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The Wellness Blueprint: With Dr. Caleb Davis
Welcome to The Wellness Blueprint with Dr. Caleb Davis, where we uncover the secrets to living a long, active, and pain-free life. Hosted by Dr. Caleb Davis, an orthopedic surgeon and fitness enthusiast, this podcast is your ultimate guide to musculoskeletal health, injury prevention, and wellness.
Dr. Davis combines his expertise as a shoulder and elbow specialist with a passion for empowering people to take charge of their health. From deep dives into cutting-edge restorative medicine to practical tips on avoiding surgery and optimizing recovery, The Wellness Blueprint offers valuable insights for anyone seeking to preserve their body and thrive at every stage of life.
Join us each week for professional guidance, fascinating medical discussions, and actionable strategies that help you move better, feel stronger, and stay functional for years to come. Whether you're an athlete, a weekend warrior, or someone looking to age gracefully, The Wellness Blueprint provides the tools to design a healthier you.
The Wellness Blueprint: With Dr. Caleb Davis
Episode 14: The Cardio Controversy: HIIT vs. Steady-State for Maximum Fat Loss"
Ever wondered if your cardio routine is truly effective, or if there's a better way to boost your fitness goals? Join us on the Wellness Blueprint with Dr. Caleb Davis and co-host Nicole Davis, as we discuss the intricacies of cardio and fitness just in time for the new year. We take you on a journey through various exercise options, from the simplicity of jogging to the intensity of CrossFit, and compare the merits of steady-state cardio versus high-intensity interval training (HIIT). Discover how personal motivations like mental clarity and weight loss can shape your fitness path, and pick up tips on how to avoid common pitfalls such as plateauing or injury.
We'll dive into the science behind improving your VO2 max and aerobic health, weighing the pros and cons of cardio versus strength training. Personal anecdotes shed light on the curious world of oxygen deprivation masks and high-altitude training. We also tackle serious topics like stress fractures in athletes, especially young female distance runners. Learn about the vital differences between stress fractures and shin splints and why proper nutrition and diagnosis are crucial to recovery. Through real-life stories, we emphasize the importance of balanced nutrition and correct mechanics to prevent injuries.
Finally, we bring a playful and informative discussion on interval training and exercise science, including the intriguing concept of Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption (EPOC). Hear why mixing sprinting with steady-state cardio might just be the best thing for your cardiovascular health, and how variety and recovery play a key role in a successful routine. We explore the nuances of fasted versus non-fasted cardio, and remind you of the importance of recovery essentials like hydration, sleep, and protein intake. Prepare to be entertained, informed, and maybe even inspired to switch up your fitness routine as you step into the new year with us.
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Hey everybody and welcome back to the Weldist Blueprint with Dr Caleb Davis. I'm your host, dr Caleb Davis, and as usual I am joined by the wonderful, beautiful, talented Calipygian, nicole Davis, nicole thanks for being here.
Speaker 2:Thanks, dr. Big Guy.
Speaker 1:That's a throwback to our glutes episode, in case you haven't listened. Yes, so, as the new year approaches, a lot of people are going to be getting into some new fitness routines, some new workouts, and my thought was a lot of people are going to be getting into some new fitness routines, some new workouts, and my thought was a lot of people are going to think where should I start? And I think the question is usually cardio versus strength training. There's Zumba, crossfit, weightlifting, jazzercise, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's all sorts of boutique fitness places. And what was the place we tried in Tampa? Orange Theory?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then we tried in Tampa, orange Theory.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then there's like F45.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So the question comes up okay, do I just go outside and jog? Should I try swimming, gymnastics? There's all sorts of things, there's millions of different things you can try, and I think the question always comes up to what's the most optimal thing, and that's what I wanted to cover today. The thing that popped in my mind was okay, what's the difference between steady state cardio and higher intensity cardio like sprinting? Steady state I just mean going at a constant pace for a jog.
Speaker 1:Just think like cycling or jogging, something that you can maintain for up to hours at a time.
Speaker 2:Hours. Who's doing this for hours? Well, not you, or?
Speaker 1:me, but other people.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:You know marathon runners, half marathon runners I used to bike a lot. I would go cycling for hours at a time I could do 30 miles in a day.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't do that anymore.
Speaker 2:It's not my jam.
Speaker 1:No, no, I know, but that's okay. You have many fine qualities.
Speaker 2:I remember you got into CrossFit and you really enjoyed that, yes, but one of the reasons why I love CrossFit is because I didn't have to spend hours on it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you didn't usually typically run more than a mile right. That was kind of using the max.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was in the MRF or something.
Speaker 1:Anyway, I thought we'd start off with what's the difference between steady state cardio and sprinting?
Speaker 1:like higher intensity and, if we have time, we might get into more strength training, stuff A lot of people talk about. You should do high reps and low weights so you can be toned and not get too muscular, versus going with a higher weight to build more muscle mass. I bet we're going to have to split that into a second episode because I think there's a lot to talk about here. I imagine this will be a twofer again, but let's go ahead and talk about cardio. Like I said before, with the new year coming along, I think a lot of people are going to just try jogging, probably because it's very low barrier to entry. All you need is a decent pair of shoes and a place that's not 130 degrees or negative 30 degrees.
Speaker 2:So people in Arizona and people anywhere, alaska or something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and most of the time people can have access to that and there's treadmills so it's pretty low barrier to entry so I think a lot of people start there. Tell me a little bit about your thoughts on that, just broadly, like jogging, sprinting, rowing elliptical machine. Tell me kind of your general impressions on what's optimal, maybe the pros and cons. I want to hear what a normal person's perspective is on this.
Speaker 2:Okay, when I think of jogging, I think about people who run around the neighborhood and they're generally going at a slower, more doable pace. A lot of people who jog. I know that they talk about how it clears their mind and they really like that. I've also heard people in the weightlifting industry say oh well, jogging is not going to help you lose weight. I've heard that a bunch. What was it Rowing? Let's see Rowing on a machine versus rowing in real life.
Speaker 1:Most people aren't going to row in real life. That's not very accessible, so most people are going to go on a rowing machine.
Speaker 2:Okay, so I know that rowing on a machine is more, not as high impact, so it's arguably better for your joints is from what I understand.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's probably the common conception, but what did we talk about with cartilage health before that? Sometimes some impact on your joints is actually necessary.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, but I know that's why a lot of people like it, especially if they've had knee issues with running. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You hear the same thing for swimming and the elliptical machine. Those are things that don't cause striking on the ground to cause that impact. Yeah, that's definitely a conception.
