New Year, New You: Smart Exercise for Lasting Results

Happy New Year! I won’t sugar coat it: getting in shape can be hard, but by using smart exercise tricks and techniques (science-backed) you can achieve lasting results with less effort. Only 46.9% of adults get enough aerobic physical activity, and less than 25% meet the minimum for aerobic and muscle-strengthening activity, according to the CDC.

The World Health Organization says that “Regular physical activity is proven to help prevent and manage noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) such as heart disease, hypertension, stroke, diabetes and several cancers. It also helps to maintain a healthy body weight and can improve mental health, quality of life and well-being.”

Engaging in regular physical activity is not just about preventing disease; it also enhances overall vitality and longevity. As we age, maintaining an active lifestyle becomes increasingly important for preserving mobility and independence. By incorporating various forms of exercise—such as strength training, cardiovascular workouts, and even flexibility exercises—we can bolster our physical health while also reaping the mental and emotional benefits associated with an active lifestyle.

Why I Needed To Write This Article

Growing up, I was active, spending hours skateboarding daily, yet I still struggled with my weight and was a bit of a chubby kid. Despite my high-energy lifestyle, it wasn’t until my mid-twenties, when I started focusing on calorie restriction, that I finally lost a significant amount of weight. However, this journey came with its own challenges—I ended up losing muscle in the process, shifting from a chubby kid to a very skinny (underweight) young adult.

I’ve finally started to put on more muscle, but only after years of trial and error. In the last 2 years, I’ve made more progress than ever before because I finally did the research instead of just listening to the hype. Hopefully, you’ll also get benefits from what I’ve learnt so let’s get into it!

Work Hard, But Not Too Hard

New Year’s resolutions are apex of our desire to get healthy and in shape, but nobody wants to spend more energy or time exercising than they need to. We all want to just do the bare minimum, or even less if possible, while still reaping as many health rewards as we can.

Exercise is as important for your health as your diet is. But if you’re like me then exercise seems like something that is hard to make time for every day, or week, or even for longer periods—like during the holidays.

New Year’s resolutions seem to happen predominantly because we simply let ourselves go during the holidays. So what’s the fastest, and lowest effort, that we can get away with doing, while still making actual progress towards our fitness goals?

My goal was to uncover what clinical trials and medical studies reveal about minimizing effort while maximizing results. Given the vast amounts of money invested in exercise and sports based clinical studies each year, it makes sense to utilize the valuable data that’s just sitting there gathering digital dust.

Understanding Effort vs. Results: Why It Matters

When embarking on a fitness journey, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that more effort always equals better results. Many of us have been conditioned to believe that pushing ourselves to the limit is the only path to success—the whole “no pain, no gain” mantra that we’ve been taught all out lives. However, understanding the relationship between effort and results is critical for achieving sustainable progress without burning out or wasting time without added benefits, or even risking detrimental outcomes.

Maximizing results isn’t about constantly increasing the amount of weight lifted or the number of hours spent in the gym. Instead, it’s about consistently working smart—focusing on the quality of your workouts and the effectiveness of your training methods. By recording and recognizing the optimal balance of intensity, frequency, and volume to fit your unique desires and goals, to not only lead to better outcomes but also to help you to maintain motivation, enjoyment, and direction in your fitness journey.

Everyone’s The Expert

There are so many exercise questions that everyone seems to be an expert on, but nobody actually knows the truth about. I am not a fitness expert. But I’ve done my own research and that’s what I want to share with you today.

Seemingly simple questions about exercise often lead to confusion: How do I get started? What’s the least amount of effort required to see results? Which exercises are truly effective? How frequently should I work out? These are the kinds of questions that should have straightforward answers, yet they often become murky and confusing.

Big Business & Money

Health and fitness is big business and money often wins out over facts. For example this study from Brazil concluded that “prominent Brazilian IG (Instagram) influencers disseminate low-quality information about exercise and health, contributing to the wide-spreading of misinformation to millions of followers.” Similarly, this study from Australia concludes that “nutrition-related information published by influential Australian Instagram accounts is often inaccurate and of suboptimal quality.” 

With so much noise, endless hype, and marketing out there I decided to do my own research to cut through some of the confusion and lies.

From everything I’ve read and heard, it appears that the primary barrier to starting and maintaining a consistent exercise routine is a lack of knowledge. Common concerns include: What exercises should I choose? For how long should I work out? How often should I train? And, most importantly, is my effort yielding any real results?

So the most important factor in a study on exercise would seem to be accurate tracking so that methods can be replicated, tested, and put to use.

One Rep Max

Before we dive deeper, it’s essential to understand a key concept that nearly every scientific study on resistance training addresses: the One Repetition Maximum, commonly referred to as 1RM. So, what exactly is 1RM?

