Why Does Interval Training Really Work?

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you should be pretty well aware that aerobic exercise is next to worthless for fat-loss.  You can put a woman on an 18month marathon training program and she won’t lose a pound! (1)  (If that sounds weird to you, then please read my piece from last week as the Washington, DC Weight Loss Examiner.)

While the most important part of a fat-loss exercise program is the metabolic resistance training, there isn’t a very good consensus on WHY metabolic resistance training and interval training work so well for fat-loss.

I used to think that it was because of this thing called EPOC – excess postexercise oxygen consumption, or the metabolic boost (elevation) that you get after intense exercise.  But, it turns out that EPOC probably isn’t big enough to account for the amount of fat-loss, and fat-loss doesn’t really work that way (calories in vs. calories out).

I have a new theory of why it works that I am reprinting here from my Monday post as the DC Weight Loss Examiner:

Interval training only consumes your stored carbs for fuel.  Body-fat is fundamentally regulated by the hormone insulin.  More insulin = more body fat and vice versa.  When you deplete your muscles carbohydrate stores (glycogen) you improve your sensitivity to insulin.  The more sensitive you are to insulin the less insulin you need to make to handle the same amount of food and/or carbohydrates.  The increased sensitivity to insulin is temporary, but if you do high intensity exercise like interval and resistance training you will appear to be someone with better insulin sensitivity (have less body-fat). (2-5)

That is the primary way that I think interval training creates superior fat-loss.

The secondary way is that intense exercise releases stuff called catecholamines.  These are chemicals like epinephrine and norepinephrine that stimulate the release of fat from your fat cells to be burned off.  The calories consumed by the workout are probably irrelevant.

I could be totally wrong, but that doesn’t matter.  it still works far better, in far less time and is more fun.

For more free info on how to do intervals click here.

Josef Brandenburg is Washington, DC’s top personal trainer for busy people. He shows normal people with hectic lives and average genetics how to create the bodies they want in the time they actually have. To find out more about the 7-Day Free Trial click here. You can also pick up a copy of his brand new CD – “Why Eat Less and Exercise More is The Worst Advice Ever” here.

References:

1. Janssen, G. M., et al.  Food intake and body composition in novice athletes during a training period to run a marathon. International journal of sports medicine, May 1989; 10(1 suppl.):s17-21
2. Joslin. Elliot. Et al. Joslin’s Diabetes Mellitus. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. 13th edition, 1994
3. Nussey, Stephen. et al. Endocrinology: An Integrated Approach. Informa HealthCare, 1st edition, 2001
4. Kronenberg MD, Henry M. et al. Williams Textbook of Endocrinology. Saunders. 11th edition, 2008
5. Lehninger, Albert. Et al. Lehninger Principles of Biochemistry. W. H. Freeman. 5th edition. 2008

Taking Off and Keeping Off 180 Pounds

This is Jimmy Moore in 2004 – one and a half feet in the grave.

410 pounds!

This is Jimmy in 2005

This is Jimmy in 2009

I seriously doubt that there are that many people with 180 pounds to lose who read my blog.  There is a really important lesson to take away from Jimmy – it is possible to take it off and keep it off long term.

More importantly, the lesson is that you can take it off, keep it off an not be miserable in the the process or the maintenance.  You don’t have to be hungry.

Would you like to know how he has done all of this without hunger?  Great!  I recently did an interview with Jimmy, and you can download it (or listen to it at your computer) absolutely free right here.

Josef Brandenburg is Washington, DC’s top personal trainer for busy people. He shows normal people with hectic lives and average genetics how to create the bodies they want in the time they actually have. To find out more about the 7-Day Free Trial click here. You can also pick up a copy of his brand new CD – “Why Eat Less and Exercise More is The Worst Advice Ever” here.

Josef Brandenburg’s Article is “Retarded”

I had a interview that I did with Gary Taubes published on T-nation yesterday and here are a few of my favorite comments:

“This whole article is retarded… Look into a little something called ASP”

“This sh*t should be pulled from the site. Can’t t-nation/muscle/mag get a decent science editor?”

“Man this is so wrong on so many different levels.

“Anyone who buys into Taubes’ bullsh*t is clearly too feeble minded to grasp any rational argument to the contrary… What Tuabes and the rest of the low-carb community don’t like talking about is a little compound called acylation stimulation protein (ASP) which stores dietary fat in the fat cell with ZERO rise in insulin levels.”

“I agree that this article is completely retarded.”

“People like Josef Brandenburg who make ridiculous statements about eating all you want.”  (I really like this one because he spelled out my first and last name correctly.  You’re not important until you get trashed on an internet forum!)

So a lot of the criticism (a lot more than listed here) was aimed at the fact that ASP was left out of the interview, because the claim is that with ASP you can make fat without insulin and that is the “nail in the coffin” for low-carb.

So, What’s Up With ASP?

ASP (Acylation stimulating protein) definitely does regulate body-fat, if you have more then you’ll store more fat.  But, if you dig just a little deeper you’ll find this:

#1. Insulin increases ASP production 2 fold

http://www.jlr.org/…/reprint/38/1/1

J Lipid Res. 1997 Jan;38(1):1-11

#2. “ASP… secretion is regulated by insulin”

Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol. 2001 Jun;21(6):1034-9

http://atvb.ahajournals.org/…/full/21/6/1034

So, ASP seems to be related to insulin.

Josef Brandenburg is Washington, DC’s top personal trainer for busy people. He shows normal people with hectic lives and average genetics how to create the bodies they want in the time they actually have. To find out more about the 7-Day Free Trial click here. You can also pick up a copy of his brand new CD – “Why Eat Less and Exercise More is The Worst Advice Ever” here.

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