I was listening to Mark Sisson’s Primal Blueprint Connection and they discuss how amateur gym-goers like me need to be careful not to fall into the trap of doing too much chronic cardio and mistakingly thinking that it is a healthy activity. He explains that “elite endurance athletes manage themselves very carefully: they don’t rush from workout to commute to desk job”. Instead they flow through their workouts at a relaxed pace, the warm up and cool down, they have a smooth transition from their workouts, they do lots of rehab and therapies to keep them stress balance, including massage, foam rolling, stretching, yoga, core strengthening, etc. They also sleep much more than amateur athletes. I think that’s probably true. When I did gymnastics when I was young, we’d be in the gym for 4 hours at a time but we did tons of stretching, conditioning, took breaks etc. I was no elite athlete, but we were coached to pay a lot of attention to the state and maintenance of our body. Hmmm…I should probably increase my stretching time along with a few other therapies!
Chronic Cardio and Sleeping like a Pro athlete
