There is no one-size-fits-all approach to exercise. Two people doing the same workouts may get very different results. One person might work hard in the gym for months without much progress, while their training buddy gets stronger in each session.

Are you not getting results from your exercise program? Here’s what you can do that is backed by science.

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to exercise. Two people doing the same workouts may get very different results. One person might work hard in the gym for months without much progress, while their training buddy gets stronger in each session.

There’s a term in exercise research¹ for someone who doesn’t get the expected results from a specific type of exercise: non-responder. In study after study, some participants improve a lot, and some don’t improve at all, even using the same program.¹

It can be frustrating for those who put in the effort and don’t see the results they want, but we can learn from the research in this area to ensure that everyone gets the benefits of exercise.

Here’s an example of how much variation there is across individuals in response to a specific exercise program.

One hundred and twenty-one adults participated in a 24-week walking program, exercising five times per week. Before the study² started, they were randomly split into three groups:

1. A low amount, low-intensity group who walked for an average of 31 minutes per session at an intensity that would be considered moderate according to exercise guidelines. I’ll call this the low group.
2. A high amount, low-intensity group who walked at the same intensity but for about double the time in each session (an average of 58 minutes) as the first group. I’ll call this the medium group.
3. A high amount, high-intensity group who walked for about 40 minutes in each session at a vigorous intensity. I’ll call this the high group.

Cardio fitness was measured several times throughout the study. After six months, here is how each group did:

• In the low group, 62% of the participants improved their fitness.
• In the medium group, 82% improved their fitness.
• In the high group, 100% of the participants improved their fitness.

When you look closer, there is a wide range of fitness changes, even within the groups.

These graphs show how each person’s fitness changed after completing the program. Each bar represents a person’s response. You can see that some people improved a lot, others a little, and some people decreased.

• In the low group, the range of responses was between an 8% decrease in fitness and a 30% improvement.
• The medium group had a range between a 10% loss of fitness up to a 43% improvement.
• In the high group, the least responsive participant improved by only 7%, while the top responder improved by a whopping 118%.

Remember, within each group, these people were doing the same exercise program, but their results were very different.

This study³ focused on endurance-type exercise for cardiovascular fitness, but this happens in other types of exercise studies as well, including interval training and strength training.

In one strength training study,⁴ for example, the same 12-week program resulted in changes in strength ranging from no improvement for one person to a 250% increase for another. There were also significant differences in muscle growth between individuals, with one person decreasing their muscle size by 2%, while the most responsive person increased by 59%.

This effect⁵ has also been seen in nutrition science, with people following the same diet experiencing very different amounts of weight loss, and sometimes even weight gain.

The reasons for these differences aren’t obvious. Of course, factors like sleep, stress, nutrition, and incidental physical activity can impact how someone responds to an exercise program.

Researchers try to take these things out of the equation by asking participants to follow a standardized diet or having them wear activity trackers when they’re not in the lab, but it’s not possible to fully control for them.

Genetic factors also certainly play a role, with research⁶ indicating that about 50% of the response to cardio exercise is the result of genetic differences.

What Can We Learn From This?

If you’re one of the lucky ones who happen to respond well to a specific exercise program, that’s great! If not, don’t worry. While these findings seem discouraging at first, there is good news. If we delve further into the research, it appears that there are no true non-responders to exercise. Everyone does improve in some way.

If you aren’t getting the results you expect from your exercise program, here are some things to consider the following.

When it Comes to Exercise, Consistency Is Key

The most effective program for you is likely to be the one you’ll do regularly.

In the walking study, the researchers reported the fitness improvements only of the people who attended at least 90% of the exercise sessions over the six months.

Not everyone completing the study managed to do 90% of the sessions. When the researchers went back and included those, who attended at least 70% of the sessions, the percentage of people who increased their fitness dropped by about 4% in the low and medium groups and by about 12% in the high.

I’d say that 70% is still fairly consistent. It means that those people exercised for an average of 3.5 sessions a week, every week, for six months. Most of them improved their fitness. More consistency is better, though. People who attended 4.5 sessions per week (90% of the total sessions) were even more likely to improve.

Consistency is probably the most critical factor in achieving the benefits of exercise. Do something, anything, every week. If you struggle with consistency, focus on setting small, achievable goals and creating sustainable exercise habits before you worry about any of the details of the program you’re doing.

Have the Other Pieces of a Healthy Lifestyle in Place

Get enough sleep, drink enough water, eat plenty of nutritious foods, move as often as possible throughout the day, and manage your stress.

Unless you have these things pretty well under control, you won’t know if it’s the exercise program that you’re not responding to, or if something else in your lifestyle is holding you back.

