Wayne Westcott, PhD: A Lifetime of Fitness

Finding time for fitness -- no matter who you are!

Fitness is for everyone, regardless of age. We talked about making time for fitness, workouts for arthritis sufferers, strength training for seniors with Wayne L. Westcott, PhD, fitness research director at the South Shore YMCA in Quincy, Mass. on Oct. 14, 2003.

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The opinions expressed herein are the guest's alone and have not been reviewed by a WebMD physician. If you have questions about your health, you should consult your personal physician. This event is meant for informational purposes only.

Moderator: Welcome! Our guest today is Wayne Westcott, PhD, fitness research director at the South Shore YMCA in Quincy, Mass. He will answer your questions about exercise habits and techniques.

Member question: I work for eight hours; I also have to spend two more hours driving to and from work. How can I possibly find time to exercise?

Westcott: That is perhaps the most practical question and prevalent question in our busy society. We have just completed two research studies called Brief Strength Training Sessions, one for beginners, one for more advanced. We found that for the beginners, doing just one set of four exercises to include all of the major muscle groups produced really outstanding benefits in just eight weeks.

For example, these beginners who did about five minutes of actual strength training, coupled with just 15 minutes of aerobic activity, such as stationery cycling, improved their body composition significantly, adding 2.5 pounds of muscle and concurrently losing 2.8 pounds of fat. That was almost a 6-pound change in their body composition. They also improved their physical performance test results by more than 100% in both upper body pulling strength and upper body pushing strength. Twenty minutes a day for a combination of strength and endurance exercise is sufficient when done three days a week to make major improvements in both health and fitness parameters.

Our advanced study with experienced exercisers was also eight weeks twice a week, but included eight exercises for the major muscle groups. The strength workout required about 30 minutes total with two sets of each exercise, one with a relatively light-weight load, the second with a relatively heavy-weight load. The results were 2.7 pounds more muscle, 2.5 pounds less fat, and almost 100% improvement in our upper body test measures, chin-ups and bar dips, and a roughly 40% increase in leg press strength.

Considering the total exercise time for this brief but very beneficial strength training program was only one hour a week, I believe that even busy people can fit this type of activity into their schedules. For strength and muscle improvement, brief training sessions are highly effective. For endurance exercise, 15 to 30 minutes can be highly productive, especially if you use an interval training approach, which means a couple minutes at a relatively low effort followed by a couple minutes at a relatively high effort, alternated throughout the training session.

Just be sure to do a few minutes of warm-up and cool-down activity each exercise session.

Moderator: Can you really address all the major muscle groups in just five minutes of strength training? Can it be done with just a set of dumbbells at home?

Westcott: In the research study, we did chin-ups for the upper body pulling muscles, bar dips for the upper body pushing muscles, knee-ups for the midsection muscles, and weighted squats for the leg muscles. Most people could do chin-ups, bar dips, and knee-ups at home and could certainly do dumbbell squats rather than the machine version.

However, if limited to dumbbells, you may substitute bent-over rows for chin-ups, chest presses for bar dips, and trunk curls for knee-ups. In fact, in a previous study, we had similar results doing chest presses, rows, and leg presses, which would be similar to squats. Although not ideal, four basic dumbbells can effectively condition most of the major muscle groups.

When you start to plateau, it may be necessary to change the exercises or add a couple more exercises, but the beauty of strength exercise is time efficiency and equipment versatility.

Member question: Where can I found some sample exercise routines for the major muscle groups (I have access to the equipment at a gym)?

Westcott: There are several excellent strength training books that provide clear illustrations and concise explanations of the major muscle group exercises performed with weight stack machines or free weights. My books on this topic include "Building Strength and

Stamina," "Strength Training Past 50," and "Strength and Power for Young Athletes." These three books provide the appropriate exercises and recommended resistance for adult men and women, senior men and women, and boys and girls respectively.

Member question: What is the best exercise for an overweight woman of 54 who has some breathing issues when she goes up stairs? What are the best exercises to start with?

Westcott: First, be certain to have your physician's approval to do strength exercise. Lifting your body weight upwards for several yards is definitely a muscular strength exercise, and strength development will make this task much easier. The appropriate exercises include leg extensions for the front thigh, leg curls for the rear thigh, leg presses that work both the front and rear thigh and hip muscles concurrently, or any type of weighted squat, such as using dumbbells.

I also believe that strong low back muscles and strong abdominal muscles are useful in climbing stairs with proper posture and body position. I therefore recommend the low back machine and abdominal machine for strengthening these key muscle groups.

In addition to the strength development, some aerobic exercise should help with cardiovascular conditioning and reduce the heavy breathing that you presently experience. Walking, stationary cycling or other aerobic activities should be appropriate.

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