These things are NOT part of your weight lifting routine (also known as strength training)
Just saw another thread about balanced routines and I started thinking about this. As you probably don't know, I'm too lazy to Google for you. I'm a big fan of weight lifting forums, books and actually lifting weights. There is A LOT of misinformation out there so don't take my word for it, although it would be cool if you did.
As they say, the best exercise is the one you're doing. Many things are better than doing nothing. Using an iron lung is better than not breathing. Then there's the next step: there are things that awesome uses of your gym time.
This thread is assuming you know how important a weight routine is to your overall health, especially if you're a woman. If you're a woman over 30 and not doing weights three times a week, GET OFF THE COMPUTER AND GO START THAT RIGHT NOW.
Note: If you are getting your info from any of the following, please start the research process over: Cosmo, Shape, Self
1. Pilates and yoga: not weight lifting.
2. Weight lifting classes: this is tricky because they lift weights in there. They lift light weights for countless reps. This is NOT an effective weight routine. Is it an easy class? No. Is it the best use of your time and energy? Hell no. Put that sort of effort into a weight routine not set to music and you'll shock yourself at the progress
3. Running. I can't believe I have to say this. Do you build muscle when you run? I dunno perhaps. Is it a substitute for a weight routine because you feel your legs are getting more muscular? NOPE.
4. Machines: this falls in the category of better than nothing. There are rants about free weights vs machines all over the place. If you're going to be at the gym anyway, do what works best and that's free weights.
spirochete, I hate you. With that said, I don't have access to a gym. I can't follow your sucky advice!
There are many posters here that have great advice about home gym alternatives. There are many heavy, weighted things you have, you can make or you can buy. I saw one poster talk about doing curls with soup cans. Do NOT do that. I think that had to be a joke post but you never know
If you post about toning and not bulking up, I'll probably show up at your door and you're not gonna like that.
Original Post by spirochete:
Original Post by xzcandizx:
But lets face it, if you are looking to loose weight, cardio is always first and weights come second. I know that you might disagree with this, but pretty much every reliable fitness source would agree.
Haha ok I'm done with you. What's your reliable fitness source? Shape? Cosmo?
Ok, you're done with me? You certainly don't act like you are 39. Taking a ridiculous artificial jab at me because I disagree with you? Great display of maturity.
I train at a nationwide prestigious gym. All of the trainers there (board certified) as well as all of the board certified nutritionists I have spoken with as well as just about any one else that I know agrees with me. I am not going to waste my time searching for articles so I can "prove" it to you, when we both know that at middle age you (in particular) are pretty much set in your ways. But really you need to acquire some maturity. Weight training alone is not going to do enough to make most people loose weight. I know from experience. I have had my trainer 2-3x a week without making the time for cardio and there have been minimal if any results. Within a week of adding more cardio to my routine I loose at least a pound or two that week. So my personal experience is enough for me to know that weights alone do not work. And let me add again, that my weight routine is very cardio based (short breaks etc.) and alone it just isn't enough. I believe strongly that most people who are trying to slim down and tone (yes tone) would be in the same position.
D, DE, and DES demonstrated a similar and significant (P <= 0.05) reduction in body mass (-9.64, -8.99, and -9.90 kg, respectively) with fat mass comprising 69, 78, and 97% of the total loss in body mass, respectively.A third of the weight loss in the diet-only group was muscle (2.98 kg, or 6.5lbs) and the diet+cardio exercise group also lost significant muscle (1.98kg or 4.35lbs), while the diet+cardio+strength training group mostly retained theirs, losing 0.297kg or just shy of 0.6lbs of muscle.
Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. 31(9):1320-1329, September 1999
The impact of two different modes of training on body fatness and skeletal muscle metabolism was investigated in young adults who were subjected to either a 20-week endurance-training (ET) program (eight men and nine women) or a 15-week high-intensity intermittent-training (HIIT) program (five men and five women). The mean estimated total energy cost of the ET program was 120.4 MJ, whereas the corresponding value for the HIIT program was 57.9 MJ. Despite its lower energy cost, the HIIT program induced a more pronounced reduction in subcutaneous adiposity compared with the ET program.Spiro's routine is the bleeping minimum for health. Not lifting as heavy as you can manage while dieting is a recipe for muscle loss, bone density loss, and a whole host of other negative health effects. Strength training will mitigate the negative impact of calorie restriction and cardiovascular exercise while in a calorie deficit, but as the cited research shows there's no way to avoid loss of muscle mass while dieting.
