A study that came out this year in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition on the relation of body fat mass and fat-free mass to total mortality, is freely available for all to read and the findings confirm what most Breaking Muscle readers already know, BMI is not a good indicator of wellbeing or physical fitness.

In the study, higher instances of fat mass was associated with 50% more risks of mortality compared to lower fat mass. To put it in a better way, more muscularity is associated with lower risks of mortality.

The study is based on a 14-year follow-up on seven other studies and included about 16,000 subjects. So, while other studies have made similar observations, this body of evidence adds further weight to the arguments against the use of BMI, predominantly by insurance companies, to determine mortality risks.

BMI is a ratio, obtained by dividing weight, in kilograms, by the square value of height, measured in meters. Obesity is indicated by a BMI of 33-35, and above. A very muscular person can have a BMI of 25 and above, considered as overweight.

Body fat measurement alone may not be sufficient to determine the impact of your body composition on your health and the distribution of fat around the body is also a consideration, in particular the waist to hip ratio, where the greater the amount of fat around the belly the more impact on the mortality risk to the subject.

There are no simple answers to how your size and weight impacts your general health. There are guidelines, but what is clear is that there is a great deal of variance depending on ancillary factors including muscularity and fat distribution.

No two people share the same body and no two people sharing the same general statistics will have the same risk profile for mortality. You should look at yourself as a glorious experiment in personalization when it comes to training, goal-setting, and lifestyle choices. It’s your life, and it has to be your way, the way that works best for you and only you.

More than any other factor, people new to exercise or fitness regimens should approach the process as a long-term experiment that will never end, carrying you through life at all ages.

The post Body Composition More Important Than BMI appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Your sleeping patterns could be slowing you down from achieving your fitness and body composition goals. Many of us have heard the 8-hour rule for sleep that deals with sleep quantity, but what about sleep quality? Optimizing sleep quality could be the missing key to getting leaner and boosting your energy and productivity.

Why 8 Hours?

Here’s the deal with the 8-hour rule. There’s a small number of people that can function properly, and even thrive, on just a few hours of sleep per night. Famously ex British Prime Minister Winston Churchill functioned on just a few hours of sleep per night, most nights.

Thomas Edison also famously got 3-4 hours of sleep each night, while more recently Donald Trump was quoted saying, “How does somebody that’s sleeping 12 and 14 hours a day compete with someone that’s sleeping three or four?”

We do know that not enough sleep is bad for us. It strongly impacts brain function and can cause hormonal and blood sugar fluctuations. These side-effects will wreak havoc not only on your productivity but your body composition, too.

So, unless you’re the rare exception, the “you can sleep when you die” mentality for most is not a smart approach. Sleep deprivation can cause you to age faster, getting you closer to your goal of sleeping when you die a bit sooner.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are those that truly need to get in 10 hours or more per night. This is just how they are wired, and they might truly need that amount of sleep for proper brain function. As a rule, you also need less sleep the older you get, with infants needing the most while the elderly the least. Teenagers do generally need more sleep than mature adults, too.

There are the extremes at either end of sleep quantity, and they represent a very small percentage. For most of you reading this, chances are that 7-8 hours is a good quantity of sleep to aim for. Here are five tips to improve your sleep quality, the often-missing key.

1. Workout Early

Not an early morning person? Well, you should be! Research shows that a workout done early in the day will improve your sleep quality. When you choose to workout later in the day, for example after work in the evening, research shows this can have a negative effect on your sleep quality.

Get to bed on time, set an earlier alarm, and ideally get your workout done before work not after. You will sleep better that night and the cycle can start all over again the next day. It takes 66 days to form a new habit, that becomes automatic to you. Not the often misquoted 21 days. So, persevere with the early morning workouts as nothing will change over just one night.

2. Take a Warm Shower or Bath Before Bed

Small changes in body temperature can have a huge impact on your sleeping habits. A warm (not too hot or too cold) shower before bed temporarily raises your core body temperature, only until you step out into the colder room allowing your body temperature to drop again. This tiny little trick sends powerful signals to our body’s internal clocks, helping to synchronize them and provide a more optimal internal environment for a better night’s sleep.

A room temperature of a pretty cool 60-67 degrees Fahrenheit (15-20 degrees Celsius) will help you sleep deeper also, so be sure to adjust that thermostat before bed.

3. Eliminate Technology

I’ve you haven’t heard already, phones, tablets, computers, and TVs keep you awake at night. The blue light emitted from these devices can keep you awake for longer, as well as disrupt your sleeping patterns.

The solution? Ban these devices at least 30 minutes before bed if you can, ideally longer. If you cannot do this then some devices have programs or apps that alter the color and level of light emitted from your device. Eliminating the culprit before bed will be the better option, but if you need your nightly fix of TV or social media then these light adjusting tools can be a real sleep saver.

4. Create a Cave

Your bedroom should be cave-like. Think of a place where very little light can get in, and its sole purpose is for sleep and hibernation. Outside your sacred sleep space, your home could be full of technology and distractions, but when it comes to your bedroom your brain needs to be associating that sacred space with sleep and restfulness.

Because your body adjusts its internal sleep clock to light exposure, you also need to make sure your room is as dark as possible, that means lined curtains or good blinds. Even a standby light on a TV can have an effect, the body is that sensitive.

Just create your own dark cave free of worry and distraction, reserving your bedroom for sleep and sex only. The latter is optional, but due to the release of several hormones, sex can help you sleep.

5. Choose the Right Supplements

You already know that you should try and avoid caffeine before bed. Caffeine not only keeps you awake but completely disrupts your sleeping patterns. You’ll be tossing and turning all night. What you may not know is that caffeine has a chemical half-life of 5-6 hours.

That means it takes approximately 5-6 hours for caffeine to be half-eliminated from your body. That means that even if you have a coffee, take some caffeine pills, or have your pre-workout mid-afternoon chances are there is going to be an effect on your sleep that night. As a rule of thumb try to avoid caffeine after mid-day to ensure a great night’s sleep.

There are also some supplements that have been shown to help you get a great night’s sleep and are more than worth the investment if you really struggle. Even a placebo effect would help. Most of these have been shown to increase levels of certain chemicals or hormones that regulate your internal sleep clock, such as melatonin.

Here are some of the best supplements to consider:

• Ornithine is an amino acid that helps your body to eliminate ammonia in the gut and helps to relax and de-stress the body. Some people sleep dramatically better with ornithine. As a bonus, it will also increase growth hormone levels, too.
• L-theanine in capsule form helps with relaxation.
• 5-HTP is a precursor to serotonin and melatonin. It helps you fall asleep, and many have reported how effective it is for sleep quality.
• L-tryptophan is an amino acid that has been shown to increase brain levels of serotonin, a “feel good” hormone, as well as melatonin. Both are extremely important in sleep, and studies show that low intake of tryptophan through diet can disrupt the amount of serotonin and melatonin naturally produced by the body.
• Melatonin is a powerful sleep hormone and can be found in supplement form, although not as widely available in some countries. Melatonin supplementation is also particularly effective for helping prevent jet lag when taken at the right time according to the destination time zone.
• GABA is a neuroinhibitory transmitter. It’s what your brain uses to shut itself down—great for type-A personalities and people whose brains are always active. Taken away from any other protein, since this can affect its absorption, GABA can dramatically calm you before bed.

