What Is Training Economy

Training economy is one of the most important factors when it comes to designing programmes for health and wellness. It is one of the least discusses factors because it is what makes making progress in your training so hard, you just don’t have enough time. Training economy is a fancy way of saying how much time you have to train and exercise. What is your time commitment to training per week? This is your training economy. It can range from 30 minutes to 10 hours and it is an absolutely crucial part of programme design.

We Do Not Live In Time Rich World

Unfortunately, especially coming from a perspective of someone who coaches people, training economy is far too small most of the time. Most of the time it is from 1-2 hours per week that can be allocated to training. When dealing with a situation where you are very time poor and do not have time to invest in your health, you need to make excellent decisions around your training protocols. Instead of dwelling on the fact that people are not willing to invest enough time in their health and wellness, we need to be pragmatic about it and make decisions around it.

The Challenge

When someone has two hours a week to train, we need to make some serious training decisions about how we are going to allocate this time. How is this person going to make progress in this amount of time in a way that they find enjoyable and sustainable but also allows them to progress towards physical health? Which exercises are we going to use to get the most out of this time? Are we going to try and improve their cardiovascular capabilities? We are in a very time poor world where these sorts of decisions can be the difference between the two hours having a huge impact and having little to no impact. Most people, again unfortunately, squander their training economy and use it on ineffective training plans.

Defining Physical Health

VO2 Max + Muscular Strength + Movement Capacity = Physical Health

Before we can discuss how to make good training decisions for health we must have an agreed upon aim, something to target our physical training towards. I have written an extensive article about my definition of physical health and how it relates to physical training. For the purposes of this article I will just give a brief description.

Physical health is built upon three pillars of training

1)VO2 Max - Cardiovascular Health (prevention of cardiovascular disease)

2)Strength - Muscular Skeletal Health (prevention of sarcopenia and age related muscle loss)

3)Movement Capacity - Mobility and Movement Virtuosity (the ability to perform a wide variety of movements with excellence)

Making Training Decisions

Now we have defined the aim of physical training, we need to make decisions around how we are going to best use our time. In this example I will outline what a well designed training plan looks like for someone who has two hours to exercise in the week.

Resistance Training

The first priority is strength and building muscle mass through resistance training. This means heavy squats, deadlifts, pushing, pulling and all the fun exercises we perform in gyms. A well designed resistance training programme will involve performing a variety of movement patterns depending on the individuals abilities and goals. In order to provide enough stress in terms of the volume required, resistance training will take up 90 minutes of the training week.

High Intensity Interval Training

Next is the importance of high intensity interval training, in a time poor environment this has to be the go to form of cardiovascular training for those who are capable of performing it. This can easily be done in a 30 minute block of training, at the end of a strength training block.

Low Intensity Steady State

I realise I have already used up the two hours available but I cant help adding a bonus, building a cardiovascular base through performing 30-60 minutes of low intensity cardiovascular training.

Poor Training Decisions

Pilates

I don’t know how training the core for an hour at a time became popular, but this has to be the most stylish time sink available when it comes to physical training. Most likely because it is performed by models that are on an extreme calorie deficit’s that people are trying to emulate. Two hours of movement a week can just about provide the amount of volume required to progress your strength and cardiovascular system. If you waste an hour of that training economy on pilates you are wasting your time, if your goal is truly to be physically healthy.

Yoga

Yoga is an amazing relaxation practice, a relaxation practice that can help with building movement capacity, but only to a certain extent. However, it really cannot replace training your cardiovascular system and your strength. People die because they have no lung capacity in reserve, and because they no longer have the strength to pick up a glass of water and I just don’t think you can make the argument that yoga helps mitigate these issues. A practice of yoga is hugely beneficial, but when dealing with a low time budget you really need to consider if it is going to impact your physical health enough.

Arms + Calves

Training your arms and calves when you have two hours of training in your week should be a crime. Just don’t bother training if your going to give a 15 minute block to your arms. Do pull ups and rows, squats and deadlifts instead. If you have the economy (time) then go for it, but this should not be on your list of prioritise.

Complex Skill Acquisition

Learning complex skills like weightlifting movements is another huge time sink when working on a low time budget. These are amazing for the brain and it is enjoyable to learn new skills. However they do not move us towards our goal of physical health in a time effective manner.

Caveats

Movement is always better than no movement. If it is between doing these activities and not moving your body then it is always a better idea to move. But performing these styles of sessions on a low training economy is, in my opinion, a poor use of your time budget. They might have some wide ranging benefits but that doesn’t move you towards your goal of physical health.

These are all amazing practices, but only once you have performed the behaviours that are going to have a profound impact on your physical health, being resistance and cardiovascular training. To make an analogy to nutrition, resistance training and cardiovascular training are your main meal of the day, with plenty of protein, vegetables and carbohydrates made into a delicious meal that sustains you. Pilates is the green juice you drink once a week that makes you feel like really healthy.