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Slow Down
A question was asked recently at one of our free fitness seminars that prompted this article. A member told me that she had been pushing to increase the repetitions and/or weight during her workouts and was experiencing some joint pain. My advice – “use slower movements.”
Our articles and seminars have stressed the following main points to Coach’s workouts:
1. Coach’s circuit provides muscle building exercises for all major muscle groups of the body.
2. If you work every major muscle group “progressively,” you will gain muscle. “Progressively” means that you must increase the number of repetitions and/or weight each time you complete your workout, if possible. For example, on a particular exercise you can perform 10 reps with 30 pounds. Your next workout, perform 11 reps with 30 pounds. Your next workout, perform 12 reps with 30 pounds. Once you reach about 15 or 20 reps, increase the weight to 35 pounds. That’s progression.
3. Write down your progression. As you see your strength increase, you are building muscle. As you build muscle, your metabolism increases and you burn more calories all day long.
We have many members who are effectively using progression. However, some members also are performing the movements way too quickly. Trying to move quickly to get a “burn” in the muscles really doesn’t do much for building muscle. That’s just a buildup of lactic acid.
Muscles are pushed to grow by progressively increasing the amount of work that you make them do. However, speed of movement really does not matter. Let me repeat, the speed of movement does not matter! When you use quick and jerky movements in your weight training workouts, you impose huge forces on your joints, tendons, and ligaments due to the rapid start and stop motions at the upper and lower portions of the movements. Most weight training injuries occur due to these rapid motions and/or poor form.
Use a slow steady motion. Take 2 to 5 seconds in each direction of each weight training exercise. Learn to count the time in your head. For example, when doing a chest press exercise, you should take at least 2 seconds from the point that your hands are near your chest to the point where your arms are fully extended. Then take at least 2 seconds to bring the weight back to the starting position. Use the same speed every time. Find a speed that works for you (2 seconds, 3 seconds, etc.). Then use that speed every time so that you get used to the movement.
So use great form and progressively push your muscles using slow movements. Your joints, ligaments, and tendons will thank you with years of pain free workouts.
“Burn Fat While You Sleep
Burning fat while you sleep” sounds like the tag line for a new wonder drug that will melt off fat with no effort whatsoever. In my opinion, these drugs often are dangerous to your health. However, you do burn fat when you sleep, and there is a way to increase the amount of fat that you burn while you are sleeping.
Your body burns calories to fuel physical activities. Your body also burns calories through the thermic effect of food (TEF). The TEF is the energy required for your body to digest foods. Your body also burns calories just to sustain your life, even while resting. This is called your resting metabolic rate (RMR). This information may not be surprising to you. However, it may come as a surprise that your RMR accounts for approximately 65 to 75 percent of your total daily caloric expenditure.
So let’s say that you require 2,000 calories per day to maintain your current weight. Then 1,400 of those calories are burned each day without any effort on your part. If you sleep for 8 hours per night, about 467 of those calories are burned while you sleep.
So how do you increase the number of calories you burn while you sleep? Regular readers of our articles should already know the answer: build more muscle in your body. The number of calories that each pound of muscle burns per day is of considerable debate. However, a good average is about 45 calories.
If you are new to muscle building exercise, you will build muscle fairly quickly. Let’s say that you are able to add 10 pounds of muscle over a period of time. By adding that muscle, you are automatically burning 450 additional calories per day. If you sleep for 8 hours per day, then you burn one-third of your calories at night. So you are burning an additional 150 calories each night.
Burning a pound of fat requires burning approximately 3,500 calories. At 150 calories per night, you will automatically burn enough calories to burn one pound of fat every 23 days. While 1 pound per 23 days is not dramatic, it’s not bad considering that you are burning that fat in your sleep. In addition, when you are sleeping, you burn the highest percentage of calories from fat than at any other time of the day. If you include the additional calorie burning power of your increased RMR during the rest of the day, you’ll be burning enough calories to total of 3 pounds of fat every 23 days without lifting a finger.
I don’t know about you, but I really like the thought of burning more calories while I’m sitting at my desk, watching TV, or sleeping at night. I also like the added muscle tone and improved shape that I get from additional muscle.
Remember, you only build muscle with “progressive” resistance exercise (increasing the number of repetitions or the weight used every time you work out, if possible). So, as long as you’re not experiencing any pain, don’t forget to write down your results and gradually increase your repetitions or weight each workout to see real results and burn more fat while you sleep.
