Flat Abs For A New You

The Top 3 Things to AVOID at Restaurants to Stay Lean and Healthy

2011-07-12T10:58:00.000+01:00

by Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer
Author of best-selling program: The Truth About Six Pack Abs

I've been traveling a lot for business in the last year, and I've noticed that most people totally fall off their fitness routines while traveling...

In fact, eating out at restaurants frequently is one of the biggest reasons why so many people fatten up while traveling. It's almost damn near impossible to eat healthy when you dine out, UNLESS you follow a couple simple tricks that I use to make every restaurant meal healthier, reduce calories, and not lose control.

Here's a few tricks you can use to eat healthier and stay lean even while traveling on business or eating out any time for that matter...

The 3 most important things to avoid that are EVERYWHERE at restaurants are:

the deep fried foods
the refined starchy foods
and any sodas, juices, or other sugary foods (except whole fruits, which are great)

This eliminates the major food sources that do the worst damage in our food supply - the evil trans fats, the inflammatory refined vegetable oils, refined starches, and processed sugars.
This means trying to skip the table bread, skipping the french fries (that come with every single sandwich on every menu known to man), and reducing all of the heaping portions of rice and pasta that are often loaded on the plates as well.

Instead, try to order just meat, side vegetables, and a salad, asking for the vegetables or salad as a substitute for the typical fries, rice, or pasta that the meal probably comes with.

Almost every restaurant I've ever been to will always allow me to substitute veggies or a side salad for the fries or chips that almost always come with sandwiches or burgers.

Side note: It always amazes me how many people scrutinize me because I substitute veggies for fries by telling me that I'm "not living" because I won't eat fries...

Yet they are always the first to complain that they are overweight and have "tried everything", yet can't lose weight. I'm not sure why so many people think eating french fries equals "living it up"... I'm all for moderation with many things, but if there's 2 things that should be almost totally removed from everyone's diet because these foods are simply that evil... it's fries and sodas!

Take a look at the typical difference this simple substitution makes between choosing smart and doing what most people do...

Most people will eat a meal out such as this:

Sandwich or burger
fries or chips
soda or other sweetened drink

A MUCH smarter alternative for a leaner, healthier body is very simply this:

Sandwich or burger
veggies or salad
unsweetened iced tea or water with lemon (and no diet drinks -- unless you enjoy drinking carcinogenic poisonous artificial sweetener chemicals).

These 2 simple substitutions save at least 400 - 900 calories EACH time you dine out (depending on drink refills and fries portion sizes)... AND you're cutting out the most harmful foods to your body as well by avoiding the trannies and high fructose corn syrup.

Also, it may be rare to find this in most restaurants, but if you can find some that offer much healthier grass-fed beef burgers, it's a much smarter decision compared to grain fattened beef.

Side note: a little-known way to eat full portions of rice, pasta, and breads and actually get away with it without packing on the bodyfat is to make sure to schedule a high intensity full body resistance training workout before your scheduled meal time.

Sometimes it may be hard to fit the workout into your schedule right before the meal event, but if you can, the meal can be your "post-workout meal", in which case, your body can handle a higher amount of carbs than normal to help replenish the muscle glycogen depletion you had during the intense workout.

A cardio workout WON'T cut it for this... it must be high intensity resistance training to deplete enough muscle glycogen to handle restaurant portions of carbohydrates.

I hope these dining tips help you choose smarter and healthier next time you eat out. Feel free to share this article with your friends:

Ask The Fat Loss Expert

2011-07-10T12:56:00.001+01:00

What's the Required Bodyfat Percentage to See Your Abs?
By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com

QUESTION: "Tom, I know what I want to look like and I follow your advice about visualization and seeing my abs the way I want them to look. But what I can't figure out is what body fat % I should be aiming at to achieve that look? I am female, 35 yrs old and I've done awesome on your Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle program. I started at 19% body fat and the lowest I've gotten so far was 11.8% body fat with a caliper test. I've been thinking about doing a figure competition, but even at that body fat percentage, which I know is very low, I still had some "patches" of fat. How do I know what body fat percentage I should target so that all the fat is gone?"

ANSWER: Congrats! For most women, 11.8% is ripped, and for many women, that’s contest ready.
Just for comparison, I’ve done over 7,000 body fat tests during my career, and the lowest I have ever measured on a female was 8.9% (4-site skinfold method). She was a national-level figure competitor and she was shredded - full six pack of abs… “onion skin!”

However, I do know some women who get down to 11-13% body fat - by all standards extremely lean, complete with six pack abs - but oddly, they still had a few stubborn fat spots - usually the hips and lower body - so this would confirm your experience.

I know a guy who looks absolutely chiseled in his abs at 11% body fat, but other guys don’t look really cut in the abs until they get down to 6-8% body fat.

That’s the trouble with trying to pin down one specific body fat number as THE body fat level for seeing 6-pack abs (or being contest or photo-shoot ready).

Everyone distributes their body fat differently and two people may look different at the same percentage.
Here’s what I’d recommend:

Get familiar with some benchmarks for body fat levels.
My Burn The Fat system has a body fat rating scale, which includes averages and my suggested optimal body fat percentages.

This is my own chart, which I created with a combination of research literature and my own personal experience.

:: Burn The Fat, Feed the Muscle Body Fat Rating Scale ::
WOMEN:
Competition Shape (“ripped”): 8-12%
Very Lean (excellent): < 15%
Lean (good): 16-20%
Satisfactory (fair): 21-25%
Improvement needed (poor): 26-30%
Major improvement needed (very poor): 31-40+%

MEN:
Competition Shape (“ripped”): 3-6%
Very Lean (excellent): < 9%
Lean (good): 10-14%
Satisfactory (fair): 15-19%
Improvement needed (poor): 20-25%
Major improvement needed (very poor): 26-30+%

Just a quick note: You’re not destined to get fatter as you get older, but in the general population (non fitness and bodybuilding folks), the average older person has more body fat.

What I did to accomodate this is to include a range instead of one number, so younger people can use the low end of the range and older people can use the higher number.

Also, just so the average reader can keep things in perspective, single digit body fat for women and low single digits for men is far beyond lean - it’s RIPPED - and that’s usually solely the domain of competitive physique athletes.

Competition body fat levels were not meant to be maintained all year round. It’s not realistic and it may may not be healthy, particularly for women.

The average guy or gal should probably aim for the “lean” category as a realistic year round goal, or if you’re really ambitious and dedicated, the “very lean category.”

You’ll probably have to hit the “very lean” category for six pack abs. However, the bottom line is that there’s no “perfect” body fat percentage where you’re assured of seeing your abs.

Besides, body fat is one of those numbers that gets fudged and exaggerated all the time. I hear reports of women with body fat between 4 and 8% and I usually dismiss it as error in measurement (or there’s some “assistance” involved). Body fat testing, especially with skinfolds, is not an exact science. All body fat tests are estimations and there is always room for human error.

The low numbers are nice for bragging rights, but the judges don’t measure your body fat on stage. What counts is how you look and whether you’re happy with that (or whether the judges are happy with it, if you’re competing).

You can use my chart to help you set some initial goals, but for the most part, I recommend using body fat testing as a way of charting your progress over time to see if you’re improving rather than pursuing some holy grail number.

One final note: there are always a few people out there who take exception to my body fat rating scale. More often it's females than males. More often older than younger. And more often non athletes than athletes. Usually it's because they have a body fat of 26% or 27% or thereabouts, they are perfectly healthy and they are not significantly overweight. They argue that a body fat of 26% or so should not be rated as "poor" and that the standards on my chart are too high.

Having been influenced by the bodybuilding and physique world my entire life, I do have high standards, and my chart is admittedly skewed slightly toward an athletic population. However, for a young girl, 26% body fat and for a 40 or 50-something woman, 30% body fat, does in fact, leave plenty of room for improvement which is exactly what the chart says.

I'd like to encourage all my readers to consider setting higher standards and loftier goals. Not everyone wants or needs to be "ripped." But in my opinion, many people set goals too low and settle for what they think they can get, not what they really want. With that said, please use my chart only as a guideline and not as gospel. Ultimately, it's up to you to set your own goals and standards. if 6-pack abs are your goal, I think this info should give you a better idea of what it will take.

In my Burn The fat, Feed The Muscle system, you can learn more about how to measure your body fat - professionally or even by yourself in the privacy of your own home.

Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle explains why body mass index and height and weight charts are virtually worthless, and shows you how to track your body composition over time and “tweak” your nutrition and training according to your weekly results.

Get more details at: www.BurnTheFat.com
Train hard and expect success!
Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is the author of the #1 best seller, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle: Fat Burning Secrets of the World’s Best Bodybuilders and Fitness Models. Tom is a lifetime natural bodybuilder and fat loss expert who achieved an astonishing 3.7% body fat level without drugs or supplements. Discover how to increase your metabolism and burn stubborn body fat, find out which foods burn fat and which foods turn to fat, plus get a free fat loss report and mini course by visiting Tom's site at: www.BurnTheFat.com

2011-07-09T12:56:00.000+01:00

Fat Loss Per Week: Average vs High Achievers

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com

QUESTION: Dear Tom: I know it will probably be different for everyone, but I find it hard to set weekly goals for body fat percentage because I don't know what an average body fat percentage drop in a week is supposed to look like. I'm a 30 year old female. Any input?

ANSWER: I recommend setting a fat reduction goal of about half a percent per week (0.5%). Based on many years of testing clients in person with skinfold calipers, I've concluded that this is about average.

This is an honest number that reflects not just the outliers in the top success stories, but an average of everyone. That's what makes this figure a good realistic weekly goal

To see some of the more exceptional transformations, click here:

Chris, for example dropped 9% body fat in 7 weeks. That's not typical, but its possible in a highly motivating environment like our Burn the Fat body transformation contests]

To calculate realistic, average weekly fat loss:

If your body fat measured 24.6 percent on day one of week one, then 24.1 percent would be your goal for the end of that seven-day period. That will be an impressive 6% drop in your body fat if you keep that up over 12 weeks.

If you're more ambitious and you want to shed body fat even faster, it's certainly possible, although it does depend on body size. Larger people can often lose larger amounts of weight and body fat.

When someone is already lean and wants to get even leaner, there is less fat remaining so it becomes more difficult to lose large amounts every week.

I've seen many people drop 0.6 percent or 0.7 percent body fat per week if they worked hard, usually doing multiple cardio sessions per week on top of their weight training, combined with excellent dietary compliance.

I've even seen people shed 0.8 to 1.0 percent body fat per week, but more often than not, those were temporary spikes in progress, reflecting one exceptionally good week, or in conjunction with a highly motivating event, like one of our burn the fat challenge contests (where the reward of a luxury trip to Maui is dangling in front of you).

If you lose less than a half a percent per week, as long as you made some forward progress, you should celebrate that as success.

It's more normal for results to vary from one week to the next than to drop the same amount every week, so an occasional slow week is nothing to get upset about. It's just feedback.

After a below average week, to bring the rate of fat loss up to average or better for the next week, you'll need to:

(a) re-establish compliance if you had a bad week (get back on the wagon! and start tracking food intake more meticulously if necessary) or

(b) make adjustments to your nutrition and training to increase your caloric deficit and optimize body composition changes.

Last but not least, if you want to be one of those "not typical" people, then remember this:

* Above average results require above average effort.
* Extraordinary results require extraordinary effort.

Everything in this article is explained in even further detail in my fat loss program, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle at: http://www.BurnTheFat.com
Train hard and expect success!

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

About the Author:

The DIRTY truth about canola oil

2011-07-07T18:46:00.002+01:00

Have you been lied to about the health benefits of canola oil?
by Mike Geary, Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best selling program: The Truth about Six-Pack Abs

If you've been following my fitness newsletters for some time, you may have noticed that I NEVER include canola oil in any of my recipes or any of my lists of healthy foods.

Many people have asked me why, because all they hear in the mainstream media is that canola oil is "heart healthy" and a good source of monounsaturated fats similar to olive oil.

Well, first of all, you need to realize that much of what you hear in the mainstream media has been influenced by heavy handed marketing tactics by big food companies. Canola oil is cheap for them to produce so they want to fool you into thinking it's a "health oil" so that people, restaurants, etc will buy it up as their main oil of choice.

The dirty truth about canola oil

Yes, it's true that canola oil is high in monounsaturates, but let me explain why canola oil is anything but "healthy".

Canola oil is made from something called rapeseed. Rapeseed actually had to be bred over the years to reduce the percentage of a problematic component of rapeseed, which is erucic acid.

Important note on canola oil "urban legends": There is a problem with most websites that DEFEND canola oil, saying that internet "urban legends" on the dangers of canola oil are unfounded. The problem is that these websites that defend canola oil ONLY talk about the issue of erucic acid. The issue of erucic acid IS an urban legend, because erucic acid has been bred out to very low levels over the years, so it is a non-issue.

However, these websites that defend canola oil are barking up the wrong tree because they don't address the issue of the processing of canola oil and oxidation of the polyunsaturated component of canola oil, which is what makes it unhealthy for human consumption. THAT'S the real issue that they either don't understand (because they are not nutrition experts) or are simply ignoring.

Let's look at the REAL issues with canola oil:

Canola oil typically ranges between 55-65% monounsaturated fat and between 28-35% polyunsaturated fat, with just a small amount of saturated fat.

While we've been led to believe that high monounsaturated fat oils are good for us (which they are in the case of virgin olive oil or from unprocessed nuts or seeds), the fact is that canola oil has more detriments than it does benefits.

As you may have heard me talk about in other newsletters or in my The Truth about Six-Pack Abs Programone of the biggest problems with highly processed and refined vegetable oils such as corn oil, soybean oil, and yes, even canola oil, is that the polyunsaturated component of the oil is highly unstable under heat, light, and pressure, and this heavily oxidizes the polyunsaturates which increases free radicals in your body.
The end result of all of this refining and processing are oils that are highly inflammatory in your body when you ingest them, potentially contributing to heart disease, weight gain, and other degenerative diseases.

The reason that extra virgin olive oil is good for you is that it is cold pressed without the use of heat and solvents to aid extraction. EVOO also contains important antioxidants that help protect the stability of the oil.
Canola oil, on the other hand, is typically extracted and refined using high heat, pressure, and petroleum solvents such as hexane. Most canola oil undergoes a process of caustic refining, degumming, bleaching, and deoderization, all using high heat and questionable chemicals.

Does canola even have trans fats?

Even worse, all of this high heat, high pressure processing with solvents actually forces some of the omega-3 content of canola oil to be transformed into trans fats.

According to Dr. Mary Enig, PhD, and Nutritional Biochemist, "Although the Canadian government lists the trans fat content of canola at a minimal 0.2 percent, research at the University of Florida at Gainesville, found trans fat levels as high as 4.6 percent in commercial liquid canola oil".

And this is the crap that they are marketing to you as a "healthy oil"!

As you can see from the details above on how canola oil is processed, it is barely any healthier for you than other junk oils like soybean oil or corn oil. The bottom line is that it is an inflammatory oil in your body and should be avoided as much as possible.

The only canola oil that might be reasonable is if you see that it is "cold pressed" and organic. Most canola oil is NOT cold pressed or organic, so you might as well choose oils that you know are healthier.

Your best bets are these truly healthy oils:

extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) - for lower temperature cooking or used as a healthy salad dressing oil
Udo's Choice Oil Blend - NEVER use this for cooking as it has a higher polyunsaturated fat content (therefore heat destroys the benefits of this oil, and increases it's inflammatory properties), but it is a cold processed blend of healthy oils that mixes well with olive oil for salad dressings.
Virgin coconut oil - great for all temperatures of cooking due to its super high stability under heat. A great source of healthy saturated fats in the form of medium chain triglycerides (MCTs), one of which is Lauric Acid, which helps support the immune system and is lacking in most western diets.
Organic grass-fed butter - I like to use a mix of grass-fed butter, coconut oil, and a small bit of olive oil for most of my cooking. Grass-fed butter is a great source of the healthy fat, CLA, which has even been shown in studies to have muscle building and fat burning properties. Grass-fed butter also has a much healthier omega-6 to omega-3 ratio than standard butter at your grocery store. Kerrygold Irish butter is my favorite grass-fed butter.

So don't be fooled by food labels claiming that they contain "healthy canola oil"... as you can see, this couldn't be further from the truth! Choose some of the healthier options above and your body will thank you!
If you liked this article and want to help protect the health of your friends, please feel free to share it below

Are There Over 20 Nasty Chemicals in Your Burgers?

2011-07-06T11:52:00.000+01:00

The "bionic burger" that won't decompose even after 18 years?

by Mike Geary - Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best-selling program: The Truth about Six-Pack Abs

Whether you choose to believe the exact story that this popular video below portrays is up to you. However, I think we all know that there are some major issues with the sources of food in popular fast food chains, and the amount of pesticide residues, hormones, antibiotics, preservatives, and other nasty chemicals in typical fast food meals. Check this story out:

I know that the story in that video may sound a bit embellished, and that's possible... however, I've seen news stories of dozens of these types of informal experiments that random people have done over the years with popular fast food burgers that won't decompose even after years in their basement.
Seriously, if even mold refuses to consume these burgers and buns, is this really something that we (and our children) should be putting in our bodies? What chemicals, preservatives, etc are in this fast food that is preventing even mold and bacteria from being able to consume this "food"?

And can we really consider this to be real "food" at all?

