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BodyPump is a fast paced workout with barbells. Light(er) weights, high reps, loud music and a drill instructor... if you know one, you'll know all of these group based "resistance training" workouts.

Sunday and time for a brief review of the latest exercise-related publications. Today, I picked two studies that took a closer look at something I would never suggest you'd consider a primary measure of the quality of your training: The energy expenditure during and after your workouts.

While exercise and the exercise-induced increase in energy-expenditure is an important pillar of diet (+ exercise) induced weight loss. The dietary component is what makes you lose weight, while the exercise component is meant to (a) maximize the retention of lean muscle tissue and (b) improve your overall fitness and health. If you're just "working out to burn energy" you're destined to fail; not least because you will never be able to tell exactly how many kcals you've "left in the gym". And beware: Especially while dieting, it's usually much less than you think ;-)

• People overestimate the energetic demands of "intense" exercise (Berthiaume. 2015) - In view of the fact that everyone knows the (inaccurate) rule of thumb that says that the amount of energy (in kcal) you expend when you're jogging is roughly your body weight times 10 (it's actually rather body weight times 7, unless you're running really fast, by the way), it's not surprising that Berthiaume et al.'s latest study shows that their subjects, 40 healthy men and women (age: 31.7±5.8 years, body mass index [BMI]: 24±2.6 kg/m²), significantly overestimated the amount of energy they expended during a (perceived) "intense" BodyPump(TM) workout.
  

  Figure 1: Young, healthy BodyPump practitioners overestimate the energetic demands of this kind of equipment based group workouts by over 36% (Berthiaume. 2015).

  Instead of the 394.1±116 kcal, the subjects thought they'd burned, the scientists measurements yielded an average energy expenditure of only 250.3±67.8 kcal during the 60 minute workout. Now, that's not really a problem if do BodyPump, because you like group workouts like these. In view of the fact that the typical clientele of programs like these tends to charge the energy they expend during workouts against the energy from extra food they'd like to eat (BIG mistake, learn why), this may be problematic.
  

  Figure 2: Just a reminder: The energy expenditure (kcal per kg of body weight per hour) due to body weight exercises calculated based on oxygen uptake during the exercises (traditional) or during the rest periods has been shown to be rather under- than overestimated (Vezina. 2014 | read more)

  Now, you may remember the results of Vezina's 2014 study (see Figure 2 and previous article). In said paper they used a much more precise method to arrive at the actual energy expenditure. In Berthiaume's study, a simple SenseWear armband was used. That's not the "traditional calc." in Figure 2 that proved to be so unreliable in Vezina's study, but it may still suffer from the same shortcomings when it comes to measuring anaerobic vs. aerobic energy expenditure. It would thus be prudent to be at least somewhat skeptical of the exactness of Berthiaume's results.
• Exercise type and post-workout supplementation influence post-exercise resting energy expenditure and respiratory exchange ratio (Wingfield. 2015) - I know, I have written about EPOC, which is actually nothing else than the total post-exercise energy expenditure in relation to the respiratory exchange ratio, repeatedly. There is a reason, though, that the latest study from the University of North Carolina still made it into the waredownloadsoft news: It compared six exercise sessions, consisting of three exercise modalities and two acute nutritional interventions - that's extraordinary, for sure.
  • AEE - aerobic endurance exercise - 30-min on the treadmill at 45% to 55% of the heart rate reserve), high-intensity interval running 
  • HIIT - ten rounds of a 60-s treadmill run at 85% to 95% HRR with a 60-s passive rest period), and 
  • HIRT - high-intensity resistance training consisting of leg presses and bench presses, lunges, shoulder presses, biceps curls, and triceps extensions using free weights for three sets of 6RM to 8RM followed by a 20- to 30-s rest for each set of a given exercise and 2.5 min between each exercise 
  • CHO and PRO (25 g of CHO (maltodextrin) or PRO (whey isolate) mixed with 6 oz of water in an opaque bottle. 
  With its s randomized, crossover, double-blind design, the study is also pretty well-powered, even though it had only twenty female, recreationally active participants (mean ± SD; age 24.6 ± 3.9 years; height 164.4 ± 6.6 cm; weight 62.7 ± 6.6 kg).
  

