Have You Noticed This?

In case you haven’t heard me mention the first 10,000 times I’ve said it, I love working out in the great outdoors.  And barring ungodly weather (over 95 degrees or under 25 degrees) I try to get out consistently.

I know many of you exercise outdoors as well.  And those of you who don’t, I know you have seen many people workout outside.  Enough probably, that you can probably relate to an observation I’ve made. 

Perhaps you’ve even made the same observation:

With almost no exceptions, people who work out outside – people you see at the track, park, jogging roadside, etc. - fall into one of two categories:

1. The minority, who move quickly and are fit and lean.

2. The overwhelming majority who move slowly and are unfit.

And here’s the important lesson for all of us to learn today, my fellow connoisseurs of all things fit and lean:

People who are lean, are lean because they move fast.  They are NOT moving fast because they are lean.

People who move slowly are unfit because they move slowly.  They are not moving slowly because they are unfit.

I cannot be clearer about the sequence of causation here:  If you move slowly, you will never become lean and fit.

Yes, I understand that moving fast is a relative term.  I know you will never be Usain Bolt.  But you can move faster than you do now.  You can push the pace a little.  You can make it so you get short of breath and have to stop to take a break.  Then you can repeat that process.

THAT is what gets your metabolism up, and THAT is what helps you get fit and lean.

Moving slowly only reinforces an already slow metabolism.  Moving slowly ensures time is being wasted at the least, joint issues from the repetitive motion at the worst.

Push the pace a little.  Get out of breath.  Keep it short and sweet, but breathtaking (literally).

That’s what the lean and fit do to get leaner and fitter.

Any questions, let me know.

Exercise Will Not Help You Lose Weight (?)

“What?” you may be asking…

Well the statement above is technically correct, depending upon a few factors.

I think I’ve read more on nutrition in the past two years than I did in the two decades before that.  Of course, most of the writings and discussions are centered toward fat loss and how to lose weight.  Invariably however, there will always be a short chapter, appendix, or side note about exercise and the role it plays in fat loss.  (Exercise suggestions written by a nutritionist…hmmm…red flag #1.)

The book I re-read most recently by Gary Taubes, “Why We Get Fat”, which was an extremely influential book in the areas of diet and nutrition, claimed that exercise will not help you lose weight.

In spite of what you may expect, I’m not going to attack him for disagreeing with my position on exercise, which I’m sure you are aware differs from his.  His opinion on exercise, like all his opinions on nutrition, are backed by facts.  And he certainly isn’t the only person to make this claim – as I said most non-fitness professionals do.  There is strong evidence that suggests that exercise won’t help you lose weight.

But…the studies and evidence that suggest that exercise doesn’t help lose weight, are based on people who exercise incorrectly.  They are studying exercisers who are doing it wrong.

That would be like me saying most people who diet don’t lose weight.  Which happens to be 100% true.  But the problem is that I’m leaving out the fact that most people “diet” incorrectly.

Ditto for exercise.  True – most people who exercise do not lose weight.  But it’s because they exercise incorrectly.  Don't blame exercise.

In almost every case they do either or both of the following:

• They do not pay attention to quality of their movement.  This leads to injury and/or joint pain, both of which either end an exercise regimen or greatly limit its effectiveness.

• They perform the wrong kind of exercise.  They continue to believe the dogmatic nonsense that long duration, steady state, low to moderate intensity exercise works.  It doesn’t.  If you don’t see that, then you aren’t watching closely enough.

Now, I’m not even going to get into the obvious – there are other reasons to exercise besides trying to lose weight.  You will look better, you will feel better, and you’ll be healthier.  Again, assuming you’re doing it correctly. 

But the bottom line is that exercise – if it’s the right type of exercise and if it’s performed correctly – will help you lose both weight and body fat.

For more on what types of exercise are right for YOU, and how to do it correctly, keep following us.

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Two Simple Ways to Fatten Up

Getting and keeping the slim, strong and sexy look is TOUGH.  Unfortunately, getting fat is pretty frigging easy.  One needs to look no further than commercial gyms and outdoor exercise areas, where the majority of the participants are overweight.  (That seems a little incongruous, no?  More on this later…)

What we have to do as people who are interested in health as well as looking great, is to avoid the two black holes of exercise and nutrition.

But if you really insist on keeping those spare tires and muffin tops, here are two suggestions:

 1. Keep performing low intensity exercise

This will ensure your metabolism never rises.  In fact it will continue to drop due to the natural aging process and due to your proclivity to always make your activity low intensity.  Your walk/jog/treadmill jaunt will burn very few calories comparatively speaking, and the calorie burning process will stop as soon as you stop.  The next time you eat – even if it’s something small and healthy – you will have put back the calories you just used, netting a break even on fat loss.  In other words you just wasted your time.  And the repetitive nature of your jaunt is also likely to be causing joint problems.  More on that later as well.

