<p>idad, I can’t understand a single thing that guy is saying on the video!
It’s an interesting move though (straight leg dead lift – where did that name come from anyway?). There is a similar pose in yoga where it is held statically with the body horizontal, balancing on one leg (same T shape) and the arms, without weights, are either held straight out in front of you parallel to the ground, or behind you alongside your body. It’s a great core strengthener and very good for your knee on the standing leg as you “twitch” all your leg muscles to keep your balance.</p>
<p>teriwtt, WOW, that woman!</p>
<p>Great article. Thanks.</p>
<p>I wonder if “Svetlana” will still be doing one-legged burpees on YouTube when she’s 90? I wonder if she’ll still get half a million views in a week? :)</p>
<p>I feel like I’m cheating age with exercise and I’m not even in great shape. I think it has something to do with being in better shape at age 56 than I was at age 46 that creates the illusion of cheating age.</p>
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<p>Yeah. Between the Boston accent and the fitness lingo and speaking in shorthand, Boyle can be a bit inscrutible.</p>
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<p>The deadlift is a specific lift in Olympic weight lifting. Basically, it’s lifting a barbell from the floor in front of you up to just above the knees and back down.</p>
<p>Boyle is all about taking conventional weightlifting moves and doing them on one leg. There are several reasons. First, you can work one as hard as two legs with half the total weight. This means less total load on the back. Second, almost all athletic moves involve force applied to one leg then the other. Even running is a one-leg load. Thus, the theory goes that training one leg at a time improves performance and prevents injury. Third, the imbalance of single-leg work requires a lot of core stability to keep from falling over. This makes every exercise a core exercise, as I discovered today with one-arm dumbbell presses on the stability ball. They are incredibly difficult, using a third less weight than I use in each hand when I’m pressing two dumbbells. It takes so much effort to stay balanced against the one-sided load.</p>
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<p>That’s basically the move I’m working on – with my arms outstretched and reaching towards a wall in front of me. That’s what Boyle is describing in the video when he talks about starting his guys reaching with a medicine ball before adding the dumbbells. I just hold a 2.5 pound dumbbell weight in my hands, not so much for weight as to give me something to “reach” with. I find the way to go about it is to add these to my warmup and do them over time to let the balance and flexibility come to me. There’s no point in adding them to a huffing and puffing workout until I can do it without falling over or losing my balance. </p>
<p>It was pretty good today, so I’m getting there, which is more than I can say for my attempts at pushups with one leg on the stability ball. That is one seriously hard exercise. I ended up collapsed on the floor in all three sets. On the flip side, I actually think I’ll be able to get the one-leg plank on the stability ball. As long as I didn’t breath or twitch, I was able to do that for a few seconds today without falling off the ball. It make for a very tenuous grasp on balance.</p>
<p>Feeling a bit better today so may try to go for a little walk and loosen up my chest congestion. Ate some chicken tortellini soup for dinner and that was awesome! Gained back 1.5 pounds so thinking I was dehydrated and that the soup was a little sodium enriched. Planning on more soup today with lots of water! </p>
<p>Wish I could be motivated to do those core and body weight exercises! That will be my New Year’s resolution for sure!</p>
<p>NMinn, glad you’re feeling better. I only do 2 core exercises, the plank with alternating leg lifts, and the side plank. I think my trainer knows I am only mentally capable of that much, :D. But even just those 2 exercises make a big difference, and they only take a few minutes.</p>
<p>Recently discovered plank on forearms, then raise hips into down dog on forearms (called dolphin, in Yoga). Pulse back and forth betw/ forearm plank and dolphin. Man oh man my abs were noticing things in the three following days. Try it - I’d like to hear if this is as intense for you guys as for me.</p>
<p>New study just released claims even being a LITTLE overweight affects your health. The study was based on decrease in longevity- i.e. you are more likely to die if you are at all overweight. The study did not include people with cancer or heart problems. So- I guess we are all on the right track.</p>
<p>Rode my trainer this morning for 45 minutes. This is a tough time of year for me with food. We had our department lunch and yesterday we went out for lunch for Greek food since our Idaho law partner was in town. He’s lost 55 pounds (he’s 6’8") since I last saw him.</p>
<p>My 1.25 pound weights arrived today. They are silver in color and about 3.5 inches in diameter. I’m looking forward to putting them on for my son to try out on the dumbbells tonight. Maybe I’ll do some left-arm exercises too.</p>
<p>Played tennis yesterday and felt fine today. I guess that’s progress. Too busy to workout today outside of maybe doing weights at the YMCA tonight.</p>
