High-intensity interval training

5 Popular Fitness Trends in 2018

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In November, the American College of Sports Medicine released the results of a worldwide survey projecting the most popular fitness trends for 2018.

Whether you’re looking to get reacquainted with consistent exercise, hoping to spice up your current routine, or searching for workouts that are fast and effective, these forecasted trends offer a little something for everyone. Plus, many of these workouts can be done in the comfort of your home with very little equipment. From a list of 16, here are my top five picks for convenience, affordability, and accessibility.

1. High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT)

If you haven’t tried a HIIT session before, this time-saving, full-body workout might surprise you. Generally, classes last around 30 minutes, but they could be longer or shorter depending on the repertoire of exercises. HIIT incorporates short spurts of high-intensity training followed by a brief time of rest or recovery. You can find HIIT classes in just about every gym and online. When doing the exercises, concentrate on your posture and form. Because HIIT can be very fast-paced and intense, you want to minimize your risk of injuries.

2. Wearable Technology

Whether you wear a Fitbit or keep your phone in your pocket, counting your steps can help you track how much mileage you’re logging each day. As a bonus, you can monitor your heart rate and time spent sleeping, so you can make sure you’re not just working hard, but getting adequate rest as well.

3. Yoga

Every year, there seems to be something new in the world of yoga, from pool yoga, aerial yoga, and yogalates, to more traditional forms like Hatha, Vinyasa, and Kundalini. Yoga’s staying power lies in its variety, and its ability to challenge both the mind and the body. Since it’s available at nearly every gym and online, this fitness favorite won’t be going away anytime soon.

4. Functional Fitness

The study defines functional fitness as, “using strength training to improve balance, coordination, force, power, and endurance to enhance someone’s ability to perform activities of daily living.” In other words, this type of exercise trains your muscles to work more efficiently in your everyday life, which is why it’s a leading form of exercise around the world. Functional fitness may incorporate props like medicine balls, kettlebells, or your own body weight. Additionally, you can complete a functional fitness session in your home, gym, or class setting. Who doesn’t like the sound of strengthening your body to make your daily activities a little easier?

5. Outdoor Activities

If the sound of going to a gym or working out at home has you feeling a little confined, you’re in luck! Outdoor, sporting activities make the list of next year’s fitness trends. Whether you’re into hiking, biking, cross-country skiing, or something else entirely, outdoor activities allow you to enjoy and interact with your natural surroundings. Best of all, they can be done alone or as a group — whatever motivates you to engage in an active lifestyle!

What fitness trends or activities are you looking forward to doing in 2018?

Here’s What You Need To Know About Feeling Nauseated After Your Workout

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Unfortunately, exercise-induced nausea is a real thing—here’s why (and how to deal).
nauseated-during-workout_feature

In this age of tough bootcamp workouts and high-intensity interval training, feeling like you want to hurl has become an increasingly common aspect of a serious sweat session. If you ever (or often) find yourself dealing with queasiness as the result of a challenging workout, know this: You’re not alone; exercise-induced nausea is a real thing—and it can really get in the way of the post-sweat pride you should be feeling.

There are a few reasons for that puke-y feeling towards the end of or after a difficult workout. Here’s what you need to know about feeling sick (or even vomiting) after you sweat—and how to know if you might need to back off a bit for your body’s sake.

When you get your blood pumping during a hard workout, your digestive tract gets the short shrift.

“Because of the intensity [of a hard workout] and the significant workload, blood is distributed to the muscles to promote nutrient and oxygen transport. Unfortunately, this leaves little blood left to circulate to the stomach and intestines, and as a result oftentimes triggers a nausea or vomiting response,” exercise physiologist Dr. Joel Seedman, Ph.D., an athletic performance specialist and owner of Advanced Human Performance in Atlanta, Georgia, tells SELF.

Basically, your gastrointestinal system isn’t getting adequate support when your body is moving blood to where it’s needed most. Some workouts are worse than others when it comes to commanding tons of blood flow—for example, leg daycan leave you more prone to nausea. “This is due to the size of the muscles as well as the overall volume of work that the legs are capable of handling.”

“In addition, intense full-body workouts can further exaggerate this response, as every muscle in the body will be competing for blood flow,” he says. To counteract this affect, Seedman suggests balancing out a full-body workout by only focusing on intensity for one area. If you’re doing a crazy-hard upper-body workout, take it easy on your lower body that day.

Working out at a higher intensity than you’re used to can make you feel ill.

While it’s great to challenge yourself in the gym, if you choose a workout that you’re not conditioned enough for, you could be setting yourself up for sickness. This is because your body isn’t able to handle the metabolite accumulation that happens when you push extra hard.

Seedman explains, “The harder your muscles work, the more oxygen they need, but after certain point your body is unable to match the oxygen demand with the intensity of the exercise, so you begin to build up metabolic wastes in your body such as hydrogen ions, carbon dioxide, and lactic acid.” This is also what causes that burning feeling in your muscles during a workout. “This buildup can also create a toxic environment and increase the acidity of your body, which can cause an individual to experience a temporary state of nausea and sickness,” he says.

You can experience this no matter what your fitness level is, but you’re more likely to be affected when your body isn’t used to the work you’re putting it through. If you find yourself feeling nauseated after a workout often, try scaling back your workout intensity. Consistently feeling nauseous after a workout can be a sign that you’re overdoing it. “Even for metabolic conditioning purposes, the goal is to provide an intense stimulus without destroying the body in the process,” says Seedman. You can also take longer rest periods in between exercises.

The good news, though? Once the exercise is complete, these metabolites start to clear out of your body, so that sick feeling fades away.

What (and when) you eat before exercise also plays a role.

Going into a workout hydrated and fueled is important, but you can have too much of a good thing. “Having an excess of food and liquids in the stomach before workouts can trigger exercise-induced nausea simply because there won’t be adequate blood circulating in the stomach to promote optimal digestion,” says Seedman.

To avoid that sluggish, ate-too-much, gonna-vom feeling during a workout, Seedman suggests planning your workout about one-and-a-half to three hours after a regular meal. Also, even though healthy fats are hailed for their ability to keep you full for longer, that’s not a great thing when you’re getting ready for a tough workout. “Minimize high-fat foods in the meal leading up to an intense workout, because fats sit longer in the stomach and take more time to digest,” he says. Focus on protein and carbs instead, which will fuel your workout.

If you can’t plan your workout around a meal, you can have a small pre-workout snack—just try not to eat within an hour of starting your workout if you’re nausea prone, Seedman says. (Here are five balanced snacks to try.) And try not to chug water immediately before a workout—focus on sipping consistently. Slow and steady wins the race, and in this case, literally.

There are a few other things you can do to minimize exercise-induced nausea once it’s set in.

