If you are looking for something interesting to do today, try the following:

Perform kettlebell swings in the following manner (probably men 53#/ women 35#):

Do one swing
Take one deep breath
Do two swings
Take two deep breaths
etc.
When you reach 20, reverse the order and go back down to one:

1
2
3
4
etc...
20
19
18
17
etc...

Frank M. and I will be trying this in Tahoe.

Maeve & her dad improvise a GHD for a Father's Day "Michael".

We may be moving in this direction with some of our training. Pretty much all of the CF Benchmark WODS can be done with sandbags which are versatile and cheap. The poundages would have to be cut back a bit for most things, as they are awkward.

HOW TO MAKE SANDBAGS

Check out CF East Bay Athletes Rebecca and Daniel's Blog at ROCK ON.

To Stretch or Not to Stretch? The Answer Is Elastic

Filip Kwiatkowski for The New York Times

NEWS about stretching seems to come in waves. Stretch as part of your warm-up. No, stretch after your workout. No, don't even bother stretching. Or the doozy: Even if you think you like it, it's been oversold as a way to prevent injury or improve performance.

The truth is that after dozens of studies and years of debate, no one really knows whether stretching helps, harms, or does anything in particular for performance or injury rates. Yet most athletes remain convinced that stretching helps, and recently more and more have felt a sort of social pressure to show that they are limber, in part due to the popularity of yoga. Flexibility has become another area where many athletes want to excel.

They're like one of my running partners, Claire Brown, a 35-year-old triathlete.

"I always feel like, well, athletes should do yoga," Claire said. "It's supposed to be really good for running, and when I do it regularly, it does loosen up my hips and make me feel better for running."

Yet she puts off going to yoga.

"It shouldn't feel like an obligation, but it always does," Claire said. "The good classes are often an hour and a half long, and I'm thinking: 'I could be running, I could be biking. But here I am, stretching and breathing.'

"Isn't it funny, though, that something that should be calming can actually cause stress because you think you have to do it?"

For the bottom line on stretching, there is an official government review by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published in the March 2004 issue of the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. Its conclusion, that the research to date is inadequate to answer most stretching questions, still holds.

The best that Dr. Julie Gilchrist, a medical epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and one of the study's authors, can offer is a few guidelines and observations about why studies have yet to answer the stretching questions.

If your goal is to prevent injury, Dr. Gilchrist said, stretching does not seem to be enough. Warming up, though, can help. If you start out by moving through a range of motions that you'll use during activity, you are less likely to be injured. (emphasis mine - Max)

In fact, Dr. Gilchrist said, in her review of published papers, every one of the handful of studies that concluded that stretching prevented injuries included warm-ups with the stretches. (emphasis mine - Max)

That is one reason the studies so far have been inadequate. Researchers need to separate their variables, said Malachy McHugh, the director of research at the Lenox Hill Hospital Nicholas Institute of Sports Medicine and Athletic Trauma in Manhattan.

"What's missing are studies of stretching alone and studies of no stretching and no warm-up," Dr. McHugh said.

But it may not be so easy to do such studies, he admitted, because most athletes in strength and speed sports like soccer and football believe in stretching, no matter what scientists say. Suppose you wanted to do a proper study, with a control group that did not stretch. Good luck, he said.

"If you go to a team and say, 'You guys are not going to stretch and you guys are going to stretch,' they would say, 'You can leave the room now,' " Dr. McHugh said.

Some athletes -- gymnasts, hurdlers and swimmers among them -- may need to stretch to gain the flexibility they need for their sport, Dr. McHugh said.

But distance runners do not benefit from being flexible, he found. The most efficient runners, those who exerted the least effort to maintain a pace, were the stiffest.

That study involved 100 people who were tested with 11 flexibility tests. Then they walked and ran while the researchers measured their efficiency. Those who were the most flexible expended 10 to 12 percent more energy to move at the same speed as compared with the least flexible. But that study did not involve stretching -- it could be that the most flexible people would have been flexible with or without stretching. And even when studies do ask whether performance changes after a stretching program, they usually involve artificial laboratory situations, said Christopher Morse, an exercise physiologist at Manchester Metropolitan University in England who has published papers on stretching and reviewed the stretching literature.

