lay off my eating etiquette! The point is that exercise to merely burn calories is a tedious means of achieving energy balance.

Dismounting the dieting/treadmill...treadmill.

There's definitely more to the story of how you look, feel, and function. What we eat will always be relevant, but it's not the bottom line. Exercise is important, and overall lifestyle even more so.

[runs away, screaming in terror]

So many of us are ultra particular about what we will and will not eat. Of course there's the gluten thing, which kind of ruins it for people who really do have celiac disease. I've recently heard intelligent people describing how non-organic apples are pure poison and having a little chocolate wrecks the immune system. Does everyone believe they are the exception to the basic tenets of human physiology? By definition, this cannot be the case.




How refreshing would it be to hear someone say "I'm not having cake right now because I already had a huge cheeseburger and some fruit salad. But really, right now I'm just trying not to be a hog?"But instead, we are far more likely to get "Take these non gluten free croutons off my organic non-GMO free range chef salad because, yeah, I can't eat those."

I wish people would quit kidding themselves. Don't tell me that you never go home and pound the m&ms. You could have, well, pretty much anything if you ate it less frequently and in reasonable amounts. I've seen what happens when an individual musters enough willpower to follow the diet and their metabolism crashes and they look and feel deflated. We pound the m&ms. And then, well of course - we need a more strict diet!

I think we are asking too much of our diets.

We place far too little value and effort in a common-sense approach to eating, and far too much emphasis on -our- particular diets. Most of these particular/fundamentalist diets have no legitimate research behind them and their rules are over-rated. But do you know what's under-rated? Not eating the whole bag. Eating your fill and holding off on desert most of the time. Getting enough sleep. Turning your attention to something productive when you're bored in front of the TV. 

The NKYCS (No Kidding Yourself Common Sense) diet is sufficient for those who are reasonably active and carry some muscle on their frame. Eat fruit, vegetables, lean meats/proteins, and minimally-processed foods most of the time. Eat what you need 80 or 90% of the time and a reasonable amount of what you want 10 or 20% of the time. The everday readily available foods can be healthy if we use a little forethought. 

Why is such common sense advice and follow-through insufficient? One of the reasons, I believe, is because we have it too good.

Options

We have so many options. After all, in America the poorest among us are not starving, but obese. Instead of using common sense and following through when it's challenging, we become diet Pharisees. We find or make rules to lean on when we don't want to think for ourselves. Rules to narrow our options. We look to ever compounding minutia that will deliver us to the health and fitness Promised Land, staring right past our freedoms and blessings and a million and one other more important things.

Comfort

Most of us take rather drastic measures to achieve comfort. Have you stopped to consider the typical grocery store and gym? What I witness at the Giant grocery store and Golds Gym is not typical of the human experience. So many of the foods, gadgets, machinery, and exercise programs are an attempt to achieve health and fitness without getting too uncomfortable. Comfort is king and we have lost perspective.

You sit on this behemoth so you can straighten your elbows.

The thing we're most lacking is not some perfect "Eat this" and "Don't eat that." The missing ingredient is simply making formal and informal physical activity a priority in our busy schedules. And what if we could add a willingness to gradually get acquainted with discomfort? This is not a call to injury, but to pushing through the inertia that got us where we are, to carefully increasing the intensity in all it's forms, to confronting weaknesses instead of doing what comes easy.

Informal activity

Informal activity is the movement behind life. You enjoy hiking or gardening or serving others or chasing your kids or playing softball or whatever you get lost in.  Calories are burnt, for sure, but this is not the primary point. The point is living life, and getting yourself busy with something productive or enjoyable. This could be just about anything that does not involve sitting on the couch or at a desk.

Formal exercise

Some people enjoy limited amounts of formal exercise, but please understand that the point is not enjoyment or merely burning energy. This is where you work on specific impairments in movement quality. Two or three times per week you emphasize building strength, balance, and coordination. Adding muscle is not just for middle school football players. Muscle keeps you functioning well and moving in life. Muscle on the frame increases energy expenditure around the clock and stops the cycle of more exercise and more dieting rules needed to maintain energy balance.