Speaker 2:The rowing machine doesn't take up too much space because typically they like also will stand up vertically, which is kind of nice and let's see. So we talked about running, we talked about rowing. What's the other one?
Speaker 1:Let's cut back for a second. You talked about losing weight. Do you think losing weight's like the primary indicator of health? What do you think the goal is when you go for a jog? My thought is okay. Do we worry about how well our heart is pumping, or do we worry more about weight loss?
Speaker 2:I think it really depends on the person. Yeah, because when I see a relatively fit 30-something-year-old guy running around the neighborhood, I think to myself okay, this guy is probably trying to clear his head, he's probably trying to get some me time where he's able to go and maintain his health. And when I see a woman running around, typically I'm thinking, oh, she's probably unhappy with her weight and is running and maybe this is like a new hobby that she's taken up. That could be very sexist, by the way, but that is just because of the Is that culturally ingrained in you?
Speaker 2:It might be, but I think it's also a generational thing because, most women my age are mothers and most of them are struggling to maintain or lose weight just because their lifestyle with children is very challenging and they've gained baby weight and they're trying to lose it and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1:As usual, you're digging down into the psychology of the matter, which is great, of course. That's why I love you, one of the reasons I love having you on the show, because I don't often go that direction and you've taught me to think about that so much more often. I would say the majority of Americans start exercising to lose weight Occasionally when you're older and you see a cardiologist and say, hey, your heart's not in good shape. People are exercising specifically so their heart will function better. But I think the vast majority of people on January 1st, new Year's Day, new Year's resolution they want to lose weight.
Speaker 2:Well, you and I talked about in one of our previous episodes about how two-thirds of American adults are overweight.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's a lot of people who are very overweight. A lot of times people just at least in my experience as a doctor seeing patients who are in their 60s they say, yeah, I'm overweight, I don't care, who cares what I look like, I'm married. I've been married for 30 years. I'm not trying to attract anybody, I'm functional, I'm happy. So when they start exercising, it's because their doctor has scared them into thinking they're going to die, which maybe they are, so they're doing it more for cardiovascular health. The dichotomy I'm trying to create here is that there's two different reasons that people run. One is for weight loss, one is for they want to reduce their mortality, and I think most people between the ages of 20 and 50 are probably doing it for appearances and cosmetics and they don't like the way they look and they're unhappy with the way they function. And then people who are older, playing the odds. I think they're doing it more because they're scared of dying.
Speaker 2:Well, I would say that there's a third thing in there. The third thing would be mental health, like just how it makes your body and your mind feel, because I think that is a motivation for a lot of people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've heard that a lot from people who are really into running that it's just a way to escape the world and empty their mind and they can focus and think about things and process during that time. And I think there's plenty to say that people who do long walks or runs can help. That can help them that their emotional processing doesn't work for everybody. I hate running.
Speaker 2:That's one of the reasons why I like yoga.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that does it for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1:Going back to that mindfulness practice we've talked about in the past of just escaping things like your phone and doom scrolling and just being constantly distracted by work emails. I think there's lots of different activities that can do that for you and everyone's just going to be a little bit different. But I think you're right. A lot of people get some mental health effects from steady state cardio. I enjoy cycling, but I just never got into running, Even though I used to do it a lot. I just never really enjoyed it.
Speaker 2:You never really liked stationary cycling either, though.
Speaker 1:No, I like the change of scenery.
Speaker 2:I really like being able to watch TV while I cycle, so I prefer the stationary. Yeah, I get that.
Speaker 1:I get that too Well. I think that's a good entry point into this conversation of what's the difference between fat loss and cardiovascular health. So let's break that down. Cardiovascular health in broad terms refers to how effectively your heart pumps, what volume it's been able to pump, how your blood vessels respond to that force. How resistant is your blood vessel versus how pliable is it? Can it react well to different stresses and adjust based on your body's needs? It also refers to how well your lungs work, meaning how much oxygen can you get into your bloodstream and how efficiently can you deliver it to the rest of your body's needs. It also refers to how well your lungs work, meaning how much oxygen can you get into your bloodstream and how efficiently can you deliver it to the rest of your body. That's, in a nutshell, a great way to define cardiovascular health.
Speaker 1:I mean, people throw that term around a lot and maybe don't understand exactly what it means. I think they probably just think that the likelihood of me having a heart attack or not, which those two things do correlate, but if you think you have a hard time going up a flight of stairs, you're going to have poor cardiovascular health. It means you're not getting oxygen where you need to. You're running out of breath because your lungs are working really hard to get that oxygen to all your muscle tissue and fuel your body correctly. And as you get in better shape, so to speak, you're getting more efficient with your lung capacity and ability to deliver oxygen to your body. One of the ways we measure this is a term called VO2 max. Have you ever heard this term?
Speaker 2:Maybe in the recesses of my mind, but I'm not super familiar.
Speaker 1:It's usually used in scientific literature to determine how much oxygen can your body use during intense exercise. Much oxygen can your body use during intense exercise. So people with a higher VO2 max have better aerobic capacity, meaning in what general what most people would just term they are in better quote unquote shape. A good indicator of this, just for lay people, would be a lower resting heart rate. I'd say most people understand that a person who has a lower resting heart rate meaning beats per minute let's say the average is 70,. People who are in good vascular health will often have a resting heart rate of 40 to 50, significantly lower than the average, because their heart is delivering blood and oxygen so efficiently it doesn't have to beat as often. Low blood pressure, at least at low normal, would also be an indicator of good VO2 max and good cardiovascular health. So why does all this cardiovascular fitness matter? It's not just about being able to run a mile. It's a key predictor of overall health and longevity. Studies have shown that people with a higher VO2 max are less likely to develop chronic illnesses like heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure. A study published in 2019 demonstrated that the combination of aerobic exercise and resistance exercise combined provided good cardiovascular health and yielded most significant improvements in VO2 max, blood pressure and heart efficiency.
Speaker 1:Now I've already spoiled it, because the question was going to be what's the best? Is it cardio, is it strength training? I've already given away the answer. So now that we've Nicole, do you have any questions on this? Since we've covered this whole VO2 max thing, I think it's what most people would just refer to as aerobic health. You're in shape.
Speaker 2:No, the only thing that keeps popping into my mind is I remember a few years ago these people would train with those masks on to kind of restrict their oxygen, and I wondered if that had an effect on their VO2 or something.
Speaker 1:I think the thought was that it did, but I think most studies bore out that there really wasn't a significant improvement in VO2 max on people who wore those oxygen deprivation masks.
