The Italian fitness tech and equipment brand has been working with ACSM researchers since 2010 to create disease treatment protocols

Technogym and the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) have deepened their ties, with the Italian fitness giant now an official partner of both the ACSM and the organization’s global Exercise in Medicine initiative.

As a leading fitness technology and equipment brand and the official supplier to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, Technogym has been selected for what it calls “several global projects and institutional efforts” aimed at promoting exercise as a preventative measure and as a therapeutic for treating a variety of conditions.

The ACSM’s global Exercise in Medicine initiative was launched in 2007 and encourages health professionals to include exercise in medical prescriptions. ACSM researchers have collaborated with Technogym since 2010 to create treatment protocols for cardiovascular diseases, obesity, Type 2 diabetes and osteoporosis using specific exercise programs. 

“We are excited about this next phase of our long-time partnership with Technogym,” ACSM president Stella Volpe, PhD, said. “Leaders evolve and adapt as they seek continuous improvement, and we share a mutual vision to drive better health through physical activity and advances in science, technology and innovation.”

The sports medicine organization has made its training and information channels available to the sports medicine professionals it represents, as well as its nearly 50,000 members and certified professionals from 90 countries.

For its part, Technogym has been a pioneer in prevention with its ‘Technogym as Medicine‘ philosophy and offerings, such as its premium health and fitness equipment and ecosystem. Founded by Nerio Alessandri in the early 1980s, Technogym has evolved into an AI-based, end-to-end open platform, transforming the fitness and health experience for both consumers and operators.

Two of Technogym’s leading AI-driven offerings, Technogym Checkup and Technogym Coach, have transformed fitness equipment into a “fitcare” system.

Technogym Checkup, a high-tech health assistant that assesses physical and cognitive conditions and allows operators to prescribe and provide personalized programs, can measure body composition, strength, balance, mobility and cognitive abilities. It also forms a “Wellness Age,” so users are provided a well-being metric that is more comprehensive than a biological age. 

Technogym Coach serves as an AI-based trainer that provides users with a personalized prescription, guiding and encouraging them on their health journey while adjusting its results-targeted training programs as users make progress. 

Back in 2016, I wrote a column with the rather glib headline: “Yes, Professional Runners Are Weak.” In my defense, I was merely paraphrasing the recently retired marathoner Ryan Hall. After hanging up his running shoes, the American record holder in the half marathon had hit the weight room hard and transformed himself from a scrawny endurance athlete into a muscle-bound beefcake. “I’ve been small and weak all my life,” Hall said in an interview with Runner’s World. “I’ve always wondered what it would feel like to be big and strong.”

For Hall, getting jacked was also a boon for his overall vitality. As he told CNN in 2021, his energy levels are “ten times better” now that he spends “60 to 90 minutes a day” lifting weights, as opposed to when he was grinding out 130-mile weeks. Who can’t relate?

Ryan Hall may be a physical outlier, but his example speaks to one of the more enduring debates in popular fitness culture: Is one better off prioritizing cardio or strength training? (With apologies to gym bro taxonomists, in this article “strength training” will be used interchangeably with “resistance training.” While strength training is usually more specifically about gaining muscle mass, both forms of exercise involve working the muscles with some kind of counterforce, e.g. dumbbells or one’s own bodyweight.)

Although the pendulum is always swinging back and forth, the resistance-training over cardio movement seems to be gaining momentum, at least among certain fitness influencers. The popular “She’s a Beast” newsletter, from the runner-turned-weightlifting-evangelist Casey Johnston describes itself as “counter-programming for the alleged ‘thin is in’ era.”

Meanwhile, even accounts that explicitly promote weight loss and body fat reduction are pushing back against a perceived overemphasis on aerobic exercise. “What if I told you that by doing less cardio, you could actually lose more fat?” asks the online fitness coach and trainer Katie Neeson, who runs the TikTok account @thefitmamalife. “The number one reason that doing less cardio is going to be great is because you can spend more time getting your ass in the weight section.”

A common refrain among those advocating for more of us to get our collective asses into the weight section is that resistance training will “improve body composition,” a euphemism for “make you look hotter.” It’s a reminder that often the cardio vs. weights debate is as much about aesthetics as anything else. Indeed, if you have specific fitness goals, whether it’s to acquire a certain physique or run your fastest marathon, it should be pretty clear which form of exercise you need to prioritize.

But what about when we consider the question from a general health standpoint?

Which Is Healthier: Cardio or Strength Training?