Here's another example of these types of experiments below... about half way through this video, you see some shocking examples that this woman kept from her own experiments:

I hope this gives you something to think about in terms of what we are putting inside our bodies if we choose to consume fast food. Don't we deserve better? Don't our children deserve better food?
I personally have not eaten a meal at any of the major fast food chains in years. I will eat burgers sometimes, but only from restaurants that use higher quality ingredients. And at home, I choose to only use grass-fed organic beef, as we've discussed the superior nutrition of grass-fed beef dozens of times in this newsletter previously.

Please share this article with your friends and family to help them avoid the nutritional disaster lurking in fast-food.

Is the Area that You Live Harming Your Health?

2011-07-01T08:37:00.000+01:00

A fascinating, but serious investigation into how our location that we live and our skin pigmentation affects our health
by Mike Geary - Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best-selling program: The Truth about Six-Pack Abs

I thought the video below was VERY interesting, and is explained in a way that's easy to understand. It's also one of the reasons for a MAJOR problem in the health of many people.

I know we've been discussing a lot about Vitamin D levels in your body lately and how vitally important that is to almost EVERY single aspect of your health, including your immune system, your ability to deter cancer and other diseases from developing, your ability to lose fat and build muscle, your bone strength, and so on.
This video shows the health problem we humans have created for ourselves because we have moved around the globe to areas of either higher UV radiation or lower UV radiation than what would have been ideal for our particular genetics. It talks about skin pigmentation and how each person can be vastly different in how their body deals with UV radition for both good and bad, including Vitamin D production based on what latitude (distance from the equator) that you live.

This really is an information packed video, so please watch the whole thing. I really think you'll get a lot out this, and it shows a very sinister aspect of health that is not talked about often... how some people can have health problems based on their degree of skin pigmentation, where they live, and how they may actually be sun deficient.

I hope you got a lot out of that video. Here are a few comments...

1. I think you can see the main issue as it relates to your ancestry and what part of the world that your particular genetics have you adapted to thrive best. For example, let's say that you have very light skin pigmentation, and your heritage is from a far northern latitude such as Sweden, Russia, Finland, or Ireland. This means that based on your genetics, you weren't meant to live too close to the equator and get excessive UV radiation exposure. If you moved to Hawaii for example, you may experience skin problems if you're out in the strong Hawaii sun too much or get burned too often. There's a balancing act here where this type of person would need small amounts of daily sunshine on their skin to produce enough Vitamin D, but not too much sun to get burned.

2. But let's look at the opposite scenerio, which is rarely talked about... The opposite scenerio would be a person with more darkly pigmented skin that has a heritage that originated from closer to the equator, such as Columbia, Thailand, or Central Africa as a few examples.

If a person with this type of heritage and darkly pigmented skin moved to live in a latitude that is far away from the equator, such as the northern US, Canada, or northern Europe, this person could end up SEVERELY vitamin D deficient since their body is programmed to require much stronger sun exposure for optimal health. And THAT is a major health problem that could be brewing for a person with darkly pigmented skin living in high latitudes far from the equator.

As you can see, all of this information means that we need to understand as individuals how much sun exposure we really need based on our heritage and skin pigmentation. We need to get our Vitamin D levels tested in a blood test and see if we're dangerously deficient or if we're at adequate levels. Don't just assume that you're getting enough simply because you're getting 400IU per day from a supplement -- although 400IU is considered 100% daily value, it has been determined by many scientists to be insufficient for most people.
I'd love to go on more with this, because this topic is so vitally important to your health. But I want to dedicated separate articles to exploring this topic even more. I'm working on those as we speak.

The Missing Link Destroying Your Health

2011-06-29T13:18:00.000+01:00

-- Yes, You Most Likely ARE Deficient in This

by Mike Geary - Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best-selling program: The Truth about Six-Pack Abs

I think most people in this day and age are starting to understand the concept that for animal-based foods, the health of the animal and whether that animal ate what it was meant to eat in nature greatly affects whether that food is healthy for you to eat, or not healthy, and whether it has nutritional imbalances.

But with this article, I want to expand this discussion from just the diet of the animal to another possibly even MORE important factor that nobody is really talking about. And this directly relates to one of the MOST important substances in your body that you probably ARE deficient. In fact, most people are deficient in this.

More about that in a minute, but first, let's make sure we're on the same page with quality of the diet of animals in our food supply.

For example, as you probably already know, grass-fed beef from cattle that roam outside in grassy fields is MUCH healthier for you than typical grain-fed beef from a factory farm feedlot. The unhealthy grain-fed beef has been consistently shown to have lower levels of vitamins and minerals (particularly Vitamin A and E) and lower levels of the healthy fat, CLA compared to properly raised grass-fed beef. We also know that grain-fed beef has an unhealthy ratio of omega-6 fats to omega-3 fats compared to grass-fed beef, which contains ideal healthy ratios of these fats.

Another example would be chicken... Unhealthy chickens that are raised in factory chicken houses, never see an outdoor environment, and fed unnatural amounts of grains are going to produce a significantly less healthy chicken meat for your meals compared to a chicken that spent most of its time outdoors roaming fields and eating greens, seeds, bugs, worms, and other natural items that chickens like to eat. The chicken that ate a natural diet roaming outside is going to have more vitamins and minerals and healthier omega-3 to omega-6 ratios compared to the chicken that lived a horrible life inside a factory farm chicken house, and ate unnatural amounts of grains to be fattened up quickly.

This also applies to your source of eggs... healthy hens that roam outdoors and eat what they are supposed to eat naturally (not piles of grains) will supply healthy eggs for your consumption... unhealthy hens in factory hen houses fattened up on nothing but grains will produce less healthy eggs with lower vitamin and mineral content, less carotenoids, and lower omega-3 levels.

I know this for a fact, as I get my eggs from a local farmer here in Colorado where the hens get 40 acres to roam on daily and eat whatever their little hearts desire...all the greens, bugs, worms, etc that they want. Their eggs have thick strong shells and DEEP orange yolks indicating super high levels of nutrition and carotenoids in those yolks. Compare that to the thin weak shells and pale yellow yolks of most eggs that you'll find at grocery stores or restaurants which came from factory raised hens. It's a shocking comparison when seen side by side, but sadly, most people in this day and age have never seen what real egg yolks are supposed to look like, and have never experienced the quality nutrition that those egg yolks were supposed to have.

Ok, so I think we're pretty clear on the fact that the diet of an animal directly relates to how healthy that meat or eggs (or even milk or butter) will be for our consumption as a food source. But here's a vitally important aspect of how an animal is raised that almost nobody is talking about...

How much sunshine did those animals receive?

Yes, if you know a lot about nutrition, I think you know where I'm going with this... how much vitamin D is in that meat, dairy, or eggs based on how much sun the animal received?
As you may have heard, it's no secret that there's a major epidemic going on in "westernized" countries in this day and age... and that's Vitamin D deficiency in us humans... but nobody is talking about vitamin D deficiency in our animals that make up our food supply, hence further exacerbating the problem.

Part of the reason for this mass scale vitamin D deficiency is that there's a major propaganda campaign going on where companies and the media constantly tell you that you should never go out in the sun between 10am to 3pm as those "deadly" sun rays will automatically give you cancer (by the way, this is the ONLY time that UV-B rays are strong enough to trigger vitamin D production in your body).

They also tell you that you should slather on chemical-based carcinogenic sunscreens (which absorb through your skin and into your blood stream) to protect yourself from the so-called "deadly" sun... this excessive use of chemical sunscreens also means that your body can't properly produce the vitally important Vitamin D from your sun exposure.

But I have to digress on that topic so I don't stray too far from this discussion of animals health. If you want to read more, here's an article where I show why most people may actually be underexposed to the sun which is making them even more vitamin D deficient.

Now with that said, one of the other major reasons that the majority of the population in "westernized" countries are more and more vitamin D deficient is that our animals are being raised in indoor factory environments nowadays and are seeing MUCH less sunshine than the animals are meant to see.

You see, many animals and birds are just like us humans in that they depend on the sun to produce vitamin D through oils that react with sunlight (UV-B rays) shining on their skin, fur, or feathers.

So what do you think happens now that most of the animals in our food supply are raised in horrendous indoor environments and see much less sunshine than our animals from farms several decades ago did?
Well, that means that the meat, eggs, and dairy from those animals has significantly less vitamin D than it used to contain back in our grandparents day...in addition to all of the other nutritional deficiencies that we talked about earlier in this article.

Let's go back to the eggs example from above, but this time lets relate it to vitamin D content instead of omega-3's and carotenoid deficiencies. In today's factory hen houses where the hens never see any sunshine, this means that they do not pass on much Vitamin D to the egg yolks, and you end up with Vitamin D deficient egg yolks.

However, remember those eggs that I told you about that came from hens that roamed around outside every day on 40 acres eating greens, bugs, seeds, and worms? Well, what we didn't talk about earlier is that those hens are also being exposed to daily sunshine and that helps the hens produce Vitamin D, and therefore pass that Vitamin D onto the egg yolks. In this case, you get egg yolks with MUCH higher vitamin D levels... this is what we were meant to get in nature, and grocery store eggs are a far cry from the eggs that our grandparents and great grandparents would have eaten 60-100 years ago.

When you combine the fact that most people are NOT getting adequate small doses of daily sunshine, are over-using chemical-based sunscreens that prevent your body from producing vitamin D, and are also getting less Vitamin D from the meat, dairy, and eggs in our food supply these days, you can see why Vitamin D deficiency is a major problem right now.

Remember that Vitamin D is NOT just any old "vitamin"... it's actually produced into a hormone in our body and is one of the most important substances in our bodies that regulates everything from hormone balance, to helping prevent cancer, to helping control blood sugar, to helping you lose fat and build muscle.
Remember that Vitamin D is also the MOST important factor involved in how strong your immune system is... why do you think people get sick more in the winter with colds and flu and not in the summer? Yep, it's almost 100% involved with Vitamin D levels in your body that decline in the winter from lack of sun exposure. Come on, did you really think there were more "germs" floating around in the winter...nope, it's all about Vitamin D levels and your immune system.

Side note: From late October through early March in the northern hemisphere, north of an imaginary line from approximately Atlanta to Los Angeles, the sun's rays are too weak, and UV-B rays cannot pass through the atmosphere due to the low sun angle during those months. This means that UV-B rays are inadequate during those months to trigger any Vitamin D production in your body. Your only solution is either a tropical vacation (which will only temporarily help improve vitamin D levels) or obtaining your vitamin D from your diet and carefully chosen supplements.

By the way, since you may already be a Prograde nutrition customer, the source of vitamin D in Prograde's VGF25 whole-foods based multi-vitamin is obtained from fish liver oil and is therefore a good quality source. But even with 400IU daily, although this is the recommended daily value, most scientists warn that this level will not sustain adequate vitamin D levels in your body, and therefore, you will still need regular sunlight and additional vitamin D from the right food sources to make sure you get enough D. Fatty fish, organ meats, egg yolks, and pork fat are reasonable sources of vitamin D, but cod liver oil or other fish liver oils are the highest in vitamin D.

The only way to know if you're dangerously deficient in Vitamin D is to get a blood test. When I had my Vitamin D levels tested a while back, I ordered a self testing kit that you can do at home instead of going to a doctors office, and you mail it to the lab for analysis. It's much cheaper than a doctors visit. I haven't asked permission to mention the company's name that performs this Vitamin D testing service, so I will contact them and see if it's okay to do so. I'll update you on that soon.

I also plan to put together a whole series of articles that will shock you and show you a few important videos on this topic as well, so please be on the lookout for my articles in your email inbox. Please don't take this information lightly... vitamin D is one of the most important substances in your body, and almost any health issue you're having can possibly be traced back to low vitamin D levels, and that includes sicknesses or anything immune system related, hormone imbalance, etc.

Please share this article with your friends and family, as it is so important to our health.

3 Major Fat Loss MISTAKES

2011-06-27T17:57:00.000+01:00

AVOID these 3 mistakes and start burning fat faster!

by Dr. Kareem Samhouri - CSCS, HFS
Neuro Metabolic Fitness & Rehab Expert
Author of the popular program: Abs Strength Guide

If you want to lose stubborn abdominal fat faster, don't make these 3 common fat loss mistakes below...

1. Relying on Abs-Specific Training:

For some reason, the misconception of spot reduction continues. No argument has ever convinced me that you can lose fat in a specific area by contracting the muscle in that specific area. Fat loss just does not work this way. Yet for some reason, we see hundreds of people every day at the gym doing hundreds of crunches and situps and thinking that they are somehow burning fat from their abdomen, when in reality, they're just wasting time!

Fat loss is a systemic effect that takes place as your body morphs into a healthier you. Fat storage patterns vary person to person according to hormonal levels, genetic fat storage patterns, myofascial restrictions, and inflammation. Reducing body fat in those areas through exercise is only done if you are working to modify hormonal levels that have related fat storage areas, for example.

However, there has yet to be convincing evidence that you can do tricep presses, for example, and lose fat in the back of your arms... Just doesn't work that way. The same is true with your abs. In this case, even if you do 3000 sit ups per day, you wouldn’t be doing much for fat loss. Fat loss is about:

1. Energy system training
2. Compound movements targeting many joints at once
3. Muscle balancing
4. Motor unit recruitment, and
5. Multi-planar movement

It’s impossible to add all of the above into an abs exercise, or even a series of abs exercises. The goal is to tire as much of your body as possible, to a safe extreme. This is referred to as momentary muscular failure, and it’s when lactic acid onset takes place. Remember, lactic acid, which is what makes you sore, is a very good thing. It means your body is working hard to reduce inflammation and repair. You’re well on your way to rapid fat loss. You’ll see incredible results when you accept this:

I believe muscle soreness following a fat loss workout should be a 5 - 7 (on a 0 to 10 scale), most of the time, where:

0 = no pain whatsoever, no muscle soreness
10 = extreme muscle soreness, emergency level

This is a big wake-up call for a lot of people, but it may just shed light on why you're not seeing the fat loss results for which you were hoping.

2. Low To Moderate Intensity Cardio For Long Duration:

Walking. This, alone, simply won't work for long-term fat loss results. It may work at first for somebody who is extremely obese and has been sedentary, but not for most people. While I strongly believe in the benefits of walking for stress relief, personal time, reflection with movement, blood pressure and cholesterol modification, etc., I do not consider it a good method to lose body fat.

Losing fat is about shocking your body and stimulating a repair process. Giving your body the chance to adapt to a demand over time doesn't help you lose fat quickly. Sure, you can see some initial results, often masked as 'toning', but in the end you're turning your Type IIa muscle fibers (oxidative-glycolytic, or medium speed fibers) to Type I (oxidative, or slow muscle fibers that have great endurance). The only trouble is that the Type II muscle fibers do a much better job of getting you lean.

By stimulating muscular strength (not necessarily "bulking") you are enhancing your metabolism. It takes energy to build and restore lean muscle tissue. Allowing it to grow consumes a bit more energy, but you don't have to bulk up to see great results. Rather, just create a muscle repair process while stimulating your metabolism with fat-burning foods and you'll see your results go wild.

After a full-body resistance-based alternation-style workout session, you'll spike your metabolism for 2-3 days as your body re-uptakes the lactic acid from your bloodstream, restores oxygen to the muscle tissue you've worked, and repairs the micro-tears that took place in your muscles. Supersets or circuits in full body workouts is one example of this, and interval training accomplishes this too, but what if we take things a step further and get you off a machine?

I suggest that we alternate body parts, directions, speeds, intensities, and muscle synergies, or pairs. Alternation in any form, even when the intensity is a bit lower, is still a rapid fat loss signal to your body. You're sure to see wild fat-burning results once you start thinking about fat loss as "shocking the fat away".

3. Caloric Restriction:

Caloric restriction = muscle starvation = fat loss grinds to a halt.

Muscle requires calories to grow. Without some degree of muscle growth, it will atrophy under duress. If you're exercising intensely, which you should be, your muscle will be eating itself to survive.

It's really important that you feed your system so it can grow and maintain its level of function. Your body requires food for muscle repair, concentration, heart health, and digestive health. Regular meals are best.

There are 2 schools of thought with eating for fat loss:

1. Eat 3 meals per day and up to 2 snacks.
2. Eat 5-6 small meals per day.

Normally, I recommend #2, because I find this is a great way to ensure you are not snacking on things that are bad for you, because you are eating healthy small meals often enough. Also, I tend to never feel hungry when I'm eating on this schedule. That's very helpful for fat loss.

Contrarily, eating 3 meals per day seems like it should also allow you ample time to digest and re-spike your metabolism. I believe there should be a small bout of exercise in between each meal if you choose this approach. If thats the goal, let's go at it.

Again, my recommendation is 5-6 meals/day, where you pre-plan your week's meals over the weekend, cook many meals at once, and prepare yourself for fat loss. The most helpful resource I've read to date, on this, is Fat Burning Kitchen. I recommend you read this also.

Most importantly, make sure you are getting enough calories. Yes, you do need a caloric deficit to lose fat over a certain time period, but taking your daily calories too low can reduce your metabolism and halt your fat loss.

Under no circumstance should an active female eat less than 1300 calories or an active male eat less than 1500 calories when trying to lose weight. Within a few months of coaching, most of my female clients are eating 1800 - 2000 calories, and my male clients are eating 2100 - 2800 calories. ...and they keep losing fat faster and faster. The goal should be to stimulate your metabolism to be able to eat more, not less.