And all hope’s not lost if you’re already feeling a little sick. “Walking around at a slow to moderate pace after training is one of the best things you can do to keep exercise-induced nausea to a minimum, even if it has already set in,” says Seedman. You can also try laying down with your feet higher than your stomach, which helps redirect blood back to your heart and digestive system, he says.

And even though sports drinks aren’t that necessary most of the time, they can be a great recovery drink if you feel ill. “Fluids with quick-digesting carbohydrates cause quicker fluid delivery and further assist in gastric emptying, which can help alleviate and prevent nausea symptoms,” says Seedman. Gatorade, anyone?

At the end of the day, exercise-induced nausea is unpleasant, but it’s probably not going to hurt you. “If it’s a mild to moderate response immediately following training, it’s most likely nothing to be concerned with, particularly if it subsides within 60 minutes.” If it happens all the time or continues to linger, he says, you might want to get checked out by a doctor to make sure there’s nothing else going on, because the last thing you want is for your fitness grind to be derailed by feeling sick every single time.

Mom of 3 Dies After Finishing Pennsylvania HalfMarathon

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In a tragic turn of events at what was supposed to be an exciting sports competition, a young mother collapsed and died after running a half-marathon in Pennsylvania. According to Fox News, an autopsy is pending.

From improved insulin sensitivity to better aerobic ability and fat-burning capabilities, running is a fitness sport that’s normally healthy. In fact, runners have a significantly reduced risk of death from all causes and from cardiovascular events compared to non-runners, so it’s especially tragic when something like this woman’s death happens in connection with this sport.

And while news reports said she had been training for the event, it’s important to note that too much of a good thing sometimes can actually damage your heart — especially when you’re engaged in prolonged exercise such as high-endurance training, which puts extraordinary stress on your heart. The fact is vigorous exercise performed during a marathon raises your cardiac risk seven-fold!

Of course we won’t know whether something like this is what triggered this woman’s death until autopsy reports come back, but in the meantime, if you’re interested in beginning a vigorous exercise program, why not try short, intense workouts called high-intensity interval training (HIIT)? These quick workouts — as in seven minutes or less — can yield greater fitness benefits in less time compared to longer, low- or moderate-intensity workouts.

They also can be varied and intensified as you grow stronger. The good thing about HIIT is that you can tweak it to your needs, from working out at a slightly lower intensity to a level of intensity that best fits you.

Source:mercola.com

High-Intensity Interval Training Could Be Your Best Bet for Keeping Your Cells Young

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Recharge your cells.

 

High-intensity interval training (HIIT), where short bursts of activity are mixed with rest periods, is your best pick when it comes to using exercise to combat the cellular signs of ageing, according to new research.

In the study, HIIT beat weight training for boosting your cells’ mitochondrialactivity – the chemical reactions that release energy and fuels cell growth. This activity usually declines with age, but HIIT was shown to actually reverse it in some cases.

 That could help us understand more about limiting disabilities and diseases such as diabetes as people get older, say researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, even if it can’t help you live forever just yet.

And although the study only involved a relatively small sample size of 72 volunteers, the team says the results are impressive enough to be significant.

“These things we are seeing cannot be done by any medicine,” says one of the researchers, Sreekumaran Nair.

“Based on everything we know, there’s no substitute for these exercise programs when it comes to delaying the ageing process.”

Researchers enlisted the help of 36 men and 36 women split across two age groups; a ‘young’ group aged 18 to 30, and an ‘old’ group aged 65 to 80.

These volunteers were put into three mixed-age groups: one group did high-intensity interval training on bikes; one group did weight training; and one group did a combination of the two, for a period of 12 weeks.

 The HIIT program involved three days a week of cycling, with high-intensity spells of pedalling split up by less intensive periods, plus two days a week of treadmill work.

Muscle cell make-up, muscle mass, and insulin sensitivity were then analysed and compared with a control group that did no exercise at all.

At the molecular level, HIIT produced the biggest benefits, with the younger participants on HIIT showing a 49 percent increase in mitochondrial capacity, and the older participants on HIIT reaching a 69 increase on average.

The cells of the older volunteers started generating energy at a rate comparable to cells from much younger bodies, in other words.

Mitochondria act like energy factories for our cells, converting glucose into power for our bodies at the lowest levels, but as we get older this process starts to slow down. That leads to the cell damage and dysfunction we associate with ageing.

While scientists still don’t fully understand how this all works, kickstarting more mitochondrial activity through exercise could be one way of keeping many of the signs of ageing at bay.

And while it’s been well-established that exercise is good for the body, scientists are still figuring out the changes it makes at the molecular level.

What’s more, the researchers say the regeneration of muscle protein seen in this study could also be replicated in the heart and brain, two other areas of the body where cells wear out more easily as we get older.

HIIT improved insulin sensitivity levels too, which reduces the risk of diabetes, though it wasn’t as effective as weight training at building up muscle mass. As you might expect, any kind of exercise was shown to be better than doing nothing at all.

“If people have to pick one exercise, I would recommend high-intensity interval training, but I think it would be more beneficial if they could do three to four days of interval training and then a couple days of strength training,” says Nair.

Weekend Exercise Alone Has Significant Health Benefits

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The BBC reports that exercising on weekends alone can provide significant health benefits. This is further evidence of the benefits of exercise and the damage wrought by increasingly sedentary lifestyles.

Weekend exercise is a great starting point and the goal should be to make it a lifelong practice. Consistent exercisers have made exercise a habit triggered by a cue, such as hearing the morning alarm and heading for the gym first thing in the morning. This kind of habit is referred to as “an instigation habit,” and it’s the only factor able to predict a person’s ability to maintain an exercise regimen over the long-term.

Reframing your thoughts about the rewards of exercise, focusing on the immediate — how you feel right after exercising — rather than long-term rewards, can also make your exercise habit stick. There are plenty of reasons to aspire to this level of conditioning. Those who succeed at maintaining good health into old age typically have one thing in common: a healthy diet and regular exercise as part of their day-to-day lifestyle.

For optimal health and fitness, strive for a varied and well-rounded program that incorporates a wide variety of exercises to avoid hitting a plateau. I recommend high-intensity interval training (HIIT). HIIT involves alternating short bursts of high-intensity exercise with gentle recovery periods, and is central to my Peak Fitness routine.

A final piece of advice is to sit as little as possible. The research is quite clear on this point: The more you sit, the greater the risks to your health. This applies even if you exercise regularly and are very fit. The key is to keep moving all day long.

High-Intensity Interval Training and Intermittent Fasting – A Winning Combo for Fat Reduction and Optimal Fitness

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If you’re still not doing interval training, you’re likely wasting an awful lot of time in the gym. This is one of the most important developments in fitness science that I can think of, as you can reap far greater health benefits in less time.

