Ever thought about how much exercise your body really needs? What if you could strike the perfect balance between overtraining and undertraining, and optimize your workout routine?
This episode of The Dirobi Health Show dives into these questions, tackling the subject of exercise, and how much is really enough. We share our fitness journey experiences, discuss different workout goals, and reveal how they can dictate your workout intensity and duration.
Drawing on expert advice from the American Heart Association, we shed light on combining low and high intensity exercises for a healthier and more energized lifestyle.
Find episode links, notes and artwork at:
https://blog.dirobi.com
This show is for informational purposes only.
None of the information in this podcast should be construed as dispensing medical advice.
These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
Find episode links, notes and artwork at:
https://blog.dirobi.com
This show is for informational purposes only.
None of the information in this podcast should be construed as dispensing medical advice.
These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
Ever thought about how much exercise your body really needs? What if you could strike the perfect balance between overtraining and undertraining, and optimize your workout routine?
This episode of The Dirobi Health Show dives into these questions, tackling the subject of exercise, and how much is really enough. We share our fitness journey experiences, discuss different workout goals, and reveal how they can dictate your workout intensity and duration.
Drawing on expert advice from the American Heart Association, we shed light on combining low and high intensity exercises for a healthier and more energized lifestyle.
Find episode links, notes and artwork at:
https://blog.dirobi.com
This show is for informational purposes only.
None of the information in this podcast should be construed as dispensing medical advice.
These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
Find episode links, notes and artwork at:
https://blog.dirobi.com
This show is for informational purposes only.
None of the information in this podcast should be construed as dispensing medical advice.
These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
Hello and welcome to the DiRuby Health Show. Let me tell you a story. When I was about 43, seems like a long time ago now, unfortunately I was doing triathlon and I was not a great swimmer. I was an okay cyclist and running was my strength and at that time I was pretty into it. It was a great answer to my health why? It was something that I felt would keep me in great shape running, biking, swimming foundational movements, but quite different from each other. Something would help me with my longevity, with my health, and I got really serious about it because I found after a couple of years that I could be competitive and potentially even win races. I was working really hard at it. I was training about 15 hours a week and in some ways felt on top of the world. I was running, biking, swimming for about five hours for each of those activities, maybe a little more time on the cycle. I was doing a routine that ranged between long and slow exercise, sprinting, mid-level, what we call tempo runs, that type of thing. I felt on top of the world. At the same time, I wasn't sleeping very well and I was having some. I was always sore. For one thing, I loved racing, but I realized later that I was overtrained and maybe had adrenal fatigue. I don't know. I never got a diagnosis of that, but I kind of self-diagnosed as having adrenal fatigue and realized that I was overtrained. Now I think there's actually quite a few people who are overtrained in this country. More commonly, though, I think many people are under-trained and don't have the level of health that they want.
Dave Sherwin:Today I'm going to explore how much exercise do you really need, and this is a very personal thing. For some people, of course, the answer is very different than other people. It depends on your goals and your why. I would start right there. What is your why? Why do you exercise at all? If you have a strong why, then that'll hopefully get you up in the mornings to accomplish your goals. Having goals, of course, makes a huge difference. If you're preparing for a race or some form of activity, if you're trying to just improve your physique because you have a reunion coming up, or you just want to look great at the beach next summer, whatever no judgment here, whatever. Whether it's looks, whether it's how you feel, whether it's longevity, whether it's performance, all of those are valid reasons, and maybe it's some of all of the above, but I think identifying exactly how much you really need is a really valuable project. We're going to talk about that here Now.
Dave Sherwin:First of all, there are some rules or guidelines For one. According to the American Heart Association, the duration depends a lot on the intensity and the type. Now, ideally, we get a combination between high intensity and lower intensity. But if we're doing all low intensity, 150 minutes a week is a great guideline. But if we're doing higher intensity, 75 minutes of vigorous activity will get us the same bang for the buck, according to the American Heart Association, based on thousands of studies and a lot of research. So that's a great place to start. So if you're exercising harder, you need less time. Also, note that they talk about per week.
