326: Programming Both Weight Lifting and Cardio for Peak Fitness with Dr. Alyssa Olenick, PhD

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps After Babies Radio Episode 326.

Hello and welcome to Biceps After Babies Radio. A podcast for ladies who know that fitness is about so much more than pounds lost or PR's. It's about feeling confident in your skin and empowered in your life. I'm your host Amber Brueseke, a registered nurse, personal trainer, wife and mom of four. Each week my guests and I will excite and motivate you to take action in your own personal fitness as we talk about nutrition, exercise, mindset, personal development and executing life with conscious intention. If your goal is to look, feel and be strong and experience transformation from the inside out, you my friend are in the right place. Thank you for tuning in. Now, let's jump into today's episode.

Hey, hey, hey. Welcome back to another episode of Biceps After Babies Radio. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke. And today on the podcast, I am inviting Dr. Alyssa Olenick onto the podcast and she is going to blow your mind. If you are a science nerd like me, you're going to love this episode because we get deep into energy systems. We talk about the balance between cardio and weights from, you know, a 30,000 foot view. And then we get down into some of the specific recommendations too as well so that you can really figure out that balance that's going to work, understanding that both weightlifting and cardio, they're both important. They train different energy systems. They do different things for your body and they're both really important when it comes to building a healthy, well-rounded fitness program. So I really appreciate, Dr. Alyssa, you can better at Doc Lyss on Instagram, but I appreciate her diving deep into the science, you know me, I as a as a you know former registered nurse, I love the Science and like I said, we get deep into it anytime you can use phosphocreatine cycle and ATP and mitochondria in a podcast episode like ah, I eat it all up. So again, if you're like me, you're going to love this podcast episode. We get into the nitty gritty, we talk about cardio, we talk about weightlifting, we talk about how to combine those two and to create a well-rounded fitness program. So, whether your goal is to do 50 milers like Alyssa or your goal is to do you know your first power lifting competition or your goal is just to be able to get on the floor and play with your grandbabies, both weights and cardio are a really important part of your programming, and so we dive into that in this podcast interview, so let's roll it.  

Amber B 02:35 

I'm excited to welcome Dr. Alyssa Olenick to the podcast, also known as Doc Lyss, that you may know her on Instagram as Doc Lyss. Yeah, Alyssa, thanks for coming on the podcast.  

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 02:43 

Yeah, thanks for having me on. I'm glad we finally got to pin this down. 

Amber B 02:48 

I know I'm this is, I've been. I've been super excited and wanting to have Alyssa on the podcast for a really long time and so I was just so grateful that I got to snag her at the real coaching summit and be like, will you come on the podcast? And she was so gracious and and said, Yeah, so in case somebody maybe doesn't follow you on Instagram yet because they probably will want to after this episode, tell us a little bit about you and about what you do. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 03:09 

Yeah, I'll give you guys a Cliff notes version PhD, Exercise Physiology. I have been an athlete my entire life obsessed with exercise since I was a young teen, declared that I was gonna spend my life learning as much as I could and sharing it with others. And by golly gosh, I am doing that. So, I grew up running, playing lacrosse field sports. I would just was like the only girl in the weight room, only girl running after school. I was infatuated with exercise and movement and performance and health and all of those things at a very young age. And I really took it and ran with it. No pun intended. Got a Bachelors in Exercise Science and Masters and Exercise Health Science, Masters in Health Exercise Science and Physiology. Same thing, PhD. Finishing up a post doc and menopause and metabolism right now. And throughout all that I've kind of done a little bit of everything from powerlifting competition, strong man, ultramarathons, tons of trail and ultra running hiking, make things obstacle horse racing, like anything I could get my hands on over the years, I've probably for the most part tried and done. I just love to move and I love exercise and I feel like it's a gift that I get to give others, but luckily for the people that I'm giving that gift to, I also like spent a really long time actually studying and researching Exercise Physiology and I know a lot of you guys listening to this podcast, women, and specifically women's Physiology in relation to that as well. So, I kind of bring a breadth and depth of experience and knowledge and like to blend that together and that’s it, that's the Cliff notes. 

Amber B 04:33 

Yeah, I mean, that's one of the reasons that I wanted to have you on because I do feel like under like having the depth of knowledge that you have to have in order to to get a a masters degree and a PhD, you just bring an understanding that it's it's deeper than a lot of people can provide in social, quick scroll social media platform really makes you stand apart is like you do have the depth and the scientific understanding and knowledge, and yet you're so good at being able to communicate in a way that is accessible for a wide breadth of people like you don't have to have PhD to listen to you and understand what it is that you're saying, which is it's unique. Not a lot of activate that not a lot of academics can like share in a way that the general population can really understand. I feel like sometimes academics try to talk over people and you absolutely don't do that. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 05:11 

Yeah. I appreciate message. Appreciate that. Yeah. Well, I appreciate that. It's very hard skill and I were, I'm constantly refining it. So I always really appreciate that feedback because I I work really hard at that. 

Amber B 05:29 

It's awesome. I am curious, when you were growing up, did you have that modeled for you of like, exercise is important women in the weight room is totally normal. Is that modeled for you from your parents or is that just something just like came to the earth with? 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 05:43 

OK, for one, I came to the earth in same, so we'll just put that on the table right here. I joke. I was like a Nicky baby miracle baby type thing. Like supposed to die and have all these things really dramatic. And so I joked that like, I just came out kicking and screaming and fighting. And that's where I am now, stubborn as all hell. But my dad was like a sports dad. 

Amber B 05:51 

Oh my gosh.  

