Home > Exercise > June
2008
Posted on June 30, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
The Detroit Free Press tips us off to some nifty exercise equipment. Take a look:
Resistance Bands
"The most beneficial equipment would be a set of resistance bands," says Ali Witherspoon, owner of A.L.I. Bootcamp in Hollywood, Fla. "They come in different strengths -- light, medium and heavy resistance -- to work your upper and lower body."
Ankle Weights
"With ankle weights, you can do a whole body workout, and ladies can do all leg exercises," says Natalie Brabner, owner of Florida Fitness Trainers in Aventura. You can tone your muscles and burn more calories just by wearing them throughout the day, and "while watching TV, you can do hip extensions and build your glutes."
Calisthenics
"There's nothing better than old-fashioned body-weight exercises," Thomas says. "They worked for Jack LaLanne and they will do the same for you." Calisthenics also have "what I call a survival slimming effect. Since you are lifting your own body weight, the body is forced to adapt. In other words, if you are heavy, this type of exercise will encourage weight loss out of the sheer will to survive."
Swiss ball
In addition to core training, such as sit-ups, which can be done on the Swiss ball, you can perform stretches and explosive athletic exercises, Thomas says. "This makes the ball the Swiss Army knife of fitness."
I haven’t done jumping-jacks since high school.
Posted on June 28, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Central Park might not have been built for running, but it’s actually becoming a great place to jog. Liz Robbins of
The New York Times reports:
For those who choose to push the boundaries of Central Park, there is every type of workout — speed, hills, distance and exploration — for every kind of runner.
Start with the 4.2 miles of dirt bridle path, in three connected sections, which offer the truest sanctuary.
From there emerges a web of paved and wood-chipped trails, adding miles and topographical variety to any run.
Even at the risk of seeing those routes become more worn, coaches, local runners and staff members of the New York Road Runners shared their favorite off-the-beaten-path runs.
Consider this a primer for thinking, and then running, outside the loop.
I’ve walked through Central Park countless times, but haven’t jogged it yet. I’ll add it to my to-do list!
Posted on June 26, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Listen, we all don’t have the time to rock climb, ski, or hike. So, just how does your average Joe stay fit?
The Detroit Free Press called for submissions. Here’re some stories that caught my eye:
"A young colleague at work turned me onto 'Dance Dance Revolution.' It helped me lose about 12 pounds." Brian Nichols, 42, Livonia
"I have a 7-year-old daughter, Miranda, and just keeping up with her is a real workout. She's involved with soccer, swimming, and tae kwon do. She and I spend a good deal of time working on her skills. As a result, I too get a decent workout." Eric Stileski, 46, and Miranda Stileski, 7, Waterford
"In my attempts to get fit and stay healthy, I find taking my dog, Eddie, for walks to be most rewarding." Jessica Shuler, 26, Novi
"I play Wallyball during the winter months and do strength and flexibility exercises at home to stay fit, and with the nicer weather, have been walking and riding my bike. Wallyball is volleyball played inside of a racquetball court." Kim Howard, 42, Novi
"I Rollerblade, walk briskly on a treadmill, play the Nintendo Wii and use an exercise ball and hand weights." Miria Strzalkowski, 39, New Baltimore
Actually, this is a good question. How do all of you stay fit? You can check out my exercise routine in this post:
Blogging and Dieting, a Follow Up...
Posted on June 24, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
One gym is turning to
ellipitical machines to help generate electricity. More from
That’sFit:
The elliptical machines at my local Gainesville Health & Fitness Center are being used for more than health and fitness. They're being used to convert the energy spent exercising into something pretty darn useful: Electrical power.
Credit for this energetic feat goes to Hudson Harr, the 22-year-old who came up with the ReCardio system -- a patent-pending technology currently wired to 15 elliptical machines and working to convert the kinetic energy from pushing pedals into electricity. The power produced by the machines is plugged straight into the utility grid, which helps produce power for the gym and offsets utility costs. Each elliptical machine can produce one kilowatt of electricity every 10 hours -- enough to charge the battery for a 2004 Toyota Prius once or a cell phone up to 397 times. So far, 150 kilowatts of electricity has been produced.
