tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84095852074532060262024-02-24T16:02:55.078-08:00Lost In FitnessGiving fitness direction in the age of confusion.
From strength and conditioning to ultrarunning. Stopping at corrective exercise and olympic lifting along the way, and visiting everywhere in between...Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.comBlogger118125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-84823593913940912772020-06-24T08:01:00.002-07:002020-06-24T08:10:56.491-07:00Has Lockdown Changed Fitness Forever?They were halcyon days (if you could ignore the pandemic and you were lucky enough to avoid it, and you weren't working double shifts in a hospital or supermarket). When the sun shone forever, and the streets were full of people walking, running and cycling with only the occasional Ocado truck on the road. We were told we could exercise once a day, and many people took it as an instruction. More people were outside exercising in more numbers than ever before. A route I run in my local town, before lockdown I used to see 0 to 5 other runners, but during it I would see 20-40 other people walking and running.<br />
<br />
For some people lockdown was a fitness bootcamp, with 3 or 4 sessions a day. For others it was a 1000 yard stare, a drinking competition with sloe gin and slow internet connection. Others were in the middle like me, initially over-reached myself trying to do 30 ab-wheels in a row and ripped my abs, then couldn’t run for weeks due to persistent cough and then found a happy middle ground of runs, walks and home workouts, however, the people who run my local corner shop probably think I live on beer, discos and double deckers.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0NWw-UcrARDHzrA_mXbUHQj8SEPKaP8iIoY4hCEz2GYYnZkwwkY8Jw4cth_yc5eAA-kAOXYDcPvFo4C-uM9smpAXgzIo2r9qsnP8lNxO-M131xSxwE08u33HgWXpXQl_v3kUB3VdCHzI/s1600/kettlebells+and+bands.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0NWw-UcrARDHzrA_mXbUHQj8SEPKaP8iIoY4hCEz2GYYnZkwwkY8Jw4cth_yc5eAA-kAOXYDcPvFo4C-uM9smpAXgzIo2r9qsnP8lNxO-M131xSxwE08u33HgWXpXQl_v3kUB3VdCHzI/s400/kettlebells+and+bands.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Home workout kit: Will this be the end of gyms? (These are not all my kettlebells, didn't want to make anyone jealous)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
And if you weren’t outside, you were inside following Joe Wicks (or the parents were while the kids were on their ipads) or yoga with Adrienne, (I also like <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/yogawithkassandra">yoga with Kassandra</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/SarahBethShow">SarahBeth yoga</a>). Or doing a zoom class with some instructors from your local gym, or like me taking part in a zoom yoga class once a week. At the same time every fitness influencer on instagram was showing you how you could do a home booty blaster workout with equipment you made from a watering can, a towel and 2 bags of weight loss tea.<br />
<br />
I saw a lady walking around my local park eating a pot noodle, I guess she figured it was a way of staying in calorie balance. And from the odour wafting through some of my local parks, half the population have been stoned through lockdown, and getting the munchies could account for supermarket shelves being bare for a while. And these people may be desperate to get back to the gym to lose some of the ‘lockdown lard’ (I’m copyrighting this phrase because some gym is bound to use it in a membership campaign). But many people may not be going back to the gym.<br />
<br />
<br />
And now things are getting back to normal. Already I see less people out walking and running, maybe they’ve gone back to work or popped to Primark instead. And the traffic went back to normal, which means I could either run into the dick on the pavement who refuses to socially distance or run in the road and risk getting hit by a Ford Ranger. There are still a good amount of cyclists on the road, families too, which is good to see, and some place have increased cycle lanes and provision. Unfortunately, where I live that hasn’t happened, which means if I cycled to work it would be like a scene from the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SutDTIhbQ2g">Spielberg film Duel</a>.<br />
<br />
In the park I’ve seen old guys doing jumping jacks, a couple teaching themselves to skip and an adult lone guy teaching himself how to skateboard (must have been a lockdown goal he set himself). The personal trainers are out in the park too, and you can play ‘eye spy which one of these people watched the body coach’. To paraphrase Homer Simpson, it’s like a freakin’ fitness jambaroo around here!<br />
<br />
<br />
Meanwhile <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/10/greg-glassman-crossfit-ceo-resigns-george-floyd-protest-coronavirus-tweets-conspiracy-theories">crossfit imploded</a> because one of its head honchos went insane, and not in a cool Colonel Kurtz has gone ‘up river’ Apocalypse Now way but more like that dishevelled guy you see wandering around town carrying a bag for life with indeterminant contents who then stands too close to you in the supermarket queue and talks about lizard people conspiracies and then follows you onto the bus and sits next to you with no mask because viruses are a myth because you can’t see them.<br />
<br />
And then all those crossfit affiliates realised that yes, people joined because of the crossfit name, but now they stay for the community and people. So there probably is <a href="https://morningchalkup.com/2020/06/22/a-damaged-brand-or-no-brand-awareness-at-all/#">no need to be an affiliate anymore</a> because 1) You get to make up your own random circuit workouts 2) You can now call those workouts whatever you want, no need to call them Cindy or Fran anymore… you could use a wildlife name instead, Woodpecker WOD and <a href="https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/wildlife-explorer/amphibians/natterjack-toad">Natterjack</a> AMRAP to celebrate the fact the animals took the land back while we were all watching Netflix and daily briefings.<br />
<br />
At this point no one knows when gyms will re-open, but it will probably be the day the kettlebells and bands you ordered 3 months ago finally arrive. But will people go back? The answer is some wont, they are happy with home workouts and training outside, especially in the summer, things are always different in the winter. And if your activity is swimming you will go back unless you're brave enough to do open water swimming, because you can’t do lengths in your kids paddling pool.<br />
<br />
But I think most people will go back in some fashion. Because the gym is not just about exercise, it is about community and belonging and this is a big one for many people, mental health. Yes, you could workout at home, the same way I could make a coffee and sit at home and save £2.80, but I like going to coffee shops and watching the world go by.<br />
<br />
How ever much corporations and businesses think otherwise, generally people don’t join and stay at gyms because of anything your marketing department put together, every local micro/ single site gym knows this. People join because of location and price, and these days its less about equipment because all gyms are pretty much the same. But they stay because of the atmosphere, their friend's, the instructors. Your entire management team could leave tomorrow and members wouldn’t know, but if their favourite yoga or pump instructor leaves you will definitely know about it.<br />
<br />
The unsung heroes of fitness during this lockdown are all the instructors and coaches who have carried on teaching classes on zoom, doing house party hangouts or instagram live workouts for free or donation only. Not because anyone in the companies they work for asked them to do it or paid them but because that is what they do, they teach people, they make peoples day better. And your customers and members want to support your business because of your staff they see every day. And some of those instructors and PTs may not be coming back, they may have figured online zoom classes and PT in the park is better for them and their clients.<br />
<br />
It could change for the better, people realising that workouts don’t have be one hour, and businesses providing more online content for members and better in person coaching. It may diversify how people consume fitness. If it makes more people more active in any way, it will be a positive thing to take from this terrible event.<br />
<br />
People will go back because collective amnesia is a powerful thing. Just like in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Plague">The Plague by Camus</a> (which of course, I read in lockdown), people go back to normal, people forget, people get used to new norms. And maybe it will make fitness facilities raise their game as well as their cleaning rather than their prices.<br />
<br />
And when gyms re-open they should probably instigate fancy dress Friday in homage to Joe Wicks. And in 100 years time someone will ask "why do you all dress as spiderman and knights on a Friday?" and someone else will reply saying "I think it’s to celebrate when Sir Joe of Richmond stopped parents going insane during the first corona pandemic" and then they will eat a post workout <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070723/">Soylent Green</a> protein bar and discuss who will win The Hunger Games 2121, will it be Crossfit <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nations_of_Nineteen_Eighty-Four">Oceana airstrip one</a>, or Crossfit Eurasia.<br />
<br />
But until those gyms open, I'm off to do some press ups in the sun followed by a post workout beer.<br />
<br />
<br />
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Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-63983889115734924252018-05-08T03:57:00.000-07:002018-05-08T03:57:04.517-07:00Night Run.<div style="text-align: center;">
"Midway upon the journey of our life</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
I found myself within a forest dark,</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
For the straightforward pathway had been lost."</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
-Dante, The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Canto I</div>
<br />
<br />
I'm running up the sand dune. Well, not really running but crawling, it's too steep to run.<br />
<br />
All day waiting on the beach, then a zodiac boat ride across the bay to the start point. It's some time after 9pm when we start. The sea, the beach, the sky, the dune are like a pastel drawing we're moving through. Pastel pinks, blues, mauve and pale yellow.<br />
<br />
It has an 'other world' quality about it.<br />
<br />
Night is falling in.<br />
<br />
On top of the dune, head torch lights flicker on, like insane fire flies we head into the forest. Fairy lights strung out through the night.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVoDasuls8bHqplLbW414vOWM_6AeuqBdGAI46iRB2mJ1aWsXqRk6HFNNS8XkGD_5Midafqe3fac-vZSjioHTAsVdhGGXqx9NUtF5AseN0Je6XTJR_RxjxYRYT8sxB8YoEZQ3846sm_04/s1600/La+trans+aq.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="838" data-original-width="826" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVoDasuls8bHqplLbW414vOWM_6AeuqBdGAI46iRB2mJ1aWsXqRk6HFNNS8XkGD_5Midafqe3fac-vZSjioHTAsVdhGGXqx9NUtF5AseN0Je6XTJR_RxjxYRYT8sxB8YoEZQ3846sm_04/s400/La+trans+aq.jpg" width="393" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I'm probably in this picture somewhere. Source: trails-endurance.com</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
The forest at night. The stuff of nightmares and fairy tales. The primordial human fear of being alone in the forest at night. A trail of breadcrumbs is replaced with glow sticks to lead you out. After several hours your sense of direction is lost, it's hard to orientate, up and down look the same, the torchlight rebounds back and washes out the contours and gradient, it tells you nothing about the ground.<br />
<br />
I didn't go into the the forest 'to live deliberately' or 'suck the marrow out of life' like Thoreau. I went in to find the edges. If something doesn't scare you, its easy.<br />
<br />
Running with my brother, some time after midnight, he is suddenly injured. We tape up his leg, and then agree that I should go on, as he is now having to walk. Leaving someone behind in the forest goes against the human instinct to stay together, stay in tribes, stay safe, don't leave someone behind. I leave him and run off into the night.<br />
<br />
We were walking and I have cooled down quickly. The heat of the day has dissipated into the ether. I run hard temporarily to get my body temperature up. I also run hard so I don't have to hear anything apart from my breath, I don't want to listen to the sounds of the forest right now. I turn off my head torch, there's nothing, like a coal mine I once visited as a kid.<br />
<br />
Sounds. Sounds of the forest, everything that is meant to be here at night, we are not meant to be here.<br />
<br />
Shapes, coming across an oil field one time and seeing the nodding machinery of hydrocarbon extraction in the middle of nowhere. Another time in another forest, a tree stump looking like a native American head carved, pointing the way to go.<br />
<br />
Movement, there is rustling, keeping looking straight ahead. Then you see your shadow cast in front of you, you see it before you hear the people behind approaching, the light bobbing light lanterns at sea. Breathe in the torch light.<br />
<br />
Another time, running in the mist at night, the torch light rebounds off the water particles hanging in the air, no path, no direction, running by feel and memory on familiar ground.<br />
<br />
Another time, hours alone, senses in overdrive, making sure every turn is correct, no marker is missed. Follow the breadcrumbs, follow the clues. Others were lost but somehow I made it with no wrong turns, luck.<br />
<br />
So focused, no time for the mind to drift, no time to think or reminisce. One pointedness.<br />
<br />
'What do you think about when running?' In moments like this, nothing, the past and future are gone, its just night and movement.<br />
<br />
If you think too much in these moments you will miss a turning, miss a marker. You will be lost, alone in the forest at night.<br />
<br />
And the last time. An easy circuit. This time real fairy lights hanging in the trees, and the last thing I hear is 'Running up that hill' before I wake up in another town. The circle is not complete. The final night run.<br />
<br />
-------------------<br />
<br />
In the distance a vague hum of a generator and artificial light. Hot soup, or ginger beer or coffee at 3am, depending where you are. You've made it. And if you don't , the horizon always glows, the dawn always breaks. Another day will begin.<br />
<br />
There is something about night running that cannot be captured anywhere else.<br />
Sometimes I think about running at night.Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-43132231952781797802018-04-29T08:20:00.000-07:002018-04-29T08:20:53.970-07:00Ghosts.I park up. The rain and cloud are closing in.<br />
<br />
I've already stopped at the petrol station I always used to go after a run and got a take away tea and driven up here. There are two other cars in the car park and then one.<br />
<br />
A version of me is still out there running on The Downs. A younger version.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3mDkjEb0X4tHMP7MSdTHclDYOumkqkmQfklBs4JCjPM-wjBDo7xH4iZPZpfSZGYHt2beeVXgJBTHL8rw30id_fgnFT7aANQjhcbmbCARe-DrqaQ8RC7lZdAaeC1GY74mpKuo9QQosznI/s1600/the+downs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="608" data-original-width="1080" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3mDkjEb0X4tHMP7MSdTHclDYOumkqkmQfklBs4JCjPM-wjBDo7xH4iZPZpfSZGYHt2beeVXgJBTHL8rw30id_fgnFT7aANQjhcbmbCARe-DrqaQ8RC7lZdAaeC1GY74mpKuo9QQosznI/s400/the+downs.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Low cloud and rain.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
There is the first version, when I first seriously tried to run a distance 9 years ago with my father, a rucksack on my back, I think it was 30 or 35k. I got lost, and it hurt, I finished it, and had that classic feeling of my legs seizing up driving back, and the next day it hurt even more.<br />
<br />
Now I can run these trails from sense memory. I know the markers for 10k and 12k and 20k, I know the ground. The topography is etched on me.<br />
<br />
I think of all those other versions of me still out there running, those versions would not be able to picture the older, greyer, version of me sitting here now thinking back. The younger version of me doesn't know this moment, here and now, is coming. He doesn't know how far he will run, or that he will go to terrain that scares him and run across it for days. He doesn't know about the mountains, and the trails and breaking down crying from exhaustion in tents, he doesn't know the exact moment this journey will end. He doesn't know how strong he will get and how weak he will become.<br />
<br />
There are versions running in hail and rain. Another version is running in the early morning mist as the sun breaks through and horses run across a field, and that version smiles at how perfect the moment is. There are versions running in heat, and wind and night. There is a version trying to run the big 50 in training, with his partner waiting in the car park. There are versions running alone and seeing no one, shouting at the top of their voice and there is no one to hear. There are versions running on summer days, with the car parks full, and daytrippers and mountain bikers on the trail.<br />
<br />
Echoes of long lost conversations. There are versions of me in the car park talking to my brother and father about GPS watches, and energy gels, and Tarahumura indians, and before ultrarunning became a thing.<br />
<br />
I ran to break myself. And one day I broke. Broken, frozen, soaked to the bone, sitting in the car, with my heart beat banging in my ears.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoZL8PnYheYNXV8d8X5t7uv-pOcYdv85ofN6nuWRQA-EJ5Wbtpk008tPFWXGxbS5oc-9RBKWwVHLQ0goDrgrSE3c4qe8tSTQGOYKhxZ6Lz10Uj9fDK0Dbz1IrQ9M952wClc0tq9AM2pDI/s1600/windmill.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="608" data-original-width="1080" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoZL8PnYheYNXV8d8X5t7uv-pOcYdv85ofN6nuWRQA-EJ5Wbtpk008tPFWXGxbS5oc-9RBKWwVHLQ0goDrgrSE3c4qe8tSTQGOYKhxZ6Lz10Uj9fDK0Dbz1IrQ9M952wClc0tq9AM2pDI/s400/windmill.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Under repair.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
I can't run those distances anymore. I'm afraid of those distances now.<br />
Afraid of early mornings, sleep deprivation and creatine kinase. But maybe that version will pass into history too.<br />
<br />
There is a future version of me that will come here with my son. We might fly a kite, like the child version of me that came here years before and remembered seeing that. My son wont know this version of me, he wont know that version of me out there running on the trail. But that ghost is out there always running.<br />
<br />
Maybe ghosts are versions of ourselves we cross paths with sometimes, trying to teach us a lesson from the past or future.<br />
<br />
There are earlier versions of me out there everywhere running. One is running a 5 mile fun run as a kid. Another is running from the old house to the farm, the classic out and back, he's not even a teenager yet. There's another in one of those northern towns running through an endless winter in a park next to a university, running just to run, no idea of time or distance. There's another running up that hill to the apartment in the heat to prove he's still got it and he's not even 30 yet.<br />
<br />
There are earlier versions of you out there too, they live in memory, they are captured in landscape. There are versions of the people you meet now, you will never know them.<br />
<br />
'What did you do up there... read a book?'<br />
No, I didn't. I started to write one.<br />
<br />
I thought about that version of me that will always be on that trail, the one who stepped on this trail 9 years ago.<br />
<br />
I start the car. The windscreen wipers grind. I head back towards the towns.Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-91307181515217961492017-12-31T08:26:00.000-08:002017-12-31T12:24:35.739-08:00New Morning.<b><span style="font-size: large;">Where walls meet and coffee cups are made.</span></b><br />
<br />
An oblate spheroid has spun round one more time and orbited a giant fireball. Due to an arbitrary decision made a millennia ago, you woke up and a new year had begun.<br />
<br />
Over the last year practically every cell in your body has been replaced and renewed. You are a new version of yourself but a year older. The atoms that make you up have been around since the beginning of the universe... and still you can't figure out what your new year resolutions should be.<br />
<br />
An infinite number of possibilities brought you to this exact moment, most of which are unknowable. I am typing on a computer invented by someone in California, containing precious elements mined in Africa or Asia, which lay buried in the ground for millions of years, drinking a coffee farmed somewhere in South America, in a cup made of earth fired in a kiln, with milk from a cow in England, all made using a machine made of metal dug out of the earth and run using electricity burning in a power station somewhere, I'm sitting in a room where the walls meet at a perfect right angle, built before I was born by a person who was skilled at things I can't even comprehend how to do. All of this is one moment, all of those things took thousands of humans, thousands of years to perfect, it is beyond the imagination of just one person.<br />
<br />
We want to see certainty, meaning, patterns, logic and reason, and when we don't the universe seems like it was built on shaky ground.<br />
<br />
No <i>i ching</i> throwing, fortune telling, tarot card reading, astrologer will be able to make sense of it for you, there are just too many variables.<br />
<br />
All these infinite events will coalesce into moments you will remember over the next year.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Fragments.</span></b><br />
<br />
Through a grubby bus window the sun will hit the hoar frost on the fields, and for a second the prosaic and poetic collide and everything will seem perfect, as it should be.<br />
<br />
Other times. The sun comes up like a piss stain streaked across an old tramps blanket. But you will still get up and start another day.<br />
<br />
But most days are in the middle. Most conversations you will forget, in a lifetime only a handful will stick; same with people.<br />
<br />
3am and you'll wake up haunted by things that don't matter and somethings that do, and there will be nothing you can do.<br />
<br />
Fragments will spin out of your brain; driving into Reno in the sleeting rain, watching a hillside fire in the Mediterranean, standing under an aircraft wing sheltering from the rain, watching the bodies burn at Pashupatinath. What seeps out of your brain will be unique to you and meaningful to you alone.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqCPFLhau8i9r4OFDXbAv-orYVdOg2oKKMwkViuud6LCiIV6RotzjaZK_8Y7QwyeHGBJKJskW0H0Fqalv1xsh_Ly0lVOXE42srappDH5c25gUSGjh27kVZGhoLHfC6BfzAmwMi0gTll3M/s1600/bladerunner+roy+quote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="580" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqCPFLhau8i9r4OFDXbAv-orYVdOg2oKKMwkViuud6LCiIV6RotzjaZK_8Y7QwyeHGBJKJskW0H0Fqalv1xsh_Ly0lVOXE42srappDH5c25gUSGjh27kVZGhoLHfC6BfzAmwMi0gTll3M/s400/bladerunner+roy+quote.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Memories, are they what make you 'you'?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Kindness and Gratitude.</span></b><br />
<br />
The year in review, a long list things you've forgotten. Then your own year in review, for me I didn't read Proust or War and Peace, I didn't write a novel, didn't even have an idea for a novel. Didn't start a PhD or MSc in Neuroscience or anything, didn't run more than a few miles, did no events. But then, be kind to yourself. I do live in a great place with a great partner and a great son, I met some good people and had some good conversations; went to some new places. Everyday life is full of highlights, a cup of coffee here, a laugh at work there. These moments form a life.<br />
<br />
Don't go in with too many fixed ideas. What you thought were your goals, may not ultimately be the ones you need to pursue.<br />
<br />
The only responses that seem to make sense in the face of all this chaos and stuff is to be kind. Be kind to yourself and others, in a world where we are all trying to be happy and make connections.<br />
<br />
And gratitude, to be thankful for the little things that make make up each day and manage to puncture through the hardness of it all.<br />
<br />
Try and find a sense of purpose in the moment, every moment. This does not mean everything you do has to be imbued with mystical meaning. The fact that the sun comes up, rain falls from the sky and we are in a nondescript corner of the universe where I'm writing this and you are reading this, despite all the other infinite possibilities of things we could have been doing is mystical enough for any one day.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Goals. The Why.</span></b><br />
<br />
'comfort is overrated' see the video below.<br />
<br />
<iframe allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" gesture="media" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/v8YdY4BB2Lk" width="560"></iframe>
<br />
<br />
Anything that involves learning something new or doing something new will be uncomfortable. People like the idea of speaking a new language. They can visualize themselves sitting in an Italian cafe conversing with the locals fluently, what they don't want to visualize is the hard slog of remembering verbs and making mistakes. Ultimately they don't want to look or feel stupid, which is probably the main reason most adults don't try new things or learn new subjects, the ego is fragile.<br />
<br />
In the words of Zen fella John Tarrant Roshi<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">"There is no end to the suffering caused by comparison."</span><br />
<br />
Whether that be comparison with others or comparing yourself to what you think you should be.<br />
<br />
Why do those new year resolutions fail? Is it because people are stuck in the future goal, they don't like the process, it brings them no satisfaction. There is no real sense of purpose, except some vague idea of capturing their lost youth by weighing the same as they did when they were eighteen. The most satisfied people love the process of training, gym or running or classes, or whatever they are learning or doing.<br />
<br />
It's the reason your 1 day or 7 day free gym trial wont work. People who take these out have no investment in the process and 7 days isn't long enough for them to start enjoying it. It is long enough to remind them they can't achieve anything in 7 days, their goal is harder than they thought, will take longer than they thought and involves something they don't get that much pleasure from. It reminds them of their mortality, that life is short and to give up and go and do something they do enjoy doing like watching Netflix or going to the pub.<br />
<br />
<b>The guiding lights for the next year:</b><br />
<br />
3 principles as outlined by Richard Nisbett (2015:225) and which underlie Eastern thought:<br />
<br />
1) Principle of change: Reality is a process of change. What is currently true will shortly be false.<br />
2) Principle of contradiction: Contradiction is the dynamic underlying change. Because change is constant, contradiction is constant.<br />
3) Principle of relationships(holism): The whole is more than the sum of its parts. Parts are meaningful only in relation to the whole.<br />
<br />
Is it worth having a goal, or plans, or resolutions?<br />
<br />
Here is a little exchange:<br />
<br />
Dizang asked "Where are you going?"<br />
Fayan said "Around on pilgrimage."<br />
Dizang asked "What is the purpose of pilgrimage?"<br />
Fayan replied "I don't know."<br />
Dizang responded "Not knowing is most intimate."<br />
<br />
Replace the word pilgrimage in the third line with the word 'goals', or 'resolutions' or 'relationshsips'.<br />
<br />
If through all of the information, chaos, infinite decisions, fuzziness and confusion that life throws, you somehow become aware of a clear goal or subject or area of interest or something that sparks something in you; then go for it, cling to that life raft.<br />
<br />
The burning questions and ideas that keep coming back to you, they are your life koan. The ones you carry around with you your entire life.<br />
<br />
It's up to you, the most important thing is to enjoy the process, to find things that are satisfying, and mostly these are things that are out of your comfort zone. The years are spinning on, you are wearing down, but there are still infinite moments to enjoy, little things. You can always learn and renew.<br />
<br />
You don't need to retreat to the woods to 'suck the marrow out of life' or 'to live deliberately', you can do it in everyday humdrum life and make it meaningful. You don't need someone elses list of goals.<br />
<br />
And of course, sometimes the best thing to do is binge watch a TV series on Netflix and have a beer.<br />
<br />
It's a new morning, a new day, a new beginning, a new moment. It always is.<br />
<br />
Happy New Year, have a good 2018 or whichever year you are in.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #b45f06;">"Great understanding is broad and unhurried; little understanding is cramped and busy. Great words are clear and limpid; little words are shrill and quarrelsome. In sleep, people’s spirits go visiting; in waking hours, their bodies hustle. With everything they meet they become entangled. Day after day they use their minds. in strife, sometimes grandiose, sometimes sly, sometimes petty. Their little fears are mean and trembly; their great fears are stunned and overwhelming. They bound off like an arrow or crossbow bolt, certain that they are arbiters of right and wrong. They cling to their position as though they had sworn before the gods, sure that they are holding on to victory. They fade like fall into winter—such is the way they dwindle day by day. They drown in what they do—you cannot make them turn back. They grow dark, as though sealed with seals—such are the excesses of their old age. And as they draw near to death, nothing can restore their minds to the light."</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
- The complete works of Zhuangzi, Burton Watson translation, Ch, 2, p.8 </blockquote>
<b>Other references:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
The idea of infinite unknowable things, pilgrimage quote and John Tarrant quote taken from a day workshop on Freedom & Intimacy by Kevin Jikai Pickard at Zenways.<br />
<br />
Nisbett, R (2015) Mindware. Tools for Smart Thinking. Penguin.<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-62670853275708672012017-12-17T13:51:00.000-08:002017-12-17T13:51:16.520-08:00Give yourself a break.It's that time of the year when half the population is eating their body weight in chocolate and promising themselves they are going to get fit and lose in January.<br />
<br />
And another smaller group of people are panicking that they will not be able to go the gym on Christmas Day and Boxing Day, wondering when they will fit in arm day. And waking up in a cold sweat about their fat percentage increasing by 1% when the ambassador offers them one more ferrero rocher.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1luKX7RrqjhHfP0WnEoxb_f6a1zxuHqPSYTf5FLKuuCeMMq6gPG80c952vGNwCxuka_lHs9eP7tzL_jcphLFhBExs0HqFpzUeK_EepQWvOA-LRSjVu19OWUA47uO8_-Ki9_xYEjpdn40/s1600/ferro+rocher.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="468" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1luKX7RrqjhHfP0WnEoxb_f6a1zxuHqPSYTf5FLKuuCeMMq6gPG80c952vGNwCxuka_lHs9eP7tzL_jcphLFhBExs0HqFpzUeK_EepQWvOA-LRSjVu19OWUA47uO8_-Ki9_xYEjpdn40/s400/ferro+rocher.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Why yes ambassador I will have another Ferrero Rocher (and tomorrow I will spend 3 hours in the gym guilt ridden).</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
This is aimed at the second group of people.<br />
<br />
A break from training for a week or so will not make any difference unless:-<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>You are training for the 2018 Olympics.</li>
<li>You have a 100 mile race in late January.</li>
<li>You are stepping on stage and need to be contest ready in the middle of January.</li>
</ul>
<div>
If none of these apply give yourself a break.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">A break will do you good.</span></b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This a good time for a deload week or two. Go easy, have some back off sessions, no heavy lifting, or if you are a runner some easy runs.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
You may not be near your usual gym or usual running routes. Take some time to do something different. Do the opposite of what you normally do, if you normally lift heavy go for a jog or a run, if you normally do endurance work then do some body weight work or mobility.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
If you normally train 4 or 5 times a week and can't guarantee your normal routine or you're not sure how many times a week you can train then go total body.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
For example, pick one exercise from each of the following:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Vertical Pull</div>
<div>
Vertical Push</div>
<div>
Horizontal Pull</div>
<div>
Horizontal Push</div>
<div>
Quad dominant</div>
<div>
Hip Dominant</div>
<div>
Accessory - core/ arms/ whatever</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Which could be something like:-</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Latpulldown</div>
<div>
Dumbbell shoulder press</div>
<div>
Seated Row</div>
<div>
Lunge or goblet squat</div>
<div>
Leg curl or dumbbell RDL</div>
<div>
Plank or some bicep/ tricep supersets<br />
<br />
2-3 sets of 10 to 15 reps.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Or if you don't have access to any equipment then try a simple body weight routine:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Press up</div>
<div>
