re: I quit doing cardio

I’m sorry I shouldn’t have drug body builders into it, you’re right, they are extreme examples.

I just feel like you underestimate your bias towards strength for complete fitness. You obviously are promoting a level of strength that is well beyond what is needed for a person to retain grip strength and stability in old age. Not that there is anything wrong with that, it is a preference.

I’m not trying to pick a fight, I benefit from a ton of the stuff you post. I’m just suggesting that there are likely diminishing returns for overall fitness when you are talking about 5 plus hours of intense lifting in a week. The same could be said for a guy running 6 hours per week, he would be better off spending half of that in the gym.

My kids aren’t old enough for me to compare. Hopefully it’s a short season of life and you free up some time in the future.

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I’m sorry I shouldn’t have drug body builders into it, you’re right, they are extreme examples.

I just feel like you underestimate your bias towards strength for complete fitness. You obviously are promoting a level of strength that is well beyond what is needed for a person to retain grip strength and stability in old age. Not that there is anything wrong with that, it is a preference.

I’m not trying to pick a fight, I benefit from a ton of the stuff you post. I’m just suggesting that there are likely diminishing returns for overall fitness when you are talking about 5 plus hours of intense lifting in a week. The same could be said for a guy running 6 hours per week, he would be better off spending half of that in the gym.

My kids aren’t old enough for me to compare. Hopefully it’s a short season of life and you free up some time in the future.

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5 hours is about 1.15 for 4 sessions a week and about what is needed to maximize benefits or come close. and its not just intense lifting, most guys over 30 should be doing about a 10-15 min warm up and prehab routine.


but i usually tell people this, if you are looking to maximize overall health

3 days lifting. 4-5 exercises with A day and a B day based around compound exercises and progressive overload. should take an hour including warm up. think GSLP of some form

10k steps per day

2 days of hard conditioning. 10-15 min max plus 8-10 min warm up. think full sprints, sled pushes, sandbag work, things like those found in the greyskull viking conditioning book


as far as over estimating and bias towards strength...yep because i have been on both ends and seen which one is much better. what you are not factoring in, is quality of life. im very much anti jogging and think its a shitastic way to spend time. either walk(even can use a vest or carry kettlebells) or hard conditioning. jogging doesnt do anything but make you better at jogging and slower at everything else that matters like power. been proven tons of times. also recipe for getting hurt

if you want to zone out wathcing tv at home on a bike cool. if you like jogging cool. if you like racing cool, do what you like.


but from a health and aesthetics view its dog shite when compared to either lower intensity or much higher intensity.

and there are other studies on strength and mortality besides just grip strength. they have them on pushups, pullups, being able to run a true sprint


like i said though, if you like jogging do so if you are not in search of aesthetics. nobody is going to stay disciplined if they are always doing things they dont like so do the things you enjoy just make sure you include something of the other side.

right now im crazy busy so i only get lifting in as a true training stimulus so i make sure i get plenty of steps in and when at the fields/courts with my kids i run around and play with them. only way i can get any vo2 training in.

but yes their are diminishing returns. what i laid out is about the minimum to do to see big time returns. 4 days plus more walks and more hard conditioning is certainly better but again you eventually bump into diminishing returns.

2-3 days lifting, 2-3 days true hard conditioning is about right for most really really busy people like myself.

I agree with everything you have there. I’m also not somebody who spends more time running than lifting. I love lifting but I’ve been on the side of lifting 6 times a week with ZERO cardio thinking I was fit.

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3 days lifting

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10k steps per day

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2 days of hard conditioning

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That is certainly an efficient and effective program

In agreement with you about intense cardio being more beneficial than the other zones, I think research shows that. I’ll have to do some more reading on the benefits of zone 1 walking vs zone 2 jogging or hiking.

I lift 3 days a week.

The other 3 days:
1. Peloton class
2. Treadmill tabata (3-4 rounds)
3. Long zone 2 jog

Rest day or optional cardio day for day 7.

Try to keep carbs to 50g a day or less. (Except for Sat and Sunday)

Seems to work well for me. Nice mix of strength/cardio. Been battling back issues so I haven’t been as disciplined as I want but this is ideal state.