Interval Training

Story at-a-glance –

  • When combined, high intensity exercise and intermittent fasting can be a winning strategy to bring your fitness to the next level
  • Recent research demonstrates that restricting carbohydrates can help burn calories more efficiently and increase muscle oxidative potential even in highly trained athletes
  • High intensity interval training has also been shown to burn more calories in less time
  • Examining data from participants in the reality TV show “The Biggest Loser,” researchers found that diet alone was responsible for more weight loss than exercise, but only 65 percent of that weight loss was body fat. The remaining 35 percent reduction in total body weight was a reduction in lean muscle mass. Exercise alone resulted in fat loss only, along with a small increase in lean muscle mass

But I’ve recently also started talking about the potential health benefits of intermittent fasting and working out in a fasted state (i.e. skipping breakfast before hitting the gym).

When you exercise while fasting, it essentially forces your body to shed fat, as your body’s fat burning processes are controlled by your sympathetic nervous system (SNS), and your SNS is activated by exercise and lack of food. The combination of fasting and exercising maximizes the impact of cellular factors and catalysts (cyclic AMP and AMP Kinases), which force the breakdown of fat and glycogen for energy.

Evidence is indeed mounting in support of this strategy, and I believe it could be quite beneficial, provided you’ve already made some fundamental lifestyle changes with regards to diet and exercise.

When combined, high-intensity exercise and intermittent fasting could very well be a winning strategy to bring your fitness to the next level.

Keep in mind that fasting, or exercising in a fasted state, would be unwise if you’re still eating a diet full of processed foods, so addressing your diet is absolutely crucial before you venture into any kind of fasting. Also, when undertaking any kind of calorie restriction, such as intermittent fasting or simply skipping breakfast, it’s critical to cut the right calories, namely carbohydrates (those from sugars and grains that is, NOT vegetable carbs).

Carb Restriction May Improve Performance in Elite Athletes

A recent study from the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences1 shows that restricting carbohydrates can help burn calories more efficiently and increase muscle oxidative potential even in highly trained athletes.

Ten elite level cyclists performed one hour of interval training at approximately 64 percent of maximal aerobic capacity with either low or normal muscle glycogen levels, achieved by prior exercise or diet intervention. Muscle biopsies were taken before and three hours after exercise. Results showed that exercising in a glyocogen depleted state increased mitochondrial biogenesis. (Mitochondrial biogenesis is the process by which new mitochondria are formed in your cells.)

According to the authors:

“We conclude that exercise with low glycogen levels amplifies the expression of the major genetic marker for mitochondrial biogenesis in highly trained cyclists. The results suggest that low glycogen exercise may be beneficial for improving muscle oxidative capacity.”

Part of what makes working out in a fasted state so effective is that your body actually has a preservation mechanism that protects your active muscle from wasting itself. So if you don’t have sufficient fuel in your system when you exercise, you’re going to break down other tissues but not the active muscle, i.e. the muscle being exercised.

According to fitness expert Ori Hofmekler, author of The Warrior Diet, you can quite literally re-design your physique using a combination of under-eating and exercise. However this really only works well once you’ve become fat-adapted, meaning your metabolism has become proficient at burning fat. To learn more about this, please see my other recent article on this topic, What Does it Mean to Be Fat-Adapted?

Interval Training Burns More Calories in Less Time

In related news, research presented at the Integrative Biology of Exercise VI meeting2 in Colorado on October 10-13 this year, demonstrated that high-intensity interval training burns more calories in less time – a mere 2.5 minutes, divided into five 30-second sprint intervals at maximum exertion, each followed by four minutes of light pedaling to recuperate, can burn as much as 220 calories. All in all, in less than 25 minutes total, you can burn more calories than you would if you were cycling at a moderate pace for half an hour.

According to lead researcher, exercise physiology graduate student Kyle Sevits:3

“‘You burn a lot of calories in a very short time… Nearly all the calories are burned in those 2.5 minutes; you burn very few during the rest period.’ He also points to additional benefits that come from interval training, including increased insulin sensitivity and glucose tolerance, both of which are important for overall good health.”

High-intensity interval training, which is part of my total Peak Fitness program, has also been shown to produce greater health benefits overall than conventional aerobic training. Back in April, I reported on a study that found doing just three minutes of high-intensity training per week for four weeks, could lead to significant changes in important health indices, including a 24 percent improvement in insulin sensitivity.

Another important benefit of high-intensity interval training is its ability to naturally increase your body’s production of human growth hormone (HGH), also known as “the fitness hormone.” HGH is a synergistic, foundational biochemical underpinning that promotes muscle and effectively burns excessive fat. It also plays an important part in promoting overall health and longevity. This is something you cannot get from conventional, aerobic endurance training.

How to Maximize the Health Benefits of Peak Fitness Training

While it’s theoretically possible to reap valuable results with as little as three minutes (plus rest periods in between spurts) once a week, it would be more beneficial doing them two or three times a week for a total of four minutes of intense exertion per session, especially if you are not doing strength training. You do not need to do high-intensity exercises more often than that however. In fact, doing it more frequently than two or three times a week can be counterproductive, as your body needs to recover between sessions.

Intensity is KEY for reaping all the benefits interval training can offer. To perform it correctly, you’ll want to raise your heart rate to your anaerobic threshold, and to do that, you have to give it your all for those 20 to 30 second intervals. Different studies will use different intervals of exertion and recuperation. For example, in the featured study on elite athletes, bouts of exertion were separated by four-minute rest intervals. They also didn’t “max out” during the exertion phase.

I use and recommend the program developed by Phil Campbell, which will trigger HGH production as you go “all out” during the exertion phase. Here’s a summary of what a typical interval routine might look like using an elliptical:

  • Warm up for three minutes.
  • Exercise as hard and fast as you can for 30 seconds. You should be gasping for breath and feel like you couldn’t possibly go on another few seconds. It is better to use lower resistance and higher repetitions to increase your heart rate.
  • Recover for 90 seconds, still moving, but at slower pace and decreased resistance.
  • Repeat the high-intensity exercise and recovery 7 more times.

When you’re first starting out, depending on your level of fitness, you may only be able to do two or three repetitions of the high-intensity intervals. As you get fitter, just keep adding repetitions until you’re doing eight during your 20-minute session. Once you regularly incorporate these 20-minute exercises about twice a week, most people notice the following benefits:

✓ Decrease in body fat ✓ Improved muscle tone
✓ Improved athletic speed and performance ✓ Ability to achieve your fitness goals much faster
✓ Increase in energy and sexual desire ✓ Firmer skin and reduced wrinkles

Exercise is Key for Reducing Body Fat While Preserving Your Muscle

I’ve frequently stated that 80 percent of the health benefits you reap from a healthy lifestyle come from your diet, and the remaining 20 percent from exercise. However, it’s important to realize that there is a profound synergy between the two, as yet another recent study demonstrates.