Formal exercise should not look like hours on the elliptical or sitting on various exercise machines. Whether or not you enjoy walking and running, exercise should include more than straight ahead "cardio."

In conclusion

It's a shame that the NKYCS diet would not sell. Asking people to shift their priorities, to get busy and be uncomfortable is also unlikely to be well received. I'm sure the next big diet will be sciency, flashy, and new. There will be a physique, realistic but with just enough digital alteration to promote discontentment. Add an exercise contraption, a sense of urgency, and dash of fear to complete the winning formula.

And remember that I'm no dietician or chemist. I'm just a physical therapy guy who will readily admit that ANY activity, even walking three hours per day or driving to the huge temperature controlled environment to sit on a tricep extension machine, is likely better than nothing at all.

- - - - -

You have heard that it was said long ago, "You cannot out-exercise a poor diet." But I say that you should not diet at all; neither by calorie counting, for this is unnecessary tedium; nor out of fear, for some form of hatred quickly follows; nor by an appeal to the past, for the blessings and curses of the present are inevitable.

Instead, seek common sense, self discipline, and gratitude. Use your time and abilities wisely. And stay strong.


a

Wall Sits for No One

Wall sits. 
Huh.
What are they good for? 
Absolutely nothing. 

Digging a hole and filling it up is more purposeful. A stroll down the driveway burns more calories. Getting up off the couch demands more flexibility. Jumping up and coming down is far more physically taxing. And brain training? Well, wall sits are like learning to write by pressing your face into a letter chart.

Do not confuse "difficult" with "worthwhile." 




Wall sits build endurance? Endurance at what? Okay - I'll give you down-hill skiing. But there are about a thousand more efficient and productive ways to gain strength and endurance for that. I'll also give wall sits "effort." While even the worst resistance training machines demand more strength, flexibility, and energy burn, none of them rival the misery of wall sits.

Wall sits are misery for the sake of misery. So if that's what your after...

Yeah, exactly. How do you progress wall sits? I mean, other than timing them until you collapse of boredom and muscle cramps. What you need is a creative, attention-getting way to increase the ineffectiveness of wall sits, piling on the misery with...even more lack of benefit. 

This? No. Oh - no.

When the lever arm is zero, torque is zero, no matter how large the force.

THIS is precisely why you should have actually learned your simple Newtonian physics instead of whining around and questioning why exercise science and athletic training majors have to take basic science courses. This is why you should always keep an eye out for applying those basic trigonometric functions and free body diagrams.

[Incidentally, it's also why a good trainer or PT is worth something.]

You can stack the weight of an entire hippo on someones thighs. I don't care if you have the Cat In The Hat himself come and balance on the person with a book on a ball with a fish and a rake. It's all the same to the wall sitter (well, until their patella dislocates or tibia splinters)

Instead, try some goblet squats or step-ups, side lunges or even burpees or pistol squats, suitcase lifts, jumping jacks, somersaults or pirouettes, or, or...

Trainer, coach, teacher, wellness coordinator, great uncle Jimmy... Please. You can do better than wall sits.

an exercise in perspective

I was beating the clock on a timed weightlifting interval in my backyard. Such things make for brief yet effective training if you're willing to push yourself. An appointed rest interval ended. The time to get moving quickly came and went, slipped away like a car speeding down the highway. Instead of starting the task at hand I kneeled and pulled a weed from the lawn.
- - - - -

1. Training: 

Training is select movement with a specific performance goal in mind. Variables like loading and reps, speed and rest are manipulated with intent. One session supports and builds upon the other, and the end goal is much too lofty and specialized for any single bout of effort. Training requires a chunk of time with structured progressions and regressions, recovery and peaking. This type of effort requires the greatest amount of discipline regarding what to do as well as what not to do.

Training culminates in astounding displays of nearly superhuman strength and speed and endurance. This is exercise.

2. Working out: 

Working out requires showing up, and it may require great effort and courage. This is what usually comes to mind when we talk about "getting in shape." You lunge or dance, kick or spin, or maybe follow what an instructor planned for the hour. You fit in a jog or brisk walk. You put in a DVD and repeat circuits of calisthenics. Working out may or may not have much structure. It's formal calorie burning, where you gasp and sweat and go on with your day.  

