The Simple Exercise Prescription That Fixes Your Training

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(Cont.) The Simple Exercise Prescription That Fixes Your Training

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Welcome to There Is a Method to the Madness. My name is Rob Maxwell, and I'm an exercise physiologist and personal trainer. I am the owner of Maxwell's fitness programs, and I've been in business since 1994. The purpose of this podcast is to get to the real deal of what really works and most importantly why things work. Hence the name, There is a Method to the Madness. Before I get to today's show, I want to thank Jonathan and Lynn Gilden of the Gilden Group at Realty Pros. They are committed to providing the highest level of customer service in home sales. Why don't you give them a shout and figure out what your home is worth? 386-451-2412. Welcome to There Is a Method to the Madness. It is what day of the week is it? It is Tuesday around 10 a.m. Not sure when you're going to be listening to this. Had a good workout this morning. I um did a little warm-up on my new Peloton treadmill that I got from a client. Um what a great piece of equipment that that is. And then I did a little bit of upper body push in my home gym. So that got me uh off to a good start. I like to say that uh exercise is one of the best ways to start the day. So, anyway, let's jump into there is a method to the madness. I always like to uh remind people why I picked the name to this podcast and my first book. It's because I like to use the science. If you look at my logo, it says we're training is science. So if we really understand what we're trying to do and what works, then we'll be more apt to do it and do it correctly. So that is what the show is all about. Speaking of which, a concept I've talked a lot about through the years is does the tail wag the dog or does the dog wag its tail? That is really, really, really a big part of there is a method to the madness. And that's got a huge impact in our physical training with what we do. And so often, especially when it comes to cardiorespiratory training, the dog does not wag its tail. It actually is being wagged by its tail. So let me explain what that means. So often, people, runners, especially, even you know, walkers that know their paces well, uh, bicyclists, cyclists, swimmers. I mean, pretty much any form of cardiorespiratory exercise where people maybe get a little competitive, whether they're very competitive or somewhat competitive, they tend to know their paces, and then they tend to do most of their runs, rides, or swims or whatever, based on either what they think they should be at, or maybe a little bit better, but not much better, based on what their performance is in certain races. So that is like the epitome of the tail wagging the dog. We get, I mean, we can accidentally get more fit doing that. Like getting more fit will become the byproduct of just moving around doing things. Of course. I mean, structured exercise really didn't become a thing until the Industrial Revolution, until after the Industrial Revolution, I should say, because prior to that, people were working and they were working manually. And, you know, of course, people were fit. There were always sports from as far back as I've studied. I mean, there was always different kinds of events, people running races, people were doing different kinds of strength feats, they were climbing, all these things. And naturally that leads to greater physical fitness. But if we want to reach our best physical self, then it would be better to follow an exercise prescription instead of letting the tail wag the dog. So I'll go back to the example of runners because they are the most famous for this. They're often going to run either what other people are running, so they think it's a s it's a pace thing they got to run at because they hear of somebody doing it, or maybe their training partner runs at a given pace and they talk about it. Or, you know, again, maybe a little bit better, but not that much better. They're going to use performances in past races to determine their pace. But that is the exercise prescription consists of a few things, but the big three is going to be the mode, the duration, and the intensity. And that's going to be true for no matter what form of exercise that you pick, whether it be flexibility, whether it be strength training, whether it be cardiorespiratory exercise, there is a prescription that you can follow that's going to be individualized for you that'll help you reach your fitness goals. There's also a dose response relationship, just like medications. So prescription is pretty much a common way for us to look at how to set up a training protocol for somebody. Since I've been doing this, I've used exercise prescriptions because it just helps me. I like to have things down on paper. I like to be able to think about things, and it helps me organize what the person needs to do. So I'll get their vitals, I'll get their assessments, I'll get the information I need, I'll get their goals, and then I'll sit down and figure out their mode, their frequency, their time, and their intensity. That is the dog wagging the tail. All right, so let's go back to our running example. Let's say somebody says that for their easy day, which is good. It's good to have easy days, tempo days, interval days, long slow distance days, like all the slang that runners use is good. The problem is they're often in a very much wrong zone when they do this training because they're going by some external parameter of what that intensity should be, or they're trusting their feelings, which often lie to them, always lie to them, by the way. I mean, very rarely will you find somebody who's really able to dial in where they're really at and where they need to stay with that intensity. So let's say they go out on their easy long run, which is very common for runners, even runners training for shorter distance races will typically do a longer run on the weekend, whatever long that is. It's relative to, I suppose, what they're doing. A whole nother area of the tail wagging the dog, by the way. But let's say they go out on their easy run, and it's supposed to be easy. Now, when you look at all the research, easy really means like what we would call zone two