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The china study byDenise Minger

UPDATE – Use this code to get a 5% discount from the Myprotein site – MP58503

Hey everyone,

I’ve had a couple of people ask why I’ve decided to put these Myprotein UK banners on my site so I thought I’d explain.

I’ve used their stuff in the past and have always thought the ingredients and the quality of their products to be a high standard.

Like all young guys, it was forced upon us that we needed to take a protein shake within 30mins of training. However somewhere along the line, I started noticing that the protein brand I was purchasing from changed their ingredients because it started to smell like horse urine, or something like that. Actually it was more like a chemical smell 

Usually these products are shipped over from America, I stopped taking them in 2001-2002 and its only recently in 2010 that they discovered some protein powders in America contained traces of arsenic, cadmium, which I’m told were used to make batteries? Lead and Mercury was also found and bunch of others….YUMMY right?? (Article here)

So fast forward to today, being a personal trainer with an interest in Nutrition and its effects.

Supplements and why I use them -

I’m a big believer in just eating real food, the big problem with supplement companies is that they obviously have to promote their brands and they come out with these diet templates where it looks something like this….

There’s alot of products in their sample meal plan and they do it to sell their products. I’m sure you clever readers know it’s marketing ploy, it’s just best to eat real food.

So here is the list of supplements I use (when I can remember) -

BCAA – Branched Chain Amino Acids (BCAAs) are Leucine, Isoleucine and Valine. They are considered to be essential amino acids because humans could not survive unless they were present in their diet.
I mainly use this product to maintain muscle mass, conventional diets tend to break down muscle tissue and lower the metabolism.

Whey Protein Isolate -

I actually bought this supplement as a test, Whey Protein products are made as the by product of cheese and being mildly lactose intolerant (strangely it didn’t affect me when I was younger) I found that I wasn’t able to take the protein shakes like I could before.
This was another reason I stopped, however this whey protein isolate contained little lactose as the filtration system is able to separate the lactose, carbs, and fats.
If you do have lactose problems, use a whey protein isolate, I’d recommend the Whey Protein Isolate. Click on the picture above to buy the product, it does come in different flavours, haven’t tried the zest flavours.

Digestimax -

I use this product as a digestive aid.
DigestiMax is a potent blend of ingredients designed to support healthy digestive function and improve the over all health of your digestive system. The blend of ingredients have been combined to help your body break down protein, carbohydrates and fats in order to fully utilise these valuable nutrients as part of a healthy diet.

One of the key ingredients is Betaine (click to read more)

To boost the overall health and effectiveness of your digestive system Betaine is included, which helps your body produce the digestive acids responsible for breaking down food. This is further enhanced by the presence of Pancreatin which provides the digestive enzymes that help breakdown macronutrients; protease (protein digesting), amylase (carbohydrate digesting), and lipase (fat digesting) enzymes.


I’m not really taking note about how I feel after taking this product, as again it’s more to do with the foods you eat and whether they’re causing you digestive stress. Don’t eat a McDonalds and expect this digestive aid to work miracles!
However, I do feel that it’s important supplement as some people can’t produce enough of the stomach acid to kill off any bacteria and end up getting gastrointestinal problems that way.

So far these are the only supplements I really take, the digestimax I’ve been taking regularly and the other supplements only as and when needed.

If you are looking to supplement, clean up the diet first. Ideally you want to reduce inflammation/digestive stress as much as possible i.e. food intolerances to gluten/lactose etc
Good luck.

UPDATE – Use this code to get a 5% discount from the Myprotein site – MP58503

Hey guys, you’ve probably heard about the whole Dr Dukan vs Dr Cohen lawsuit……

Dr Dukan famed for his Dukan diet used by celebrities, such as the Middletons, Jennifer Lopez and Gisele etc, is suing Dr Cohen for saying that his high protein diet is a health hazard.

Isn’t it funny that when you grow up you can sue people for saying something nasty about the other person and yet if this was the school playground…you push and shove each other saying “come on then!”

Anyway, I’m not saying I’m a follower of the diet but what the Dukan diet does right is that it recommends that you should eat real food, banning calorie counting from his diet and also recommends eating as many vegetables as you want.
Dr Cohen’s diet recommends eating 900kcals to 1600kcals a day. This is his recommendations for men. I wonder what he recommends for women….I’d probably pass out due to the caloric restriction.

From what I’ve read and heard, the science definitely seems to back up what Dr Dukan is recommending, when we consume protein roughly 25-30% of it is burned already due to the thermic effect of food, carbohydrates on the other hand seems to burn 5-15% and fats seem to be under debate. (click here to read study)

The real reason why the diet works is the effect on hormones, mainly insulin.

