Research worries

July 25, 2003

Joe,

Your post opens up a Pandora's box. We may be able to excuse some of the old

research because they did not have the technology or the know-how to do some of

the things that we are capable of today. A simple example is when I was doing my

research I spent a week or more on a calculator working out the statistical

analyses. Today, such work is done in a matter of hours.

The biggest problem as I see it is that we have too many psuedo-experts in many

areas. One would think that as time goes on each generation would use the

knowledge gained in the previous decade(s) and build upon it to develop even

more understanding of past information and come up with new and more effective

practices. Instead I see us only maintaining the status quo and going backwards

in some areas. I have been in the sports and fitness fields for over 50 years

and I can tell you that the information we had in the 50s in the area of sports

and fitness is basically the same as it is today.

The only changes have been in the area of new gimmicks and machinery but no

solid advancement in terms of applicable knowledge. Even a discussion of

whether slow lifts are better than fast lifts, should not be discussed, we

should already know (and I think we already do know) some of the answers.

For example, if slow lifting is better than fast, who is it best suited for,

beginning athletes, high level athletes, only bodybuilders, powerlifters and

weightlifters, etc.? Is it good for explosive athletes? The same questions can

be asked for executing lifts at a fast rate of speed. The key point here is

that we need more information and we must specify exactly who, what and when,

when we discuss the efficiency of a particular method. Otherwise it is a

discussion in futility.

Some of you who have read past issues of the Soviet Sports Review can appreciate

some of the work that they did at that time. I can take studies that they did

back in the 50s and 60s, write it up as something brand new and it will pass as

great information for most people.

The research in fitness and sports being done today is deplorable. It is done

mainly to get a degree, not to expand the field of knowledge. I taught research

and how to do research on a university level for many years, thus I know a

little of which I speak. It is because of this when I read published studies

from various sources including the NSCA I throw about 80% of the studies out as

invalid research.

Since I know I will be challenged on this statement I will give you a couple of

examples of why I say this. How many studies have the subjects well defined and

the results limited only to those subjects, or class of subjects. When they say

" high level athletes " what do they mean? If they say they are on a varsity team

what does that mean? There is a world of difference among all of these classes.

They have to be defined physically, technically and in relation to their sports

mastery. Such information is first needed in order to quantify not only the

subjects but also the results.

In many articles in the Soviet Sports Review (Fitness and Sports Review

International) the researchers brought out quite clearly that certain exercises

and types of training were very effective for lower class athletes (class 3 and

class 2 but not at all effective for high level first class and master of

sport). When the Soviets did research it was very specific to the type of

athlete and not generalized to fit all, the way many present studies seem to do.

How many studies contribute to expanding knowledge in the field, especially when

they are based on false assumptions?

For example, soon before I retired I had a student come to me with a proposal

for a study comparing plyometrics and strength training. She wanted to see

which one improved strength more. I told her this was invalid because

plyometrics is not used for strength training. I told her to read up on the

topic, learn what plyometrics is all about and the same for strength training.

Instead of doing that, six months later she was defending her study with another

faculty member who didn't know anything about plyometrics. To him, it was a

valid study. But was it?

Many studies that are done today are redundant. The person doing the research

does not do enough reading or is not knowledgeable enough in the area. They do

not learn all about it and then find out what is needed to clarify a particular

position or point in the knowledge that is available. Only in this way can we

see growth. Instead, they just do studies that seem like they would be

worthwhile. Students don't first become educated in a topic, they first look

for a topic that sounds good. Is this true research?

The only place I see this problem being corrected is in the university. Until

professors become better educated as to what is happening in the sports and

fitness world they will continue turning out terrible research. There are many

other problems relating to standards in the universities or policies of

universities which state that the professor must have X-number of studies under

his belt before he can be promoted. This leads to promoting companies' products

merely to get the money to do the research.

An example of regressing is the present definition of the term " power. " Power

has come to mean the lifting of very heavy weights in a slow manner, but yet the

true definition of power in physics as well as the way it has been used in

sports for many years, is execution of an action as quickly as possible. Thus

the definition of the word has made a 180 degree change.