The researchers examined data from 11 participants in the reality TV show “The Biggest Loser.” Total body fat, total energy expenditure, and resting metabolic rate were measured three times: at the start of the program, six weeks into the program, and at week 30, which was at least four months after participants returned home. Using a mathematical computer model of human metabolism, the researchers calculated the impact of the diet and exercise changes resulting in weight loss, to evaluate the relative contributions of each.

Interestingly, while diet alone was calculated to be responsible for more weight loss overall than exercise, only 65 percent of that weight loss was body fat. The remaining 35 percent reduction in total body weight was a reduction in lean muscle mass. Exercise alone resulted in fat loss only, along with a small increase in lean muscle mass. According to the National Institutes of Health press release:4

“The simulations also suggest that the participants could sustain their weight loss and avoid weight regain by adopting more moderate lifestyle changes – like 20 minutes of daily vigorous exercise and a 20 percent calorie restriction – than those demonstrated on the television program.”

Tips for Fasting and Exercising Safely: A Post-Workout Recovery Meal is Crucial

An effective exercise program that incorporates high-intensity interval training combined with intermittent fasting can help counteract muscle aging and wasting, and boost fat-burning. If at any point you don’t have enough energy or don’t feel good, then it is likely time to shift your experiment and reduce the hours of fasting. Intermittent fasting should make you feel better, and if it doesn’t then it is best to reevaluate your strategy.

Make sure to keep the following two points in mind:

1. Timing of meals: Intermittent fasting is not extreme calorie restriction. You’re not supposed to starve yourself. Rather it’s simply a matter of timing your meals properly by abstaining from food during much of the day, and limiting your eating to a small window later in the evening. If you were to limit eating to say 4-7 pm, you are effectively fasting for 21 hours. Ideally, you’ll want to fast for at least 12-18 hours.

If you can’t abstain from food entirely during the day, limit it to small servings of light, low-glycemic, mostly raw foods such as fruits, vegetables, whey protein or lightly poached eggs every 4-6 hours. Whatever times you choose, it will be very helpful to avoid having any food or calories for three hours prior to going to bed as this will minimize oxidative damage to your system and give your body a major jumpstart in intermittent fasting.

2. Break your fast with a recovery meal on workout days: On the days that you work out while fasting, you need to consume a recovery meal 30 minutes after your workout. Fast-assimilating whey protein is ideal. Then fast again until you eat your main meal at night. It’s very important that you eat an appropriate recovery meal after your workout session, as this will prevent brain and muscle damage from occurring, so do NOT skip this meal.

If the thought of fasting for 12-18 hours is too much, you can get many of the same benefits of fasting and exercise by simply skipping breakfast and exercising first thing in the morning when your stomach is empty. This is because eating a full meal, particularly carbohydrates, before your workout will inhibit your sympathetic nervous system and reduce the fat burning effect of your exercise. Instead, eating lots of carbs activates your parasympathetic nervous system, (which promotes energy storage – the complete opposite of what you’re aiming for).

Complete Guide To HIIT: Everything You Need To Know About High-Intensity Interval Training

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First, what exactly is HIIT? Generally, it combines two of the most effective fat-burning methods: maximum effort to achieve muscle fatigue and maximum oxygen use in a quick burst of exercise. A term that commonly gets thrown around when discussing HIIT is VO2 MAX — the largest amount of oxygen our bodies consume during exercise. Getting our bodies as close to VO2 MAX as possible triggers the afterburn effect, meaning the body continues to consume O2 hours after we’re done working out.

HIIT programs are not all the same. They tend to have different lengths of time for both high- and low-intensity training intervals, different ratios of high- to low-intensity levels, and different levels of intensity during lower-intensity intervals. There are three leading HIIT programs: the Tabata Method, the Little Method, and Turbulence Training. Before you start any HIIT program, find out which one is best for you based on your skill level and the amount of time you can spend on exercise.

 

http://visual.ly/track.php?q=http://visual.ly/high-intensity-training&slug=high-intensity-trainingHigh Intensity Training

 

Vigorous Exercise May Significantly Lower Your Stroke Risk.

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Story at-a-glance

  • A new study shows that vigorously exercising at least four times per week can reduce your risk of a stroke, especially if you’re a man; the results are unclear if you’re a woman
  • This study (and some prior studies) seem to suggest that women may respond better to less vigorous exercise, such as walking, although most studies don’t take into account that all forms of cardio are not equal
  • Vigorous exercise is important for overall health, but conventional cardio is risky due to the extreme stress on your heart, which may cause inflammation, plaque, arrhythmias, and even heart attack or stroke
  • Regardless of your gender or age, you can optimize your exercise benefits by doing high-intensity interval training, which pushes your body hard enough for a challenge while allowing adequate time for recovery and repair
  • You can further reduce your stroke risk by getting adequate sunshine for the vitamin D and nitric oxide benefits, grounding yourself to the earth, and consuming adequate fiber, especially the soluble variety.
  • Vigorous Exercise

Exercise is one of the best ways to keep yourself healthy. The benefits of exercise for lowering your heart attack risk, reducing stress, and helping to prevent obesity and diabetes are widely known.

Well, now you can add another big one to your list of benefits from breaking a sweat: reduced risk of stroke.

The American Heart Association reports 800,000 Americans suffer from stroke each year. Stroke is the leading cause of disability in the US and the fourth leading cause of death. Up to 80 percent of strokes are preventable, because for the most part, strokes are the result of unhealthy lifestyle choices.

Recent research published in the journal Stroke1 found that, if you’re inactive, you have a 20 percent higher risk for having a stroke or mini-stroke (transient ischemic attack) than people who exercise enough to break a sweat at least four times a week.

The study involved more than 27,000 Americans for an average of 5.7 years, male and female, Caucasian and African-American. It included a larger proportion of people from the “Stroke Belt” states, where stroke rates are higher (Virginia, Tennessee, the Carolinas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, Florida, Arkansas, and Alabama).

The connection between vigorous exercise and stroke risk was very clear in men, but interestingly, less clear in women. Lead researcher Dr. Michelle McDonnell speculates that women may benefit more from less vigorous exercise, such as walking, which this study did not examine.2

Stroke Rates Increasing Among Younger People

Your risk of stroke increases with age, with most occurring after age 55. However, younger people are increasingly at risk, according to the latest statistics.

The rate of strokes among younger people (under age 55) nearly doubled between 1993 and 2005.3 The primary driving forces behind this are increasing rates of obesity, diabetes and high blood pressure—which can all increase your risk for suffering a devastating stroke.

