First Day of 2011

First post for this year.  I can’t believe this is 2011 already.  2010 seemed past so fast, unnoticed.  It was brutally hard work, work, work.  Thank God, I survived.  But I don’t to live the same way as I did in 2010.  Every day and everything was in surviving mode.  It was really stressful.

So here are my new year resolutions:

  1. Get back to work out routine – 30 min per day.  Starting 3 days per week, my goal is 5 days per week.
  2. Try not to bring work home.  Spend more time with my kids and help them to stick to their schedules.
  3. Be calm.

My Mom was off the Stitches

I had to leave office early yesterday afternoon to take my mom to see her surgeon.  We felt so released that her surgeon said she recovered very well.  He took out stitiches.  I will take her to see him next week.  But for now, it is such a great new.

My mom is very strong and resilient lady.  She endured so much, from life to her health.  But she never gave up.  Every time she came out strong.  I really admire her.  She is such small lady.  But she shows me that we can stand tall by how we chose to live our life.

I am going to my college re union

Oh my God, I can’t believe the date is so close!  I am going to my 20 year college re union.  I am so excited.  Not a word can describe how I feel right now.  It’s all started 20 years ago.  Me, as a newly high school graduated, with full of my dream and energy, I could not wait to start my new life.  I did not know what’s going to lay ahead of me.  But one thing for sure, adventure and excitement.  It labeled me I was grown up.  I finally did not have to live under my parents’ roof.  I could go on all by myself.  I still remember the moment that my parents sent my off in the train platform in Fuzhou Train Station.  Here were my parents, full of worry so obviously written in their face.  Their only child was going to leave them and started her own jouney which they had no clue what was going to turn out.  Here was I.  Couldn’t wait for the train to pull off station.  The chu chu sound of train was so sweet.  It’s marked of my adulthood.  I was going to live and study independently in the city that I had never been but so much looked forward to it.  My dear highschool deskmate was sad.  I wish I could tell her not to worry about me.  I would do just fine.  But I would not forget her. 

Looking back after 20 years, I really feel that I owed enormously gratitude to my college, my classmates, friends I met and made then and later, the teachers, professors and even my tennis coach.  It gave me the space and opportunity to build my confidence, self esteem.  It built up my personal characters in so many facets and demonstrated so valuable down in the road.  It built the solid foundation for me to be who I am today.  I wanted to say Thank You to everyone in my college.  It might sound lame.  But I don’t know what’s the best way to say it.
 
Oh, dear, 15 more days, I am going to land in the place gave me so many dreams and nutured me in every possible way 20 years ago.  Geez, I am speechless.  Can’t wait to meet my friends…
 

A Man’s Guide to Getting His Woman In Shape

by John M Berardi, April 21st, 2009.

From Precision Nutrition

Guys, let’s face the facts. If you plan on spending the better part of your life banging away at the iron, you’re going to want your woman to join in on the fun.

Sure, you might not always want her as a training partner. But you’ll definitely want her paying some attention to her health and her body composition. And that’s not just because you want a hot chick on your arm. I’m guessing you’ll also enjoy the benefits that come along with fitness, including increased self-esteem, increased self-efficacy, and a generally more positive outlook.

So, you’ve got two choices in life. Either choose a mate that already works out and is fit — in which case, you should probably start chasing women on one of a host of health and fitness forums.

Or you can choose your woman based on some other criterion. And then, if she’s open to your assistance, show her how to get in awesome shape by exercising and eating right. Of course, in this article, I’ll focus on the latter, sharing some strategies for helping your woman get into the best shape of her life.

Exercise

I love this quote:

“Movement is medicine for changing a person’s physical, emotional, and mental state.”

Indeed, recent research has demonstrated that exercise is more effective in treating depression than antidepressant medications! Beyond that, we all know that exercise helps us lose weight and build lean muscle. Hummm… exercise helps reshape the body, brighten the spirits, and sharpen the mind. I’m sold!

The biggest question I get about exercise is: “What type of exercise is best for my woman?” Well, for starters, any exercise is better than none. The best exercise is the kind of exercise she’ll actually do. But if she wants to really reshape her body, she’ll need to do mostly high intensity exercise.