Body weight squat</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Do a simple a ladder up routine, 1 rep of each then 2,3,4,5,6 up to 20.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Other things to consider:</span></b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
A simple Christmas mobility routine, you spend days on end sitting down in a chair or in car stuck in traffic or stooped over a stove (or over a pint), time to reverse posture.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Something like:<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Cat camel</div>
<div>
Bird dog</div>
<div>
Downward dog</div>
<div>
Updog</div>
<div>
Spidermans with overhead reach</div>
<div>
Half kneeling hip flexor stretch with over head reach</div>
<div>
Sit back into hamstring/ half splits stretch</div>
<div>
Finish in puppy dog pose.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This is the type of routine you can bust out in your Christmas jumper. (In fact I will film it later this week and post it up).<br />
<br />
But most importantly - ITS OKAY TO TAKE A DAY OFF!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Think outside the box.</span></b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>You are in a house that has been centrally heated to the same temperature as the Sahara</b>. This is a chance to do some heat acclimatization training for that desert race you have been considering. Put on your running kit and rucksack and run up and down the stairs.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Mass building phase. </b>Been trying to bulk up and put on weight but can never get enough calories in? Now is your chance, you should have protein and carbs coming out of your ears. For once you can hit those 6000 calories. Train hard up to until Christmas day, over reach as much as possible, then sit back and let the super-compensation happen while you watch you favourite Christmas film. You are literally resting for mass. Your biceps and quads will be growing as you lay there with the meat sweats.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>How much does that turkey weigh?</b> Quick press it over head for maximum reps before putting it in the oven, a chance for a sneaky shoulder workout.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Always wanted to get photo shoot ready?</b> Now's your chance. Go low carb for the week before hand. Then start drinking alcohol from 8am Christmas day, bucks fizz, wine and beer should dehydrate you nicely combined with the indoor greenhouse, then add in all those carbs. Next thing you know, your muscles have refilled with glycogen, all the water has been drawn out from under your skin, you will be pumped and ripped and all you need to do is find someone to give you a fake tan on Boxing Day and get ready for that photoshoot. (Ask for a fake tanning kit as a gift, problem solved).<br />
<br />
<b>Burpee drink penalty.</b> Every time you have a drink do 10 burpees.<br />
<br />
<b>Exercise food label.</b> Use your Christmas gift tags to label the exact number of minutes of exercise it will take to burn off the calories in the food. Yes, labelling every Quality Street or Heroes will take some time.<br />
<br />
<b>Sleep penalty.</b> First person to fall asleep has to do 50 mountain climbers or is made to join a crossfit gym in the new year.<br />
<br />
<b>Christmas cracker exercises.</b> Get those crackers that you can put your own gifts and jokes in. Instead of jokes put in exercise routines. What better way to start dinner than 25 jumping jacks.<br />
<br />
<b>Television penalty.</b> If anyone mentions any soap opera christmas special, 1000 burpee penalty. Enforce this.<br />
<br />
<b>Exercise charades. </b>You have to mime a sport and everyone has to guess which one. For crossfitters, WOD charades, you start doing a WOD and everyone has to guess which one, of course that is Kelly or is that Fran? Wear the crossfit gear you got as a present while you do this.<br />
<br />
<b>Weighted cups and cutlery. </b>You can be working on your biceps all day long. A great stocking filler.<br />
<br />
<b>Baileys protein shake. </b>Of course you can put Baileys in a protein shake. And yes, I've now decided this is a real thing.<br />
<br />
<b>Protein eggnog</b>. See above.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Alternatively, relax.</b> Don't be so hard on yourself. Go for a walk in the fresh air. Don't get too stressed. All your progress will not be undone in one week. Consistency always wins, if you're consistent the rest of the year, give yourself a well earned break and enjoy yourself.<br />
<br />
Christmas dinner is basically lean meat and vegetables. And if you are in the UK Boxing Day is more lean meats and vegetables.<br />
<br />
All the stats about people putting on weight at Christmas and never losing it are about sedentary people with crappy diets all year round.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And as long as you don't drink until your liver dissolves or eat until you go into insulin shock, you'll be okay.<br />
<br />
And hey, there's always next year.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbcKyDFTcHtmlObgnobp94Wp4OGvxhaTj2TOLVVP9gSvOroprfwpkPwhDbQ9fkIOu9e711-vj99dsnvOCRA10i1M3sH4K2z9enWQnY8RMy30oVFWEUGn_UWl-tpMkcroF5lK-Y3pcOzQE/s1600/Kwanzaa-Bot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="250" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbcKyDFTcHtmlObgnobp94Wp4OGvxhaTj2TOLVVP9gSvOroprfwpkPwhDbQ9fkIOu9e711-vj99dsnvOCRA10i1M3sH4K2z9enWQnY8RMy30oVFWEUGn_UWl-tpMkcroF5lK-Y3pcOzQE/s400/Kwanzaa-Bot.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">May the Kwanzaa-bot bring you everything you wished for.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Happy Christmas one and all.<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-62645174441496170732017-12-10T12:54:00.002-08:002017-12-10T12:54:45.042-08:00Getting Older (and training).<b><span style="font-size: large;">Do you need to train differently as you get older?</span></b><br />
<br />
Recently there has been a spate of books and resources for the 'older' lifter, which the people providing these resources normally define as over 40. A few of them define it as over 30 or 35, which is of course laughable (these are normally the ones written by people in their 20's).<br />
<br />
This trend seems to be because all the coaches writing these various programmes now find themselves in their 40's or 50's.<br />
<br />
Full disclosure I haven't read any of the books aimed at the over 40 trainee or joined any of the online programmes ( I'm 43 by the way). I have purchased Bill Hartmans book on kindle but not read it yet. Therefore anything I write here is my take on it.<br />
<br />
Notice I have generally referred to these as resources for the older 'lifter,' as most of the guys writing this stuff are coming from a lifting back ground and not so much the endurance background.<br />
<br />
But do you need to train differently as you get older? Does anything need to change? And does it depend more on your training age or chronological age? Is it more to do with your training background, whether it be classic bodybuilding training, powerlifting, olympic weightlifting, endurance running 10k to 160k, or a sport like football (soccer)? And is it just a matter of getting wiser and not doing stupid stuff so much?<br />
<br />
<b>"Remember when you were you young, you shone like the sun"</b><br />
<br />
When you're young you can pretty much get away with any stupid training regime and diet.<br />
<br />
You can drink a gallon of milk, inhale some pre-workout, train for two hours, have a post workout KFC, go for a few beers, sleep in til 11am and repeat as necessary.<br />
<br />
Remember those days you could spend 2-3 hours in the gym, with 30 minutes mobility, a chat, and a dedicated soleus and forearm day? No, me neither. Of course no one did any mobility work in the 1990's for a start.<br />
<br />
And then you can do stupid stuff like deadlift maximum with no warm up because your friends are, keep running with an open wound on your foot because you want to finish a 5 day event, or run off a wall drunk in the dark, injure your knee and elbow, wake up covered in blood and don't bother seeking any medical treatment (okay, these are all things I did).<br />
<br />
And then...<br />
<br />
<b>"With a boulder on my shoulder, feelin' kinda older"</b><br />
<br />
One day you wake up and things hurt. And the bit that hurts keeps changing, it could be your shoulder, or lower back, or neck, or forearm, or t-spine or knee (or is that just me?).<br />
<br />
If you made it into your 40's without any injuries you are either a replicant or never did anything stupid or pushed out of your comfort zone. Well done either way.<br />
<br />
And all those guys that were squatting maximum everyday, well they had hip replacements. Maybe there was no correlation and they were going to get them anyway. Who knows. And training like a Bulgarian weightlifter is probably okay if you are genetically gift, chemically assisted and are only doing it for a short window of time to win something.<br />
<br />
One day you wake up and realise you are going to face the grim reaper, which means you need to do 2 things: 1) Improve your chess game 2) Not knock on heavens door with a Dad-bod.<br />
<br />
<b>"So you're scared and you're thinking that maybe we ain't that young anymore"</b><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyBNcemk8zA2Py-XQeTu1ZB473Idhj3Ju_a8YBxRkrb6ynTfcqlQb5SsMeDn-PlvdW6QSDcsEVhhjR3mNv17pTeFQ_8YEjEWoRMdOb1lYB_WW6oqByaQmUd2uUMWiiv1yHCsp0rW3esbQ/s1600/the-seventh-seal-chess-game.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="346" data-original-width="640" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyBNcemk8zA2Py-XQeTu1ZB473Idhj3Ju_a8YBxRkrb6ynTfcqlQb5SsMeDn-PlvdW6QSDcsEVhhjR3mNv17pTeFQ_8YEjEWoRMdOb1lYB_WW6oqByaQmUd2uUMWiiv1yHCsp0rW3esbQ/s400/the-seventh-seal-chess-game.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Playing chess with death. Film reference for the day. The Seventh Seal. source:empire online magazine</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
I know quite a few guys lifting weights into their late 50's, and guys running into their 60's.<br />
<br />
There are two interesting things I've observed, the guys still lifting in their 50's when I've talked to them never deadlifted or squatted heavy. Basically when they started in gyms in the UK there were no power racks, so they never did that type of training. And then when these things were popular they decided it was too late for them to take up that type of lifting. Coincidentally these guys don't have back or hip injuries, although they do have shoulder injuries from benching! These guys are still lifting heavier than I can on things like chest press, shoulder press, pulldowns etc.<br />
<br />
And then you have the runners, there is some evidence that people are actually get faster in their 60's than in middle age. I know at least one runner in this age category who is still running sub 18 minute 5k and sub 35 minute 10k, on three short training sessions a week.<br />
<br />
Of course, this is not a random sample, it is my biased sample. And it will be interesting too see how todays younger generation look in their 40's and 50's after training in the current milieu.<br />
<br />
<b>Its not the age, its the responsibility.</b><br />
<br />
Another thing I've noticed about the guys writing these over 40 resources, it seems to be much more a factor of having children than aging.<br />
<br />
And I know where they are coming from (I have a 2 year old son).<br />
<br />
For example, there is a big trend at the moment about the importance of sleep and how you should be getting 8 hours a night. Any new parent is laugh manically at such a suggestion.<br />
<br />
I used to run ultras but then realised I didn't need to run 100 miles to experience sleep deprivation, a young baby will do the same for you.<br />
<br />
Getting woken up every 2 hours by the sound of a crying baby, then having to get up and train, your pre-workout meal now consists of a biscuit you found on the floor and a cup of tea you are drinking out a bowl because you can't find any cups. You then go to work, stick your head in a vat of caffeine, then return home, look into your partners eyes which have developed the 1000 yard stare of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Dien_Bien_Phu">Dien Bien Phu</a> veteran and start all over again. Yes, its a combination of Guantanamo Bay and Special Forces training but with more nappy changes.<br />
<br />
Suddenly your priorities change, you need to do more time efficient sessions. You need to get back home, you are not sure if one week you will be able to train 2 or 3 or 4 times. You can't go for a 7 hour run on a Sunday, and you don't want to.<br />
<br />
You can't always hit it hard, as you are knackered and you are not going to get that precious recovery sleep that all those sanctimonious 20 something coaches keep going on about; at this point you are so tired you can't even figure out how to fit the coloured blocks into the right holes in that toy your baby has. And you start doing yoga purely for the 10 minute relaxation at the end, where you hope to catch a quick powernap.<br />
<br />
(Of course, you wouldn't change it for the world, and you get to carry the baby around in a rucksack, basically doing weighted vest steady state cardio wherever you go).<br />
<br />
<b>'The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older'</b><br />
<br />
At this point let me point out there is a difference between chronological age and training age.<br />
<br />
Some people don't start lifting weights until their 50's. I know at least 2 women who are lifting heavy weights for the first time in their 50's. This means the accumulated trauma hasn't happened yet, I know one has recently been injured from lifting heavy (as in powerlifting world record for her age heavy). Same with some guys I know who started lifting weights in their 30's. They have a golden period of high volume training, lack of any periodisation or back off weeks until one day something snaps. If you started in your teens or 20's it just snaps earlier.<br />
<br />
Same for running, the earlier you started, the more chance you didn't start by training intelligently and you've had more time to wear yourself down and amplify any movement impairments.<br />
<br />
But do not despair..<br />
<br />
<b>"Too old to rock n roll: Too young to die"</b><br />
<br />
We live in a time of unprecedented training information and modalities. Look at the evolution of mobility over the last 10 years or so.<br />
<br />
This means you have more training options than ever before.<br />
<br />
Do you need to train differently as you get older? In short no. Unless your circumstances and injury profile dictate you should.<br />
<br />
But its probably time to accept a few home truths.<br />
<br />
You are probably not going to crossfit regionals<br />
You are not stepping into the MMA octagon for a world championship<br />
Your are not going to win <a href="http://utmbmontblanc.com/en/">UTMB</a><br />
You are not going to a club on a Friday to impress anyone with your biceps<br />
You are not playing in the premiership (and you should probably give up football if you value your ACL's and dignity)<br />
<br />
However, this does not mean you cannot train hard, it doesn't have to be darts and golf unless that's what you like.<br />
<br />
Having said all that here are my top tips:<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Shorter more focused sessions.</li>
<li>If you are unsure how many times a week you can train, go total body each session. If you know you can 3 or 4 times a week, you don't have to do this.</li>
<li>Avoid too much spine compression, why are you heavy squatting, can you achieve the same in a different way?</li>
<li>Technique is paramount</li>
<li>Accept that some exercises are over for you. For example, due to an old injury I haven't done any dips for nearly 10 years. I still manage to work my triceps and chest without this exercise.</li>
<li>I like rest pause sets and descending sets to maximise time efficiency and overload with the minimum number of sets. For example, with rest pause, 2 warm up sets, then one set where you get 6-8 reps, rest 10 seconds, get 1 or 2 reps more, if you are feeling good, rest another 10 seconds and get another 1-2 reps.</li>
<li>You never need to do a 1 rep max</li>
<li>Variety is your friend - dumbbells, kettlebells, bands, yoga, bodyweight, sprints.</li>
<li>Meditate</li>
<li>Warm up</li>
<li>Mobilise, if pushed for time, pick 2 mobilisations for key areas you need to work on each session.</li>
<li>Power, stop those sarcomeres withering, keep those fast twitch fibres. Sprints, and jumps (but warm up first!, build up sets and sprint speed).</li>
<li>Strength, especially for endurance athletes do some strength work. </li>
<li>Run up hills.</li>
<li>Probably stop drinking a gallon of milk a day.</li>
<li>Probably stop eating like a teenager on holiday in Magaluf.</li>
<li>Just keep going.</li>
<li>Feel free to ignore all of the above, you're old enough to know your body by now.</li>
<li>And if you are in your 70's enter <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badwater_Ultramarathon">Badwater</a> or the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barkley_Marathons">Barkley Marathon</a>, what've you got to lose?!</li>
</ul>
<div>
But most of all don't use age as an excuse, keep moving, keep learning.</div>
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<div>
(all things in quotes, songs, you can guess which ones, Springsteen, Pink Floyd, and even Jethro Tull for all the old heads).</div>
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<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-67237749701706634182017-11-26T08:16:00.000-08:002017-11-26T08:16:26.599-08:00Walk like a monster for glute activation.Glute training is the de-jour training of the last few years.<br />
<br />
If anything has defined the recent fitness zeitgeist its glutes.<br />
<br />
There are now approximately 40 zillion glute exercise variation videos available on instagram. But are they all worth it and effective?<br />
<br />
And what if you want to progress a client from bodyweight side lying clamshells? Which exercise is the next step? . Of course, there are a 1000 next steps, but the ones I like are the side mini band walk (aka sumo walk, x-band walk) and monster walk. (Also band resisted clamshells, but I will post them in a separate video/blog).<br />
<br />
I do see quite a few people in the gym these days with their own mini bands (mainly women - thanks Insta coaches). Butt (see what I did there) nearly all of them places the band around the knees for doing band walks and various squat exercises.<br />
<br />
Is this the best placement?<br />
<br />
Well no, the research shows (see <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22464817">Cambridge et al 2012</a>) that to get more glute medius activation and less Tensor fascia latae the band should be lower down around the ankles or feet.<br />
<br />
And the most glute max activation is when the band is around the forefoot. I am assuming that most of the women in the gym (and guys) are looking for more glute max activation for either injury rehab purposes, athletic purposes or lets face it aesthetic reasons. Therefore the optimal placing of the band would be around the forefoot and then next best would be around the ankles.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Why do it?</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<ul>
<li>can help as part of a programme for lower back pain.</li>
<li>can help as part of a hip programme (my hips always feel better after it).</li>
<li>get more toned glutes!</li>
<li>athletic purposes, in which case always go in different directions.</li>
<li>warm up, activation and mobility either for a leg workout or sport.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
In the 2 videos below my colleague Nick is demonstrating the side walk and monster walk. Now you may be asking why is the band around his ankles and not his forefoot, if forefoot is better? The answer is you can do both, but from a practical point of view the band around the foot can end up getting caught the floor depending on the surface you have, and the friction of the band on the floor can wear your band out quicker. But hey, try both.<br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/RpAt5MK7QkI" width="560"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br />
Or the monster walk, I don't see too many people doing this one, but I find it hits the glutes just as much, all you have to do is pretend you are a zombie or Frankensteins monster!<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cb65-rDvbkI" width="560"></iframe><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>How to do it:</b></span><br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Place band around the ankles or foot!</li>
<li>Get into a quarter squat/ athletic position.</li>
<li>Don't step too narrow, you will lose tension on the band.</li>
<li>Don't step too wide, you will end up using your back and not your glutes. In fact, a common thing I see when looking at peoples lower backs while doing this, is their spine bending to the side and doing the movement and their hips are not really doing anything. Especially if someone is not used to using their glutes or activating them you will see this compensation.</li>
<li>To stop the above happening, get some light core bracing. Also, getting the client/patient to put their hand on their waist and lower back, try and breathe diaphragmatically into that whole core region and be cognizant of not moving through the lower back.</li>
<li>Also look out for the knees collapsing inwards, they don't have to be excessively forced out but you don't want to see knee collapse.</li>
<li>Keep a good neck and shoulder position too.</li>
<li>Top tip: a band around the ankle with bare skin can cause chaffing and pinching. Either wear longer socks or trousers/leggings. Or try the band around the foot position.</li>
</ol>
<div>
I like to do this exercise before a leg workout, just one or two sets of 10 in each direction. Or put it into your leg workout and superset with something like walking lunges or glutes thrusts.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
For people with back pain, it might be one of the exercises you give them as part of their programme.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And as always, even though someone might be doing it on instagram there is no need to make this exercise more complicated by doing it sideways or backwards on an inclined treadmill or by jumping up the steps on a stairmill - yes I have seen people doing this in the gym!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
If you want to feel a glute burn give these variations a go!</div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>References:</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span>
Cambridge E, Sidorkewicz N, Ikeda D, McGill SM (2012). Progressive hip<br />
rehabilitation: The effects of resistance band placement on gluteal activation during two<br />
common exercises. Clin. Biomech. 27:719-724<br />
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<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-71987233460299481252017-08-29T13:54:00.002-07:002017-08-29T13:56:20.794-07:00Do this single leg exercise.In the video below you can see me demonstrating a single leg balance exercise with multi-directional reach. Aka <a href="https://www.physio-pedia.com/Star_Excursion_Balance_Test">Star Balance</a> aka <a href="https://www.scienceforsport.com/y-balance-test/">Y Balance</a>. Or if you really want to impress your friends call it a multiplanar exercise in the sagittal, frontal and transverse plane.<br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/kpavPDJcDnE" width="560"></iframe>
<br />
Of course, I didn't invent this exercise. As mentioned above, the Star Balance has been used for a long time in physio circles as an assessment and the FMS guys use the Y balance.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Why do it?</span></b><br />
<br />
So much of gym work takes place on two feet and is very linear. The rise of S&C, squats and deadlifts are a good thing, but there is another dimension to training that should be addressed. Lateral movement and single leg work should also be part of a well rounded programme.<br />
<br />
This exercise is good for<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>anyone who needs balance training, fall prevention</li>
<li>running or any sport that requires you to be on one leg</li>
<li>post ankle, hip or knee injury to help build up proprioception (being aware of where you joints and body are in space) and strength.</li>
<li>as part of a warm up drill</li>
</ul>
<div>
In the video I am reaching as far as I can in each direction, and I am using three directions (Y shape). But if someone has had a recent injury, is starting to work on their balance or is recovering from something such as a stroke then the movement can be small. Some other key points:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>You could hold onto a chair to begin with and then try and do it with just finger tips resting on the chair.</li>
<li>Try and maintain spine integrity, it is unloaded so I wouldn't worry about some spine flexion, but try and hinge from the hips.</li>
<li>Keep an eye on that support knee, you don't want it collapsing in excessively.</li>
<li>Also think about neck position, keep the back of your neck smooth.</li>
<li>You can reach with the arms as well.</li>
</ol>
<div>
You can also do a reach forward with the leg (which I don't do in the video). Kind of like a mini pistol or heel dig. For some people this causes more issues with the knee and spine bending, so listen to your body. For others it helps to strengthen the muscles around the knee.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I used this exercise when running, and I think it helped me rehab a niggling knee issue I had. I think it also helped as I increased the miles and do more and more trail running.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
You may feel it in the muscles around the hips and pelvis. I can particularly feel a stretch in the outer hip when I reach the leg behind me across the midline of the body. It is also working the muscles around the knee and ankle.<br />
<br />
This exercise is not trying to isolate anything, it is integrating the limbs and torso as happens in real life. You want your hips, knees and ankles to respond reflexively when running, jumping or even stepping down a curb.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Do three or four circuits on each leg as part of your warm up, or do it at any point during the day.</div>
<div>
There is no need to 'progress' this exercise, you don't have to add in weight or stand on a bosu.<br />
<br />
Keep it simple and effective.</div>
<div>
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Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-68492524970846225402017-08-13T14:26:00.001-07:002017-08-13T14:28:55.894-07:00Hill Sprints. Do Them!<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRZFm9RIBIBuJC7GBXi1c2a_AL8XYTmMsODiUGw-EJ5X4qE9XaAIQcUN4RB0R1rzN8tD4dvCjzR4A0IPGg0rL1HB-nt2lEmZip0mWSfMlK4hFCYccVEOGvTxS2BJKGL3bSLqrJqd9eUFA/s1600/20170507_095123.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRZFm9RIBIBuJC7GBXi1c2a_AL8XYTmMsODiUGw-EJ5X4qE9XaAIQcUN4RB0R1rzN8tD4dvCjzR4A0IPGg0rL1HB-nt2lEmZip0mWSfMlK4hFCYccVEOGvTxS2BJKGL3bSLqrJqd9eUFA/s640/20170507_095123.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In short: find a hill, run as hard as you can up it, rest, repeat a few times then run home. Feel better, look better.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Hills sprints are a great
addition to your training.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">They are not just for runners
who want to improve their speed in shorter distances like 5k. But for
anyone who wants to improve power and strength.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">And for leg development
(quads and glutes my friends). Have you ever seen a sprinter with poor legs!</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">They are also great for
improving conditioning. I would also use them at the start of a phase
for a long distance athlete (10k, marathon, and ultra distances).</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">If you don’t have access to
a prowler or sled, hill sprints are the 'go to' for field athletes that need power and
strength.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Of course, I didn’t invent
hill sprints. I first became aware of them from running coach Brad
Hudson, and by his own admission he took his approach from coach
Renato Canova, who in turn took them from sprint coach Bud James.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">According to Hudson (2008),
hill sprints will</span></div>
<ul>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Strengthen running muscles</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Make the runner less injury
prone</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Increase power and efficiency
of stride</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Take little time</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">are fun to do!</span></div>
</li>
</ul>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">But they also have benefits
for the non runner.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Power!</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Power is about recruiting more
fast twitch muscle fibres. It is about building fast strength, not
grinding strength. It is what makes athletes explosive.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">A maximal hill sprint is about maximal muscle fibre recruitment in one of the safest and least technically demanding ways.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Traditional training for this
would include the Olympic lifts, plyometrics (jumps, bounding) and
medicine ball throws.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">However, many of these methods
are technically demanding. To get the most out of Olympic lifts, you
need someone to coach you to make sure you are competent. And you
need access to the equipment. Plyometrics are also technically
demanding and there is a large amount of force going through joints
and tendons when you land.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Hill sprints require no
equipment. As you are running on a steep hill you are not absorbing
force in the same way as when you jump off a box.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Power is the missing element
in many peoples training. They may lift weights and work on strength
in lifts such as the deadlift and squat. They may do hypertrophy
training. They may do steady state endurance training. They may even
do some conditioning – but this is not power.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">As you get older power gets
more important to train. And of course, for athleticism you need some
power training.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Hill sprints are part of the training puzzle.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
“<span style="font-size: small;">Hill repetitions help build
the ‘fitness bridge’between strength and speed.” (Hudson, p.81)</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Of course, there is no reason why your training can't consist of Olympic lifts, plyometrics and hill sprints.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Why not flat sprints?</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Many years ago a myself and a
colleague ran a boot camp. As part of it we incorporated some track
sprints. We had screened all the participants before hand to make
sure they were injury free, did a long warm up and some build up
sprints. Then we got them to sprint a bit harder, and 8 out of 10 of
them suddenly grasped the middle of their quad.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">What had happened? It was a rectus femoris strain. As their psoas muscle wasn’t used to having
to flex the hip, suddenly the rectus femori was trying to flex the hip and
straighten the knee fast, while putting in a near maximal effort. The
muscle was pulled in 2 different directions and the middle of the
muscle couldn’t cope and got strained.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">As strength coach Mike Boyle
says in is his book Functional Training for Sports</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
“<span style="font-size: small;">The athlete will use the
rectus femoris to create hip flexion. This can result in the
mysterious quad pull seen in sprinters or on forty-yard dash day in
football.”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">(A similar thing can also
happen in the hamstrings, where the hamstring tries to bend the knee
and extend the hip as the glutes aren’t doing their job, this can
also result in pain at the front of the hip, that the person attempts
to correct by stretching, when in fact it is not tight. Thanks to
physio Shirley Sahrmann for that!).</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Flat sprinting is more
technical than hill sprints. Hill sprints actually make your
technique better, it is making you drive into the hill with the front
part of the foot and use the posterior chain, it is making you lean,
there is less shock absorption going on. There is less impact.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Plus on tracks, everyone feels
the need to sprint 100 or 200m. And if you are putting in maximal
effort, this is actually a very long way! Usain Bolt may make it look
easy, but not until you’ve tried it do you realise it is hard to
keep form, technique and effort over those distance. </span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">It is much better to think of
the shorter sprints of American sports like the NFL, where the 40
yard dash (36 metres) is the staple. A much shorter distance and time
under tension.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Or if you are doing hill
sprints, think about no more than 8 seconds to begin with.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Why not use the treadmill?</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">On the one hand you can
control the exact gradient and speed on the treadmill.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">However, I don’t find
treadmills very good for very short maximal sprints of 8-10 seconds.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">It takes too long to increase
the speed up to where you want it. Or for extra danger, you can try
jumping onto it after you have built it up to the speed you want to go.
