Wayne FawWayne FawMenuSkip to contentHomeStart HereAboutWork With MeShopContactmenuPersonal DevelopmentLeadershipCheckupHealth ConcernsWeight ManagementResourcesPosted on Wednesday, April 29, 2015Is Your Cardio Routine Doing More Harm Than GoodShare| Tweet| print| emailPrior to starting wasting hours upon hours on those boring treadmills, stationary bicycles, and elliptical exercise machines, let’s examine if low-moderate intensity, long duration cardio exercise really is doing your body worthwhile, or if it is mostly a waste of time. I hope you will concede upon finishing this short article that there’s a better way of getting in good condition, and it doesn’t have to involve endless hours on boring cardio machines.It’s quite common to hear fitness professionals and doctors prescribe low to moderate intensity aerobic training (cardio) to individuals who’re wanting to prevent cardiovascular disease or lose weight. Quite often, the recommendations constitute something along the lines of “perform 30-60 minutes of steady pace cardio 3-5 times weekly keeping your heartrate at a moderate level”. Prior to deciding to just give in to this popular belief and become the “hamster on the wheel” doing endless hours of boring cardio, I’d like you to take into consideration some recent scientific research that indicates that steady pace endurance cardio work might not be all it’s cracked up to be.First, be aware that our bodies are built to perform physical activity in bursts of exertion followed by recovery, or stop-and-go movement as an alternative to steady state movement. Recent studies suggesting that physical variability is one of the most critical aspects to take into account as part of your training. This tendency can be seen throughout nature as all animals demonstrate stop-and-go motion rather then steady state motion. In actual fact, humans are the only creatures in nature that attempt to do “endurance” type physical activities.Most competitive sports (except endurance running or cycling) are also based upon stop-and-go movement or short bursts of exertion followed by recovery. To evaluate an example of the different effects of endurance or steady state training versus stop-and-go training, consider the physiques of marathoners versus sprinters. Most sprinters carry a physique that is very lean, muscular, and powerful looking, while the typical dedicated marathoner is a lot more often emaciated and sickly looking. Now which would you rather resemble?Another factor to keep in mind regarding the benefits of physical variability is the internal effect of various forms of exercise on our body. Scientists have known that excessive steady state endurance exercise (different for everyone, but sometimes defined as greater than 60 minutes per session most days of the week) increases free radical production in the body, can degenerate joints, reduces immune function, causes muscle wasting, and can cause a pro-inflammatory response in t