Body by Science Excerpt
The Super Slow protocol
Chapter 2: Global Metabolic Conditioning
- Low-intensity, steady-state activity is not necessarily the best way to improve your cardiovascular system.
- Other elements of metabolism apart from the aerobic system should not be ignored, but are when you employ a low-intensity, steady-state approach to exercise.
- Legitimate health benefits are attainable from high-intensity exercise as it pertains to metabolism that are not possible from lower-intensity exercise.
Chapter 3: The Dose-Response Relationship of Exercise
Exercise in accord with muscle and joint function
You will be training with a meaningful load and using a heavy enough weight to induce a mechanical stress on the musculature, which is one of the components of the stimulus. As you move from slow- to intermediate- to fast-twitch motor units in your recruitment pattern, your metabolism will shift toward an anaerobic nature, which results in the metabolism of glucose at a rate that allows for the accumulation ol lactic acid and other by-products of fatigue. This condition also appears to be beneficial to the stimulus process.
Chapter 4: The Big-Five Workout
Breathing
Breathing throughout the performance of each exercise should be continuous and natural, and it should be performed with an open mouth.
Understanding the inroad process
Chapter 5: The Benefits of the Big-Five Workout
- More muscle can save your life
- Strength
- Gastrointestinal transit time
- Resting metabolism
- Glucose metabolism
- Insulin sensitivity
- Release of bodyfat stores
- Cholesterol (blood lipid) levels
- Blood pressure
- Bone mineral density
- Symptoms of arthritis
- Lower-back pain
- Flexibility
- Cardiovascular stimulation
The Best Resistance-Training Program
The excessively slow lifting speed provides two beneficial effects.
- By moving slowly, the weight cannot get moving under its own momentum, and this enhances muscular loading and intensities the exercise.
- The slow movement eliminates acceleration. Since force = mass X acceleration, we can greatly reduce the amount of force that the trainee will encounter.
Chapter 6: Enhancing the Body’s Response to Exercise
- Sufficient Rest
- Adequate Hydration
- Adequate Nutrition
- Putting Stressors Into Perspective
- Don’t Cultivate Training Angst
Chapter 6: Tweaking the Exercise Stimulus
Obstacle Number One: Mechanical Sticking Points
- Segmented Manual Assistance (Forced Repetitions)
- Partial Repetitions.
- Timed Static Hold.
- Rest-Pause.
- Negative-Only.
Obstacle Number Two: The Narrow Therapeutic Window Revisited
1- Reducing the Big Five to a Big Three
Workout 1 Workout 2 Pulldown Seated row Chest press Overhead press Leg press Standing calf raise
2- The Split Routine
Workout 1 Workout 2 Workout 3 Chest press Leg press Pulldown Lateral raise Standing calf raise Seated row Triceps pressdown Abdominal machine Shrug or lower back machine Biceps curl
3- Single-Joint (Isolation) Exercises
- Standing Calf Raise [Calf]
- Lateral Raise [Deltoids]
- Shrug [Traps]
- Lower-Back Machine
- Biceps Curl [Biceps]
- Triceps Pressdown [Triceps]
- Abdominal Machine [Abs]
4- Max Contraction
Workout 1 Workout 2 Workout 3 Leg extension Pullover Lateral raise Leg curl Lower back machine Rear deltoid Standing calf raise Shrug Biceps curl Abdominal crunch Arm cross Triceps extension
Chapter 8: The Genetic Factor
Determining Factors
Skeletal Formation
The bodily proportions normally associated with the bodybuilder’s physique are broad shoulders, narrow hips, and arms and legs of medium length.
Fat Distribution
On average, non-obese people have approximately 25 billion to 30 billion fat cells; moderately obese people have about 50 billion; and extremely obese people have as many as 240 billion.
Neuromuscular Efficiency
Neuromuscular efficiency refers to the relationship between the nervous system and the muscles. Ilow muscles are innervated and how they are activated by the brain determine the degree of muscle power and the number of fibers required to produce a certain movement against a certain resistance. People with high levels of neuromuscular efficiency have the ability to contract a greater percentage of fibers during a maximal effort. People with high levels of neuromuscular efficiency have the ability to contract a greater percentage of fibers during a maximal effort. In an all-out effort, the average person may contract 30 percent of the fibers within a specilic muscle, and a few may have the capacity to activate as many as 40 percent, while even fewer can manage 50 percent. The ability to contract a high percentage of fibers increases contractile capacity and thus enables more intense exertion. In matters of endurance, this endowment is a disadvantage, but it is a definite advantage for stimulating muscle growth, sprinting, and single-attempt efforts.
Muscle-Fiber Density
Muscle-fiber density is a measure of the number of individual muscle fibers per cubic centimeter. The more fibers you have per cubic centimeter, the more you have available to be stimulated to hypertrophy.
