Take some time to think about yourself

*****

Go back four or five years and I was on the traditional carb-heavy active person’s diet (porridge each morning, pasta salads and bakes for lunch, pasta and rice-laden meals at dinner).  I was living in my trainers, had lots of stress from day to day, plenty of cardio through walking and cycling, no weights, no supplements.  I couldn’t even overhead press an empty dumbbell handle weighing a hefty 1kg.  As for my body weight, I had weighed 50kg for about 10 years, despite being 5’6”, with it never going either up or down.

Sound familiar?

Since then I’ve been through a journey of discovery.

I’ve converted to an almost carb-free existence for a while to learn to be a fat-burner, I went strictly paleo for long enough that I can now get away with the odd non-Paleo diversion from time to time but know that I’m looking after my body the rest of the time.

I care for myself better, both mentally and physically.  I have learned to control my stress levels better and know how to recognise my stress characteristics and manage them.  I can feel different muscles in my body working with an awareness I never had before and, as a result I can use self-massage techniques to keep my body feeling as free and relaxed as possible.

Elsewhere in my life I’ve converted to living in Vibram KSOs whenever I can get away with them.  I still cycle and walk a huge amount but I balance it now with a programme of lifting weights.  I’m push-pressing a 20kg kettlebell for reps, squatting safely over my national qualifying weight (with the BDFPA) and happily hip thrust 140kg for reps.

As for my body composition, I’ve gained an enormous amount of muscle and struggle to keep my weight near 56kg because my love of food, when put alongside the hours I spend sitting still in my desk job mean that it tends to drift up a kilo or two at times, despite the fact that I’m carrying less body fat than I was when I weighed 50kg.  I definitely can’t fit my quads, hamstrings or glutes into any of the jeans I used to wear (which is actually a bit frustrating, but never mind).

*****

It’s a lot of changes in a surprisingly short space of time and that’s just what I’ve achieved without removing the full time desk job from my life.  I expect that a lot of others who read this blog have come through similar journeys of self-discovery and change in the recent past.

Have you adopted some changes to diet, training or lifestyle and seen similar massive changes and benefits to your overall being?

No related posts.

6. Natalia Muntean

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ylcy354a_9w

• Key exercises:  Wide stance deep squat, Horse stance, Skier squat, box jumps, lateral lunge, split squat, frog jumps – she is showing these as bodyweight exercises although she does suggest that you may choose to add some weight to some of them.
• Set/rep schemes:  7 exercises, 1 set, 20 reps.

7. Belinda Benn

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRvOcQxX3M4

• Key exercises:  Barbell squat to parallel, barbell lunge (without bringing the feet together between reps), leg press, extended leg calf press – there aren’t too many exercises here and good form seems important to her, but it’s a shame that the weights are so light.
• Set/rep schemes:  She’s not clear on the number of sets but recommends 15 reps on each leg for the barbell lunge, so it’s looking like a low set, high rep approach.

8. Diana Chaloux

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RbDfB2az5I

• Key exercises:  Lunges (without bringing the feet together between reps but with static holds at the bottom of the movement),step ups, high leg step ups (I’m not sure what else to call the step ups onto the bench), Romanian deadlifts (to the floor), box squats (but I’m not sure I like her form on these), lateral step ups with squat, box jumps (or what Aubrie Richeson and Lacey Lynn called plyometric bench hops, but to a much lower platform), leg press, extended leg calf press, leg extensions (I presume that’s what this is called), some sort of calf extension (we really are getting into the realms of things I don’t recognise now, given that I have never worked out in a commercial gym and avoid the machines in hotel gyms when I have to use them).
• Set/rep schemes:  There is no mention of the set and rep schemes but she seems to be doing millions of reps with everything so I’m guessing low sets (possibly even single sets, given the number of exercises she needs to fit into her workout) and very high reps.

Drawing some conclusions

So, what conclusions can we draw together from all of this?

• Everyone seems to be agreed that to get some bulk of muscle volume in the glute and hamstring area you need high rep work.
• I don’t know if some of the models were using lighter weights because these were example videos of the workout, but there appear to be mixed views on whether we should be going with heavy weight or not.
• That said, the ones who actually talk about the weight they recommend (eg. Liza Hughes or Matt Skeffington) certainly seem to be tending towards “the heaviest you can manage without form breaking down”.  In my own experience, it helps to build some base strength with lower rep work first so that the “heaviest you can manage” is still a significant weight.
• Deep squats and lunges seem to feature throughout with Romanian deadlifts, step ups, variations on box jumps and leg presses also featuring reasonably frequently.
• Matt Skeffington is the only one with a really strong emphasis on unilateral work, but most programmes have an element of unilateral work in them due to the inclusion of exercises like lunges and step ups.
• I was surprised to see that glute bridges and hip thrusts didn’t really get much air-time at all.  Given the fantastic results I’ve seen with them (they give a lot more bang for their buck than a lot of other exercises) is this just because they are less well-known, or are there form/strength issues behind not wanting to include them in these sort of higher rep programmes?  Though I do note that even Bret Contreras, the Glute God himself, only recently had a play with higher rep work on hip thrusts.  I’ve certainly found high rep hip thrusts a challenge, but then, I’m doing them with 90kg.

