Why I'm not for cardio and resistance concurrently
Replies
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I seperating my workouts. If I'm going to do cardio I want to go all out and do cardio. If I want to do strength I want to push myself and do strength.
This seems logical enough. Glad I've been doing them seperately.0 -
Bottom line is that fitness, whether it be cardio or strength training, isn't a one size fits all genre. Each person needs to find what works for them. There are too many varibles involved to say this is written in stone. Conventional wisdom tells us cardio and strength training should be on non-consecutive days, personally doing both on the same day has worked off and on for me over the last three years. I've lost 90lbs. AND kept it off! My advice to everyone is to experiment, find what works for you, and then go with it. Afterall we all aren't cookie cutters of each other.
Brandy
Here's the thing, I agree with everything you've just said. But the bottom line of this post was something else.
People, through the years I have been here, have always asked whether it's better to do both in the same session. I'm simply clearing up why, if you have the option, or a specific goal of building muscle strength or size, you should separate them.
So the bottom line of this post is, to optimally train for strength and size, separate your workouts. If you're looking to lose fat, then it's not so much an issue, but for myself, and many others on this site, strength, power, and size are something we are working for having reached our fat goals, and in those cases, specificity in your workouts helps reach individual goals faster and easier.0 -
I usually do cardio first then a trip around the gym for my strength training. Cardio lasts about 20-25 mins (without counting warm up and cool down) and then I go and lift weights but more so the lighter weights with higher repetitions. I feel like that should mean that I can still do both in one session since you mentioned that the strength training the journal is talking about is the sort of strength training with those big dumbbells and whatnot. I really only go to the gym once a week which is why I combine the two. Should I change that?0
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Interesting topic.
I understand we are just discussing optimal performance here, not saying that you must never cobine the two types of training. So what would be the optimal way for an amateur to train for a sport which required both strength and cardio training?
Take for instance rugby. If I was a pro, I could separate my cardio and weight sessions to different parts of the day, separated by some recovery and refueling. However as I work for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, and have to fit life around my exercise, what would be the optimal way to combine these 2 activities?
I realise I'm taking this thread on a bit of a tnagent, but I'm interested to see what would be recommended in this case.0 -
I usually do cardio first then a trip around the gym for my strength training. Cardio lasts about 20-25 mins (without counting warm up and cool down) and then I go and lift weights but more so the lighter weights with higher repetitions. I feel like that should mean that I can still do both in one session since you mentioned that the strength training the journal is talking about is the sort of strength training with those big dumbbells and whatnot. I really only go to the gym once a week which is why I combine the two. Should I change that?
that's correct, high rep, low weight is not really a true "resistance" program (not in the mass or strength building sense), it's closer to anaerobic HIIT training (targeted) than it is an overload routine. It's fine, but it won't really build any mass or increase your strength very much.0 -
Interesting topic.
I understand we are just discussing optimal performance here, not saying that you must never cobine the two types of training. So what would be the optimal way for an amateur to train for a sport which required both strength and cardio training?
Take for instance rugby. If I was a pro, I could separate my cardio and weight sessions to different parts of the day, separated by some recovery and refueling. However as I work for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, and have to fit life around my exercise, what would be the optimal way to combine these 2 activities?
I realise I'm taking this thread on a bit of a tnagent, but I'm interested to see what would be recommended in this case.
it's a nice thought actually. so as a Personal trainer, one of my specialities is AQR (agility, quickness, and reaction time) which is a big factor for Rugby (Yes I'm a Yank, but I played college and mens rugby for about 7 years, fly half). I am certified in AQR by Swift Fitness, I'm also certified by the united states Olympic team to train Olympic Weight Lifting(clean and jerk, snatch and all the progressives leading up to it). I'm just telling you guys this to give you an idea of my expertise, not to brag. I'm not just pulling stuff from the sky.
