NYT on weight training

http://tinyurl.com/38nsqf

This article is written as though there is no research on the subject.
A lot of anecdotal reports and little substance. Maybe they should
consult MFW before writing stories on weight training and athletic
performance?

--
Is this thing on?

On Thu, 28 Feb 2008, Joe Humble wrote:

> http://tinyurl.com/38nsqf
>
> This article is written as though there is no research on the subject. A
> lot of anecdotal reports and little substance.

They do mention that there's research, but write it off as using small
study groups and having too much variation in the kind of people
recruited, both of which are very much fair criticisms, although not
strong enough to justify ignoring the data.

Mostly, the article is just stating the bleeding obvious. But hey, it's a
newspaper.

> Maybe they should consult MFW before writing stories on weight training
> and athletic performance?

Yeah, maybe if they're writing for the NRA magazine.

tom

--
intelligence, purity, the potential freedom of space, and the potential
aesthetics of mathematical computations

Tom Anderson <twic@urchin.earth.li> writes:

> On Thu, 28 Feb 2008, Joe Humble wrote:
>
>> http://tinyurl.com/38nsqf
>>
>> This article is written as though there is no research on the
>> subject. A lot of anecdotal reports and little substance.
>
> They do mention that there's research, but write it off as using small
> study groups and having too much variation in the kind of people
> recruited, both of which are very much fair criticisms, although not
> strong enough to justify ignoring the data.
>
> Mostly, the article is just stating the bleeding obvious. But hey,
> it's a newspaper.
>
>> Maybe they should consult MFW before writing stories on weight
>> training and athletic performance?
>
> Yeah, maybe if they're writing for the NRA magazine.

This is the New York Times, not some cheap paper that just makes stuff
up. Oh, wait...

--
Jim Janney

On Feb 28, 10:44 am, Joe Humble <jhum...@rr.com> wrote:
> http://tinyurl.com/38nsqf
>
> This article is written as though there is no research on the subject.
> A lot of anecdotal reports and little substance. Maybe they should
> consult MFW before writing stories on weight training and athletic
> performance?
>
> --
> Is this thing on?


Well, note that they were relating weight training to endurance sports
-- that's the "athletic performance" they had in mind: whether weight-
lifting helps with endurance sport performance. (And the kind of
lifting they studied seemed mostly machine exercises, too!)

I'm curious why there's this constant "bias" towards the endurance
sports. Now I believe cardiovascular power to be the prime foundation
for good health in general, but it seems that the mainstream press
only ever talk about fitness in relation to aerobic activities. Is
resistance-strength in itself not an indicator of anything worthwhile,
like how endurance-strength is, on its own??

On Feb 29, 11:59 am, Jim Janney <jjan...@xmission.xmission.com> wrote:
>
>
> This is the New York Times, not some cheap paper that just makes stuff
> up. Oh, wait...
>
> --
> Jim Janney


It's good to see the old Gray Lady get egg on her face, but their
Health & Fitness section has a lot of unusual findings. I mean, how
come none of the health magazines talked about this? Not Runner's
World, and not any muscle mag -- not even Milo. These aren't very new
studies, after all.

I would have thought that by the time I read something about fitness
in the NYT, it's already old news. But I have not seen comparable
articles in the health magazines I follow.

Right off the top of my head I can recall some memorable ones:

Yoga Guy -- about the one-man pussy patrol that's found in every yoga
class.

Calorie Counts -- how wildly unreliable cardio machine readings
*necessarily* are.

Working Through Injuries -- contrary to the old adage about rest,
newer findings suggest that working through certain injuries is
actually a better course of action.

Runners' Circles -- the article made me think of usenet hobby
newsgroups!

Genetic Disposition for Certain Sports -- based on one's physical
genotype.


How come the health and fitness magazines don't discuss such things?
How many issues of recycled workout tips can you do before people stop
renewing their subscriptions??