L.I.F.T.

I want to give a brief explanation of the reasoning behind the workout paradigm I did a video of yesterday. Here’s the vid:

Now here’s the rationale.

There’s something called Henneman’s Size Principle (I know, right?). It says that motor units are recruited by the nervous system from smallest (slowest) to largest (fastest).

The small/slow muscles, because they are used all the time, are more fatigue-resistant. The bigger/faster units aren’t able to sustain contractions for very long, but when they do contract, it is very powerful.

The only way to recruit those large/fast/powerful motor units is through very intense (high-tension) work. Things like jumps, explosive/ballistic movements, and very heavy lifting will recruit more of these fibers.

Typically, those types of movements require greater stabilization assistance.

So, if you do endurance stuff before heavy lifting, 1., you won’t have any energy for it, and 2., you may be injured because your synergists (assistance-muscles) are too fatigued to help you maintain form/posture.

Therein lies the rationale for the sequence. Warmup (get things loose/fluid, neurologically prepared), Explosive or Ballistic movements (get those fast/large fibers, and the nervous system amped up) without weight, Max Effort (work up to a 3RM maybe), then Endurance or Hypertrophy work. If you want to do Isometrics, do them at the very beginning, in the warmup, at the very end, or at a different time.

That said, I only briefly mentioned the importance of good skeletal structure/alignment, and good movement patterns in the video. I’ll do another session about this topic later this week, but for now – make sure your posture is good, and you have good range of motion and control in your joints before doing any of this stuff!!!

Pay particular attention to the pelvic girdle, shoulder girdle, and neck…and then the peripheral joints (elbows/knees, wrists/ankles)…

more soon!

I’ve put up some videos on YouTube about using a piece of rope to exercise with.

Please steal my ideas, and come up with your own!

I’ll produce more ideas about using “common” items to play with in your exercise programs in the near future…

ROPE 1 – ROPE! configurations

ROPE 2 – Partner ROPE!

ROPE 3 – Handle ROPE!

What’s the difference?

“Physical activity” is anything you do with your body. It’s a very vague, broad term.

“Exercise” is more specific. Here let’s define it as the use of the body for a specific result. But let’s be even more specific, let’s talk about “working out.”

“Working out” is exercise to achieve greater strength or endurance, some health benefit, or aesthetic qualities.

We Indigenes
Indigenous means you’re born of a certain area. Literally “produced” (gen) “within” (in-).

Normally we think of “indians” with this term…or “aborigines” (a similar type of meaning to this word – “from” (ab), “the beginning” (origine, origin)).

While I’ll use the typically understood meaning of those words in this post, I think it’s worth pointing out that we all are “indigenous” to our habitat, whatever that may be at the moment. We are continually produced within and crafted by the environment (in every sense of the word – buildings, nature, people, weather) that we are within.

We also all are “aboriginal” – coming from our own origin. You can track your heritage back all the way to the “origin” if you have the time and gumption.

Source of the Physically Active
If you read my previous post, you know that I disagree with a lot of the arguments made these days in attempts to explain overweight/obesity, lack of physical activity, and associated diseases.

In sum – I think the built/man-made environment has very little real effect on what physical activities people choose to participate in, but that participation in physical activities and use of ones environment is largely a matter of imagination supported by a like-minded community – and examples of this can be found in many places today or throughout history. I think that agriculture is not the downfall of mankind, and that there are many examples of extremely healthy populations that practice agriculture. I think that over-abundance of cheap calories is not the cause of obesity or overweight, but that over-indulgence is.

Most importantly, I think that most of these arguments involve the removal (or subjugation) of self-responsibility from the individual and their free choice to engage or not engage in whatever they choose. Discussions supporting the built environment approach imply that people have no free will to engage in whatever they want, but are determined to behave in certain ways by their surroundings. Parkour would be a counter to this idea. Discussions of agriculture imply that people cannot choose what to plant in what manner. Masanobu Fukuoka would be a counterpoint. Discussions of over-abundant, cheap, and “empty” calories say that a person cannot choose to eat other things. Granted, this one is trickier, as some areas literally have no alternatives within easy grasp. But there still are alternatives – get out of those areas.