Speaker 1:The Bain masks yeah, they're cool looking. You look real hardcore, but I don't know that it actually had much improvement. One of the big things that has been shown to give you good VO2 max improvement, or aerobic capacity, is to train at high altitudes. So a lot of people go to Denver or in the Rocky Mountains to do their training because the oxygen saturation in the air is lower, so you're having to work a lot harder. Being from Florida at zero feet above sea level, I experienced that when going to Colorado for vacation or something, you just run out of breath so much faster. Do you remember?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we were in Yellowstone right.
Speaker 1:Yellowstone was one spot there. I think that's around 6,000 feet above sea level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we were just walking upstairs outside and it should not have been challenging and both of us were like what is happening? Why are we like winded?
Speaker 1:I didn't realize how high Yellowstone was. Everyone knows Denver's a mile up. And then I remember when you and I went to Mount Evans, which is 14,000 feet up, you remember we'd had to take a break every 20 feet because it was so exhausting. So that's the whole thing. Even if you're in reasonable shape, you're not. Your lungs aren't used to having such little oxygen per breath.
Speaker 1:All right, let's dive into steady state cardio versus sprinting, or what some people might refer to as HIIT training, h-i-i-t, which would be high intensity interval training. So this is more bouts of intense exercise with small rests in between, where I think steady state is exactly what the name sounds like Same pace, same intensity for a longer sustained period of time, without breaks or without any sort of difference. So I believe that steady state cardio is probably the number one exercise that people adopt when they're first getting into fitness and trying to get healthier and lose weight, again because it's super accessible and easy to get into. So let's talk about it. You can get improved VO2 max when you do jogging. We're going to just talk about jogging. Understand that there's varieties, like an elliptical machine or a rowing machine or a stairmaster. There's other varieties of exercise you can do that would be considered steady state, but for the sake of simplicity, let's just say jogging.
Speaker 1:The big debate is also what energy are you using when you exercise? So if you're sprinting or doing high intensity, you're using more glycogen, meaning the way sugar is stored in your muscles and liver, where the general consensus is that when you're doing steady state cardio, you're actually burning more fat during that form of exercise. So on its face, that sounds like a good thing, right? Everyone wants to burn more fat. If you want to get really into the weeds, which I do not, the duration and the intensity of your steady state cardio can affect what you're burning, at what rate you're burning it and how you utilize it, and it can actually change over the duration of time as well. If you get a biochemist, they'll get. They can go into all that into detail. Lane Norton is probably one of the more prevalent PhDs who discusses a lot of this on his podcast and his YouTube channel. If you ever want to check out his stuff and if you got no, if you want to listen to this podcast, you'd probably pick it apart and tell me where I'm wrong a bunch of times, but I'm trying to keep it simple.
Speaker 1:As you mentioned, there's a lot of health benefits. A lot of people talk about reducing stress and having mental clarity when they do the steady state cardio. It's just a time for them to process and relax, and there's studies to show that it lowers chronic stress and lowers cortisol levels from being overly elevated as well, although there is a flip side to that for those people who train too much, which I think is very common in people who get really into running. They run too often and can actually have elevated cortisol because they're not giving themselves enough time to rest, recover and they're not eating properly. Some of the cons to me you can plateau. Once your body becomes more adapted, you stop having so much improvement and to get more adapted you have to run faster and run longer to keep getting the fitness improvements that you're getting, because eventually it just becomes normal exercise too. It doesn't become so difficult.
Speaker 2:But that's the same thing for weightlifting too, though, right.
Speaker 1:Yes, but increasing intensity in weightlifting is a lot easier because you just put more weight on when, if you run 10 miles and then that becomes normal for you, then you have to run 12 miles. It becomes harder to increase intensity and duration. The other one is just time intensive People who do a lot of running. They're talking about running 10 hours a week Sometimes it's it becomes intense. It's a lot of exercise.
Speaker 1:One of the things that I hear a lot from people and when I say people I mean me, I say it's a lot is that one of the downsides to steady state cardio to me is that it can deplete muscle tissue. Now, that's not just to say that you go for a jog doesn't mean you're going to deplete all your muscle tissue. It is burning fat, it's burning other fuel resources but potentially, if you're not fueling yourself correctly and not resting correctly, it has been shown to break down muscle tissue and slow down progress of muscle gain in the gym if you are doing resistance training. But as with most things, I think a healthy balance is necessary. I'm sure you've seen guys who are powerlifters but can't go up a flight of stairs because their cardiovascular capacity is not that great.
Speaker 2:Are you talking about you from about three or four years ago?
Speaker 1:I have no idea what you're talking about. There is that balance that's hard to strike sometimes, but for a normal person who's not trying to be a competitive runner or a competitive powerlifter, I would say that training both is very important, and we'll get into that. Nicole, you've played around with steady-state cardio in terms of rowing and jogging. What are your thoughts? Have you had any success with it? What are the pros and cons in your personal experience?
Speaker 2:I just get really bored and lose motivation. And that might be like a ADHD thing, or it could just be because I'm a human, I don't know. But I don't really find it motivating to just do the same thing for long periods of time. I get more of a high doing something like high intensity interval training, and so I like it when maybe I'm doing the same thing for three rounds of, let's say, it's, a as many rounds as possible kind of exercise.
Speaker 2:So you pick out three to five different things that you're going to do, and maybe it's deadlifts, maybe it's rowing on the rowing machine for a set number of meters, maybe it's also doing air squats or squats with weight, that kind of thing, and you're cycling through these different exercises for a set period of time and you're always trying to beat the clock and you're trying to beat yourself. So there's just a lot of motivation to keep going and to challenge yourself. And if you're with a group of friendly people, like, maybe you guys have little challenges together as well. But for something like jogging, for very self-motivated people, I'm sure that they can say, oh, I got to beat this time, like I want to beat this distance that I did last time, but for me that's just not exciting enough.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I feel the same way. I think the most I ever ran was around 10 miles. I was training for a half marathon. I just got so bored and I was also trying to bench press a lot of the time and it did affect my strength because I was running so much and I didn't like that. So I ended up giving up steady state cardio for excessive training, so I just found it was boring. It was really time consuming to run that much so I decided to move on to other things too. But again, as I've said on this show before, the exercise that you actually enjoy doing and you find that you can do and be entertained and find fulfillment in it is probably your best bet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no. What's interesting, though, is I don't like the slow paced stuff, but what I do love is yoga, and the particular kind of yoga that I like is the hot yoga 26 and two, otherwise known as Bikram yoga but you're not allowed to say that anymore, yeah, but basically, the idea behind it is there's the same 26 movements and two breathing exercises. Every class, the same class, and I would have thought to myself oh, that's going to be super boring for me.
