The Essence of Exercise

- Ken Hutchins, founder of SuperSlow
- Delivered at the 1999 SuperSlow Exercise Guild Convention

Why are you here? Why are we here? Many of you have come thousands of miles at a cost of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of dollars to hear me and a few other relatively uncelebrated people speak over the next couple days. Well, there are many reasons, but I would like to draw out what I believe is important—the big reason.

First and foremost you are here to learn more about exercise. You, like me, strongly believe that it has great benefits. And, of course, you want to be able to better serve your clients. I do not believe that you would have bothered if you did not sincerely seek this information. And I do believe that if this information is beneficial to you, personally, and to your clients, your businesses will improve.

Some of what I am going to say constitutes "preaching to the choir." And there are those of you who are new to this and don't know me very well and have never read the SuperSlow Technical Manual. Some of what I am about to say is entirely new, even to me. So this leaves me with a dilemma as to where exactly to begin.

I believe the best way to get into this information is to first plead with you, the audience, for your patience and intellect. I am going to fire a few passionate salvos; but also I am going send you off into the inner reaches of your intellect to ruminate on some things that might not even have answers. Nevertheless, what I sincerely desire, for the next little while is your mind.

A good way to begin is with a definition for exercise. Don't you think that it would be appropriate that other exercise-related organizations start their proceedings with a definition of what they consider exercise?

Much of the confusion, as I have belabored before, starts with Webster. The dictionaries contain many possible uses for the word. Exercise might refer to military operations, either real or in preparation for war. I have heard the term used to refer to a military parade or funeral. It is often used to describe passages practiced on a musical instrument and problems practiced in math. Obvious is that it is used to describe exertional activity performed to enhance the human body or for that of some animal. Exercise is applied to the putting to action of almost anything, particularly the carrying out of a legal contract. It is also applied to the rituals of decorum in awards, graduations, etc. Hence, the word is popularly overused.

By those trying to refine its use to organized and methodical physical exertion, we have that definition of the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) in conjunction with the Centers for Disease Control(CDC), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH):

Physical Activity is defined as any bodily movement produced by skeletal muscles that result in energy expenditure. Energy expenditure can be measured in kcal.

Exercise is a subset of physical activity that is planned, structured, and repetitive, and has as a final or an intermediate objective the improvement or maintenance of physical fitness.

Physical Fitness is a set of attributes that are either health- or skill-related. The degree to which people have those attributes can be measured with specific tests.

Note that first statement is acceptable. The second statement then loses its bounds by the use of the term, "physical fitness," because this is a general term that takes on an almost personal meaning. The third statement is then an attempt made to prop up "physical fitness."

Do you see that the definition for Physical Fitness works only within the context of arbitrary testing protocols? Thai Exercise can be defined in this context only by the acceptance of the definition of Physical Fitness ? And that it then must follow that "tests" define "exercise?"

And it is further unrealistic to tailor a definition on tools that don't work. Apparently the framers of these definitions are ignorant that the tools (tests) they use—which the) conveniently omitted from their statements—are rarely valid If you go back to our third newsletter you can see that w« documented that most fitness testing tools are worthless. This newsletter is posted on the SuperSlow Web Site at SuperSlow.com.

Nevertheless, we do need measurements. We do need some practical way to ascertain the effect of the activity performed as exercise. If not, then why do it?

Remember the late Michael Pollock's Quote: "VO2Max is not a test of anything." Note that Pollock was largely responsible for erecting the infrastructure of exercise physiology with textbooks, cardiac rehabilitation programs, and exercise physiology degree programs predominantly based on the tool he admitted is worthless. And Pollock was not one of us. He was esteemly respected by his peers in exercise physiology.

As most of you know, we define exercise very precisely as the following. [Repeating seems ridiculously unnecessary to the present audience, but to one lone person who has never seen or heard it, we are also remiss to exclude it from any presentation regarding other's definitional deficiencies, especially when I stand in front of you criticizing others for its omission.]:

Exercise is a process whereby the body performs work of a demanding nature in accordance with muscle and joint function, in a clinically controlled environment, within the constraints of safety, meaningfully loading the muscular structures to inroad their strength levels to stimulate a growth mechanism within minimum time.

After presenting this definition to most fitness enthusiasts, the common reply is: "Well, Ken, that it your definition." I say, "OK, perhaps that's a fair objection. What's yours?" They then admit that they are operating without a definition. In other words, they are aimlessly floundering by the directions of their emotions.

Because the dissection of this definition by the principles of epistemology is performed in other documents, explaining the separate qualifiers, I will not perform that here and now, so that we can go on with some new insights.

Letting our emotions determine our actions and beliefs is easy and natural. This has always occurred prelude to the advent of scientific and reflective searching for reality. As we proceed, I will give several examples that demonstrate that this often leads to harmful consequences.

Often, a listener will state that he disagrees with my philosophy of exercise. Perhaps it is merely his disenchantment with the constraints of the definition. If this opposition can be found to arise from a single statement or concept, I will ask him what about it he opposes. He will then say something to the effect that, "Well, I just don't believe that is true." Note that, if he cannot oppose the material with a concise argument, some statement that clearly represents a counter argument, he does not, technically disagree. He is unable to disagree. He can only oppose it with his original statement of belief garnered from his emotions.

What is SuperSlow? Most basically, it is performing exercise in accord with muscular function with a 10-second positive and a 10-second negative. It might be enough to say only this, but it also helps to spell out that you do not have SuperSlow if:
You are mixing it with something else like Aerobics
If you train six days a week
If you perform 20 exercises
If you vary the speed from 10 seconds to 5 and then 20, reasonable exceptions notwithstanding
If you vary the exercises beyond a bare minimum.

Why so Slow? Why not 8 seconds or 6 seconds or 4 seconds?
We go so slow, SuperSlow, for three big reasons:

First, since almost all injuries are due to acceleration, moving so slow is most safe.

Second, since the essence of exercise is about loading muscles, and since momentum unloads muscles, and since slower movement minimizes momentum, exercise is most effective when performed at a minimum speed of motion.

Third, since you have more awareness of your body when you move slowly, you must then move very slowly to permit mental concentration during exercise.