  Figure 3: Overview of the study design (Wingfield. 2015).

  Next to the post-exercise resting energy expenditure (REE) and respiratory rate (RER), which were analyzed via indirect calorimetry at baseline, immediately post (IP), 30 minutes (30 min) post, and 60 minutes (60 min) post exercise, the scientists obtained salivary samples, as well (both didn't change sign.). The latter were used to determine estradiol-β-17 and cortisol levels before the workouts. To exclude any influence of dietary changes, the subjects were asked to eat diets similar to those they had consumed when they wrote their 3-day food logs at the beginning of the study. Practically speaking, this meant that, on average, subjects ingested 2,078.7 ± 679.9 kcal, 253.7 ± 97.6 g CHO (approximately 48.8% CHO), 84.3 ± 29.9 g PRO (approximately 16.2% PRO), and 80.9 ± 36.7 g of fat (approximately 35.0% fat) per day.
  

  Figure 4: Only the HIIT modality yielded sign. inter-group differences as far as the resting energy expenditure is concerned. Even those were very transient, though, and disappeared 30 min after the workout (Wingfield. 2015).

  Interestingly, a statistical significant effect for the resting energy expenditure (REE) was observed only in the HIIT, yet not in the HIRT trial (Figure 4, A). This is a result you may not have expected based on the assumption that any form of intense activity (like resistance training in this case) should have some sort of "afterburn" effect.

• What is less surprising is the relatively small, but "significant" (statistically, only!) increase in REE in response to protein vs. carbohydrate (Figure 4, B). So, protein is thermogenic even after a workout. Unfortunately, the increase in energy expenditure and the increase in fatty oxidation as signified by the reduced respiratory exchange ratio in Figure 5 B are way too small to be of any practical relevance.
  

  Figure 5: Effect of exercise modality and CHO vs. PRO supplement on the respiratory exchange ratio (RER); lower values indicate greater fat and lower carbohydrate oxidation (Wingfield. 2015).

  Eventually, the same can be said of the decrease in RER (=increase in fatty oxidation) in response to the HIIT and the increase in RER (=decrease in fatty acid oxidation) in response to the HIRT regimen. Both are statistically significant and look large enough to be relevant. When all is said and done, it does yet not really matter if you burn fat directly or glucose first. Whether you lose or gain body fat is after all a matter of the total energy balance over days and weeks, and not the fatty acid oxidation during and 60 minutes after your workouts.

Specifically for teenagers it may be important to work out in both aerobic and anaerobic workouts. So, this would be another reason to favor the combined over the other regimen.

You will probably have overheard the "knowledgeable" trainers at the gym tell their credulous clients, who just told them they "want to lose that belly fat", that the best thing they could do was to "stop spending that much time with weight training" and to do some more (steady state) cardio. Well, in general, there's nothing wrong about steady state cardio - in fact, many studies show that it is superior to resistance training when it comes to "merely" shedding body weight (in the obese). If "weight loss" is still everything you're aspiring, though, you are either new to the waredownloadsoft or another of the "headline skimmers" who happen to ask questions that are answered not just in the article, but actually in one of the red boxes... ah, I am digressing.

So, what I actually wanted to tell you is that a recent study from the Universities of Ottawa and Calgary (Alberta. 2015), clearly contradicts the average commercial gym chain trainer's recommendation and shows that belly fat loss is better achieved with diet + resistance training.
The subjects of the study were youngsters, 304 (! the high number of participants is a huge plus of the study) 14-18 year-old overweight and obese teenagers (mean body fat almost 50%!), to be specific, who were randomized to four different treatments for 22 weeks:

Table 1: Training progression in the Aerobic and Resistance group (Alberga. 2015)

• aerobic training (Aerobic), 
• resistance training (Resistance),
• combined aerobic + resistance training (Combined) or 
• non-exercising control group (Control)

Adolescents,... ok, but unless they're too sarcopenic (=suffer from pronounced age-induced muscle loss) to hit the weights, your overweight clients or you, yourself, should be able to follow the same training programs the adolescents did and see similar results if you fully adhere to the following training prescriptions:

• Resistance: The duration of each session progressed to a maximum of about 45 min. Exercises were primarily performed on weight machines, and when required with dumbbells (lateral raise, shrugs, bicep curls, front raise, preacher curl, dumbbell pullover) or by using one's own body weight as resistance (lunges, sit-ups and abdominal crunches).
  

