Strength & Fitness
With Marty Gallagher
Special to washingtonpost.com
Tuesday, December 09, 2003; Noon ET
Are you trying to lose weight, build muscle, get stronger or excel in a given sport? Maybe you're just hoping to slow the aging process, which exercise and good health habits can surely help accomplish. But male or female, young or old -- where do you start and what do you do? And if you're already an experienced exerciser or athlete, how do you fight your way off a plateau or avoid going stale?
Over the past 20 years, Marty Gallagher has written more than 200 articles for such magazines as "Muscle and Fitness," "Flex" and "Powerlifting USA." He has interviewed hundreds of the world's top athletes, quizzing them on the training tactics they used to succeed.
Gallagher, a World Powerlifting Champion and fitness expert, takes your questions about every fitness topic under the sun.
A transcript follows.
Editor's Note: washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control
over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
Marty Gallagher: Hello everyone - damn, it just registered that 2003 is about up - is anyone out there on the New Year resolution band wagon? Any health or fitness resolutions? "Any port in a storm" as my old dead Irish mate Peter Grady would say...the point being that's its never to late to take a stand and within four weeks of initiating a serious and comprehensive fitness regimen you could be light years ahead of your current phyiscal condition. You'd need to nail down a progressive resistance program, institute a cardio regimen and get the calories under control...If a novice were to suddenly begin a fitness regimen wherein they lifted weights 2-3 times a week, did cardio 4-6 times a week and were able to lower calories down to the floor of the caloric breakeven threshhold, after 30-days you be radically altered. Irrefutibly, unquestionably better. The trick is you need all three elements and you need them in proportional balance: when all are present and accounted for the total exceeds the logical and realistic sum of the parts. Its physical synergy.
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Raising your metabolism:
Marty,
You said raising your metabolism thru cardio is not the same as through weight lifting. At least I think that was your point.
What's the difference again ?
Marty Gallagher: After an intense cardio session, one in which the heart rate is elevated to say 120-170 beats per minute, to between 70-85% of age-related heart rate maximum, and assuming the HR is kept elevated for at least 25-minutes, the basal metabolic rate will stay elevated for hours after the session ends. The rate at which the body, your body, oxidizes calories is accelerated. Insofar as progressive resistance training goes, if you train fast enough to elevate and sustain an elevated HR then I suppose you'd get the same effect. As Bill Pearl once pithily quipped, "The heart really doesn't care how it get elevated just as long as it getselevated." On the other hand please don't turn lifting into a half-assed cardio mode...
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Chantilly, Va:
Marty,
I'm looking for some exercise diagrams that I can download off of the Internet. I'm going to put them up in our community fitness center, so the folks can learn the proper technique for their workout.
Maybe someone on the chat knows of a site I can go to.
Marty Gallagher: Nearly impossible in my opinion to learn proper technique by looking at a still photo - a video tape is far more effective.
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Georgetown, D.C.:
For me, the hardest part of the fitness triangle is the eating. Despite eating a relatively healthy diet, I have never been a calorie counter and it depresses me to start. Can you give an example of a typical day on a 1500 calorie per day diet, and is the 5-6 meal approach really better than the regular 3 meals per day. Can this be done without the shakes and other expensive alternatives to real food, or am I kidding myself. I know you won't pull any punches so give it to me straight.
Marty Gallagher: Who said you had to count down to so finite a number? Think of caloric breakeven in practical terms. There is a point where if you reduce the amount of food you eat you'll start to lose body weight. I would suggest a primitive yet effective method: eat less at every feeding; keep everything intact, when you eat, what you eat - alter one thing - eat less of it. Keep constant and keep constantly cutting, at some point, you'll start to head down in scale weight. Hold this amount of food and layer on some progressive resistance and cardio exercise. The caloric deifict created by the exercise will cause you to oxidize stored body fat. The trick is to not slash calories so far and so dramaticlly that you 'go catabolic.'