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 06:02 

And my dad has always exercised and always been really active, and I wasn't really super into sports like when I was younger, I I was dancing gymnastics, but I was always active, right? And my parents like encouraged like whatever we were doing. They just, we were being active in something. But my dad was a sports dad through and through. So my dad was always running and lifting. And I just always saw him doing that. My mom not so much. But it was great though, because once I started, so my gateway into fitness was running. So, I actually, my master's thesis and PhD like entry essays, talks about like me learning like going on runs in my back rows in Pennsylvania. When I was like 13 going on 14 like the year after I first start playing lacrosse cause I realized I was good runner and in my head I'm like good runner, good athlete. So I just started running all the time. And there was like this pivotal moment where I was like, Oh my God, this is amazing. I want to share this with everyone. And I just like, really got. I just loved it. I would run like to my dad ,with coach, my brother, football practice and baseball practices and it was like 4 miles away and I like you, probably couldn't trust a 13-14 year old to run along nowadays like that. But I was running to my brother’s practice. My dad would drive me home. More like. You know, I think my dad just kind of let me do my thing, and he saw me get into sports and he just kind of fostered that. But I really started weight training because we had some gym coach come talk to our lacrosse team and how you strength training to make us better athletes and I was like ohh better athlete and so I was the only girl on my team who started weight training on her own in the offseason. I'd stay after school and run and then I would also stay after school and left. I was like me. That was the only girl in the weight room, the men's soccer coach taught me how to do my first squat without falling over and then I joked that I used to go to the high school in the summer as my brother was training for football and I lived in the weight room and the wrestling, the football coach just like, helped me get my first pull up and like, help me with weight training. So I was really just like the only girl in the weight room because it was taboo, but all the other male athletes were there and I it is me. I'm stubborn as all hell. I don't care if I'm the only girl in the weight room like girl power. You know what I mean? I was like, I'm there to be a better athlete and so I, you just like in the rooms with men like, basically just none of my teammates were there, but I wanted to be the best that I could be, and so I didn't really. I have that model to me other than like my dad was a sports dad, my brother played football. My dad was very, very active. He's still very active. He's like 62 years old. And he walks the steps if it's too cold out to go outside to get an exercise, he's still weight trains. He's like he still runs. He has, you know, things like that. So I luckily had that kind of nurturing environment, but otherwise I really was like your clinician. So, 15-year-old girl sitting there in the weight room with a bunch of men by myself. 

Amber B 08:34 

Figure it out man. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 08:36 

Yeah, yeah. And I'm grateful for those male coaches, though, that, like, saw that and like, something under their wing and, like, taught me how to do things, cause otherwise you're like, yeah, you know, if you're doing 15.  

Amber B 08:44 

Yeah. Absolutely. OK. So I feel like in the 90s, there was a lot of programming around cardio, cardio, cardio, cardio, cardio and then we kind of went to the other side and was like cardio is dumb. We don't need cardio. All we need to do is lift all of the weights and do 0 cardio and I feel like we're kind of realizing those are probably both really extreme. And the answer is somewhere in the middle. They're actually both really important. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 09:00 

Yeah. 

Amber B 09:10 

And that's when you talk about a lot is hybrid training, how do we get the cardio in and have that be a staple and a mainstay of our our health and fitness journey as well as also include the weight training, right. So this idea of hybrid training. So can you kind of just explain the concept of hybrid training and why this is not just for someone who wants to run an ultra marathon? 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 09:22 

Yeah. Yes, yes, you want to get that to every podcast so you don't have to be like me. I am crazy and I know it. Yeah. Yeah. So one, if you're listening to this like, you know, be cautious. The industry loves to hyper swing and the hyper swing is always the solution. But then in 5-10 years the opposite is the solution and we're just keep over correcting and it feels good and sexy because it's black and white. 

Amber B 09:45 

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 09:52 

Absolutist. But you now this new and now hybrid fitness is trendy. So now people think it's a trend now. They think it's gimmicky and it's like really, you know, when we come, when we boil it down, it's just combining 2 modes of fitness into the same thing of training you, I I don't care if people use the word hybrid fitness or they don't want to use it to describe themselves, but the scientific word for those listening is concurrent training. Combining two different things within the same training program, the current trend of hybrid training is more so people who are really trying to like maximize their strength and endurance at the same time, but you don't have to be trying to maximize both at the same time to get health benefits or to do both in the same program. Or, you know, include both or whatever that looks like. So I always like to get the disclaimer cause I think some people they feel like they're like, well, I'm not athletic enough to identify with this and like the ideal mode of training when it comes for even metabolic health and general health and well-being is a combination of these two things. It doesn't have to be as serious as you being like a hybrid athlete, but we should be doing, like, concurrent. Or mixed mode or multi mode training. I actually think like the best fitness plans have multiple components of fitness in them or not one-dimensional. It's not just even cardio and strength training, but it's like are you jumping, running, playing, lifting, being explosives. Like you know, using your body like it's full range of motion like we want to move in multiple ways. We're designed to do that, but the fitness industry has always painted us into buckets of powerlifter, bodybuilder, runner, CrossFitter. Which CrossFit is kind of like the OG hybrid thing, you know, that came up over the last like, couple decades, but it's really just comes down to, hey, you're including a piece of cardio in a style of lifting together in the same week in general training program across time. 

Amber B 11:34 

And can you explain just for people who may quite not quite understand like why it why is that. Why does not everybody think that that can be done like why? Why do we have this idea that like we should only do weightlifting or we should only do cardio and like putting them together in a training program where you're doing some of both feels for some people counterproductive, like, can you explain how those contrasts with each other?  

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 11:56 

Yeah. So there's a few reasons people do this. One, people just want to move in one way. They want to have their one thing. They have a camp, they belong to it. They think this is what I do. And then, you know, from the lifting side of things, we have a lot of lifters who think cardio will kill my games. It's gonna kill all my muscle tissue. It's going to make me weak. It's going to hurt my performance. And then you have, like, the quintessential cliche out of breath powerlifter who's like eating a bag of gummy worms between sets of three. But, like, hasn't, like, you know, gets winded going out with flight of steps like, that's not ideal, right? But then we also have, like, the the cliche runner who thinks well, this will make me too big, too bulky, too slow. This will hurt my running performance and then they're like littered with nags and niggles and injuries and low muscle density. And you know, we really we want both and that, you know, we think of like the rules of specificity in training cause people are like, well, if you want to get better at actually have to do X, yes. And This is why I like to, really, I preface that with the hybrid thing of, like, not all of you have to be trying to maximize both things at the same time. I like to think of hybrid training as a spectrum. And on one side of the spectrum, you have, like, the absolute lifters who only lift, that's all they do is lift. Lifting is the only mode of fitness they do, and the other end you have like the only I'm only doing endurance in cardio and that's all I do. And ideally everyone exists 1 notch in on each side between that middle point of like maximizing hyper fitness or hey, I care about cardio, but I need strength to support my health and longevity and musculature. And you know overall well, like well-being in structure or any cardio to make sure that I have enough of the stimulus for cardiovascular fitness and health, we ideally all of us unless we are elite, elite, elites who are having to like really go in at specific times probably want some mix of both, but you get to define what that means to you. So, you know, but we, we, we have these ideas that come into like, OK, you know, Oh my gosh, it's going to kill my, my powerlifting performance if I do cardio. But like you're not, you're not even an elite powerlifter or it's going to kill my running performance.  

