Conditioning Research

Check out this superb infographic at Dan's Plan

Nothing much to this post, but I wanted to point to a couple of recent posts on Intermittent Fasting. First off a post from Adelfo Cerame where he describes his diet approach.   He talks about IF, refeeds and how he cycles his calories and macros.  Some really useful material. Then there was a post today from John Briffa where he analysis a new study on eating frequency . The study was just published and being a PLoS one it is all available for free  - Effects of Meal Frequency on Metabolic Profiles and Substrate Partitioning in Lean Healthy Males Conclusion The higher rise and subsequently fall of insulin in the Low Frequency  diet did not lead to a higher fat oxidation as hypothesized. The LFr diet decreased glucose levels throughout the day (AUC) indicating glycemic improvements. RMR and appetite control increased in the LFr diet, which can be relevant for body weight control on the long term. It is worth reading the whole...

Examine.com have refreshed their section on Creatine .  I've pointed to the site before and the depth of information that they have.  They have now done a major redesign though and it is easier to use. Definitely worth reading through if you are interested in this supplement.

From OnlineCollegeCourses.com    

Squats are actually a difficult move to do properly and safely.  In fact for safety's sake I'd have most people focus on wall sit initially at least.  The squat remains an important skill however and I like the Gray Cook idea of practicing the squat - learning and maintaining this useful movement pattern - while training the deadlift (although the deadlift itself is not as easy as it looks either!) Anyway, I thought this video was good with a simple cue about how to squat.  The squat is not a hip hinge.  Rather you need to do what Colin Gordon told me to do - squat between your legs.  We think squatting is about sitting.....but it is not.

Again via Bret Contreras I came across this article.  We used to get told to  RICE (rest, ice, compression, elevation).  Well now that is Old School – now it’s POLICE -  Protection, Optimal loading, Ice, Compression, Elevation. RICE needs updating.....

I am no biochemist so will not analyse this study, but I found the impact of exercise on the body in the context of a high fat meal quite interesting. Maybe a lot of the fuss about fatty food at one level is because we as a population in general are so inactive. If you think high blood triglycerides as a consequence of a fatty meal are a bad thing, then just take a walk! Combined Light Exercise after Meal Intake Suppresses Postprandial Serum Triglyceride. The effect of exercise performed on the day of meal intake on postprandial triglyceride concentration, which is an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease, is unclear. The present study investigated the effects of combined low-intensity exercise before and after a high-fat meal on serum triglyceride concentrations. METHODS: Ten healthy young subjects (4 men and 6 women) consumed a relatively high-fat diet (fat energy ratio: men 37.8%; women 39.1%). In the exercise trials, subjects performed brisk walking (2....

I've been away from the blog for a few days - I had a week off work and my Mum was visiting so it was all about looking after her and doing things together.   We are both, and as a family, still grieving the loss of my Dad, more so her after 55 years of marriage.  Again that loss, death puts so much in perspective.

I saw this on Bret Contreras blog and it is fascinating

The title of this post is a quote from a post on James Fisher's blog where he is reporting on a recent article that he has had published: A randomized trial to consider the effect of Romanian deadlift exercise on the development of lumbar extension strength There are some very interesting implications to the study: Deadlifts are not a lower back exercise....but strengthening the lower back can improve the deadlift Once a week training is enough for most major muscle groups If you want a stronger lumbar extension....then train lumbar extension, not deadlifts

Bret Contreras has posted a get set of quotes from Gray Cook.  There is lots in here to chew over: 50 Shades of Gray Cook When someone’s back hurts they don’t want to blame their lifestyle, fitness level, or daily patterns.  Instead, they want to blame their back pain on starting the lawn mower last week, which, in reality, is probably just the straw that broke the camel’s back.  Human beings live under the philosophy of, “I have a snowball and I have to throw it at someone.”  No one wants to take responsibility. Remember that muscles do what they are told. If they are doing something you don’t like, tell them to do it differently: communicate to the muscle through repetition of posture and movement.  While some serious injuries are unavoidable and need surgical repair, we should do everything possible to build an injury buffer zone by training healthy movement. It is always better to bend than break—and strong agile bodies be...

Background This post is more personal than most of those that go up here.  I wanted to give an account of my diet over the last 6 months or so and how I've made an attempt, with some help, to achieve what I'd always struggled to attain in the past - visible abs.  I'll talk about the diet, the training and the coaching. I've been training with weights since I was 15 initially obsessed with bodybuilding, reading voraciously and studying all aspects of diet and exercise with the aim of getting big and ripped.  My body was never built for that though - tall and skinny no matter how hard I tried.  I was a bit disillusioned with the whole thing as my own efforts and dedication got no where while I saw people with less effort grow like weeds due to superior genes or often steroids which in the gyms of the 1980s and 90s were pretty common. I kept training, encouraged by Stuart McRobert's Hardgainer magazine just to focus on getting stronger on basic exercises and e...

I came across this today - a warm up routine for footballers as endorsed by FIFA - the 11+ The focus is on injury prevention through basic strength work mainly for the core.  There is nothing new here - planks, squats, leg curls - but it is good stuff.  Also interesting to see that they specifically exclude stretching: Research has shown that static stretching exercises have a negative influence on muscle performance, and results on the preventive effect of dynamic stretching are inconclusive. Stretching exercises are not recommended as part of a warm-up programme, but can be performed at the end of the training session. The manual is available on the website and it is worth studying. Anyway, what actually brought this to my attention was when this abstract popped up in my scanning of the journals:  ( the whole paper is available) Background The incidence rate of soccer injuries is among the highest in sports, particularly for adult male...