But then we even have problems on the highest levels of the FDA. I recall

reading a copyright on a particular product for a particular lawsuit in which I

was an expert witness. It was concluded that the product was effective because

the test group lost more weight than the control group. This loss, however, was

a gain. Both groups gained weight, but the test group gained less than the

other group. Therefore it was concluded that the test group lost weight. How

can this be? Check with the people at the FDA for an answer.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yessis, Ph.D

President, Sports Training, Inc.

www.dryessis.com

PO Box 460429

Escondido, CA 92046

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Message: 17

Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2003 08:23:51 +1200

Subject: Research worries

Hi all,

Over the last year I have become increasingly aware of the unreliability of

" that which went before " in terms of research.

For example, in biochemistry you learn how all the pathways work, and then

use those principles to develop either nutritional or physical theories to

increase performance. Now, what happens if the assumptions that were made

during this original research were wrong?

In the case of biochemistry, most of the basic research has been performed

in organisms other than humans, and then has been " validated " in humans. The

problems are that in reality the pathways in humans do not act as we read

them in the textbooks, they act " alive " and use micro-evolution & adaptation

to optimise the pathway for the current set of nutrient intake profiles.

Now, for a case you might not ever think... anatomy. I have a friend who is

performing research into the microanatomy of the SI joint. Simple you say?

Done it all before? The problem is that it hasn't been done correctly, and

the information in the textbooks is not all correct. The same goes for a lot

of other joints and muscles, for example the spinal discs have recently been

shown to differ significantly between lumbar and cervical. There is some

research [hopefully] coming out soon that will outright dispel some myths

about the trunk muscles, which I will be VERY happy about concerning recent

discussions.

I read on the supertraining list last year about a guy backed by a lot of

Nobel laureates that says the underlying physiology is wrong, but he is

being shunned by the scientific community.

Does anyone else have any other examples of where the underlying principles

of a field may be unknown, or wrong to some degree?

I find this extremely humbling, but also very worrying. Because science is

based on that which came before, how much could be wrong? No one gets papers

for validating 10 year old research, so there is no push to study these

things. Who in their right mind would fund a project if it has been done

before, and is accepted by fact? How will we break out of this mould? How

much trust should we have of others research, especially old research??

What are your thoughts?

Joe Cole

Dunedin, New Zealand

July 27, 2003

Dr Yessis,

Thanks for the reply. I was reading " The spinal engine " by Serge

Gracovetsky over the weekend, and was amazed to see such insight

from an old book.

He has a brilliant insight early on in the book which is

particularly relevant to our recent discussions :

" There is no such thing as the perfect model. The best that can be

acheived is the creation of a model that explains the data available

at a particular point in time. Some models survive for a long time

whereas others do not. Irregardless, a model is no substitute for

common sense. Rather, it is a tool to be used to express hypotheses

and rigorously evaluate their consequences. "

I completely agree. I believe some models have been held on to for

too long, and as you said, a lot of people lose the focus of why

they are researching in the first place.

This has implications to all supertraining members :

1. We must accept that what we know now will not always hold true

for the future.

2. We must keep an open mind and discuss models objectively, without

emotion and using our common sense.

3. We must be prepared to challenge the staus quo - it is not the

current status quo that will hold in the future.

How do we spot models that are being held on to for too long?

For example, the food pyramid in nutrition is one such model. It has

no real backing by biochemical models of energy consumption, and

lacks a lot of evidence in certain areas.

Other such models are those of trigger points - we know they occur

at specific sites in the body, we know they have a certain motor

discharge. But as yet we have only really hypotheses about their

functions. We do not have any proof.

Another example would be that of thorax anatomy. We have current

anatomical data on the thoracolumbar fascia, but does that data hold

(it was revoked by its original discoverer)? What about the research

on the SI joint (according to a friend there are only ~ three good

papers on it, and they didn't have good microscopes back then, and

nearly everyone quotes indirectly these papers)? What about TVA and

the biomechanical model so many papers directly or indirectly refer

to - the cantilever model? Does this model hold? Will they hold

forever (if they do now?)

I think they way to spot invalid models is to look at the proponents

of those models. Have they continually updated their work? Have they

considered every point of view? Can they admit that they may be

wrong?

Anyone else?

I am at a loss to explain what it is we do to overcome the problem

of fallacious research, and would be interested to hear others

opinions. I can think up rationale biochemical basis for nutrition

and training, but are these hypotheses, backed by research, correct

if the underlying research is incorrect?

I am leaning towards just using common sense. No in depth

explanations, as I do not know for a fact that my background

knowledge is correct.

Joe Cole

Dunedin, New Zealand

July 29, 2003

Dear Mr. Cole I might have a good one for you.