Stress is also a significant risk factor for stroke, just as it is for heart attack. According to a 2008 study in Neurology,4 the more stressed you are, the greater your stroke risk—especially a fatal one. Heart attacks and stroke have many other risk factors in common, including:

A Stroke Is a ‘Heart Attack in Your Brain’

Heart attacks and strokes are both events in which cells die from lack of oxygen. With a heart attack, your heart is the affected organ, but with a stroke, it’s your brain.

A stroke involves either a rupture of an artery that feeds your brain (hemorrhagic stroke), or an obstruction of blood flow (ischemic stroke), with the ischemic type representing 75 percent of all strokes. In both types, your brain does not get enough oxygen and glucose, in addition to pooled blood putting physical pressure on areas of your brain.

And then there are mini-strokes, or TIAs (transient ischemic attacks). Each year, as many as 500,000 Americans experience TIAs, caused by temporary blockages in cerebral blood vessels, with symptoms similar to those of a stroke but oftentimes milder and shorter in duration.

Although less imminently dangerous than a full stroke, they should NOT be ignored. According to an article by Loyola University Medical Center’s journal,Expert Review of Neurotherapeutics, 10 to 15 percent of people experiencing TIAs will experience a full-blown stroke within three months, and 40 percent of those will occur in the first 24 hours.5 Stroke victims experience a variety of sudden symptoms, the most common being those listed in the table that follows.

Weakness, numbness, or paralysis in one arm or leg Sudden speech difficulties
Loss of coordination or trouble walking Confusion, memory loss or other sudden cognitive deficit
One-sided facial paralysis or facial droop Sudden visual problems
Sudden severe headache Dizziness

If you or someone you love suffers a stroke, getting medical help quickly can mean the different between life and death, or permanent disability. This is an area where conventional medicine excels, as there are emergency medications that can dissolve a blood clot that is blocking blood flow to your brain. If done quickly enough, emergency medicine can prevent or reverse permanent neurological damage—but you typically need treatment within one hour, which means the faster you recognize the warning signs, the better the prognosis. The National Stroke Association recommends using the FAST acronym to help remember the warning signs of stroke:6

F = FACE: Ask the person to smile. Does one side of the face droop?

A = ARMS: Ask the person to raise both arms. Does one arm drift downward?

S = SPEECH: Ask the person to repeat a simple phrase. Does their speech sound slurred or strange?

T = TIME: If you observe any of these signs, call 9-1-1 immediately.

Exercise Reduces Stroke Risk—But ONLY the Right Kind of Exercise

There have been a number of scientific studies about the benefits of exercise in stroke prevention, and recovery from stroke. Differences between men and women, in terms of the type of exercise that is best, have appeared in more than one study to date. The thing to keep in mind is, not only is it important to get enough exercise, but you must be doing thecorrect kind of exercise if you want to reap the benefits, which I’ll be discussing in more detail shortly. Further research is definitely needed in order to clarify how much and what type of exercise is best for men and women, in terms of preventing stroke.

  • ·A 2013 study published in Stroke7 concluded that walking at least three hours per week reduces stroke risk in womenbetter than inactivity, but also better than high intensity cardio. This may have something to do with the inordinate amount of physical stress “conventional cardio” has on the heart, and the fact that people generally do too much of it for too long. Perhaps women are more susceptible to these risks than men.

Conventional cardio can cause arrhythmias, and in some cases, atrial fibrillation (A-fib), which is a known risk factor for stroke. It would be of value to study the effects of high-intensity interval training (HIIT) on stroke risk in both men and women, which is very different than conventional cardio. But unfortunately, when cardio has been studied, it’s usually the conventional type.

  • ·In 2009, a study in Neurology8 found that vigorous exercise reduces stroke risk in men, as well as helping them recover from a stroke better and faster. However, moderate to heavy exercise was not found to have a protective effect for women. I would expect the right type of cardio would be found to lower stroke risk in both men and women, but those studies have not yet been done.
  • ·In 2012, Canadian researchers found that stroke patients who exercised were able to improve problems with their memory, thinking, language and judgment by close to 50 percent in just six months. Notable improvements in attention, concentration, planning and organizing, as well as benefits to muscle strength and walking, were seen among stroke patients who exercised.
  • ·In 2008, a study published in Neurology9 found that people who are physically active before a stroke have less severe problems and recover better, compared to those who didn’t exercise prior to their stroke.

Several recent scientific studies indicate that conventional cardio, especially endurance exercises such as marathon and triathlon training, pose significant risks to your heart, some of which may be irreversible and life threatening. Long-distance running can lead to acute volume overload, inflammation, thickening and stiffening of the heart muscle and arteries, arterial calcification, arrhythmias, and potentially sudden cardiac arrest and stroke.

I don’t think anyone can argue against the fact that vigorous exercise is beneficial to your heart and brain, but conventional cardio is just not the way to do it. This could be why the cardio benefits to women are not being detected in these studies… but that’s just a theory.

Ideally, to get the most benefits from your exercise, you need to push your body hard enough for a challenge while allowing adequate time for recovery and repair to take place. One of the best ways to accomplish this is with HIIT, or high intensity interval training, which consists of short bursts of high-intensity exercise, as opposed to extended episodes of exertion. This is a core part of my Peak Fitness program, which Phil Campbell was instrumental in helping me develop. Briefly, a Peak Fitness routine typically includes:

  • ·Warm up for three minutes
  • ·Exercise as hard and fast as you can for 30 seconds. You should feel like you couldn’t possibly go on another few seconds
  • ·Recover for 90 seconds
  • ·Repeat the high intensity exercise and recovery cycle 7 more times

You can do HIIT by running/sprinting (if you love running), or by using gym equipment such as a treadmill or elliptical machine, or you can accomplish the same thing without running at all by doing super-slow weight training, as I demonstrate in the video above. HIIT maximizes your secretion of human growth hormone (HGH), optimizes your metabolism and helps regulate your insulin and blood sugar. And it takes far less time than training for a marathon! You can do a complete Peak Fitness workout in 20 minutes or less.

The Importance of Recovery

Remember, adequate recovery is crucial between workouts. This includes not only resting your body, but also giving it the nutrients it needs for complete recovery. Your post-workout meal can support or impair your recovery. For instance, consuming a fast-assimilating protein such as high-quality whey protein within 30 minutes of your workout will essentially “rescue” your muscles out of their catabolic state and supply them with the nutrients they need to make their repairs. Any sort of intense exercise should also be balanced with strength training, proper stretching, core strengthening, stress reduction, good sleep and an optimal nutrition plan. You’ll find much more information about HIIT and other types of exercise in the fitness section of my website.

