Body by Science / HIIT Experiment

Also, after the session, I do just a few extra abdominal exercises for fun, and wow, are they difficult! One shown by the trainer was the Plank Exercise. They're not necessarily needed though, as the "Pull Down exercise ... loads the musculature of the frontal torso, including the abdominal muscles", as the author wrote.

To really load the abs during the pulldown, you'll want to pull the bar all the way down to your chest and slowly do a crunch. Try to focus on only using your abs to do the crunch, and then when you're "fully crunched" hold for 3 seconds.

Might be better to do the same process but separate from the pulldown exercise though. For me, my back is pretty strong so trying to crunch that weight is a bit... 'shaky' let's say. ;-D

I suppose training to exhaustion/complex muscle fatigue worries me when training on my own.

Yeah, if you have or can get access to machines that's ideal, but the big 5 can be adapted to fit what you have available. For a while I substituted weighted dips for the chest/bench press, and they were just as effective for instance.

I watched a short video and started right away before the book arrived. There was, however, a couple of adjustments I had to make once I had more info. But it's ridiculously effective. I had been working out consistently for several years and hit a plateau for sure. I caught myself in the mirror without a shirt on a couple of times this morning and went; "holy sh*t!" Monday I did the workout without timing the exercises. I think I went through the big five in about eight minutes. I know what I'm doing and can really push it to failure. So yeah, I'm happy with the results!

:headbanger:

Yesterday I did my workout and the trainer said that he upped my weight more on the leg press than he meant to and I still went over on time, so next time he's going to have me do 800lbs on the horizontal leg press. I asked him what I started at and he told me 540lbs. So in 4 months I've increased my exercise weight by 260 lbs. Talk about effective! Definitely happy with the results so far as well.
 
Well I’ve started the program after watching and reading online though I have just received the book. Felt strange training for such a short period of time but I’m sure I can get used to that! 😉
I was a bit out with my weight and times but should have that cleared up next week.
Mick’s Training Record
I used machines and the exercises I did were the seated row, chest press, pull down, overhead/shoulder press and leg press. Went over the 90 second time frame on seated row, chest press, pull down and leg press but I’ll up the weight next week and I wasn’t far out. I’m going to work on a weekly time frame with walking/running some ab work through the week.
 
Does anybody have experiences with taking creatine and Branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs)?

I've been taking both for the last week and noticed improvements on 3 out of 5 "Big Five" exercises.
 
Altair, I go through periods on taking creatine monohydrate. The research supports it's use for multiple areas of health aside from strength training - namely Alzheimer's and other mitochondrial-based diseases. I would recommend it to most people apart from those with kidney failure/liver damage.
 
Does anybody have experiences with taking creatine and Branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs)?

I've been taking both for the last week and noticed improvements on 3 out of 5 "Big Five" exercises.
I have a very good experience with Creatine Monohydrate. 6-7 years ago I was using it 5 grams about 30 minutes before the workout. I have very good results with Creatine. First of all, after about 2 weeks using it, I noticed a significant improvement in my strength. Later I tried some other formulas of Creatine but they were not as effective as a pure Creatine Monohydrate.

Yesterday I bought a 300grams Pack of L-Glutamine. It is another supplement ( amino acid ) that can improve your muscle performance, and at the same time, it will have a good impact on the whole body. It is also good for people having leaky guts.

I was using it a few years ago and the one thing that I noticed was a much quicker recovery of the muscles after a training with heavy weights.
 
I have a very good experience with Creatine Monohydrate. 6-7 years ago I was using it 5 grams about 30 minutes before the workout. I have very good results with Creatine. First of all, after about 2 weeks using it, I noticed a significant improvement in my strength. Later I tried some other formulas of Creatine but they were not as effective as a pure Creatine Monohydrate.

Yesterday I bought a 300grams Pack of L-Glutamine. It is another supplement ( amino acid ) that can improve your muscle performance, and at the same time, it will have a good impact on the whole body. It is also good for people having leaky guts.

I was using it a few years ago and the one thing that I noticed was a much quicker recovery of the muscles after a training with heavy weights.

I'm using creatin and l-glutamin as well. Additionally I use BCAAs. Doug McGuff talked about using BCAAs during a recent interview this year. I noticed quite strong increase of performance (which is in accordance with the literature on creatine, that speaks of up to 30 percent more power output of the muscles I think) and a quite strong improvement on the "how far you can go during a exercise". The recovery seems to go much better as well and aching muscles afterwards is much reduced (although it already is pretty low with this HIT method on its own).