Professor Duck-Chul Lee is the director of the Physical Activity and Weight Management Research Center at the University of Pittsburgh, and the author of many papers on exercise and long-term health. Earlier this year, he co-authored a study comparing how different kinds of exercise help mitigate risk factors for cardiovascular disease (CVD). The study, published in the European Heart Journal, looked at 406 adults (53 percent women) between the ages of 35 and 70, all of whom were either overweight or had high blood pressure. Participants were divided into groups doing one of the following three times a week over the course of one year: one hour of resistance training; one hour of aerobic training; 30 minutes of resistance training and 30 minutes of aerobic training; or no training at all. After one year, only the groups who had done aerobic-only or aerobic and resistance training showed an improvement in their composite CVD risk-profile, compared to the no-exercise group.

However, while the CVD-related benefits for those who focused exclusively on aerobic exercise and those who couple it with strength training were almost identical, the latter group also showed additional improvement in metrics like lean body mass. “The message that I wanted to deliver from that study was that if people switch half of their cardio with resistance training, they get the same magnitude of benefits to reduce CVD risk factors, but they get extra benefits like increased strength and muscle mass,” Lee says.

This isn’t the first time that Lee has published a study implying that many of the benefits of running can be gleaned from relatively small doses. A 2014 study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC) that looked at the relationship between running and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality in over 55,000 adults found that running as little as five to ten minutes a day at slow speeds showed similar benefits to running over three hours per week.

“Runners were not happy about those findings,” Lee told me, noting that he received a fair amount of hate mail from hardcore endurance athletes who felt that their fanaticism was being put on trial. But according to Lee, the contentious question of whether it’s possible to do too much cardio is still undecided.

What about overzealous weightlifters? A widely-cited 2022 study from the Japanese sports science professor Haruki Momma found that resistance training did, in fact, reduce one’s risk of all-cause mortality, but that the maximum benefits appeared to top out at 30 to 60 minutes per week. The study cautioned that more research is needed to determine the potential benefits (or downsides) of high volume muscle-strengthening exercise. To that end, Lee told me that he had just received a grant to conduct a year-long study to compare the effects of a weekly weightlifting regimen of varying degrees of intensity–from zero to 120 minutes per week.

The Difference in Benefits for Men vs. Women

Unsurprisingly, more research is also needed when it comes to assessing the relative benefits of exercise for men and women. That was the upshot of another JACC paper published this year, titled “Sex Differences in Association of Physical Activity With All-Cause and Cardiovascular Mortality.” The authors of the study examined the relationship between the exercise habits of 412,413 Americans (55 percent women) and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality from 1997 through 2019. Looking at the data for nearly 40,000 deaths in this time period, the authors of the study found that men got the greatest mortality benefit (18 percent risk reduction in all-cause mortality) from 300 minutes per week of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA). Notably, women got a similar benefit from only 140 minutes per week of MVPA.

Sex difference was significant when it came to the specific benefits of muscle-strengthening exercises, too. Among those who regularly engaged in muscle-strengthening activities, men showed a cardiovascular risk reduction of 11 percent, while among women, the risk reduction was a whopping 30 percent.

There are certainly caveats with this study (as with most large-scale fitness studies, all exercise behaviors were self-reported), but the central point that sex differences should probably be given more consideration when making general exercise recommendations seems hard to argue with. As Susan Cheng, a professor of cardiology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and one of the lead authors of the study, told me, “A certain person, with a certain physique, might get a lot more out of 75 minutes of exercise, than somebody with a completely different physique and body stature, who might need 350 minutes to get the same benefits.”

Another co-author of the study, Professor Martha Gulati, who among other things is the president of the American Society for Preventive Cardiology, told me that “anytime I see identical recommendations for men and women, my usual question is: ‘Where did that come from?’ Because chances are the data is not strong.”

The Bottom Line: How Much Cardio and Strength Training You Need

Nonetheless, while more studies need to be conducted to fine-tune sex-specific recommendations, the current evidence suggests that most people, regardless of gender, would still be well-served to target the American Heart Association’s recommendation of 150 minutes per week of moderate intensity aerobic activity, combined with at least two days a week of moderate-to-high intensity muscle-strengthening activity.

If that sounds a little ambitious, everyone I spoke to was adamant that the difference between doing a small amount of exercise–as little as five to ten minutes a day–and doing nothing was far more significant than discrepancies in health gains between those on the other end of the spectrum.

When it comes to optimising muscle growth and strength, Dr. Mike Israetel, a renowned fitness expert, has specific go-to exercises for each muscle group. These exercises are based on his extensive knowledge and experience, ensuring maximum effectiveness for both beginners and seasoned lifters.