Three Bonus Tips for Stroke Prevention

Here are three simple tips for further lowering your stroke risk—but by no means is this a comprehensive list. For more information about lifestyle changes specific to preventing stroke, please refer to this recent stroke prevention article.

  1. Sunshine. Sunlight causes your skin to produce nitric oxide, a critical compound for optimizing your blood pressure, which reduces your risk for both heart attack and stroke. Nitric oxide enhances blood flow, promotes blood vessel elasticity, and functions as a signaling molecule in your brain and immune system.

And of course, exposing your skin to the sun also helps optimize your vitamin D level, which should be between 50 and 70ng/ml, or higher if you have a serious illness.

  1. Grounding. Walking barefoot on the Earth, aka “earthing” or “grounding,” has a potent antioxidant effect that helps alleviate inflammation throughout your body. It also makes your blood less prone to “hypercoagulation”—so, less apt to clot—and that reduces your stroke risk.

There is a constant flow of energy between our bodies and the earth. When you put your feet on the ground, you absorb large amounts of negative electrons through the soles of your feet, which reduces the tendency of your blood cells to “clump together.” Technically, grounding increases the zeta potential of your red blood cells causing them to repel each other and become less sticky, very similar to a natural anticoagulant.

Research has demonstrated that it takes about 80 minutes for the free electrons from the earth to reach your blood stream and transform your blood, so make it a point to regularly walk barefoot on grass or on wet sand for about 90 minutes to two hours, if possible.

  1. Fiber. If you eat more fiber, you will probably reduce your chances of a stroke, according to a report in the journalStroke.10 For every seven grams more fiber you consume daily, your stroke risk is decreased by seven percent, according to this study.

Fiber is the non-digestible part of plants, which can be either soluble or non-soluble; soluble fiber was found to lower stroke risk the most. Soluble fiber can also help nurture beneficial gut bacteria, which are critical for good health. The American Heart Association and UK health authorities recommend adults consume 25 grams of dietary fiber each day, but I think you should get upwards of 32 grams per day and most Americans don’t get anywhere near this amount.

Great sources of fiber include seeds (especially chia, psyllium, sunflower, and organic flax), berries, vegetables such as broccoli and cauliflower, root vegetables and tubers (including onions and sweet potatoes), almonds, and beans (legumes).

This Interval Training Infographic Helps You Pick the Right Workout.

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By now you may have heard the good news: exercising at very high intensity interspersed with periods of moderate rest, a program known as high-intensity interval training (HIIT), is one of the best ways to get in shape.

That’s good news because the workouts are considerably shorter than you’re probably used to and involve as little as four minutes of intense activity combined with rest for a total workout of only around 20 minutes.

hiit

Because HIIT is so intense, you should only do it two to three times a week, max, making it a workout that even the most time-crunched individuals can fit in their schedules.

Interval Training 101

If you’re wondering what HIIT is all about, Greatist has summed it up nicely in the interval training infographic that follows.1 From explaining the benefits and why it works to how to perform a variety of different HIIT workouts, this is the place to start if you want to give HIIT a try.

Research Overwhelmingly Supports HIIT

Compelling and ever-mounting research shows that the ideal form of exercise is short bursts of high intensity exercise.

Not only does it beat conventional cardio as the most effective and efficient form of exercise, it also provides health benefits you simply cannot get from regular aerobics, such as a tremendous boost in human growth hormone (HGH), aka the “fitness hormone.”

One study published in the Journal of Obesity2 reported that 12 weeks of HIIT not only can result in significant reductions in total abdominal, trunk, and visceral fat, but also can give you significant increases in fat-free mass and aerobic power.

Other research published in the journal Cell Metabolism3 showed that when healthy but inactive people exercise intensely, even if the exercise is brief, it produces an immediate measurable change in their DNA.

Several of the genes affected by an acute bout of exercise are genes involved in fat metabolism. Specifically, the study suggested that when you exercise your body almost immediately experiences genetic activation that increases the production of fat-busting (lipolytic) enzymes.

Yet another study found that unfit but otherwise healthy middle-aged adults were able to improve their insulin sensitivity and blood sugar regulation after just two weeks of interval training (three sessions per week).4 A follow-up study also found that interval training positively impacted insulin sensitivity. In fact, the study involved people with full-blown type 2 diabetes, and just ONE interval training session was able to improve blood sugar regulation for the next 24 hours!5

Which HIIT Workout Is Right for You?

There are a large number of variations when it comes to HIIT. The infographic outlines three of them, including the Tabata Method, which calls for just 20 seconds of all-out drop-dead effort, followed by a mere 10 seconds of rest. This intense cycle is repeated eight times.

When the Tabata Method was performed four times per week for six weeks, participants in one experiment increased their anaerobic capacity by 28 percent, and their VO2 max (an indicator of cardiovascular health) and maximal aerobic power by 15 percent. This is in contrast to the control group, who performed an hour of steady cardiovascular exercise on a stationary bike five times a week. These participants improved their VO2 max by just 10 percent, and their regimen had no effect on their anaerobic capacity.6

As the infographic explained, this protocol is likely best for those who are extremely fit have very little time. I have not even attempted this protocol as I know how hard Peak Fitness is, which has a 90-second recovery. I shudder to think how painful the Tabata protocol is with only 10 seconds to recover… that said, if you’re looking for an extreme intensity workout, this may be it. For those of you just starting out with HIIT, you may want to try Peak Fitness first.

For the past couple of years, I’ve encouraged the use of high-intensity interval training as a key strategy for improving your health, boosting weight and fat loss, promoting HGH production, and improving strength and stamina. I’ve been doing it myself since April 2010 after meeting fitness expert Phil Campbell (author of Ready Set Go), so I can also vouch for its effectiveness from personal experience.

The HIIT approach I personally prefer and recommend is the Peak Fitness method of 30 seconds of maximum effort followed by 90 seconds of recuperation. I personally modified the number of repetitions from 8 to 6 this year, as it was sometimes just too strenuous for me to do all 8. So by listening to my body and cutting it back to 6 reps, I can now easily tolerate the workout and go full out. Plus, I no longer dread doing them.

Another tweak I made is to incorporate Butyeko breathing into the workout, which means I do most of the workout by only breathing through my nose. This raises the challenge to another level. I will discuss more of the benefits of this in a future article, as I do believe it has many benefits. I then finish my Peak Fitness workout with Power Plate stretches, 10 pull ups, 10 dips and 20 inverted pushups, and call it a day.

