Basic Core Exercise - Pullups

The pullup is one of the best exercises using body weight.  When done correctly, it is not a muscle specific movement, like a lat pull down, or a biceps curl, or some combination of those.  It involves the entire body, from the arms, through the core and abdominal muscles, and can even include the legs.  The great thing about them is that they can be done anywhere you can find a bar or tree limb that can support your weight.  The advantages to being able to do a pullup with ease and comfort is the functional capability inherent to the movement.

If you can do a pullup, it's a good idea to simply start doing them.  To build up to a pullup, there are a lot of variations that one can do.  Placing a bench under the bar will allow you to use your legs to support the movement.  As you become stronger, your legs will be needed less and less.  Another way to build up to a full pullup is by jumping and and holding yourself up and then slowly lowering down.  This is called training the negative of the movement.  It builds strength and prepares you for the full normal pullup.

Eventually you will be able to start doing regular pullups.  There are two distinct types of pullups.  Strict, which is what most people do, involves no swinging or "cheating" in the movement.  A "kipping" pullup involves swinging the legs and generating momentum to swing the chin or chest up to the bar.  These can be done repetitively, doing many in a row.  These pullups require a greater coordination of the whole body than a strict pullup, and are more functional in the sense that if you had to do a pullup, this is the way you'd likely do it, especially if being chased by an animal and trying to hide up a tree or climb a wall!

It's one of my favorite exercises, and it comes up often in my CrossFit workouts.  Since incorporating the kipping version, the strength in my upper body, grip, core, and legs have all improved.  Aim to do these at least once a week, maybe twice, and you'll be adding a great body weight upper body 

The Dangers of Headlines

As a student of Chiropractic philosophy, I am always seeking to expand my understanding and awareness of natural principles and science in order to treat my body in a way that allows me to experience life optimally.  What does that mean?  It means that I choose to exercise in a way that supports me and allows me to do the activities I enjoy, while adding strength, flexibility, and stability to my physical being.  It also means that I am constantly striving to eat in a way that supports my body rather than adding stress to it.

When I was in high school, I allowed my weight to get up to around 240 lbs.  I wasn't particularly athletic, though I played soccer and studied martial arts, so that weight didn't represent a great proportion of fat and muscle.  By simply restricting my calories (i.e. eating one bowl of cereal in the morning instead of three!) I was able to drop weight.  I also got strict with a running program and weight training routine, and my health improved dramatically.  As that journey has continued, I've managed to refine my eating choices over time until finally discovering the diet that has worked the best for me.  I now effortlessly maintain a weight of between 205 and 210, while staying around 8% body fat (if you trust calipers).

A word about that.  I do not believe in one diet for everyone.  People are different, and thus they have different needs when it comes to food.  Some people tolerate dairy very well, while others do not, for example.  For me, I have found that by adopting the eating plan most similar to the Primal Blueprint, by Mark Sisson, (check him out at marksdailyapple.com) I stay lean, with lots of energy, and increasing strength.  I am also almost never hungry, and when I am, I eat some veggies and meat, and it goes away, and I'm not just hungry again a few minutes later, as I used to be.

I do believe that almost everyone will benefit by eating a lot of vegetables.  I also believe that most people require animal products to be optimally healthy.  There are likely a few people out there who do just fine on a pure vegan or vegetarian diet, but I don't believe it's the healthiest choice for most.  As always, experiment and see what works for you.

So how does this relate to the headline and the dangers of them?  Simply put, the standard diet proposed by our government is NOT the right diet for most people.  The reliance on whole grains and legumes as staples tends to increase overall carbohydrate loads while decreasing fat and protein, leading to increased insulin production and resistance, and a host of other diseases that result from that.  A recent study that supports a lower carb type diet was lambasted in the press, but not for study flaws or poor design.  Rather, it was simply lied about.  Here are some examples (note these aren't actually headlines, but you get the point, I hope): (borrowed from The Eating Academy)

USA Today

…the authors note a downside to the low-carb diet: it appears to raise some risk factors for heart disease.

