On Working Out Exercise experts recommend systems based around Maximum Heart Rate (MHR), calculated by subtracting one’s age from 220. Thus a 40 y.o. has a theoretical MHR of 180. This may be adjusted for fitness, a little bit higher for a fit person, lower for an unfit one.

TO BURN FAT The trick is to do mild exercise such as brisk walking, slow jogging etc. which will raise the heart rate to 65-70% of the MHR and keep it there for a minimum of 20 minutes. This requires a rate of exercise that will not be particularly strenuous, but it requires putting in the time to burn the fat. Now many people wishing to lose weight give up far too quickly because they are looking for immediate results. Losing weight too quickly is dangerous and will probably result in it all being put back on again quite quickly.

Let’s look at an appropriate time-span. Supposing a man of 1m70 weighs 90kg and wishes to reduce it to 65kg. 25 X 1kg blocks of butter is a lot to burn and it’s not going to happen over a couple of weekends. Imagine this person walks for an hour per day. Lots of factors involved, but this may burn off 100g. Daily weight fluctuations may be of the order of 3kg. Therefore, after doing this exercise routine for one month, the fat man may find that his recorded weight has not changed, even though he has actually lost 3kg of fat. He should feel fitter, but the fact that the loss does not show on the scales and is not obviously visible yet may cause him to give up.

However, keeping it up for 3 months, losing 9kg puts him well on the way to reaching his goal. Within a year, he is there. Do not buy into this nonsense of losing 6kg in a week. (You actually can do that by drinking 6 litres of water immediately before weighing yourself the first time, but it will not affect the amount of fat you are carrying around.)

TO INCREASE CARDIO VASCULAR FITNESS Mild exercise will not do this. It requires pushing the heart rate up to At least 75% of the MHR. It is dangerous for all but very fit people to go over 90% of MHR. Your body will probably warn you of this if you work out on a machine that has a heart rate monitor and you push the HR into the 90%+ range. Do not push your heart rate high if you are very unfit. It may be fatal.

BUILDING MUSCLE

If you are using Nautilus type equipment, read the instructions. Know which muscles you are exercising: if you can’t feel the target muscles working, you are probably doing it wrong. You shouldn’t be pushing the maximum you can do all the time. Generally, you should be lifting weights that are considerably lighter that your strength permits. Personally, I use a Bullworker, and follow the instructions. It has the following advantages over weight benches etc.: 1. Cheapness, 2. Portability, 3. It doesn’t take up much space when not being used. Measurable improvements in strength can be achieved in a few weeks.

USING TIME EFFECTIVELY

I used to go to a gym, and the main reason I stopped and got a Bullworker instead was because people would occupy the most useful machines even between sets. Everybody else didn’t seem to care about their time, but I did. Nowadays, because I exercise at home, I can use the resting time between sets to carry out a list of small chores. E.g. I can cook while exercising, checking the kitchen situation out between sets. Also it’s possible to leave on didactic materials such as language learning recordings the whole time. I probably get more stuff done while working out than I would do without exercising.