During the initial attack phase of the diet it says you should consume only protein for 7 days. This puts a lot of people off because there are no vegetables, no fruits, no carbohydrates, no dairy.
While I was researching on the Dukan diet, I came across the Cosmopolitan message board and women were having a debate about whether the diet was any good, one of them stuck out in my mind, she was convinced the diet was bad because it gave her headaches and she had no energy.

Let’s note that sugar is addictive. Food scientists are getting so good that we actually crave these foods. What was the Pringles slogan “once you pop you can’t stop!”
That’s what all the drug addicts are saying……

Imagine a drug addict suddenly goes cold turkey, what happens when they give up their drug addiction they obviously feel like crap and clearly it’s tough. This is exactly what happens to your body when you reduce your high sugar consumption. Exactly the same when we give up caffeine.

The attack phase of the Dukan diet seems fairly extreme but its purpose is to get you into ketosis.

Ketosis is a state in which the body produces ketone bodies during fat metabolism, this means your body is burning your own fat stores as energy.
If you were to eat any kind of sugar it would halt ketosis and you end up burning the sugar you’ve put in your mouth.

(I don’t know why people train and drink lucozade sport when they’re not training intensely)

A study by Kuwait university researching the long term effects of a ketogenic diet in obese patients concluded that during the 24 week long study a ketogenic diet was more beneficial in reducing body mass, body weight, as well as decreasing LDL (bad cholesterol) and increasing HDL (good cholesterol), there was also a significant decrease in triglycerides, which is a great thing as high triglycerides are linked to a heart disease. (click here to read the study)

They also stated that there were no side effects and using the diet over 24 weeks was perfectly fine.

So where did it go wrong?

I think the media and bad science/researchers screwed alot of it up for people.
Even in today’s media, they’re still stating fats are bad when they haven’t proved it, they’re still advocating a low calorie diet when it’s nothing to do with the amount you eat it’s more the effect on your hormones and by the way Atkins didn’t die from his diet that many people claim, he actually died from a fall and according to a researcher who saw him 6 months before he died, he wasn’t fat at all.

So what should you do?

• Eat meat (ideally organic)

• Try to stay away from gluten if anything. No breads or pasta. (Gluten has been linked to intestinal villus atrophy, which basically means your gut loses the ability to absorb the nutrients you’re getting from food. Calcium not absorbing in your small intestine means you may get Osteoperosis.)

• Everyones ability to handle starch is individual so if you do eat it, try eating more from lower G.I starchy vegetable like sweet potatoes, eat rice if you need to. Once in a while doesn’t hurt
• Steer clear of cereals, they’re basically a bowl of sugar. Even the “healthy” versions, why would you want to eat something fortified with vitamins and minerals? doesn’t that mean the nutritional content of the food isn’t worth eating? why add something that isn’t there in the first place?
• Eat alot of vegetables
• Drink alot of water
• Minimize your sugar intake (including alcohol and any other type of juice)

There’s loads of other factors you need to remember when trying to be more healthy.

You need to be getting enough sleep, you need to exercise smart, you need take into account your level of stress, there’s also toxins and chemicals around us that we need to be aware of, and definitely try to think positive!

I would recommend you read “The Primal Blueprint” by Mark Sisson as well as Robb wolf’s ” The Paleo solution.”

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/definitive-guide-primal-blueprint/

http://robbwolf.com/faq/

Oh yeah definitely go pick up a copy of “why we get fat and what to do about it” by Gary Taubes.

(I’ve been staring at my screen for like 2 hours writing this and I feel a little wired so if it doesn’t make sense let me know and I’ll edit)

Kang.

So check it out I’m watching an old clip by Sean @ Underground Wellness that made it clear about how soy isn’t that great as a health food.
I think confusion lies in the fermented soy that they use over in asian countries and the unfermented soy we have here in the west.
We have unfermented soy nuts, soy beans, soy milk, tofu, quorn etc, where as they have fermented soy like natto’, miso, which are much more beneficial for their health as it allows them to get their protein sources without all the other dangers of soy.

Here’s what I was shocked at finding out, unfermented soy actually turns down the dial on your thyroid (hypothyroidism) which basically means that it slows down your metabolism, which is obviously bad.
The other thing is that the plant contains a natural chemical that mimics estrogen, high levels of estrogen is apparently linked to breast cancer.