Hopefully this has given you some ideas of things you could do to achieve a bit of glute hypertrophy (if that’s what you are after).  Do you think there are any other key features which stand out in all these videos which I’ve missed and could make or break a successful glute/leg “toning” workout?

Of course, there is an alternative to the whole thing.  You could just get yourself a Flex Mini and then you don’t have to do all those pesky exercises at all!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbQfTWV5Xx8

Related posts:

1. Video-watch: Bums, tums and thighs (part 1)
2. Blog-watch: introducing the Turkish Get-up
3. Blog-watch: Turkish Get-ups revisited

Be warned that I have split this out over two weeks so that you aren’t stuck watching videos for too long each week.  I’ll pull together my key points and conclusions from them at the end of next Thursday’s post.

1. Matt Skeffington

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrF27lPsGAo

This video is the “bad” example from an excellent post by Matt Skeffington in which he sets out what exercises we ought to be doing for a better set of glutes.  He has illustrated the entire post with videos so I recommend you check it out and part two is more of the same content.

• Key exercises:  Dumbbell sumo deadlift, split squat, dumbbell one-leg stiff-legged deadlift, single leg hip thrusts – emphasis on unilateral (single leg) work.
• Set/rep schemes:  low sets, high reps (typically 2-4 sets of 8-12 reps)

2. Aubrie Richeson and Lacey Lynn

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gX2kpHEUXk8

• Key exercises:  Bodyweight side lunge and jump squat combination, pendulum lunge and press, plyometric bench hop, single leg jump squats (I’m just loving the fact that she barely does a partial squat for this), kneeling cable kickback, Parillo lifts (also known a weighted glute bridges in a Smith machine, perhaps?) – emphasis on explosive moves (eg. the jumps) though not necessarily getting the best glute development out of their workout by making it a bit too much of a bodyweight/weighted cardio circuit and reducing the chance of building additional strength (and muscle size) in the glutes.
• Set/rep schemes:  they don’t say but it looks like high reps are the order of the day.

3. Liza Hughes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cReZhhF-rLc

• Key exercises:  Wide-stance squats to parallel, deep reverse lunge with barbell, Romanian deadlift (though it would be good if she went a bit deeper), lying leg curls – it’s a shame about the Smith machine for the first two exercises, however I like the combination of high rep and heavy(ish – I’m not convinced I’d really call it heavy) weight and there are some good compound exercises here.
• Set/rep schemes:  Liza refers to high reps, but only on the lying leg curls does she explain that she aims for 12-14 reps with the weight as heavy as possible before form deteriorates.

4. Project Swole

An article on Project Swole about the top five best glute exercises.

• Key exercises:  Squats, walking lunges, deadlifts, step ups and stiff legged deadlifts or Romanian deadlifts – all classic exercises for glute development, with a mix of unilateral and bilateral exercises and also mostly compound movements.  They are also all exercises which can be worked on with some heavy weights.
• Set/rep schemes:  No comment is made about this.

5. Article on Exercise Goals

This article defies analysis!

• Key exercises:  Lots of big compound classic exercises to choose from.
• Set/rep schemes:  Low set, high rep (typically 3 sets of 10-15 reps).

That’s it for this week.  More videos next week and a summary of what conclusions I think we can draw from all of this.

Related posts:

1. Video-watch: Bums, tums and thighs (part 2)
2. Blog-watch: pull ups
3. Core workouts (Part 1)

I found myself wondering if the original view wasn’t skewed by usually being aimed at men.  Men are generally prepared to give up the lean look for a brief period while they achieve their muscle-gaining goal.  In comparison, I don’t know many women who would comfortably pack on several pounds of fat to gain extra muscle bulk.

My muscle gain goal at the moment is figure related.  I want to build up a larger set of glutes which, despite plenty of strength (hip thrusting 10×4 with over 100kg and 5 second holds) are stubbornly petite. 

After so much success last year cutting off excess fat I am not prepared to pack on fat again to get those glutes.  I don’t feel as comfortable in my skin or as feminine when the fat is wobbling around on my thighs, hips and bottom (where it is sadly destined to go), I can’t imagine trying to explain planned weight gain to my friends or family and I’m not convinced the yo-yoing fat gain/loss is that good for my health.

When I was losing fat I managed to maintain my strength and I think I managed to maintain most, if not all, of the muscle.  I wondered if a slower approach, which was so successful during my fat loss programme, would get the muscle bulk without the fat.

Recipe for muscle gain

To gain muscle, you need the calories required for your usual daily living, enough to fuel some heavy, muscle-breaking lifting and then some spare to fuel the development of new muscle as your muscles recover from the work you put them through and apply additional muscle to make them more able to cope with that level of work next time.

This requirement is probably the biggest reason why people say you need to accept getting fat while packing on muscle.  It is pretty difficult to predict the extra calorie intake needed and it is generally safer to over-do it than to under-do it (and not get the real benefit from your workouts).

