Fitness Experts Praise Bodyweight Workouts Over Machines

By Dorene Internicola

NEW YORK, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Man versus machines? In the realm of fitness at least man seems to be winning.

Despite a gym floor bulging with weight-lifting equipment, fitness experts said the only thing people need to push, pull and lift is the weight of their own body.
"If more people knew you could get a good physique using your body as a bar bell, they could take matters into their own hands," said Bret Contreras, author of "Bodyweight Strength Training Anatomy," a guide to bodyweight-only workouts aimed at everyone from the exercise-challenged to the personal trainer.

Known as "the Glute Guy," Arizona-based Contreras has been resistance training for 21 years. But in high school, he couldn't do a push-up. "At 15 I was so skinny people used to make jokes," the 37-year old said. "I just got so tired of being made fun of I decided to take charge."

Often thought of as a stepping stone to weight training, bodyweight training can be a complete, whole body workout in itself, Contreras said. Once the person masters the simpler version of a push-up, squat, or chin-up, a more advanced version can be tackled, often with a little help from the living room furniture.

"Find things in the environment: a table to get underneath, hold on to the sides of and then pull the body upward; a rafter for a pull-up," he said. "To work your glutes (buttocks muscles), all you need is a couch."
Contreras recommends the beginner start with 15 minutes a day and increase over time. "It doesn't have to be intimidating," he said. "You could do a 20-minute workout three times a week and have an incredible physique, so long as you push hard and keep challenging yourself."

ANYTIME, ANYWHERE

Bodyweight exercises return people to the way they move naturally, according to Lisa Wheeler, national creative manager of group fitness at Equinox, the upscale chain of fitness centers.

"We squat, lunge, crawl, reach," she said, adding that a bodyweight class at Equinox is called "Animal Flow" because its crab crawls, lunges and swings were inspired by the primal movement patterns of man and beast.

"Bodyweight training is great for mobility, stability and creating movement patterns," she said. "You want to build a strong foundation, be stable around the shoulders, hips and spine." Because the load doesn't change, progression is achieved by changing the center of gravity of the exerciser or the complexity of the movement. Another challenge, she said, is getting enough pull to match the push of most bodyweight exercises.

"Bodyweight training can make everything else better," she said. "Dancers, moms, we all live push-pull now."
Jessica Matthews, an exercise physiologist with the American Council on Exercise, said bodyweight training blends with the trend toward functional training, or training that mimics the way we move in everyday life, as opposed to the older bodybuilder model of targeting one muscle group at a time.
"Our body is one kinetic chain, everything moves together, so most everyday exercises will move multiple muscle groups," she said.

Matthews said not only can bodyweight training be done anytime, anywhere, it also works easily into popular interval training, circuit and boot camp workouts.
"Using bodyweight exercises allow more of a cardiovascular component because you can move rapidly from one exercise to the next," Matthews said.
So are machines a thing of the past?

"I think there's a place for everything," she said, "For some people a fixed path might be the way to go. It boils down to having proper joint stability and quality range of movement, then adding load. Form is imperative." (Reporting by Dorene Internicola; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Vicki Allen)

Your Body is All You Need: The World’s Oldest Training Method (and a 1% Workout)

Arnold said it best: 1%. Just 1% of your day—15 minutes—can make a tremendous difference in your life, and in the lives of others. For some, that’s a little hard to believe, especially from a champion bodybuilder known for his marathon workouts. But it’s true.

The 1% Workout
This bodyweight workout can be done 3-4 times per week, and is intended to help you burn fat and build strength. If any of the exercises feel too hard, make modifications and build up to them.
Bodyweight squats – 8-10 reps
Push-ups (or knee-push ups) – 5-8 reps
Plank – hold for 15 seconds
Jumping Jacks – 15 reps
Bodyweight Reverse Lunges – 6 reps per leg
Lying Hip Raise (double or single leg) – 10 reps

How to Do it:

Cycle through the exercises sequentially, resting and repeating as prescribed based on your fitness level.
Beginners: Perform exercises 1-6 in order, resting 30 seconds between each. This is one circuit. Perform a total of 4 circuits, resting 90 seconds between each. This workout should take you approximately 15 minutes.

Intermediate: Add 10 seconds to the plank. Perform exercises 1-6 in order, resting 20 seconds between each. This is one circuit. Perform a total of 5 circuits, resting 75-90 seconds between each. This workout should take you approximately 18 minutes.

Advanced: Add 20 seconds to the plank. Perform exercises 1-6 in order, resting 20 seconds between each. This is one circuit. Perform a total of 6 circuits, resting 75 seconds between each. This workout should take you approximately 22 minutes.

Elite: Add 3-5 reps per exercise and 30 seconds to the plank. Perform exercises 1-6 in order, resting 10 seconds between each. This is one circuit. Perform a total of 6 circuits, resting 45 seconds between each. This workout should take you approximately 18 minutes.

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With the above workout, you are on your way to the next level of fitness, no matter where you’re currently starting. Remember, in just 15 minutes, you can start to make a tremendous change in your life. All it takes is a spark, and 1% of your day.