The Best Cardio for Fat Loss
We have written a lot of articles about the benefits of building muscle. Building muscle and eating a healthy diet is absolutely the best way to get fit and lose fat. But you also need to include cardiovascular exercise that progressively pushes your cardiovascular system in order to stay healthy.
Which type of cardio exercise do you think will help you reduce the most body fat?
A) 1 hour of walking
B) 30 to 40 min. on an exercise bike (moderate intensity)
C) 4 to 10 min. of sprints on an exercise bike (high intensity)
Many of you probably won’t believe it, but the answer is C. How could that possibly be? How could 4 to 10 min. of exercise do anything for you?
As discussed in an article published in Metabolism (1994) Volume 43, pp.814-818, Angelo Tremblay, Ph.D. and colleagues at the Physical Activities Sciences Laboratory, Laval University, Quebec, Canada performed experiments to assess the fat loss attained by long, moderate level exercise versus short, high intensity exercise. One group of test subjects performed 30 to 45 min. of moderate stationary cycling at 60% to 85% maximum heart rate 4 to 5 days per week for 21 weeks. Another set of test subjects performed 10 to 15 bouts of 15 to 30 sec. intervals or 4 to 5 bouts of 60 to 90 second intervals at very high intensity over a 15-week period. Each high intensity interval was followed by a resting interval.
The group that performed long, moderate level exercise burned more than twice the number of calories as the short, high intensity group. However, the short, high intensity group lost 9 times as much subcutaneous fat over the 15-week period as the long, moderate level exercise group lost over a 21-week period. The reason for the increase in fat loss was determined by Dr. Tremblay et al. to be due to changes in metabolism after exercise that led to higher calorie and fat burning. High intensity interval training actually is thought to rev up the metabolism for anywhere from 24 to 48 hours after exercise.
So, what do you do with this information? I feel that some form of progressive cardio work each week is important to your cardiovascular health. Burning fat is secondary. However, if you do wish to burn more fat and improve your cardio health simultaneously, a good choice may be high intensity interval training (HIIT).
By definition, HIIT training is very intense. If you wonder whether you are healthy enough to perform HIIT, make sure that you check with your doctor first. Then be cautious and start slow and work your way up. An example of HIIT cardio on a stationary exercise bike would be the following:
1. 5 minute easy pace warm-up
2. 5 minutes of intervals (alternating between 30 sec. very hard pedaling and 30 sec. at a slow resting pace)
3. 5 minute easy pace warm-down
Push yourself as hard as you can during the hard part of the interval. However, be careful not to injure yourself. If you need to, increase your intensity gradually over several weeks. And don’t do HIIT cardio too often. Stick to 2 to 3 HIIT sessions per week. You need a day or two of rest between HIIT cardio sessions to let your body recuperate.
If finding time to exercise is a problem, this may be the solution. With 10 to 15 minute sessions, 2 to 3 times per week, you could burn 9 times more fat than spending several hours per week performing moderate level cardio. You’ll also push and improve your heart and aerobic capacity like never before.
The Cure for Aging?
Addressing the annual meeting of the American Dietetic Association, William Evans, Ph.D., of the USDA Human Nutrition Research Center, was quoted as saying (concerning the normal changes associated with aging), "it's changes in muscle mass that may trigger all of the other changes." The possible cure for aging: build your muscles.
The average person reaches the peak amount of muscle mass in their body at about age 25. They then lose approximately 10% of their muscle by age 50. After age 50, they lose around 45% of their muscle mass over the next 30 years. As Dr. Evans notes, this dramatic loss of muscle may cause a chain reaction that triggers most other aging processes in the body, including skin aging, organ aging, and brain aging.
A big part of that chain reaction: fat gain. Muscle burns more calories than fat. As you lose muscle, your metabolism slows down. As your metabolism slows down, you gain fat. As you gain fat, a plethora health risks come into play. This is why most people seem to constantly gain weight after about age 30. This is why you hear people say, “I can’t eat the way I used to – it goes straight to fat.” You can’t eat the way you used to without gaining fat because your body has less muscle and is burning less calories.
As you become even more aged, the loss of muscle mass can eventually lead to total immobilization. In fact, more than any other reason, people end up in nursing homes because they are no longer strong enough to take care of themselves.