Any system, as I’ve mentioned before, is self-sustaining, by definition. Every system must seek to maintain, sustain, and maybe even to further, itself, in order to continue to survive in the presence of/cooperation/competition with other systems. Society is no different. The discussions mentioned above are part of society, so they reflect the values of that society. Mine is as well, so take it with a grain of salt.

How, Kemosabe
So what is it then, Josh? What’s the difference between working out and physical activity, and how does it relate to health?

Indigenous cultures are “physically active” throughout the day/week/month. Usually, in small discrete increments, but sometimes for extended periods of time at a stretch. Usually at relatively low intensities, but sometimes at very high intensities. And almost never at very high intensities for extended periods of time.

Indigenous cultures (except for ours here in the US) largely don’t “work out” to get their physical activity. Even in many places in Europe today the concept of going to a gym and working out is still seen as a secondary and inferior mode of exercise.

Rather, physical activity in indigenous cultures (and in many places in “civilized” Europe) comes from and in daily living. They walk to work. They walk to the store. They push or pull or carry their food, instead of driving it in a car. They may have to do physical activity to get their food. Their days have physical activity “built-in.”

I don’t want you to think that this is true only of “indians” and “aborigines” (as we typically think of those terms). I mentioned that there are places in “civilized” Europe where physical activity comes as part of daily living.

There are also a few agricultural communities that still behave this way, nestled within our own (US) culture.

An example of this is found in this paper: Physical Activity of Canadian and American Children: A Focus on Youth in Amish, Mennonite, and Modern Cultures, by David R. Bassett, Jr.

From the abstract:
“Amish and Mennonite children have higher levels of physical activity than modern-living children, despite less participation in competitive sports. As a result, Amish and Mennonite children tend to be leaner than their counterparts in contemporary society.”

If you can get your hands on it, you should read this paper. It’s very interesting. It says something that seems terribly obvious when you read it – that people who do physical work as part of their daily lives are leaner than those who do not.

But if you look deeper, you’ll see that the “agriculture” argument breaks down here as well. Amish and Mennonite groups participate in agriculture. It doesn’t make them fat or stupid.

They also have an abundance of available calories most of the time. But that doesn’t make them fat either.

They construct a built-environment very similar to any you or I might live in. There are buildings with rooms. But they don’t just sit in those rooms all day.

Opposite-Land
Where “traditional” human activity is intermittent, as I stated above (btw, this paper is a fantastic overview of “intermittent” exercise in the animal world), physical activity in our US culture has become limited to “workouts” – half-hour or hour-long blocks of relatively continuous, relatively intense exercise.

Problems of overtraining and burnout in physical activity arise because our exercise has no tempo, other than a factory-based one, a vestige of the early-industrial foundations of our “work culture.” That is, “work” in the United States is based mostly on ideas of labor that came about during the industrial revolution – still. Things like “shift work,” where the employee works a certain shift every day, set daily/weekly schedules, set meeting times every week, etc. – the artificial, machine-based (i.e., machine-rhythm) division of time into measurable increments, with the aim of “maximum production” – where the ability to produce never fades, never waxes and wanes, but is always set at the maximum.

This is even more apparent in the term we use to describe exercise – it’s a “work out.”

This industrial idea of work has little to do with what happens in “natural” living, where work, though it is intense, and regular, happens in waves of exertion and rest, happens with a rhythm that matches the ability of the body to produce energy, and in rhythm with the seasons, the weather, and the habitat.

Our ideas about what constitutes “exercise” have been shaped by this. Just go into any gym and look at all of the machines in there. To use a machine, you must become one. Using one, you are used by it.

The Big But
But, Josh, you might say, we don’t live in a culture where physical activity is demanded of us in our work, throughout the day. So we have to go to the gym to exercise. We have to “work out.”

Here’s where that old argument comes in again – that we are without option. That we have no free will. No choice. We “must” because “that’s how things are.”

I disagree.

In fact, I have to thank one of my clients for proving this point to me. He is a very successful corporate executive. He travels about two weeks out of every month. He’s in fantastic physical shape.

Yes, he does go to the gym to work out, but he also has a stability ball at his desk, that he sits on intermittently throughout the day instead of sitting on his office chair. When he is using the ball, he’ll do crunches, and other exercises whenever he feels like it. He’ll get some intermittent physical activity.

