Heavy Lifting.

dbrightwell1270
dbrightwell1270 Posts: 1,732 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I keep seeing people comment that heavy lifting is necessary to decrease body fat percentage. How is "heavy lifting" being defined? It seems to me that some of the leanest people I see are people who do physical activity within their job and aren't necessarily doing heavy lifting but more or less medium weight for a long period of time. My garbage man (the one on the back of the truck not the one driving) looks like he is probably 10% or less body fat. I know that various women's magazines routinely rank firefighters and UPS delivery drivers as the occupation with the sexiest men. This also seems to provide evidence that occupations that require moderate lifting combined with cardio over long periods of time are likely to produce favorable results. I haven't seen any of the various fitness routines like Insanity, P90X, 30DS, etc, but my understanding is that there isn't much weightlifting in those videos, it is more using the body as resistance, gettng the heart rate up and combining cardio with body weight based exercises.

Replies

  • Quickster34
    Quickster34 Posts: 209 Member
    Being consistently active like the professions you describe will of course only aid in keeping someone healthy because they are burning more calories( also usually picking up and putting down things constantly i.e lifting). Cardio alone however will only get you so far, hence why you hear the hype about lifting, mainly because it works, it is an excellent way to increase your heartrate and more importanty keep your body burning fat after the activity. Heavy lifting to me involves moving weight, Barbells, dumbells, compound lifts, etc.. the benefits from lifting are enormous and paired with a good diet and cardio the results will follow
  • dbrightwell1270
    dbrightwell1270 Posts: 1,732 Member
    I guess I should elaborate a little more. I started lifting about 2 months ago and see a uge difference. I don't consider it "Heavy" lifting because of my previous background. I used to lift in olympic-style competitions where a typical workout would be about 5-6 exercises with about 3-6 sets/ exercise, 3-6 reps/set at 70-85% of the one-rep max. Why I do now is a lot of circuit training with one set of 20-25 reps per exercise and about 8 exercises followed by 3-5 minutes on the treadmill followed by repeating the circuit, followed by some core work, another 10 minutes walking fas on the treadmill and then stretching. After 7ish weeks, I am to the point where I can see the individual muscles in the legs and calves move with every step I take (even though I weigh 347 lbs).
  • BigJohn82
    BigJohn82 Posts: 25 Member
    I think my issues with the term "heavy lifting" getting tossed around here is, how do people define it.

    I consider it lifting in that lower 1-6 ish, rep ranges, but that you have to have the know how and discipline to work in that range with ACTUAL heavy weights.

    I think a lot of times people (and I myself was guilty of the same thing when I first started lifting) are guilty of just being wussy in the gym and or under estimating their actual potential.
  • zafferFL
    zafferFL Posts: 402
    I think my issues with the term "heavy lifting" getting tossed around here is, how do people define it.

    I consider it lifting in that lower 1-6 ish, rep ranges, but that you have to have the know how and discipline to work in that range with ACTUAL heavy weights.

    I think a lot of times people (and I myself was guilty of the same thing when I first started lifting) are guilty of just being wussy in the gym and or under estimating their actual potential.


    Qft
  • margieward82
    margieward82 Posts: 406 Member
    Gotta move north of the vag!
  • JNick77
    JNick77 Posts: 3,783 Member
    I think a lot of times people are guilty of just being wussy in the gym and or under estimating their actual potential.

    Amen to that.
  • JNick77
    JNick77 Posts: 3,783 Member
    Gotta move north of the vag!

    Holy crap, LOVE THE WENDLER QUOTE!!! Don't see much of that around these parts. :)
  • margieward82
    margieward82 Posts: 406 Member
    Gotta move north of the vag!

    Holy crap, LOVE THE WENDLER QUOTE!!! Don't see much of that around these parts. :)

    Thank BigJohn for introducing me to him :)
  • breeanreyes
    breeanreyes Posts: 228 Member
    The "heavy lifting " term confuses me too, I would consider it the 1-6 rep technique too, but you don't have to lift that much. I think strength training is very essential to ultimate health and fitness, but bulking up is not necessary as long as you're building muscles through resistance training or high reps/low weight
  • BigJohn82
    BigJohn82 Posts: 25 Member
    The "heavy lifting " term confuses me too, I would consider it the 1-6 rep technique too, but you don't have to lift that much. I think strength training is very essential to ultimate health and fitness, but bulking up is not necessary as long as you're building muscles through resistance training or high reps/low weight

    So then, what do you consider bulking up?
    I would consider adding muscle mass to be in that realm.
  • JNick77
    JNick77 Posts: 3,783 Member
    The "heavy lifting " term confuses me too, I would consider it the 1-6 rep technique too, but you don't have to lift that much. I think strength training is very essential to ultimate health and fitness, but bulking up is not necessary as long as you're building muscles through resistance training or high reps/low weight

    So then, what do you consider bulking up?
    I would consider adding muscle mass to be in that realm.

    Agree. The very basis of bulking up is to add muscle mass and inadvertently adding some fat at the same time. Just exercising to gain some strength isn't really bulking.

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