Evidence Based Fitness
Evidence Based Fitness is an organization which provides individually tailored evidence based diet an
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https://www.instagram.com/reel/CaIYuSSF4PA/?utm_medium=copy_link
Watch this reel by squat_university on Instagram squat_university • Original Audio
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🤪Cheat Weekends... 🌭🍔🍟🍕🥓🍳🥞🍨🍿🍩🍪🍺
We've all had "cheat meals" and perhaps even "cheat days"...
But what about a full on "cheat weekend"?
We've all been there at some point or another... I know I have... 🤥
Maybe you just went through a "Cheat Weekend" 🤯
If so, then you need to... Watch This Video because it will show you how to "Hit The Reset Button" and get back on track after blowing your diet over the weekend...
Did you have a "Cheat Weekend"?
If so, Here's How To Fix It:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmfSmoGvFm0
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https://www.instagram.com/p/CWLiPoNgCvR/?utm_medium=copy_link
Evidence Based Fitness Evidence Based Fitness is an organization which provides individually tailored evidence based diet and exercise programming and consultation.
05/02/2021
Swings are a dynamic exercise that can bring a variety of benefits to the proverbial exercise table. As a whole-body exercise, swings train the posterior chain – the muscles of the back half of your body, running along your spine and hips down to your heels. In addition to stabilizing the spine, the posterior chain is essential for maintaining postural balance with the muscles of the front of the body. In everyday activities and sport, the posterior chain generates the strength and power needed for movement.
Originally made popular with kettlebells, swings can be done with any weighted implement – no fancy equipment required. To perform a two-handed swing using a dumbbell, clutch one end of the weight with both hands or interlock the hands around the handle and swing just like using a kettlebell. Additionally, one-arm dumbbell swings make for great unilateral work.
To incorporate swings metabolically, select a lighter weight and do for time or total swings, resting as needed. For strength and power training, use traditional set and rep schemes with a heavier load. Swings make an excellent finishing movement at the end of any training session.
Add swings to your programming to improve your health, stability, and athleticism today. http://www.ebfitness.app/
01/02/2021
Exercise Spotlight: Rear Foot Elevated Split Squat (RFESS), also known as the “Bulgarian Split Squat”, is an excellent knee-dominant single leg movement. Over the traditional squat, the RFESS offers a greater balance challenge and increased stabilizer activation while using a far lesser load to achieve an equivalent training stimulus.
How should the movement be used? The RFESS makes for a great secondary movement on a lower body training day following a traditional squat or hinge-based movement. Alternatively, the lift can be beneficial in environments where limited or no external loading is available, making it a great selection for a home gym training program. Back injuries make traditional loading too painful? The one-leg nature of the lift can cut the loading on the back by half while still providing for a full training effect on the legs. http://www.ebfitness.app/
23/01/2021
Rest intervals are a critical variable for exercise and can dictate the nature of the training adaptation.
The “best" rest interval depends on your exercise goals. Shorter rest periods (30-60 seconds) can increase metabolic factors in the muscle, but incomplete recovery can reduce total training loads and limit the tension on the muscle. Longer rest periods ( >3 min+) lead to full recovery and higher training loads, but limits metabolic challenges to the muscle. Moderate rest periods (1-2 min) may be the right compromise for allowing sufficient recovery periods to support challenging training loads while also providing the buildup of metabolic stress factors in the muscle.
Alternatively, tier your rest intervals to fit the nature of the movements: primary movements receive long rests to ensure a recovered nervous system to maintain performance across sets, secondary 'assistance' movements are paired with moderate rest, and tertiary ‘finishing’ movements have lower rest to drive up metabolism and push blood into the working muscles.
18/01/2021
What best defines what physiological outcome a given exercise produces? What makes one movement "cardio" while another similar movement "strength", like stair climbing versus loaded step ups?
Repetitions, especially when pushed close to voluntary fatigue as a function of total load, capture the nature of the body's adaptive response.
Thus the exact same movement, done with different loads to control for reps, dictates what can be a form of cardio, such as body weight squats done for many repetitions (20-30+) or muscle strength, like a barbell back squat done for few reps (1-10).
So even if access to novel equipment is reduced or old injuries limit exercise variation, progress can be made by focusing on the movements that DO work and adjusting the targeted reps to achieve your desired training outcome.
https://ebfitness.app/
14/01/2021
48 Hours left on our New Year / New Website sale!
20% Off on ALL training, diet, and consultation services through Jan 15, just use the code NEWYEAR21.
All new EBF clients receive a free washable mask - great for getting back into the gym.
See the new site at https://ebfitness.app/
09/01/2021
"How often should I do resistance training?" A frequent question and one dependent on a few, but important, factors:
1) What is your experience level?
2) What are your goals?
3) How well do your training needs fit your life's demands? To be effective, training *must* be consistent, working with your daily life, not against it.