Tremblay A, Simoneau JA, Bouchard C.
Impact of exercise intensity on body fatness and skeletal muscle metabolism.
Metabolism. 1994 Jul; 43(7):814-8.
Dr. Mel Siff was a widely-respected coach and biomechanics PhD, his works are widely cited, and yes, hype happens for a reason: marketing and making money. However, within the field of sports science and human performance/biomechanics, a lot has happened in the past 80 years and Pilates is as outdated as the theories of Charles Atlas, Dr. Attilla, or Eugen Sandow who wrote the fitness manuals Joseph Pilates studied as a young man.
Pilates was a better marketer than Sandow, but that's all he had on the man he learned from.
Don't try to pass off Pilates marketing material as real science though.
If you enjoy doing it and it works for you, fine, as I've written several times just today fun causes consistency, and consistency is superior to efficiency when it comes to fitness. But Pilates is not anything special or even very good when it comes to efficiency - even when you only consider bodyweight-based training with limited equipment it loses out to Olympic gymnastics.
And all the marketing material from Pilates instructors and claims to the contrary won't change that fact.
If you wish to dispute the point - feel free to go to pubmed and find a creditable study published in a reputable journal in the field to back up your marketing claims.
Or even an olympic medallist who've trained according to Pilates' methods, to balance the dozens who have followed the system outlined in Supertraining by Siff and Verkhoshansky.
P.S.- Your profile really says a lot about you!
Laura=quoting someone she doesn't even know and a sleeping pill popper. Wow you just must be a joy to actually meet in person. Could it possibly be the roids acting up? Maybe that is why you feel so tense towards me? Otherwise you are just a debbie downer. boo hoo.
Original Post by xzcandizx:
Original Post by spirochete:
Original Post by xzcandizx:
But lets face it, if you are looking to loose weight, cardio is always first and weights come second. I know that you might disagree with this, but pretty much every reliable fitness source would agree.
Haha ok I'm done with you. What's your reliable fitness source? Shape? Cosmo?
Ok, you're done with me? You certainly don't act like you are 39. Taking a ridiculous artificial jab at me because I disagree with you? Great display of maturity.
I train at a nationwide prestigious gym. All of the trainers there (board certified) as well as all of the board certified nutritionists I have spoken with as well as just about any one else that I know agrees with me. I am not going to waste my time searching for articles so I can "prove" it to you, when we both know that at middle age you (in particular) are pretty much set in your ways. But really you need to acquire some maturity. Weight training alone is not going to do enough to make most people loose weight. I know from experience. I have had my trainer 2-3x a week without making the time for cardio and there have been minimal if any results. Within a week of adding more cardio to my routine I loose at least a pound or two that week. So my personal experience is enough for me to know that weights alone do not work. And let me add again, that my weight routine is very cardio based (short breaks etc.) and alone it just isn't enough. I believe strongly that most people who are trying to slim down and tone (yes tone) would be in the same position.
Can I ask what a Bord Certified trainer is? There are different certifications out there, good ones and bad ones, but no standard Board Certification. Are they club certified is that what you ment?
Original Post by melkor:
No, pretty much every reliable fitness source would agree that weight training is more important than cardio for fat loss, interval training is more important than steady state, and lots of steady state training is bad for you.
D, DE, and DES demonstrated a similar and significant (P <= 0.05) reduction in body mass (-9.64, -8.99, and -9.90 kg, respectively) with fat mass comprising 69, 78, and 97% of the total loss in body mass, respectively.A third of the weight loss in the diet-only group was muscle (2.98 kg, or 6.5lbs) and the diet+cardio exercise group also lost significant muscle (1.98kg or 4.35lbs), while the diet+cardio+strength training group mostly retained theirs, losing 0.297kg or just shy of 0.6lbs of muscle.
Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. 31(9):1320-1329, September 1999
The impact of two different modes of training on body fatness and skeletal muscle metabolism was investigated in young adults who were subjected to either a 20-week endurance-training (ET) program (eight men and nine women) or a 15-week high-intensity intermittent-training (HIIT) program (five men and five women). The mean estimated total energy cost of the ET program was 120.4 MJ, whereas the corresponding value for the HIIT program was 57.9 MJ. Despite its lower energy cost, the HIIT program induced a more pronounced reduction in subcutaneous adiposity compared with the ET program.Spiro's routine is the bleeping minimum for health. Not lifting as heavy as you can manage while dieting is a recipe for muscle loss, bone density loss, and a whole host of other negative health effects. Strength training will mitigate the negative impact of calorie restriction and cardiovascular exercise while in a calorie deficit, but as the cited research shows there's no way to avoid loss of muscle mass while dieting.