So to answer your question, that depends on how serious you are, how much time you have, and what your current conditioning level is at. But lets say you're an average Joe with a full time (5 days a week, 8 hours a day) job at a desk. If you have 4 to 5 days a week to work out for about an hour to 90 minutes each time and it's IN SEASON, then I'd say for rugby, do 1 full body power training (overload) set, that should take 60 to 75 minutes. Then 2 days of straight cardio (you should be able to sustain moderate (70 to 75% Max HR) cardio for at least 30 to 45 minutes to play rugby, and a day of hiit training and maybe a few targeted low weight, high rep exercise thrown in. the last day should depend on what your real goal is, if your goal is power, do another overload day, if it's sprint speed, do another HIIT, if it's endurance, do another cardio. Try to keep your power days as far from the Match days as you can, make yoru rest day the day before the match or do the cardio day the day before the match.
Now, off season depends on what you're looking for, if you want to get stronger, remove a cardio day and add a second power day, if you want to increase your ability to sustain maximal output for longer periods (like sprinting longer and more often) then do more HIIT training and eliminate a cardio day, if you want to increase overall endurance, look into more cardio with a training program for it (places like coolrunnings.com or runnersworld.com both have excellent programs that you can use).
Specificity is important in this aspect. Being a generalist means you'll never get AWESOME at any one physical activity, but it means being strong in most, being a specialist means you're working to be GREAT at 1 thing but your other physical activities may suffer. it's why you never see professional marathoners that have large chests or biceps, and you never see body builders doing tempo runs 3 weeks before a competition, these are specific routines designed to increase 1 thing, and it detracts from other physical processes.0 -
I know when I've finished a strength workout I can barely walk down the stairs.
I used to workout on a Sunday then play indoor football within the hour and I noticed that my performance at football seriously suffered as I just didn't have the energy to put in.0 -
Interesting!
Thanks for the research & post.0 -
On my running days, I do only upper body strength training. My arms feel like jello when I'm done and can barely pick up my cell phone, but my legs work just fine....so I run.
On leg days, I break it up as much as possible, and do either a light cardio workout after my strength training (usually a medium setting on the stairmaster or elliptical) or I do cardio in the morning, strength in the evening. After I do strength training for my legs, I can barely walk down the stairs.
It would be LOVELY if I had the time to work out twice a day every day that I want to do cardio and strength training, but the reality is that I don't have that kind of time. I have a 5 year old in pre-k and tee ball, a full time job, a volunteer job, and a boyfriend. So if the only way I can get my full workout in is to do strength training and cardio in one gym session, then that's just how it has to go down. I push myself as hard as possible and lift the heaviest weights I can.0 -
Thank you for posting this. Very informative.
The drag is that there's not a sufficient number of days in the week to do everything I want to do. I want to lift 3x to build muscle & beat you at arm wrestling. I want to run multiple times so I can be ready for my races/mudrun. I want to do my salsa fitness class & pole dancing class bc they're hella fun. Solve that, science!
I would have to agree. There never seems to be enough days or times in the week to fit everything in that I like to do. How do you find the time for all of it?!0 -
Thank you for posting this. Very informative.
The drag is that there's not a sufficient number of days in the week to do everything I want to do. I want to lift 3x to build muscle & beat you at arm wrestling. I want to run multiple times so I can be ready for my races/mudrun. I want to do my salsa fitness class & pole dancing class bc they're hella fun. Solve that, science!
I would have to agree. There never seems to be enough days or times in the week to fit everything in that I like to do. How do you find the time for all of it?!
there's no rule that you have to do everything in a week. I workout on a 9 day cycle, works for me.0 -
Thank you for posting this. Very informative.
The drag is that there's not a sufficient number of days in the week to do everything I want to do. I want to lift 3x to build muscle & beat you at arm wrestling. I want to run multiple times so I can be ready for my races/mudrun. I want to do my salsa fitness class & pole dancing class bc they're hella fun. Solve that, science!
I would have to agree. There never seems to be enough days or times in the week to fit everything in that I like to do. How do you find the time for all of it?!
there's no rule that you have to do everything in a week. I workout on a 9 day cycle, works for me.