Amber B 13:50 

Yeah. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 13:51 

So like, you're not even. You're not even breaking 25 minutes in the 5K. Like you're probably not fit enough to worry about these things. And that's not to say like, you know, those things are bad. Well, we really want to think about like realistically, who am I? What am I trying to do and is this really going to actually have that much of a detriment to my performance? And you know, I said it, real coach to some. And I joke a time like and I just said now you're not fit enough to worry about. I think most people over dramaticized the impacts of like small things that can potentially become issues at large scales, or if done like poorly or whatever, or are small issues and there's other big things that we can control and are more controllable in these situations for our training performance. So it's really just a lot of misinformation mixed with you know I think cardio lovers hate lifting. They think it's boring. It's not mentally stimulating enough. It's not intense enough, mixed with lifters, or like they act like if they do cardio, it's the worst thing in the world and, and so I think it's just like a blend of all of these different social, cultural things mixed with what you know, misinformation. And now there's the craze of like cardio is going to make you fat and it's bad for you or it's harmful for you. And there's just always misinformation coming around, all these things. And so it paints people in the buckets of like, I only do one type of fitness, which is funny because like, that's not even optimal for health. And we're all claiming that we're out here trying to improve people's health. 

Amber B 15:13 

Yeah, right. Like, you really want to improve health, like, they're both important. They there's the principle. And I mean, I love the thing. You're not fit enough to worry about that. And I think so many of us would do well to just realize like like you said, unless you're an elite athlete trying to peak performance in one specific thing, like you don't need to worry about the fact that having a little bit more cardio is going to like “hurt” your gains, yeah, you don't need to worry about that, so I'm gonna. You're gonna get a chance to to show how everybody, how smart you are and how good you are at explaining it in simple terms because I know you can geek out on like energy systems.  

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 15:47 

Yeah. Yeah.  

Amber B 15:48 

Man, I can too.  

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 15:49 

I'll hold. I'll hold it back. 

Amber B 15:50 

Well, like I want you to. I want you to explain it because I think it's so valuable when people start to understand it. So can you just give us? And I know it's like a hard question because it's like, it's broad, but can you give us just a brief overview of like the energy systems and you know, how do these systems interact? What are we tapping into when we do more like long, you know, studies take cardio versus like lifting and so I think when people can understand that they can start to see, oh, it's really important that I play in these different energy systems. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 16:16 

Yeah. So I'll, I'll start with backing that up one step. So when we think about adaptations to training people think lifting, muscle, cardio, heart and there are adaptations to the heart and cardiovascular system become its training. But most of you here are probably unaware of the fact that there are muscular adaptations that come in response to cardiovascular training, just like there are muscular responses that are in response to, to lifting and resistance training. And so in our muscles we produce energy which is allows us to reduce force at different intensities or different fatigue ability or different durations depending on the muscle fiber types we're using and the energy systems that we are using within our muscles. So I want you to think not just cardio as heart and lungs, lifting as muscle, there is adaptations that are happening in our muscle and that's where these energy systems are working. Our body is breaking down fat and or carbohydrate in order to turn that into something called ATP, which then is basically our muscles energy currency that gets broken down and the energy that's released from that allows us to produce whatever amount of work we need to do to complete our reps, our sets, our times are running our miles. So we're in the muscle right now.  

And so in the muscle we have a few main energy systems that contribute to this. We have the breakdown of ATP directly so that that little molecule that can be broken apart for energy, but we run that really fast, so almost instantaneously we're producing you know, you're using the phosphocreatine system, which you guys have probably heard of creatine, the creatine supplement that allows us to maximize this. That's breaking that up for even more rapid energy production. And this is like the first like 1, 5, 10 seconds are these two things kind of happening. But your body has very limited storage of those things, unless it like rests and replenishes that and all that stuff. And so then it starts to breakdown carbohydrate and uses carbohydrate in essentially a non-oxygen dependent way, but it's basically rapidly breaking down carbohydrate to keep producing more energy. And now we're talking into the 30 seconds, one minute mark. But then we can only use non oxygen dependent energy systems for instantaneous energy for a short period of time before we either have to stop, slow down or shift into using more oxidative. And when I say oxidative, I just mean your body is using energy to help kind of drive the systems that produce energy metabolism. So those first, you know, 5-10 seconds, 30 seconds, 60 seconds of activity are largely going to be the things that we think about that are, like, forceful, short burst of energy and activity.  

So like your weight training, your lifting, your sprinting, you know your, your power, your explosion, things that you want a lot of force, but you can't repeat that over and over and over again forever and ever cause you will fatigue or you can't sustain it or keep up with it without again having to slow down or stop. So we have these energy systems that are using either creatine or mainly carbohydrates. Kind of fueling this at this point in time, but then as we go into longer and longer duration activities, we start to use more and more of this aerobic energy system and essentially in your muscles, you have mitochondria. I'm sure you guys have all heard of the powerhouse of the cell. And so these mitochondria either outside of them or inside of them, you know we have or with you within your muscle cells in the mitochondria, you have, you know, I'm thinking inside and outside of what's the matter conjure. But I won't go there with you guys. Bear with me. You have these different things that are working together, but when you have oxygen that's being delivered from your heart and your lungs again, that adaptation coming to that muscle cell being taken up by that mitochondria, then you can fuel this thing called the electron transport chain, which you don't need to know about, but it basically is this oxygen electron pump that allows us to take in a ton of these carbs and fats that we have coming in.  