Do Your Sleep a Favor

Some of us spend half of our lives or more in bed. It would be doing your body and brain a disservice not to consider your sleep quality. Use these simple tricks to help you feel sharper, gain energy, and achieve your body’s potential.

The post 5 Sleep Tips to Help Fat Loss appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

In our efforts to lose body fat, we Google solutions until the wee hours, swear off carbs, and run at level 10 on the treadmill, hoping that our hard work and diligence will pay off. But despite the rules, our workouts, super clean eating, and the supposedly secret sauce sold by clever health marketers, it’s not working.

The answer isn’t in some new diet dogma or product line. Losing body fat can and should be a natural process that involves a lot more than eliminating carbs, fasting, or counting macros. Here are a handful of truths about losing body fat naturally that could make the difference between success and failure for you.

Eat More Fat

The myth that eating fat makes you fat is, thankfully and finally, dying off. While it’s true that fat is the most energy-dense substance we consume (at nine calories per gram), it is also necessary for a huge range of biological processes, from hormone production to cell membrane function.

Diets that exclude or severely limit fat tend to replace all those calories with carbohydrates, which sets you up to ride the blood sugar roller coaster. Your body is constantly chasing balance between blood sugar and insulin levels, which can in turn impact your cortisol (stress hormone) production. Cortisol signals your body to store body fat, rather than burn it, and can also lead to increased intake of high-carbohydrate foods.

Dietary fat can help keep energy levels more even, and hunger at bay. Reach for healthy fats with each meal, and in place of carbohydrate-based snacks, reach for a snack with healthy fat or protein as the base. Look for things like raw nuts and seeds, olive oil, coconut oil, coconut butter, avocado, olives, ghee, grass-fed butter, full-fat fermented yogurt, fatty cuts of organic meats, pastured eggs, or avocado oil.

Don’t Fear Carbs

Just because I’m telling you to eat more fat doesn’t mean that carbs are the enemy, either. When we go too low on carbs, particularly from veggies, we risk also eliminating fiber, which is essential to digestion, your gut biome, and metabolic balance. Extreme diets at either end of the fat vs. carbs spectrum can negatively impact your metabolism.

Researchers and dieters everywhere are asking, which is better, low fat or low carb? But there isn’t a single correct answer. Some people do better with more carbs, and some do better with more fat. Every body is different. For example, some women who have issues with their blood sugar or insulin resistance have found ketogenic diets beneficial as a short-term dietary approach. However, women who have their blood sugar under control, but have some adrenal fatigue or hormone imbalances, have found a ketogenic diet more harmful in the long run.

Conspicuously, there has yet to be a study that shows that an overall balanced diet does any harm at all. Therefore, instead of chasing the new extreme trend for body fat loss, aim for the simplest, realest foods, and strive for as much balance as possible. Look for carbohydrate sources the human body thrives upon:

• Leafy greens (cooked and raw). 1-3 servings per day.
• Pre-biotic carbs like green-tipped bananas or plantains, cooked and cooled potatoes, winter squash and sweet potatoes, Jerusalem artichokes, onions, garlic, or asparagus. 1-2 servings per day.
• Fiber-rich veggies like broccoli, zucchini, yellow squash, asparagus, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, celery, cucumbers, etc.
• Starchy tubers like potatoes, sweet potatoes, squashes, carrots, beets, yucca, jicama. Limit to 1-2 minimal or moderate servings per day.

Some people also find that less fruit consumption helps for the short-term, and that grains are not an ideal source of carbohydrates for a variety of reasons that are beyond the scope of this article.

By aiming to include more healthy fats in our diet, alongside moderate protein and moderate carbohydrates from real foods, we turn on our metabolism, and help keep our blood sugar stable.

Your Body Runs on Colors, Not Numbers

Our bodies don’t see food in terms of macros or calories. They see nutrients, and need lots of nutrient-dense foods to thrive. The problem many people run into with macro- or calorie-based plans is that they fixate on numbers, scales and measurements, without acknowledging the nutrient density in foods, and how your metabolism responds to that.

For instance, a half cup of gummy bears may supply your body with a punch of “quick digesting carbs” after a workout, but the nutrient composition and health benefit it provides is completely different than a half cup of berries or a small sweet potato. Your body responds to the real food with increased satiety and a better metabolic result.

Diet staples like chicken, olive oil, and rice do give your body some protein, fat, and carbs, but what about their nutrient density and variety? Put another way, how many colors are in that meal? Generally speaking, less color means fewer nutrients, and less satisfaction from eating them. You might have hit your macro goals, but your body is still craving the rest of the many nutrients it needs to function at its best.

When we consume lots of colorful veggies, body-boosting healthy fats, and essential proteins, our metabolism comes alive, extracting various vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants to keep your body revving. My top picks include:

• Dark leafy greens
• Colorful veggies (aim for 2-3 different veggie colors at each meal)
• Berries
• Citrus (lemon, orange, lime, grapefruit)
• Organic herbs (parsley, cilantro, rosemary, thyme, sage)
• Organ meats
• Fermented foods like sauerkraut
• Pastured eggs and poultry, grass-fed beef, wild-caught fatty fish
• Coconut oil, cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil, ghee, and grass-fed butter
• Avocado
• Raw brazil nuts, walnuts, and macadamia nuts

While you’re at it, make sure you are eating enough. Under-eating is just as detrimental as overeating.

Stress Less

Stress is the #1 driver of all disease, including stubborn body fat. Stress is inevitable in our society, but it is often overlooked in areas beyond mental health. Even if you don’t think you’re stressed out, minor daily stressors can threaten metabolic balance.

Biologically, your cortisol level needs to be in a state of balance in order to shed body fat. If your body constantly feels threatened, cortisol levels become chronically high. The last thing your body wants to do when it thinks it’s fighting for survival is comply with your fat loss protocol.

Some simple (but effective) game changers for balancing cortisol include:

• Shut off screens in the evening hours, or power down to “night mode” if your device supports it, or use an app like f.lux.
• Get outside for at least 30-60 minutes each day.
• Move your body with a “Goldilocks” approach. Too much exercise will keep cortisol levels high just as surely as too little. Destress naturally with regular exercise, without over-exerting or pushing your body beyond limit.
• Get off the treadmill. Build a foundation of lean muscle with strength training, and less focus on all cardio, all the time. For balance, 1-3 times per week, sprinkle in a little bit of HIIT, like sprints or CrossFit-style workouts, and endurance training like cycling, swimming or running.
• Support all of this with a daily movement lifestyle (walking, playing with your kids, standing at work, etc.), and plenty of simple movement.
• Say “no” to things draining your schedule, energy, or time.
• Get your beauty sleep. When it comes to fat loss, insufficient sleep works against your body. One study showed that those who slept 8.5 hours per night lost 50% more body fat than a group that got only 5.5 hours.