and into zone one training. So, what that means from a physiological standpoint is the majority of calories are being burned utilizing fat, not carbohydrates. That's easy. What that does is that helps the mitochondria build up and become more fit. The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell, and when it becomes more efficient, it gets better at burning fat. That happens at an easy intensity. I've spoken a lot about the SEDS principle, specific adaptations to imposed demands. So if you're trying to train your aerobic system, and when you are 100% aerobic, you are burning fat for fuel. Once you break into carbohydrate metabolism, you are no longer 100% aerobic with that. So when it becomes predominantly carbohydrates being burned, you're now getting into anaerobic metabolism. That's got its good to it. There's definitely points to that becoming more fit. We're improving our anaerobic threshold when we do that. But when we're trying to build up our aerobic system, we don't want to cross into that, which is typically what they would call like zone three training, where we get above somewhere around 85% of our maximum heart rate or 80% of our heart rate reserve. That's when that typically happens. Zone two is typically anything under 80%. And there, most people are going to be aerobic. Now, a little caveat to this: there is no, well, there is a perfect way to figure out your zones. You literally could get a VO2 max test done where you're hooked up to an EKG, you have that, and you have everything else to measure. You can really figure out what your maximal heart rate is, and then they can figure out your zones for you. But other than that, you have to oftentimes use the guesstimates that are given to you on most of today's smartwatches like Apple Watches and Garmin's and Fitbits and things like that. Now, I will say that those are pretty good. I mean, the estimates are pretty good. There is some error in it. But once you learn it, and the longer you wear your sports watches, the more it learns you and it tabulates your resting heart rate and it helps you figure out your zones. So it dials it in more accurately. And I can promise you this it is absolutely better to use those than it is to either wing it or use a pace. All right. So let's go back to that example. The person's going out on their easy run, and they're telling you their pace is easy, because let's say they typically run a seven-minute mile for a 5K, which is a good clip, it's a good time. So they say, Well, you know, if I'm going to run an 830 mile, so a minute and a half slower than the 5K pace, you would think that's going to be easy. And in some cases, it might be, like if the temperatures are great, if the humidity is low, if the course is flat, if it's shaded, a certain time of day, the person's um, you know, feels better, comfortable at a certain time of day. Like I know for me, everything is elevated before sunset, sunrise, I should say. Sunset to sunrise. So I don't like running in the dark. Like that's me. It definitely affects my heart rate. So everything is going to be a little bit elevated. So if I'm going by pace and all that, then all of that is totally screwed up. And that is totally the tail wagging the dog. So it feels easy. Well, of course, if you run a seven-minute mile, then an 830 mile is going to feel a lot easier. That is just absolutely common sense. But that doesn't mean it's easy enough to get the adaptation that you're looking for. Is it better than laying on the couch? I mean, I suppose so. I mean, not in everybody's case. I mean, there are some people that are chronically injured in running, they get hurt all the time, they have stress fractures, and then they end up they can't run after the age of 60 or something like that. So then in that case, I would say no. They probably should have taken more rest days because they're just not disciplined enough to go easy. And everybody's a little bit different on that. But most people aren't disciplined enough to go easier because they let their ego take over. And when people run with other people or cycle with other people or swim with other people, they are always, almost always, allowing the crowd to take over their pace because it's very hard for somebody to kind of eat crow and go, well, I'm just back here, you know, following my heart rate zones. And then, you know, they just don't do it. I mean, I can do it, but I like to train alone most of the time, mostly for that very reason. I learned that years ago, that it's like if I'm going to really follow my plan and get as fit as I can be and not over-train, I've got to like resist training with people because I'm going to have a tendency to not follow where I need to be. The other side of it is I really prefer to train alone. I just really, really enjoy this solitude. I'm with people all day long, listening to them, you know, listening to them, their their problems, they're good, they're bad, and the other. And it's like I actually prefer to be alone a lot of the time. So when I train, that's oftentimes when I can do that. But the other part of it is because I've learned well enough to know, you know, to thy own self be true, as the Greeks say, that I need to do what's best for me and if I'm going to follow my zones. All right. So that's just the example of running. So that person goes out, they're running the 830. They're supposed to be zone two or easy, whatever you want to call it. Easy just means you pretty much can hold that all day. Like if somebody said, Okay, you're going to do this for the next four hours, you say, okay, it's going to be boring. And maybe my feet will begin to hurt. But heart rate-wise and all that, yeah, I can do that. Just make sure I have some food and drink and I'm good. That's what easy is supposed to feel like. So they're out on their 830 and their heart rate is 20 beats ahead of their zone two because they think it feels easy. They're going by ego. They think it should feel easy, but they didn't bother to check that it's 95% humidity, it's 82 degrees at 6 a.m. They didn't sleep well the night before. So all these variables have made their heart rate creep up. And we actually call that cardiac creep. Like the heart doesn't always stay where you hope it's going to. So do you listen to the heart or do you ignore the heart? You listen