Misinformation and Fitness Nonsense!

I go to Gold's Gym and have been generally happy with the atmosphere there.  The weights area has plenty of serious lifters, men and women alike. 

That's why I was so mad when I saw this article on Golds' website - how does anybody get good results with weight-lifting drivel like this? Yikes!

Here is the relevant quote and a link to the whole article:

       &nb sp;    Men                                         Women

Goal: Build bigger, badder,              Banish dreaded "lunch

shirt-busting guns        ;       &n bsp;        ;        lady"  underarm jiggle

Reps: 8–12                                          16–25

(Sorry the formatting is funky ;)...but you get the idea

how are ladies ever going to get nice arms with this sexist bad advice??

Here is the whole article: http://www.goldsgym.com/healthy/newsletter/20 09-08/the-arms-race.php

This is why I study and learn on my own, as opposed to listening to idiots at gyms think they know what they're talking about.

As long as they think that's what we want to hear - it's a vicious cycle.

Imagine all you know is whatever drivel Shape and Fitness (and Cosmo) say. And you go to a gym, and they say "no, that's not right - do this!" If a trainer said it to you, you might listen. But if you are looking at their website, shopping for a gym, and you actually believe that training that way will make you "bulky", you aren't going to pick that gym, because you believe that they're trying to make you bulk up.

And then that's what Shape and Fitness write about, because they want to keep selling their magazines.

Original Post by amethystgirl:

As long as they think that's what we want to hear - it's a vicious cycle.

Imagine all you know is whatever drivel Shape and Fitness (and Cosmo) say. And you go to a gym, and they say "no, that's not right - do this!" If a trainer said it to you, you might listen. But if you are looking at their website, shopping for a gym, and you actually believe that training that way will make you "bulky", you aren't going to pick that gym, because you believe that they're trying to make you bulk up.

And then that's what Shape and Fitness write about, because they want to keep selling their magazines.

my gosh, we are talking heavy-duty conspiracy ;)

But you are right about the sociology and psychology of it - and women really do have a hard time getting their heads around lifting heavy.  Sad.  I would have expected better from Gold's Gym, though, since they are the closest we've got to "hard-core."

It's not a "conspiracy", it's what they do

I may be paranoid, but that doesn't mean I'm wrong

don't hate the playa hate the game

Can't I hate both? The playa could chose not to play.

Original Post by spirochete:

It's not a "conspiracy", it's what they do

Quoted for truth.

You know, if you want to find the roots of this you can look at the strongmen at the turn of the last century through to Charles Atlas and beyond - they all built impressive physiques lifting weights but sold their exercise courses and equipment based on calisthenics and high-rep pumping workouts because the profit margins were higher if you didn't have to actually ship anything heavier than a paperweight. 

 So the business model for a certain segment of the self-improvement/fitness business was "lift heavy weights to get an impressive physique, lie about what you did and sell a course based on those lies." That business model never went away, in fact it's evolved into Shape, Self, Fitness and any informercial you see on TV from Gaiam or Guthy-Renker.

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud- Instead, it merely doesn't work quite as well as advertised since it's missing the critical component of going to the gym to lift heavy weights 3-4 times a week; but it does work somewhat since it's cardio of a kind. This primes the public for more sales of the next almost-complete workout system....

Original Post by melkor:

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud-

So what do these things do? Besides provide endless entertainment?

Original Post by amethystgirl:

Original Post by melkor:

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud-

So what do these things do? Besides provide endless entertainment?

uh yeah when i first heard about those shake weights (actually on those darn google ads on here) i thought of something else, but it was in a different shape

Original Post by amethystgirl:

Original Post by melkor:

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud-

So what do these things do? Besides provide endless entertainment?

I have no idea - I suppose they come under the heading of "anything more active than vegging on the couch" which does somewhat work for complete beginners starting from sedentary. Though I have a hard time guessing the delta-n* of their calorie burn and training effect, I think you'd need pretty sophisticated equipment to detect it.

 (* Effect =sedentary + delta-n of applied exercise)

Original Post by amethystgirl:

Original Post by melkor:

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud-

So what do these things do? Besides provide endless entertainment?

Well laughing is an awesome ab workout, and with that chair, eating at your desk would become quite challenging, if not impossible.

Original Post by amethystgirl:

Original Post by melkor:

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud-

So what do these things do? Besides provide endless entertainment?

LOL

"so the key to getting tone is giving a hand job for 6 minutes a day?"

Original Post by healthisinplease:

Original Post by amethystgirl:

Original Post by melkor:

It's not the case that their workouts and gear doesn't do anything at all, that would be too easy to detect as fraud-

So what do these things do? Besides provide endless entertainment?

LOL

"so the key to getting tone is giving a hand job for 6 minutes a day?"

That's what my husband tells me... except he'd never use the word "toned."