060519 Exercise and rest period cycles Part 3 Background information continued

060519 Exercise and rest period cycles Part 3 Background information continued

In 1954, Hans Selye came up with a description that described how an organism adapted to sources of stress in their environment. He called the model the “General Adaptation Syndrome” aka GAS. From this modest start, strength and conditioning specialists have come up with all sorts of training plans. A well-designed program will be characterized by a continuation of the Eustress processes. On the other hand, stagnation, soreness, minor injuries, and a lack of desire to exercise provide an early indication of distress that eventually leads to “Overtraining”. Leading into the overtraining is a condition called overreaching.

Overreaching is a desired effect that results from setting and achieving goals. It is the push to a higher plateau of ability. But if you remain in this zone too long, you soon reach the overtrained condition. Recovery from over reaching is easily accomplished with a few days active rest, a lighter than normal load, intensity and frequency of effort. How do you know if you are entering the overtrained realm?

290419 Exercise and rest period cycles Part 2 Background information

290419 Exercise and rest period cycles Part 2 Background information

In 1954, Hans Selye came up with a description that described how an organism adapted to sources of stress in their environment. He called the model the “General Adaptation Syndrome” aka GAS. He further described two such stressors, one good and one bad. They are respectively:

Eustress or that which produces growth, performance enhancements and repair.
Distress, which can cause decay, damage, death or disease in the living organism.

The General Adaptation Syndrome theory states there are three phases to an exposure to stress. Phase number one is the initial alarm, phase two is the resistance to the stress and the final phase is the adaptation to the stress (which Selye called exhaustion).

Breaking the three phases down into manageable bits of information one will find the first stage is the body’s initial response to the stress, i.e. flight, fright or freeze. (“Shock or alarm”, as it is described in the Essentials of Strength Training and Conditioning book by Baechle and Earle) The body at this point has a temporary inability to cope with the situation; however, it quickly calls on energy reserves and begins to function in a more appropriate manner.

This is the beginning of the resistance phase in which the body adapts to the stimulus and returns to a more normal state. The body is preparing itself for a continuation of similar stresses by growing stronger in response.

The final stage is exhaustion. If the organism does not have a pause in the constant stress, it begins to break down. Thus, overtraining has reared its ugly head and progress begins to “grind to a halt”. Minor injuries appear, desire diminishes, and working out is no longer enjoyable. The workout program has failed!

140119 Control your eating by applying Paretos’ law, Hara Hachi Bu and other techniques 2/2

140119 Control your eating by applying Paretos’ law, Hara Hachi Bu and other techniques 2/2

Briefly, Pareto’s law states that eighty percent of the resultant effects come from twenty percent of the involved parts. In the case of food it’s that piece of pie or cake that is calling your name after you’re already full. That’s the twenty percent you don’t really need to eat.

Now that you’ve got a handle on how to control your intake at the big meal let’s take a look at some other ideas to keep your weight at its pre-Thanksgiving meal level.

A half an hour before the meal eat a big apple along with a big glass of water.

Leave the liquid calories alone. This includes pop, sports drinks and alcohol. Try skim milk instead of full or reduced fat milk.

Eat an orange instead of a glass of orange juice.

Increase your water intake. Not to ridiculous levels but at least until your urine is a pale yellow similar in color to lemonade.

Take extra helpings of fruits and vegetables but without the whipped cream and added sugar.

Eat reduced fat light mayonnaise and fat free sour cream.

After all the dishes and food have been put away go for a nice walk. Doing so helps keep your cholesterol and triglycerides at more moderate levels.

Movement is wonderful for your body. Fidgeting is good because it burns calories. Be active and you’ll feel better.

311218 Changes in pain 2/2

If you experience the following, it is time to seek outside help.

Fever or chills and or night sweats
An inability to empty your bladder
Incontinence of your bladder or bowels
Weight loss that you can not explain
Pain that cannot be relieved with rest and relaxation
If you are awakened at night by your pain
The inability of positional changes to alleviate your pain symptoms
Numbness, pain weakness in your legs, either one or both of them

These signs or symptoms could indicate an undiagnosed condition such as an infection, compression fracture of the spinal column due to osteoporosis, nerve root or spinal cord compression, a kidney stone or stones, an abdominal aortic aneurysm , spinal cancer or a tumor that may have started elsewhere and spread to the spine.

In the case of the latter, these are especially true in the case of prostate, breast and lung cancers.

Pay attention to what your body is telling you and don’t let these signals pass without an examination by your doctor.

241218 Changes in pain 1/2

241218 Changes in pain 1/2

Typically, your pain will gradually subside over time with the proper treatment. If this does not happen then a revisit with your doctor is in order just as it would be if the pain changes in character. For instance if your pain moves up the scale from mild to severe or greater then call your care provider and follow their suggestions. A more serious change would be an onset of new symptoms such as tingling or numbness; both demand a consult with your doctor as soon as you can get in to see them. Your doctor should reevaluate these changes in the pain characteristics. They will conduct an examination and either eliminate a possible serious threat to your health or change the directions of the present care program.

Low back pain (LBP) is one of the most commonly reported health issues.

Throughout ones life, there more than likely will be at least one episode of low back pain. The cause can be muscle strains, deconditioning of the body brought on by a sedentary lifestyle, spinal disk damage from accidents and the degenerative diseases of osteoporosis and osteoarthritis. In some cases, the pain escalates into an unbearable situation and must be aggressively dealt with by the medical professional. In the present case of low back pain, serious red flags that appear need to be heeded and promptly attended to by a medical professional.