The first method makes the sprint too long and you are not going at
max effort at the start. With the second method, all the benefits of
driving hard to overcome inertia are loss, so some the muscle adaption is
lost.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">I would only use the treadmill
for sprints of 30secs or longer interval work.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>How/Format?</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">First of all build up!</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">If you are a beginner they
will put a massive amount of load and stress on your joints and
muscles. And as a beginner you may not be able to sprint at all, but
can do some faster efforts.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Yes, in the long term they should help prevent injury and improve muscle recruitment, but you have to gradually progress.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Hudson recommends starting on
a hill with a 6-8% gradient, and then going to a hill with a 10%
gradient. In practice, you probably just have to find the steepest
hill you can near you.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">My preferred format is:</span></div>
<ul>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">jog, easy run to the hill you
are going to use. About 7-12mins for me depending on the hill I’m
running to.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">A couple of easy build up
‘sprints’, really more like striding out (pushing slightly above your coomfortable pace), for about 8-10
seconds. If you’re are a beginner, this might be all you do.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Use the arms, lean in to the
hill, visualise the glutes firing as you drive into the hill. Relax the face and shoulders.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Walk back down to start, nice
and easy between each effort. Or if it is a really long hill, I
gradually make my way to the top, resting by walking across the hill
between each rep.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Then increase the effort, now
near maximal for 2 x 8-10secs.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Err on the side of caution,
less time is better, 6-8 seconds might be enough.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Then jog/ run home.</span></div>
</li>
<li>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Total session time is
20-30mins.</span></div>
</li>
</ul>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
I would then increase the number of sprints by 1 or 2 a week.</div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
“<span style="font-size: small;">Most runners will achieve
as much strength and power improvement as they can get by doing 10-12
hill sprints of 10-12 seconds each, twice a week.” (Hudson, p82)</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Personally I think for the
general athlete, once a week is enough. And 5 or 6 sprints might also
be enough. Of course, it depends on how much time you have. Its also
about listening to your body, if I start to lose speed and intensity
on the sprints I stop, its no longer a maximal effort session.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">You can also use markers us
the hill such as trees, and sprint between them, gradually making
your way up the hill, again making sure these are very short sprints. A kind of short burst hill sprint fartlek.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">You could also be doing once
every 2 weeks as part of a general training plan.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Even for an ultra runner I
would still sprinkle them through a training cycle to stop them
adopting the classic one speed, one gear, ‘ultrashuffle’, and
problems of over use of the same muscles.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">For a runner, you might then
start to use longer hill repeats, 30-60seconds. Or if training for
very long distances, I used hill repeats that were 1k or 1 mile long.
(Of course, these are no where near maximal effort, and are about
endurance and technical efficiency for mountain/trail running).</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;">But I think these benefits go
beyond runners. For the general athlete, and general population they
are great for building strength, power, developing the legs and I
believe do help with injury prevention. (and of course help you lose
weight and tone up, joke).</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
But mostly you do them to go maximal, at the end you are stooped over with your heart beating hard and unable to catch your breath, your are in the moment, there isn't anything else to think about.</div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>References.</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://www.coachhudson.com/booksandcoaching/">Hudson B & Fitzgerald M(2008) Run Faster from the 5k to the Marathon.</a></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://www.humankinetics.com/products/all-products/new-functional-training-for-sports-2nd-edition">Boyle M(2016) FunctionalStrength Training for Sports. Human Kinetics. Kindle edition.</a></span></div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0.08in; margin-top: 0.17in;">
<br />
<br /></div>
Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-73698773040891482502017-08-06T12:17:00.000-07:002017-08-06T12:17:49.744-07:00Who Are You? The type of person who exercises?You hear it all the time:<br />
<br />
I'm no good at maths<br />
I can't run<br />
I'm no good with computers<br />
I can't do this or that<br />
I'm no good at learning languages<br />
I'm not that type of person<br />
I'm not a gym person<br />
I'm more of a .....insert here what you believe you are... type of person.<br />
<br />
Only yesterday I heard a guy in a coffee shop tell his friend he didn't have an ear for languages. And yet, he had learned one language fluently, the one he was speaking. He then told his friend he had an A-level in French. Despite this he had decided he was the type of person who was not good at learning languages.<br />
<br />
At what point did you decide that was the type of person you were?<br />
At what point did you decide there was a certain skill set you did not posses or there was a certain skill set that was your strong point?<br />
Were you a child or a teenager? At what point did you think this is me?<br />
And how many times have you changed your mind as an adult?<br />
<br />
People adopt a series of habits and patterns and rituals and they become them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/269537/the-path/">Professor Michael Puett in his book The Path</a>, about how we can apply some of the lessons of ancient Chinese philosophy to our modern lives, states<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"What we in the West define as the true self is actually patterns of continuous responses to people and the world; patterns that have built up over time. For example, you might think, <i>I'm just the type of person who gets annoyed easily. </i>On the contrary, it's more likely that you have <i>become </i>the kind of person who does get irritated over minor things because of how you've interacted with people for years. But that's not because you are, in fact, such a person." (p.43)</blockquote>
<br />
A bad experience with maths or PE at school and that's you for life. Suddenly you are the type of person who doesn't like exercise or running.<br />
<br />
Also, its easy, if that's who you are, then you never have to change, its just the type of person you are, its not your fault, you don't have to try new things.<br />
<br />
Now this doesn't mean you have to try everything new thing in the world, every new activity. You don't have to be 'good' at everything and 'like' everything. For example, I'm never playing golf or watching Britains Got Talent.<br />
<br />
Also, I'm not saying you have to be excellent at everything. There is a lot of ground in between saying 'I can't run' and being Mo Farah. And if you're not 7 foot tall you're probably not going to play in the NBA but you can still enjoy basketball.<br />
<br />
However, don't dismiss activities because they may be hard or push you out of your comfort zone.<br />
<br />
How many people leave school and never learn anything new? The pattern is set. It congeals and rusts.<br />
<br />
You learned a series of habits and rituals and you accept them, you greet people in a certain way, in the West you use a knife and fork to eat, you drive on a certain side of the road - these were all learned - they are not you.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"We cling to a fixed idea of who we are and it cripples us. Nothing and no one is fixed." - Pema Chodron (2001)</blockquote>
<br />
There is no core self. It changes all the time. In the words of Chuck Palahniuk<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_vj2xEKw1367dXRZu6ORE-uBE83NFrL5MqybGB1z13CKXolvwPe7aGyvzj4HyHcJee0QDqIQSnRWrGK9ffjKJrR6FRoHH1C3hvI1rkwJGXWeuTs0Wk_Z0rKtZ5FqaHC_b81kFDIUJXyw/s1600/chuck+pal+quote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="323" data-original-width="491" height="262" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_vj2xEKw1367dXRZu6ORE-uBE83NFrL5MqybGB1z13CKXolvwPe7aGyvzj4HyHcJee0QDqIQSnRWrGK9ffjKJrR6FRoHH1C3hvI1rkwJGXWeuTs0Wk_Z0rKtZ5FqaHC_b81kFDIUJXyw/s400/chuck+pal+quote.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
But this means at any time you could start to choose something else, pick different 'china patterns', sit in a different place, brush your teeth with the wrong hand, be the type of person who buys a bicycle and cycles to work!<br />
<br />
Was your view on the world and personality set by 16 years old by a few teachers, parents and friends. It doesn't mean you have to reject all this, and form a whole new personality, but don't be limited, build on this.<br />
<br />
As a kid you learned the most complex things possible - how to walk, talk and read. And then at certain point many adults think, well I'm an adult now, I don't have try things that I may fail at or make me look 'bad', I will not push the envelope, I will seal it up and stay inside of it.<br />
<br />
And if you only perceive the world in a certain way, and have already decided that you are not the type of person who takes up cycling or goes to a yoga, where does that leave you?<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"But remember that who you think you are - and especially what you think is 'you' when you are making decisions - is usually just a set of patterns you've fallen into." (Puett & Gross- Loh, 2016).</blockquote>
<br />
And before you know it you never push out of your comfort zone or try something new.<br />
<br />
Learning new things is fantastic for your brain health, learning new languages and new skills makes your brain form new connections. And the other thing that is good for brain health is exercise.<br />
<br />
And this is where exercise rears its head. So many people like the idea of say running or being 'fit', but no, <i>I can't do that, I'm not fit enough to go to a gym</i> (cue flashback to running around a field in the snow at school while half the class hide behind the cricket pavilion for a smoke).<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Its not easy.</span></b><br />
<br />
Even confident successful people can crumble when faced with a new skill. Only the other day I was showing a lady around the gym, she was confident in herself, knew she wanted to get fit, she went on the cardio machines no problem, a few resistance machines no problem. Then we tried a goblet squat with a kettlebell, we were standing in the dreaded freeweights area. Her technique needed a bit of work, she couldn't get it straight away like she had on the machines. She was pitching forward a bit, had a bit of knee collapse. I gave her a bit of coaching, said not to worry, it was a new movement, just practice a bit and she would get it after a few sessions. But no, for her this was disastrous.<br />
<br />
The next session in the gym she was adamant she did not like the goblet squat, did not want to do it again, despite the fact at this point she had probably only done 20 reps total in her life, and spent 2 minutes on the exercises. But because she had not grasped the technique and skill instantaneously she did not want to continue.<br />
<br />
I have had a similar thing even on cardio equipment, a cross trainer that's a bit different to what people are used to, you say you just need to do this and this, and the technique needs a bit of work and next thing they are saying '<i>I don't like this machine I want to get off'</i>, after 90 seconds. This is code for <i>'I didn't come here to learn a new skill, or feel like you are judging me, or to look like I can't do something, I am adult now, I don't need anyone to teach me anything'</i>.<br />
<br />
What they expected and reality don't match and their brain doesn't like it, the ego kicks in, fear kicks in.<br />
<br />
It is hard to break habits, set new patterns and learn new things, as <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Peak-Secrets-New-Science-Expertise/dp/0544456238">Anders Ericsson says in his book Peak</a><br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Getting started is easy, as anyone who has visited a gym after New Year's knows. You decide that you want to get in shape or learn to play the guitar or pick up a new language, and so you jump right in...Then after a while, reality hits. It'd hard to find the time to work out or practice as much as you should... you start missing sessions. You're not improving... It's why gyms that are were crowded in January are only half full in July. So that's the problem in a nutshell: purposeful practice is hard." (kindle edition of the book)</blockquote>
<br />
But as adults, its easy to duck out, no one is making us go back to school or go to the gym. The television and social media feeds are waiting to anaesthetize us as the end of another hard day.<br />
<br />
My friend is learning to play guitar, its hard, he's an adult with a job. I can explain and show him things on the guitar which are easy to me, because I learned them when I was a teenager. Conversely, this same friend is a very good rock climber, he has been climbing for years. I'm trying to be better at climbing, but compared to him I'm terrible. He can free climb something in his flip flops which looks like El Capitan to me. But we are both trying to push out of our comfort zone, willing to fail and let go of that ego a little bit.<br />
<br />
Ericsson talks about practice<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"The hallmark of purposeful or deliberate practice is that you try to do something you cannot do - that takes you out of your comfort zone - and that you practice it over and over again, focusing on exactly how you are doing it, where you are falling short, and how you can get better. Real life - our jobs, our schooling, our hobbies - seldom gives us the opportunity for this sort of focused repetition..."</blockquote>
<br />
Fitness is a skill, many people perceive themselves as time poor, I don't have time to learn these exercises, I just need to get fit and lose weight. This is missing the point. They don't want it to be a skill or a process, they don't really want to change anything.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The future is wide open.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Something inside us likes the world to be stable and fixed, but if you never explore new things you may never find parts of you that you never knew existed. You go to a zumba class and suddenly find out you love dancing, you avoided swimming your whole life because you lacked confidence, you get a few lessons and suddenly you enjoy going for a swim to clear your head and like using the pool on holiday. You get the idea.<br />
<br />
As coaches, it is up to us to show this to clients.<br />
<br />
In 2009 I walked into a book shop in London and bought <a href="http://www.chrismcdougall.com/born-to-run/">a book by Christopher McDougall</a>. It was about a sport I hardly knew anything about; ultra running. Then a few years later I saw one of the lead protagonists talk in London. A couple of years after that I went to Leadville and run a 100 miles in a race that seemed mythical and for super humans to me 5 years before. If I had a fixed idea of who I was none of this would have happened.<br />
<br />
Its funny how things end up.<br />
<br />
So the final word to that person I saw talk in London, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micah_True">Caballo Blanco</a>. During the talk someone asked him 'Can anyone run 100 miles?'. He answered 'If they want to'.<br />
<br />
Can you be the type of person who exercises?<br />
If you want to.<br />
<br />
Can you change?<br />
If you want to.<br />
This applies to all things.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">References.</span></b><br />
<br />
For my tribute to Caballo and my thoughts when I went to see him talk<br />
<a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/micah-true-is-gone-caballo-blanco-runs.html">http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/micah-true-is-gone-caballo-blanco-runs.html</a><br />
<a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/evening-with-caballo-blanco-you-know.html">http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/evening-with-caballo-blanco-you-know.html</a><br />
<br />
On why it is hard to form a new habit and how to do it<br />
<a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-how-long-will-you.html">http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-how-long-will-you.html</a><br />
<br />
On how habits are embedded in your memory and how you become them<br />
<a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/forming-new-habits-part-4-memory.html">http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/forming-new-habits-part-4-memory.html</a><br />
<br />
On habits and choices<br />
<a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/forming-new-habits-part-5-choice.html">http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/forming-new-habits-part-5-choice.html</a><br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Path-New-Think-About-Everything-ebook/dp/B016PKNV2C">Michael Puett & Christine Gross-Loh (2016) The Path.</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://peakthebook.com/index.html">Anders Ericsson & Robert Pool. Peak, Secrets from the new science of expertise.</a> Kindle edition quoted.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Places-That-Scare-You-Fearlessness/dp/000718350X">Pema Chodron (2001) The places that scare you.</a><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-5804055894798114932017-08-04T03:51:00.000-07:002017-08-04T03:51:51.623-07:00And then everyone was a strength coach.There was a time when people working in gyms were fitness instructors and personal trainers. But this wasn't cool enough. <br />
<br />
It started to get a bad reputation, the barrier to entry was low, the qualifications were easy. And no one was going to pay an online 'fitness instructor guru', it just didn't have a cool ring to it.<br />
<br />
Being a strength coach was much cooler. All those guys training people in American high schools, and in their garage and selling online products were strength coaches.<br />
<br />
Before you knew it, power racks sprung up and people were powerlifters and following Westside. And there were dynamic effort days and bands and chains. And if you didn't know a buffalo bar from a Texas power bar you might as well have still been balancing on a swiss ball with Paul Chek.<br />
<br />
And then Olympic lifting was a thing. 10 years ago there wasn't one Olympic lifting technique video on the internet – I know because I looked for them and couldn't find them, so I went and did the lifting course back in 2007/8.<br />
<br />
On the same course were some guys who were going to open something called a 'crossfit gym'. None of us had lifting shoes, we all did it in trainers, the coaches running the course didn't even mention lifting shoes. And I went back to the gym and had to practice with metal weight plates on a normal floor.<br />
<br />
Fast forward ten years and there are coaches on the internet who by rights should be coaching the Chinese team with the expertise they appear to have – not hanging out at the local gym or critiquing peoples technique on the internet.<br />
<br />
And everyone expected a power rack and bumper plates.<br />
<br />
And trainers wanted to be coaches, and everyone had to deadlift and squat. Because coaches had respect and weren't poorly paid cleaners in disguise. Who could blame them, '20 years of schooling and they put you on the day shift'. And this stuff was way more interesting than standing next to a treadmill and asking someone if their RPE was 12 or 13.<br />
<br />
And one of the safest sports started to throw up injuries. Things that were rare became common places such as end plate fractures in the spine. And your Doctor is not really looking for it because who fractures an end plate? Someone under massive spinal compression.<br />
<br />
And heavy unilateral lifting without qualification ended up with people breaking their pelvic rings.<br />
And then everyone wanted to train like an 'athlete' or train 'athletes'. Well kind of… Take some plyometrics and put them together in a long intense class format and give it to a bunch of people who haven't jumped off the ground since they were skipping in primary school. And there were blown ACLs and ruptured achilles.<br />
<br />
And some of the biggest fitness/ class companies in the world started to put together HIIT/ plyometric workouts. But they didn't grasp it, they didn't fully understand it. They hadn't immersed themselves in it for years. And then 50 year old women started to rupture achilles because they were doing exercises designed for Soviet athletes.<br />
<br />
And the strength coaches had everyone Olympic lifting, and I was guilty too. And those clients who just wanted a bit of weight loss and tone were doing cleans and jerks without screening, and had no business ever doing these exercises. Like suddenly introducing your client to the sport of javelin or hammer throwing when they are 60 years old.<br />
<br />
And people who had no business putting a weight over their head in a deep squat were trained relentlessly for a sport they should never had started because strength was good and reps were bad unless they were metcon reps. And anything above 5 reps was cardio.<br />
<br />
And cardio was a joke, because a fat man in a lifting suit said so.<br />
<br />
And young injury free coaches who were used to training young injury free contemporaries who did sports like rugby thought this was a universal template. Regardless of spine disc shape, or injury history or training age.<br />
<br />
And these coaches who were used to training high school athletes and college athletes, with GOMAD a gallon of milk a day protocol, and 5x5 was all you would ever need convinced the poor guys and girls in the local gym that everyone could be trained like this. Because they had never encountered anyone who couldn't do 10 pull ups straight off or who couldn't walk up a flight of stairs without getting out of breath.<br />
<br />
But women started lifting weights, and lo it was good. For their body shape started to change. And booty was the new boobs, and fitness was this years model.<br />
<br />
But don't talk about the back injuries and the stupid sit ups. And everyone wore lifting shoes all the time, and wondered why their knees hurt when they back squatted.<br />
<br />
Now there were powerlifters, crossfitters, and strongmen and Olympic lifters in every gym, and the bodybuilders hid in the corner (even though they weren't really bodybuilders and had never entered a competition, but they clung onto their bodypart splits and preacher curls like the Golden fleece they knew it was) but their time would come again. The rise of the fitness model was about to happen, fake tan sales and posing stage costume sales were about to explode. And the fitness competition organisers knew this, and their were posing coaches, and online nutrition programmes, and people who placed top 50 in their local bikini comp were now not just strength coaches but figure coaches and body transformation coaches.<br />
<br />
(and it was okay to objectify women and make them strut around in stripper heels as long as you tack the word 'fitness' to the event, because that's empowering, how very post modern, and as my friend heard the compere say at one of these event 'don't forget we're not just judging their bodies, but their faces as well'; at least they were being honest, T&A with quarter turns were now fine, we could all look and not feel bad like the bad old days of the 1970's and Miss World competitions. Now they didn't even pretend to want world peace, they just wanted a supplement sponsorship deal and 100,000 insta followers).<br />
<br />
And of course, guys had fitness comps as well, where they wore board shorts and fake grins, but mostly everyone laughed at them because they weren't strength coaches.<br />
<br />
And it was all fine, there was more choice than ever. But somewhere along the line, quality was forgotten.<br />
<br />
And most of the strength coaches out there doing their job everyday had no internet presence. And knew training individuals was always an individual programming decision, and they thought deeply about methods of training and the philosophy of it all. But they were not trying to be all things to all people.<br />
<br />
It was the best of the times, it was the worst of times. Everything it could ever be was right there, but it was ever so slightly off target. And it could have been so good, it could still be.<br />
<br />
But wait long enough and everything will go full circle again and again and again.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-34993448913293857572017-06-25T06:22:00.002-07:002017-06-25T06:22:53.019-07:00Should you be honest with clients?Should we tell clients the truth? I'm not saying we are outright lying to them, but much of the time we are not being entirely honest with them about what it will take to achieve their goals.<br />
<br />
Imagine someone books a training session with you or enquires about training with you.<br />
<br />
There are three key scenarios where you can be honest, or try and convince the client otherwise or essentially kick them into touch and realize your services are not the best for for them.<br />
<br />
<b>Scenario one: Being honest and about frequency and consistency.</b><br />
<br />
Initial consultation or chat, the person tells you they can train once a week, maybe twice ( hint: this means they are coming once every 2 weeks at best). You know they can't achieve anything on this schedule. Should you be honest with them? Or start working with them, and hope they gradually form the habit, start enjoying exercise and build up to three times a week? Anyone who has worked in a commercial gym knows that option 2 is rarely successful.<br />
<br />
We all know ideally it takes 3-5 sessions a week, focus and at least some acknowledgment that nutrition is part of the puzzle.<br />
<br />
On the other hand, we don't want to burst anyones bubble. They have taken the step to walk into a gym, to push out of their comfort zone; however their expectations do not match the level of effort they are willing to put in.<br />
<br />
Now. I'm not talking about the motivated people, who are going to train by themselves consistently, and want a programme and check in session once a month.<br />
<br />
This is more the people,who decide they don't want to do anything in the programme you've written. And between follow up appointments it transpires they haven't done any training and have basically ignored your programme.<br />
<br />
I was speaking to a colleague about all the programmes he has written, all the individual/ bespoke programmes. He was going through the names, and realized that at best 10% had actually done the programme.<br />
<br />
That is a lot of wasted time and effort. The thing is you don't always know who is going to be the one who sticks with it.<br />
<br />
<b>Scenario two: I want to tone up, lose weight and not bulk up.</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
As the conversation moves on in your initial consultation, the client will tell you their goal, or a vague idea of a goal. If you have worked in fitness for more than a week, then the phrase you will hear nearly everyday from women is 'I want to lose weight, and tone up, I don't want to bulk up'.<br />
<br />
Occasionally, you get a guy who also says they don't want to bulk up, but a more common guy phrase is 'I don't need to work on my legs, as I play football'. At which point you laugh in that guys face.<br />
<br />
But seriously, back to toning. The great industry lie. We know that muscles either get bigger or smaller, fat percentage goes up or down. Yes, in the initially phase of training, a person may start by recruiting more of their current pool of muscle fibres, and become more 'neurally efficient' but at some point if you want to see an actual visual change, some muscle mass is going to have to be generated.<br />
<br />
Mention this and a look of panic will wash over the woman's face. 'I don't want to bulk up'. It turns out they are the genetically gifted 0.001% of the female population who easily bulks up, who could have entered Ms Olympia if they had so wished and won based on training twice a week, eating 40 grams of protein a day and a post workout Prosecco.<br />
<br />
So you point out all the guys in freeweight area who have taken enough pre-workout to stun a horse, and are trying to mainline protein to get an extra millimetre on their biceps, and are training 7 days a week.<br />
<br />
But no, she is different, she will bulk up. You say weights and muscle mass and all she sees is Dorian Yates (or Gal Ferrera Yates, if you want to use the google). Now, of course, some women do want to do this, but mostly they aren't walking into a commercial gym to have a sit down with a trainer, 95% of women you will ever see will say they want to lose weight and tone up.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFP267nvVqdd2yWwBae9MlVfyY6Oz51r-4Z3sND6gTr_OQxnuVbpYkVTIb-XJ-DMIzdw7uxqTiCKmjHctyWI9d98ekCY7YHU1JLAcRmh-_B91Jmj9RZjG_MrhMdn2yPuMiVpV6BECNt_A/s1600/dorians+back.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="363" data-original-width="348" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFP267nvVqdd2yWwBae9MlVfyY6Oz51r-4Z3sND6gTr_OQxnuVbpYkVTIb-XJ-DMIzdw7uxqTiCKmjHctyWI9d98ekCY7YHU1JLAcRmh-_B91Jmj9RZjG_MrhMdn2yPuMiVpV6BECNt_A/s400/dorians+back.jpg" width="382" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dorian Yates back is so big: easily achieved on twice a week of a machine circuit and a bar of dairy milk. Source: every bodybuilding internet forum.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
As my colleague once said to some women, 'why do you think it is my interest to make you look like something you don't want to be? If I did that, I would be out of a job, I wouldn't have any clients, Its in my interest to help you achieve the look and fitness you want.' I paraphrase here of course, I wasn't recording the conversation, but you get the idea.<br />
