Strength Changes Everything

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about dose-response and what it means for your fitness...   Learn how a little-known principle in exercise determines whether you get the fitness results you are looking for, or you just spend some time moving weights up and down at the gym. Find out why the dose-response to exercise is what you should really be paying attention to, and how it can guide you to easier fitness gains in a shorter amount of time. More exercise is not necessarily better. The dose-response relationship applies not only to medication and stressors but also to exercise. It describes the magnitude of the response the body has in response to a stressor, in this case exercise and the response is the result that we are looking for. Your body is what produces the results and adaptations that you want, not the exercise. If the stress is of sufficient intensity or quality, you will get the response that you want. Just going through the motions of exercise won’t necessarily produce an adaptive response in the body. You also need to give the body enough time and resources to produce the response you are looking for. Exercising too often is actually preventing your body from adapting and growing. This is how athletes experience overtraining. The adaptations occur after the exercise session is complete, and only if the stimulus is of a high enough intensity and quality. Exercise is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Just putting in time exercising isn’t necessarily a good thing. A lot of what passes for exercise is just enjoyable activity, and it won’t trigger adaptations or reverse the effects of aging. Exercise impacts every system of the body. For every single exercise session, you should be able to measure the improvements in fitness level. This is a key component of the program at the Exercise Coach. When you don’t see improvements between sessions, it means one of two things. Either you need to increase the intensity of the exercise, or increase the amount of rest and recovery between sessions. Your dose-response is very individualized. The amount of stimulus you need to generate an adaptation will vary. At the Exercise Coach, client’s individual abilities are measured and programs are designed to be just the right fit for them. At the end of the day, the right intensity for one is different from the right intensity for another.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about how strength training should complement dieting for weight loss...   Dr. James Fisher answers the question “Why does muscle really matter for weight loss?” Find out why muscle mass should be a vital component of your weight loss strategy and why dieting without strength training is a recipe for long term disaster for your body.  There is a direct connection between your body’s muscle mass and its metabolic effectiveness, the ability to lose fat and keep it off, and your overall health. Why does muscle matter for weight loss? Muscle is metabolic reactive and consumes calories just by existing. You will burn a larger number of calories on a daily basis by having more muscle mass than someone with less. Instead of thinking about weight loss, we should think of it as fat loss because we don’t want to lose just any kind of weight, we want to improve body composition. Focusing on weight loss can be discouraging when people lose less weight than they hoped without taking into account gains in muscle mass. Without strength training, any weight you lose with dieting or activity will not be as much fat as you could lose by incorporating strength training into your routine. Anyone who goes on a calorie reduction plan to lose weight will end up with about 50% of the weight loss occurring within their muscle mass, which is an absolute tragedy. We want to hang on to as much muscle mass as we can as we age. Diet and cardio without strength training exacerbate the loss of metabolically valuable muscle tissue. Protein is a great calorie to consume as it’s thermogenic and used to absorb some of the protein you take in. Government nutrition guidelines should be adjusted to account for this. Maintaining your muscle mass has the additional benefit of preventing and reducing injuries so you can continue enjoying aerobic activities as you age. Weight loss without strength training results in frailty. In the older population, people who are lean are generally weak and have poor mobility. The best thing to do is to focus on strength training to build muscle and improve quality of life along the way. If you increase the amount of muscle mass you have, you will burn more calories by default. Muscle also stores glucose, which will help you with insulin-related conditions like Diabetes.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Dr. James Fisher, Chief Science Officer of The Exercise Coach, discusses innovative strength training techniques to alleviate lower back pain. He reveals why traditional exercises like deadlifts may not effectively target lower back muscles and emphasizes the importance of isolation exercises. Surprisingly, significant strength gains can occur in just 15 minutes a week! The talk also covers safe ways to strengthen lower backs across different age groups, the potential for enhanced mobility, and how tailored approaches can help combat chronic pain.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about solving the problems causing lower back pain...   