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Fitness and health
PETE GLADDEN
Pete’s World
Published: May 22, 2017
I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard people comment on this person or that being in “the greatest shape ever,” seemingly an epitome of a super healthy individual,” this simply because of the individual’s rigorous workout routine.
Yet every picture does not always tell the real story, for being in amazingly great fitness shape (or race shape) doesn’t always equate to being in great health shape. They’re two very different animals. And if you’re not careful, great race/fitness shape can morph into poor physiological shape.
Let me explain. Unfortunately, due to the barrage of fitness propaganda that haunts the internet and cable television nowadays, the words fit and healthy are used synonymously.
In reality these two words have totally different meanings.
Fitness connotes the ability to perform a given exercise function, while health connotes a person’s state of well-being, where one’s physiological systems work in unity.
Now these seemingly super fit individuals I’m referring to are typically participants in high intensity sports and activities, where they often push themselves much further than any normal healthy person needs to push.
Of course this is because their competition, or conversely their peers, are pushing them to be better.
That push to be better can be relentless. And because these fit athletes spend so much time and effort training to be better, they can end up with nervous and hormonal systems that are battling hard against too much stress, in this case exercise induced stress.
It’s these training stresses that can cause a seemingly superb looking, sounding and performing athlete to be walking the razor’s edge with respect to the state of his/her immune system - and health.
And because our society’s fixated on training hard, espousing a “no-pain no gain” mantra, we see more of what I call “recreational,” nonprofessional athletes teetering on the brink of disaster with respect to their fragile immune systems.
This malady isn’t new. It’s called overtraining, and it’s been discussed for decades. Nonetheless, that no-pain no-gain mantra has been gaining momentum in the recreational fitness arena with the emergence of extreme programs like CrossFit and P90X, which advocate the short-term benefits of high-intensity interval training.
Now I’m 100 percent on board with the short-term benefits of high-intensity training (HIT), but what I’m talking about here is the sustainability of this training methodology over time.
It’s a dangerous tool when used without adequate and systematic recovery. This scenario is even more prevalent in endurance sports, where athletes sometimes get caught up in a pushing-to-get-better cycle that inextricably leads to overtraining syndrome.
There, I’m referring to the overuse of high intensity anaerobic interval training as opposed to high intensity resistance training.
So the question is: How do you know if you’re performing or instituting a responsible, safe and effective short-term, HIT workout program without ending up crossing over that razor’s edge?
One of the most effective ways is by using heart rate.
As I’ve explained in previous columns, there are numerous heart-rate zone methods to accomplish this, so first choose the method that’s appropriate for you.
Then, by ascribing high-intensity and recovery heart-rates, you can better control and monitor the volume and frequency of your HIT.
How would this work?
Well, when you reach your high intensity HR, your recovery period begins, and that lasts until your HR drops to a predetermined threshold.
Once there, you begin the next interval.
This is a much safer way to approach HIT because it addresses your fitness level and provides you with a measurable strategy that can be adjusted depending on your workout performance.
It’s much more advisable than pushing through far too much and far too frequent HIT.
Bottom line, by utilizing HR zones you’ll have definitive data specifying your training parameters, which enables you to better monitor your HIT efforts.
Resting HR in addition to atypical high intensity HR’s can also tell you when you’re overtraining and when you need recovery.
So…are you one of those incredibly “fit” individuals who does a lot of HIT?
If you are, you might want to consider using HR to track your volume and intensity - your health depends on it.