
You Don't Need to Exercise for Hours a Week to Look and Feel Better - theBashShell
https://www.inc.com/christina-desmarais/15-minutes-a-day-is-all-it-takes-to-be-more-fit-according-to-science.html
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colbyh
This feels like pseudoscience dressed up as the real thing.

"Getting stronger only takes 13 minutes three times a week" starts off with a
reference to a recently published paper that looks promising, but the second
paragraph is about the author's personal belief that high intensity/slow
motion workouts are the best for you. There's no real connection between these
two paragraphs except that they both prescribe shorter weigh lifting sessions.

"You can improve your body's function and alleviate anxiety in two minutes a
day" again lists someone's personal take on dealing with anxiety and stress.
While deep breathing is certainly helpful they don't site any peer reviewed
papers or clinical studies that say 2-4 minutes of deep breathing a day will
impact your heart rate/blood pressure/anxiety much less do it via increasing
alpha waves.

"Cutting out sugar..." is similarly good intentioned (almost everyone should
eat less sugar than they do, myself included) but again cites nothing
meaningful.

Also this damn site somehow popped up two autoplaying audio/video ads, one of
which I could not see or get rid of. Rage inducing.

~~~
kace91
I am no expert but I tend to read a lot of studies and interviews/talks with
Phd's regarding fitness, and the consensus is that the most important
predictor for muscle growth is volume (time under tension). That is, the
longer your muscle fights the load, the more you grow, provided you have
sufficient nutrition and rest.

Everything else (time of the day when you work out, number of repetitions /
series, specific exercises, etc) is secondary and seems to only matter insofar
as it allows you to stay more time under tension...

So I'd be VERY sceptical of anyone who claims you can have great results in X
minutes a day.

With that said, it takes very little time under tension for a newbie to
stimulate growth. But that effect doesn't last for long.

~~~
Zanni
The cited study specifically says that muscle growth (hypertrophy) _does_
improve with volume, from 1 to 3 to 5 sets, but that _strength gain_ doesn't
differ significantly. There's a lot of conflation between hypertrophy and
strength. You can be strong without being big (up to a point) and vice versa.

~~~
stochastic_monk
This reinforces what strength athletes have said for a long time. The point
was that in this short study, strength came from intensity (weight lifted) and
size came from volume. (Hence a powerlifting program might have 3 sets of 3 to
5 of 5, whereas bodybuilding programs have much higher volume at lower
weight.)

This isn’t surprising; strength gains are substantially neurological. Over
time, though, you still need more muscle to move heavier weight.

I know a some powerlifters, and their personal size varies with their volume
(and whether or not they want size). Some are deceptively small for the weight
they can move. That being said, you can’t deadlift 500 pounds without putting
on some significant mass, either.

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BLKNSLVR
The last third of this short article is about cutting sugar out of your diet.

Anecdotal:

For the last two and a bit weeks I've stopped adding sugar to anything, and
stopped having any dessert or pointless snacks that are primarily sugar.

One week in and people asked if I'd lost weight. For most of last year I was
hanging around 86 kilograms and probably tending slowly upwards. I weighed in
mid last week at 83.

No other habits have changed.

Don't know if I "feel" any different, other than being hungry more often and
physically feeling the void of the drug-like high of sugar intake to the point
that I need to pursue an activity in order to distract myself from it. Two
weeks isn't very far in though.

~~~
ardit33
Most likely just water loss...

Every bodybuilder knows: when they start 'cutting', the first few kgs, in the
first couple weeks are almost water loss and glycogen, so you always discount
it (i.e. don't count it as fat loss).

Eating carbs (carbo-hydrades) makes your body retain more water. Less ingested
carbs means your body will shed that extra water out.

After the first week or so, if you keep losing weight, then it means that it
is actual fat loss.