In the workout room, the bodybuilders swear by higher reps too.  However, if you watch something like Pumping Iron, the documentary put together by Arnold Schwarzenegger just before he retired from competitive bodybuilding, you’ll notice that this isn’t high reps with the pink dumbbells.  This is high reps with challengingly heavy weights.  The bodybuilders who aren’t pumped full of steroids (and even the elite ones who are) are working seriously hard to gain their muscle.

What I’m trying – the workout

From a workout perspective, I am only taking a bodybuilder approach to my glutes.  That’s the bit I want to enhance.  So I’m doing heavy hip thrusts at the end of every workout (currently 85kg) for high reps (eventually aiming for sets of 12-20 reps).  I’m still doing a static hold at the top of each rep though to get the most from the exercise.

Heavy hip thrusts for high reps and high volume

I start with four sets and add another set with each workout, until I am doing twelve sets.  I then increase the weight by a significant step up and drop back down to four sets.  This wave-loading approach is designed to give me volume while making workouts sustainable without causing me to suffer from burnout and need several weeks of rest every so often.  It certainly seems to be working so far.

I’ve also got a mix of fast and slow work on total body exercises in the form of RDLs and squats.  That’s all thanks to the Hepburn approach of high sets of low, heavy reps immediately followed by low sets of high, lighter reps (done more explosively).

What I’m trying – the diet

The diet is the crucial bit.  

I have retained my fat loss diet levels, with a fraction more calories and dietary fat in each day (so I’ve put my yolks back into my eggs, and I’m frying them instead of boiling them, but otherwise it is pretty much the tuna and broccoli/cabbage diet each day still).  Not enough to gain muscle, I’m sure you’ll say.

The difference is round my workouts.  Immediately before my workouts I have a pre-workout “snack” which is loaded with carbohydrates.  Currently I’m using bananas and yoghurt since they’re quick and easy.  That gives my muscles the fuel they need to work really hard in the gym and tax them.

Pre-workout fruit and yoghurt - delicious!

This moves my daily calorie-intake from the usual 970 calories to a hefty (for me) 1,500-1,800 on workout days.

Results?

I drafted this article a few weeks ago when I was already five weeks into the program.  A week later, the article by Elliot Hulse about Hybrid Muscle and an interview with Glenn Pendlay both landed in my inbox.  Both seemed to pick up on things that my approach includes, such as heavy weights, total body movements, varied speeds with the weights, partitioned food in my diet and timing of calorie bulking round workouts.  It seems I’ve accidentally (through trial, effort, failures and guesswork) landed on some of the crucial keys to getting this right.

At the moment I’m seeing a little fat gain early in the wave-load cycle and then a little fat loss again towards the end when the volume is much higher.  I’ve also definitely seen some increase in glute size, although muscles generally respond well to any new program so I don’t know if this will continue.  I also saw some increase in fat levels, but that was due to a week when I went off the wagon and ate everything in sight, even on the non-workout days.  I’ve paid the price for that.

I’m keeping track of my measurements and my weight and will let you know in a few months time if it looks like I may have cracked the muscle without fat gain conundrum.

Have you got any tips on what else I might do to try and achieve this goal?

Related posts:

1. Improving nutrition for muscle gain
2. Diet to gain muscle as a woman
3. Lessons learned: side-effects of building muscle

Liver - a great source of some of the B vitamins

Vitamin B Complex

Let’s start with the basics.  Vitamin B is not actually a single vitamin.  Unfortunately, when vitamins were first conceived in the early twentieth century, the similarities between the B vitamins, such as the fact that they are all water soluble and stored in the liver, meant that they were mistaken for a single vitamin.  That said, I do wonder how they clearly distinguished Vitamin B from Vitamin C, which is also water soluble and stored in the liver.

Once they started recognising the separate vitamins that make up the Vitamin B Complex, only a few years later, they allocated a number to each of the individual vitamins.  However, it seems that they got a bit over-enthusiastic and recognised a collection of things that are no longer considered to be vitamins, hence the gaps in the number sequence that we now have.  You can read more about the “vitamins” that are no longer recognised on Wikipedia.

So the Vitamin B Complex is now recognised as being made up of the following:

• B1 – thiamine
• B2 – riboflavin
• B3 – niacin
• B5 – pantothenic acid
• B6 – pyridoxine or pyridoxamine
• B7 – biotin
• B9 – folic acid
• B12 – various cobalamins or cyanocobalamin

Key benefits of the B vitamins

The B vitamins seem to have some key properties which apply to several of them and then some other health benefits which only come from specific B vitamins.  The main benefits include:

• aiding proper digestion, including assisting in the production of hydrochloric acid in the stomach lining;
• required for proper metabolism of carbohydrates, proteins and fats;
• synthesis of carbohydrate into glycogen;
• synthesis of fatty acids;
• cell regeneration;
• repair of hair, skin and nails, since these are essentially reliant on cell regeneration, and that includes helping you to maintain clear youthful skin, reduce wrinkles, delaying the greying of hair and preventing dandruff;
• synthesis of DNA;
• production of red blood cells;
• aiding the immune system;
• helping circulation;
• aiding proper function of the heart and other muscles;
• synthesis of certain hormones, including sex hormones; and
• maintaining health of the nervous system, including protection against memory loss and enhancing the effect of the adrenal glands.