Part 2 next week

171218 Obesity 2/2

171218 Obesity 2/2

Obesity poses a serious threat to our health and occurs when the overall amount of calories consumed exceeds the calories expended. Per the accepted definition, obesity is an excessively high proportion of body fat in relation to lean body mass on an individual.

If your child is between two and five years old and they are overweight or worse yet, obese, there is sufficient reason to be taking additional health related to steps to reduce their body fat.

Consult with your pediatrician and work together to stabilize and then reduce the level of body fat in your child. The suggestions may include a healthier diet with an ample selection of fruits, grains, milk, vegetables, and non-sugary fruit drinks along with exercise or physical activity.

You can start by going to the USDA MyPyramid site here at http://teamnutrition.usda.gov/resources/mpk_close.pdf to see for yourself what a healthy diet consists of for your child.

Help your child grow healthy and live a life that is not consumed by potentially avoidable medical problems.

051118 Sport and lifestyle activity-range of motion exercising

051118 Sport and lifestyle activity-range of motion exercising

Your joints and muscles are meant to function within standardized degrees of movement, commonly referred to as the range of motion (ROM). The stronger you are within these ranges, the better protected you will be in preventing injuries from occurring. Therefore when doing your exercise routine keep in mind the following two guidelines:

You gain the most strength within the range of motion (ROM) at which you exercise.
The smaller the range of motion you in the joint, the less will be the carry over strength throughout the rest of the movement.

The basis of every quality strength training or fitness program relies, in part, on these two premises. As an example, let’s look at the squat while explaining these principles.

Many lifters do short range squats, known as high squats, in the gym. They get into a machine or in rare cases under a bar and drop down a few inches and call it good. In many instances this isn’t even to a parallel position, let alone below parallel where they should be before starting back up again. Depending on the load of the bar or on the machine, strength may be increased within this small range of motion but its unlikely this will happen.

This range of movement is too little and does not support normal living activities such as sitting down in a chair and then getting back up. If the strength is not developed within a range that is vital to living an active lifestyle then it is not useful. This group of fitness enthusiasts would be better served by going deeper in their squats, thereby getting a transfer of useable strength into their daily lives. This naturally leads in to the second principle.

An individual or strength athlete will become stronger when training the full range of motion. This expands the strength curve and transfers more useable muscle activity across greater degrees of the joint angle. Greater degree angles of strength protect the joint from injury, especially at the far ranges of motion.

The take home message is don’t cut yourself short with limited range of motion exercises.

Training theories 291018 5/5

Training theories 291018 5/5

Two models of thought predominate the current thinking in strength training. One is ‘supercompensation’ or the one-factor theory, the second is the ‘fitness-fatigue’, also known as the two-factor theory. These two are generalized theories and as such contain only the most essential portions of the training ideas. Extraneous options are not included in this brief snap shot of these two training programs.

A rough rule of thumb with a normal training load is the duration of the fitness gains and the impact of fatigue differ by a factor of three. That is the fatigue effect is three times shorter than the positive effects, which last up to three times longer. As an example if the effects of fatigue last 24 hours, the improvement in fitness lasts 72 hours.

Using the two factor model the coach must keep in mind the two offsetting components of training and plan each follow up session accordingly. Maintenance of preparedness, avoidance of fatigue and continual training sessions comprised of several warm up type sessions prior to a contest. The idea behind this is to decrease the training load during each session rather than reduce the number of training sessions. A tapering off of the training load has been proven to enhance the final strength outcome.

In order to accomplish this feat the intervals between sessions must be long enough so the “negative traces of the preceding workout pass out of existence but the positive fitness gains persists.” This has become a rather popular model for use in planning strength training programs.

Training theories 151018 3/5

Training theories 151018 3/5

Several popular methods try to achieve this state. One is overloading in a Microcycle, one heavy cycle of training is followed, after a brief rest, by another heavy training cycle. A lengthy rest and restorative period is then included in the schedule. The belief is that by adhering to this schedule the final supercompensation will be greater than normally results from a training cycle.

A critical look at this theory leads one to believe it may be too simplistic to be of much use any longer. The very fact that supercompensation even exists is not a proven fact in scientific experiments. Glycogen depletion, however, is a fact after heavy exercise. It is a possible to increase glycogen in the cells via a particular program of correct training and carbohydrate loading-but only before important competitions. Replication in everyday training situations has not been proven.

ADP, adenosine triphosphate, generally thought to deplete after heavy exercise in fact shows little change at all in the cells. Other substances require differing amounts of time to restore to initial levels.

It is unclear as to which substance the program planning should be adjusting to in anticipation of a supercompensation result. “In general, the theory of supercompensation is too simple to be correct. Over the last few years it has lost much of it popularity”.

Training theories 081018 2/5

Training theories 081018 2/5

Supercompensation

In order for this to work, the program design must take into account the phases of enhanced absorption and plan accordingly for these periods. If, on the other hand, the program planner inserts a workout before the cells have had a chance to take on the higher levels of the growth producing substances they will be less apt to tolerate the new load. An injury or deleterious cell damage will be the result rather than growth occurring.

Equally disruptive to growth is a lengthy period between workouts. After too much time has elapsed, the cells will revert to their normal status. Perhaps a small amount of growth will take place but not nearly as much as if the period had been correctly planned.

The coach has to keep in mind these two variables while planning a program.

Optimal rest periods between successive training sessions and
An optimal load in each workout.

“The aim selecting these intervals and loads is to ensure that a subsequent trading session coincides with the supercompensation phase”.

Tag: exercise