So it allows us to use both carbs and fats. So you can only use fats when you're using oxygen-based metabolism and uses them to keep pumping out more and more of this energy that's stored in these little, tiny molecules. So we can keep going. But the thing that happens when you start using this more. Oxygen dependent metabolism is you have. It's usually related to slower, less powerful, less forceful activity, but longer duration, which is essentially why the longer you go and the longer you do something, the slower essentially you can sustain during that any point of activity and so these energy systems, they're not happening in like an on off switch. They're kind of always happening in fluidity and are muscles. They overlap at any point in time. So even when you're lifting in between your lifting sets, your aerobic systems recovering your phosphocreatine system so that you can perform and repeat. The work that you just did again, and if you have like a short burst of activity, your energy say you're in the middle of a race and you have to spread up a hill, you will kind of shift towards a thing. So it's not just like, oh, if you're working out for two hours, you're in your aerobic system all the time. You can shift and have and flow. And we've seen this, you know, if you go on a run like I just said and you go hard up a hill, you might notice it to slow down or stop a second to catch your breath because your body has an oxygen debt. It's trying to replace. You can kind of keep going at the pace and intense. You're going see the spectrum of your body using you know either oxygen or non oxygen dependent metabolism and/or carbohydrates or fats to essentially feed into your body's energy production and just breaking down. You know the most simplified forms of carbs and fats into these tiny little molecules that they can broken apart and then released into energy over time.  

And so you have this spectrum and then pretty much anything past like a minute or couple of minutes is has a good component of aerobic fitness to it. So for the most part, like your aerobic systems being used and everything passed like that first, like 10-30, sixty seconds to some degree. But when we think about training and you know our performance, we can think about specifically developing different parts of this energy system by training your body's ability to either, you know, clear out lactate which is a byproduct of carbohydrate metabolism when oxygen isn't available. So you start to accumulate lactate in your blood which is acidic. And you'll start to breathe more rapidly because your body's going to want to clear out that CO2, and you'll either have to slow down or stop because it's too fatiguing in your body at that point in time to sustain what you're doing without again bringing in oxygen dependent metabolism, but you can train your body to tolerate that more by doing more high, intense high, you know above your lactate threshold type exercise that high hard burning type stuff you can tolerate that or you can do slow, slow, easy stuff. The Zone 2 stuff everyone's talking about but nowadays, to develop your body's ability to build more mitochondria, be better, have more efficient mitochondria, be better at using oxygen and burning fat for fuel so you can go longer and be more steady during this.  

And So what you can do with your training is kind of target these different inner parts of your energy systems and your body and how it does things or essentially characteristics of what you're trying to do for the activity that you're trying to do and you can kind of think about where you're falling and using these things and really cardio training. I you know, I said some real coaches summit talk as well. It's essentially just energy systems development. That's what most athletes are doing is like, OK, what are we trying to develop with this? Do we want to be powerful and explosive, do we want to be able to go really hard at the maximum velocity that we can saying are we trying to go for a really long time? Are we trying to improve the pace of which we can sustain while going at a long time. That's all adaption to improving these different things. And essentially what it's doing is it's training you above or below different parts of your lactate threshold where that lactate accumulates or clears where your body can be aerobic can it use oxygen, turn that into energy, or are you being powerful and explosive for short bursts of time and trying to improve that kind of power output. And I know some of that is probably really over the heads of a lot of you. But essentially short, fast, high fatigue, medium, fast, medium fatigue, low, low intensity, low fatigue. You can go forever and that's kind of what it goes on the spectrum there. And you can train your body's ability to do those things better and or improve its ability to kind of just do all of it across the board by being more fit. 

Amber B 24:22 

Yeah. So good. And so then this is where, like, we could start to get into the idea of, you know, which is. I feel like it's I’m coming of age too or of thing they see a lot more on social media is just like the heart rate zones. Right. So you're like zone one and two is like, like you said, you're low and slow and long training. You're zone four and five is like you're hit and you're set. And you're like, fast, intense, powerful. And then you have your Zone 3, which is kind of that moderate in between. So when we start to think about OK understanding you know you explain it so well like we need to train these different energy systems and and kind of playing around and with all of them if somebody is listening and again we're not elite athletes, we're just people who enjoy fitness and getting a little bit fitter and they're thinking about, OK, I'm kind of reflecting on my training cycle or what I do in a week, how, how much should, how should they know how much cardio they should be doing versus how much time playing and zone 5 versus zone 2 versus weight lifting, right? There's a lot of moving pieces and I think people's minds gonna get a little bit blown up like I just know how to balance all of these things. And so it's just easier just to be a lifter. You know, like so.  

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 25:25 

Yeah. No, I agree. 

Amber B 25:26 

Like how can they again, not missing the forest from the trees. It doesn't have to be like perfect, but how can they start to think about this in terms of their own training? 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 25:34 

I mean, yeah, I agree. I think for many people besides misinformation, it just comes down to people like why don't the freaking time to do all this to do all this or I don't have to balance it. So you just it's easier to do one thing right. And so the answer that everyone hates is, it depends, because it depends on who you are, how much time you have to give each week, how much you want to spend training and like you know what you're lacking in or have or all these things. But I have, like minimums that I think are easier for people. So one. And everybody needs to be lifting at least two days a week. At least resistance training two days per week. That's kind of my minimum there. Getting that in, I think 3 is like the perfect Gen pop sweet spot so that it gives the place to balance for cardio training and resistance training up to like 4 if you're someone who has more of a lifting heavy goal or focus, you know or like you have more time to train or more interested to train and I think those are probably my like those are my barometers for lifting there. It's like OK like, let's see where you're lifting here and how much you can train and handle and then it's like OK well what are your cardiovascular goals? Somebody who's running a ton is going to be very different than somebody who's like, you know, lifting and just trying, adding cardio. So keep the salt, the caveat of like, just it might bury a little bit by who you are.  

