Is Zone 2 Training Effective for Women? Dr. Stacy Sims on Fitness & Longevity Training | Be Well Moments

Is zone 2 training actually effective for women? In this conversation with Dr. Stacy Sims, she breaks down the science behind Zone 2 and explains why women may need to rethink how they train for fitness and longevity.Dr. Stacy Sims

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If you enjoyed this episode you might also like:

Dr. Stacy Sims EXPOSES the Myths Hurting Women's Health | Fasting, Protein & Exercise https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1uksGzoick

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#Zone2Training #DrStacySims #WomensHealth

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
There is a huge buzz online around zone 2 training and it's
kind of supposedly holds the keyto endurance and long term
health. And again, the buzzword of
longevity that, you know, we allwant to have first of all, like,
why should women care about this?
And is it, is it important? Does it like fit into a woman's

(00:23):
workout routine? Is this what we should be
thinking about as the golden child of endurance training?
And, and what is it? Because I think that that some
people might not know, but I think generally it's blown up
online. It's like this golden child of
women's training or training in general.
And I get so frustrated with it because again, when we're
looking at the data of Zone 2 right and we see who have pushed

(00:45):
it, it's the, you know, the two the two primary dudes that bio
hack and put the words out aboutit, very popular podcasts and
everyone say who they. Are.
Sure. Huberman and Atia, right.
And we know that they put that out there very Bruce science and
and as an exercise physiologist,I understand the zones and I

(01:07):
understand the idea of, yeah, wehave to have base miles.
But again, it's coming from thatmale data.
So if we pull it back and look from a physiological perspective
of why people are pushing zone 2is to improve metabolic
flexibility and the body's ability to uptake and utilize
free fatty acids. When we look at women who come

(01:28):
from XX, and I'll apologize in advance because we don't have
any data outside of the binary of XX versus XY, when a baby is
born XX, they're already born with more oxidative fibers, that
means endurance fibers. And we're also born with more
mitochondrial proteins within there to be metabolically

(01:49):
flexible. Then as we go through puberty
and we get the exposure of estrogen and progesterone, and
we have more influence on being metabolically flexible because
these two hormones change the way that our body responds to
carbohydrate across the menstrual cycle.
Then as we start getting into perimenopause, we might lose
those hormones, but we still have the undercurrent of

(02:11):
mitochondrial density and bettermitochondrial respiration than
men. What we need to do as women is
look and say, hey, wait, we don't have a lot of glycolytic
or type 2 fibers. So it's lactate producing
fibers. And we know that lactate
production is really, really important for brain health.
And if we don't use them, we spend so much time zone twoing,

(02:32):
then those crossover fibers are becoming more oxidative and
we're losing our body's ability to produce lactate, which is a
risk factor for dementia and Alzheimer's. 1 billion people
worldwide are deficient in this nutrient that so many of you
guys might not be aware of. And women, if you're listening,
you are more at risk of being deficient in this nutrient.

(02:55):
So I'm going to first of all explain what the physical
symptoms are. If you have cold hands and feet,
pale skin, extreme lack of energy or fatigue, then you
might be suffering with iron deficiency or anemia.
Now First off, please go to yourGP to get your iron levels
checked. Secondly, please explore a good
iron supplement. Many people that come to me are

(03:17):
worried about taking iron supplementation because it can
cause Constipation or GI distress.
That's why I'm so incredibly proud to be partnering for this
episode with Spartan, the numberone iron rich water supplement.
Now I've personally been using these for years.
The reason why is because they are naturally sourced, highly

(03:38):
absorbable iron. That means it's much more gentle
on your stomach. There's no harsh tablets, it's
just one naturally sourced ingredient that works very well.
You can pick it up in Boots or buy online at Amazon.
But please do not ignore this. It is really critical to make
sure your iron levels are in check, which is the leading

(04:00):
cause of death in the UKI just want to put that out there
because a lot of women in their 30s and 40s might not even be
thinking that this is a thing. It's the leading cause of death
in the UK. And it is a significant sex
difference. And I mean there's lots of
reasons from sociocultural and mind stimulation to the
population that's dying now. But a physiological basis

(04:22):
underneath is the plaque development and that comes from
misstep of the glial cells and the metabolism of the brain.
We start to become more hypo metabolic, meaning that our
brain doesn't use blood glucose very well, so it relies more and
more on lactate. And because women don't have a
lot of those glycolytic type 2 fibers, we're having more and
more difficulty producing that lactate.