A Brief Discussion of Bodyweight Training

Before the inception of weights, machines, genetic engineering, time travel, light sabers, or the Internet, people who wanted to get big and strong had to train using only their bodyweight. Although it originated out of “necessity,” this training method continues to be used because of its efficacy.

The methodology of bodyweight training has a long and storied history, particularly in military settings. From the Spartans to the Romans to the Navy SEALS, bodyweight only training has been a consistent component of the methods of nearly every military organization from antiquity to the present.

Admittedly, this is due in part to the inexpensive nature and the inherent convenience of not needing any equipment and being able to perform these exercises anywhere. However, expense and convenience notwithstanding, bodyweight workouts are undeniably effective for everyone from new recruits to drill sergeants.

Outside of being used in the training of the world’s greatest warriors, bodyweight exercises continue to be used in the athletic training world, and are a key component of many of the best fat loss and muscle gain workouts available, anywhere—like this one.

Within the context of a complete program that uses weights as well, bodyweight training has some specific benefits. Now, notwithstanding the fact that bodyweight exercises have been empirically proven to be effective, speaking generally, bodyweight exercises are fundamentally different from most weight bearing exercises—even when the same muscles or movement patterns are involved.

As an example, I don’t think anyone would debate that there is a tremendous difference between a bodyweight pull-up and a machine pull-down.

This fact remains true despite the fact that the same muscles—the latissimus dorsi, teres major, rhomboids, et al.—are involved; this will also remain true if one were to use the same load. That is, use weight on the pull-down comparable to your bodyweight, which acts as the load on the pull-up.

Of course, this raises the question: why are they different?

In the gym, your run of the mill meathead will tell you it’s a matter of pull-ups being “hardcore” and pull-downs being kind of a wussy exercise. The may be true, and while you know I love a good broscience argument more than anyone, that answer isn’t really relevant to your goals.

Instead, let’s focus on something substantial.

Bodyweight exercises like pull-ups, push-ups, squats, lunges, and the like belong to a group of movements known as “closed kinetic chain exercises.” Closed kinetic chain exercises include those in which the distal end of the exercise is fixed, such as a squat or lunge, where the foot remains in place. In other words, are exercises performed where the hand or foot is fixed, and does not move relative to the body.

Compare these with exercises like the pull-down, bench press, leg press, or leg curls, which are known as “open kinetic chain exercises.” In contrast to CKCEs, open chain kinetic exercises don’t have a fixed distal point. Put another way, OKCE are performed without the movement hand or foot being fixed, and instead allow movement relative to body position.
Speaking generally, if you are moving your body towards or away from an object (instead of moving an object towards of away from your body), the chain is closed; if you’re moving something either towards or away from your body (instead of moving your body towards or a way from an object).

This might seem a little academic, and while I apologize for boring you with the science, the differentiation is of vital importance when considered within the context of a complete training paradigm.

Interval Training Burns More Fat, Increases Fitness, Study Finds

Date: June 29, 2007

Source: University Of Guelph

Summary: Fitness buffs and athletes have long used interval training -- short bursts of intensive effort interspersed with more moderate stretches -- to improve performance. This new study shows that the practice also improves cardiovascular fitness and helps the body burn more fat, even during low-intensity or moderate workouts.



Interval training burns fat and improves fitness more quickly than constant but moderately intensive physical activity, according to research by a University of Guelph researcher.

The study by Jason Talanian, a PhD student in the Department of Human Health and Nutritional Sciences, was published recently in the Journal of Applied Physiology. It found that after interval training, the amount of fat burned in an hour of continuous moderate cycling increased by 36 per cent and cardiovascular fitness increased by 13 per cent.

Fitness buffs and athletes have long used interval training — short bursts of intensive effort interspersed with more moderate stretches — to improve performance. But Talanian’s study shows that the practice also improves cardiovascular fitness and helps the body burn more fat, even during low-intensity or moderate workouts.

Talanian studied women riding stationary bikes in hard-easy intervals in the training lab of his supervisor, Guelph Prof. Lawrence Spriet. The eight subjects included moderately fit women in their 20s as well as borderline sedentary subjects and an active soccer player. They trained every other day for two weeks. They alternated 10 sets of four-minute bursts of riding at 90-per-cent effort with two-minute rest intervals.

It did not matter how fit the subjects were before. After interval training, they experienced not only an increase in fat used and in aerobic capacity, but also an increase of enzyme activity in the muscle

Talanian notes that faster fat burning and greater overall fitness may not necessarily mean immediate weight loss. The technique may improve someone’s potential to burn more fat, “but for weight loss, you need to consider a balance of exercise and a healthy diet,” he said.

The message from his studies is to mix interval training into an exercise routine once or twice a week, particularly in running, swimming or cycling.

For his follow-up study, Talanian plans to look at about a dozen women over a six-week training period. “We will look at muscle transporters that carry fatty acids into the cell that might help explain those earlier results,” he said.

Story Source: The above story is based on materials provided by University Of Guelph. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

A healthy gut is the hidden key to weight loss

The role of gut health in obesity and diabetes. I’d like to go into more detail on that subject here, especially since it’s not a very well known relationship.

