I do not like to work out. I enjoy the benefits of being healthy. By working out, I mean specifically the traditional 45 minutes or longer workouts at home or in the gym. These workouts simply don’t seem efficient or even worth it if your goal isn’t to build muscle. I much prefer to maintain my level of fitness rather than trying desperately to change my body. That said, I do genuinely enjoy a variety of activities that require physical exercise. Some of these include walking, biking, sports, yoga, hiking, and manual labour. Ideally, I could simply live an active lifestyle and never block off time to “work out”. I have tried this approach and it doesn’t take long before you start losing muscle mass and cardiovascular capacity. Unless your lifestyle includes strength training and frequent periods with an elevated heartbeat, you may want to consider mixing in some formal workouts.
I was blown away when I first read Martin Gibala’s research (McMaster University) presented in The One-Minute Workout. The idea that I could get most of the benefits (cardiovascular fitness & insulin sensitivity) of traditional workouts in a fraction of the time sat well with my busy schedule and preexisting notions of the 80/20 rule, of greasing the groove and the minimal effective dose.
The 80/20 Principle (a.k.a. the Pareto Principle) is the idea that 80% of outputs often result from 20% of the inputs. For example, two of your top 10 friends might provide 80% of the benefit of having friends. Such insight can lead you to double down on these two friends and invest less in the others. You can at least better attempt to match the way you spend your time and energy on your friends with the rewards distribution. You can apply this line of thinking to your exercise routine. Which exercises give you the most bang for your buck? What would happen if you limit your workouts to 2 exercises instead of 10? Run the experiment and find out.
The concept of greasing the groove (GtG) was introduced by Pavel Tsatsouline who is famous for popularizing the kettlebell. The idea is that the best way to build strength is to train your nervous system by doing sets of fewer reps more often. He suggests to do about half of the reps you could do with long rest periods in between (5 to 15 minutes). GtG is great since you do not need equipment and you can do the reps anywhere since you won’t break a sweat. For me, this might look like doing five sets of 10 pushups spread throughout the day. This idea also ties in nicely with BJ Fogg’s Tiny Habits. Doing 10 pushups requires less activation energy than going to the gym. Reducing the amount of friction required to complete a task increases our likelihood of doing it.
Lastly, the concept of the minimal effective dose (MED) originates from medicine. It is the lowest amount of a substance that will elicit a statistically different response than the one from the placebo group. I first stumbled onto it while reading The Four-Hour Chef by Tim Ferris. What is the lowest number of muscles worked, exercises, sets, and reps you can perform during a single session (volume) that would measurably differ from not working out? I wanted to find out for myself by submitting myself to the experiment below.
The Experiment
I committed to doing three sets of ten lunges or other leg exercises and three sets of ten reps of any core exercise. This amounts to a total of approximately 60 repetitions which takes about 5 minutes to complete. The intent of this experiment was to stay active despite having a cast on my broken hand.
My Experience
The workout’s minimal length made it easy to squeeze whenever and wherever I could. I often did the workout in the local park and in a parking lot when travelling or waiting for something. On the days I felt like pushing myself, I would either do more reps or simply choose a more explosive exercise such as jump squats. These workouts were enough to elevate my heartbeat and produce a good pump. On the days I felt like I needed to take it easy, I slowed it down and used the workout as a dynamic warmup for active recovery. I enjoyed splitting my work session with the workout. I would often work immediately before I showered which acted as a reward to reinforce the habit.
Takeaways
- A short workout is surprisingly effective at maintaining fitness levels and overall health.
- Time was not the reason I didn’t exercise. I simply valued other things more.
- Consistency and being active throughout the day trumps doing long gym workouts three times per week.
- K.I.S.S. You do not need fancy equipment to be healthy. That is a modern lie.