Two types of high intensity exercise work best.

  1. Strength training
  2. High intensity interval/conditioning training

Strength training

While most women think of strength training as something reserved for bodybuilders and strongmen, nothing could be farther from the truth. While strength training can be done in the gym with weights, it also can be done with dumbbells, sandbags, old tractor tires, exercise bands, or even her own body weight. And all of this can be done at home, at a local park, or at a community centre. The real key is challenging her body through six key movement patterns:

  • Pushing
  • Pulling
  • Twisting
  • Squatting
  • Bending
  • Lunging

Here’s an example strength training program that would be great for most women, regardless of their level.

Workout 1

Warm-up – 2 minutes of rowing

Exercises

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

sets x reps

sets x reps

sets x reps

sets x reps

1A Barbell corner press

3 x 8/side

4 x 6/side

5 x 5/side

6 x 4/side

1B Barbell corner row

3 x 8/side

4 x 6/side

5 x 5/side

6 x 4/side

2A Standing seesaw press

3 x 8/side

4 x 6/side

5 x 5/side

6 x 4/side

2B Pullups* or assisted pullups

3 x 8/side

4 x 6/side

5 x 5/side

6 x 4/side

3A Machine flyes

2 x 10

2 x 8

2 x 6

3 x 5

3B Seated cable row

2 x 10

2 x 8

2 x 6

3 x 5

*With weight if possible

Warm up

Corner press

Corner row

Seesaw press

Pullups

Machine flyes

Seated cable row

Workout 2

Warm-up – 2 minutes of rowing

Exercises

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

sets x reps

sets x reps

sets x reps

sets x reps

Tri-angle lunges

3 x 9/leg

3 x 12/leg

4 x 9/leg

4 x 12/leg

Single-leg dumbbell deadlift

3 x 12/side

4 x 9/side

6 x 6/side

9 x 4/side

Pistol squat

2 x AMAP*

3 x AMAP

4 x AMAP

5 x AMAP

Ab rollout (Swiss ball)

3 x AMAP

3 x AMAP

3 x AMAP

3 x AMAP

Weighted plank

3 x ALAP**

3 x ALAP

3 x ALAP

3 x ALAP

*AMAP = As many as possible  **ALAP = As long as possible

Warm-up

Tri-angle lunge

Single-leg dumbbell deadlift

Pistol squat

Ab rollout

Weighted plank

Workout 3

Warm-up – 2 minutes of rowing

Exercises

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

sets x reps

sets x reps

sets x reps

sets x reps

1A Dumbbell snatch

4 x 3/side

4 x 4/side

4 x 5/side

5 x 3/side

1B Dumbbell vertical thruster

4 x 6

4 x 7

4 x 8

5 x 4

1C Dumbbell iron cross

4 x 8

4 x 10

4 x 12

5 x 6

2A Renegade row

3 x 6/side

3 x 7/side

3 x 8/side

4 x 6/side

2B Dumbbell T-pushups

3 x 4/side

3 x 5/side

3 x 6/side

4 x 4/side

Warm up

Dumbbell snatch

Dumbbell vertical thrust

Dumbbell iron cross

Dumbbell Renegade row

Dumbbell T-pushup

Conditioning work

In addition to strength exercise, your woman should also include some conditioning exercise, often referred to as cardio. Now, although most people think of long jogs, bike rides, or the Stairmaster, this type of exercise is not all that effective. Indeed, high intensity interval exercise, in which you work really hard for 20-90 seconds, rest, work hard again, rest again, has been shown to be the most effective form of conditioning work.

Here are two videos demonstrating one of my favourite forms of conditioning exercise, interval circuits.

Circuit #1

Circuit #2

Circuit #3

Although in these videos our model Amanda is doing 10s of work and 10s of rest, this is only for illustrative purposes. Typically, she does 30 seconds of work and then takes 30 seconds of rest for the first and last circuits. And she does 40 seconds of work and then takes 40 seconds of rest for the second circuit. She’ll also do between 6 and 12 rounds, depending on work:rest time.

