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Question: Is the gym necessary for fitness?
Yes - 0 (0%)
No - 11 (100%)
Not sure, but I like the mirrors. - 0 (0%)
Total Voters: 11

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Author Topic: Is the gym necessary for fitness?  (Read 599 times)
Matt Emery
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« on: July 13, 2007, 06:00:58 AM »

Recently the Caveman Power crew have been chastised for our vigorous workout styles, by gym owners... so let me say this;

Most people at the gym are wasting their time.

There! I said it.  In the gym you're likely to see three types of training;

  • Strength - pumping weights, weights, and more weights.
  • Cardio - running like crazy on treadmills, trying to beat yesterdays time by one second.
  • Visual fitness - a bit of cardio, a bit of weights, and a lot of mirrors.

These types of unnatural regimes seem to be more suited to making revenue for gym owners than they are for creating fit bodies.  It seems the runners get faster, the weight lifters get stronger, and the visual fitness people get...  more visual... I guess, but are any of them truly fit?

Can the runners lift anything heavy?  Can the weight lifters run to save their own lives if they had to?  And can the visual fitness types do anything at all?  I've taken such gym people on bush walks and guess what - they're usually the slowest ones.  However, I can take somebody who never goes to the gym, and they perform very well.  Amazing eh?  Well, not really, if you take a good look at why.

The gym and all it's isolating machines are not conducive to natural functional fitness.  And all the fancy equipment you often see in gyms seem to subconsciously offer "more for less" - as if they promise better results for less effort.  So as a result, the person lifts a carefully measured amount of weight for a carefully measured number of times, and relies on the miracle of the machine to do the rest.  But guess what;

"Mother nature doesn't care about sets, reps, or measurements"

People are relying too much on the science of fitness as opposed to just "having a go" - it's like we're desperately trying to get fit without having to do anything.  Gyms have become the modern day equivalent to libraries... very quiet.  The culture at the gym is this; don't sweat, be quiet, and be gentle with the equipment...

"Most people would be better off pushing their car for 5 minutes a day,
rather than going to the gym for 1 hour a day"

Now obviously I am stereotyping quite heavily, I understand there are some smaller gyms with real heart, and other gyms with real goals and wisdom, but i'm talking about your average yuppie-city-gym.

I can almost guarantee you that doing 1 month of working out using the Caveman Power Workout principles will get you fitter than a yuppie-city-gym could with 6 months typical gym training, and it's ridiculously priced personal training sessions.

If you want to know a few things about exercise that will actually help you in life, rather than drain your wallet (and your time), head on over to the Caveman Power exercise pages
http://www.cavemanpower.com/fitness/ and check out this page too http://www.cavemanpower.com/forum/what_it_means_to_be_truly_fit-t38.0.html


« Last Edit: February 24, 2008, 06:55:03 PM by Matt Emery » Logged

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TrailGrrl
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« Reply #1 on: May 06, 2008, 04:32:02 PM »

Army Rangers and Navy SEALS are the best evidence that it isn't necessary.  Running, pushups, pullups, all bodyweight exercises and they don't feed them that much during training.  And they all come out lean, mean fighting machines.

TrailGrrl
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Matt Emery
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« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2008, 07:08:48 PM »

Army Rangers and Navy SEALS are the best evidence that it isn't necessary.  Running, pushups, pullups, all bodyweight exercises and they don't feed them that much during training.  And they all come out lean, mean fighting machines.

Yes, fitness becomes a serious issue when your life is on the line.  Crossfit understand this well, and I encourage you to check them out here; www.crossfit.com
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BigKhanz
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« Reply #3 on: May 15, 2008, 05:38:28 PM »

The only thing necessary for a strong body is a strong mind.

 When speaking of the military units, we used a ton of resistance workouts, including: weights, each other, inflatable boats, our gear, rucksacks, huge logs(evil, evil tree!), and anything else we could pick up. Add the running, climbing, tons of swimming, an obstacle course of epic proportions, and whatever evil that the instructors could think of and we were among the most elite athletes in the world.

But I have to disagree about the food. In the hardest school I went thru, we were losing 5-20lbs a week and eating 9000+ calories a day. I went from a very fit 275 to 240 in 4 weeks and I was eating around 12,000 calories a day. It was pure hell, but you can bet we never saw a mirror!!!!!
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