Brian Cygan and Dr. James Fisher discuss the origins of lower back pain and why the vast majority of Americans will experience some form of lower back pain in their lives. Learn about the root cause of lower back pain and why most treatments only deal with the symptoms and the pain instead of solving the problem, which often leads to even worse issues down the road. Fisher is an academic and researcher in the UK. He’s published research on muscular strengthening as well as lower back pain. Lower back pain is a constant issue for a large swath of society. According to his study, somewhere between 70% and 90% of people will experience lower back pain in their lives. Lower back pain can be extremely debilitating to a person’s lifestyle and sleep patterns, and can have a major impact on their mental health as well. There is also an enormous cost to society in terms of productivity. At the Strength Coach, we’ve found that strengthening is an important strategy to improving the quality of life of someone experiencing lower back pain. Chronic lower back is when it occurs for longer than three months. At that point it’s important to seek medical guidance from a physiotherapist or general practitioner. About 10% to 15% of people experiencing chronic lower back pain have a specific reason for it like nerve issues or a slipped disc. The remaining 85% to 90% have what’s referred to as non-specific back pain which reduces the ability to mitigate the pain. For many of those people, the solution is often some form of painkiller or passive treatment like stretching and massage. The theories about the existence of non-specific lower back pain have to do with our evolution from quadrupeds in the past. The muscles around the lower back don’t tend to get much direct exercise and there seems to be a correlation between non-specific lower back pain and weak or atrophied lumbar muscles. The muscles that are more intrinsic to the spine over time, as we live a normal life, can atrophy as a result of not using them in a specific and demanding enough way. For most people, their gluteal muscles and hamstrings are very developed and do a lot of the work that the muscles in the lower back should do, and this can result in those lower back muscles becoming weaker, misfiring, and causing pain. With non-specific back pain, strengthening the muscles in the lower back should be the foundational approach to prevent future episodes of lower back pain. Specific lower back exercises are important for everyone in society to maintain their strength and muscle mass in that region and avoid the onset of lower back pain. Once something negative has happened, the road to recovery gets longer. Your lower back is central to everything you do. Without good control of your central muscles, you cannot throw or catch or jump or move well. From there it’s a downward spiral into the realm of disability. An imbalance between ab strength and lower back muscle strength can be part of the problem. We want all of the muscles surrounding the core of the body to be trained effectively, and it’s the lower back muscles that tend to be forgotten. The weak link is usually the lumbar muscles, and this can lead to a negative feedback process, where someone avoids exercising those muscles even more to avoid the pain resulting in greater muscle atrophy. We have other societal factors that are also contributing to the lower back pain that so many people experience as part of their lives.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about the importance of muscle burn...   Amy Hudson and Brian Cygan explain why that feeling of your muscles burning is exactly what you want to feel every time you go to the gym. Learn why muscle burn is one of the best indications that you’re exercising at the right intensity and without it, you won’t get the fitness results you’re looking for. The intensity of an exercise is crucial to achieving the fitness results you want, and the feeling of muscle burn is a positive indication of that intensity. Effective exercise is simply a stimulus, where you stress the body in order for it to change for the better. Effective strength training needs to be intense enough to serve as that stimulus. Labored breathing, muscle burning, and a little discomfort are necessary elements of that kind of exercise. If you’re not experiencing some level of discomfort when exercising you are just going through the motions and aren’t putting in enough effort to see any real results. The fast-twitch muscle fibers are the ones that burn during exercise and they are the main focus of high-intensity exercise. The reason they burn is because they utilize the anaerobic subsystem of metabolism. Fast-twitch muscle fibers store sugar in the form of glycogen, and that’s what is consumed when exercising at an adequate intensity level. Muscle burn is a sign that you’re really tapping into the stored energy of your muscles, which is a good thing and you need to do to get stronger. Some people have more fast-twitch muscles than others and some muscle groups have more fast-twitch muscle fibers than others. Our natural response to the sensation of muscle burn is to be worried, but it’s okay to keep pushing through. The burn sensation is different from pain. As muscles fatigue near the end of a set, that’s when coaching and encouragement are vital. The brain is a prediction machine, and we have to intentionally override the survival mechanisms that tell us to stop exercising and preserve some energy in order to achieve the greatest results. People often look to muscle soreness as an indication that the workout was effective, but it doesn’t actually correlate to results later on. Muscle burn doesn’t necessarily lead to muscle soreness afterward. Eccentric training doesn’t burn as much as basic strength training, but it does produce more soreness later on. Delayed onset muscle soreness occurs more at the beginning of a new program and tends to reduce over time. The Exerbotics equipment gives Strength Coach clients an important advantage but showing progress over time instead of relying on sensations like muscle soreness. If your exercise isn’t delivering any changes to your body, then it’s not intense enough.