Mike Boyle on Aerobic Exercise

ragg

http://www.alwyncosgrove.blogspot.com/

Second entry on this page -Titled

"More Mike Boyle Controversy!!"

I have to say, I really started losing weight and getting in better shape when I ditched the long & slow cardio.
Despite the fact he is selling his new dvd and thrives off this kind of controversy, I have to say I agree with him.

What are peoples thoughts on this?

corkcomp

that sort of crap really annoys me .. yes, lifting heavy and HIIT may be a more efficient use of time but there is noting wrong with longer cardio sessions .. sometimes I dont feel like lifting anything, or doing intervals in the gym, especially if early morning .. I could use the reasoning that I would be better off staying in bed, but IMO i am better off going in an doing an hour of med intensity cardio ... a lot of the anti cardio brigade are trying to sell something or push some agenda, even on here ....

Khannie

Load of sensationalist rubbish IMO (along with nearly everything else in life that takes an extreme view). Cardio definitely has its place in a fat loss regime. It has a much shorter recovery period than interval training for example.

ragg

Regardless of recovery, cardio rarely, if ever achieves a real body transformation.

Coming back to recovery time, if you recover from something easily, would it not to be safe to assume that you don't eleveate your Metabolic base rate for any length of time?

If you like cardio, you like cardio, so be it - but if your goal is increased athletic performance or body transformation is going for a long cross country run going to achieve that?

Khannie

ragg wrote: »

Regardless of recovery, cardio rarely, if ever achieves a real body transformation.

I didn't say that cardio should be used to achieve a real body transformation. I said that cardio had its place in a fat loss regime.

ragg wrote: »

Coming back to recovery time, if you recover from something easily, would it not to be safe to assume that you don't eleveate your Metabolic base rate for any length of time?

You engage in cardio based exercises (let's say jogging) for much longer periods than HIIT. If you take a tabata HIIT session as an example, your total amount of time spent exercising is 160 seconds. A 5K run will usually last upwards of 25 minutes.

ragg wrote: »

If you like cardio, you like cardio, so be it - but if your goal is increased athletic performance or body transformation is going for a long cross country run going to achieve that?

I don't really like cardio to be honest, but I use it for weight control. You need only look at distance runners to see its effectiveness for weight control purposes. Like corkcomp, I don't always want to push myself to the max. Sometimes it's nice to tip away at 5K, knowing that you've burned a few hundred calories or whatever.

edit: In general there's a fair bit of cardio bashing goes on here. I'm just saying I think it has its place.

ragg

About distance runners - I personally dont think they should be an example to follow. Most distance runners have quite a lot of muscle wasteage.
I read something somewhere that has always rang home with me.
"To look like a sprinter, you should train like a sprinter"

You engage in cardio based exercises (let's say jogging) for much longer periods than HIIT. If you take a tabata HIIT session as an example, your total amount of time spent exercising is 160 seconds. A 5K run will usually last upwards of 25 minutes.

I'm still at work, so i probably can't dig out the stats just now - but the difference in calories burnt is minimal. If you include the EPOC factor you get from HIIT - the opposite is true. Also, the law of diminishing returns really kicks in with steady state distance running.

I don't think im cardio bashing, i think im bashing steady state aerobic cardio exercise. I run every day im at the gym, however, i rarely, if ever, jog at a comfortable pace

Captain Furball

If his students knew about the different energy systems, they would easily know this guy is full sensationalist marketing babel.He is saying nothing new.

Khannie

ragg wrote: »

About distance runners - I personally dont think they should be an example to follow. Most distance runners have quite a lot of muscle wasteage.
I read something somewhere that has always rang home with me.
"To look like a sprinter, you should train like a sprinter"

I didn't say that distance runners were an example to follow. You keep infering things that I'm not implying. I said that you need only look at distance runners to see its effectiveness for weight control. That is all. I do not have, and do not want a body like a distance runner. I do not want the kind of fitness a distance runner has.

ragg wrote: »

I'm still at work, so i probably can't dig out the stats just now - but the difference in calories burnt is minimal. If you include the EPOC factor you get from HIIT - the opposite is true. Also, the law of diminishing returns really kicks in with steady state distance running.

Ok, a few things here:

1) Maybe the difference in total calories burned is minimal, but recovery time is longer for HIIT.

2) The diminishing returns thing depends on how often you do it. Again, I use cardio as *PART* of what I do and it serves that purpose well.

3) Doing HIIT all the time is a pain in the hole.