<br />
You explain to the woman that lifting heavy weights at low reps might be the way to go, but this goes against the perceived wisdom, this is what big guys do. You explain all about testosterone levels in men compared to women, but she has already glazed over. She's thinking toning occurs with high reps and lots of volume, right, like in toning classes? Which bizarrely, is the thing that research shows causes increases in muscle mass given the right nutrition etc. (See Schoenfelds research on high rep ranges, 25 reps plus).<br />
<br />
You could stay true to your ideals. Or nod your head, say you've got the perfect toning programme, mix in some machines, cardio, light dumbbells, and sprinkle in a couple of strength exercises under the guise of toning exercises. Bingo, everyones a winner, she gets results and you keep your client.<br />
<br />
<b>Scenario three: The trainer lies to themselves.</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
When you first start training people you need clients. And you may be paying monthly PT rent you need to cover. Therefore, how likely are you to turn down a client? You are just starting out, but suddenly your level 3 qualification means you can train everyone.<br />
<br />
Can that person really be an expert on triathlon training, back pain, all injuries, marathon training, getting someone contest ready for figure competition and write comprehensive nutrition plans for everyones needs?<br />
<br />
Or like the classic insta-chump coach, everyone get the same fully customized training and nutrition plan regardless.<br />
<br />
You might get lucky, and someone you train wins something, gets a pro card or their injury heals up. Of course, genetics and time had nothing to do with this, it was your training programme.<br />
<br />
This is where the industry is at now. Whereas, Alberto Salazaar is never going to coach 100m runners, some PTs can apparently coach everyone.<br />
<br />
Wouldn't it be better to refer out, admit you don't actually have a nutrition qualification and are therefore not meant to write nutrition plans; and you don't have MRI x-ray vision and can't fix their injury, but they should go to an actual person who's job it is to do that. If Eric Cressey is referring out, then may be some trainers should do as well.<br />
<br />
<b>If you're in it, you're in it.</b><br />
<br />
The above spiel wasn't meant to give any answers. It just is the way the industry is. Of course, adherence rates and the number of people achieving their goals is probably the same as it ever was, so what have we got to lose by telling the truth? If a business model is already broken, then abandoning it to try something new can't be any worse.<br />
<br />
Ultimately, it comes down to the art of coaching. That indefinable ability to get the best out of people, to tell them what they want to hear when they start, and gradually shape the conversation as they continue to train. If they get results they wont care. But it's going to be difficult when so many coaches promise the earth, quick fixes and easy solutions. If you're new to the industry, do what it takes, don't starve because you think everyone should do 5x5 barbell work, but keep your integrity as a coach as well.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjykx2ExVFBQ0kZJUkatOTK1dE3SIwKrMlBpSZJ3DR9cL4QpyQK1nVq5vygAOs1K6qyoOM48fcvNhqk3sjJyZuavUVK5a1ehXtjFg9RlsQalnMz8jF2L_U4cIQrUf5yOXiUhNdaW_8MdkQ/s1600/slim+charles.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="588" data-original-width="1024" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjykx2ExVFBQ0kZJUkatOTK1dE3SIwKrMlBpSZJ3DR9cL4QpyQK1nVq5vygAOs1K6qyoOM48fcvNhqk3sjJyZuavUVK5a1ehXtjFg9RlsQalnMz8jF2L_U4cIQrUf5yOXiUhNdaW_8MdkQ/s400/slim+charles.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Slim Charles: The Wire</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-71890090609910631022017-05-16T03:47:00.001-07:002017-05-16T14:20:48.747-07:00You've never had it so good. You are WEIRD.If you are reading this you probably live in the Western world, can speak English, have a computer or device of some sort and access to an internet connection.<br />
<br />
You are probably <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/05/weird_psychology_social_science_researchers_rely_too_much_on_western_college.html">WEIRD</a><br />
Western<br />
Educated<br />
Industrialised<br />
Rich<br />
Democratic<br />
<br />
You are a freak, an aberration. Most of the world does not live like this, for most of human history for most people none of this was true.<br />
<br />
As in you are rich compared to most of the world, you probably aren't homeless, and democratic as in you get to vote every so often. Educated, you probably finished at least Secondary (High School).<br />
<br />
You have access to a clean water supply, antibiotics and can buy all the painkillers you want.<br />
<br />
You can say and do what you want within a certain legal framework without fear of being put in prison or arrested.<br />
<br />
You have access to more information and knowledge than any other humans in history ever did.<br />
<br />
If you are involved in an accident (in the UK) a helicopter will take you to a state of the art medical facility and give you the best treatment in the world for free and may save your life.<br />
<br />
You are not trying to grow food to survive on a poor scrap of land owned by a despot you have never met. Your kids are not working in a dangerous mining operation for a dollar a day for 15 hours a day, 7 days a week.<br />
<br />
You probably have a gym membership, go to coffee shops, eat out every so often and try to eat healthily some of the time. Depending where you live, you may have access to free healthcare and probably can go for a walk without fearing for your life.<br />
<br />
You've never had it so good...<br />
<br />
And yet<br />
<br />
You are probably stressed and angry, over 70% of work related health and safety issues are stress related.<br />
<br />
In the UK, 7.8% of the population meet the criteria for diagnosing anxiety and depression.<br />
1 in 6 adults have a common mental health disorder<br />
19.7% of people aged 16 or over show symptoms of anxiety and depression in 2014.<br />
1 in 3 adults have high blood pressure<br />
More than 25% of the population are obese.<br />
4.5 millions people have diabetes (of which 90% have type 2)<br />
And the number one cause of death of men under 50 is suicide.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhydaX8-aCftBpr3pLTSHEg-emCnFo9YWtuIdijEAF_rqG1w1684KEYt-ngnUK3-neUUG1MN1LY8w-wS7-mOkYpqPxNB4h4e_snr4cuwLpeqTRWokkVXFHr2V7Mq7JEnxlKLvz6EUyjg_c/s1600/sandra-bullock-quote-im-angry-all-the-time-and-i-dont-know-why.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhydaX8-aCftBpr3pLTSHEg-emCnFo9YWtuIdijEAF_rqG1w1684KEYt-ngnUK3-neUUG1MN1LY8w-wS7-mOkYpqPxNB4h4e_snr4cuwLpeqTRWokkVXFHr2V7Mq7JEnxlKLvz6EUyjg_c/s320/sandra-bullock-quote-im-angry-all-the-time-and-i-dont-know-why.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Quote from the film Crash. Source: QuoteHD</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
You may have have a skewed body image and control what you eat to an extreme level because it feels like the only thing you can control. You could look in the mirror and think you are too small or too big, and be wrong in both cases.<br />
<br />
You may self medicate with alcohol, class A drugs, prescription drugs, food, shopping or soap operas.<br />
<br />
You live in a filter bubble to confirm your world view.<br />
<br />
You should be healthy, fit and happy. Everything is in your favour.<br />
<br />
And yet...<br />
<br />
The cult of the self overtook us, women who are still paranoid about lifting weights and putting on 1 gram of muscle in case they get big and bulky, despite the overwhelming benefits of strength training; standard body image never changes for the masses.<br />
<br />
And the young guys taking anabolics who are never stepping on stage or competing in any sport ever but want their biceps to look good in a t-shirt down da club.<br />
<br />
We don't have to think about clean water supply or not eating. But as soon as these needs were satisfied something else overtook us, we had time to think and confront ourselves.<br />
<br />
You could be unhappy, despite having more than any other humans in history, you could be trapped on a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill">hedonic treadmill</a>.<br />
<br />
And yet...<br />
<br />
Nearly all the diseases and conditions listed above are preventable, treatable and manegeable with simple interventions.<br />
<br />
<b>Prevention.</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Its a cliche but the health system is reactive, it waits for you to break before it tries to fix you, mostly with pharmaceutical intervention.<br />
<br />
The holy trinity of exercise, nutrition and mindfulness (or call it spiritual connection, or relaxation or spending time in nature, or being in the moment - we know all these things have a powerful effect on emotions, physical health and brain health).<br />
<br />
And the thing about most of these things is they are essentially free. Going for a walk in the park is free. Replacing sugary snacks and processed foods with some vegetables is cost neutral. Buying less stuff, spending more time with friends and in nature and less time watching 24 hour news disaster should cost you less and make you more time rich.<br />
<br />
<b>Industry fail.</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
I'm not saying these things are easy. But somehow, in some fashion the fitness industry and leisure industry should be playing its part. Yes joining gyms and going for a swim (unless you go to a lake or the sea) costs money.<br />
<br />
And all these pursuits can end up being middle class, white activities. They need to be spread further and wider into the population.<br />
<br />
I don't know the answer, I don't have the grand plan. But I do know that the health 'reckoning' is already here.<br />
<br />
The media want quick sound bite answers, it's more nuanced than that. They need to grow up and so do we.<br />
<br />
And it has to be authentic, its not about paying lip service to schemes and bids for community projects. It has to be more.<br />
<br />
People are angry and stressed, but at the wrong things for the wrong reasons in (in my opinion).<br />
<br />
The industry has to step up, fuck instagram and the cult of self we helped to make. We need to take it back, it needs to be about health and well being for everybody.<br />
<br />
Let me know your thoughts.<br />
<br />
<b>Statistic sources:</b><br />
http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/loseweight/Pages/statistics-and-causes-of-the-obesity-epidemic-in-the-UK.aspx<br />
https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/sites/default/files/fundamental-facts-about-mental-health-2016.pdf<br />
https://www.diabetes.org.uk/Professionals/Position-statements-reports/Statistics/State-of-the-Nation-2016-Time-to-take-control-of-diabetes/<br />
Various Office of National Statistics reports.Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-44175928140699249722017-04-25T03:03:00.002-07:002017-04-25T03:03:51.796-07:00Why Run? (Last thoughts).<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>"This is already a long time ago, I can remember the feelings but I can't still have them. A common prayer for the over-attached: You'll let it go sooner or later, why not do it now?" - Michael Herr, Dispatches.</i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<i>
</i></blockquote>
<br />
<br />
The eternal question?<br />
<br />
'Because it's there' the quintessential mountaineering answer. Doesn't quite get to the heart of it.<br />
<br />
The question should be why write, or paint or make films or sing or dance or play a musical instrument. Why create art? Running is the same, or maybe for you it's lifting weights or rock climbing or swimming in a cold lake.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbearF0sXTF8nlNQABMlrAkWMaOXAxCjjKiiRedV7mpiKq7OPpohN0re5hmjrx2mRucoRdSe_VAxn5RAyI7NOHHwdE_jRrhRdnv0tb5xGhOKieoIJnn6B5Al_mOGAjS_pHYBnZ5lXxe44/s1600/henry+rollins.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbearF0sXTF8nlNQABMlrAkWMaOXAxCjjKiiRedV7mpiKq7OPpohN0re5hmjrx2mRucoRdSe_VAxn5RAyI7NOHHwdE_jRrhRdnv0tb5xGhOKieoIJnn6B5Al_mOGAjS_pHYBnZ5lXxe44/s400/henry+rollins.jpg" width="282" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Movement is a natural expression of being human, like art. To such an extent, that if you don't do any of the things listed above then there is something fundamentally missing from your life. It has to be more than being a passive consumer.<br />
<br />
A moving koan. The answer is there, but you can't quite grasp it or vocalize it.<br />
<br />
You run to escape, you run to go home, you run to remember, you run to forget, you run from the past, you run to ignore the future, you run for now, you run to be like someone else, you run to create your own identity, you run to lose yourself, you run to create your own myth, you run to think, you run to not think, you run because you have to, you run because it's a choice, you run because it's free, you run to be social, you run to be different, you run for your spirit, you run because no one understands you, you run to understand, you run for comradeship, you run to be part of something, you run for no one, you run to disappear, you run to be alone, you run to feel, your run to not feel, you run to understand pain, you run yourself into the ground, you run to ground yourself, you run to see if you can find your breaking point, you run to be stronger, you run when you are angry, you run when you are sad, you run when you are happy, you run to cope, you run to create memories, your run to erase something and start again.<br />
<br />
Some people run for PBs and split times. This seems limited in its scope. Too constrained.<br />
<br />
You are compelled to run. In bitter cold, unforgiving heat, brilliant sunshine, drab dull dark wet mornings and endless mediocre grey days. With aching joints and a pounding head. Searching for a meaning. But mainly just running to go through the motions.<br />
<br />
But mostly it's prosaic. I once made up the statistic that 1 in 20 workouts are sublime, 1 in 20 are terrible, and 18 in 20 are mediocre/ going through the motions/ get it done. In truth I probably overestimated the number of good workouts, but you are always chasing that golden moment.<br />
<br />
The answer as to why you do something is always clearer when that activity is taken away from you. It is always easier to know what you don't want to do with your life than what you do want to do.<br />
<br />
For me it was the usual story, running at night and then waking up to 2 litres of IV fluid in a strange room. Be careful, we don't know.<br />
<br />
The moment was always coming, it had been encoded in me from birth, I just didn't know it at the time. Years later someone would tell me.<br />
<br />
He told me to be careful going West (a true story, crossing time zones can kill). But I had spent my whole life heading West, like some 'Oakie' looking for the promised land of California.<br />
<br />
I held my breath for a few years. They told me. And I breathed out.<br />
<br />
There would be one last hurrah,, but my heart wasn't in it. I ran into Chamonix as the sun fell behind Mont Blanc. The mountains had kicked my ass. I knew it was over. Another chapter was forming, this one was closed. An unsatisfying unresolved ending. The kind that some people hate to read in fiction books. But life is like that.<br />
<br />
There would be no Hardrock, or UTMB, or Badwater or 6 days in Mustang.<br />
<br />
There would be no more endless beach run that went on forever, or 10 hours passing like a minute. There would be no more sunrising on the Downs, with a distant sketch of twin windmills, as horses run towards me through the mist, as I run on alone.<br />
<br />
And after all that 20 minutes on the road was never going to be enough.<br />
<br />
There are other Annapurnas in men's lives, but when Maurice Herzog wrote that, he had made it to the top of Annapurna, if he hadn't, he would have kept going back like all the other obsessed mad men and 'Conquistadors of the useless'.<br />
<br />
Like telling Picasso he could only ever use an Etcha A Sketch (to be fair Picasso would have probably done pretty well with an Etch A Sketch) or telling Monet he could only use a paint by numbers. The 5k park run was never going to be enough, so I let it go. It's not that Etcha A Sketch, paint by numbers and 5ks are bad or worth less, you just can't go back.<br />
<br />
The dopamine rush of equipment. Seeing the rucksacks, hydration options, trainers and GPS watches. Like the paraphernalia of drug addicts. It's best to go cold turkey.<br />
<br />
Just another story about lost love. They all are. Me and the trail were never going to be just friends, it was more complicated than that.<br />
<br />
Who the hell wants to take the road most taken?<br />
<br />
Like a retired punch drunk boxer who keeps making ill advised comebacks trying to recapture the glory days and getting beaten to a pulp. It's best not to step into the ring again.<br />
<br />
If you haven't got the answer to the question after running 100 miles, then you wont answer it, so you might as well let it go and move on.<br />
<br />
Sense memory, the way the cool air hits on a clear morning in the forest near where I live (where there isn't actually a forest, another mystery), a faint odour of earth and passing rainstorm. Molecules of pine vapor. And it all comes rushing back. A Proustian Madeleine moment of memory recall.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIHfntUv2S8QLcvuxv3mWCn9vEqnqryZ2DZOxsePXx7U93PWI7AkE2GBSkc9IspKpfbg_fihhmFhJQEA8YqkPu6DQB68zgxBvdGeAaxkxPRsdZjV8rTNSUbMd-Qw2P0CyhPnXN2u2TQi8/s1600/ashdown+forest.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIHfntUv2S8QLcvuxv3mWCn9vEqnqryZ2DZOxsePXx7U93PWI7AkE2GBSkc9IspKpfbg_fihhmFhJQEA8YqkPu6DQB68zgxBvdGeAaxkxPRsdZjV8rTNSUbMd-Qw2P0CyhPnXN2u2TQi8/s400/ashdown+forest.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A forest where there is no forest.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Songs from my youth resonate, fragments remembered<i> 'Is a dream a lie if it don't come true, or is it something worse..' </i>Yes, probably.<br />
<i>'You get used to anything, sooner or later it becomes your life'. </i>Yes, may be you do.<br />
<br />
You carry it with you.<br />
<br />
Why run? All I can say is...<br />
<br />
Sundown.<br />
Twin Lakes.<br />
I kept running.<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-53369866123758379092017-04-19T13:14:00.001-07:002017-04-19T13:14:12.634-07:00Do you need to deadlift?<b>More specifically do you need to deadlift with a barbell from the floor?</b><br />
<br />
If you are a powerlifter, yes, you have to.<br />
<br />
Everyone else... probably not.<br />
<br />
The height of the deadlift is arbitrary, based on the size of an Olympic plate, it is not based on your height, limb length, mobility or spine.<br />
<br />
If you are 5 foot tall with long arms it's not that far away, if you're 6'5" it's a long way down.<br />
<br />
What about the sumo deadlift I hear you say? Yes, there is less shear force on the spine (you are not bending over so much), but it still depends on your hip architecture, your back may be more upright and it may be more leg dominant, but you still need to be able to pick the bar up from near the floor. I know now a hybrid position of half sumo and half conventional is more fashionable, so it might be worth giving this a go.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmhLb47tJPtd9_aJoX1Xlv6NbIKMZ2vxGlSpBocAppjX6tcoOwMQCcak-mbfaZmzQgMFbmo8gcidFPqKOvLNDBJdBm7sqVA7xb6cmpPyonI6TzOv5vuWbYOSLwoK8MCw4-hZlCmatfrZ0/s1600/ed+coan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmhLb47tJPtd9_aJoX1Xlv6NbIKMZ2vxGlSpBocAppjX6tcoOwMQCcak-mbfaZmzQgMFbmo8gcidFPqKOvLNDBJdBm7sqVA7xb6cmpPyonI6TzOv5vuWbYOSLwoK8MCw4-hZlCmatfrZ0/s400/ed+coan.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ed Coan: If you look this feel free to keep deadlifting.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Don't get me wrong the hip hinge is a fundamental movement.<br />
<br />
But so many people can't lift from the floor without losing a good neutral spine position. Or they end up using a mixed grip or straps chasing a PB and the next thing you know, something snaps and it's not the cheap straps. Getting the bar up anyway possible becomes a fixation for them and can end in disaster.<br />
<br />
Yes, you need to be able to hinge from the hips to use the glutes and protect the back when picking all sorts of things up.<br />
<br />
One of the best ways to spare the spine when picking an object up is the so called 'golfers lift' which is essentially a 1 leg RDL, hinging on one leg and using the other as a cantilever. But I wouldn't be doing this with 200kg. No one ever chased a golfers lift PB.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Why are you deadlifting?</span></b><br />
<br />
Is it to chase arbitrary weight goals, hit 100kg, 200kg, 300kg+. If you enjoy the process then fine.<br />
<br />
If you are doing it to get 'stronger', then stronger for what? For more deadlifting?<br />
<br />
Or for a sport? Then I would contend there are better options like rack pulls, suitcase deadlifts into farmers carrys.<br />
<br />
The farmers carry will get your quadratus lumborum activating in the back, abductor activation, obliques, grip work and more, add in some distance and you've got endurance as well; all with much less chance of technical breakdown under a very heavy load.<br />
<br />
If it is to increase muscle mass, then again there may be better options, such as rack pulls, RDL, cable pull throughs, kb swing.<br />
<br />
Plus all the single leg work options such as single leg RDL. In the single leg version, in my experience, people can normally keep a much better back position and it is more self limiting as an exercise.<br />
<br />
What benefit is there lifting the barbell from the floor, or in some cases from a deficit by lifting by standing on a small box or step such as the snatch grip deadlift; that can't be garnered from the lifting the bar slightly higher?<br />
<br />
For most people a rack deadlift would be a better option. This takes out the most problematic part of the lift for most people. And means they can still focus on hip hinging, gripping the bar, irradiating tension through the body and keep a better back position. The same with a snatch grip from the rack or hang position. Add in a power shrug or high pull to the movement and you've got a good overall athletic move.<br />
<br />
Now, I'm not talking about guys who load up the bar and set the rack about 1 inch below lockout, put straps on and then do a 1 inch 400kg deadlift.<br />
<br />
The trap bar deadlift is a much easier lift for most people, it is much more intuitive and how people pick things up. However, the biggest issue with the trap bar is how awkward it is to move around and load up. Trap bars normally weigh more than the standard Olympic bar, typically 30kg plus. People tend to put their back in a poor position trying to move the thing and load it up, not during the actual lift.<br />
<br />
When I injured my back, the Jefferson lift felt fine, it never aggravated my back. I couldn't lift as much as conventional deadlift, but it felt as hard and demanding but safer. For a good video and <a href="https://www.dellanave.com/how-and-why-to-do-a-jefferson-deadlift/">explanation of the Jefferson have a look at this link</a>.<br />
<br />
The only downside of the Jefferson, is everyone is going to think you are one of those guys doing a crazy exercise for the sake of it.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Take home points:</span></b><br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>If you like deadlifting, then keep on doing it, and if you are a powerlifter then you need to. Nothing I say would stop you anyway.</li>
<li>But be a stickler for form in the gym, there should be no variation in the reps. Leave the 'whatever it takes' rep for competition.</li>
<li>Ask yourself why you are chasing numbers, are big numbers on the bar carrying over into your other goals such as improved sport performance, hypertrophy or overall strength.</li>
<li>Try rack deadlifts, the bar might only have to be slightly higher than the standard height for you to keep better form</li>
<li>For sports performance try suitcase deadlifts, farmers walks and long jumps (broad jumps).</li>
<li>For hip hinging and hypertrophy try single leg deadlifts with dumbbells or kettlebells, RDLs, cable pull throughs, a whole range of machines, kettlebell swings and more.</li>
<li>If you've had back issues which tend to show themselves when you start to load up on the conventional deadlift but you still want to deadlift, then try the Jefferson deadlift.</li>
</ul>
<div>
Let me know your thoughts, is the deadlift a staple of your programme? Do you lift heavy all the time, or use deload periods, speed/ dynamic variations. Do you switch up the style you use? Do you think you need the deadlift for strength, hypetrophy and sport performance.</div>
Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-61024761236182839532017-04-11T03:01:00.005-07:002017-04-11T03:01:55.295-07:00Do you need to squat?<b>More specifically do you need to back squat with a barbell on your back?</b><br />
<br />
If you are competing in powerlifting, then the answer is yes.<br />
<br />
If you are competing in weightlifting, the answer is probably yes.<br />
<br />
For everyone else I'm not so sure.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The squat pattern is fundamental..</span></b><br />
<br />
Now, don't get me wrong, I think the squat pattern is fundamental. Young babies do it naturally, and adults need it to get out of a chair.<br />
<br />
In fact, one of the things I see with many back pain sufferers is they get out of a chair using their back, and spinal flexion, and don't use their hips or knees properly at all. It's the same with stroke patients I see, and some very elderly people, they can't get out a chair. This is sometimes because of weakness, but also an exacerbating factor is they normally have too narrow a stance, have valgus collapse and don't use any type of hip hinge at all. Many manage to get out a chair with some simple cues, without actually getting any stronger per se.<br />
<br />
Recently, I haven't really programmed back squats for anyone.<br />
<br />
It's not as if I never did them, I've done high rep squats in the past, 21 days of squats myself, squatted maximum, done high bar, low bar, safety bar, cambered bar, box squats. But now, if I do a squat it is invariably a front squat with a barbell or 2 kettlebells.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Squats ahoy.</span></b><br />
<br />
There was a time when the back squat was rare. Now thanks to most gyms having power racks and the influence of a few key people, back squatting is very popular from young girls to rugby players and beyond.<br />
<br />
Also increasingly popular is back squatting in Olympic weightlifting shoes. These allow people to go lower, in a sense give them false mobility. This has resulted in a rush of people complaining about their knees hurting squatting. The standard answer is the Dan John one, squats don't hurt your knees, what you are doing does...<br />
<br />
However, I know from personal experience and from friends of mine continuous squatting in lifting shoes does hurt your knees and cause excruciating pain if you are squatting regularly. And as soon as you take the shoes off, the knee pain spontaneously resolves.<br />
<br />
Now, don't get me wrong, I have lifting shoes, and for front squats, cleans and snatches I would use them if I was going heavy and really wanted focus on these moves and the sport. But as I generally don't, if I do a power clean or front squat I do them in my normal shoes I train in (inov8 F-lites).<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Why are you back squatting?</span></b><br />
<br />
There is the issue of why you are back squatting.<br />
<br />
If you are doing it for leg development, I think there are better options. Front squats target the quads more and with less spinal loading and less chance of technique breakdown.<br />
<br />
I know some people can't do the front squat grip, in which case I would do a goblet squat with a dumbbell or kettlebell rack squats. I am not a big fan of the classic bodybuilding front squat with the arms crossed over, it looks like an accident waiting to happen.<br />
<br />
Alternatively, a Bulgarian split squat (rear foot elevated squat), or the leg press using one leg at a time (I prefer the one leg version as it's easier on the lower back, and stops the dominant leg taking over).<br />
<br />
I know there is a school of thought that bilateral leg work, and specifically 5x5 on squats is all you really need to do. I respectfully disagree.<br />
<br />
The hack squat seems to have become fashionable recently, possibly because it can be loaded up and is technically easier than a squat. To me it still seems to cause the same compression issues, and is overrated. It also seems to be exactly the same movement pattern as the Smith machine squat (legs forward, back vertical) that we used to do back in the day when gyms didn't have power racks.<br />
<br />
For the posterior chain, take your pick from RDLs, single leg RDLs, hip thrusts, glute bridges, glute ham raise machine, Nordic hamstring curls, and various leg curl machines.<br />
<br />
For most people I think there are better ways of targeting the legs.<br />
<br />
For athletic purposes I think some unilateral leg work is a must, and something as simple as a bodyweight jump squat or lung jump (broad jump) would be more effective.<br />
<br />
Athletically, I would say the prowler push and sled drag have more carry over to the field with less spine compression, less coaching and less risk of losing form and powering through anyway.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Technical breakdown.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Some of the issues with squatting I have are to do with trying to fit all people into the same box. Same stance, same depth.<br />
<br />
If you have what Stuart McGill calls the 'Celtic hip', you are going to probably need a wider stance and squat above parallel - and no amount of mobility work is going to change this.<br />
<br />
The shrill call of everyone having to go 'ass to grass' seems to have lessened recently.<br />
<br />
If you have a much shallower hip socket, Eastern European hip, your squat will look text book. Very few people look like this in the gym. However, there is still no excuse to be bouncing out of the bottom with the sacrum tucking under unless there is a gold medal at stake.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfhc4r9zbpbPXuQ2n0kz4NtAXFpqBJu7jjWI7vbJ4oG1s0beg6lo9PevE72jTWPzvL3Q8-ME9RFsxS-d-PVjLOD32LDE6pPTNNTyJIJ0gCFNtECA73cXrroajMN0HZFLukUS6v_darHZE/s1600/dave+draper+squat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfhc4r9zbpbPXuQ2n0kz4NtAXFpqBJu7jjWI7vbJ4oG1s0beg6lo9PevE72jTWPzvL3Q8-ME9RFsxS-d-PVjLOD32LDE6pPTNNTyJIJ0gCFNtECA73cXrroajMN0HZFLukUS6v_darHZE/s400/dave+draper+squat.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dave Draper squatting. If you look like this then carry on. Source: everyone on the Internet who thinks this is Tom Platz</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
