Moving snow the old fashioned way is a great exercise. Minute for minute it is one of the best winter exercises you can do – and it can be a great service as well.

On average here are the calories burned per minute shoveling snow. These are just averages that I could find on the net.

In some ways a comparison is more effecting than thinking of actual calories. Shoveling heavy snow is the most strenuous winter activity that I could find in calories burned per minute. Shoveling light snow was bested only by cross country skiing, downhill skiing, running 8 mph, and full court basketball.

On Saturday I spent about 3 hours shoveling around my neighborhood. It felt good to get out and do a little service. And at the end of the day (I had worked out to a movie as well that morning) I burned off over 7500 calories by these calculations! Not too shabby. I commented to Janille that I could feel myself getting skinner as the hours moved on. It was kind of funny, but I did feel like my clothes got loser as I went:)

Anyway, this is not something everyone should do. There are a ton of medical concerns that need to be taken into account. Not the least of which is the heart and back.

It is estimated that you are 3x more likely to have a heart attack while shoveling snow than just your normal risk factor. There are several reasons for this. The strenuous nature of the exercise is one, but the cold is another major factor. Cold constricts the blood vessels making it harder for the blog to pump as you engage in hard activities – hello heart attack.

It is also easy to get dehydrated. You will sweat a lot, but you may not notice that you have stopped sweating because your clothes will keep the moisture close to your body. So you feel hydrated when you really are not. 

So if you have a heart condition be very careful – maybe even get a snow blower until you get your heath under control.

If you do not have a heart condition – well – go out and do a little service. It will be great for your heart and your soul.

Be Healthy – Enjoy Life!

Matthew Stearmer

I so relate to Bob Incredible! I remember back in the good old days when I used to take on the evil forces in the universe and stop their sinister plans to take over the earth. Those were the days. /sigh.
 

Once we find our purpose we can move from the Really Strong Fat Man mode to one of health and wellness. We will have a reason to be healthy and continue in a lifestyle that will bring us a complete life. Not one just focused on one thing at a time.

One thing that I really like about Bob is that his end result was not what he looked like in his glory days. He was different, but still looked good. There was a maturity about him that was different.

As I work on transforming my body I realize more and more that I will never by 18 again. On some level that used to bother me. But now, I think that I have a better self image in mind. First off, I’m working on being healthy, not just skinny. And second, because of a focus on health, I am free to let my body become its best self right now. I know that I have matured. I will look different, but I still intend to look really good:)

Be Healthy – Enjoy Life

Matthew Stearmer

I just found a neat tool online that will tell you on average, how long your family lives. Based on genealogical archives the database automatically calculates the average life expectancy of your family compared to all others and then graphs it over a 30 year time frame.

Over the last 30 years my family has about a 10 year longer lifespan than average.

I guess that is comforting. But then I remembered a story a friend of mine told. A friend of his was hitting middle age and decided he wanted to create a 100 year plan. He wanted to live 100 year – and enjoy it. So he went to his doctor to help him develop this 100 year plan. They consulted, ran tests and then evaluated.

The doctor said all of your test came back perfect. Your cholesterol is great. Blood pressure is great. Triglycerides are normal…. And your obese.

What?

The man protested, but I workout ever day. I can bench press twice my weight. Doesn’t that make a difference?

The doctor then went to his whiteboard and wrote "Really Strong – FAT MAN"

The point, there is more to health than just strength, or being skinny, etc. health and living well is much more than that. And if we want to not only live a long time, but really enjoy it we need to be healthy, not just strong, or good in a health measure or two. A real 100 year plan will not just rely on the genes, but will integrate exercise, proper eating, sleep, stress reduction – the whole gamut. When we focus on the whole, not just one piece, then we can have a real 100 year plan that we will want to be around for.

So Be Healthy – Enjoy Life

Matthew Stearmer

The last two weeks have been something else. I’ve barely been able to get a few miles in a week and that is way down from my regular goals. Basically my workour progress has just been a joke the last 2 weeks.

Now, I’m quite please with my diet all things considered. I have continued to eat smaller portions and that has helped. I’ve not gained back any weight, but I certainly have not made any progress. Oh well. I’ll have to be thankful for small blessing.

So now that I finally got back on the elliptical again it felt so good!

I don’t know why, when I need to exercise the most, I tend to do it the least. When I am stressed exercise is the best remedee for me. When I am tried, exercise helps me get back to better sleeping. When I am feeling overworked, exercise helps me to organize better. I know all of that, but for some reason I lose track of that when I am in the heat of the moment as it were.

So, with most of that behind me now Ill be moving on.

Be Healthy – Enjoy Life!