"The problem is that what is actually studied in the lab has very little intrinsic links to what is happening" when people actually exercise, he said.

Stretching can make you more flexible, but does it change a naturally efficient runner into an inefficient one?

No one knows, Dr. Morse added, but there also is no evidence that it does.

And while holding a stretch temporarily reduces muscle power when measured in the lab, Dr. Morse said, many people also warm up in real life, counteracting stretching's negative effect and enabling muscles to work with full force.

That means, Dr. Morse said, that those studies showing stretching makes muscles temporarily weaker "might have no real-world consequences."

THE few studies in real-world situations typically used military recruits. Some concluded that stretching was useless. Others that it prevented injuries. The stretching, though, was part of a training regimen, muddying attempts to decide whether the recruits had fewer injuries because they were better conditioned or because they stretched.

While the stretching debate goes on, some researchers who used to believe in stretching say they have become disillusioned.

Stacy J. Ingraham, an exercise physiologist at the University of Minnesota and a long distance runner, suffered from hamstring injuries when she was on a team. She stretched and stretched, for months on end, to no avail.

That made her wonder about stretching's benefits, as did her subsequent years of coaching female high-school and college cross-country runners. Her runners stretched but, Dr. Ingraham said, stretching "did not seem to do what we'd been schooled about all our lives -- it did not prevent injuries."

She reviewed published papers, saw none that convinced her that stretching either protected people from injuries or improved performance, and became an antistretching evangelist.

"Runners don't need to stretch," she insists.

Dr. Charles Kenny, an orthopedist in private practice in Stockbridge, Mass., is even more adamantly opposed to stretching. The practice, he said, weakens performance and makes an injury more likely.

"If stretching was a drug, it would be recalled," Dr. Kenny said.

Stretching the hamstring muscle, for example, teaches the muscle to relax when the knee is fully extended, Dr. Kenny said. But that is not what a runner needs. Instead, runners need to have their hamstrings stiff and activated when the knees are extended. Of course, one test of how passionate researchers are about stretching is to ask them whether they themselves stretch. Many say they do.

Dr. McHugh, who plays Gaelic football, which is similar to soccer, said he needs some flexibility to play, so he stretches.

Dr. Morse, a wrestler, also has a routine: "I get leg-muscle pulls, so I do low-level contractions, isometrics and dynamic stretches to warm up. And I stretch afterward."

Dr. Gilchrist, who, at 40, runs, swims and lifts weights, has not been stretching, but is wavering.

"I am so inflexible I think it's hazardous," she said. "I am seriously considering stretching," Dr. Gilchrist said.

But she is not thinking of yoga.

Dr. McHugh, for one, suggested that yoga may actually be more than most athletes need.

"I just saw a guy with arthritis in his knee," Dr. McHugh said. "He was very flexible. He got into the lotus position, sitting on the floor with his knees hyperflexed in a figure-four. I told him this may not have brought on his arthritis but it is bringing on symptoms."

Claire will be glad to know.

5 Rounds For Time:

Run 200 Meters
10 "KettleBear" 55#/35#

The "KettleBear": without putting down the Kettlebell, perform:

Deadlift left
Clean left
Front Squat left
Push-Jerk left
Overhead Squat left
Deadlift right
Clean right
Front Squat right
Push Jerk right
Overhead squat right

That is ONE rep. A momentary touch on the second DL is acceptable. Resting the KB on the floor is a miss, and the rep must be repeated.

Here is a valuable resource via ExRX.net and Lon Kilgore, PHD. If you don't meet the intermediate standards, you might want to think about using the CFEB strength protocol, found HERE, until you are.

The standards (not norms) presented in the linked tables below represent a 1RM performance (in pounds) that can be reasonably expected of an adult athlete at various levels of training advancement using standard full range-of-motion barbell exercises with no supportive wraps or suits.

• Press
• Bench Press
• Squat
• Deadlift
• Clean

In the tables linked above, the term:

Untrained

Expected level of strength in a healthy individual who has not trained on the exercise before but can perform it correctly. This represents the minimum level of strength required to maintain a reasonable quality of life in a sedentary individual.