I sometimes forget that I can slow down. I'm so focused on losing the last 15-20 lbs that I can over do it sometimes. Like today I will lift for an hour at my work gym and then tonight I will go and do cardio kickboxing or walk on the stair climber for 45-60 min. And if I don't workout on my lunch hour doing weights I feel lost and like its a waste of 60 min. If I don't go at night to do something I feel like I haven't done all that I can do. My head never stops.....0 -
Thank you for posting this. Very informative.
The drag is that there's not a sufficient number of days in the week to do everything I want to do. I want to lift 3x to build muscle & beat you at arm wrestling. I want to run multiple times so I can be ready for my races/mudrun. I want to do my salsa fitness class & pole dancing class bc they're hella fun. Solve that, science!
I would have to agree. There never seems to be enough days or times in the week to fit everything in that I like to do. How do you find the time for all of it?!
there's no rule that you have to do everything in a week. I workout on a 9 day cycle, works for me.
I sometimes forget that I can slow down. I'm so focused on losing the last 15-20 lbs that I can over do it sometimes. Like today I will lift for an hour at my work gym and then tonight I will go and do cardio kickboxing or walk on the stair climber for 45-60 min. And if I don't workout on my lunch hour doing weights I feel lost and like its a waste of 60 min. If I don't go at night to do something I feel like I haven't done all that I can do. My head never stops.....
I guess my only advice on that is to make sure that it is sustainable. Can you keep up with that routine long term, see this as a lifestyle0 -
Could of already been stated as I stopped reading halfway through the second page of replies, but I agree it's what you want on your end result.
It's good to weight train a little while you're trying to lose weight, since your body will take muscle tissue in to complete its nutrition needs if you're eating very little. Maintenance on muscle instead of heavy resistance would be ideal.
I'm hitting up 70% cardio and 30% weight training on my normal daily workouts, spacing out muscle groups to every other day. The good thing about including weight training is to look fit when you actually lose the weight instead of "thin" -- probably important to most guys. It also curves the ratio of being totally within your BMI when the muscles on your build exceed the fat surrounding them, and take more calories for maintenance for a pound of muscle compared to a pound of fat.
I'll switch to 70% strength and 30% cardio when I reach my weight goal and want to develop my chest and back a bit more with a higher calorie intake. But, that's my two cents.0 -
Thank you for posting this. Very informative.
The drag is that there's not a sufficient number of days in the week to do everything I want to do. I want to lift 3x to build muscle & beat you at arm wrestling. I want to run multiple times so I can be ready for my races/mudrun. I want to do my salsa fitness class & pole dancing class bc they're hella fun. Solve that, science!
I would have to agree. There never seems to be enough days or times in the week to fit everything in that I like to do. How do you find the time for all of it?!
there's no rule that you have to do everything in a week. I workout on a 9 day cycle, works for me.
I sometimes forget that I can slow down. I'm so focused on losing the last 15-20 lbs that I can over do it sometimes. Like today I will lift for an hour at my work gym and then tonight I will go and do cardio kickboxing or walk on the stair climber for 45-60 min. And if I don't workout on my lunch hour doing weights I feel lost and like its a waste of 60 min. If I don't go at night to do something I feel like I haven't done all that I can do. My head never stops.....
I guess my only advice on that is to make sure that it is sustainable. Can you keep up with that routine long term, see this as a lifestyle
I understand that. As of right now I'm pushing hard to lose but I think once I get to a happy weight I can scale back and maintain with that just fine. I've been doing twice a days for some time now and I do enjoy it. Some days I don't make it 2x but then I try an make up for it later on. IDK....I'm hoping after I drop the last of the weight that maintaining will be easier than losing.0 -
bump to read later0
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Thanks so much for posting
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Interesting!!!0
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it's a nice thought actually. so as a Personal trainer, one of my specialities is AQR (agility, quickness, and reaction time) which is a big factor for Rugby (Yes I'm a Yank, but I played college and mens rugby for about 7 years, fly half). I am certified in AQR by Swift Fitness, I'm also certified by the united states Olympic team to train Olympic Weight Lifting(clean and jerk, snatch and all the progressives leading up to it). I'm just telling you guys this to give you an idea of my expertise, not to brag. I'm not just pulling stuff from the sky.