Most often people comment on its beneficial effect for improving the strength and health of hair, skin and nails and for its role in improving the nervous system and protecting against memory loss.  However, I found the points about the metabolism of the macronutrients, aiding the muscular function, production of red blood cells and the synthesis of sex hormones to be of equal interest.

If you want to understand better which vitamins provide which benefits, I thoroughly recommend a detailed article on the NetFit website.

A few of the B vitamins are of particular interest to me, so I’ve gone into a bit more detail about these below.

Niacin (Vitamin B3)

Niacin is the vitamin which is present in every cell of the body.  Niacin dilates blood vessels, improving circulation, but is also important for the nervous system and is used for the synthesis of sex hormones – crucial for getting the most out of my workouts in terms of muscle and strength gains, among other things.

A deficiency of niacin brings with it a host of other potential problems, including dry, itchy and inflamed skin, muscle soreness, cramping, exhaustion, insomnia, indigestion, mental problems, mouth sores and loss of appetite.  I’m particularly interested in the dry skin, muscle soreness, cramping, exhaustion and insomnia since these are all problems I unexpectedly suffered from concurrently in the last two weeks of my diet last winter.  Perhaps my diet was low in niacin.

Vitamin B6

I wanted to pull Vitamin B6 out because of some research which has been done showing that it may relieve symptoms of premenstrual syndrome (PMS).  Researchers did an analysis of nine studies which had previously looked at the effect of this vitamin on PMS and concluded that there was a strong correlation between Vitamin B6 supplementation and the reduction of symptoms like depression, breast tenderness and bloating.

Folic acid (Vitamin B9) and Vitamin B12

These two vitamins work together for the synthesis of DNA, the breakdown of proteins and the formation of haemoglobin, the element within blood cells which enables them to transport oxygen and carbon dioxide through the blood.  Vitamin B12 is, in fact, essential for creation of all of our blood cells. 

Many people will already be aware of the advice for pregnant women (or women who are trying to conceive) to supplement their folic acid levels.  This is because folic acid is essential for growth.  A deficiency occurring at anytime during pregnancy, especially when the foetus is in the early stages of development, could result in insufficient growth at those all-important early stages or some oxygen depletion (since oxygen is provided through the bloodstream).

Food sources of Vitamin B

The problem with trying to supplement your diet to increase your Vitamin B levels is that several of the B vitamins tend to be grouped together into a single supplement, meaning that you lose control of which of the vitamins you are dosing with.

The best answer is therefore to get your B vitamins from your food as much as possible.  The general rule is whole grains, meat (especially organ meats and chicken), fish (especially tuna) and green leafy vegetables, but here is a more comprehensive list of some of the most potent sources of each vitamin, mostly taken from NetFit.

• B1 – Brewer’s yeast, wheat germ, oatmeal, whole wheat, bran, whole brown rice, molasses, soy beans and meats.
• B2 – Principally cheese and milk, but also green vegetables and whole grains.
• B3 – Fish and chicken.
• B5 – Organ meats, brewer’s yeast, egg yolk, whole grain cereal, chicken, bran and nuts.
• B6 – Whole grains, potato, banana, chicken.  Worth noting that whole grains are the best source by a long way, provided they are in a fortified cereal – four times better than chicken – but the whole grain source is no use for those readers who follow a paleo diet.
• B7 – Brewer’s yeast and nuts.
• B9 – Liver and green leafy vegetables, especially broccoli and spinach.
• B12 – Liver, kidney, meats, fish, dairy products and eggs.  Note that this is the only B vitamin which cannot be sourced from plants and is therefore a required supplement for vegans.

A few Vitamin B reduction notes

A final point worth noting that there are a few things which can reduce the amount of Vitamin B in the body.  If any of the points below apply to you, you may want to consider increasing your Vitamin B sources to compensate.

• Coffee
• Alcohol (despite brewer’s yeast being a source of Vitamin B, apparently this is more than negated by the ethanol itself).
• Birth control pills.
• Sulfa drugs.
• Sleeping medications (recall that niacin deficiency could cause insomnia, so turning to sleeping medication could put you in a downward spiral if the insomnia is caused by niacin deficiency).

It’s been fascinating doing this bit of research, since I knew nothing about Vitamin B before I started.  Hopefully you’ve learned something new too.

Related posts:

1. Blog-watch: Vitamin D
2. Blog-watch: sunshine and Vitamin D
3. Blog-watch: Vitamin D controversy

The key purpose of Bret’s post was to help us get our strength into perspective.  In particular he highlighted the fact that just doing some resistance training as a woman is pretty unique thing and if you gain some basic strength through that then you are already streets ahead of most women.

The key points for me in Bret’s post

I thought I would start by pulling out the key points that I took away from reading the article.

