But, you said cardio is "a waste of time." Why does Villopoto, Cianciarulo, Weigand, and many others do it, if it's a waste of time? Why are the Rynopower workouts structured to have a large cardio component, if cardio is a waste of time?
I guess those guys don't know how to train?
What am I supposed to get out of those links?
The first one is about maximizing fat loss, which isn't our goal here, and it's from a website/trainer who is obviously on the strength/form/competition side of things. This doesn't make him "wrong," but what works for someone trying to get a deadlift PR or trying to lean out for a competition isn't necessarily the right thing for moto racers (or anyone else). Aside from people whose fitness activity is directly tied to leanness (body competition, etc), endurance athletes have the least body fat of nearly every type of sport, so it's pretty hard to argue that cardio isn't good at burning fat. Those tour de france guys are pretty lean, and they do mostly cardio. How, exactly, do we explain that away, when cardio is supposedly a "waste of time"?
The second link is pretty clear in its biased perspective as soon as you get to the title. "Cardio Kills". Some real objective journalism there! Of course high level training for running can be bad for your body. High level training in anything can be bad for your body. You think olympic lifting or mr olympia competitions don't have possible bad side effects?
Additionally, the studies cited are specifically for long-term marathoners and other extremely long endurance sport participants. Projecting these results into "cardio is bad" is like taking a study that shows that arsenic is bad for you and claiming that metals are unhealthy, because arsenic is a metal. Taking a small extreme group and trying to project it onto a much larger more general group is not good science.
Within the article, he picks and chooses the findings that best fit the narrative he is trying to write. He glosses right over this one:
"Not surprisingly, the marathoners in the study from Missouri State had lower resting heart rates, BMI (Body Mass Index), and triglyceride levels than the sedentary group."
Most people would say these are good things, but they don't fit his message so he doesn't bother to comment on them, and focuses only on the negative side effects the study found. Amazing really, that it has both positive and negative aspects, like basically everything in life.
Then he goes on and posts THREE people who died or had heart attacks at an early age, and presents them as examples of the dangers of cardio. That's called anecdotal evidence, which isn't scientifically valid. For one thing, you can easily find people in ANY field who had health problems regardless of their level of fitness. For another, he doesn't bother to control at least 2 of the 3 for any external factors that might be unrelated to running. For another perspective:
http://www.runnersworld.com/runners-stories/why-did-alberto-salazar-have-heart-attack
Alberto Salazar's heart attack may not be related to his running at all, as he had many other risk factors. His cardiologist says it may have happened at an earlier age or been fatal had he not been in excellent cardiovascular shape. We'll never really know, but presenting it as evidence of the danger of running is misleading at best.
Then the author really nails it down with this quote:
"And lastly, if you love running... I suggest finding a new hobby. I love eating chocolate and drinking wine, but that doesn't mean I'm consuming them 5 times a week for 3 hours at a time. In all seriousness, anything you love about running (endorphins, alone time, camaraderie, competition) can be experienced elsewhere, while potentially increasing your lifespan instead of knowingly shortening it."
This is like getting your news from Fox News or MSNBC.
If you want to get information from more than on source and form an educated opinion, try this:
http://www.outsideonline.com/fitnes...ning-Isnt-Going-to-Shorten-Your-Lifespan.html
There are also plenty of other studies, if you want to look at the breadth of the knowledge of the scientific community, and not just the studies that reinforce your point of view. For example:
http://www.escardio.org/about/press...egular-jogging-increases-life-expectancy.aspx
Furthermore, you can google for something like "health benefits of cardio" or "health benefits of running" and get plenty of peer-reviewed studies showing the benefits of these types of exercise.
http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/107/1/e2.full
Try searching here:
http://scholar.google.com/
Finally, as somebody who body lifts weights and "cardios," you claim of "cardio is easy" is laughable. Go knock out a fast 10k, half marathon, marathon, mile swim, or a century on a road bike before you are so eager to label other people's exercise as easy. Cardio can be easy, if it consists of sitting on a bike or elliptical for 15 minutes at low resistance, just like weight lifting can be easy if you do it with poor form, incomplete movement, and/or light weight. Done properly, both are similarly difficult, yet in different ways.
I want to point out that I managed to make an entire post in support of one type of exercise without needing to slam another type. It seems like people, such as the trainer you linked to, can't promote their own school of thought without slamming another. It's no better than the guys who promote their brand of motorcycle while running their mouth about how the other brands suck. Prove your point with information, not insults. You can benefit from cardio AND lifting.
(This type of BS is why I don't post here much anymore)