This too is exercise.

3. Corrective exercise and rehab:

This is highly specific and structured but less intense. You may sweat depending on your fitness base. The primary aim is to use movement as a means to gradually build tissue resiliency, improve joint stability or mobility, and ingrain more efficient movement patterns. You alter the mechanical forces on your bum knee by stretching the ankle in a specific way and building hip strength. This is physical therapy, gait and balance training, and I suppose some forms of yoga.

These count as exercise.

4. Work: 

Work involves a bazillion reps of moderate to low intensity. You lift and sort packages, mow the grass, pick green beans, build a shed, perform stretching and adjustments, wash windows, or pace hospital floors. Work is, well, work. It's the 40-plus hour per week grind that lasts for months and years. Work is also the weekend binge, like loading the barn with hay or painting the house.

A reminder of the obvious is warranted here. Work is awesome because at the end of the day you have achieved something beyond fitness. Your muscles tugged at your skeletal segments and your heart beat fast and it resulted in compensation or some other immediately tangible offering to the world.

Labor is definitely exercise. Every pile of split firewood warms you twice.

- - - - -

With this as a reminder, here are a few thoughts:

-The vast majority of human activity has always been in the realm of #4. Only in recent times have many of us needed #2 or had the time and means to take #1 very seriously. Most with a career that requires even moderate manual labor cannot comprehend why anyone would want to spend their limited leisure time and energy on #1 or #2. These days, the #1 and 2s just assume those folks are neglectful or lazy. Maybe they are. Or maybe they're just tired.

-On sports: Playing the game where winning is the primary intent is #1. Playing where the main goal is to have fun or exercise is #2. Pay heed to this and do not mix the two.

-The #1s often fail to realize that doing time with #3 will help them resist injury and achieve new levels of performance. It goes for #2 and 4 as well. In fact, excessive anything outside of #3, without attention to #3, will often result in taking you to #3. But as Ronnie Coleman would say, ain't no one wanna do no boring-ass corrective work.

-There is sometimes a fine line between #1 and #2, but often there is not. Currently there is a LOT of confusion between the two. Athletes who have a specific performance goal in mind are caught running around, giving their body too much variety, going through unnecessary random draining workouts, with all the effort serving to stifle their advancement in #1. On the other hand, those who aspire to simply be active and get in shape are isolating their muscles on resistance training machines or, even worse, performing relatively technical and heavy movements they don't need or want.

-The funny thing is when a person who is all about the workout and gym culture imagines their #2 is some kind of magical greatness when in fact almost any #4 would be a lot more demanding and beneficial for them. Pay someone to plow the snow so you can go to the gym and work bis and abs.

-Military personnel, police, and other public servants are the only true #1s. Or at least they should be. Where else in modern times may life and death truly depend on high level performance? Professional athletes are often impressive genetic freaks with sharp intellect and superhuman work ethic. But at the end of the day, win or lose, they go home and eat, sleep, and hang out with their friends and family.

-The point, I think, is to clarify exactly what you want out of your fitness program (and life). I will point you to the enjoyment of pursuing a purposeful #1 rather than merely suffering through workouts. Do not discount the myriad of psychological benefits that even a light #2 provides.

-Right now I waver between #1 and 4, and except for casual mountain biking, usually altogether avoid structured #2. There's no need for random energy burning with all the work, housework, children, semi-rec sport. I remain fascinated with the idea of being a serious athlete, the discipline and diligence, structure and progression of #1. But could this be fading? I did pull the dandelion when I could have set a PR.

Sucker didn't come easy.

The Slow, Boneheaded Way to a Big Dead Lift

So here's my story of reaching a raw (no lifting gear) 600 pound, triple body weight dead lift. I wrote this because being a strong dude plus personally experiencing my unscientific study of N=1 means that I know everything there is to know about dead lifting.

But really, there are hundreds of good dead lifting resources out there and I don't claim expertise in power lifting. My forte is more in the realm of using weight training to stay healthy and be awesome outside of the gym (sports performance and rehabilitation). But since more than a few people have asked the question...