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Washington, D.C.:
Hey Marty,
For most of my life, starting in high school, weightlifting was my sport of choice. Now in my mid-30s, it's triathalon. But the years in the weight room mean I am carrying a heavy upper-body load on my bike and run. Is there a way to actually decrease muscle weight, and reshape my body more like Lance Armstrong and less like Arnold?
Marty Gallagher: What a problem...I want to look 'less like Arnold' - how tall are you and what do you weigh? The prescription will be totally different if you are 5-10 and weigh 230 than if you're 5-10 and 155.
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Chicago, Ill.:
Hi Coach,
I've started an 8-week cyclic ketogenic diet (carb ups on weekends, per Mauro DiPasquale) and it occurred to me that it may not make much of a difference if I time my cardio work for the a.m. Since my level of glycogen depletion won't really vary based on what I eat during the week if there's no sugar or carbs, does it matter if I do cardio in the evenings instead?
Thanks!
Marty Gallagher: If you have no glycogen in the bloodstream - what's the difference? Keep me posted on progress - particularly psychological aspects: honestly for stripping off the last fat vestiges at the final stage of an ever tightening diet, going ketogenic always worked for me. I'm the type of person that gets by better with some fat left in my diet. I'll drop the carbs if I can keep some tryglycerides in my food. If I have to jettison the carbs (excepting fibrous) so be it. I'd rather eat rich and dense food and less of it than fluffy food without substance or taste. If I'm allowed say 500-calories per feeding, I need to keep the 500-calorie limit which is more important then what those calories consist off - to a point.
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Washington, D.C.:
Re: not wanting to look like Arnold.
I'm right in the middle. 5-10 and 192, though most people are suprised by how much I weigh. Could stand to lose some body fat, but I look OK.
Marty Gallagher: Okay - if you are lifting, keep lifting but bump up the cardio, increasing both frequency and duration. I'd start taking refined carb and starchy carb calories out of my diet. Make sure you intake enough protien to effect healing and repair. Protein allows you to hang onto muscle mass in the face of the declining calories of a systematic diet. Let's lose some intracellular body fat
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Howard County Ice Hockey:
Marty,
Just wondering if you caught the Peter Jennings special on ABC last night about the obesity epidemic? As a longtime reader and poster I know this chat is centered more on physical fitness but as I watched this program last night I couldn't help but think about the chat and your saying, "The way to lose weight is as simple as burning more calories than you intake daily."
Basically, the news report focused on government farming subsidies encouraging the growing of corn, leading to an insane amount of calorie laden high fructose corn syrup being used instead of more expensive sugar in all kinds of processed foods. Junk food advertising targeting children. And the food industry's claims that what people eat is nothing more than a matter of personal choice. I thought it to be an interesting report. Just more info for those looking to make a physical change.
ABC News: Obesity in America
Happy holidays to you and yours Marty!
Marty Gallagher: To paraphrase Ms. Stein, 'a calories is a calorie is a calorie' and the really smart dieters first get a grip on overall caloric intake then they kick progress in the pants once again when they clean up the food selection. Basically certain foods are great for building muscle and a lot of these same foods are very difficult for the body to transform into fat and store it as excess. On the other hand, certain foods are easily compartmentalized as body fat and usually these are the same foods that make insulin go crazy. By loading up on the former and avoiding the latter progress is accelerated. Its all science and logic.
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Washington, D.C.:
You've mentioned that you need only do a certain amount of weight lifting per body part in a given session before any additional exercises become a redundancy and don't produce additional benefits. In terms of strengthening your heart can the same thing be said about cardio, meaning is there a certain point in time in a given session where you're not gaining additional benefits?
Marty Gallagher: As a layman I'd agree with that but I am not a trained medical professional and could not say with scientific certainty that this is the case. On a practical level I reach a point on diminishing returns when I do too much cardio. There are three benchmarks that can be monitored to measure cardio progress: frequency, duration, intensity. I will try work up to my momentary capacity in one or more of these three benchmarks in my daily sessions. My momentary capacity will vary slightly day to day.