Muscle Shape and Size Potential
Muscles come in two distinctly different shapes, and it is the manner in which fibers are arranged within a muscle that determines it that particular muscle has the potential to increase its size. These two classic fiber shapes are fusiform and pennate.
- A fusiform muscle is shaped like a football. An example is the biceps muscle of the upper arm. Because of its shape, this muscle has considerable ability to increase its volume.
- In pennate muscles, the fibers are arranged more like the fronds of a feather. This arrangement creates a pulling angle that gives them a hefty force advantage over their fusiform counterparts. However, pennate fibers are layered such that they’re only a few fibers thick, as opposed to being layered around and around like a jelly roll, as fusiform fibers are.
Myostatin
A specific gene, named growth and differentiation factor 8 (CDF-8), produces this protein, the function of which is to stop muscle stem cells or satellite cells from becoming larger.
- Ciliary Neurotrophic Factor (CNTF)
- Interleukin-15
- Alpha-Actinin-3
- Myosin Light Chain Kinase
- Angiotensin Converting Enzyme
High-Intensity Responders
In practical terms, the genetic research discloses that with a training protocol that is especially high in intensity and low in volume, the type of trainee that is going to respond best is someone who has the alpha-actinin-3 component. By extension, this person will be more of a sprinter than a distance runner. The prime responder will also probably possess the myosin light chain kinase enzyme, which would have been inherited from both parents.
This trainee is going to experience greater strength increases from resistance exercise but will also have increased levels of muscle damage and inroad, requiring a longer recovery interval between workouts.
Moreover, this person is going to have the angiotensin converting enzyme dual deletion, along with a relatively higher percentage of fast-twitch fibers, and consequently will respond better in terms of strength to lower reps and lower sets.
Modest Intensity Responders The trainee who is lacking alpha-actinin-3. This trainee also has lower levels of myosin light chain kinase and has the “ii” version or the angiotensin converting enzyme. A trainee who combines these three factors w ill be further along the continuum of responding better to a slightly lower level of intensity, which allows for a slightly higher level of volume. Still, ideals aside, there’s no evidence that you can’t have various combinations of these three elements that might put you anywhere along that spectrum.
The Power Of Environmental Influence
Everything” about your environment in some way determines how your DNA is going to be expressed, because, as previously discussed, not only is DNA sell-replicating, but also it has an interest in passing itself into the future. Consequently, it also makes sense that having some plasticity in this molecule would offer an adaptive advantage, better ensuring that the “rental car” of the body carries it forward into the future.
Chapter 9: The Science of Fat Loss
Fat Storage
The ability to eat when food was available and to store excess caloric energy for future use allowed people to survive when food was not at hand.
Leptin
Ob-Gene controls how much bodyfat a particular individual may carry. It produces the protein leptin, which is a strong suppressor of appetite and food intake. As one’s bodyfat level rises, more leptin is produced, causing appetite to decline, so that bodyfat levels stabilize. By the same token, il one’s bodyfat level falls, leptin production declines, and appetite is disinhibited.
The Sedentary Life?
The problem is not that people today are inactive; the problem is that calories are so readily available to be consumed.
The Fitness Industry Lies: Exercise Doesn’t Burn That Many Calories
Muscle tissue is the most metabolically expensive tissue in the body. You require between 50 and 100 calories a day just to keep a pound of it alive. Let’s assume tor a moment that it requires the lower number ot 50 calories a day: were you to lose 5 pounds of muscle over time as vou perform your steady-state “calorie burning” exercise on the treadmill, that would result in a loss ot 250 calories per dav that would otherwise be used to keep that muscle alive.
More Muscle: The Real Key To Burning Calories
The key to getting rid of accumulated bodytat is to get back your youthful metabolism by regaining your lost muscle mass. You have probably heard people say, “Muscle has memory,”
The Thermodynamics Of Fat Loss
Energy intake basal metabolic rate [determined largely by the degree of muscle mass] increase because of added muscle through proper exercise — energy cost of activity, including exercise + thermic cost of digestion — heat loss to the environment = fat loss (or fat gain, if energy intake is greater than the energy cost of the listed components).
Insulin Revisited: The Role Of Omega-3 Fatty Acids
Every cell wall in the body is made up of fatty acids, the molecules of which have a carboxyl end and a hydroxyl end. One end of the fatty- acid molecule attracts water and is called the “head,” while the other end repels water and is called the “tail.” If you drop fish oil or olive oil into water, it will form a little globule on the surface. The reason is that all the water-loving “heads” of the fatty acid will face outward toward the water environment, and all the water-avoiding tails will point toward the center, away from the water.