Novice

A person training regularly for a period of 3-9 months. This strength level supports the demands of vigorous recreational activities.

Intermediate

A person who has engaged in regular training for up to two years. The intermediate level indicates some degree of specialization in the exercises and a high level of performance at the recreational level.

Advanced

An individual with multi-year training experience with definite goals in the higher levels of competitive athletics.

Elite

Refers specifically to athletes competing in strength sports. Less than 1% of the weight training population will attain this level.

Submaximum loads may be used to estimate one rep maximum values using the One Rep Max Calculator.

Tables for the basic barbell exercises were developed from:

• definitions in "Practical Programming" by Kilgore, Rippetoe, and Pendlay
• the experience and judgment of the authors,
• the exercise techniques described and illustrated in "Starting Strength" by Rippetoe and Kilgore, and
• published performance standards for the sports of powerlifting and weightlifting.

Provided by Dr. Lon Kilgore, PhD

There will be a few changes happening in May.

1. Starting Sunday May 4th, The Sunday Noon class will be  a "Fundamentals" Class. I will be going over the basic movements, in detail, with a brief "finisher" of around 10 minutes. Feel free to come if you want to brush up on basics, or are new to CrossFit.

2. Starting Wednesday May 7th, we will be test-piloting a lot of WODs that involve climbing so check the website and bring your climbing shoes: If you have some less aggressively sized ones it may be faster on some workouts to wear them so you don't have to take them on and off. There will be subs for non-climbers.

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From The Desk Of Clarence Bass

If you enjoy and benefit from our website and products, tell your friends.

"This has the potential to change the way we think about keeping fit. We thought there would be benefits but we did not expect them to be this obvious. It shows how effective short intense exercise can be"
                             ~ Professor Martin J. Gibala (London Telegraph, June 5, 2005)

  "Slowly, slowly the rest of world figures this out." Laszlo Bencze

  Sprints Build Endurance!
------

Tabata-type Training Takes Center Stage
--------
Two Minutes Potent as Two Hours 
-----
Intensity Trumps Volume

My friend Richard Winett, PhD, publisher of Master Trainer, was one of the first in this country--perhaps the first--to write about Dr. Izume Tabata's groundbreaking research published in 1996, on short, intense intervals. Dr. Tabata and his colleagues at the National Institute of Health & Nutrition, Tokyo, Japan, reported: "[Six to 8 very hard 20 second intervals with 10 second rest periods] may be one of the best possible training protocols..." Dr. Tabata told Dick Winett in a personal communication:  "The rate of increase in VO2max [14% in only 6 weeks] is one of the highest ever reported in exercise science." What's more, anaerobic capacity increased by a whopping 28%.

Several of the earliest articles on this website were about high intensity intervals for fitness and fat loss; articles 10 and 11 in our Aerobic Exercise category discuss Dr. Tabata's research.

Because of my interest in high-intensity aerobics (I first wrote about it in Ripped 3), quite a number of people emailed about the recent research on sprint interval training done by Kirsten Burgomaster and colleagues at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and published in the Journal of Applied Physiology (June 2005).

In that study, sixteen active but untrained students, average age 22, were divided into two groups: eight who performed two weeks of sprint intervals, and eight controls who were tested before and after, but did no training.

The test group did four to seven "all-out" 30-second sprints on a bicycle ergometer with four-minute rest periods, six times over two weeks. (Dr. Tabata's subjects did intervals five days a week for six weeks; the rest periods were much shorter, of course. We'll discuss the differences in the two studies below.)

The muscles of the trained group showed substantial aerobic adaptation: 38% increase in citrate synthase, a mitochondrial enzyme that indicates the power to use oxygen, and a 26% increase in glycogen (muscle sugar) content. Interestingly, there was no change in peak oxygen uptake (VO2max) or anaerobic work capacity.

"Most strikingly," the researchers wrote, "cycle endurance capacity increased by 100% after [sprint interval training]." The time to fatigue cycling at about 80% of VO2max increased on average from 26 minutes to 51 minutes!

The control group showed no change in any of the test parameters.