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about life-changing advice and details about pre-diabetes...   Amy and Brian break down the science behind pre-diabetes and how strength training is the most efficient and effective way to escape the negative feedback loop of insulin resistance, systemic inflammation, and weight gain. If you or someone you know has been diagnosed as pre-diabetic, this information could change your life. Approximately 1 in 3 Americans are pre-diabetic, which increases their risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes, heart disease, and stroke, and most people don’t even realize they are at risk. Pre-diabetes also increases the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, problems with vision, and amputation later on in life. There are two leading factors to pre-diabetes: exercise and nutrition. As we lose muscle as we age, we develop insulin resistance which exacerbates the problem. High blood sugar levels over time lead to the wearing out of the body’s ability to even produce insulin. The good news is that pre-diabetes is a very modifiable condition that can be positively affected by exercise and proper nutrition. When we condition our muscles, we improve insulin sensitivity. Fast twitch muscle fibers store sugar in the form of glycogen, which removes it from the bloodstream. When muscles resist the effect of insulin, the insulin remains in the bloodstream at elevated levels and leads to systemic inflammation. Systemic inflammation is the root cause of all the health issues mentioned. Unlike acute inflammation, you don’t feel systemic inflammation except for the symptoms of the diseases and the effects of aging. The most important lifestyle recommendations are to start eating a whole food diet, eliminate high carbohydrates and refined sugars, and then begin strength training. A1C is the measurement of how saturated your red blood cells have become over a 90 day period. Whole food and whole effort strength training are how to keep that number in the safe range. Only strength training can target the fast twitch muscle fibers which are directly related to A1C levels in your body. People can experience tremendous improvements in their A1C levels over a short period of time just by implementing a strength training program in their life. If your doctor has diagnosed you as pre-diabetic, they are going to recommend exercise, and whole effort strength training is your best bet. Research shows that losing the first 5% of your body weight confers the majority of the health benefits, which is good because that means it’s easier to see results in a short period of time. Diabetes predisposes you to weight gain, but the reverse is also true. Elevated insulin levels, weight gain, and insulin resistance act on each other, which leads to a dangerous feedback loop. The best way to break the cycle is smart and brief strength training sessions.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about the Exercise Coach's strong business model...   Amy and Jesse Hudson explore the reasons the Exercise Coach saw phenomenal growth over the past 18 months while other fitness brands struggled to stay open. Learn about the key differences in the business model that make the Exercise Coach a great franchise to open, and why the community of franchisees that support one another is the secret ingredient to franchise success. Jesse is the National Franchise Director for the Exercise Coach. His job is to work with franchise candidates and educating them on what it means to open an Exercise Coach location and recruiting quality business owners to help continue the company’s growth. The last year was notoriously difficult for the fitness industry. Jesse had the opportunity to write an article last year detailing the growth of the Exercise Coach during the Covid pandemic in a national franchise journal. The number one factor that Jesse identified of the Exercise Coach brand was the one-to-one service delivery. Coach-led exercise environments have shown that they deliver excellent results, and this operating model has proven to be very resilient over the last year and really set the Exercise Coach apart from the traditional gyms. Even during restrictions, the Exercise Coach was able to train and cater to the same number of clients. The fact that it’s a personal training brand that doesn’t need as many clients in a single room has kept the Exercise Coach as a very desirable option for franchisee candidates. One thing that franchise candidates notice when they go through the process is the strength of the culture of the company. Without a good relationship between the franchisee and the franchisor, the brand suffers but people saw that Exercise Coach was a brand that went above and beyond to support franchisees. In franchise evaluation, there is a process called validation where you independently verify the information you’re receiving. This was another major factor in the growth of the Exercise Coach as existing franchisees felt well taken care of. The third component of the Exercise Coach’s strong growth is the franchise owners themselves. For most franchise owners, it’s