Dave Sherwin:You don't have to exercise every single day. Now, of course, we move our body every day and everything does tend to count. However, your dedicated exercise sessions, where you put on your gym clothes, you put on those yoga tights, whatever it is you're going to do at the end of the week. If they all add up to the right amount of minutes, you'll do fine, even though, of course, they vary day by day, and maybe you even have a complete rest day once or twice within that week. So think in terms of weeks, not days. As a matter of fact, I find for a lot of people that's a very liberating principle, because instead of going to bed at night, going, oh I didn't exercise, I meant to exercise today and I didn't know. By the end of the week, add up your total volume and that's going to be much more meaningful than your day. Now, of course, don't don't try to do it all on Saturday either. Ideally, you're doing this in three to five sessions.
Dave Sherwin:Okay, now, of course, we know the benefits of exercise, but some of these are more important to Some people. Then they are two others, and so let me just go through them really quickly. Cardiovascular, and of course this is very much related to our, our longevity, especially because it's keeping our heart and our lungs healthy, the very engines of our body that we need to keep running For as long as possible. But then there's other benefits, like improved mental health. We generally feel better, we have more confidence, we feel better about ourself and we're achieving goals, and so we also are releasing the feel-good hormones, like endorphins and serotonin.
Dave Sherwin:Weight management people who exercise tend to have less weight problems. We strengthen bones and muscles. This is even more important for women than men as we age. As we know from a great body of research, weight-bearing and resistance exercises enhance bone density and, apparently, the long-term effects of resistance training are even more valuable to women than men in terms of avoiding osteoarthritis and osteoporosis. It boosts our energy levels. We feel better for the rest of the day after we exercise I know I do. It enhances sleep quality again, as long as you're not over trained. Sleep quality is aided if we're training in the right zone not too high, not too low.
Dave Sherwin:Increased lifespan We've talked about that. Longevity, combating cancer people who exercise regularly tend to be less likely to get cancer and, of course, diabetes Risk is lowered as well. So five hours a week is a great starting point, and If you just don't know where to start, you don't know how much exercise you need. You can't go wrong with shooting for five hours a week, remembering that everything counts, including a brisk walk. So don't think that, you know. Don't picture yourself in the gym as a gym rat working your butt off for all of those five hours. It's a combination usually between low intensity and high intensity.
Dave Sherwin:Let me go over a few different options here as well, because I think some people don't exercise because they just think of exercise as a certain activity that they have Convinced themselves is the way they should exercise and they don't really want to do it, but they never consider other options. So consider that if you right now are stuck, you're not getting five hours a week of exercise in and you would like to Well change things up. There's walking, jogging, cycling when's the last time you did a cycle class, for example? Those things are absolute butt kickers and really will get you into into terrific shape. Or, of course, riding a bike if the weather is conducive to that and you have Good and safe places to ride where you live. Swimming is absolutely fantastic and, of course, low impact, as is yoga. Pilates is another surprising butt kicker that enhances overall body strength, flexibility and posture and in our sedentary environment, where many of us are sitting at a desk and being generally inactive other than one we're exercising, pilates is a great thing to consider.
Dave Sherwin:Crossfit is Adaptable and available to many people and there's something really cool about crossfit and you just pay your monthly and you just show up. If you're the type of person who doesn't want to plan out all your Exercise and and come up with a different regimen on a day-by-day basis. You'll get everything from crossfit. You'll get endurance to get cardio, you'll get strength and you'll be doing it as a group where someone else has put in all the time to figure out the programming, and you just show up and get a phenomenal workout. And you could go three times a week, four times a week, five times a week and just put your ego on the shelf. Don't feel like you have to lift more than the person beside you with crossfit. If you just stay within your ability and Work on really great form, you can have a tremendous experience with crossfit Dancing. My buddy, ed, him and his wife have danced for years. It's how they stay in shape and it's fun, and they do it together. And this is something that you know. A lot of people kind of might, you know, look down their nose at, but dancing can be a legitimate form of exercise. You can even join a club or find a class and have a good time with it.
Dave Sherwin:Weightlifting is a fantastic way of working out and, contrary to popular belief, you can get cardio while you're lifting weights If you don't take a break for too long. Remember your heart is dumb. It doesn't care what you do to raise the level of your heart rate. Whether you're weightlifting, running, swimming, cross-fitting, does not matter. Keeping your heart elevated for a certain amount of time gives you cardio. So if you take brief breaks and don't allow your heart rate to come down too low, then you're getting cardio while you lift weights.