If One Method Doesn’t Work, Try Another

Maybe you have healthy lifestyle habits, and you’ve been consistent in your exercise for several months with lackluster results. What should you do?

Try increasing the intensity or the duration of each session. If we look at the walking study again, several participants didn’t improve their fitness after six months of consistent, moderate-intensity exercise.

Still, all of the people exercising at a higher intensity did improve. Even with moderate intensity, people who increased their volume (doubling the time spent in each session) were more likely to see improvements.

You could also do more sessions across the week. In another study⁷, researchers found that when people performed 60 minutes of cycling exercise 1-2 times per week for six weeks, not everyone improved their fitness.

In that study, there were also people doing the same cycling workouts 4-5 times per week, and all of those people did respond. Afterward, the people who hadn’t improved their fitness repeated the program. This time they added two more sessions per week, and all of them improved.

You could try a different type of training. One study had people complete a three-week endurance cycling program as well as a three-week interval training program in random order.⁸

They found that while some people didn’t improve their fitness with one program, those people did improve when they completed the other program.

For strength training, a range of set and rep protocols⁹ seems to be effective for different individuals. If increasing muscle mass is your goal, for example, and the traditional four sets of 8-12 reps haven’t worked for you, maybe your body will respond better to heavier weights and fewer reps or lighter weights and more reps.

Treat Your Training As A Science Experiment

Exercise provides a range of different and vital benefits. It can improve your body composition, decrease your risk of many diseases, improve your performance, your brain function, and your mood, and much more.

Even if you don’t see the specific results you’re expecting, you will improve your health and fitness in some way as a result of consistent exercise.

For example, researchers had participants complete a one-year cardio program, exercising for 45 minutes, three days per week. Four different types of cardio fitness were measured at the end of the program.

Again, there was a tremendous amount of variability in the individual responses. And, some of the participants didn’t improve in all four ways. However, every person in the study showed improvement in at least one aspect of their fitness.¹⁰

Maybe you’re focusing on the wrong measure of results, or perhaps you’re not tracking your progress closely enough to realize what you’re achieving. If you don’t keep track of what you’re doing and how you are progressing, you won’t know whether or not your program is working for you.

Make a list of a few of the benefits of exercise that are important to you and keep track of each one.

• If you’re interested in improving your health, you might keep track of your resting heart rate, blood pressure, or blood sugar.
• For body composition, you could track your body fat percentage or measurements.
• If fitness and performance are important to you, keep track of your time to complete a certain distance, the amount of weight you lift for each exercise, or the number of push-ups or pull-ups you can do.
• For the more subtle (but equally important) benefits of exercise like mood, stress reduction, focus, the incidence of pain, or energy levels, use a simple 1-10 scale to gauge how you’re feeling each day.

Log this information in a notebook or use a spreadsheet or your phone. Follow a specific program for a few weeks or months, assess how you are responding, and make changes if necessary.

You’ll probably be pleasantly surprised at how many ways you improve your body and your life with exercise.

Maybe your blood pressure didn’t go down, but your mood may have improved, and your 5K time may have gotten better. Perhaps you didn’t lose weight, but your strength increased, and you gained energy and started sleeping better.

These improvements can motivate you to keep going, and if you do, chances are you will find a method of exercise that works best for you.

Don’t Compare Yourself To Others

It should be evident by now that just because your friend got great results following a particular program doesn’t mean you will too. Focus on your progress, not anyone else’s.

The Bottom Line

If you do not see the results you want, keep trying. If you still don’t see results, try something different. Finally, keep in mind that the science is clear. Everyone responds.

If you keep at it consistently, you will achieve meaningful benefits.

References:

1.Pickering, Craig, and John Kiely. “Do Non-Responders to Exercise Exist—and if so, What Should We Do About Them?.” Sports Medicine 49, no. 1 (2019):1-7.

2. Ross, Robert, Louise de Lannoy, and Paula J. Stotz. “Separate Effects of Intensity and Amount of Exercise on Interindividual Cardiorespiratory Fitness Response.” Mayo Clinic, Proceedings 90, no. 11, (2015): 1506-1514.

3. Gurd, Brendon J., Matthew D. Giles, Jacob T. Bonafiglia, James P. Raleigh, John C. Boyd, Jasmin K. Ma, Jason GE Zelt, and Trisha D. Scribbans. “Incidence of nonresponse and individual patterns of response following sprint interval training.” Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism 41, no. 3 (2016): 229-234.