If you have nice ovoid shape discs in your back (again see Stuart McGills work), you can probably take the compression in the spine. If you have a much more slender spine, there is more chance of buckling and an end plate fracture with continuous heavy loading (I'm not saying this will happen, but look at the risk reward).<br />
<br />
Then we have too much lordosis, too much arch in the back, I see this with quite a few women squatting. They can be quite stiff in the hips and compensate with the back.<br />
<br />
Then there are people with limited shoulder mobility, normally guys, and even getting the bar onto the back is problematic and causes shoulder issues before they even start.<br />
<br />
Then there are the people who shift to one side under load, twisting and having one leg stronger than the other. These aren't necessary bad things, its just the way this person is built. But I don't think bilateral back squatting is going to make there leg strength more equal or change their movement for the better.<br />
<br />
To paraphrase Gray Cook, people are loading up their dysfunction for no other reason than they think they need to back squat. They then breakdown and they could have got the same results with a different exercise.<br />
<br />
Now I know many of these issues can be fixed by coaching, cuing, using a box, adjusting peoples stance and depth, using different bars on their back. However, most clients don't come to you to get better at back squatting, they come to you to lose weight, or get stronger or more toned. And in my experience for many of these people, save yourself time and do something else instead that gets them the results they want.<br />
<br />
<b>Squat patterns that I use.</b><br />
<br />
Sit to stand to box or chair - the fundamental pattern for rehab clients.<br />
<br />
TRX supported squat and deep squat for lats with exhale at the bottom - good for turning off the lats, breathing and giving people the confidence to squat lower.<br />
<br />
Goblet squat - nearly every session I do includes this, use a dumbbell or kettlebell.<br />
<br />
1 kettlebell rack squat - asymmetric loading for core and more.<br />
<br />
2 kettlebell rack squat - one of my favourites for added anterior core activation and a great leg workout.<br />
<br />
Barbell front squat if someone can get in this position, if they can't I wouldn't bother with various bodybuilding versions I would do kettlebell rack squats instead.<br />
<br />
Bodyweight jump squat for athletic development if needed.<br />
<br />
--------<br />
<br />
Is the barbell back squat bad? No. Do I use it with most of my clients anymore. No.<br />
<br />
Let me know what you think.<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-14775506379926343782017-04-02T11:15:00.001-07:002017-04-02T11:15:51.470-07:00Forming new habits. Part 5: Choice.<b>For part 2, 3 and 4 go <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-why-is-it-so-hard-to.html">here</a>, <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-how-long-will-you.html">here</a> and <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/forming-new-habits-part-4-memory.html">here</a></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Why do you make the choices you make?</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Why do some people choose to exercise and eat healthily and others don't.<br />
<br />
Every day you are exposed to an enormous amount of information. According to Plassman et al (2012)<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Each second we are exposed to an estimated 11 millions bits of information that reach us through our senses, yet humans are capable of processing only around 50 bits of that information."</blockquote>
Think about that for a second (and if you did, 11 millions bits of information were just missed by you). Your brain filters information so it doesn't get overwhelmed.<br />
<br />
Your brain and body use autopilot, short cuts and what Daniel Kahneman calls fast thinking all the time (see part 2 for a description of this system 1). Without it you would probably be paralyzed by indecision everyday. You get up, shower, clean your teeth, get to work without much thought. These become habitual activities. When you travel somewhere new, have you noticed how much you have to concentrate, in the car you have to turn the radio off and really focus on the sat nav and the road, not the same as when you do your daily commute.<br />
<br />
Certain decisions have been taken out of your hands from an early age. Where you were born and your parents preferences have already determined the language you speak, the foods you culturally like, the school you went to, many of the hobbies and past times you chose. You may not even be aware of other choices, you can't miss a food you've never had or are not even aware of. And that job you drifted into after school or university, it may have not been your top choice, but possibly, only years later you realize you want to do something else.<br />
<br />
This fast system of shortcuts is useful. Going out for a coffee on your lunch break if you live in a big city could be overwhelming. If you were really to evaluate all the options you would have to go to every coffee shop, try every different type of coffee, weigh up the price and distance from your work places and then make a decision (okay, I may have actually done this). Whereas, most people will intuitively go to the same coffee shop and order the same drink.<br />
<br />
If the choice is limited it is easier, only one coffee shop, you go there. Only one gym, you join that one. In fact, it has been shown the more choice people are given the harder they find it to make a choice. In one study, given a choice between two different types of jam, you pick one quite easily. Given the choice of 10 or 20, then what? You are frozen with indecision over a pot of jam.<br />
<br />
Extrapolate that to big life decisions like choosing a career or partner, the number of variables is overwhelming. This is where the shortcut, intuitive system, works best.<br />
<br />
Dijksterhuis et al (2006, good luck pronouncing that name by the way) state that conscious thought works best when you are making simple choices like "buying towels or an oven mitt" but more complex matters like choosing a house, or car (or life partner) should be left to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconscious_thought_theory">unconscious thought</a>. What they call "deliberation without attention". Your unconscious mind has much bigger processing power and your conscious mind finds it hard to focus on more than one thing at a time.<br />
<br />
When buying a car, studies have shown people make better decisions when they don't consciously think about all the variables.<br />
<br />
Dijksterhuis et al (2006) got people to choose a car based on 4 attributes or 12 attributes (safety, mileage etc). They were given 4 minutes to think about their choice, or 4 minutes distracted by doing anagrams. The people who were distracted doing anagrams and therefore used their unconscious mind, made a much better choice when choosing a car when they had to think about 12 attributes.<br />
<br />
We make emotionally driven choices all the time. We are not even aware we are making them.<br />
<br />
Companies and marketers know you can be influenced, so they exploit these systems.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">You are influenced by marketing even when you think you are not.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Think about all the advertising you are exposed to. Does it influence you? Of course not, you are smarter than that. Or may be not.<br />
<br />
In a study by Bagdziunaite (2014) three group of people were shown commercials before going in to a store to buy paint.<br />
Group 1 - random commercials<br />
Group 2 - random commercials plus adverts for brand A paint<br />
Group 3 - random commercials plus longer adverts for brand A paint<br />
<br />
They were then told to go and buy some paint for redecorating.<br />
Group 1 - 78% chose brand A<br />
Group 2 - 94% chose brand A<br />
Group 3 - 100% chose brand A!!<br />
<br />
Group 2 and 3 also spent more time looking at brand A on the shelf. And guess what, 23 out of 25 participants did not perceive the link between exposure to advertising and their purchase.<br />
<br />
And ALL of the participants who saw brand A remembered it, but reported it did not affect their choice!<br />
<br />
Now think about the adverts you are exposed to, the filter bubble you live in, the shops you go to, the choices you make. In the supermarket, trying to make healthy choices...<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Plassman et al (2012) state</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"At fast decision speeds a significant number of food choices were biased towards the food items with bright packaging, even when subjects preferred the taste of alternative food options." </blockquote>
In fact, given less than 1 second you will choose the most salient thing, given a second or more you will choose your preference,<br />
<br />
Now given that most foods that are brightly packaged are processed, and if someone has been eating unhealthy for a while and has certain in built preferences, what choices do you think they are going to make?<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">You will choose from the menu on offer. </span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
There is a myth that humans will make rational economic choices. Choosing between an apple and a snickers, you choose the one that costs the least or has the most benefit for you. Except in the Western world the cost difference between these purchases is irrelevant.<br />
<br />
The value you assign to anything is subjective. For example, chocolate or strawberry ice cream have no intrinsic value, you make a decision which one you prefer (Padoa-Schioppa, 2011). And if one is not available, it doesn't figure in your decision making process.<br />
<br />
Or put it another way, do you want a £1000 or a glass of water? The answer is obvious unless you just came out of the desert, you're dying of thirst and someone offers you that choice. Context matters.<br />
<br />
The orbital frontal cortex (OFC) front part of your brain has neurons that are particularly active when you prefer one option. They are not sensitive to the menu, but decide based on what is on offer.<br />
<br />
For example, Padoa-Schioppa (2007) offered monkeys* raisins or apple slices. Monkeys prefer raisins, but eventually when the monkeys are offered 3 times as many apple slices to raisins they switch to choosing the apple. The OFC neurons then start to fire off more, as they react to one decision that is clearly better than the other.<br />
<br />
This also happened when the monkeys had to choose between drops of water and kool aid. The monkey prefer water, until they were offer 6 times as many drops of kool aid to water, and then they switched and chose the kool aid and the OFC part of the brain was more active and helped make this decision. They even did this when they were given 2 food options they had never encountered before, they would make a choice and then switch if significant quantity of their less preferred option was given.<br />
<br />
What does this mean for you? It means you can switch your own choices.<br />
<br />
I read somewhere that you should crowd your diet with healthy choices. If you eat enough vegetables and whole foods, you will 'crowd out' the unhealthy options. (Sorry, I can't remember where I read this, if this is your idea, let me know, and I will credit you)!<br />
<br />
Eventually, you brain will choose from the menu you on offer. You can control the menu and the quantity of the menu as well.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">You go to a petrol station...</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
How does this all work in practice. A classic way people lose track of their diet.<br />
<br />
They have gone to a petrol station to fill up the car. This is a top down conscious decision.<br />
<br />
But then in the shop they are confronted by chocolate bars and crisps. All brightly coloured. There are no healthy options on offer, you're hungry (you've just left the gym) and you are not carrying any healthy snacks.<br />
<br />
Before you know it you are making a bottoms up decision, you had no intention of buying chocolate. But it's there, and the menu on offer is chocolate or more chocolate. Before you know it you are in your car eating a snickers and your diet has been derailed before you've even had time to think. The pleasure centres in your brain are firing off and you go home and wonder what happened.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Why you will be fooled by expensive wine and works of art.</span></b><br />
<br />
The orbital frontal cortex helps you make choices. And the medial part of it (mOFC) is believed to activate more when you experience pleasantness.<br />
<br />
In one study by Plassman et al(2008) they measured the activation of peoples brain in an fMRI scanner while they were given wine of different value, they were told the wine cost $90 or $5 o $10. Of course, there was no difference in the wines but people experienced more activation in the pleasantness areas of the brain when they thought they were drinking the more expensive wine.<br />
<br />
The perceived price did not change the activation of the primary taste centre of the brain, but the expectation of how good it was meant to be changed the activation in the pleasantness centre of the brain.<br />
<br />
(And as a side note: Wine experts can't even tell the difference between red and white wine when blind folded!).<br />
<br />
In another study people valued works of art more and had more engagement in the mOFC when they thought they were painted by an expert rather than a novice. Of course, none were painted by an expert.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhulYQHkz4ET26Nn0YSJSIlyxfzr1m2OuOtzdVDg6ycferRRA9rSv4u2uTBE1EFACrlwpClI8_9ISDwaVEJ_c4eBn0-BrVBcTRwCex3LC0G2X2PfclzwuZICv6vxVzoWcuSDGhXmxuiBPU/s1600/pollocktatemodern.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhulYQHkz4ET26Nn0YSJSIlyxfzr1m2OuOtzdVDg6ycferRRA9rSv4u2uTBE1EFACrlwpClI8_9ISDwaVEJ_c4eBn0-BrVBcTRwCex3LC0G2X2PfclzwuZICv6vxVzoWcuSDGhXmxuiBPU/s640/pollocktatemodern.gif" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If I told you I painted this you'd give me £1 for it. But if I told you Jackson Pollock did, you might be willing to pay way more.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
This has led to the idea of "placebo marketing".<br />
<br />
Why do people spend £200 more on a computer because it has an apple on it? (like the one I'm typing this on).<br />
<br />
In the world of fitness and nutrition you could use this effect to your advantage. If you spend £80 a month on a gym membership or get the platinum super duper personal training package with the best trainer in town, you may well perceive that your results will be superior to the £20 a month gym and the free programme you got given.<br />
<br />
You may possibly work harder and just have more belief in the product.<br />
<br />
In terms of nutrition, the super detox juice you bought for £6 a glass may seem more beneficial than the apple and bag of spinach you bought in the supermarket.<br />
<br />
This may also explain why people see famous online coaches, posting up pictures of clients, and testimonials. You may automatically perceive this person as an expert and expect to get results when you buy their programme or online product.<br />
<br />
Even if objectively the expensive options are no better than the cheap options.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Where does this leave us?</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
So you know your brain is now making decisions on autopilot all the time and whether you like it or not marketing can influence you.<br />
<br />
Here are a few take home points relating to health and fitness<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Make it as easy as possible for your brain to make the right decision. Reduces the cognitive load. This is why Steve Jobs wore the same outfit everyday. Put your gym gear in your bag ready to go in the morning. I once heard someone give the advice of sleeping in your gym kit and then getting up and going, it might be going too far, but you get the idea.</li>
<li>Put the gym session or class on your schedule, it becomes an autopilot activity.</li>
<li>Not sure what to do in the gym, get a plan/programme that is not too complex and stick to it. Again it will take another decision out of your hands.</li>
<li>You will choose from the menu on offer. Fill your cupboards with healthy options, crowd out the unhealthy.</li>
<li>Be prepared when out and about. Take your own snacks with you, a box of nuts in the car may stop you buying chocolate in the garage. Also prepare your own lunches.</li>
<li>Avoid the office on cake day!</li>
<li>Trying to give up fizzy drinks/soda? Try drinking 6 glasses of water when you feel the need for a soda. (I'm serious, give it a go, but don't over hydrate).</li>
<li>You can change your preferences with regards to food, they are subjective and you can switch them.</li>
<li>Take a shopping list to the supermarket. Take your time, when tempted by bright colours and packaging. Pause, take a breath and stick to the list.</li>
<li>You may think the more expensive product is better, it may not be.</li>
<li>OR if you are a personal trainer or gym, people may perceive your product as better if you charge more and be more willing to listen to you if they perceive you as an expert. (Testimonials, qualifications etc can help with this).</li>
<li>Sometimes your brain will make the right decision without you thinking about it, especially if it is a complex decision.</li>
<li>Beware of placebo marketing and living in a filter bubble.</li>
<li>Your environment and the people you surround yourself with will influence your choices. The old adage that you are the sum of the 5 people you spend most time with is true. Expand that to environmental influences, the websites you visit, the TV shows you watch, the books you read.</li>
<li>Buy cheap wine and tell people it's expensive. They wont know any different!</li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">References.</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jesper_Clement/publication/262953962_An_added_value_of_neuroscientific_tools_to_understand_consumers%27_in-store_behaviour/links/57a837ce08aee07544c21104.pdf">Choosing paint research</a></span><br />
<span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="http://people.hss.caltech.edu/~mshum/ec106/plassman.pdf">Expensive wine research</a></span><br />
<a href="http://pcg.wustl.edu/padoaschioppalab/files/Download/Padoa-Schioppa%202007.pdf">Monkeys choose raisin or apple</a><br />
<a href="http://pcg.wustl.edu/padoaschioppalab/files/Download/Padoa-Schioppa%20and%20Cai%202011.pdf">OFC in making choices overview</a><br />
<a href="http://www.chilleesys.com/scp/assets/plassmann.pdf">Plassman et al "Branding the brain"</a><br />
An Introduction to Neuroeconomics: How the Brain Makes Decisions. www.coursera.org<br />
An Introduction to Consumer Neuroscience & Neuromarketing. www.coursera.org<br />
<br />
<br />
*Yes, I find the research involving monkeys problematic, as they don't get to choose to be part of the study. But it is what it is.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-47256170552243008752017-03-21T04:15:00.001-07:002017-03-21T05:09:51.148-07:00Experiments in Hypertrophy: Part 3 - Reps, Rest and Tempo.In parts 1 and 2 I covered the best training splits and how many exercises to do. For part 1 and part 2 go <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/experiments-in-hypertrophy-what-is-best.html">here</a> and <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/experiments-in-hypertrophy-part-2-how.html">here</a>.<br />
<br />
Note: if you don't want to read the whole post, skip to the bullet points at the end which tell you everything you need to know.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Rep Ranges.</span></b><br />
<br />
The classic hypertrophy rep range is 8-12. Most guys (and women) training for mass spend the majority of their time in this rep range, with the occasional venture into the strength range of 6 or less during winter bulking phase and into the higher 12-15 'endurance' range when getting ready for summer.<br />
<br />
But some athletes appear to increase muscle mass and never go near the 8-12 range. For example, Olympic weightlifters are normally way below this and Crossfitters are normally near maximal or doing some crazy high rep range (55 rep deadlifts anyone?).<br />
<br />
So what does the research show. Previously in part 2 I outlined <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261516420_Effects_of_Different_Volume-Equated_Resistance_Training_Loading_Strategies_on_Muscular_Adaptations_in_Well-Trained_Men">Brad Schoenfelds research where one group did 7x3 and another 3x10</a> and basically got the same results and improved muscle hypertrophy. However, the 7x3 workout took more than twice as long as the 3x10 and the strength group started to break down and complain of overtraining.<br />
<br />
In a follow up <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311132772_Differential_Effects_of_Heavy_versus_Moderate_Loads_on_Measures_of_Strength_and_Hypertrophy_in_Resistance-Trained_Men">study Schoenfeld et al (2016)</a> did something interesting, they compared 3 sets of 2-4 reps with 3 sets of 8-12 in experienced lifters. This meant there wasn't a big difference in volume, 3 sets of 2-4 is achievable. Both groups did 7 exercises to failure in the prescribed rep range with 2 minutes rest between sets. They measured the cross sectional area of the triceps, biceps and lateral thigh before and after the 8 week trial. There was an increase in biceps in both groups but not much difference, an increase in triceps in both groups but not much difference and an increase in lateral thigh in both groups but a statistical significant difference between groups, with the 8-12 rep range working best. So even though the study shows moderate 8-12 rep range to be better, both schemes increased cross sectional area and when you look at the raw data it is really not that much different. The authors put some of the strength groups success down to the novelty of changing the programme, as most participants were training 8-12 before the trial. Unsurprisingly the group training heavy increased their squat 1RM the most as well.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">But what about high reps?</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Two studies stand out showing very high rep ranges, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25853914">Schoenfeld et al (2015) compared 3 sets of 8-12 reps with 3 sets of 25-35 reps</a>, using 7 exercises, 3 times a week.<br />
<br />
Both rep schemes significantly increased the cross sectional area of the biceps, triceps and quads. There was no significant difference between the groups. None of the high rep group had lifted with this many repetitions before despite being experienced lifters. But they were experienced, this was not 'newbie' gains. It could be they were targeting the type I endurance fibres, whereas normally they would be targeting the same fibres all the time - the type II ones.<br />
<br />
But don't be fooled, very high reps to failure is taxing, as Schoenfeld says "half the subjects in the low load group puked during the first week of training"!!<br />
<br />
And in another study by <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311705036_Acute_and_Long-term_Responses_to_Different_Rest_Intervals_in_Low-load_Resistance_Training">Fink et al(2016) which was actually about rest periods</a> (which I will get to later); they were using 4 sets of 40% 1RM for squat and bench press to failure, in non experienced lifters (but involved in sports). All the participants showed significant increase in cross sectional area for triceps and thighs and they all increased their 1RM! The cross sectional increase was 9.8% and 10% in the triceps in both groups in the study. The paper doesn't say how many reps they were doing but the authors say it didn't drop below 12 even on the last set and using their data I have worked out the rep ranges would have been between at least 19 and 36 per set!<br />
<br />
The authors say that low load training (less than 30% of 1RM) may cause a prolonged period of post exercise muscle synthesis compared to 90% 1RM.<br />
<br />
We know that muscle growth is due to a whole range of factors such as mechanical tension, metabolic stress, chemical release, hormones and more.<br />
<br />
In this case the conjecture is high reps may result in sarcoplasmic hypertrophy, so called non contractile protein and fluid. For the average gym jock, this makes no difference. Mass is mass.<br />
<br />
<b>Where does this leave us?</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
From personal experience low strength reps don't increase muscle mass that much in me. But the mass it does produce is qualitatively in my opinion denser and more likely to be the functional strength and power fibres. What is known as myofibrillar hypertrophy. I respond best to higher reps for hypertrophy.<br />
<br />
In reality, for most trainers the rep range will vary with the exercise. For example, no one is going to try a 3 rep max rear delts flye, but a 15-25 rep rear delt flye seems reasonable. The same could be said for calves, if you are going to train them. This then comes down to the old adage about different parts of the body having different fibre mixes, if the calves are mainly type I endurance fibres then high reps would work best. Conversely, no one is probably going to do 3 x 35 reps for pull ups, so the exercise itself makes you go into moderate rep ranges.<br />
<br />
Some things intuitively don't make sense, for example, if you do 35 reps of deadlifts you are inadvertently doing Crossfit. Whereas, 35 reps of a bodyweight 1 leg glute thrust would work.<br />
<br />
The research does seem to show the benefits of high rep squats increasing muscle mass, see<a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/50-rep-squats-theyll-make-you-believer.html"> my post here on high rep squats</a>. This is a taxing exercise but well worth putting in occasionally.<br />
<br />
Exercises like cable flyes and machines lend themselves to high reps 12-15 whereas I think things like your classic dumbbell bench press are better in the 8-12 rep range.<br />
<br />
I also like timed sets, set a stop watch for 35 or 45 or 55 seconds and then see how many bicep curls or press ups you can do with controlled tempo. This type of training keeps you honest!<br />
<br />
I think many guys avoid high rep training because it is hard and burns, plus you have to leave your ego at the door and venture over to the chrome dumbbells.<br />
<br />
<b>Could you use interval endurance/ training?</b><br />
<br />
Given that very high reps of 35 have caused hypertrophy could you not use sprint intervals on a bike or rower or ski erg or hill sprints to increase muscle hypertrophy? If the intervals are all out intense 10-20 seconds I can't see why they wouldn't work. The size of track cyclists legs is probably a testament to this.<br />
<br />
I would also think exercises like prowler pushes could result in increases in muscle mass and strength depending on load and timing.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The perfect rep.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
One thing I have really being trying to do over the last few months is feel every rep.<br />
<br />
It doesn't matter what rep scheme you use if all your reps are crappy.<br />
<br />
Really try and feel the muscle you are working on every rep. Let go of the ego of the weight, there is always the temptation to try and move up to the next set of dumbbells on the rack. Before you know it, you are going partial range and cheating the weight up.<br />
<br />
Although there are times when partial range may be beneficial such as when doing 21's, in most cases go full range.<br />
<br />
Also note in all the studies above they make the participants go to failure.<br />
<br />
Lift with focus and intensity!<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">How long to rest?</span></b><br />
<br />
The research is not consistent on this issue.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/284711582_Longer_inter-set_rest_periods_enhance_muscle_strength_and_hypertrophy_in_resistance-trained_men">Schoenfeld et al (2015) compared resting 1 minute versus 3 minutes when training 3 sets of 8-12 reps</a>. This research actually showed resting longer was more beneficial for hypertrophy. The authors state that in the long rest group "muscle was significantly greater in the anterior thigh and a trend for greater thickness in the triceps brachii"<br />
<br />
However, when you look at the actual data from the study, there is not that much difference between groups. And as the authors state 1 minute is probably too short but 2 minutes would be long enough.<br />
<br />
The difference in the anterior thigh would makes sense. As anyone knows, leg exercises such as squats are systemically taxing and need longer rest than some upper body exercises. A tricep kickback might only need 30 secs rest.Therefore, regional hypertrophy in the body may mean different rest periods (and rep ranges) for different body parts and different types of exercises.<br />
<br />
Schoenfeld et al state<br />
<br />
"Longer rest periods can allow for the completion of a higher number of repetitions and the maintenance of a higher training intensity and volume, and this may allow for greater muscle activation per set."<br />
<br />
However, another researcher studying elderly men (average age 68) found a 1 minute rest period was better than a 4 minute one, and resulted in greater gains in lean mass and strength.<br />
<br />
And don't forget how much longer it takes to rest an extra 2 minutes per set, that would be an extra 6 minutes per exercise for 3 sets, and an extra 42 minutes if you do 7 exercises. If you used those 40 minutes to do additional exercises and sets with less rest would you get better results?<br />
<br />
And could you not maximize time efficiency with rest by doing supersets and if you are alternating limbs, say in a tricep exercise, one side is resting while the other is working?<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">High reps need less rest.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In a study already mentioned, Fink et al (2016) compared resting 30 seconds with resting 150 secs when lifting 40% 1RM squat and bench for 4 sets.<br />
<br />
Both groups got increases in muscle mass and strength, with no significant difference between groups. And the blood work showed the metabolic stress for both groups was the same.<br />
<br />