1RM is the maximum amount of weight that you can lift only once, it’s just too darn heavy to lift up a second time. This probably is obvious to you but when I first saw 1RM it confused me and only later did I understand that was all there was to it: what is the most amount of weight that you can do a single repetition with? That number is your 1RM.

Most studies utilize a percentage of the 1RM to determine the optimal exercise dosage for achieving the best results. This approach allows anyone, including those working out at home, to apply the same sets, repetitions, and percentages of their own 1RM. By doing so, you can effectively improve strength, hypertrophy (muscle size), weight loss, bone density, and other health benefits, often yielding results comparable to those seen in the study participants.

1RM Calculator

I’ve created a 1RM Calculator that estimates your 1RM based on factors such as weight, age, height, and fitness level, or alternatively based on a workout routine (weight lifted and repetitions performed) that estimates your 1RM.

Keep in mind that these estimates are based on formulas, used in clinical trials, and I highly recommend consulting a health and fitness professional before embarking on any new exercise routines or diets.

I suggest doing a workout session with weights you are comfortable with and doing as many reps as you can until you can’t do anymore reps (call lifting to failure). Type in the amount of weight you lifted and how many reps you did until failure (until you couldn’t lift it again) and with those and your weight and height you can get a close approximation to your 1RM value.

Disclaimer: all this information is not medical advice. Seek guidance from a professional before attempting anything mentioned on this page.

🏃‍♀️Weight Loss

One of the best way to lose weight is still a combination of diet and exercise. A Whole Food Plant-Based diet without added oil can lead to weight loss faster than you might think is possible! It’s even shown to be “safe, simple, sustainable solution to the obesity epidemic,” other studies say “whole food, plant-based diet achieves greater weight loss compared with other dietary interventions that do not restrict calories or mandate exercise,” and even called it “…the most effective diet for weight loss…”

Just limit nuts and seeds to the daily recommened intakes until you get your weight under control.

Do I Need To Diet And Exercise To Lose Weight?

There have been findings that diet and exercise had a “synergistic” effect when done together, and studies state things like “the greatest change arising from combined [exercise and diet],” or “…weight loss is increased when diet and physical activity are combined.”

Walking is a low-impact exercise that most people can do, at any age, that isn’t too hard on the body and Harvard Health researchers looked at obesity-causing genes and found that “the effects of those genes were cut in half” by daily walking.

When To Walk For Weight Loss

A randomized controlled trial concluded that “waiting for 30 min following eating might be optimal in modifying the glycaemic response,” and case studies have reported that waiting 30, but not 60 minutes or more, after eating had better results on weight loss. Most of this they think is because “glucose increases to its maximum at 30–60 minutes after a meal, walking must be started before the glucose level reaches a maximum, because once insulin is secreted it will play a role as an obesity hormone.“

The below (older) clinical trial from 2002 titled “Dose-response effect of walking exercise on weight loss. How much is enough?,” looked at if 60 or 30 minutes of brisk walking (plus diet restriction) was significantly better for weight loss. They found that 30 minutes of brisk walking 5 days per week, with a low-fat and reduced-calorie diet “may be as beneficial as 60 min.”

It’s important to note that exercise alone, without dietary changes, is unlikely to yield significant results in weight loss. Research indicates that “substantial weight loss is unlikely to occur from a [physical activity] program unless the overall volume of [exercise training] is well above the minimum recommended levels.”

What levels? Most suggest 150 minutes per week, or 30 minutes per day 5 days per week (like above). As a reminder the Universal Health Guide and sources like Nutrition Facts recommend 200-450 minutes per week. The 2002 study also found that participants who exercised for 18 months, without making dietary changes, lost an average of:

• 200 minutes per week: 13.1 kg (28 lbs)
• 150-199 minutes per week: 8.5 kg (18 lbs)
• Less than 150 minutes per week: 3.5 kg (7 lbs)

These clinical subjects were burning around “700 kcals,” per day, just from exercising which is about 1/3rd of what an average 150 lbs (or 70 KG) person eats in a day! That’s about 40 minutes a day of high intensity exercise to lose only 28 lbs in a year and a half. The CDC says that a slow “gradual, steady pace [of] about 1 to 2 pounds a week” is safest and sustainable, but at 28 lbs over 1.5 years that’s only about 0.36 lbs per week.

Too Much Of A Good Thing?

This graph uses weekly MET hours, which make things a bit confusing, but 7.5 is roughly 30 minutes of brisk walking 5 days per week. The graph shows that there isn’t much added benefit after 60 minutes and that at around 5 hours diminishing effects start to take place causing actual harm.

So the main takeaway is don’t just restrict calories, and don’t just exercise: do both for the best results. Synergize your weight loss and don’t over do it.