(04:43):
So if we bring it back down to Zone 2, we don't need to do the
Zone 2 workouts that are being pushed so much.
If you have all the time in the world, right, and you're not
working and you can train as much as you want, sure, put in a
lot of Zone 2 because it is low intensity, it gets you out in
nature and it's great. But if you're looking to
maximize health and longevity, we need to take a step back from

(05:08):
that Zone 2 training as women and focus more on how are we
developing these glycolytic fibers?
How are we pushing true lactate production as the mainstay with
our resistance training, which is also super important for
brain health as well as maintaining lean mass, right?
So those become the mainstay andthen we look at Zone 2 as our

(05:29):
soul food, like we want to go out with friends on a hike or a
long ride or we're training for 1/2 marathon, right?
Because we have this goal. We still put a precedence on
that higher intensity, but we have time and a place for Zone 2
because it does fit in. But it does not mean that that's
what you have to do day in and day out for an hour and a half

(05:49):
because it's so time intensive and it's not as metabolically
stimulating in a positive mannerfor women.
Because being that CIS woman, that XX, you already have all of
the fat burning capacity and themetabolic flexibility that zone
2 is trying to push. So when I say you train for zone

(06:10):
two, men need to do it to becomemore like women.
God, that's the best line I've ever heard.
Men needs steps come more like women.
That's going to be the title of this podcast.
OK For any women that maybe you're like, oh, I didn't.
I'm not quite sure what Zone 2 is.
Can you give the definition of what Zone 2 training actually is
and where it like the parameters?

(06:31):
Yeah. So Zone 2 is typically said to
be the pace that you go, that you can maintain a conversation
where you're still a little bit breathless, you're might be
breaking a sweat, but it's pretty low intensity.
If you're looking on a rating and perceived exertion scale of
0 being like you're just waking up dead on the couch and 10

(06:53):
being maximum full gas Sprint. Zone 2 sits about a four.
So you're not going to easy, butyou're not going moderate to
hard either. And so people are like, OK, I'm
going to use a heart rate monitor.
So I make sure that I'm going really super easy so they can
stay in Zone 2, because a lot ofpeople don't realize how easy it
actually is. I'm going to give you 2

(07:14):
different subgroups. I'm going to give you a woman
kind of 30s to early 40s and then going more into
perimenopause into kind of the mid 40s to the mid 50s.
How should these two types of women be looking at their
training, whether it's own 2 or not?
What is their kind of a bit of like the plate that we made?

(07:35):
How should women be approaching their training in these two
different sets? Yeah, so across the board, all
women should be doing strength training.
And I don't mean our little pinkdumbbells and our 3K weights.
They. Are they're gone?
They're gone, Yeah. It's when you're in your
reproductive years or your younger years, you can play
around a little bit more about like your 11:50, your

(07:58):
hypertrophy stuff. But as we get into peri and
postmenopause, we really need tolook at the strength development
and do neural adaptations. So we know that when we're doing
the power based stuff that's more neurally adaptive, we are
also going to build lean mass and keep the impetus for
building lean mass. But if we're doing more
hypertrophy type training, we don't get strength, we just get

(08:19):
a little bit of lean mass build.So when we're looking at lifting
weights, we want to be strong. When we're looking at intensity
and what we're doing. It's paramount that women who
are perimenopausal into postmenopause do 2 to 3 high
intensity interval sessions a week.
So this is, you know, either Sprint interval that's your 30

(08:39):
seconds or less as hard as you can, or it's true high intensity
work, not AF 45 Orangetheory type class, but you know, you're
doing your every minute on the minute for three minutes and
then having a full minute off. And then you repeat that two or
three times done and dusted in 30 minutes.
And then for women who are in their their reproductive ears,

(08:59):
so their 30s and early 40s, you can get away with a lot of stuff
and, and play around a lot, right?
So yes, we want some high intensity who want polarization
because we want that lactate development with the eye to, I'm
getting older. I'm going to have to train my
body this way anyway, But there still is room if you want to go
and do ultra endurance stuff, right, You can still benefit
from that. The caveat of that is we don't

(09:23):
want you to keep training those oxidative fibers so much that
you're just going to keep getting slower and slower and
slower. We have to have an eye of
peppering it with that high intensity work too.
So if we're looking at our 30s to early 40s, have a play, don't
overtrain, eat well. You have a little bit of room to
do a lot of kind of fun stuff, and then we have to become a

(09:44):
little bit more dialed to what is the bread and butter for
longevity. When we get into our mid 40s
onwards, the bread and butter again is that heavy resistance
training peppered with some highintensity work.
And then if you're someone who'slike, I'm training for an ultra
run, how do I do this? Well, yeah, we look at what
you're doing when your event is.We can put in time on the feet,

(10:06):
but again, we really want to maintain that high intensity
quality work and then we see where we fit in the longer
stuff. And I think it's important,
right, to talk about this through the lifespan because I
guess, you know, we do need to start adapting as opposed to
just having a very rigid plan of, OK, I'll do a bit of
resistance training and I'll maybe do a run.
And that that's kind of it. And I'm not going to think about

(10:28):
changing my exercise routine at all.
Thanks so much for listening to hear the full episode.
There's a link in the description.