A past client and friend messaged me:

Hey Bob how did you get your dead lift up so much? I've been stuck for a long failing to hit 315 (lbs).

That question could be taken anywhere. But I can narrow my answers down a bit since I know the person asking the question. His commitment level, access to equipment, coach-ability, and work ethic are definitely not in question.

First, here are a few principles:

TIME:

Believe it or not, lifting as much as you can for one rep is absolutely not the best way to drastically increase how much you can lift for one rep (at least not for a while). You probably need to spend a long time consistently dead lifting weight that is relatively heavy for you but you can handle with perfect form. If 315 pounds is your assumed 1-rep max that means multiple sets of something around 275 - 300 pounds for 3 to 5 reps. This is heavy but totally within your power to crush and repeat. You do need to lift heavier weights and practice pulling heavy singles (like >90 % of your 1 rep max), but give it at least 8 weeks before you increase the load and cut reps.

This was 590X1

Appreciate the inverse relationship between load and time under tension. Heavy loading (like one rep for max effort) does wonders for improving the nervous system but the time under tension is insufficient to stimulate muscle growth. Lighter loading (like something you can handle for 8 to 12 reps) provides plenty of time under tension, but the load often isn't heavy enough to really cause muscle tearing and rebuilding process that provokes sizZZE.

That's why the magical formula for actually increasing your YOU is to hit between 10 and 20 reps total, usually over 3 to 5 sets of somewhere around 80 to 85% of your 1-rep max. This applies to all of the major lifts.

REST:

Also - you definitely need to recover better. Ensure at least 2 days of recover from any leg or back work prior to your regular dead lifting day. Really, recovery is everything. Let go of the machine training altogether.

ACCESSORY EXERCISES:

Should include chin-ups, row variations, and squats. Some big lifters swear by glute-ham raises but I've never done-a-one. Getting your lats and hips strong through is key. But again, rest from these at least 2 days prior to dead lifting and don't squat so intensely that it interferes with recovery for dead lift day.

FOCUS YOUR EFFORTS:

Cool it with conditioning. I'm not saying to be lazy or go Sumo. But you MUST understand that exercising for specific, focused performance is not the same as exercise for what our culture is obsessed with - namely wellness and weight loss. Exercise for the sake of creating energy balance (burning calories) is a time-consuming, labor intensive, and recovery hindering endeavor. Get leaner by adding muscle to your frame and eating relatively clean, not through burning calories through "cardio."

It's such a basic idea, but one I see poorly handled quite often. A focus on strength means that you will save the "leaning out" or weight loss or what-have-you for another time after you are a dead lift beast.

Now here are a few specifics of my experience:

I had my first go-round with dead lifts at the age of about 24 right after graduating from college. That ended after five (or so) months when I experienced a fairly significant lower back strain (and likely disc herniation) while trying to dead lift 365 pounds.

It was a while before I went at it again. By 30 years of age I could pull 405 fairly easily but I was focused on squatting very heavy and for high reps.

[See 20 Rep Squats Are Not For Everyone.]

At the age of 34, after a two year dead lift sabbatical and no preparation, I threw 405 on the bar and hurt my back severely. About 6 months after that I decided to build back the correct way, as if I were training a client. 405 came back easily and then increased to about 455. At the age of 35, after a long cycle of regular heavy training, I was able to eek out 500 lbs for one rep.

At the age of 36 I tore my right pectoral muscle and then about 9 months after that broke my left hand. I was able to keep strong through turning my gaze back to squats which didn't involve those areas. By my 37th birthday I was back to dead lifting around 475 for reps. I once got 500 for 5 reps.

Then...THEN...something profound happened. I started to actually listen to someone else. Matt said I still was not recovering well enough. He said I should practice more single reps, even with relatively less weight, and build it up. He said I should cycle intensity rather than pushing my limit with 4 heavy sets of 3 to 5 reps each and every week.

