We all grow up having the same perspective about exercise:
– As much more you do “exercise” more healthy response you get or more fitness response you get or more performance response you get, right?
Isn’t that what we learned from a young age? Exercise is always good for you and you should do it, the more the merrier, in the same perspective we learned to eat a lot of processed / GMO / package edible products, not real food.
Common solution (Fitness Industry): Exercise (move) more and eat less!
If you are reading this blog post that means that you are part of this era of exercise more and eating less and if you can’t cope with it, it is your lack in disposition, your lack of will, you are lazy, sick and fat.
Wow, so cruel or simply reality.
My Exercise Journey
When I say that, I mean that is a belief from all of us including myself, understanding exercise (more and more often) and nutrition based on the food pyramid. I tried various protocols of training and nutrition since I started my journey.
I am a great supporter of sports in general, I am a physical educator (4 years university bachelor degree, specialised in sports training + 1 year specialisation course) I did have several courses in strength & conditioning, I competed as a cyclist, fighter (different martial arts), powerlifting, I surf and I relate my life choices in a healthy lifestyle since a young age, with my mom’s life example, ballerina still teaching and dancing, one rule in my house was; you need to be doing a sport if you stop one, you have to start another.
I had incredible life experiences from team sports and individual competitions, I wanted to introduce some of my backgrounds so you won’t miss the point here.
5 years ago while still competing in Brazilian jiu-jitsu and preparing for a natural bodybuilding competition it was when I found myself in the worse health case scenario since I was 14 years old (when I started lifting weights ).
5 years ago I had chronic bursitis in both shoulders, tendinitis on my elbows and wrists, arthritis on my hands, I had accumulated some injuries from the past from overtraining, I broke a rib training jiu-jitsu, torn ligaments, I was constantly fatigued, not very energetic on the weekends where I suppose to be enjoying life.
The meal preparation to support all the action was just annoying, I was eating 6 to 8 times a day (low-fat diet, grain-based). Which led to some issues like irritated bowel syndrome, blood markers were not the best and stress levels were always really high.
But I can guarantee you that everyone that would get in the gym where I used to work would say: Marcelo is a machine ( BEAST MODE aye!?), his dedication is impressive and he is in very good shape. In the outside, I looked great but I was a total wreck on the inside.
One beautiful day my wife and I sat down for a talk and we just got to the conclusion that what I was doing wasn’t working, I remember her saying: I don’t want you to get hurt anymore, I want to spend all my life with you and the way you are going you probably won’t be able to move your hands when you get to your forties, will struggle to lift our grandchildren, I was 30 years old at the time.
Both of us have bachelor degrees, we know how to look into research and that was the turning point were we both have had enough…
Let’s find better answers, let’s find a way to get all the benefits from exercise but none of the side effects and Intense Health was born.
We’ve spent months studying again and recycling what once we believed was the way to go, questioning the norm, questioning the conventional wisdom, testing, experimenting, formulating, collecting data, reading the work of people that faced similar challenges in their life, academics or not.
Trust me I lived among a lot of professionals and amateur athletes during my career and I can guarantee most doing too much and too often like i was doing it, would have similar or comparable side effects, side effects that turned into injuries that turn into losing functional ability that will eventually deprive life of basic movements or will accelerate the ageing process…
Answers
Intense Health, a new way to look at exercising
“The Dose-response relationship of exercise:
Both a drug and an exercise act as a stimulus to the body, both require an optimal concentration, both require a dose that is not “too high”, and both require an appropriate dosing frequency.
The concentration of the drug is analogous to the intensity of the exercise, the dosage is analogous to the amount of sets performed in a given workout, and the dosing frequency is analogous to the frequency of exposure to the training stimulus.
Also, just as within medicine, there exists in exercise a ‘’narrow therapeutic window’’ within which the volume of exercise can act to stimulate the body to produce a positive adaptive response that is optimal. Transgress the borders of this window and, as with a drug, the benefits do not increase, but rather the toxicity does.”
– Doug McGuff,M.D. and John Little (body by science)
Work harder but briefly and infrequently
High Intensity Training HIT – Do not follow the majority, follow the right way…
Exercise is simply the stimulus, a negative stressful stimulus for your body, the positive adaptive response is created if proper rest and recovery/nutrition are in place. And when an individual can train intensely it will take a lot more time to recover and overcompensate the previous stimulus (workout) that we once believed.
Intensity – I will write another blog post just to cover Intensity.
All the reaction of the human physiology, biochemistry and biomechanics will be taken in consideration to find the best recipe for all my clients to be as lean, strong, happy and productive as possible without experiencing any of the side effects from it.
Everyone can have an opinion about exercise and nutrition but science is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of FACT.
Lifestyle
6 months after applying the Intense Health method I decrease my inflammation levels to non-existent, I have had no injuries since then, my blood markers showed that I de-aged my body (10 years), my energy levels are higher than never before, I have better body composition than ever before despite the fact that I have dropped my exercise routines from 10 to 12 hours per week to maximum 1 hour per week, in fact, is less than that most of the weeks. I am leaner and it’s not a struggle to maintain a low body fat %, in fact, I enjoy every single meal 🙂
(Marcelo & Andreia were training MINUTES per week 6 months prior to their honeymoon in Bora Bora Tahiti)
Come down and try the INTENSE / EFFECTIVE / EFFICIENT & SAFE workout and the experiencing of all the benefits but none of the side effects from exercise.
The first consultation will challenge your norm, your conventional wisdom and when you try the exercise routine you will experience the future of exercise, my wife and I have the mission in this lifetime that is to improve quality time spent on this planet; one client at a time.
Intense Health method is maintainable and sustainable, you just have to commit once or twice weekly!
See you soon
Marcelo
Intense Health