"To our knowledge, this is the first study to show that sprint training dramatically improves endurance capacity during a fixed workload test in which the majority of cellular energy is derived from aerobic metabolism," the researchers reported. Impressively, the short period of very intense exercise produced improvements "comparable to or higher than previously reported aerobic-based training studies of similar duration." In other words, about two minutes of very intense exercise (15 minutes over 2 weeks) produced the same or better results than previously shown after two hours a day at about 65% of VO2max, or 20 hours over two weeks.

  Intervals for the Masses

Although in some ways less impressive the Dr. Tabata's results (more later), the new study has created quite a stir, especially among health professionals eagerly looking for ways to motivate people to exercise.

Martin J. Gibala, an associate professor in the Department of Kinesiology at McMaster University and lead spokesman for the new study, has been quoted widely in this country, Canada and in the UK.

"The whole excuse that 'I don't have enough time to exercise' is directly challenged by these findings," Gibala told the London Telegraph. "This has the potential to change the way we think about keeping fit. We have shown that a person can get the same benefits in fitness and health in a much shorter period if they are willing to endure the discomfort of high-intensity activity."

"This type of training is very demanding and requires a high level of motivation; however less frequent, high intensity exercise can indeed lead to improvements in health and fitness," Gibala told CNN.

"We thought the findings were startling," Gibala told CTV, Canada, "because it suggests the overall volume of exercise people need to do is lower than what's recommended." He added, "We think there might be a public health message that you can perform intense exercise, but less volume, and obtain similar benefits."

The Journal of Applied Physiology found the new study noteworthy enough to merit a thought provoking "Invited Editorial" in the same issue by Edward F. Coyle, Department of Kinesiology and Health Education, University of Texas at Austin.

Not only is the study a "documented first," Coyle writes, it "serves as a dramatic reminder of the potency" of intense exercise to improve performance, with "implications for improving health." It shows that sprints are "very time efficient, with much bang for the buck."

  Challenge to Conventional Wisdom

It seems logical, says Coyle, that "aerobic endurance performance is only enhanced by aerobic endurance training, but it has been proven wrong in the realm of athletics as well as muscle biochemistry." In short, prolonged low intensity exercise is not necessarily the best way to build endurance. Long slow running or biking may be a waste of time for people who want to become fit and healthy but have no plans to run a marathon or compete in high-level bicycle racing.

Coyle observes that middle-distance runners typically include sprint intervals in their training to improve aerobic endurance. "Indeed," he writes, "it is likely that if an experienced runner or bicyclist had only 2 weeks and very limited time to prepare for a race of [about] 30-minutes duration, that sprint interval training would become a mainstay of their preparation." Roger Bannister's preparation to run the first 4-minutes mile is a classic case in point; see article 136 in our Aerobic Exercise category.

Coyle points to the recent popularity on "spinning" as an indication that the idea may be catching on in the general fitness population. "From the perspective of muscle biochemistry," he adds, "it has long been recognized that 6-8 weeks of sprint interval training increases aerobic enzyme activity in muscle [citing several studies]."

Regarding the health implications, Coyle adds: "The large increase in citrate synthase activity in muscle implies that a host of adaptations typical of aerobic endurance training have been initiated, such as improved insulin action, improved lipoprotein lipase activity, and greater clearance of plasma triglycerides [citing studies]."

Referencing a research paper about the evolutionary underpinning of modern chronic diseases, Coyle suggests that sprint interval training might be an efficient way to keep our sedentary population from crossing "a biological threshold, beyond which chronic health conditions develop." (See "Grow Or Decay, Your Choice," # 146, Health and Fitness category.)

  Energizing the Fibers

What accounts for the surprising effectiveness of very hard 30-second sprints in improving endurance capacity? It obviously works, but why? What's the precise mechanism? The researchers offered a smorgasbord of possible mechanisms, but I found the explanation offered in the editorial more satisfying and quite logical.

"We can only speculate," the researchers state, "but it is plausible that a training-induced increase in mitochondrial potential, as measured by citrate synthase maximal activity" is responsible for the improvement. Being good scientists, however, they go on to muddy the water, perhaps unnecessarily: "However, the precise mechanisms that regulate endurance performance are multifactorial and extremely complicated, and the data from other studies suggest that sprint training can stimulate a range of adaptations that might facilitate performance aside from changes in mitochondrial potential." They then proceed to give a long list of possibilities that only an exercise physiologist would appreciate.