So the workout might look like this:

Tire flip – 40s
Rest – 40s
Ball toss – 40s
Rest – 40s
Ball smash – 40s
Rest – 40s
KB swing – 40s
Rest – 40s
Ring pull ups – 40s
Rest – 40s

That’s 1 round and takes about 6 minutes or so. She’d repeat this about 6 times, for a 36 minute workout.

Here’s another awesome form of conditioning work: 20:10 sprints.

20:10 treadmill sprints

  1. First, Amanda does a 5 minute warm up.
  2. Next, she sets her treadmill at an incline of 15% and a speed of 8 mph.
  3. Then she runs for 20 seconds.
  4. Next, she recovers for 10 seconds (jumping off while the treadmill is still going along).
  5. Again, 20 seconds of running.
  6. And 10 seconds of recovery.

She typically continues this for 5 total minutes.  Then, she takes a 5 minute rest. And does it all over again. In total, it’s a 15-minute workout. And believe it or not, this workout is way more effective at burning fat and improving her conditioning than 45-60 minutes of walking or jogging!

Thus, my recommendation: in addition to the 3 weight training workouts per week, add in 1 circuit workout and 1 sprint workout, at least at first. Eventually, if she’s interested in getting really lean, she can add more. But for now, this should get it done.

Other exercise

You probably think of your exercise time in terms of single workouts, e.g. “60 minutes three times per week”. I encourage you to think of it in terms of total time per week.

Research I’ve done in conjunction with the University of Wyoming has demonstrated that 5 hours per week is the magic number. Anything less fails to produce results while 5 hours or more of exercise produces great results.

So far, we’ve compiled about 3 and ¼ hours of exercise with the three 45 min weight training sessions, one 45 min circuit session, and one 15 min sprint session. To reach the 5 hour threshold, and to help your lady recover from this high intensity work, have her finish her week with some very low intensity cardio work: Walk around the block.  Go for a bike ride. That’s the sort of stuff I mean. Lower intensity yoga counts too. 30 minutes 3x per week should do the trick.

The total program might look something like this:

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

Day 5

Day 6

Day 7

Weights
45 min

Walk
30 min

Circuits
45 min

Rest

Weights
45 min

Walk 30 min

Sprint
15 min

Weights 45 min

Walk 30 min

Rest

Nutrition

Just as exercise is medicine, so is food. And just as it’s possible to dig your grave with your own knife and fork, it’s also possible to prevent and treat disease as well as improve your body with your utensils.

Unfortunately, most people are never very honest about what their knives and forks are doing. In fact, a speak no evil, see no evil, hear no evil approach is usually taken. If I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard one of these lines, I’d be a very wealthy guy.

“I eat really well…”

But…

“…I’m still 20lbs overweight.”

“My diet is perfect…”

But…

“…I often feel sluggish and my energy is low.”

“I make good nutritional choices…”

But…

“…I’ve got high blood pressure, cholesterol, and type II diabetes.”

Obviously these are all lies. If you ate really well, your diet was perfect, or you made good nutritional choices, these would not be problems. So, the best way for your lady to get started in improving her diet is to follow these five rules:

1. Eat about 4 – 5x a day and don’t wait so long between meals.

Research has demonstrated that those people who eat more frequently tend to have better blood sugar control, lower stress hormone production, lower body fat, and more lean muscle. But their food has to be the right stuff.

2. Include lean, complete protein at every meal and snack.

The ideal amount of protein per day for an exercising individual is 1 gram per pound of body weight. For a 140 lb woman, that’d be 140 g of protein. To make this easier, every time your woman snacks or eats a meal, she should include some protein.

3. Include veggies at every meal and snack.

The ideal amount of veggies each day is about 8 servings. Now, the every meal thing isn’t necessary. But it’s quite tough to get all these servings if you don’t include some cooked, raw, juiced, or blended veggies with each meal.

4. Include a variety of healthy fats.

Our food supply today contains a fat balance that’s out of whack. To get our fat intake back to where it should be, we need to include things like olive oil, avocados, flax oil, fish oil, raw nuts, etc. each day.