• There are probably only about 10% of women in the US who perform proper resistance training – I suspect you could take this percentage and apply it to the majority of westernised countries.
• Bret’s guess is that only 5% of women can do a chin up.
• Different anthropometry (height, weight, body segment length ratios) affects which exercises you will excel at.  You need to accept the natural advantages that different people have and be proud of performing at the personal best for your anthropometry.  Remember, you are already in a unique category of 10% who do proper resistance training.
• Typical untrained women need to concentrate on developing a good foundation in mobility, stability and motor control.

Bret’s strength levels table

Bret has provided a table of Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced and Elite strength levels based on the full female population, rather than a strength table which is based on just those who already carry out resistance training.  Bret has built it up over the years based on his considerable experience of training women, starting with untrained women.  Interestingly though, the table has been a point of controversy. 

Female strength levels - developed by Bret Contreras

As Bret points out in the comments, the men responding to his post have not had issues with Bret’s table.  In comparison, the women who have commented have mostly been unhappy with the table, complaining that the numbers on it are too low. 

We’re clearly an ambitious and motivated group of women who read Bret’s blog!

If I have understood correctly, Bret is trying to drive home the point that those of us who are in the advanced and elite columns really are elite.  Maybe not in comparison to that small sub-group of female lifters, competition powerlifters and Olympic lifters, but we are still elite women when comparing ourselves to the full population of women.

What are untrained women really like?

Many women will be aware of Ripptoe’s Basic Strength Standards from Starting Strength and will ambitiously track their progress against this chart.  It’s motivating and provides something to aim for, but we should remember that Ripptoe’s chart is classifying us within the already-elite group who do resistance training on a regular basis. 

What I find far more interesting is Ripptoe’s idea of “untrained”.  When you compare this to Bret’s chart you’ll notice some significant differences.  Most noticeably that Bret has found from experience that there are certain movements, like the back squat, press and bench press where he wouldn’t expect an untrained woman walking into his gym to be able to manage anything.  Ripptoe already expects some basic strength.

My personal experience definitely aligns more with Bret’s view.  I could barely do a dumbbell military press with a 5kg plate and the barbell was completely beyond me, for squatting I started out with a 2.5kg dumbbell in each hand, leaning these up on my shoulders in a front squat position.  I think Ripptoe means “untrained” in the sense of someone who has mucked about in the gym but had no structured or formal strength training.

Why I think Ripptoe is more relevant for men

Something I do find fascinating is how we, as women, tend to compare to men in our early years of lifting.

I believe that men, even in an untrained state, tend to have more basic neural strength.  Whether they get this from mucking about in the gym in their teens (in the UK there is generally no formal resistance training taught at school and gyms won’t let you in until you are 16) or from just being “the man about the house” and undertaking ridiculous manly “feats of strength” competitions against each other, it seems that an untrained man already has some basic strength.

Compare this to women.  Before we start resistance training what have we done?  If they are anything like me, they had maybe done a fair amount of endurance-type activity (jogging or long walks).  However, our total strength regime would be to pick up semi-heavy shopping bags or objects round the house, calling upon friends or men-folk for assistance when it all got too much. 

I’m taking it to an extreme but I had never tried doing anything with weights (other than a fortnightly half-hour walk home from the supermarket with an 18kg rucksack of tins and bits).  I certainly hadn’t tried any sort of resistance training movement patterns before that first session when Chris introduced me to dumbbells.  (“Ammi, these are your dumbbells.  Dumbbells, this is Ammi.”)

More capacity for neural improvements

Gains during the early part of strength training come from learning the movements, developing efficient motor patterns and building up neural strength (teaching the nerves how to fire within the muscles to get the muscle you have to contract effectively).  You don’t need to build additional or larger muscle fibres to get stronger.  Those first few months are spent teaching your body to use what it already has.

My theory, supported by my own experience where I am still increasing in strength while on a sub-maintenance calorie intake, despite being several years into weight training, is that women start from a much less efficient strength position and can therefore leverage those neural training benefits for longer. 

Ultimately though, I have to remember that while I am still not at the point at having to put on significant muscle in order to gain additional strength I am certainly elite in my strength.  Especially in comparison to those women who are where I was a few years ago when Chris laughed at me for my inability to press the 7.5kg dumbbell he handed me to at the start of session one.

What do you think of Bret’s post?  Are you able to class yourself as advanced or elite amongst womankind and if so, does it make you feel proud?  Do you agree with my theory that women have more capacity for strength gains without muscle gain in the early years?

Related posts:

1. Blog-watch: female strength and conditioning blogs
2. Blog-watch: strength and conditioning blogs (non-female specific)
3. Celebrating female strength

Try to find some time and a special place to release the stress

Since I last went through a stressful period at work I’ve collected together a few select articles about stress, in particular articles about how these impact on training and diet.  If you have a tendency to get stressed then take a moment to read through these articles and see if they ring as true for you as they did for me.