Pretty cool! I’m always on the ellipticals.
Posted on June 20, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Recently the IceNewtwork.com interviewed Dr. Fuhrman about his previous life as a figure skater and his current life as a nutrition guru. Here’s a bit:
"When I was a skater, I was always reading about nutrition, even as a teenager," says Fuhrman. Although he attended college and earned good grades, figure skating was his primary focus. When it became clear his skating career was over, he started to think about the next phase of his life. He'd graduated from college with an economics and business major and started coaching skating and working in his father's shoe business. Then he decided he wanted to go to medical school, so he took the pre-med program at Columbia.
"It was a gradual thing through my teenage years and early 20s. I had that passion for nutrition," Fuhrman says. "I felt the only way I could really express it and have an effect on society and use nutrition as medical therapy would be to get a medical degree. So I went to medical school with the idea in mind I was going to be a doctor specializing in nutrition."
Dr. Joel Fuhrman is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Health Association and serves on the Advisory Panel of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. He is a certified family physician with a nutritional specialty. He is considered a leading expert on nutrition and natural healing. His 2003 best-selling book, Eat to Live: The Revolutionary Plan for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss, has gone through 17 printings.
To see Dr. Fuhrman in action, check out his 1973 winning routine.
Posted on June 20, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Karen Voight of
The Los Angeles Times offers up
a great back stretch you can do without even getting up. Take a look:
Looks like a lazy version of
Trikonasana or Triangle Pose. Via
ABC-of-Yoga.com:
I’m all about strengthening you back.
I exercise my back almost everyday.
Posted on June 19, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
A Dutch study insists that physical training should be part of a cancer patient’s rehabilitation.
Reuters reports:
After being treated for cancer, people showed significant improvements in physical function and vitality for up to three months after completing a 12-week training program. They also felt healthier, Dr. Bart van den Borne of Maastricht University and colleagues found.
Adding cognitive behavioral therapy to the mix didn't result in additional improvements, van den Borne and his team report in the medical journal Psychosomatic Medicine, but they say it's too early to conclude that this type of counseling has no value for patients.
More and more people are surviving cancer, the researchers note, but as many as 30 percent say their quality of life has been reduced and that they could use help with both physical and psychosocial issues.
To investigate what type of rehab program might be most effective, van den Borne and his colleagues randomly assigned 209 patients who had completed cancer treatment to a physical training program, or to physical training plus a weekly cognitive behavioral training session, or to a waiting list.
Exercise, always a good idea! Be sure to check out
DiseaseProof’s exercise category.
Posted on June 18, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Promoting bicycling among citizens has saved Australian public health services millions! Via
TreeHugger:
A new report, has after analysing the data, come up with a figure for the public health benefit offered by cycling. The study, Cycling: Getting Australia Moving, funded by the Australian government and prepared by Melbourne University and the Cycling Promotion Fund concluded that thanks to the increased health of cyclists, public health services are spared an estimated $227.2m AUD annually.
They also noted that per 100,000 participants, an individual is seven times more likely to be hospitalised playing football than riding a bicycle. And observed that “the more cyclists there are, the safer it becomes. In fact, if cycling doubles, the risk per kilometre falls by 34%.” The report’s authors were pleased to find that between 2001 and 2006 bicycle journeys to work had risen 22% in Australian capital cities, with Melbourne being the standout, recording over a 42% increase.
With the cost of gas off the charts, maybe Americans should start bicycling more.
Posted on June 17, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
According to a new study fitness is a very important component in determine male diabetics’ lifespan. Kevin McKeever of
HealthDay News is on it:
"Death rates were the highest for those who were 'low fit' in all weight categories," researcher Dr. Roshney Jacob-Issac, an endocrinology fellow at George Washington University Hospital, said in a prepared statement.
Researchers used 2,690 male diabetic veterans in VA hospitals, most of whom were overweight or obese based on their body mass index (BMI), a measure of body fat using height and weight.
