High Intesisty Training – Workout # 1

Posted by Teodor Lazar on July 1st, 2009
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After weighing myself this morning, I made a green smoothie and headed to the gym. I met with my trainer and after a brief greeting, he started measuring my body’s muscle groups. As soon as he was done, he walked me through the workout, pre-adjusting the Nautilus equipment to fit my body type. Then he measured my resting heart rate at 60 bpm.

I was starting to get excited. I thought the workout would be challenging, but nothing I couldn’t get through. At the time, I didn’t fully appreciate why the workout only takes 10 minutes. I mean there must be a catch, right? Well, there is. The intensity is hellish!

The first exercise was the chest press. I got on the machine and pushed up slowly. This took about 5 seconds. I then slowly brought the bars back to the starting position, taking another 5 seconds. I was so busy concentrating on doing each exercise slowly, I didn’t think about anything else. I didn’t even count the reps. Luckily, my trainer did.

I did 5 reps and as I struggled with the final one, I could feel my chest burning. This was only the first exercise. I wanted to quit, but my trainer encouraged me to breathe and give it all I could. Meanwhile, my body was screaming at me to stop. I took a quick breath and continued to push against the bars and moved them up about 2 inches. My trainer urged me to keep going. After seeing me freeze in place, he told me to lower the weight back down SLOWLY. Even though I felt like my chest was about to explode, I did as he said.

We moved on the lat pull down machine. The machines were right next to each other, so my rest time was around 15 seconds. As soon as I got on, I started the lat pull downs and felt relieved that my chest was no longer on fire. After 3 reps on the lateral machine, I realized this was going to be a repetitive process. The pain had returned and was now in my lats and back. There was no escaping it and I barely completed 5 reps.

I moved on to the shoulder press – more burning pain. I completed 5 reps on the shoulder press.

The biceps came next and I felt somewhat relieved. I’ve done slow reps for biceps before and I felt they were easier to do than some of the other exercises. I did 6 complete reps. After biceps were done, we moved on to the leg curl machine. The leg curls proved difficult, but I got through the set, finishing 4 reps. Then we moved on to the leg press machine.

The leg presses proved to be the most challenging for me. I work out my legs once a week and it’s usually a light workout. The leg presses were anything but light. Doing the reps on this machine proved to be the most painful out of all the exercises. After completing my set of leg presses (a total of 6 reps), I could barely walk. I just sort of wobbled over to a chair. I had given it all I had and now I felt light headed. I sat down in the chair next to the leg press machine. My trainer measured my heart rate again and it was 140 bmp. I felt like the room was spinning. Since the intensity of the exercises is really high, most people throw-up their first time. I was not to be the exception.

It happened shortly after I stood out of the chair. I had gone into the bathroom to throw some water on my face and while I was standing over the sink – I felt my stomach kick up some of the smoothie I’d had for breakfast. I regurgitated about a handful of it. I then lay down on a bench and rested for 5 minutes. This made me feel somewhat better.

My total workout time was only 9 minutes and 26 seconds, but due to the brief rest time in-between exercises, this workout was truly horrendous. You may think I’m exaggerating – I want to assure you that that is not the case.

There were times during the workout I wanted to take it easy, but I couldn’t slack off because as soon as I did – I would hear my trainer say, “Slower” or “Push it, come on.” As the exercises progressed, I felt like my heart was jumping out of my chest – I could feel the adrenaline all over my body. The fight or flight response at its finest.

Welcome to high intensity!

High Intensity Training (HIT) – Experiment 2

Posted by Teodor Lazar on July 1st, 2009
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For my second experiment, I’ve decided to get into top physical shape by exercising. I haven’t been to the gym since the middle of May and I’ve put on some weight. Apparently I’m not the only one. If you don’t already know, our nation has one of the highest obesity rates in the world and each year we’re getting fatter. Fast food, SUVs, and TVs have all played their part in shaping our bodies. Although I am not obese, I’m not as physically fit as I’d like to be – that’s why I’ve decided to get into shape. I’m not only doing this for myself, I’m doing it to inspire you to start your own fitness program.  :-)

Now I know that you may think exercising takes up too much time. Time that you can’t take out of your busy schedule. Well I’m here to tell you that I intend to lose as much fat and gain as much muscle as possible by only working out 20 minutes a week (only 10 minutes for the first week of July), for a grand total of 1 hour and 30 minutes this whole month. That’s right, a grand total of 1 HOUR and 30 MINUTES of exercise the WHOLE month.

The exercise program I will be experimenting with this month is called High Intensity Training (HIT) and it packs a whole workout into just 10 minutes. This form of strength training was first popularized by Arthur Jones (founder of the Nautilus machines) and the premise behind it is that exercise should be brief, infrequent, and intense.

This may sound like your typical infomercial, but there’s nothing easy about this workout! The exercises may be packed into a short time span, but they are unimaginably brutal. Each one involves using multiple muscle groups at once. I will be doing 6 different exercises per workout, one set of each, until I reach complete muscle failure. While doing the exercises, I will do each rep slowly (10 seconds from start to finish). After completing as many reps as possible on one exercise, I will move on to the next exercise with only a very brief rest period inbetween (15-30 seconds).

Aside from whey protein, I will NOT be using any suplements during this experiment. I’ve decided to use whey protein because in order to gain muscle and lose fat I need to increase my overall protein intake. Since I don’t want to constantly be stuffing myself with food throughout the day, I figured whey protein was the best way to go. Whey protein is easily absorbed by the body, it can be prepared in seconds, and it tastes great.