A more extreme version of getting intermittent physical activity in our daily lives, one that I really highly respect, and think that we all could take a cue from, is Herschel Walker.

When he was a boy, according to one article I read, he would do pushups and situps while watching TV and studying (which usually were happening at the same time).

Can you do that as well?

If you feel resistance to doing pushups and situps during commercial breaks while you’re watching TV, why is that? Let’s do some physiology tracking – Where does that resistance come from within you (I mean, physically – your gut, your heart, your mind, your limbs – where do you feel the “pressure”?) and where does it come from outside of you (peer pressure?)?

Why can’t we do pushups and situps at work? Or walk or run up and down the stairs a couple of times? Why can’t we get up from our desks to take walks around the office park whenever we’re feeling stagnant or burnt out?

Physical activity for us, has become a choice, not a necessity. We choose not to.

The answer to the question above is – we can, but we don’t. We choose not to.

Why don’t we? Why don’t you?

In the most recent Exuberant Animal blog post, head of EA, Frank Forencich, offers us a compelling question to ponder:

Is “exercise” part of the problem?

Frank says it is.

Exercise, he says, involves sets, reps, forced movements in unnatural or limited planes of motion, etc.

I think he’s right.

The “Workout” Dilemma

For many of us, even the term “workout” fades into the single word “work.”  It doesn’t sound like fun.  What’s supposed to be enjoyable about it?  Especially after you’ve already been working all week anyway?!  Who wants more work?!

A Rose by Any Other Name

It’s important to remember where gyms came from.  Original “gymnasiums” in Ancient Greece (the ones the European gymnasiums were modeled after, which are the gyms that ours were modeled after) consisted of an open sandy pit outside, and maybe a large, empty room, with some different apprati and weights to throw around.  But mostly, you’d just throw yourself (or maybe another person) around.

In the process, you’d learn some things.  Like how to deal with your own body.  Or how to deal with disorientation (tumbling).  Or how to deal with another person’s body (wrestling, boxing), or an external body of other sorts (shot put, weight, discus, javelin).

In the earlier part of the 20th Century, most American gyms still looked this way.  They were mostly empty space, with some weights around the perimeter, and maybe some uneven bars and gymnastic rings.  Maybe the gym would be totally outdoors.  Or at least have some outdoor space to play around in.

Your “workout” would consist of a combination of strength-skill movements.  Things that weren’t as simple as “just pick that up.”  You’d have to think a little bit about what you were about to do.

You might even have done some gymnastic-type things in there.

Further, there would be a community of like-minded folks in there watching you, coaching you, helping one another out, and competing with each other.  It wouldn’t be a line of hamsters on their wheels…excuse me, treadmills…

Oh The 80’s

In the 1980’s, the bodybuilding phenomenon really took off.  Large chain gyms like Gold’s, Bally’s, etc., took advantage of, and fueled the craze.

Group exercise classes became modeled after school classes – One Teacher, Many Students.

People grew competition-crazed.

Muscles bulged and glistened.

And the nation continued to get fatter.

The True Cost of Fitness

And in the melee, we all were swept up.

But what was it all about, in the end?  “Fitness?”  Fitness to do what?  For what  purpose?  To be able to do our jobs better?  No, most likely not.  To contribute to our communities?  No.  To hunt more effectively, or do something better?

No, just fitness.  To be fit.

Many of the aspects of our lives have turned into this in the past twenty years – to do something, simply to do it.

No value other than the doing of it.  Which is fine, but weird.

Those massive gyms, with all of their equipment, and the fees people pay to belong to those gyms…what is that about?

It isn’t about fitness.

What is your goal?  Why do you do it?  And wouldn’t you want it to be enjoyable?

Exercise, Fitness, and Movement

Frank insists that what people need is more movement.  I agree with him 100%.  But I also see that people must be coerced to move.  Calling it one thing or another doesn’t mean much.  Changing the way it looks, its external appearance, attracts attention.

All animals are attracted by the new, the novel.  They require what is familiar, but they are attracted to what is different.

So while I agree, that people need to move more, and that “exercise” may inhibit them, I think the means to get ourselves moving will come from different sources than from symantics.

We need more toys.