The medical term for this muscle loss with aging is Sarcopenia. This term was coined in 1988 by Dr. Irwin Rosenberg, who leads the Human Nutrition Research Center on aging at Tufts University in Boston. He coined this term to get the medical community to take it seriously. In the past, most people just accepted the gradual weakening of the body with age as inevitable. However, this perception is gradually changing, and we are learning to slow the aging process dramatically.
There are some causes of Sarcopenia that appear to be unavoidable. These include neurological changes that reduce the number and size of muscle cells, a reduction in muscle-building hormones, and decreased muscle protein synthesis. However, the prime cause of Sarcopenia can be eliminated. That cause is lack of muscle use.
Sarcopenia often comes as a real shock, because many people who are affected by it are active. For example, people who regularly perform aerobic activities but do not engage in resistance training assume that they are in excellent shape. However, as the body loses muscle mass, the areas of the body that lose muscle mass actually pad themselves with fat. So, as these active people age and lose muscle mass, they maintain the same weight and appear as if they are maintaining their fitness. However, their percentage of body fat is rising as their muscle deteriorates.
Of course, the solution is resistance training. Progressive resistance training for all major muscle groups in your body combined with good nutrition will prevent more of the effects of aging than anything else you can do. And your current age does not matter. Many studies have shown that progressive resistance training will add muscle to your body at any age. This has been proven with test subjects in their 80s and 90s. Keep in mind, progressive resistance training means you must keep increasing the number of repetitions and/or resistance used so that you progressively push your muscles to grow.
As you build muscle in your body, you reverse many of the effects of aging. You stimulate the body to continue to produce many of the hormones that help your body keep from aging, such as HGH (human growth hormone). You maintain strength that allows you to be active in other areas of your life. You maintain muscle tone that improves the shape of your body. And, you reverse the chain reaction that we discussed earlier: body fat. As you gain muscle, you speed up your metabolism and improve your overall percentage of lean muscle to body fat.
Is building muscle really a “cure” for aging? Right now, it appears to be the closest thing. So, if you want to do something about the effects of aging, make sure your weekly routine includes a nice dose of pumping iron. You’ll be glad you did in the future when you are running up the stairs of the nursing home to visit your friends who didn’t.
How are you doing on your New Year’s resolutions? For many of us, one resolution is to get in shape. And, for many of us, it seems to be the same every year. We start the year with great intentions. We start a new exercise program or diet, and things are going great. Then, after a month or two, it has become easier and easier to skip going to the gym or to eat whatever the heck we want. We’re right back where we started.
Why does this happen? It happens because we don’t see results fast enough. We begin our exercise program and work our butt off. We go to the gym 4 or 5 days per week, but we don’t see any results. We get on the scale and the weight is not going down after a week or two or four. So we lose heart. We begin to get down on ourselves and think that we must be doing something wrong.
How do you keep yourself motivated? Progression is the key. What does that mean? Your body doesn’t lose much weight after 4 or 5 workouts, unless you lose a bunch of water weight or burn up a bunch of muscle. What do you want to lose? FAT! Am I right? You want a lean, toned, muscular body with not much fat. If you go to the gym and do the same workout over and over again, you are doing almost nothing to improve your body. What? How could that be? Because, your body doesn’t respond to simply moving around on the treadmill or lifting some weights. Your body responds to continually increasing stimulus.
You must continue to increase the weights that you are using or the number of repetitions. You must increase the speed that you are walking or running. You must GRADUALLY increase the effort that you are putting out. This is what causes your body to respond to exercise.
So how do you do this? You write everything down. When you go to the gym, write down that you walked on the treadmill for 15 minutes at a speed of 4.0 and a grade of 0.5. Write down that you did 10 repetitions of 50 pounds on the bench press machine. Write down every exercise that you do. Then, after resting for a few days, go back to the gym. This time walk on the treadmill for 30 minutes at a speed of 4.1 and a grade of 0.5. Do a set of 11 repetitions with 50 pounds on the bench press machine. Continue with a slight increase for every exercise that is included on your current workout. Do the same exercises each week in your workout plan, but increase each one SLIGHTLY. Do the same routine each week for at least 6 to 8 weeks, but increase the difficultly of each exercise a little bit every time.