5. Consume carbohydrate-rich foods only after exercise.

Carbs aren’t the enemy. But they should be controlled — especially for women — since it’s easy to over eat them. The best strategy to control carbs is to eat mostly whole grain carbohydrates (like amaranth, quinoa, whole grain oats, etc.) and to save them until after exercise. Since exercise increases our body’s ability to effectively utilize carbohydrates, the ideal time to eat some whole grains is within the first few hours post exercise.

These “rules” are a great start. But they won’t get the job done alone. In fact, there are two other secrets to helping your woman build a great physique.

Other Food Ideas

The first is a lesson we can take from the Okinawans, called hara hachi bu. In Okinawa, heart disease and stroke rates are lower than in North America. So are cholesterol, homocysteine, and blood pressure measures. Rates of cancer are lower — especially breast, colon, ovarian and prostate cancer. Hip fractures are lower and dementia is rare. Plus the Okinawans tend to live longer.

What’s their secret? Hara hachi bu. Roughly translated this means eating only until you’re 80% full. And no more. Now, this isn’t a dietary suggestion. Rather, it’s part of their culture. Anyone who stuffs themselves is considered a glutton. In the end, many experts believe that this cultural practice, in conjunction with the Okinawan diet rich in fruits and veggies, fish, and legumes is the secret of their success.

The other thing that’ll help your lady look her best? Making sure that your portion sizes don’t impact hers. Here’s something few guys think of: If you and your woman live together and dine together, chances are she automatically overeats simply because you two are chowing together.

Think about dinners out. You’re served the same portions. Yet you’re likely not the same size. Do you really think that your lady needs to eat the same amount as you? Only if she wants to weigh the same as you, I guess. And the same goes for meals at home. I bet you serve meals on the same size plate for both of you. That’s another recipe for overeating.

To help prevent your portions from influencing hers, there are a few strategies you should adopt immediately.

First, when at restaurants, ask if they’ll accommodate small potion sizes. You get the normal size, she gets the smaller one. And if that doesn’t work, here’s something my lady does. She orders what she wants. Then she tells the server to split it into two, boxing up one half for later. This way she gets two meals for the price of one.

Next, at home, make sure you have two different size plates: One large one for you. And one small one for her. Then you can fill both plates, neither looks sad and empty, and each of you eats an appropriate portion.

Supplements

Many experts suggest that supplements aren’t necessary when the diet is complete. Unfortunately in North America, the diet is pretty much never complete. Can you believe that 68% of the population is deficient in calcium, 90% in chromium, 75% in magnesium, 80% in vitamin B6, and 95% in omega-3 fats?

In fact, in a recent study, even athlete diets didn’t measure up. In this project, the diets of 70 athletes were analyzed for vitamin and mineral intake and not a single one met the recommended daily amount. All of them were deficient in between 3 and 15 nutrients.

Beyond this, other research has shown the following:

  • Less than 3% of men and 5% of women get the minimum number of fruits and veggies per day (3-5 servings).
  • On average, women get only 80 g of protein per day (when their needs are closer to 120-140 g) and men get only 120 g of protein per day (when their needs are closer to 170-190 g).

I’m definitely not one to heavily promote nutritional supplements. However, with the deficiencies above, folks have to either improve their food intake tremendously or they have to start supplementing their diets with things like:

1. Protein supplements (link to our supplement page): 1-2 scoops a day works well for women

2. Fish oil supplements (link to our supplement page): 4-6 capsules a day is typical for my female clients

3. A good, broad spectrum multi-vitamin (link to our supplement page): 1-3 capsules depending on the potency

Also, for women, I recommend the following

4. Branched chain amino acids (link to our supplement page):I prefer my female clients sip a BCAA drink during exercise to help promote high performance and more complete recovery.

5. Sleep enhancement: Although this isn’t a requirement, I find that many women who start training hard have a hard time falling asleep and/or sleeping through the night. Phosphatidylserine help quite a bit depending on the circumstances.

These are some of my top strategies for helping you get your woman into awesome shape. Trust me, these strategies work fantastically if they’re consistently applied.

However, don’t be one of those a-hole boyfriends or husbands that’s chronically pestering your partner to make unwanted lifestyle changes. Only introduce these if she’s actually interested in making a change.

