The single best exercise

I read this article the other day at NYTimes.com about “The Single Best Exercise”.

Well, really, that’s just an eye-catching headline, because there is no one “single best exercise”. Or, rather, for my money, the single best exercise is the one you do! Just do something, ya know?

The article did get me to thinking, though. What if I could only do one thing, one exercise — well, let’s make it a group of exercises — the rest of my life. What would it be?

I know it would come down to either weight training or yoga. But how to decide?

Weight training definitely burns a lot of calories. It also makes me stronger, so it improves my aerobic fitness, too.

Yoga probably doesn’t burn as many calories, but it’s easy to make it a total body workout.

I’m going with yoga.

As I perused the yoga titles at Netflix and Amazon, I was amazed by how many people use yoga as a relaxer. There are yoga workouts on DVD, designed to make you sweat, and these people were complaining that it’s not what they wanted. Yoga is supposed to be relaxing, they said.

Okay, I guess so. It’s really all what you’re used to.

I was introduced to yoga by Tony Horton’s P90X, so to me it’s a workout. And I love it as such!

In fact, that’s why I was looking through Amazon and Netflix for yoga videos. I want more!

How about you? Which exercise would you do, if you could only do one? Running? Martial Arts? For me, it’s yoga.

HAH! I was looking for a video to put with this post and found this one from Tony Horton. I had not seen it before, but he came to exactly the same conclusion as I did about yoga.

How many reps should you do in P90X?

When I started Tony Horton’s P90X, one of the first decisions to make was whether to go for larger muscles or simply toned muscles. Tony would repeat over and over: 8-10 reps for mass or 12-15 reps for lean.

I have no desire to look like Tony Horton. He’s very muscular, has a bodybuilder’s body, and that’s just not me. But, hell, I could stand for my muscles to be a bit larger, so I decided to go the route most men take through P90X and shoot for 8 to 10 reps of each move.

To explain a bit more, the idea is to adjust the weight you use to work properly for the number of reps. That is, regardless of how many reps you do, the last two or three should be difficult. So if you’re shooting for 8-10 reps, you should be struggling on reps 7, 8, and 9. If you are not, you need to increase the weight.

Tony never gets into the lower rep side of things, probably because he is a bodybuilder, not a powerlifter, but you should know that HEAVY WEIGHT + LOW REPS = STRENGTH! You won’t necessarily get the muscle size, but your strength will increase dramatically with this approach.

Here, then, is a quick rundown on the whole number of reps concept. Tom Venuto includes this information in his article on his website.

  • If you are trying to improve strength, then most of your weight training will be in the 3 to 5 rep range. You may even do some 1 and 2 rep moves. This will make you stronger and faster without bulking you up.
  • Bodybuilders work on muscle mass, so most of your training will be in the 8 to 10 rep range. Doing some heavier weight training at lower reps makes sense, too, because you may not want to simply look strong.
  • To tone up, you should work in the 12-15 rep range. This is also useful for bodybuilders, to smooth things out.

I spend most of my time doing 8-10 reps. When doing body weight exercises, like pushups, I do as many as possible, so I have the high-rep end covered.

I have not, however, done anything in the lower rep range, and it seems to me I need to do that, so I’m going to try to work that into my workouts starting after this current recovery week.

Remember that fitness is not just finding one thing and doing that. That’s a good start, but fitness is really a lifelong commitment that involves reading and learning and implementing new techniques to stay as fit as possible.

So be sure to determine your fitness goals and then make an informed decision about how many reps to do based on those goals.

The most important meal of the day

My brother posted a question on Facebook the other day. He often posts questions to spark discussion, and they often do just that. The question he posted the other day was “Trick Question: What is the most important meal of the day?”

Of course, people chimed in with “Breakfast.” WRONG! (Should have known that from the “trick question” hint.)

Without going any further into the wrong answers, let’s get to the right answer. The most important meal of the day is the one right after you work out.

(Yes, this does assume that you work out. If you don’t work out, I dunno, maybe breakfast is right ;=)

What is so important about the post-workout meal? For about 45 minutes after your workout, your body is primed to start repairing itself, building muscle.

Do not waste that opportunity!

What should the post-workout meal consist of? Lots of carbs and some protein. I’ve read 3:1 ratio of carbs to protein. I usually go with about a 2:1 ratio, with 60 grams of carbs and 30 grams of protein. Specifically, my meal is a protein shake composed of

  • 8-12 ounces of unsweetened almond milk (I prefer Blue Diamond brand)
  • 4 dates or an equivalent carbload of organic honey or dried figs, and
  • a heaping scoop of a vanilla-flavored low carb whey protein powder (Optimum Nutrition makes my favorite).