  Table 2: Overview of the individual workouts in the Resistance group (Alberga. 2015).

  Participants alternated among exercises from groups A1, A2, B1 and B2 shown in Table 2. Participants were asked to rest for ~ 2 min between sets and were instructed on proper breathing techniques.
• Aerobic: Participants randomized to the aerobic training group underwent a 22-week program (Table 1, left) wherein the exercise intensity and duration increased progressively to a maximum of 45 min per session. Exercise was performed on a cycle ergometer, elliptical or treadmill and participants were free to vary the machine(s) used. Exercise intensity was standardized using heart rate monitors (Polar Electro Oy, Kempele, Finland).
• Combined: This group performed the full exercise programs done by both the aerobic and resistance training groups (Table 1, left + right) during each session for a total of 4 times per week for a maximum of 90 min per session.

Figure 1: Changes in subcutaneous (SAT) and visceral (VAT) body fat at different regions; L4L5 represents area between 4th and 5th Lumbar vertebrae; * indicates sign. difference to control; # sign. difference to aerobic (Alberga. 2015).

References:

• Alberga, A. S., et al. "Effects of aerobic and resistance training on abdominal fat, apolipoproteins and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein in adolescents with obesity: the HEARTY randomized clinical trial." International journal of obesity (2005) (2015).
• Dansinger, Michael L., et al. "Comparison of the Atkins, Ornish, Weight Watchers, and Zone diets for weight loss and heart disease risk reduction: a randomized trial." Jama 293.1 (2005): 43-53.
• Thompson, A., and J. Danesh. "Associations between apolipoprotein B, apolipoprotein AI, the apolipoprotein B/AI ratio and coronary heart disease: a literature‐based meta‐analysis of prospective studies." Journal of internal medicine 259.5 (2006): 481-492.
• Walldius, G., and I. Jungner. "The apoB/apoA‐I ratio: a strong, new risk factor for cardiovascular disease and a target for lipid‐lowering therapy–a review of the evidence." Journal of internal medicine 259.5 (2006): 493-519.

I can almost guarantee that the results of this study are not sex-specific. Ladies, pick up the weights fater you hit the treadmill, stairmaster, elliptical or other torture instrument you like to use!

It has been a while since the last study on exercise order (cardio or weights first) has been published. Now, scientists from the University of Kurdistan have conducted another study to investigate the effects of intrasession sequencing of concurrent resistance and endurance training on the serum leptin, testosterone, cortisol responses and body composition in obese men.

And don't worry, we are not talking about useless acute-phase data that shows no correlation with either strength or muscle gains, or fat loss (West. 2012). Sheikholeslami-Vatani and colleagues conducted an eight-week study on thirty obese young male students without continuous exercise history (age: 23.2±1.4 year, BMI: 31.8±1.6 kg/m²).
The subjects were randomly divided into three groups: concurrent resistance-endurance (CRE, n = 10) group, concurrent endurance-resistance (CER, n = 10) group and control (C, n = 10) group (no training program). The concurrent training groups (CER and CRE) trained three times a week on alternate days for 8 weeks. The training itself consisted of which consisted of ...

"running with 70—75% of maximal heart rate (HRmax) for 10 minutes which gradually increased to 80% HRmax for 21.5 minutes [plus] resistance training consisted of 3 sets of 8 repetitions at 80% of 1 repetition maximum (1RM) in 5 resistance exercises (leg extensions, lying leg curl, triceps pushdown, bench press and lateral pull down)" (Sheikholeslami-Vatani. 2015). 