This shows that when doing very high reps, 20-35 - then you can rest less. Caveat being if you have ever tried to rest 30 secs between high rep squats you will blow up or throw up.<br />
<br />
<b>Where does this leave us?</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Most studies that are not testing different rest periods seem to use 2 minutes.<br />
<br />
In reality now I do not measure rest periods, by the time you changes your weights over, take a sip of water, write in your training diary what you just did you will be ready to go again. This means I am probably resting about 60-90 secs at most and no where near 3 minutes. The difference between resting 2 or 3 minutes is very marginal and other factors come into play<br />
<br />
If you are mainly interested in strength, definitely rest longer.<br />
<br />
Supersets are a good way to maximize rest efficiency, for example superset a dumbbell row with dumbbell chest press.<br />
<br />
In my opinion, isolation exercises like tricep extensions and high rep exercises like rear delt flyes will need very little rest, 30 secs, legs will need more.<br />
<br />
The caveat is special training techniques like descending sets and rest pause, where rest may be 10 secs or less, which I will cover in part 4 of this series.<br />
<br />
In my experience, most clients and women will not rest enough when you are training them, they will rest a few seconds and try and go again. This means you need to educate them and make sure they are going to real failure!<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Tempo.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
There was a time when tempo was big, mainly because of Ian King and Poliquin programmes. You would see things like 51X0 and 3111 written on programmes.<br />
<br />
Normally referring to how fast you should lower a weight, eccentric, then concentrically press it up and may be squeeze and hold a peak contraction.<br />
<br />
This seems to have fallen out of favour recently. I would imagine probably because when you are trying to focus on perfect reps and counting to 15, the last thing you want to do is try to count exact tempo as well.<br />
<br />
The caveat would be triphasic training, this is using eccentric, concentric and isometric contraction in a specific way. For an explanation of triphasic training go <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/a-review-of-triphasic-training-by-cal.html">here</a>, and how to apply it <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/a-simple-way-to-use-triphasic-training.html">here</a>.<br />
<br />
The eccentric phase is the part of the movement causing muscle soreness. Sports like Olympic weightlifting and track cycling do not have much eccentric loading of muscle but can still result in muscle mass. (Yes, I'm aware these groups may do some training use eccentric loading and possibly have chemical assistance). Soreness is not necessary for growth but we all like the feeling of DOMS!<br />
<br />
In most of the studies I have read they normally get the participants to do a 2 second eccentric and 1 second concentric. This would seem about about right, I would probably go closer to 3 second eccentric and possibly a 1 sec squeeze on things like latpulldowns , with an explosive but controlled concentric. But I wouldn't spend too much time thinking about this.<br />
<br />
Of course, I am talking specifically about hypertrophy training here. Strength and power are different.<br />
<br />
One thing I would avoid is super slow training, this seems pointless to me, as do super slow concentric phases.<br />
<br />
<b>No studies involved women!</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Its important to note that none of the studies cited used women. It was the usual young male college student in most cases.<br />
<br />
Would women respond differently to high reps, and different rest periods? Who knows. Someone needs to do that research.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Take away points.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<br />
<ul>
<li>You can increase muscle mass in all different types of rep ranges, 2-4, 8-12, 25-35</li>
<li>Moderate rep ranges are probably better than lower reps for hypertrophy.</li>
<li>Keep most of your training in the 8-12 rep range for hypertrophy but..</li>
<li>Try some high rep stuff, its hard, and occasional strength work. In other words periodise and vary. Leave your ego at the door, the chrome dumbbells are calling you!</li>
<li>You could try 3 total body sessions a week, one strength 3x2-4, one moderate 3x8-12, one high rep 3 x 20-30. </li>
<li>Different exercises lend themselves naturally to different rep ranges and rest periods. </li>
<li>Try some high reps squats!</li>
<li>Different body parts can be trained with different rep ranges and rest periods. Rest longer on legs.</li>
<li>Rest period, if you are an experienced lifter self selecting will work best.</li>
<li>Rest 30-45 secs for small body parts/isolation work and very high reps.</li>
<li>Rest 90 to 120 secs for compound movements, legs and taxing exercises.</li>
<li>The benefits of resting 3 minutes is marginal at best for hypertrophy and very boring and time consuming. If you have time give it a go and see if it makes a difference.</li>
<li>Tempo, don't get obsessed, slow eccentric 2-3 secs, fast concentric, squeeze hold where you can.</li>
<li>To increase 1RM do more work in the 2-4 rep range, and rest longer. Bizarrely your 1RM will also increase if you do high rep training with minimal rest.</li>
<li>Go to failure at some point. Not on every set, but definitely on some of your work sets.</li>
<li>Think about executing the perfect rep and feeling the muscle working probably trumps everything else for hypertrophy.</li>
</ul>
<div>
Next time special techniques - rest pause, descending sets and more.</div>
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-14512669333692515242017-03-14T03:53:00.001-07:002017-03-14T03:53:50.094-07:00Coaching Ethos.<b>How do you create a high level coaching team?</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
This is a question I think about a fair amount.<br />
<br />
These are my thoughts after talking to people who have been in high level coaching teams, observing how organizations like the NFL work and reading some of the literature.<br />
<br />
Much of the literature and most of the books are about teams within business organizations. Some of this applies to the 'actual' coaching fitness professionals do. Some of it applies to professional sports teams, but is not so applicable to paying clients. I think it was Mike Boyle who said it is way harder to coach the general public than professional athletes.<br />
<br />
I am also assuming you are not a lone personal trainer, in which case you are the coaching team, and should build a referral network for things that may be beyond the scope of your skill set at this moment such as nutrition and sports injury. Unfortunately, many lone personal trainers do not do this, to be blunt they need the money and therefore try to be an expert in everything. Sometimes this works out for them, sometimes it doesn't.<br />
<br />
So without further ado in random bullet point format (easily tweetable).<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Everyone in the team knows their exact role.</li>
<li>Everyone knows the exact goal of their team and their part in it.</li>
<li>Everyone needs to know the product. Yes that includes the cleaner and the receptionist working one hour a week.</li>
<li>Clear metrics on what we are measuring. What is important to us.</li>
<li>Consequences for not meeting the metric.</li>
<li>Reward for meeting the chosen metric.</li>
<li>Regular coaching get togethers. Make the agenda clear, not moaning and gossip. But plans and solutions.</li>
<li>Every day, week, month think what did we do well, what could we do better/different. And then act on this.</li>
<li>The coaching team should complement each other. They don't have to be clones.</li>
<li>Make it clear to customers and clients -'this is what we do'.</li>
<li>Make it clear to customers - 'this is not what we do' but we may know someone else who does.</li>
<li>Don't try and bend the product to the customer.</li>
<li>But be flexible with your product, if the market and the science and the zeitgeist changes you may need to change. But make that change whole hearted, not piecemeal.</li>
<li>If the client is willing to work hard, or the customer is a promoter, go all out and give everything.</li>
<li>Sack the customer who doesn't want it. Sack the customer who annoys other customers.</li>
<li>The basics that every customer expects - clean, equipment works, greeting, acknowledgment from staff.</li>
<li>Clear pricing, clear proposition.</li>
<li>Don't be afraid of your price if the product is worth it.</li>
<li>USP, it could be weightlifting, or rehab, or beginners, or weightloss, or being cheap or group training or being luxury. Choose what it is and embrace it.</li>
<li>Let the USP inform every level of your product from marketing, social media presence, staff recruitment to layout of the building or the equipment you choose.</li>
<li>Amateurs come across as amateurs. If you are a professional this is how you make your living. It should be all consuming. For amateurs it is a hobby, professionals get paid.</li>
<li>None of your team should come across as amateurs. Again this applies to the cleaner, the receptionist and the back room staff.</li>
<li>If half your salary depended on retaining members and customers what would you do differently? (Self employed people already get this). Who and what would make the cut?</li>
<li>If you are new to the market you may need to discount to get your name out there.</li>
<li>If you are established and still discounting there is either something wrong with your business model or your pricing is wrong.</li>
<li>Don't phone it in.</li>
<li>If you've got nothing on the line what have you got to lose or gain? Managers of big organizations find it hard to grasp this.</li>
<li>Your coaches should be constantly learning and training. What does the team actually <i>want</i> to improve at? Organize that training for them</li>
<li>What does the team <i>need </i>to improve at, organize that training for them.</li>
<li>Everyone should be improving and engaging in deliberate practice. In-house training and external training should be built into the schedule and built into the budget, not an after thought.</li>
<li>Use scientific rigour to inform your coaching, but also realize that coaching is an art that requires creativity.</li>
<li>Be honest.</li>
<li>Be open. Other people can have really good ideas.</li>
<li>You don't need to be the expert in everything, but know someone who is.</li>
<li>It should be fun. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't also be serious, challenging and sometimes stressful. Being good at something is hard. being the best is really hard.</li>
<li>Listen. If no one is saying anything, you are in trouble.</li>
<li>Passion only gets you so far, eventually you need a plan, skills, grit and dedication (cue Record Breakers theme tune from the 1980's with Roy Castle on his trumpet, outside of the UK this reference doesn't mean anything)</li>
</ul>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMXKFWkg2N1Hb8lqNwQcovXR1mW1igpgLMm9Y4mlap_Qz8V6uolS_IVoplWsgqSzHiasHiXNsDH7wAJgjTMJ10a2cAWUz3xNwcL79XBxPi4MuWvlPTohsCKn8IMCd33QotClvGKsMPCNg/s1600/record-breakers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMXKFWkg2N1Hb8lqNwQcovXR1mW1igpgLMm9Y4mlap_Qz8V6uolS_IVoplWsgqSzHiasHiXNsDH7wAJgjTMJ10a2cAWUz3xNwcL79XBxPi4MuWvlPTohsCKn8IMCd33QotClvGKsMPCNg/s400/record-breakers.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1980's flashback.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Of course, all this is easier said than done.<br />
<br />
Well, that's all I've got right now. Let me know if you have anything else to add to the list.</div>
Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-65748318693921214262017-03-07T03:55:00.002-08:002017-03-07T03:55:19.419-08:00Experiments in Hypertrophy: Part 2 - How many exercises per workout and per body part.In the second part of this series, I expand on my own experiments in hypertrophy, see what other people do and have a look at the science.<br />
<br />
See <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/experiments-in-hypertrophy-what-is-best.html">here for part one on training splits</a>.<br />
<br />
Once you've decided on your training split, and you know you have to a hit a muscle with at least 10 sets per week, possibly up to 20, and optimally train it at least twice a week, then how many exercises should you do?<br />
<br />
Assuming your workout is 60 minutes or thereabouts (excluding any cardio but including at least a quick warm up and some core at the end) I found you can't really do more than 6 or 7 exercises in a hypertrophy workout. In reality sometimes 5 is enough depending on how intensely you are training and the training methods you are using.<br />
<br />
So, for example, on a classic chest day, this would be 3 or 4 chest exercises and 2 tricep exercises.<br />
<br />
On a total body training day, I found I could do 7 exercises at most, sometimes skipping triceps and only doing 6. Interestingly, In <a href="http://www.lookgreatnaked.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Frequency-Table.jpeg">Brad Schoenfelds study where he compared total body training with body part split training</a> this is exactly how many exercises participants did when they were doing the total body training. It is is obvious, one exercise per body part and using the classic bodybuilding delineation of body parts and you have 7 exercises (unless you are the type of person who does a calf, forearm and abductor exercise as well).<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">What does the science say?... Not much.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
I can't find any research that shows how many exercises per body part is best. The advice is generally common sense, hit the muscle from multiple angles and do a variety of exercises.<br />
<br />
But you may be thinking, if I have do 10 sets for an exercise, couldn't I just do 10 sets of 10 reps of one thing like a bench press in one workout and then be covered? You would basically be doing German Volume Training(GVT) which seems to get re-discovered every year.<br />
<br />
After a while I think this type of training would get boring, draining and you are hitting the muscles from the same angle all the time.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Redundancy.</span></b><br />
<br />
At the other end of the spectrum you could be thinking, could I do 1 set of 10 different exercises. Here you face two problems, you don't really do an exercise enough to get good at it or know what is the best weight to use and you could end up doing a lot of sub par exercises, and secondly redundancy.<br />
<br />
This is where you are essentially hitting the muscle with different exercises which basically do the same thing, you are not optimizing the muscle stimulation. For example, if you do barbell bench press, DB flat press and machine chest press, you are doing a very similar horizontal pressing move for all three exercises.<br />
<br />
However, if you did incline DB press, flat DB press, pec flye and possibly a press up - you will be hitting the muscle from different angles and with different actions. You could do all these in one workout if you have a dedicated chest day or if you are hitting a muscle multiple times per week you could do 1 or 2 of these per workout. This way you will find you can lift more, for example, a pec flye after 2 other chest exercises will involve lifting less weight than if it is the only chest exercise you do.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Different body parts, different approach.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
The number of exercises you do will depend on the body part. For example, for back you are looking for at least a vertical pull and a horizontal pull (row) to hit different muscle groups.<br />
<br />
If you look at the way muscles fibres run (see the picture of the trapezius) and if you want to be fancy use the word 'pennation', you can see that some muscles are not going to be fully worked with one exercise.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0x7qWtGKpSzFZ9okLFHxzqT5lJrlvM5d2y3E0JC6rfbGFRKj1obrbhHBpHcVdRo7rqKkwynhxKW5NWPm6ne4CF_47pZC49IQBNr7mJ5X-MrQvpfRg3mOKI8WfwLruQ3audSE16U0xeS0/s1600/trapezius.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0x7qWtGKpSzFZ9okLFHxzqT5lJrlvM5d2y3E0JC6rfbGFRKj1obrbhHBpHcVdRo7rqKkwynhxKW5NWPm6ne4CF_47pZC49IQBNr7mJ5X-MrQvpfRg3mOKI8WfwLruQ3audSE16U0xeS0/s400/trapezius.png" width="253" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Look at the different way the muscle fibres run on the trapezius, the 'pennation' if you want to get fancy. How many exercises do you need to train all of them?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
The shoulders are another classic example, with 3 deltoid heads, and the rotator cuff muscles and the trapezius, you could do 4 or 5 exercises which don't have much crossover.<br />
<br />
Whereas with biceps and triceps, quite a few people over do it, considering these muscles are also being worked with chest, back and shoulders. Even, when I did a dedicated arm workout I only managed to do 3 bicep and 3 tricep exercises.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">How far do you want to go?</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
How many exercises you do is also dependant on how far you want to go. Glute/booty/ posterior training is very much in vogue at the moment. In the past you may have done a quad exercise, a hamstring exercise and possibly a calf one.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7TfQ71MdLKfF7x6O6gqiwa1jjBNMW4ejpmHcLay2CaCsYUtX-VVUlgWJ7FoQ6w2TQLD20yfocJ1G7kpToPJoIaqHZRKe5tnuN95DbrLWhklAA3FSDZeKxvnY64ZYf5bI2As1ohwB_4CA/s1600/glutes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7TfQ71MdLKfF7x6O6gqiwa1jjBNMW4ejpmHcLay2CaCsYUtX-VVUlgWJ7FoQ6w2TQLD20yfocJ1G7kpToPJoIaqHZRKe5tnuN95DbrLWhklAA3FSDZeKxvnY64ZYf5bI2As1ohwB_4CA/s400/glutes.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If you are doing 10 exercises for these muscles you are either in an LBT class or Brazilian.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
But you could do a hamstring exercise for knee bend, a hamstring exercise for hip extension, glute exercise for hip extensions, adductor, abductor, quad multi joint, quad isolation knee extension only, calf gastrocnemius, calf soleus. And that's only one exercise per body part, before you know you can be doing 10 plus exercises and be in the gym 2 hours. Which begs the question of how intense you training is?<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Nuts and Bolts: Strength hybrid, pure hypertrophy, circuits.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In my recent experimentation (and as I said in part 1, no it's not a real experiment) I have gone pure hypertrophy, eschewing the big compound lifts and low reps.<br />
<br />
But if yo want to do a more strength hybrid split, powerbuiding approach or something like Wendlers 531, then the split would something like this:<br />
<br />
<b>Day 1:</b><br />
Squat 5x5<br />
RDL 4x8<br />
Accessory work: Walking lunge etc<br />
<br />
<b>Day 2:</b><br />
Bench press 5x5<br />
Row 4x8<br />
Accessory work: DB incline press, seated row etc<br />
<br />
<b>Day 3:</b><br />
Deadlift 5x5<br />
Bulgarian split squat 4x8<br />
Accessory work: Leg curl etc<br />
<br />
<b>Day 4:</b><br />
Military Press 5x5<br />
Pull Up 3xmax<br />
Accessory work: Lateral raise, rear delt etc<br />
<br />
Generally as you go into the strength range you have to do less exercises because it takes so much time, as anyone who has ever done the Olympic lifts know. 10x2 with 2 mins rest and set up, and before you know it one exercise has taken 25-30mins. Add in some mobility work, warm up sets and you'll be lucky to get 2 exercises in a 60 minute workout. And it is very taxing.<br />
<br />
Whereas, 3x10 with 30-60secs rest takes less than 5 minutes per exercise, hence you can do more at a lower percentage of 1RM and it will be less systemically fatiguing.<br />
<br />
In circuit training you could easily do 10 exercises, but I would not call this hypertrophy training in the purest sense.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">3 exercises will do it: What the science inadvertently shows.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In a study I really like the design of <a href="http://www.lookgreatnaked.com/blog/bodybuilding-vs-powerlifting-type-training-which-builds-more-strength-and-muscle/">Schoenfeld et al (2014)</a> compared 7 setx x 3 reps and 3 sets x 10 reps training schemes. A strength group and a hypertrophy group both training to failure. Both groups were experienced trainees.<br />
<br />
A few things stand out from this research:<br />
<br />
1) Both training schemes resulted in hypertrophy<br />
2) They were both only doing 3 exercises per workout but still got results (increased muscle mass in the biceps). They either trained using a total body scheme, 1 push, 1 pull and 1 leg exercise per workout for 7x3 or for hypertrophy 3 exercises per body part; a day consisting of three chest exercises, another day three back exercises, and a day of three quad exercises. Note, no isolation exercises for the biceps.<br />
3) The 7x3 group took over an hour to complete their routine whereas the 3x10 group took only 17 minutes<br />
4) The strength group got more general fatigue and mental fatigue. Strength training day in day out is hard to maintain for weeks on end.<br />
<br />
This echoes my own experience of strength training with no variation in volume or rep ranges. You begin to ache, start to get injured and breakdown. Strategic planning placement of higher rep work and deload weeks should stop this.<br />
<br />
A 17 minute workout is highly achievable and means you could add in more volume or another body part such as biceps. Plus you could easily repeat this session more than once per week, thus hitting every body part twice and getting twice the volume of 18 sets per muscle.<br />
<br />
There is also a certain amount of personal preference here and what you respond to. Personally, if I do 10x2, 7x3, compound exercises, I get stronger but my muscle mass does not increase. Eventually if I try to go heavy on things like barbell bench press and deadlift I break down.<br />
<br />
If I want to increase muscle mass and generally not break down I have to keep in the higher rep ranges, towards 10-12 reps, and even some higher rep work. And I find isolation exercises work for me as well.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Where does that leave us?</span></b><br />
<br />
A brief survey by me in the gym and online showed that 99% of people train using some kind of body part split. With most people doing a class Chest & Tri's, Back & Bi's routine. Most people were doing about 3 to 4 exercises per body part and 1 or 2 for muscles like biceps and triceps. Th exception being younger people, some of the younger guys doing 6 exercises for chest and one girl doing 11 exercises on leg day! Possibly younger people can get away with more volume, or they have to lower the intensity to complete these marathon routines and therefore don't get enough stimulus for growth.<br />
<br />
Here are some example routines from my training diary. The actual exercises are not important at this stage (I’ll get to that in another post), at this stage I’m trying to give an idea of how many exercise per body part.<br />
<br />
<b>Chest & Triceps</b><br />
Incline cable cross press<br />
Incline press plate loaded<br />
Cable flye high to low<br />
Pec flye machine<br />
Tricep tall kneeling rope press<br />
Cable kick back<br />
<br />
13 sets for chest, 4 exercises<br />
<br />
2 exercises for triceps, 5 sets<br />
<br />
Core: stir the pot<br />
<br />
<b>Back & Biceps</b><br />
<br />
Incline bicep curl<br />
Seated Cable row<br />
Meadows stretcher<br />
Diverging latpulldown<br />
DB Pullover<br />
Drag curl<br />
<br />
Back 4 exercises, 13 sets,<br />
Biceps 2 exercises 6 sets<br />
<br />
<b>Legs</b><br />
<br />
Hack squat<br />
Leg curl machine<br />
1 leg mike boyle pistols<br />
Nordic hamstring curl<br />
Hanging leg raise<br />
<br />
2 exercises 7 sets quads,<br />
2 exercises 7 sets hamstrings<br />
<br />
<b>Chest & back & Triceps </b>– would be repeated again in the week<br />
<br />
Flat DB Press<br />
Chest Supported Row<br />
Cable Flye<br />
McGill side pulldown<br />
1 arm rope pushdown<br />
1 arm cable kickback<br />
<br />
2 exercises chest 6 sets<br />
2 exercises back 6 sets<br />
2 exercises triceps 4 sets<br />
<br />
<b>Push – Shoulders, Chest, Tricep</b><br />
<br />
Flat DB Press<br />
DB Arnie Press<br />
Bottom to top cable crossover<br />
Lateral raise<br />
Pec Dec<br />
Rear delt<br />
Overhead tricep ext<br />
<br />
3 chest exercises 9 sets<br />
3 shoulders 9 sets<br />
1 tricep 3 sets<br />
<br />
<b>Arms only day</b><br />
<br />
DB skullcrusher<br />
Incline DB curl offset grip<br />
Drag curl<br />
Kneeling bench supported tricep ext<br />
Kneeling bench supported bicep curl<br />
Rope over head tricep ext<br />
<br />
3 exercises biceps, 3 triceps,<br />
9 sets each<br />
<br />
<b>Total Body routine</b><br />
<br />
DB Chest press<br />
Seated Row<br />
Barbell bicep curl<br />
Lying leg curl<br />
Goblet squat<br />
Lateral raise<br />
<br />
1 exercise per bodypart, 3-4 set each body part, 3 or 4 different total body routines per week = 12-16 sets.<br />
<br />
<br />
Of course, these are just some random entries from my training diary and don't give you an actual routine to follow. It's not meant to be the ideal training programme in any sense, after all I was experimenting.<br />
<br />
They don't show what rep ranges I used, they don't show what techniques I may have used such as rest pause, descending sets and so forth. Or how to fluctuate the volume, you might deliberately over reach for a couple of weeks on a body part and do multiple exercises, and get 18-20 sets and train 6 x week. And then you might back off for a week with some total body training session and train only 3 x week with only 1 or 2 exercises for a body part and 10 sets total, in the hope you would super compensate.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">In summary.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
The research is scant and says to hit muscles from multiple angles<br />
<br />
Most people naturally gravitate towards 5-7 exercises per workout unless they are doing strength training or circuits.<br />
<br />
3 to 4 exercises for big muscle groups and 2 to 3 for smaller muscle groups per workout is about the maximum you can do. Anymore than this and I find your intensity and focus would start to suffer. If you are doing 5 or 6 exercises per bodpart per workout there will probably be redundancy and replication.<br />
<br />
The art is having enough exercises and variation for stimulus, but not so much that it is no longer optimal.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Next time.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In part 3 of this I will cover what rep ranges to use, how long to rest and those special training techniques like rest pause (extended sets) and descending sets.<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-46515297503186127512017-02-21T03:33:00.001-08:002017-02-21T03:33:52.495-08:00Forming new habits. Part 4: Memory.<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Every habit you have is embedded in your memory somewhere. </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">For part 1,2,3, go <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/what-i-learned-from-30-days-of-yoga-and.html">here</a>, </span><a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-why-is-it-so-hard-to.html" style="font-family: inherit;">here</a><span style="font-family: inherit;"> and <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-how-long-will-you.html">here</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The more you practice a habit, the more the neural pathways are laid down. The pathway gets stronger and the memory becomes consolidated. As the neuroscience adage says 'neurons that fire together, wire together'.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">But you memory is unreliable. It does not store fixed digital files, they change over time. Less like a digital photo and more like a painting you keep adding to and re-touching. Your memory of playing frisbee at 10 years old is different when you remember it at 14 years old to when you remember it at 50 years old.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">You will have attachments to certain activities and foods beyond the utility of getting enough calories to survive and filling up your days with stuff to do.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Think of all your favourite comfort foods, they will probably have a memory attached to them. A roast dinner at your grandparents, a cheese sandwich after school, being given a certain chocolate bar as a treat. That food you had once on an amazing holiday.</span><br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=8409585207453206026" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And you may have an aversion to other foods because of a bout of food poisoning, or that time you got so drunk on Sambuca that you can never face drinking it again.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And you cannot escape your culture.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>Pepsi vs Coca Cola.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In one famous study (McClure et all, 2004) the researchers compared peoples brain activation in an fMRI scanner when they were drinking Pepsi and Coca Cola. They are both essentially brown sugary drinks, so should activate the same areas of the brain.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">When the participants didn’t know whether they were drinking Pepsi or Coca Cola the VMPFC lit up, an area of the brain that relates to taste.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">However, when they were told they were drinking Coca Cola the DLPFC and hippocampus were activated. This didn’t happen when people thought they were drinking Pepsi.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The DLPFC is involved in working memory and perception based on previous experience. The hippocampus is involved in memory recall.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The coca cola was causing a memory recall in people, not just a taste sensation. The influence of culture and brand knowledge had made their brain remember Coca Cola (bear in mind they didn’t actually have to drinking Coca Cola for this to happen, they just had to think they were).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs-R-Q8LHv0e9Xl69_Lf2CRj_bKOSXSLhF2umsDSHHatmlCOnC-GpA-JmjXYWeSbGQan_vJ6uv2Ve-CoW7Pm0MqoRuLYakyYv6nWAVTFIp4dUhmsgOhfxBfDLMU71JanZZ2dD5Q1MAIZE/s1600/coca+cola.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs-R-Q8LHv0e9Xl69_Lf2CRj_bKOSXSLhF2umsDSHHatmlCOnC-GpA-JmjXYWeSbGQan_vJ6uv2Ve-CoW7Pm0MqoRuLYakyYv6nWAVTFIp4dUhmsgOhfxBfDLMU71JanZZ2dD5Q1MAIZE/s320/coca+cola.png" width="186" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If you're American this is probably embedded in your memory, whether you want it to be or not.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Interestingly, the memory parts of the brain were not activated for Pepsi. And even the people who had a stated preference for Pepsi only showed activation of the memory parts of the brain when they though they were drinking Coca Cola.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This study was in the USA, and shows how much Coca Cola is part of peoples culture and upbringing in that part of the world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">For me this wouldn’t happen for Coca Cola, but it would probably happen for a cheese sandwich on white crusty bread and a cup of tea. These were more significant foods and drinks for me. Or possibly even Tizer, or Irn Bru if your Scottish!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2vU-ZE-RELeTwT1QJYVzkcVmWFpu0M_ZDgH-XWZGX88D0SNKYTV0jbtB6cPeSCNUbn_a5c5VktOzdWfF_mk_LPunXkUQlhca44qycGz5H6_uhS0ZwyRVGJvD3vcuUM4t1L1Cc_sAOy0c/s1600/tizer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="347" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2vU-ZE-RELeTwT1QJYVzkcVmWFpu0M_ZDgH-XWZGX88D0SNKYTV0jbtB6cPeSCNUbn_a5c5VktOzdWfF_mk_LPunXkUQlhca44qycGz5H6_uhS0ZwyRVGJvD3vcuUM4t1L1Cc_sAOy0c/s400/tizer.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If you're British and of a certain age this is in your memory. If you're American or Chinese this means nothing.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<center>