The vets were categorized as having low, moderate or high fitness level, depending on their performance on a standard treadmill exercise tolerance test.
The researchers found that the higher the man's level of fitness, the lower his risk of dying during the study period. For example, those in the high fitness level -- whether at normal body weight or overweight -- reduced their risk of death by 40 percent. The findings were even more dramatic for those classified as obese but in reasonable good shape: a cut in death risk of 52 percent, when compared to peers not physically fit, the study found during its seven-year follow-up period.
"Diabetics should improve their fitness level or exercise capacity to at least a moderate level, by being physically active. Weight loss is great, but being active is just as important," Jacob-Issac advised.
If you ask me, exercise is always a good idea!
Posted on June 16, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Can’t sleep? Well,
a new study has determined that moderate aerobic exercise can ease the symptoms of insomnia. Robert Preidt of
HealthDay News reports:
Researchers at the Federal University of Sao Paulo divided 28 women and eight men with primary chronic insomnia into three exercise groups -- moderate aerobic, heavy aerobic, and moderate strength -- and one control group.
After the exercise session, those who did moderate aerobic exercise showed reductions in sleep onset latency (54 percent) and wake time (36 percent) and increases in total sleep time (21 percent) and sleep efficiency (18 percent). They also showed a 7 percent decrease in anxiety.
"These findings indicate that there is a way to diminish the symptoms of insomnia without using medication," study author Giselle S. Passos said in a prepared statement.
Sometimes I get up so early to exercise. It feels like I have insomnia.
Posted on June 10, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
I admit it. I used to collect action figures. It started as a kid with
Transformers and
Ninja Turtles and continued with pro-wrestling as a teenager. So, obviously these
Yoga figurines have captured my now twenty-something attention.
The Seattle Times reports:
"When I am showing them poses, I also am giving them a visual," Raymond D. Fogleman said. "It's very hard when you are learning to keep that visual in your mind."
To help novices when they are practicing alone, the Hummelstown, Pa., man created 16 3-D action figures to illustrate yoga's controlled breathing and stretching techniques. He calls his product "3-D Yogis and Yoginis Box of Poses."
Fogleman, 43, started studying yoga 14 years ago and has been teaching full time since 2003. He got the idea for the statuettes after finding a toy soldier in a collection of toys three years ago. He realized that the antithesis to a soldier would be a yoga figure.
The plastic statuettes are 3 inches tall or 3 inches wide depending on the pose. Each has a 1-by-2-inch base. Each of the eight yogis (male) and eight yoginis (female) statuettes has a number and a code embossed in its base. The code corresponds to an explanation of the pose in an accompanying instructional guide.
Yoga has been practiced for thousands of years in India. It is based on the principle of mind-body unity. Estimates are that 20 million people in America practice some form of yoga.
Sorry, curiosity killed my cat. Check out these photos from
Raymond’s website:
Yoga is great exercise, but I doubt reenacting the
Civil War with these figures will burn as many calories.
Posted on June 10, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Here’s an article from Dr. Fuhrman's colleague Dr. Steven Acocella, MS, D.C., DACBN, Board Certified Clinical Nutritionist, American College of Lifestyle Physicians, and a Diplomat of the American Clinical Board of Nutrition:
In disease free individuals resting pulse rates reflect our current state of fitness. Being aware of our pulse rate can help us avoid injury when beginning an exercise regime, measure the effectiveness of various exercise routines and determine if we are under or over training. By monitoring our heart rate throughout an exercise session we can adjust our efforts in real time so that we achieve our desired results and goals. Using our heart rate as a guide we can specifically focus on improving cardiovascular health, maximizing body fat reduction, improving stamina and endurance or build lean-muscle mass. As we become more fit, plotting our resting heart rate over a period of time on a graph will demonstrate our progress as clearly as fitting into those skinny jeans again!