4. Hubal, Monica J., Heather Gordish-Dressman, Paul D. Thompson, Thomas B. Price, Eric P. Hoffman, Theodore J. Angelopoulos, Paul M. Gordon, et al. “Variability in muscle size and strength gain after unilateral resistance training.” Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise 37, no. 6 (2005): 964-972.

5. Gardner, Christopher D., John F. Trepanowski, Liana C. Del Gobbo, Michelle E. Hauser, Joseph Rigdon, John PA Ioannidis, Manisha Desai, and Abby C. King. “Effect of Low-Fat vs Low-Carbohydrate Diet on 12-Month Weight Loss in Overweight Adults and the Association With Genotype Pattern or Insulin Secretion: The DIETFITS Randomized Clinical Trial.” Jama, 319, no. 7 (2018): 667-679.

6. Ross, Robert, Bret H. Goodpaster, Lauren G. Koch, Mark A. Sarzynski, Wendy M. Kohrt, Neil M. Johannsen, James S. Skinner, et al. “Precision exercise medicine: understanding exercise response variability.” British Journal of Sports Medicine 53, no. 18 (2019): 1141-1153.

7. Montero, David, and Carsten Lundby. “Refuting the myth of non-response to exercise training: ‘non-responders’ do respond to higher dose of training.” The Journal of Physiology 595, no. 11 (2017): 3377-3387.

8. Bonafiglia, Jacob T., Mario P. Rotundo, Jonathan P. Whittall, Trisha D. Scribbans, Ryan B. Graham, and Brendon J. Gurd. “Inter-Individual Variability in the Adaptive Responses to Endurance and Sprint Interval Training: a Randomized Crossover Study.” PloS one 11, no. 12, (2016).

9. Beaven, C. Martyn, Christian J. Cook, and Nicholas D. Gill. “Significant Strength Gains Observed in Rugby Players After Specific Resistance Exercise Protocols Based on Individual Salivary Testosterone Responses.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 22, no. 2 (2008): 419-425.

10. Scharhag-Rosenberger, Friederike, Susanne Walitzek, Wilfried Kindermann, and Tim Meyer. “Differences in adaptations to 1 year of aerobic endurance training: individual patterns of nonresponse.” Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports 22, no. 1 (2012): 113-118.

The post When It Comes to Exercise, Different People Get Different Results appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

The feeling that you are in control of your choices and actions is known as autonomy.

Building long-term motivation and consistent exercise habits are the most valuable things you can do for yourself. Many mindset shifts can help you achieve those goals, and here I’ll address an important one: taking ownership of your exercise.

The feeling that you are in control of your choices and actions is known as autonomy.

According to the Self-Determination Theory¹, autonomy is one of the three primary factors for creating intrinsic motivation.

It’s the type of motivation that comes from enjoying the activity itself, and it’s the best type of motivation for sticking to an exercise program.

The Power of Autonomy

A 2009 study² had participants exercise on a treadmill for 30 minutes. In the first session, they could adjust the treadmill speed to whatever they liked. They couldn’t see the control panel display, so they didn’t know precisely the rate.

About a week later, they came back and did another 30 minutes on the treadmill. This time the participants were told that the researchers were going to set the speed for them.

They didn’t know that the researchers set the treadmill to the same speed that the participant had chosen in the first session.

Before, during, and after the exercise, the participants rated their enjoyment and motivation. Even though they were doing the same workout, they enjoyed it more and felt more motivated when choosing their speed.²

Other research backs this up. Many studies have examined the relationship between cardio intensity and how pleasurable or enjoyable the exercise is. These studies have found that exercise changes from pleasant to unpleasant for most people around the ventilatory threshold or lactate threshold.³

Those two thresholds are slightly different, but they both correspond to the point at which you start breathing heavily.

An Exception to the Ventilatory Threshold

When you pass that point, your workout starts to feel unpleasant. That means interval training, sprinting, or other high-intensity workouts are usually not enjoyable, at least not while you’re doing it. Interestingly, though, there is an exception.

• In research studies, the researchers usually control the treadmill speed or incline during the experiments. Once they increase the speed past that heavy breathing threshold, participants start to dislike the exercise they’re doing.
• In a couple of studies, though, participants were allowed to choose their exercise intensity. When people increased their intensity to or past the heavy breathing point, they didn’t experience that same decrease in pleasure. It still felt good to them.
• In one of those studies, for example,19 women did three treadmill tests.⁴ The researchers set the treadmill intensity in two trials, once below their lactate threshold and once above it. They also did a third test where they were allowed to set the intensity themselves. During each test, they rated how the exercise felt.

On average, they chose an intensity around their lactate threshold.

