Body By Science, Fasting and BFR Training Results (with pics!)

(Windmill Tilter) #61

Interesting! I either glossed over that, or it went over my head. Probably both because I don’t know what a cytokine is. :yum:

I’ll be really curious to hear what you find out! :+1:

(Eric - The patient needs to be patient!) #62

Dr McGuff talks about the metabolic responses in this presentation video. Most of it starts at about 21 mins and is scattered through the rest of the video. https://youtu.be/RwgywNZzEi4?t=1267

There is a lot of information to unpack in this video. Nick if you get a chance to watch this let me know what you think.

This information Dr. McGuff presents give me hope that I can continue to improve and reverse my biological age.

(Windmill Tilter) #63

I’m definitely going to check this out. :+1:

(charlie3) #64

Workout systems tend to get more complicated than they need to be which ends up leaving lifters over trained. A lot of approaches work about equally well, none of them work forever.

At 70 years old and 20 months in, I want to gain for as long as possible, not fast as possible. The challenge I’m having right now is adding muscle without adding fat. Once I get to 13% body fat my body wants to add more fat faster than muscle and trying to reduce that fat reduces the muscle faster. I hope there is a drug free solution for this. Time will tell.

Another thing that challenges me is priorities. I have to put health first. I’m spending extra time on moderate intensity cardio aiming to remodel my vascular system end to end, not just have a stronger heart. I also want to burn a lot of calories by activity so all the supporting organs and processes get a workout. I can’t do those things with lifting alone which I can tolerate for 2 hours a week.

(Windmill Tilter) #65

That’s why I love the Body by Science approach. It’s 5 exercises, it takes 15 minutes, and I do it once per week. It doesn’t get any simpler than that.

This is a great way to approach weightlifting. I’d bet the leading cause of people giving up on weightlifting isn’t laziness, it’s injury. I did stronglifts 5x5 and I really enjoyed it until I hurt my lower back. By the time my back was squared away I’d lost the motivation to restart lifting, particularly since I was concerned about my back. Body by Science was developed to minimize the risk of injury, it’s pretty much the safest way to lift!

In the book Body by Science, McGuff claims that you can optimize the cardiovascular system with lifting alone. You should check out Skyler Tanner on this topic as well. I’ve seen the research that supports the claim. I’m going to do my own personal experiment on this point by getting a VO2 max test done, and comparing it to my VO2 max in 6 months.

(Windmill Tilter) #66

I hit the gym today for a Body by Science workout and wow, what a difference a couple extra recovery days make! I was making really slow progress the last couple of weeks. This week I waited for a full 6 days before lifting again and my lifts went way up! I love lifting weights now, so I have a tendency to go to the gym too soon (just 3 or 4 days rest). The extra couple days of recovery made a huge difference. Bear in mind that these exercises are done to total muscle failure, so both days represent 100% effort. My strength is coming back!

From now I’ll be taking a full 7 days between workouts; obviously I simply don’t recover in 3-4 days progress was very slow. Over-training is counterproductive so I won’t be doing that again! I’m going to be really curious to see how BFR training will let me sneak in an extra workout since it causes muscle hypertrophy via metabolic stress rather than central nervous system stress, and it causing very little muscle damage (relative to BBS).

(charlie3) #67

All summer I did 2 one hour walks daily (semi brisk), 50-60 miles a week and then 1 hour lifting twice a week. For the past 3 weeks I’ve finally had access to a schwinn airdyne in the place I’ve been living so 2 45 min rides daily at 70% of age adjusted max heart rate and half as much walking. The airdyne is less wearing than the walking so I’ve been able to raise activity calories from 30% to nearly 40% with no apparent additional fatigue. Now I’m back home where I have an airdyne and a basement gym. I might do the same exercises, sets and total time per week spread over 3 days instead of two.

I know this is way out of line with the system you are following. I believe the extra lower intensity activity has long term benefits that don’t come any other way, especially walking. All the lower intensity work may be slowing muscle mass gaiins but I’m still gaining and that’s enough. May be someday I’ll come around to 5 sets once a week. Right now I’m happier doing 6 sets of 10 exercises on 2 or 3 days a week. I was a hobby lifter in my 30’s.

I look unusual compared to other 70 year olds but go back to the days before cars, electricity and tractors and 70 year olds in my condition would be a common sight. So all that time and work just to reach normal. But we have to go back 150 years to see the normal we’re talking about.