In-between the endurance and resistance (or vice versa) training parts of the workouts, the subjects rested for 5 minutes. Blood sampling and skin-fold measurements to asses the body composition was conducted 48 hours before the start of the course and again 48 hours after the last training session (learn why waiting longer for the body comp test may have been better, but no study does that).

Figure 1: Relative changes in hormone levels (left) and absolute and relative changes in body fat fat free mass and body fat % (right) after 8 weeks of doing nothing (C) or doing cardio (CER) or weights (CRE) first (Sheikholeslami-Vatani. 2015).

I've plotted the most important results in Figure 1a & b. So, let's take a look: The first thing that everyone should see is that both workout regimen had relevant health and physique effects:

• Similar gains w/ weights vs. cardio first in trained men | more.

  normalization of leptin levels (health)
• slight increases in testosterone (health)
• increases in cortisol (which are benign | learn why)
• significant reductions in body fat (health + physique)
• increases in fat free mass (health and physique)

References:

• Sheikholeslami-Vatani, D., et al. "The effect of concurrent training order on hormonal responses and body composition in obese men." Science & Sports (2015).
• West, Daniel WD, and Stuart M. Phillips. "Associations of exercise-induced hormone profiles and gains in strength and hypertrophy in a large cohort after weight training." European journal of applied physiology 112.7 (2012): 2693-2702.

Wouldn't it be great if  Taubes was right and you could sit your lazy flat-ass even flatter without having to worry to miss a chance of losing weight?

The idea that you can lose weight only by working out (most people even think of "cardio") is as hilarious as it is ingrained in the Western cultural believes. In fact, the fact that some studies indicate that overweight individuals end up losing weight when they are (often put) on an exercise regimen, however, does not mean that their workouts "pulled the trigger". Rather than that, their ability to lose weight is a consequence of an incomplete compensation of the extra-energy expenditure... and yes, I am talking about calories in vs. calories out here, because, in the end, the energy balance is what counts - even if energy intake and output must not be seen as independent quantities (learn more).

So, if exercise will only help you lose weight, if you don't fully compensate for the exercise induced extra-energy expenditure, the obvious and important question is: What determines to which extent the extra-energy that's consumed by your muscles during physical activity is compensated for?
In a recent systematic review, Marie-Ève Riou and colleagues tried to answer this very question. To do so, they reviewed the contributions of sex, age, initial adiposity, as well as duration, dose, frequency and intensity of exercise in 61 studies with a total of 928 subjects. And what the researchers from the University of Ottawa found is a complex conglomerate of data that requires careful consideration and interpretation.

• Firstly, the overall mean energy compensation was 18% ± 93% - This may suggest that the average subject lost weight, but with a margin from -75% to 111% that's far from significant. And still, on average, the data indicates that exercise does not make those who get off the sofa and move their a$$ more hungry (one has to keep in mind, though, that not all of the studies allowed their subjects to eat as much as they wanted; in some cases where the energy compensation is negative, the subjects were simply required to diet)
• The analyses indicated that 48% of the variance of energy compensation is explained by the interaction between initial fat mass, age and duration of exercise interventions. The scientists even came up with an equation to determine the energy compensation in % for young and old individuals, respectively:
  
  
  What both equations have in common is the fact that a constant coefficient is divided by the duration in days. In other words: The longer people exercise, the more they compensate, the lower the exercise-induced energy deficit.

• It's also interesting to take a look at the more complex graphs of a model that includes the other two previously mentioned parameters: Age and fat mass at the beginning of the study.
  

  Figure 1: Fat mass (FM), age, duration of the exercise intervention and degree of energy compensation (100% compensation = no energy deficit, -200% = sign. appetite suppression + huge deficit | Riou. 2015)

  As you can see in Figure 1, fat, young individuals benefit most from exercise. Initially, they don't compensate at all for the extra-energy expenditure, but rather reduce their energy intake for every 1kcal/day they burn by another 2kcal/day (that's why the graph starts at - 200%).
• Sex, frequency, intensity and dose of exercise energy expenditure were not significant predictors of energy compensation. This is a bit surprising, as previous studies had suggested that women may be a bit more susceptible to exercise induced overeating (=overcompensation) than men, and that HIIT may less prone to cause people to compensate for the extra-energy they burnt than longer duration steady state exercise, but obviously these effects haven't been consistently observed in the studies the scientists reviewed.