And so when we think about the cardio training, I think then for everyone, the minimum is like let's get to the exercise guidelines. So if you guys are unfamiliar with exercise guidelines, it's 150 minutes of moderate intensity per week or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity cardiovascular activity per week. And so the intensity is relative to you and your fitness level. So for some people, walking might be moderate intensity, but some of you might not be, but also your goal long term should be that you're walking should be not enough to get you into that. You want to think about getting more fit over time, but you still want something a little bit more intense mixed in there. And so when you come up the exercise guidelines, it's basically, I mean, you know, you can trade minutes for intensity within that. I'm of the the stance of, like, this is just showing at a population level what's minimum for health. But I don't think that one easy minute of cardio or two easy minutes of cardio is the same adaptation of one minute of hard cardio. It's just saying that, like, you can trade this off. So that's basically coming down to like, OK. Maybe you're doing two to three hits. I think it's even a lot to say, like, do three hit sessions per week? For most people, they're not doing hit sessions. For most people, even running as moderate takes them, kicks them into vigorous activity for a lot of things that they're doing. But you really want to think about doing like maybe one or two hard sessions per week that are hit, sit your cross hitting that con. Your orange theory, your F45 give or take the programming.  

It always depends with those multiple fitness things what kind of programming it is, what it's doing. I know people like group fitness. I never like to poo poo on it. But I'm like, make that you're like 2-ish hard days. You know, formal hit and Sprint interval training here is really great. CrossFit, if it's a good program class should balance this across the week to some degree and then kind of fill in the rest of the time being easy so one or two hard-ish days and then one to three easiest days on top of that. And so I like to encourage everyone to kind of keep it at least one hard-ish bout of training in per week, you know, if you're a very, very beginner or you're new to this, you don't need to jump into this. Start with easing in gradually building up, etcetera, etcetera. It might not be tolerable or comfortable to you or any like everything you do is good if you're just starting, but people want specifics. So I like having one or two hard-ish days or very hard days the week, depending on what you're exactly doing, and then kind of fill the rest in with easy cardio or just whatever general activity you want to do and I and I give you guys these brain just people hate it because I want to tell them exactly which is like,  

Amber B 29:16 

I know. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 29:17 

Well, you only have four days a week to work out. I'm not going to tell you to lift four days a week and do four days of cardio. I'm going to tell you, OK, let's lift two days a week. Let's do 2 days of cardio per week and maybe on one of those days per week you're doubling up or you're, you're focusing on increasing activity across the border across that. I really like the like 3 days of lifting, 3 days of cardio for the people who want to train most days per week. It gives you a workout to do each day of the week. Otherwise two and three is a great split. Like really you have to figure out what works for you, but trying to get those those minimum. And then from there we can refine and essentially the more cardio you cardio you do. So once you get above the exercise guidelines say you start doing you know 150 minutes of activity per week is like 4 ish 30-minute sessions of cardio per week. That's a lot for a lot of people to do. But once you start to do more like we're getting to 300 to 500 plus minutes of cardio a week which is somewhere around like basically three to five hours, give or take. Then you want to start thinking, OK, well, like, I'm starting to do more and more cardio, I probably need to make more of this easy training more of this needs to be the easy stuff. So you're keeping that quality there and that one to two days of what you're doing, but you can't make everything high hard across the week. So a lot of people come to the mistake of like, especially the group fitness background when they're doing five days a week of like, it's essentially ends up becoming moderate intensity activity because it's never high and hard enough that it's truly high intensity activity, but it's never actually easy. It's still like that moderate to vigorous, it's kind of zoned 3 to 4-ish and there's nothing wrong with zone 3 to four training and and and independently. But when you're doing this all of the time for everything that you're doing, you lose the intensity and quality and nothing's ever truly easy, so you're not. Everything just becomes like in the middle, in the moderate, so you're not doing anything high or hard enough to really push that adaptation above that lactate threshold. But you're never actually low enough and easy enough to develop that that, that training below it, where you're getting good at using oxygen and burning fat and mitochondria and all that stuff. So kind of the more you do, the more of it's going to be easy and everyone wants a perfect percentage. But like 8, 20 even coming from a running in a dance background like that's totally different because the person doing three to four days a week of training for a 10K or half marathon that's only doing like 30 miles a week is so much different than the person who's training like 60 miles a week for a marathon.  

So you know, everyone knows these hard cut rules. I think it's just easier to say, start with one quality day, fill the rest with easy stuff. If you start to get to a higher level of training, maybe you can bring in a second quality day or it really just depends. Like the lower end, the less you're doing, the more it can be higher and hard intense because you're not doing so much that it's hard to recover from, then the more that you're doing, the more it's going to be easy. I mean, if you start doing a ton of easy then it's like OK, now you have some room and the total amount you're doing to make even more intense again. But the ratio is always going to be relative to what you're doing. I think that's hard for people cuz they don't like that. So start with those minimums for most of you, unless you're trained for specific endurance event. I like one or two harder days per week and then one longer, easier day per week or something like that. I think is a great kind of approach this like one hit or sit day, you know one Zone 2 day and then one like you, and you can make one of them fun. Like you're CrossFit classes are your orange theories and your F45s are probably enough to give you cardiovascular health. You're probably OK. Just make sure that you're balancing the hard stuff with the easy stuff or actually getting stuff out of your sessions if you care about specific progress. But if you only do like three days a week of cardio, it probably really doesn't matter how much what your split is, because you're probably not doing enough for it to matter anyway. But if you do specifically care like one or two hard, the rest easy. 

Amber B 32:57 

Yeah. Yeah. And let's talk a little bit about the easy, like the zone to you, because I think you say this idea like it's it's supposed to be easy and people like. Well, then what is it doing? Like if it's easy, like, what are they. So what, like helping people to kind of buy into because we we all know if it hurts and it's hard it's probably doing something but I think we struggle with it. If it doesn't hurt and it's easy, is it really doing anything? So can you kind of speak to some of the adaptations and the importance of having a bulk of your training be in that zone 2? 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 33:27 

Yeah. So, you know, this really comes from like, endurance training and running, and now it's been like Co-opted by the biohacking Wellness thing. Again, I want to circle back that like Zone 2 is good for you. It is beneficial. There is merit to doing some of it. But for most of you, you know, you got to start with where you're at or you aren't probably doing enough cardio in a week where you would really reap. Like a ton of these benefits. So save on the caveat not to discourage people, but like the Perks of Zone 2 and you should do some cardio easy. This isn't to like poo poo. What I'm just about to say is that you can do a lot of it and it's not fatiguing. It's not. It's not like, very stressful on your body to do so essentially zone 2, regardless of how we classify it or pin it down or figure out what is, it's essentially trying to say physiologically below our first lactate and ventilatory threshold.  