With the Olympics over it is interesting to look back on some of the performances and their background.  Mo Farah has become a bit of a hero - he comes across as a nice guy and such an amazing athlete. There has been some good commentary about Farah and how Salazar as his coach got him set up to win gold.  A key thing was strength training: Salazar said: ‘When Mo came to me 18 months ago, he was a skinny distance runner with a great engine but no upper body. At the end of races, he would tire and his head would bob around and his arms would flail. ‘He was the weakest athlete I’d ever trained — in terms of core strength and being able to do push-ups, sit-ups and single-leg squats. He was a 90lb weakling. ‘ The No 1 thing that has helped Mo is not the 110 miles a week he puts in on the road, but the seven hours a fortnight in the gym.’ Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/olympics/article-2187860/Mo-Farah-weakest-athlete-Ive-seen-says-coach-Alberto-Salazar.h...

I just wanted to point you to a great new post from Matt - How To Lose Weight This page is designed to show a simple and sustainable way to lose weight.  I have systematically experimented with each of the variables over several months, and I believe that this plan can work for many people. He presents some very simple tactics to reboot your body;  what I find particularly exciting is his focus on sleep.  I'd also note that all of his tools need to go together.  Eating only when really hungry and stopping when full is so much easier when you are sleeping well and eating a real food diet.

I've said it before, but all this fitness stuff is only worth it if it allows you to get out and do things, to experience this world.  This is where I was yesterday:

Well they've done stuff on HIIT training and an expose of why fancy shoes and sports supplements are generally a waste of money....now they discover intermittent fasting!   I think the producers must be scanning the blogs to find out what the cool kids are into. The power of intermittent fasting Scientists are uncovering evidence that short periods of fasting, if properly controlled, could achieve a number of health benefits, as well as potentially helping the overweight, as Michael Mosley discovered.

yeah maybe..... I was the fat kid at school.  I remember doing the 1500m in a school sports day and coming dead last by a long way, each of those laps taking forever. Lets be realistic though.  It is diet that will get rid of this kid's fat gut.  Activity is great and he should be out there moving....but diet is a lot more efficient. Also Nike will have nothing to do with his greatness.  If he loses weight and gets fit then that will be fantastic.  But shoes or kit will not do it.  His diet and activity will. I will quote Mike  from Facebook Weight loss is 85%+ nutrition, exercise does have a complimentary role. Time and time again exercise (esp just cardio) promoted as a solution to weight loss yields little long term results.  Same can be said for fad diet, as people stop at some point.  IMO kids need to learn (and actually enjoy) eating more real foods as a sustainable solution (as they will tend to eat less overall calor...

There was a lot of reporting in the last week about a study which many interpreted as saying that because it looked like a certain hunter gatherer population had activity levels similar to those of modern people then the modern obesity epidemic must be all about diet.... Dr Briffa certainly interpreted it that way  -  this evidence points away from differences in activity and energy expenditure as being a major explanation for why hunter-gatherer populations tend to be much lighter than those living a more Westernised existence - as did the Daily Mail . It is not as straight forward as that of course....it never is.  Health Uncut point out three flaws in the paper, "sealing its place in the realm of fiction" 1)    The study was a population of only 30 people, and of these 17 were women, who had NO statistically significant increase in physical activity levels versus Western women. That’s right in a study comparing the effects of high...

Just for completeness, I thought I'd point to this one: Two Minutes of Sprint-Interval Exercise Elicits 24-hr Oxygen Consumption Similar to That of 30 min of Continuous Endurance Exercise Eight male students did either 30 minutes of endurance exercise or two-minutes of sprint intervals (it is not clear from the abstract what this was), three times a week for six weeks.  Their oxygen consumption (VO 2 ) during and after 24 hours of exercise was measured and while it was 150 percent higher during endurance exercise than during the sprinting intervals, after 24 hours the overall amount of oxygen consumed between athletes was nearly identical. There is a lot of debate about EPOC and what it means for calorie burn.  Here is another one to through in the mix

Here is an intriguing one: Significant effect of a pre-exercise high-fat meal after a 3-day high-carbohydrate diet on endurance performance These results suggest that ingestion of a HFM (high fat meal) prior to exercise is more favorable for endurance performance than HCM (high carb meal).  So maybe bacon and eggs would be better than that pasta party before the marathon.....

This is exciting.  A mechanism of how exercise really is good for you in fighting cancer A novel myokine, secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine (SPARC), suppresses colon tumorigenesis via regular exercise Conclusions These findings suggest that exercise stimulates SPARC secretion from muscle tissues and that SPARC inhibits colon tumorigenesis by increasing apoptosis

I thought this was interesting.  After a workout it seems to be calories that are more important to recovery than stressing about the carbohydrate / protein ratios of your post workout meal: Recovery from cycling exercise: effects of carbohydrate and protein beverages Beverages containing similar caloric content but different proportions of carbohydrate/protein provided similar effects on muscle recovery and subsequent exercise performance in well-trained cyclists.

Given the current  Olympic excitement, I thought this was interesting Source: sportsbettingspot.com