So to answer your question, that depends on how serious you are, how much time you have, and what your current conditioning level is at. But lets say you're an average Joe with a full time (5 days a week, 8 hours a day) job at a desk. If you have 4 to 5 days a week to work out for about an hour to 90 minutes each time and it's IN SEASON, then I'd say for rugby, do 1 full body power training (overload) set, that should take 60 to 75 minutes. Then 2 days of straight cardio (you should be able to sustain moderate (70 to 75% Max HR) cardio for at least 30 to 45 minutes to play rugby, and a day of hiit training and maybe a few targeted low weight, high rep exercise thrown in. the last day should depend on what your real goal is, if your goal is power, do another overload day, if it's sprint speed, do another HIIT, if it's endurance, do another cardio. Try to keep your power days as far from the Match days as you can, make yoru rest day the day before the match or do the cardio day the day before the match.
Now, off season depends on what you're looking for, if you want to get stronger, remove a cardio day and add a second power day, if you want to increase your ability to sustain maximal output for longer periods (like sprinting longer and more often) then do more HIIT training and eliminate a cardio day, if you want to increase overall endurance, look into more cardio with a training program for it (places like coolrunnings.com or runnersworld.com both have excellent programs that you can use).
Specificity is important in this aspect. Being a generalist means you'll never get AWESOME at any one physical activity, but it means being strong in most, being a specialist means you're working to be GREAT at 1 thing but your other physical activities may suffer. it's why you never see professional marathoners that have large chests or biceps, and you never see body builders doing tempo runs 3 weeks before a competition, these are specific routines designed to increase 1 thing, and it detracts from other physical processes.
Thanks for taking the time to reply.
I wasn't looking for any specific advice, as I've been playing and training for the last 18 years or so, was just more interested in both your ideas and the science in programming for such training, where the requirements\boundaries between strength and cardio training get blurred a lot more than more basic general fitness training.0 -
Good stuff my dear, I'm happy I could be a small influence towards your better health! :happy:
Well, you're one of the folks on here who finally got it through my head to drop the low weights/high reps for heavy lifting (heavy being a relative thing of course, I'm still working on building up). I love it and am seeing great results from it. So, thank you, good sir!
only if you want to, there's no law that says you have to be totally drained after a workout, especially if you're targeting a specific muscle group. if you're doing heavy weight, the group you're targeting should be exhausted, but other groups can be fine. I often walk out of the gym on upper days feeling fine in the legs, could do a 5 mile moderate run if I really wanted. I don't but just because time is limited for me.My upper-body is definitely spent from my weight session but my legs do have that last little bit of oomph left. So maybe I need to add in another weight training routine or two for my legs instead of doing the few intervals I'm doing? Your thoughts?
Again, thanks in advance.
I only lift heavy 2x/week and do a full-body, compound exercise routine. So I'm always targeting my lower body, too. I think I'll try adding a couple sets of different lower-body exercises with weights to my routine and see if I get that nice spent feeling without having to do my little HIIT routine.
Thanks again!0 -
Bump.
Cool topic! Very informative. Thanks for taking the time to post and to explain :happy:0 -
I am fairly new to understanding and intergrating the physiologic / metabolic soup that you talk about. So forgive my naive approach thus far and the fairly simple questions that I ask.
First, does your supposition that doing both exercises in the same setting (less than 8 hours apart) assume that one wants to "bulk up" by weight training? I personally started lifting a month ago and have used it more for tone and cardio than to add mass. I don't see any problem with adding it to the elliptical or swim. In fact, those exercises warm the muscles up and get me going. If I do the elliptical I do arm work with weights. I make sure to eat a good meal mixture of complex and some simple carbs and protein at least 2 hours prior to my extended workout replentishing stores.