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Not sure why you're being down voted but I absolutely do not have time to run/lift in the evenings. If it's not baseball, it's track, or church, or football. Literally every day of the week. I've started lifting at 4:30 and although I hate it, it is the best way. Lift 4 days, walk 3 days.

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I've thought about getting into the office a little early and then just lifting on my lunch break for this reason. My gym is right down the road from my office. I won't be able to do some super intense workout, but if I'm focused and build around supersets it should be fine.

That's what I've enjoyed the most about the zone 2 training is that there are so many ways to get it: weighted stadiums at the local high school (walking, not running), slide board, jumping rope, jogging, swimming, cycling, etc, etc. It's low intensity so most of those nagging injuries that I've had in the past have mostly gone away.

When Attia interviewed the San Milan guy (the expert on training cyclists), he stated that 3 hrs of zone 2 was necessary to maintain fitness and that anything above that was adding to fitness levels. 180 mins/ 12 min miles = 15 miles per week. That's not very much.

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When Attia interviewed the San Milan guy (the expert on training cyclists), he stated that 3 hrs of zone 2 was necessary to maintain fitness and that anything above that was adding to fitness levels. 180 mins/ 12 min miles = 15 miles per week. That's not very much.

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I've also heard something about cardio effects don't really kick in until around 15-20 minutes to maximize improvements. So if you workout for a half hour cardio session 3-4 days a week, you'd see minimal improvements. But extending that to 45 minutes, you're already in an elevated HR zone, likely zone 2-3, and it may have taken you that 15-20 minutes to get there and sustain it. So you're only adding 15 minutes to your workout time, but all of that is like a bonus, and better than doing a short 15-20 minute cardio based workout on another day. And after you acclimate to that, you stretch it to an hour.

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I've also heard something about cardio effects don't really kick in until around 15-20 minutes to maximize improvements. So if you workout for a half hour cardio session 3-4 days a week, you'd see minimal improvements. But extending that to 45 minutes, you're already in an elevated HR zone, likely zone 2-3, and it may have taken you that 15-20 minutes to get there and sustain it. So you're only adding 15 minutes to your workout time, but all of that is like a bonus, and better than doing a short 15-20 minute cardio based workout on another day. And after you acclimate to that, you stretch it to an hour.

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As a former collegiate strength coach, one of the more frustrating but also fascinating aspects of human adaptation is that they are highly individualistic and also adaptations are never in a vacuum. If even the most learned doctor tells me something so specific, I will be highly skeptical of what they say afterwards.

For myself, ive found that working incline walking into rest times for my lifts have made a huge difference. 30 minutes of walking 5-6 times a week in addition to 5x calisthenics has been incredible for my physique. Its my sweet spot...at my age in my 30s. Who knows how I would have responded in my 20s etc.

The key is trial and error. I know this is cliche but its also everyone's best path for success. Add an input for minimum 2 weeks...see what output you get

**Take-home: A great starting point to cardio is incline walking on treadmill or just terrained walking outside. Start with 20 min/day. You CAN do this during rest times for intense lifts if the walking intensity is low enough but youll have to monitor your performance in your subsequent sets

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As a former collegiate strength coach, one of the more frustrating but also fascinating aspects of human adaptation is that they are highly individualistic and also adaptations are never in a vacuum. If even the most learned doctor tells me something so specific, I will be highly skeptical of what they say afterwards.

For myself, ive found that working incline walking into rest times for my lifts have made a huge difference. 30 minutes of walking 5-6 times a week in addition to 5x calisthenics has been incredible for my physique. Its my sweet spot...at my age in my 30s. Who knows how I would have responded in my 20s etc.

The key is trial and error. I know this is cliche but its also everyone's best path for success. Add an input for minimum 2 weeks...see what output you get

**Take-home: A great starting point to cardio is incline walking on treadmill or just terrained walking outside. Start with 20 min/day. You CAN do this during rest times for intense lifts if the walking intensity is low enough but youll have to monitor your performance in your subsequent sets

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exactly

and IMO unless you are under 15% bodyfat measured by DEXA and at a FFMI of 22ish, consistently walk 8k steps and can do the following

1 mile- 9min
press-135
bench-200
squat-315
deadlift- 350
pushups- 40
chins- 10 dead hang

then dont really care about all the rest because havent trained consistently enough to worry about vo2 max this or that longevity exercise