Medical Journal study proves you need an hour rigerous exercise a day

Check this out.  No wonder people can not get this all to work.  Myth of moderate exercise.

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1827342,00.html?cnn=yes

 

 

 Seen it. Same old mistake. They studied cardio again, and cardio has only weak or no correlation to fat loss, this has been known for like ever. (Strasser et.al.Ann Nutr Metab 2007;51:428-432 (DOI: 10.1159/000111162)

 Diet+ 15 minutes of strength training, 3 times a week will demolish those results. A real resistance training program like any of the ones in the FAQ will give fat loss results that are orders of magnitude better than cardio-based programs.

I think that both the article and melkor are right. I have found that my 1-2 punch for losing is the weeks when I actually combine between 50-70 minutes of cardio with 3-4 times a week strength training or weights.

And by the way the link you posted doesn't bring you to the article

Try this http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1827342,00.html

If that doesn't work the title of the article is The myth of moderate exercise. 

Eh...another study.  They're not representative of everyone - I've learned to stop paying attention to studies and go with what I know works from experience. 

I've been doing 30-40 minutes of moderate exercise 3-4 times a week for the past year, and combined with my eating modifications, it's helped me lose 45 pounds.  I've recently mixed it up with including more strength training, but my exercise "load" for any given day still doesn't go above 30 or 40 minutes.  It doesn't look like a "myth" to me.

 I think the myth here is fat loss without calorie counting, really - diet+exercise means you lose orders of magnitude more fat than exercise alone. 

I also just have to say no one study can prove you need anything.

Original Post by melkor:

 Seen it. Same old mistake. They studied cardio again, and cardio has only weak or no correlation to fat loss, this has been known for like ever. (Strasser et.al.Ann Nutr Metab 2007;51:428-432 (DOI: 10.1159/000111162)

 Diet+ 15 minutes of strength training, 3 times a week will demolish those results. A real resistance training program like any of the ones in the FAQ will give fat loss results that are orders of magnitude better than cardio-based programs.

Wait.  Really?  So if I'm eating between 1200-1400 calories a day and busting my as$ biking/walking/jogging/running for at least an hour every day this is not going to help me lose weight as quickly as if I did 45 minutes of strength training a week?  I always heard that cardio is the only way to slim down.  Sigh.  Why is this all so confusing?  I just wanna be 110 lbs.  :(

The study was too small and short to be significant.  They only followed 200 women and only for 2 years.  Compare that to the original studies of cholesterol with 100,000 test subjects for 20 years.

Original Post by clairelaine:

The study was too small and short to be significant.  They only followed 200 women and only for 2 years.  Compare that to the original studies of cholesterol with 100,000 test subjects for 20 years.

 But have you got 20 years to wait for that long term study to show results?

 

All I know is thru healthy eating and exercise I lost over 20lbs, and still going down....

 But have you got 20 years to wait for that long term study to show results?

Yes and no, the thing is, the results are much more meaningful because there's less chance for random variation, but sometimes they can perform some analysis on the data during the study 

But about the study, is that really surprising that more exercise would mean more weight loss (given same diet and at intensities that won't cause overtraining)? Of course you have to eat less than you burn, and there may be something to the "set point" idea, your body is generally reluctent to change weight, and will adjust metabolism to an extent, but I really hope no one looks at that and think "oh there's nothing I can do, I just have a high set point" There's a reason obesity's on the rise and I don't think people's set points are getting high. Sorry, some things I just key in on that bug me

Original Post by melkor:

"...this has been known for like ever."

like for sure, like, really? (sorry just feeling a little frisky today).

so it sounds like everyone is in agreement about this article.

It depends on the exercise intensity - if you're busting yo' behind doing sprint intervals you'll lose more fat than if you jog in a steady tempo, if you strength train 1.5-3 hours/week with a sensible program you'll lose more fat than any cardio program can do for you. As Strasser showed, there's barely any detectable difference in some cardio parameters if you burn off 500 calories through exercise or just don't eat them in the first place, and as Westcott showed in this study, from frickin' 1991, 15 minutes of strength training resulted in the study participants losing 10lbs of fat, and gained 2lbs of muslce while the women who did cardio for 30 minutes lost 3lbs of fat and 0.5 pounds of muscle.

 It's 2008 now, so it's been more than 17 years since Westcott showed what kind of workout you should be doing if you want to lose fat. And this still hasn't penetrated the public consciousness - the cardio myth is so strong that even people who research obesity for a living and ought to know these things still don't. From the interviews I've read, it's never even crossed his mind to study anything involving strength training.

 Sometimes, it's like beating your head against a wall to get through to people - cardio without strength training is virtually useless for fat loss, strength training without cardio works just fine. But noooo, every frickin' study that comes out, you see that the participants have been doing steady state cardio; which as Strasser showed, they might as well not have bothered.

smartjock256 writes:

There's a reason obesity's on the rise [...]

Some say that the rise in obesity coincides with the fedgov's "food pyramid," that favors carbs over protein.

Some say that the rise in obesity coincides with the widespread use of high fructose corn syrup in almost everything.

Some say that the rise in obesity coincides with ever more sedentary lifestyles (kids grow up playing videogames intead of being out in the woods, riding their bikes, etc., and continue that lifestyle as adults).

I think there's a lot to the HFCS angle, and a lot more to the sedentary lifestyle angle. It's hard to turn into a balloon if you spend most of your day on your feet, moving, lifting crap, swinging a hammer or an axe, using a shovel, etc.