So when you guys are exercising, say you're going to start running on a treadmill, you go to the gym, you run to the treadmill and you start increasing the speed of the treadmill and the incline of the treadmill. Like every two to three minutes and you cannot run anymore when you're doing that, you're going to have two points in that workout where things get noticeably harder and these are like these physiological thresholds that we have. And so the first one is your first lactate threshold and your first ventilatory threshold. So it's essentially where your blood lactate that we've been talking about a little bit starts to kind of accumulate a little bit more, but it's not so much more that your body can't clear it out as just doing it, but it's a little bit higher. You can kind of still keep going. It's kind of like your steady your steady state like you could sustain that, but it's a little bit more fatiguing on your body to do and at that point in time you will notice that you're talking, it gets harder, your breathing goes up, you're having to exhale more or you basically my litmus test is could you carry a phone conversation up to this point, no. OK, so below that is a technically your zone 2. So it's below that first lactate threshold. 

And so the goal there is that you're relying predominantly on fat oxidation and oxidative metabolism. And you can do a lot, a lot of it. It's very easy. It's not very fatiguing on your body. So it's not creating this massive recovery deficit. You know, it's not very stressful on you. You can kind of sustain it. And you know, when it comes to zone 2 training. Because of this, we can kind of do as much of it in a week as we can honestly fit in, recover or adapted to and tolerate. If it's truly zone 2. And so a lot of people, especially endurance based people or people who are focused on this do it because you can do a lot of it. It's not fatiguing and you can do it because you can do a lot of volume. You essentially get to get more benefits of cardiovascular training through this mechanism because you can only do so much of the hard stuff in a week before it starts to lose that clotting and intensity. And so when you think about the way our body adapts to cardiovascular training. And and and the benefits we get from it, you stimulate similar things with high intensity training and this easy training. The difference is though you can only do so much hard training in a week and still recover from it and get benefit from it, or actually keep adapting to it before it becomes too stressful or you can't. You can't do seven hit sessions in a week and get them and have them all be quality. 

Amber B 36:35 

That would be the high intensity you need it to be. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 36:37 

And be them high intensity and yeah some of them, but you can do a shit ton, I hope I can swear your podcast of easy cardio and get a lot of benefits from it. So think about it with lifting the more volume you do to some degree, the more you usually get strength or or muscle adaptations right. But if you do all of your training and 90% of your one Rep Max all of the time to failure. You're you're eventually. You're not going to recover. It's going to be too stressful or you're not going to keep adapting to it because you want to stay kind of below that failure point. You, you, we we don't always train at 80 to 90% of our one rep max Sector etcetera. So you know I I think if we associate it back to lifting it's like think of that as like your volume and you're developing your volume, your sub one rep Max volume in order to drive it up. And so when you're doing this, you're increasing mitochondrial density and capacity. Your body is essentially your aerobic capacity. Your body's ability to deliver uptake and use oxygen in your muscle to then fuel or recover those energy systems we talked about. And so, yes, the same benefits can occur from high intensity training, but you're often not able to do enough of that to do that totally on its own and develop the same kind of aerobic system and base. And like muscular characteristics that you get from true pure aerobic training, that doesn't mean for most people, if you're just doing a few days a week and you're sedentary and just getting started, like literally everything works and it's good. But if we're trying to get more specific over time, that's where this benefit comes in, because you can do a lot of it and get a lot of stimulus. And you can stimulate these adaptations at a higher threshold level, and it's bringing essentially what it's doing. It's increasing your machinery of your muscles, so you're getting more those mitochondria. They're getting more efficient. You're getting better at regulating carbohydrate and and and and fat metabolism and regulation within your muscle. You're building more capillaries and your body is getting better at pumping out, delivering and using oxygen at that muscle level.  

So it the reason it's easy is good. I think a lot of people get this negative connotation, especially coming from like the more and more and more hard, hard, hard especially we have for years is like you're not not getting any benefit from it. The idea is that it's easy and it's recoverable, and you're getting a stimulus from your training without a kind of burning you out or putting your body into this massive recovery deficit. But it really does work. And like and I I know it's so hard for people to buy in on it because if it's easy, then it doesn't feel like it's working. But I always try to, like counter people back on that. I'm like well. It's hard, right? It's hard to do that. It's hard to stay true. It's hard to do the easy thing. Oh, it's boring and like some people like, you know, it's fun to turn them on their heads and they go. They like I'm a warrior in the gym and like if you can't do 30 minutes of zone 2 versus the people who are like I'm bored or whatever. So don't be. If you really, really hate the stuff and it's easy, you can like kind of mix in zone 2 like you could do like cyclical circuity type things to keep it interesting for yourself. But it does have to be you know, true cardio like biking, rowing, ski or swimming, running, like the Elliptical the stair stepper incline hiking, it has to be a true cardio modality. You can't really cheat this by doing a lot of other things. It's boring. You have to do it for a long period of time, but you get a lot of bang for your buck. It's not as fatiguing and we think about the world right now as everyone's like cardio is too stressful. Cardio kills your hormones. Cardio makes you fat. Cardio this, cardio that like if we just did more easy cardio, you know, and we wouldn't have to worry about this because we'd be like, it's essentially polarizing or pure pure middle pure. Pure middlelizing. I don't know. That's a word I'm trying to think of a word that I'm making up in the moment, you're training so that you're distributing that intensity and volume more appropriately across the week. So you can both get the adaptations you're looking for and recover from the training that you are doing. So you know it's a whole bunch of things for people, but essentially it's it's it allows you to do a lot of training with low fatigue, it's easy to recover from and allows you to get benefits and a lot of adaptations when it comes to your muscular adaptations at your mitochondrial capillaries and oxygen delivery and utilization from training. 

