New Blog Location

Thank you to all of my loyal readers for being with me for the first year and a half. I am now moving this blog to a location that allows more functionality and an improved user experience. Please find it at http://www.garrettsalpeter.com.

Lessons From Our Cells

In his book, The Biology of Belief, Bruce Lipton draws on his experience as a cell biologist to create an elegant framework for understanding our lives and our health. Among the many lessons in his book, I'm emphasizing one in particular. Human beings, like each of the 50 trillion cells from which we are made, are never stagnant; we always move either into growth or into protection.

His particular experiments involved cloned stem cells in a petri dish. They exhibited two survival mechanisms. In the presence of nutrients, they opened themselves to their environment and brought those nutrients inside as part of a growth response. In the presence of toxins, they closed themselves off and moved away as part of a protection response. The cells' growth and protection structures were totally different from each other, and they could only be in one mode or the other at any one time.

Humans, too, can exist in either a growth state or a protection state. When we are mobilized against stress, our sympathetic nervous system literally takes our energy away from growth and repair processes. Only when we are relaxed does our parasympathetic nervous system direct the processes that lead to growth.

So why, you may wonder, must we always be in either of these states and not just stay neutral? The answer is that just to remain alive, our body has to build hundreds of billions of new cells each day to replace those that die. So a certain amount of growth is necessary just to maintain life. Additionally, growth-oriented processes like digestion are required to produce the energy that we require to move, think, breathe, etc.

Moving one step further, a natural conclusion is that we are always somewhere on the spectrum between growth and protection. Everything that we do moves us in one direction or the other. And our body is always responding to every stimulus that we encounter, including our thoughts, our movements (including the position in which we hold our bodies), our interactions, our food, our breath, etc. Whether you look at this spectrum as growth-protection, parasympathetic-sympathetic, anabolic-catabolic, health-illness, or life-death, be aware of the importance of each and every thing that you do and think. Every moment is an opportunity to move along this spectrum in the direction of your choice.

Emotions, Exercise, and the Stress Response

A 1981 study demonstrates the effect that our mental-emotional state can have on the outcome of exercise. Previous studies found, for instance, that anger and fear both raise heart rate and blood pressure while at rest, but didn't show what happened during exercise.

The study itself involved college-level acting students, who would be relatively comfortable accessing different emotional states and displaying them in public. They accessed different states through visualization. The mind-body connection's power is clearly seen: in all cases the visualization produced physical changes. Before beginning their exercise, the subjects all had elevated heart rate and blood pressure levels while experiencing anger, fear, and happiness. Their heart rate and blood pressure were lower in both relaxed and sad states. All of the test subjects then did the same exercise sequence (stair-climbing) in each of the emotional states.

There are a few interesting observations corresponding with different emotions, and they are relevant to our ability to access sympathetic and parasympathetic states. (Quick review: sympathetic is the fight or flight response to stress that mobilizes our body for immediate action, and parasympathetic is the relaxation response in which our body recovers, repairs, and regenerates). Performing the exercise sequence in a relaxed state, the subjects saw an increase in heart rate and blood pressure that seemed relatively appropriate for exercise. We do need an increase in both of these markers, after all, to get blood to our working muscles. In fearful, angry, and happy states, heart rate and blood pressure rose much higher, indicating an exaggerated sympathetic state. In a sad state the subjects actually had too little increase in heart rate and blood pressure, indicating an overly parasympathetic state in which they could not mobilize their energy stores at all.

The takeaway here is that there is an optimal level of emotional-intellectual stimulation during exercise. If we want the long-term health benefits of exercise, then we should use our training as an opportunity to learn to handle more and more stimulation without having to dip into our sympathetic reserves. Under real stress, our bodies release adrenaline and other stress hormones to help us deal with the situation at hand. And when we have genuinely stressful situations, that is a good thing. The problem is that most people in our society are dipping into their adrenaline stores too often, which is the cause of chronic stress-related diseases. Proper training can actually help them learn to stay more relaxed and only go to their sympathetic reserves when absolutely necessary, which will have a dramatic effect on long-term health.

Looking at Two Popular Training Systems: P90X and CrossFit

In my last post, we discussed evidence from neuroscience and how it points to the importance of both consistency and specificity in training. Because of how important these principles are, you'd think they would be incorporated into all successful training regimens. Unfortunately, that is not always the case.

