Year: 2011

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A 45-Minute Vigorous Exercise Bout Increases Metabolic Rate for 14 Hours

In recent years, there has been a focus on the calorie burn after training.  Colloquially referred to as the “afterburn effect” and more technically as EPOC (Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption), a number of popular training approaches have been advocated to try to leverage it for fat loss.  But there is a long held issue regarding the absolute magnitude of EPOC and how much of a contribution it actually makes.  I want to address this issue by examining the following paper.

Knab AM et. al. A 45-Minute Vigorous Exercise Bout Increases Metabolic Rate for 14 Hours.  Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2011 Sep;43(9):1643-8

Background on EPOC

As stated above, EPOC stands for the Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption and this represents the calories burned after a workout has been completed.   For years EPOC was thought to be related to the “oxygen debt” from exercise, essentially the difference in how much oxygen was needed during exercise and how much was available. … Keep Reading

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The Skate Bearing Story

The Inline Skating Track

This will be an odd little digression where I want to talk about one of my many experiences during my time pursuing ice speed skating.  Today I want to tell the skate bearing story.

You Can’t Buy Performance

I’ve never been a big equipment guy (though I love training toys, go figure).  At some point I think I got fed up with people who try to buy performance, either to make up for a lack of talent or being unwilling to put in the work.

And as I so commonly do, I jumped to the opposite extreme often neglecting my equipment.  When I was in Salt Lake City, for example, I’d have my ice speed skates blow apart at least once every year because I’d forget to tighten the bolt on the Klap.

And while I still feel that, for the most part, equipment is secondary to other things relevant to performance, there are places where it matters. … Keep Reading

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The Sports Continuum

The following is an excerpt/concept from my The Applied Nutrition for Mixed Sports Book/DVD examining what I call the sport continuum, the training continuum and the adaptation continuum.  These are separate but related concepts linking the requirements of specific sports, to their training, to the adaptations that are being sought.

These continuums are relevant because it impacts on the nutritional requirements for any given sport.  Too often I see dietitians give essentially the identical diet regardless of sport.  A good friend, a strength coach in Ireland, once told me a story about sending two of his athletes: one a track sprinter and the other a rugby player to some local nutrition type.  Both were given the identical nutritional program.   That’s absurd.

Clearly optimal nutrition for any given sport will depend on the demands of that sport and the adaptations being sought.  Determining those means first looking at where sports fall on the continuum.… Keep Reading

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Success Leaves Clues

Among several trite phrases (one of my current favorites is ‘Train like an athlete to look like an athlete”) that often gets thrown around in the fitness community is that of Success Leaves Clues.  The premise, essentially, is that by looking at the habits of the best/elite performers, we can determine what does and doesn’t work since, by semi-logical extension, these folks are all elite because of those habits.

Success Leaves Clues

Make no mistake there is arguably some truth to this but I generally find that people throw around the Success Leaves Clues bit by selectively picking and choosing from whatever habit they happen to want to push; at the same time they tend to ignore that:

  1. The least successful performers usually did the same thing.
  2. There are usually other, far more important habits, that were probably responsible for the results.

So, for example, someone pushing supplements will point out that all high-level bodybuilders used supplements; ergo supplements should be used. … Keep Reading

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Mass Made Simple by Dan John

Mass Made Simple by Dan JohnIn a previous site update, I did a review of Dan John’s Never Let Go, effectively a collection of articles he had written talking about his various and sundry experiences in the weight game.

It’s still a book I highly recommend, if not for the training wisdom it contains then for its highly entertaining and readable style.  I reread it about once a year and something in it always manages to make me chuckle or think.

As a collection of articles there wasn’t really any single theme that ran through it except for perhaps the fact that Dan is as old as the hills and has truly seen it and done it all when it comes to the weight room.

I mean, I’m fairly sure Dan was the guy who pointed Milo at the bull and told him to get cracking.  Hell, Dan might have been the bull.  For those who have truly been living under a rock, as the story goes, Milo lifted a bull on a daily basis.… Keep Reading