The most important message, however, is the fact that the longer you train (=adhere to an exercise regimen, not "60 min vs. 20 min"!), the more you tend to compensate for the extra energy you burn.
References:

• Riou, Marie-Ève, et al. "Predictors of Energy Compensation during Exercise Interventions: A Systematic Review." Nutrients 7.5 (2015): 3677-3704.

While this picture shows loaded cardio in its most beautiful form, the study investigated loaded cardio on the treadmill and compared it (for questionable reasons) to non-loaded cardio on a stationary bike and guess what: Both burn the same amount of muscle - NET: Zero!

Carrying a (heavy) load during cardio? Sounds dumb? Well, that's however, how the real world looks like. Not just soldiers who are carrying armor and a heavy backpack in the field, but also hikers will attest to the fact that doing "cardio" with a weight on your shoulders or elsewhere is more natural than running around in the park with your mobile and ear-plugs as the only load you're carrying on top of your ultra-light runners clothing.

With that being said, it is actually quite astonishing that Stefan M. Pasiakos and colleagues from the Military Nutrition Division at the US Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine in Natick are the first to take a look at the muscle anabolic and catabolic effects of regular (unloaded) and loaded cardio training in 40 free-living healthy, physically fit (peak oxygen uptake, VO2peak 40/60 mL/ kg/ min), adults (37 males and 3 females), normal weight men and women between the ages of 18–39 years.
In said study, the volunteers were then randomly assigned to one of four experimental groups, each
of whom performed a single 90 min exercise bout.

• Two groups performed CE and the other two performed LC. 
• One of each of the exercise groups received EAA drinks to consume during exercise, and the other groups received control (CON) drinks. 

To determine the effects on skeletal muscle, the subjects' individual muscle protein synthesism (MPS) was assessed during exercise and recovery and whole protein turnover was determined in recovery only. What may be a bit surprising in this context is the fact that a resting MPS measure was not included in the study. The authors, however, have a good argument to neglect this, when they say that (a) the MPS responses to endurance-type exercise (i.e.,as they relate to resting MPS) are well established and that (b) their ...

"[...] intent was not to determine temporal changes in MPS within an exercise mode (with or without EAA), but to examine MPS responses between LC and CE during exercise and recovery independently" (Pasiakos. 2015).

Another thing that was just like in any other study, though, was the standardization of diet and physical activity, the scientists describe as follows:

"Volunteers completed 3 d diet and activity records at baseline, and similar to our previous work (Pasiakos. 2011), these records were used to individually prescribe 7 d lead-in diets to maintain body weight and to limit the potential confounding effect of diet on outcome measures. Compliance was confirmed by 24 h dietary recalls conducted every two days during the lead-in phase (Food Processor SQL1, version 10, ESHA Research, Salem, OR) (Table 1). Volunteers were also instructed to maintain activity levels reported at baseline for the first five days of the lead-in phase. All resistive and endurance-type activity was prohibited 48 h before data collection to minimize any potential residual effects of previous exercise on protein turnover" (Pasiakos. 2015).

The actual news is however not the dietary standardization what you are (rightly) interested in is probably the exercise protocol which is - and I will get to that in the bottom line - not ideal: While the LC, i.e. the load carriage training, was performed by walking on a treadmill while wearing a weighted vest equivalent to 30% of baseline body mass, the CE, i.e. the control endurance exercise, was non-weight bearing and performed on a cycle ergometer (Lode, BV, Netherlands), of which the scientists say that they used it to "allow for comparisons with our previous studies" (Pasiakos. 2015).

Illustration 1: Graphical overview of the study design (Pasiakos. 2015) | EAA = 10g of EAAs, CON = non-nutritious control drink; LC = load carrying cardio on a treadmill, CE = control endurance exercise on a stationary bike.