So 10 weeks before hitting my 600 pound goal, dead lift days looked something like this:

Week 1: Four sets of 500 X 5
Week 2: 500 X 3, 535 X 1, 535 X 1, 555 X 1
Week 3: 500 X 5, 535 X 3, 555 X 1, 555 X 1
Week 4: 500 X 5, 535 X 1, 555 X 1, 565 X 1
 and then I'd take a week of lighter work like 405 X 20

At one point I hit 565 X 2 and 585 X 1, took a de-load week, then gradually pushed it back up over four weeks in the above manner.

Did I mention that this requires patience and a lot of awfully hard work?

On PR day I wore my PR shirt and after warming up pulled 500 X 1, 535 X 1, 565 X 1, put a good song on and pulled 600.

[For some reason I find the missing beats and discordant sounds of this 

particularly worthy for providing the calm-crazy it takes to hit a big rep.]

What else did I do (and not do)?

I quit playing basketball Monday nights since this left little recovery for Tuesday afternoon, my only option for heavy lifting day.

When the weights were getting up there or I was due to push some jumps in loading, I backed off the intensity of sprint training. For a while I made my weekly "Plyo Fridays" more into power events with short sprints and powerful jumps but nothing grueling. 

I quit squatting intensely, made them into a DL accessory rather than a main event. I squatted hard but not like I prefer to be ground into the floor.

I committed to eating a lot. I thought this may cause some weight gain and I would have to accept at least a little softer middle. But I gained only around 5 pounds and noticed no real difference for better or worse in my abs.

Of course, you can always not listen to me and plow your own slow, injury laden, boneheaded road to something ; )

beyond calorie burning

Most people know plenty about the idea of energy balance, calories in - calories out. What many don't fully understand, despite the millions of diet and exercise resources out there, is that exercise is an inefficient and sadistic way to work at day-to-day energy balance.

Remember that time when you huffed and puffed, strained and dripped sweat on some exercise contraption and 30 minutes later your face dropped as it reported that you burned 340 calories? You stepped down deflated, wondering if the stupid calculation accounted for boredom and hustle.

The bad news is that 340 was probably ball park accurate. And your body would have used almost one third of that to simply maintain itself on the couch. So all you profited from the disciplined effort was a measly 250 calories, and you blew nearly half of that by tasting your friends energy drink and eating two of those purple tootsie roll things.

= at least 90 minutes on the treadmill

Thirty of your limited minutes on this earth, plus preparing and driving to and from the gym, all for 150 calories? As the band Switchfoot said, we were meant to live for so much more than burning out on machines that accomplish little more than calorie burning. Or something like that.

Don't get me wrong. Activity is better than inactivity. Jogging, biking, Zumba, and elliptical...ing all pay dividends for your cardiovascular and mental health. And if you enjoy endurance activities or compete at them, have at it. The claim here is that these forms of exercise are not nearly as important as most people think for the purposes of energy balance.

Without sounding too sophisticated, not eating crap is clearly the most efficient and effective way to achieve the energy deficit required to lose weight and get in shape.

The good news is that all the time on the treadmill or stationary bike or elliptical isn't necessary. The bad news is that there will be no more weak excuses about not having time to get in shape.

Before marching over to your local gym under dark of night with torch and pitchfork, please know that exercise is important, but maybe not in the way that you thought. Exercise signals the body to retain muscle when it's dealing with a calorie deficit.

The body knows that muscle is costly, metabolically speaking. When you take in less calories than you expend, it's the first thing to go. Yet having more muscle means that the body burns more energy every second of every day which in the long-term means that you can eat more burritos without tipping into calorie surplus.  Besides, muscle is functional and looks good and is the root of all awesome.

farmers walk  !

 Now, which of these two activities sends a bigger and better "signal" for your body to retain muscle as you cut a slight calorie deficit? Which requires more time to effectively "get in shape?"

recumbent bike (zzz)

It has been shown that endurance exercise on top of a calorie deficit causes only a slight retention of muscle and decreases bone density as compared to cutting calories and doing no exercise at all. Meanwhile, all those who regularly lift relatively heavy things are enjoying diamond-like bone density, enjoying each others company over meatball subs while riding the train to Awesomeville.

So in summary, you can devote much of your life to learning how to properly take in calories and then burning those calories or you could try:

1. Be active. Find physical work that you enjoy or is productive, basically anything that doesn't involve computers or TV or video games.