Speaker 1:It is.
Speaker 2:It's not you. Take that back, sir, no.
Speaker 1:I'm really glad you like it, but I've gone to four or five classes with her and every time it's like, man, this is boring. Yeah, she took me to the hour long class, whichlong class, which you know 20, 30 minutes and you're like, okay, this isn't so bad. But then you have another 30 minutes. It's like, okay, I'm done. I think it was the 90 minute class you couldn't handle maybe, maybe, yeah, mentally, I mean you can handle it physically, that's right. Thank you yeah yeah, so I.
Speaker 2:But for whatever reason, I just really love that because I find it a challenge against myself. With every move from the last class that I went to like, oh okay, this time I can get into that position a little better. Or I can tell hmm, there's one move where I'm supposed to sit on my butt with my knees kind of curled underneath me and then lean backwards. I used to not be able to do that at all, man, and now I can completely get on my back in that position.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, we're all very impressed with your flexibility. Yeah Well no, no, I am You're. You're awesome, You're really good at that. You're actually. It's very impressive to watch her do it. But this is not strength training or cardio, so we're going to have to move on from no it is.
Speaker 2:It is cardio, though because I have a steady state, cardio the entire time, according to my Apple Watch. Okay, it's not traditional cardio, it's not what we're talking about today Am I a very traditional person, caleb, I'm not a trad wife.
Speaker 1:You always bring it back to yoga, though we might as well just make this the Dr Big Yoga podcast.
Speaker 2:I would love that. Yeah, why don't you start?
Speaker 1:your own hippie yoga podcast and I can be your guest podcast and I can be your guest. Okay, All right. Since we're talking so much about steady state cardio and people who just love to run, let's take a little segue into Fractured Facts. Welcome back to Fractured Facts. I don't think that we did a Fractured Facts for the last couple episodes.
Speaker 2:Really, that's a travesty.
Speaker 1:I know People talk about how much they love it and also people have been really complaining to me that we don't do video podcasts anymore. So the people are not getting what they want. The people are displeased.
Speaker 2:Oh man. It's probably because my scrubs are so awesome.
Speaker 1:I've actually had a lot of people tell me how much they love your scrubs. It's just, unfortunately, the surgical season is very busy and I was finding that I was just having way too much time being taken up by editing video podcasts. So we'll get back to it someday, but unfortunately right now is not gonna be that day. But enough of that, let's get back into our fractured facts. Since we're talking about running so much, I wanted to talk a little bit about stress fractures. Now, your average person who gets out and runs and jogs is not going to experience a stress fracture. But as you get a little bit more intense and more into it and start doing doing it regularly, multiple times a week and getting up in the miles, you are at a pretty increased risk of stress fractures.
Speaker 2:But does that mean that it's broken?
Speaker 1:Depends on who you talk to. Most people when they say broken, they mean that the bone has moved where by definition, that wouldn't really be a stress fracture anymore. Some people use the word stress fracture meaning there was not a huge acute trauma that caused it. It was more of a repetitive stress injury. Some people refer to stress fractures as meaning small cracks in the bone that have not yet propagated all the way through the full thickness of the bone Propagated.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So maybe having a small crack that may not even be visible on x-ray will only be visible on MRI. I have patients, especially young female distance runners is probably the most common. They come in with some sort of hip pain or shin pain and their x-rays look completely normal. Oftentimes I'll get an MRI because you can see swelling in the bone where it hasn't fully cracked across the full diameter of the bone but it will if it left untreated. So that's often the case of something I'll see when I'll get an MRI to see the fracture.
Speaker 2:How do you treat a stress fracture?
Speaker 1:Rest, yeah, if the fracture has not gone all the way through the bone. A lot of times it's just a matter of rest. Occasionally, if it's up in the hip, it will require surgery if it's severe enough, even if it hasn't broken all the way through yet.
Speaker 2:Didn't your dad get a stress fracture during a marathon? One year he did.
Speaker 1:I believe it was in his toes, though I think it was in his metatarsal, so that's another common spot. Stress fractures can be defined as small cracks or severe bruising within bone caused by repetitive forces and usually from overuse. The tibia, or the big bone in your shin, is probably the most common spot. Metatarsals are the bones that make up the majority of the mid portion of your foot and sometimes the femur and pelvis as well.
Speaker 2:The femur is your thigh bone and the pelvis. I think everyone knows what the pelvis is. How do you know the difference between your tibia having a stress fracture and you having shin splints?
Speaker 1:Well, usually the shin splints are only painful during repetitive activity, where once you develop a stress fracture of the tibia, it's usually painful all the time, even just with walking. Okay, shin splints will often have pain up and down the entire tibia, where a stress fracture is usually only painful right at that one spot, and an MRI will make it look different as well.
Speaker 2:An.
Speaker 1:MRI will usually help differentiate the diagnosis.
Speaker 2:if you have concerns or doubt, Is a stress fracture kind of like when you get a chip in your windshield and they tell you, oh, you've got to make sure you fill that in before it turns into like a full blown crack.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's pretty. That's a pretty good analogy. The only difference is the windshield is not going to heal itself where a bone will, if given the correct nutrition and time to rest. Yeah. So the tibia, though, is the one that we are concerned about the most, because they make up about 50% of stress fractures in runners, so it's very common to see that in the tibia lot. I actually was treating a young man with a tibia stress fracture some months ago, and essentially I just had to make him non-weight bearing, put him on crutches for six weeks, got him on vitamin D and calcium, I got him to eat more calories, and he healed up just fine without needing surgery. So that's oftentimes the case.
Speaker 2:So is that what your bones want to consume is vitamin D and calcium?
Speaker 1:Well complicated. I'll try not to get too technical. You need vitamin D to help uptake calcium from your diet and into your bloodstream, and there's a very complex mechanism by which collagen in your bones have deposition of minerals to then mineralize and harden the bones and heal them. Vitamin D and calcium are typically two very important factors at play at restoring bone density and healing. Sometimes, though, just giving the bone the proper rest to heal is all that's necessary, especially in young people.
Speaker 1:Typically, the most common cause of these stress fractures is repetitive high impact activities like running, especially without adequate rest or recovery or nutrition. A lot of times when you see it as somebody who's getting ready for a competition like a marathon or a cross country race, and they suddenly dramatically increase the number of miles they're running in a week or increase the number of hours they're running, that's out of their normal proportion, and then their body just can't take the stress. People who are that high level of athletes are also burning large amounts of calories because they're running for 20 hours a week sometimes and are not properly replenishing.