To the best of my knowledge, in weekend warriors like me (not really, I work out 5 days a week) I understand our glycogen stores in the liver to be about 100 grams. We use about 1 gram a minute and therefore have about 90 minutes before we exhaust our liver stores and start grabbing glycogen from muscle (stores there about 280 grams in non-elite atheletes). My intense work-outs (weights cardio and swim/elliptical cardio) are about 45 min for each exercise (ie 90 minutes total). I then replace protein within 30 minutes of completing the exercise with a mixture of carbs/protein in liquid form (easiest when at the gym and not headed home to eat right away). Skipping the arguement over whether a mixture of complex proteins/carbs mixed with some simple fast absorbing is best in various ratios....for the non-elite athelete...one would think this is probably enough. If I were training for the Olympics and in that kind of shape, the story might be different...and the whole story does change depending on the type of exercise (swim, row, run) and effort etc. Elite atheletes actually reportedly carry less stores in the liver and run around with an average of 55 grams in the liver at baseline (not the 100 grams in my liver). By carb loading they can increase muscle stores up to 800 grams (mine are probably stuck at 280). So for them, they can store even more and go harder longer. All this is to say that I do believe while the arguement of not combining exercises of resistance and cardio on the same day apply to some, it probably doesn't apply to all. Just depends on what you want out of it and how long you do it and how hard you are doing it. Yes? or am I down a creek without a paddle?
Lastly, why is it that we say cardio exercises don't build muscle? or need a positive testosterone balance to improve muscle synthesis and slow breakdown? Bikers have big quads and hamstrings. Aren't they building muscle too?
Just asking....as I said....this is all new to me...I've been reading for a week or two and realize I know enough to be dangerous. So educate and convince me.
All good questions tex, I'll see if I can respond in kind.
to your first question, it does assume you are looking to gain or maintain muscle mass by targeting muscles for specific weight training. I.E. testosterone release happens only in certain conditions (over and above the normal levels in the body that is), and moderate cardio, or even most HIIT training routines don't trigger high releases of testosterone, mainly because the body will only release hormones when the muscles "request" the need for more power. It's actually a complex set of hormonal releases based on charge balance and chemical homeostasis. I.E. glycogen depletion doesn't cause the testosterone trigger to happen, only using muscles to their maximal effort for an extended period will do this. As the body perceives failure because of mechanical work will it release testosterone, not because of energy depletion.
your understanding of localized and liver glycogen stores is actually very close to right on, the only thing you should be aware of is that muscle glycogen is not mobile, in other words the 250 to 350 grams in most adult males at the muscle site is locked at the muscle site, thus is not available to other muscles. Only the liver glycogen will be released to replenish muscle use, and the liver will always hold some glycogen in reserve for the brain if it can, it's almost impossible to completely deplete the liver of glycogen, thus about 80 grams can be released, and that takes 5 to 15 minutes to replenish a fully depleted muscle, that's why when you're looking for hypertrophy, your rest times between sets should be about 3 to 5 minutes, we're looking for mechanical work failure, not glycogen depletion.
to your last question about whether cardio builds muscle. It just doesn't, there's hundreds of studies documenting this, I'm not going to go listing them, but they're easy to find if you go to ajcn.org and search for cardio and muscle mass gains. But to be more to the point, and easier to understand, cardio works below the aerobic threshold, never triggering the response needed to build new muscle mass, unless the person never uses or uses very infrequently, the muscles being used for cardio, the body won't trigger mass (power) gains. Remember, the body is an efficiency engine, it will only add extra muscle when it perceives a need. If the need (like when doing cardio) is for better oxygen efficiency and OSAT (oxygen saturation in the blood) then the body will increase lung capacity, and mitochondrial counts to account for this, the one exception to this is the heart, and smooth muscles around the arterial systems which can grow stronger with cardio. But I'm sure we've all heard the stories of highly trained athletes that have extremely low resting heart rates, it's because their bodies are both adapted to better extract oxygen out of the blood, and their hearts are stronger, pumping more blood volume during each stroke (thus needing less beats to deliver the same amount of oxygen).