🏋️‍♀️Strength Training

According to an article from Harvard Health titled “Evidence mounts on the benefits of strength training,” said that individuals who performed strength training “had a 10% to 20% lower risk of dying […] from all causes.”

In this review study from 2021 titled “No Time to Lift? Designing Time-Efficient Training Programs for Strength and Hypertrophy,” offers several time-saving strategies. These include warming up with lighter loads instead of stretching, using supersets and drop sets, focusing on bilateral multi-joint exercises, and concentrating on just three key movements: pushing, pulling, and leg pressing. See below for more of the recommendations from that study.

What About Stretching?

Harvard Health says that stretching keeps the “muscles flexible and healthy, and we need that flexibility to maintain a range of motion in the joints. Without it, the muscles shorten and become tight.”

A cohort study from 2023 concluded that “flexibility activities are associated with lower risk of mortality” and another 2020 study said that “adjusting for engagement in all exercise types and confounders, stretching and playing volleyball were uniquely associated with lower risks of mortality.”

This meta study concluded that strength training “and stretching were not different in their effects on [Range of Motion],” so it’s possible that you can get similar benefits from simply doing daily strength training.

(If you want more on stretching, including science-backed suggestions, then send me a message on Substack letting me know and if there’s demand then I’ll create a similar article for stretching or update this section.)

Training Volume (or what if I miss a day?)

One of the most important takeaways from the “No Time To Lift?“ study was that “weekly training volume is more important than training frequency,” which is another way of saying that if you miss a day or two then that’s fine, as long as you make up for it by the end of the week.

Other studies, which we’ll soon review, found that even fewer sets—specifically 2 to 3 sets per week—are just as beneficial for improving strength, muscle mass, and bone density. The latter is crucial for health as we age.

What Is Too Much?

This study said that the federal government guidelines “noted that the upper threshold of benefit for aerobic activity and potential harms associated with very high levels of activity were undefined.”

This article from Harvard Health also said that “the benefits plateaued after one hour, and decreased after two hours,” suggesting that strength training exercises should not exceed 2 hours, and additional benefits are unlikely if you continue to exercise for more than an hour straight.

The following table is from a meta-study on the easiest and quickest way to gain strength from resistance training (weight lifting, bands, calisthenics, machines, etc.) it’s actually titled “The Minimum Effective Training Dose Required to Increase 1RM Strength in Resistance-Trained Men: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis“

Push-ups & Calisthenics vs Weights & Machines

According to another article on Harvard Health “With a regular push-up, you lift about 50% to 75% of your body weight. (The actual percentage varies depending on the person’s body shape and weight.) Modifications like knee and inclined push-ups use about 36% to 45% of your body weight.” So knowing your weight you can try to roughly calculate the weight of doing different push-ups, if you don’t have weights, by simply multiplying your weight by 0.5, 0.75, 0.36, 0.45 to get a rough close guess.

But do calisthenics really work? Is equipment necessary for effective strength training? A RCT study found that progressive calisthenic push-ups showed “no significant differences” in improving upper body strength compared to the bench press. Another study, aptly titled “Bench Press and Push-up at Comparable Levels of Muscle Activity Results in Similar Strength Gains,” reached the same conclusion.

This research also indicated that push-ups and bench presses are “comparably effective for muscle hypertrophy and strength gain.”

But what exactly is hypertrophy?

💪Hypertrophy (Muscle Growth)

Hypertrophy is a fancy way of saying muscle growth or gains. It refers to the increase in the size of muscle fibers, which is a primary goal for bodybuilders and those looking to enhance their physique. When muscles are subjected to resistance training, such as weightlifting or calisthenics, they experience small tears. The body repairs these tears, resulting in larger and stronger muscle fibers.

Hypertrophy & Fat Loss At The Same Time

Many influencers and experts say that it’s not possible to gain muscle while losing fat. This very old clinical study (from 1993) concluded that “weight training can produce hypertrophy in skeletal muscle during severe energy restriction and large-scale weight loss.” So the myth that you can’t lose weight and build muscle at the same time seems to fall flat. Skeletal muscle is also very important as we age.

The below meta-analysis titled “Dose-Response Relationships of Resistance Training in Healthy Old Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” outlines the minimal requirements for muscle growth, even in adults older than 64. This challenges another common belief that gaining muscle mass at 65 and older is extremely difficult, or even impossible.

In essence, hypertrophy is crucial for those seeking to increase muscle size and strength. And this is possible even for older adults who think muscle loss is as unavoidable as bone loss.

🦴Bone Strength & Density

Yale Medicine says that “low bone density is a widespread problem” especially as we age, and that “low bone density can lead to serious medical conditions.” Such as bone fractures and even osteoporosis which can increase chances of extremely serious injuries like hip fractures, “the most serious of all osteoporotic fractures” that can cause a “loss of mobility and independence and even death.”