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Washington, D.C.:
I'm 54 and in pretty good shape, 6' 195 lbs. I play tennis, basketball,jog and like to maintain strength and tone by lifting weights. (I have an office job.) Lifting is where I find the problem. As I get serious and start gradually increasing the amount of weight, my shoulders hurt from bench pressing and my elbows get sore from curls. What could/should I do to eliminate the soreness in my shoulders and elbow? Thanks.
Marty Gallagher: I would suggest limiting the reps and poundage but increase the time-under-tension by doing a second or even a third set with the same poundage for equal reps. In others words, if I wanted to trigger an adaptative response in a target muscle and were limited in my capacity, I would increase the number of sets. Perhaps you were able to do 150x8 in the bench press without pain. At 160x8 there was pain. I would perform not one but two or three sets of 8 with 150 in my workout. This will provide additional stress required to bust you through to the next level of development without breaching the pain and injury zone.
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D.C., D.C.:
What dooes it mean to "go catabolic"?
Marty Gallagher: Anabolic: Good!
Catabolic: Bad!
When the body is catabolic it will cannabalize its own muscle tissue to cover caloric shortfall. We want the body to use stored body fat as fuel to cover calorie shortfalls - when the calories are slashed too radically and dramatically a primordial anti-starvation mechanism is triggered and the body burns muscle tissue as well as body fat. This is why people who use crash diets end up looking like miniture versions of their old fat self.
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Arlington, Va.:
Marty,
I'm just starting to get back to into a workout routine. My main cardio is 30-40 minutes on the treadmill: 15-ish of those running, the rest a fast walk. Which is more important ... time or speed? I'm at a fast jog now, but I know if I get the speed up my running time will shorten. Thanks!
Marty Gallagher: Do it all! Master it all! Mix and match! No one way trumps all others! Never become comlacent, or exclusively gooved in to a single mode or method - the body thrives on sameness and groove and that's EXACTLY why we deny it sameness. To trigger an adaptative response we need to subject to new and different stresses - do the same thing over and over and the body will figure out how to nuetralize the benifical effects sooner or later...
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Alexandria, Va.:
PLing question about sticking points.
When I bench, I miss a couple inches off the chest. When I deadlift, I get the bar off the ground about 2 inches, but it stalls there. When squatting, I can usually start up out of the hole but then die about 4 to 6 inches up from the bottom. Any suggestions about what to do to work through the weak points?
My current hypothesis is that my weak points are quads and leg drive for the DL and SQ, and delts for the bench. Do you agree?
P.S. I saw your article on Bill Pearl in Milo; I haven't gotten that far into the issue yet.
Marty Gallagher: You didn't open the Milo magazine, see I had an article in it and go right too it and read it immediately?
That's like Elaine stopping for Juicy Fruits at the concession stand before visiting her injured boyfriend in the hospital ...
The bench press solution is more tricep work.
If the deadlift, stalling 2-inches off the ground indicates the poundage is out of your league - you just ain't near strong enough for that particular poundage! Ditto the squat: crank the poundage way back in both deads and squats and do 2-3 sets of 8-reps. Build the base poundage up say 10-pounds a week for 4-6 consecutive weeks...
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Kennebunkport, Maine:
Marty!
Thanks for taking my question. I've read in your chats that one's weight regimen needs to be revamped every 4-6 weeks or something. What about cardio? I typically use the elliptical each time I go to the gym for about 40 minutes but am wondering if I'll become stagnant if I do the same cardio routine each day. Thanks!
Marty Gallagher: You have to periodically alter the progressive resistance portion of the fitness tripod - ditto the cardio and ditto the diet. If you insist on using the same methodology over and over, ad infinitum, the body will neutralize the benifits in no-time flat...the seductive part is we develop allegiances to a particular methods of weight training, or perhaps a particular cardio mode done at a particular pace, perhaps we got great results from a diet - its only natural to stay with what yielded results but that is false logic. Every program and system needs to be rotated on a periodic basis. Never end a regimen that's yielding results but never carry on past the point of diminishing returns.
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Saginaw, Mich.:
Coach, can you comment on session "pace". How much rest between sets, etc. I know you've said nothing trumps intensity, but I'm not sure the line is between enough rest between sets and too much.