<p>MOWC - I agree with this, but as you mentioned upthread, I think we need to be careful about relying on weight alone, that it’s also about being tone and fit. One can be super skinny and still have a high percentage of body fat. I’m a walking example of that (not NOW, of course, because I’m not even skinny, much less super skinny). Many, many years ago, when I was having thyroid issues and before they got it under control (required surgery to remove half of it) I got down to 100 lbs. (I’m 5’6"). I know people thought I was anorexic, but I wasn’t. In fact, I kept telling myself that if I hit 99 lbs., I was going to march myself into my physician’s office and tell him he must do something about it now. But my body fat percentage was still high. So it just goes to show being skinny alone is not enough. You can be on the heavier side of ‘healthy’ be fit and tone, and be healthier than someone who is 5’6" and weighs 100 lbs.</p>
<p>hugcheck:</p>
<p>That dolphin/doggie down thing looks brutal. I think the ol’ fat guy would need a glass of wine or two for limbering up before that one! Ol’ fat guy hips just don’t hinge like that.</p>
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<p>One trick to improving balance (besides increasing core strength) is to “activate” the muscles in the free leg/arm, rather than letting them dangle. Think of shooting energy through your foot, as if you were actually pressing it against a wall. This way, you are using your whole body to balance rather than the one standing leg. It really works.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, that study used the BMI index as a measure of being overweight. This index doesn’t take into account body fat or age or gender at all. It is a simple formula based on height and weight. So a muscular athlete (think football player) with extremely low body fat would be in the “overweight” category on this scale. This is the same scale that says Barack Obama is borderline overweight when anyone looking at him would say that he’s a very thin, maybe even “scrawny” guy. IMO, the BMI index and the way it is used to beat people over the head is a big negative motivation for overweight people. On this index, I would have to weight less than I did the day I gradudated from college (and I was skinny) to get below their “overweight” category. At age 56. So, if I thought that index was anything but the mindless musings of a goverment and WHO bureaucrats, it would be very discouraging. Why even bother? I certainly would not be healthy or fit at that weight as the only conceivable way I could get there would have to include losing a bunch of lean muscle. I would literally be anorexic at that weight. Based on my lean muscle mass, I would have to get down to 7% body fat for the BMI index to say that I’m no longer overweight. </p>
<p>Here’s a picture of a fit guy at 10% body fat:</p>
<p><a href=“http://anabolicminds.com/forum/attachments/weight-loss/20286d1203601764-body-fat-pics-10.jpg[/url]”>http://anabolicminds.com/forum/attachments/weight-loss/20286d1203601764-body-fat-pics-10.jpg</a></p>
![http://anabolicminds.com/forum/attachments/weight-loss/20286d1203601764-body-fat-pics-10.jpg[/url]](http://anabolicminds.com/forum/attachments/weight-loss/20286d1203601764-body-fat-pics-10.jpg%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
<p>Now, is that really a reasonable realistic body image goal for a 56 year old guy? Keeping in mind that BMI would still say I need to loose another 5 pounds from there to get out of their “overweight” category where their studies stop pointing a finger at me and saying I’m going to die because I’m fat. I think the use of these targets makes it less motivating to eat less and move more. It’s like saying that any of you mothers of adult kids should be scolded for being “fat” if your abs and shoulders and legs don’t look like Svetlana doing Burpees are Forever. I’m all for getting fit, but I like to see people feel good about losing five pounds and going for a walk.</p>
<p>MOWC, for every study like that there is one that claims the opposite. There are studies that show that being overweight when you are older is associated with increased bone density, for example. It also matters where you are overweight, for example, extra padding on the hips, besides cushioning falls, is not associated with the kinds of problems that belly fat are linked to (heart disease, diabetes). </p>
<p>I’m not disagreeing, just pointing out that medical and general opinion is further out on the ledge than any study would indicate (see Vitamin D). Personally, I would rather be trim than overweight, as much for vanity reasons as health, but I don’t think you can make a blanket statement that thin is better.</p>
<p>On a related note, according to my best estimate of body fat (determining my lean muscle mass by averaging six months of daily body fat and weight readings from the Tanata scale), I am now officially no longer in the overweight category. My body fat puts me in the healthy range. So I guess that makes me the ol’ (formerly) fat guy!</p>
<p>Woo hoo! Congrats, idad!</p>
<p>I’ll have to be the new fat guy unless someone else steps up.</p>
<p>Did you take before and after photos?</p>
<p>I tried the new weights - they work perfectly.</p>
<p>Idad, how do you know all that info, do you have some kind of special scale?</p>