Matthew Stearmer

I’ve been thinking about feedback loops. I know, its kind of a random topic, but hear me out. I think that it is very important. In our body we have neurological feedback loops. If you touch a hot stove – you do not think, ‘wow, that was hot, I should remove my hand now.’ Before you can even think your body just reacts.  These reactions are governed by the emotional part of the brain. We do not have to think about it, the body just does it. If it did not every 4 year old in the world would be literally scared for life.

More of our body and life are like that. We respond to the stimulus around us. Often without even thinking. It is just what we do. And if we can control the stimulus, or use that emotional reaction to our favor – we will win the weight loss game.

From a weight loss perspective this blog is an immediate consequence for me. I know that I have to post my performance on a regular basis, so I modify my life styles more naturally now that the whole world can see and comment on it. I don’t really think about it any more. It is just what I do

Some foods offer the same thing to me. If I eat chocolate I get sick. That feed back loop ensures that certain things will not tempt me to break my regime.

As my body has become more sensitive to good foods, I crave the bad much less, and I can feel the immediate consequence of indulging.

Unfortunately we have modern medicine that helps us cover up the feedback loops. Here I am thinking mostly of the anti-acid pills we can take to “enjoy” whatever we want to eat. If we let the body suffer the consequences I think that we would be more apt to listen to our body’s feedback and that, I believe, is one of the best keys to weight loss that I can find.

I think that I will post more on this over the next few days – or write an article on it. It is a good topic to continue. If you are interested let me know.

From a weekend goal perspective, I’m going to just live a normal as possible. I’ll get in some good exercise, drink lots of water, try to get some sleep and if I lose some more weight that will just be great.

Be Healthy – Enjoy Life!

Matt Stearmer

I’m testing a new photo upload tool here. It works pretty good!

Weight loss is a complicated issue. One of the greatest conundrums of weight loss is that the more exercise you do the more efficient your body gets a burning calories. So the 5 miles that you ran at the beginning may have burned 1000 calories – but 5 months later it may only burn 750 calories for the same exercise.

Now you can speed things up, increase the incline etc. Anything to increase the intensity, but the fact of the matter is your body will adapt. So if you are not constantly varying your exercise regime you will hit a plateau.

You actually need a combination of several different exercises in order to have an effective workout regime. I’m just going to outline the different parts here.

1) HIT (High Intensity Training): Wind sprints are great for booting the metabolism. Does not burn as many calories, but it will increase your overall metabolic rate throughout the day.

2) Endurance (heart rate around 70-80% maximum target heart rate – 220-Age = Max Target Heart Rate): Get that heart rate up high high high for as long as you can go up to about 40 minutes. The main point here is that you will burn more calories over all.

Be careful on these first 2. If you have not exercised in awhile you will want to talk to a doctor before engaging in these really seriously intense exercises.

3) Low intensity (Heart rate in the 60-70% of max range)- This is great for over all fat burning power. The longer you go (1-2 hours here) the more and more of the calories will come directly from your fat stores. Which is a really good things

4) Weight Training – This will add muscle which requires energy just to exist, let alone move. So as your body becomes more efficient if your are adding muscle you will burn more energy anyway, even if your body is more efficient at burning the calories over all.

Here is what I like to do.

Monday, Wednesday and Friday: Long upper end of the “low intestisty” exercises. This is where I will run while watching a movie. I will keep my heart rate up as high as I can for as long as I can. So typically I will get in about 40-60 minutes of Endurance style training. And then I will keep going at a slower pace for the 2 hour movie to get over.

Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday I will do weight lifting and HIT excercises.

It does not always work out that way. Sometimes I have to cut my MWF regime to just the endurance category. But as often as possible I try to get in 2 hours at a time.

Weight lifting I sometimes have to do throughout the day. I will take a break from programming to do push-ups or sit-ups or curls etc.

For me the point is to move more, eat less, and replenish the nutrients in my body. It seems to work very well for me

Be Health – Enjoy Life!

Matthew Stearmer

Weight loss in the winter time is always difficult to manage. But this winter I not going to put on any weight. In face to make this weight loss regime the hardest I possible could I managed to “schedule” my last 30 pounds to lose right during the holiday season.

Maybe not the best plan in the long run – but here we go.

On top of the holidays that constantly come up for the next 3 months it is also freezing cold here in Utah. So getting out and running gets a little harder. Not impossible mind you – but a little more challenging. Normally I would just get on my elliptical and put in a movie, but since I broke the right front wheel and the replancements are still coming I’m going to have to be a little creative.

Somewhat fortuitiously I came accross an article today in the New York Times on how jumping rope is coming back into weight loss style. After doing a little research I discovered that this is one of the hardest and best cario workouts that you can do indoors, and in one place no less. With more and more people living in small appartment and condos jumping rope becomes a natural weight loss regime.