My point is basically this:
It isn't an all or nothing game, you can do both, and you'll probably return about 70% to 80% of the results that you would from each if compared to if you did them separately. Which, for many people is fine. It does make it easier if you're in a time crunch.
BUT
A lot of people ask me whether you should do both, 1 first, or the other first. And I always give them the answer of: "if time is an issue, then do both, but don't expect optimal results from either". And I say that simply because when you get right down to it, if you're training to gain strength, then your body needs fuel to recover, if you do that AND do cardio, you're depleting your energy levels, muscle repair waits for nobody, and if you have no energy to fuel your recovering body, then the protein and amino acids that would normally go towards building or repairing muscle tissue will instead be used to supplement energy recovery as the body deems that more vital to short term survival than building new muscle later (I.E. run away from the saber toothed cat, THEN worry about being strong enough to kill it next time)
The study I noted in my original quote wasn't elite athletes, they were adult males that were in good shape, but not elite, the process is similar for everyone. It's as much about balance as it is about anything. If you're looking for specific gains (I.E. strength and size gains, then the focus should be on hypertrophy and power, if your looking for overall endurance gains then the focus should be on sub-maximal cardiovascular work, if your focus is to gain endurance at one specific muscle site then the focus should be on HIIT training with specificity.
You mentioned cyclists, and that's true, but what we don't see is that the off season training regimen of most professional athletes has just as many strength days as it does specific sport training days. I.E. bicyclists do squats on some days, but they very rarely will do squats immediately followed by a long cardio session, the may do it in the same day, but always separated by hours and a re-feeding to replenish. The other thing to remember about professionals is that their bodies are trained to a point where they are supremely efficient at recovery, so what may take you and I 8 hours may only take them 3 or 4, that's more individual, but it's still a factor.
hope this helps clear some stuff up.
Let me know if you have any more questions.
Fascinating info here! I love reading this kind of stuff because it really does cement things as far as WHY we do the things we're told to do in these books, etc.0 -
to your last question about whether cardio builds muscle. It just doesn't, there's hundreds of studies documenting this, I'm not going to go listing them, but they're easy to find if you go to ajcn.org and search for cardio and muscle mass gains.
You mentioned cyclists, and that's true, but what we don't see is that the off season training regimen of most professional athletes has just as many strength days as it does specific sport training days. I.E. bicyclists do squats on some days, but they very rarely will do squats immediately followed by a long cardio session, the may do it in the same day, but always separated by hours and a re-feeding to replenish.
Ok you are far more knowledgeable than I on this topic, and I have been reading and learning much on this thread. But this part just made me sit up and say "whoa!" There are hundreds of thousands of runners and cyclists out there who never do any strength training yet have awesome muscular legs. I was an example of that to some degree, though I have started strength training in recent years. If any study says that this can't be done I'd just pitch it in the trash, I don't care what authority wrote it; it is clearly incorrect. Maybe I am misreading you here; I hope so. But go to any local running or cycling race and you will find hundreds of ordinary folk there who don't do squats or any strength training at all yet have highly developed muscular legs. What's up with that?
Not sure why my writing shows up blue like a quote, I guess I did something wrong in editing the quote.0 -
to your last question about whether cardio builds muscle. It just doesn't, there's hundreds of studies documenting this, I'm not going to go listing them, but they're easy to find if you go to ajcn.org and search for cardio and muscle mass gains.
You mentioned cyclists, and that's true, but what we don't see is that the off season training regimen of most professional athletes has just as many strength days as it does specific sport training days. I.E. bicyclists do squats on some days, but they very rarely will do squats immediately followed by a long cardio session, the may do it in the same day, but always separated by hours and a re-feeding to replenish.
Ok you are far more knowledgeable than I on this topic, and I have been reading and learning much on this thread. But this part just made me sit up and say "whoa!" There are hundreds of thousands of runners and cyclists out there who never do any strength training yet have awesome muscular legs. I was an example of that to some degree, though I have started strength training in recent years. If any study says that this can't be done I'd just pitch it in the trash, I don't care what authority wrote it; it is clearly incorrect. Maybe I am misreading you here; I hope so. But go to any local running or cycling race and you will find hundreds of ordinary folk there who don't do squats or any strength training at all yet have highly developed muscular legs. What's up with that?