<div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div>
</center>
<center style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">You cannot separate yourself from your culture or your memories which are hard wired into your brain.</span></center>
<div style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 0.36cm;">
<div style="line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Now think back to exercise. If someones memory of exercise is being made to do it at school, going for runs in the freezing cold and hiding behind the cricket pavilion for a cigarette; this is what they think of when they think of running. However, they may have more positive associations with dancing or cycling. Who doesn’t like riding their bike as a kid? Or swimming on holiday?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>Spreading activation. Run = school = cold = bullying PE teacher!</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spreading_activation">Spreading activation theory</a> is how your brain groups things together.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The networks in your brain seem to group words and objects together. Think pets, and you brain might thing dog or cat (in western culture) . You can prime someone by using associated words. Say the word carrot, and someone takes longer to recall the word doctor, say the word ‘nurse’ and they recall the word doctor a lot quicker.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Your neural network is dependent on your experience and your culture. You could prime yourself by associating certain feelings and words with exercise.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">For example, for me running is not like the example above, but is running with my Dad as a kid - going to cool places, being outside.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And for a lot of new people going to the gym, especially women, I suspect that when you mention the words 'lifting weights' there neural network goes with the only examples it knows: weights = olympic = massive guys lifting massive weights = masculine/drugs. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">But could you change this, can you create a new pathway?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>False Memories.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Elizabeth Loftus and her team were the first team to show you could implant a false memory in people, the memory was of being <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_the_mall_technique">lost in a shopping mall as a child</a>. It has to be a plausible memory, it is less likely you could implant the memory that someone climbed Everest as a child.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">They have also managed to do it with food (Bernstein et al, 2011). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">In one study (where the participants did not know it was about false memory, but about food preferences) the researchers managed to plant false memories in subjects to make them believe they had a bad experience with egg salad or strawberry ice cream ( up to 40% of participants). So much so that when offered these food one week or several months later they avoided them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=8409585207453206026" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><span style="font-family: inherit;">They also managed to plant a false memory about a 'healthy food', in this case, Asparagus, making them believe they love it the first time they had eaten it. They managed to convince 50% of participants they had loved Asparagus the first time they had eaten it. They then offered them a choice of foods to eat at a later date, the people with the false memory chose Asparagus more than those without the false memory. The participants with the false memory also said they would pay more for asparagus and choose it as a preferred food to have several months after the study.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkwhl5ylFm4wy_ftJ0jfuLcnENiG5Jhy1sKNyH6G827E8V_DfQyAnwPw44CQ_GjLxUeA7JMrhbRnCS2D48e3jP9RJzWzfe2x5vdhW6y-kiTAaZeXcqgLugRJqgEb1hIecNPzEoH4HyoqU/s1600/Big-Green-Asparagus.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkwhl5ylFm4wy_ftJ0jfuLcnENiG5Jhy1sKNyH6G827E8V_DfQyAnwPw44CQ_GjLxUeA7JMrhbRnCS2D48e3jP9RJzWzfe2x5vdhW6y-kiTAaZeXcqgLugRJqgEb1hIecNPzEoH4HyoqU/s400/Big-Green-Asparagus.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">You can be made to think you loved this the first time you ate it. Maybe you really did?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">However, they were unable to plant false memories about a bad experience in the past or fake food poisoning with cookies (biscuits) or potato chips (crisps). This could be because these food are too tasty to give up and too common OR it could be intuitively as humans we generally know we don't get food poisoning from crisps.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Also, note they were not able to plant the false memory in everyone, more than half the people did not accept the memory.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The researchers also managed to do it for alcohol as well.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">From a real memory point of view this makes sense, you aversion to Sambuca after that heavy night of shots years back or that terrible bout of food poisoning means you avoid a certain restaurant or seafood. And if you are allergic to something like peanuts or red wine your are very likely to avoid it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Whats less clear is if you could deliberately plant a false memory in your self, while knowing you are actually doing it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Be careful!</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">There is something called <b>covert sensitization</b>, which is essentially the idea of gradually associating a feeling of nausea/sickness with a food until you don't want it. Of course, this may result in you never wanting a food, even something as tasty as cheese. And lets not forget obesity and healthiness goes beyond one food group.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">More useful could be the idea of making yourself want healthy foods more. And then associating these healthy foods with healthy words and healthy positive images in your brain.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">You could make yourself remember that you loved running at school, you liked all vegetables as a kid and can't get enough of them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Of course, there are techniques that people already use like hypnotism and NLP. Even though these have been considered fringe methods up until now, the research which uses quite basic methods of visualization shows there could definitely be some merit in some of these approaches. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This is not going to happen over night, like all visualization techniques you have to practice.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>What is real and not real?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">There is another famous study, where one group of people learned to play a sequence on the piano actually sitting at the piano, and another group visualized practicing it. After 5 days, both groups showed an increase in the motor cortex where the fingers are controlled from in the brain.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Think about this for a second, not only did it show the brain in adults is plastic and can physically change when learning a new skill. It can be changed just by visualizing a new skill!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Now, you have to make your visualization targeted, you can't just sit there and pretend you are Elton John or Jimi Hendrix. You have to make your visualization a clear practice.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And one last study for you, Ganis et al (2004) Got one group of participants to look at a sketch of a shape, and another group to imagine the shape while in an fMRI scanner. There was a lot of overlap in the regions of the brain activated, in fact about 90%. There wasn't complete overlap, but there was a large amount of similarity.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This shows how powerful imagination can be.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>Take home.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Hopefully, this has shown that your brain and habits are not fixed. After all people give up smoking and start exercising every day, and some stick with it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">You brain is plastic, you can change how you think about things and what your memories are 'telling' you.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Always remember that what you believe and remember and like are all products of the culture you were brought up in, at a certain point in history. And even though these things can be quite deeply embedded, there is no reason why you can't use strategies of visualization and mental imagery to change the things that are may be not working for you now.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">You can visualize new skills, you can create positive word associations with healthy foods and exercise and probably even convince yourself how much you love vegetables. But, be careful, don't create a permanent aversion to cheese or coffee or bread - what could be worse. Live your life!</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>References:</b></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="http://eugrafal.free.fr/McClu-et-al-2004.pdf">Coca
Cola v Pepsi Study</a> </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Elizabeth_Loftus/publication/228212893_The_False_Memory_Diet_False_Memories_Alter_Food_Preferences/links/0fcfd50928e991e790000000.pdf"><span style="font-family: inherit;">False
Memory Study </span></a></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<a href="http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1580438,00.html"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Piano
Study</span></a></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<a href="http://www.overcominghateportal.org/uploads/5/4/1/5/5415260/brainareas_visual_pereption_imagery.pdf"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mental
Imagery Study </span></a></div>
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<br /></div>
Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-41551807561390830012017-02-12T03:11:00.001-08:002017-02-12T03:17:57.513-08:00Experiments in Hypertrophy. What is the best training split?<b>In this series I will cover the best training splits, the optimal number of exercises per body part and per session, the optimal sets and reps, the best training techniques and the best exercises for each body part. First up, what is the best training split?</b><br />
<br />
What you training today bro? Chest & Tri's.<br />
<br />
It's a conversation repeated in every gym around the world on a daily basis.<br />
<br />
I hadn't trained for hypertrophy for years, all my training was total body, in the strength and power range with the occasional conditioning session. Power cleans, squats, push press, plyometrics, with some unilateral work. Throw in some core and occasional 'pre-hab' work. Generally things to make me better at running up mountains, and keep athleticism and strength with minimum time in the gym. Of course I would throw in a bicep curl every now and then if I had time.<br />
<br />
Then I lost my mojo, got injured, had enough of the gym, quit for three months to try some other things like rock climbing and yoga. Then I joined a new gym, which had way more machines and it was time to try something new. And so begun experiments in hypertrophy.<br />
<br />
I wrote down everything exercise I knew, I then asked people what their favourite exercise for a body part was, what training split and methods they used; I wrote that down too. Then for several months I tried all different types of splits, exercises combinations and methods.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The science.</span></b><br />
<br />
Of course I checked out the research. Brad Schoenfeld is your go to man.<br />
<br />
You can see his work on number of sets <a href="http://www.lookgreatnaked.com/blog/how-many-sets-do-you-need-to-perform-to-maximize-muscle-gains/">here</a>, rep ranges <a href="http://www.lookgreatnaked.com/blog/what-is-the-best-rep-range-for-muscle-strength-and-size/">here</a>, how many times a week should you train a muscle <a href="http://www.lookgreatnaked.com/blog/how-many-times-should-you-train-a-muscle-each-week/">here</a><br />
<br />
In summary<br />
<br />
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
1)Meta analysis by
Brad Schoenfeld shows that hitting a muscle group twice a week is
optimal when trying to maximize gains, but gains can still be made
hitting a muscle group just once a week.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
2) 10 plus sets per
week caused almost twice as many gains as doing 5 sets per week. But
there is no known upper threshold yet (where gains start to go down). Note, the dose of sets is over a week NOT necessarily in one training session.</div>
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<br /></div>
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3)And also a variety
of rep ranges work.<br />
<br />
In terms of rep ranges Schoenfelds study shows muscle growth in rep ranges from 8 up to 35 (yep 35 reps, sorry all you ladies in toning classes, there is a good chance you are still building muscle) and this was in trained subjects.<br />
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Of course, as always
with research, the studies tend to be short, there is individual
difference, and there is always a grey area of what exercise is working
what muscle group*(see my definition at the end) with multi-joint exercises, when do your work sets
start**(see my definition at the end) etc.</div>
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<br /></div>
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So, we know a
variety of rep, set and training frequency schemes all work. But
generally training a muscle group twice a week for more that 10 sets
using a variety of rep ranges is probably optimal.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
But of course,
everyone is individual and what is optimal is also what you are going
to do and enjoy.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi__6Y8Y6tQ1f5gYk1tOA2IWgZmrZCLuGBqinH8jynQsnZaqJtBNlKAj0SZxgyljjNtJbEurdCWHHKDqJQ_7Z7wfTM3EvBIsPIsCyZsQUBdKu2HkRbs8GJ59dRk4wDznCWFjKB5Db5jSNg/s1600/rodin+thinker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi__6Y8Y6tQ1f5gYk1tOA2IWgZmrZCLuGBqinH8jynQsnZaqJtBNlKAj0SZxgyljjNtJbEurdCWHHKDqJQ_7Z7wfTM3EvBIsPIsCyZsQUBdKu2HkRbs8GJ59dRk4wDznCWFjKB5Db5jSNg/s400/rodin+thinker.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rodins Thinker: Since the beginning of time people have pondered whether to combine chest and biceps on the same day.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The rules.</span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
I used the holy trinity of broscience to test if it was worth doing an exercise or split:<br />
<br />
1) Could I feel the muscle I was targeting with a particular exercise<br />
2) Did I get a pump<br />
3) Was that muscle sore the next day (I know, there is no correlation with soreness and growth but who doesn't feel like soreness = you worked a muscle)<br />
<br />
And in the long term could I see visual changes in a muscle. There a few caveats, for example, I can make my chest sore pretty easily, and my biceps, my legs generally don't get sore (I think from all that trail running) and I never met anyone who could get deltoid DOMS.<br />
<br />
<div style="line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 0in;">
With this in mind I carried out my own experiment. And tried a whole range of different splits</div>
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Caveat – I don't bother with calves or forearms! And didn't really count any core exercises, although I did them.</div>
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<br /></div>
And the nature of my workouts is they will not last longer than an hour. Therefore no 2 hour marathon sessions.<br />
<br />
Of course. it wasn't a real experiment, there was no control group, I wasn't using ultrasound to see if my muscles had got bigger.<br />
<br />
<b>A few rules I set myself:</b><br />
<br />
1) Try and feel every rep, get that mind muscle connection, don't worry about weight<br />
2) Use machines, cables, body weight, dumbbells<br />
3) Avoid the big compound barbell movements like deadlifts, squats, military press I had used extensively in the past. One exception is I did try some high rep squats.<br />
4) Keep rep ranges high, 10-12, or even higher 15+, unless doing rest pause sets.<br />
<br />
With all that in mind, here are the splits I tried, and what I think are there advantages and disadvantages,<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The classic split.</span></b><br />
<b>Day 1: Chest & Triceps</b><br />
<b>Day 2: Back & Biceps</b><br />
<b>Day 3: Legs</b><br />
<b>Day 4: Shoulders</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
This is still probably the most popular split in gyms worldwide or a slight variation on it.<br />
<br />
You need to be able to train 4 days a week to be able to do this.<br />
<br />
<b>Advantages: </b><br />
<br />
I managed to do 12-14 sets for major muscle groups like chest and back. Exceeding the 10 set threshold that Schoenfeld showed is needed. For smaller muscle groups like biceps and triceps I only managed 5-6 sets. However, these muscle groups are always indirectly trained with other muscles.<br />
<br />
Good muscle pump, and soreness. Not too long in the gym.<br />
<br />
<b>Disadvantages:</b><br />
<br />
You are only hitting a muscle once per week, not the optimal dosage of twice or more. You have to be able to train 4 x week, if you miss a session, a muscle group wont be trained for 2 weeks.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Even more of a split:</span></b><br />
<b>Day 1: Arms</b><br />
<b>Day 2: Chest</b><br />
<b>Day 3: Back</b><br />
<b>Day 4: Legs</b><br />
<b>Day 5: Shoulders</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Advantages:</b><br />
<br />
Less time in the gym, if time crunched do this, because you are only doing one body part. Super pump. The volumes tends to be the same as the classic split, about 12-14 sets per major muscle group, and slightly higher on the biceps and triceps - 9 sets.<br />
<br />
<b>Disadvantages:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Need to train 5 x week, still only hitting each muscle once per week, and the volume you can achieve is not much higher than the classic split.<br />
<br />
Now I know some people split it down even further, having a quad day and hamstring day and bicep day, but this as far as I went with splitting.<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Push, Pull, Legs.</span></b><br />
<b>Day 1: Chest, Shoulders, Triceps</b><br />
<b>Day 2: Back, Biceps</b><br />
<b>Day 3: Legs</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Advantages: </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
If you train 3 x week you hit each muscle at least once. This is achievable for most people. If you train 6 x week, you hit every muscle twice, this is not achievable for most people. Makes you train legs as you have a whole day dedicated to it.<br />
<br />
<b>Disadvantages:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
You only hit each body part once. I don't like doing shoulders and chest on the same day , I find at least one of these muscle groups will suffer. In my case, my chest is weak and doing shoulders means I can't hit the chest as hard as I want. A whole day dedicated to legs can be taxing, and if you're a bro like me and don't really want to have a whole dedicated to legs you end up dreading it.<br />
<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Push Pull, basically combine legs into day 1 and 2</span></b><br />
<b>Day 1: Pushing - Chest, Shoulders, Quads (leg pressing pattern), triceps</b><br />
<b>Day 2: Pulling - Back, Hamstrings/Glutes (hinge pattern), biceps</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Advantages:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>When most people talk about total body training, this is the split they actually mean. You can cover all your muscles in 2 sessions. And you can then work on multiples of this, train 4 x week (achievable for most), or even 6 times. Less taxing on the legs in each session but it is still making you train legs!<br />
<br />
<b>Disadvantages:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
As in the previous split, I think shoulders and chest training can interfere with each other. Less exercises per body part, which means less sets per session - which mean you could end up doing less than 10 sets if you only train twice, however if you train 4 x week you will make up for this and do more volume than the classic split.<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b><br /></b>
<b>My variation:</b></span><br />
<b>Day 1: Chest, Back, Biceps</b><br />
<b>Day 2: Shoulders, Legs, Triceps</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Advantages:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Same as push pull except now chest and back are on the same day. This means you can superset exercises more effectively for these body parts, which is a good way to train and can make your workout more time efficient. Putting chest on a different day to shoulders and triceps allows you to hit these pressing exercises without so much interference in a workout.<br />
<br />
<b>Disadvantages:</b><br />
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You will probably lower the volume on one body part to fit the workout in, for me this was legs.</div>
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Total body
training.</span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Each session
consists of one exercise for chest, back, shoulders, quads,
hamstring/glutes, triceps, biceps.</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
This is 3-4 sets per exercise per body part per workout, 7 exercises
per workout.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<b>Advantages:</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
You hit every body part in the workout. Which means if you only
manage to train once or twice that week you have covered everything.
If you train 3-4 times you have done 9 to 16 set per body part. Which
means the dosage of sets is the same or more than a body part split
over a week.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="font-weight: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
And you are hitting each body part 3 or 4 times a week.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Disadvantages:</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<div style="font-weight: normal;">
Once you are beyond beginner level this is a taxing workout. Several
times I left out the triceps or only did one set because of time
constraints and fatigue and the feeling I had worked them enough with
the chest and shoulder exercises.</div>
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<br /></div>
<b>Flexible:</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<div style="font-weight: normal;">
This is generally how I train most of my clients, a push exercise, a
pull exercise, squat exercise, hinge exercise, then core. For clients
looking for general health and only training twice a week, I find
this the best approach. When I write programmes for people who want
to train 5-6 x week, or compete in something I take a different
approach.<br />
<br />
You can use this format to make an easy day or a conditioning day or a big intense day, depending on how you are feeling.</div>
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<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Using the total body split approach you can change the emphasis of the day, say you are not feeling it one day, you go easy and for isolation. For example, 2-3 set x 12-15 reps of</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Pec flye machine</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Rear delt machine</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Latpulldown</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Lying leg curl</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Goblet squat</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Cable bicep curl</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Cable tricep pushdown.</span></div>
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OR of you want a more conditioning based day:</div>
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DB Snatch</div>
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Pull Up</div>
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Press up/Burpee</div>
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Squat Jump</div>
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KB Swing</div>
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not hypertrophy but you get the idea. OR if you really want a big hypertrophy day you hit the big guns of dumbbells and compound lifts for high reps.</div>
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<b>Why don't most lifters in the gym use a total body split?</b></div>
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<br /></div>
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Despite the evidence showing training a muscle group multiple times
per week for a few sets each session will result in gains and results, nearly every 'serious' guy in
the gym does not train this way. Why so? I think, there is a
psychological element, lack of muscle pump and soreness (even though
DOMS not correlated with growth) means they don't feel they have
trained hard enough or hit the muscle with enough volume. And the
overwhelming perceived gym wisdom – every bodybuilder uses a
training split.</div>
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<br /></div>
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And lets face it, some of us like the variety, the pump, the volume
and doing legs 4 x week is hard!</div>
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I've seen several people online says that body part splits are okay
for beginners and those on drugs but too hard for anyone else, and once you are intermediate and drug free you should go total body. I can
only assume these people haven't actually tried to do a total body
training session. A total body session is way harder psychologically
and physically than doing 'chest' day. I think most of these people
conflate total body training for push/ pull.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Conclusion. Which
is best.</span></b></div>
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The answer as always, it depends on what you enjoy, how many times a
week you have to train. And having enough variety to keep it
interesting and your body responding.</div>
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In general I ended up hitting about 12-13 sets per week for bigger muscle groups when doing various body part splits. When carrying out total body training this reached a peak of about 16 sets (4 sets per muscle group per workout for 4 workouts) and about 6-12 for smaller muscles, again with the highest number being hit when total body training – 3 sets of biceps per workout for 4 workouts = 12 sets (but of course triceps and biceps would have been indirectly hit on chest, back and shoulder exercises).</div>
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Now, for some Bro's this is low, it is not unusual to hit 20 sets per muscle group per session. But the research doesn't really say if this is actually worth doing. Does your intensity drop until you are barley getting any muscle stimulation with such an approach? And I am assuming you are drug free.<br />
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<b>
My favourite split is probably:</b></div>
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<br /></div>
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Day 1: Chest, Back Biceps</div>
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Day 2: Shoulders, Legs</div>
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<br /></div>
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or
</div>
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Day 1: Push – Chest, Shoulders, Squat(Quads), Triceps</div>
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Day 2: Pull – Back, Biceps, Hinge(Hamstring/Glutes)</div>
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<br /></div>
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This way, training 4 x week I hit each part twice and feel I am
getting enough volume.</div>
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Now if you are looking to emphasize a certain muscle you could target
that multiple times per week and de-emphasize other muscles. For
example, if you wanted to target glutes you could train them 2-4 x
week, and if you are not bothered by chest only train it once.
After all the research shows you can still get hypertrophy with once a
week, but you get more if train the muscle twice or more.</div>
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<br /></div>
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If you are not sure how many times a week you can train and it can
vary at short notice go total body.