Heart rate training is based upon a key anchor point, our maximum heart rate (MHR). From our MHR we derive heart rate training zones. As we will see later, these zones help us target the results we want and achieve those goals from our efforts. There are 3 ways to determine what our individual MHR is, a strictly mathematical formula based on age or by measuring our heart rate during actual exercise. There are 2 methods that use our ‘perceived level of exertion’ (how we feel) during actual exercise. I prefer these exertion-based methods of capturing MHR as they better reflect individual fitness level and ability. However, a resent study reviewed some 50 different mathematical MHR formulas and identified the most reliable and accurate calculation method. The study found that the maximum heart rates obtained using this formula varied only fractionally when compared to exercise derived MHR’s in the same subjects. Certainly, for the average fitness enthusiast, both methods are useful and valid. I will present the mathematical and exercise derived methods in this article.
There are two ways to obtain your pulse, manually by feel or by using a heart rate monitor. Heart rate monitors use a transmitter housed in a chest strap worn during exercise; this device detects the heart’s electrical activity and then send this information to a receiver, usually housed in a wrist watch which displays heart rate and other data. Once only available to professional athletes, personal heart rate monitors are quite inexpensive and accessible to most of us weekend warriors. If you shop for a monitor I recommend you find one with a built in “Fit Test”, a program to calculate your heart rate zones via a guided exercise routine. Many home and most club gym exercise machines have heart rate monitor receivers built right into them. If you have access to these machines you may only need to purchase the chest strap. Some machines with built-in receivers even adjust the workout intensity automatically based upon the user’s target heart rate zones!
If you don’t have a monitor here are a few tips on taking your pulse directly. You can take your pulse on the underside of your wrist on the thumb side using your 1st and 2nd fingers (never use your thumb to take a pulse). Or, some prefer to take the carotid pulse located on the front side of your neck about 1/3 of the way down and about an inch on either side of center. Practice locating your pulse. Once you’re good at finding and feeling the pulsing blood vessel, use a second hand watch and count the pulses for 60 seconds, this is your current heart rate. Once you’re proficient you can count the pulse for 30 seconds and simply double the number. Be sure to master pulse taking before you need to do it during a heart rate test or when exercising.
Firstly, let’s determine your MHR mathematically. Simply plug your age into this equation: MHR = 205.8 – (0.685 x AGE)
For example, the MHR for a 45 year old is: MHR = 205.8 – (0.685 x 45) = 175 Beats per Minute
Now let’s look at the methods that use exercise to capture MHR. The first method, known as the Sub-Maximal HR Test is useful for people that are just beginning an exercise program, recovering from an injury, medical procedure or anyone not in good enough shape to push themselves to their absolute limit. This method instead derives MHR by estimating or extrapolating from a heart rate obtained from a less than all out effort. This test is most accurate when supervised by a professional but an average test is still quite useful.
Using walking as the ‘control effort’ - map out a 1 mile course, a ¼ mile track is optimal but not mandatory. Walk briskly (without jogging) pushing yourself into a challenging but comfortable stride. A good rule of thumb is the talk test, i.e., you should be able to maintain a conversation during this level of effort. At about the ¾ mile mark, without stopping, take your pulse. Keep walking and repeat taking your pulse a couple more times during the last quarter mile. If there is more than a few beats difference in each heart rate simply add them together and take the average to obtain a more accurate number. If you are using a heart rate monitor simply note your HR 3 times during the last ¼ mike and take that average. Now that you have your sub-maximal heart rate, add 50 beats per minute (BPM) to that number to calculate your MHR. Again, this is a working ball-park average but it’s still very useful especially for those of us closing the doughnut box and getting off the couch for the first time.
Finally, we’ll look at obtaining a MHR from the Maximal Effort Method. This method should be utilized only by those whom are already fit and in good cardiovascular health. Be forewarned that this method is quite challenging. Choose an activity such as biking, an elliptical machine, treadmill or any aerobic activity in which your body position is upright. I do not recommend recumbent exercises or swimming for the Maximal HR Test as MHR can be sport specific and these activities have the greatest variation.
