Interested in dropping fat and increasing strength, all while becoming a conditioned athlete?
A lot of people wear heart rate monitors for steady state cardio… But have you ever worn a heart rate monitor to see the fluctuations during a strength session? This is something that we’ve been doing over the last few months, and it’s completely changing the way we are programming our conditioning.
Check out the changes in Zach’s heart rate in this barbell complex:
Here’s a little food for thought- we could program based completely around heart rate response to exercise. For example, we’ve done the usual intervals with implements like the battling ropes for time. Let’s say I asked two different individuals to perform battling ropes for 3 x :20/:15 (work:rest). We pick those numbers because we believe that they will challenge the individuals for conditioning. However, do you think they will both respond the same from a heart rate perspective? No. If someone really well conditioned, and a “not-so-conditioned” individual do that same interval, it may be too easy for one, one may “dog” the intensity that they work at, it may be too much, etc… This type of training also teaches people to survive set times…
This is a huge flaw with traditional interval training, conditioning, CrossFit, etc… The individual is pushed, but is it right for them? But what if we programmed by heart rate? We could come up with a TON of alterations to the traditional interval.
- Variable/Fixed– 3 x 85%HRM/:30
- Fixed/Variable – 3 x :30/60%HRM (or Zach’s barbell complex, completion of reps- then recover to 60%, repeat for rounds)
- Variable/Variable – 3 x 85%/60%
Now, within each of those examples we could alter volume and intensity, just like we do with lifting- BUT, now we can actually work off of concrete data (percentages). Even if you wanted to compete in something like, say CrossFit, we can progress your conditioning over the phases of a periodized program to get you ready. Now the individual will realize that if they work harder (i.e. the purpose of HIIT and EPOC) they will hit % goals faster. Now the individual will pay more attention to recovery techniques (i.e. sounds great for fighters/wrestlers between rounds) so they aren’t sitting on the sidelines waiting for their heart rate to come back down. NOW we can track improvements over time…
Conditioning is going to become very exciting with the direction that technology is headed, and we at Beyond Strength Performance NOVA are making some changes to bring you the BEST technology out there today.
We have a BIG announcement coming in the new few weeks.
STAY TUNED! (3814)
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