Muscular Fitness Training: Guidelines & Improvements

1. Chapter 11 C H A P T E R 11 Muscular Fitness Training: Lifetime Mobility

2. Objectives This chapter will help you do the following: • Develop training prescriptions for muscular strength, endurance, and power • Take precautions and follow guidelines to make training safe and effective • Improve and maintain core fitness • Adopt a program to maintain lower back health

3. Repetitions Sets Frequency Achievement Maintenance Dietary needs Changes in these depend on the goal. Prescription for Muscular Strength

4. Prescription for Components of Muscular Fitness

5. Strength Training Guidelines • Ease into the program with lighter weights and fewer sets. • Avoid holding your breath during a lift. • Exhale during the lift and inhale as you lower the weight. • Always work with a companion or spotter when using free weights. • Alternate muscle groups during a session; alternate arm and leg exercises. • Keep records of your progress.

6. Strength Improvements Strength doesn’t increase rapidly; you can expect the following: • Rate of increase will range from 1 to 3 percent per week. Your rate of improvement will decrease or level off as you approach your potential maximal strength. • Rate of improvement may decrease if you combine strength training with strenuous aerobic training. • Improvement will take place only in the muscle groups that you train. • Your gains will be smaller if you fail to maintain adequate protein and energy in your diet (see chapter 12).

7. Maintenance and Detraining You will maintain strength with lower volume and frequency of training as long as intensity remains high. Frequency of once or twice a week will maintain strength.

8. Strength and Aerobic Training Conflicting research • 1980 study concluded that combining strength training with aerobic training diminished strength but not the aerobic outcomes. • 2002 study indicates that concurrent strength and aerobic endurance training does not impair adaptations in strength or muscle hypertrophy. • 2004 study on untrained subjects found that concurrent strength and endurance training did not interfere with strength development but might hinder development of aerobic capacity. • What does this mean?

9. Prescriptions for Muscular Endurance • Difference between training for strength and training for endurance is the level of tension in the muscle and, consequently, the resistance used and number of repetitions possible. • Number of repetitions that you need depends on whether you are training for short-term endurance (anaerobic) or long-term endurance (aerobic). • Refer to table 11.1

10. Endurance Improvements • When you have sufficient strength for the task, gains in endurance come with relative ease. One study showed improving short-term endurance 70 percent versus 50 percent for strength training. • Adequate endurance enables you to maintain good technique.

11. Diet and Endurance • Best endurance performances occur when muscle fibers are well supplied with glycogen. • Take energy snacks throughout the day and begin energy replacement immediately after activity, with several hundred calories of a carbohydrate–protein mix (ratio of 4 grams carbohydrate for 1 gram protein).

12. Circuit Weight Training • Circuit weight training involves a series of resistance exercises designed to promote strength and muscular endurance, with short rest intervals between sets. • This technique will improve strength and muscular endurance; however, its effect on aerobic fitness is slight (3 to 5 percent).

13. Calisthenics • Calisthenics include a wide range of exercises, such as push-ups, chin-ups, and sit-ups. • Just remember that as the number of repetitions exceeds 10, you are shifting toward endurance training. • You can use calisthenics to train for both endurance and strength; simply modify them to increase the intensity. • Refer to your textbook for different callisthenic exercises.

14. Resistance Training • Weight-training machines • Free weights • Isokinetics • Refer to your textbook for resistance training exercises.

15. Prescriptions for Speed and Power • Key to speed and power training is specificity: pattern the training after the intended use. • Speed (velocity). Do high-speed contractions with low resistance. Sprinters have gained speed by running down slight grades, running against resistance, and performing assisted running (being towed). For more on speed training, consult a good book on the subject. (continued)

16. Prescriptions for Speed and Power(continued) • Power (force times velocity). Do three sets of 15 to 25 high-speed contractions with 30 to 60 percent of maximal resistance. • You can use accommodating resistance devices to do power training, but free weights are not well suited for high-speed training. • Athletes use sport-specific devices, higher resistance (e.g., 8RM), and explosive contractions to improve power for brief, intense efforts (e.g., football). (continued)

17. Prescriptions for Speed and Power(continued) • Plyometrics are explosive movements designed to improve power. • Start slowly with plyometrics. Use easy jumps and few repetitions. Increase repetitions and intensity gradually. • When overdone, plyometrics can cause joint pain and delayed-onset muscle soreness.

18. Core Training • Core exercises focus on core muscles that anchor and stabilize the arms and legs involved in work, sport, and recreational activities. • There are a number of ways to train the core, ranging from old fashioned calisthenics, and medicine balls to Swiss balls, yoga, and Pilates.

19. Summary • This chapter has provided ways to train, outlined what progress you can expect, explained how to maintain muscular fitness, and described what happens when training stops. • Other important reasons for muscular fitness include avoidance of crippling osteoporosis and lifelong maintenance of mobility and independence.