I gotta tell ya, when I put the dates in there, wow, that is seriously one of my favorite things to eat/drink. Delicious.

You could eat a meal of lean meat or fish and pasta. I am personally not in the mood to do a lot of cooking right after I workout, but if you are, go for it! A protein shake does the trick for me, and every once in a while, I’ll have some fat-free Greek yogurt with honey in it. Tasty.

So, that’s the upshot. If you work out, the most important meal of the day is the meal right after you exercise, so, if you have to skip one, don’t skip that one!

Kill your television!

I remember seeing a bumper sticker back in the 90s that said “Kill your television!” I also remember thinking that was a rather harsh solution to a somewhat benign problem.

I was wrong.

Many of our lives seem to revolve around television. Who’s eliminated from “American Idol” or “Top Chef” is the topic of many discussions. What’s happening on “Burn Notice”? When is “Breaking Bad” going to come back on? What’s up with Larry David and “Curb Your Enthusiasm”?

KILL IT!

How much of our time is spent watching crap on the TV? Seriously?

I know we all need down time, and mindless entertainment — television’s specialty — is good for that. I also know that I am personally very bad about taking down time. I try, and sometimes succeed, but usually I end up remembering something else I need to do, like write a blog post, create a new website for a client, process some photos, work on a video. I can’t just sit there and watch “Ghost Hunters”. I can’t!

Admittedly, with TV I am probably one extreme. Are you the other?

Are you the person who has to record Letterman, “House”, “Biggest Loser”, and other shows, so you can keep up with what is going on. That’s all fine, unless, of course, the TV is interfering with your fitness goals.

Do you find yourself thinking, “I should work out, but, you know, I do need to catch up on all those back episodes of ‘Glee’ I have on the DVR….” If you end up with decisions like that to make — those kinds of decisions that should be no-brainers, and do end up being no-brainers, but in a different way — then you need to kill your TV, or at least wound it severely, so it will release its hold on you.

How do you go about doing that?

  • Don’t turn it on. For an afternoon. Then for a day. Then for two days. Then for a week.
  • Cancel cable or satellite. Save yourself some money. People complain that they can’t afford Tony Horton’s P90X but they drop hundreds each month on TV.
  • Be more selective. Watch only limited run shows. Stick to half-hour sitcoms — you can watch them without worrying about following a season-long story arc. It’s all crap, so don’t let the crap trap you.
  • Find more outside interests. Start a new hobby.

Of course, you could always kill your TV. Get rid of it. Perhaps my original conclusion was correct: That’s too extreme. Without a television, how will you work out with your Tony Horton’s P90X DVDs? (Hmmmm…. Guess you could use your computer for that….)

Here’s a song about killing your TV.

Lap band? Really?

A friend of mine is considering a laparoscopic adjustable gastric band — more commonly called a lap band — because he just can’t lose the weight any other way.

Really?

My friend and I have had discussions on many occasions about his obesity. He can’t exercise, he says — he’s too fat. I’ll grant you, he does have a problem back that has required several surgeries, but, still, can you at least give some kind of exercise a shot for a couple months? Answer: no.

Fine. I know that your body composition is 70% to 80% determined by what  you eat. So how about you get on a primal or low-carb or low-calorie diet and see how that goes?

Tried it. Just can’t do it.

WHAT?

Seriously, this guy — and he is my friend, I love him like a brother, which is probably why I’m so hard on him — is clinically obese, obviously because he has an eating problem. He just cannot control himself.

But he’s an adult with the freedom to choose how to live his life. Why would he choose to continue to eat himself to death?

I don’t know why I’m asking you, because he doesn’t know either. All he knows is that he has tried everything and failed, so now he’s probably headed into surgery.

I cannot even imagine doing that. I mean, I was obese. Okay, not as overweight as my friend, but I was seriously fat. Then one day something clicked inside me and I became determined to lose weight. Then I became determined to get into shape. Click. Click.

Many people are clickless. They know what they have to do, but they just can’t do it.

I wish my friend luck with his lap band. I have another friend who had one installed, and it worked for her. She lost a ton of weight and is living a fuller, happier life now, thanks to the lap band.

Fine. I don’t get it, but I always say that we all need to test ourselves and choose our own paths to fitness. If your path involves a lap band, I wish you well.