The Leap: Lifetime Exercise Adherence Plan

This book is an excellent way to determine a beginning program in terms of effort and time and a logical method how to progress without burning out. It has some questionaires, but don't be put off by the arithmetic. The charts determining your VO2 are accurate (correleated with my 1 1/2 run time) and the method of determining your first weeks target number and the increase for each week, helps you from being too lazy or pushing not hard enough. However it would have been good if the chart on the VO2 had been supplemented with a percentage(%) maximum heart rate chart, but the % heart rate and the correlated VO2 can be found on the web. In short, the point system is far superior to the Aerobic Points from the Ken Coopers books.

The biggest benefit this book gave me was a reasonable, sensible goal. Without some kind of measurable goal (in this case, meeting the minimum number of exercise points per week), you have nothing to measure yourself against and I always felt I wasn't doing enough! Now, when I've done my exercise for the week and I don't feel like getting up on Saturday morning, I just crawl back into bed! And it's working! Without changing my diet I've lost 10 pounds over the last month, just by using my stationary bicycle, hiking, and exercise videos.

This is the closest thing to an idiot-proof fitness plan out there; trust me, I should know. Before I started using this book, I was overweight and not very fit. In school I was the kid who hated gym class and faked doctor's notes to get out of it. Over the years I had tried and failed at lots of fitness regimens. Then a friend gave me this book, saying it had worked for her. A year later I have slimmed down and I feel a lot stronger and more energetic. This may sound like a cheesy testimonial, but it's true. What's great is that the author, Dr. Richard Brown, uses the same plan with the Olympic athletes he coaches -- it is entirely customized to your level of fitness and your goals.Under this plan, any exercise counts -- from scrubbing floors to Tae-Bo to sailing -- because you rate the effort yourself according to an easy-to-use scale (no heart-rate monitoring). The main point is to choose something you enjoy, the reasoning being that you'll be more likely to stick with it that way. I get my points mostly from walking, stationary cycling, and a strength-training video workout, but I can just as easily figure out my effort for the occasional day of hiking or swimming in the ocean. Even if you don't keep track of your points, you can still use the general principles to pace yourself. The result for me was that I didn't burn out the way I had on other plans, because I was doing exactly the right amount of exercise, and I started noticing the benefits right away. I'd like to thank the author: L.E.A.P. is quite an achievement.

I recently bought this book and applied its models to my own exercise program. It was a remarkable experience. I answered the list of lifestyle questions, worked out the simple numbers, and was very surprised when the results almost exactly matched my intuitive expectations. Since the model in this book is based on oxygen consumption to produce energy, the book is on firm theoretical ground. The lifestyle questionnaire is used to estimate your ability to burn oxygen to produce energy. From this knowledge, the model can predict a whole series of useful numbers (energy conversion points) for various exercise/workout levels. For example, the model identifies the following levels based on your ability to convert oxygen: safe level, disease prevention level, body change level, VO2max change level, optimal level, and overtraining level. These numbers help you to exercise sensibly, without under or overtraining. I had only 1 or 2 questions after reading the book, and the author was kind enough to explain them. The emphasis on 75% of VO2max is because this estimate (75%) represents the boundary between aerobic and anaerobic exercise. The 75% is not a hard number, and can vary among individuals from around 70% to 82% or so (I hope I remembered these numbers right...). Anyhow, the point is that when you work out hard enough to cross that boundary (wherever it is for you), you suddenly have to work very hard to get small improvements in output. I think the book is a fine piece of research, based on years and years of experience in working with high-performance athletes. It's particularly nice that the model presented is so simple and easy to use, yet so effective. I rated the book 9 out of 9 on my book reading scale, based on over a thousand books in various fields. Books don't get any better than this one. Highly recommended.

I have known Dr. Brown for some time now but for the past two years he has been helping me train for the Portland Marathon. The training program he used with me was based on the principles in his book. My first marathon time was 3:11:07 and this year improved to 2:58:16. I guess you can say I'm living proof of the effectiveness of this program. It is a very indepth technique of achieving any level of fitness one may desire. Dr. Brown takes a very conservative approach so as to avoid injury and/or burn-out by including not just hard physical exercise to achieve goals but also everyday activities like gardening(and even sex!)This book is great for those who find it impossible to have their own personal trainer but still have the dedication to want to achieve a more healthier lifestyle