Tremblay A, Simoneau JA, Bouchard C.
Impact of exercise intensity on body fatness and skeletal muscle metabolism.
Metabolism. 1994 Jul; 43(7):814-8.
Dr. Mel Siff was a widely-respected coach and biomechanics PhD, his works are widely cited, and yes, hype happens for a reason: marketing and making money. However, within the field of sports science and human performance/biomechanics, a lot has happened in the past 80 years and Pilates is as outdated as the theories of Charles Atlas, Dr. Attilla, or Eugen Sandow who wrote the fitness manuals Joseph Pilates studied as a young man.
Pilates was a better marketer than Sandow, but that's all he had on the man he learned from.
Don't try to pass off Pilates marketing material as real science though.
If you enjoy doing it and it works for you, fine, as I've written several times just today fun causes consistency, and consistency is superior to efficiency when it comes to fitness. But Pilates is not anything special or even very good when it comes to efficiency - even when you only consider bodyweight-based training with limited equipment it loses out to Olympic gymnastics.
And all the marketing material from Pilates instructors and claims to the contrary won't change that fact.
If you wish to dispute the point - feel free to go to pubmed and find a creditable study published in a reputable journal in the field to back up your marketing claims.
Or even an olympic medallist who've trained according to Pilates' methods, to balance the dozens who have followed the system outlined in Supertraining by Siff and Verkhoshansky.
Umm I didn't say anything about steady state being better than intervals? Look up metatraining.
And marketing? If you actually took any time to look at the page you would have noticed it had a list of certified instructors (the main reason I posted). And that the page for Romana is listed because she is the master teacher. To say it is "promotional materials" is totally whacked. And your thoughts that Pilates is crap, are just that, your crappy thoughts. They are no where near the facts that you are attempting to portray them as.
melkor are you a middle aged woman because you sure act like one.
Your fitness results are 70% diet, 30% exercise.
If you're not losing fat on a strength training program you're either doing it wrong or you're not eating right for your goals.
Everyone knows a study done with n=1 is by far the most widely respected by the scientific community.
Or you actually need to add cardio. Genius.
Ok clearly I just need to back off, because that rage is acting up again. It really is especially sad when women partake in that crap.
Original Post by melkor:
Until it's peer-revied in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning or published in any of the sports medicine or exercise physiology journals you can find through PubMed it's marketing, not science.
You clearly have too much faith in the system my friend. If you knew anything about peer reviews you would know that they are total bull. But anyone involved in any type of science knows that...
I totally lied, I'm not done with you. Here is your idea of research:
So my personal experience is enough for me to know that weights alone do not work.
I think that speaks for itself.
It absolutely does. For me, that is the case. For several months that was the case. And clearly you can't keep doing the same thing and expecting change.
I still want to know what a board certified trainer is?
Anyone with even a modicum of training knows that quoting papers and studies at each other is how arguments are settled between scientist, and may the one with the best citation list and coauthor credit win.
Original Post by melkor:
Anone involved in any scientific field in any substantial and credible way knows that peer review is the only way that any field advances.
Anyone with even a modicum of training knows that quoting papers and studies at each other is how arguments are settled between scientist, and may the one with the best citation list and coauthor credit win.
It may be the only way we have at the moment, but it certainly is not the most legitimate way. These people are PEERS and it happens very often that they do favors for each other in these journals. Like the philosophy: you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours applies very well here.
How about all of those pharmaceuticals that have been approved later to find out, oh, they really do kill/maim/cause heart attacks/cancer etc. If you don't believe that was because of some back scratching, maybe you just have more faith in "the system" than I do.
Maybe the FDA can push through the next drug that worked on one guy? I mean he seemed to like it.
And let me just add: http://www.equinoxfitness.com/Home/PersonalTr aining/Metatraining.aspx
exactly what do you find "wrong" about this cardio plan? I have started it recently but there have been many success stories at my gym. Even with the trainers. To all of you: do you JUST do weights? no cardio?