• I’m going to start with an oldie.  The Tight Tan Slacks of Dezso Ban is a fantastic site since it specialises in reproducing old magazine articles about lifting and can therefore give you a “new” perspective in the modern age.  Sometimes the old information is the most reliable since it was built up over long periods of time and is firmly grounded in experience.  I like the fact that the articles are so well-written as well.  Recently they reproduced “Training during periods of stress” by Tom E. Kakonis.  A few of the examples are a bit outdated, but the observations of the different ways people may go with their diet and training when under stress are spot on and may help you recognise the signs earlier.
• A few months ago the same site featured an article entitled “The Mental Approach”, originally written by John Grimek in 1961.  The article isn’t actually about stress but concentrates on how your mental state can affect your performance in the gym.  So why is it relevant to this blog-watch?  Simple because when you are really stressed you are rarely in the right mental zone to perform well and poor performance can make the stress worse.  A reminder that if you start on this downwards spiral then a rest week or two may be a good place to start.
• Next up is an article from Patrick Ward.  Patrick explores the idea that we actually have a finite resource at any one time for stress.  When we are mentally chilled we can place more physical stress on our body.  When we are going through mental or emotional upheaval we need to reduce the physical stress we place on our bodies.  I really liked this concept and it certainly rang true for me.
• If we’re going to deal with this stress issue then we ought to spend a bit of time thinking about what is causing it.  Take a moment and think about it.  What is really causing your stress?  You can’t solve the problem until you identify it and start addressing the root causes.  Here’s a piece from Dan Pallotta on the Harvard Business Review about how we can convince ourselves that work is causing the stress but that our mindset may actually be what is making work stressful.  Chris suggested that I put this quote from the article on my partition wall at work:

  “Worry isn’t work. Being stressed out isn’t work. Anxiety isn’t work. Entertaining a sense of impending doom isn’t work. Incessant internal verbal punishment isn’t work. Indulging the great unknown fear in your own mind isn’t work. Hating yourself isn’t work.”
  

• Once you’ve identified what is causing your stress you’ll need to work on getting control of those problematic factors.  In the meantime, here are 100 ways to help overcome stress.  Some are perhaps a little more helpful than others although you’re bound to find something on the list to help you.

I hope you found a few of these links as useful as I did.  Do you have any special tips on other ways you’ve found to deal with stress?

Related posts:

1. Blog-watch: stress
2. Blog-watch: impact of the contraceptive pill on performance
3. Blog-watch: weight loss mind-games

Our bedroom is on the back of the house overlooking some fields so, with the addition of some very thick curtains, the only light we tend to see is natural light as it filters between cracks in the curtains in the morning.  Unfortunately for anyone who comes to stay with us, there is a street light just outside the front of our house which shines through the thin curtains of our two front bedrooms.

Why I’ve done this research

I’ve done posts about sleep before.  Sleep is hugely important to our general health and, specifically, to our mental and physical recovery.  Good sleep can make the difference between good and poor gym performance.

Posts I’ve done so far have been about ways to improve sleep, briefly touching on things like the disruption of sleep patterns by too much artificial light late into the night.  However, on a recent Robb Wolf podcast he mentioned that humans are sensitive to light even if their eyes are covered, so a room with light sources can still impact on your sleep, even if you are wearing a sleep mask.

This piqued my interest, so I’ve decided to learn more about artificial light and sleep.

How can we improve our sleep?

Circadian rhythms

Most people think of our reaction to the daylight phase as the circadian rhythm, however this isn’t strictly correct.  Circadian rhythms are actually a much broader category covering any roughly 24-hour cycle in the biochemical, physiological, or behavioural processes of living entities which, according to wikipedia, meet three criteria:

1. the rhythm persists in constant conditions (eg. constant dark);
2. the rhythm maintains the same period over a range of temperatures; and
3. the rhythm can be reset by exposure to external stimulus.

The most relevant impact on the last of those conditions is the way light can affect the sleep circadian rhythm.  The different pattern of light and dark when moving to a different time-zone will eventually trigger us to change our sleep pattern, but we suffer from jet-lag until all the circadian rhythms have adjusted.

Humans contain a “master clock”, the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), a group of cells found near the hypothalmus.  Light received by the eyes directly affects the SCN and as a result it is the visual cycle of light and dark which primarily drives our systems.  However, we also contain numerous other peripheral oscillators found in places like the oesophagus, lungs, liver and skin which react to other forces, including food consumption, and send their messages back to the SCN.

Light sensitivity without your eyes

So why doesn’t covering your eyes stop your sleep being disrupted?  Despite significant amounts of searching, I’ve not found the answer to this.

However, in a study in which they exposed the skin behind the knee to light pulses (Campbell SS, Murphy PJ. January 1998. “Extraocular circadian phototransduction in humans”. Science 279 (5349): 396–9) they found that there was a systematic relation between the timing of the light pulse and the magnitude and direction of shifts in the human circadian clock responses, measured through body temperature and melatonin concentrations. 

This certainly provides some evidence that we are capable of “extraretinal circadian phototransduction” (reaction to light presented to something other than the eye) through the skin, even if not explaining how this happens.

Why is artificial light particularly problematic?

Search on the internet for artificial lighting and health and you open a world of horror.