2. Lift heavy things for 30 or 60 minutes, including a little corrective/prehab type work, two or three times per week.  **Do this in order to build and retain muscle so that you're not caught on the treadmill of more and more exercise and less and less food just to maintain energy balance.**

3. Eat foods that are minimally processed. Load up on vegetables (if you have to) and lean protein. Loosening the diet about once a week supposedly helps both psychologically and physiologically. So live a little too.

Local to Mechanicsburg, I would suggest the knowledge and accountability over at http://www.synergyfitnesspt.com/
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don't train like it's 1985 [please]

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a question

 
Since ranting against long drawn out cardiovascular exercise (L-doc) may not be the best way to inspire change, my serious question is this: can you afford to spend that much of your valuable time and energy doing L-doc?

The repetitive, mind-numbing exercises like jogging or that elliptical thing at 60 to 80% of your maximal heart rate for at least 40 minutes costs you something. There are many factors, but you must consider the possibility that random cardio is easily and often over done.

But first the disclaimer.

Who am I to tell someone not to engage in physical activity that they enjoy? When well below 40% of adults exercise at all? Whatever the age, if you're up and moving away from the work desk, TV, and computer, great for you.  I'll admit that L-doc does have some value as a component of many athletic and fitness goals, though less than you would think. If cardio workouts are compatible toward your sport- or activity-specific training goals, then certainly, have at it.

split squats - always worthwhile

But with your hectic work week, your limited days of summer break, your finite physiological ability to adapt, can you afford to devote the majority of your training time to random cardio? Are you stuck in the 1980s cardio overkill mindset where if a little is good, then a whole lot must me better for all things?

what say you?

You, 160-pound forward who wants dunk by next basketball season? You, middle aged mom, hoping to avoid achilles tears and rotator cuff impingement while playing softball, tennis, or freeze tag with the kids? You, old timer, wielding exercise in the fight against the many tired heads of frailty?

And you...YOU coach or parent of a female athlete? My next exhibit in the case for less L-doc is a lunge for the jugular. I must drag out the dreaded anterior cruciate ligament because women suffer about 8 times more ACL tears than men, and about 1 in 100 high school and 1 in 10 collegiate female athletes tear an ACL.

that moment

Imagine that it's the fourth quarter of an intense soccer match-up. Every player on the field is suffering some degree of neuromuscular fatigue (certainly not for lack of cardiovascular conditioning). Our female athlete lunges off her left leg to avoid a defender, recovers with the right leg, redirects her body, accelerating to the ball.

What happens internally at the knee in that moment ? Do the quadriceps have enough power to decelerate the forward glide of the femur on the tibia? Do the hip and trunk muscles sufficiently hold the femur from buckling and twisting into the knock-kneed position? Has the athlete ingrained correct movement patterns beyond consciousness; summer time training memories of how the hips, knees, and feet should feel and react during leaps and cuts?

An off season 7-mile jog does virtually nothing to address the neuromuscular and biomechanical patterns of an at-risk female athlete caught in that moment. (I also suspect that various balance exercises on unstable surfaces do little to prevent ACL tears, though the literature is mixed, and that can of worms is hereby reserved for another writing.)

how now shall we train?

ACL and weekend warrior sprain/strain prevention is simply just    plain   smart   training.

The details depend upon the individual, but the weekly routine should include a day or two of plyos and/or form sprints. A day or two of full body resistance training with emphasis on the legs and "core." Maybe a day or two of L-doc for some, but certainly not all athletes.

And of course, intervals for a relatively healthy grandma look a lot different than our teenage soccer player. 

Intelligent training is structured with a few individualized goals in mind; goals beyond "stay toned" or "maintain an 8-minute pace over 5 miles." Even if distance running is your main end, rather than thousands upon thousands of linear, mid-range ploddings, why not mix it up with just a little whole body, multidirectional movements that address aspects of both strength and coordination?