(Windmill Tilter) #68

@CaptainKirk, I bought some occlusion bands! They should be delivered on Monday, and I can’t wait to try them. I’m also looking into getting a set of the clinical grade one’s after I experiment with these one’s a bit. I know you recommended the rigid one’s, but from what I’ve read the risk of arterial occlusion due to muscle expansion is mitigated by the elasticity and smaller width. The risk is really tiny, but the fact that this set was $10.00 cheaper tipped the scales. These are the one’s I got:

If the BFR bands don’t impair my recovery, and I’m able to make weekly strength gains with my Body by Science workouts, I’ll buy the expensive one’s. I like the idea of using the same precision pneumatic cuffs they used in most of the BFR research. I’d like to be able to know the precise pressure being used for compression so I have a repeat-ability from workout to workout so I can do a bit of experimentation. I’m considering a handheld ultrasound as well to monitor arterial blood flow as a function of cuff pressure. That’s overkill obviously, but I’m a gadget/data geek at heart…:yum:

(Windmill Tilter) #69

Oh, it’s much worse than that.:yum: It’s actually just one set per week for each exercise!

Nobody believes that one set per week could work until they try it and need to sleep on the couch for a few days because they can’t walk up stairs…:rofl:

I’m not knocking low intensity exercise in the least. I think it’s great! I’m still losing weight though, which is why I’m trying to minimize exercise as much as possible. There are some people who are capable of losing weight despite exercising every day, but I’m definitely not one of them. When I’m no longer losing weight, I plan on upping my exercise.

(Kirk Wolak) #70

Yeah, these are a tighter band than my original elastic ones.

I was not worried about the over tightening issues, but I know it can happen as the arms (especially) get a severe pump going. I just keep checking my pulse at by my elbow.

Keep me posted on the progress. I truly think doing this 1-2 days before your Slow Slow weekly routine would be best. I tend to go WAY overboard (no weights, until exhaustion, while walking). But have seen AWESOME progress on my arms. To the point that people are asking if I am lifting weights! Will do another scan to see the differences Jan 1st.

After you do about 5 workouts, I think you will kick yourself if you bought the expensive ($5,000 unit)… I would… LOL

(Kirk Wolak) #71

I am going to meet Dr. Ben in Jan 2020! Woot Woot!

Also, another guy (Drew Baye) in this space. Awesome guy to follow.
He explains how you have to adjust the motion to do with Free Weights or Body Weights.
Love it!

Nothing beats free! And these routines adapted like this, can be used with BFR!

(Windmill Tilter) #72

Yeah, definitely not getting the $5,000 one! The one I want is quite a bit less expensive ($270). It’s sold by an extremely reputable brand that marketed for clinical use by physiotherapists. They offer in person training and certification. To prevent occlusion, they actually recommend using a handheld ultrasound. The ultrasound unit only costs $125. Like I said though, the ultrasound is probably over-kill, but in a physiotherapy clinic, it’s well worth from a liability perspective. Taking my pulse on legs and feet will be just fine for me.

Here is the setup I’d like to get:

dGz7vc7.png1378×875

Here is a link:

(Windmill Tilter) #73

Yup. I love Drew Baye. I bought his HIT book. It’s fantastic! The “big 5” that Dr. McGuff recommends is definitely just a starting point for HIT.

Great link btw! :+1::+1::+1:

(charlie3) #74

I get it, you mean 1 set of 5 exercises. This morning is the first workout since getting home. I did 2 sets of 10 exercises insted of 3 sets in 40 minutes. I’ll try that 3 time a week instead of 3 sets twice a week. I’ll be paying attention to how recovered I am.

You mention exercise vs weight loss. I agree that using exercise to promote body fat reduction is not a magic pill but it can play a couple of useful roles. I’m sure we agree that adequate exercise is necessary to minimize loss of lean body mass. There’s another possibility.

Satiety has been a challenge for me from the start. I stopped buying nuts and cheese because they are too tempting for snacks. I gave up on carnivore after 60 days because I was always hungry and over eating. I keep a very large non starchy salad in the meal plan because it’s filling and covers the micros.

I made a discovery putting a Schwinn Airdyne back in the routine recently. First, I don’t run.
Without the Airdyne I could exercise to a point where activity is 30% of daily calories (walking plus lifting). With the Airdyne and less walking I can increase calories to 40%.and feel the same or less fatique than at 30%. The practical effect of this, for me, is it’s become a challenge to eat that much additional food while keeping to my 40 net carbs real food diet. So far the Airdyne is giving me more control over food because I can be always satiated if I want to be without eating surplus calories.

One more thing you mention, occlusion training. I’m not going to let my resistance training get complicated. Before cars, electricity and tractors people got impressive physiques and good health with lifestyle alone. I’m trying to emulate that and look the part.