4) I use HIIT and find it very effective.

The guy that you linked to in the first post was banging on about cardio being utterly useless and I disagree with that.

ragg wrote: »

I don't think im cardio bashing, i think im bashing steady state aerobic cardio exercise. I run every day im at the gym, however, i rarely, if ever, jog at a comfortable pace

Again, you're infering things that I'm not implying. I did not accuse you of cardio bashing. I said that cardio bashing goes on here.

The Davestator

My personal experience;

A regular gym user (work in one too), mainly weights. Decided to run the marathon this year and lost 6 kg of fat in about three months. (just ran)

What people sometimes don't realise is that the duration & consistency of exercise is very important. Running for 6 hours per week will burn fat, weights for 6 hours per week will burn fat too but a lot of people are looking for the 'best' exercise to get the 'best' results in the shortest amount of time and if they just did what they enjoy for a bit longer, they'd be better off.

ragg

Khannie, dude, I wasn't attacking you, far from it.
I was just using what you said and giving an opinion on it.

The distance runner point i was trying to make is, muscle wastage seems to be a common theme among distance runners - which, IMO, is the opposite of what people should be training for.
I'm not saying everyone should look like a body builder, but people should at least train to maintain muscle.

weightlifter

Is it just me or is this not controversial at all?

He says he doesn't use over 300m distances with his athletes... Who does?

He says he tried to make his ice hockey players (one of THE most anaerobic team sports) stronger, faster and more powerful... eh, duh.

He acknowledges that he athletes do some cardio on their off days. He says they don't prescribe it (but he doesn't seem to suggest that they really discourage it either). After all, if you prescribe cardio, no athlete is oing to pay you to coach it.

He has a point about sending your kid off to run cross country but again, its commonsense. Who does that? Some rugby players might play some GAA in the summer, or some GAA players might take up another sport in the off season but I know very few (intelligent) athletes in the last 5 years who have ever taken up marathon running to "get fit".

There is nothing new here, just sensible use of coaches and athletes' time and sensible understanding of energy systems.

weightlifter

surely this is more controversial:

http://www.functionalstrengthcoach3.com/squats.html

I can't see what exercise he is suggesting to replace them with, anyone know?

(by the sounds of things it might be a single leg bulgarian squat)

He keeps harping on about 115lbs on one leg single leg exercise being equal to 230lbs on two legged exercise (like squat). Again there is nothing new here. That is just the long known bilateral deficit phenomenon.

ragg

yeah, i was talking about this on a different forum, he was talking about unilateral leg work- ala split squats..

Personally, I can't do more single leg work because i have dodgy groin adductors and this really aggravates it but the general consensus seems to be that most people can go proportionately heavier on single leg stuff. For Joe soap the traditional squat is better as its a full body move. Athletes can get more benefit from unilateral stuff

Khannie

ragg wrote: »

Khannie, dude, I wasn't attacking you, far from it.
I was just using what you said and giving an opinion on it.

Sorry man....I was a little bit ..... edgy .... earlier. I had a weigh in this evening for a fight tomorrow so I was both dehydrated and very very hungry when I wrote that. I actually put that at the start of the reply, then took it out for some reason.

ragg wrote: »

The distance runner point i was trying to make is, muscle wastage seems to be a common theme among distance runners - which, IMO, is the opposite of what people should be training for.
I'm not saying everyone should look like a body builder, but people should at least train to maintain muscle.

Agreed.

thirtyfoot

ragg wrote: »

athletic performance or body transformation is going for a long cross country run going to achieve that?

My goal is athletic performance and I would do the odd long (ish) cross country run to aid my performance. Whether its building an aerobic base to a certain level or for recovery and restoration purposes integrated into a periodized training program geared towards performance, then cardio can be very valuable. If the activity/sport that you wish to improve athletic performance in involves activity that is greater than 40-50secs then I would say you need aerobic conditioning of some sort once its relevant to your sport or activity.

Transform

ragg wrote: »

http://www.alwyncosgrove.blogspot.com/

Second entry on this page -Titled

"More Mike Boyle Controversy!!"

I have to say, I really started losing weight and getting in better shape when I ditched the long & slow cardio.
Despite the fact he is selling his new dvd and thrives off this kind of controversy, I have to say I agree with him.

What are peoples thoughts on this?

i think most of these trainers could do with going for a good long run every now and again so they can vent their frustration in a more productive way and get some feckin fresh air.

More trainers looking to stand