[Oogadee Boogadee]

I'm so burnt out on fitness right now.... the industry, that is.....

I've been a personal trainer since 2000 and have worked in managing fitness centers to different degrees since 2001.... and sadly, i don't have much of a desire to browse the H&F section.....

but given my career, I figured I'd at least blabber on about something b/c I should at least contribute something.....

I mostly deal with folks (ladies) who want to lose weight, so that's where my head is most fresh, but I'll try to mention the strength / body building / cardio vascular components as well.

first, the key to weight loss:
do more, eat less.

it's that simple.

let's say you sleep 6 hours. you have 18 to spare, with 1 hour devoted to exercise. you have 18 hours to burn calories and eat smart, or be a lazy f*ck and eat like a dumbass w/o common sense.

Stand in the office, take the stairs, walk in the parking lot, stand in front of the tv, --- burn as much calories as possible.

Eat right and eat early

never get "full"

save half your dinner for tomorrow's breakfast/lunch.

Minimize your carbs.

maximize your protein intake so that your body doesn't breakdown muscle to replace the missing carbs (make it convert your ingested proteins).

lift weights to avoid muscle loss

lift weights to gain calorie-burning tissues (muscle)

lift weights so you wont be a pansie-ass

don't pay attention to the "fat-burning" zone (heart rate monitors).

Train like that athlete that has the body-type you want (want to look like a sprinter, train like one. Like a marathoner? train like one. Bodies are the result of training).

the skinniest athletes in the world, like marathoners, aren't staying in the 'fat-burning' zone. They're hauling ass - not thinking about stupid fat burning zones. consequently, they're skinny. those in the gym, keeping in the zone, are heavy.

the miseducation comes in the form of ratios.

1:5, carbs to fat metabolism, at rest (arbitrary numbers).
5:1, carbs to fat metabolism, at intense exercise.

The former - you're burning more fat. The latter, more carbs. The details look like this:
1:5, carbs to fat metabolism, at rest (arbitrary numbers).
5000:1000 (or, 5:1), carbs to fat metabolism, at intense exercise.

Relative & absolute. Relatively speaking, you're burning more carbs than fat at 5000:1000. However, You're burning 1000 fats to 5 fats, when you compare resting levels with intense exercise levels. Which one wins?
Absolutely speaking, you're burning 6000 vs 6 total. What is the better scenario?


soooooo don't hold back, kill yourself with an intense cardio work out AT LEAST once a week (hill runs, interval sprints, cardio machine intervals). I'm talking levels where you're ready to die, levels that you can't maintain forever. You're workout might be shorter, and it may take an hour for you to stop sweating, b/c you literally jacked up your metabolism and now you get to ride the wave of extended calorie burn till you come back down off the 'high'.

diversify your cardio in exercise selection (but keep it full body - running, elliptical, rowing, a combo of all that), as well as intensity.

for lifting - keep it multi-joint (compound joint) exercises. don't bother with bicep curls, do chin-ups or chin-up negatives, or under-hand grip pull downs. Lunges and squats and leg presses destroy leg extensions and leg curls. don't waste your time.

diversify your exercise selection, exercise order, rep speeds, rep/load/set schemes (there are standards for endurancing, hypertrophy, strength - do each for 1-3 weeks or whatever suits you best, then SWITCH), rest periods, etc. I'd say practice good form - but i'm not even going to get into that here

the world of true strength training is in a different universe than body building. Performance vs looking strong.

When it doubt, find a saw and hack off unwanted tissues.

i just burned myself out on my own post.

maybe more later.

i'm going to search through constructions jobs.

see ya!

[Papa Shank]

I'm all for compound exercises, they're just more fun. I'm not sure I'd say people who lift specifically for size only look strong though, there are some crazy strong bodybuilders out there.

[Oogadee Boogadee]

you're right. they are strong. some are just blessed. some are weightlifters and powerlifters in disquise. it's weird. Ronnie coleman is amazing. he's very strong. he could cross over if he wanted to.

however, a true average body builder is less likely to be as strong as a true average power/weight lifter.

but again, as you mentioned, there are exceptions to every general rule of thumb.