2. Keep believing grains are good for you

"Healthy Grains" is an oxymoron.  Evidence is overwhelming that sugars and grains are harmful both long term and short term.  Harmful meaning they will make you sick, both long term and short term.  I’m talking about mood swings, depression, ADD, ADHD, violent episodes short term and cancer(s), heart issues and cognitive disorders like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s long term.  But grains and sugars will make you fat as well, and that’s what we’re here to discuss.  A really good way to get fat is to keep your insulin raised all day.  What’s the best way to do this?  Keep having grains and sugars.

For those of you looking to lose the muffin tops and spare tires, make sure you keep following us:

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Discover the Secret to Flexibility

If you’ve read my stuff before you know my feelings on stretching:  It’s probably the most misunderstood and misused aspect of fitness.  Frankly, there isn’t even a close second.  The overwhelming majority of exercisers take what is an extremely complex area of bio-mechanics and dumb it down to “If I pull on this muscle, that’s a good thing.”  Sorry, it’s a wee bit more complex than that.

A recent pulled muscle – my own quadracep – provided me with an example to prove my point:

I perform sprint intervals in my own workouts pretty often.  In fact, sprinting may be my favorite exercise in terms of return on investment.  The keyword here is “sprinting”.  100% all out sprinting.  The kind that if you do it for more than a few seconds you have to slow down or stop.  The exact opposite of what the shuffling limpers you see on the side of the road as you’re driving to work do.

Sorry, back to the point:

During one of my recent workouts, I felt a pull in my quad while sprinting.  Not quite bad enough to call it a day, but some tension and slight discomfort that made me more aware of my form and speed.  It occurred to me that this was a perfect example of what I’ve been telling people for years.

Think about it:

• I warmed up and loosened up prior to the workout.
• It was in the 8^th round of sprints, so had fully extended my legs are far as they can go hundreds of times prior to this.
• I was obviously “loose”.  My quad was working fine up to that point.

So why the pulled muscle?

Because my body could no longer control the lengthening.  “It wasn’t just stretch it and hold it”, like what everyone suggests you do.  It was rapid fire lengthening and shortening.  I.e., real life.

And therein lies the secret to flexibility, my fiends.

My body could no longer control the lengthening (as it had merely seconds prior) due to:

a) Fatigue, which caused poor mechanics

b) Poor mechanics, which caused fatigue

c) Some combination of a and b.

A very subtle change in my physiology and mechanics led to an injury.

In the fitness business, this is called an inability to maintain optimal length- tension relationships.

Incidentally, this is a concept Bruce Lee discussed decades before it became cutting edge.

This is also why any trainer who suggests that an excessively high number of reps of anything is an imbecile.  Fatigue causes injury.  Reason #742 if your coach is a Crossfit coach, fire your coach.

Parenthetically, just the night prior to my pulled muscle, Jacoby Ellsbury of the Yankees pulled a muscle running the bases.  If you think about it, that doesn’t make much sense either.  He obviously warmed up and stretched out.  It was the middle of the game so he had been on a 100% sprint more than once.  But because of choices a, b, or c above, he pulled a muscle too.

So here are the secrets to flexibility:

Pre-workout stretching, or static stretching does not prevent injury.

Functional flexibility is a matter of neuro-muscular coordination, not just lengthening a muscle.

Bruce Lee was decades ahead of his time not only in regards to the martial arts and filmmaking, but in exercise.

Crossfit coaches are dense.  Really, frigging, dense.

OK, the last two are generalized observations and far from secrets.  The first two are the take home messages for you. J

If you say this, you will fail.

As you know, I talk to people about exercise A LOT.  Many people, each in different situations and under different circumstances.

But I’ve picked up on a red flag that tells me whether or not the person with whom I’m speaking will ever get results.

Yes – there is one short phrase that if you utter it, tells me unequivocally that you will not get results from your program.

Want to know what it is?  Here it is:

“Well, it’s better than nothing.”

It's usually spoken when they tell me they are doing ____ for exercise and I roll my eyes.  “Well, it’s better than nothing, Jon!”  Wrong.

Yep.  That’s it.  When I hear "It's better than nothing" I know the person saying it WILL NEVER GET RESULTS.  They will never have the healthy, slim physique and lifestyle they want.  It tells me they are OK with the lowest common denominator and actually don't want to get better.

Let’s get the obvious out of the way:

Eating a doughnut is better than nothing – but it’s still pretty stupid.

Breathing polluted air is better than nothing – but it’s not a good idea.

(Insert waste of time exercise) is better than nothing – but it’s a waste of your time and may be injurious. 

If you want results from exercise, you need to stop doing things that are “better than nothing” and start doing things that WORK.  Like just about everything else in life, it’s about making better choices.

Want to be slim, sexy and strong?  Go to a good facility who will assess where you are, listen to your goals and design a plan for you.  A plan that won’t include things that are “better than nothing”.

As always, we're here to help.