Let's look at two of today's popular training programs, CrossFit and P90X. CrossFit has become extremely popular in recent years. And with good reason -- it gets some results. People who do CrossFit put on muscle and burn fat in a relatively short period of time. As a training regimen, however, it lacks specificity in terms of training body position. Position is the foundation of human movement, and, almost without exception, CrossFit has people training out of position.

For example, CrossFit'ers routinely perform high repetition olympic lifting movements like the clean, which can be seen in this video. Observe how far forward of vertical the athlete's knees travel. This position trains the body to be very quad dominant at the expense of hamstring development, which leads the body to produce compensation patterns. And these compensation patterns are the reason most people who do CrossFit suffer some type of injury within the first few months.

A major issue with P90X can be seen in its tagline, "Muscle Confusion!" If you're confusing your muscles by constantly mixing up your training, then it's pretty clear you lack consistency. In effective training your nervous system receives one stimulus repeatedly, and your body lays down some myelin (a fat-based substance that insulates your nerve pathways) to improve the efficiency of the neurological pathways that are being used. That's how movement patterns form, and to prevent injury proper training must stimulate the body consistently to develop proper movement patterns.

Though I have my preference, I'll never argue that there is only one correct way to train. What is absolutely necessary is following underlying principles that must be present to make training effective. That means we must train to be strong enough to handle the forces of life. If we don't, our body responds with inflammation and our health, mobility, and quality of life are jeopardized.

Training technique itself must emphasize position and velocity. Position ensures we use the correct muscles to do their intended jobs, and velocity ensures we activate the appropriate reflex arcs in our nervous system that teach our muscles to stay long, absorb force, and keep us healthy and active. These principles are the foundation of our training program, so please get in touch through my web site if you'd like to learn more.

Consistency and Specificity in Training

I've been reading Dr. Joe Dispenza's book, Evolve Your Brain, and in this book he writes about a neuroscience experiment done by Alvaro Pascual-Leone. The experiment compares the effects on the brain of four different activities: practicing a consistent piano sequence every day for a week, playing the piano in random patterns every day for a week, visualizing (without actually touching a piano) playing a consistent piano sequence every day for a week, and doing nothing related to the piano whatsoever.

The group of people who practiced the same piano sequence daily showed development in new areas of the brain; they literally added a new, functional neural network. The group who visualized themselves playing the same sequence every day demonstrated the same, positive neurological adaptations. The groups who played random piano sequences every day showed the same results as the group who played no piano at all: no new neurological development whatsoever.

So, what are the ramifications of this study? First, since visualization created the exact same neurological development as actually practicing the piano, we see that visualization techniques are tremendously valuable. Second, the concept of consistency (and specificity) becomes incredibly important in training.

The group that randomly practiced the piano put in the same amount of effort as the groups that practiced the same sequence over and over again (whether on a physical piano or in their minds), but achieved none of the results. Many athletes who lift chest one day, do cardio the second day, arms the third day, hot yoga the fourth day, and legs the fifth day see the same pattern: effort in the gym does not translate to results on the field, court, ice, etc. Consistency of stimulation, we see, is required to create adaptation in the nervous system. And since we know the nervous system controls all of our movement, consistency is an absolute necessity for effective training.

Let's look at training to sprint, for example. Effective training requires consistently activating the neurological patterns that create the powerful movements of a sprinting stride. One possible way of training is to simply go out on the track and sprint. If this sprinting is done correctly (position) and maximally (velocity), that can work. As every track athlete knows, however, it can be difficult to maintain maximal velocity longer than 2-3 runs of 100 meters. That means anywhere from 20-40 seconds of proper neurological programming.

What if, instead, there was a tool that allowed you to get 300 continuous seconds of that exact same neurological programming, consistently, in every workout? Fortunately this tool exists -- it's called the extreme isometric. And when done according to our specifications, this technique improves sprinting in exactly the same way as repeatedly practicing a piano sequence improves the ability to play the piano: it consistently programs the same pattern into the body so that the new pattern takes hold.

The other major takeaway from this experiment, visualization, also plays in to our system. When you participate in extreme isometrics with us, we instruct you to visualize your outcome for the duration of the exercise. When your brain sees the end, it can take you there. And the ability to see the end from the beginning is what empowers us to do great things.

