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“Fat is good. Even saturated”

There it is. It’s been said. Take a moment and let that marinate in your mind a little bit…..

I recently watched a comedy/documentary made by Tom Naughton. He’s a middle aged guy in America on a quest to get the truth out about fat. In this documentary Tom eats fast food for 28 days.
Do I agree with that? no. Even he doesn’t think it’s right. So this isn’t a blog about how we should all go eat McDonalds this blog is about how bad fat really is.

I dont know if anyone has seen Super size me? the film about a guy who ate burgers every day for 30 days and gained loads of weight.
If you haven’t I’ve included it below there’s alot of references to that film so make sure you watch super size me first then watch Fat Head.

So anyway, after watching Fat Head, it’s kind of confirmed what I’ve been hearing from alot of clever people.
I’m a Paleo diet fan, it involves eating meat, alot of vegetables, some fruits. Things you cut out/avoid would be grains, legumes and diary.

I chose this way of eating because I got tired of being ill, constantly craving food 1-2 hours after eating breakfast already, having digestive issues after consuming gluten. Paleo for me just seemed like common sense.

I can’t remember where I read it but apparently this was in a list of the top 10 fad diets of the year.

Is this really a fad when your grandparents, great grand-parents used to consume these kinds of foods? is it still a fad when this is what they ate thousands of years ago?

To any vegetarians/vegans coming onto this site, I dont mean any offense I just feel that for myself in terms of how I feel and perform eating meat and fats keep me feeling satiated more so than eating just a vegetarian diet. Grains and dairy give me gastrointenstinal problems and they make me feel rubbish so the only way I’m going to get my calories in is having enough fats and enough proteins as well as those veggies.

We’ve been pushed this idea that saturated fats are bad and they cause heart disease for so long that EVERYONE thinks this is the norm.

So this is what I’ve been hearing among the clever ones -

• Inflammation is the cause of heart disease not saturated fats
• Omega 3- Anti-inflammatory – Omega 6 – Immflamatory (yes that means nuts, IF you happen to eat buckets)
• Insulin = Fat storage (it’s not the enemy ideally hormones need to be balanced out, theres no bad/good hormone)
• Gluten is bad (I’ll update this with links later)

First watch Super Size Me below

Then watch Fat Head – The Movie below.  Keep an open mind, listen to the science. Research the data if you disagree. This film will really make you think and hopefully you’ll learn something.

It’s a very interesting topic, the lipid hypothesis is flawed and no-one wants to let it go.
The battle between vegetarians/vegans vs the meat eaters continues, everyone points their fingers at meat/fats being the bad guy but there are many lifestyle factors to look at.

I had a member get all huffy at me when I told her that insulin = Fat storage, her diet consisted on 3 teas with spoon of honey, 3 coffee’s with a spoon of honey, sandwich, and a fruit cake. She got extra huffy when I said that her gluten free bread still means insulin secretion.
Her excuse was that it was too hard/too much to change. I gave up.
It’s been said that its harder to change someone’s diet than their religion.

To each their own. However the truth is out there….you just need to find it.

Happy new year all! 2012 is upon us, the year of the olympics in london and hopefully other good stuff to come.

3 recommendations to the technological minded to ensure that you don’t fail on your new years fitness resolutions.

You’ve got a goal in mind, great! but what are you doing to really make it happen? have you set yourself up to fail because you didn’t take it seriously? Lets look at a way of using what modern science have given us and use it to help form better habits to achieve your goals.

 Log/Track everything!

Use the technology you have to form a habit of tracking everything when I say everything, I mean sleeping patterns, training routine, food log, thoughts and feelings.

Sleeping patterns -

There’s an app on the iphone that’s been around for ages and I’ve only recently used it called sleep cycle, using the accelerometer built in the iphone it records the different phases of your sleep cycle as we move a little going from phase to phase, it figures out whether you’re in light sleep or deep sleep. A handy feature of the app is that it uses a 30minute window to wake you up during the lightest phase of your sleep eventually waking you up fully by the end.