Not sure why my writing shows up blue like a quote, I guess I did something wrong in editing the quote.
your reply was blue because you had an extra open quote at the beginning of your reply.
to answer your response, I never said a cyclist can't have strong, muscular legs, I said that professional cyclists use weight training in order to increase their leg power, and it's true. Do a google search of cycling off season workouts, you'll notice many use weight training routines in order to increase leg power. but very few do much more than maintenance in season, because
it's counter productive to do both strength and power increases, and makes it more difficult to prepare for races. I think some people are taking bits and pieces of the study and this topic, you have to read the whole thing, all the replies as well, yes it's a lot of reading, but if you're interested enough to reply, you must read the whole thing, we went over a lot of stuff in here, and it all ties together.0 -
to your last question about whether cardio builds muscle. It just doesn't, there's hundreds of studies documenting this, I'm not going to go listing them, but they're easy to find if you go to ajcn.org and search for cardio and muscle mass gains.
You mentioned cyclists, and that's true, but what we don't see is that the off season training regimen of most professional athletes has just as many strength days as it does specific sport training days. I.E. bicyclists do squats on some days, but they very rarely will do squats immediately followed by a long cardio session, the may do it in the same day, but always separated by hours and a re-feeding to replenish.
Ok you are far more knowledgeable than I on this topic, and I have been reading and learning much on this thread. But this part just made me sit up and say "whoa!" There are hundreds of thousands of runners and cyclists out there who never do any strength training yet have awesome muscular legs. I was an example of that to some degree, though I have started strength training in recent years. If any study says that this can't be done I'd just pitch it in the trash, I don't care what authority wrote it; it is clearly incorrect. Maybe I am misreading you here; I hope so. But go to any local running or cycling race and you will find hundreds of ordinary folk there who don't do squats or any strength training at all yet have highly developed muscular legs. What's up with that?
Not sure why my writing shows up blue like a quote, I guess I did something wrong in editing the quote.
your reply was blue because you had an extra open quote at the beginning of your reply.
to answer your response, I never said a cyclist can't have strong, muscular legs, I said that professional cyclists use weight training in order to increase their leg power, and it's true. Do a google search of cycling off season workouts, you'll notice many use weight training routines in order to increase leg power. but very few do much more than maintenance in season, because
it's counter productive to do both strength and power increases, and makes it more difficult to prepare for races. I think some people are taking bits and pieces of the study and this topic, you have to read the whole thing, all the replies as well, yes it's a lot of reading, but if you're interested enough to reply, you must read the whole thing, we went over a lot of stuff in here, and it all ties together.
Yes, I have been a cyclist since the early eighties and I'm quite familiar with pro cyclists training routines. However, the point I disagree on is saying that one cannot build muscle through cardio. So ignore the pro cyclists training or whatever and just look at the thousands of runners and cyclists that do no strength training yet build very muscular legs. I can accept the point that one could build muscle more effectively by separating cardio and strength training, I just can't accept that cardio cannot build muscle as above when you say it just doesn't. Ok, maybe you were just making a broad generalization to make a point, but as a guy that does primarily cardio I read a lot of stuff from the lifting community about cardio that is just not true and it riles me up a little. No offense intended towards you, I do appreciate all that you have written. But clearly one can build muscle while doing cardio - maybe not the best way, but it can be done. I don't mean to argue so I'll bow out after this post; I just want to point out that that cardio can build muscle.0 -
Yes, I have been a cyclist since the early eighties and I'm quite familiar with pro cyclists training routines. However, the point I disagree on is saying that one cannot build muscle through cardio. So ignore the pro cyclists training or whatever and just look at the thousands of runners and cyclists that do no strength training yet build very muscular legs. I can accept the point that one could build muscle more effectively by separating cardio and strength training, I just can't accept that cardio cannot build muscle as above when you say it just doesn't. Ok, maybe you were just making a broad generalization to make a point, but as a guy that does primarily cardio I read a lot of stuff from the lifting community about cardio that is just not true and it riles me up a little. No offense intended towards you, I do appreciate all that you have written. But clearly one can build muscle while doing cardio - maybe not the best way, but it can be done. I don't mean to argue so I'll bow out after this post; I just want to point out that that cardio can build muscle.