You can’t improve your body when your mind is freaked out. Stress reduction has been shown to help alleviate an otherwise broken metabolism. Incorporating a practice of deep breathing, meditation or prayer, meditative movement (stretching, yoga, dance), and reading or listening to positive truth (podcasts, books, speakers, etc.) are all tactics for mindfully reducing stress.

Pay Attention to Your Meals

Speaking of mindfulness, research tells us that practicing it during meals can help reduce cortisol and abdominal fat. Incorporate these techniques into your own meal times:

• Chew your food (fully)
• De-screen: turn off the TV, phone, computer and even books
• Assess your level of hunger and fullness. You don’t have to always finish your plate, and sometimes, you may need seconds.
• Be aware of how food makes you feel. Are you bloated, constipated, breaking out, anxious, have an allergic reaction? Something may be in your food that is not sitting well with you.
• Don’t eat the same things every day. Incorporate a variety of nutrients from real foods.

Heal Your Gut

Beyond diet and stress, one essential factor most people don’t consider when it comes to body fat loss is what’s going on in their gut. Underlying gut issues like fungal or bacterial overgrowth, imbalanced gut bacteria, chronic bloating or constipation, or low stomach acid, can lead to nutrient deficiency and malabsorption issues.

The result? Your body is going to fight against you, no matter how clean you eat or how much you work out. One study on the effectiveness of a gut-healing protocol in people on a fat loss program found those who focused on healing their gut lost an average of about 11 pounds of body fat, with only three of those pounds related to diet alone. Other research has shown that individuals with a healthier gut (less bacterial overgrowth) and better digestion respond better to intermittent fasting, versus those who have an unhealthy gut microbiome.

In short, you are only as healthy as the trillions of bacteria in your gut. You can think of your gut as the gateway to all other systems in your body. If it is unable to absorb and digest your nutrients appropriately, or it is rotting and fermenting bacteria inside, then your other body systems won’t get what they need. When that happens, health declines. Your hormones get out of whack, you experience increased anxiety, feel the need to binge, and gain body fat.

Because of a tragically poor diet, gut issues impact the vast majority of all Americans, even if they don’t have obvious gut symptoms. Beyond the typical bloating, constipation, or loose stools, less obvious signs may be slowed metabolism, unexplained weight loss or gain, allergies, low immunity, anxiety, skin breakouts, or general fatigue.

When you get rid of unwanted bacteria or undigested food hiding out in your gut, inflammation lessens, your metabolism, cortisol levels, and thyroid are supported, and your body is free to stop holding onto unwanted body fat.

The best way to find out if you have a gut issue? Test, don’t guess. Consult with a practitioner skilled in digging deeper into gut health for a personalized approach. Testing may include SIBO, stool, hormone level, and food intolerance screenings. In my own practice, I find that most of my clients who struggle to lose body fat often have a gut or metabolic imbalance sabotaging their efforts.

Supplement Smart

The diet industry is saturated with formulas and magical pills to shed the body fat. However, most of these are just clever marketing. What’s worse, many of these may also jack with your cortisol levels, making your stress and body fat worse in the long run, not better.

Supplements are a secondary consideration to all of the approaches listed above. If you choose to supplement, the key areas I recommend for body fat loss are simple: a quality probiotic, and fermented foods. For example, a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar in 2-4 ounces of water around meal times, and some digestive enzymes for helping break down food.

That’s it for “essentials.”

Not all supplements are created equal. In fact, the vast majority of probiotics on shelves do not contain the probiotics they claim, or the quality of probiotics needed to compose a healthy gut microbiome.

A few of my favorite digestive supplements include:

• Megaspore Probiotic
• Floramyces by Designs for Health
• Primal Flora Probiotic
• Garden of Life Primal Defense Ultra (if you don’t have SIBO)

Gut health can also be supported by 1-2 condiment-sized servings of fermented foods daily:

• Sauerkraut
• Low-sugar kombucha
• Kefir
• Grass-fed plain yogurt
• Beet kvass
• Fermented pickled veggies

Fix Your Mindset

These essential strategies could be the game changers you’ve been looking for to get your fat loss efforts on track. But the biggest of all comes from a gut-check of a different kind: not making your goal solely about fat loss.

Fat loss is only the means to get something else you really want. You want that feeling of fat loss—feeling good in your own skin, feeling good when you fit into your favorite jeans, feeling confident in your work, social interactions, or relationships. Identify that feeling that you think your fat loss will bring you, and begin feeding into goals and pursuits outside fat measurements or the scale itself in order to attain what it is you truly want.

The biggest game changer in getting the body you want will come when you stop focusing so much on the scale or size, and instead make goals and set intentions around other more important things in your life. It’s not bad to want to improve your body composition, but when our sole drive and focus is aimed at body fat loss alone, that dangling carrot will never be fully attained. There will always be someone better, fitter, prettier, or leaner than us.

Instead, set primary goals for personal development, peace with yourself and food, healing your gut or hormones, stressing less, improving relationships, and chasing dreams. When you do, the body fat loss will follow, I promise.

The post The Reasons You Aren’t Losing Body Fat appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

This week I thought I’d share something that many of you might find surprising. For most of my life, I’ve had relatively poor body composition, especially considering my athletic interests and my fairly high-visibility fitness career. In other words, until quite recently, I was fat.

The reason you’d find this surprising is that we tend to assume the experts we follow do everything right, or at least most things. Or we assume they were born with various “gifts” that made their path to success a lot easier. That may be the case for some, but it certainly wasn’t true for me.

Starting Points Matter

I’ll start by sharing a handful of pictures with you. A few of these are fairly old, so please excuse the image quality, but I assure you they’ll suffice for the purpose of illustrating my story.

This first photo is me at age seventeen. I weighed 140lb at my current height of 6’1”. At this stage, I’d been involved in the martial arts for about 5-6 years, had just started to lift, and had an absolutely savage metabolic rate. I ate huge quantities of food, and not much of it was healthy. It was all I could do to maintain the 140lb that I carried in this photo.

Back when food intake and body composition didn’t seem remotely related.

The Takeaway: Whenever you’re evaluating someone’s level of expertise based on physique, it’s helpful to know where he or she started. A female fitness trainer who’s currently 35 percent body fat but who started off weighing 450lb is someone you might want to listen to, just as an example.

Thirty Years of Fat

Fast forward to age 28. By this point, I had been lifting seriously for about ten years, but as you can clearly see, I didn’t have much to show for it. I ate more than my activity levels warranted, and as a result, tipped the scales at about 235lb in this photo.

Somehow, I could look at this photo and not think I was fat.

This was my all-time highest bodyweight. Why was I so fat? A combination of things accounted for it, including poor nutritional knowledge, lack of discipline, and inaccurate body image. I didn’t realize I was fat, believe it or not.

Next, we jump to 2008, age 48. By this point in my life, I was a well-known fitness authority, but as you can see in this photo, oftentimes my clients were in better shape than I was, at least in terms of body composition. I was pretty strong, and the way my body fat was distributed made me look leaner than I actually was, but at 220-225lb, I was at least 20 percent body fat.