As far as I understand, creatin causes your cells to hold more water (therefore the muscles look bigger) and thus enhance and improve the synthesis of building muscles. Apart from muscle performance and aiding in the synthesis of it, there are a number of other + effects that Kehole mentioned. The literature seems to suggest that it is quite good for the brain as well.

As for the "negative side effects" it is not clear if there are even some. From what I have read about the few studies that showed a negative correlation, there seems to be quite some doubt in how reliable those results were. Creatin can be found naturally in meat products and especially in fish:

http://www.usfsa.org/content/Creatine.pdf said:
Creatine is not new. ... A pound of raw meat has about 2 grams of creatine and a pound of raw fish has up to 5 grams. Therefore, athletes who eat large amounts of meat, poultry and fish are ingesting more creatine than athletes who limit meat are. Strict vegetarians will have the lowest intake.

Herring and a number of other fish have pretty high concentrations of creating in them.

A couple of other things I would like to mention about this HIT training and my experiences with it.

Since McGuff and Little made quite a good argument in the book (and in interviews) for using Nautilus Type Machines instead of barbells I went on the search to find suitable machines (those they recommend: The Original Nautilus Machines that were supervised/build by Arthur Jones or the later offspring company called MedX) and was unsuccessful. It is almost impossible to get all those machines they use nowadays and it would cost a fortune anyways.

So I searched for another solution and came across a very good one, at least for people living in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg or Australia. It it called Kieser-Training. They have many Training Studios in those countries that are especially designed for HIT Training by the "Kieser Method". They have doctors in the studios, constantly improve the machines and build new ones and make studies. Werner Kieser founded this training studio. He was the first one who got the License from Arthur Jones to import his Nautilus Machines into Europe. He worked with Jones as well.

Werner also wrote a couple of books about HIT Training in german.

In short: all the machines they use in their studios (which is the same selection in every studio worldwide) are MedX Machines with Arthur Jones patented cam profiles! So pretty much exactly what the recommend in the book.

Naturally, I was very happy to discover that one such studio is just 6 Minutes car drive from my place! So I went there to test it out. They had an offer for 6 free trainings. Very nice studio that is only focused on HIT and muscle training in general. That is their only focus, no annoying background melodies nor any TV screens. No "Wellness Centet" either just the machines and people working on it. No pain no gain is pretty much the Motto of Kieser. The Studio has onle one focus; muscle training and nothing else, no sauna and anything like it. Kieser makes a point about that. paraphrasing "For wellness activities people can go elsewhere, here we only concentrate on training".

Werner Kieser sums it up by saying:

"Der Mensch wächst am Widerstand" [Rouhgly transated as "The human Being grows on/from Resistance"]
~ Werner Kieser

Every Machine can be adjusted exactly to your needs (height, strength and movement etc). All Big 5 Machines are present in every Studio. No matter on which machine you train, you can look at a ordinary clock hanging from the sealing from every position. Every now and then your streght will be tested objectively with their own techy things built for it and compared statistically according to age gender and weight in regard to others who trained in the studios with the Kieser method for one year already. (Did my first yseterday with interesting results.

Keep in mind that I started well below average I think, since I'm pretty skinny and never really trained in anything and that it was measured against a group that already trained in the Kieser program for one year.

Unbenannt 3.jpg
Unbenannt 2.jpg

It should also be mentioned that my first real training was around the 06.05, not on Kieser Machines, followed by another good Training the week after, also not on Kieser Machines. Then it was followed by two rather sloppy trainings at home with barbells and about three first Training sessions with the Keiser machines which weren't full/good trainings either, since I tried to find my weight and a lot of time in between the exercises was wasted. So taken together, the above is the result of about 5 real trainings starting from well below average with zero training beforehand

As you can see above, in the legs I already have a 2+, which is well above average according to the sheet and the Trainer (left one). For the other two exercises I'm already approaching average (left to right: belly muscles and chest press) from a point that was probably much lower before I started. Compared to a one year trained grpup of kieser people, who usually train twice a week with lower weight and faster and more machines. That's quite something I think. Let's see how that looks like in a couple of years.

So by measuring every now and then you can objectively see the progress (which is included in the monthly payment). Additionally you can also book a higher monthly payment for a regular test with their computerized back machines for example guided by a doctor or a trainer.