Dr Mike Israetel, PhD in Sport Physiology and co-founder of Renaissance Periodization, is a well-respected professor in the bodybuilding community. He doesn’t only talk about workouts and fitness tips, he often dives deep into health and nutrition.

He was asked by Mike Thurston on his weekly video on First Things THRST YouTube Channel. Let’s delve into Dr. Israetel’s top exercise recommendations for various muscle groups.

Dr Mike Israetel Go-To Exercise for Each Muscle Group

Chest: Incline Cambered Bar Bench Press

For developing the chest, Dr. Israetel highly recommends the incline cambered bar bench press. This exercise utilises a cambered bar, which has a unique curve allowing for a greater range of motion compared to a standard barbell. According to Dr. Israetel, the deep stretch achieved with this exercise is unparalleled.

“The cambered bar allows you… to press super deep. That pec stretch is just unbeatable,” Israetel says. “It’s pretty close to objectively the best chest exercise you could do if you had to pick one.”

This exercise not only targets the upper chest but also provides a significant pump, making it an excellent choice for overall chest development.

Shoulders: Cable Machine Lateral Raises

When it comes to the shoulders, particularly the side delts, Dr. Israetel favours cable lateral raises. He suggests setting the cable height at hip level to achieve optimal tension throughout the movement.

“You get a crazy peak tension at the bottom, the super stretch, and the top has almost no tension at all… that exercise both from an internal perspective of how it makes me feel and from a theoretical perspective is difficult to beat.”

This exercise ensures that the deltoids are fully engaged, promoting muscle growth and strength.

Back: Barbell Bent-Over Row

For back development, Dr. Israetel’s go-to is the barbell bent-over row. This exercise is versatile and effectively targets the lats, mid-back, and spinal erectors.

“A strict bent row like that… hits the lats decently, hits the mid-back really well, and hits the spinal erectors too because you have to spinally erect yourself against the load,” Israetel explains.

The barbell bent-over row is a comprehensive exercise that promotes overall back strength and hypertrophy.

Biceps: Lying Dumbbell Curl

Dr. Israetel’s favourite new bicep exercise is the lying dumbbell curl. This unique variation, which he created himself after trying a couple of new things, maximises tension on the biceps throughout the movement.

“It exposes the biceps to maximum tension at their longest length and is just unreal… it gives me predictable repeated delayed onset bicep soreness which almost no other exercise has been able to give me.”

This exercise targets the biceps effectively, promoting muscle growth and strength.

Triceps: EZ Bar Behind the Neck Tricep Extension

For tricep development, Dr. Israetel recommends the EZ bar behind the neck tricep extension. This exercise targets all parts of the tricep and provides a deep stretch.

“The EZ bar behind the neck tricep extension… is phenomenal. It works every part of the tricep and a huge deep stretch.”

This movement is excellent for isolating and developing the triceps.

Quads: Belt Squat

When it comes to leg exercises, Dr. Israetel prefers the belt squat. This exercise eliminates axial fatigue, allowing for more effective quad targeting.

“A belt squat properly done just has no axial fatigue… you can just zap your quad.”

The belt squat is ideal for those looking to focus on quad development without placing undue stress on the spine.

Hamstrings: Stiff-Legged Deadlift or Good Mornings

For hamstring training, Dr. Israetel recommends both the stiff-legged deadlift and good mornings. These exercises ensure a deep stretch in the hamstrings, promoting muscle growth.

“Stiff-legged deadlifts are really tough to beat… it’s a biarticulate muscle which means it crosses the knee and the hip, so you can load it under a load of stretch super easily.”

Additionally, Israetel also talked about good mornings as another effective hamstring exercise:

“Stiff-legged deadlifts or good mornings are really tough to beat, but every kind of hamstring curl is awesome as long as I get a nice deep stretch in the hamstring.”

Both exercises target the hamstrings effectively, promoting hypertrophy and strength.

For glute development, Dr. Israetel suggests the front foot elevated Smith machine lunges. This exercise provides stability and allows for a deep stretch in the glutes.

“Front foot elevation pre-stretches that glute… one set later I’m like, oh my God, my glutes are cramping.”

This exercise is excellent for isolating and developing the glutes.

Dr. Mike Israetel’s go-to exercises for each muscle group are designed to maximise muscle growth and strength. By incorporating these exercises into your routine, you can ensure comprehensive development and optimal results. Whether you’re targeting the chest, shoulders, back, biceps, triceps, legs, hamstrings, or glutes, Dr. Israetel’s recommendations provide a solid foundation for your fitness journey.

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