And for more on the nutrition and supplement side of things,  PN V3 has everything you need to know.  You can get yourself a copy, at a special discounted price, right here:

Precision Nutrition V3

Categories: Advanced Diet and Sports Nutrition Blog, Newsletters

Calculating Maximum/Maximal Heart Rate

How Effective Is Your Exercise and Workout?

by Carrie Harper,ACE Certified Personal Trainer

Our time is precious. The amount of time we spend exercising is directly proportional to the time we have for everything else. Add a full time job or two and a family, and gym time becomes crunch time. So, how do we know for sure that our body is being as efficient as we would like in that time frame? Whether our goals are increased fitness or weight management, we would like to know that we are not wasting time and that we are actually making headway toward those goals.

First, let’s crunch some numbers. There are several means of calculating a maximal heart rate. The most common equation is the Karvonen equation: 220-age=maximal heart rate. That is a rough estimate, with most people falling plus or minus 12 beats to that. Some are now using 210-(.5)age. That may be closer for some. And for exercisers that are older, 65 and up, use 226-age.

In today’s age of fitness, these estimates can be far from accurate because we are all so different in our level of fitness. For example, professional athletes will have a very low resting heart rate, which affects their numbers, and many young people have high resting heart rates due to inactivity and body weight, which greatly affects their numbers.

Your trainer or physical therapist can also do a maximal heart rate test for you for a better estimate. If you want to know how healthy your heart is, take your own resting heart rate when you first wake up in the morning. Wake up without an alarm clock, stay still for a few minutes, and then count your pulse for one minute. That is your approximate resting heart rate. Look at this number in comparison to your maximal heart rate. If your RHR (resting heart rate) is 75-85% lower than your MHR, you most likely have a fit and fabulous heart. 45-55% would be a tender and tired heart. If this is your level of fitness, please see a doctor before starting an exercise regimen. Anywhere in between (55-75%) would be an average heart.

Now, to determine where your heart rate should be when you are exercising, you can approximate by using the 220-age formula and multiplying it by .75-.85. That is a good average working rate for the average heart. For a more specific zone, determine your Heart Rate Reserve (HRR)= MHR-RHR.

Then, to find your parameters:

HRRx.55+RHR=low end

HRRx.65+RHR=high end

Now, many people ask how to determine how many calories that would be. Unfortunately, there is no way for the average exerciser to know. Everyone burns calories differently and everyone’s metabolic rate is different. Some hospitals have a breath and heart rate monitor that can determine the actual calories burned, but the average fitness center does not have such equipment. The cardio machine at the gym that estimates how many calories you are burning is a very, very rough estimate and may be no where close to actuality.

For most people, instead of the numbers swimming through the mind the whole time they are exercising, I would use a RPE test. RPE is the rate of perceived exertion. On a scale from 1-10, how are you feeling? Are you working your absolute hardest (10) or are you just now waking up (1)? An exerciser can not stay at a 10 for very long, so please don’t try! The upper RPEs are reserved to increase our stamina, not for calorie burning. In fact, this is the anaerobic threshold, where the body is no longer burning but conserving calories. In a solid cardio workout, where the heart rate stays evenly elevated for 20-90 minutes, the RPE should be around a 6 throughout. In an interval workout, alternate between a 3-4 and a 7-8 for the workout. This type of workout will increase stamina, strengthen the heart, challenge the muscles involved, and burn more calories. However, the constant cardio workout is important as well. In an average regimen, make sure both of these types of cardio activity are used.

Carrie Harper
ACE Certified Personal Trainer
ACE Certified Weight Management Consultant
Carriefit.com

Carrie Harper is a long time PEERtrainer member. She has been helping people with health and fitness goals since 1994, where she started teaching group exercise at The Florida State University. She is certified in personal training and in weight management consulting through the American Council on Exercise. Carrie is also a full time elementary music teacher and a full time mom. She still enjoys teaching group exercise at Family Fitness in Lake Jackson, Texas, where she works with individuals and groups with their fitness, health, and weight loss goals. Carrie also works with students and is passionate about ending the obesity crisis in today’s youth. She also tackles women’s health issues, including training for women with diastasis recti, or training after childbirth.