Evolving Fitness - Part 2

So, in the last post I was returning to weights from a season of bodyweight training.

My new inspiration was The New Rules of Lifting by Lou Schuler and Alwyn Cosgrove:

The authors don't claim any of this is really new, but that a lot of popular training articles and programs have deluded people. In future posts, I'll share the basics of the "new rules" without giving you the actual "new rules" since there are at least 19. Here are two:
1. Focus on large muscle groups - (ie. chest/shoulders, back, quads, glute/hamstrings) these programs have VERY few curls or tricep exercises. When you do any sort of upper-body press, your triceps HAVE TO work hard. When you do any pull/chin up or row, your biceps HAVE TO work hard.
2. Focus on exercises that imitate (relatively) "natural" movements: push - pull - squat - bend - lunge etc.

I love these principles and I enjoyed these workouts and made progress, but the recommended workouts were still just a bit too long for a grad student with a wife and a baby whose demands seemed so disproportionate to his size.


The missing piece I needed at the time was a workout system called Escalating Density Training (EDT). The program is described in basic form in several places online and was published in the book Muscle Logic by this guy, Charles Staley, and boasted, "Cut your workout time in half, with better results." This may be an exaggeration, but it did cut my workout time down. I did get better results and I loved the way this system makes you compete with yourself successfully and have continual progress.

My workouts became a hybrids of the principles from New Rules and EDT. I'll explain how I did this in future posts too.

Using this fusion, if I did a 3-5 minute warm-up and rested 3-5 minutes between 2 series of intense supersets, I'd be in and out of the weight-room, or basement, in around 40 minutes or less. If you need shorter workouts, do slightly shorter series of more intense supersets. I think people could make progress with as little as 10 minute series.


I'm doing some other things now that mix up a bunch of these principles with some other things I've learned, but these are the basic building blocks. My pastor recently preached on taking care of ourselves, so maybe this will help someone do that...


My advice to everyone is to do the exercise you enjoy. Play, run, lift, jump, march, whatever. But if you DON'T like what you are currently doing, try something else!


I haven't even talked about nutrition, but I have gained 25-30 pounds since I got back into lifting and I don't think my body-fat percentage has increase much at all. People might ask, "what about cardio-vascular health?" and even though I only run about once a year, I went out and ran 5 miles with a running friend a few weeks ago and felt pretty good!


So, if you're into working out, let me know what you've learned or found helpful! I'm always trying to learn new things. If you have any questions, feel free to ask...