| Tips on Using Ice for Acute Soft Tissue Injuries |
| Cryotherapy (putting ice on it) is still a standard first-line measure for acute soft tissue injuries and it is even used in the rehabilitation of chronic injuries. I recommend immediate ice application in the event of a strain or sprain. But there is a right way and a wrong way to do it. Here are some basic guidelines:
Use a bag of melting ice water wrapped in a towel. Ice alone is not cold enough and commercial ice packs are inconsistent, either being too cold or not cold enough. However, as part of a first aid kit for when ice is not available commercial cold packs should be considered a viable option.  The cold compresses used for sports injuries are not to be confused with the commercial ice packs used for keeping foods cool in coolers. These are MUCH too cold and are not to be used on injuries. Products such as Rubbermaid's "Blue Ice" (shown below) are what I'm speaking of. The goal is to reduce the temperature in the muscle and to sustain this reduced temperature during the initial recovery phase from an acute injury. The best time frame tends to be around ten minutes. Any longer than that and you risk damaging the skin and also possible pain within the muscles…which is obviously counter productive. Icing too long at once will simply further injure the tissue. The target temperature is 50 °F or 10 °C. Using short and repeated applications will allow the skin temperature to return to normal but the muscle temperature will remain low. Direct ice application is not good for sustained cooling of muscle since there will tend to be a reflex "heating" of the tissues. If you are in a competitive situation then ice is the best for an immediate return to play, if at all possible and desirable.  Keep in mind, however, that reflex and coordination can be affected by the ice application. Look at it this way, if you hurt your ankle and then ice it down a long time, your ankle is not going to be very usable. In these cases there would usually be compression wrapping as well to stabilize the joint. If an immediate return to activity is not needed, as in the case of training related injuries, then REST and apply ice for periods of ten minutes. In between wait for the skin temperature to return to normal, then repeat. Cold water immersion, rather than ice application, can be used for joint injuries for the first 24 hours and there is some evidence that immersion is a more effective way to reduce swelling in the joint than ice application. Be careful with cold water immersion and use at your own risk, as with ice application. Please note that these tips are for informational purposes and should not replace professional medical advice. More information on first aid for musculoskeletal injuries I also recommend that you follow the link below to my short explanation of "nondisruptive muscle strain injuries". This is something that you must understand about injuries in gym. If you are involved in strength training; sooner or later you will pull something. However most severe injuries are a result of misunderstanding the mechanisms of those little tweaks we get from time to time. |
| Olive Oil Health and Omega 3 Comparisons |
You know that olive oil contains a large amount of mono-unsaturated fatty acids (MUFA) however olive oil is not only studied for it's fatty acid content. Olive oil also contains an abundance of phenols, also called phenolics or polyphenols. These phytochemical compounds may have distinct biological actions in our bodies, such as antioxidants and anti-inflammatorie. Considerable study, and controversy, is going on today concerning phytochemicals and their implications in human health. This research review by Sara Cicerale, Lisa Lucas and Russell Keast is a summary of the current research on the subject of virgin olive oil phenols.
 Omega 3 fatty acids are a type of polyunsaturated found as eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) in marine sources and as alpha-linolenic acid (ALA) in some leafy vegetables, nuts and oils (most notably flax and chia). The cardioprotective and other health benefits of the marine oils are the most extensively studied and well known and thus much focus has been put on the conversion of ALA from vegetable source to EPA and DHA in the body. You are probably aware of the questions concerning ALA as this is the primary source of Omega 3 in the western diet. This is because the conversion of ALA is inconsistent and inefficient. Conversion to EPA has been observed to vary from 0.2% to 21% and that of DHA from 0 to 9%. It is very likely that ALA's cardioprotective effects depend on it's conversion to EPA and DHA. But what of the effects of ALA itself? There has been a lot of hub-bub about ALA and prostate cancer but of course there is more to the story than that. The following review compares research findings on EPA/DHA versus ALA regarding several health issues. |
Spotting Bad Fitness Articles |
| So you are looking for answers and you get so many different ones you don't know who to listen to. Even those of us with years of experience find ourselves awash in a sea of contradictions and, of course, dogma. For the beginner the search for answers can come down to figuring out what guru to listen to. Many people seek their answers in online forums and I can't tell you what to do there but the other primary way is internet articles.
How can you know what is right, or at least not totally wrong, when you know next to nothing? Are you doomed to years of hit and miss until you've gathered enough successes and failures to be a better judge of sense versus nonsense? That's what many will tell you but it ain't the truth. The truth is you can learn to "spot" bullshit without having a great deal of knowledge of strength training, bodybuilding, conditioning and "fitness". To that end I have begun a series of articles aimed at ferreting out those "spots", aptly named Spotting Bad Fitness Articles. So far I have the use of quotes, jargon and journalese, and assumptions. These will get you well on your way to being a good spotter of bad fitness articles. |
| Advanced Training Methods and a Problem with Methods |
When it comes to so-called advanced training methods, most people move on from one "method" to the next without any thought as to what came before. You've heard of cookie-cutters, well this is cookie baking. Pull the done cookies out of the oven and slide the next tray in. Get another ready to go.
 Now how in the heck am I going to relate baking cookies to advanced strength training? Oh, yeah, with a rhetorical question. Why do you need so many damned trays of cookies? How's about you take out a tray and have a cookie when it's best, warm from the oven. There's a saying: "In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities. In the experts mind there are few." Apparently many "experts" take that a bit to literally since they tend to run back over the few "possibilities" in a never ending loop. It worked before so it will work again. At the risk of going all Zen, you are not a construct of all your past training moments. You simply are, right now. Right now is what you have to deal with. Right now is your opportunity. Instead of explaining this further I'll give an example, using cluster set training. Most people just "do some clusters" and then "do something else". Here is advanced idea for building from clusters. Clusters + Density Training = Badass Say you're working on your weighted pullups. You could take a weight that you can do 8 to 10 reps with and use cluster sets. In the case of 10 reps you might break that down into 3 rep mini-sets with short rests of 10 to 15 seconds in between (three reps is about the maximum set productive for clusters, in my opinion). In the following example the first number is the reps per set and the second number is the number of sets. Each mini-set would be separated by a short rest. The idea is to take that 10 rep limit, and by allowing a very short window of recovery in between the mini-sets, allow more reps. This is but one way to do clusters. You'd want a stopwatch for this because you'll need to know the total time for the density training. Workout 1: 3 x 5 (minisets) — so 15 total reps instead of ten Workout 2: 3 x 6 (minisets) — so 18 total reps ( say this takes around 90 to 100 seconds) Workout 3: Density training with 18 reps in less than 1.5 minutes (so say you do 18 reps in 1 minute 20 seconds) Workout 4: Density training for 1:20 seconds with at least 19 reps or more. The numbers and times given are examples of what might happen. They are not meant to be taken literally. You may get more or less reps and take more or less time. The idea is to build on what happens not to build expectations or preconceptions of what should happen. The point is to bridge the cluster sets with the density training to increase tolerance and proficiency with the given workload. This is a quick example for the newsletter. If you don't understand clusters or density training you'll have to come to GUS and ask. |
| If you would like to subscribe to this newsletter… |