Toys That Change Worlds

Toys That Change Worlds is the subheader of one of my all-time favorite blogs (linked to the first few words in this sentence).  It’s not for everyone.  It’s very philosophical…just warning you.

But the point of that blog is that it’s possible to change your perception of reality, to change yourself, deeply and meaningfully, by playing with a new toy.

That’s why I’m not against things like Wii Fit, or the vibrating health saddle, kettlebells, bodyblades, or anything else.

In fact, I wish there were more of them!  And I wish that more groups of people would get together on a regular basis to play with all of those great toys.

Imagine if you had a block party, where everyone went around the block, into everyone’s house, and had to use the workout toys in that house for at least 5 minutes.  Then you all rotated.  Heck, what if you raced from house to house?

Sounds like fun!

And I think there’d be a lot of exercise equipment that would get dusted off, and have the hanging clothes taken off it.

Real Strength

In the end, true strength is total-person strength.  It is strength of will, strength of character, strength of judgment, strength of muscles, lungs, heart, mind, connections.  Real strength knows no bounds.  It spills over and out of the individual, into everything they do and touch.  It extends beyond them, into their friends, family and community.

Real strength also accepts no limits.  It seeks constantly to improve itself, to become more, to become stronger still.

Real strength is flexible.  It does not break, it bends, and then springs back into place.  It flows like water, wearing away even the hardest material over time.

To be truly strong, you must cultivate yourself.  You must accept who you are.  You must come to learn and embrace your greatest gift to humanity, and act to express that gift in every word, thought, and deed.

You must “workout.”  You must “exercise.”  You must “play.”  You must “stretch.”  You must do it all, and do it from the core of your being, for all you are worth, every day, tirelessly, until your time has run its course.

That is real strength.

I’ve said this for a long time now – that someone, somewhere, needs to put “the rules” of muscle physiology down in plain language, so that everyone can have a fair shake at strength, endurance, and physical health.

So I’ll do it here, now.

The Four Horsemen

There are only four rules that you really need to understand in order to exercise properly.  They are:

1. Specificity

2. Progression/Overload

3. Acute Variables – Intensity/Volume/Frequency

4. Form/Technique

Let’s go over each.

1. Specificity – I’ve S.A.I.D. It All Before

The first rule of physical training or conditioning is the SAID principle, coined by Digby and Sale, I think back in 1984.  SAID stands for “Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demands.”

The concept is this – the body is an incredibly efficient system.  It will only respond to what it must, in exactly the degree it must, and only for as long as is absolutely necessary.

Therefore, you must train specifically, for the specific outcomes you wish to attain.

This is true in all of life.  If you want a cheese sandwich, don’t get the peanut butter out of the cabinet.

Specificity applies not just to the type of movement you do, the muscles used, or to the type and amount of weight you use, but also to the metabolic demands placed on the body as a whole.

If you want to be a marathon runner, lifting very heavy weights is not going to help you.  That is, depending upon how quickly you want to run that marathon.  If speed isn’t an issue, but slowness is, maybe lifting weights is a good idea!

2. Progression/Overload

The next principle to understand is progression/overload…or, let’s call it “the progressive overload principle.”  Actually, that’s what Thomas Delorme called it in his book “Progressive Resistance Exercise,” back in 1951.

The principle is this (and is directly related to the SAID principle) – by allowing a muscle or system to grow accustomed to a stimulus, you have made it stronger.  To continue making it stronger, you have to continue to increase the resistance the system must overcome.

Bam.

So, basically, keep adding weight. When it gets easier (and it will), add more weight.

Yeah?  Ok then.

3. Loading – Reps/Sets/Intensity/Volume/Frequency

This principle is, again, related to the SAID and Progressive Overload principles.  Most people refer to this as “Periodization” – or the planning of loading based on some sort of organized schema.

First, for the sets/reps portion of this discussion, take a look at the chart below:

I made it really big on purpose.  So you can see all the pretty things in there.  Feel free to print this chart out and put it on your fridge, or wherever you’d like. This chart represents, to the best of my knowledge, an accurate depiction of how your muscles will respond, for the most part, to resistance based work.  There are some exceptions.  For instance, you can experience quite a bit of hypertrophy from high-repetition bodyweight work.  Just look at a gymnast.