their first time in business and 2020 was a time where many people questioned their decisions. When you go through a crisis, you can’t be certain what’s going to happen but Exercise Coach franchisees really came together to help offer each other advice and support on how to deal with the challenges over the past year. As unfortunate as it is to go through something like the pandemic, in some ways, it does reveal the strength or the weakness in a brand, and we can definitely say that the pandemic revealed a lot of strength within the Exercise Coach. The Exercise Coach is positioned for even greater growth in 2021. There are currently over 120 locations operating right now, with an additional 100 territories coming in the US. The long-term development goal is to open 50-60 territories each year going forward. There is a wave coming. People want to get in shape and spend money on themselves and their families again. The Exercise Coach continues to be one of the strongest fitness franchises in the industry and many investors are recognizing that. The high-tech and completely personalized approach is the future of fitness, and more people and investors are realizing that and coming on board. It’s much easier to walk into a system already in place and run with it, opening a franchise is a great way to start. Jesse believes that the Exercise Coach is going to be the best in fitness over the next three to five years.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about misconceptions about machines and if free weights or machines are better...   Amy and Brian settle the age-old debate of which one is better: free weights or machines? Learn about some common misconceptions about machines that prevent people from getting the fitness results they want in the timeframe they want, and why free weights can lead to reduced strength gains and a higher risk of injury. Spoiler alert: You’re not going to find any free weights at any of the Exercise Coach locations and for good reason. There is a significant strength training advantage to using machines over free weights and it has to do with the purpose of exercise. The results we want from exercise are muscle and neurological adaptations, and that happens when we expose the body to the right type of muscle loading for the right length of time. You can get those results from free weights, but they come with tradeoffs, whereas machines minimize what you need to learn so you can focus on what matters most. Your body doesn’t know or care if you’re lifting a dumbbell, or you’re working on a weight machine, or an isokinetic high tech strength machine, lifting a bag of dirt, or bodyweight exercises. It all has to do with muscle activation and fatigue. The Exercise Coach uses machines because it helps people focus and feel confident in what they are doing without having to worry about the risk of injury. Using a machine will position yourself specifically to do that exercise. You won’t have to worry about the variables and skills associated with using free weights. Machine weights create an on-ramp for anyone to begin exercising and democratize high-intensity strength training. Research shows that high intensity strength training is safe for anyone and targets what matters most, which is age-related skeletal muscle loss. When we effectively and optimally work our muscles, every system of the body gets better as well. Using biomechanically correct machines is the easiest way to introduce people to high-intensity strength training. Many of the conventional exercise methods don’t make it possible for the vast majority of people to safely and confidently engage with high level strength training. One of the objections that people will bring up against using machines has to do with stabilizer muscles, but it’s actually an argument against free weights. The requirement of balancing free weights prevents you from actually applying the optimal stimulus to your muscles. Every muscle in the body can act as a stabilizer muscle. Machines can help you target those muscles directly, instead of relying on free weight exercises to hit them as a side effect. There is no such thing as muscles specific to “real world” applications. There are just muscles, and research shows that strength gains generated from machines do transfer to other types of activities. At the College of New Jersey, researchers found that people using Exerbotics machines developed strength that transferred to free weight and calisthenic exercises as well. The reverse is not always true. There is a lot of skill involved in moving free weights around, that it doesn’t necessarily transfer to other areas of life. Strength Coach clients often report back that they have noticed that everyday activities like carrying the groceries or golfing get so much easier, which are great examples of how strength changes everything. People don’t want to spend a lot of time at the gym and they don’t have to. With a science-based approach to strength training, people can get the results that matter most to them in brief and safe training sessions.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about how you can use more effort in less time...   