Older Bolder Life

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sprinting

Inquiring Minds Want to Know: Older Bolder Links, Reads, Podcasts, Recipes, and More 17 June 2020

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Interesting Links and Reads from the Week: Exercise, Low Carb, Omega-3s, and More

Physical activity and A-Fib: It’s Complicated. And riskier for men?

Yet another trial of low carb/high fat works. I’m shocked I tell you, shocked….

Association between omega-3 intake and muscle strength in mature folks.

Training the masters sprinter: our stride length shortens, among other things.

Longevity hack: volunteer.

Happiness and gut health is no laughing matter. The study the article is drawn from here.

COVID-19 Links from the Week

Sex differences in immune responses to COVID-19.

Could up to 60% of the non-infected population be immune to COVID-19? Maybe.

COVID-19 fact check: Infection Fatality Ratios probably aren’t what you’ve been hearing.

The CDC’s data suggests COVID-19 infection fatality rates are below 0.3%.

Are bald men more susceptible to COVID-19?

Podcast of the Week

Q&A with Brad Kearns.

Food, Glorious Food

Poisson Cru in French Polynesia.

Libby’s Chile Crisp.

Sprinting: A Definitive and Easy Read

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Mark Sisson and his team over on Mark’s Daily Apple have recently posted a nifty two-part series on sprinting, something just about all of us should be doing in one form or another. Read Part One here and then Part Two here (includes a short video of Mark sprinting on the beach).

I was a competitive sprinter in my youth, and sprinted in the context of other sports in college and grad school (even playing the occasional flag football and Ultimate match in later years), though as my weight blossomed sprinting became a distant memory for over two decades.

Several years ago when beginning my own health reclamation I knew that I needed to add some form of sprinting back into the mix, though when I first starting my journey back, weighing over 400 pounds made that almost impossible. I eventually added hill sprints and cycling sprints into the mix, but have been enjoying the heck out of all out running sprints on a well-maintained soccer/football field most of all for the past several months.

There is something about running at (more or less) all-out effort that feels incredibly invigorating and plain youthful (something this 60 year old hasn’t necessarily felt in a while). As I’ve shared before, I do my main workouts every day fasted, my weekly sprints included, and I’ll swear my energy levels are even better on sprint days (and for a few days thereafter). More on sprinting, including some interesting research data, to come.

Best for Fat Loss: HIIT, SIT, or MOD?

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One the most common questions I hear, as do fitness trainers across the fruited plain, is this:

What exercise will make me lose weight fastest?

First Caveat: That’s Sorta’ve a Trick Question

Before looking at some interesting data recently published in the British Medical Journal, it’s worth stating one more time that in my opinion, for most of us, our body composition is by far and away largely a result of what we eat, not how much we exercise.

You can split hairs as to how much diet and exercise each play a role in determining your body composition, and as always, your specifics depend on a host of factors unique to you and you only. From where I sit these days, it’s reasonable to argue (again for most of us) as does Sisson that roughly 80% of your body composition is related to what you eat, roughly 10% to exercise, and 10% to managing stress and sleeping well. Do those exact numbers apply to everyone? Of course not, but it’s a decent conceptual starting point to launch from…

The trick question issue has to do with the fact that exercise is in no way the biggest determinant in “losing weight”; no matter how hard you try to burn calories, you still can’t outrun your fork, particularly if you’re eating along the lines of a standard American diet. Another way to look at it, and one that’s particularly damning to the traditional medicine and nutrition way of thinking, is that in no way does the simple adage of calories in, calories out ring true.

That said, here’s an interesting spin on the issue from the BMJ, first published in Feb 19.

HIIT, Particularly SIT, Beat MOD for Absolute Fat Loss

From the abstract –

Objectives To compare the effects of interval training and moderate-intensity continuous training (MOD) on body adiposity in humans, and to perform subgroup analyses that consider the type and duration of interval training in different groups.

Design Systematic review and meta-analysis.

Data sources English-language, Spanish-language and Portuguese-language searches of the electronic databases PubMed and Scopus were conducted from inception to 11 December 2017.

Eligibility criteria for selecting studies Studies that met the following criteria were included: (1) original articles, (2) human trials, (3) minimum exercise training duration of 4 weeks, and (4) directly or indirectly compared interval training with MOD as the primary or secondary aim.

The Summarized Results: Interestingly, they found that both MOD and HIIT reduced participants’ body fat percentage, with no statistically meaningful difference noted between the groups.

The kicker was this, when looking at loss of total absolute fat mass (the magical “weight loss”), HIIT groups, particularly those engaging in SIT (sprint interval training) dropped 28.5% more total fat mass than the MOD groups.

The Take Home: Adding sprinting to your routine offers a host of benefits regardless if weight loss is an objective or not, but it is particularly beneficial if you have pounds to drop.

Granted, for some of us, adding HIIT and in particular SIT (Sprint Interval Training) might see like a long shot given current physical condition, joint or other orthopedic issues, or any number of other things. I get that, and it can be a real challenge to incorporate, but it’s doable with imagination, willingness to experiment a little, and some trial and error.

We’ll revisit the sprinting for the non-sprinter, older wannabe fitness jockey, and the rest of us in the next week or so.