You're the inspiration!

As I was riding in the car last week, I got to thinking that I should share those people who have or continue to inspire me.  I can honestly say that this list will not consist of celebrities (mostly), largely because if they act in film or whatever, it's not tremendously inspiring.  There are only a small handful of people that I f
eel have brought me to where I am right now, but it's still important that I note them.  Also important to note, not all of these people are currently alive.

1.  Jesus Christ = This should be easy, but I feel like you should know/realize that he is super importan
t in my life.  Without him, we are nothing and with him, everything.

2.  Lewis B. "Chesty" Puller = The Marine's Marine.  He exeplefies confidence and heroism by only doing his job.  He changed lives for the better (unless you were Chinese or a Korean, the Northern kind) and his legacy still lives on.

3.  My parents = They get a team effort here, largely because they set the stage for me to become who I am today. 

4.  James "Chaos" (not Mad-dog) Mattis = Another Marine's Marine.  He keeps it straight and is always ready to throw-down on behalf of his Marines (and now the whole military). 

5.  Walt Disney = He created, he followed his dream, and he created an empire. 

6.  Arnold Schwarzenegger = His work influenced me, in-part, to the career that I'm in. 

7.  Everyone whom I've ever come into contact with.  While this is extremely general, I try to take 1 ounce of wisdom from each and every person that I come across.  Each life is different and each have something to offer, and thus I become better through them. 

I believe that every person has something to offer, either good or bad.  Nevertheless, it's important to recognize that each of us have different experiences and different backgrounds.  When we be kind and nice to others, they will (eventually) project that knowledge to you and you gain from that.  Be a douche and it's unlikely that it will ever happen. 

This is a list of my inspiration, think about yours and why they are your inspiration.  This helps to figure out who you are and what you stand for. 

Labeling your understanding

For the next several weeks, I'll be going through the nutrition label.  There's a lot there that is important and it's something that we all think we understand but we really don't.

The example here is something provided by the FDA as part of their labeling program.  When you look at an actual label it isn't color coded with all of these side labels on them.  But what do they mean?  That's what I'll go through for you.

Understanding the food label is important because without knowledge of it, how do you eat better?  When we go to the Dr. and he/she tells us to eat better, to lose weight, or anything along those lines, what do we do about it?  This is the first step bettering yourself.  With the knowledge of how to read this, you'll be able to make better decisions about buying and about consuming.

Next week, I'll begin with covering the serving information.  

Not what, but why?

Maybe about a month ago or so, I briefly posted about clients or members asking about "which muscle does this work?"  As I thought more about it, I realized that many people just like the more "sciencey" answer, but it serves no real good for them.  A better question to ask, yourself and a trainer, is "why is this exercise or series of exercises appropriate for me?"

Just knowing what muscle becomes activated serves no real purpose.  As a trainer, I look more at balance between planes of movement.  This may be contrary to what other trainers look at, but I always look at movement first, which is much more skilled.  The muscles come next, as if you cannot move correctly then targeting certain muscles may not serve a purpose.  Of course, if an obese individual comes to me for training, it does change somewhat to how I approach it.

Since I proposed the "why" question, think about what your goals are.  If your goals are to lose weight and you end up doing a lot of things that only impact small muscles such as your biceps (front of your upper arm) or your calves (back of lower leg), then you're likely not going to get anywhere anytime soon.  These muscles are small and don't have a high energy requirement and thus losing weight is probably going to take an eternity.  However, if you do barbell front squats, you generally use most of the muscles in your entire body to do the exercise and obviously with more muscle you have more energy use.

If your goal is to jump higher, than knowing what muscles are required isn't all that practical, but how to get them to simultaneously activate is.  This also comes with practice, confidence, and being able to contract your muscles when needed to accomplish your goal.

There's a lot to training more than just muscles, consider asking why before anything else, and learn what later.  

Which muscle does this work?

A question that routinely is asked is "which muscle does this work?"  The question that I have is "what value do you receive knowing the answer?"  What purpose for you, as the exerciser, does knowing which muscle is the one being used?

Part of my undergraduate and graduate studies consisted of anatomy, physiology, and biomechanics.  Each of these allow for me to understand which muscles are being used, which energy systems are dominant, agonist/antagonist movement, and a variety of other fairly important items when it comes to understanding how the body responds to exercise.  So for me to answer that question to myself or better yet, why am I working this muscle, is much more relevant than what muscle is it.