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nradov
High intensity single set training can absolutely work to build strength, if
that's what you want. But muscular endurance takes longer to develop. And be
careful trying to lift too heavy too soon; your muscles may be fine but you
can really damage your tendons if you don't build them up gradually.

~~~
Zanni
If you click through to the study, they say they tested endurance too (at 50%
1RM). It may be that one set is insufficient to build endurance at higher
loads (say 80% 1RM), but not clear. The biggest difference between 1, 3 and 5
sets was muscle hypertrophy (which increased with the number of sets). A _lot_
of "strength" training has hypertrophy as an unstated goal, which makes sense
if you're training for the football team, but less so if you're just training
for life.

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sridca
Eat meat. Do calisthenics[1]. Practice prolonged fasting every month. There is
no money to be made in any of these activities (hence you won't see it as part
of everyday propaganda).

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-
reviews/R2G0WUH73YBFYE/](https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-
reviews/R2G0WUH73YBFYE/)

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dejaime
Scientists: #########################################

"Yeah, let's get 34 males that did not regularly workout and then prove that
they can get stronger even with 13 minutes of a good workout routine!

All we need to do is get non-lifters and put the 70 minute group with a shitty
lazy routine. That ensures the "year one effect" where everyone gains a lot of
strength in the beginning and gives a good advantage to the 13 minutes group!

In the end we'll prove that for a beginner a good yet short workout routine is
superior to the lazy yet long one!"

Journalist: #########################################

"That's not going to get any clicks! I'll just say that 'we don't need to
exercise for hours a week to look and feel better' based on a research that
doesn't even mention 'look and feel better'.

And now we pretend that this also applies to experienced lifters, that's
important!"

That's science journalism for you.

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blocked_again
My daily exercise routine is to walk for an hour (8000 - 10000 feet) in the
evening and then do pushup and situps as much as I can. I am currently at 30
pushups and 20 situps. I have started the pushups and situps only recently but
I have been walking for a while now. Is this healthy?

~~~
mikekchar
Certainly healthier than not doing it! "Healthy" in the context you've used is
not a binary state. "If I do X it is healthy, therefore I will do X and I
don't have to do anything else". Unfortunately it doesn't work like that.

It's more like a curve and it's not just one thing. So you can be super fit
training for marathons, but honestly you need some excess muscle mass because
you're going to start losing it when you are 50-60 years old. You need to make
sure that you are flexible because when you get older, if you aren't flexible
you won't be able to balance and walk, etc. It's best to start training early
so that it's easier to maintain that flexibility. Even if you are running
marathons and staying trim, if you eat junk you can die of lots of different
conditions. So endurance training, strength training, flexibility training,
and diet all work together to help your health.

At the same time, there are lots of ranges of activity where you will be just
fine as you age and there are ranges of activity at both ends (sedentary and
over training) where you won't be fine (although it's a heck of a lot harder
to over train that to be sedentary ;-) ). Finally, there is something to be
said for not overdoing things at a start. So while you might want to have this
amazing training regimen someday, it would be a bad idea to start out tomorrow
and do it -- you want to slowly work your way up to it.

So the answer you are probably looking for is "No, it's probably not
sufficient to keep you fit and healthy for your whole life". But it's
certainly a great start -- especially if it gets you doing other things that
you might not have tried before. And it doesn't have to be training -- it can
be playing soccer with a local league, or cycling with your friends or any
number of social and pleasant activities.

How much is enough? Try to keep your weight, muscle mass, endurance and
flexibility a fair bit more than what you actually need so that you can afford
to lose some. Eat a diet that makes you feel good and consult with doctors
when you have health problems. It's hard to say exactly what that will entail,
because it is different for everybody.

~~~
blocked_again
Thanks. This is a great piece of advice. I loved playing soccer and cycling
when I was growing up. I should start again with that :)

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joker3
"one set to failure is all you need!" is one of those ideas that seems to come
up every fifteen years or so, and gets really popular for a while before
people discover that it doesn't really work all that well. Mike Mentzer was an
advocate in the 80s, it was popular when I was just starting out in 2003 or
so, and I guess it's coming around again.

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RegW
Is it possible to turn off the irritating music on this page. Sorry, but I
like to choose my own.

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newnewpdro
As little as a one ~maxreps set of pushups every day before showering will
have you looking like a soldier after a couple years, assuming you're not
starting out obese and are eating reasonably.

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rambojazz
What does "one ~maxreps" mean?

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NegativeK
One means one set of pushups, no rests.

Maxreps means do pushups until you can't do another, despite digging really
deep.

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stefanperson
I'd have a look at what Dr. John Jaquish is doing with the X3 Bar.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ewn0f7LY7c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ewn0f7LY7c)

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alphabettsy
This feels a lot like an ad.

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luxuryballs
Yeah but I mean look what he’s doing with the X3 bar.