Dave Sherwin:Running, of course, is a fantastic activity. Build up slowly. A lot of people get injured running. Make sure you get excellent footwear and build up slowly. No more than 5% increase per week and you can have tremendous health benefits from running. And another one is martial arts. Now there's a last one that I would mention, and that is rowing, and I have a rowing machine. I love to row. Now it does get kind of boring staring at the wall, so I got to have my iPad and some show or something on the screen in front of me. But that's also kind of cool that I can just watch a show and do a long, slow row or do a hit workout on the rowing machine Also low impact.
Dave Sherwin:Now let's talk about supplements, of course. I'm here talking to you from Derobi, a supplement company, and supplements help my workout. I often take a pre-workout. Sometimes I do a full blown workout with L-Argenine and Citrulline and a variety of other cool ingredients. However, they tend to have a lot of caffeine, and so sometimes I use our own focus up as a pre-workout. I find it's an excellent pre-workout drink, actually, as is our NeuroBoost. You can learn about both of these on the website. Focus up and NeuroBoost have very different ingredients. They have a very different effect and some people prefer one to the other. Neuroboost has a nice orange flavor, focus up as a berry flavor, but I find them both to be excellent pre-workouts.
Dave Sherwin:During my workout, I drink cell fuel Eight drops in my water bottle. I try to finish the water bottle while I'm working out. Cell fuel is an oxygenating supplement, and what we're trying to do when we exercise is increase our aerobic capacity and get more oxygen to our extremities. As a matter of fact, when people are doping, what they're doing is trying to increase their body's use of oxygen through doping, and so using a natural supplement for this is a fantastic idea. Also, before weightlifting workouts, I take perfect aminos both before and after a heavy weightlifting session, and this is something I learned from the Perfect Amino website and some of their pro athletes that do this, and they find and I have found as well that taking the Perfect Aminos before and after a workout really helps me get the most out of a workout and keeps that protein in my body right when I need it.
Dave Sherwin:So there's three. Well, there's actually a fourth. There's another one that I think is highly what's the word? I'm looking for, something that really helps your performance when you're working out, and that is our Omega product. Our pureform Omega is a plant based Omega, and Omega's are also critical on exercise days. I take my Omega's before my workout, whatever type of workout I'm doing, and, as a matter of fact, you get a little bit of energy just from the oils themselves. But whatever your normal amount of Omega's is because it's it's 30 Per one pill per 30 pounds of body weight. Okay, so if you weigh 120 pounds, you would take four perfect aminos. If you weigh 180, you take six. However, if you take two more than whatever that number is before your workout, they will give your body Fuel and nutrients that it needs to increase the the effectiveness of that workout.
Dave Sherwin:Now Eating plans. Of course, we're always going to recommend the dirobyne undieted, because it's so easy, it's so fundamental and it will make sure your body has all the macro nutrients that you need to have that energy that you need to recover properly. If you Just eat according to the end diet, that is a fantastic way to eat with normal food from the grocery store and Not difficult to do, and you're still allowed to have the odd treat here and there. It's not some type of super strict diet. It's really based on just the fundamentals of cutting out the bad stuff, increasing the good stuff, but in a very easy and easy to understand way. So, in conclusion, of course, the perfect amount of exercise will vary.
Dave Sherwin:Five hours a week is a fantastic guideline. If you do more than that for a certain activity that you're trying to train for, like an event, then of course do be careful, pay close attention To your sleep patterns. You could have hormone imbalances when you over train, but again, most people don't have that problem. I think most people are having a hard time getting in enough exercise, and so I think that if that's you doing a combination of some walking, some strength training and some form of exercise that you really enjoy, that adds up to five hours a week. You absolutely can't go wrong with that.
Dave Sherwin:I hope you've enjoyed this episode and some of these ideas and thoughts that I've shared with you. As always, we do an entire post on our blog at blogdirobicom, where we have the podcast and also links of anything that I've mentioned in this, and you can get 10% off by using the coupon code podcast. This is Dave Sherwin, wishing you health and success. Thanks again for listening and don't forget about all the free resources on dirobicom. That's D I R O B I. Dot com. Also find the show notes for this episode by clicking on the podcast link there on the website and if you want to pick any of our World-class products while you're there, use code podcast to get 10% off anything you like.