That intensity should decrease exercise enjoyment, but these participants rated the exercise as feeling much better when setting the treadmill themselves than in either of the other tests. In interviews afterward, they talked about feeling in control and making their own choice as one reason the exercise felt better to them.

When they chose their intensity, they were also more confident that they could handle the exercise and felt it was just challenging enough for them.

Those feelings could describe competency or your belief in yourself and your abilities, which is another one of the three factors in developing intrinsic motivation.

Some people worry that if they choose their exercise intensity without pushing the limits, they won’t exercise hard enough to get the benefits they want. That wasn’t the case in this study.

Exercising at your lactate threshold is enough to improve fitness and get the many health benefits of exercise.

These participants weren’t regular exercisers. They were only eligible for the study if they had exercised less than once a week for six months.

Consistent exercisers usually self-select higher intensities than non-exercisers do, so they would be even more likely to choose (and enjoy) higher intensity exercise, which has even more significant potential to improve their health and fitness.

What Does This Mean for You?

You can improve your motivation and be more likely to exercise consistently just by changing your mindset and reframing your exercise experience:

Exercise is a gift; you don’t have to exercise. You get to exercise.

Furthermore, you get to choose the exercise you do. Take ownership of your workout by deciding for yourself which exercises you will do, how you will structure the exercises, and how hard you’ll work.

Basic Guidelines for Effective Exercise Are Flexible

There are basic guidelines for effective exercise, but there is a lot of flexibility in those guidelines. Anyone can learn enough about exercise to make their own exercise choices safely and effectively.

• Do some cardio, use heavyweights to push, pull, squat, and hinge, and move as much as you can throughout each day. Choose a way to move and lift that you enjoy.
• If you need more guidance in the form of a made-for-you program or a group class or trainer, at least take ownership of your movement within that program.
• Choose the program based on your goals, and learn about the exercises so you can understand why you’re doing them.

If nothing else, take ownership of each movement as you do it. When it’s time to sprint, don’t think,

“Ugh, my trainer says it’s time to go all-out, so I have to do it now.” Instead, think, “I’m choosing to go all-out right now because I know it will benefit me.”

Choose to exercise:

• Because it’s going to make you feel good (afterward, if not during)
• Because it’s going to give you a sense of pride and achievement
• Because it’s going to help you get a little fitter so you can have more energy to do the things you love

Overall, remember that you are in charge of your choices, so choose to do something great for yourself and get moving.

References:

1. Teixeira, Pedro J., Eliana V. Carraça, David Markland, Marlene N. Silva, and Richard M. Ryan. “Exercise, physical activity, and self-determination theory: a systematic review.” International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 9, no. 1 (2012): 1-30.

2. Vazou-Ekkekakis, Spiridoula, and Panteleimon Ekkekakis. “Affective consequences of imposing the intensity of physical activity: Does the loss of perceived autonomy matter?” Hellenic Journal of Psychology 6, no. 2 (2009): 125-144.

3. Ekkekakis, Panteleimon, Gaynor Parfitt, and Steven J. Petruzzello. “The Pleasure and Displeasure People Feel When They Exercise at Different Intensities.” Sports Medicine 41, no. 8 (2011): 641-671.

4. Rose, Elaine A., and Gaynor Parfitt. “A quantitative analysis and qualitative explanation of the individual differences in affective responses to prescribed and self-selected exercise intensities.” Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology 29, no. 3 (2007): 281-309.

The post Take Ownership of Your Exercise Habits To Build Better Motivation appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

In resistance training, the amount of weight used during a particular exercise correlates with intensity, and in sports science research and athletic training programs, intensity is often expressed as a percentage of 1-rep maximum (1RM). That’s the maximum amount of weight that can be lifted during a particular exercise, with good form, for only one repetition. Once 1RM has been determined, a percentage of that maximal weight is prescribed for each exercise in a session. For example, an athlete’s program might call for four sets of bench press at 80% of 1RM.

Some studies have found that resistance as low as 45% of 1RM can be beneficial for increasing strength in the early stages of training,¹ but that level of resistance is unlikely to be effective after the first few weeks. To make meaningful, ongoing gains in strength and muscle size, beginners (people with little or no resistance training experience) should be lifting at least 60-70% of their 1RM. Experienced lifters (who have at least 6-12 months of weight training experience) should be lifting at least 70-80% of their 1RM.²

Lifters Go Too Light

A few research studies have tested whether the average person chooses weights that meet these guidelines for resistance training.