Speaker 1:I don't know if you've ever seen these cross country teams running around and they're always rail thin because they're just run so much Rail thin, tiny shorts yeah, I don't know why they have to wear such tiny shorts. That's always been very suspicious to me. I don't know what these guys are doing out there with their tiny shorts Very suspicious. A lot of times it's poor mechanics. When you're having these metatarsal fractures you may be running incorrectly, more on the side of your foot on the outside border. Sometimes you're running out of cushioning on your shoe and it's causing you to run more on the one side. So sometimes people aren't replacing their shoes often enough because they're wearing down too quickly and then you can have bone density issues.
Speaker 1:What we see and again I hate to pick on the ladies here, but this is something that we focus on in medicine is that a lot of times these female cross-country athletes are running so much and not getting enough calories just because in general, women aren't eating as much as men are. Someone's going to hate on me for that generalization, but especially the athletes are not getting enough calories. One of the big telltale signs is if your menstrual cycle as a female is altered, that means that you're having such a low body fat, low calorie, that you're actually altering your normal hormonal axis.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've heard about that. For women who are anorexic, that will disrupt their menstrual cycle, but you're saying that this is separate.
Speaker 1:No, this is separate. You don't have to be anorexic. You're just literally running so much and not compensating by eating and resting enough, that you're basically having somewhat the effects that you would have anorexia. Even though you don't have anorexia, You're literally starting to lose your ability to produce estrogen and progesterone and have a normal menstrual cycle. Another time we see these stress fractures when you have a sudden change in your training environment. So if you're someone who's running on a treadmill all winter long in a very cold state and then it gets warm and then you hit the asphalt and you're doing the same amount of miles, you've changed from a soft surface to a hard surface. Sometimes your bones don't tolerate that well either, and in general though, it's just overtraining.
Speaker 2:That's true. I have heard you say that running on a treadmill is not the same as running outside.
Speaker 1:It's softer, you're not having as much impact on your bones.
Speaker 2:But you've also said that, for whatever reason, it's more effective to run outside.
Speaker 1:That's because impact stimulates bone density Just like everything else in life. You can overdo it Because remember how we talked about exercise essentially is breaking down your tissue, that so that your body can heal itself and build back stronger. Yeah, so imagine you're breaking down your tissue and then you're breaking down your tissue, and then you're breaking down your tissue and you're doing it every single day. Your body doesn't have time to rebuild back stronger. That's essentially what a stress fracture is. In a nutshell. Yeah, you're doing all this tearing down, you're never building it back up, and if you're not giving yourself the proper down, you're never building it back up. And if you're not giving yourself the proper building blocks, you're never building it back up.
Speaker 2:There's a song from like the 90s about this.
Speaker 1:Tell me.
Speaker 2:I get knocked down, I get up again. Is that from the 90s?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it is. Yeah, I think that is. Let's go over just the symptoms real quick, just because I'm sure everyone out there is afraid that they have a stress fracture. Gradual onset of pain in a localized area, meaning a small area, worsens with activities and alleviates somewhat with rest, although it becomes more constant if left untreated. It's gradual and goes away as you rest eventually, but eventually becomes severe all the time. With any weight bearing there's often swelling and tenderness to touch right around the area, especially in the tibia or the foot, and a lot of times you'll notice that you change the way you're walking or running to try to keep more weight off of that affected leg. Probably the most at-risk athletes would be long-distance runners, cross-country athletes, track athletes and sprinters, and actually another group that I see in a lot is military personnel Really Well. They do these 20-mile or 30-mile rucks where they put on a heavy backpack and are
Speaker 1:forced to march or jog for long periods of time and again, kind of like CrossFit, how you are forced to work out more than maybe you would normally. You are being made to march where you normally would have stopped because your body is telling you I've exercised enough or too much. You're not going to do that because you're being pushed by your drill sergeant to go harder and longer than you normally would have stopped because your body's telling you I've exercised enough or too much. You're not going to do that because you're being pushed by your drill sergeant to go harder and longer than you normally would, and they're not going to listen to you complaining and whining that your leg hurts. So I actually have seen stress fractures in military personnel quite often. The other thing I didn't mention is as girls lose weight and lose their hormonal cycles. Estrogen as a hormone is very protective of bone density. So as they lose weight and they lose their estrogen, that's also a compounding effect, making their bones even softer and more susceptible to stress fractures because they're losing their estrogen. So it's all a stacked effect for young female athletes. If you have any concern for stress fracture, you can start by just resting, increasing your sleep, increasing the amount of time or days between running ice and anti-inflammatories and see if it improves. But if it doesn't, I definitely recommend getting an x-ray and if there's any significant concern from a physician, if you see one, they'll probably order an MRI if they have any significant concern that you have a stress fracture. Initial management is really just what I just talked about resting more often, ice elevation, anti-inflammatories help with the swelling. If it's a significant fracture, they say it can actually be seen on x-ray I will typically make them non-weight bearing to actually let it heal, because I'm afraid it'll actually break all the way through and they may need surgery.
Speaker 1:So how do we help avoid this from happening? Progress slowly in your training. Don't just have these sudden jumps or sudden changes in your environment or the way you trained. You should always progress slowly so that your body can adapt. Optimize nutrition Make sure you're getting enough calories. You should be calculating how many calories you're burning every day and make sure you're keeping up with that. Supplement with calcium and vitamin D. You're keeping up with that Supplement with calcium and vitamin D. Help improve bone density by not just doing running but by strength training A lot of these cross-country athletes don't strength train and by doing some squatting and deadlifting, you might actually be able to increase your bone density without putting so much repetitive stress on them by running all the time. Make sure that you're replacing your shoes often enough when they start to run out of cushioning and tread, so that you're less prone to getting these as well.
Speaker 2:But what if you're one of those barefoot proponents?
Speaker 1:I can't talk to those people, whoa? No, I'm just kidding. Anything else to add about stress fractures?
Speaker 2:No, I think you covered it pretty well.
Speaker 1:Awesome. That pretty much wraps it up for Fractured Facts, so let's get back to the episode. All right, we're going to talk about sprinting.
Speaker 1:I would covered the steady state cardio and some of the pros and cons.
Speaker 1:So this is more of a bursts of maximum effort or close to maximum effort, fast as you can, as intense as you can.