Some of my clients had better body composition than I did.

Again, skewed body image and poor nutritional discipline were at the core of this. I definitely knew enough about nutrition to get lean, but just never buckled down and did the hard work required.

The Takeaway: Even the experts you admire most still make mistakes. While they don’t do everything perfectly, the “good” things they do outweigh their mistakes, so the net result is a high level of success. Don’t seek perfection – seek progress. Find your least productive habits and behaviors, and work to improve them.

Time to Get Lean

Then something happened, and I’m not really sure what triggered it. In October of 2012, shortly before my 53rd birthday, I woke up one day, looked in the mirror, and thought, “I don’t need to be this big. It’s about time I get lean once and for all. I need to prove to myself that I can do this.”

I knew I’d need some help, so step one was to find a coach. After quite a bit of research, I settled upon Eric Helms of 3D Muscle Journey. Eric used (and I believe still uses) a “flexible dieting” or “IIFYM” approach. Looking back, I don’t think I would have succeeded had I used any other strategy.

That’s not to say that my new nutritional plan didn’t require some adjustment. It certainly did. In particular, it required that I eat a lot more protein and a lot less fat than I was accustomed to. After about 4-5 days, I realized that I wasn’t quite prepared, and had to call Eric and tell him I’d restart in a few weeks. The next day, I went to the grocery store and took photos of various foods and food labels, looking for ways I could create relatively high-protein, low-fat meals.

The Takeaway: Do you actually understand enough about nutrition, but fail to apply it to yourself? Or do you not understand enough about nutrition to make it work for yourself? In either case, consider hiring a competent coach.

This Week’s Training:

Volume: 65,324lb (Last Week: 56,744lb)

Significant Lifts:

• Low Bar Squat: 315×3
• Concept2 Rower: 500m/1:46
• Deadlift: 425×5
• Military Press: 125×5

Well as you can see, I dropped down to sets of 5 this week, and managed a few good performances right out of the gate. Spending more time in higher-rep brackets seems to benefit me.

I’m also having fun on the Concept2 rower, even though it spanked me pretty good on Tuesday. After hitting 200 meters in 1:47, I was totally destroyed. Much respect to whoever holds the 2000m world record, which is about 5.5 minutes.

Bodyweight: 200.8lb

Volume: 21,745lb

Goblet Squat

• Set 1: 25lb × 10
• Set 2: 53lb × 10
• Set 3: 70lb × 10

Low Bar Squat

• Set 1: 45lb × 5
• Set 2: 95lb × 5
• Set 3: 135lb × 5
• Set 4: 185lb × 5
• Set 5: 225lb × 5
• Set 6: 275lb × 5
• Set 7: 315lb × 3
• Set 8: 275lb × 5

Seated Calf Raise

• Set 1: 70lb × 8
• Set 2: 70lb × 8
• Set 3: 70lb × 8
• Set 4: 70lb × 8

Toes To Bar

• Set 1: 5 reps
• Set 2: 5 reps
• Set 3: 5 reps
• Set 4: 5 reps

45° Back Extension

• Set 1: +140lb × 8
• Set 2: +140lb × 8
• Set 3: +140lb × 8
• Set 4: +140lb × 8

Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Bodyweight: 200.2lb

Volume: 1,050lb

Rowing

• Set 1: 0.5 km in 2:00:04
• Set 2: 0.5 km in 0:01:47
• Set 3: 0.5 km in 0:01:55

Goblet Squat

• Set 1: 35lb × 10
• Set 2: 35lb × 10
• Set 3: 35lb × 10

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Bodyweight: 200.2lb

Volume: 11,169lb

Bench Press

• Set 1: 135lb × 5
• Set 2: 165lb × 5
• Set 3: 185lb × 5
• Set 4: 205lb × 5
• Set 5: 210lb × 5
• Set 6: 185lb × 5

Hammer Row

• Set 1: 90lb × 8
• Set 2: 140lb × 8
• Set 3: 140lb × 8

Lying Dumbbell Tricep Extension

• Set 1: 60lb × 8
• Set 2: 70lb × 8
• Set 3: 78lb × 8

Bicep Curl (Dumbbell)

• Set 1: 70lb × 8
• Set 2: 70lb × 8

Thursday, January 28, 2016

Bodyweight: 200.2lb

Volume: 22,150lb

Deadlift

• Set 1: 135lb × 5
• Set 2: 135lb × 5
• Set 3: 185lb × 5
• Set 4: 225lb × 5
• Set 5: 275lb × 5
• Set 6: 315lb × 5
• Set 7: 365lb × 5
• Set 8: 425lb × 5 (Video Below)

Hack Squat

• Set 1: 45lb × 10
• Set 2: 90lb × 8
• Set 3: 115lb × 8
• Set 4: 140lb × 8
• Set 5: 140lb × 8
• Set 6: 140lb × 8

Standing Calf Raise

• Set 1: 200lb × 8
• Set 2: 200lb × 8
• Set 3: 200lb × 8
• Set 4: 200lb × 8

Friday, January 29, 2016

Bodyweight: 200.4lb

Volume: 9,210lb

Rusin Shoulder Warm Up

Military Press

• Set 1: 45lb × 10
• Set 2: 65lb × 8
• Set 3: 85lb × 6
• Set 4: 105lb × 5
• Set 5: 115lb × 5
• Set 6: 125lb × 5
• Set 7: 95lb × 5

Pull Up

• Set 1: 5 reps
• Set 2: 5 reps
• Set 3: 5 reps
• Set 4: 5 reps
• Set 5: 5 reps

EZ Bar Curl

• Set 1: 65lb × 8

More on Body Composition:

• Let’s Talk About Diet, Part 2: Macronutrients
• Get Back to Fighting Weight and Conquer Race Season
• Your Diet Needs a Reality Check
• New on Breaking Muscle Today

Photos courtesy of Charles Staley.

The post From Thin, to Fat, to Fit: Coaches Are People, Too appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Like most things in health and fitness, the problem stems from a simple fact: you were lied to. Lies form the basis of the fitness industry. Included among them are ideas like needing to join a big gym that has an army of treadmills and two of every machine created in order to get in shape. Or that you need to consume four different protein concoctions to help burn fat. Most of it is just designed to sell things – usually supplements or gym memberships.

The truth is simple: the quality of your diet dictates your body composition.

A Growing Epidemic

These lies have propagated because the modern world is getting fatter and fatter. The rate of obesity has increased 214 percent since World War II. Three out of five people are overweight, and one in five is obese. That leaves only one in five with a healthy body mass.¹

Like everything in our modern world, we have access to a lot of information about diet. Probably too much information, because the reality is, diet isn’t that difficult. The biggest problem is that many people wrongly interpret their needs. Figuring out the type of diet you need starts with an honest assessment of where your body composition is right now.

If you’re one of the five who isn’t overweight or obese, congratulations. Your task is to train the house down and increase athleticism. Make yourself as strong as you can while keeping your body weight in a healthy range.

Which category do you fall into?