The specific muscle being worked isn't hugely important unless your bodybuilding or in therapy.  For many, it's the bio-energetic system(s), the energy systems the body uses, which is usually more relevant.  The amount of muscle recruited to perform a task is also generally more relevant to me than which muscle I'm working.

Now, don't get me wrong, if I tell you that you're working your "lats" while performing a pull-up I'm not lying, they're being used.  But, what does this tell you?  It honestly doesn't fully help me unless I'm trying to hypertrophy (grow) or recruit (contract) the lats.  And even still, lats isn't really the name, it's shortened for lattissimus dorsi.  It is however, one of the primary movers in a pull-up.  It helps to stabilize the spine and the upper body in general. Generally speaking, it's involved in all large compound movements such as dead-lifts, squats, and bench press.

So knowing which muscle being worked, has it helped you with this knowledge?  Or is it important to ask "why am I working this muscle?"  Think of questions like that as opposed to which muscle, which really doesn't serve a practical matter.  

Eating for the fluffy pillow

In my previous post, I described some of what I do regarding training the fluffy pillow.  For this post, I'd like to go into the food side of things.

For me, the nutrition side of things is the most difficult.  Not to say that I don't know what I'm doing, but I freaking love food.  For the most part, I see the best results compositionally when I do a super low carbohydrate meal plan.  The upside of this is that I do tend to see a heavy reduction in mass, mostly fat mass, but the downside is I also tend to see a dramatically reduced performance when it comes to exercise.

Most with a similar shape such as myself benefit immensely off of a lower carbohydrate diet.  However, carbs truly benefit the performance aspect of the fluffy.  So it sometimes boils down to either a composition goal or a performance goal.  There are ways to get both, and it requires a significant amount of planning and discipline, something that my life with 3 small kids is nearly impossible to complete.

I generally try to stick with eating as much protein and vegetables as I can.  Usually, for breakfast I have a quart container full of vegetables such as cucumbers, peppers, celery, carrots, and/or an apple as well; I also have a banana to accompany that.  I use a protein in my coffee that is a collagen peptide base, rather than your traditional milk-based proteins.  My goal last year, at least nutritionally, was to have vegetables for breakfast nearly every day, something of which I've carried into this year.  This year's goal, nutritionally, was to do the same but for lunch, and so far meeting a moderate degree of success.

I try to have my starchier carbs around my workouts, which the super-intense ones are only 4x per week.  I still try to maximize what I can take in, but with clients it's sometimes difficult to escape long enough to consume anything.  My kryptonite is around when I'm home from work or on the weekends when I have more time to eat something other than what I've prepared for lunch at work, usually Oreo's.

In the end, I try to keep as healthy as possible.  My goals are more or less training goals rather than compositional goals, though I wouldn't hate those when they come.  Goal setting is a characteristic of training, and not exercising.  Nevertheless, the dietary side of things is my more complicated part of my life.  

A prescription for exercise? No thank you!

My previous post was not met with a whole lot of fanfare.  For those who are interested, you can check it out here.  I'd like to clarify that I'm not against doctors, I have a lot of respect for them and the training by which they've earned their position.  I'm more of a patient advocate if you will, asking questions or even questioning the doctor when his or her orders are vague or even emotionless.

A client and I were talking today regarding her recent visit to the doctor.  For the condition she's dealing with, she's gone 5 times, some of which were for a bronchitis related condition.  The most recent was for a severe pain in her ribs which was brought on by her incessant coughing that was a result of the bronchitis.  Anyway, her doctor recommended only walking as a form of exercise for her.

I'm not against walking, but as an exercise professional I can acknowledge that most people, even with a rib strain, can do more than that.  The problem that I have is that when it comes to exercise, many doctors do not have adequate training in understanding the dynamics of varying exercises and their effects on the body.  As of now, there's very little interaction with doctors and exercise professionals, unless they happen to be in an environment to where they are employed side by side.

The point that I'm trying to make here is that many doctors are inadequately trained in exercise.  They may have had a semester or two in college regarding nutrition and exercise, but for the most part it's really minimal.  This is where fitness specialists and even physical therapists come in, to bridge the gap.  So if you go to a doctor and they recommend exercise, it's probably a good idea to seek out some specialized coaching, even if it's for only a little while.

If we can get more doctors on board with recommending exercise and improvement in nutrition, specifically with pointing to adequate coaching as their prescription, we can change the entire landscape of the United States.  It is going to take the doctors respecting the fitness professional and the advice that they can give to change the tide.  What could strengthen the relationship will be the fitness professional reaching out to the doctors and even buying them lunch, like a drug rep would, so that they can explain their scope of knowledge and ultimately work side by side.