Fitness buffs, gym rats - I need your help. At the moment I’ve been feeling like an RPG character at the gym; only so many points to spend on either strength or stamina. As the weeks go on, I’ve found that I can only beast cardio or resistance, trying to maintain both ends up with me either exhausted on the treadmill way before time or failing my reps (seemingly at random, I can’t predict which).
Put me out of my misery - is there a physiological reason why stamina would decrease while strength increased (and vice-versa), or is it all in my head?
Can you give us an idea of what your regimen is? Particularly, what’s the difference between when you “beast” one or the other? There certainly are some limits, and depending on the extremes of your workouts, it may make sense. There’s also just plain overtraining, and if you expend all your energy in one area, you’re just going to have less of it in another.
Thanks for the quick replies fellas, appreciate it.
3 or 4 times a week, about 2 hours a time. I do cardio first then resistance (usually about 1 1/4 cardio, the remaining resistence), but lately this has been falling apart due to my current dilemma. I might manage only half an hour cardio, but then go dumbell-crazy or alternatively run like a mofo only for my arms to feel like they’re gonna fall off after a few reps.
Big breakfast of cereal and fruit, very light lunch like a sandwich or something, biggish evening meal. Try and train between the latter two and not eat too much crap.
On preview; I also get through two litres of water per session (I tried sports drink, but found it just too sickly) and glug a litre/litre and a half an hour and a bit before so I’m hoping hydration ain’t the prob!
ETA; should preview more! @ runner pat, that’s what I would have figured but week by week it seems almost random which one I’m crap at, even though I always do cardio first.
@ Blaster Master, for cardio it’s usually a 10k hill run on the treadmill (increasing the incline as weeks go on to make life harder) or a hill run on the static bike for an hour getting as far as I can, for the resistance 45 reps each (15/15/15) of dumbbell curls, dumbbell lifts, knee lifts (dunno if that counts) and decline presses on the big rig.
Dilute the sport drink to half strength. Taste perception changes with exertion. Also, most drinks from the bottle are too strong(sugar) for good absorption.
How soon after breakfast are you working out?
Big meal means blood diverted to the stomach/intestines plus the mass in the stomach can be a problem to some.
CT Fletcher is not natural. I don’t care what he spews, he’s on dat dere cell tech.
You should do the cardio AFTER your weight training.
Do you have an established routine (ICF, SL, SS, 5/3/1) or are you just going in and doing what you feel like?
It’s hard to tell if this is enough for you or not. Are you losing weight or gaining weight eating what you are eating? If you are losing weight, then you are going to lose some strength. If you are gaining weight, then it’s probably the cardio first problem.
Oh, you’re damn right - early on I tried exercising after biggish meals but it just made me feel sick as a parrot. I try to get my session in after lunch, which is always real light (pasta salad or sandwich or something)/before evening meal.
Do you reckon just drinking plain old water is causing me grief? I know there’s a lot of hype about electrolytes and osmosis and all that, but I dismissed that after sports drink made no difference for me. Have you had any joy with rehydration/electrolyte tablets?
On preview; thanks for the reply Meatros - cardio after, you say? The only reason I do it the other way round is because I feel ‘warmed up’ enough - is it fine to go into resistance ‘cold’ as it were?
On my weight, if I’m gymming it it stays pretty constant/increases slightly (about 165 lbs), if I slack off the weight falls off me (like 10 lbs).
Not completely cold, no - it depends though. On leg days (squat day or deadlift day) I’ll do something like 3-8 minutes on the elliptical to get the heart rate going and then I’ll do a few warm up sets (around 3) until I’m warm. I also stretch before squats.
You are doing an hour to an hour and a half (roughly) prior to weight training - you are using up all the ‘fuel’ in your muscles prior to working out.
So you are maintaining your weight? If so, you should probably eat a little more so you can gain more muscle (if you are looking to become stronger, that is).
I’m with Meatros, hit the weights before your cardio.
Also drink more water, get 8 hours of sleep every night, and give yourself an hour after finishing yoru meal before you train.
As others have said, the biggest issue here, I think, is doing cardio before you weight train. I would recommend doing cardio after weight training and/or doing it on separate days. Ideally, you want to do a quick warm-up, 5-10 minutes of light cardio before you exercise, then do more intense cardio afterward. And if you still feel you need to do more, go in and a solo cardio day once or twice a week.
The difference here is that, with your routine, if you go hard on cardio, you’ll be lacking the energy to properly exhaust your muscles with resistance training afterward, and to have enough energy, you’ll have to hit the cardio light enough to make it ineffective. If you do it in reverse, you won’t be able to hit the cardio as hard as you’re used to, but you won’t need to hit it as hard as you’ll have kept your heartrate somewhat elevated from weight training.
I’ve tried several different methods of mixing them together, doing it before, doing it after, doing it at separate times and on separate days. I’ve found my best results as far as overall stamina and strength was definitely doing it afterward. Yes, I could hit it harder when I did it separate, but I actually got more real stamina and more strength doing it after. And by that, I mean I started being able to lift more and do more reps with no other changes, and if I want to go run a couple miles on an off-day like I did before, I still have that ability.
B. You’re right. You only have so many points to spend on either strength OR endurance.
Weightlifting is anabolic, meaning it builds muscle. Long slow distance cardio is catabolic, meaning it burns muscle. Pick one to focus on or you won’t make any progress with either.
If you must do cardio while trying to get stronger, make it shorter and higher intensity. Sprints, hill runs, push a prowler, etc.
Remember though, higher strength will help your run times fairly significantly. Imagine each step is a tiny rep. When you’re stronger, each of those reps is less taxing and you can do more of them. And you can afford to use more force for each “rep” so you’ll run faster too. Of course all this applies only up to a point.
More endurance won’t really help you get stronger though. The general advice I hear is to get pretty strong first, then if you want to focus on cardio, you can use your acquired strength to be faster and endure longer than you would otherwise.
Cereal and fruit is not even close to a “big breakfast” for someone working out the way you are. Go ahead and eat the cereal, but add a couple of eggs and some meat. Maybe potatoes, too. Milk or yogurt.
And a sandwich at lunch? Also doesn’t sound like enough.
IANA-bodybuilder/nutritionist, but I think you need to eat a lot more.
Really appreciate the thoughts so far. It sounds like I’m doing things a bit back-asswards in doing a load of cardio before resistance training which is compounded by running out of fuel too quickly. I’m sleeping all right, about 7-8 hours a night.
Eating more meat and eggs shouldn’t be a problem for me, delish!
Lots of steady state cardio will decrease your strength gains. Doesn’t mean that is wrong to do, it depends on your goals and likes, but if your goal is strength and/or muscle mass you are better off doing high intensity interval training (HIIT) for your cardio than prolonged steady state.
If you are committed to doing 3 to 4 times a week for 2 hours rather than 6 times a week for 1, then it is fine to do both. The general rule is you do the one that matter most to you first, when you are fresh. Alternatively doing HIIT sets between weight sets (and in the process keeping your heart rate up the whole time) is very well regarded as a technique. And of course alternating days works fine too.