What's unquestionable a strength of the study, though, was the fact that the baseline VO2peak and associated heart rates at maximal and submaximal levels were used to establish target exercise intensities for the LC and CE trials. In addition, speed and grade for LC and power (watts) for CE were adjusted to match the absolute exercise intensity (intended oxygen uptake was 2.4 L /m) and
to elicit a similar energy cost (intended energy expenditure was 1050 kcal /90 min) between
LC and CE. Lastly, ...

"[m]atching the intensity and energy cost was done to isolate the effects of the possible differences in mechanical force and contractile properties of LC and CE from the relative intensity and energy cost of the exercise bout [and a] familiarization trial was conducted to ensure the accuracy of the exercise prescription and the ability of the volunteer to complete the prescribed exercise bout" (Pasiakos. 2015).

As previously alluded to, the intra-workout beverage the subjects consumed was either a high EAA drink (10 g EAA: 0.7 g histidine, 0.7 g isoleucine, 3.6 g leucine, 1.2 g lysine, 0.3 g methionine, 1.4 g phenylalanine, 1.0 g threonine, and 1 g valine) or an identically looking placebo drink (non-nutritive).

Figure 1: Overview of protein fluxes (synthesis vs. breakdown and oxidation) and subsequent net protein balance in the four treatment groups, i.e. loaded and control cardio with and with out EAA (Pasiakos. 2015)

Interestingly enough, the latter, i.e. the 10 grams of EAA drink that was consumed in four small doses (i.e., 350 mg of phenylalanine and 900 mg of leucine per serving), over 90 min to minimize "any isotopic dilution that may have occurred if the EAA drink was consumed as a bolus" (Pasiakos. 2015) was the only treatment that made a difference to the protein flux parameters illustrated in Figure 1. In that it is worth mentioning the tthe difference in protein oxidation alone does not fully explain the conservation of skeletal muscle protein even if we assume that all the amino acids that were oxidized during the EAA supplementation trial came from the EAA supplement. This is curious in view of the lack of effect of BCAAs on exercise (learn more) induced protein breakdown and points with a finger to other EAAs as potential motors of this effect.

Figure 1: Protein synthesis. Mixed-muscle (A), myofibrillar (B), and sarcoplasmic (C) muscle protein synthesis (MPS) during exercise and mixed-muscle (D), myofibrillar (E), and sarcoplasmic (F) MPS in recovery from a 90 min, metabolically matched load carriage (LC) or conventional endurance (CE) exercise bout, with and without (control, CON) essential amino acid (EAA) supplementation. Data are mean ± SD, n = 10 per group. †Mode main effect; LC different than CE, P < 0.05. *Drink main effect; EAA different than CON, P < 0.05 (Pasiakos. 2015).

The fact that the loading didn't make a difference in either direction, i.e. that it did neither increase nor decrease the breakdown or synthesis of muscle protein may be surprising, but it's not the only result worth mentioning before we evaluate the results in the bottom line. In addition, it should be noted:

1. The EAA-mediated decrease in muscle breakdown was complemented by both enhanced mixed-muscle and sarcoplasmic MPS during exercise.
2. During the recovery phase, the mixed muscle and sarcoplasmic protein synthesis in response to loaded cardio training were higher than they were in the control group.

Of these results, finding #2 is of most interest as it puts the alleged uselessness of loaded cardio into perspectives. Muscles do after all grow during rest and if the muscle protein synthesis during the recovery phase is increased compared to the control non-loaded exercise this clearly suggests that loaded endurance exercise is more anabolic than non-loaded endurance exercise.
References:

• Pasiakos, Stefan M., et al. "Leucine-enriched essential amino acid supplementation during moderate steady state exercise enhances postexercise muscle protein synthesis." The American journal of clinical nutrition 94.3 (2011): 809-818.
• Pasiakos SM, McClung HL, Margolis LM, Murphy NE, Lin GG, Hydren JR, et al. "Human Muscle Protein Synthetic Responses during Weight-Bearing and Non-Weight-Bearing Exercise: A Comparative Study of Exercise Modes and Recovery Nutrition." PLoS ONE 10.10 (2015): Online only.