So is Cardio - for health only (need to keep from having heart-lungs-brain get colesteral, and be able to handle the shocks and healing of major medical procedures

and strength training - for beauty only as it builds skeletal muscular strength but will not help much for typical medical issues as you age.

??

 

 

 

 Nah, they're all important, and you should do some of everything for a complete health/fitness program - unless you have sports-specific concerns that dictate that you work to maximise a specific kind of physical developement to excel at the sport you're competing in.

 You a competitive biker? Then you shouldn't bench - chest muscle is only extra weight and will negatively impact your performance. Conversely, if you're a climber you shouldn't work legs - leg muscle is only extra mass your arms have to pull up.

 Outside of performance concerns like that (You a powerlifter? Better not run marathons then) which are very specific to athletes, you should do a bit of everything. You're human, and we humans are generalists who do a lot of things reasonably well. Don't go overboard with the high-intensity stuff, but do train in a variety of ways :)

Original Post by melkor:

It depends on the exercise intensity - if you're busting yo' behind doing sprint intervals you'll lose more fat than if you jog in a steady tempo, if you strength train 1.5-3 hours/week with a sensible program you'll lose more fat than any cardio program can do for you. As Strasser showed, there's barely any detectable difference in some cardio parameters if you burn off 500 calories through exercise or just don't eat them in the first place, and as Westcott showed in this study, from frickin' 1991, 15 minutes of strength training resulted in the study participants losing 10lbs of fat, and gained 2lbs of muslce while the women who did cardio for 30 minutes lost 3lbs of fat and 0.5 pounds of muscle.

 It's 2008 now, so it's been more than 17 years since Westcott showed what kind of workout you should be doing if you want to lose fat. And this still hasn't penetrated the public consciousness - the cardio myth is so strong that even people who research obesity for a living and ought to know these things still don't. From the interviews I've read, it's never even crossed his mind to study anything involving strength training.

 Sometimes, it's like beating your head against a wall to get through to people - cardio without strength training is virtually useless for fat loss, strength training without cardio works just fine. But noooo, every frickin' study that comes out, you see that the participants have been doing steady state cardio; which as Strasser showed, they might as well not have bothered.

Thanks a lot for this info, melkor.  So I checked your FAQ and I was wondering if you could suggest a strength training routine for someone like me.  I can't afford to join a gym really, which is why all my exercise is cardio that takes place outdoors and for free.  Basically, if I have a couple cheap 8lb free weights is there anything I can do with those, combined with like yoga, situps, and pushups to increase my weight loss?  Or do I have to save up and join a gym so I can use the nautilus (sp) machines?

Machines are a distraction and a hindrance more than anything - you never use your muscles in isolation in your daily life, you almost never move something around a fixed pivot axis and along a linear track in the real world, so the functional carryover to your life is pretty much zero.

 In contrast, using free weights is very functional for just about anything - at the core it's picking up an object and moving it, which is basically what you'd do when you live your life. From deadlifts (helping someone move), via one-arm rows(pulling the starter on the lawn mower) to clean and press (picking something off the floor and plcing it on an overhead shelf), free weights approximate everyday activities and have strong functional carryover to your daily life.

 This is different from the "functional training" nutjobs who want to make you wave a bodyblade around while doing squats on an inverted bosu or other such silliness - it's simply about training around the planes of force that's natural to your body.

 Initially, a program centered around bodyweight and calisthenics for the major muscle groups (squats, pushups, lunges, hanging rows) and improvised weights for the small stuff can work well. And when you need to increase the challenge, that's easy - check my gallery for examples of improvised weights, but basically all you need to do is find something reasonably heavy around the house and pick it up a few times. It's all about sufficiently challening your muscles, but not overdoing it :)

Original Post by melkor:

Initially, a program centered around bodyweight and calisthenics for the major muscle groups (squats, pushups, lunges, hanging rows) and improvised weights for the small stuff can work well. And when you need to increase the challenge, that's easy - check my gallery for examples of improvised weights, but basically all you need to do is find something reasonably heavy around the house and pick it up a few times. It's all about sufficiently challening your muscles, but not overdoing it :)

Thanks again!  So I guess I am gonna start with the about.com strength training for beginners.  I'll do that one tonight and see if it's too easy.  It looks like it might be.  If so, I'll switch to the next one.  How do I know when I need to increase?  Will it just be "easier" or is there a more precise way to tell?

 You'd want to feel your way into it, mostly - Paige's workouts are very good and covers the basics; though I think the absolute beginner's workout is probably only useful for a few weeks before you'd move on to part two - in general you should increase the resistance when you can do more than 12 repetitions of a single exercise, anyhting less than 12 and you're good.

 A pure calisthenics alternative is this home workout - again, probably only useful for a few (4-6) weeks before you need to move on, but that's true of just about everything. Change your program around a bit every 8-12 weeks when you're a beginner, 6-8 for intermediate, and every 3-4 weeks for an advanced trainee.

Original Post by melkor:

 You'd want to feel your way into it, mostly - Paige's workouts are very good and covers the basics; though I think the absolute beginner's workout is probably only useful for a few weeks before you'd move on to part two - in general you should increase the resistance when you can do more than 12 repetitions of a single exercise, anyhting less than 12 and you're good.

 A pure calisthenics alternative is this home workout - again, probably only useful for a few (4-6) weeks before you need to move on, but that's true of just about everything. Change your program around a bit every 8-12 weeks when you're a beginner, 6-8 for intermediate, and every 3-4 weeks for an advanced trainee.

K.  Thanks!  Sorry to treat this thread like a personal training session.