The Maximal Effort Method test is designed to last about 15 minutes. Begin to exercise and after about a 3 minute warm-up begin to exercise at the level of effort described for the sub-maximal test. Maintain this level for a full 10 minutes. Once you are at this 10 minute mark the fun begins. Over about a minute, accelerate and intensify your effort until you can push no more. You should be at a level of effort that is very uncomfortable and barely sustainable. After pushing yourself at this highly competitive pace for about a minute note the reading on your heart rate monitor or take your pulse (ask a partner to help you by tracking the time for you) while maintaining your pace. It is this pulse rate during this final minute that is your MHR. Once you have obtained it you can then slow down, cool down and then fall down!
So, now that you have obtained your MHR from the mathematical or effort derived methods we’ll apply this information to get results from our workouts. The broadest application is to define a single target heart rate range to make sure you are getting something out of your workouts. This is a general heart rate range that is required to improve respiratory capacity, cardiovascular health and general overall fitness. This HR range is 60 – 85 percent of our MHR. To find your range simply calculate these 2 numbers:
- Lower limit of Heart Rate Range = MHR X .60
- Upper Limit of Heart Rate Range = MHR X .85
So, our 45 year old with a MHR of 175 BPM would have a beneficial heart rate training range of 105 BPM – 149 BPM (175 X .60 and 175 X .85).
Here’s where monitoring your heart rate during exercise begins to become useful. As we become more fit, activities that initially brought our heart rate into a beneficial range become too easy. But many of us continue our routines and hence our efforts become less productive as they no longer stress our bodies to the point of gaining improved fitness; this ‘staleness’ is avoided by heart rate guided training. We can engage the same activities but are forced to work harder to bring our heart rate into this beneficial zone. But this is only one application. MHR can be tailored for much more specific training goals.
By breaking this wide training range into more narrow ‘zones’ we can use heart rate data to customize our workout intensities for optimal and specific results. Generally, I use 4 reference zones. All are expressed as a percentage of MHR with an upper and lower limit. Although there are overlapping benefits, generally speaking each zone has a particular result associated with it. The percentages of MHR for each zone are:
- Zone I – Light Intensity 60 -70 percent of MHR
- Zone II – Moderate Intensity 70 -80 percent of MHR
- Zone III – Heavy Intensity 80 -90 percent of MHR
- Zone IV – Maximum Intensity > 90 percent of MHR
So, again using our 45 year old as an example our target heart rates would be:
- ZI = 105-122 BPM
- ZII = 123-139 BPM
- ZIII = 140-157 BPM
- ZIV = 158-175 BPM
Here’s an overview for each zone:
Zone I – This is the easiest level of intensity you can work at and still gain benefit. It’s best used for overall health, flexibility and agility and maintaining a weight reduction. This is an excellent zone to stay within during the first 1 -3 months of beginning an exercise plan to avoid injury, especially for those who have not engaged in a fitness program for a long time. It’s also the warm-up and cool down zone to enter into or come out of more intense exercise.
Exercise at this level should feel easy and pass the ‘talk test’. You should never be out of breath, feel any pain or burning and be able to maintain this effort indefinitely.
Zone II –Working out in this zone effectively builds endurance, stamina and muscle tone without significant increase in girth. It’s also excellent for cardiac strengthening and building co-lateral circulation (adding more small blood vessels in the extremities). This is an excellent zone to stay in during the first 2-4 months of training.
When in this zone breathing should be slightly labored but not difficult. You can still converse comfortably. You should not be in a ‘no-pain, no-gain’ condition but may need to vary your effort from time to time. When fit you should be able to maintain this level of effort for a few hours.
