The 60 Minute Workout Is Dead

And that goes for the 40 minute, 30 minute and even the 20 minute workout. All dead. You may still do your timed workouts for the next few months but they are officially over. Done.

Time spent exercising was once important. You put in a “30-minute” workout and felt...great, sometimes. The other times you didn’t feel so good. Your feeling after your workout has more to do with your individual, specific metabolism at that time, then say, your exercise routine.

Maybe some days you should workout for 19 minutes, some days 7 minutes and in either of these cases you might feel the same but more importantly, have the same physiological effect.

Here’s what the government has to say; this is the latest.
The Department of Health and Human Services issued the federal government's first-ever Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans in 2008 to help Americans understand the types and amounts of physical activity that offer important health benefits. Physical activity is any form of exercise or movement of the body that uses energy. Some of your daily life activities—doing active chores around the house, yard work, walking the dog—are examples.

Let me interject; there is a striking difference between exercise and activity and when you confuse the two of course you’re going to get way off track as our story shows. Exercise is working a muscle through its range of motion against resistance to the point of exhaustion. That’s my definition of exercise. House work and yard work are just work, not exercise.

Here are just two of their points.

• “For substantial health benefits, adults should do at least 150 minutes (2 hours and 30 minutes) to 300 minutes (5 hours) a week of moderate-intensity, or 75 minutes (1 hour and 15 minutes) to 150 minutes (2 hours and 30 minutes) a week of vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity, or an equivalent combination of moderate- and vigorous-intensity aerobic activity. Preferably, aerobic activity should be spread throughout the week.”
• “Additional health benefits are gained by engaging in physical activity beyond the equivalent of 300 minutes (5 hours) of moderate-intensity physical activity a week.”

Did you get that? Most of that is confusing, no wonder people have trouble.

Let’s stick with vigorous workouts because what we’re going to find in the next few years that this is the most important type of exercise for all ages when done appropriately to achieve the metabolic effects we’re looking for in a workout.

First of all, they say two and a half hours a week. What are you going to be doing for two and a half hours? Just what kind of vigorous exercise can you sustain for, let’s say, if you’re breaking that up into 3 days per week, that’s 50 minutes each of those 3 days. That’s killer! No one is going to be able to do vigorous exercise for 50 minutes. They did not specify intervals which may make this possible but still, you’re not going to sprint for 10 minutes, you’re not going to pedal your bicycle intensity for 30 minutes, 3 days a week, a week! Maybe if you’re a super athlete.

Secondly, the additional health benefits they say you can gain. That is very incorrect. More does not equal better.

Let’s bring this into more practical terms. Your fitness club. And this is going to get dicey but watch this. How many fitness facilities have you been to that offer timed workouts? Almost all of them. You’re probably doing this now.

Think about yourself. Should you always workout for 30 minutes? Or 45 minutes?

The other day I was on the phone with a nice lady from Florida who was trying to sell me a fitness franchise, there must be a million fitness clubs in Florida. She and a few people were starting their own fitness franchise and it was called something like Bolt-45 or something like that but the title was related to the time you’re going to spend working out. You’re going to spend 45 minutes. You’ll pay for that and get your 45 minutes of value.

Nonetheless I wasn’t interested. No conscientious physiologist or metabolic practitioner is going to have a person working out for 45 minutes.

But aren’t you doing this now? Working out for a certain time period? Working out just like everyone else, no matter your age, physical health, metabolic condition, amount of physical exertion, your diet, your mental state, your diphasic state - whether you are deeply in a catabolic state or anabolic state.

See, there are just so many variables and what I’m saying is that one size does not fit all. If you wake up in the morning and you don’t feel well, then you probably should not either workout out or significantly reduce your workout efforts and/or time. If you’re not motivated, that’s another thing for another day - this could mean many things.

I have an answer for you that I hope you will help me start a trend. And it has to do with biometrics.

Let me explain it this way.
The exercise machine I developed does not fit any class of exercise equipment currently on the market. In fact, you cannot exercise on it like anything else. You simply cannot do it.

The entire premise of my machine is exercising the most muscles, which means all four arms and legs, and both anterior and posterior muscle groups of the arms and legs. In other words, you’re exercising the most muscles as is possible. And by exercising, I mean against bi-directional resistance. It’s like there are four people, one at each of your wrists and ankles, and they’re resisting your arm from going 180 degrees of motion and your leg 120 degrees of motion. That’s under resistance. Just how long can you do this exercise? Not very long at all.

In fact, less than 2 minutes and you’re exhausted. Two minutes of vigorous exercise. You cannot do any more exercise. And that is just one half of the first interval. You repeat that interval a few more times, and here’s the whole point of this discourse, you repeat these intervals based on your own biometrics. It’s your function that determines your exercise time. Not anything or anyone else. Your body tells you when to stop.

I’m anticipating that biomarkers will also tell you when you should start working out, what time of the day you should workout, they are going to measure your oxygen, your heart rate and all the heart rate variables, and who knows what other markers will be introduced. Not yet, but soon.

Do you see where the timed workout is dead? It’s not important. It’s probably not healthy.

Talk to your fitness person and see if this isn’t right. Talk to your health care provider and see if you should be gauging your biomarkers, at least your maximum heart rate before, during and after your workout.

The next level of fitness is going to be individual. Mark my words. I’m already doing it with my machine. I have to. There is no way I can follow any conventional systems of working out.

​I’m sure you would rather spend 36 minutes a week, and most of those minutes are spent in the rest interval of the workout, rather than the two and a half hours a week working out. That’s less than two and a half hours per month! You’ve got other things to do than spending the afternoon or morning in the gym.