Strength Training vs Cardio

 

 

Strength Training vs Cardio

Strength training or cardio, which one should you do?

And the answer is coming at the end.

We typically see certain benefits that come with these different training styles, and with strength training, we usually see an increase in our muscle mass.

This will help build bone density and retain our bone density as we age because muscles pull on bone when you lift stuff, and when you do that, you stimulate the bone to make more bone.

So hanging on to bone density and hanging on to muscle mass are perfect things as we age.

Other things that we see with men, and when we see this improvement in testosterone levels, especially for men getting older, because lifting weights is an anabolic process, your body is lifting stuff that stimulates muscle building.

We need hormones like testosterone to do that.

The other thing I've noticed in my practice specific to chiropractic is that proper strength training can improve your posture.

Because you're stimulating the muscles, especially the muscles in the back, your core muscles, you're stimulating these muscles to fire and to be used, and that tends to improve our posture because those muscles are now working more.

This is good for patients with hyper-mobility issues, meaning their joints move too much.

Patients with scoliosis fit in that bracket, other patients with other hyper-mobility issues.

Strength training can be very effective for them in preventing flare-ups in pain.

So this is a very important form of training.

The other form of training we have out there is cardio, and what are the good things about cardio?

Well, with cardiovascular training, we improve our VO2 max, our ability, and our lungs' ability to bring in very important oxygen, especially for our older patients.

They've actually studied this, and if you have a higher VO2 max as you get older, you are far less susceptible to lung infections, pneumonia, and the flu, and as you get older, that can kill you.

Having a higher VO2 max can help prevent those harmful infections from worsening.

This is also very good for your heart.

That's a no-brainer.

We know getting cardiovascular exercise, fast-paced walking, running, doing the bike, and swimming are all great forms of cardiovascular exercise that we know are very good for the heart.

The other thing that it does is it increases our capillary density.

And what that means is you have blood vessels that eventually turn into these small little blood vessels called capillaries, and that's where your cardiovascular system delivers the oxygen and nutrients to those cells and then removes CO2 and takes it back to the lungs.

So whenever you increase capillary density, you are more efficient at bringing oxygen and nutrition to your cells.

So this is a good thing.

So what is the answer?

Which one do we do?

The answer is pretty simple.

You want to do both.

Doing both can help, and cardio can help strength training, just like strength training can help your cardio.

The two go hand in hand.

There shouldn't be a battle between, and you should only do this, you should only do that.

You really should find a balance between the two.

At my age at 42 years old, when I'm strength training, I want to focus on good quality form.

I want to stay calm with heavy lifting.

I want to lift heavier weights, but I want to avoid getting carried away with it.

I stay in that eight to 12 rep range, sometimes 12 to 15 rep range, and I'm focused on my form when I do this.

That's more important at age 42 than bragging about some crazy weight I lifted and hurting for the next five days.

The cardio that I like to do is more of a steady-state cardio.

I will throw in some sprints here and there because I think that's good for us, but I'm not doing a ton of higher impact training at this age just because as we get older, our joints can't take that as much, and that can cause more damage than it's worth.

So, if you're looking at training, you look at combining both of these things because the two together are the best bet for your health.

I'm Dr. Aaron Seaton with The Chiropractic Place.

 

Call our office today to schedule an appointment to kickstart your healthy life: 530-221-8443

 

 

*The transcription is auto-generated by a program and may not be accurate. In order to ensure you get all the information from the video properly, you must watch the video.