Zone III - This is the best zone to use stored fat for energy, i.e., the most efficient weight loss or ‘fat burn zone’. Zone III balances maximum caloric demand while still remaining under the anaerobic threshold, the key criteria for burning fat. In less fit people training in this zone too soon uses more glucose than fat for energy. As we become more fit and can maintain this level of intensity for longer periods of time it becomes fueled by an increasing percentage of energy from stored fat. This is why you often hear people say that they started working out and are “exercising like crazy but not losing any weight”. This is exactly why I recommend to patients that want to lose weight and are just starting out that they exercise in Zone II for a while. Pushing too far too soon can be counter-productive. It takes time for the chemical plant in our muscles to adapt to the new demands of exercise. The cells that use oxygen in producing energy increase over time (this is known as Davis’s Law) so that we can sustain a Zone III level effort for longer and longer. It’s the physiological equivalent to learning to walk before you can run, or perhaps this analogy can be applied literally!
Exercising in this zone should be quite challenging but still not painful. It’s the highest zone you can be in and still be able to carry on a conversation, albeit difficult and in-between breaths. You should be able to maintain this intensity for up to about 1 hour but that may be much shorter initially and increase proportional to you level of fitness.
Zone IV – This is the anaerobic zone whereby we use primarily glycogen (glucose stored in muscle tissue) for energy. This zone contributes greatly to the efficiency by which our muscles can burn fat in the lower zones. By pushing ourselves into this zone we raise our ‘lactate threshold’, the line between using fat verses sugar as a caloric energy source. The more time we can stay in zone IV the higher our lactate threshold and the longer and stronger we can perform athletically. This zone ‘ramps-up’ our muscles to burn fat while we’re at rest by making our ‘oven’ more efficient. Most importantly, this is the zone where the most dramatic muscle building gains live. We could call it the Buff-Zone!
Exercise in this zone can be maintained for only very short periods of time, usually seconds to a few minutes maximum. If you can maintain this zone for longer than 3 minutes you are either not in this anaerobic zone or your name is Lance Armstrong. You can not talk during this level of exertion and are in significant pain. There is no significant fat weight loss in this zone but rather a break down of muscle tissue that leads to growth. This is the ‘no-pain, no gain’ zone and if you’re in it you should be hating life.
Remember, as you become more and more fit the beneficial changes that take place are reflected in your heart rate. Make a chart and plot your resting pulse by taking it first thing in the morning before you get out of bed. Do this for a few months and you’ll see over time the line slopes lower and lower! As your resting pulse plummets the range of your resting heart rate and your MHR increases allowing your heart to work less hard at the same level of effort. By using your heart rate as a barometer of how hard you are exercising you will avoid boredom, progress plateaus and stagnation.
You are now armed with valuable and useful information about heart rate training. You can now see how knowing and using your heart rate can help you maximize weight loss goals, achieve those 6-pack abs and keep you moving onward and upward to the fittest you possible. I applaud you for taking the time to read this article, see you in the gym!
Posted on June 6, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
A new study claims short high-intensity workouts are just as heath health as endurance training.
The New York Times Well blog is on it:
Researchers at McMaster University in Canada recruited 20 healthy men and women whose average age was 23. All of the study subjects rode stationary bikes. Some exercised five days a week, doing 40 to 60 minutes of moderate-intensity cycling. Others did four to six sets of 30-second sprints on the cycle, allowing 4.5 minutes of recovery time between sets; their total exercise time was about 15 to 25 minutes just three days a week.
After six weeks, the researchers found that the intense sprint interval training improved the structure and function of arteries as much as traditional, longer endurance exercise.
“More and more, professional organizations are recommending interval training during rehabilitation from diseases like chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, peripheral artery disease and cardiovascular disease,'’ said Maureen MacDonald, academic advisor and an associate professor in the department of kinesiology.
I do both. I run for a steady pace and then I sprint the last leg—it’s not how you start, but how you finish! Here’s more on my exercise routine:
Blogging and Dieting, a Follow Up.
Posted on June 6, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Protein shakes are a mega business—saturated in hype. Dr. Fuhrman talks about it in
How Safe Are Protein Drinks And Powders? Here’s a snippet:
Unfortunately, most trainers and bodybuilders are influenced by what they read in exercise and bodybuilding magazines. This is worse than getting nutritional information from comic books. Look through any current bodybuilding magazine; what are the vast majority of advertisements selling? Supplements! Most of the pages in these magazines are devoted to pushing worthless powders and pills. Supplement companies slant the opinions of the magazine article writers. The articles in the magazines are geared to support their advertisers.