to it. You don't let the tail wag the dog. You wag the tail and go, well, that's okay. If I got to jog down here to 12-minute mile to get in the right zone, then that's what I'm going to do. Ellen did an email that's coming out tomorrow on The Road Less Traveled, the famous book by Scott Peck. And uh, it's a great book, but it makes me think of this. It's like, that's the road less traveled, is having the discipline to go down and go as easy as you need to go, not worrying about the people you think are judging you, because really nobody can give a shit about what you're doing when you're out there, but you think they do. So not worrying about that and going, you know what? I'm doing my own thing. You know, there's this guy, he's pretty famous in the area. I mean, he's probably the most famous endurance athlete in the Volusia County area ever. His name is Rob Kish. He won the race across America three consecutive times and was in it like 15 more times or something like that. Nobody hardly ever hears of him because he's so quiet and introverted and he could give a rat's, you know, what about fame and popularity. But it's it's crazy because he's won the biggest races in the world in his events, yet you would never know. But I bring him up because he does the road less traveled. He always rides by himself, sticking to his guns. You know, he's always consistent. I don't think he ever like goes a different speed. He knows exactly what his speed is. He's in his 70s now. He still rides over 100 miles a day because he loves it. And yes, I said a day, not a week. He rides all the time, everywhere. He loves what he's doing. He definitely, definitely just goes by where he knows he needs to go. He used to ride with us occasionally when we had big group rides, and he would kind of stay off in the back because he didn't want to get in the pace and have it like mess up where he was supposed to be. And he also just didn't want to rely on the group. He wanted to do his own thing. So back when 20 years ago, when he was a little bit younger, we could be cruising along in our big pack going 25 to 30 miles an hour, and he would be sitting right off to the right out of the draft, or I should say to the left, out of the draft, still holding the same pace. I mean, you talk about a machine, that's exactly what he is. Part of it's mindset, but then the other part of it is he's just learned he's got to do his own thing, regardless of what anybody says or does. You know, he's gonna stay in the zones he needs to stay in. So that's that for cardio. The same is true for strength training. There's an exercise prescription as well. It is so hard to get people to understand the concept. We all want to be able to lift more weights. Most people want to be able to do more pull-ups. Most people want to be able to do more push-ups. All these things are true. It's natural to want to get better. To get people to understand how to get better can be very frustrating because it's the same thing. If you put 100 pounds on the chest press and just for whatever reason say you're going to do five, I mean, is the tail wagging the dog or is the dog wagging the tail? I mean, it's it's obvious. You're letting a load, an external load, dictate what you're going to do. So if you want to get stronger on the chest press machine, the best thing you can do is to figure out what a good moderate load is for you, meaning you can do repetitions of 10 or more or so and go until you can't do any more repetitions. Like that is the exercise prescription for strength training. The mode is what do you want to get better at? I mean, we should all be trying to train all the major muscle groups. We should be doing all of our legs, our hips, our upper back, our chest, our shoulders, our biceps. All that's true. But what do we want to get stronger at? That's the mode. So in the case of let's say pull-ups, that's the mode. So the reps is, well, how many can you do? And the intensity isn't, oh, do three, do four, do five. No, it's do as many as you can in good form. If you do that, you will continue to get stronger. I mean, the research on all of this is so critically clear. They've shown it. If you're able to basically challenge your limits when you strength train. I mean, now we know for sure if you get within three reps in reserve of anything, you are at the sufficient intensity to get better. So that means if you got 70 pounds in a leg extension or 130 pounds in the leg extension, you can use 130 if you want, because you saw the guy before you use 120. So you're going to allow, you know, him to dictate your load. Or you can say, you know what, I really don't care. Yeah, I've learned from Rob and other exercise physiologists that results have pretty much been shown from five reps, even up to 35 reps. So I'm going to pick a load where I'm going to get very close to failure and I'm going to stop. And then the amount of volume I need will depend on my recovery and everything else going on in my life. But that's the key. So once again, the load doesn't matter. I worked out this morning at my house. As I already stated, my dumbbells at home go up to 40. They don't go any heavier than that. And I couldn't tell you how many reps I did when I did the chest press and fly today. I did more than 10 because that's a fairly easier load for me. So I know I want the failure though on all three sets. I know I did that. I know I did three sets to failure on all three. And really that's that was my objective of doing that because I used the loads that I had. I did the exercises I needed to do. I needed to do an upper body push. I needed to do a pectoral fly. I don't have a cable machine at home, so I use dumbbell flies, obviously. And I brought them close to fatigue every set. Maybe it was failure. I don't know. I know that I came within one or two in good form. And so I know I got the adaptation that I needed to get. So again, there are exercise prescriptions for all of the forms of physical fitness. Flexibility is no different. If you want to get more mobile, which I highly recommend, I work on it every day, all day at the gym. Even when I'm training clients, I'm often going to be stretching something. Um, there's one guy I trained that every time he goes to a different exercise, I stretch a different part of my body. It works out perfect for me.