Speaker 1:This can be as much as you just go outside onto a running track and run half the track, take a 10 second rest, run it again and just do intervals. Or it can be more like CrossFit, where you pick 10 exercises and just hit each one as hard as you can for a certain set amount of time. The interval training can be a lot of different things, but it's typically maximum effort for a short duration of time, with short rests in between. So you're getting your heart rate much, much higher than you would for steady state cardio, where the goal is to hit a percentage of your maximum heart rate and just maintain it for a long period of time. So very different. A lot of people have their HIIT training, their high intensity interval training, for maximum 20 minutes, probably more often five to 10 minutes. It can actually be pretty short. So one of the key benefits compared to steady state is that you can do just as much work in a fraction of the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's what I've heard. Like I read some sort of I don't know if it was an article or just an overview of this exercise guy who claimed that it was actually more effective for you to do these short bursts of things than it was to do any other kind of exercise, but I don't know.
Speaker 1:That's my contention as well. By the way, you're able to do just as much work in a shorter amount of time. We're going to get into this magic concept of epoch in just a second and we'll talk about that.
Speaker 2:Isn't that a name of a rapper?
Speaker 1:You're asking the wrong guy. That's true.
Speaker 2:I am asking the wrong guy, and I think that's Deepak. That might not be a rapper.
Speaker 1:You're thinking Tupac Dang it Uh-huh man. Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 2:Now we're like super white. This is terrible. You can cut that out.
Speaker 1:Maybe just cut that out. Yeah, I'm not the most up on my hip-hop culture, but I guess I'm better than Nicole.
Speaker 2:I'm a pumpkin spice latte kind of girl. What?
Speaker 1:can I say so think about. Have you ever heard anyone say that your metabolism gets elevated after exercise for hours after exercise? That actually helps you burn fat longer, not just during your exercise. Yes, that's the concept of EPOC. That stands for excess post-exercise oxygen consumption. So EPOC, epoc, not Tupac and there's a lot of studies that have shown that sprinting you have a higher EPOC than you do after steady state cardio.
Speaker 1:This is not so common anymore, but you remember back epoch and there's a lot of studies that have shown that sprinting you have a higher epoch than you do after steady state cardio. This is not so common anymore, but you remember back in the day people would get on the treadmill, they'd run for an hour and they'd be like, oh man, I burned 600 calories. I burned 600 calories in that hour. That's pretty good, but they're not the epoch after steady state cardio is not that high. When you burn that 600 calories while you're on the treadmill, great.
Speaker 1:But now what? You're not really burning that many more after, other than what your normal basal metabolic rate is, where sprinting you have an epoch. Some studies have shown up to 48 hours after sprinting you can go about living your life, doing your daily duties and you're burning more calories because of that sprinting, so that adds up over time. You're burning more calories because of that sprinting, so that adds up over time. People fall into this trap of okay, I had this meal that was 700 calories, so I have to spend that much time on a treadmill to burn that amount of calories. And then you get stuck in this endless loop of chasing the calories you eat and trying to punish yourself and try to work it off at the gym, and I don't personally find that approach very fulfilling or effective. Have you ever experienced anything like that?
Speaker 2:Oh well, sure, but women, and when it comes to women and food and calorie restriction, it's complicated.
Speaker 1:So yeah, the other thing, sprinting and HIIT training, is much more explosive in nature and it actually has more fast twitch muscle fiber activation.
Speaker 2:Okay, fast twitch muscle fiber. Just something I was hoping you'd bring up, because it's always a weird concept to me.
Speaker 1:When your muscles have different types of fibers. You have the slow twitch and fast twitch that involve more explosive movements versus steady state movements. So the slow twitch are more designed to be able to have steady state exercise. The fast twitch is more what gives you that powerful, explosive movement like doing a squat or a bench press or sprinting. A lot of people's fast stretch muscle fibers are not very well trained or adapted because a lot of our professions don't involve doing anything like that anymore and if we don't play sports after high school, we're not doing anything explosive in our lives.
Speaker 2:That's maybe some diarrhea.
Speaker 1:You're disgusting. It always comes back to poop, doesn't it? Yeah?
Speaker 2:Poop or sex, one or the other, hopefully not combined, oh God.
Speaker 1:Man, you're on a roll. Man, you're disgusting. So I'm sure you've heard lots of stories of guys getting out there. They're 40. They go out and play football in the yard, play a pickup game of basketball on the weekend, and they tweak their hamstring or their calf right. How many times have you heard that?
Speaker 2:Pretty much every week at church.
Speaker 1:Right, and that's because people's fast twitch muscle fibers are not very well developed, they're not conditioned. They go out and try to do something explosive and they get themselves hurt. That's one of the cons of doing this high intensity interval training and sprinting, by the way, because if you're not conditioned, you don't do any exercise. If you try to go straight into HIIT training and sprinting, you have a higher injury rate.
Speaker 1:If it's your first foray into health and fitness, I often think that sprinting is not going to be your best option off the bat. I think it's something that people should definitely consider, but if you're injury prone, you're not confident, you don't have someone showing you exactly what to do. I think it's something that people should definitely consider, but if you're injury prone, you're not confident, you don't have someone showing you exactly what to do. I think that steady state cardio is probably a great way to introduce yourself and then build your way up into more explosive sprinting, interval training type exercises. But in the long run, I think that if I had to choose one, I would actually say interval training and sprinting is probably better than steady state cardio, although it's a great introduction and in an ideal world you would do a little bit of both, because they both have benefits, sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say I feel super awkward running because apparently I run the wrong part of my foot. I didn't really know that there was so much technique behind running, but there is, there is, and I get shin splints if I do it incorrectly for too long. So when you talk about steady state cardio, I'm definitely going to move more toward stationary biking or rowing rather than jogging myself.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But what about those postprandial walks you love so much?
Speaker 1:Well, the postprandial walks. I like those because they help regulate blood sugar after eating.
Speaker 2:In case anyone forgot postprandial just means take a walk after you eat.
Speaker 1:Yes, Something I recommend that everyone does. Even if you're at an office eating lunch, get up and walk around your office building a couple times after lunch. It helps regulate your blood sugar, helps keep you from having those blood glucose spikes, those sugar spikes and crashes.
Speaker 2:What if you're just constantly snacking, though?
Speaker 1:Stop it. There's no need to be constantly snacking.
Speaker 2:Every time you eat a meal, you get up and go walk and I'm thinking to myself, man, but what if you don't actually have a meal? You're just the kind of person that, like constantly, is snacking to sustain yourself.
Speaker 1:Well, maybe you should just strap on a feed bag and just walk around like a horse and just walk while you are snacking.
Speaker 2:You know we could find a market for that. You remember those like beer hats at football games.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'll just fill it with M&M's and just say, all right, go for a walk.
Speaker 2:Well, not like protein shake. That's more on brand for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. I don't want to promote people. You know M&M's, that's a rapper too, right, m&m.