For most, 2-3 dedicated weight sessions per week can cover the resistance training. Add in cardiovascular work, flexibility/mobility, and nutritional support to cover all the bases for a health and fitness program. Contact http://www.ebfitness.app/ to develop the right program for you.
04/01/2021
Tight on time for fitness? High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) may be exactly what the exercise physiologist ordered.
HIIT is a form of interval training characterized by brief periods of intense effort followed by longer periods of lower intensity active recovery. Often, HIIT sessions can provide the same the same benefits as a traditional steady state cardio work out in a fraction of the total time.
Another upside of HIIT – no treadmill required! Interval training can be done with a single barbell, a few DBs, or even just bodyweight in a limited space. String together a series of high metabolic cost movements [Think: Squats, Hinges, Lunges, and Presses – or even combinations of all the above] for time interspaced with fixed rest intervals. HIIT can pack a wallop, so start with just a few interval sets and build from there. See more at https://ebfitness.app/.
30/12/2020
Our new website is LIVE! Check us out at https://ebfitness.app/.
To celebrate, we're offering a 20% Off Sale on ALL training, diet, and consultation services till Jan 15, just use the code NEWYEAR21.
All new clients will receive a free Evidence Based Fitness mask. Contact us today - all initial consultations are *always* free!
26/12/2020
Flexible dieting takes into account holiday meals - even if they were bigger than planned - by fitting your caloric needs with the natural variation in your daily life.
Instead of focusing on past meals with regret, look at the frequency of what you have been doing well.
Considering the feeding opportunities across the week (3 meals per day x 7 days per week), even with a couple meals falling short of the plan, you are on target over 90% of the time - still landing that "A". Contact EBF to design a flexible diet to fit your needs for 2021.
22/12/2020
Gym closed? Social distancing doing a number on your exercise? Minimal access to equipment from your usual routine?
Schedule a consultation to get your training back on track for 2021.
Plus, consults make great gifts too - custom to any desired time block or budget. Contact Evidence Based Fitness at [email protected]
20/12/2020
The benefits of resistance training for building muscle, bone, and fitness are well known. However, these benefits are only possible when specific training parameters in load are met. Many who perceive themselves to be conducting “resistance training” are falling short in their training efforts due to insufficient load.
Simply, they are not training heavy enough to induce the positive adaptations associated to progressive resistance training.
To ensure you are optimizing your resistance training efforts, spend most of your training between 6-12 reps. In terms of intensiveness, training to failure is unnecessary and likely counterproductive if employed frequently. Instead, the last repetition should still be done with excellent form, and in terms of effort, be challenging to complete.
Contact Evidence Based Fitness at [email protected] to make sure your weight work is working for you.
17/12/2020
Exercise is not just for the gym. Small doses of physical activity interspersed throughout the day can lead to significant improvement in long-term health outcomes.
Have shoulder, neck, or back pain and work a desk job? Try some band pull-aparts when you take a break. A single set of 15-20 reps can help restore some postural balance, enhance scapular mobility, and reduce injury risk.
15/12/2020
The topic of our discussion today is behavior change, and the role personal trainers have in it. I chose this topic because a friend recently asked: “What exactly does an online personal trainer do”. My response was immediate: “we motivate, educate, and facilitate”. In essence, we help people change. But what exactly does that process look like? Can everyone benefit from a trainer? Especially an online trainer? Obviously the EBF team thinks so; but before we can show you some evidence, let’s take a moment to explain the process of change. Social psychologists have numerous theories to explain how people change. A popular one, and the one we use here at EBF is the Transtheoretical Model or Stage of Change Model by James Prochaska authored in 1977. The model describes six discrete stages of behavior change. They are listed below:
1. Pre-contemplation (where individuals are not interested in changing)
2. Contemplation (where individuals are thinking of change, but have taken no action)
3. Planning (individuals are actively intending to change, making a “plan”)
4. Action (individuals have put their plan in motion and the daily struggle to focus and resist falling backwards is in full effect)
5. Maintenance (individuals have reached at least one goal, and maintained their new behavior for some period of time)
6. Termination (individuals now face no temptation for relapse and the new behavior is fully integrated into their lives).
Some of you are going through these stages right now. You may be thinking that with the pandemic, now is not the time to start an exercise plan, not the time to think about yourself (pre-contemplation). Maybe you are thinking you will start at the New Year (planning). Maybe you are already working out and everything is just fine thank you very much (action, maintenance, etc…)
What does all this have to do with personal training? Your journey to health and fitness is a journey through the stages of change. And trainers, if they are doing their job right, can help you progress from any stage until you reach maintenance and termination. And I have evidence to prove it (see what I did there). A 2008 study, by Fischer and Bryant, demonstrated that personal trainers had a positive effect on exercise adherence, decisional balance, and self-efficacy on college females as they progressed through a resistance training program. A 2016 review of 18 studies on physical activity and diet interventions using the Transtheoretical Model concluded that such interventions led to greater fat loss, increases in fruit and vegetable consumption, and increased physical activity. And lastly, a 2000 study by Mazzetti et al showed that individuals exercising under the direct supervision of a personal trainer increased their upper and lower body strength over a 12 week period.