In summary, there are 3 major fat loss mistakes you absolutely want to avoid:

1. Low to moderate intensity cardio for long duration - great way for your body to adapt to exercise and stop burning fat. Plus, you're converting your muscle fibers to the wrong type.

2. Abs-specific training - 3000 sit ups and no result? That's just depressing. Train for full body systemic fat loss. You'll be glad you did.

3. Caloric restriction = starving muscle = no more fat loss; instead, make the goal to eat more and build more fat-burning muscle to ramp up your metabolism, permanently.

I specialize in helping people just like you burn fat at absolutely ridiculous rates. I've focused on this for 12 years now, and I've even added advanced physical therapy techniques that exploit how your nervous system works to get you results faster than anything you've ever seen. I'd like to teach you all about this awesome method that has people losing fat at record speed with these 2 special gifts below:

Gift #1: How to Lose Fat 9x Faster <--- awesome method for rapid fat loss

Gift #2: Dr K's FREE video >> 3 Metabolic Tricks for a Flat Stomach

Bodyweight Cardio for Fat Burning

2011-06-27T16:29:00.000+01:00

by Craig Ballantyne.

You're surrounded by nothing. Stuck in a house or hotel, miles from the furthest gym.Perhaps visiting the in-laws, or a seminar in Independence, Ohio (trust me, I've been there), but you still want to do a fat burning
workout.

You can't even go for a walk because its a) raining, b) snowing, c) there are no sidewalks (hello independence, Ohio).

So what can you do?

A bodyweight cardio fat burning workout to the rescue. Some other trainers might call it metabolic conditioning, and sure, you can do similar workouts with kettlebells or even dumbbells, but those
implements can't help you now because you are stuck in the middle of nowhere with now way out.

The only "equipment" you have is your own body, but all they taught you in gym class was how to do crunches, pushups, and flexed arm hangs. And you aren't doing that from the doorframe here in the
doubletree.

Fortunately, I've spent my entire adult life researching wild workouts, exotic exercises, and bodyweight movements. My bodyweight exercise obsession all started back in college, when I came home for a Christmas break in my freshman year, and had no ride to the gym, or even the money to afford a day pass.

So instead, I went through all of my old issues of Men's Health magazine and put together a list of every body weight exercise I could find. Eventually, I stumbled across a workout that wasn't full of crunches, situps, and plain old pushups. I somehow managed, at the age of 19, to figure out a bodyweight circuit that was
tough, worked the entire body, and didn't require equipment.

Fast forward fifteen years later, and I'm still on the hunt for more bodyweight workouts. You've probably used one of my bodyweight challenges from Men's Health magazine, or found one of my workout
videos on youtube.

This fat burning workout video below is probably my most famous, the no-equipment 5 rounds of 5 minutes bodyweight workout program. You don't need anything - other than your own bodyweight - to get
an amazing full body workout, anytime, anywhere.

You don't need to be outside to do this bodyweight cardio fat burning workout, but hey, it doesn't hurt to be out in the sunshine, getting a glorious sweat on with this intense bodyweight
workout.

A minute of bodyweight exercises doesn't sound like much, but seriously, when you get down to the brass tacks, it sure is a heck of a challenge. I'd love to know what you think of this workout and other ones like it. I have dozens of interval-type workouts that don't require you to sit on a stationary bike or use a treadmill.
And you absolutely have no need to ever suffer the 'dishonor' of slow boring cardio ever again.

Thanks to bodyweight exercises (plus kettlebells, dumbbells, TRX exercises, etc.), there are far too many fun workouts out there that can help you burn fat without the need for expensive, overcrowded gym memberships.

That said, you can also do a tremendous workout in a hotel room (even in Independence, Ohio), in your in-laws living room, your backyard, the park, or even your office (but you'll want to shut the door, of course).

Bodyweight cardio fat burning workouts to the rescue.

For over 101 bodyweight exercises plus more bodyweight cardio and a 6-month bodyweight workout plan, get the Ultimate BodyweightExercise deal here.

You'll be able to burn fat with bodyweight exercises anywhere,

Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS

The Top 5 Healthiest Fat-Burning Foods

2011-06-26T12:05:00.000+01:00

If you want to lose body fat faster, try incorporating these 5 healthy super-foods into your diet & regular meal plans.
by Mike Geary, Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author - The Truth about Six Pack Abs

1. Grass-fed beef or bison (NOT your typical grocery store beef!) - I know most people think that red meat is unhealthy for you, but that's because they don't understand how the health of the animal affects how healthy the meat is for consumption. Keep this in mind -- "an unhealthy animal provides unhealthy meat, but a healthy animal provides healthy meat".

Typical beef or bison that you see at the grocery store is raised on grains such as corn and soybeans. Soy and corn are NOT the natural diet of cattle or bison, and therefore changes the chemical balance of fats and other nutrients in the beef or bison. Grain-fed beef and bison is typically WAY too high in omega-6 fatty acids and WAY too low in omega-3 fatty acids.

On the other hand, grass-fed beef from cattle and buffalo (or bison) that were raised on the type of natural foods that they were meant to eat in nature (grass and other forage), have much higher levels of healthy omega-3 fatty acids and lower levels of inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids (that most people already eat way too much of) compared to grain fed beef or bison.

Grass fed meats also typically contain up to 3 times the Vitamin E as in grain fed meats.
Not only that, but grass-fed meat from healthy cattle or bison also contain a special healthy fat called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) in MUCH higher levels than grain-fed meat. CLA has been proven in scientific studies in recent years to help in burning fat and building lean muscle (which can help you lose weight!). These benefits are on top of the fact that grass-fed meats are some of the highest quality proteins that you can possibly eat... and this also aids in burning fat and building lean muscle.

Grass-fed meats are a little harder to find, but just ask your butcher or find a specialty grocery store and they usually have cuts available. I've also found a good site to order grass-fed meats online - http://healthygrassfed.2ya.com

2. Avocodos - Even though these are typically thought of as a "fatty food", it's all healthy fats! Not only is this fruit super-high in mono-unsaturated fat, but also chock full of vitamins, minerals, micro-nutrients, and antioxidants.

Also, I think guacamole (mashed avocados with garlic, onion, tomato, pepper, etc) is one of the most delicious toppings ever created, and you can be happy to know that it's also one of the healthiest toppings you can use on your foods. Try sliced avocados or guacamole on sandwiches, burgers, scrambled eggs or omelets, in salads, or as a side to just about any meal.

The quality dose of healthy fats and other nutrition you get from avocados helps your body to maintain proper levels of hormones that help with fat loss and muscle building. Also, since avocados are an extremely satiating food, eating them helps to reduce your appetite in the hours after your meal. Say goodbye to junk food cravings and bring on that lean body!

3. Whole Eggs, including the yolk (not just egg whites) - Most people know that eggs are one of the highest quality sources of protein. However, most people don't know that the egg yolks are the healthiest part of the egg... that's where almost all of the vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants (such as lutein) are found in eggs.

Egg Yolks contain more than 90% of the calcium, iron, phosphorus, zinc, thiamin, B6, folate, and B12, and panthothenic acid of the egg. In addition, the yolks contain ALL of the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K in the egg, as well as ALL of the essential fatty acids. Also, the protein of whole eggs is more bio-available than egg whites alone due to a more balanced amino acid profile that the yolks help to build.

Just make sure to choose free-range organic eggs instead of normal grocery store eggs. Similar to the grass-fed beef scenerio, the nutrient content of the eggs and the balance between healthy omega-3 fatty acids and inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids (in excess) is controlled by the diet of the chickens.

Chickens that are allowed to roam free outside and eat a more natural diet will give you healthier, more nutrient-rich eggs with a healthier fat balance compared with your typical grocery store eggs (that came from chickens fed nothing but soy and corn and crowded inside "egg factories" all day long).

4. Nuts: Walnuts, Almonds, Pecans, Macadamia, etc -- Yes, this is yet another "fatty food" that can actually help you burn fat! Although nuts are generally between 75-90% fat in terms of a ratio of fat calories to total calories, this is another type of food that is all healthy fats, along with high levels of nutrition such as vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. Nuts are also a good source of fiber and protein, which of course, you know helps to control blood sugar and can aid in weight loss.

Nuts also help to maintain good levels of fat burning hormones in your body as well as helping to control appetite and cravings so that you essentially eat less calories overall, even though you're consuming a high-fat food. My favorite healthy nuts are pecans, almonds, pistachios, and walnuts, and by eating them in variety, you help to broaden the types of vitamins and minerals and also the balance of polyunsaturated to monounsaturated fats you obtain.

Try to find raw nuts instead of roasted nuts if you can, as it helps to maintain the quality and nutritional content of the healthy fats that you will eat.

Also, try to broaden your horizons beyond the typical peanut butter that most people eat, and try almond butter, pecan butter, or macadamia butter to add variety to your diet.

5. Berries - including blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, and even the "exotic" Goji berry: Berries are a powerhouse of nutrition... packed with vitamins and minerals, and also some of the best sources of antioxidants of any food in existance. Berries also pack a healthy dose of fiber, which slows your carbohydrate absorption and digestion and controls your blood sugar levels to help prevent insulin spikes (which can stimulate fat gain).

Get creative and mix up your berry intake by using the basics -- blueberries, strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries... but also get adventurous and give a more "exotic" berry a try, such as Goji berries (which are one of the most nutrient-dense and highest protein berries on the planet).
I like to add berries to my yogurt and cottage cheese mixtures, as well as oatmeal or oat bran, salads, or just taking a bag of mixed berries and mixed nuts with me for the day as a mid-day healthy snack!

I hope you enjoyed this look at some of the healthiest fat-burning foods you can possibly eat. I could list a ton more, but wanted to give you my favorites for now!

If you liked this article, please feel free to share it below for Facebook:

The Ultimate Hard-Body Exercise

2011-06-24T12:31:00.000+01:00

Get a rock-hard body from head to toe, and ripped abs with this exercise!

by Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer
author of best-selling program - The Truth about Six Pack Abs

A Look at the "Front Squat" (a surprising exercise not only for legs, but also rock hard abs!)

As you may have already discovered, the squat is at the top of the heap (along with other greats like deadlifts and clean and presses) as one of the most effective overall exercises for stimulating body composition changes (muscle gain and fat loss).

This is because exercises like squats and deadlifts use more muscle groups under a heavy load than almost any other weight bearing exercises known to man. Squats and deadlifts use hundreds of muscles throughout your entire body to move the load and also to stabilize your body while doing the drill.

Hence, these exercises stimulate the greatest hormonal responses (increasing fat-burning & muscle building growth hormone, testosterone, etc.) of all exercises.

Another weird fact: University research studies have even proven that inclusion of weighted squats into a training program increases upper body development, in addition to lower body development, even though upper body specific joint movements are not performed during the squat. Whether your goal is gaining lean muscle mass, losing body fat, building a strong and functional body, or improving athletic performance, the basic squat and deadlift (and their variations) are a couple of the ultimate exercises to accomplish this.

If you don’t believe me that squats and deadlifts are THE basis for a lean and powerful body, then go ahead and join all of the other overweight people pumping away mindlessly for hours on boring cardio equipment and getting zero results!

Squats can be done with barbells, dumbbells, kettlebells, or even just body weight. Squats should only be done with free weights – NEVER with a Smith machine! (This article shows why smith machine squats are a horrendous exercise for your body)

Side note: My program, The Truth About Six Pack Abs contains the full story on why machines are so inferior and even potentially DANGEROUS compared to free weights.

The type of squat that people are most familiar with is the barbell back squat where the bar is resting on the trapezius muscles of the upper back. Many professional strength coaches believe that front squats (where the bar rests on the shoulders in front of the head) and overhead squats (where the bar is locked out in a snatch grip overhead throughout the squat) are more functional to athletic performance than back squats with less risk of lower back injury.

I feel that a combination of all three (not necessarily during the same phase of your workouts) will yield the best results for overall muscular development, body fat loss, and athletic performance. Front squats are moderately more difficult than back squats, while overhead squats are considerably more difficult than either back squats or front squats. I'll cover overhead squats in a future newsletter issue.

If you are only accustomed to performing back squats, it will take you a few sessions to become comfortable with front squats, so start out light. After a couple sessions of practice, you will start to feel the groove and be able to increase the poundage.

To perform front squats:

The front squat recruits the abdominals to a MUCH higher degree for stability due to the more upright position compared with back squats. It is mostly a lower body exercise, but is great for functionally incorporating core strength and stability into the squatting movement. If you're doing front squats right, you'll feel a hard contraction in your abs during these.

It can also be slightly difficult to learn how to properly rest the bar on your shoulders. There are two ways to rest the bar on the front of the shoulders.

In the first method, you step under the bar and cross your forearms into an “X” position while resting the bar on the dimple that is created by the shoulder muscle near the bone, keeping your elbows up high so that your arms are parallel to the ground. You then hold the bar in place by pressing the thumb side of your fists against the bar for support. This technique is a bit tricky and you want to make sure to have the weight resting on muscle and not bone!

Alternatively, you can hold the bar by placing your palms face up and the bar resting on your fingers against your shoulders. For both methods, your elbows must stay up high to prevent the weight from falling. Your upper arms should stay parallel to the ground throughout the squat. Find out which bar support method is more comfortable for you.

Then, initiate the squat from your hips by sitting back and down keeping the weight on your heels as opposed to the balls of your feet. Squat down to a position where your thighs are approximately parallel to the ground, then press back up to the starting position. Keeping your weight more towards your heels is the key factor in squatting to protect your knees from injury and develop strong injury resistant knee joints.

Keep in mind – squats done correctly actually strengthen the knees; squats done incorrectly can damage the knees. Practice first with an un-weighted bar or a relatively light weight to learn the movement. Most people are surprised how hard this exercise works your abs once you learn the correct form.

You also need to use a good bit lighter weight on front squats compared to back squats. For example, personally, I use about 250 lbs for 8 reps on the back squat, but on the front squat, I need to be around 175 lbs for 8 reps, so a good bit lighter.

START/FINISH

MIDPOINT

So there you have it... one the best exercises for both rock hard abs, and a rock hard body from head to toe! I could list a LOT more, but wanted to focus on front squats today as they are one of the most under-utilized.

Help spread health and fitness to your friends and feel free to share this article

New Study Reveals LIES about High-Fructose Corn Syrup

2011-06-23T15:47:00.000+01:00

Does high-fructose corn syrup make you fatter than sugar? See this new study and you decide...
by Mike Geary - Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best-selling program: The Truth about Six-Pack Abs

A "Corny" Lie?

Unless you've been under a rock for the last year or two, you've undoubtedly seen the massive media campaign that the Corn Refiners Association (the CRA) has been running on TV commercials, online ads, etc trying to "clean up" the poor public image of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS).

They have even tried a re-branding campaign trying to change the name to "corn sugar" instead of high-fructose corn syrup.

In addition, the TV commercials try to convince you that HFCS is "no worse than sugar", and even try to imply that it is somehow 'natural', with this phrase:

"It's made from corn, has no artificial ingredients, has the same calories as sugar and is okay to eat in moderation"

REALLY? I'd say that it's a downright LIE to say that HFCS has no artificial ingredients if you've ever seen how HFCS is refined and processed and the chemicals involved in that process. Watch the entertaining documentary King Corn and you'll see the NASTY chemicals involved in refining HFCS!

And let's not forget that HFCS is almost always made from Genetically Modified corn. Not so "natural" anymore huh!

In response to this CRA propaganda campaign to revamp the image of HFCS, Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest stated: "High-fructose corn syrup starts out as cornstarch, which is chemically or enzymatically degraded to glucose and some short polymers of glucose. Another enzyme is then used to convert varying fractions of glucose into fructose... High-fructose corn syrup just doesn't exist in nature".

What about the debate: Is High-Fructose Corn Syrup worse for you than sugar?

This seems to have been an ongoing debate for the last couple years, but I personally think it's a stupid debate... In terms of your health and your waistline, they are BOTH pure evil! Over time, with excess consumption of either HFCS or sugar, they can both lead to diabetes, obesity, and other major health problems, including premature aging, and a bulging belly!

However, with that said, I personally avoid HFCS at all costs, but I don't necessarily avoid sugar altogether. I minimize sugar greatly, but I don't avoid it like I avoid HFCS. Have I mentioned that I haven't had a soda pop since I was a teenager... not one! Two things that I try to avoid almost 100% are HFCS and trans fats... because they are easily two of the MOST evil food additives that cause the most damage from a biochemical standpoint internally in your body (keep that in mind when you're about to eat or drink them, and it's easy to say no).

The only HFCS I get is probably the minor amounts that I might get in ketchup at a restaurant (sorry, I'm not giving up my ketchup... but I do get organic ketchup at home, which has no HFCS). But other than ketchup at a restaurant, I stay away from anything and everything with HFCS in it, including store-bought salad dressings which are often laced with high amounts of HFCS. Instead, I make my own healthy lean-body salad dressings at home.

The reason that I avoid HFCS more than I avoid plain sugar is that there is just too much evidence at this point that your body DOES process HFCS differently than sugar... despite the propaganda that the Corn Refiners Association is trying to shove down your throat with their ads.

New Princeton Study reveals that HFCS can stimulate more weight gain than sugar

Leave it to those geniuses at Princeton to give us some good evidence that HFCS can make you fatter than sugar! In a 2010 Princeton University study, researchers found that rats given water sweetened with HFCS gained significantly more weight than those given water sweetened with plain sugar, despite calorie intake being the same between both groups.

Princeton researchers also state: "In addition to causing significant weight gain in lab animals, long-term consumption of high-fructose corn syrup also led to abnormal increases in body fat, especially in the abdomen, and a rise in circulating blood fats called triglycerides".

And what about those claims by the Corn Refiners Association that HFCS is "no worse than sugar"? Well, let's get past the propaganda, and hear what an actual researcher has to say:

According to professor Bart Hoebel, who specializes in the neuroscience of appetite, weight and sugar addiction... "Some people have claimed that high-fructose corn syrup is no different than other sweeteners when it comes to weight gain and obesity, but our results make it clear that this just isn't true, at least under the conditions of our tests. When rats are drinking high-fructose corn syrup at levels well below those in soda pop, they're becoming obese -- every single one, across the board. Even when rats are fed a high-fat diet, you don't see this; they don't all gain extra weight."

Princeton researchers also noted that the HFCS groups in the studies gained significant amounts of visceral fat around the belly. As you might know, visceral fat is more deadly than subcutaneous fat and is a serious health concern as it releases inflammatory molecules into your system.

One reason that HFCS appears to cause more weight gain than plain sugar is that HFCS doesn't trigger a leptin response in the body. This means that it won't signal the body to decrease appetite despite those HFCS calories that were consumed.

Another reason that HFCS affects our bodies differently is this... according to Princeton researchers, although HFCS only has 10% more fructose than table sugar (55% fructose content vs 50% fructose content in sugar), the fructose in HFCS is more sinister... According to Princeton, "as a result of the manufacturing process for high-fructose corn syrup, the fructose molecules in the sweetener are free and unbound, ready for fast absorption and utilization. In contrast, every fructose molecule in sucrose that comes from cane sugar or beet sugar is bound to a corresponding glucose molecule and must go through an extra metabolic step before it can be utilized."

Aha... very interesting!

Well, I hope that's enough evidence for you to simply try to fully avoid HFCS from now on. Again, this doesn't mean eating loads of table sugar is good for you either (that should be obvious), but these studies clearly show that HFCS is at least one step WORSE for you than sugar. And you also know that HFCS contributes to more abdominal fat, so with that said, why in the world would you ever want to touch another soda again!

You also now know that the deceptive advertisments by the Corn Refiners Association have basically been LYING to you with their propaganda that "HFCS is no worse for you than sugar". Yeah, right.

How about some good comedy about HFCS to finish this off...

When I first saw this SNL skit that mocks the Corn Refiners Association ads on TV, I didn't know which direction they were going with it... but if you watch to the end, you'll see where they went with it... hilarious! See what I mean below...

Too funny!
Please share this article with your friends and family to help them avoid the dangers of HFCS (and also to share a good laugh

3 Counterfeit Foods Marketed as "Healthier" that are Deceptive

2011-06-20T14:30:00.002+01:00

by Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer
author of best-selling program: The Truth about Six Pack Abs

I was at the grocery store yesterday and had to shake my head at all of the deceptive labels with everything claiming all sorts of things that are supposedly "healthy", but aren't really.
One of the things that really disturbed me was that I saw several examples of healthy foods in their natural state, but I saw counterfeit versions of these foods claiming that they were healthier than the original...

Yet in reality, all of these "counterfeit" versions were actually MUCH worse for you than the original, and more highly processed... and they still have the balls to claim that their overly processed "junkified" versions are better.

This is food marketing deception at it's worst!

Example #1: Product claiming "Better than peanut butter" by being a low-fat peanut butter

This product is ridiculous! I can't believe anyone would ever believe that this junk is better for them than natural peanut butter.

What I'm talking about here are the types of peanut butter that claim to be "lower-fat peanut butter"... But remember that "low-fat" many times just means more added sugars and carbs to replace the fats they took out. Not good!

First of all, if you buy a good simple peanut butter (organic is best), it is usually nothing but 2 ingredients... peanuts and salt. And they don't add much salt so it's not high in sodium. Note: Remember to always avoid peanut butters that contain harmful hydrogenated oils. Peanut butter that contains palm oil is a better alternative than added hydrogenated oils... but natural peanut butter with just peanuts and salt is best.

Back to the counterfeit peanut butter... This counterfeit peanut butter which claimed it was "better than peanut butter" (trying to seem healthier than peanut butter based on it's label claims) had a list of junk in it you wouldn't believe. First of all, they strip most of the healthy fats out of the peanuts so that it is a "low fat" product. Ok, now you've just taken away one of the healthiest parts of the product...the appetite satisfying healthy fats that you need to control cravings and manage more stable blood sugar levels.

To make things worse, the healthy fats were replaced with TWO different types of sugary syrups as well as additional dehydrated cane juice (aka SUGAR), in addition to added refined starches.

This product has taken something as simple and natural as peanut butter, and turned it into what should really be called some sort of processed candy. Yet, they claim that it's healthier than peanut butter because it's "lower fat". And somehow they get away with deceiving people like this. Don't be their fool!

This overly processed peanut butter may be lower in fat (by removing the healthy fats), but it's also higher in sugar and total carbohydrates, bringing the calorie total pretty close to regular peanut butter.

Example #2: Product claiming to be "better than eggs".

I won't get as detailed on this one because I recently talked about this entire topic in another newsletter.

But basically, this product was just egg whites with a bunch of added chemical colorings, flavorings, and other nonsense, including fake added vitamins.

Again, this product has essentially ruined a good thing by removing the healthiest part... the YOLKS! And yes, the yolks ARE the healthiest part of the egg. Anybody that tells you different doesn't understand much about REAL nutrition. The important thing to look for in quality whole eggs are cage-free and organic, and also the diet that the hens ate.

Most commercial egg farms are a disaster for the health of the hens, as they are crowded inside hen houses and never see the light of day, and are fed unhealthy amounts of grains.

Your best bet is to find a local farmer that you know allows the hens daily time outdoors to roam freely on land and eat a variety of greens, bugs, etc. I understand that not everybody can find a local farmer that does this type of thing... so what you want to look for at the grocery store is organic, free-range eggs, and also brands that claim higher amounts of DHA or omega-3's.

A slight improvement over standard eggs is if the hens had flax seed or algae feed included in their diet to increase the omega-3 content of the eggs. These eggs will have a better ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 fats.

If you missed my previous article about whole eggs vs egg whites, you can view it here...

Are Whole Eggs or Egg Whites Healthier?

Example #3: A product claiming to be "better than butter".

This was essentially crappy margarine loaded with highly processed and deadly trans fats, yet it had the nerve to claim it was "better than butter".

Who are they fooling!

Even low quality butter is healthier than ANY margarine. One problem with butter can be pesticides and hormones from improperly raised cows.

For this reason, you always want to choose organic butter, and if you can find "grass-fed" organic butter, then I would even say it can be healthy for you. In fact, a little known fact is that adding a little butter to your steamed vegetables helps your body to absorb more of the vitamins and minerals in the veggies. It's true...having veggies with a fat source aids your assimilation of vitamins and minerals.

Another factor in favor of butter:

Due to the content of stable saturated fats in butter, this makes butter one of the healthiest oils or fats to cook with. Oils high in polyunsaturated fats are the worst to cook with due to their highly unstable nature, which contributes to excess free radical production. For more info about this topic, here's an article I did about healthy vs unhealthy cooking oils

What about the saturated fats in butter?

No, the saturated fat in butter is NOT bad for you. If you've been reading my newsletters for some time, you know that we've already beaten that topic to death. If you're new to this newsletter, you can go back to this page to see why saturated fats are a perfectly natural part of the human diet and always have been:

Evidence that saturated fat is NOT bad for you

Feel free to share this article with your friends and family and help to protect their health:

Are Whole Eggs or Egg Whites Better for You?

2011-06-19T14:51:00.000+01:00

By Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer
Author - The Truth About 6-Pack Abs

I was on a weekend trip with some friends recently and one of my friends was cooking breakfast for the whole group. I went over to see what he was cooking and saw he was getting ready to make a big batch of eggs.

Well, to my shock and horror, I noticed that he was cracking the eggs open and screening the egg whites into a bowl and throwing out the egg yolks. I asked him why the heck he was throwing out the egg yolks, and he replied something like this...

"because I thought the egg yolks were terrible for you...that's where all the nasty fat and cholesterol is".

And I replied, "you mean that's where all of the nutrition is!"

This is a perfect example of how confused most people are about nutrition. In a world full of misinformation about nutrition, somehow most people now mistakenly think that the egg yolk is the worst part of the egg, when in fact, the YOLK IS THE HEALTHIEST PART OF THE EGG!

By throwing out the yolk and only eating egg whites, you're essentially throwing out the most nutrient dense, antioxidant-rich, vitamin and mineral loaded portion of the egg. The yolks contain so many B-vitamins, trace minerals, vitamin A, folate, choline, lutein, and other powerful nutrients... it's not even worth trying to list them all.

In fact, the egg whites are almost devoid of nutrition compared to the yolks.

Even the protein in egg whites isn't as powerful without the yolks to balance out the amino acid profile and make the protein more bio-available. Not to even mention that the egg yolks from free range chickens are loaded with healthy omega-3 fatty acids.

Yolks contain more than 90% of the calcium, iron, phosphorus, zinc, thiamin, B6, folate, and B12, and panthothenic acid of the egg. In addition, the yolks contain ALL of the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K in the egg, as well as ALL of the essential fatty acids (EFAs).

And now the common objection I get all the time when I say that the yolks are the most nutritious part of the egg...

"But I heard that whole eggs will skyrocket my cholesterol through the roof"

No, this is FALSE!

First of all, when you eat a food that contains a high amount of dietary cholesterol such as eggs, your body down-regulates it's internal production of cholesterol to balance things out.

On the other hand, if you don't eat enough cholesterol, your body simply produces more since cholesterol has dozens of important vital functions in the body.

And here's where it gets even more interesting...

There have been plenty of studies lately that indicate that eating whole eggs actually raises your good HDL cholesterol to a higher degree than LDL cholesterol, thereby improving your overall cholesterol ratio and blood chemistry.

And 3rd... high cholesterol is NOT a disease! Heart disease is a disease...but high cholesterol is NOT. Cholesterol is actually a VERY important substance in your body and has vitally important functions... it is DEAD WRONG to try to "lower your cholesterol" just because of pharmaceutical companies propaganda that everyone on the planet should be on statin drugs.
If you're interested in this topic of cholesterol specifically, I have another article listed at the bottom of this page about why trying to attack cholesterol is a mistake, and what the REAL deadly risk factors actually are.

In addition, the yolks contain the antioxidant lutein as well as other antioxidants which can help protect you from inflammation within your body (the REAL culprit in heart disease, not dietary cholesterol!), giving yet another reason why the yolks are actually GOOD for you, and not detrimental.

To help bring even more proof that whole eggs are better for you than egg whites, I recently read a University of Connecticut study that showed that a group of men in the study that ate 3 eggs per day for 12 weeks while on a reduced carb, higher fat diet increased their HDL good cholesterol by 20%, while their LDL bad cholesterol stayed the same during the study. However, the group that ate egg substitutes (egg whites) saw no change in either and did not see the improvement in good cholesterol (remember that higher HDL levels are associated with lower risk of heart disease) that the whole egg eaters did.

So I hope we've established that whole eggs are not some evil food that will wreck your body... instead whole eggs are FAR superior to egg whites.

But what about the extra calories in the yolks?

This is actually a non-issue and here's why... even though egg yolks contain more calories than just eating the egg whites, the yolks have such a high micro-nutrient density in those calories, that it increases your overall nutrient density per calorie you consume. Essentially, what this does is help to regulate your appetite for the remainder of the day, so you end up eating less calories overall. In addition, the healthy fats in the egg yolks help to maintain a good level of fat-burning hormones in your body.

Overall, this means that the extra fats (healthy fats) and calories from the yolk are so nutrient-dense that they actually HELP you to burn off body fat!

Also, your normal supermarket eggs coming from mass factory farming just don't compare nutritionally with organic free range eggs from healthy chickens that are allowed to roam freely and eat a more natural diet. Your typical cheap grocery store eggs will have lower nutrient levels and a higher omega-6 level and lower omega-3 level. On the other hand, the cage-free organic eggs from healthier chickens allowed to eat more natural feed and roam freely will have much higher vitamin and mineral levels and a more balanced healthier omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acid ratio.

I recently compared eggs I bought at the grocery store with a batch of eggs I got at a farm stand where the chickens were free roaming and healthy.

Most people don't realize that there's a major difference because they've never bought real eggs from healthy chickens... The eggs from the grocery store had pale yellow yolks and thin weak shells. On the other hand, the healthier free range eggs from the local farm had strong thick shells and deep orange colored yolks indicating much higher nutrition levels and carotenoids... and just a healthier egg in general.

This is due to the fact that a free-roaming hen allowed to roam on plenty of land will eat a variety of greens, insects, worms, etc transferring MUCH higher levels of nutrients to the eggs compared to an unhealthy hen that is trapped inside a dark factory farm hen house in horrible conditions and fed nothing but piles of corn and soy. It's a DRASTIC difference in the nutrition that you get from the egg.

So next time a health or fitness professional tells you that egg whites are superior (because of their "fat-phobic" mentality towards dietary fats), you can quietly ignore their advice knowing that you now understand the REAL deal about egg yolks.

And can we all please STOP with this sillyness about eating an omelete with 4-5 egg whites and only 1 egg yolk... If you want real taste and real health benefits, we'd all be better off eating ALL of our eggs with the yolks.

After all, do you REALLY think that our ancestors thousands of years ago threw out the yolks and only ate the egg whites? NOT A CHANCE! They intuitively knew that all of the nutrition was found in the yolks. But our modern society has been brainwashed with misinformation about fats and cholesterol.

Another interesting study about eggs...

I read a study recently that compared groups of people that ate egg breakfasts vs groups of people that ate cereal or bagel-based breakfasts. The results of the study showed that the egg eaters lost or maintained a healthier bodyweight, while the cereal/bagel eaters gained weight.
It was hypothesized that the egg eaters actually ate less calories during the remainder of the day because their appetite was more satisfied compared to the cereal/bagel eaters who would have been more prone to wild blood sugar swings and food cravings.

Oh, one last thing I almost forgot... I personally eat 4 whole eggs almost every day with breakfast, and I maintain single-digit bodyfat most of the year.

Enjoy your eggs and get a leaner body!

If you liked this article, please share it with your friends

Does Canned Food and Bottled Water Increase Your Abdominal Fat Through Hidden Chemicals?

2011-06-18T12:52:00.000+01:00

..and 9 Tips to Minimize Your Exposure to these Harmful Chemicals
by Mike Geary - Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best-selling program - The Truth About 6-Pack Abs

You may have started hearing in the news about some of the hidden chemicals that might be lurking in your canned foods and bottled water and other drinks. Some of them are known as xenoestrogens, which have the potential to cause serious health problems over time, as well as increase abdominal fat from the estrogenic effect.

Today, I want to share with you some important details about one of the MOST problematic chemicals that you're being exposed to specifically from canned foods and bottled drinks, etc...
It's called Bisphenol A (BPA).

BPA can be found as a component of some types of plastic bottles, and also in the lining inside of canned foods.

Since BPA is a known "xenoestrogen", it's been linked in animal studies (at surprisingly small doses) to all sorts of various health issues such as cancer, metabolic disorders, heart disease, diabetes, and fertility problems and birth defects or miscarriages... and of course, any xenoestrogens in large enough amounts can trigger your body to hold onto abdominal fat (aka - stubborn belly fat).

The major offenders to look for are polycarbonate bottles (some plastics with the #7 symbol on the bottom are polycarbonate, but not all) and also canned foods, since the lining of most canned foods contains BPA, which can leach into food. The longer that a can of food sits on a shelf and the higher the temperature, the more BPA can leach into your food. The same can be said for polycarbonate bottles that contain food or drinks.

According to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), BPA was detected in the bodies of 95% of Americans in one CDC study (this is a worldwide issue though, not just limited to the US). This is nothing to shrug off either... look at this scary finding...

The Environmental Working Group reports, "analysis of our tests reveals that for one of every five cans tested, and for one-third of all vegetables and pastas (ravioli and noodles with tomato sauce), a single serving would expose a pregnant woman to BPA at levels that fall within a factor of 5 of doses linked to birth defects — permanent damage of developing male reproductive organs".

If that didn't get your attention, how about this...

The EWG also reports evidence of... "An investigation demonstrating that low doses of BPA spur both the formation and growth of fat cells, the two factors that drive obesity in humans (Masumo et al. 2002)."

This is not surprising, since as I mentioned at the beginning of this article, BPA is a known xenoestrogen, and any xenoestrogens can contribute to what's been referred to as "stubborn abdominal fat" as well as cancer and other health problems.

It's also important to note that any canned tomato products (canned ravioli, pastas, canned tomato pastes, tomato sauces, etc) are some of the biggest offenders with the highest BPA concentrations due to the acidic nature of tomatoes, which leaches more of the BPA.

So what steps can you take to minimize your exposure to BPA and it's negative effects on bodyfat and other health risks?

1. Try to always avoid canned foods as much as possible and choose frozen or fresh foods instead. Buy the ingredients yourself and prepare the meal the old fashioned way instead of resorting to canned foods. Also, a better alternative to canned foods is products in glass containers.

2. If you do resort to using canned foods instead of fresh foods, try to find labels that say that the cans are free of BPA.

3. If you need tomato products, always avoid canned varieties and search for tomato sauces, pastes, etc in glass bottles instead (unless the can specifically states that it is BPA-free). Or just make your own tomato dishes from scratch with fresh tomatoes.

4. If you use plastic wrap, plastic ziplock bags, plastic containers for food storage, etc, try to investigate on the label if the product is BPA-free or not. Some brands packaging will label if their products are BPA-free.

5. If you for some reason choose to use a microwave with your food (which by the way, microwaved food is thought to have negative health effects), then by all means, do not microwave the food in plastic containers as it can increase the leaching of chemicals including BPA.

6. If you drink bottled water, or water from reusable plastic bottles, make sure that it is not a polycarbonate bottle, or make sure that the label says BPA-free. Plastic that shows #7 on the bottom will sometimes contain BPA, but not always. If a bottle shows "PC" on the bottom, it is made from polycarbonate, so it will contain BPA. In addition, sometimes aluminum bottles will contain a lining that has BPA, so avoid these.

7. Avoid soda cans, as the EWG states analysis showed that 42% of soda cans contained BPA. Of course, if you care about your health and your body, I'm sure you never drink soda anyway -- it's pure evil for your body... and yes, that includes unhealthy diet soda too, with it's dangerous artificial sweeteners.

8. Never use plastic cups for hot liquids such as hot tea or coffee, as this can accelerate leaching of BPA and other chemicals, depending on the type of plastic.

9. As much as you can try to avoid BPA and other xenoestrogens, you will most likely still be exposed to some levels of xenoestrogens from various chemicals in your foods (from pesticide/herbicide residues, packaging chemicals, etc), chemicals in your water supply, chemicals from cosmetics, lotions, etc.
However, you can help to protect yourself and counteract these harmful xenoestrogen chemicals in your body with certain powerful phytonutrients in foods like onions, garlic, chamomile and green teas, and cruciferious vegetables. In fact, read this article to see how 3 specific veggies can help you to fight abdominal fat by counteracting xenoestrogens.

If you stick to most of these guidelines, you can help to protect yourself and your family from the health dangers of bisphenol-A (BPA). And you can also help protect yourself against the issue of "stubborn abdominal fat" that can be caused by the xenoestrogen effect of BPA exposure too... which I'm sure you'd rather avoid!

Please share this article with your friends and family to help them protect their health from BPA exposure.

7 "FATTY" Foods that Can Help You to Get a Flat Stomach

2011-06-16T14:24:00.000+01:00

(some of these will surprise you!)

These 7 shocking Fatty (but healthy) super-foods can actually help you to burn body fat faster!
by Mike Geary, Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of the best-seller -- The Truth about Six Pack Abs

1. Super Dark Chocolate (at least 72% cacao content or higher) - It might not be a secret anymore, but yes, dark chocolate (NOT milk chocolate) can be a very healthy food, even though it is technically calorie dense.

However, I would contend that dark chocolate can actually HELP you to burn off more body fat if you're the type of person that has a sweet tooth and likes to eat a lot of desserts. In this case, just 1 or 2 small squares of dark chocolate can many times satisfy your sweet tooth for only 30 or 40 calories as opposed to 500 calories for a piece of chocolate cake or a piece of pie.

Also some brands of dark chocolate that are in the mid 70's in % cacao content or higher, can have a fairly high ratio of fiber content (I've seen some brands have 5 grams of fiber out of 15 grams of total carbs per serving), and relatively low sugar content compared to the amount of healthy fats. In fact, that's one of the "tricks" I use to select a good quality chocolate... I look for more total fat than total carbs (or about the same number of grams of each).

The importance of that fact is that it means many dark chocolates will not greatly affect your blood sugar and will have a fairly blunted blood sugar response compared to other "sweets".

In addition, dark chocolate is also very rich in healthful antioxidants, including a powerful compound called theobromine which has been shown to help lower blood pressure and have other health benefits. The fat content in a good dark chocolate should come solely from the natural healthy fats occuring in cocoa butter and not from any other added fats. Any chocolates with added fats or other additives will generally not be as healthy.

The reason I say to choose dark chocolates with at least 72% cacao content is that the higher the % of cacao, the lower the % of sugar. However, this does mean that any chocolate over 80% cacao content will generally start to get a more bitter taste and have very little sweetness. If you like this type of taste, then the higher % cocao, the better. Otherwise, a good 75% dark chocolate is in my opinion an almost perfect combination of lightly sweet with a rich chocolate taste. Just remember to keep those daily quantities of chocolate small as it is calorie dense!

You can also reap the benefits of the antioxidants and fiber without all of the calories by using organic unsweetened cocoa powder in your smoothies or other recipes.

2. Coconut milk, coconut flour, and coconut oil -- Coconut milk and oil are great sources of a super healthy type of saturated fat called medium chain triglycerides (MCTs), including a component called lauric acid, which is a powerful nutrient for your immune system, and is lacking in most western diets. In addition, MCTs are readily used for energy by the body and less likely to be stored as bodyfat compared to other types of fats.

Along with coconut milk and coconut oil as healthy fat choices, we've also got coconut flour as a healthier flour option for baking. Coconut flour is an extremely high fiber flour alternative (almost ALL of the carbs in this flour are fiber and not starch!). Coconut flour is also VERY high in protein compared to most flours and is also gluten free!

Just beware that if you're going to use coconut flour for baking, it absolutely NEEDS to be mixed with other flours as it sucks up moisture like crazy... I've made delicious baked goods by mixing coconut flour with almond flour and quinoa flour in equal parts, and adding slightly more liquid ingredients than the recipe calls for.

3. Grass-fed (pasture-raised) butter -- yes, delicious smooth and rich BUTTER (real butter, not deadly margarine!)... It's delicious, contains loads of healthy nutritional factors, and does NOT have to be avoided in order to get lean. In fact, I eat a couple pats of grass-fed butter daily and maintain single digit bodyfat most times of the year.

There's a lot of confusion about this topic... in fact, I just saw a TV show today that was talking about unhealthy foods and one of the first things they showed was butter. It just shows that the majority of the population has zero idea that butter (grass-fed only!) can actually be a healthy part of your diet.
This discussion of why butter is actually healthy would take up too much room on this article, so I refer you to this article: how REAL butter can make you leaner.

If you have a hard time finding a grass-fed butter at your grocery store, Kerrygold Irish butter is one of my favorites, and even though the label doesn't clearly state "grass-fed", the cows are 100% grass-fed on lush green pastures in Ireland. It's one of the richest butters in color that I've seen, which indicates high levels of carotenoids.

4. Whole Eggs, including the yolk (not just egg whites) -- Most people know that eggs are one of the highest quality sources of protein. However, most people don't know that the egg yolks are the healthiest part of the egg... that's where almost all of the vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants (such as lutein) are found in eggs.

In fact, the egg yolks contain more than 90% of the calcium, iron, phosphorus, zinc, thiamin, B6, folate, and B12, and panthothenic acid of the egg. In addition, the yolks contain ALL of the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K in the egg, as well as ALL of the essential fatty acids. Also, the protein of whole eggs is more bio-available than egg whites alone due to a more balanced amino acid profile that the yolks help to build.

Just make sure to choose free-range organic eggs instead of normal grocery store eggs. Similar to the grass-fed beef scenerio, the nutrient content of the eggs and the balance between healthy omega-3 fatty acids and inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids (in excess) is controlled by the diet of the hens.

Chickens that are allowed to roam free outside and eat a more natural diet will give you healthier, more nutrient-rich eggs with a healthier fat balance compared with your typical grocery store eggs (that came from chickens fed nothing but soy and corn and crowded inside "egg factories" all day long).
If you want more details on eggs, here is an article that details more about why egg yolks are BETTER for you than egg whites.

5. Grass-fed beef or bison (NOT the typical grocery store beef!) -- I know most people think that red meat is unhealthy for you, but that's because they do not understand how the health of the animal affects how healthy the meat is for consumption. Keep this in mind -- "an unhealthy animal provides unhealthy meat, but a healthy animal provides healthy meat".

Typical beef or bison that you see at the grocery store is raised on grains, mainly corn (and to some extent, soybeans). Soy and corn are NOT the natural diet of cattle or bison, and therefore changes the chemical balance of fats and other nutrients in the beef or bison. Grain-fed beef and bison is typically WAY too high in omega-6 fats and WAY too low in omega-3 fats. In addition, the practice of feeding cattle corn and soy as the main portion of their diet upsets their digestive system and makes them sick... and it also increases the amount of dangerous e-coli in the meat. This is not the case with grass-fed meat.
On the other hand, grass-fed beef from cattle and buffalo (or bison) that were raised on the type of natural foods that they were meant to eat in nature (grass and other forage), have much higher levels of healthy omega-3 fats and lower levels of inflammatory omega-6 fats (that most people already eat way too much of) compared to grain fed beef or bison.

Grass fed meats also typically contain up to 3 times the Vitamin E as in grain fed meats.
In addition, grass-fed meat from healthy cattle or bison also contain a special healthy fat called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) in MUCH higher levels than grain-fed meat. CLA has been proven in scientific studies in recent years to help in burning fat and building lean muscle (which can help you lose weight!). These benefits are on top of the fact that grass-fed meats are some of the highest quality proteins that you can possibly eat... and this also aids in burning fat and building lean muscle.

Grass-fed meats are a little harder to find, but just ask your butcher or find a specialty grocery store and they usually have cuts available. I've also found a great site to order grass-fed meats online and have gotten to know the owner of this company well, and they are dedicated to the quality of their foods.

6. Avocodos -- Even though avocados are typically thought of as a "fatty food", they are chock full of healthy fats! Not only is this fruit (yes, surprisingly, avocados are actually a fruit) super-high in monounsaturated fat, but also chock full of vitamins, minerals, micro-nutrients, and antioxidants.

Also, in my opinion, guacamole (mashed avocados with garlic, onion, tomato, pepper, etc) is one of the most delicious food toppings ever created, and you can be happy to know that it's also one of the healthiest toppings you can use on your foods. Try sliced avocados or guacamole on sandwiches, burgers, eggs or omelets, on salads or with fish, or as a delicious side to just about any meal.

The quality dose of healthy fats, fiber, and micronutrients that you get from avocados helps your body to maintain proper levels of hormones that help with fat loss and muscle building. Also, since avocados are an extremely satiating food, eating them helps to reduce your appetite in the hours after your meal. Say goodbye to junk food cravings and bring on that fat burning! I personally eat anywhere from a half to a full avocado DAILY and it only helps to keep me lean.

7. Nuts: Walnuts, Almonds, Pistachios, Pecans, Brazil Nuts, Macadamias, etc -- Yes, this is yet another "fatty food" that can actually help you burn belly fat! Although nuts are generally between 75-90% fat in terms of a ratio of fat calories to total calories, this is another type of food that is all healthy fats, along with high levels of micronutrients such as vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. Nuts are also a good source of fiber and protein, which of course, you know helps to control blood sugar and can aid in fat loss.

Nuts also help to maintain good levels of fat burning hormones in your body (adequate healthy fat intake is vitally important to hormone balance) as well as helping to control appetite and cravings so that you essentially eat less calories overall, even though you're consuming a high-fat food. My favorite healthy nuts are pecans, pistachios, almonds, macadamias, and walnuts, and by eating them in variety, you help to broaden the types of vitamins and minerals and also the balance of polyunsaturated to monounsaturated fats you obtain.
Try to find raw nuts instead of roasted nuts if you can, as it helps to maintain the quality and nutritional content of the healthy fats that you will eat.

Also, try to broaden your horizons beyond the typical peanut butter that most people eat, and try almond butter, cashew butter, pecan butter, or macadamia butter to add variety to your diet.
One of the little "tricks" that I've used with clients when trying to cut down body fat is to have them eat a handful of nuts such as almonds or pecans about 20 minutes before lunch and dinner. This ends up being a perfect time to control your appetite before lunch or dinner and helps you to eat less overall calories on that meal.

I hope you enjoyed this look at some of the healthiest "fatty" fat-burning foods you can possibly eat. I could list a ton more, but wanted to give you a few of my favorites for now. Enjoy!

My Recipe For HEALTHY Pancakes -- High Fiber and Protein

2011-06-04T18:17:00.000+01:00

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that your typical pancakes are certainly NOT the type of food you want to eat if your goal is fat loss or staying lean. The refined flour with almost zero fiber, the added refined sugars, the crappy inflammatory vegetable oils... not good.

The fact is... normal pancakes make you gain FAT!

However, for years, there's been a basic type of modified pancake recipe floating around in bodybuilding circles that is a healthier higher protein version (although not my favorite)...

Basically, the bodybuilder version is as simple as using a carton of egg whites in a blender, adding some dry oatmeal and vanilla whey protein (and a few other minor ingredients), and then cooking them up as "protein pancakes".

But I'll be honest with you... this bodybuilding pancake recipe tastes more like sweetened eggs than it does like pancakes.

So what I've done is come up with my own variation of healthier higher fiber and high protein pancakes that actually TASTES like pancakes. Of course, we know that most pre-made pancake dry mixes are not the healthiest option. However, they can be more convenient for most people than trying to make pancakes from scratch.

Here's what you can do to make much healthier pancakes:

1. Take only 1/3 of the quantity of pancake mix that the box calls for. So if the box says to use 1 cup of dry pancake mix, just use 1/3 cup instead. This way, you're greatly reducing the amount of refined wheat flour and sugar that are in these mixes by only using 1/3 of the amount recommended.

I know I'm usually pretty strict with ruling out ALL refined wheat flours, but sometimes just reducing the quantity and substituting the remainder with healthier ingredients is the best option for something like this. If you want the healthiest option, start from scratch with your own blend of almond flour, coconut flour, and quinoa flour. Otherwise, the easier method is just to follow this recipe.

2. For the remaining 2/3 of the dry mix, substitute in a mixture of equal parts oat bran, rice bran, and whey protein (preferably grass-fed raw whey protein). You can find oat bran at most grocery stores, and rice bran at most health food stores. Try using a little cinnamon too if you like the taste (cinnamon boosts the antioxidant content and also stabilizes the blood sugar response).

3. Use whole eggs instead of egg whites and use 1 extra egg than what the recipe calls for to increase the protein and healthy fats content.

If you missed my previous article about whole eggs vs egg whites, you'll see why it is downright foolish to use egg whites instead of whole eggs.

4. After mixing in the milk called for on the box, whisk the mixture in a bowl. Now you're ready to pour the healthier pancakes into the pan. Don't forget to top them with some blueberries or other berries for some extra taste and healthful benefits.

5. The best oil to use in the pan for cooking is virgin coconut oil. I use virgin coconut oil for most of my cooking as it's one of the healthiest options. It's a much more stable oil for cooking so it's not prone to the oxidation and free radical production that typical vegetable oils are prone to.

If you're confused about which cooking oils are healthy and which are not, this article of mine clears that up.

Again, the trick to this recipe is using only 1/3 of the dry pancake mix (since that's the least healthy part of this recipe) and the other 2/3 of the dry materials are the oat bran, rice bran, and whey protein (healthiest whey is this raw grass-fed whey here) to boost the fiber and protein content of the pancakes.

I only do pancakes on occasion as they are a nice treat, but at least with this recipe, you have yourself a much healthier version of pancakes that are quite high in fiber and much higher in protein and healthy fats than your typical pancake recipe... but they still taste like pancakes and are delicious in my opinion!

And do yourself a favor and please do not ruin this meal by dousing it with your typical fake maple syrup, which is usually all high fructose corn syrup! Real maple syrup is better than fake syrup, but beware, as it still packs a LOT of sugar and calories.

Instead, a much lower calorie option is to simply top your high fiber, high protein pancakes with some REAL butter (grass-fed, organic) and some fresh berries or other cut fruit instead of syrup.

Enjoy!

Feel free to share this page with all of your friends, family, and coworkers that might enjoy it. Copy this page into facebook to share this healthy pancake idea with your friends.

Mike Geary
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer
Founder - TruthAboutAbs.com

New Study: Can Cell Phone Use Damage Your Bones?

2011-06-03T12:27:00.000+01:00

If you read a lot of health news, I'm sure you've read plenty of articles about some of the emerging health risks that are being found with excessive use of cell phones. Well, I just read about YET another study that is showing health concerns with cell phone use...

According to a study conducted by Dr. Fernando Saravi at the National University of Cuyo in Argentina, they studied bone mineral density of 48 healthy men who carried cell phones on their right hip for a year. It was found that the men who carried cell phones on their right hip had lower mineral content and bone density in the upper thigh bones near where the cell phone was carried, compared to their left hip.

The researchers believe that the low level EM radiation given off by cell phones leads to bone degradation over time in the area that the cell phone is carried most. This means that it could potentially raise the risk for osteoporosis or other bone diseases the longer that someone carries a cell phone in the same place on their body.

This shocking study doesn't surprise me... In fact, make sure to read this article below which ALSO shows some actual tests that were performed that showed reduced testosterone levels, reduced sperm counts, and other health risks associated with carrying a cell phone in your pocket:

Shocking study about dangers of carrying a cell phone in your pocket

This information shouldn't be taken lightly. I know that cell phones are a major part of most people's lives now, and they are here to stay, but there are simple steps that can be taken to reduce your risks of getting long term health consequences, and those protective steps are described in the article here.

Please help to protect the health of your friends and family and fwd this email to everyone you care about. The article above also has easy sharing buttons to share with your friends on facebook and twitter.

Helping to protect your health,

Mike Geary
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer
TruthAboutAbs.com

My 12-day Carbohydrate Binge Experiment

2011-06-02T12:20:00.000+01:00

How I gained lean muscle and lost body fat by using strategic carb cycling and training styles
by Mike Geary - Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author of best-selling program - The Truth About 6-Pack Abs

Here's how this cool little carb binge experiment went down... I just went on a 12-day trip where the first 7 days were spent in beautiful Turks & Caicos with my girlfriend and also my good friends Dr. Kareem (the author of the popular Double Edged Fat Loss program) and his wife Karen.

The next 5 days of our trip was spent on the east coast of the US visiting my parents and helping them to do a lot of spring yardwork, etc. before coming back home last night to a springtime snowstorm here in the rocky mountains of Colorado (hello May powder day tomorrow at A-basin!)

Since I knew that high carbohydrate temptations were going to be everywhere during this 12 day trip (yes, even at my parents house!), I decided to not try to fight the urge to indulge, but rather, just indulge like crazy in the extra carbs, and shift my training program to benefit from the extra carbs for muscle building... and then shift back to a low carb "paleo" style nutrition plan upon returning.

The Priming Phase

In order for this carb binge to work favorably and not just pack on loads of body fat, I had to "prime" my body for about 10 days prior to this trip by going very low carb and using a specific style of training. Then, my body would be primed to utilize the extra carbs during my trip for muscle glycogen and using a high volume "pump" style training program to shift focus to muscle building.

The low-carb phase is also used to increase insulin sensitivity and improve the efficiency of the body in regulating blood sugar. I've actually used similar low-high carb cycling (combined with the appropriate training style) throughout this past winter and have seen some great gains in strength and lean muscle mass, and also reduced bodyfat a couple % too!

Here's how I maximized the benefits of this high-carb and low-carb cycling:

First, during the 10-day low carb "priming" phase, I didn't eat any breads, cereals, pasta, or any grains at all... none! I only ate a small amount of daily carbs from berries and lots of veggies. This phase was mostly healthy fats and protein.

I ate almost entirely meat and veggies, lots of eggs (yes, including the yolks!), nuts, cheese, seeds, some berries, lots of almond butter on celery, supplemental protein and fiber (this grass-fed raw whey is my favorite new protein), veggies and hummus, lots of avocados, olive oil, coconut oil and cream. All of the meats I eat at home are always grass-fed or free range organic meats (bison, beef, venison, and some free range local chicken or pork).

The low-carb priming phase workouts

When you're going low carb, it's no time to try to do high volume training... meaning, you won't be able to achieve a "pump", so it makes more sense to do 2 specific styles of training:

1. Very heavy weight low rep training for max strength -- This type of training was the first 30 minutes of each workout during the low carb phase and included mostly heavy deadlifts, barbell squats, weighted pullups, and bench press. The goal of this training is to maintain lean muscle and max strength on a low carb phase. Reps per set would be no more than 3-4 reps, which means HEAVY training.
The absolute BEST supersets for this style of super heavy training is deadlifts paired with bench, and squats paired with weighted pullups. The reason that pullups and deadlifts can't be paired together is that they're both grip intensive and will hurt the results on each other if paired.

2. High intensity metabolic training -- This type of training was the second 30 minutes of each workout during the low carb phase and involves more "circuit" style training at high intensity and almost no rest in between sets. One of the killer combos I used was this:

Dumbbell squat and presses
Renegade dumbbell rows
Dumbbell reverse lunges
Dumbbell bench step ups
Dumbbell bent over reverse flyes

The goal of this style of training for the second 30 minutes of each workout was simply to get a super high metabolic response and further deplete muscle glycogen and burn body fat.
I did this style of training and super low carb nutrition plan for about 10 days leading up to my trip, which I planned to go on a carb bender and indulge in whatever high-calorie high-carbohydrate foods I wanted during my trip.

Weird side note: Oddly enough, as much as I enjoyed the carbohydrate bender and eating loads of breads, pasta, and desserts on my trip, I actually really enjoyed the super low carb strict phase too. Overall, I think I just feel better and more mentally clear, and with more energy when I'm eating a lower carb "paleo" style of diet. But I won't lie... the carb bender was loads of fun too!

The 12-day high-carb binge phase!

While I was on the 7-day trip in Turks & Caicos, we were obviously eating a lot at restaurants, which means lots of carbs, but we also stocked up at the grocery store and made breakfasts and lunches in our condo. Regardless, I wasn't shy about loading up on the carbos!

The purpose of the high carb binge phase was:

1. Allow myself to go a little nuts on vacation with food
2. Max out muscle glycogen to get a super "pump" during high volume weight training
3. Benefit from the extra calories and the extra insulin production to get a muscle building effect.

Although high insulin can trigger fat gain if left high for too long, elevating insulin strategically can also help to gain muscle. Gaining lean muscle can subsequently make fat loss easier due to your increased metabolic rate. Muscle is KEY to having a blazing metabolism for life!

During the carb binge period, I still had at least one daily serving of Athletic Greens, which is shockingly delicious for a "greens" drink. It's loaded with antioxidants, superfoods, and also lots of probiotics, so that was an important part of my regime to make sure my digestion was still going strong and all of my micro-nutrition was complete.

After the 7 days in Turks, we had 5 days at my parents house in Pennsylvania, and I continued the carb binge, as there was lots of cereal, pasta, and desserts lying around. In defense of my parents, they eat a healthier diet than 95% of the population... at least 75% of the meat that they eat comes from wild game or wild fish that they caught themselves.

And they grow most of their own organic produce for at least 7 months out of the year as they keep a huge organic garden in their backyard. But, they also eat bread and cereal almost daily and have sugary desserts almost daily too. So they eat more grains and sugar than I would recommend to anyone, but aside from that, they eat pretty healthy overall. They're very active too, so they are not overweight despite eating more grains and sugar than they probably should.

It was a carb feast!

While at my parents house, we had big pasta and venison sausage dinners, sandwiches, lots of bread, lots of cereal, and lots of ice cream every night for dessert. I was in a carb coma most of the time! This is almost a shock to my system since I eat such a low carb "paleo" style diet most of the time. But remember that I was utilizing these excess carbs for a PURPOSE! To build muscle. Of course, the carbs themselves aren't the building blocks of muscle (that's the job of protein), but they add the extra calories and the biochemical environment that can make muscle building easier.

Although I might have loaded up on high carb foods that I wouldn't normally eat during this 12 day phase, such as pasta, cereals, muffins, and breads, I still stuck to my guns and refused to eat any artificial trans fats at all, and zero high fructose corn syrup as well. Those 2 food additives are just too evil in my mind.
Keep in mind that I also worked my arse off every day during this carb binge!

The high-carb binge phase workouts

My goal during the high carb binge phase was different than during the low carb phase. Since I was maxing out muscle glycogen with all of those carbs, I wanted to take advantage of that and do more high volume weight training and go for more of the "pump" with the workouts. One of the things we're trying to do is "stretch" the muscle fibers while in a pumped state.

This was also the only time that I would include some single joint "bodybuilding" style exercises into my routine, such as bicep curls, tricep presses, dumbell pullovers, pec flyes, etc. However, the focus of the workouts was still multi-joint compound exercises first (such as squats, bench, lat pulls, barbell rows, dumbbell rows, etc), but in higher rep, high volume fashion.

In addition to the high volume "pump" style weight training during this carb binge phase, I was also doing a lot of daily firewood splitting with an axe to help my parents prep for next winter (I LOVE the muscular workout involved in splitting massive logs the old fashioned way!). This was a great way to help my parents with some of the yard work and get in some extra daily exercise.

So although it might have sounded careless (especially if you know my track record of healthy eating) for me to be carb bingeing so heavily, realize that I was also getting TONS of daily exercise and trying to make the best use of those excess carbs for building muscle.

Back to a lower carb plan again...

Now that I'm back home, I'm back on a lower carb plan again eating almost solely meats, lots of veggies, eggs, nuts, seeds, avocados, etc. When I'm on a lower carb "paleo" style plan, if I had to estimate my macro-nutrient ratios, I'd say it's probably around 15% carbs, 35% protein, and 50% healthy fats.

Side note: One of the purposes of the super heavy, low rep weight training during the low-carb, high fat phase is that both of these aspects (the heavy training and the high fat intake) help to maximize healthy testosterone levels... which is obviously good for both maintaining muscle and losing body fat, among other benefits. I have another article here that explains the exact workout methods that help increase both testosterone and growth hormone naturally to help lose body fat and build muscle faster.

After my first workout back on a lower-carb plan today, I broke lifetime personal records in 3 of my lifts on strength levels! Score! Yes, that was a benefit of this type of cycling. And I guarantee that losing that last bit of abdominal fat is going to be easy over the next couple weeks of low carb eating now that I'm carrying a few pounds more lean muscle on my frame.

I'll continue a low carb cycle again for another 2-3 weeks before I go on another carb binge for 10-12 days.
I've done this type of cycle several times in the last 4 months or so, and I can say that I've improved body composition every time... more muscle and less fat after all was said and done!

If you have a vacation coming up and want to "go nuts" on the carbs and calories while on vacation, keep this strategy in mind and make sure to do the low carb "priming" for 10-14 days before the trip and about 2 weeks after the trip too, before settling back to your "maintenance" diet.

This plan of low carb and high carb cycling and associated workout modifications can also be used even if you're not going on vacation... but it sure is fun on vacation!

Feel free to share this article with your friends on facebook, twitter, etc...

Metabolic Damage Why It Happens, How to Avoid It and How to Fix It

2011-05-28T17:11:00.000+01:00

By Tom Venuto, Fat Loss Expert,
Author of Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle

Somewhere in your fitness travels (or random googling), you may have come across the topic of “metabolic damage” or its close relative, “starvation mode.” Perhaps both. If so, you probably felt a twinge of fear after hearing a description like this one:

star•va•tion mode - noun (stär-ˈvā-shən mōd): a series of metabolic, hormonal and behavioral responses to extreme or prolonged calorie deprivation, which is common during many popular weight loss diets. Since your body can’t recognize the difference between severe dieting and starving, it responds as if you were really starving: Protective mechanisms are activated to decrease your rate of further weight loss, including reduced energy, lower physical activity and increased appetite. Your metabolism also slows down more than you’d predict for the amount of body weight lost.

As you self-diagnose your symptoms, you really begin to worry: low energy… hungry all the time… can’t stop thinking about food... seems like you’re not losing fast enough for how little you’re eating… weight loss has gotten slower or even reached a plateau. And when returning to normal eating, you seem to gain back the weight faster and easier than you ever gained weight before!

At this point, your heart drops into the pit of your stomach and you’re convinced that you’re a metabolic damage victim. “What If I’m in starvation mode?” you ask yourself. “What if I’ve messed up my thyroid gland?” “What if I’m stuck with this fat forever because my metabolism is SHOT?”

Okay, now that I’ve scared you half to death, you can take a deep sigh of relief. Not because there’s no truth to the problems I’ve just described, but because there are solutions.

The metabolic damage and starvation mode controversies

First, I want to confirm that both “starvation mode” and “metabolic damage” are real, although some bloggers and internet writers keep insisting they’re not. The reason for the confusion is understandable though, because these phenomena are misunderstood, and myths about them abound.

The big doozy is the (mythical) girl who (claims) she’s eating “only 300 calories a day and not losing weight.” Funny how you put her in a metabolic ward on 1000-1200 calories a day (measured and enforced) and she starts losing weight like crazy. That wasn’t starvation mode caused by a 300 calorie per day “slow metabolism.” The damaging admission you’ll never hear from our physics-defying girl is, “I suck at counting calories and I underreport how much I eat…. Oh yeah, I overestimate how many calories I burn too.” [end sarcasm]

Starvation mode and metabolic damage are also not scientific terms, which is another reason they are unduly dismissed. If you look up “adaptive thermogenesis” however, (the technical term for the metabolic decrease part of starvation mode), you’ll find plenty of evidence proving that it’s real. It affects some people more than others due to genetic and lifestyle factors and it’s not a stretch to suggest that metabolic damage hits women harder than men.

Details about the mechanisms and hormones involved are beyond the scope of this article and would put 90% of my readers to sleep anyway. What’s important for now is that you understand this: starvation dieting causes rapid weight loss, but also causes “bad stuff” to happen to your body that makes continued weight loss more difficult and weight regain more likely. It’s a very complex process, involving numerous feedback loops and body systems.

The lasting effects of starvation dieting

Research dating back to the 1980’s and 1990’s found that diet-induced decreases in metabolism can extend to the period AFTER the diet is over. This gives us yet another reason why keeping the weight off is so hard.
Diane Elliot, an MD and professor of medicine at Oregon University published her research in 1989 about the lasting effects of very low calorie diets. She wrote:

"Resting metabolic rate of our obese subjects remained depressed after massive weight loss despite increased caloric consumption to a level that allowed body weight stabilization."

In 1997, Abdul Dulloo and his colleagues at the University of Geneva completed a similar study which examined the effects of semi starvation after the calorie restriction had ended. He said:

"The reduction in thermogenesis during semistarvation persists after 12 weeks of restricted refeeding, with its size being inversely proportional to the degree of fat recovery."

In 1999, Arne Astrup published a meta analysis with data from all the studies which had investigated changes in metabolism after weight loss. They found that formerly obese subjects had a 3-5% lower resting metabolic rate than control subjects who had never been obese.

These and other studies suggest that metabolic consequences of crash dieting and rapid weight loss persist after the diet is over. The degree of metabolic drop can vary from the almost insignificant to the very serious, but the drop is real. This is “metabolic damage.” I would define it not only as the bad stuff that happens during the diet, but also as the lag time between when a severe diet ends and when your hormones, metabolic rate and appetite-regulating mechanisms get back to normal.

Pursuing weight loss the wrong way (“dumb dieting”) makes the bad stuff worse and aftereffects linger longer. Pursuing fat loss and body composition improvement the smart way minimizes the bad stuff and prevents outright metabolic damage. The Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle (BFFM) program is based – from A to Z – on doing fat loss the smart way.

7 Smart strategies for fat burning and metabolic health
Below, you’ll see 7 of the best fat burning strategies which keep your hormones happy and your metabolism burning hot.

Eat more! You need a caloric deficit for weight loss, but there are different ways to do it. You can eat less. You can exercise more. You can do a little bit of both. In addition, how specifically you eat less and exercise more makes all the difference. The smart way is to avoid crash diets and pursue slower but steady fat loss with an eye on body composition. Start with a conservative deficit of only 20% below your maintenance level. Use a larger deficit only if you’re seriously overweight. Increase the deficit incrementally when you need to, ideally not going above 30% under maintenance. When you add in resistance training, cardio training and an active lifestyle, your calorie expenditure (metabolism) goes way up, and that’s how you can legitimately eat more and keep getting leaner.

1. Eat natural. The long term use of refined, artificial foods will eventually take its toll on your health. When hormonal health declines, body composition outcomes are worse during weight loss and risk of metabolic damage may increase. Furthermore, most natural, unprocessed foods, especially vegetables and lean proteins, are lower in caloric density and can lead to spontaneous decreases in caloric intake compared to the standard American diet (S.A.D.) For optimal body composition results and metabolic and hormonal health, it’s not just about calorie quantity, but also calorie quality. Don’t focus on one to the neglect of the other.

2. Eat often and regularly: I recommend eating like a physique athlete. Spread your total daily calories into 4-6 small meals per day, if feasible, and be sure to include a source of lean protein with every meal. But whatever meal schedule you choose, consistency is of great importance: studies have shown that haphazard eating patterns are at least partially responsible for metabolic disarray including decreased thermic effect of feeding and dysregulation of blood sugar and insulin

3. Use carb cycling. The Burn The Fat, Feed the Muscle Method puts you in the optimal healthy calorie deficit, but periodically, you increase your calories to keep your metabolism and appetite regulating hormones up at the normal level. Instead of the carb-phobic diets that millions of people still follow (which can actually suppress hormones like thyroid and leptin), carb cycling with a high carb refeed every 4th day or so, allows you to eat more carbs and you still keep losing fat. The benefits are physical and psychological and best part is, you’re never completely deprived.

4. Take Diet breaks: Avoid prolonged periods in aggressive caloric deficits. If you have a lot of fat to lose and it’s going to take more than 3 months to hit your long term fat loss goal, don’t do it all in one stretch. Take a week at maintenance calories after 12 weeks of restricted dieting. This – raising your calories - is the most counter-intuitive of all the metabolism-rebuilding strategies but it’s one of the most important.

5. Do Cardio. Don’t Over-Do It. If you’re overweight, you can sometimes get away with very low calorie diets without adverse consequences if you’re not doing tons of cardio on top of it. Endurance athletes get away with high volume training because they provide ample amounts of food to fuel it (man, those guys can EAT!) Dieters and physique competitors on the other hand, often semi-starve themselves while doing huge amounts of cardio at the same time.

6. Do Cardio. Don’t Over-Do It. If you’re overweight, you can sometimes get away with very low calorie diets without adverse consequences if you’re not doing tons of cardio on top of it. Endurance athletes get away with high volume training because they provide ample amounts of food to fuel it (man, those guys can EAT!) Dieters and physique competitors on the other hand, often semi-starve themselves while doing huge amounts of cardio at the same time.

Exercise research says that extreme amounts of cardio during a diet can actually cause the same type of adaptive metabolic downshift as eating too little food. Fitness and figure competitors have been known to do 2 or even 3 hours of cardio a day before competitions. This kind of overtraining can be counter-productive when you look at the metabolic damage and “cardio dependency” potential. And remember, if you’re not diligent, you can out-eat almost any amount of exercise. If you’re doing upwards of an hour of cardio a day and not seeing significant fat loss, you’d better take a close look at your diet first before you rush to add more cardio.

7. Weight training: In the physique world, weight training is a foregone conclusion. But in the everyday world of non-athletes, weight loss = “diet,” not weight loss = “lift weights.” For Suzy soccer mom, “lift weights to lose weight” probably doesn't even compute. But weight training is so important for metabolic health and better body composition, that if you were forced to choose one or the other – cardio or weights – the weightlifting would be a NO BRAINER decision. If you have a concern about metabolic damage and you’re not weight training yet, there’s nothing else to discuss. Start pumping iron, then get back to me.

What if you have long history of starvation dieting and yo yo weight cycling?

Ok, so these 7 strategies are great for avoiding metabolic damage and minimizing the metabolic adaptations that happen while dieting. But what if you’re a chronic dieter and you fear that you’ve already messed up your metabolism?

Take another sigh of relief. With the exception of a pessimistic report we see here and there about metabolic damage being irreparable, the majority of the research says the effects are temporary. In severe cases, it may take a little longer to get back to normal and continue on to achieve your long term goals, but it's never hopeless.

One case I recall was a former jazz and ballet dancer. At 5' 5", she was previously 110 lbs and had increased to about 145 or so. She didn't want to reach her previous 110, but find a happy medium of about 125 -130 lbs. I figured with at most 20 lbs to cut, this would be a simple and predictable process, but she had a challenging time dropping fat even on a surprisingly low caloric intake. I didn't know why at first – but I knew she wasn’t cheating and she was tracking food intake meticulously.

I later found out that she had been anorexic and bulimic for many years. This had lasting repercussions, and although she did reach her goal, it took about twice as long as we anticipated.

Easing into more calories and more carbs with a transitional period

If you think you’re in the same boat: (A) it seems like you’re not eating that much, but you’re not losing fat and or (B) you’ve finally reached your goal but you’re terrified of regaining if you raise your calories, you should use the same 7 strategies to get your metabolism back in gear. You simply need to add a “transition period” to build your calories back up slowly. If you’re worried about suddenly increasing your calories, you’re not paranoid – you’re prudent.

After becoming accustomed and somewhat adapted to a lower caloric intake, avoid abruptly jumping up to your predicted maintenance level. Instead, increase calories slowly 100-200 at a time and hold them there for one week. Measure the results after each one week phase, and then repeat until you reach your appropriate deficit or maintenance level. This will give your body and your mind time to adjust.

Here’s another safe way to ease into a higher food intake. This is ideal if you’ve been on a low calorie, low carb diet and you want to ease out of it. Add carbs, but start by adding them only in the post workout meal. During the post-training window of opportunity, not only will the carbs NOT get stored as fat, (they’ll get sucked right up into muscle glycogen), this strategy can dramatically improve your body composition and workout recovery.

If you still feel discouraged despite now having these strategies at your fingertips, then take one last sigh of relief. The good news is, even in extreme cases, these nutrition and training principles work! It just takes a little longer.

My dancer client? She kept going. With patience and hard work, she placed top 5 in a national fitness competition – and as you can imagine, her routine was killer, just like her body! By the way, her program included serious heavy training with free weights and she ate a lot more (clean) food than she had ever eaten before…

Your friend and coach,

Tom Venuto
Fat Loss Coach
www.BurnTheFat.com

A New Morning Ritual to Get Ripped Abs

2011-05-27T11:19:00.000+01:00

Instead of an in-depth article for you to read today, I just wanted to share a few fitness techniques I've been using myself lately, and my new "morning ritual" which has been getting killer results!

In fact, just doing this morning ritual for the last 7 mornings in a row, I can already see that my lower abs are getting more defined by the day (indicating that this is lowering my body fat % a bit more).

This involves both exercise AND nutrition tricks, so read this whole post, even if you can't do the exact same type of exercise.

Ok, here's the method I've been using that is getting amazing results...

We just started getting really warm spring weather here in the Rockies, so the last 7 mornings in a row, I've walked 15 minutes over to the local soccer field and done about 20 minutes or so of all-out wind sprints (50-100 yard wind sprints with full out intensity), and then I do the 15 minute walk back home.

Even if you can't do wind sprints, keep in mind that you can still do something similar that is a higher intensity for you personally (perhaps hill walking instead of wind sprints, for example).

By the way, outdoor sprints are where the action is... sprints on a treadmill don't have the same effect as there's more force production involved in accelerating a sprint outdoors compared to on a treadmill. Plus, the max speed on a treadmill is not high enough usually for an "all-out" sprint. In my mind, it's a world of difference. Personally I never step foot on a treadmill.

How wind sprints raise your fat melting hormones:

One of the reasons that wind sprints are so effective at chiseling your body and reducing body fat to "ripped" levels (have you ever seen the bodies of some competitive sprinters? ripped!) is that sprints are one of the specific exercises that are known to have a great effect on increasing Growth Hormone (GH) naturally in your body...

...and we all know that GH production in your body is one of the key secrets to getting lean, strong, and also staying youthful!

For the wind sprints, what I've been doing is increasing distance on each sprint from 50 meters to 60 meters, 70, 80, 90, and finally 100 meters. Then I repeat the cycle. Usually just 2 cycles of this is enough to get me fully whooped (about 12 all-out sprints)! But as time goes on this summer, I will try to increase distance, the number of sprints, or the intensity to keep progressing.

Now for the morning nutrition trick I've been using...

I've tried "morning empty stomach exercise" in the past, and here's the deal... I usually don't have the energy to do anything intense first thing in the morning without eating, so for these sprints, I've found a nice little concoction I came up with that gives me the energy to do these high intensity sprints without weighing me down, and without many calories. It's just enough to do the trick!

What I've been doing is mixing Athletic Greens (which is lightly sweetened with stevia, nothing artificial, and with only 40 calories per serving, but 76 superfoods mixed in) with unsweetened iced tea (green, white, oolong, and yerba mate mixture) first thing in the morning. I usually have a big batch of unsweetened iced tea in a gallon container in the fridge that has at least these 4 teas mixed for taste and diversity of antioxidants.

I also mix in about a half scoop (12 grams) of raw grass-fed whey protein, and I have a couple grams of BCAA's (to help minimize muscle catabolism), and a few caps of krill oil.

This entire concoction is only about 120 calories total (with only 3 grams of carbs from the Athletic Greens), so it's just enough to give me energy to do the high intensity sprints, but not too much to weigh me down.

I also take one capsule of an oolong tea extract (capsules are explained on the order page there) that I've been experimenting with lately. This has about 50 mg of naturally occuring caffeine per capsule, and oolong tea is shown in some studies to increase the % of fat calories burned if taken before exercise.

I get about 15-20 minutes to digest this mixture a little (the walk to the soccer field takes about 15 min) and then I start to rock out the 20-25 minutes of all-out wind sprints. The 15 minute walk back home is a nice cool down.

It feels amazing, and I end up getting an insane workout with plenty of energy, as opposed to the no energy feeling I have if I try to do "empty stomach" exercise first thing in the morning. This also makes me feel really energetic for the rest of the day too, and I'm sure boosts my metabolism!

When I come back from the sprinting, I then make my full breakfast, which lately has been my fairly low-carb healthy breakfast of 4 whole eggs (free range from a local farmers market), grass-fed bison sausage, lots of veggies mixed in to the eggs (mushrooms, onions, spinach, kale, and red peppers), and a half of an avocado on the side. And I have a cup of unsweetened green tea or yerba mate.

The fat loss results so far:

Keep in mind, I've only been doing this morning ritual for about 7 mornings so far... but even with only a week of this method, I've already had noticeably more definition in the lower abs doing this every morning for the last 7 days or so!

So if you're up for a challenge and a great training and nutrition combo method, this seems to be working wonders for me so far! Let's get ripped and ready for summer! Perhaps you can find a way to do something similar in your routine.

I hope this post has given you some good ideas to use. Have fun!

By the way, if you haven't seen this article yet, give it a read, and make sure you're not doing any of these:

The 7 WORST exercises to STOP doing

Mike Geary
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer
TruthAboutAbs.com

The 7 WORST Exercises to NEVER Do

2011-05-26T12:29:00.000+01:00

These 7 exercises are popular with most workout enthusiasts, but they could actually be HARMING your body!
by Dr. Kareem Samhouri - CSCS, HFS
Neuro Metabolic Fitness & Rehab Expert
Author of the popular programs: Abs Strength Guide and Double Edged Fat Loss

Exercise is meant to help you, right?
Unfortunately, there are certain “exercises” in the gym that cause more harm than good. I’d like to take a strong look at the 7 most prevalent injury-causing exercises in most gyms. The worst part is that these exercises are pretty much useless when it comes to building strength or losing fat. There really isn’t much of a point in doing them, whatsoever, and yet they can destroy our results.
It’s time to put an end to the worst exercises on Earth. I’m here to help you understand how your body moves, why it responds to exercise the way it does, and how to minimize your risk while you maximize the effect from every exercise you do.
As a side note, I think it’s important to mention that the last thing I want is for you to feel discouraged; rather, it’s important that you feel inspired to know you have eliminated the negative from your exercise program. Now, you’ll be able to safely rely on the fact that “you’re doing it right” when you exercise. Plus, I think you’ll be shocked to realize how much you’ve learned about your body’s ideal positioning and muscle recruitment strategies with exercise.
The main reasons that an exercise would qualify in the following list is one or more of the following:

Creates muscle imbalances
Has zero functional benefit
Winds up joint into unsafe position

If an exercise creates muscle imbalances, this can lead to joint deterioration all over your body and even blunt fat loss. You see, once your joints are out of position, your body has sub-sensory pain signals taking place all over the body. These pain signals tell your brain to shut down the muscles in the area in order to avoid “pulling on the injury” and causing more damage. The end result: no muscle contraction and weaker muscles.
We exercise to be stronger in our daily lives and live a longer/higher quality of life. If an exercise has no true benefit in either or both of these categories, then what’s the point?
Just because someone tries an exercise in a gym isn’t a reason to make this part of your routine. The gym is full of mostly amateurs, including several of the personal trainers at big name gyms. After all, that’s where many of us started out at one point or another...
“Winding up your joint” into an unsafe position involves increased pressure on the labrum or capsule of a joint while performing an exercise. Simultaneously, it’ll be likely that a muscle is being overstretched while being recruited to contract. This is a recipe for disaster. Instead, let’s find a position of rest for the joint and then exercise it. This will assist the natural delivery of nutrients to the joint and joint capsule.
Also important to mention, we should consider these two terms in understanding the benefits/consequences of an exercise:

Active Insufficiency - this is when a muscle is over-shortened and you try to use it. An example is if you “make a muscle” with your biceps and then see how strong you are. The muscle is already short, so you’re not as strong as you are in the middle of the movement.
Passive Insufficiency - this is when a muscle is over-lengthened and you try to use it. An example is if you tip your wrist back all the way and then try to curl your fingers. Because your wrist flexors are over-stretched, your muscles are having a hard time contracting. Again, you’d be much stronger if your wrist were in neutral, or halfway in between.

Lastly, I’d like to discuss the difference between open and closed chain exercises, and how this will affect the functional carryover in a particular exercise:

Open-chained exercise: Fixed proximal segment, moving distal. Proximal means closer to your heart and distal means closer to your fingers and toes. So, in this case, it would be our hand moving towards our elbow (biceps curl), foot moving towards our buttocks (leg curl), etc.
- It’s important to note that open-chained exercises are very effective for sculpting muscles in the final stages of bodybuilding, or isolation training for rehabilitative purposes; although, they do create much more torsion into the joint and generally only exercise one muscle at a time. Due to these being isolation type movements, the metabolic effect of open-chain exercises is generally much lower than closed-chain movements.
Closed-chain exercises: Fixed distal segment, moving proximal. This is just the opposite, so your foot would be fixed as your body moves closer to it (squat/deadlift), or your hands would be fixed as your body moves closer to them (push up, pull up.)
- Likewise, it’s noteworthy that closed-chain exercises are very effective at building balanced joints, spiking metabolism, and increasing functional gains in daily life while reducing or eliminating risk of injury. Closed-chain exercises have a higher metabolic effect because more muscle groups and joints are being used.

Ok, you’ve already got a great background for judging exercises and their quality, or lack thereof. Now, let’s dive in and take a look at the 7 worst exercises:

1) Leg Presses

These are awful. Here’s why: Creates muscle imbalances, zero functional benefit, winds up joint to unsafe position
Muscle Balance Perspective:

Quads are generally stronger than hamstrings; this reinforces the problem.
When your quadriceps overpower your hamstrings in deep knee flexion, there is increased torsion placed into the meniscus, increasing the likelihood of knee injury.
Quads and glutes should be used as a pair. In this case, they are not being used effectively.
When your glutes do not fire while using your quads with a great level of force, there is increased risk of low back injury.

An imbalance between your quadriceps and hamstrings can quickly result in a number of knee issues, including patellofemoral (kneecap) and meniscus damage. Even worse, when your quads overpower your hamstrings, it’s not uncommon to develop restrictions in these muscles as your body attempts to even things out. These restrictions lead to increased pull on the top of your pelvis, tipping it forward, and placing pressure in your low spine.

This all sounds complicated, but let’s make it easy. Just stand up and lean backwards. If your hip flexors are tight, you’ll feel a stretch in the front of your thighs. It’s a good bet that we should get you training in more functional abs positions. You may already be spending too much of your day in this pre-shortened position, causing ‘active insufficiency’ to take place.
Functional Benefit Assessment:

In most cases, people aren’t coming down to a full 90 degrees of knee flexion, which is needed for getting in/out of a chair.
Even in these cases your abs are so pre-contracted (active insufficiency) and low back extensors so overstretched (passive insufficiency) that it’s tough to use your quads with any abdominal or low back support.
Since your abs and low back are out of the picture, this exercise loses a lot of its functionality.

Metabolic Effect:
The metabolic effect of this exercise is less because the number of muscles used is less than similar weight-bearing (closed-chain) exercises. Ultimately, the number of muscles and joints you use in a given exercise determines the metabolic effect of that exercise.

2) Leg Extensions

Muscle Balance Perspective:

Quads are generally stronger than hamstrings; this reinforces the problem.
Quads and glutes should be used as a pair. In this case, they are not being used effectively.
Interestingly, if you are having a hard time contracting your vastus medialis oblique (VMO) in your knee, the last 15 degrees of this movement can be helpful, but careful with the torque into your knee joint.
Again, only for the last 15 degrees until your knee is totally straight, and this can often cause more damage than good.

Functional Benefit Assessment:

It can also be argued that this exercise may help if you are a soccer player, but power lifting has been demonstrated to improve sprinting and kicking ability much more than any variety of leg extensions.
When you walk, you use your quads and hamstrings; here, it’s just quads.

This comes down to torque. Think about a long screwdriver and a short screwdriver. It’s easier to use the long one, meaning you don’t have to turn it as hard. This is a result of the force of you turning the screwdriver x the distance to the end of the screwdriver. That’s how torque is calculated.
In this example, we are exercising above our knee, but the weight goes on our ankle. Think about that distance... that’s a lot of torque into our knees with a lot of weight!

Metabolic Effect:
Low. This is a single joint exercise that is isolation-based. By definition, there will be a low metabolic effect. Instead, choose more compound movements such as squats, deadlifts, or lunges for an increased metabolic effect with this muscle group.

3) Machine Leg Curls

Muscle Balance Perspective:

Majority of force placed through distal hamstring, rather than proximal. This results in increased pressure behind the knee.
Requires change of position to recruit medial hamstrings and glutes on this exercise, which should be used as a muscle pair.

Functional Benefit Assessment:

I can’t think of a moment in time where I need to perform this movement in daily life.
However, if I ran hurdles, this may help, but again deadlifts and power lifts seem to improve sprint capacity at the same time and provide greater benefit.

This is a question of torque into the knee again. Also, in this case, the hamstrings tend to cramp a lot, which isn’t necessarily a good thing, or necessary at all.

If you have a Baker’s Cyst behind your knee, that’s a lot of pressure. For others, it’s really pulling the posterior horn of your meniscus, while missing your proximal (closer to your butt) hamstring altogether.

Metabolic Effect:
Low effect, as this is a single joint exercise.

4) Biceps Preacher Curls

Muscle Balance Perspective:

Forward shoulder position leads to increased stretch (passive insufficiency) on the rotator cuff and biceps tendon.
- An imbalance between your pecs and lats/shoulderblade stabilizers results in a forward shoulder position. This leads to rotator cuff tendonitis, biceps tendonitis, and increase risk of tears. Also, this limits the amount of growth of both your pecs and lats, due to the sub-sensory pain stimulus, as well as the actively insufficient pecs and passively insufficient lats (see above for definitions.)
- This is true for your shoulders and neck. In this forward position, you are at risk for injury. Also, like many people who perform this exercise, you may be placing excessive weight into your armpit, which is where your brachial plexus is. This is the bundle of nerves that controls your arms.
- This all sounds complicated, but let’s make it easy. Just stand up tall and place your hands straight up into the air. Now, bend your elbow out to the side until your shoulder and elbow are both at right angles. If you already feel a stretch, your pecs are super tight. You may already be spending too much of your day in this pre-shortened position, causing ‘active insufficiency’ to take place. This will limit your strength and fat loss gains, while also increasing your risk of injury.
Position also leads to increased pressure on the anterior and posterior capsules of the shoulder. Any pain signal or pressure will reduce the recruitment of your delts and shoulder stabilizers.
Biceps are being shortened in an over-shortened position for your pecs, reinforcing a common imbalance.
The elbow is only safe when balanced. You need to train your brachioradialis (hammer curls), biceps (curls), and brachialis (reverse curls) in order to hit all elbow flexors.

Functional Benefit Assessment:

This is an artificial movement, in an abnormal position. It’s only purpose is to build biceps, and there are better ways. For example:
The biceps is an elbow flexor, but it’s also a supinator (meaning it turns your palm up). Preacher curls only work on elbow flexion, which means you’re missing 50% of the muscle’s action. Whoops!

Evening out all of your elbow flexors has more carryover effect.
Metabolic Effect:
Low effect, as this is a single joint exercise. In fact, it may be detrimental due to the likelihood of the sub-sensory pain stimuli going off in the shoulder girdle, preventing some of the neurological signal from reaching the muscle.

5) Smith Machine Squats
Muscle Balance Perspective:

Your hamstrings are basically off in this exercise, meaning that it is totally quad dominant.
Simultaneously, it’s very hard to properly recruit your glutes when the weight is not directly loading your spine. Without glute support, you are weakening your core, ultimately increasing risk of injury and slowing fat loss.

Functional Benefit Assessment:

Since your hamstrings and glutes don’t really have to work here, you’re not squatting like you would in real life.
Actually, here, it’s unsafe for the opposite reason, interestingly enough. Check this out...
When you squat with your arms overhead, you tend to lean forward, or your knees come forward, or both. Controlling for this is the controlling inter-related segments so they can get stronger and more mobile together. These segments need to work together to prevent injury, so squats that are not on the smith machine tend to limit you to the correct weight selection, while these squats do not.

Metabolic Effect:
Low to medium. Since you are using your ankle, knee, and hip joints, the metabolic potential goes up slightly. However, it’s important to remember that muscle imbalances lead to all sorts of situations that lend themselves to a metabolic crash.

6) Overhead Tricep Extensions With Dumbbells
Muscle Balance Perspective:

Overstretched proximal triceps in this position, causing increased tension on the triceps tendon by the elbow.
Internal rotation, targeting the medial triceps head, can lead to shoulder impingement and more serious issues.

Functional Benefit Assessment:

This is another movement that never happens in daily life. When are we overhead forcefully extending our elbow like this. It’s kind of silly, if you think about it.
You may be arching your back while doing this, which could cause a lot of strain and take your abs out of the picture, altogether. Bad idea!

Metabolic Effect:
Low to none. Since we are only really working our elbow joint and a small muscle group, we aren’t gaining much of a metabolic effect whatsoever. Also noteworthy, this is an open-chained exercise that produces a lot of torque into the shoulder and elbow.

7) External Rotation with a Dumbbell, Standing

Functional Benefit Assessment:

Since this exercise actually is working brachioradialis against gravity (the dumbbell is weighing me down, against gravity, not side to the side), it’s only adding to the muscle imbalances I may already be experiencing.
Holding a dumbbell in my hands and moving it side to side is not placing tension on the external rotators of my shoulder, just my elbow flexors. This issue is not being resolved.
The only weight being placed into the shoulder is the torque from your hand, which is holding the dumbbell, through your elbow, and up to your shoulder.

So, all in all, it’s causing a very small amount of damage with no benefit.

Functional, Muscle Balancing, and Metabolic Effect Summary:
As you can see, not all exercises were created equally. I strongly recommend that you analyze an exercise before just going for it. I realize that you’re working hard to get great results, improve your health, and create a higher quality of life for yourself.

How To Burn A Pound Of Pure Fat In One Day

2011-05-25T08:52:00.000+01:00

by Joel Marion - CISSN, NSCA-CPT

A pound of fat is 3,500 calories.

So, to lose 10 pounds of pure fat, you need to create a 35,000 calorie deficit.

(please realize that 10 pounds of *fat loss* will probably equate to somewhere between 15 and 20 pounds of actual "wt loss" due to the simultaneous water loss that occurs any time you lose fat).

So, a 35,000 calorie deficit, huh? That's easy. In fact, if you didn't eat anything for 15 days, combined with exercise, you'd probably burn even more than that and finish up absolutely ripped after only 2 weeks of sacrifice, right?

WRONG.

Your body does *not* like long-term, drastic reductions in calorie intake and simply responds by 1) shutting down metabolism and 2) holding on to body fat, both as a starvation protection mechanism. Therefore, should you ever decide to try something akin to the above, you'd only end up wasting a heck of a lot of time and sacrifice for some pretty crappy results.

In fact, you'd probably end up looking "sick" and still fat. Probably *not* the look you're going for…

Simply put, creating massive calorie deficits (by not eating, or eating very little) does NOT work for optimal fat loss and physique transformation, and those looking for a quick fix all too often fall victim to trying something so silly in attempt to wake up next week with the body of their dreams.

Bottom line: your body is smarter than these elementary methods, and will very quickly put the breaks on your fat burning efforts in favor of protecting you from starving to death.

So does that mean that the "slow and steady" road is the only path to fat loss, or that rapid fat loss is a dead dream?

Nope! It just requires "smarter" methods that keep you one step ahead of your body, always in “good standing”, instead of repeatedly aggravating it by denying it the nutrients and energy it needs to function.

So how can we be smart about rapid fat loss?

Well, there are a number of ways (that when combined in the most strategic fashion can equate to some incredibly fast fat loss results), but one of the pieces of the puzzle is to create a massive calorie deficit that *actually works* because it's timed appropriately in conjunction with a time in which your body is very receptive to fat burning.

If you've read any of my past writings then you know that I'm a strong believer in utilizing Cheat Days to upregulate metabolism and important fat burning hormones, particularly leptin, while dieting. After all, it only takes one day of overfeeding or "cheating" to bring these hormones back to baseline and put the body back into an optimized fat burning state (while it takes about a week for them to substantially drop off again).

The end result is greater net fat loss week after week while still being able to enjoy your favorite foods on a regular basis. I'll take that deal.

Given that information, let me ask you a question:

When do you think might be the ideal time to introduce a massive calorie deficit to a diet cycle in order to burn the most fat?

I'll let you think about that for a minute…

Okay, got your answer?

Well, if you said after a Cheat Day, then you are 100% correct! Fact is, after a Cheat Day, your body is *massively* primed to burn fat. Leptin levels are at their peak, in addition to other important fat burning hormones, and your body is READY and WILLING to use fat for energy.

So, it's after a high calorie day that you'll want to create a massive calorie deficit via:

1. minimal calorie intake (i.e. strategic fasting)

2. massive energy expenditure through optimized exercise

Essentially, you're creating a huge calorie deficit (through both diet and exercise) on a day in which your body is extremely primed to burn those calories as fat AND when metabolism is at its highest point.

Make sense?

The truth is, through proper timing and proper strategy, you really CAN burn a pound of pure fat (and lose even more on the scale) in one day, without silly fat loss gimmicks or fads.

The secret, my friends, is all in the strategy.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The above fat loss trick is just one of the 9 advanced strategies that Joel uses in his new 25-day rapid fat loss program, The Xtreme Fat Loss Diet. Make sure to grab your copy now before Joel's special deal ends on Thursday:

http://www.XtremeFatBurningDiet.com

Enjoy!

Mike Geary
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer

Metabolic Resistance Training for Fat Loss

2011-05-23T20:07:00.001+01:00

"What is Metabolic Resistance Training"

By Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS, CTT
Turbulence Training

What the heck are these metabolic resistance training workouts that everyone keeps talking about for fat loss? Well, you've probably heard the term because the internet is buzzing about this type of training for fat burning.

After all, gone are the days of slow cardio for weight loss. Heck, even interval training is starting to get passed over. All in favor of this specific type of workout called metabolic resistance training.

It's really exciting though, to know that we can build muscle and lose fat at the same time, while getting lean and even having ripped six-pack abs thanks to these short, burst workouts. And you don't need fancy, expensive equipment. Instead, you can focus on using bodyweight exercises, dumbbells, kettlebell exercises, or even TRX exercises.

Let me explain in this short, fun video with a few examples:

Anytime you use supersets or circuits and train with an elevated heart rate and insufficient recovery. You are doing metabolic resistance training. But the metabolic resistance training used by Turbulence Training readers is different. I've modified the heavy metabolic resistance training and also incorporated metabolic resistance conditioning using lighter resistance, and less rest.

In this new Turbulence Training metabolic resistance training workout program, you'll get 4 workouts, broken down into these two components. Two workouts of heavy metabolic resistance training and
two workouts of metabolic conditioning. The heavy workouts are done first, and are followed immediately the next day by the conditioning workouts.

I'll be writing a lot more about metabolic resistance and conditioning workouts in the future to help you lose fat and gain muscle at the same time. That's the beauty of the system; not only do the fast-paced, short burst workouts help you burn a ton of calories, but if your goal is muscle building, you can do that too.

Until then, get ready to use a few new exercises and a few training methods we haven't used before to elevate " in-workout and after-workout" calorie burning.

It's all about working your metabolic systems for maximum calorie burning, while only permitting yourself to have incomplete recovery. These are the intense workouts you've been looking for.

No more slow, boring, monotonous cardio workouts that take forever.

Those days are over.

So be prepared to hear a lot more about MRT and metabolic lifting and conditioning workouts. And again, you aren't limited to machines or weights. You can do these workouts with almost any equipment, and even with bodyweight exercises only, as my bodyweight cardio circuits have proven.

You'll have a total blast even doing these types of programs at the park with your TRX and kettlebells and bodyweight. You'll be so much better off than being stuck in stuffy gym with machines. And make sure to watch my video to find out why MRT might even be better than traditional interval training.

Times are a-changing. The entire fitness industry is going through a revolution where we move away from bodybuilder and cardio bunny workouts. And that's a good thing. Doing less cardio and eliminating little isolation exercises, such as crunches, from your routines will help you get results fast.

Get started with the Turbulence Training Metabolic Resistance

Training workouts here.

You now have a fun, four-day program that will get you ripped and give you the body that you deserve.

Train hard but safe with new MRT workouts.

Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS
Turbulence Training

The New Method For Six Pack Abs

2011-05-14T19:48:00.000+01:00

I have a guest article today from my good friend Dr. Kareem Samhouri, an expert doctor of physical therapy, and he shows you a really unusual way to train the abs.

This is a totally different style of training as you can see below in the 5 step method...check it out:

*The New Method For Six Pack Abs*
by Dr. Kareem F. Samhouri, CSCS, HFS
Neuro Metabolic Fat Loss Expert
http://metabolicabs.com/

Slow abs training is now over.

It's time for a new era.

Training for six pack abs takes strategy. Understanding how to properly utilize your abs as stability muscles in all exercises will quickly improve your six pack abs training results. However, in order to be able to utilize your abs to their full capacity, you have to first know how to recruit them. This is where most people get lost... at least until now.

I've developed a sure-fire method for 'turning your abs on' with each and every exercise you do, beginning after the first 5 minutes of your exercise program. There's no way around it, and you simply cannot fail. I'm more than excited to share this method with you - are you ready to see major change in a very short period of time?

I'm going to teach you exactly what to do if you want to 'activate' your abs in every exercise you do, throughout every workout. If you think about it, this is going to make ab rockers feel like dinosaurs, and crunches seem as silly as those electrical stimulation devices you see on TV. You will literally be working your abs out for every rep of every exercise you do, and your midsection will be begging for a break when you're all done.

Your six pack abs results are about to improve exponentially.

Step 1 - Fatigue out your extremities completely.

Step 2 - 100 reps glutes

Step 3 - Fatigue out your extremities completely.

Step 4 - 100 reps abs

Step 5 - Rest 4-5 minutes and repeat, involving more of your trunk musculature with each exercise of each circuit.

Let's take a look at each one of these steps in greater detail, with an explanation for each, and why this works so well.

Step 1 - Fatigue out your extremities completely.

Example Set:

1. Squat & Dumbbell Presses - Light weight, as follows: 10 reps slow, 10 reps medium, 10 reps fast - repeat until fatigue or form broken

2. Push Up Superset on Knees - 3 Push Up Positions, alternating to fatigue, as follows:

Diamond (close grip) Push Up,
Standard (shoulder width) Push Up,
Wide Grip/Mid Pec (hands as far apart as possible)

This goes against most modern teachings of 'proximal stability before distal mobility' and should be used with caution. The reason people usually teach you to work trunk muscles first is so that your little muscles (muscles in your arms and legs) won't give out and collapse on you when you're lifting a heavy weight. However, we're taking the neurological signal from our trunk, spreading it to our extremities, and then never bringing it back to our trunk.

In this step, what we're doing is depriving our arms and legs of oxygen, forcing blood out of our extremities, and producing lactic acid there quickly. Since our bodies will hold onto our blood and oxygen regardless, it's a strong bet that this oxygen is moving centrally, or towards our trunk. In a sense, we've now supersaturated our trunk muscles with blood, nutrients, and oxygen. We are primed for Step 2.

Step 2 - 100 reps Glutes

Example Glute Exercise:

Straight Leg Bridge On Ball

Lay on your back, placing your heels into the ball avoid stabilizing with your arms as much as possible. Emphasize squeezing your glutes to 'levitate your bottom off the ground' & go fast!

100 reps

Your glutes and lower abs are a pair. If you're like 99% of people out there, you have a difficult time recruiting your lower abs. By focusing on glute activation exercises second, once we have the oxygen present to endure more reps, we are actually targeting our lower abs, or "pre-activating" them for what's to come.

Step 3 - Fatigue out your extremities completely.

Example Set:

1. Side Step Squat With Med Ball Press

- Start with your feet together, take a large step to the right, keeping your left foot on the ground, then squat and stand onto only your right leg while drawing your left knee towards your right shoulder. Simultaneously, press a medicine ball into the air. As you return the medicine ball towards your chest, shift your weight back into the wide squat position with your left leg on the ground and perform in reverse as you stand.

10 reps slow, 10 reps medium, 10 reps fast - repeat until fatigue or form broken

2. '3-Position' Bicep Curls With Dumbbells - 3 Curling Positions, alternating to fatigue, as follows:

Palms backward (Reverse Curls),
Palms inward (Hammer Curls),
Palms forward (Bicep Curls)

It's time to shift focus back to our arms and legs, but this time our abs are working to stabilize us, reduce risk of injury, and become a part of all exercises. We are now working our abs involuntarily, but driving more oxygen and blood to them at the same time through the aforementioned method above.

Step 4 - 100 reps abs

Ok, so it's time to test our ability, with no rest whatsoever, to really challenge our abs to hit the next level of strength and endurance. Because we have supersaturated them with oxygen, our aerobic abs fibers (about 80% of the abs fibers the average person has) are primed for the best performance of our lives. Now it's time to really challenge ourselves to do the impossible, and force ourselves to go above and beyond what we 'know' to be our limits. It's time for the new era for our abs.

Example Abs Superset:

Inversion Abs & Abs Wheel - Alternate each exercise to fatigue (perhaps 10 or so reps at a time), until you reach 100 total repetitions.

1. Inversion abs is to be done on a decline bench, with your feet towards the floor. Keeping your legs as straight as possible, while pulling through your abs, drive your legs into the air so that your spine is curved and you are slowly returning down towards the bench, one spinal segment at a time. As your low back approaches the bench, be sure to keep it as flat against the bench as possible to activate your transversus abdominus, or human waist belt.

2. Abs Wheel - similar to a push up position on knees, begin with abs wheel underneath the center of your chest. Now, maintaining tension between your shoulder-blades, slowly guide the abs wheel out in front of you, without dipping or bending your back. Maintain an abdominal tremble throughout. As you return the abs wheel to the starting position, be sure not to shift your weight posteriorly, as this will take away much of the effect.

100 reps, alternating between exercises each time you reach fatigue.

(That's just an example abs superset -- if you can't do those, you can choose your 2 favorite direct abs exercises from Truth About Abs or another routine)

Step 5 - Rest 4-5 minutes and repeat, involving more of your trunk musculature with each exercise of each circuit.

Adequate rest is necessary to derive as much from the following set. By involving more of our trunk muscles with each successive set, we are essentially teaching our bodies to always activate trunk muscles when using our extremities. This is a good habit to form to reduce risk of injury, and it also serves our greater purpose of teaching our bodies how to turn every exercise we do into an abs exercise at the same time.

Why spend your days exercising body part after body part, isolating one muscle group after the next?

Why spend so much time in the gym?

It's no longer necessary. It's time that you learn how to exercise as much of your body as possible, and to do it quickly.

Thanks so much to Kareem for a killer article! This is definitely a unique style of training that can help people to get to the next level with their abs.

Make sure to check out Kareem's site at http://www.DoubleEdgeFatLoss.com as he has an amazing program there for you!

Enjoy!

Mike Geary Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer
TruthAboutAbs.com