Speaker 2:Fun fact, I used to think that his name actually was M, ampersand you know, and signed M.
Speaker 1:Like Mars, the Mars candy company. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's not, is it?
Speaker 2:No, it's definitely not.
Speaker 1:EPOC and Eminem. I want to get more into this EPOC thing, okay, because I think it's an incredibly important concept that a lot of people really overlook. Okay, I think so many people focus on how many calories they burn while they're exercising and they overlook how many calories they're burning when they're not exercising. So let's get through it. I'm going to try to get through it real quick. Nicole, you tell me to stop if I'm being like way into the weeds here? Okay?
Speaker 2:All right.
Speaker 1:Epoc refers to elevated oxygen consumption that your body experiences after exercise. Essentially, it's the extra energy your body uses to return to its pre-exercise state. So during the recovery period, your body is restoring depleted energy resources like glycogen and ATP. This is the smaller energy molecules that your body uses. It's repairing muscle tissue that's damaged during exercise. It's clearing metabolic byproducts Think lactic acid, Things that when you're breaking down cells, you're breaking down molecules to burn for energy. You get byproducts or waste products in your muscles and blood vessels. So your body has to clear that.
Speaker 2:Okay, wait, wait, wait before you go on. I just want to say when you talk about damaged tissues, you mean that in a positive way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a lot of people refer to it as micro tearing of the muscle tissue, which sounds horrifying.
Speaker 2:But in reality it's like a completely normal process.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Anytime. Your body is constantly turning over. Its cells, the skeleton, the muscular tissue lots of different things are constantly undergoing repair and regeneration as it has becomes damaged. So the concept of repairing after exercise is normal. That's a normal thing. You can't undergo growth and adaptation without some small amount of micro damage.
Speaker 2:I think that's kind of a weird concept. Before I married you, I don't think I really thought of my body in terms of it's constantly breaking down and restructuring and building itself back up. It just wasn't a thing I thought about.
Speaker 1:There's lots of statistics and there's trivia on how often does your blood supply become completely recycled, how often does your bone actually become completely recycled, like your body's literally built a brand new skeleton every so many years or months? I don't remember off the top of my head, but, yeah, you're constantly being rebuilt, torn down and rebuilt every single day. Now we talked about a little bit how fat oxidation you're breaking down fat more often in steady state and you're doing more glycogen in sprinting right. Okay, so you might think, okay, steady state cardio is better than maybe in the short term, but this epoch you're doing more of that fat oxidation during your recovery. So throughout the day you're now burning more fat because you did that sprinting high intensity and you're having a prolonged duration of this epoch than compared to steady state cardio.
Speaker 2:So does it matter for this epoch thing whether you do your high intensity training in the morning or in the evening?
Speaker 1:A lot of debate on that and I don't know that anyone really has an answer, because you can still burn fat in your sleep too, if you train in the evening. There's lots of people who argue that you should run in the morning, fasted, not eating zero calories, and you'll have a better burn.
Speaker 1:As far as I know, a lot of the as far as I know, a lot of the data has not proven that to be the case. Fasted cardio versus non-fasted cardio I think it's really more of a personal preference. Some people just can't run on an empty stomach, or vice versa. Some people can't run if they've eaten, and sometimes for a lot of people working professionals they the only time they have to work out is in the morning, so they just choose to do it fasted and they feel good that way.
Speaker 2:Me back when I was competing as a power lifter, I wanted to have two full meals in me before I lifted, because I just felt, oh, he got super into this whole, like, oh, I have to know exactly what I'm going to eat so that I can plan my workouts, and blah, blah, blah. And he'd get really cranky if we, like, didn't eat when we said we were going to eat. It was a lot, guys.
Speaker 1:You make me sound like such a roid rager. I was not on steroids, just for the record. Nor am I now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but no, it's just really funny to think about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, things have changed a lot. I don't work out nearly as serious as I used to just because I don't compete anymore and I just don't have the. I hate to say this. I just don't have as much time to do it like that anymore, I just work out when I can.
Speaker 2:Well, now you work out when you can and you also roll around with other big sweaty people, yeah.
Speaker 1:I do jiu-jitsu also, which takes up a lot of time and energy.
Speaker 2:That's more and that's a great workout, but is that more of a steady state cardio or high intensity interval training?
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely high intensity interval training. My heart rate has gotten up to 190 when I roll jiu-jitsu. As you get better jiu-jitsu, it becomes more efficient and more steady state because you get better at it and you don't, and you're not an idiot. I may still be in that idiot phase.
Speaker 2:Time will tell but now you're a blue belt idiot I'm still an idiot I said you're a blue belt, yeah thanks, honey.
Speaker 1:I yeah, I appreciate your love and support yeah yeah, I did just get my blue belt in jiu-jitsu and I got the snot beat out of me at the award ceremony, because that's part of what they do so I have this great picture of him with the bloody nose.
Speaker 2:It's like he has such a big smile on his face.
Speaker 1:It's really fantastic well, I was having a good time yeah, of course, yeah now that would be a great example of we'll get into that. I'll get into that later.
Speaker 2:So what now? You're leaving us hanging well it's just.
Speaker 1:it's a great example of how high intensity training utilizes glycogen first. So when you first start, so after you get your belt, at least at my gym, not my school they make you spar for 30 minutes straight. Every minute a new, fresh person jumps on top of you and starts beating the snot out of you, Metaphorically.
Speaker 2:In a loving way. In a loving way, it's all grappling. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's all very safe. There's still a lot of choking people out, it's fine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know how safe it is. No, it's safe. No one was seriously harmed during that.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:Well, I got a bloody nose, so I was a little harmed.
Speaker 2:I would be sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah me, because I know that I'm in for 30 minutes of straight sparring. So I'm trying to preserve my energy by not going too explosive, because I know if I expend all my energy right away I'm going to be a dead man. But when you're about 10, 15 minutes in, you can feel your arms and legs starting to turn to rubber because you depleted all your glycogen. There is a very definite wall that you hit because your glycogen stores are gone and then you are starting to oxidize fatty tissues more because there's nowhere else for the energy to come from. But it's harder. The glycogen and ATP is all very readily available and easy to use in a rapid, explosive way and it takes a little bit longer to mobilize that fatty acids to get you good energy. So it's just really funny to see you can actually think about the way your body's utilizing different energy energy sources and once they run out, how it has to switch, and you can feel a performance difference. By the time you're done you can hardly move.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, he was pretty beat.
