I’m ashamed to admit something. I’ve been recommending The Truth About Six Pack Abs for a long time. Click here to read my review. And no doubt, it is worth every penny and you should get a copy if you haven’t already. But my admission here is about all the bonus books that come with it. I have to admit, until this past weekend, I simply skimmed those. After all, when I first bought The Truth About Six Pack Abs, I was buying that book and the bonuses were simply extras. They all seemed decent but I didn’t dig deep. 
Well, I just read the 33-page workout report from Turbulence Training (Craig Ballantyne) that (more…)
Looking to burn fat with weight training? Tired of typical routines?
Get my metabolic routine here: Fat Burn Furnace!
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By Tom Venuto, NSCA-CPT, CSCS BurnTheFat High Intensity Interval Training, or HIIT for short, has been promoted as one of the most effective training methods ever to come down the pike, both for fat loss and for cardiovascular fitness. (more…)
Continue reading about Steady State Cardio 5 X More Effective Than HIIT????
Two quick questions for you: 1) It seems that the Science Updates and the Q&A Posts get less overall response. Because they take a lot of work, I want to make sure my time is placed right. Would you prefer a monthly Q&A call-in teleseminar, where I start off sharing some science background, then take your questions (which you could still send in if you didn’t (more…)
About a week ago, I offered to our email subscribers an open Q&A session: “ask your questions and I’ll try to get them answered”. The asking is something we only offer the email list, but RSS subscribers can still see the answers. As usual we had tons of questions. I’m posting most of them here – the rest will await a future post. Note: Please read our disclaimers at the bottom of this page – what I write is for information purposes only and you should always seek professional, licensed advice before starting any exercise program. If you have more questions, send them through http://worldfitnessnetwork.com/contact/ . On to the Q&A!
1) Question – Tyson asks: “How about doing speed runs or short speed bursts 5 times a week? Do you think that would greatly encourage fat loss? Or should i stick to doing speed bursts 1-2 times a week for fat loss?“
Answer: My answer for the typical person is no more than two HIIT (high intensity interval training) sessions a week. Note that I’m saying HIIT, not your typical interval training. I’m not sure which you mean when you say “speed runs”. HIIT is so intense that unless you are a pro athlete, you can’t last for more than about 10 minutes if you are doing it right. Tabata intervals are an example of HIIT (you go for 20 seconds AS INTENSELY AS YOU CAN – REALLY HARD, then take a 10 second break, then repeat, for a total of about 4 minutes). Most people can only do Tabata for about 4 or 5 minutes before feeling like vomiting. Myself included. I only do that once a week at most and only at certain points in the year.
Continue reading about Answers To Your Lean Muscle Questions – 4-21-09
Editor’s note – There is so much monthly science news when it comes to muscle fitness, that it’s probably hard for you to keep up. In these occasional posts, I’ll summarize various items of research in the past 90 days or so. I’ll cite the official reports so that the hard-core of you can read the science for yourself. But for the rest of you, these summaries should save you some time…
I Love This One – Cardio Plus Weight Training = Healthy Blood Vessels
To start us off, I’m actually pulling two studies from 2006 and 2007 that I just found. Many studies have shown that weight training/resistance training increases the stiffness of blood vessels (the theory is that they stiffen in response to the high pressure involved in weight training). But in Journal of Hypertension, Volume 24 – Issue 9 – p 1753-1759 researchers found that resistance training, compared to sedentary or combination resistance and cardio training, had about 20% more stiffening of arteries over a 4 month period. Conclusion: cardio training will offset the stiffness induced by weight training. And we’re talking about steady state cardio (the kind that a lot of modern day fitness gurus are pooh-poohing).
So I dug deeper and found that in J Appl Physiol 103: 1655-1661 Japanese researchers took 33 young healthy people (men and women) and broke them into groups. Some ran BEFORE weight training and some ran AFTER. And the only ones who saw the benefit of offsetting the resistance-training-induced-blood-vessel-stiffening were the ones who ran AFTER. I’ve said many times that
- Cardio is good! especially when combined with weight training; and
- Do your weight training first!
Now I have some science to back that up! You know I recommend both The Truth About Six Pack Abs and Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle. Well, in this regard, Tom’s Burn the Fat (more…)
Continue reading about Science News For Building Lean Muscle – April 18 2009
A recent article posted on the AskMen.com site made me cringe. I’m not going to cite the official link, because I don’t really want to promote them. I’ve never read anything at this site before, as it’s a little risqué for my tastes, but one of the other sites I regularly read had a link to it. The title was “Maximum Muscle Definition in One Week”.
I thought the title was provocative. So I bit.
Before I even started reading though, let’s clarify something. There’s a difference between “maximum”, meaning “the best you can get” and “sufficient”, meaning that you actually achieve muscle definition.
Nobody can go from undefined, fat, or flabby and one week be ripped. And I had my doubts about this article, that it would promise overnight results.
Sure enough, it starts out talking about “getting ready for an unexpected beach event” or even “suddenly getting that date with a particular girl” as the impetus for the overnight cure they were (supposedly) about to unveil.
There were a few nuggets of good advice, including the need to lift heavy; intake sufficient protein; carb load on day one then reduce carbs steadily.
But the author condenses what should really be an 8+ week program into 7 days. Not only will it not work, but at only 800 words, all the details are left out. Unless you are already an intermediate to advanced weight trainer (and thus, probably already in pretty good shape), most of the advice will go over your head.
Plus, this hurts the entire weight training movement – it’s hard enough to get people to realize how important resistance training (like weight lifting) is. Now, some people will try this guy’s 7-day advice and when it doesn’t work, they’ll quit. They’ll say “weight training doesn’t work to burn fat“. It’s a shame really.
And I’ll say again, it won’t work in 7 days. [If you have a personal story of seeing significant results in 7 days, please share your story and your program – I’m ok with being proven wrong!]
Now summer is around the corner, and I can appreciate that you might want to be ready and comfortable for the beach and a more active time of year. But don’t wait until the last minute.
If you need to be “ready” in 7 days from now, you really better have started out weeks ago! Don’t get your fitness advice from a site that ranks celebrities by their “hotness” (in fact, run away from such sites).
Want trusted sources for getting in shape by Summer? Check out our own “3 Months To A New You” and especially “The Truth About 6-pack Abs” if you really want good advice.
My weight training has generally been focused on muscle gain (hypertrophy) or strength training.
But the third type – fat burning – hasn’t ever been a priority for me. I do my fat burning through diet and cardio. In fact, part of the reason I do hypertrophy training is to prevent muscle loss from my running.
I’ve been really pushing myself over the past 3 months with heavier weights. And my joints are screaming.
But I’m getting ready for the Oklahoma City Marathon on the 26th of this month. So I decided now would be a good time to try a fat-burning weight training program.
Wow – these workouts are kicking my butt. It’s so intense, but a different kind of intense compared to lifting heavy stuff. But I’m getting ahead of (more…)
A recent study by the National Center on Educational Statistics found that 1 in 5 four-year olds in America are obese.
I’ll say that again: 1 in 5 four-year olds are fat.
As a parent, I have two very strong emotions when I hear this.
Meet Sympathetic Darrin and Harsh Darrin
The first is sincere sadness and empathy for what those children are headed for – a series of “fat kid” jokes and likely health challenges for the rest of their lives. Let’s call this voice the “Sympathetic Darrin”.
The second is utter disgust that these parents have allowed this to happen. Let’s call this voice the “Harsh Darrin”.
Sympathic Darrin wants to offer all those parents free advice, clinics, counseling, etc. Given America’s overall obesity problem, it’s probably a likely conclusion that the parents (more…)
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