You’re a Ticking Time Bomb

For the other four out of five people, listen up. Your body composition is indicative of your overall health. If it’s too high, your system is under extra pressure. Sooner or later you will suffer some kind of problem. Whether that is diabetes, a heart attack, or knee problems from being overweight, I don’t know. But I do know that when the odds are against you, the house always wins. So sort it out now. If you are overweight, you don’t need another bulking cycle. Nor do you need a strength cycle. You need a weight-loss cycle.

This is where that information overload becomes a problem. There are so many weight-loss programs to choose from – Zone, paleo, vegan, Atkins, Lemon Detox, Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Buddhist, Kosher, Body for Life, South Beach, Grapefruit Diet, Israeli Army, gluten-free, ketogenic, alkaline, Blood Type, intermittent fasting, and more.

And the weird thing is, they’ll work. Maybe. The one factor that determines success on any ideal eating plan is compliance. It’s easy to write down a New Year’s resolution that says you’ll finally get a healthy body composition this year. But actually eating the salads and doing the food preparation ahead of time is much harder.

5 Steps to Get Your Body Composition Under Control: 1. Get Rid of Junk Food

“I’m having a hard day. I deserve a beer.” What a complete load of crap. Food isn’t a reward system for showing up for work and doing your job. Nor is it a form of self-medication to deal with your idiotic boss. If you want to be an athlete, food is your fuel. If you want to rev your engine hard, then you need to use quality fuel.

That means fast food and highly processed snack foods need to go. Alcohol too, for the most part. Replace calorie-containing beverages with water. At this stage, what you replace these things with hardly matters, as long as you replace them with actual food.

5 Steps to Get Your Body Composition Under Control: 2. Minimize Carbohydrate Intake

Don’t get rid of your carbohydrate intake all together. That’s like trying to run your race car on fumes. Carbs fuel hard efforts in training and help keep your system running properly.

If weight loss is your goal, be mindful of timing. The best time to take carbs is post-training when the body is primed to store the glycogen gained in the muscles rather than as excess body fat.

5 Steps to Get Your Body Composition Under Control: 3. Eat More Salads and Vegetables

The root of this whole conversation is health, so you should be concerned about how many vegetables you get every day anyway. At Read Performance Training, we tell our clients to eat a minimum of four cups of vegetables and one piece of fruit daily.

5 Steps to Get Your Body Composition Under Control: 4. Add Daily Walking

Low-intensity activity, such as walking or easy cycling, won’t burn up the small amount of muscle tissue you already have. It also won’t leave you flat and unable to repeat it the next day due to soreness. I watched someone lose 100lb in a year with 10,000 daily steps as the cornerstone of the program, so I can attest to how well it works. For myself, I am always at my leanest when I get in daily walks.

5 Steps to Get Your Body Composition Under Control: 5. Add Resistance Training

This is actually the easiest of the five, which is why I’ve placed it last. For many people, the hardest part about weight loss is preparing meals and eliminating bad food choices. Daily long walks can also seem difficult for those who don’t believe they have time. If that is the case, I suggest reading Rob McDonald’s time audit article for a reality check.

Lifting weights, on the other hand, is easy. You show up, work hard for an hour or so, and then you’re done with it for 24 hours or more.

Undoing Damage Takes Time

The one piece missing from the four points above is hunger. I mean actual physical hunger. It is perfectly fine to be hungry all day long. Learn to deal with it. This is the price you pay for having not been hungry at all for however long you’ve been overweight.

Remember, you are covered in excess energy stores, and the only way to get at them is to be in a caloric deficit. There are no secrets, just the constant application of basics over enough time to get the results you want.

You’ll Also Enjoy:

• How Strength Levels Affect Work Capacity and Body Composition
• How Much Overhead Are You Carrying?
• The Intelligent Athlete’s Guide to Fueling Performance
• New on Breaking Muscle Today

References:

1. Bird, B. “How Much Have Obesity Rates Risen Since 1950?” LiveStrong.com. Demand Media, Inc., 26 May 2011. Accessed 15 Jan. 2016.

Photos courtesy of Jorge Huerta Photography.

The post Your Diet Needs a Reality Check appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Question #1: Should I Use a Scale?

READER: What’s your take on using the scale to monitor body composition? In other words, do you use it at all, and if so, how frequently do you recommend?

CHARLES SAYS: I think that for most people, the scale is the most practical method of evaluating changes in body composition. But it shouldn’t be your only method by any means, since scale weight is only a proxy for body composition. In other words, it’s an indirect measure, which means it’s capable of misleading you. For example, a sudden increase in carbohydrate and/or sodium intake can cause fluid retention and weight gain, even though you didn’t gain any body fat.

I’d recommend taking weekly progress pictures, as well as noting changes in how clothing is fitting you, and possibly taking measurements, in addition to using scale weight.

But with all of that said, there is considerable controversy around the ideal frequency of weighing, if there is in fact such a thing.

For some people, daily weighing can lead to anxiety over the inevitable day-to-day fluctuations in bodyweight, mostly from the causes I spoke of a moment ago.

On the other hand, less frequent weighings (weekly, for example), tend to be far less accurate due to those same day-to-day fluctuations. For example, you might weigh between 140-142lbs all week, and then have a lot of salt in your evening meal, and the next morning, you weigh 144lbs. You think you’ve gained three or four pounds, but in fact, you haven’t.

“Personally, as long as I think my client can tolerate it, I like daily weighings, and then calculating a weekly average bodyweight from those numbers.”

Some coaches recommend twice-weekly weighings as a way to bridge the gap between the accuracy of daily weighings and the low-stress of weekly weighings. Personally, as long as I think my client can tolerate it, I like daily weighings, and then calculating a weekly average bodyweight from those numbers.

Question #2: How Frequently Should I Train?

READER: Charles, I often hear it said that older athletes should train less frequently for recovery purposes. I’m guessing that you don’t agree (from watching your training here!) but just wondered what your thoughts were about that.

CHARLES SAYS: Well, recovery is really the key concern here. Age does affect recovery, but so do a lot of other things. So I think of recovery as the proximate determinant of training frequency, and things like age, sleep quality, stress, and nutrition simply underlie your ability to recover.

Also keep in mind that training frequency is inexorably linked to other parameters such as the volume and intensity of loading. So for example, if your training load was light enough, you could potentially train three times a day, seven days a week with no problems at all.

“I think of recovery as the proximate determinant of training frequency, and things like age, sleep quality, stress, and nutrition simply underlie your ability to recover.”

However, if you find that you can make continuous progress in your training, it’s an accurate sign that your training frequency is at least not excessive. Whether or not it could be increased with even better results would require some personal experimentation.

Finally, it’s a good idea to continuously rotate between strength and muscle-development phases (I’ll reference this idea in more detail below), and use regular deload weeks, say every four weeks or so, to ensure optimal recovery long term.

Question #3: Sets, Reps, and How Many? What Gives?

READER: I know that variety is an important component of training, but is it better to change exercises, or sets and reps? Also, how often should I change my program?