Our entire society is on a protein binge, brainwashed with misinformation that we have been hearing since childhood. The educational materials used in most schools have been provided free by the meat, dairy, and egg industries for more than seventy years. These industries have successfully lobbied the government, resulting in favorable laws, subsidies, and advertising propaganda that promote corporate profits at the expense of national health. As a result, Americans have been programmed with dangerous information…
…Nutritional supplements can be marketed without FDA approval of safety or effectiveness. Athletes who choose to ingest these supplements should be concerned with the safety of long-term use. They are low-nutrient, low-fiber, highly-processed, high-calorie “foods,” whose consumption reduces the phytochemical density of your diet.
Ingesting more protein than your body needs is not a small matter. It ages you prematurely and can cause significant harm. The excess protein you do not use is not stored by your body as protein; it is converted to fat or eliminated via the kidneys. Eliminating excess nitrogen via your urine leaches calcium and other minerals from your bones and breeds kidney stones.
And now
The New York Times investigates what you need for a long workout; protein or carbohydrates. Gina Kolata reports:
Dr. Tarnopolsky, a 45-year-old trail runner and adventure racer, might be expected to seize upon the nutritional advice. (He won the Ontario trail running series in 2004, 2005 and 2006.)
So might his colleague, Stuart Phillips, a 41-year-old associate professor of kinesiology at McMaster who played rugby for Canada’s national team and now plays it for fun. He also runs, lifts weights and studies nutrition and performance.
In fact, neither researcher regularly uses energy drinks or energy bars. They just drink water, and eat real food. Dr. Tarnopolsky drinks fruit juice; Dr. Phillips eats fruit. And neither one feels a need to ingest a special combination of protein and carbohydrates within a short window of time, a few hours after exercising.
There are grains of truth to the nutrition advice, they and other experts say. But, as so often happens in sports, those grains of truth have been expanded into dictums and have formed the basis for an entire industry in “recovery” products.
They line the shelves of specialty sports stores and supermarkets with names like Accelerade drink, Endurox R4 powder, PowerBar Recovery bar.
“It does seem to me that as a group, athletes are particularly gullible,” said Michael Rennie, a physiologist at the University of Nottingham in England who studies muscle metabolism.
The idea that what you eat and when you eat it will make a big difference in your performance and recovery “is wishful thinking,” said Dr. Rennie, a 61-year-old who was a competitive swimmer and also used to play water polo and rugby.
I don’t bother with any of these “energy” products. The only thing I eat, either before or after my workouts, is
my chocolate pudding.
Posted on June 5, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Using surveillance of hospital staff to observe the ways the wipes are used routinely, researchers discovered hospital workers were using the same antimicrobial wipe on many surfaces, from bed rails to monitors, tables, and keypads. One wipe was frequently used to wipe down several surfaces or to wipe down the same surface repeatedly before being thrown away.
The research team then replicated the disinfecting methods they’d observed for laboratory analysis. The lab findings showed that some wipes were more effective than others at removing bacteria from hard surfaces but they did not kill them. When the bacteria-laden wipe was used repeatedly on one surface or on several, it spread the bacteria instead of eliminating it.
The Agriculture Department, which detected the flu in samples tested at its Ames, Iowa, laboratories, said the H7N3 strain of influenza isn't dangerous to humans. Although the Tyson flock of 15,000 chickens is being destroyed, regulators aren't blocking U.S. consumers from eating chicken raised in Arkansas, the largest poultry-producing state after Georgia.
The Tyson label has been a point of contention and confusion since it was cleared by the Agriculture Department in May 2007. As the department was moving to rescind the label, Tyson officials tried to beat regulators to the punch by announcing earlier this week that it was "voluntarily" withdrawing the label.
Removing the label quickly is a logistical and financial headache for Tyson, which said Tuesday that the Agriculture Department's June 18 deadline is "unrealistic." Tyson says it has "several months" of chicken labeled "antibiotic-free" in storage.
