Exercise As Obsession
April 17th 2007 10:01
The orthodoxy maintained for the last 20 or so years that aerobics and cardio are superior approaches to long term fitness and augmented health is beginning to face the same kind of scrutiny that the high carbohydrate,low fat diet did at the beginning of this decade. The fact is that there are now individuals who are willing to openly suggest that massive amounts of running, jumping, hopping etc are not only not the elixir for overweight couch potatoes that they appear to be, but may even be detrimental in the long term.
The new vogue appears to be the interval or short term workout, in which the respiratory and cardio systems of the body are pushed past a threshold at which they are forced to make expand their capacities. Weight training has also undergone an upgrade now in which there are "experts" who claim that it is sufficient to assure fitness without augmentation by cardio. In posts like"Aerobic Weight Training" I have maintained that the demarcation that is believed to exist between weight training and cardio training is or at least can be a false one. I believe weight training can be paced in such a way as to make it highly aerobic.
The reality is that treadmilling etc will not go gently into that good fitness night. At any given time in my gym a numeric majority of the members are in the cardio area. They outnumber the weight trainers and the aerobics class combined. When these folks read that they are no longer treading the path to true fitness, they will not take it well. I don't think my gym will soon be shrinking the cardio area to put in more weight equipment.
This resistance brings me to some brutal truths about exercise. The first is that the vast majority of people will never undertake a successful exercise program. They are temperamentally incapable of sustaining the amount of work and inconvenience it demands. This blog will never match the readership of a celebrity news blog,because the number of people who can even contemplate a fitness program of any magnitude is minuscule. If health concerns motivate such people to undertake exercise they will gravitate to gurus who assure them that minimal exertion workouts are all that is required. The "total fitness on 20 minutes of walking" myth is destined to be sold to every generation.
Those that do undertake successful exercise programs often unfortunately can be classified as suffering from an obsession. To the non-exerciser the idea that one can be addicted to it seems absurd, but the gym has a fair percentage of members who are compelled to train. I personally believe that the treadmills and other cardio equipment are more likely to be more populated with such obsessive trainers than the weight area.
Cardio equipment with its readouts which track progress breed trade-off behavior. The "miller" might be atoning for something he/she has eaten, feeling increasing relief as the calorie count heads upward. He/she may be making a withdrawal from the calorie bank, knowing that a piece of cake can be thus paid for. There are numerous other scenarios for those driven to exercise out of some powerful psyhchological need.
The obsessive trainers will never abandon their activity based solely on evidence that it is not the optimal way to achieve and maintain fitness. When asked what the primary joy is for her in a marathon one runner admitted that the eating necessary before and after was by far the best part. I think that says alot about whether there will be layoffs at the running shoe factory. Your servant, as always.
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