If you’ve ever woken up to your alarm and felt zombified then that’s what you get for waking up during your REM state.

Whether this works app works to help you wake up feeling refreshed I don’t know because I’ve used it for 2 days, however I am using it to record my sleeping patterns.

If I remember correctly android had a version of this on their store, blackberry I’m not so sure about.

If all else fails, just write down the time you went to bed and figure out how long it took for you to sleep and when you woke up.

Evernote – Evernote is a note programme that I’ve been using for the last 2 months.

I mainly use it for recording my diet but you can use it for anything you want.

Main things to record are what you’re eating, time you’re eating, and digestion after, mood can be recorded like whether it made you full, whether you felt groggy afterwards.

You could record calories but I’m just not into the whole calories game. I find the nutritional quality of the food to be the main thing you should be concerned about rather than the amount of calories you’re consuming. I’m not saying it doesn’t work if you eat less calories, I just find it an annoying habit to make for yourself. Constantly worrying that the food you eat is 300 kcals which tips you over your recommended intake. If your hungry eat but eat the right foods.

Anyway….. back to Evernote, you can download Evernote on your PC, Mac, Ipad, iphone, Android, even for blackberry!

You have no excuses not to record it. It also syncs between all devices which is handy because you literally have all the data right there whenever you need it.

Why is it good to keep a food log?

Logging the food down as you eat, makes you think about what you’re eating. People forget about what they put in their mouth depending on their emotional state.
We have food in abundance and its very easy to get into the habit of eating junk food, hopefully keeping the log makes you aware of how you’re feeling after eating it.

Tracking workouts -

3 ways of tracking your workouts.

1 – pen and paper/book. Do it! it’s inexpensive.

2 – http://www.fitocracy.com/ It’s a tracking website that turns your workouts into a game. You input your workouts into the site and are given points depending on the exercises you did, points increase your level and the higher your level the higher you are on the community boards. It is pretty fun, but I found it slightly annoying having to spend time writing it on paper and transferring it.

3 – Blog it – This is what I’ve been doing.

I’m a tech geek, so I like to use my iphone to record my workout in a pre-made word template using Documents 2 go.

I then email it to myself and just copy and paste it into my workout blog.  Write down any thoughts and feelings about the workouts etc.
I find this way much better as I can save on paper, have my workouts accessible from anywhere and can add video to my blog to critique technique. That way I can remember how terrible my technique was haha.

Tracking the workouts are important to figure out what you need to change to progress, even to see your progression gives you that confidence boost. Use any of the methods above, they all work.

So there you have it 3 tips to help you on your way.
You have to look at what your goal is, what stops you from achieving those goals and come up with solutions on how to achieve them. There’s no point in making up goals if you’re not serious about making them happen. Come up with a plan of attack and follow it through.

Hopefully you have no excuses now, find the time to exercise, and make sure you’re eating right.

All the best for 2012.

Kang.

The china study byDenise Minger

Fat Joe loses 100lbs of weight, that’s 45kg, that’s 7stone!! That’s a person!!

Now for anyone who doesn’t know who Fat Joe is, he’s an American Hip Hop artist. He’s been around for years and it’s really good to see someone go from his former size to his current state. It’s mind blowing.

If you check out the video below, he states that he cut out the carbohydrates, and just educated himself on what foods were right for him.

Personally from what I’ve seen that works with my clients is a primal type of diet template, decreasing the amount of carbohydrates, increasing the amount of protein and fats.
You basically get rid of all the processed junk and basically eat real food. There’s no secret.
They do say their energy levels increase and just feel alot better all round.

Now when I say decrease the amount of carbohydrate, I don’t mean they go “Zero” carb, if anything it really depends on how they feel. Nutrition is very individual and you have to base it around how the person is feeling on the day.
If someone is highly stressed as well being sleep deprived, of course they’re going to crave more carbohydrate/Sugar. Then if you go blasting them with a high intensity workout, cortisol levels are going to rise and it kind of defeats the object. No wonder they’re not losing fat.

