Good evening Jordan and Austin,
I tried searching the forums to prevent duplicate posting, but was unable to find anything already posted on this topic.
I’m a huge fan of your content and podcast; it has literally changed my life.
I currently lift 3-4 times a week around four 4 sets of 6 to 10 reps trying to hit all the major muscle groups.
I jog about 30 minutes every other day. I also try to jog for around 10 or 20 minutes on lifting days after I lift for a total of jogging 6 days a week.
I eventually want to do more, but this is where i’m at balancing life and motivation.
My blood pressure is a little on the high side of comfort for me.
I’m usualy around 124/82 at the doctors office; however, I realize I should measure it the way you guys have recommended. I just haven’t gotten around to buying one I can use at home to take more measurements once I’ve been relaxed and track multiple readings over an extended amount of time and days.
I saw an article: Tai chi reduces blood pressure better than aerobic exercise, study finds
News: Tai chi reduces blood pressure better... (NPR News) - Behind the headlines - NLM.
If my goal is to lower my blood pressure do you guys think it would be worth my time to also perform 30 minutes of Tai Chi daily in addition to my current lifting and conditioning for a couple months to see where it gets me, or do you think my time would be better spent using that additional 30 minutes daily to do additional jogging?
I am a 41 year old male. 5’5" 150lbs. 30" waist.
My Comprehensive Metabolic Panel in 2017 and 2024 was in the normal ranges according to the doc.
I know there are many factors that are important to consider that I have left out.
I’m mostly curious if you guys have researched this topic at all. Or if you want to do a podcast on it or add it to a questions asked one.
You guys are the best!
Thanks,
Kent
Kent,
Thanks for the post. I think if you want to do Tai Chi, that’d be fine. However, I do not think it is likely to improve your resting blood pressure more than doing the same volume of other conditioning. I’m not sure if you need more exercise or if your current exercise routine could be altered to better improve your resting blood pressure (or both). I’d be curious to poke around at your current conditioning programming and see if there’s anything that stands out to me.
I believe we have a few podcast on blood pressure, but none specifically on Tai Chi vs. other forms. In general, volume of activity tends to correlate well with blood pressure lowering effects. In a number of these studies, the intervention group (Tai Chi in this case) do more exercise than the other groups when measured directly. I don’t think Tai Chi is bad per se’, but I am skeptical it’s uniquely beneficial for many.
-Jordan
Good evening Jordan,
Thanks so much for the reply and taking the time to read.
I was thinking along the same lines that Tai Chi would not be uniquely beneficial.
My conditioning programming is not very well thought out. I’m just trying to hit the recommended minutes a week.
If you are still curious about my currenting conditioning programming, here’s some more data.
Most of my 30 minute runs (3x a week) look similar to this:
I try to keep my RPE around a 7 out of 10.
Even though I try to keep the RPE around 7, once I get around 30 minutes I’m usually crushed, so I’m trying to get better about forcing myself to slow down more in the beginning.
Sometimes, if I don’t feel too bad around the 30 minute mark, and I’ll push longer to 40 minutes total run time. This doesn’t happen very often though.
Once a week I try to do a hill sprint:
These are:
(1) one mile warmup,
(2) sprint up the hill, recover walk down the hill, repeat for 5 to 10 sets (its a pretty gnarly hill takes me about 20 seconds to run up it)
(3) one mile cooldown
In the example below, I was only able to get 5 sets of the sprints.
If I’m feeling up to it, I will add in a 10 or 20 min jog following my lifting days to try to accumulate a total of 6x runs in the week. About 50% of the time, I’m too tired after lifting to also jog.
I have been 90% consistent with the above plan (minus the hill sprints) for a little over 3 months now. The hill sprints were added in recently for about a month now.
My friend just got me a garmin watch, so I’ll be following one of the recommended 5k training programs it has to replace my current ad hoc running plan.
Again, you guys rock. Always look forward to the next podcast.
Keep up the great work!
Kent,
Thanks for the kind words and the additional information here. If you’re open to it, I’d consider making the following changes:
- Adjust from ~150-minutes to 170-minutes/wk
- To do so, replace post lifting running with cycling 3x/wk for 20 min (60 min total). Aim for zone 2 heart rate targets in the chart I made you below.
- On your 30 minute runs 3x/wk, aim for z1 to z2 (90min/wk)
- Continue the hill sprints currently (20min/wk)
For reference, the above chart is based on a calculator included in our General Strength and Conditioning II Template and eBook.
-Jordan
This is beautiful. I will give it a go. Thanks Jordan!