Swap a day or two of the same old thing for something different now and again. Emphasize power over efficiency as the brain is tuned into a progression of pre-stretch/counter-movements. Do it now, before I'm tempted to bust out some Jane Fonda lyrics.

sprinters aren't happy about all that L-doc

Evidence that a little less L-doc does help endurance athletes, especially from an injury-prevention perspective:

Improvement in Running Economy After 6 Weeks of Plyometric Training

TURNER, AMANDA M.; OWINGS, MATT; SCHWANE, JAMES A.

Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research. 17(1):60-67, February 2003.

Maximal Strength Training Improves Cycling Economy in Competitive Cyclists

Just a few of many other sources that support my rant   question.

 

Sunde, Arnstein; Støren, Øyvind; Bjerkaas, Marius; Larsen, Morten H; Hoff, Jan; Helgerud, Jan

Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research. 24(8):2157-2165, August 2010.

Hewett GD, Myer TD, Ford KR, et al. Biomechanical measures of neuromuscular control predict anterior cruciate injury risk in female athletes: a prospective study. Am J Sports Med. 2005;33:492-501.

Meeuwisse WH, Tyreman H, Hagel BD, Emery C. A dynamic model of etiology in sports injury: the recursive nature of risk and causation. Clin J Sport Med. 2007;17:215-219.

Ekegran CL, Miller CM, Celebrini RG, Eng JJ. Reliability and validity of observational risk screening in evaluating dynamic knee valgus. J Ortho Sports Phys Ther. 2009;39:665-674.

Myer GD, Brent JL, Ford KR, Real-time assessment and neuromuscular training feedback techniques to prevent anterior cruciate ligament injury in female athletes. J Strength Cond Res 2011;33:21-35.

 - - - - -

Spare the Arm III: Training

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Following Parts I HERE and II HERE, this concerns strength training and conditioning for pitchers. Traditional training may be worse than useless. These are strong words because I feel pretty strongly that training "like a pitcher" may in fact increase the chance of injury.

HERE'S WHY:

The traditional training of pitchers focuses an awfully lot on the arm, often to the exclusion of other critical elements in the total body effort of throwing. While certain precautions and modifications are needed to maximize benefit and minimize risk, pitchers are often treated far too gently in their training.

The conventional bodybuilding formula of training isolated body parts is not best for specific performance gains. Leave it to baseball guys to go ahead and do exactly that with their rotator cuff and core. The Throwers 10 is a series of shoulder and wrist exercises that are still referenced and used as the thing for getting and keeping a healthy arm. Traditional ab training is one or two steps removed from increased arm strain.

Lastly, what's with all the distance running? When close to 60% of pitchers suffer injury each season, should they be using their time running poles and shagging fly balls? Plodding along may even add to the typical imbalances that result from the repetitive asymmetrical forces involved in throwing. That's not even to speak of the peak power reductions that occur when endurance training is added to strength training (1).

Not hitting 90 m.p.h.

Baseball requires repeated doses of TNT, not a flow of kerosene; drag racers exploding on jet engines, not a Prius brigade. The very best thing we can do to spare the arm of a pitcher is to make the rest of the body more powerful, symmetrical, and athletic.

HERE'S HOW:

It happens by challenging the entire athlete with safe and effective ways to become rotational monsters.

The majority of the body's muscle mass is not in the rotator cuff. Tugging on rubber tubing in a manner that isolates the infraspinatus does not help pitchers create a huge amount of force in the legs and core. It does not help them efficiently transfer that force through the core and into the throwing arm. The upper back, lower back, and lead leg quadriceps muscles relieve the puny rotator cuff muscles from the entire duty of decelerating the arm.

Just like isolated forearm training does nothing to increase bat speed (2), wrist curls do not help in the acceleration and immediate deceleration of the violent "whip" that just produced a 60, 70, 80, even 90 mph fastball. Thick forearms are simply an indication of a heat throwing or long ball hitting person. How many athletes can perform 20 chin-ups or 70-pound "lawn mower" rows with weak forearms?

Check the massive 1 rep-max wrist curl! Surely he can hit 90 m.p.h.
.

Pitchers should spend 10 minutes or working the tubing exercises that support balance and fine-tuning of the scapula and humerus. Then get down to business. The legs the legs the legs. The legs. Train the legs for increased force generation (strength training) and power (plyometrics).