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(Windmill Tilter) #75

This is a really important point that is easily overlooked. In the absence of resistance training or something else, weight loss can lean toward lean mass loss which nobody wants!

(Eric - The patient needs to be patient!) #76

Nick,

I’m doing 7 days right now. My emotional brain wants to do more in a week because I see fantastic results.

My intellectual brain knows that 7 days is good based on the numbers.

My recent benefits in no particular order

  • visual improved muscle definition
  • fat loss as evidenced by wrinkles (aka lose skin) in many places that I would not expect including but not limited to:
    • neck
    • inside upper thighs
    • above knee caps
    • lower legs
    • largest part of my belly
    • upper arms (grandma arms LOL)
  • lower BP
  • need less sleep and even when short I’m rested

I could go on. BBS HIT Training is amazing.

I’m not experiencing DOMS for the lower body and some slight in the upper. Upper soreness shows up day 4 and goes to day 5 or 6.

(Windmill Tilter) #77

For those HIT resistance training aficionados out there who suffer from delayed onset muscle soreness, here is the best article I’ve read to date. It provides a nice summary of the existing research on the subject: what doesn’t work at all, which might help a little, and one thing that has shown promise (curcumin).

I was really intrigued to see that curcumin mentioned, because this time around doing HIT, I’m having more DOMS than I did last year. One thing that’s different is that last year I was preemptively using turmeric & black pepper on a frequent basis because I was concerned about keto resulting in a gout flare-up. I can’t say whether it did any good for the gout, but I didn’t have a flare up. What’s interesting is that curcumin is a concentrated extract of turmeric, and piperine is a concentrated extract of black pepper. Long story short, I haven’t been taking it this year, and my DOMS is way worse.

You can buy concentrated curcumin & piperine as a supplement pretty inexpensively. It’s a powerful inflammatory with heaps of research in treating arthritis (gout is a form of arthritis). I’m going to buy some and see what happens.

(Windmill Tilter) #78

Well, I tried my BFR bands for the first time. I had them for a week before I tried it. The idea of blood flow restriction training sounds a bit crazy to me, and it kind of weirds me out. I had never even heard of it before a few weeks ago. I was really reluctant to try it.

I’ve got to say though, the literature is pretty compelling. There are literally hundreds of journal articles spanning decades on the subject, and it’s being used by thousands of physiotherapists throughout the world. It’s basically standard operating procedure now in the recovery of athletes in pro sports. It’s not crazy, and it’s safer than traditional resistance training. The evidence is overwhelming that it works.

Well I tried it. All I can say is wow! It felt a little weird, but in a good way. Since it was my first time, I decided to go really light. I my 1 rep max for the leg press is about 705lbs. I decided to start with bodyweight squats to see what would happen. I did the recommended workout of 4 sets with 30 seconds rest between (30,15,15,15).

The first set was so easy that I didn’t think it was working, and I considered tightening the bands. That turned out to be unnecessary. I was completely stunned when I could barely finish the 4th set! Unbelievable! I was absolutely shocked. Same thing for my bicep curls. Having been humbled body weight squats, I dropped my dumbbells down to 5lbs. It was embarrassing, but who cares. I couldn’t finish the 4th set. Wow!!!

The next thing will be to see how it effects my recovery. If I’m able to increase or maintain my time under tension (TUT) on all my lifts for my weekly BBS workout on Sunday, I will be thrilled. If I can increase hypertrophy 50% each week, with an additional 15 minute time investment, I’d say it’s a win.

(Kirk Wolak) #79

Nick,
Awesome. I, too, was blown away. The pure simplicity.
And there are an estimated 18,000 BFR Training Sessions PER DAY, Every Day!

This is the second best kept secret behind KETO. And I honestly believe it is because it works and will be incredibly disruptive.

The hypertrophy has been impressive in about 6 weeks, my forearms and biceps, and chest has really been re-shaping. And this is adding ONE day a week of BFR to a 1 day BBS/wk workout! (I fast too much, it turns out, to do BBSx2 in a week).

Yeah, the workouts SEEM like “no big deal”. I do isometrics while walking. Bodyweight exercise is perfect. And these things TRAVEL easily! Even better, you can do this type of workout almost DAILY, because of how it tricks the body. (Professional Athletes can do use it daily).

I am curious, how was your DOMS? (Should not really have too much).
Do be careful with overtightening (we all do it, lol), I had to loosen my arms up on my last walk. The pump I was getting was starting to hurt. But I did 4 sets of 40 (weightless/isometric). And when I was done, I couldn’t lift my arms!

#80

Thats great, looking forward to your updates :slight_smile: