Gymrats - Sharing Tips/information

[Jennin]

Hi BodyBlitz, are you a personal trainer? I'm trying to lose some weight and i'm looking for someone who can train with me.

[BodyBlitz]

Hi BodyBlitz, are you a personal trainer? I'm trying to lose some weight and i'm looking for someone who can train with me.

I am however I don't wish to take on clients who are half-hearted or wants a quick fix, because it is a waste of their time and money; I'm not a miracle fat loss person, it takes time, effort and dedication.

Also it'll be a negative influence on themselves as it'll push back their mindset towards a healthy lifestyle even further - e.g "All the diets I've tried and exercise i've done is useless. I've done everything i could, looks like i'm destined to be fat and out of shape."

I want you to ask yourself these questions before making your decision.

1. Do you wish to train because of peer pressure or because you feel a need to invest in your health and fitness? - If you know how it benefits your quality of life and improves your health in the long run you'll see a bigger meaning than just aesthetics and it'll help motivate yourself when the going gets tough.

2. Are you willing to go all the way to achieve your fitness and nutrition goals and put in 110%? - Making lifestyle changes, putting in the effort to make time to work out and prepared for hard work.

3. What if you fail? Are you going to pick yourself up and keep trying or just give up? - Changing your lifestyle is going to be hard, there will be set backs and possible failures. But as the saying goes - "If something is worth doing well, it’s worth doing badly at first." Are you going to pick yourself up and keep trying knowing that going help you in the long run or are you just looking for a quick fix?

Please think about it, if you have further questions feel free to ask any question here so that everyone can benefit from your questions.
When you're ready with your resolution, let me know how i can help you with it.

[BodyBlitz]

Nutrition is key to any goal for your health, be it just staying healthy or performance and physique. It is one of the fundamental elements to success in your goals and one that is often overlooked. There is a saying, "you cannot out train a crappy diet." This is true because it is like using lousy fuel for a good car and it is an investment to your health and fitness goal.

Taking on a new diet regime is like a first date - will you like what you see? Is it love at first sight or will it be "okay call you later.." and never bother to contact him/her again.

I remember my first experience embarking on a new nutritional regime, making drastic changes and trying to keep within the parameters. It sounded great on paper and almost relatively easy to do but when i actually got down to do it, it was nightmare and a very stressful event.

I went around the supermarket wandering aimlessly, staring at food labels after food labels, putting items into my basket and then putting them back when i found a better one numerous times. I could have sworn this was the longest time i spent in a supermarket just trying to get everything i needed - 3 hours to be exact.

What i learned from this event was that i now knew what i should be looking for and which brand was the better choice. I can easily tell you the prices and which brand of canned tuna is a better choice.

So if you're embarking on a new regime, spend sometime to be "in the trenches"(supermarket) learning about what suits best for your taste and meeting the requirements/limitation to your regime.

It can be quite fun as you'll feel like you're playing treasure hunting, looking for the best bargain/product however if you're pressed for time, doing your research prior and having a list on what to get and where you can find it, would cut short your shopping time. This is a better for people who get distracted and end up buying more junk.

So now with everything in cart, i headed home to be even more frustrated. I had no idea where to start, what to cook and which ingredients should i use. I simply bought everything i thought would be a great addition to my regime.

In all seriousness, I feel variety is overrated. It is more of a pain than luxury unless you love to cook and have a lot of time to experiment. However for a person hard pressed for time, its hard to even to try to get my meals packed and ready to go before i leave for work.

After some culinary experiments, my list of meals were quite standard - 3-4 different variation which i can whip up easily to get a meal done fast. I considered them the foundation to my regime because it is the few options off the top of my head whenever i get hungry or whenever i wish to cook.

However the most important aspect to limiting your choices is that you know exactly where to get your ingredients, how to prepare it and with enough time spent, make it taste good.

What you need to note with limiting your choices is that you can rely on them which is important. Convenience will always be useful, because you won't result to eating food you buy outside which you cannot control what they put inside and also it doesn't give you any excuse to eat junk, which is the root of most problems.

to be continued..

[BodyBlitz]

Like any human, sometimes i forget to pack my meals. Like any normal human, sometimes the food i usually eat gets boring. 8 weeks into the diet, limiting my choices had its draw backs.

My taste buds staged a mutiny, and my mind was growing weak to curb the desire to eat something else.

I looked for alternative sources of food to eat and found that there are healthier choices. First off, i found Cold storage to be a great source of quick fixes when i forget to pack my food or had to time to prepare one.

For $7, a whole roasted spring chicken could be split into 4 meals or 2 meals if you're hungry. If Cold storage wasn't near by, i'll go to a store selling chicken with rice.

For $5 you can get a decent meal of about 150grams of chicken + some cucumber ( tell them you want the chicken only, no rice). Or if you like fish, there are stores selling boiled sliced fish with some vegetables and tomato. You can get about 100grams of fish or so.

If all else failed, you can go to any supermarket and pick up 2 cans of Tuna Mayonnaise - Ayam Brand for about $2.10
I like this option because its portable and convenient; find a spot to sit, open the can up and dig in and dispose the can after.

Take home point is that you can always find alternative, if there is a will there a way.

Although i'm not a big fan of counting calories, sometimes its better to go the hard way and discipline yourself to do it.

I couldn't care less in the past because i thought it was troublesome, then i started a food and workout log and found that it helped me troubleshoot many things.

It helped me see what i was usually eating, helped me understood my body better and also got me to think about my choices. Without it, i would be without eyes wading through the dark trying to figure out why it worked and why it didn't.

Its a pain honestly but is it worth it? Definitely.

With the food log, i know how much i need to gain/lose/maintain my optimal composition, which nutrients would cause it and which one would help me aid in my fitness goal.

I keep two logs now, one on www.fitday.com and on a notebook which i scribble down the combination of what i eat as a meal.

If you're serious about your progress, then a log is a must. Like a business without accounts, you won't know if you're losing money or earning and that's bad practice. Before you know it, you'd go belly up(pun intended)!

[BodyBlitz]

recipe -

Ingredients
300 grams chicken breast without skin (Marinate with salt and black pepper)
200 grams spinach
3 stalks of red chili ( if you like spicy meals)

Stir fry with butter and garlic chops -
Chicken first till they are golden brown then add the vegetables in.

Easy meal that is tasty.

[sundaymorningstaple]

Actually, to make that even healthier than it already is (and I know, I eat enough of it for the past year), instead of using butter, use Pam (spray lubricant) or only a wipe of extra virgin olive oil. Or, for added flavouring that will not do any harm at all, instead of oil or butter, use a mixture of Balsamic Vinegar and water to cook in. Excellent.

[ksl]

I enjoyed the read, and yes i have been a gym rat for over 40 years, missing only the occassional 2 to 3 month break a year.
I believe in most of what you have to offer, although from my secondary school runs, until i joined the army, i hated running but loved all out door sports.

Your break down of body size is far too simplistic and generalised, which one must expect when dealing with the masses, I say that because I have a main frame with a BMI of 30, which in accordance with the index is obese, at 170cm yet when i am in training, i will eventually have a waistline of 32/33 chest 45 and kneck 17, with biceps at 16.5 wrist 9 inch, calf muscles 16 inch......at 58, and having studied nutrients, body building techniques, fitness training and interval trg, i have still only one goal in mind and that is to beat myself, every time that i set out to do it within a certain time period.

I find this quite strange, when i have never ever wanted to be a body builder, although physical hard work is what i have been accustomed too, and i can and will say, that no matter what training, one must enjoy it, which doesn't come easy for the average joe, and keeping it up for a life time is the only way to see success, which does have a cost!

When i say cost, my mind remains open minded, because i have no proof whatsoever, that fitness training is more harmful than good, if over done, and what is over done, especially if you have really enjoyed your sports.

From a Chinese perspective one must also consider the issue of balance, the yin and the yang, typically the old wisemen would say walk do not run, to conserve your energy, of which there maybe something in!

If one thinks of free radicles that flow through the bloodstream, the faster one is pumping the blood around, the more wear and tear is done on the artery walls, when a free radicle strikes the soft tissue cell at high speed, more damage is likely to be caused, is it not? Anyway it's food for thought, because I had a great shock in September after a heart attack, in which heart specialists gave me the all clear, based on scans, ultra sound and my very low fat lipid counts.

Although they did advise me to slow down on training, because of my age, so my point is, stress and wear and tear on the pump in my case appears to have caused damage to the artery walls, caused by calcium particle build up, with very little fats, working on the theory that increased heart pumping may have caused scarring and stenosis over time.

One should remember that heart attacks have nothing to do with ones fitness. and that smoking, heavy drinking and free radicles do damage the heart, and even supplements when not required, will do more damage than good.

Although why be a freak too, and not enjoy some of the foods you shouldn't really eat often.

If we consider a human, untrained and unfit, with good genetics and metabolism, he/she will probably be just slightly over weight, on the other hand a person that looks the part with bulging biceps and sporty looking body may also be unfit.

This is because fitness comes in peaks and drops quickly off, so someone at there peak, can stop training, and be totally unfit within a very short time, at a guess i would say within 3 weeks, the person will have dropped off the top rung, down to the bottom rung of peakness.

The other interesting point to mention is how does one measure fitness?

Most fitness coaches, especially in gym work, may not even be aware of the fact, that fitness is measured by timeing how quickly the heart pulse returns to normal, within a certain time frame, So what is the recovery rate from ones maxium, tends to measure how fit one is and not how many reps one can do...the pulse should drop between 20/30 beats within 30 seconds of stopping the intensive exercise to measure fitness levels in my opinion.

Bodyblitz, enjoyed the read!

[BodyBlitz]

Well sms, I need the butter so that i can make up the fats in my low carb diet. Current two weeks induction phase for this anabolic diet is to have 70% fats 30% proteins. on-top of that, i'll add in 5-10 grams of fish oil per meal.

The rational is that you need to accustom the body to use fats as fuel via ketosis.

If you used too much proteins, the body will convert proteins into glucose via gluconeogenesis and you will be still running on glucose as oppose to fats as your secondary energy system.


Ksl, fitness is very broad spectrum and i'm glad you've brought it up.
I've watered most of my articles down because not many people want to know the science.

They prefer the - I want to lose the weight, tell me how and not why.

You speak about heart attack is very evident and if you've read Gary Taubes - Good calories, bad calories.

Serum cholesterol - LDL/HDL is very different from dietary cholesterol which we get from eggs and all the other meat product.
It has been a misnomer by the public health to think that cholesterol we eat causes us to have heart attacks when in fact it is the insulin resistance and pre diabetic status that forces us into that state.

In fact with the prescription of low fat craze, nothing gets solved; people got fatter, heart attacks became more evident and a whole host of diseases came with in which are relatively modern and akin with modern civilization.

You may be hesitant with your condition towards resistance training, everyone will given your case.

However resistance training is very beneficial for elders, i have a client who is 71 - his routine every day was to swim for 45 mins and walk around the block. He came to me very frail and need alot of rehab just to get his posture/movements back to speed.

I had to spend 2 months to rehab him slowly just for him to walk properly.

Of course when we say resistance training, i'm not talking about bodybuilding which is mostly associate with the iron game. For me its coming from the physiotherapy side of things and training movements as oppose to muscles.

I've got him to retrained his body and thought him how to relearn to use his hips. He got stronger, walked up a stairs without afraid of falling over, improved his posture and also walked with ease. If you know how an old man walks, you should know how painful it is for me to watch him shuffle his feet in.

So fitness for him is to fight of age related diseases and also to retain a healthy composition of muscles mass so that he doesn't fall and has the strength and power to prevent it.

In the same light, fitness for a Olympic weightlifter vs a gymnast is on different spectrum. However one common ground holds they use resistance exercises and not what the BS the mainstream media says about cardio - which is jogging and aerobics - fat burning zone lol what a joke!

They don't jog, do anything that involves aerobics but still spot a 6 pack and are extremely lean. So if you're still tuned to conventional knowledge, you need to look outside of the sphere for alternative information.

oh i can go on and on, i hope answered your questions without digressing too much.

[BodyBlitz]

[quote]Metabolic Danger of High-Fructose Corn Syrup
By Dana Flavin, MS, MD, PHD
Metabolic Danger of High-Fructose Corn Syrup

Americans are being poisoned by a common additive present in a wide array of processed foods like soft drinks and salad dressings, commercially made cakes and cookies, and breakfast cereals and brand-name breads.

This commonplace additive silently increases our risk of obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and atherosclerosis.

The name of this toxic additive is high-fructose corn syrup. It is so ubiquitous in processed foods and so over-consumed by the average American that many experts believe our nation faces the prospect of an epidemic of metabolic disease in the future, related in significant degree to excess consumption of high-fructose corn syrup.

The food industry has long known that “a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down in the most delightful way.”

[BodyBlitz]

For the senior forumers -

Natural Methods for Reversing Atherosclerosis
By Joanne Nicholas
Natural Methods for Reversing Atherosclerosis

Even when cardiologists aggressively manage their patients’ cholesterol and blood pressure levels, millions of Americans continue to suffer heart attacks and strokes. The reason is that many cardiologists fail to address the key underlying cause of coronary artery disease—that of endothelial dysfunction.

Endothelial dysfunction is the major cause of atherosclerosis—the blockage of arteries that increases the risk of heart attack, stroke, and congestive heart failure. Fortunately, it is never too late to start counteracting this circulatory breakdown, which is often a part of the aging process.

A wealth of research now points to several nutritional agents suchas cocoa polyphenols, pomegranate, and bioavailable superoxide dismutase (SOD) that have been shown to dramatically improve arterial blood flow, helping promote youthful endothelial function and protect against the processes known to damage aging arteries.

Conclusion

Preserving optimal endothelial function is essential to maintaining smooth flow of blood through the arteries and preventing the accumulation of atherosclerotic plaque that can contribute to heart attack, stroke, and other cardiovascular diseases. Powerful, natural antioxidant sources like cocoa and pomegranate have been shown to enhance cardiovascular health. In some studies, pomegranate and cocoa have been shown to limit or reverse atherosclerosis, lower high blood pressure, and improve endothelial function in people with the most serious arterial problems, including heart disease and diabetes. Scientists continue to research superoxide dismutase, the body’s own powerful antioxidant. Now that it is bioavailable as GliSODin® to supplement the body’s naturally declining levels, there is another powerful anti-aging strategy to maintain healthy endothelial function and help prevent or reverse atherosclerosis.

http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2008/oct ... sis_01.htm

[BodyBlitz]

Insulin Resistance—A Lethal Link Between Metabolic Disease and Heart Attack
By William Davis, MD
Insulin Resistance—A Lethal Link BetweenMetabolic Disease and Heart Attack

Due to multimillion dollar advertising and marketing campaigns by the pharmaceutical industry, patients and physicians alike seem to associate heart attack and stroke risk only with cholesterol. Drugs that lower cholesterol (statins), have created a windfall of profit for pharmaceutical companies, with a single company’s statin drug often exceeding several billion dollars in annual sales. However, cardiovascular risk entails far more than just elevated cholesterol levels.

In fact, the phenomenon known as insulin resistance offers a direct link between metabolic disease and cardiovascular risk, and is an often overlooked culprit underlying diabetes and heart disease. Learn how and why these two common diseases are intimately related and how to untangle them from your life.

What You Need to Know: Insulin Resistance

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Most people with heart disease and diabetes are insulin-resistant, which is a root cause of the metabolic syndrome that leads to the same destination—raised blood sugar, increased triglycerides, reduced HDL, heightened inflammation, and an increased risk of heart attack, stroke, and diabetes.
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Diabetes and heart disease are intimately connected. Diabetics without heart disease have the same risk for heart attack as non-diabetics with established heart disease.
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The first step in guarding against metabolic syndrome is to gauge the risk of insulin resistance through simple blood tests such as triglycerides, insulin, HDL, CRP, and DHEA.
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Insulin resistance and inflammation can usually be reduced effectively without the need for prescription drugs by using the right nutritional supplement and lifestyle strategies.
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Nutritional supplements that are effective for reducing insulin resistance include fish oil, chromium, white bean extract, DHEA, vitamin D, lipoic acid, magnesium, cinnamon, beta glucans, resveratrol, and polyphenols found in cocoa, green tea, and apples.

Break the Insulin Resistance Connection and Lower Your Risk of Heart Disease and Diabetes

Choosing low glycemic-load foods rich in soluble fiber, getting a full night’s sleep as consistently as possible, exercise, and taking nutritional supplements like fish oil, vitamin D (especially if you are sun-deprived), lipoic acid, magnesium, cinnamon, beta glucans, resveratrol, and polyphenols found in cocoa, green tea, and apples are part of a powerful integrative plan for breaking the insulin resistance connection.

You can chart your progress by periodically measuring a variety of important metabolic and cardiovascular factors.

You want to achieve:

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Fasting blood glucose: <100 mg/dL
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C-reactive protein: < 0.55 mg/L for men and <1.5 mg/L for women
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Fasting blood triglycerides: <100>40-50 mg/dL for men and >50 mg/dL for women
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Waist circumference: <40 inches for men and <35 inches for women.

If you have had a lipoprotein analysis, e.g., a VAP® (vertical auto profile) or NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) test, reducing small LDL to <15% of total LDL can be a helpful secondary measure. Achieving a blood pressure of ≤130/85 mmHg is another important goal.

Remember, decreasing heart disease risk is far more than simply taking a statin drug or making sure that your LDL is within an optimal range. By focusing on improving insulin sensitivity, you can help reduce the risk of heart attack and break the lethal connection between cardiovascular and metabolic diseases!

Dr. William Davis is a practicing cardiologist in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He is founder of the Track your Plaque program, a heart disease prevention program that shows how to use CT heart scans to control coronary plaque. He can be contacted through www.TrackYourPlaque.com.

http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2008/aug ... ack_01.htm

[ksl]

In the same light, fitness for a Olympic weightlifter vs a gymnast is on different spectrum. However one common ground holds they use resistance exercises and not what the BS the mainstream media says about cardio - which is jogging and aerobics - fat burning zone lol what a joke!

I take it you mean the BS from mainstream media and not the fat burning zone....

The other fact of life is, that people do not live longer because of diet, or evolution of the human race, that we know it, because our life spans are far too short to see any relavant change. So the only life extending we see is through medical intervention.

So let it be said now, that it is very common, for people over the age of 45 to start getting problems, by the time one is 60 quite a few of your own school friends will be dead, if you are not.

Genetics play a very big part and are very difficult to change, my father and grand fathers on both sides of the family lived until their 90's, only to show that their life was extended by medical intervention and not diet.

My father was 84 and mother 87, so obviously a shock for a fitness fanatic, to have a heart attack, and you are wrong about the resistance to insulin in my case.

Although people that are resistant are of course at higher risk. What may even surprise you, is that you are only 24 years old, and I bet you all the money in the world, you may feel fit and healthy like i have done...but without going through all the tests, it will also hit you like a sledge hammer too, especially if it happens while you maintain your fitness and diet.

Heart disease can be caused by virtually any free radical, understanding the process of heart disease maybe wiser than any diet, like there may well be no heart disease if the flow of blood was restricted to walking and not running....The faster the flow, the more wear and tear, it's really quite logical, so when the free radicles bounce off the artery walls, it damages the walls and heart disease gets in, with stenosis.

Walking on the other hand would not have the same effects, and the body may last longer, just like a sports car V's the love bug... So my food for thought is listen to the wise men if i want to live longer, or I continue doing what I enjoy, which is challenging my body to be 18 years old, which is obviously very bad and damaging, but I enjoy what i do!

