By Mike Mahler
Most of us under 40 are addicted to entertainment. The younger you are, the greater your need to be entertained at all times. That’s why I call the kids who’re 16 to 24 “Generation Entertainment” (or Gen Ent if you’re into that whole brevity thing).
When we aren’t watching four hours of TV every night, we’re surfing the Web or sending idiotic text messages to our friends laced with infuriating acronyms. As a result, we’re getting fatter and weaker. Even worse, we’ve lost any semblance of mental toughness. We have no concept of sacrifice.
Since we’ve screened out anything that isn’t entertaining, few of us can slog through weeks and months of boring training. But the problem is even worse for Gen Ent. Unless training is fun and consistently stimulating, the dumbbells will gather dust long before any of it appears on the Game Cube.
Now, given everything I’ve just said, you’d think that I’d start this series with something sexy, like abs or biceps. Nope. I’m going to show you a better way to do the most boring type of exercise known to man.
Cardio: the remix
When you think of cardio, what comes to mind? Deconditioned schlubs trudging joylessly on treadmills? Overcaffeinated Spinning addicts cranking like madwomen on a bike going nowhere?
Cardio, the way most people do it, is a severe form of mental-toughness training. But I don’t mean that in a good way. It takes a lot of mental toughness to do that kind of cardio training five times a week for months on end. But it doesn’t do much for your body. Unless you’re born with good genetics for endurance training, it’s probably not going to make you much leaner than you are now.
Fortunately, there are plenty of alternatives that are both fun and effective. They produce fast results with no boredom required. And best of all, they’re cheaper than basic cable.