CHARLES SAYS: Yes, you’re right — variation is a key element of effective programming. Too much or too little though, or the wrong types of variation, will definitely hinder your progress.

In terms of whether it’s better to vary exercises or your set/rep patterns, you should actually do both, but according to your primary training goal. In phases of training devoted to muscle growth, you’re better off changing exercises, since if you veer too far away from the 8-12 rep range, you won’t be in the optimal loading zone for hypertrophy development.

You certainly can grow muscle using all sorts of set/rep brackets, but the 8-12 rep range seems to allow for a high enough intensity as well as high enough volume for growth.

So while you could, for example, grow muscle by using sets of 3, this would be impractical, since you’d have to do so many sets to obtain sufficient volume, your workout would take all day. Plus a workout like that would take forever to recover from.

If strength is your primary goal however, you really won’t have much variation, for a few different reasons:

• First, since strength is a skill, by definition, you’ll need to do the same type of training for extended periods of time for skill development purposes. This precludes the idea of changing exercises.
• Second, for optimal strength development, you’ll need to stay in (roughly) the 3-5-rep bracket to ensure sufficient intensity. This precludes the idea of changing rep patterns.

So as it turns out, the best way to provide variety during a strength phase is to switch to a hypertrophy phase. Similarly, the best way to provide variety during a hypertrophy phase is to switch to a strength phase.

Another, perhaps simpler way to envision this strategy is this — don’t think so much in terms of switching exercises or set/rep patterns. Instead, think more in terms of switching training foci.

“The inability to add more weight on the bar while using your current set/rep bracket signals the need to switch things up.”

This brings us to your last question about how often to implement these changes. When training for muscle gains, a significant dissipation of post-exercise muscle soreness is a sign that your body has habituated to your current scheme. Typically this happens in 3-5 weeks. At this point, either overhaul your exercise menu, or switch to a strength-training emphasis.

When training for strength on the other hand, the inability to add more weight on the bar while using your current set/rep bracket signals the need to switch things up. Usually this will mean switching to a muscle-building phase of training.

This Week’s Training

This Week’s Volume: 63,294 Pounds (Last Week: 36,594 Pounds)

Significant Lifts:

• Squat: 330×5
• Deadlift: 495×1
• Bench Press: 235×5

This week I found myself in an unfocused mood, partly due to some persistent shoulder pain, and partly because my training partners are all deloading. The result of all this is that I wasn’t terribly fired up this week, which is probably a good thing for the sake of my shoulder.

One result of me feeling lazy this week was that I wasn’t in the mood to do a lot of volume as my current program calls for, so I opted for a heavy single on the deadlift, just for the change of pace, and worked up to a single big set of five on the squat and bench.

I expect to be back on track next week. I’ve got three more weeks of general strength training, and then an eight-week peaking phase, where everything will be in the two to three rep range.

Definitely check out the videos this week, keep those questions coming, and if you find this column helpful, please spread the word!

Monday, August 31, 2015

Bodyweight: 202.6 Pounds

Volume: 17,595 Pounds

Squat

• Set 1: 45 lbs × 5
• Set 2: 95 lbs × 5
• Set 3: 135 lbs × 5
• Set 4: 185 lbs × 5
• Set 5: 225 lbs × 5
• Set 6: 275 lbs × 5
• Set 7: 330 lbs × 5 (Video Below)
• Set 8: 315 lbs × 5

Stiff-Leg Deadlift

• Set 1: 135 lbs × 6
• Set 2: 185 lbs × 6
• Set 3: 225 lbs × 6
• Set 4: 225 lbs × 6
• Set 5: 225 lbs × 6

45° Back Extension

• Set 1: 150 lbs × 6
• Set 2: 150 lbs × 6
• Set 3: 150 lbs × 6
• Set 4: 150 lbs × 6

Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Bodyweight: 202.6 Pounds

Volume: 15,470 Pounds

Bench Press

• Set 1: 45 lbs × 10
• Set 2: 95 lbs × 8
• Set 3: 135 lbs × 6
• Set 4: 185 lbs × 5
• Set 5: 215 lbs × 5
• Set 6: 230 lbs × 5
• Set 7: 205 lbs × 5
• Set 8: 205 lbs × 5

Seated Row

• Set 1: 150 lbs × 6
• Set 2: 150 lbs × 6
• Set 3: 150 lbs × 6
• Set 4: 150 lbs × 6

EZ Bar Curl

• Set 1: 75 lbs × 6
• Set 2: 75 lbs × 8
• Set 3: 75 lbs × 8
• Set 4: 75 lbs × 8

Lying Tricep Extension

• Set 1: 75 lbs × 8
• Set 2: 75 lbs × 8
• Set 3: 75 lbs × 8
• Set 4: 75 lbs × 8

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Bodyweight: 202.2 Pounds

Volume: 14,080 Pounds

2.5″ Deficit Pull

• Set 1: 135 lbs × 5
• Set 2: 135 lbs × 5
• Set 3: 185 lbs × 5
• Set 4: 225 lbs × 5
• Set 5: 275 lbs × 5
• Set 6: 315 lbs × 5
• Set 7: 365 lbs × 5

Deadlift

• Set 1: 405 lbs × 1
• Set 2: 455 lbs × 1
• Set 3: 495 lbs × 1 (Video Below)

High Bar Squat

• Set 1: 45 lbs × 5
• Set 2: 95 lbs × 5
• Set 3: 135 lbs × 5
• Set 4: 185 lbs × 5
• Set 5: 225 lbs × 5
• Set 6: 225 lbs × 5

Friday, September 4, 2015

Bodyweight: 202.2 Pounds

Volume: 16,149 Pounds

Bench Press

• Set 1: 45 lbs × 10
• Set 2: 95 lbs × 8
• Set 3: 135 lbs × 6
• Set 4: 175 lbs × 5
• Set 5: 195 lbs × 5
• Set 6: 215 lbs × 5
• Set 7: 235 lbs × 5
• Set 8: 205 lbs × 5

Chin Up

• Set 1: 1 reps
• Set 2: 2 reps
• Set 3: 3 reps
• Set 4: 4 reps
• Set 5: 5 reps
• Set 6: 5 reps

Bicep Curl (Dumbbell)

• Set 1: 60 lbs × 8
• Set 2: 70 lbs × 8
• Set 3: 70 lbs × 8

Tricep Pushdowns

• Set 1: 140 lbs × 8
• Set 2: 140 lbs × 8
• Set 3: 140 lbs × 8

Check out these related articles:

• Last Week’s Smart Strength Mailbag
• Why the Scale Lies About Your Health (and Where to Find the Truth)
• Maximize Your Strength and Gains With This Simple Rep Scheme
• What’s New on Breaking Muscle Today

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Frequency and Variety: Smart Strength With Charles Staley appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

The Debate

This problem also surfaces in the combat sports, especially in boxing. Whenever Sugar Ray Robinson’s name is mentioned, invariably somebody will add that he was “pound for pound the greatest.” While not all agree with that assessment, they would all agree it is unfair to compare Robinson’s skills against much bigger fighters on an absolute basis.