Speaker 1:So breaking down this EPOC further, now that we've talked about the EPOC and what it is, what it does, the implications of why it's so important, steady state cardio generates a very low to moderate EPOC effect compared to higher intensity forms of exercise. I think we've covered that the sprinting has a pretty high EPOC effect and that often lasts up to 24 to 48 hours post-workout, depending on the duration and intensity.
Speaker 2:No, I feel like you've also talked to me in the past about how weightlifting helps with your body's metabolism and epoch stuff maybe.
Speaker 1:That's right. If you compare pretty intense weightlifting, it actually some people have suggested that strength training and weightlifting has the highest epoch effect of all.
Speaker 2:But what's considered intense weightlifting?
Speaker 1:That's going to be different for everybody. You know, the more conditioned and healthier you are, the more intense you have to get. So people who have less conditioning don't require as much intensity to have their bodies shocked into this. Whoa, we're in overdrive now. But part of the other thing is that just building more muscle mass in general at baseline, you're going to require more calories to maintain it, and so a lot of people have contributed that to a higher baseline basal metabolic rate. Because you have higher muscle mass, take the epoch completely out of the equation. Just having more muscle mass means you have more calorie burn at baseline.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay, thanks for your advice.
Speaker 1:It also helps with stabilizing our hormones and blood sugar, and it's very good for your health in general to have more muscle tissue.
Speaker 2:Right, it's good for your bones too.
Speaker 1:It is Well. Strength training and resistance training in general helps with bone density. That's right. So just to summarize the EPOC steady state cardio some people have proposed that EPOC lasts for an hour to two hours after steady state. Some studies have shown that sprinting it can last 24 to 48 hours at a high level. Up to 15% more calorie burn than baseline for two days with sprinting and with intense strength training with muscle building it's been shown to last up to three days.
Speaker 2:Okay, wait. But if let's say someone theoretically is I want to make my EPOC last forever, so they sprint one day and then the next day they go back and sprint, and then the next day they go back and sprint, but your EPOC stuff lasts for three days.
Speaker 1:I think in theory it would continue to last. The thing you run into is are you feeding yourself correctly, are you resting correctly? Because exercise has all these amazing benefits. But if you exercise too much without sleeping correctly, you're putting yourself at risk for stress, fractures, muscle tears, increased cortisol. You can actually start to have health detriments if you're not resting and recovering correctly. So there's always a fine balance. If you're someone who wants to exercise literally every day, I probably cycle between steady state, cardio, sprinting and strength training, doing those every other day, essentially switching every type so that you can have lower intensity exercises to break that up.
Speaker 2:When are you going to do your yoga, Caleb?
Speaker 1:Well, yoga to me, would be more of a recovery day. It certainly is exercise, but that could be a day that you're not going to burn as many calories or do something so intense and explosive.
Speaker 2:You don't do my kind of yoga.
Speaker 1:Caleb, yes, you're very special. You're a very special flower, a very flexible, strong, firm flower.
Speaker 2:A Calipygian flower.
Speaker 1:A Calipygian flower. That's right. I think we've summarized epoch pretty well. Hopefully I explained it in a way that makes sense to a normal person who's not a big geek like me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I will say that 10, 15 years ago, if somebody said, oh yeah, I'm majoring in exercise science, I was sort of like, hmm, yeah, that sounds just as intriguing as political science, which is to say it's not. But these days there's so much that goes into exercise science, there's so many really smart people who try and go out there and try to figure out that perfect blend of nutrition science and exercise science and all this stuff it gets really into the weeds. I just think to myself you know, our ancestors just kind of existed in the way they existed. They seem to do all right, except for maybe getting eaten by bears. So I'm like maybe we should probably just kind of move back to that lifestyle.
Speaker 1:I think that this is a pretty good place to take a break and we can get into strength training a little bit more for the next episode, since we talked mostly about cardio. But I think people should definitely take into account the EPOC effect and that you can really get more from your exercise than just steady state cardio like jogging or cycling at a moderate pace Because we're busy. Everyone's so busy. We everyone talks about how I don't have time to exercise at all, which I definitely sympathize with that. But if you think about it, going for a five mile run, that takes some time, if potentially up to an hour. Some people are going to go much faster than that and you're probably only going to burn calories for a couple hours after that, versus you could go do a really intense sprint exercise in 15 minutes and potentially burn calories more for two whole days and you're still going to have an increased VO2 max and be working on your cardiovascular health. But you're going to be also working on strength from those explosive fast-switch muscle fibers and you'll be burning more calories over a longer period of time, probably much more than you would in just that two hours after steady-state cardio. If you're someone who's passionate about steady-state cardio, then I encourage you to continue doing it. It's great.
Speaker 1:Make sure you're resting, make sure you're having proper technique, look out for stress, fractures and other tissue breakdown from chronic overuse without proper recovery. But more power to you. Go ahead and do it. But I would encourage anyone who does it to also consider throwing in high-intensity interval training or sprinting once a week at the very least to throw in some more EPOC.
Speaker 1:Well, that's a good place to wrap up. We talked about EPOC and having higher, increased caloric burn after exercises and how sprinting versus steady state cardio and how sprinting can have a higher EPOC effect. We talked about some of the cardiovascular effects from both forms of exercise and how there's really a place for steady state cardio and sprinting and HIIT training, and I'd encourage everyone who does one or the other to add a little variety into their life and do a little bit of both, because they both clearly have benefits. And, as always, make sure you are recovering well and appropriately, getting good hydration, making sure you're getting enough sleep so that you can avoid all of these chronic injuries that people get, especially when they're participating in steady state cardio.
Speaker 2:Oh, you should throw in a thing about protein and how much that's necessary for, particularly if you're doing weightlifting.
Speaker 1:Well, sure, a lot of people don't get enough protein in their diet. I recommend around two grams per kilogram of body weight if you're taking your exercise seriously. I think we talked about that a little bit in our sarcopenia episode, where people are dealing with muscle mass loss and how it's so unhealthy for you. But yeah, in general, the more you exercise, it's hard to overdo protein. It's also more satiating, makes you full faster and actually in a sense, helps you burn more calories when you eat more protein, that's definitely but it's also repairing those muscles.
Speaker 1:Yeah, without giving yourself the building blocks to repair. When you're doing all that microtrauma, it's hard to heal and recover, so make sure you're feeding yourself adequately, even if you are trying to lose weight. It's important to have that balance. Nicole, thanks for joining me. Really enjoyed the episode. On the next episode, we're going to cover the differences in different types of strength training that we can do, so stick around for that. We should have that episode up in a week from this one. So I'm going to be working on that. Remember be humble, be happy, be healthy. Go do some squats.