• Glass and Stanton³ had 13 men and 17 women with no resistance training experience choose their own resistance for five different exercises: bench press, leg press, seated row, shoulder press, and bicep curl. They were allowed to perform as many repetitions as they wanted, with the instruction that they should “choose a load that you feel will be suf?cient to improve your muscular strength”. The participants selected weights that were an average of 42-57% of their 1RM, and performed between 10 and 25 repetitions, depending on the exercise.
• Focht⁴ had 19 women with no resistance training experience choose their own resistance to perform 10 reps on the chest press, leg extension, lat pulldown, and shoulder press. Those participants selected weights that were an average of 56% of their 1RM.

The average participant in each of these studies chose resistance that was too light to make significant, ongoing improvements in strength or hypertrophy. These findings aren’t exactly surprising. The participants in these studies had no resistance training experience, and developing the ability to select appropriate resistance and to push yourself in the gym takes time and practice. I would hope that with some training experience and guidance, people would learn to select appropriate resistance for their goals. Unfortunately, two other studies indicate that that’s not necessarily the case.

• Ratamess et al.⁵ recruited 46 women who had been resistance training for at least three months. One group of these women had been training with a personal trainer for at least the previous three months, and the other group had been training on their own. The average length of time that the personal training participants had been working with a trainer was 15 months. The average total resistance training experience for the personal training group was 4 years, while the average total resistance training experience for the non-personal training group was 4.5 years. Each participant was asked to choose a resistance that they would normally use for 10 repetitions. Four exercises were tested, all of which were machine-based. They included the chest press, leg press, seated row, and leg extension. In the non-personal training group, average chosen resistance was 38-48% of 1RM, and in the personal training group, average resistance was 43-57% of 1RM, depending on the exercise.
• Dias et al.⁶ recruited 12 men and nine women with at least 12 months of resistance training experience. One group of participants had been training with a personal trainer for at least two days per week for the previous six months, and the other group had been training on their own for at least six months prior to the study. Each participant was instructed to choose a resistance that they would typically use in their own workout for 10 reps on the leg press, bench press, leg extension, and bicep curl. The non-personal training group selected resistance that was 42-61% of their 1RM, and the personal training group selected resistance that was 48-62% of their 1RM, depending on the exercise.

In both studies, participants expressed that their goals were to increase strength, hypertrophy, or “muscle tone,” but the average participant, regardless of whether they had been training with a personal trainer, didn’t select heavy enough resistance to achieve those goals, considering their training experience. The authors of both studies reported that their participants were “surprised” or “astonished” at how much weight they were able to lift during the 1RM tests, and that most of the participants had never trained at an intensity close to those values.

Trainers Help, But Some Fall Short

Both studies reported that personal training did confer benefits. The personal training participants’ 1RMs were greater (11-16% and 6-26% greater in the Ratamess and Dias studies, respectively), and they selected relatively heavier resistance, on average, than the non-personal training participants.

Still, these findings are disheartening. It is disappointing that some of these study participants had been working with a trainer for years, and yet were unable to select appropriate resistance to meet their goals, and even reported afterwards that they had never lifted weights close enough to their 1RM to prompt ongoing strength or muscle gains.

A trainer’s job is to help their clients get the results they want, to educate them on how to train effectively, and to provide support and motivation. While there are many incredible trainers out there doing a great job every day, these studies seem to show that some trainers don’t live up to those expectations.

Muscles Don’t Tone

There’s a lot of readily available misinformation about fitness, and some people seem determined to believe that misinformation and train in ways which may not be appropriate for their goals. Some people have a misunderstanding of resistance training and many, especially women, may be hesitant to lift heavy weights. If they aren’t interested in increasing strength or size, low-to-moderate resistance may be appropriate. But often, people don’t want to lift heavy weights, and yet they want to get stronger, increase muscle size, or get “toned.”

A quick note about “muscle toning.” It doesn’t exist. This myth has been plaguing fitness professionals for too long, and it’s time we dispel it once and for all. Muscles don’t get toned, they don’t get longer or leaner. They get bigger, smaller, or stay the same size. That’s it.

People, especially women, who want “toning” are often referring to a lean and muscular physique without excessive muscle mass. That look is achieved by increasing muscle size and decreasing bodyfat. You do that with heavy resistance training and high intensity cardio. Lifting heavy weights will give them the physique they want, while lifting weights that are too light will likely do nothing but waste their time.

It can be hard to convince people to train heavy when many magazines and popular fitness blogs are telling them that they can “tone” their triceps by doing kickbacks with a soup can. But that’s part of a fitness professional’s job, and it’s in our clients’ best interests to do so.