Amber B 40:45 

It's good, it's good. So if somebody has very short like they're looking at their schedule and for, you know, whatever reason, they only have a a little bit of time to be able to do cardio. It might. Am I correct in assuming that you're saying the hit and the sit is going to get you the most bang for your buck, and if you only have a little bit of time, maybe that's what we do. But if you have a little bit more time. We can't keep adding hit and sit, and so then maybe that's where we supplement with the zone 2 like kind of is like now we can get more volume with a longer duration. Am I am I like interpreting that correctly? 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 41:16 

You are. It's like yes and no. It's like, yes. Yes. So if you are like, hey, I only have like 20 minutes of cardio to do a week with one maybe we just shift some things around in your training otherwise.  

Amber B 41:28 

So they can open up more time. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 41:29 

Yeah, yeah. Maybe not your life. But maybe we have to shift some, some lifting things around. Maybe you need to lift for 90 minutes. Maybe you can lift for 60 minutes, you know. You know you have to look at what you're doing. Sure. So I think, yes, the less you're doing or the less you can do, it can be high intense. It's not the exact same benefit and the exact same adaptation, but from a health perspective, the checking the box perspective, yeah, the getting the benefits that we need at a minimum to function as just healthy adults. Yes, that's totally fine. You know, do your one or two harder days per week and then if you can, this is where I'm like, if you can, because it is hard for people to get a lot of cardio. Like, if you can't get in a lot of formal carding on your training, then try to fill as much of the rest of your time in with, like, the steps or The Walking or the gardening or the activities or the cleaning and like try to keep the rest of your general activity like decently active and high, it's not the exact same thing, but that's also like that can be a big component of this if you can't like fill that in with the rest of this, but you know this is where I think too of people. If you're listening this and you're like you do have a decent strength base and you lack a lot of aerobic fitness and that's something that you lack, you know, and you don't have a lot of time, you're limited I know your audience has a lot of moms and busy people like you might need to consider, which is funny to give this advice because not all women might need not need this advice. But you might need to consider a period of time where you specifically make that like a primary outcome of your training, so I'm very big on the seasons approach of training. I think people, when we think about concurrent training or hybrid training, whatever is, everyone thinks about maximizing everything in this exact week or this exact moment. 

Amber B 43:03 

Yeah. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 43:04 

Instead of thinking about like Athletes go through seasons and they have like preseason and season and then postseason and then off season. And then you kind of circle back right and so if you black like, if you're like, hey, I haven't done cardio for years. I get winded doing anything. But I have decent lifting strength based like you might just need to pull back that whatever you have to. That's why I said in the beginning. It depends on how much you have per week. You might need to pull back that to maintain it like you keep maintaining or gaining, but doing slightly less. You make space and room to develop that, but once you develop that that, that fitness that you need, it's a lot easier to keep maintaining it or building on it from there, then it is. It's same thing with lifting right? Like every person who spent their 20s obsessively lifting, now in their 30s and 40s, can do so much less to maintain a higher level of strength, muscularity and fitness than the people who are just starting. Like if you're just starting, you have to do so much more work to get to the point that like we are at right and the same thing goes with cardio. You might just need to spend a period of time like. Like or maybe it's a year or whatever it is like. You know, we give these runners or these cardio junkie, Bunny lovers, whatever we want to call them, this advice is like going all in on strength for like a year and that's great advice because you want to build muscle strength. But if you lack cardio fitness, it's it is important to have it develop. You might have to have a season or period of time where you are making that more of a priority and goal and you're scaling back that time distribution so you know for those that are fixed on time, I don't think that's talked about enough is that like you might only have your five days of 30 minutes to work out per week, and maybe for one season you're lifting two of them and you're doing cardio on three of them versus like lifting four of them and doing cardio on one or whatever that looks like for you. And if you lack both, then that's fine. Just keep doing both and keep pushing and proving your fitness and and. Keep going because you can build both at the same time for a very long period of time with, you know, if you're building up from there. But I think sometimes a lot of people who are coming from the counter side of being very lifting only, they need to hear that like you need to spend time developing that thing and doing less of the thing that you already are really, really good at and then it will be a lot easier to maintain or sustain kind of doing both in in your training kind of at the same period of time. So that's kind of my like, yeah. You know, yes it is. Do one or two hard days. If you can't do anything else, be as active as you can be. If you can fit that in and the nice thing about that though is 2 with Zone 2 it's like. It can be flexible if you're doing it on like a bike or a rower and not like running where like you have to have skill and your tissues have to adapt that it can be something where you don't have to be perfect about it. Some weeks maybe you're getting it in and some weeks you're not, but it's still is beneficial to get in that extra activity when you can. Don't think, OK, if I can't do a 60 minute session of zone 2 every single week, I’m a failure, more like summer and spring and and good weather is coming. Like if you're only getting out on the weekends, once a week for a long hike or a long bout of cardio or more intense walk or whatever it is like that's still beneficial, don't write that off. 

Amber B 46:02 

Yeah, that's so good. So good I I mean one of the things I I remember from your presentation that I I really took away is kind of what you were talking about when you're talking about when you're trying to do 2 things at once, there is a long period of time where they're not really interfering that much with each other. Like you can build a lot of strength and a lot of cardio and there's no interference between it. And yes, at some point when you get a more elite level. There is that interference and you have to be concerned about them, you know, damaging the other. The gains in the other area. But for most of us, there's still a lot of area that you can be growing in both of them without it damaging your gains in the other. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 46:37 

For most people, including myself and Pete Carlson's podcast, I think for most people, the biggest struggle when it comes to like hybrid or combining fitness has more to do with your schedule limitations. 

Amber B 46:49 

Sure. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 46:50 

And you're having a time cap on what you can do in a week than it does with 99% of the other things that you're worried about. But besides your schedule, nutrition, sleep and just like not throwing volume at yourself like crazy are really going to manage so many of those for so many people, like really the answer for most people when it comes to like I have a hard time balancing the both. It's like well, you just need to do more and you need more time. But that's not a practical answer for most people. But that's the biggest limiter for those people listening to this, like your biggest limiter is your schedule and that's why I think it's important to recognize that you might need to shift your priorities. I use this with clients all the time, like I build a system of training where it's like, hey, you can go from 2-3 or four days per week and the sessions range and how long they are and your cardio options range. You can really like make it work where you're at and what you're doing because for most people that's the biggest limit or more than like 90% of the interference kill my gains make me slow tight narratives that we hear or tell ourselves. 