Personally from my own training two things I have started eating more of is Brown rice and sweet potato especially post workout.
I’ve played around with whether I can eat just a paleo diet of just meat and veg but due to my activity levels, I tend to give in to that hormonal craving for something starchy and just end up snacking on junk.

Having a starchy carb post workout tends to help stop the cravings I’ve been getting.
I’ve been playing around with the paleo type diet but added in extra carbs where I felt like I needed it, like on days where I’ve trained hard.
In a recent study an intermittent low carb diet was much better compared to a calorie restricted diet, similar to the “Anabolic diet” where you cycle the amount of carbohydrates from low, medium to high.

So what should you do -

• Eat food, real food. Meat/Veg. No processed stuff.No wheat i.e. Pasta, bread, pastries, etc.

• Clean Carbohydrates – post workout (brown rice works for me, Sweet potatoes are okay but note how you feel after it)
  On days you’ve trained hard you can afford to eat a little more carbohydrate, on days you do nothing then taper back.

• Ideally make sure you’re eating  colourful vegetables to vary the types of antioxidants you’re getting.

• Listen to your body. Keep a food log, note down what you ate, the time you ate it, and how you felt.
  Any digestive issues, bloating/burping etc. Time’s you’ve felt sluggish.
  Note them all down, you’ll see a pattern emerge from what you’ve been eating and how it impacted your energy levels.

Check out the video below to find out how Fat Joe lost the weight and “dropped a body”

The latest fitness gadget to hit my radar is a product called the JawBone Up, A bracelet that monitors your lifestyle, sleeping patterns and activities.

I only came across this as I was on the internet and for some reason it was BIG news that celebrities like Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher and Mark Zuckerburg were sporting the bracelet…a couple of days later my friend wanted to go get some food and he was telling me about this magic device that somehow helps get your lifestyle in check. He ended up getting one and we’ll wait to hear his findings later….

The deal with the bracelet is that you have to wear it all day everyday, it is waterproof so you can wear it in the shower.
It’s marketed as being a health monitor, capturing data from your sleep, activity, and food.

It measures the amount of sleep you get, the quality of sleep and it supposed to tell you when to wake up so that you can wake up feeling refreshed.
For the sedentary office workers, the device has a vibration motor that notifies you that you have been sitting down for some period of time and you need to start moving about.
For the food intake the user is requested to take a picture of the meal, it then asks the user how you feel after eating it.

The app for the iphone (I’m not sure if they’re currently developing an app for the android and blackberry) syncs the data recorded on the Jawbone up and plots the data on a nice looking graph.

I personally don’t have the device myself so I can’t give a full review, I wonder with Christmas/new year round the corner, how many other fitness gadgets creep out of the woodwork.
The good thing about the device is that I hope it will help people take notice to what their body is telling them, especially with regards to food and sleeping patterns, I just hope they realise that this isn’t a magic device.
If you already know that your sleeping patterns aren’t great, if your food quality isn’t great, and your activitiy levels are low then I can’t really justify spending £80 on a device for data you kind of know already.

I’m still undecided whether I’m going to give this a thumbs up, on one hand I can see how it would help my clients as I could translate the data. Looking at why their sleep isn’t great, looking at the quality of the foods they eat to see if there are commonly known allergens and finding out if their activity levels/exercise prescription suits their goals/needs.

I’ll be interested in seeing the reports on whether this is worthwhile tool for your everyday user or just some kind of passing trend. I really want to like it, but with reports from some users saying the app crashes and even the tech reviewers from Gizmodo saying this off their christmas list makes me think twice. I’ll find out from my friend in a month whether improvements have been made.

Currently the device is sold out, the Apple store states 6-8 weeks wait for UK consumers. Probably going to be heavily marketed in the New year. Click the link above if you’re interested in buying…then email me your thoughts/results.