<br />
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If you like short sessions but like to train every day a traditional
body part split could be for you.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Next time.</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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In the next few parts of this, I will cover how many exercises per body part. The best training techniques and methods. And the best exercise for each body part.</div>
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------------------------------------------------</div>
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<b>*Definition of a set:</b></div>
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As always the question is what counts as a set. For the purposes of this, warm up sets were not counted, these would typically occur on the first exercise of the day, or if it was a new exercise or machine and I had no idea what weight to use, so started light and built up. Actual sets were 'hard' or to failure.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>**Definition of a body part:</b></div>
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Body part splits are by their nature somewhat artificial, especially when it comes to multi-joint compound exercises. For example, is a squat quads, hamstrings, glutes, adductors or back? Well for the purposes of this I'm going with the traditional definitions. Your brain doesn't know muscles, it only knows movements, but EMG activation and soreness, pump etc tell us what was working – and these normally follows the traditional definitions.</div>
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Then there is the perennial worry of putting an exercise on the right day – is the dumbbell pullover on chest day or back day or arm day?! Is the shrug a back or shoulder exercise? My answers – pullover goes on back day, and if you do shrugs they are on shoulder day! All I can say is you decide and stop worrying so much.</div>
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Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-21447710561545921662017-02-06T13:44:00.009-08:002017-02-06T13:44:56.736-08:00Review of The McGill 2 course: "Reducing pain and enhancing performance: The three hour back assessment."I attended this course on 4th February at the <a href="http://www.aecc.ac.uk/">Anglo-European College of Chiropractic</a> in Bournemouth. I previously attended McGill 1 ('Building the ultimate back: from rehabilitation to performance') in Dublin in 2015.<br />
<br />
To see the general description of Professor Stuart McGills courses and his books and publications go <a href="http://www.backfitpro.com/courses.php">here</a>. I assume by reading this blog you already know who he is.<br />
<br />
Now, I'm not going to give the detail of the course, if you want that you can pay for the course yourself! But I will compare McGill 1 and 2, give a few insights and suggest whether it is worth you doing the course yourself if you are interested. Also, McGill doesn't let you take pictures of video either, so none of that here.<br />
<br />
Anything in quotation marks is a quote from Stuart McGill unless otherwise stated.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">McGill 2.</span></b><br />
<br />
The course is one day, and split in two halves. The morning is lectures covering the theory, movement screening, imaging and examples from various research studies.<br />
<br />
The afternoon is the practical going through various tests, movement screens, and practical recommendations in a clinical environment. In this case using Chiropractor plinths - which I must say are bizarre and not very good if you are not doing Chiropractic manipulations! Apparently McGill has presented at AECC on several occasions, so they should have known that the treatment tables they had were not going to be any good for the practical things we were doing.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Movement Screens.</span></b><br />
<br />
McGill is quick to point out that he is not going to give you a simple system like an FMS to use. There is no simple screen or test with complicated back pain cases.<br />
<br />
He covers his research into the FMS - which he also does on McGill 1. He probably spent more time on this in McGill 1.<br />
<br />
There is an assumption that people on this course had done McGill 1, but it seemed most people hadn't. Most people on McGill 2 were Chiropractors (surprising eh, being at a Chiro school) whereas I would say at McGill 1 there were more athletic trainers.<br />
<br />
In short, even though he has a lot of good things to say about Gray Cook and suggests any new trainer learns the FMS, this is not going to be enough for anyone trying to be a top notch clinician. In essence the FMS is a three chord punk song whereas the McGill assessment is "jazz".<br />
<br />
For example, the overhead squat test in the FMS, which requires very good shoulder mobility to score a 3, but "shoulder mobility is a gift from God!', not necessarily something you can change.<br />
<br />
His approach is about "converging on a precise diagnosis".<br />
<br />
This is where his scientific background comes in. You formulate your hypothesis, and then test it. For example, pain is coming from disc at L.4. Test it, if your wrong, go again.<br />
<br />
You can read his books, get his DVDs and listen to podcasts with him in to garner most of what he covers in his seminars. However, there is that extra quality to seeing him in a real life situation. He has charisma, a wealth of knowledge and despite protestations that he is no clinician - obviously is gifted in this area as well as his ability to relate to people.<br />
<br />
He has worked with so many different types of people from professional hockey, NFL, MMA, rugby, powerlifting, as well as every day people with everyday jobs with back pain that has been dismissed or misdiagnosed (or not diagnosed at all). He is normally the last resort, if you are seeing him, you are desperate and have seen 10 other experts; his approach has to work.<br />
<br />
He brings all this into the lecture theatre, at his best when going off on tangents, citing a research study, talking about specific patients, answering questions - but genuinely listening and not afraid to give strong opinions and say "I don't know" when he doesn't.<br />
<br />
For example, I asked him why people sit into their pain, it seems counter-intuitive that someone who is forward flexion intolerant would adopt that posture. He said he didn't know why people did it, but they do and we don't know why.<br />
<br />
Or, a friend of mine who is in his 2nd year at Chiropractor school asked if McGill ever saw acute cases. He doesn't, by the time they reach him they are chronic. He said the acute cases are for the clinicians and manual therapists.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Context.</span></b><br />
<br />
His approach is all about context. He gives the example of posture, no variability and too much variability in posture will result in injury, there is a "sweet spot" in the middle. However, in the weights room there should be zero variability (not in that everyone should squat or deadlift the same) but when you have found the best technique for you or a client, you should be fastidious with every rep.<br />
<br />
He also gives examples of very good winning athletes with so called 'poor movement', are you going to change their posture when they are winning and not in pain? Of course not.<br />
<br />
He also covered several studies in the morning session. Including one on firefighters and movement screening, and how some moved better with load and some moved worse with load. And studies on changing hip mobility, stretching, and trying to change peoples lordotic spine curves.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG6NANsTf5DIO0SnZhyFkhhHSlzZVSE1MxIc6DZN3A6aoVIOgv35lUGHsBDmO2_2CN6uOgJzGfoR6CD1u-GtgbNJVPurPwkAim3Qj_8X-rSnINV07GtO8tAOCUkN0thWRWPjlZ0Uexpm8/s1600/square+peg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG6NANsTf5DIO0SnZhyFkhhHSlzZVSE1MxIc6DZN3A6aoVIOgv35lUGHsBDmO2_2CN6uOgJzGfoR6CD1u-GtgbNJVPurPwkAim3Qj_8X-rSnINV07GtO8tAOCUkN0thWRWPjlZ0Uexpm8/s320/square+peg.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Stop trying to fit a pentagon shaped peg into a square hole. Everyone is different.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Non specific back pain and imaging.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
If you really want to wind up Prof. McGill mention non specific back pain and general exercise recommendations.<br />
<br />
He is dismissive of the medical profession that gives this diagnosis (no one ever had non specific head pain and then was told to have surgery anyway to remove part of the head!) and also some radiologists and their inability to interpret an MRI.<br />
<br />
In the morning session of McGill 2 he briefly covers medical imaging and differential diagnosis.<br />
<br />
For example, MRI might show a disc bulge at L.2, but if all the symptoms show a problem with L.4, then surgery in L.2 is not going to do anything, even if the MRI shows 'abnormality' there.<br />
<br />
In fact, he is very much certain that in 95% of cases that have been told they need surgery you can help them avoid it.<br />
<br />
I think one of the other attendees used the phrase "Victim Of Medical Imaging Technology" - VOMIT. Haha. Yes imaging is a fantastic tool but know its limitations.<br />
<br />
People giving general exercise recommendations like 'do yoga or pilates' is also lazy. Know the limitations of research where people are diagnosed with 'general back pain' and given 'general exercise'.<br />
<br />
In terms of differential diagnosis, McGill interestingly says he has only come across two cases of piriformis syndrome - it is very rare. But, as anyone working in this field knows, people get told all the time they have piriformis syndrome and advised to drive a lacrosse ball into it.<br />
<br />
Two interesting things McGill mentioned were spinal shock and neural resonance.<br />
<br />
These were interesting, and I will have to think about them more from a neuroscience point of view. The neural resonance effect is when someone has a shuddering in a 8-10 Hz range before being able to do a movement like stand up. This appears to be coming from the Motor Cortex itself. This is easier to demonstrate than explain.<br />
<br />
At this point he mentioned visualization and trying to lay down myelination and form new engrams (the software in the brain needs updating, the hardware is fine) of movement. This very much chimes with what I've been reading recently in neuroscience, neuroplasticity and long term synaptic potentiation.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The assessment.</span></b><br />
<br />
I think what he is trying to get across is how complete the assessment of the person in front of you has to be. From observing how they get out of their car, walk up the stairs, open the door, the look on their face, their complete history, how they sleep, how long they sleep, are they a type A or B personality and on and on.<br />
<br />
He doesn't have a set assessment form. Every person is different.<br />
<br />
You need to see how they move when fresh, when under stress, when under fatigue - 'break them down' and see what their movement does.<br />
<br />
"What matters most to that person" is what you need to focus on.<br />
<br />
Is it getting down on the floor and playing with their kids or returning to the NFL or running 10k? There is not one route.<br />
<br />
When you have tested the hypothesis, and have a plan you then need to "coach movement not corrective exercise"<br />
<br />
You should then "know the goal of the training programme and every single exercise."<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">The practical.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In the afternoon McGill then goes through the various practical assessments such as heel drop test, seated compression and things like neural flossing. All looking to identify if there is a stability problem, what are the triggers etc. Too many to mention here, with too many pearls of clinical wisdom.<br />
<br />
But, I think if you hadn't read his books or watched his DVDs this section could be overwhelming. I would recommend familiarizing yourself with these before attending the course.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJLmzSFHVnNOzfEcSMqUoAUaRNTiKCGohPlstunAxFtzHT0B7kEJf55nBtzHc3DW1C0YSNd6G7nuQlaj52ebI35fUPDy7ghPCO9Ahw9HWli5oEpAqXJnFCRo23AdWda9aMh3lZOHBSr7Q/s1600/McGill+books.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJLmzSFHVnNOzfEcSMqUoAUaRNTiKCGohPlstunAxFtzHT0B7kEJf55nBtzHc3DW1C0YSNd6G7nuQlaj52ebI35fUPDy7ghPCO9Ahw9HWli5oEpAqXJnFCRo23AdWda9aMh3lZOHBSr7Q/s400/McGill+books.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yeah I'm the fan boy who bought the books when they originally came out over 10 years ago. I would read these or watch his assessment DVDs before attending the course. These are my books from 2002 and 2004, the latest editions contain more recent research.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
His assistant Joel (website for his facility <a href="http://www.performancerx.co.uk/">here</a>) covered the hip assessment, I believe he is an S&C coach.<br />
<br />
By 6pm everyone was flagging and there was information overload. And left me with a couple of final thoughts on how to integrate all this information.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Three hour assessment.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In reality I don't think anyone in that room apart from McGill is going to go away and start doing three hour back assessments. However, I think everyone can take something away and make their approach more rigorous. We all get stuck in patterns, become a bit lazy and default to certain ways of thinking , or diagnosis (if that's what you do).<br />
<br />
Courses like this re-energise you.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">McGill 1 or 2?</span></b><br />
<br />
McGill 1 covered the research for the exercises more in depth and had a big practical element going through cat camels, bird dogs, side bridges, curl ups, glute exercises and more. Afterall McGill 1 is 2 days long.<br />
<br />
If you are an athletic trainer, McGill 1 is the course to do. If don't have access to a therapy couch or your job doesn't allow hands on testing and assessment then there is not much you can practically take away from McGill 2.<br />
<br />
From a clinician/ therapist point of view, McGill 2 is going to give you more assessment tools and some treatment options that can be done in a clinical setting and help the client can move better. But if you don't know the big 3 exercises, what a hip hinge is, and more, then it doesn't give you much to give your client to take away and do. For example, McGill mentioned the side bridge on the course and some peoples obsession with making it harder, but said that lifting a leg in a side bridge can double the spine load. If you don't know how to do the side bridge in the first place, this information may not be of use.<br />
<br />
McGill 1 cover more things you can do with athletes as well. He covers deadlifting technique, squat technique, neural drive and more. In McGill 2 he only briefly mentions the spate of end plate fractures from people deadlifting and broken pelvic rings from people going too heavy on unilateral leg work.<br />
<br />
In someways, it might be better to have the courses the other way round.<br />
<br />
We had more time on McGill 1, McGill 2 seemed like we were rushing through the tests and assessments in the afternoon. And these are subtle things, with nuance that take time to learn. In some ways trying to cram too much in can cause confusion and lack of clarity.<br />
<br />
On McGill 1 we were given a pdf of all the lectures. On this course there was no pdf or printed copy of the slides provided. This would have been useful to have.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Questions.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Some of these questions have only occurred to me after the course, some I had on the day.<br />
<br />
McGill 2 doesn't give you an exercise pathway as such. For example, someone has a underhook at L.3, does this change the way you do the cat camel or bird dog? Aren't you going to do the big three exercises regardless of outcome?<br />
<br />
Why do some people sit into their pain?<br />
<br />
Why do some people have "reversed perception" and constantly self manipulate, how can you stop them?<br />
<br />
Does any professional team or facility have a robust screening/assessment process that has been shown to reduce injury and improve performance by individualizing programmes?<br />
<br />
Would it be possible to see neural resonance traces on an EEG or fMRI?<br />
<br />
As always courses like this always throw up more questions and more to learn.<br />
<br />
As McGill says "It depends" and "We are playing Jazz here". Treat or train the person in front of you, adapt and freestyle as needed, but use science and logic as your guide.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Closing thoughts.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
You could learn nearly all that is covered on the course from McGills books, DVDs and research publications.<br />
<br />
But by going on the course, you learn something more. It gives you an insight into how to interact with clients and patients. You see the man in action and his thought process.<br />
<br />
He has just retired and is winding down, so if this is your thing now is probably the time.<br />
<br />
I believe AECC billed this as a more intimate course than McGill 1 but it seems there were as many people as McGill 1, with 50+ other people in the room.<br />
<br />
But even if you only take away 1 or 2 new bits of information or a way of phrasing something or carrying yourself in front of client then it was worth it.<br />
<br />
I preferred McGill 1 as a course, and from McGill 2 I enjoyed the morning lectures session the most. It has given me a list of research to follow up. But maybe that's just my bias of wanting to know more about the research and not being so clinic based.<br />
<br />
Take home message - be better, know more.<br />
<br />
Now should I do McGill 3?<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-84025552285622281082017-01-27T04:10:00.001-08:002017-01-27T05:05:05.060-08:00Forming new habits. How long will you wait for results? Part 3.<b>How long before people abandon their new nutrition plan or exercise habit?</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
For parts one and two, go <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/what-i-learned-from-30-days-of-yoga-and.html">here</a> and <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/forming-new-habits-why-is-it-so-hard-to.html">here</a>.<br />
<br />
Research shows that by now most people have given up on their new year exercise plan or nutrition plan. Dry January or Veganuary have quickly turned into beer and a burger for quite a few people.<br />
<br />
But why? And why are some people still going and sticking to their plan?<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Temporal Discounting.</span></b><br />
<br />
In behavioural economics and neuroscience there is something called Temporal Discounting. Basically, how long are you willing to wait for a reward. And in general humans (and animals) prefer immediate reward to delayed reward.<br />
<br />
For example, its not unusual for people to say after a week of exercise 'I haven't lost any weight yet' or a week of more healthy eating 'I don't feel any different, when will I lose weight?'.<br />
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The brain wants immediate results and rewards.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">"Large probable, immediate rewards are preferred to smaller, less likely and distant ones." </span></b>(Gazzaniga et al, 2008:p528)</blockquote>
<br />
This could explain two phenomena we all see on a daily basis. One, people weighing themselves after every workout, in the hope there has been an immediate loss of fat or gain in muscle mass. Two, people rewarding themselves with a chai latte and cake after a workout and immediately consuming more calories than they burned off.<br />
<br />
Most of the studies focus on monetary rewards in humans (sometimes while they are are in an MRI scanner) or giving juice to monkeys, or sometimes a poor rat with an electrode implanted in the 'reward' centre of the brain.<br />
<br />
A common question in these studies is, would you like £10 now or £11 tomorrow,? Most people choose £10 today. But if you say would you like £10 in a year, or £11 in a year + 1 day? It is so far in the future people will choose the £11. (McClure, 2004).<br />
<br />
It is not uncommon for lottery winners to be offered a lump sum now, but half the actual amount they won, or the total sum in portions over several years. People opt for the lump sum, even though it is less money.<br />
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Exercise and new nutrition habits are by their very nature delayed rewards for people new to it. They are not necessarily exercising because they love it, they are doing it because of a future delayed reward such as fitting into a dress, looking good on the beach. And for many people this reward seems 'distant' and unlikely (due to past failures).<br />
<br />
The brains reward system likes immediate rewards. The release of dopamine creates pleasure. It activates neurons in the Nucleus Accumbens/ Ventral Striatum (the 'reward' centre deep in the brain).This dopamine release can be caused by drugs, but also by other things such as a tasty cake. Therefore, your reward system can say 'eat the cake, weightloss is too far away to think about, we need a reward now, we've had a tough day at work.'<br />
<br />
Back to rat in the lab, when it has an electrode in its brain that fires off some dopamine reward cells every time it hits a lever, guess what it does? It hits that lever obsessively, in fact ignoring food and water until it collapses from exhaustion because it values the activation of the reward centre in the brain over everything else.<br />
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If you keep checking social media every 5 mins, or have ever played a computer game all night, you are basically that rat hitting the lever, looking for a hit of dopamine.<br />
<br />
BUT, humans are not rats. We have some (newer from an evolutionary point of view) parts of the brain that deal in self control and planning. The Pre Frontal Cortex (PFC), at the front of your brain.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">You can make your brain choose healthy foods.</span></b><br />
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For example, in one study on dieters (Hare et al, 2009). There were two groups, a group exercising self control, a group not exercising self control. They rated 50 different foods for taste ( very bad to very good) and healthiness (unhealthy to very healthy). These foods included 'junk' food like crisps and candy, and healthy foods like fruit and vegetables.<br />
<br />
Then while in a MRI scanner they had to reject foods on offer and choose other ones. They had actually not eaten for three hours, and the food they choose they got to eat at the end. The self controllers rejected the unhealthy foods they liked and choose healthy ones they disliked more often. It is not that they didn't find junk food tasty or really likes healthy foods, they just had better self control. In fact, a part of their brain called the dlPFC was more activated in the self controllers. This is the part of the brain that is making more deliberate decisions. This part of the brain was operating far sighted behaviour.<br />
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And your brain does this all the time. For example, people book holidays in the future, they save money for pensions and they go to University, when the reward of a degree is years away.<br />
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Our brain would like things as soon as possible (Kable and Glimcher, 2010), but it knows that this might involve a delay. For example, you order something on the internet, it wont arrive for 3 or 4 days, but you are prepared to wait. If you went into a shop and they said you had to wait 3 or 4 days before you could buy an item, you would go somewhere else. Your brain understands context.<br />
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The reward has to be big enough and important enough. £10 now or £10,000 in a year, err I'll wait a year thanks. The problem is most people aren't thinking about the rewards of exercise and nutrition like this. In their mind the reward isn't big enough to wait.<br />
<br />
They are thinking about it much more like a monkey being given juice. A trigger goes off, a few seconds later the monkey is given some juice, there is a dopamine spike in the brain and the reward centre is activated. After a while, there is a dopamine spike when the trigger happens, before the monkey has had the juice. The expectation of reward is triggering a response in the brain. But, if there is a trigger and no reward, eventually the monkey gets wise and realises there will be no reward, the expectation has gone, that 'reward' part of the brain no longer activates.<br />
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This is like someone who starts exercising, the anticipation of weight loss and feeling better drives them, but after a while they get no results, they get despondant and give up, the reward system is not firing anymore. A cake will fire it off immediately.<br />
<br />
Whereas, the crash diet industry knows how to hit the reward system. Have a novel food you have to eat, restrict calories, lose a lot of weight in a short period of time, weigh yourself five days later and the reward system in the brain goes into overdrive. But the pain is too much, eventualy they give up.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Your emotions are affecting your decisions.</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Attractive women, bad decisions and blue oceans.</span></b><br />
<b><br /></b>
In one study called Do Pretty Women Inspire Men to Discount the Future ( Wilson and Daly, 2003), the researchers offered men a small monetary reward tomorrow or a larger sum in the future (7 to 236 days). One group were shown pictures of 'hot women' (yes, the researchers actually got the pictures from hot or not.com). The men who viewed the hot pictures were more likely to accept the smaller offer tomorrow than a larger amount in the future. They forgot about the future, the planning part of their brain wasn't thinking that far ahead.<br />
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Or to put it another way, a young guy is doing some shoulder rehab work and mobility exercises in a gym, an attractive female in yoga pants walks past, next thing you know he is doing max bench press and bicep curls and ignoring his shoulder health.<br />
<br />
The researchers found no such effect with women looking at hot men, they were better at keeping a sense of perspective!<br />
<br />
<b>Imagine a calming blue ocean...</b><br />
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In another study (Delgado et al 2008), a group of people were asked to visualise a small money monetary reward, $4, or imagine something in nature that is calming and blue, while in an MRI scanner.<br />
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The people imagining the calming blue ocean had less activation in the reward centre of the brain and more activation in the control, future planning centre of the brain. They weren't thinking about the money they were going to get.<br />
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Now, this doesn't mean emotions are bad. In fact, people who have damage to the emotional parts of the brain make notoriously bad decisions or no decision at all.<br />
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The point of this is not that you should avoid hot women or imagine blue calming things, but how even the most basic visualisation and exposure to pictures can affect your brains activation centres and decisions.<br />
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What if you actually applied these principles in a much more in depth, sophisticated way?<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Where the rubber meets the road.</span></b><br />
<br />
This is what neuroscientist Sam McClure calls where the rubber meets the road. The practical advice arising from all these studies.<br />
<br />
He also points out the hippocampus (where memories are made) is now known to be involved in prospecting about the future.<br />
<br />
He recommends:<br />
<br />
1) Envisioning future rewards. Make them easy to envision. Envision what the reward will do for your life.<br />
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So, really imagine how exercise and nutrition will make you feel and look.<br />
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2) Change how you frame things.<br />
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Frame rewards in different ways. See the exercise session as a reward in itself. Or in relation to food, demotivate appreciation of unhealthy foods, try seeing cookies like inanimate objects like a rock and think of green tea as a reward or treat.<br />
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3) Become more myopic in the way rewards are represented.<br />
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Attach more positive emotions to healthy foods. The self controlling dieters knew the junk food was tasty, they were just more focused on their goal and choose a 'less tasty' healthy option. Or even better make it so you see the healthy food as tasty and a rewarding. There are plenty of visualisation techniques to do this. Its just most people don't do them, and have no systematic approach.<br />
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And don't forget<br />
<br />
<i><b>'neurons that fire together wire together'</b></i><br />
<i><b><br /></b></i>
The more you use a pathway in the brain, the more you practice, the stronger the connection gets.<br />
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And one last thing, aerobic exercise is shown to activate that deliberate dlPFC part of your brain more. It becomes a self fullfilling prophecy, the more you exercise, the better your brain will get at decision making and planning!<br />
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<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Nuts and bolts are easy.</span></b><br />
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The fitness and nutrition industries have focused on the nuts and bolts, the programme, the recipe. But this is the easy bit, the nuts and bolts.<br />
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The hard part is making people stick with it. The future will be the coach who can change mindset.<br />
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Some visualisation techniques have been dismissed in the past as pseudoscience. However, neuroscience is now showing us how important envisioning and mindset are in framing your goals, seeing where you want to be and succeeding.<br />
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Lastly, associating the process itself as the reward. Taking pleasure in the exercise, looking forward to cooking that healthy meal. The people who stick with exercise are the ones who look forward to going to the gym or for a run. It becomes their passion, their reward.<br />
<br />
Or as Adrienne of Yoga with Adriene said this week:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"The journey is the reward, the process is the candy."</blockquote>
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Or for another excellent article I read this week about focusing on the process and forgetting goals by James Clear please click <a href="http://jamesclear.com/goals-systems">here </a><br />
<br />
In part 4 we will cover memory.<br />
<br />
<b>References:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cognitive-Neuroscience-Michael-Gazzaniga-x/dp/0393111369">Gazziniga et al (2008) Cognitive Neuroscience</a><br />
<br />
McClure et al (2004) <a href="http://www.cmu.edu/dietrich/sds/docs/loewenstein/SeparateNeural.pdf">Separte Neural Systems Value Immediate and Delayed Monetary Rewards.</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.rnl.caltech.edu/publications/pdf/hare2009.pdf">Hare et al (2009) Self control in dieters study.</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.martindaly.ca/uploads/2/3/7/0/23707972/w___d_2004_pretty_women.pdf">Wilson and Daly (2003) Hot women cause men to discount the future study.</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.decisionsrus.com/documents/asap-effect-in-human-intertemporal-decision-making.pdf">Kable and Glimcher (2010) We want things 'as soon as possible'</a><br />
<br />
Interview with Sam McClure, Introduction to Neuroeconomics MOOC.Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8409585207453206026.post-13426560962649814392017-01-18T11:45:00.002-08:002017-01-18T11:45:53.077-08:00Forming new habits. Why is it so hard to give things up? Part 2.<b>Why losing things is twice as painful as gaining things.</b><br />
<br />
In this series I am going to cover some of the behavioural science and neuroscience of forming habits, giving up bad habits, goals and rewards. I am going to come at it from a different tack possibly to the usual writings on fitness and nutrition, and at points I am going to extrapolate, stretch the science if you will, or apply some principles to exercise and diet that you may not have seen framed in this way before.<br />
<br />
Human decisions are complex, the brain is complex(go figure), so there will be some simplification as necessary.<br />
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Over the next few posts I will cover the parts of the brain that deal with addiction and reward, loss and memory, making comparisons, motivation and decision making.<br />
<br />
But lets break it down.<br />
<br />
First up<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prospect_theory">Prospect Theory</a></span></b>.<br />
<br />
I've covered forming new habits before, <a href="http://lostinfitness.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/what-i-learned-from-30-days-of-yoga-and.html">see here for part one</a>.<br />
<br />
Essentially, I don't think the process of forming the new habit is hard. What is hard is the things you have to give up for the new habit to work.<br />
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It might be time you have to give up to go to the gym, this could be time when you normally watch TV or cruise the internet.<br />
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It could be some foods you have to reduce or give up and then replace with better alternatives. Despite what you may have read, you can't just eat what you want and lose weight, you may have to actually modify what you eat.<br />
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I am an example myself. Yes, I add in healthy foods, vegetables, green tea and all that but I still eat way too much cheese. Yes, there may be some addiction here (which I will cover in future posts) but basically I don't want to give it up.<br />
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If humans were following purely rational utility, then we would not eat the donut if there was an option of an apple as well. But as we all know, this is not always the case.<br />
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Most of these traditional theories of economics and utility ignore emotions but obviously your emotions have a profound impact on what you choose.<br />
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Human beings are risk averse and loss averse.<br />
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In some classic studies by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, they showed people when given a choice generally accept the less risky option. Even if they could possibly win more money, people generally go with the sure thing.<br />
<br />
Two of their classic problems:<br />
Which do you choose:<br />
Get $900 for sure OR 90% chance to get $1000?<br />
<br />
Which do you choose?<br />
Lose $900 for sure OR 90% chance to lose $1000<br />
<br />
<br />
Most people choose option 1 in the first problem and option 2 in the second problem, essentially for the same reason. People don't like losing things, they like the sure thing, but will take a risk if the sure thing could involve a loss.<br />
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<b>In fact, most people find losing something twice as 'painful' as gaining something</b>.<br />
<br />
See the graph below.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIDkJrG0WhDt96t8Unv-szf49WiRCZtB6-cBLMD0rmlRwQZ6RGsErKjq0EsCQi0V7aO4z-K-6X8af5Sm_dK98lmosxX_yODYR8ohpOiQukyqfFKRppM4HhyphenhyphenQldcU7rTRT1ciopbDJ5Sg0/s1600/prospect+theory+graph.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="352" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIDkJrG0WhDt96t8Unv-szf49WiRCZtB6-cBLMD0rmlRwQZ6RGsErKjq0EsCQi0V7aO4z-K-6X8af5Sm_dK98lmosxX_yODYR8ohpOiQukyqfFKRppM4HhyphenhyphenQldcU7rTRT1ciopbDJ5Sg0/s400/prospect+theory+graph.gif" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Prospect Theory graph: Note how losing something causes twice as much psychological pain, as the joy of gaining something.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
(The caveat being if you trade on the stock market and take class A drugs there is a chance you are not risk averse and are prepared to lose big time).<br />
<br />
These studies are normally done in purely economic terms, you could win money, but what if we applied these ideas to fitness and nutrition?<br />
<br />
If you are trying to develop a new lifestyle there is uncertainty and this cause emotional arousal.<br />
<br />
Yes, logically you know eating healthier and exercising is good for you But these are things that are going to happen in the 'future'. All the time you brain is making a cost benefit analysis.<br />
<br />
To frame prospect theory in fitness and nutrition terms, as some people see it:<br />
<br />
Which do you choose:<br />
Give up an extra hour in bed, eating crisps and chocolate, sitting on the sofa when you get home OR the chance you may lose weight, feel better and possibly prevent a future disease.<br />
<br />
Or when taking out a gym membership think of it this way:<br />
<br />
<i>Lose £40 a month for sure (gym membership fees) and you may get fitter and lose weight and prevent disease</i><br />
<br />
OR<br />
<br />
<i>Keep £40 a month for sure (don't join a gym) and you might get fitter a lose weight by going for a walk everyday or may not develop those diseases anyway by doing nothing.</i><br />
<br />
<br />
Some speculation on my part...<br />
<br />
There is the potential loss of your old self or things you enjoy. This can fire off a part of the brain called the Insular Cortex. This part of the brain is also monitoring body states such as disgust, if you are eating something you find horrible then could this part of the brain fire. If you find exercise painful and not enjoyable then this part of the brain could again be active. Meanwhile the part of the brain that responds to reward and potential gains (the fabled dopamine response) could not be so active.<br />
<br />
Going into a gym, getting out of your comfort zone, trying something new are all 'risky' things. And to begin with you may not perceive them as pleasurable, in fact they may be decidedly uncomfortable to begin with.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgw6sXQLy0B8HIsftFxREqngUZY2hUVdz7OlSz57jc-uxO_LQddVvma608S5zM2l36jBb7VrAWr01qQ2v8kXFkTHOpW0lWtRju38-U26MGDccdceFMYRofo4T7KskNyUZ03Rz8mFIVBq7k/s1600/insular.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="340" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgw6sXQLy0B8HIsftFxREqngUZY2hUVdz7OlSz57jc-uxO_LQddVvma608S5zM2l36jBb7VrAWr01qQ2v8kXFkTHOpW0lWtRju38-U26MGDccdceFMYRofo4T7KskNyUZ03Rz8mFIVBq7k/s400/insular.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Where you Insular is, in case you were wondering.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Then we have the amygdala, the so called fight or flight part of the brain. But, it is a bit more complicated than this. The amygdala is also working out cost benefit (should I do this new thing, what is the cost, what is the benefit), fear conditioning and more.<br />
<br />
Of course, if you start to really enjoy exercising, or enjoy the health new foods, and enjoy the feeling of being healthier and maybe carrying a little less fat, then the potential gain has outweighed the potential loss of Dominos pizza and 10 hours on the internet. But, the gain would have to be perceived as twice as much as the loss.<br />
<br />
<b>This also relates to what Kahneman calls system 1 and 2 of thinking.</b><br />
<br />
In general system 1 is quick, emotional, intuitive and can actually make better decisions than your logical mind when there are a lot of factors to consider.<br />
<br />
System 2 is slow and rational.<br />
<br />
When you eat that donut, you are probably already licking your lips before system 2 has had a rational chance to start working.<br />
<br />
People are not risky in all aspects of their life, for example, people can make sound financial decisions, wear a seat belt while driving and still smoke.<br />
<br />
People normally view monetary risk in terms of the status quo, you don't want to lose what you've already got.<br />
<br />
In terms of health and well being you have to re-frame it in your mind. Make the potential gains and benefits overwhelming.<br />
<br />
So to re-frame one of the statements above:<br />
<br />
<i>Invest £50 a month in your health, add a new enjoyable activity into your life for 4 hours a week, try some new nutritious food and it is a sure thing your health and fitness will improve and you will probably live longer and have less chance of developing certain diseases (and look better naked!).</i><br />
<br />
People make subjective probability choices rather than objective ones. For example, If people were being objective they would never buy a lottery ticket, and they would realize that something like a terrorist attack in the western world has a very low probability (which they will tend to overreact to, thanks media) whereas heart disease, cancer and type 2 diabetes have a large probability and people tend to under react to them.<br />
<br />
Except, if they get a health scare, then some people modify behaviour but some people don't.<br />
<br />
One thing Prospect Theory cannot contend with is regret and disappointment. The choice you should have made, that could have been an easy financial win but you were greedy. OR in terms of health, the small lifestyle changes you could have made that would have had a profound impact on your well being but you chose the status quo instead.<br />
<br />
Why is that? Why would your brain let you continue on a path of behaviour that may result in its early demise?<br />
<br />
Find out in part 3.<br />
<br />
<b>References:</b><br />
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow">Kahneman D (2011) Thinking, Fast and Slow.</a><br />
Introduction to Neuroeconomics, How the Brain Makes Decisions, MOOC, Higher School of Economics(Moscow).<br />
<br />
<br />Steve Collinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10522401888215813812noreply@blogger.com0