Smart Exercise: Burning Fat, Getting Fit

Covert Bailey is a master at making physiology easy to understand for the average person. If you are looking to improve your health and get into better shape, then you should have this title on your bookshelf. It does a great job of helping you to understand what works and what doesn't. Much like Bill Phillip's book Body For Life, this book stresses that exercise is the key to reducing fat and improving overall health. It explains why diet alone won't help you to lose weight permanently, and what the benefits of cardiovascular exercise are. When you finish reading this book, you will have a basic understanding of how the human body works, what makes people gain weight, how muscle is formed, how fat is formed and how to take it off permanently. Medical techno-babble is translated into terms that absolutely anyone can understand. His humor and amusing metaphors make for an enjoyable reading experience as well. ...This book is worth way more than it sells for. It is packed with useful information, good science and great advice.

I bought this book because it was recommended in a mens' fitness magazine as being one of the best fitness books of the decade and I don't regret it. I've read a lot about diet and exercise and after a while it all sounds the came, but Mr. Bailey's book tackles the subject of exercise in a more in-depth manner. He doesn't just tell you that low-intensity full-body exercise is good for burning fat. He explains why in a convincing manner and the explanation goes beyond the "standard" stuff you tend to see in magazines. And it's not just about burning fat either. He explains what are the best ways to work out so that you can improve your aerobic fitness or how to train your short-term engery system for sprinting, etc...Beware that there is some discussion of biochemistry -- so you will see references to scary-sounding terms like the Krebs cycle, glucose, lactic acid, pyruvic acid, and triglycerides. However, he doesn't go into horrible, boring detail about these subjects. In fact, having some familiarity with this from previous biology classes, I think I might've enjoyed a little more in-depth treatment of these areas, but then that depends on what you're interested in. Don't worry -- it's not super-complicated. He doesn't go through all the steps of the Krebs cycle for instance. He gives you enough to illustrate the points and to show that he knows what he's talking about.Some might find his cute humor style annoying. For instance, he talks a lot about making you a "better butter burner". And he sometimes makes up silly stories that are not true to illustrate a point. It didn't bother me, but some people might be bothered by his lack of political correctness. He is quite liberal in his use of the word "fat people". He is pretty consistent in calling them "fat" rather than "unfit". Not being into political correctness, I found this amusing rather than offensive.One other caveat is that the book is a little bit depressing at times in that it talks a lot about fat people (his phrase, see above :-) don't burn fat well, have a smaller range in which they can rest, have difficulty exercising at the proper intensity for results, and basically are just at a tremendous disadvantage while fit people burn fat well and have many advantages in getting fit. Might be depressing to you, but if it's true, you need to know so that you can take the right steps to get on the slow road toward fitness.

Bailey's style can be technical and overbearing but the man knows what he's talking about. I had been exercising for about 3 years when I found Covert's book. I had lost and kept off 30+ pounds but I wasn't really getting any closer to heavenly body I wanted to have. I could run 5+ miles, cycle about 30 and walk 20 without hurting too much. But I couldn't seem to lose that last ten or so pounds, not to mention get the definition I wanted to have in certain trouble spots like my thighs. I did killer workouts, sometimes running in the morning and cycling at night for only minute changes in my physique. It was so frustrating I wanted to give up.I wasn't a fat or out of shape person but I wasn't able to get the results I wanted though I was working very hard. It wasn't until I read Smart Exercise and began using wind sprints and longer aerobic sessions in conjunction with a small split weight-training routine that my body began to look and feel significantly different. I learned how to eat to fuel my body, how long I could work out and what the best frequency was. I learned that more is not always better and I definitely learned the value of allow my body to recover. With Bailey's help I developed a schedule and routine that allowed me to lose 10lbs in a little under eight weeks. I literally went from burning 500 calories in a 45 minute session to burning over 700 in 35 minute session because of windsprints and cross-training. With what seemed to be 70% of the effort, I was getting twice the results. If you're at plateau and you want some good advice. Or if you've been working out for a while and want to develop a more efficient routine, this is an ideal book to buy.

I enjoyed this book so much I gave it to all of my personal training clients for Christmas last year. If you have seen those health rider infomercials then you probably recognize Covert. You will be pleasantly surprised with his knowledge of exercise physiology and his great analogies and explanations of how your body burns fat and what it takes to keep it off. Covert has a knack for taking the most complex, scientific subjects and breaking them down so anyone can understand them. Some topics can get a little heavy but for the most part you will learn fact from fiction and get a few laughs along the way. Whether you are ready to get back on track, a weekend warrior or a hard core fitness enthusiast you can learn something from Covert. Take that four letter word D-I-E-T out of your vocabulary and get ready for realistic solutions to maintaining your health and exercising smarter.

The clearest, most practical book I've ever read on fitness and using exercise to feel fit and lose fat. Smart Exercise taught me about our body's three different fuel systems, and what the effects of different kinds of exercise are on them. Now I know how hard to exercise, how often to exercise, how long to exercise, and how to vary my workouts appropriately for best results. In a "past life", I ran regularly, and completed three marathons (last one in 1992), but then my third child arrived, and I got too busy raising (and chauffering) children to spend all that time running. I gained 30 pounds, and floundered badly in my efforts to design and stick to an exercise program. The information in Smart Exercise has been both informative and motivating. So far, I've dropped 10 pounds, and I'm enjoying my exercise quite a bit more. I especially appreciate the book's emphasis on helping us make sense of the science, and helping us apply common-sense principles to cut through all the propaganda, hype, and misinformation surrounding fitness and its relationship to weight loss. I consider myself an honorary Missourian (the "Show Me" state), and this is a book that lives up to the "show me" standard, with all its points backup up by credible scientific research. Smart Exercise has been immensely helpful, and highly MOTIVATING in designing my own exercise program, and making sure it is doing what I want it to--feel fit, lose the spare tire, and live longer. If I could have only one book on fitness and exercise on my bookshelf, this would be the one.