So I went there with the goal of doing the Big Five workout on their great machines. I was very clear from the get go toward the (very competent) trainers that the primary reason I'm coming to them ist that I would like to train there with a slow HIT program according to Doug MsGuffs book.

Since they usually only work with the Kieser Programs (of which there are several, from moderate, to heavy and slow HIT, much like Guff describes) and are quite strict on it and the right training methods, it was something that wouldn't have been that easy if I wouldn't had prepared my reasoning and program beforehand to explain it to them.

But since I stated from the getgo my intentions and explained to them the basic principles of the book and that it is not much different from the Kieser Program, they were willing to let me choose my own program according to the book. They needed to ask their chief for permission for it and he said yes.

Now I train there once a week and it is just great! Makes it also much easier to track progress with those machines and measuring methods. All are pound based machines. One Trainer told me that I am one of the few in their studios (they have about 270.000 people training there worldwide) who even choose this type of hard HIT program. Most use a lower intensity and faster method.

The feedback from different trainers I got, was that it is a good method (this slow and high intensity that I use). They know what they are talking about. Another thing that is great is that the trainers will occasionally have a look at how you work out and correct your posture if you happen to do it wrong on a machine.

In my first "training" I was brining my workout plan with me which I created using their website in which every machine is described. They have in total 50 different Machines, numbered from "A" to "L". The machines for the big 5 Workout and which I asked them to be my workout, right from the get go, are the following: "C7", "D6", "C2", "E3" and "B6".

The first three trainings are assisted by the trainer and in the first one the machines are adjusted to your needs, which is then written on your specific HIT program protocol which is basically the same as the Guff protocol in my case. If you reach 2 Minutes you increase the weight next time 5%. Their optimal time window for HIT is 90 - 120 seconds.

So in the first few training sessions, I didn't really have enough weight and the trainers were explaining a lot during and between the exercises. So I couldn't really train fully according to the book in those first 3 or four trainings. I needed to find the right weight and decrease the time period between the exercises which should be about 30 - 60 seconds at most.

Now I can train pretty much according to the book.

Some machines (not any of the big 5 though!) which I'll consider to use as well in the future, first need the approval of the doc and a computer testing of the back. When you have done that successfully you can also train on those.

IT isn't exactly cheap, but considering the great machines and services they provide, I think it is well worth it peronally. For me it costs 45 Euros a month, for a two year contract. I could have also chosen a 1 year contract wich is about 10 Euros more expensive. There is also the option to have a regular computerized training with the doc and a trainer and other specialities for more then that.

If anyone is interested, there might be an option, if you choose to train there, that you will get an extra month that costs nothing, if you tell them that someone else referred you to them, who also trains there (aka. me). If anyone is interested, I could send them my details so that they can get the discount.

In Germany, you can find a studio pretty much everywhere. In Austria and Switzerland a bit less so and in Luxembourg is only one. In Australia there are 12 Studios centered around Sidney, Melbourne and Geelong.

I want too also thank Scottie again for making us aware about Guff and his HIT Method. The book is packed with very useful information about muscles in general and the astounding health impact a proper training has on pretty much every function in the body. Very enlightening work!

I also listened to quite a number of recent interviews with Guff and the guy is quite literally a multi talent and knows quite much in all sorts of fields, not only in medicine and training. He seems to very well read in a number of fields and is also on a paleo diet with intermitted fasting.

Quite an inserting guy, to say the least! In his "spare time" he is still working crazy shift hours as a full time emergency doctor in a clinic and keeping his other primary business of training people up at the same time. Amazing. He also plans for a long time to write other pretty interesting sounding books about other topics. He also published three other books after Body by Science: "BMX Training: A Scientific Approach", "The Primal Prescription: Surviving The Sick Care Sinkhole" and "The Body By Science Question and Answer Book" which is on its way to me right now....

In one interview he also talked about how easy it is to fall into the "believe" trap and taking yourself and your ideas too serious. Instead he tries to be as open as possible for change when new data comes in and not trying to view things as "gospel" that is fixed.
 
From Pashalis: I want too also thank Scottie again for making us aware about Guff and his HIT Method. The book is packed with very useful information about muscles in general and the astounding health impact a proper training has on pretty much every function in the body. Very enlightening work!

Yes, yes yes! Thank you Scottie. Really!
 