The editorial, on the other hand, goes for the jugular. Coyle says that both sprint interval training and prolonged sub-maximal aerobic exercise increase mitochondrial potential, but reminds us that the muscle fibers affected are different. The specific fibers affected probably explains why very brief sprint training proved to be as effective [or more effective] for improving endurance as much longer and less intense aerobic training, according to Coyle. "All-out sprint training especially stresses recruitment and adaptation of fast twitch muscle fibers that are remarkably and equally responsive as slow twitch muscle fibers in their ability to increase mitochondrial enzyme activity," Coyle explains. "In fact, the low-intensity aerobic exercise that is typically prescribed for endurance training or health is not very effective at increasing aerobic activity in [fast twitch] muscle fibers, which comprise approximately one-half of the fibers within the muscles of most people," he continues. "Thus low-intensity aerobic training is not a very effective or efficient method for maximizing aerobic adaptation in skeletal muscle because it generally does not recruit  [fast twitch] fibers."

In other words, sprint interval training increases the endurance capacity in all muscle fibers, fast and slow, while long slow training leaves half of the fibers unused and untrained. Makes perfect sense, doesn't it? It's like pulling the wagon with one horse, when two would get you a lot farther down the road. (See Ripped 2 for an explanation of the "all-or-none" law of muscle fiber recruitment, and The Lean Advantage (first volume) on the order in which muscle fibers, slow and fast, are recruited.)       

  A Price to Pay

There is no free lunch, of course. High-intensity intervals are hard. The editorial also addressed this issue. "[Repeated all-out sprints] cause a feeling of severe fatigue lasting for at least 10-20 minutes," Edward Coyle writes. "That is the price for its effectiveness and remarkable time efficiency. It remains to be determined which population, depending on age, health status, and psychology, are most likely to adhere and benefit from sprint interval training." The possibility of injury is also a factor to be considered. "Chance for impact injury during stationary cycling or swimming seems low and might be compared with sprint running," Coyle suggests.

Recognizing that adherence and motivation would be an issue, the London Telegraph asked three "quite fit" employees of the Reebok Sports Club in Canary Wharf, London, to evaluate sprint intervals. As might be expected, reviews were mixed.

One eager beaver, 35, rode for 10 minutes in 60-second sprints. "It felt like I had just done an hour's run," he reported. "It was more than I was used to but I feel more exhilarated because it was so intense."

"To be honest, it was not much fun and unless I was really pressed for time I would not change my exercise regime," he added.

Another fellow, 23, tried the two minutes of cycling in 30-second super-bursts and found that he was exhausted. "It was torture, really, but I was amazed at how short a time it took me to tire myself out completely," he related. "I didn't enjoy it but it felt like it worked."

The third guinea pig, 27, who rode for 45 minutes at a moderate pace, insisted that she had also received a good workout. She said, "I am not sure I would want to go through the pain of 30-second sprints."

A fitness expert for Reebok, who had not tried the study protocol, thought that most people would not want to do it "because it is so uncomfortable, but for those willing to endure it would work."

Finally, an Olympic triple jump gold medallist offered a more positive spin: "Going for a 40-minute run is not for everybody. The idea of going and doing a short intense workout would appeal to people and help them to embrace a healthier lifestyle."

 Tabata Compared

Anyone who has tried them both will tell you that 30 seconds "all-out" with 4 minutes rest is a walk in the park compared to the Tabata protocol. Four minutes allows almost complete recovery--and time to renew enthusiasm for another very hard 30 seconds. The heart of the Tabata protocol is the 10-second rest interval, which allows partial recovery at best. That's the idea; incomplete recovery makes each rep harder than the last, and brings you to the point of exhaustion on the last rep. Seven or eight reps and you're done, literally.

The longer rest period in the study under discussion was probably a drawback in terms of effectiveness. On the other hand, the three-day-a-week frequency was very likely an advantage. (The Tabata protocol was done Monday through Friday with no rest days between exercise bouts.)