You can find soy in ALOT of products these days as it is pushed as a health food and that’s the scary thing, so to bullet point -

• Soy is not a health food
• Unfermented Soy mimics estrogen
• It is also linked to hypothyroidism (low metabolism)

Listen to the videos and think about getting your protein from other sources if possible, try to rotate them so you’re not only eating one thing.

My own opinion is that if you want to eat soy now and again then that’s fine, this post is here to highlight the dangers of consuming excessive amounts of soy foods.

Click Here to read the reports and studies about the dangers of Soy.

Before doing these 7 movements, it is important that you have had your kinetic chain assessed for any impairment. I recommend getting your static posture assessed as well as performing movement screens to find out if you have any impairment in the human movement system.

The body is capable of many different movements, many can be traced back to the times of cavemen and not much as changed since then in terms of movement, the 7 types are listed as –

Push (horizontal or vertical)
Pull
Squat
Bend
Lunge
Twist
Run/Jog/Walk

The Push

Pushing exercises are probably the most popular among fitness fanatics possibly because it’s the easiest to learn or because every time you open a magazine someone is doing a push up or a bench press. Even by the time you’ve started school everyone knows that doing push ups will enable you to develop upper body strength and size.
There are two types of pushing, horizontal and vertical.

Both movements are needed in everyday life, this could be when you need to push a car or when you need to reach up to place something on the top shelf, it’s really an exercise that is definitely needed in any good program.

Muscles worked – Chest, triceps, Anterior deltoid (front of shoulder) and core musculature depending on the exercise.

Push up

Kettlebell Press

Dips

The Pull

The pull is often neglected because of the popularity of the pushing exercises. It’s important to remember that the body likes to maintain homeostasis (balance) lack of any pulling exercises will not only cause structural imbalances it will lead to injury, postural defects and altered force couple relationships (altered recruitment of muscles.)
There are many exercises that you can use to do a pulling motion, what you need to do first is learn proper scapular retraction.
I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve seen people doing a seated row or one armed DB Row with improper activation of their scapular, I usually ask them if they feel it working in the place they want it to and 9 times out of 10 the answer is usually no. Pulling movements use the trapezius and rhomboids to pull the scapular into retraction and depression. It is very important in improving the health of your shoulders.

Muscles worked – Mid/Lower Traps, Rhomboids, Latissimus Dorsi, Biceps

Pull up

Bent Over Row

The Squat

The squat is not a popular exercise for everyday gym goers, everyone wants to develop their chest, arms and six pack abs, nothing wrong with that goal but do not neglect the other half of your body. If you’re serious about getting abs then the squat has to be close to the top of your list of most important exercises.  Benefits include, core control/stability, increase in growth hormone (dependant on weight), strengthening of the posterior chain and improved movement.

Muscles worked – Quadriceps, Glutes, Hamstrings, and the core (erector spinae, abdominal complex)

Front Squat

Back Squat

The Bend

Along with the squat, the deadlift is one of the most demanding exercises. It works pretty much everything from your chest, lower back, abdominals, glutes, hamstrings to your grip. It is often overlooked for one of the more popular exercises, it looks like a very simple movement but can be quite technical at the same time.
There’s nothing else really to say about this exercise except that you should do it, the body has 600 muscles and the more we can use them the more metabolically active they become.

Muscles worked – Glutes, Quads, Hamstrings, Erector spinae, Latissimus dorsi, Trapezius, Abdominal Complex, Arms

Deadlift

Romanian deadlift

The Lunge

Lunging is a very athletic movement, it requires stability, balance, strength and co-ordination. If you’re going to start lunging start off by performing a static lunge on the spot, just up and down holding something sturdy to help with your balance. Once you have the required strength then progress to using no support and onwards to the full lunge.
I find that clients have difficulty with this exercise the most.

Muscles worked – Hamstrings, Glutes, Obliques, Quadriceps

Multi planar Lunges

The Twist

The twist is a movement that we frequently use, think about every time you move when you turn to pick something up, when you throw, when you put something down, twisting is a movement that we can do however little or no people train within this plane of motion.

Muscles worked – Internal, external obliques, Rectus Abdominis, Erector spinae.

Lateral Twisting Plank

Cable Twist

Walking/Jogging/Running

Walking/Jogging/Running also called your gait cycle are some of the most basic of movement patterns, jogging and running should be added to your routine to maintain the most basic functions.


I hope that this article has helped teach you something new and made you think about how to programme your own exercise routine. If you are truly serious about making changes then utilizing these types of movements will definitely be beneficial.
Doing these 7 movements and their many variations will help to improve your strength, fitness and movement, as an added bonus doing these movements in a structured program will also help with fat loss. Consult a trainer to find out how.