Thursday, September 29, 2011

Multi-Tasking for Fitness

Since the early part of July I have been evolving my fitness training from an exclusive focus on cycling to a more varied routine that is intended to provide better overall fitness.  My current routine is what I call Multi-Tasking for Fitness and is inspired by several experts, especially Richard Winett, whose website ageless-athletes.com has loads of great information on strength training for seniors.   The second is Phil Graham, a coach who subscribes to a combination of strength training, cardiovasular work, stretching and intense sprint/interval based training.   Graham's book Ready, Set, Go Synergy Fitness is an excellent resource for those wanting to achieve peak fitness and athletic success at any age. I have also incorporated more stretching in my workouts based on the advise from The Stretching Institute, which provides some great stretching resources.

My weekly workouts include four sessions of strength training done Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.  I do an alternating two-way split routine - upper body/lower body.  I incorporate 20-30 minutes of cardiovascular training either on an indoor recumbent cycling trainer or a rowing machine 2-3 times per week.  I do a longer, outdoor training session on my bike, which typically last 2-3 hours in length.  Within the overall cardiovascular work, I include two intense sprinting routines called the Sprint 8.  I do Sprint 8 either indoors or outdoors.

I call this multi-tasking because I do more than one dimension to my training every session. The multi-tasking approach is described in detail in Phil Graham's book.  I often do strength/stretch/cardio in one session, and outdoor cardio/sprint in another, for example.  My weekly goal is to do four strength, four cardiovascular (including two Sprint 8), and 3-4 stretching sessions.  During my strength training, I am reducing the time between exercise sets to add cardiovascular intensity.

This is admittedly a quite ambitious program.  I will report back as to my ability to stay motivated with this program.  So far, I am enjoying it very much.  My overall fitness is improving.  You can see  my workout logs on my training blog.



2 comments:

witchdr said...

Howard,
Have you missed the 150 mile weeks riding your bicycle's yet? Keep up the good work and keep the blogs coming!

Scott

Howard Veit said...

I have been doing mostly strength training and indoor exercise bike since about the first of July. One, maybe two, outside bike rides per week during this period. I do miss the long bike rides, especially being outside, breathing fresh air, and viewing the countryside. I also miss the bike events, Centuries, etc. But, for now at least, I am focused on total fitness and strength training. I want to keep this up at least until January 1, and then we will see how I feel about continuing. I should have no trouble returning to lots of cycling miles. Don't think I can do both at the same time.