Less Time, More Results
“Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it and I shall move the world”
-Archimedes
Hope you guys had a great holiday weekend. Time to settle back in and build some momentum again. The quote above holds true in every area of life. While Archimedes was talking about physics, the idea of leverage is useful in business, education and even health and fitness.
An 80 year old can lift a car with a mechanical jack. But a powerlifter would struggle to lift that same car by hand. That’s the power of leverage. Some daily habits are high leverage. They take little time and yield major outcomes. Other tasks are low leverage. More effort and smaller outcomes.
I’ll give a few examples of each so you can maximize your return on time investment.
Lower Leverage Activities:
Circuit based strength training:
Circuit training is a lot of effort. Are there benefits? Yes. It’s going to be better than no exercise, but it isn’t the best use of time or energy.
Circuit training generally involves hopping from one exercise to the next without a rest. The exercises might even be timed rather than working toward failure. The result is reps performed with sloppy form or too quickly because of the high level of cardiovascular and systemic fatigue and a race against the clock. If your goal is to break a sweat, it will work and can yield benefits short term. And while we shouldn't be scared of some hard work, if your goal is to build muscle and strength efficiently with a lower risk of injury, this is not the way.
Rest between sets is important for allowing your heart rate to come down and your nervous system to recover so you can get the most out of the next set. Focus on quality over quantity with strength training especially as you get older.
Cardio for weight loss:
I want to be clear - cardio is great. And cardio can aid in weight loss, but it’s not high leverage from a time perspective. And therefore not a good place to start.
You could burn 600+ calories doing an hour of cardio. This is helpful, but if your meals aren’t planned and your nutrition isn’t dialed in, you could easily overeat 600 calories throughout the day. Especially because cardio tends to leave you feeling hungry afterwards.
For comparison, 1 cup of mixed nuts has over 600 calories. Snacking on an extra cup of nuts throughout the day has negated your calorie burn from an hour of time invested.
For the record, I do cardio. And I highly recommend it. But not as a primary goal of fat loss. Do cardio for the cardiovascular and mental health benefits rather than thinking of it in terms of calorie burn. Most apps and machines drastically overestimate your calories burned during activity anyway.
Excess supplementation:
There is a time and a place for supplements. I take a few myself. But the number of supplements on the market today is outrageous given the average lifestyle habits. Some supplements are not worth the plastic bottle they are packaged in. The industry is not highly regulated which leaves plenty of opportunity for scams. And when it comes to effectiveness, most supplements are only going to move the needle by a fraction of 1%.
Your lifestyle including your sleep, food intake, sun exposure, alcohol consumption and activity levels are going to have massive effects on your health either positively or negatively. Spending money and energy on supplements before making important lifestyle changes is like trying to bail out a sinking ship with a teacup. Supplements should be exactly what they sound like: a supplement to an already healthy lifestyle to help fill the gaps.
High Leverage Activities:
Meal planning:
My wife and I spend 15 minutes on a Sunday and it saves us 5-10 hours throughout the week. Figure out what meals you’ll make, when you have for activities that week and what foods you need. This makes grocery shopping easier and ensures you’ll have your proteins thawed going into dinner. It also keeps you from going off script with takeout or other unhealthy options unless it’s part of the plan. These 15 minutes per week provide some of the highest return you can get for your health.
Cooking leftovers:
Along with meal planning comes cooking leftovers. Whether it’s lunch for the week or to get you through another dinner, this is one of the biggest levers to pull. Why cook 7 nights per week when you can cook 4? You’ll simplify the grocery list, save tons of time preparing meals and have a few less dishes to clean. The nights we eat leftovers are noticeably less chaotic. The kitchen is cleaned earlier and it creates a few more valuable time in the evening for family or productivity.
Resistance training to failure:
Resistance training is the fountain of youth. If you want to recondition your body and convert higher levels of body fat into higher amounts of muscle, this is the lever to pull. Even 2 hours weekly can completely transform your body. But only if you are training effectively.
If you take your sets close to failure, you don’t need as many of them to get the same result. You can get more out of 2 hard sets done at the right intensity than 5 sets where you leave some reps in the tank. The idea is that nearly all of the growth comes in the last few reps. So if you want to get the most out of your time in the gym, working close to momentary muscle failure is a necessity. Many people complete sets without even getting within 5 reps of failure. This means that the entire set has negligible benefits with a goal to build muscle or strength.
Whey protein powder:
This is the simplest way for busy parents to get protein in while keeping calories controlled. Yeah, in a perfect world, you are still getting most of your protein from real foods, but whey protein IS food. Whey is separated from the milk curd during the cheesemaking process. Yes there is some processing involved but whey protein is the most bioavailable source of protein for our bodies. It contains all the essential amino acids and is absorbed and utilized better than any other protein source on the planet. It mixes easily into a variety of foods and can be consumed anywhere. It’s high leverage both from a time investment and from a protein to calorie ratio.
Friday is back to our hypertension series and next Tuesday we’ll talk getting the most out of your weight training with an emphasis on "effective reps".
Until then,
Brett
Brother2Brother
P.S. We’re excited to have an influx of new clients as we take our new website live this week.. Check it out here and if you are interested in working with us 1 on 1 to lose weight, build muscle, and improve your metabolic health, apply today to secure a remaining spot. We’ll build you a personalized plan to your meal preferences, schedule and goals and be with you every step of the way for daily accountability.
www.brother2brotheru.com
“What did one candle say to another? … Do you want to go out tonight?”