Via Rhonda Patrick:


In this podcast, I interview Dr. George A Brooks, an expert in exercise physiology and lactate metabolism. Lactate, once demonized as being a dead-end toxic metabolite (lactic acid), has been vindicated by the work of Dr. Brooks, his colleagues, and others. Lactate has been shown not to be the cause of muscle fatigue, but to actually be a source of energy itself, even being metabolized greedily with a greater degree of preference than many other more well-known sources of energy, such as glucose.
 
Thanks for mentioning the book, it is fascinating and flies in the face of what I thought I knew about exercise. This type of exercise is a time saver, among other beneficial things, and an antidote to "exercise angst".
 
Here's another interesting fact that seems to highlight the importance of HIIT. From "In an Unspoken Voice" by Peter Levine, footnote in page 174:

...slow (intrinsic) movements, when done mindfully, operate through the gamma efferent system. This system is intimately connected to the brain stem-autonomic nervous system and involves the extra pyramidal motor system... Gamma-mediated movements tend to "re-set" the nervous system away from extremes of activation.

I immediately thought about HIIT and how it can help your brain stem get a hold of hyperarousal energies via the strengthening of grounding pathways in the brain stem. Other voluntary and fast movements run though alpha pathways that don't involve this grounding (extra pyramidal motor system) pathway in the brain stem. For me, this is the fact that makes HIIT worth it, even if it has nothing to do with Martial Arts.

Thanks for mentioning this Gaby. Sometime after starting the iodine protocol I started shaking when doing EE or any sort of meditation where I focus on being present to what's going on in the body. Shaking is one of the ways that the body de-stresses and releases hyperarousal energies cause by some sort of trauma, as explained by Levine. After experimenting with HIIT I noticed the same thing; slow, high intensity exercise seems to be helping the nervous system to reset. I already feel better after only two sessions of HIIT, I wonder what will happen if I keep at it.
 
Time for my 6-month Report:

Yesterday, I did my old workout. For about 50% of the exercises, they seemed easier and/or I could do more reps. 15% of the exercises seemed harder. And the remaining 35% saw no change from what I can remember.

This morning, I didn't wake up with any soreness, which was nice.

I also tried going for a few runs starting maybe 1.5 months ago, and that was pretty interesting.

I stopped running 16 years ago because even once a week, it killed my knee. About 15 years ago, I started smoking rollies.

Well, I was kind of curious to see if I could do it, so off I went with a buddy (or two). I could do 4.1km at a slow pace without much problem. That floored me, because I remember starting running in high school, and anything over 400m made me feel like I was about to die... heart pounding, head pounding, dizzy, wanting to barf, etc. Not this time!

Last week, I ran 2.7km at a faster pace. That was a bit harder, but then again it was 28C outside at the end of the day when I was already a bit tired, and heat and I do not cooperate very well.

After the 1st run, my legs were VERY sore for 3 days after. That was kind of surprising given the progress I made on the leg press in the BbS workout, but also interesting. Now my legs might be sore for half a day after, but not bad at all.

And as for my knee, it hasn't given me any trouble. It did hurt a tiny bit after the 2nd run, but then the same happened with the Buff McGuff workout early on. In both cases, it went away after a day and was pretty mild.

I don't plan on running very often. Once a week at most, but probably more like once every 2 weeks just because I like it and because the BbS workout is already pretty thorough and tiring for me.

I have to say I'm pretty happy with the BbS workout. It's short, effective, and I continue to feel better and more "solid" even if I'm not getting way stronger than I was with my old workout.

Only 18 months left until X-Man Status! :wow:
 
I would like to give a warning about Creatin, since it was mentioned below to be quite good.

Does anybody have experiences with taking creatine and Branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs)?

I've been taking both for the last week and noticed improvements on 3 out of 5 "Big Five" exercises.

I would recommend it to most people apart from those with kidney failure/liver damage.

I have a very good experience with Creatine Monohydrate. 6-7 years ago I was using it 5 grams about 30 minutes before the workout. I have very good results with Creatine.



As for the "negative side effects" it is not clear if there are even some. From what I have read about the few studies that showed a negative correlation, there seems to be quite some doubt in how reliable those results were.

Something changed a couple of weeks ago that I couldn't quite figure out. I started to have the almost constant urge to pee (even more so then normal) every half an hour or so, my lower body felt strangely bloated and worse of all I would wake up at least once in the middle of the night and had that bloaded feeling an very urgent need to pee and could hardly go back to sleep and fall a sleep in general.