Agriculture Minister Chung Woon-chun said earlier Tuesday that Seoul had asked the U.S. to refrain from exporting any beef from cattle 30 months of age and older, considered at greater risk of the illness.
Presidential spokesman Lee Dong-kwan said the president told a weekly Cabinet meeting that "it is natural not to bring in meat from cattle 30 months of age and older as long as the people do not want it."
The spokesman also expressed hope that the United States would respect South Korea's position following large-scale anti-government protests over the weekend.
The risk of being hospitalized was greatest among babies 6 months old and younger, but the increased risk persisted up until the children were 8 years old, Dr. M. K. Kwok of the University of Hong Kong and colleagues found. Children who were premature or low birth weight were particularly vulnerable.
The findings suggest that secondhand smoke exposure may not only be harmful to children's respiratory tracts, but to their immune systems as well, Kwok and colleagues say.
Hong Kong banned smoking in public places in 2007, but babies and children may still be exposed to secondhand smoke at home, the researchers note in their report in the journal Tobacco Control. While the danger smoke exposure poses to children's developing respiratory systems is well understood, less is known about its effects on overall infection risks.
Scientists previously thought that fat cells were relatively passive and inert. Now they have evidence that fat cells are metabolically active, continuously communicating with the brain and other organs through at least 25 hormones and other signaling chemicals.
For example, fat cells seem to release hormones that inform the brain how much energy is left and when to stop (or start) eating, guide muscles in deciding when to burn fat and tell the liver when to replenish its fat stores.
All this cross talk can be a mixed blessing in the body, however. A healthy population of fat cells, for example, helps the immune system fight off infection by releasing chemicals that cause mild inflammation. But an overactive group of fat cells might keep the inflammation permanently in the "on" position, eventually leading to heart disease.
Adult-onset asthma, like other inflammatory diseases that disproportionately affect women such as rheumatoid arthritis and lupus, may be a relatively strong risk factor for heart disease and stroke, Dr. Stephen J. Onufrak from the US Department of Agriculture, Stoneville, Mississippi told Reuters Health.
Onufrak and colleagues used data from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study to examine the association of asthma with the risks of heart disease and stroke according to gender.
They found that, compared with their counterparts without asthma, women with adult-onset asthma had a 2.10-fold increase in the rate of heart disease and a 2.36-fold increase in the rate of stroke.
There was no association between childhood- or adult-onset asthma and heart disease or stroke in men, or between childhood-onset asthma and heart or stroke in women.
Researchers found that among 9,100 middle-aged men at higher-than- average risk of heart disease, those with gout were more likely to die of a heart attack or other cardiovascular cause over 17 years.
The findings should give men with gout extra incentive to have a doctor assess their cardiac risks, lead researcher Dr. Eswar Krishnan told Reuters Health.
And if they have modifiable risk factors -- like high cholesterol, high blood pressure or excess pounds -- it will be particularly important to get them under control, noted Krishnan, an assistant professor at Stanford University School of Medicine.
Give Yourself Permission to Do Less.
If you're struggling to exercise at all, bribe yourself with a mini-workout--it's better than none. You may not need to, once you get going, but the "permission" should be sincere. It's not the end of the world to shave off 10 minutes of cardio or skip a few strength training exercises. Check your routine for duplicate exercises that work the same muscles --you may be able to alternate rather than doing them all every time. If the thought of an easier workout gets you out the door, it's well worth doing "less" sometimes.
Change Routes and Routines.
Another obvious tip, but one we don't do often enough. If you exercise outdoors and have found the "best" route available for your run or walk, it can be tempting to just stick to it until you are totally sick of it but don't even realize it. Find new routes, or if there are none, revisit rejects that seemed too hilly or busy or boring--they may make a good change of pace even if they're not perfect.
Posted on June 4, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
Here’s another eco-friendly travel method that also doubles as a great work out. Introducing the
RailRunner. Via
TreeHugger:
Cool, but not as exciting as the
Trailcart.
Posted on June 3, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