It is obvious that a smaller, but far superior fighter could still lose to a less-skilled bigger man. For that reason, many boxing magazines now publish monthly “P4P” ratings along with their usual bodyweight class rankings. As you might guess, there is considerable debate over the lists, but that is what makes it interesting.

What Is Fair?

Smaller lifters are definitely much better on a P4P basis. This has led some to conclude that they are even morally superior to their larger teammates whose pound-for-pound performances make them appear lazy and pampered in comparison. The lighter athletes, in these cases, would prefer that the only formula needed to compare performances is one where the performance is simply divided by the bodyweight.

“Strength-to-bodyweight potential is not a straight-line arithmetic progression.”

It will soon be pointed out that such a comparison is inherently unfair. Strength-to-bodyweight potential is not a straight-line arithmetic progression. Instead, it is a logarithmic one based upon exponential growth using a power of ⅔. This is because the cross-sectional area of the muscle increases to the power of two while the volume of that muscle increases to the power of three.

Note: I will not go into this further here since it is well documented in many places elsewhere. You’re going to have to take my word for it. But the weight sports have developed formulae based on such bio-mathematical concepts. The Sinclair Formula is used in weightlifting while the Wilks Formula prevails in powerlifting.

The History and the Math

Weightlifting has the advantage over boxing in that its performances are purely numeric. Back in the 1930s, Bob Hoffman, owner of the York Barbell Company, developed the Hoffman Formula, which attempted to neutralize the bodyweight issue when comparing performances. This worked reasonably well for a number of decades until it was generally agreed that the formula was increasingly favoring the heavier athletes. This was at least partly explained by the fact the heavier weight categories improved much faster than the lighter ones and consequently ended up with better scores. An attempt was made at correcting the Hoffman formula, but this only held sway for a few years until Dr. Roy Sinclair developed his and was able to get it recognized by the International Weightlifting Federation.

With the passing of Dr. Sinclair, there has been some renewed discussion about the various formulae. Sinclair developed his back in 1978, deriving it from the performances of top-level weightlifters so that top performances could be displayed graphically. At all points along the resulting curve there is a corresponding coefficient for each bodyweight. This coefficient is then simply multiplied by the lifter’s total in order to get his “Sinclair total.”

What that figure gives you is essentially what that lifter would have totaled if that lifter was a super heavyweight. The formula was normalized at a high bodyweight under the assumption that most lifters would like to know what they would lift if they were bigger – not smaller as Hoffman’s had done. This formula is updated every Olympiad in order to stay current. In this way, the performance of a 60kg athlete can be readily compared with the performance of a 100kg athlete. Whoever has the highest Sinclair total would be adjudged the better P4P lifter.

Wilks vs. Sinclair

Powerlifting also used the Hoffman in its early years, but also came to recognize its shortcomings. Several different formulas were arrived at over the years, until we now have the Wilks Formula. This formula appears to be much different from the Sinclair model if you merely look at its coefficients. This has prompted some to wonder why they are so different.

Some try to answer this question by assuming that since the nature of the lifts, their number, and manner of lifting are so much different, that it is only reasonable that a far different formula would be required. Although I have only a sketchy knowledge of mathematics and statistics, I was sure that these assumptions are not warranted.

“This may well be true since in the sport of powerlifting the three lifts are not as well correlated as they are in the Olympic lifts.”

To determine if I was right, I decided to compare the coefficients used by both. Each formula started with high coefficients at the lighter bodyweights and decrease toward the heavier end. This only stands to reason as the smaller lifters will need a bigger coefficient to equalize performances.

The main problem encountered with this method is that each set of coefficients was normalized at differing body weights. Sinclair normalized his at the super heavyweight level since, as mentioned, lifters typically like to see how they would do if they were larger. The Wilks, by contrast, is normalized down at the 51kg level. His formula answers the question, “What would I total if I weighed 51kg?” Now do you see the problem?

In order to correct this, I renormalized the Wilks figures by simply dividing each one of them by the Wilks coefficients of the same bodyweight as Sinclair’s model. Since they all divided by the same figure, it does not change the general nature of the curve. Therefore the two formulae can be more readily compared. The following is a graphical interpretation of the results.

• The red line at the top is the Sinclair curve.
• The green line at the bottom is the raw Wilks curve.
• The blue line in the middle is the normalized Wilks curve.
• The X-axis numbers are the body weights.
• The Y-axis numbers are the coefficients.

From this, it can be easily seen that the graphs of the Sinclair and renormalized Wilks numbers are very similar. The Sinclair has a steeper curve than the Wilks, so the next question has to be “why?” I cannot give an easy answer to this, but others have tried.

The Fault of Correlation

Wilks based his formula on the totals results of world championships, just as Sinclair did. Some have reasoned that if a separate formula existed for each of the individual lifts that their curves would be a little steeper. This may well be true since in the sport of powerlifting the three lifts are not as well correlated as they are in the Olympic lifts. In the latter the snatch is usually about 80% of the clean and jerk, give or take only small variances. The snatch and the clean are very similar movements and differ only in the height to which they must be lifted. Therefore, one is easily predictable if the other is known.

“What both demonstrate is that the P4P ratio is not fixed, neither is it arithmetic. It is logarithmic – whether we like it or not.”

The powerlifts are not so well correlated. Most lifters deadlift more than they squat, but not all of them do. Powerlifting has more specialists on individual lifts due to the fact that the type of body that makes for a good bench presser does not make for a good deadlifter. It frequently happens that bench and deadlift record holders do not do so well in the total. Those who do better in the total are more well-rounded lifters. This tends to flatten out their totals compared to what the three individual record lifts would add up to.

The Whole P4P

While I am not sure all this is the reason for the slight differences in the formulas, I think what is more important is their similarities. They are not vastly different as some people assume them to be just because their coefficients appear so. Their underlying premises are the same – strength potential as one increases in size is a logarithmic function not an arithmetic one.

What both demonstrate is that the P4P ratio is not fixed, neither is it arithmetic. It is logarithmic – whether we like it or not.

You’ll also enjoy:

• Strong Is as Strong Does: Your Ideal Weightlifting Weight
• Cutting Weight in Weightlifting: Is There a Better Way?
• Lose Weight, Not Bone: How Strength Training Benefits Weightloss
• What’s New On Breaking Muscle Today

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Pound for Pound Lifting: Who Is Stronger? (Wilks vs. Sinclair) appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

The supplemental use of betaine has so far received mixed review, though. Its effect on both strength and endurance seems to be inconsistent. Since betaine plays a role in cell volume and cell health, it may also be useful for maximizing hypertrophy. However the jury is currently out on this too. In a recent study in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition, researchers took a look at the effects of betaine supplementation on a six-week training program, to see how participants fared against a placebo group.

The training program used was a fairly standard bodybuilding style program. The major difference between the groups was the betaine. Those who took the betaine supplement took 2.5 grams daily. That’s about as much as you’d get from eating a little over a pound of spinach. That’s a lot of spinach.