Further, people will differ in their responses.  I, for instance, respond to 8-10 reps with hypertrophy.  I’ve known some people for whom that wasn’t true.  And, finally, strength itself is the combination of all of those factors – endurance, hypertrophy, maximal, and explosive strengths.   Most athletes will benefit from following the 80/20 rule in their training – training 80% of the time in ways very specific to their sport, with the other 20% of the time spent in non-specific “crosstraining” type activities.

Intensity is next.

Intensity is defined as the percentage of a person’s 1-rep maximum being moved.  You can see the “Load % 1RM” in column two in the chart above.  That is, what % of a person’s 1-rep maximum is optimal to achieve the desired response in the muscle.  It’s also directly related to how much weight a person will actually be capable of doing a certain contraction-type with.  For instance, you can’t do 15 reps with 100% of your 1-rep max, by definition.

Isometrics and Explosive Work

I’ve seen people who have lifted incredible amounts of weight on their first-ever attempt at a particular weightlifting exercise, simply because they have always trained isometric (where you contract a muscle against an immovable object or opposing force – the muscle doesn’t change length during the contraction) and explosive strength.

Does that destroy the SAID principle?  No, because these people also used progressive resistance in their isometric and explosive training.  In fact, they were preparing their musculature in the same way that someone doing heavy lifts might, just from the other side.

So there’s another strength type to add – static/isometric strength.  Train isometric strength with one set of 6-10 contractions of 6-8 seconds, anywhere between 60 and 100% of maximal contraction force – at the specific joint angle you want to increase strength in.  For instance, a great use of isometrics is to get past “sticking points” in exercises.  Let’s say you can’t do a pullup, you always get stuck halfway up.  Start training isometrics at the end of your normal workout in that specific joint angle.  Progress by adding more sets of contractions, but go slowly!

Finally, for this mini-section, the best training of explosive work is with ballistic movements – where the weight is actually physically thrown – or with plyometrics/shock-training.  For ballistics, it’s fun to go to a field with a weight of some sort and just throw the hell out of it.  Do squat-jump-throws, etc.  For plyometrics, follow guidelines on plyo’s before beginning.  Running around and jumping off and on things is not the same as plyometrics.  Plyo’s are typically very specific, and involve progression to depth-jumps, and, sometimes, loaded depth-jumps.  If you want more information on plyometrics, send me an email.

The last part of Number 3 here is training volume.

Volume (frequently expressed as “total sets x total weight”) is better-seen in A.S. Prilepin’s chart for training weightlifters:

Prilepin’s chart was compiled after years of charting elite weightlifters in the Soviet Union.  But it works pretty well for the rest of us.

Basically, the higher the intensity (the more weight/explosiveness) of the lift, the fewer the total repetitions you do during a set, the fewer the total repetitions you do during a workout, and the fewer workouts you do during a week.

That being said, total training volume may be the same regardless of what intensity you’re training at.  Total training volume is usually related to an athlete’s (or exerciser’s) level of experience with the type of training they’re doing.  If you’re really experienced, you can handle a much larger total training volume (though, often, you don’t need to) than a less-experienced athlete.

While this particular version of Prilepin’s chart does not include weekly, monthly, or yearly values, you – I hope – get the idea.  You can only overload the muscle so far, till it breaks.  There is such a thing as “too much of a good thing.”

For the purposes of this post, it’s helpful just to remember this – the more difficult, demanding, or stressful a lift, exercise, or workout is, the more time you need for recovery.

The Soviets were, I think, the first to really emphasize the importance of recovery (physical, nervous system, and psychological) to the degree that it’s only starting to receive today.

So recover!

4. Form/Technique

The final chapter in our list of things to know in order to succeed is this – perhaps the keystone of the four.

Form/Technique assumes, to some degree, a certain knowledge of how the body works.  This is particularly true for heavy weightlifting, but can be just as true for things like Yoga and Pilates, where small, difficult movements, can cause big problems if not done correctly.

The best thing you can do is to learn how your body works.  This is a fantastic book that covers just about everything you could ever need to know about this topic.

Doing, is another issue, though.  When first learning how to do a particular exercise, movement, or technique, it is really important that you have a good instructor there.

As the old saying goes – Never Trust A Bald Barber.