Our gut is home to approximately100,000,000,000,000 (100 trillion) microorganisms. That’s such a big number our human brains can’t really comprehend it. One trillion dollar bills laid end-to-end would stretch from the earth to the sun – and back – with a lot of miles to spare. Do that 100 times and you start to get at least a vague idea of how much 100 trillion is.

The human gut contains 10 times more bacteria than all the human cells in the entire body, with over 400 known diverse bacterial species. In fact, you could say that we’re more bacterial than we are human. Think about that one for a minute.

We’ve only recently begun to understand the extent of the gut flora’s role in human health and disease. Among other things, the gut flora promotes normal gastrointestinal function, provides protection from infection, regulates metabolism and comprises more than 75% of our immune system. Dysregulated gut flora has been linked to diseases ranging from autism and depression to autoimmune conditions like Hashimoto’s, inflammatory bowel disease and type 1 diabetes.

Recent research has shown that the gut flora, and the health of the gut in general, also play a significant role in both obesity and diabetes. I’ve seen this anecdotally in my practice as well. Nearly every patient I treat with a blood sugar issue also has a leaky gut, a gut infection, or some other chronic inflammatory gut condition.

We now know that the composition of the organisms living in your gut determines – to some extent, at least – how your body stores the food you eat, how easy (or hard) it is for you to lose weight, and how well your metabolism functions. Let’s take a closer look at the mechanisms involved. Intestinal bacteria drive obesity and metabolic disease

A study published this year in Science magazine found that mice without a protein known as toll-like receptor 5 (TLR5) in their gut gain excessive weight and develop full-blown diabetes and fatty liver disease when fed a high-fat diet. If we think of the gut flora as a community, TLR5 is like a neighborhood police force that can keep the houligans in check. Without TLR5, bad bacteria can get out of control.

The study authors found that these bad bacteria caused a low-grade inflammation in the mice, which caused them to eat more and develop insulin resistance. They also found that treating these mice with strong antibiotics (enough to kill most of the bacteria in the gut) reduced their metabolic abnormalities.

But the most interesting part of this study is what happened when the researchers transferred the gut flora from the TLR5-deficient overweight mice into the guts of skinny mice: the skinny mice immediately started eating more and eventually developed the same metabolic abnormalities the overweight mice had. In other words, obesity and diabetes were “transferred” from one group of mice to the other simply by changing their gut flora (as shown in the image below).

Other studies have shown that the composition of the gut flora differs in people who are obese and diabetic, and people who are normal weight with no metabolic irregularities.

One possible mechanism for how changes in the gut flora cause diabesity is that different species of bacteria seem to have different effects on appetite and metabolism. In the study on TLR5 deficient mice I mentioned above, the mice with too much bad bacteria in their guts experienced an increase in appetite and ate about 10 percent more food than their regular relatives. But it wasn’t just that these mice were hungrier and eating more; their metabolisms were damaged. When their food was restricted, they lost weight – but still had insulin resistance.

Other studies have shown that changes in the gut flora can increase the rate at which we absorb fatty acids and carbohydrates, and increase the storage of calories as fat. This means that someone with bad gut flora could eat the same amount of food as someone with a healthy gut, but extract more calories from it and gain more weight.

Bad bugs in the gut can even directly contribute to the metabolic syndrome byincreasing the production of insulin (leading to insulin resistance), and by causing inflammation of the hypothalamus (leading to leptin resistance). How modern life screws up our gut and makes us fat and diabetic

What all of this research suggests is that healthy gut bacteria is crucial to maintaining normal weight and metabolism. Unfortunately, several features of the modern lifestyle directly contribute to unhealthy gut flora:

· Antibiotics and other medications like birth control and NSAIDs

· Diets high in refined carbohydrates, sugar and processed foods

· Diets low in fermentable fibers

· Dietary toxins like wheat and industrial seed oils that cause leaky gut

· Chronic stress

· Chronic infections

We also know that infants that aren’t breast-fed and are born to mothers with bad gut flora are more likely to develop unhealthy gut bacteria, and that these early differences in gut flora may predict overweight and obesity in the future.

It’s interesting to note that the diabesity epidemic has neatly coincided with the increasing prevalence of factors that disrupt the gut flora. I’m not suggesting that poor gut health is the single cause of obesity and diabetes, but I am suggesting thatit likely plays a much larger role than most people think. How to maintain and restore healthy gut flora

The most obvious first step in maintaining a healthy gut is to avoid all of the things I listed above. But of course that’s not always possible, especially in the case of chronic stress and infections, and whether we were breast-fed or our mothers had healthy guts.

If you’ve been exposed to some of these factors, there are still steps you can take to restore your gut flora:

· Remove all food toxins from your diet

· Eat plenty of fermentable fibers (starches like sweet potato, yam, yucca, etc.)

· Take a high-quality probiotic, or consider more radical methods of restoring healthy gut flora

· Treat any intestinal pathogens (such as parasites) that may be present

· Take steps to manage your stress