Looking forward to "Day Camp" in January.
Best regards.
Marty Gallagher: Looking forward to it -
The idea is to rest long enough to be at 100% capactiy for the upcoming set. Resting too long allows you to get cold and lose timing and explosiveness. Going too quickly cuts into the sheer poundage you can handle or amount of reps you can perform. If, by resting another minute I can squeeze out two more reps, then by god I'm gonna take that extra rest. Lou Ferrigno suggests waiting until breathing normalizes than going again. I like that rule of thumb.
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Gloves:
Marty,
Do you say yay or nay to wearing gloves while lifting weights? I think it helps after a while, those bars can get slippery as your hands start to sweat.
Am I taking it a bit too far ?
Marty Gallagher: I wear them in my unheated garage gym - below 20-degrees and if I get sweat on my palms I risk sticking to the ice-cold barbells.
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Washington, D.C.:
In practical food terms, what does it take to put on 1 pound per week. (for example, add one protein shake and protein bar per day?)
I am concerned about unintentionally adding fat.
Marty Gallagher: It takes as much as it takes - that's the Zen answer. You need to eat enough calories to bump that mother needle up a pound each week for 6-10 consecutive weeks. Two pounds is too much, 1/2 is not enough - what ever it takes!
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Valance, Va.:
Marty,
I'm looking for ways of beefing my shoulders up using dumbbells. I think I'm doing fairly well, but the tops of my arms, where it meets the shoulder, that muscle isn't progressing as well as the others.
Anything I can do to concentrate on that muscle and even it up with the rest ?
Marty Gallagher: Get strong as hell in the overhead dumbbell press. Concentrate all your energy at busting up the poundage and reps in the DB overhead press: seated and standing. Take six weeks, one session standing, one weekly session seated. Write back in six weeks.
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Atlanta, Ga.:
Marty,
Female, 45, 150, good shape. I'm trying to work off that last bit of tummy poof. I know you said clean eating is the key, and I do my share of power walking, but it's frustrating because it's the last area to " get with the program ", if you know what I mean.
Anything you can think of to help me with this ?
Marty Gallagher: Send me your eating schedule and foods...
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Bangor, Maine:
Marty,
I know you think pushups are a waste of time, but they're better than nothing. What groups, if more than one, do pushups work, besides obviously the arms. Are they any good on the abs ? Shoulders ?
Marty Gallagher: Alter hand spacings for varied results; high reps, low reps, paused reps, bouncing reps - do it all!
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Landover, Md.:
I want to get my husband a free weight manual/guidebook. Do you have any recommendations?
He's also a big fan of yours. Where can I find t-shirts with your face on it? I think it would motivate him during his workouts.
Thanks!
Marty Gallagher: With my face on it? I don't think so...
go to borders and check out Bill Pearl's book - is he a stone cold beginner?
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Saginaw, Mich.:
Dear Coach Gallagher,
Can you give me some advice on the proper “pace” for a strength training session? How much rest between sets? I suspect pace is another one of those variables that when changed, keeps the muscles guessing. Perhaps varying the pace introduces yet another arrow for the fitness quiver. Any thoughts?
Really looking forward to my January “Day Camp.”
All the best.
Marty Gallagher: Hey I answered this!
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Bethesda, Md.:
Marty --
I'm trying to get back into some kind healthy shape but I have several injuries that continue to put me back on square one; i.e., bad knee, tendinitis, rotator cuff injuries, etc. I'm thinking about trying yoga because my usual regimen of weight training seems to always aggravate an old injury, especially the newest one of what I think is tendinitis at the base of my bicep. I'm only 37 but sometimes feel like I'm 90. Any suggestions?
Marty Gallagher: Come on up to one of my fitness day camps - we'll get your facts stright for you!
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Marty Gallagher: Alright that's it for today - if you burn for an answer to the question you've posted, redirect it to my e-mail: mgso@supernet.com and I'll get you an answer in a day or two. Best of luck and tune in in two weeks....till then.
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