Get to Know Your Heavy

If your goal is to increase strength or build muscle, it’s important to find a trainer that will educate you about effective resistance training and encourage you to progress to heavy lifting. For lifters, it’s important to keep in mind that you will eventually have to lift heavy weights to increase strength or muscle.

Here’s the important point: heavy is relative. It’s not about the weight; it’s about the effort. Heavy means a resistance that is challenging for the individual on that particular exercise and in their chosen repetition range. Heavy for a competitive powerlifter and heavy for a 40-year-old woman who has been lifting for two months are two completely different things. For that woman, squatting an empty bar for eight reps may be heavy, and performing full-depth bodyweight squats for 12 reps may also be heavy. As long as she’s consistently challenging her muscles and increasing the resistance over time, she will get stronger.

It’s also important that people learn how to recognize what appropriate resistance feels like. A good way to do that is to incorporate ratings of perceived exertion (RPE) into your training. A simple 1-10 scale can be used to measure RPE. The use of RPE to choose resistance training intensity within sessions has gained popularity recently as a form of autoregulation, which is a great way to structure advanced training programs.

That use of RPE isn’t good for novice lifters, however, since they haven’t yet developed the ability to accurately interpret their level of effort.⁷ Instead of using RPE to adjust resistance on the fly, they should record their RPE after each set for comparison later, to get used to thinking about the weights they’re lifting and their level of effort. Over time, they will develop the important ability to recognize what heavy weight feels like, how heavy a weight is relative to their lifting ability, and how to regulate their own effort. That ability usually develops naturally with practice, but the process can be expedited using RPE.

Progress Slowly, But Keep Progressing

Incorporating gradual progressions is another essential aspect of promoting heavy resistance training. Building confidence and competency with relatively light weights or easy exercise variations and gradually increasing the resistance is a good way to alleviate new lifters’ concerns about heavy weights. Instruction in proper form from a quality trainer and the mental and physical safety net provided by a good spotter is also important in helping to build the confidence to start lifting heavier.

Trainers and lifters alike need to be aware of the common barriers to achieving results. If you are working to improve your fitness and reach aesthetic or performance goals, you aren’t going to get very far without lifting heavy.

References:

1. Anderson, Tim, and Jay T. Kearney. “Effects of three resistance training programs on muscular strength and absolute and relative endurance.” Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport 53, no. 1 (1982): 1-7.

2. Kraemer, William J., and Nicholas A. Ratamess. “Fundamentals of resistance training: progression and exercise prescription.” Medicine and science in sports and exercise 36, no. 4 (2004): 674-688.

3. Glass, Stephen C., and Douglas R. Stanton. “Self-selected resistance training intensity in novice weightlifters.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 18, no. 2 (2004): 324-327.

4. Focht, Brian C. “Perceived exertion and training load during self-selected and imposed-intensity resistance exercise in untrained women.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 21, no. 1 (2007): 183-187.

5. Ratamess, Nicholas A., Avery D. Faigenbaum, Jay R. Hoffman, and Jie Kang. “Self-selected resistance training intensity in healthy women: the influence of a personal trainer.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 22, no. 1 (2008): 103-111.

6. Dias, Marcelo RC, Roberto Simao, Francisco JF Saavedra, and Nicholas A. Ratamess. “The Influence of a Personal Trainer on Self-Selected Loading during Resistance Exercise.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research (2016). DOI: 10.1519/JSC.000000000000166

7. Testa, Marc, Timothy D. Noakes, and FranÇois-Denis Desgorces. “Training state improves the relationship between rating of perceived exertion and relative exercise volume during resistance exercises.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 26, no. 11 (2012): 2990-2996.

The post Stalled Progress? You Probably Aren’t Lifting Heavy Enough appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Nope. This is a case of research being taken out of context and misrepresented to provide an argument for one type of exercise over another. This happens way too often in the fitness industry. Let’s dispel this myth right now so you can make an informed decision about your cardio training.

What is EPOC?

EPOC stands for Excess Post-exercise Oxygen Consumption. It’s an increase in oxygen uptake above resting levels that occurs after exercise. Increased oxygen consumption requires energy, so EPOC means that you burn calories even after an exercise bout. The purpose of EPOC is to restore the body to its resting state and create physiological adaptations which will help the body handle the same amount of exercise-related stress more easily in the future.

EPOC is the greatest immediately after exercise. Some studies have found that EPOC lasts up to 24 hours, while others have found it to be much shorter, less than an hour in some cases.¹ The large range of EPOC durations across studies has been attributed to differences in exercise intensity and duration, as well as differences in study methodologies.