When you’re first starting out, depending on your level of fitness, you may only be able to do two or three repetitions of Peak Fitness. That’s okay! As you get fitter, just keep adding repetitions until you’re doing eight. And if six is what your body is telling you, then stop there. If you have a history of heart disease or any medical concern please get clearance from your health care professional to start this. Most people of average fitness will be able to do it though; it is only a matter of how much time it will take you to build up to the full 8 reps, depending on your level of intensity. For a demonstration using an elliptical machine, please see the video above. Here are the core principles:

  • Warm up for three minutes
  • Exercise as hard and fast as you can for 30 seconds. You should be gasping for breath and feel like you couldn’t possibly go on another few seconds. It is better to use lower resistance and higher repetitions to increase your heart rate
  • Recover for 90 seconds, still moving, but at slower pace and decreased resistance
  • Repeat the high-intensity exercise and recovery 7 more times. (When you’re first starting out, depending on your level of fitness, you may only be able to do two or three repetitions of the high-intensity intervals. As you get fitter, just keep adding repetitions until you’re doing eight during your 20-minute session)
  • Cool down for a few minutes afterward by cutting down your intensity by 50-80 percent

Rounding Out Your Exercise Program

In most cases, HIIT workouts should only be done two or three times a week. But that doesn’t mean you should take all the other days off. Switching up your workouts will ensure your muscles continue to be challenged and prevent plateaus in your fitness growth. You want to avoid overtaxing any one area of your body, too, and having a varied workout program helps you to do this naturally. I recommend incorporating the following types of exercise into your program on days when you’re not doing HIIT:

  • Strength Training: If you want, you can increase the intensity by slowing it down. You need enough repetitions to exhaust your muscles. The weight should be heavy enough that this can be done in fewer than 12 repetitions, yet light enough to do a minimum of four repetitions. It is also important NOT to exercise the same muscle groups every day. They need at least two days of rest to recover, repair and rebuild.

For more information about using super slow weight training as a form of HIIT, please see my interview with Dr. Doug McGuff.

  • Core Exercises: Your body has 29 core muscles located mostly in your back, abdomen and pelvis. This group of muscles provides the foundation for movement throughout your entire body, and strengthening them can help protect and support your back, make your spine and body less prone to injury and help you gain greater balance and stability.

Exercise programs like Pilates, yoga, and Foundation Training are great for strengthening your core muscles, as are specific exercises you can learn from a personal trainer.

  • Stretching: My favorite type of stretching is Active Isolated Stretching (AIS) developed by Aaron Mattes. With AIS, you hold each stretch for only two seconds, which works with your body’s natural physiological makeup to improve circulation and increase the elasticity of muscle joints. This technique also allows your body to repair itself and prepare for daily activity. You can also use devices like the Power Plate to help you stretch.
  • Non-Exercise Activity: One of the newest recommendations I have is based on information from NASA scientist Dr. Joan Vernikos, who I recently interviewed: simply set a timer when you are sitting and stand up every 10 minutes. I even modify this further by doing jump squats at times in addition to standing up. This will help counteract the dangerous consequences of excessive sitting.

You can prevent, and to a great degree, delay the damage associated with a large portion of biological aging, especially the most crippling, which is pain with movement and loss of flexibility that you had as a youth. To do so, FIRST you need to make sure you’re engaging in more or less perpetual non-exercise movement, as this is an independent risk factor. You then want to add structured exercise on top of that to reap all the benefits associated with exercise.

Going to the gym a few times a week for an hour simply isn’t going to counteract hours upon hours of chronic uninterrupted sitting, which essentially mimics a microgravity situation, i.e. you’re not exerting your body against gravity. Only frequent non-exercise movement will do that. The key point is to move and shift position often, when you’re sitting down. Meaning, you want to interrupt your sitting as often as possible.

Source: mercola.com

 

Intense But Short Exercise Is All You Need to Boost Calorie Burning.

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intense-training

Story at-a-glance

  • Recent research demonstrates that high intensity interval training burns more calories in less time. Just 2.5 minutes, divided into five 30-second sprint intervals at maximum exertion, each followed by four minutes of light pedaling to recuperate, can burn as much as 220 calories
  • Anaerobic exercises also increase insulin sensitivity and glucose tolerance, and promote production of human growth hormone—all of which are critical components of optimal health. Previous research has shown that just three minutes of high intensity exercise per week for four weeks can result in a 24 percent improvement in insulin sensitivity
  • If you’re ready to take your fitness routine to the next level, you may want to consider skipping breakfast and work out on an empty stomach. This is a form of intermittent fasting that can greatly contribute to improved weight loss, as it shifts your body into fat burning mode
  • The combination of high intensity interval training, avoiding grain carbs and sugars, especially fructose, and exercising in a fasted state, can help you become increasingly fat adapted, which is the preferred metabolic state of the human body

If you have a difficult time fitting exercise into an already crammed schedule, you’ll be excited to know you can reap truly remarkable results in a very limited amount of time. Can you carve out 20 minutes two to three times a week?

If so, you can dramatically improve your overall fitness and health – as long as you engage in high-intensity interval training, that is.

Research presented at the Integrative Biology of Exercise VI meeting1, 2 in Colorado on October 10-13 this year, demonstrated that high-intensity interval training burns more calories in less time – a mere 2.5 minutes, divided into five 30-second sprint intervals at maximum exertion, each followed by four minutes of light pedaling to recuperate, can burn as much as 220 calories.

According to lead researcher Kyle Sevits:3

“You burn a lot of calories in a very short time… Nearly all the calories are burned in those 2.5 minutes; you burn very few during the rest period.”

Besides burning more calories, high-intensity interval training, which is part of my total Peak Fitness program, has also been shown to produce greater health benefits overall than conventional aerobic training, such as increasing insulin sensitivity and glucose tolerance – both of which are critical components of optimal health. Back in April, I reported on a study that found doing just three minutes of high-intensity exercise per week for four weeks, could lead to a 24 percent improvement in insulin sensitivity.

Another important benefit of high-intensity interval training is its ability to naturally increase your body’s production of human growth hormone (HGH), also known as “the fitness hormone.” HGH is a synergistic, foundational biochemical underpinning that promotes muscle and effectively burns excessive fat.

It also plays an important part in promoting overall health and longevity. This too is something you cannot get from conventional, aerobic endurance training. Other benefits associated with high-intensity interval training include:

Decrease in body fat Improved muscle tone
Improved athletic speed and performance Ability to achieve your fitness goals much faster
Increase in energy and sexual desire Firmer skin and reduces wrinkles

Are You Maximizing the Health Benefits from Your Fitness Routine?

The key that unlocks the many health benefits associated with exercise is intensity. To perform anaerobic exercises correctly, regardless of how you do them (sprinting outdoors, using a stationary bike or elliptical machine, or using weights), you’ll want to raise your heart rate to your anaerobic threshold, and to do that, you have to give it your all for those 20 to 30 second intervals.

