Women vs Men Training and Best Way to Reduce Injuries

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Women can get the same benefits from 2 and a half hours of moderate to vigorous exercise as it would take men 5 hours to get.

That’s according to a recent study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC)

One way to look at this information is that women only need to work half as long as men to get the same benefits.

A better way to look at it is that women can maximise each minute better to get more out of exercise and that you don’t need to train all day and night to get benefits from fitness.

And to break that time down even further, the 2 and a half hours can be accomplished any way you can fit into your schedule.

That could be by breaking it down into 2 x 1-hour-long workout sessions and a 30-minute brisk walk, or by having 5 x 30-minute sessions each week. Even 5-6 x 20-25-minute sessions a week, for those struggling with time, will help you get all the benefits from fitness.

The same study showed that men need up to 3 resistance training sessions compared to 1 for females to get similar benefits.

So, one good resistance training session could complement walking, running, cardio, dance lessons, or whatever other activity that involves body movement throughout the week, which would help tremendously.

Of course, if you are training more than 2 and a half hours a week already, this is not an excuse to pull back on your training but more of a way to have realistic goals for those of you trying to get back into training.

ANY GIVEN RUNDAY PODCAST

For our 200th episode of the Any Given Runday Podcast, the lads bring on one of the best running coaches in the country, Emmett Dunleavy (@emmettdunleavy on Instagram)

Emmett Dunleavy is the owner/running coach at Perfect Pacing as well as a distance coach at @ucdathletics , Senior Club Coach with @kilcooleathleticclub , Run Coach with @belparktri , Coach Educator with @athleticsirelandofficial and Part of Irish Team Management for Senior International Championships.

With that resume, needless to say, Emmett has A LOT of coaching experience, and he brings it all to this week’s episode with tips on how to build your own race season, intervals, altitude training, working with Olympian David Gillick, thoughts on how slow is too slow/junk miles and much more.

To see more about Emmett’s coaching plans, go to his website:
PerfectPacing.com

You can listen to this week’s episode on Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5qgUDYTPwDMgAgRip4spxV?si=fUjruAAwRyCHXwrt_QPyyQ

Apple Podcasts:
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/emmett-dunleavy-on-running-in-kenya-lactate-testing/id1493778874?i=1000647886698

or wherever you get your podcasts from

#AnyGivenRunday

You can also follow our podcast page on Instagram: @AnyGivenRundayPodcast

The most ‘simple’ way to reduce injury

Sometimes, the answer is to bury your head into the pillow…

What’s one of the best ways to decrease the risk of injury?

Stretching?

Yoga?

Saunas/Steam rooms?

Ice baths?

More stretching?

Good form in the gym?

One of these has been shown to decrease your risk of injury by over 200%… and that’s by burying your head in the pillow and sleeping!

Now, all of the others do have their place. But if you’re getting only 4-5 hours of sleep per night, all of these other approaches are like sticking a plaster onto a severed leg.

Sometimes, the most simple solution is the best solution.

But the most simple solution doesn’t mean the easiest. Reduce overall stress by finding a routine to get 7-9 hours of sleep a night.

Catching up on sleep seems to be a bit of a catch-22, no pun intended.

There’s a good article on getting a sleep routine, naps and oversleeping here