In the end there were a few significant differences between the groups:

• Arm size, but not leg size, was larger in the betaine group, thus some hypertrophy was attained.
• Bench press volume, was improved for the betaine group, but squatting volume overall was not. This perhaps resulted in the improvements in hypertrophy found in the arms versus the legs.
• Body fat percentage and fat mass both went down, and lean body mass went up in the betaine group, but not the placebo group.
• There were no performance differences between the groups at the end of the six weeks, but there was a trend to an improvement in vertical jump power in the betaine group.

It should be noted that this study had corporate funding from DuPont Nutrition and Health, who also employ one of the researchers (but not the lead researcher). That said, the study was a double-blind design, meaning that not even the researchers knew which participants were taking the betaine supplements. The design of the study was such that it should have eliminated any of the competing interests involved, leaving the betaine to speak for itself.

It seems that over six weeks, using a standard hypertrophy program, betaine may indeed assist in hypertrophy and exercise volume. It’s possible that the size difference was due to greater intracellular fluid, an action that betaine does have a role in. But since betaine plays a critical role in general health, it seems both a safe supplement and one that holds potential value to athletes – especially those looking to improve their appearance and reduce fat.

References:

1. Jason M Cholewa, et. al., “Effects of betaine on body composition, performance, and homocysteine thiolactone,” Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition, 10:39, 2013

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Betaine Found Effective for Body Composition and Performance appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

We know that Biggest Loser-style weight loss efforts seldom stick. The combination of extreme, calorie restricted (and nutrient-sparse) diets together with long-duration, cardio-intense workouts decimate muscle mass. Less muscle mass, of course, equates to a smaller metabolic engine, and once that diet willpower inevitably breaks, it’s game-on for an incredibly fast, fat gain rebound.

Which is exactly what happened to Oprah. By 1989, she’d ballooned beyond her previous year’s heaviest weight. How many times have we witnessed this scenario played-out in the media? How many times with our close friends and family? The guy at work, six cubicles down?

Unfortunately, Oprah ended up like so many following this same misguided weight loss prescription – simply a metabolically broken, skinny-fat version of her prior self. What she desperately needed in this process was a more intelligently designed diet regimen coupled with a smartly programmed, resistance-exercise-based training protocol.

And to counter her obsession with the scale, she needed access to an intelligent body composition assessment method. And if you’re trying to lose weight – or gain weight, as well – you need the same. Because the scale lies to you, and you need to know that the only thing it can reveal to you is your association with gravity, which ultimately means nothing if you’re trying to gain muscle, or lose fat.

Enter the DEXA Scan

The DEXA (duel-energy X-ray absorptiometry) scan provides one of the most highly accurate measurements of body composition available, registering fat and lean mass distribution throughout the entire body. In simple terms, it is capable of detailing overall, as well as regional, fat mass, lean mass, and bone mass – all for the relatively inexpensive price of around one hundred dollars.

Sounds great. So where can I get a DEXA evaluation? And what’s involved?

Most major universities with solid exercise physiology research programs have these units, and will gladly provide evaluations to the public. Otherwise, some healthcare facilities have these units as they are used (and were originally developed) to measure bone mineral density.

And the scan itself is no more invasive than an X-ray. Which, in fact, it is – imparting about as much radiation per scan as a TSA body imaging device. The scan involves little more than lying face-up on a table while dressed in snug fitting clothing – cycling shorts and, for the ladies, a sports bra work well – while the scanning device makes a single pass over the body. The results are immediate and, at least at the University of Texas in Austin, where I’m located, come with a personal, detailed results debrief from a knowledgeable staff member.

What about other, cheaper options?

Essentially, you get the accuracy you pay for. Other popular methods like hydrostatic weighing, the Bod Pod, and calipers rely on calculated measurements of body fat that are influenced by uncontrollable environmental variables and accidental – or intentional – human error. Do you think after training with a guy for six months that he’s not apt to fudge those caliper readings just a bit?

For example, underwater weighing, the pre-DEXA body composition gold standard, assumes that densities of fat mass and fat-free mass are constant. The densities of bone and muscles are greater than water, with fat being less dense than water. Therefore, if you’re a person with a greater amount of bone and muscle, you’ll weigh more in water than someone with less bone and muscle, ergo a higher ‘body density’ and lower percentage of body fat.

This is sound in theory, but in practice, it’s limited by the density assumption, which doesn’t take into account a few important and potentially conflicting variables that strongly influence the equations used to calculate body density. For example:

• Athletes typically have denser bones and muscles than non-athletes. Thus, their measurements often underestimate body fat percentage.
• Conversely, the body fat of elderly patients – especially those with osteoporosis – may be overestimated due to these body density assumptions.
• To date, specific equations that accommodate these different population groups have not been developed.

Another important variable to consider with the underwater weighing is residual lung volume. Few people can completely exhale prior to full submersion; it’s a hardwired, mammalian reflex not to do so. This residual air floats, of course, adding yet another source of calculation error.

Other popular calculated measurements have similar limitations. When my clients question why there’s such a wide variance between their DEXA results (which are generally much higher) and past measurements from, for instance, underwater weighing, calipers, or impedance measurement, I have to explain how the subjective variables mentioned previously are inherent to any calculated measurement of body fat. Therefore, any discrepancy between DEXA and another method is not due to an overestimate of the DEXA, but rather inconsistencies inherent in other measurement methods. Of these, measurements by caliper (skin fold) and impedance testing have proven to be the most wildly inaccurate. In fact, measurement by caliper significantly underestimated body fat percentage by 3.2–5.6% in women when compared to the DEXA.¹

Which brings up to another dilemma sustained by inaccurate body composition measurement – the grossly underestimated body fat percentage.

Phil Stanforth, Executive Director of the Fitness Institute of Texas at the University of Texas, presented at 2012’s Paleo f(x) symposium. Part of Phil’s talk addressed the lay public’s misconception of what constitutes a good or athletic body composition. Though I’m not at liberty to disclose Phil’s findings here (they’re awaiting publication), I can provide you with similar, published results out of Texas A&M.

In the Texas A&M study, the body composition and bone mineral density of elite female college athletes was observed and tracked over competitive seasons. Although not the intent of the study, an interesting juxtaposition emerges between popularly reported body fat percentages, and those measured in elite athletes. For example, the DEXA-measured body fat percentage of female swimmers (22.2%) and track sprint athletes (15%) seem pretty darn high when compared to popular (urban myth?) notions of single-digit leanness.

What You Now Know About Body Composition

Don’t take it as gospel the next time you read that Suzie Fitness Model maintains a 6% body fat level, in the off-season, no less. Yeah, and every bodybuilding forum keyboard jockey benches north of 405 pounds, too. I’ll believe single-digit leanness when it’s backed with a DEXA report.

So do yourself a huge favor and whether you’re looking to gain muscle or lose fat, don’t be beholden to the scale. Over the long haul, weight means nothing unless you can accurately assess whether that weight you’re trying valiantly to lose (or gain) actually consists of fat or muscle. Think your diet and training regimen is really working? The DEXA is simple and sure-fire way of letting you know.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post The Scale Lies: Why The DEXA Scan Is Best appeared first on Breaking Muscle.