Fundamental to understanding human movement and exercise is the

study of biomechanics or kinesiology. These two sciences still teach

the classic 3 classes of lever systems by structural identification.

Fundamental to current thinking in strength and conditioning is idea

that lever systems as they are currently taught are good for

determining force of effort.

As Borelli in the 1600's first demonstrated the human body

typically uses short effective force arms to move resistances that

possess long resistance arms. This knowledge develops logically that

strength and conditioning must address the muscle used for force of

effort and that muscle must be strong for individual to exhibit

strength. The perfect example would be biceps curl. Due to its

typically small effective effort arm, the biceps must produce great

force relative to small resistance of weight being lifted in the

hand. For instance when the forearm is parallel with ground, the

effective resistance arm is larger then the effective effort arm of

the biceps.

Following this logic, the biceps curl is commonly used as teaching

tool to illustrate a 3rd class lever. The 3rd class lever being

determined by the position of the fulcrum to the effort and

resistance or FER. Your texts will relate that functionally that 3rd

class levers possess poor mechanical advantage due to the resistance

arm being larger than the effort arm.

Is this true though? The principle in physics, as lever systems in

biomechanics is commonly used, is known as the principle of

equilibrium of rotation or torque.

In 1599 Benedetti published his discovery of the effective lever

arm. He demonstrated that the effective lever arm was not the

distance of the fixed arm back to the fulcrum but rather the

perpendicular distance from the line of pull of either effort or

resistance back to the fulcrum.

Applying his finding in physics it is exceedingly simple to

demonstrate that what is commonly taught in biomechanics such as a

3rd class levers possess poor mechanical advantage as a truth is

wrong. If you go to spinalfitness.com and read the history of lever systems

and spinal biomechanics and functional lever systems identification

you can see what I am addressing.

Now not addressing this fact in itself relative to the actual math

is no big deal, but what it leads to is misconceptions and misleading

ideas. Its greatest fault it appears to me is to downplay the

importance of the lever system and thereby keep hidden from everyone

the greatest principle in levers and some may argue in physics, the

equilibrium of translation.

Whereas the equilibrium of rotation tells us about the initial

muscle used as force of effort, equilibrium of translation tells us

what is happening at the joint. It tells us how much forces are

created at the joint, it tells us are they in form of shear or

compression and once we know that we can easily determine what tissue

is being used to stabilize those forces.

Equilibrium of translation also demonstrates that a simple lever

system in spine does not consist of one vertebra but must include two

vertebrae.

Understanding proper lever system analysis has it's greatest impact

in the spine. The impact being on human health and performance.

Many posts on this site have been relative to spinal injuries. To

the degree that spinal injury is present to the degree strengthening

and conditioning of the spine for athletics decreases. Proper

application of lever systems analysis reveals in an exercise for

instance is the force on the disc or facets. Knowing that for

instance a disc injury is present than a list of exercises that

strains the disc should be well known and therefore avoided. At the

present time this type of analysis of exercises does not exist. It

not only does not exist in the spine it does not exist in simple

exercises like leg curl and leg extension.

There have been posts on this site relative to anterior cruciate

problems in athletes. Not one reply or I find in the literature

address the facts of how the leg curl or leg extension strains the

ACL. There are those individuals that actually believe that strength

of the knee is a function of the leg muscles that move the lower

leg. Understanding equilibrium of translation and lever systems it

readily becomes evident that the muscles that move the lower leg only

strain the knee joint and its tissue. The knee joints strength is

only as good as the health of it's articular surfaces and ligaments

like ACL, are able to withstand the forces taxing them created by

movement and exercises.

Also understanding equilibrium of translation in the spine makes it

evident that when the many different spinal postures all try to make

the same movement, say like hitting in football, that the different

postures will all present different physiological results. These

will range from the good to the very bad.

A proper S-shape may move forward through range motion and at point

of contact at each vertebral joint complex equilibrium of translation

is supplied by simple compression between the two vertebrae. A person

with a flat back may move forward and be in more kyphotic position at

point of contact. At each vertebral complex they may have a shear

force to the posterior. To keep equilibrium of translation

posterior spinal muscles would have to contract to stabilize shear.

This extra muscle effort would run up cost of movement, create more

damaging forces at the joint tissue and involve more anatomical

parts. It can be mechanically explain why proper lordotic posture

can produce the superior hitter in football and why posture must be

address first in football strength and conditioning program before

any type of muscle building program.

Scherger

Ridgefield, Wa

July 29, 2003