Which Comes First, Cardio Or Weights?: Fitness Myths, Training Truths, And Other Surprising Discoveries From The Science Of Exercise (2011) - Plot & Excerpts
This book does a pretty good job of countering some misconceptions, eliminating some needless worries, and busting some myths that are still active in the fitness world. There are enough important missteps to cause me to reduce the stars to three, however. Some of the statements made seem to come from a less than thorough understanding of exercise physiology. It's as if the author took to the index of an exercise physiology book, looked up the word he needed and read the first thing he found, but failed to get all the answers and simplified the results. There are some problems with jargon and terminology, which in this realm, can be a big problem as both fitness experts and researchers often fail to define their terms. One example is that Hutchinson mixes up the muscular "burn" from vigorous and prolonged muscular exercise with DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) These are two completely different things with completely different causes. As if often true today, many of the books sections over-rely on a handful of studies seen as "proving" or providing a lot of evidence for a statement when it is still too early to say for sure, and I think the author would have done better to admit when something is still unclear rather than to look for definitive answers that aren't quite there yet. In general, though, I like the book and I think it could be a good starting point but I would advise readers to delve deeper with more in-depth sources for individual subjects the book tackles. Don't just assume it's the final word. It may not be. This book was written within the last two years and contains lots of great up to date information about fitness and health. All of the information is backed up with references to scientific studies and explains plainly and thoroughly what the results mean. It's refreshing to read a book about fitness that just gives you the facts, as best as we understand them right now instead of anecdotal stories and unverified stuff made up by the "pros".
What do You think about Which Comes First, Cardio Or Weights?: Fitness Myths, Training Truths, And Other Surprising Discoveries From The Science Of Exercise (2011)?
Clearly written, informative, quick read. Glad I picked this up from the library.
—lollittt
Interesting to read and very motivating book.
—Tammiily