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Don't care, it works good for me. If he's uh, you know, if he's on the leg extension, I'll be stretching my quads. He moves to the leg curl, I'll stretch my hamstrings, he moves to the where does he usually go next? He goes to the high row, then I'm stretching my lats. I mean, I just it's a good formula. So we should be stretching all the time, but again, I'll get off my rant on that. But there's an exercise prescription for that. So the mode would be static stretches of the muscle groups that I need to stretch. So static means you're holding the stretches, that would be the mode. So a quad stretch would be the mode, a static stretch. And now the intensity in this case of a stretch is to the point of stretch. So you pull back the limb to the point where you feel a stretch, not pain, that's the intensity. And then the duration for flexibility is anywhere from 10 to 30 seconds. So I know if I held my quad stretch to the point of stretch for 10 seconds or more, I know that I am gonna get the adaptation that I want, which is greater flexibility of that particular muscle. So we don't have to always be doing guesswork. With cardio, again, it's mode. It could be walking, running, biking, swimming, elliptical. Had a friend the other day said they still rollerbladed. I mean, whatever. It does not matter. That is the mode. The duration is typically for most people. We should be striving for 30 minutes at a time. For most people, some people less, some people may need more, but the duration is typically around 30 minutes to where we get a very good cardiorespiratory benefit. The intensity can vary, but typically anywhere from say 65 to 95% of your maximal heart rate with different variations in there, but we should be trying to follow heart rate so we know where we're supposed to be and not using pace or other extrinsic variables to dictate that, because we may not end up in the right zone. Strength training, I already said, you pick the exercises you want to be stronger on. You pick the load that's sufficiently going to get you close to failure. And as long as you're doing anywhere from five, which it's a huge range when you really get down to it to 30, you're gonna get benefits. Now, everybody, again, is a little bit different on that. A good trainer will help you figure out your ranges on that. If you tend to do your reps a little bit faster, like everybody's a little different, you're probably gonna have to do more repetitions, or else you won't be under load long enough if you're doing lower repetitions. If you tend to injure yourself easily, you probably want to do the same thing, a little bit higher on the repetitions because you're simply going to be using a little bit less load. The people that tend to hurt themselves a little bit like that, or often like that, typically are lifting with their egos, they're lifting too fast, they're worrying about what other people are doing. In other words, it really doesn't have to happen. But there isn't a perfect rep range. But the key is that we know what absolutely works. All right. So that's the thought I'm gonna leave you with today. I want you to think about in all of your exercise is the tail wagging the dog or is the dog wagging its tail? When you come here, I make sure that we're following the right parameters for you. And we all right, thank you everybody for listening to today's show. I really appreciate it. I want to remind you to please hit automatic download. It really helps me and it helps the show. And now I'd like to thank Overhead Door of Daytona Beach, the area's premier garage door company. They have the best product and the best service. I personally vouch for Jeff and Zach Hawk, the owners. They are great, they're going to get you exactly what you need. So if you have any garage door needs, give them a shout at 386-222-3165. And now I'm very excited to add another sponsor. ProCharge Liquid Protein Enhancer has joined the team. And let me tell you, they are a great product. I pop one after a workout. Each container has 40 grams of protein, so that's two servings. I take 20 grams after I work out. What's really cool about them is it's portable. You can throw them in your suitcase. You don't have to worry about mixing powders and making a mess. At least that's an issue I've had with some of the protein powders through the years. And you know what? They taste really, really good. So you can check them out on my website, fit to themax.net, or you can go right to them at prochargeprotein.com.