This is how I am going to use it this weekend for my goals.

Friday is supposed to be a long work out day. It should not be too snowy until the evening, so I am going to leave an hour early for my research appointment so I can get that in before noon. I’m going to take a shirt to change into after that, so I look somewhat respectable for my meetings. That will give me about 4 miles before the meeting and time to stop sweating before any sees me. Then depending on the weather I any do another 2 miles on my way home.

Saturday I will do jump rope interval training. I’m going to jump for 3 minutes. Then rest for 1 minute while doing a combination of sit-ups, push-ups, and bicep curls. So each set will be 4 minutes long. I’m going to do 10 of them for a total of 40 minutes. That will get the heart pumping. I’ll take my pulse at the end of the first several 3 minute intervals so I can get a sense for who it compares to my elliptical exercises or regular wind sprints.

Sunday is going to be a long day as usual with all my church responsbilities. I never eat very well on these days. I normally try to go on a walk with the kids, but since it is supposed to be snowing I’m not sure we’ll be able to do that. So I will make sure that I walk around the church several times during the day. 10 Laps will be a mile. I’m going to try and get 20 laps in. I’m going to get there before my meetings on Sunday and do 6 laps. Then I will 2 after the first meeting, and 2 more after the next one. Then after the third I will do 4 more before heading home. Then when I come back I will do 2 laps before church starts, 2 more bewteen sacrament meeting and Sunday School. Then 2 more between Sunday School and priesthood. After church is very hectic, so I’ll not plan on any extra then. This will not be a strenous work out to say the least, but it will be enough to get me off my butt on a day that I usually do lot and lots of sitting.

Monday will be a long day again. My elliptical will not be fixed yet either, but the weather is supposed to be cold, but sunny. So I’m going to go on a long walk. I can get 6 miles done in a hour easily so I will shoot for that. I just got some new shoes so I am excited to run in them and see how it feels to workout with good shoes again. I literally had duct tap holding my last pair together.

Over that 4 day period I’m goin to shoot for 3 more lbs lost.

I’ll report how I did on Monday.

I hope that you all have a fabulous weekend.

Matt Stearmer

The negatives are the resistance side of the weight lifting. So you have the contraction where the muscle pulls the weight up, or pushes it away. Then as gravity then does it magic – you resist it.

Now we always have to do this part. If we did not resist the weight to barbell would come crashing in down on us. Not pleasant.

But it is the most powerful part of the exercise and we often just want to let gravity do its thing.

The main point here is to slow things down.

There are a few things that will always get weight lifters in trouble. Bad form, momentum (often contributed by the bad form), Ego (trying to lift too much – which then leads to bad form and momentum.

Look, if you want to look sloppy and hurt yourself you can continue to sling the weight around and hope to impress…. Well, honestly I don’t know who you’ll impress. Any of us that know any better will just look and laugh. And it is hard to impress the girls (if that is what you were going for) if your hunched over because of a sprained back or when you cannot walk because you blew out your knew.

Anyway, now to the point. Slowing things down will help overcome these issue.

First, we have to get rid of the ego. let’s just try to impress ourselves first, the rest will com later if you really want it.  Once the ego is out of the way you can pick a lighter weight that you can really control for no more than 10 reps and typically in the 5-7 rep range.

Now, on the form. Going supper slow, with a lighter weight to begin with, will let you really concenrate on the lift. And by slow I’m talking about 10 seconds to contact the muscle and at least 4 to resist it coming back down. REALLY SLOW. The point is not the number of reps per se, but the total time your muscles are under stress. Making them contract longer will force them to grow faster.

The main reason appears to be momentum. When a sloppy weight lifter moves the weight quickly, and allows the weight to bounce (like off the chest for a bench press, or off the calves for a squat) the body is using the momentum of the weight in order to get more poundage out of the lift – but allowing gravity to do the work, or the centrifugal force in a swinging exercise will only leave your muscles more flaccid at the end of several weeks training compared to a more dedicated lifter.

And adding to that the risk of injury goes up with bad form and too much weight – it should be a no brain-er to slow things way down in order to get the gains you want.

Have fun.

Matthew Stearmer

Where has all the weight lost gone? Start singing that to “I need a hero”

In some of my posts I have mentioned not only that I am losing weight, but that I cannot account for where it is all going. I can only see the evidence that what I am doing is not losing helping me lose weight, but it is also helping me do it faster than I can account for.

My friend politely asked for an accounting. Which I did not mind at all. He is right. The body is part of system and systems must be balanced. There is no magic that makes fat just disappear contrary to what all the late night infomercials might say.