If someone tells you they know everything about exercise and will help you to learn, but they have neither the credentials nor the physique to prove it, don’t trust them.  Find someone who does.  Preferably, find someone with both the physique and credentials, and a cheerful, sunny demeanor.  That’ll make it easier on everyone.

Your Turn

Now go out there and do it!!!

A recent article in the New York Times called “O.K. Russia, Time to Work It,” talks about a trainer in Moscow, Alex Reznik, who is in charge of the gym in the Moscow Ritz Carlton.

When I was a kid, when the Soviet Union still existed, and Communism was still the Red Scare, the Russians were terrible monsters of strength, crushing opponents in the ‘80 Olympics, and in movies like Rocky 3.

The Ruskies Are Coming!
Granted, the US didn’t participate in that Olympic games, protesting the USSR’s involvement in Afghanistan. But (after the Russians boycotted the ‘84 games in Los Angeles) they crushed the 1988 games.

As long as I’ve been around, though, the Russians have had a reputation for toughness. Even in the recent past, guys like Pavel Tsatsouline have guided American fitness enthusiasts by a tough-as-nails rubric, and fighters like Fedor Emelianenko have shown what slugging it out with sledgehammers pullups and pushups can do in the Octogon.

Wah Happan…?
The article points out the old Soviet value of physical education and fitness. This new gym culture, it says, is really only representative of the ultra-elite. It also says that even some of Reznik’s ultra-rich clients still show up with alcohol on their breath (and that some of them are seeking additional “supplementation” still legal in Russia).

But what has happened?

I imagine it’s the same thing that’s happened over here, in the Capitalist US. With prosperity comes laziness. Is that true? When calories are cheap, it doesn’t really matter how long you hit the treadmill.

What I wonder most about, is the “newsworthiness” of the story itself. What are supposed to learn by reading this piece of journalism? What is being communicated? Why is it important?

You tell me.

Workout nutrition has been a recurring theme in conversations recently.

In the old days, my buddies and I all used to drink whey protein drinks.  When I went from 175 pounds to 200 (and then to 215) in about 8 months, it was from a combination of eating two protein bars a day, and working out twice a day.

While I don’t recommend that (I was terribly uncomfortable at 215), I do think that nutrition helps a lot.

All of the “experts” and “research scientists” will tell you different things about workout nutrition.  “Eat x% cabs/fat/protein, plus branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs), plus fish oil, plus etc.”

I’m not going to cite research studies about nutrition or nutrient uptake.  They’re almost entirely based on people tested in laboratory settings, often times using college-aged males in small population sizes (less than 10), don’t take into account other factors (such as the fact that the sample used is composed of athletes, or that they eat cafeteria food all the time), etc.

That is, they’re not terribly applicable to you and me.

The guys in the trenches will tell you something different.  They’ll say this – “Increased protein, water, vitamin, and fatty-acid intake will help you to feel less sore and recover faster.”

I agree with them.

The basic idea of workout nutrition is this – get nutrients into the body when the body needs them most.

For me, post-workout is the time I emphasize “workout nutrition.”  In the recent past, though, I wasn’t using any “supplements.”  My post-workout shake was a bottle of Trader Joe’s strawberry-flavored Kefir (fermented milk product).

Recently, I’ve been lifting a little more intensely, and have been feeling it.  So I invested in some SPIZ.  Now I’ll drink a “shake” with a balanced macronutrient profile, that has some additional amino acids, immediately after my workout.

If you’re exercising for more than an hour (or two, depending on your level of experience, and the intensity of the work), you might need to consume something during your workout to keep you going strong, and to keep you from breaking down too much.

But different folks have/need different strokes.  Some people like to drink 1/3 of their workout drink before the workout, 1/3 during, and 1/3 after.  Others don’t like to drink or eat anything extra.

Experiment with how your body feels.  If you are getting particularly sore after your workouts, try some of the above strategies and see what works for you.  I prefer drinks to bars, they’re more satisfying to me, and I prefer drinks with balanced macronutrient profiles (that is, they have fat, protein, and carbs in relatively balanced proportions) to drinks that are just (or mostly) protein.

Experiment with the quantity of calories you consume, too.  Having 100 calories post-workout is much different from having 500.  Of course, intensity and volume of work will, again, be your guide here.