Amy and Brian go into the science behind eccentric overload and why this little-understood movement is responsible for the incredible gains in strength Exercise Coach clients experience in their first six sessions. Find out what eccentric overload is and how to optimize your exercise so you can use more effort in less time, and see greater results. Eccentric training is well understood by research labs and high-level coaches but it’s not the most common idea for your average exerciser. It’s built into the unique way that makes Exerbotics so effective. Eccentric is simply a muscle contraction. All your muscles ever do is generate force by either contracting or detracting, and an eccentric motion is when you are attempting to shorten your muscles but the load is so great that your muscles actually lengthen. A good example is the bicep curl. When you bend your elbow to lift the dumbbell, that is the concentric portion of the muscle action. When you lower the weight is the eccentric portion. The trouble is that bicep curls are not a great eccentric training exercise. Research shows that we get better fitness results when we overload and meaningfully tax our eccentric strength. This is difficult to do with traditional exercises but is built into how the Exerbotics machine functions. There is a mechanical mismatch with gravity-based exercises. You can only lower what you first lifted, which means you can never fully optimize the exercise for the eccentric portion of the movement. You need 40% more resistance in order to effectively work your muscles eccentrically, and it’s even greater as your muscles fatigue. We need a way to apply an appropriate resistance eccentrically if we are going to tap into the benefits of eccentric training. Exerbotics is a connected strength training technology that adapts to each user’s ability and strength in concentric and eccentric movements. This allows Exercise Coach clients to give more effort in less time by capitalizing on every second of every rep. With an increase in the quality of the exercise stimulus, comes a decrease in the time spent to get results. Research shows that you are going to get strength gains that are twice as good when you can perform effective eccentric overload. You can also gain benefits to hypertrophy in shorter periods of time compared to traditional methods. Eccentric training also increases flexibility because of the increased extensibility of the muscles involved. The benefits also extend to the metabolic systems of the body. Recent research has shown improvements in cholesterol profile and a general reduction in systemic inflammation in the body. When we perform effective eccentric training we get the fitness results we want in less time, and while feeling less demanding. Eccentric training uses fewer muscle fibers but they are generating more force, which makes it a super stimulus for those muscles. The most basic exercises and protocols are automatically built into the programs of the Exercise Coach. In only six sessions at The Exercise Coach, over 7000 women saw a 33% increase in overall strength. Compare that to traditional exercises, where it can take over a year to achieve the same results.   Link: exercisecoach.com     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.

Join us for this replay from the archives to learn more about the science and principles behind strength training...   Brian and Amy explore the scientific research that shows that strength training is the ultimate exercise for combatting the aging process, getting into the best shape of your life, and how those principles are applied to every workout session at the Exercise Coach. Over the past few months, Brian has been working on the Strength Changes Everything Scientific Support Paper. It has hundreds of scientific resources and is designed to help people dive deeper into the science of strength training. Sarcopenia, the age related loss of strength and muscle, can be prevented and reversed. An effective intervention must target fast-twitch muscle fibers, as sarcopenia selectively affects those cells. Decades of research have led to methods that are motivating and effective for people at all fitness levels. Brian co-wrote the support paper with Dr. James Fisher, Matt Essex, and Jeremy Bourgeois. The paper is structured by introducing readers to sarcopenia and its impact on muscle loss in aging, and on society at large. When we perform science-based strength training, it changes every system of the body for the better. It also fundamentally changes what is required to get fit and healthy in less time. This paper is for anyone that wants to feel inspired and motivated by what is possible with strength training. If you’ve experienced the effects of aging, this paper will show you that you are not disqualified from being in the best shape of your life. The research continues to show that strength training is the best way to combat the aging process. This foundation will help coaches take their conviction and confidence for what they do to the next level. The paper is scientific but still approachable for the average person. It is the encapsulation of years of scientific research that will help you understand the philosophy of strength training and how the Exercise Coach puts it into practice.   Link: exercisecoach.com exercisecoach.com/scientificsupport     This podcast and blog are provided to you for entertainment and informational purposes only. By accessing either, you agree that neither constitute medical advice nor should they be substituted for professional medical advice or care. Use of this podcast or blog to treat any medical condition is strictly prohibited. Consult your physician for any medical condition you may be having. In no event will any podcast or blog hosts, guests, or contributors, Exercise Coach USA, LLC, Gymbot LLC, any subsidiaries or affiliates of same, or any of their respective directors, officers, employees, or agents, be responsible for any injury, loss, or damage to you or others due to any podcast or blog content.