The evidence is clear that personal trainers have a positive effect on the quality, quantity, and longevity of your fitness journey. We know when to push you, and when to hold you back (going all out every time in the gym is not a good idea, future posts will elaborate on this). We can help you resist the temptation to blow your diet, or skip a workout (or 3), we can optimize your training plan to best suit your goals, and lastly we can provide some much needed accountability.
Contact us today for a free consultation and one of our trainers will reach to you to see how we can help. Direct message or email at us: [email protected]
Don’t Take My Word For It
Fischer, D. V., & Bryant, J. (2008). Effect of certified personal trainer services on stage of exercise behavior and exercise mediators in female college students. Journal of American college health: 56(4), 369–376. https://doi.org/10.3200/JACH.56.44.369-376
Marcus, B. H., & Simkin, L. R. (1994). The transtheoretical model: applications to exercise behavior. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 26(11), 1400–1404.
Mazzetti, S. A., Kraemer, W. J., Volek, J. S., Duncan, N. D., Ratamess, N. A., Gómez, A. L., Newton, R. U., Häkkinen, K., & Fleck, S. J. (2000). The influence of direct supervision of resistance training on strength performance. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 32(6), 1175–1184. https://doi.org/10.1097/00005768-200006000-00023
McClaran S. R. (2003). The effectiveness of personal training on changing attitudes towards physical activity. Journal of sports science & medicine, 2(1), 10–14.
Effect of Certified Personal Trainer Services on Stage of Exercise Behavior and Exercise Mediators in Female College Students (2008). Effect of Certified Personal Trainer Services on Stage of Exercise Behavior and Exercise Mediators in Female College Students. Journal of American College Health: Vol. 56, No. 4, pp. 369-376.
12/12/2020
Training with a mask on can present unique challenges for fitness through increased difficulty with breathing and hydration. Make some fundamental programming changes to bypass mask issues and set PRs, all while staying safe in the gym.
Instead of metabolic-based training, switch gears to strength training. Where metabolic-based training revolves around an elevated heart rate and fatigue, strength training focuses on performance. Metabolic-based training will incur a substantial oxygen debt, which must be made up through increased respiration. Performance-based strength training, while it will certainly elevate your HR, does NOT go to failure – thus leaving reps 'in the tank' to ensure technical proficiency and a fresh nervous system. The side effect of this is a lower oxygen debt and less need for compensatory breathing done with a mask on.
So, how can you add performance-based strength training to your workout? For your next lower body workout, DON’T do a circuit of a wide range of movements, all done with lower rest intervals. Instead, focus on two main squat or deadlift-based compound movements. Following a dynamic warm up, do 3-6 working sets at 10 reps or less, seeking to add weight each set till you reach a load that is done with perfect form, but very challenging. For this form of training, longer rests are needed to ensure the nervous system recovers between sets, so rest 90-120 seconds. No need to just sit there – do tissue activation or easy mobilization drills for active recovery. Follow your primary movements with some structurally similar, but less technically demanding accessory movements to complete your training session.
Altogether, training smart can mitigate any downsides of exercise with a mask while improving your performance over the long term in the gym. To learn more about optimizing your own training, contact Evidence Based Fitness at [email protected].
09/12/2020
“Weight loss” is a perennially popular goal as the new year approaches. While seemingly objective, achieving lasting weight loss often remains elusive.
How can this be?
The focus on weight loss itself often neglects building the machinery that burns fat: building muscle. Additionally, strict diets and excessive cardio combine to create an environment that reduces muscle mass and impairs performance. Sure, weight went down, but for how long and at what cost?
Moving forward, don’t seek “weight loss” - instead build muscle to lose fat. Contact Evidence Based Fitness at [email protected] to add some muscle to your fitness 2021 fitness goals.
08/12/2020
The mission of Evidence Based Fitness (EBF) is to provide research supported, individually tailored fitness and nutrition counseling. What does it mean to be evidence based? Evidence based means that our programming is based in science, not in myth nor fad. The fitness industry is literally flooded with misinformation, disinformation and half-truths. Our trainers will sift through that for you, delivering work-out programs and diet plans scientifically guaranteed to help you reach your goals. We will be with you every step of the way; we care about our clients, and their goals. That is part of what makes us good at our jobs. At EBF, we are not flashy. We don’t ride the latest tidal wave of pseudo-science; we read research, we consult with experts, and we stick to what works.
05/12/2020