As a final note – any workout nutrition should merely be supplemental to an already solid, whole-food-based diet, that is providing you with the foundation you need for health.  No supplement can replace that.

My last post was about community as well.  Read that one too.

By “community” I also mean “culture.”  It’s a group of like-minded individuals who want to accomplish a similar task, and who provide support for one another.

JR Atwood just posted on his PlayThink blog about an article that found that people who trained with others experienced a lower perception of pain than when they trained on their own.

Most of us can relate to this experience.  The run was much easier when we ran it that day with our friend.  The visit to the dentist’s office was much less psychologically difficult when mom was there holding our hand.  The test (or studying for the test) seemed much easier when we had our friends in our class and had a study group with them.

Community, even among two people, lessens the burden, lightens the load, allows for freedom – allows for play.

This is why group exercise has always been really popular (even though we often do it in a way that keeps people separated, standing at their “stations”).  We have a common goal, we suffer a common pain, we pull together, we help one another.  We are able to laugh at our mistakes.

Our culture, however, is one that places high emphasis on individuality, individualism, and individual achievement.  Beware this cultural tendency in yourself.  It isn’t necessary, or necessarily good.  For you, or anyone else.

Depending on how long you’ve known me, you may know that it’s long been a desire of mine to produce bodyweight workouts that can be downloaded from iTunes (or Amazon) onto an MP3/4 player, and used by just about anybody to help them get into shape.

That desire has been realized!

Today I released two (of eventually three) interval-based bodyweight workouts that can be downloaded onto a computer, iPod, or other MP3/4 player, and used anywhere (well…just about)!

If you’re interested, check them out at my site: http://www.leegertrained.com/untitled1.html

There are also PDF documents that have pictures of the exercises used on the albums, and that include descriptions of how to do those exercises (there are spoken descriptions on the albums themselves as well).

In short, the Beginner Album has three interval tracks – a 30 second work/1 minute rest track; a 30 second work/30 second rest track; and a 1 minute work/1 minute rest track.  Each track has me guiding you through the work and rest intervals, and recommending the exercises you should do for each.

The Intermediate Album’s tracks are more advanced, with a 1/1 interval as the first track (the exercises are more difficult on the Intermediate Album, so I figured I should make it a gradual increase in intensity); a 1/30 interval; and a Tabata Interval track (20/10).

Let me know what you think!

A maddening blog title, I know.

Reminds me of something else.

Pills.  Prescriptions.  Advertisements.  Marketing.  Products.

Science isn’t bad.  I love science.  Science is WONDER.  That is the basis of all science.  Science is playful.  It has to be.

What happens before and after science, though, is something else.

In exercise, a lot of emphasis is placed on counting.  How many repetitions?  How much weight?  How often?  What kind of posture?  To what degree?

For the most part, these measurements are completely meaningless.

Sorry to break it to you.  You’d have the same if not better results if you just focused on how you were feeling while you were doing things.  Granted, you need to exercise some caution when throwing heavy things around.  You need to have a general idea of how your body works (though that can be entirely intuitive, and still be just as effective).  But once you have those things, you can just go for it.

It’s better if you do.

For one thing, you’ll be more likely to stick with it for a while.  You’ll also develop something called “somatic awareness” – an understanding of your body on an intuitive level…something you absolutely cannot develop when another person is constantly telling you what to pay attention to.

In diet, the counting goes to calories.  Equally as meaningless effort.  Follow a basic rule – eat plenty of food that comes out of the ground or eats something that comes out of the ground, in the purest form possible (i.e., organic, grass-fed, non-abused, unpackaged, not overcooked, etc.), and you can throw away your calorie counter.

Do the opposite, and you’ll develop a habit of being obsessive compulsive.  That’s how things work.  You do a behavior often enough, and it becomes habit.  Period.

I think that’s something that happens to cultures.  Part of the reason that cultures disintegrate eventually.  They begin to feed upon themselves, by definition.  They establish rules, and, at first, the rules are followed.  But eventually, the rules have been focused on for so long that they become the hangman’s noose of the culture.

I wrote about this in a different sense in a previous post. I guess it’s just crystallizing a bit more.

Watch out for your noose!!!  If you feel like you’re too obsessed, you probably are.  Our culture wants you to be.  That’s how it sells you things you don’t need.

Good night!