Wednesday 6 February 2013

Heavy resistance, low reps. That’s the right direction! – 180 Degree Health

Heavy Weights Low Reps – 180 Degree Health

Lars

Finally!

Heavy resistance, low reps. That’s the right direction!

I’m 37 now ( male ), my whole life I did all kinds of sports / training / exercise. The low-carb-paleo-shit a few years ago led to my metabolic breakdown. Nothing new here, I know :-) Finally this experience brought me to 180D :-)

Since my breakdown I was always trying to find the perfect workout, studied all kinds of exercise obsessively. What’s the holy grail? What is the training a person with a damaged metabolism / health can tolerate? Better; what training can lead to significant strength gains – without drawbacks? Yeah, I was just like Matt: Not reading few hundreds books about medicine, health, nutrition – but exercise. I’m serious, my bookshelf looks like the sports book warehouse from Amazon…

The answer? It’s individual ( what a surprise!!! ). Highly individual.

For me it’s definitely the “classic strength training approach”. Never more than 5 reps – if any. The last few months I was experimenting with isometric exercises exclusively – with incredible results.

I think one of the main problems is that most people approach exercise from a cosmetic viewpoint. That’s wrong. It’s as wrong as to approach nutrition from a cosmetic viewpoint.

People want muscles, they don’t realize that strength comes first.
Train for strength! Everything else comes naturally!

On the other hand, most people are far too focused on lifting weights and finding a gym. That’s ridiculous. It’s like thinking that you have to own a Ferrari to use the highway.

You can have extremely effective and progressive workouts using bodyweight only. Your body is your gym. That’s not exaggerated.

I recommend a gymnastic oriented strength training. You can’t go wrong. And very important: It can be real fun!