I’ll only do once per week max (and basically to the pt of failure), but this may be good enough. Even 1 hour a week might produce noticeable benefits.
As for protein, I eat a lot of lentils, whole foods nobagel (which have egg protein!) and some bryan johnson blueprint (though this is a friends’ so I’m not sure if I would do it on my own)
this on 8/6 (prior to going to SF where I gained weight)
Fantastic Alex! Well done. Everyone can benefit from a little strength training. I think you’ll grow to like it (but give it a few months… at first you’ll just be sore).
I’m skeptical, how can you trigger muscle hypertrophy with 12 minutes a week without maximum intensity loads? And even by that, it seems too little. So little that I would yearn for more, much more…
Once a week training and less than 1h and without high intensity? It won’t work, no matter what the study says. Of course, if compared to a perfect couch potato, “it works”, but if you want visible results, then work, work, work is required.
To clarify, even moderate-intensity gym training works well as long as the volume per workout and week is enough.
Welcome to the club Alex! I think you will like the way you feel in a few weeks. My back, knee, and shoulder pains, which had plagued me since adolescence, went away after I started lifting. As far as rep ranges and stuff, I think you will find old fashioned sets of 5 work well. You can train 25 reps to failure on the squat, but it is absolutely brutal. Unfortunately, I am dialing back my strength training. I just learned that my aorta is abnormal, so I will abstain from heavy squats and deadlifts for a while. Any program is better than none, but I think Starting Strength is extremely well designed fwiw.
Keep in mind two of the biggest bodybuilders in history, Mike Metzger and Dorian Yates trained with very little volume, one or two sets to failure per body part (HIT training)
It depends on the intensity. Most people take more time as they warm up, and most people can not push themselves hard enough. If you look at CrossFit, many of the WODs (workouts of the Day) are under 12 mins. They are brutal. Go find your local CrossFit box (gym) and give the WOD a try. Oh yeah you need an hour for that 12 min WOD…
True, but they were extremely hi-intensity workouts, with brutal loads, Dorian Yates had a tricep tendon detached nearly completely, has to date a ruined shoulder joint and so on…
The above is totally unsuitable to elderly people, who may injury themselves easily and then say good bye to weight training. Or they may start developing joint inflammation and tendonitis, it happened to me with not even so high an intensity.
The McGuff and Little method is based,I remember well, on TUT (time under tension), loading and special machines. It has not become popular and widespread as it should have been if really efficient.
I doubt that TUT can be leveraged so much to yield the promised results with 12 minutes per week. McGuff and Little should probably have promised less, even one hour a week might have been more realistic and appealing. Besides, the machines they use are rare, the method should be exported to regular weights and i tried it, although what worked best for me was German Volume Training, as explained by late strength coach Poliquin.That’s a method which leverages relatively light loads but it takes time and organization.
I discovered there is a book now on GVT. I would suggest it to those who cannot and don’t want to try heavy loadings, because of nagging aches and pains or risk of injury.
In my case it worked, when I started training again after 25 years of inactivity, I made gains on it with relatively light loads which did not impinge negatively on connective tissue.
I gained some of my old mass back, in my avatar picture some of the results are visible.
We don’t all want or need to be peak performance athletes to benefit from a shorter resistance training program.
Our current workout (half cardio, half resistance) is 15 - 20 minutes 3 days a week and the results are noticeable both internally and externally. 5th week coming up LoL!