What does this do for you? It allows you to improve EVERY SINGLE WEEK without overdoing it. It allows you to SEE on paper exactly how much you are improving each week. It gives you confidence in yourself. Then keep going. See that you are making slight improvements every week. You won’t see dramatic changes in your body after one or two weeks. But, if you keep progressing gradually, I promise that you will see the results after 4 or 5 weeks. It will sneak up on you. You’ll look in the mirror and think “WOW, this is really working.” Then keep going and going. Keep progressing further and further and you will see results month after month.
You don’t need to work out for hours each week. Find a routine that works all the major muscles in your body (including your heart muscle). Do the routine two to three times per week. This should take only 30 to 45 minutes each time you go to the gym. Then use a little more weight, a few more reps, or a little higher speed each workout. That is all you need, and you will get in better shape.
We all know that when you burn more calories than you eat, you lose weight. When you burn fewer calories than you eat, you gain weight. We’ve also written about the ability of muscle to increase your metabolism. Every pound of muscle burns approximately 45 calories per day. But, today we’re going to talk about one additional benefit of muscle building exercises. When you use progressive muscle building exercises, you actually turn your body into a blood sugar burning machine instead of a fat storage machine. To be more precise, you turn your muscles into a blood sugar absorbing and burning machine. This then helps your fat cells avoid absorbing the blood sugar.
When you eat, your body breaks your food down into blood sugar (glucose). Glucose is then used to power your body. When your glucose levels stay high due to eating more than you burn, your body stores the excess energy in your fat cells.
Your muscles absorb glucose and store it as glycogen. Glycogen is the primary fuel that your muscles use when you are performing weight (resistance) training exercises. When you perform a resistance training exercise, you should try to use every ounce of strength that you have in that muscle. By using all the strength in the muscle, you burn up much of the glycogen in the muscle. Then, in order to prepare itself for future work, the muscle starts sucking up glucose to rebuild the glycogen supply.
If you perform weight training exercises for every major muscle group in your body two to three times per week, those muscles have to spend a day or two replenishing the supply of glycogen. So your muscles are constantly sucking up blood sugar. Your muscles have become a blood sugar absorbing machine.
If you continue performing progressive resistance training for every major muscle group two to three times per week, you’ll add muscle. (Remember, progressive resistance training means pushing yourself by adding repetitions and/or weight each week.) Again, each pound of muscle burns about 45 calories per day. So, you’re burning extra calories in two ways: 1) You’re burning more calories every day due to extra muscle; 2) You’re absorbing more calories every day in order to replenish the glycogen in your muscles.
I recently read a study on the use of weight lifting (resistance training) to reduce the gain of intra-abdominal fat that many people experience with age. The study adds to the body of evidence that resistance training is extremely important to getting fit.
Intra-abdominal fat is the fat that surrounds your internal organs. This fat is very unhealthy. It increases your risk of cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, and certain forms of cancer. It also leads to the apple-shaped body that nobody wants to have.
The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health. It involved 164 overweight and obese women in Minnesota, ages 24 to 44. One group performed supervised progressive weight training exercises for about one hour, two days per week. The other group was given brochures recommending 30 minutes per day of exercise. The women were asked not to change their current diets. The study lasted for two years.
At the end of the study, all of the women had increased their fat level - obviously due to their poor diets. However, the group that did nothing other than resistance training showed a 7% increase in intra-abdominal fat, while the other group showed a 21% increase in intra-abdominal fat. Weight lifting alone caused them to gain much less intra-abdominal fat. The weight lifting group also lost 4% of their total body fat while the other group’s total body fat percentage stayed the same.
If the weight lifting women in the study had also changed to a healthy diet, their total body fat reduction would have been much greater, and I have no doubt that their intra-abdominal fat would have been reduced as well.
So why does this occur? Remember that body fat is only increased when your calorie intake exceeds your calorie expenditure. The same goes for intra-abdominal fat. As people age, they tend to lose muscle every year. When you progressively lift weights, your body has to expend energy to repair and build the muscles. As the body gains muscle, your body burns even more calories to fuel the muscles. This new gain in calorie burning power of the body burns up calories that would normally have turned to fat.
You can’t target areas for fat loss. This includes intra-abdominal fat. You must lose fat throughout your entire body. If you eat poorly, it will be very difficult to ever lose body fat or intra-abdominal fat.
If you build muscle using the correct progressive resistance exercise routines and eat a healthy diet, your body will burn fat faster than any other way. Combine this with progressive cardio exercise, and your cardiovascular health also will improve. If done correctly, the whole process can take as little two to three 30 to 45 minute workouts per week.