As noted above, the 20:10 work-to-rest ratio in the Tabata study produced substantial improvement in both aerobic and anaerobic work capacity, while the 30-second:4-minute ratio failed to produce improvement in either category. As explained in article 10, the reason almost certainly lies in the degree of overload. The Tabata protocol overloaded both aerobic capacity and anaerobic capacity to the max, while the work-rest ratio in the present study--the much longer rest periods in particular--probably produced a sub-maximum overload.

In a later study, Dr. Tabata compared the original protocol with an interval program very similar to one under discussion. Each subject did 4-5 bouts of 30 seconds, with 2-minute rest periods, to exhaustion. Tests showed that the 20-second intervals, with 10 seconds rest, overloaded both aerobic capacity and anaerobic capacity  maximally, while the longer interval protocol, with two-minute rest periods, did not. In both respects, the stress produced by the second protocol fell well short of maximum.

But why? Why did the original protocol stress both aerobic and anaerobic capacity maximally, when the more intense (200% VO2max vs. 170%) and longer (30 seconds vs. 20) bouts of the second protocol did not? Dr. Tabata and his colleagues believe the key factor was the difference in the rest periods.

The relatively long 2-minute rest periods allowed oxygen uptake to fall considerably and, therefore, when the next exercise bout started there was a delay before the oxygen uptake increased and began again to approach maximum. On the other hand, the short 10-second rest periods allowed only slight recovery, and therefore oxygen uptake increased in each succeeding bout, reaching maximum capacity in the final seconds of the last bout. The same was true for anaerobic energy release. The 2-minute rest periods stopped the buildup of lactate and allowed the resynthesis of phosphocreatine (see article 7, Diet & Nutrition, on creatine) to occur. Again, the short rest periods in original protocol caused the oxygen deficit to continue building from rep to rep, reaching maximum anaerobic capacity at the end of the exercise.

Almost surely, that's why the current study failed to show improvement in aerobic and anaerobic capacity. The 4-minute rest periods allowed almost complete recovery and maximum stress was never achieved.

On the other hand, the one or two days rest between workouts probably gave the current study a leg up on the original Tabata protocol. The researchers believed that the rest days would be an important advantage. "The importance of rest days between sprint training sessions was emphasized in a recent study that showed that peak and mean power elicited were unchanged after 14 consecutive days of sprint training; however, when subjects performed the same number of training sessions over 6 weeks, with 1-2 days of rest between training sessions, power output improved significantly," they wrote in the study report. "Although numerous mechanisms could potentially be involved, the importance of rest days between training sessions may be related in part to the fact that strenuous exercise leads to inactivation of cation pumps, and it has been speculated that up to several days may be required for normalization of sarcoplasmic reticulum Ca2+ pump function." Simply put, it takes a day or two for muscles to recharge after very intense exercise.

So, it's possible that Dr. Tabata and his colleagues could have achieved even better results by allowing their athletes a day or two to recover between workouts.

Another advantage of the interval protocol under discussion is that more people are likely to be willing to do intervals with 4-minute rest periods than with 10-seconds. Both protocols are obviously hard, but the less demanding regimen probably has wider appeal. It might turn more couch potatoes into gym rats.    

Words to the Wise

As noted above, interval sprints are not for everyone--certainly not for people just getting started or those with health problems. If you have doubts, by all means talk it over with your doctor.

Frankly, I enjoy high-intensity intervals; they're challenging and leave no time for boredom. Not all the time, however. I make it a point to vary the work-rest ratio and cycle my training. I don't train all-out all the time.

Generally, short hard intervals with long rest periods are recommended to improve anaerobic capacity; and repetitions with short rest periods are suggested to overload the aerobic system. The Tabata research and the current study suggest that intensity--not volume--is the key to success. 

It's important to start a new regime at a manageable pace and ramp-up over time as your condition improves. When you top out, change the plan and start over.

Train smart and keep in mind that you usually get out of a program about what you put into it. That doesn't mean more is better, however. As the current study demonstrates, stress and rest are both important.

Good training.

Ripped Enterprises, 528 Chama, N.E., Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108, Phone (505) 266-5858, e-mail:  cncbass@aol.com, FAX:  (505) 266-9123.  Office hours:  Monday-Friday, 8-5, Mountain time.  FAX for international orders: Please check with your local phone book and make sure to include the following: 505 2669123

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