Ultraviolet light emitted by fluorescent lamps seems to be the worst offender with a terrifying list of carcinogenic effects being noted as well as being associated with a long list of health problems that are exacerbated by exposure to these sorts of lights (including dyslexia and chronic fatigue symptom). 

Should we be surprised at the health problems of anyone with a job in this modern age then, when so many offices, hospitals and other buildings are constantly light, day and night, by fluorescent lighting?

In addition to the health issues from the UV-B, the wavelength of the light seems to be an important factor in health effects.  A study which looked at the melatonin production in humans exposed to light with different amounts of the shorter wavelength blocked out revealed a strong link in this area (Kayumov et al.  Aug 2007.  “Prevention of melatonin suppression by nocturnal lighting: relevance to cancer”.  European journal of cancer prevention : the official journal of the European Cancer Prevention Organisation (ECP).  16(4):357-62).

Relevant to both me and many readers of this blog was also an observation by a Commander Russell M. Jaffe, M.D., Ph.D, U.S.P.H.S., Senior Staff Physician at the U.S. National Institutes of Health in 1978, which seemed to suggest that frequencies in the 0.1-100 MHz range appeared to weaken muscle strength and proper shielding restored both tone and strength.  Unfortunately I can’t find any detailed reference to this research.

Street lighting is usually achieved with low-pressure sodium lamps in the UK and this has a wavelength of about 600nm which I understand is a pretty low wavelength, although I’d appreciate it if anyone reading this can confirm that.  So it seems that the pervasive light pollution could be slowly causing health problems not solely related to circadian rhythm disturbance.

Disrupted circadian rhythms

In addition to all the general health risks of artificial light, disruption of our circadian rhythm and environmental lighting can have a host of other health problems which, in 2007, were still largely unexplored and were certainly not fully understood.  Instead there was growing awareness of altered sleep or light affecting breast cancer, prostate cancer, obesity, depression and type 2 diabetes amongst other things.

A fantastic paper summarises a workshop of scientists, held at that time to consider how best to conduct research on possible connections between lighting and health.  It is well worth reading since it gives a lot of background as well as summarising the position as it was understood in 2007 and the areas of research that were identified for future study.

So where does this leave me?

Well, I’ve learned a lot.  I’m now a bit wary about all artificial light, but especially of things like sitting in my kitchen, lit with a fluorescent tube, for long periods of time.  I’m also now even more appreciative of the benefits of sleeping out in the wilderness on holidays in the National Parks, away from areas of significant light pollution.

More importantly, I’m going to sort out those front bedrooms and put some wood-slat blinds, or something similar, in them to block out all of the light at night.

Related posts:

1. Lessons learned: sleep
2. Blog-watch: latest sleep round-up
3. Blog-watch: the impact of stress

Think carefully with carbs about when, and how much, to include in your diet

• Let’s start this week with an in-depth technical review of what fat loss is.  Ryan Andrews did a detailed article for Precision Nutrition a few months ago exploring the subject of fat loss incuding some information about things like how your hormones interact with fat loss.
• Dr Bryan Walsh caused a stir a few months back by releasing a new weight loss program called “Fat is not Your Fault”.  The instinct for a lot of healthy and active people is that this will just be the excuses used by obese people but it seems that Dr Walsh is genuinely trying to help people who want to be helped by identifying that there may be reasons other than the basic problems of poor diet and insufficient exercise.  The difference is that rather than just identifying the possible causes of the fat and shrugging your shoulders, Dr Walsh appears to also be trying to provide ways to address these causes.  Not convinced?  Try reading an article that he wrote for Alwyn Cosgrove and an interview he also did for Alwyn.
• Refeeding is something I used during my last weight loss cycle with a lot of success.  I tended to have a few hours at the end of a Saturday every other week when I would eat an enormous amount of food that was still Paleo.  Despite the spike in my calories, I found that my weight loss continued at the same rate as it had been during my very successful January weight loss session.  One of the biggest benefits for me was the mental recovery I had from a few hours of eating all the foods I was avoiding the rest of the time (eg. avocados, prawns, beef, carrots, bananas, the list is endless).  A few months ago Mark Sisson did a detailed article about carb refeeds and how they interact with weight loss.  He notes that “Carb loading or carb refeeds can be used, quite effectively, by those interested in dropping the last couple body fat percentage points.”  I couldn’t agree more.  It’s definitely something worth checking out if you are on a really tough diet.
• Anyone who has followed my previous weight loss diets will be aware that I cut the calories incredibly low when I’m on a weight loss diet.  However, my big concern when doing a tough weight loss programme is whether my hard-gained muscle is also at risk.  As a result enormous amounts of time have been spent over the last few years reading up about the effects of different weight loss diets on muscle.  I was really pleased to see that a recent study has suggested that for short periods of time (the study period was one week) very low calorie diets seemed to significantly reduce body mass without impairing acute strength performance, irrespective of the carbohydrate content.  This is perhaps, in itself, a persuasive argument for a refeed every 10-14 days although it would be good to see a similar study done which assessed the length of time they could go before there is noticeable impairment in acute strength performance.
• The danger with taking calories very low is that we then have a “treat” weekend when we take in far too many calories.  The problem is that this excess of calories can take days to “diet” off again.  John Barban pointed out that this can result in you dieting for the majority of the year just to stay in a static place with your body.  The answer is to ensure that even at these feast times we still don’t overindulge, but it’s really difficult to do and takes a huge amount of willpower. 
• IronMan Magazine wrote up about a recent study in which protein intake levels in young athletes were measured while they undertook a four week diet.  Unsurprisingly, those with lower protein intake ended up losing far more muscle than those with higher protein intake.  The take home message from this is, of course, that muscle (and presumably therefore, strength) can be impacted by weight loss and that a careful choice of diet is needed to address this.  Personally, I choose to take a significant proportion of my calories during a weight loss diet as protein because my total calories are so low and if I took in too much fat I would just use it for energy instead of burning my own body fat.
• So in the last few links we’ve established that protein helps us maintain muscle and significantly decreased calories seems to work well for weight loss.  In addition, for me, I’ve found keeping carbs very low and fat pretty low helps me, thanks to my fine-tuned ability to burn both fat and carbs for energy.  In my low-carb zeal I was therefore surprised and intrigued by a post about serotonin and the protein to carb ratio, suggesting that if we let the carb levels get too low in relation to protein we may start to suffer from poor sleep, bad moods and various other undesired traits.  This is definitely something I’ll be keeping an eye on as I go through this latest diet phase with my radically high (even for me) protein to carb and fat ratios.  Have you experienced something like this when on a low carb diet and were you already fully fat-adapted at the time?