Having given you the premise behind the experiment, I’ve decided to post the pictures I took of myself on July 1, 2009. These were taken before my first workout. After finishing the experiment, I will post the results and also go over the lessons I’ve learned. For now, I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves – and yes, I’m in my boxers.

Front Relaxed

Frontal View (relaxed)

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Raw Food Wisdom

Posted by Teodor Lazar on June 25th, 2009
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After eating raw foods for 30 days, I learned a few things about the raw food lifestyle. These are more of the technical aspects of eating raw. Since I’ve had a couple of you e-mail me about the raw food diet experiment, I decided to make a separate post detailing some of the things I learned while eating raw foods. I hope these points help you on your journey and hopefully you will learn a few things that you can add to this list.

Eat greens to stop cravings: I read that when you have strong cravings you can usually dissipate those cravings with a good helping of greens. Therefore, when I had strong cravings for cooked meat, I would go to the blender and throw as many greens in as would fit. This worked as stated and the cravings would go away in about a half hour. Towards the end of the experiment I figured out that eating some greens was not enough. In order to keep the cravings from emerging, you need to be eating around 2-3 lbs of greens per day. This may seem like a huge task, but if you have a blender you can just whip yourself up a smoothie and drink it.

Buy a high power blender: During my first raw food trial, I bought a cheap blender which cost me around $34. I was able to use it for 3 days before its engine gave out. It burned out when I put in some collard greens and some wheat grass. One moment I’m peeling a mango, next moment I’m hearing “granawwww wwrrrrr wrrrr wr…*poof*” and smoke starts coming out of the blender. Don’t let this happen to you. Buy a high end blender. It will help you cut through tough fibrous greens with peace of mind. I recommend the Vita-Mix 5200, I’ve had mine for a little over a month and it is fantastic. You can’t go wrong with it. It has more than enough power and capacity to puree the tough green vegetables you’ll be using in your smoothies.

Chew your smoothies: You need certain enzymes to break down the cellulose walls of the plants. Those enzymes come from your saliva, so if you just drink the smoothie there won’t be enough saliva enzymes present in the food in your stomach to break down those cell walls and you won’t get all the needed nutrients from those plants. So take a sip and chew it until it is warm, then swallow it.

Avoid green bell peppers: Green peppers are high in solanine – a glycoalkaloid poison found in species of the nightshade family, which green bell peppers are a part of. Solanine acts as a toxin and is poisonous in even small quantities. Solanine poisoning is primarily displayed by gastrointestinal and neurological disorders. Some of the symptoms include nausea, vomiting, stomach cramps, diarrhea, burning of the throat, heart arrhythmia, headaches, and dizziness. It can even cause hallucinations. I also talked to a friend of mine who is an 80% raw foodist and he confirmed my research. So just say no to green bell peppers!

Nuts processed in the US are not raw: During my second week on raw foods, I found out that the nuts produced in the United States are pasteurized. Because of a salmonella incident that happened years ago, laws were passed that required all nuts produced here to be pasteurized. The real kicker is that the companies who produce the nuts are not required to label the pasteurized nuts. So when you buy a bag of raw almonds, you’re not buying raw almonds – you’re buying pasteurized almonds that haven’t been roasted. I bought two bags of what I thought were raw almonds from two US manufacturers and both bags of almonds failed to germinate when soaked in water. If you aren’t sure where the nuts are produced, try giving customer support a call and find out whether the nuts are processed in the US or some other country.

These are just a few of the lessons I learned. If you have any of your own, feel free to contact me.

How to Learn a Foreign Language Quickly

Posted by Teodor Lazar on June 18th, 2009
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I came to the United States when I was 8 years old. I didn’t know anything about the English language. I didn’t even know how to pronounce my own name in English. After being in the United States for two weeks, I didn’t think I’d ever learn how to speak English. From my perspective, Americans shot their words out quickly – as though they were trying to hit targets rather than carry on conversations. English words whizzed by my ears like trains in a subway station and I felt like I was the only person that kept missing them.

Seven-months later, I was able to speak, read, and write better than 80% of the students in my class. I remember a particular instance when my second grade teacher, Mrs. Hughes, asked the class a question on English grammar – it involved direct object pronouns. I was the only one in my class to raise my hand. Even the top students were surprised.

With a perplexed look on her face, Mrs. Hughes called on me to answer the question. I gave her the right answer and she told me she was proud of me. Really proud! Up until that point, I had been the class dunce. The one who had trouble understanding the simplest of concepts. It was hard for me to believe how far I had come, but at that moment I knew I had arrived at my destination. So how did I undergo such a massive transformation so quickly?

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The Good Samaritan

Posted by Teodor Lazar on June 11th, 2009
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A while ago, I had to cruise downtown to acquire some records from my local courthouse. Finding parking was a real treat, I found a spot around 15 blocks from where I needed to be. Or maybe I was exactly where I needed to be. You decide.

While walking towards my destination, I came upon a clearing that exposed a small park. The park was in the form of a square with various trees and shrubs, plus four benches, two of which were occupied. Each one had a homeless man in it. The men were seated, looking forward, as if watching a movie at a theater. Only there was no theater screen in front of them, just a busy street. There was a third homeless man digging through a garbage container. He was trying to find some food. As I observed him, I remembered the story of The Good Samaritan.

If you are not familiar with The Good Samaritan, it was a story told by Jesus in reply to the question “and who is my neighbor, teacher?” I have posted Jesus’s response below:

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