A week or so ago I did a post on the dangers of fruit juice and included an interesting info-graphic that was sent to me. For today’s post I want to share another one of these info-graphics. This one is how the wrong carbs eaten in excess make you fat and not necessarily dietary fat.

We’ve had a government health campaign going on since the early 80′s telling us we need to cut back on fat intake.  If you’re old enough to remember you can recall when the big swing happened in the grocery store with everything being labeled as “low-fat.”

With fat being the so called culprit to our health problems, it was stripped out of foods and replaced with processed carbohydrates and artificial ingredients.

Did we get healthier with the lower fat intake? Nope

Read the rest of this entry »

We all know there are no magic bullets when it comes to losing weight and getting fit and trim. Savvy marketers are constantly trying to pitch you that they have the answer you’ve been looking for, but let’s be real, the majority of these products are just gimmicks.

Obtaining a healthy body weight is all about your decisions. The decisions you make with what to eat, whether or not to exercise, managing stress, and other healthy lifestyle habits.

If there was a secret it’s that all these pieces fit together as components in the big picture. You can’t simply watch what you eat but neglect exercise for example. Likewise, there’s a common saying that “you can’t out exercise a bad diet.�

Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ve followed me for any length of time you know that I’m NOT a big fan of drinking commercial fruit juices. This confuses some people however because I am a very big proponent of eating fruit.

I really do believe that fresh fruit is probably the MOST beneficial food you can consume.

The whole “fruit can make you fat” idea is a totally taken out of concept. Let me make sure I’m perfectly clear on this so you get it. Fruit does NOT make you fat. Eating fruit on top of starches however can most certainly lead to excess blood glucose and result in fat storage.

Read the rest of this entry »

In a recent post entitled “Carbs or No Carbs With Post Workout Nutrition” I discussed the benefits of avoiding high levels of carbs immediately after your workouts.

While this can be beneficial for a bodybuilder or endurance athlete, it’s a terrible strategy to follow if you’re a middle aged or older adult who is simply looking to get lean.

To summarize that post, the general rule of thumb is to minimize carbs in your post-workout recovery shake the majority of the time until you get lean.

Consuming a fast assimilating protein like whey with water or coconut / unsweetened almond milk is going to be your best strategy to assist with dropping body fat and rebuilding lean muscle tissue.

Read the rest of this entry »

There has been a long standing belief in the fitness industry that a post workout shake is a very effective way to speed up the recovery and rebuilding process of lean muscle.

While I would certainly agree, there are some specifics to what goes in the shake that I tend to disagree on with some of the so called experts.

Specifically it has to do with the use of carbohydrates in your post-workout shake.

For years the recommended protocol was to consume whey protein with some simple sugars as fast acting carbohydrates to facilitate an insulin response whereby amino acids could rapidly get into the muscle cells.

Read the rest of this entry »

There’s more and more research coming out every month on the role Vitamin D plays in helping individuals maintain a healthy body weight.

Now let me start by saying I typically don’t read too much into studies where scientists isolate an individual vitamin in attempt to demonstrate some benefit in the human body.

This is what I often refer to as “nutrition-ism� where food manufacturers pay big bucks to a bunch of scientists to come up with research to show how adding a particular nutrient to a food can make it healthier.

Read the rest of this entry »

In the area of vitamin and mineral supplementation there’s some controversy over whether or not they’re beneficial. I’ve long been in favor of a high quality multi-vitamin and mineral formula (Advocare MNS is my preferred choice by the way), as I truly believe it’s difficult for even the healthiest of eaters to get all their micro-nutrient needs from whole foods.

The problem is primarily due to the significantly decreased levels of nutrients in most foods due to soil depletion and modern agricultural practices. What you get (vitamin and mineral wise) from a tomato at the grocery store today isn’t the same as it was say fifty years ago. If you grow all your fruits and vegetables on your own land and use organic farming practices you might stand a fighting chance, but not many people have that luxury.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’m one who believes you’ve got to keep things SIMPLE. The more complex we try and make something the more complicated it gets and the more confused people will end up being. This is certainly the case with nutrition and food choices when grocery shopping.

If the diet or nutrition plan is too darn hard to follow or figure out, people won’t stick with it very long. A perfect example of this is the “Zone Diet” from Dr. Barry Sears. Don’t get me wrong I think Dr. Sears is an incredibly intelligent man who’s research has been monumental in our understanding of hormonal response, genetic expression, inflammation, etc.

Read the rest of this entry »

I received a great question this morning from one of my YouTube channel followers. I figured I’d share the question and expand on my reply for everyone to read.

“I just watched your video on being a Sugar Burner or a Fat Burner. It answered ( I think ) a question of mine but has lead me to more questions. Over the past two years I have lost 87 lbs I workout about 7 days week for 2.5 hours a day No BS ! An hour of weights and an hour of cardio 30 minutes of light recovery cooling down like walking and/or stretching .

All of a sudden the past 8 weeks I have craved sweets, chocolate, desserts, and things I have never craved before now. I think I know why but what can I do about it ? It’s driving me crazy and I fear gaining the weight back.

Is okay to give in once in a while like a candy bar once /twice a week or cut it out completely? I have also cut back my fruit intake for fear of stimulating my cravings. I don’t want change my workout or do i need to ?

Read the rest of this entry »

I had a couple of people ask me this week about PB2 and I must admit I had no clue what in the heck they were talking about. As I quickly learned PB2 is a peanut butter alternative with 85% less fat calories.

Basically it’s peanut butter powder made from slow roasting the peanuts then pressing them to remove the fat and oil.

The final product is completely in powdered form which you would add water to and stir.

Read the rest of this entry »