I’ve got a final batch of links about weight loss gathered together but I’ll probably leave it for a few weeks to save anyone who isn’t interested in weight loss or fat loss getting bored of this monotonous thread of blog-watches.  For those who have found the links I’ve put up so far useful, watch this space for the final instalment!

Related posts:

1. Blog-watch: weight loss diet – the final instalment
2. Alternative approaches to weight loss diets
3. Blog-watch: weight loss mind-games

Exercise on the holiday

The holiday involved a significant amount of cycling each day.  The truth is that we were actually only moving the pedals for 4-6 hours over the course of 8 or 9 hours each day – this was no Tour de France – but with a bike that is heavier than my usual racing bike and additionally weighed down with touring gear this was a significant effort output for my legs.

Cycle touring - no Tour de France but still requiring muscle adaptations

By the end of the fourth day I was beginning to get a sore knee caused by knots that were starting to form in my right quad muscles.  I made a concerted effort to massage the knots by hand overnight which reduced the soreness for the fifth and final day.  A follow up rolling effort once we’d returned to the car (where we’d stowed a foam roller) and made it to our hotel for the night made a real difference to the knots and by the next morning a brief rolling session showed that the knots were mostly cleared.

The subsequent problems

After returning home I spent the whole afternoon standing up doing the washing, ironing and tidying up.  We’re doing a bit of a rearrangement of the house so I spent several hours standing in front of a bookcase reorganising books – I’m a bit obsessive about having books organised into alphabetical order.  As the afternoon wore on my legs started to stiffen up.  I thought it was the knots coming back but a rolling session didn’t reveal any knots.

A special treat post-holiday pizza and cheesecake evening (yes, I know – distinctly not paleo) followed and I went to bed stuffed full, satisfied but a little sore.

The next morning I woke up and I can only describe the way my legs felt as “puffy”.  It was similar to the sensation that you get when you suffer from a severe insect bite or sprain where the swelling is so extreme that it starts to be constrained by the skin.  It’s incredibly uncomfortable.  I was still able to walk but the legs of my shorts were tight on my thighs and kneeling down or standing still for too long created additional discomfort.

Call me excessive but it almost felt like my skin was going to split to release the pressure at any moment.

What I think happened

I hadn’t done much cycling before the tour, having only managed to fit in one or two rides of two hours each in the weekends leading up to the holiday.  The sudden increase of cycling effort was therefore a shock to my quads.  They may have been strong from the squatting I’ve been doing, but squatting and cycling are very different activities.

To handle the cycling it is likely that my muscles rapidly developed additional capillaries to enable my body to supply my muscles with blood to help wash toxins away from them and to provide the muscles with plenty of oxygen.

By spending the afternoon after we got home standing up rather than moving about the blood will have filled up all the capillaries, thanks to gravity, and the additional blood would have swollen up the capillaries.  The intake of significant amounts of carbs that evening would then have contributed to the swelling in my legs by replenishing glycogen stores in my muscles.  So my legs really were swollen.  The combination of additional blood and filled glycogen stores will have made my legs larger than ever before and my skin wasn’t prepared for the increased girth.

That’s my theory and if it’s right then it’s a real warning about the possible side effects of significant changes to exercise patterns and subsequent rapid changes to muscle composition.  Do you think I’ve hit on the right reason for the puffy sensation in my legs?

Related posts:

1. Lessons learned: regular physical assessment
2. Lessons learned this week: the sleepless side-effect of dieting
3. Lessons learned this week: injuries and basic anatomy