Fitness for me is taking it to another level for my age group, built like a British bull dog, and good looking, So if you see anyone on the street that fits the description, it must be me

My philosophy in life, is to live while i can, and enjoy doing what i want, not what society want's me to do. Of course life is very important, but being happy and enjoying life is a lot more important, than just trying to be fit and healthy, again it's finding a balance without being neurotic!

I don't wish to worry those that have been running 3 to 5 times a week doing like 40km a week, because in my youth from 18 to 50 I was doing at least 100km a week, besides swimming, cycling and weights for 9 months of the year.

I just think one may need to think of blood flow and wear and tear on the artery's if doing endurance work on this kind of level also knee joints.

Mine crashed coming down a mountain, turned out that it is the road camber that causes the uneven body weight distribution on the joints and at over 80kg its a great deal of pressure pounding for a couple of hrs.

[BodyBlitz]

Fat burning zone is mainstream BS.

I won't argue that genetics will increase or decrease the risk, my side of the family has diabetes and it has manifested in my physiological state. I cannot handle carbohydrates/simple sugars effectively, i will grow fat if i don't control.
However we know now how diabetes is caused and how metabolic syndrome X has evolved with this society.

Do i resign myself to fate of my genetics or do i take proactive steps to prevent it?

I know that if i eliminated HFCS - high frutose corn syrup, reduce my simple carbs intake and go back to a paleolithic kind of diet, i can significantly reduce my chances of diabetes happening to me.

Along with that, i go to the gym and do resistance exercises which builds muscles and keeps my body composition in check which also helps me increase my insulin sensitivity.

Will all this stop diabetes from ruining my life in future and help me live longer? Of course.

Ever since I've taken control of my diet and lifestyle, I've not been sick once and its been 3 years since i saw a doctor for flu/cold/fever etc.

On the topic of heart disease, again you can control it and reduce the chances but it starts now not when it happens. Prevention is always better than cure and your lifestyle has to be adjusted. I can't know what is the possibilities of it happening to me in future, but with education and good practice of lifestyle options, I'm reducing the chances.

But we do have a social life, we do have to entertain our friends but we always need to make provisions. We have the ability plan ahead and make arrangements and minor adjustments to accommodate others.

There can be leeway but there must always be control, as those who do have control over their lifestyle is already fighting a losing battle.

I'm always open to suggestion and i love to learn from people but what I've learned is that there is no absolutes - which mean i have to take a pinch of salt with everything i read or what people tell me.

With that said, whatever that has came from the knowledge of previous era has to be validated and revise to fit modern context. We cannot always rely on anecdotal advises without validation of science, research and development and progress on to better ways to things.

Even sciences evolves and gets re-evaluated, that's how progression is formed. Without it, we'd still be thinking that the earth is flat and we're the center of the universe.

So its up to everyone to challenge themselves to evolve and adapt to new knowledge and not be afraid to admit that they're wrong and move on.

[pakjohn]

For what it's worth; I was diagnosed type II diabetic in my 40's. A big surprise as I was an amatueur distance runner and no weight problems. I had a further complication in that I developed allergic reactions to most of the type II treatments and when I was learning to cope with diabetes had to take insulin injections to calibrate.

After doing a lot of research I did an overhaul of my fitness program. I stopped running except for warm ups, hired a trainer to help build a resistance training program and dropped the carb heavy diet from my running days. I went from about 70 kilo and little body fat to my current 87 kilo and roughly 10 percent body fat. I don't make any more insulin than I did before, but now I have more muscle to convert with and am able to control my diabetes by diet alone. I'm not a body builder by any means, but it's great not to have the energy swings or brain fog you get with sugar imbalance.

My only other change has been cutting back on wheat the last year or so, now that I'm officially old, wheat doesn't digest as quickly. I could take enzymes but since I'm not a huge fan of bread, I'd rather cut back on wheat products. I'm not a fanatic about my diet, I eat small meals 4 or 5 times a day, one protein, two veggies, and plenty of water. My biggest weakness is peanut butter, about 2 of those jumbo sized Skippys a week!

[BodyBlitz]

Thanks john for sharing your experience.

Can you share your diet and workout regime?