How to Really Burn Fat

Everyone knows that to lose weight it is necessary to burn calories. And that's absolutely true. Simple Physics really: if you take in fewer calories than you burn, your body will be forced to tap into its fat stores to make up that deficit. As long as that deficit isn't so great that it causes other negative things to happen, the equation holds true.

So, to use up some of our fat we need to burn a lot of calories during our workout, right? Since it consumes a lot of calories, it sure sounds like cardio is a great way to do this. Well, let's find out:

For this example, you're a 200 pound man in really good shape, so you run 10 miles. Over that 10 miles, you'll burn 1300 calories (try your own calculation here) -- that's a lot! Then, over the next 2-3 hours, your metabolic rate will be elevated as you recover. This point is the key.

Assume your normal metabolic rate (what your body needs just to get through its day) is 100 calories per hour. For the next 3 hours after the run, this will increase to 300 calories per hour. So, after burning 1300 calories running, you've burned an additional 600 calories (200 extra for 3 hours), for a grand total of 1900. Good job!

Let's now check in with your friend, Ike. Ike doesn't really like to run, so he comes into the ARP clinic to do UltraFit. Most of his workout consists of holding some lunge and squat positions for several minutes, and occasionally moving some weights really fast. He claims he's working hard, but even though he somehow has a good physique, you don't buy it. In fact, during his time in the gym he may only burn 200 calories. Yikes!

But, when the body is stimulated correctly (high load and high velocity), the metabolic rate is altered more dramatically and for a longer period in recovery. So, instead of burning more calories for 3 hours after, Ike is going to burn more calories for 8 hours after. And instead of burning an extra 200 calories per hour, Ike is going to burn an extra 400 calories per hour.

And that is where the magic happens: In addition to the 200 calories during the workout, Ike is going to burn 400 extra calories per hour for 8 hours. That is 200 calories during the workout plus 3200 calories during recovery, for a grand total of 3400 calories.

In light of Ike's example, those 1900 calories you burned during the run and subsequent recovery don't sound quite as impressive. As I'm sure my wonderful readers have caught on by now, the point is to expand your focus. It matters not how many calories you burn during your workout, instead it matters how many calories your workout stimulates you to burn during an entire day.

Hopefully this example sheds some light on the riddle of why so many of the treadmill users have a little extra flab on their bodies, while a larger portion of the nice physiques are in other parts of the gym. To see a few examples of UltraFit training, check out our YouTube page.

Training With a Purpose

An ARPwave colleague in Chicago, Tommy John, recently made some comments that struck me. I'd like to share them:

"Over the past 5 years of ARP'ing injuries in anyone from 8 years old to 91 years old, the top 3 most common forms of training the 'injured' partook in were: 1. Long slow distance running or biking or stepping or eliptical, 2. Yoga 3. Pilates."

His statement may seem a bit harsh, but it's an observation that I've made in our facility too. Of course, these activities can have other benefits in terms of stress relief, balancing out your mind, or just being fun. And that's great, as long as we also realize the necessity to incorporate real strength training. Tommy continues:

"The stronger you are the less chance you have of becoming injured. The stronger you are the better chance you have to fight off illness if God forbid you acquire an illness. The stronger you are the less of a chance your joints or spine have to taking the load of force into the body which will lessen the chance of inflammation building up which will give your immune system a break to fight real disease and not symptoms bc of a lack of strength. Must be strong. Must train to become very very very strong. You cannot be too strong."

He's absolutely right. I'd like to place special emphasis on one of the last things he said. When you're strong, your muscles do the job they're supposed to. Less force will transfer to the joints and spinal column. This is so important, because most of the damage that we do to our bodies is so easily preventable. What is wear and tear? It's made up. Doesn't exist. It's really more like misuse and abuse. When we use our bodies the way they're meant to be used, they are built up rather than torn down.

I challenge you to take the time you already spend working out, in fact you can even take far less than that, and do a few extreme isometrics. Minimal space and equipment, and you'll really accomplish something. Your muscles will work to stabilize your body. The little aches and pains will vanish. You'll have more energy. And guess what? Even your mind will work better.

More on that later.

Oh, and you can check out my friend Tommy John here.