Harvard Health says that “strength training can play a role in slowing bone loss, and can even build bone,” and that strength training is “tremendously useful to help offset age-related declines in bone mass.”

Below is data from a meta-study that looked at resistance training for increasing bone mass, strength, and density.

As you can see, the recommended training doses for strength, hypertrophy, and bone density are all quite similar. Despite this overlap, it can still be overwhelming to process all this information. You might be wondering: where do I actually start?

To make it easier, I suggest the following approach to effectively target multiple goals, without too much effort, to see improvements in all areas.

ℹ️My Daily Recommendations

Based on everything this is what I recommend to get the most from all (strength, hypertrophy, bone density, and weight loss) without too much additional effort.

Resistance Training

My Compound Full-Body Exercise: All-in-One Top-to-Bottom

This is the exercise I do for a limited exercise time (about 20 minutes 2-3x per week), to work for all major muscle groups, and incorporate many of the above mentioned techniques in a single connected exercise that is moderately low impact and only requires dumbbells (or anything similar like soup cans or even milk jugs filled with water or sand).

updated: Jan 09, 2025 to fix errors and be more connected as a single combo.

1. Start with the dumbbells on the floor and start in what we will call a neutral position (a standing still farmer’s carry).
2. Squat down, pick up the dumbbells, and return to standing with the dumbbells at your side (in a neutral position). Hold for 2.5 seconds . It should take about 3 seconds to stand back up from the squat.
3. Now do a slow and controlled hammer curl over 3 seconds and hold it for 2.5 seconds.
4. At the top change the hammer curl into an Arnold Press, extend for 3 seconds and then hold it at the top for 2.5 seconds, and relax down over 3 seconds. (Optional, also at the top, add a double tricep extension at the very top.)
5. Relax the hammer curl down over 3 seconds (back to the neutral farmer’s carry position). Hold the neutral position for 2.5 seconds.
6. Lean forward slightly and do a shoulder shrug. Hold it for 6 seconds and then relax for 2.5.
7. Now do a lateral raise (I hold it for 6 seconds) and again return to the neutral position for 2.5 seconds.
8. No bend at the midsection and knees to do a bent over row over 3 seconds up and 3 seconds down, and then go directly back into the squat and return the dumbells to floor.
9. Stand up (empty-handed) and relax for 2.5 seconds.
10. Do the same routine 8 more times and then take a 2-minute break and start the second set. I do 3 sets per day but feel free to do less, especially to start.

Tips:

• It’s better to build up slower to be controlled and with good form to avoid injury.
  Start with a lighter load like 50% 1RM or even lower.
• I usually only hold for a count of “2-one-thousands and”, since it’s close to 2.5 seconds but easier to count.
  

Walking & Weight-loss

I suggest a WFPB SOS-Free diet for the fastest and safest weight loss with 40-60 minutes of walking at least 5 days per week.

Remember, every step (or lift) you take toward your goals counts, and with patience and perseverance, you can unlock your true potential and your most healthy self.

With walking I’ve been trying a new thing where I walk for 40 minutes during the weekdays, then I walk 60 minutes on the weekends which gives me a total of 320 minutes/week and is so far very manageable for me and about 40-50,000 steps / week. Let me know if you try it!

I’ve left out a lot of things in this article so let me know if you’d like me to create a follow-up with any of the following: best stretching routine, best routines for mobility or age issues, best core exercises, best passive exercises, non-exercise exercising, exercise/diet timing, how to track progress, and lots more. Exercise is a huge topic. Let me know on Substack (or other social media—see below) if you want me to do a follow-up or specific article.

Overall, from this article, it seems like exercising for longer than an hour has minimal benefits with dangers beginning at 2 hours, depending on the exercise and intensity. It would also seem that doing more than 3 sessions per week, 3 sets per day, or 12 reps per set, all have minimal advantages, and that weight should be greater than 50% 1RM. Rest times of 2 minutes seem to have the best results, as well as slower and controlled movements spanning about 2.5 seconds, and holding the weight for around 6 seconds seems to have the best response.

By focusing on smart, efficient, science-based training and maintaining a healthy diet, you can achieve sustainable, long-lasting progress without overwhelming yourself with too much too soon—or, possibly just as detrimental, not doing enough for too long.

This article is different than the usual article, so if you enjoyed this please like, share, comment, and subscribe! If you want more then please let me know on any social media channel you like.

If I’ve made any mistakes, or something doesn’t make sense, or if you want more/less details, please let me know in the comments.

Stay healthy and nourished! Happy cooking & exercising!

Chef Robert Leigh.

New Year, New You: Smart Exercise for Lasting Results