Leg training ties nicely in with lower back and core training. As mentioned above, traditional core training may actually contribute to injuries of the shoulder (and low back and oblique strains, too). Do pitchers need more activities that influence the scapula and ribs slumped down and forward toward the pelvis? That's exactly what crunches promote.

Uh, okay. And your fastball?

Weight training and core stabilization exercises on a big ball look fun and imaginative. Too bad they don't help with performance in a healthy population (3). Placing the body in unstable "environments" does cause increased activation of core muscles because the body shifts into "get by and survive this" mode. Sometimes this is a desired effect in a rehabilitative setting, but it comes at the cost of coordinating efficiency for peak power.

Gravity and firm earth underfoot are the athletes greatest activity-specific allies for core training. Hit those single leg squats, deadlift variations, plank variations, medicine ball throws, and activities that cause the core to resist rotational forces.

Conditioning is another good example of how traditional methods may actually promote injury and decreased performance. The jogging and pole running that pitchers do to "flush" muscles and keep them "in shape" enough to last seven or nine innings may promote imbalance and "flat" legs. Where did this distance running for pitchers come from? I've attempted to trace the orginal rationale for pitchers doing long drawn out cardio (4, 5). [1985, people!]

In the 80's. And I don't mean 80 m.p.h.!

Another recent report found that only power performance tests (and not endurance tests) could identify elite from average basketball players (6). In other words, elite hoopers are no more or less aerobically fit than average players. But they are far more powerful. And if power is a primary factor in a sport like basketball, imagine how it applies to baseball?

Not hitting 90 m.p.h.

Do pitchers have in mind the torso of a Roger Clemens or a (marathon champion) Kipruto Kirwa? Keep in mind that the few elite athletes who can pull off high power and decent endurance are not the norm. Whatever our genetic potentials are, we can cause the one body that we're given to be maximally adapted for only one thing at a time. The guys who "make" their body best suited to bench press 800 pounds (huge force generation) or run 800 meters (anaerobic endurance) have intentionally left behind their own maximum genetic potential for throwing hard (rotational power).

Pitching demands sporadic short distance sprints and regular short duration, high velocity bursts of rotational movement. Weak, immobile bodies will break down the fastest. While honed athletes are not made from hot-dog eating between innings, no amount of cardio will make up for laziness and poor eating habits. Intense plyometrics, sprinting, sprint training, and power training will provide plenty enough physical conditioning to get the far majority of young men through the ninth inning.

For a relatively thin 17-year old, let's concern ourselves with not getting shelled (and therefore keeping the pitch count relatively lower) before we worry about his ability to endure seven innings of baseball.

Go hard with sprints and resistance training. Go slow; like with low intensity dynamic warm ups and corrective movements that provide mobility benefits. But all power athletes need to avoid that middle area where they don't go slow and don't go fast. They need to condition their bodies to explode with muscular and elastic energy.

Or for elastic energy, they could go the traditional route and strap on the big rubber band shaking machine (7).

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1. Effect of Concurrent Endurance and Circuit Resistance Training Sequence on Muscular Strength and Power Development. J Strength Cond Res 22:1037-1045, 2008

2. Effect of Wrist and Forearm Training on Linear Bat-end, Hand Velocities, And Time to Ball Contact of High School Baseball Players. J Strength Cond Res 20(1):231-240. 2006.

3. Trunk Muscle Activation During Dynamic Weight-Training Exercises and Isometric Instability Activities. J Strength Cond Res 21(4): 1108-112. 2007.

4. Recovery from short term intense exercise: it's relation to capillary supply and blood lactate concentration. Eur J Appl Physiol Occup Physiol 52:98-103. 1983.

5. Programming and Organization of Training. Sportivny Press, 1988.

6. Physiological Testing of Basketball Players: Toward a Standard Evaluation of Anaerobic Fitness. J Strength Cond Res 22: 1066-1072, 2008.

7. Big rubber band shaking machine does not promote athleticism or loss of body flab. J of Fitness Gimmicks Bob Likes to Joke About, 2010.