Exercise and Intensity

For many of you reading this particular blog, you'll probably get a couple sentences into it and stop right away. Why? Because you are not ready for change in your fitness program. What I've been trying to do with all of our clientele and anyone else who will listen, is to try to get all of you to think outside the box of your regular fitness program and put your focus on intensity of the exercises rather than how many sets and how many reps.

What do I mean? Here we go: For years trainers around the world have always relied on writing down a program based on sets and reps. Yes, sometimes the intensity of one particular exercise may be high, mainly based on the type of exercise, but the rest of the exercises in the program for that day are generally low intensity. What I mean is, if you do a hang clean during the exercise bout your heart rate will be through the roof, if done right. Then your trainer puts you on a seated bicep curl. So now, you've just reached your anaerobic threshold and all of a sudden you drop down to almost resting HR. Then after that curl, you go to a row or whatever it may be, your HR will not come close to what you achieved on that hang clean.

What I would like you to try is this: Approach your workouts like they are your last. Every exercise you do, take your HR to it's max and do it for at least 5-15 seconds and in some cases longer. After you reach it and maintain for a little while, stop the exercise and wait until your HR drop to 65% of your max. For instance, I'm 32 so we'll do a simple equation.. 220-age (32) and I'll add 10 beats per minute because the 220-age isn't really a good indicator. My max is right around 188 +10, so 198 beats per minute (BPM). Granted, I work out already so I can probably reach that number but I'd want to puke after a couple of these. I wouldn't have someone who is new to exercise that has the same age as me try to reach the same Max HR... not a good idea and definitely not safe.

What we want to see happen once you reach your max HR and stop that particular exercise is to check HR again and watch it drop. Once you reach 65% of max, crank up the exercise again. Now the first couple weeks of training this way, you may only last 15 minutes and you'll notice that it takes your HR minutes to drop back down to 65%. But, again after a few weeks of HR training, your HR should drop really fast (recovery). This is how you know that you are starting to get in shape. You know what happens when you start to get in shape? Your body fat drops, your strength increases and thus your power output will increase.

What happens if you continue to workout with sets and reps at low intensities? The same thing that's been happening for the last 20 years of your same program.. nothing! YOU stay the same.

Why all this talk about intensity and HR? I want to make a difference in your life.. I always have, that's why I started doing what I do. No, I don't train anymore.. I sit in this office and continually find ways to motivate not only you guys as clients but my trainers as well.

I've been pumping HYBRID likes it's going out of style. Not to take away from our regular personal training groups or one on ones, they are still on the rise and we continue to make changes in those program to make them better. They HYBRID concept though is really exciting because we can incorporate all that I talked about above without anyone in the class even knowing it. We are able to keep HR at high enough levels to get amazing results... what I would like to do eventually is convince all the members of the gym to take a similar approach to there program.

The next time you walk into the gym, especially those of you who are personal training clients, tell your trainer to "bring it on and there is nothing you can throw at me today that I can't do!" This gets everyone excited because it will allow the trainer to think outside the usual box and get your HR way up and consistent... THIS is how you get in shape!

I've got HR monitors in the studio that are open to anyone. I would suggest getting your own though because of sanitary reasons but by all means, use one of ours if you need. Throw it on before your next workout and let's get rockin' You'll love the results in the end.. I promise!