Matt Metzgar

Depressing Statistics

I saw a news release for this new report(pdf) from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention(CDC).  It found that the most commonly prescribed medicine in the U.S. is now antidepressants.  Antidepressants are now more common than high blood pressure, cholesterol, or any other medication.

Obviously, this is an alarming statistic.  Part of this increase, I'm sure, is the American attitude that the solution to most health problems is pharmaceuticals.  Certainly, there are some cases where antidepressants are beneficial to patients.  But the CDC study found mention of antidepressants over the course of 118 million visits in 2005.  This seems excessive (to say the least) to me.

This problem could begin to be addressed by looking at the evolutionary functions of depression.  Scholars have been studying this for the past decade or two and believe that depression serves an evolutionary purpose.  The idea is that if a person is continually trying to reach a goal that they cannot achieve, depression sets in to help redirect the person's actions towards more appropriate goals.

Here's one article on evolutionary psychology and depression, with some nice references at the bottom of the article.  And here's a good book, "Subordination and Defeat: An Evolutionary Approach to Mood Disorders", that I read a few years back.

After looking at mood disorders in an evolutionary light, you begin to see that sadness and depression are "normal" parts of life.  Certainly, a depression that lingers on and causes other problems needs to be addressed.  But the sadness or depression that comes from unfortunate events or outcomes is not something to be avoided 100 percent of the time.  Negative feelings guide our behavior just like postive feelings do. 

I believe there is a greater likelihood of mood disorders in modern society since our mind is built for hunter-gatherer times, when family was close-knit and there was a small number of normal contacts.  Putting people in cities that contain millions of people can lead to feelings of anonymity, and this can lead to more frequent mood problems.  But I still don't see how pharmaceuticals are the answer; expending effort to deepen and strengthen relationships seems like a better alternative in my view.

Tiger's Workout Revealed

I picked up the latest issue of Men's Fitness magazine because it had a feature on Tiger Woods' workout.  The article wasn't super-detailed about Woods' routines, but it did provide some information.

First, Tiger works out very frequently.  Tiger's trainer, Keith Kleven (who actually lives here in Las Vegas), believes more frequent worouts produce better athletes, and has Tiger working out up to six days a week.

Second, Tiger does a lot of high-rep weight training, often perfroming sets with 25 to 50 reps.  He says this has prevented him from sustaining any lifting injuries.  "I've never, ever hurt myself lifting.  I don't even know what that feels like."

Third, Tiger does a lot of running.  He performs endurance runs up to seven miles, and also three-mile speed runs.  Woods is also big on stretching, going through a 35 to 40 minute stretching and manipulation routine.

What I found most interesting in the article is that Tiger had trouble putting on muscle during his younger years.  He lifted during college and his early 20s, but still only weighed around 158 lbs.  It was only during his mid-twenties that he was able to put on mass and slowly built his weight up to his current 185 lbs.

To me, this suggests that genes may control the ultimate timing of muscle growth.  Perhaps people have genes that aren't "switched on" for muscle growth until a certain age.  It's an interesting theory at least, and I may dig deeper into the subject.

 

Diets Aren't Enough II

Here's another recent study that looks at dieting and weight loss.  This study compared three popular approaches: high-carb/high fiber, high fat (Atkins), and high protein (Zone).  In the first six months, subjects from all groups lost weight.  Yet predictably, all subjects gained fat mass from 6 months to 1 year.  After one year, the subjects still averaged around 44% body fat.

Despite this, the abstract of the study states that these diets may "be appropriate options" for certain individuals.  Appropriate options for what??  To lose a few pounds and then have them slowly come back over a couple of years?  To have no significant change in body fat despite a year's worth of sticking to a diet plan?

Again, I have no idea why researchers continue to waste their energy on such studies.  The only major diet that has not been studied long-term is the Paleo diet, but I'm afraid the results of such a study would be the same.  If a person switches to a Paleo diet but does no exercise, the results would probably be the same as in the above study: quick weight loss over the first six months followed by a gradual regain over the course of a couple years.

It should be noted that both a proper diet and a proper exercise plan are needed for long-term weight loss.  A perfect diet with no exercise will still leave a person overweight in the long-run.  A perfect exercise plan with a lousy diet will yield this same result.  As to which of the two is more important, I have to lean towards exercise, especially for someone who is obese.  If someone is 50+ pounds overweight, I think a ton of exercise and a mediocre diet will still yield significant weight loss.  But if you gave that same person a perfect diet and only a bit of exercise, I doubt they would lose much weight at all. 

The Armed Services come to mind as an example.  Millions of recruits have gotten in shape through their combination of lots of exercise and some not-so-great food.  In fact here's a study on the subject.  Obese recruits lost an amazing 38 pounds on average during military basic training.

Diets Aren't Enough

I came across this recent study, which compared low-glycemic and low-fat diets in obese young adults.  This study was unique because it followed the subjects all the way out until 18 months and measured a variety of items.

One of the findings in the study was that those who started off with the worst insulin sensitivity lost the most weight.  This shows the importance of eating foods with a low glyecemic load for those who already have insulin problems.  But to me, the whole study was actually disappointing because of the minimal weight loss that took place.

On average, subjects in either group lost about 4 pounds.  4 pounds over 18 months, that's it!  It was noted that in the group that started off with high insulin and received the low-glycemic diet lost, this group lost about 12 pounds - but this group started off 15 pounds heavier than the group with normal insulin in the first place.

At the end of the 18 months, the subjects still weighed around 215 pounds and were still obese.  Why do researchers continue to spend time and effort researching diets as a treatment for obesity?  Diets simply don't work.  Exercise is the only real method to achieve significant long-term weight loss.  I don't care if a person eats the most perfect diet in the world, if their energy expenditure doesn't pass a certain threshold, they won't lose weight and keep it off.

Happy 4th of July

Happy Birthday America!

Lift Fast, Lower Slow

I've experimented with a lot of different lifting techniques over the years.  I've tried SuperSlow, fast reps, slow reps, time under tension, and others.  But for some time now, I've been sticking with a technique that has worked pretty well for me.

Previously, I had found this study that looked at repetition speed.  It concluded that "using heavy loads during explosive resistance training may be the most effective strategy to achieve simultaneous improvements in muscle strength, power, and endurance in older adults."  This makes a very strong case for explosive training in terms of strength and power.  But what about building muscle mass?

For a while, I tried this explosive lifting matched with a quick lowering of the weight on each rep.  Over time, I found this to be a very ineffective technique.  With such quick up-and-down movements, it felt like I wasn't working the muscles at all.  I moved up to some heavier weights this way, but it didn't really lead to any muscle growth.

Other research shows that the lowering phase of lifting is often more important for muscle growth.  In fact, a person can build muscle using negative repetitions alone.  So what I did is to try and get the best out of the explosive lifting style and also the crucial lowering phase.

When I lift now, I lift explosively on the positive phase and then do a four-second lowering phase.  This isn't revolutionary by any means, but this change has definitely been beneficial for me.  I don't really count reps, but I shoot for around a minute on each set.  This combination has, so far, served me better than anything else I've tried.