Despite sensational claims from some in the fitness industry, research suggests that the EPOC effect is fairly small, and probably makes only a minor contribution to weight loss compared to the energy cost during the actual exercise. The amount of extra energy burned during EPOC is only about 6-15% as much as is used during the exercise itself.² For example, 20 rounds of 1-minute running intervals performed at 105% of VO2max, separated by 2 minutes of rest, burned an average of 537 calories during exercise, and an extra 64 calories in the 9 hours after the session.³

Research has also demonstrated large individual differences in EPOC responses.¹ That means that two people who do the exact same workout would likely burn different amounts of calories both during and after the session, based on differences in their gender, age, physiology, training status, and lifestyle factors such as diet, sleep, and stress. Keep that in mind next time you hear that a certain workout or exercise will burn X number of calories, or when you look at the calorie counter on your treadmill or exercise app. Chances are, it’s not accurate for you.

The Root of the EPOC and Intervals Myth

The magnitude of EPOC increases exponentially with increased exercise intensity for the same distance or time.¹ In other words, if you run five miles in 25 minutes, you are going to get a larger EPOC effect than if it takes you 50 minutes to run those same five miles. If that’s the case, it would make sense that intervals, which are performed at a much higher intensity than continuous cardio (also known as steady-state cardio), would have a much greater EPOC effect.

That idea has been suggested as one reason for the similar weight or fat loss observed between interval training and continuous cardio, despite the much lower exercise volume needed for intervals to achieve those results. As interval research became more well-known, the idea of a greater EPOC effect became more widely publicized.

Although this explanation makes logical sense, studies that have directly investigated EPOC between interval training and continuous cardio don’t exactly back up the theory, especially when you consider the research in terms of its real-world application.

What Does the Research Say?

Studies have shown that when energy expenditure is measured for several hours after a training session, intervals and continuous cardio burn about the same amount of post-exercise calories.

Three studies found that participants burned a similar number of calories in the hours after they did either interval training or steady state cardio, but the interval session only required 20 total minutes (only about 2-10 minutes of high intensity exercise) while the steady state cardio session lasted for 30, 50, or 60 minutes.^4,5,6

Another study matched the exercise bouts by duration, so participants did about 45 minutes of interval training, 45 minutes of resistance training, and 45 minutes of continuous cardio. EPOC was higher after interval and resistance training than continuous cardio, with participants burning about 12 calories per hour more after intervals compared with continuous cardio.⁷ Of course, one of the major benefits of interval training is the ability to get similar fitness improvements and weight loss results with a much shorter exercise time than steady state cardio, so matching the duration of the interval session with continuous cardio sort of defeats the purpose in terms of the way people actually exercise in real life.

Based on those studies, it does appear that interval training has a greater capacity to induce EPOC than continuous cardio. It only takes a relatively short time for intervals to create the same amount of EPOC as continuous cardio, although the exercise needs to be done at a much higher intensity to get that effect.

Where Research Meets the Real World

But now let’s think about this in terms of its practical implications. I’ll use the data from the Skelly study⁵ as an example. In that study, participants breathed through a mouthpiece, and their exhaled air was analyzed to measure oxygen consumption and calculate their energy expenditure. Expired air was collected every few hours over a 24-hour period, including for one full hour during which participants rested or exercised. During that hour, they either rested for the entire hour, rested for 10 minutes and then cycled for 50 minutes continuously at a moderate intensity, or rested for 40 minutes and then did 10 x 60-second high intensity cycling intervals with 60 seconds’ rest in between. During those one-hour periods, here’s the average number of calories they burned:

• Rest: 125 calories
• 50min cycling: 547 calories
• 20min intervals: 352 calories

Over the full 24 hours (including the exercise period), here’s approximately how many calories they burned:

• Rest: 3005 calories
• 50min cycling: 3464 calories
• 20min intervals: 3368 calories

These participants burned more calories during 50 minutes of continuous cycling than they did during the 20-minute interval session, and they burned more total calories over 24 hours when they did continuous cycling. The difference between continuous cardio and interval training in this case is only about 100 calories over 24 hours. More importantly, as you would expect, both continuous cardio and interval training burned more calories than not exercising at all (about 350-450 extra calories over 24 hours).

So you’re probably going to burn a similar amount of calories if you do a short but very intense interval session, or a long, moderate intensity cardio session. If you do a long interval session, you should get a bigger EPOC effect than if you did the same duration of moderate intensity cardio, but remember that intervals need to be performed at a very high intensity to get the benefits. I wouldn’t recommend stretching an interval session past about 20-25 minutes, because most people won’t be able to maintain the necessary intensity over that amount of time.

