Should I lift or do cardio first

Way back when I was a University student and in need of some extra cash I met a guy named Vernon Coffey (Associate Professor of Exercise and Sports Science at Bond University). Vernon presented to a group of us the idea of being “lab rats” (my words not his) to help determine what happens to our muscles during concurrent exercise sessions (doing weights and aerobic exercise in the same session). They would take biopsies from each of our legs while we exercised, run some tests and write an article to explain the results. Sounds easy but getting a rod, like the one in the picture, stuck into your leg and then being told to jump on a bike and ride or sit in a leg press and lift some weight straight after it was quite tough. Oh and then when you are finished we are going to stick it in 3 more times. I saw it as $800.00 ($100.00 per hole).

Now for the results and the answer to the question, “Should I lift or do cardio first?” Well it depends on many variables.

• What are your overall fitness goals?

• What are you looking to gain?

• How do you want to improve?

• What is your current level of fitness?

If you are going to go to google or Youtube to find the answer then use the term “concurrent training” to help find the answers. But honestly, once you hear everyone's advice you will be even more confused. 

Below is my attempt to simplify it as much as possible and give a bit of my opinion based on experience. 

The short answer. If you want to build muscle, run first (or not at all) on days that you plan to do weights. If you want to build your endurance and aerobic capacity, run last (or don’t do resistance exercise on the same day as your endurance exercise).

Essentially, your body’s adaptive response is greater for the type of exercise that you finish your workout doing. So consider that a workout concluded with weights will trigger muscle growth and strength more effectively, while a workout ending with aerobic activity will likely stimulate your body’s aerobic endurance capabilities more effectively. 

One exception to the rule is for untrained individuals.

If you happen to be just starting out  then it really doesn’t matter too much, just get started for the first couple of weeks and progressively split your workouts. As people improve their fitness, performing concurrent exercise (aerobic exercise and weights in the same session) leads to a reduced adaptive response (see the graph below from The Journal of Physiology).  For moderately to high trained individuals it becomes more important to split aerobic and resistance sessions up to maximise the physiological outcomes. So for a trained person the adaptive response will still be greater for whatever you are doing second. However, strength, hypertrophy and aerobic adaptations will be diminished regardless of order due to fatigue and reduced capability to perform at higher intensities.

Now simplifying the literature that much has likely disrespected the complexity of said studies. But to quote Vernon Coffey,  “existing evidence supports the existence of an interference effect of endurance training on resistance training induced muscle hypertrophy and strength.”

When deciding to do exercise, especially concurrently, there are a number of things to consider related to your goals including but not limited to:

• Are you aiming to lose weight

• Are you aiming to improve cardiovascular health

• Do you want larger, stronger muscles

• Is your goal purely overall conditioning

• Do you have specific chronic diseases

• Performing sport that requires strength, power and endurance

Whether you are an athlete at the highest level, or a person wishing to simply improve health a little, if you are going to take the time to perform exercise/training sessions you might as well do it in the most efficient way to maximise your outcomes.

For a specific program to meet your goals make contact with us and we can point you in the right direction. 

What is the minimum time i should wait between sessions to get the best outcomes?

I will refer you to a 2016 study Specific Training Effects of Concurrent Aerobic and Strength Exercises Depend on Recovery Duration for this answer (or you can just read the following).

The authors say that we should, where possible, avoid scheduling two opposing exercise routines (like running and weight lifting) in the same day, but at the very least allow no less than a six-hour recovery period between them if the goal is to obtain maximal adaptive responses to each workout.

The authors also explain that daily training without a recovery period between sessions is not optimal for neuromuscular and aerobic improvements. 

So when you consider the minimum of 6 hours also consider the type of routine you perform. If you have just completed a 60 minute maximal session in the gym then 6 hours is likely not enough, in that case i would be suggesting 10+ hours (although don’t let it interfere with sleep) as a minimum. Same the other way around. If you have just spent 2 hours in the pool and covered 7km or been for a really hard interval run then maybe skip the strength session that day and wait until the next day. If your sessions were submaximal or the weight session was more of a strength endurance session then same day training with 6 hours recovery is feasible.

Recovery is just as important as the session itself when you goal is maximal physiological adaptation.