Amber B 47:47 

Yeah, that's really good. What are some common mistakes as people are trying to have this concurrent training when they're trying to balance heavy lifting and cardio like what are big mistakes that you see people making so we can kind of avoid some of those pitfalls. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 47:50 

Yeah. So I think the first mistake kind of building up what we just did is that they take what they've already doing in the gym and they try to slap on the other thing that they have to do. So one that they just start slapping on lifting or running or cardio or slapping on cardio, they're lifting. But they don't account for the fact that they're asking themselves to do more overall. So one and when you add the new thing, pull back the other thing just a little bit and make space for what your current 100% that you can give in a week and time and recovering capacity is, then as you get more fit that 100% increases how much you ge so is is is more right? So I call like the bucket or the fishbowl theory like you the less fit you are the less water you have to give. But the more fit you are the more water you have to give. But you only have so much water that you can pour out into your other mini buckets or cups per week or whatever that looks like. So think about building that capacity with time but pull back. 

Two, they think that it's not working and it's making them less fit because they don't give it enough time to adapt. So give it like a month and a half, two months for that adaptation. Or anytime you increase your volume one the other, give it time.  

Three, they don't adjust nutrition to account for the increased cardiovascular. Meaning that they're doing or lifting that they're doing. So usually people, most people like proteins, the same kind of almost regardless of goal anymore the recommendation. But if you're not eating enough protein, bump that up. But like usually if you're adding another mode of training, you probably have to reduce your carbon intake, especially if you're adding on cardio or endurance. So I think a lot of people are like, oh, I'm fatigued. It's not working. It's killing my training and my games. And I'm like, well, you're doing the same amount and adding it on you didn't give it time to adapt, and you're not increasing your eating in response to it. Like, yeah, you're gonna feel like crap. You're asking your body to do more, and it's not adapted yet. And yadda yadda, yadda.  

And then I think the next thing is they try to add it all on at once rather than adding in, like, what's the most realistic thing that I can add right now and building that habit of kind of keeping it in their training and their routine and their program within that.  

And then I also think they obsess too much about where it's at in the week and the perfect days and the perfect splits. It matters more to get it in. The only time that like split thing really starts to matter. We're managing the two is like when we're thinking about people who are doing, like, really like, right now I'm training like like 10 to 11 hours per week from what I'm currently doing, I can tell noticeably when my split gets messed around, but I've changed my freaking split of training every single week. I swear to God for the last three months cause life has been so crazy and some weeks it sucks and I'm like Yep, I am way more fatigue cause I did it this way and it sucks. But like when I'm in my lower edge of like, you know, recovery offseason, I'm only doing like 4 hours a week of work account with a normal amount. I'm like you can kind of just do things whenever and it's really not that big of a deal for most of you just going to do one workout per day of the week. And that's probably what you going to do.  

So don't stress too much about like when a day is where it's at and for 90% of you who want to know this lift first, do cardio after unless you have a specific cardio goal that is my usual recommendation if you want a better lift and adaptation for that, and don't forget if I people I say that and people are like Oh my God no. This is like if you have a specific cardio goal and that is your main priority and you're collecting it, maybe you are putting that cardio first, but for the most part like lift before cardio unless it is a primary or specific goal or the training session isn't as important as like whatever you're doing before. Otherwise lift first. That's like usually my go to recommendation after like getting it in however you can get it in. 

Amber B 51:22 

Yeah, such it's such good advice. That's right. I mean, this has been amazing. So much information and and and applicable information too, but I think that's the benefit when we can take the science and we can actually make it into tangibles and applicable which you've done such a great job of. If people are wanting to connect, they’re wanting to follow you on Instagram, they want to check out your programs, where can they find you? 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 51:42 

Yeah, so one. Sorry there. If I kind of like went I I feel like I went all over with the depth in there with you guys and can give you specific answers I know people hate that, but it just it it really depends. So just think about what I actually said here today and like make sure that it, you know, it makes sense for you and your life for those things. But if you're like, OK, well, like, I want to learn more now or no more. All that stuff. I have so much information out there on this. So you can find me and mostly hang out on Instagram and YouTube Doc Lyss Fitness is my handle for both of those. You can find me doclyssfitness.com my programs are called the Lyss method and I have so much more like in depth information on like the Zones, and the Zone 2. And I like all these, all the things. So you can keep learning and and going from there. 

Amber B 52:25 

Yeah. And I will just say I think your Instagram does a really great job of of taking like just a little bit of information and really explaining it well. And so if you feel like a lot of this went over your head like go to her Instagram because she does a really good job of like, you know, you just have one post that's on this one little topic and you really answer questions really well. So definitely you're a great resource for people to be able to use. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 52:44 

I appreciate it. Thank you. 

Amber B 52:45 

Yeah. So we'll definitely link that up in the show notes. And again, thanks so much for coming on and sharing your expertise and your brilliant knowledge my audience. 

Dr. Alyssa Olenick 52:53 

Thank you for having me. 

Amber B 52:55 

I hope you enjoyed that podcast interview. Again, Science nerd here. So I ate it all up and I'm grateful for Alyssa for coming on the podcast. You can find everything that she talked about, all of her links and things at the show notes, which are bicepsafterbabies.com/326, which is just the number of this episode. And I I'm excited to kind of use what I learned from her to refine and improve my own programming and my own split. So that wraps up this episode of Biceps After Babies Radio. I'm Amber, now go out and be strong because remember my friend, you can do anything.  

Outro

Hey friend, have you heard the news? We have a Biceps After Babies Radio insider list. If you love Biceps After Babies Radio, you don't want to miss a thing head to bicepsafterbabies.com/insider to join the group. You'll be the first to know all things about the podcast. See some behind-the-scenes and get special messages from yours truly. We want to make this a special community for those who are fans of the podcast. And last, did this episode particularly resonate with you? If so, will you please share it? Either send the link to someone who would find it valuable, or take a screenshot and post it to your social media and tell your family and friends why they should listen. Make sure you tag me @bicepsafterbabies so I can hear feedback and give you a little love. And you know, if you aren't already following me on Instagram or Facebook, that's the perfect time to hit that follow button. Thank you for being here and listening to Biceps After Babies Radio.