So let me share what I know, and what some possibilities might be.

The body has 3 primary systems for generating energy. Phosphagen (short burst sprints), Glycogen (0.5 to 20 minutes) and Aerobic (longer than 20 min). Each has it own purpose to helping the body function at its best.

The last two are where we lose weight during workouts so I will focus on those. In the first 20 minutes 95% of he energy expended is from glycogen – 5% from fat.. Then up to 4 hours of Aerobic exercise will burn up to 60% of the energy from fat (the rest from glycogen), and after 4 hours, if your even more insane than I am, your body will be burning 85+% of energy from fat.

The body can store 1-5 lbs of glycogen depending on how big you are. An average around 2 seems normal based on what I could find. And for each pound of glycogen there is 3-4 lbs of water.

Let’s take as an example a workout that I did the other day. I jumped on the elliptical machine and went for a solid 2 hours at a sustainable pace. I bumped up the resistance and just went a little slow than normal – about 130 revolutions per minute (for comparison on my sprint workouts I will alternate between 150 and 200 revolutions per minute). I burned off a little over 2500 calories. Let’s just say for this simple purpose that the calories were burned consistently through the workout. Here is how it works out

2500 calories divided by 120 minutes = approx 21 calories per minute.

At 20 minutes I burned off 420 calories – but 400 of those calories came from glycogen and only 20 from fat. At this rate, unless it was a really intense 20 minutes to boost the metabolism, I will not make much progress in weight loss.

But I still put in another 100 minutes. That was another 2100 calories and up to 60% of that came from my fat stores. That is 1260 calories directly out of my fat. If I do that 3x a week, then I will be losing a pound of fat every week. Even if I do nothing else over the course of a year just about anyone can lose all the weight that they need just adding a good long power walk to their workout.

Now, over all weight loss at the time of exercise is different. Calories from glycogen are not quite as dense as fat. So, there is not a 1 to 1 comparison in their calories. 400 calories of glycogen will give you about the same amount of weight as 1200 in fat. Plus you add to that the water loss of 3-4 times more weight than the glycogen itself and viola! I lost 5 lbs.

Only about 1/3 of that may be fat. So I will gain all of that back after eating. But that is still 1/3 of a lbs in fat. The point is to weight yourself under as close to the same conditions as possible each time. So you do not catch the swings, but the incremental process. You can also see that it would not help very much to constantly look at the scale and the mirror. That can just lead to disappointment as you see the weight go up and down.

This type of fluctuation is perfectly normal. It is not part of the yo-yo effect that you have to worry about.

Now, I have also mentioned that I cannot account for all of the weight loss that I have had over the last few months. Even taking into account all the variables that I can I still appear to be losing more weight than the energy expended. Granted, I have no proof of that, it very well could be a measuring error. I have to concede that point. But there does seem to be some evidence in my life to support an alternative medicine theory.

I’ll just give a brief overview here and will post more on it later.

The fat in your body stores energy and tries to contain free radicals (this is not disputed). Alternative medicine approaches claim that if you can beat back the free radicals then you can coax the weight to come off easier, and the body will just release the fat into the excretion systems to get rid of it without having to burn all the calories.

I’ll provide some more evidence of that in my other posts, but I’ll just conclude with my results that show that have lost about 2x as much weight as I can account for. So I either have some really serious accounting issues (just call me Enron), or there is something to be said for alternative theories.

Hope you enjoyed this.

Matthew Stearmer

I’m a big fan of fun. So are my kids. And they like to play with me while I workout. So we have started doing push-ups and sit-ups together now.

Personally I get bored doing high repetitions so adding a little weight is nice. I get a better workout. Shorter. And we can do it together as a family. Fun all around.

Push-ups: With these two kids it adds up to the equivalent of about a 270 bench press. Not bad for just getting back into shape. I can do it with the two oldest as well. With him on top they bump the weight up to just under 300 lbs. I maxed out at about 340 in my hayday, so I’m getting back up there again.

Sit-ups: Tess adds about 35 lbs to my chest. As I move up the weight distribution isn’t quite that heavy, but at the bottom it is. My middle child (Savannah) can sit on my chest as well (about 70lbs). But Conner is just too big. I tried to put her on my shoulders to increase the difficulty – but that did not work too well. Oh well. Maybe in a few more weeks!

I guess te bottom line of this post is HAVE FUN. This should not be torture. Find ways to enjoy it. This is just one way for me. The kids I hope will develop a sense that exercise is enjoyable. I try to smile and talk and joke while I workout. Taken too seriously the kids will think that it is torture. I want them to grow up with a healthy respect for their bodies, but not an obsession  with it or a bad attitude about it. It should just be healthy and fun.

Matthew Stearmer