Different studies will use different intervals of exertion and recuperation. For example, in the featured study, 30-second bouts of exertion were separated by four-minute rest intervals. I use and recommend the program developed by Phil Campbell, where you go all out for 30 seconds, followed by 90 seconds of recuperation. If you do the recommended eight repetitions, you’ll be done in 20 minutes or less.

Depending on your level of fitness when you’re first starting out, you may only be able to do two or three repetitions of the high-intensity intervals. That’s okay. As you get fitter, just keep adding repetitions until you’re doing eight during your 20 minute session. Here’s a summary of what a typical interval routine might look like using an elliptical:

  • Warm up for three minutes
  • Exercise as hard and fast as you can for 30 seconds. You should be gasping for breath and feel like you couldn’t possibly go on another few seconds. It is better to use lower resistance and higher repetitions to increase your heart rate
  • Recover for 90 seconds, still moving, but at slower pace and decreased resistance
  • Repeat the high-intensity exercise and recovery 7 more times

Greater Intensity = Greater Need for Recovery

To optimize results, do these types of peak exercises twice or three times a week. Again, you only need about 20 minutes per session, and you don’t even need a gym membership to do them. If you have beach access, you may want to take to sprinting barefoot by the water’s edge. However, before you give it a go, make sure to review some basic safety guidelines, which I discussed in depth in my previous article, Proper Sprinting and Warm-Up Techniques to Optimize Your Workout and Avoid Injury.

You can also turn your weight training session into an anaerobic exercise by following the guidelines presented by Dr. Doug McGuff. The key that turns strength training into a high-intensity exercise is the speed. Reducing the speed increases the intensity.

Whichever way you choose to do them, you do not need to do high-intensity exercises more frequently than three times a week. In fact, doing so can be counterproductive, as your body needs to recover between sessions. The importance of recovery should not be overlooked, as your body needs time to rebuild itself in order to function optimally. As explained by Dr. Jeff Spencer:

“To achieve the most beneficial effects from your workouts in the shortest time it’s essential to understand the concept of total load. Total Training Load refers to the total amount of training ‘strain’ on the body over time. For example, one single super-hard workout can strain the body as much as several moderate intensity workouts done back to back can.

The Total Training Load can be increased by increasing the number of exercise repetitions, resistance, length of workout sets and by increasing the speed of repetitions and, also, by shortening the rest interval between exercise sets. If the Total Training Load is in excess too long, the body breaks down, and illness, over-training, burnout, and injury occur.”

Recovery also includes giving your body the proper nutrients it needs in the recovery phase, as your post-workout meal can support or inhibit the health benefits of exercise. For instance, fast-assimilating protein such as high-quality whey protein, eaten within 30 minutes of your workout, will essentially “rescue” your muscle tissue out of the catabolic state and supply it with the proper nutrients to stimulate repair and rejuvenation.

The Synergy Between Exercise and Diet, and Boosting Results with Intermittent Fasting

It’s well worth noting that your choice of breakfast food may play a significant role in altering your metabolic functioning, which can either improve or deter weight loss. For example, eating carbohydrates for breakfast will inhibit your sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and reduce the fat burning effect of your exercise. Instead, it activates your parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS), which promotes storage of fat – the complete opposite of what you’re aiming for.

Avoiding fructose and other grain carbohydrates is a critical element of a successful weight loss strategy. This includes sports or energy drinks and fruit juices (even if they’re freshly squeezed). Exercise cannot counteract the harmful effects of a high-fructose diet. It’s also important to remember that if you consume fructose within two hours before or after high-intensity exercise, you effectively negate the ability of the exercise to produce HGH – one of the MAJOR benefits of interval training.

If you’re ready to take your fitness routine to the next level, you may even want to consider skipping breakfast altogether and work out on an empty stomach. You can review the article I recently wrote on this here. This is a form of intermittent fasting and I believe it’s one of the most profound new developments in weight loss management. This can radically improve your ability to shift to fat burning mode and effectively burn fat rather than glucose.

Also, exercising in a fasted state can help your cells rebuild and repair, keeping them biologically young. I’ve previously interviewed fitness expert Ori Hofmekler on the issue of fasting and exercise. According to Ori, fasting actually has the surprising benefit of helping you reconstruct your muscles when combined with exercise. This is due to an ingenious preservation mechanism that protects your active muscle from wasting itself.

In a nutshell, if you don’t have sufficient fuel in your system when you exercise, your body will break down other tissues but not the active muscle, i.e. the muscle being exercised. That said, neither Ori nor I advocate starvation combined with rigorous exercise. It’s important to be sensible. And you need to consume sufficient amounts of protein in order to prevent muscle wasting. While most people need to address the foods they DO eat before considering skipping meals, intermittent fasting can provide you with many benefits, and is another tool you can experiment with to help you reach your goals. Research has shown that the combined effect of intermittent fasting (IF) with short intense exercise may help you to:

Turn back the biological clock in your muscle and brain Boost growth hormone Improve body composition
Boost cognitive function Boost testosterone Prevent depression

Being Fat-Adapted Can Help Improve Your Health

If you follow the recommendations mentioned above, which include:

  • High-intensity interval training
  • Avoiding grain carbs and sugars, especially fructose
  • Exercising in a fasted state

another side effect will eventually become apparent: you’ll become increasingly “fat-adapted.” Fat-adaption describes the ability to burn fat directly via beta-oxidation. It is the normal, preferred metabolic state of the human body, in which your body burns fat rather than glucose as its primary source of energy. Sadly, the bodies of many, if not most, Americans operate in a state of sugar-dependency, which is an abnormal metabolic state that inevitably results in insulin resistance and related chronic disease. Signs that you’re a sugar-burner and are heading down a path of disease include:

  • Low satiety
  • Persistent hunger
  • Carb cravings

As Mark Sisson explains in a recent article, if you are fat-adapted, you:

  1. Can effectively burn stored fat for energy throughout the day.

If you can handle missing meals and are able to go hours without getting ravenous and cranky (or craving carbs), you’re likely fat-adapted.

  1. Are able to effectively oxidize dietary fat for energy.

If you’re adapted, your post-prandial fat oxidation will be increased, and less dietary fat will be stored in adipose tissue.

  1. Can rely more on fat for energy during exercise, sparing glycogen for when you really need it.

Being able to mobilize and oxidize stored fat during exercise can reduce an athlete’s reliance on glycogen. This is the classic “train low, race high” phenomenon, and it can improve performance, save the glycogen for the truly intense segments of a session, and burn more body fat.

According to Sisson, once you can go three hours or more without feeling hungry, you’re on your way toward being fat-adapted. If you can handle exercising without having to carb-load, you’re probably fat-adapted. And if you can work out effectively in a fasted state, you’re definitely fat-adapted.

Source : mercola.com