So I was trying to find out what was causing it, left out the BCAAs for a while, didn't help, left out L-Glutamin for a while didn't help either. Did not leave out the Creatin, because i thought "that can't be the problem!".

A bit later I was talking to a work college who is engaged in muscle training as well for quite some years and told him I take Creatin. He then said "stop that immediately"" and then I asked "why?". Then he told me about his experience with it and he listed exactly all the problems I was experiencing without me telling him anything in advance! So I was thankful for the suggestion and stopped taking it right away and by the next day the bloating feeling and urgent need to pee was gone. And the following day the sleep problems pretty much vanished as well.

So creatin might not be as safe as has been suggested above and the studies that talk about kidney/liver problems might be something we should not dismiss out of hand. There might also be a significant financial aspect to consider here in regards to the studies that have been done on it so far. Creatin is probably one of the most sold and taken supplements in strength and muscle training on the market. So naturally, there are probably many parties involved who have a vested interest on good studies rather then bad ones.

Thought I should mention it, in case some people here have similar problems.
 
So creatin might not be as safe as has been suggested above and the studies that talk about kidney/liver problems might be something we should not dismiss out of hand.

Did you try to spread the dosage over the day? For example, if you take 15 grams a day then trying to take it 3 times a day à 5 grams. I didn't notice any problems with creatine so far.
 
Did you try to spread the dosage over the day? For example, if you take 15 grams a day then trying to take it 3 times a day à 5 grams. I didn't notice any problems with creatine so far.

No. I feeling just fine without it and don‘t think I need it.
 
I would like to give a warning about Creatin, since it was mentioned below to be quite good.











Something changed a couple of weeks ago that I couldn't quite figure out. I started to have the almost constant urge to pee (even more so then normal) every half an hour or so, my lower body felt strangely bloated and worse of all I would wake up at least once in the middle of the night and had that bloaded feeling an very urgent need to pee and could hardly go back to sleep and fall a sleep in general.

So I was trying to find out what was causing it, left out the BCAAs for a while, didn't help, left out L-Glutamin for a while didn't help either. Did not leave out the Creatin, because i thought "that can't be the problem!".

A bit later I was talking to a work college who is engaged in muscle training as well for quite some years and told him I take Creatin. He then said "stop that immediately"" and then I asked "why?". Then he told me about his experience with it and he listed exactly all the problems I was experiencing without me telling him anything in advance! So I was thankful for the suggestion and stopped taking it right away and by the next day the bloating feeling and urgent need to pee was gone. And the following day the sleep problems pretty much vanished as well.

So creatin might not be as safe as has been suggested above and the studies that talk about kidney/liver problems might be something we should not dismiss out of hand. There might also be a significant financial aspect to consider here in regards to the studies that have been done on it so far. Creatin is probably one of the most sold and taken supplements in strength and muscle training on the market. So naturally, there are probably many parties involved who have a vested interest on good studies rather then bad ones.

Thought I should mention it, in case some people here have similar problems.

Just to piggyback here; I've always avoided supplementing with creatine because of the "bad for kidneys" stigma. In hindsight, that was probably an unfounded claim after bloodwork showing higher serum levels. In general though, I would stick to meats that are high in creatine (steak, pork, salmon) and forgo the creatine powder altogether.

When it comes to weight lifting supplements it's a jungle out there (lots of marketing and false claims). Secondly, it may seem like a good idea but it can be really easy to over-supplement one thing when trying to increase another. Especially when your body is unable to metabolize a constituent within the powder at a "normal" rate. In these cases it's prudent to get most if not all of your "supplementation" from food and let the stimulus (HIIT) / rest cycles do the work.

I think there is a lot to be said about the efficacy of HIIT in its own right. It seems a bit strange to bring in supplementation for the sole purpose of increasing the weight lifted. If creatine promotes water retention in muscles couldn't that also be a means to prevent actual inroading? Put another way, it is better to struggle and maintain form when under load than to alter your posture for help. Additional water within the muscle may serve as leverage when under load which would deplete less glycogen than it would otherwise right? Ergo you would actually be providing less of a "stimulus". Maybe it doesn't quite work that way but I would be interested in further clarification here.

As far as BCAAs (Branched chain amino acids) go I have less of an opinion there but it already seems a little more holistic than upping creatine intake artificially. Just my 2 cents.
 
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