The New York Times

…the low-carb diet “also had marked problems. It raised levels of CRP (c-reactive protein), which is a measure of chronic inflammation, and cortisol, a hormone that mediates stress.”

The Wall Street Journal

…the low-carb diet had the biggest boost in total energy expenditure, burning about 300 calories more per day than those on the low-fat diet — about the same as an hour of moderate exercise. But that bump came at a cost: increases in cortisol, a stress hormone, and a measure of inflammation called CRP, which can raise the risk of developing heart disease and diabetes.

Unfortunately, if you actually read and interpret the study, these statements are mostly completely false.  The Wall Street Journal came the closest to being true, but then they blew it by reporting on the measure of inflammation.  If you're interested in the whole study interpretation, check out the Eating Academy blog by following the link above.

The truth is, the lower carbohydrate diets improved overall energy expenditure, which can result in more weight loss.  While a calorie is a calorie, and calories in vs. calories out can determine weight loss, the source of those calories in can change how many we burn (calories out), so it's not quite that simple!

And the point of the whole thing is, don't simply believe headlines.  Journalists write what they write to attract readers, not necessarily to tell the truth.  And a story that warns people about a potentially dangerous diet gets a lot more play for some reason.

If you have any questions about the diet I'm following now, don't hesitate to ask!

Traditional Weight Training's Limitations

I was a personal trainer for many years before becoming a Chiropractor.  I have seen trends come and go, and they all seemed like fads.  Resistance training has always been an important component to workout patterns, and research shows that this training is essential for people to be optimally healthy.  But is traditional weight training the best way to go about it?  Or is it really just another fad?  For that matter, are newer models of exercise like CrossFit or P90X fads?

The form of weight training that is the standard these days is a muscle isolation type which has been made popular by body builders from the 70s.  They perform strict movements which isolate different muscle groups like the pectoralis major in the chest, or the biceps brachii in the arms in order to gain strength and size.  This kind of training is effective at gaining strength and improving health to a point.  It was my standard of exercise for many years and I received a lot of benefit and a great deal of strength from it.  There was also a lot of crossover to other activities as well.  These exercises aren't bad, but as I will demonstrate, they are somewhat limited.

First and foremost, the muscles of the body are not meant to work in isolation.  Strength gain is more than simple cross sectional force that can be applied through a muscle.  What matters more is the ability of the body to coordinate all of the muscles in the body to produce force in a given movement.  The weight training I am suggesting relies on functional body movements more than isolation to improve the ability of the body to work as a coordinated whole.

Think about when you lift something with your hand.  This would be a biceps curl in a traditional movement, but is the biceps really working independently?  Of course it's not!  Not only are there quite a few other muscles that support the arm directly like those in the chest, shoulder, and upper back, but the muscles of the spine and legs must operate in order to balance all of the other forces.  When you lift your arm, your center of gravity changes, and other muscles must compensate for that.

The exercises of the body builders are very sport specific.  They are attempting to generate as much size and strength as they can, with an emphasis on size rather than on function.  Are they strong?  Sure, but they aren't as functionally adept as someone who practices CrossFit, for example.  CrossFit is an example of a workout type that emphasizes function and form over sheer strength.  It makes no sense to be able to curl 100 lbs in the gym, if you can't bend down to tie your shoelaces, or reach behind your back.

A common exercise done in CrossFit is the thruster.  This movement requires a weight of some kind that is propped up at the shoulder.  You perform a full squat where your thighs go beyond parallel and then come back up.  At the top of the squat, you press the weight overhead.  What muscles get worked in this exercise?  A better question might be: What muscles aren't?  This exercise uses legs, arms, core, and everything in between to do it well.  I have never been so functionally capable since I started training with CrossFit.

Some caveats: I don't believe CrossFit is for everyone.  It is very intense, and there are other forms that also apply this functional concept, but without the intensity.  I would encourage people to check out Mark Sisson's Primal Fitness Blueprint at his website.