Exterior to the cell wall there is water contained in the extracellular space. Interior to the cell wall there is also water in the form of cytoplasm. Every cell wall in the body is made up of a fatty acid bilayer — two fatty acids lined up tail to tail, with their water-loving heads facing out and their water-repelling tails lac- ing in. In addition, all of the receptors necessarv to maintain an appropriate hormonal balance and an appropriate hormonal response for weight loss are located on the cell membrane.
Getting the Ratios Right
If your diet is made up of natural food stuffs that resemble a hunter-gatherer diet, you’re going to be ingesting omega-3 fatty acids and omega-6 fatty acids at a ratio of roughly one to one. With this healthful ratio, a large component of your cell walls will be made up of omega-3 tatty acids and because these fatty acids are elongated and flexible, the cell walls will be fully expanded, placing all of the hormonal receptors on the exterior of the cell facing outward toward the environment, where they can appropriately interact with circulating hormones.
Straying from this hunter-gatherer ideal, it the ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids gets to tour to one, a breakdown in hormonal function begins, which can impair fat loss.
Sources of Omega-3 Fatty Acids
Omega-3 fatty acids are contained in aquatic blue-green algae and in green leafy plants and grasses, as well as in the meat of the animals that eat this vegetation. The best way to obtain an adequate supply of omega-3 fatty acids in your diet is to eat plenty of green leafy vegetables and fish.
Hydration Is Essential
Now consider what happens if there is a calorie deficit but the body is well hydrated. The state of hydration will blunt that message and minimize the risk that metabolism will slow the mobilization of bodyfat. Our evolu- tionary past has programmed these responses into our physiology. If people became dehydrated, their bodies reflexively slowed their metabolism and drove them to eat ravenously (if load was available) out of a tear that famine was soon to follow. Staying well hydrated tells the physiology that all is well and that there is no need to slow metabolism or raise appetite.
Synergize
“Genes are the gun, but environment pulls the trigger.”
First, eat natural, unprocessed foods. These foods typically have a lower calorie density per unit oi weight.
Second, stay cool. Keep your thermostat down, and wear cooler clothes. This causes you to lose heat easily through your breath and skin. Remember that the process oi warming your body requires heat, which, in turn, requires calories. The assets keep mounting, because even more calories must then be burned to maintain your body’s core temperature.
Third, sleep well and sleep cool. Getting at least eight to nine hours or sleep per night tells your body that all is well. You’re not inadvertently communicating the message to your body that it needs to be alert for predators or out scavenging.
Fourth, avoid stress as much as possible. It’s helpful to leant stress-management techniques so that when stress occurs, you’ll handle it well.
Fifth, employ high-intensity exercise. High-intensity training will stimulate your body to build muscle — even in the face of a calorie-reduced diet.
Chapter 10: The Ideal Training Programs for Athletes
Physical Conditioning Versus Skill Conditioning
One of the first factors to be considered in performing any sport is the wide gulf between skill conditioning and physical conditioning. Different sports involve diftering levels of complexity of skill, but all ot the skills are relatively complex or else the activity wouldn’t be classified as “sport” in the first place.
Specific Practice Makes Perfect
The adage that “practice makes perfect” has merit, but it should be amended to include “only when perfectly practiced.”
The way the skill must be practiced is not merely similar to the way you would perform it in competition, but exactly as you would perform it in competition. The neural training that results in superior skill devel- opment is highly specific, and only by practicing perfectly will you become perfect at that skill. If you practice the skill in a way that differs significantly from the way it is performed in competition, you will not perfect that skill; you will befuddle it.
In most sports, practices and games are typically so physically demanding that they consume a significant amount of the athlete’s recovery resources. An athlete who adds to this burden by then attempting to engage in conditioning exercise risks not only delaying recovery but also growing progressively weaker.
Physical Conditioning
Physical conditioning is a type of training performed with the goal of improving overall physical strength and metabolic condition. It is designed to have a generalized applicability, with improvements in physical conditioning benefiting an athlete’s performance in any chosen sport.
Skill Conditioning
Skill conditioning consists of the neuromuscular coordination necessary to perforin certain complex motor tasks associated with a given sport — dribbling a basketball and coordinating a dunk, stickhandling and shooting, running, skating, throwing a football or a baseball, taking and receiving passes, hitting, and so on.
Skills are absolutely specific. You should practice skills exactly as you would be required to perform them in competition. You should not attempt to combine (as many coaches do) your skill practice with your physical conditioning practice.
Competition Is Training
In training athletes for all sorts of sports, we’ve observed that the metabolic conditioning they achieve while performing their sports is much like skill conditioning, in that both are exactingly specific.
Coaching Folklore
It is commonly assumed that athletes should stretch for two important reasons:
- To warm up the muscles prior to participation in the sport
- To reduce the chance of injury during competition
Resources
Originally published at seifsallam.com.
