The quickest results are attained by the most out-of-shape people who train the smartest…
At age 56, Kate’s physical degradation was gaining serious traction. She knew it. For the past five years, she had neglected fitness and no longer paid any attention to diet or dieting. It suddenly became time to do something when her doctor informed her that she was no longer headed towards osteoporosis and prediabetes; she had arrived.
Her bones were turning into dust, her blood sugar levels were inexplicably high, and her inactivity was problematic. A lack of physical stress caused Kate’s bones to become brittle. Without bone-strengthening and stress-inducing exercise, her skeletal structure would steadily and inexorably weaken.
The pre-diabetes was puzzling. Kate was a slight thing at 5’ 3” and 119 pounds. She ate like a bird, yet apparently had been eating and drinking all the wrong things and was borderline anemic and skinny-fat. Her blood sugar was high, despite eating a scant 1,500 calories a day – her few calories were the wrong calories in that the few she ate all spiked insulin. Kate decided that her diet approach would shift; she would shed her zero-fat phobia; now, Kate would stress the quality of the nutrients she was consuming. Her new menu consisted of nutrient-dense, organic produce and lots of high-protein power foods.
The time for a lifestyle change was now. Kate was smart and experienced and knew what to do. She had been athletic her whole life – and then she wasn’t. Kate had dieted her entire life – and then she didn’t. Now, it was time to construct Kate 2.0. There had been no terrible accidents or tragic events; it just happened that one by one, she lost interest and quit athletics and low-fat dieting.
An injury ended her love for tennis, she took dance classes for five years, and her Pilates passion flamed out. Kate took up running and competed before an injury forced her to quit. Various diets came and went. She was an excellent swimmer and loved waterskiing, but the commute and expense became too much. Finally, Kate dropped her beloved yoga.
Years came and went. Kate was now living an exercise-free, diet-free, stress-free life. As a direct result of the lack of stress on her muscles, her body was disintegrating. It was time to inject some purposeful stress and quality calories into her life. Kate created an overarching template: holistic, sane, intense, ferocious – a multidimensional approach combining two exercise types and underpinning with a (for her) revolutionary approach to nutrition.
Kate’s revelation was that her past efforts had been fragmented. This time, her approach would be multidimensional, integrated, holistic, balanced – and necessarily body-shocking on a multitude of levels. Kate knew if she started off too hard and went too fast, she would hurt herself with overzealousness and derail the entire effort.
Ernestine Shepard at age 80
Strength training would combat frailty, provide gyroscopic stability, and thicken her brittle bones. Aerobic training would develop endurance and build stamina. She would avoid high-impact aerobics, using an entirely new cardio approach: power walking. Her food would fuel and heal her anemic body with power nutrients. There needed to be a balance between the two exercise types. The copious consumption of power nutrients would energize her, revitalize her, and make her resilient.
Kate strength-trained twice weekly with great intensity, and five to seven times a week, she would engage in cardio sessions. Her mode was power-walking, done outside, weather permitting. Kate would ride her Fan Bike indoors on bad weather days. No longer consuming low-cal, lite, prefab, highly processed foodstuffs, she shifted to all-natural foods, nutrient-dense foods, and farmer’s market organic food fuel. She stuck with potent proteins like quality beef, lamb, fish, shellfish, pork, and wild game.
- Strength training: Kate had previously done mild resistance training, but the stress generated was insufficient to trigger muscle growth or cause bone strengthening. She scoured YouTube and found an excellent strength mentor who was credentialed and clear-spoken. Kate reduced the number of exercises (“fewer things better”) and concentrated on full-range-of-motion compound multi-joint exercises through twice-weekly sessions to ensure full recovery.
- Cardiovascular training: Kate successfully competed in age-group 5K and half-marathons. The pounding took a toll; the resultant knee and ankle pain caused her to quit. Now, she powerwalks around her hilly neighborhood every morning, weather permitting. She aims to generate 75% to 80% of the age-related max. “Fasted” pre-breakfast cardio, done when glycogen is lowest, accelerates fat-burning. Those sessions last 30 to 45 minutes.
- Nutrition: Kate was anemic. For decades, she had been undereating the wrong stuff: fruit juices, lite, low-fat, no-fat, 1%, 2%, highly processed foodstuffs. Unbeknownst to Kate, these denuded foods spiked insulin. She ate very little; when she did eat, it was fat-free and low-cal trans-fat industrial foods. She now eats a high-protein diet: organic, nutrient-dense, seasonally appropriate, locally sourced, farmer’s market proteins and produce.
Kate was starting off in a totally detuned state. She knew the quickest results are attained by the most out-of-shape people who train the smartest. Once she launched the effort, her blood sugar problems disappeared by the end of the first month. She had been avoiding dietary fat as if it were rat poison. Her anemia disappeared by reintroducing quality fats, powerhouse lipids, MCTs, organic meat, and fish fat.
The combination of hardcore weight training and a high-protein diet morphed her from sickly to robust. Quality dietary fat is satiating and dampens the appetite. Fat calories accelerate recovery as they are twice as dense as protein. Food combining dampens the insulin response associated with the consumption of starch carbs.
Kate tore into a progressive resistance routine. She was able to get through a “whole body session” (leg, chest, shoulders, arms, back) in 35 minutes. She muscled up quickly because of muscle memory. She fell in love with her early-morning outdoor powerwalks and wore a heart rate monitor and logged results, walking a little further and a little faster every week. Kate dusted off her kitchen skills and now, with the help of YouTube food chefs, expertly prepares chicken, pork, beef, lamb, and seafood. Her starch carbs were always complex, and she ate a ton of fiber carbs.
Kate developed a rhythm to her new multidimensional protocol and settled in. By the end of the second week, her energy skyrocketed due to detoxing off highly processed foods. She ate power meals constructed with power foods. Her resistance training was the foundation: every week, she improved in every lift or drill.
By the end of the first month, family and friends noted how much better she looked. By the end of the second month, office coworkers and girlfriends wanted to know what magic she was using. At the conclusion of her 12-week periodized cycle, Kate’s doctor conducted a body scan using his hi-tech body scan device.
Kate lost eleven pounds of fat and added back four pounds of muscle. The poundage Kate used in her goblet squats, hex-bar deadlifts, overhead dumbbell presses, shrugs, triceps presses, and curls had increased every week for twelve straight weeks. She was, in fact, twice as strong as when she commenced.
Her lifting improved, her cardio improved, her diet improved, and as a result, Kate improved – dramatically and in direct proportion to the degree of her commitment. Comprehensive periodization, the nuanced multidimensional approach, is the proven result-getter. Kate would concur. And yes, Kate is real.
0 Comments