To be clear, I’m not trying to discourage anyone from interval training. Intervals have been shown to be a very time-efficient way to increase fitness and promote weight and fat loss. The mechanism for that just doesn’t seem to be extra EPOC, as has been commonly suggested. Other suggested mechanisms for the benefits of interval training are hormonal and/or appetite changes that promote fat burning and decreased calorie intake, and/or an increase in the body’s ability to preferentially use fat as a fuel.⁶ Any of those could result in weight loss over time.

Why Does It Matter How They Work?

The reality is that many people struggle to lose weight, and misleading messages from the fitness community (especially when they appear to be backed by research) only exacerbate that struggle. In my experience, too many people get bogged down with calorie counting or performing the “right” type of exercise, and end up sabotaging their own weight loss efforts.

For example, I once had a client who had been trying to lose weight for a long time before she came to me. She thought she was doing the right things: counting her calories using an app, and going several times a week to a fitness class that advertised “high intensity intervals for maximum fat burning”. The instructor told her that she was burning 800 calories during the 30-minute class, and that she would keep burning even more calories for the next 24 hours. Of course, that instructor had no way of knowing how many calories she had actually burned during the class, and I would bet that it really wasn’t anywhere near 800. In any case, it sounded great to her, and she would go home and enter into her app that she had burned 900 calories that day from exercise (adding 100 calories to the 800 from the class to take into account that afterburn effect, of course). According to the app, she could now eat more and still maintain a calorie deficit. You can probably guess whether or not she lost weight that way.

That kind of transaction mindset, where you earn food based on calories you’ve burned with exercise, is a recipe for failure.

I also had a client refuse to do continuous cardio because he was afraid it would cause him to lose muscle and make him look like a marathon runner. That’s ridiculous, and it’s another example of how the fitness industry confuses and overwhelms people until they don’t know what to do. To be clear, I never suggested to that client that he should be running marathons, only that he should work up to being able to run continuously for 30 minutes.

Don’t Overthink Your Cardio

One exercise isn’t “better” or “worse” than another. People claiming that interval training is flat-out better than steady state cardio (or that steady state cardio is bad for you), and using EPOC to back up that claim, are mistaken, and it’s a problem. Pitting one form of exercise against another just makes it more difficult for people to do the right thing, which is to find a type of exercise that you enjoy, that’s appropriate for you and your individual goals, and that you can maintain over time.

Interval training can be great for you. So can continuous cardio. Any type of physical activity that you can perform safely is great for you. Do one or the other, or do both. Just do something and don’t worry about what’s going to burn more calories, or if this exercise is better than that exercise. Don’t overthink it. Find what works for you, and get moving!

References:

1. Elisabet Børsheim and Roald Bahr. “Effect of exercise intensity, duration and mode on post-exercise oxygen consumption.” Sports Medicine 33, no. 14(2003): 1037-1060.

2. Joseph Laforgia, Robert T. Withers, N. J. Shipp, and Christopher J. Gore. “Comparison of energy expenditure elevations after submaximal and supramaximal running.” Journal of Applied Physiology 82, no. 2(1997): 661-666.

3. Joseph Laforgia, Robert T. Withers, and Christopher J. Gore. “Effects of exercise intensity and duration on the excess post-exercise oxygen consumption.” Journal of Sports Sciences 24, no. 12(2006): 1247-1264.

4. Tom J. Hazell, T. Dylan Olver, Craig D. Hamilton, and Peter W.R. Lemon. “Two minutes of sprint-interval exercise elicits 24-hr oxygen consumption similar to that of 30 min of continuous endurance exercise.” International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism 22, no. 4 (2012): 276-283.

5. Lauren E. Skelly, Patricia C. Andrews, Jenna B. Gillen, Brian J. Martin, Michael E. Percival, and Martin J. Gibala. “High-intensity interval exercise induces 24-h energy expenditure similar to traditional endurance exercise despite reduced time commitment.” Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism 39, no. 7(2014): 1-4.

6. Cameron B. Williams, Jason G.E. Zelt, Laura N. Castellani, Jonathan P. Little, Mary E. Jung, David C. Wright, Michael E. Tschakovsky, and Brendon J. Gurd. “Changes in mechanisms proposed to mediate fat loss following an acute bout of high-intensity interval and endurance exercise.” Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism 38, no. 12(2013): 1–9.

7. Beau Kjerulf Greer, Prawee Sirithienthad, Robert J. Moffatt, Richard T. Marcello, and Lynn B. Panton. “EPOC Comparison Between Isocaloric Bouts of Steady-State Aerobic, Intermittent Aerobic, and Resistance Training.” Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport 86, no. 2(2015): 190–195.

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