the science, and my experience is very very clear, you don't build new mass with cardio. You can do minor modifications with activating dormant muscle fiber, and you can build muscle with sprint training (which is not cardio, it's anaerobic and closer to HIIT than cardio), but there's plenty of science out there that supports it, in fact, if you show me just one single research study who's conclusions say that cardiovascular exercise increases voluntary muscle mass (I.E. not the heart muscle or other involuntary muscles associated with cardiopulmonary systems) and I'll read it and concede you the point (if it's accurate).
Heck, tell ya what, you find a trainer who works with professional runners or cyclists and get a quote from one of them that says that straight cardio increases muscle mass and I'll consider it. As a trainer, and someone who's been in high level sports my whole life, I've never once heard anyone say that cardio builds muscle mass, not once. You'd be the first.0 -
Didn't bother quoting the previous discussion since the quotes get so long...
But, are you really saying that no runner or cyclist builds leg muscle by cardio alone? They only build leg muscle by doing strength training? That is so clearly wrong and easily disproven that I assume we must be missing each others point somehow. My statement is straightforward. Runners and cyclists build leg muscle by doing nothing but cardio. There are millions of examples of this across the country and globe. I was always the guy with the skinny legs until I started cycling in 1983 or so. Then my legs got big, muscular, and strong. I never did any strength training until 2009, but that didn't stop me from building strong legs. As I said before, go to any local running or cycling race and check with the contestants (not the elites, the john and jane does.) You will find muscular legs on people who have never done any strength training. It is a long widespread running joke about the marathoners with muscular legs and no upper body. My circle of friends is made up of long distance runners and cyclists who fit this mold. So yeah, one can easily build muscle doing cardio alone, but it will be leg muscle. I don't even see how this can be argued with; it is all around us daily. Don't interview trainers, go see for yourself at the races. Most of the cardio types in my age bracket (I'm 59) have never done strength training, it just wasn't part of the running craze that began in the seventies. So I see it daily and never thought anything of it until I read this thread. Again, I grant you your orignal point, muscle building is more effective when strength training is separarted from cardio. But there is no question that cardio can build muscle, millions of folks do it.
PS: I'm not combative and don't want to hijack your thread so I'm not going to post anymore. Feel free to PM me if you like, I'm open to discussion, I just don't know that I can add anything here. Thanks for all of your research and advice.0 -
I agree, but studies aside, it makes sense to me that if you are working hard enough at one, you should not have any energy for the other.
I keep seeing diaries where someone will do 45 minutes of strength followed by an hour of cardio. Neither is being done effectively. 45 mins of strength training should leave someone wanting to take a nap, not take a zumba class.
I've busted my *kitten* doing circut training then somehow found the energy to do a little bit of cardio. But only way I can do it is a 15 minute warm up beforehand (building up to a fairly good intensity), 30-45 minutes of hard circuit training, then 15 minutes of high intensity cardio....sometimes I can only manage low intensity. It's still doing the job.0 -
Thank you for the technical reasons. Steve Turano on you tube says to do them separately and I listened to that and then suddenly I started to get stronger and stronger with the weights. Yay, only problem is I do very little cardio at all. It is so unpleasant. I don't mind the weights even when it's hard.0
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I let my body tell me if I'm in any kind of shape to do ONE of those things AFTER the other. After one type of exercise,, if I've done it properly, I'm too maxed out physically to do the other, and my body usually will let me know it's a NO GO.
If I do cardio, there's usually only time and energy for some ab work. Likewise, if I'm going to do weight training, I will only warm up with about 5-10 minutes of cardio, and my weight training is usually the UPPER body on those days.0
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