Exchange the Scale for a Journal

67% of adult Americans are overweight or obese; 60% don’t exercise; 82% report having at least moderate stress, 21% still smoke and 56% have at least one chronic illness


Does this make you think about your lifestyle habits, maybe a little? That said, whether you are at an unhealthy weight, you eat poorly, you don't exercise, whatever- weighing yourself every day (even multiply times daily) is just another bad habit.  Let me explain: YOU ARE OBSESSING. How is that healthy?  Fact: stress (emotional health) has a huge impact on physical health.

It would be much more beneficial to start by making small, positive, life changes. Such as drinking more water, allowing yourself only one unhealthy snack (chips, chocolate, a beer, etc), going for a short walk once a day... Jumping on the scale all of the time isn't going to make you feel like you are making positive changes. And you know what, the number on the scale is not that important. Your weight fluctuates so much throughout the day/week/month and even if your weight is going down at a consistent rate as we all hope it does when we are trying to lose weight, it doesn't tell you anything about what you are losing. Is it water weight? Fat mass? Muscle mass???? The number on the scale isn't going to tell you.

Your percent fat mass is much more important and it can be found several different ways. The least accurate but also the least invasive tool- is the bioelectrical impedence, which is much like a scale but sends currents throughout the body (top to bottom or bottom to top, depending on the device) to differentiate between cells.  It does not tell you about body fat placement, which can be important, but it gives you an idea, over time, as to whether you are losing body fat (desirable) or muscle mass (sucky, don't lose that).  Skinfold tests are more invasive because it means a qualified physiologist, trainer, etc is pinching small sections of skin in anywhere from 4 to 11 different locations (i.e. the arm, back, stomach, thigh, chest, etc) but it is also much more accurate. The most accurate way to go is the underwater weighing. So fun! Not practical. Obviously, it requires some fancy equipment, like an underwater scale.

All of that said, Gallup has developed six domains of overall well-being that I think we should all be much more mindful of, while limiting our trips to the scale.

• Life Evaluation – on a scale of 1 – 10, how a person feels about their general life today and how they think they will feel in five years
• Physical Health – the amount of acute and chronic illnesses people experience
• Emotional health – how much people experience happiness, stress, anger, and even depression, among other emotions
• Healthy Behavior – how often people exercise, eat properly, consume alcohol, smoke and observe other proper or improper health habits
• Work Environment – how much support people receive at work and how they perceive they are treated
• Basic Access – the access people have to basic necessities such as food and shelter, but also the access they have to elements of a supportive environment, such as a safe place to exercise or affordable fresh fruits and vegetables

Ultimately, the changes that we make cannot be those temporary diet and exercise crazes. Something ridiculous like 80% of those who try this will gain the weight back (and then some). Have patience. Don't worry about the quick fix. Just take baby steps. Be mindful. That is what makes all of the difference. If you are aware of how your body feels when you eat this, after doing that workout, you will be able to make much healthier decisions.

I encourage everyone to write down how they feel throughout the day (before/after meal, pre/post exercise, sleep, etc) because it will help to see patterns, to understand what needs to be changed, to see how things impact our emotional health.  All six domains of well-being are important factors of our overall health. We can make small changes over time that help us to live full, healthy and energetic lives.

Crossfit Guarantee

Let us preface this article with a note to the wary- there are components of Crossfit that worry us and we will use this opportunity to share our fantastical thought processes about it- in the form of crazy and mind blowing rants. Please use your head and think about it for yourself while you read this.

I will first start with a quote from the 'What is crossfit' section of the crossfit website, crossfit.com:

We’ve used our same routines for elderly individuals with heart disease and cage fighters one month out from televised bouts. We scale load and intensity; we don’t change programs. 

Why would I want to do the exact same thing that EVERYONE ELSE is doing, but perhaps with a different load and intensity. I mean, I'm glad they, at the very least, have the common sense to vary that for each person, but NONE OF US have the exact same needs and goals.  And NONE OF US have the same muscular, tendon and joint balance of strength and "functionality".

Let's talk about what it means for an exercise to even be considered "funcional".

There's a new fitness craze out there called "Functional Fitness" which I think has a great fitness mentality. It's all about doing full body exercises that make daily activities fun and easy. Women are as much the culprit as men when it comes to doing exercises that accentuate certain body parts (I think it's safe to assume those are mainly the pecs and the glutes) and when it comes time to DO something, the muscles necessary to DO it, aren't the ones you've been working on... HMMM.

Another way to explain the principles of Functional Fitness is using the scientific terminology- Sport Specificity. Sport Specificity means that you are doing exercises that help you improve physiologically in the areas you need most.  For example- as a rock climber, it is extremely important that I have a strong core and I have good power output (among other things). Climbing (especially for short people) often requires a lot of jumping from one rock feature (hold) to another (this technique is called a dyno). So do you think I should put an emphasis on building muscle in, say, my pecs or my ass? Should I focus on running? NO. While those are fun and great, I should probably emphasize doing exercises that strengthen my core and help me jump better (among other things like flexibility and grip strength). So while I will definitely incorporate the aforementioned muscle groups and programs, I will probably focus more on exercises like glute bridges, planks, leg lifts, etc. and power exercises such as the dead lift, jump squats, power cleans and snatches.

When designing an exercise program, there are so many INDIVIDUAL factors to consider: What do you do throughout the day? What energy system do you rely on most? How much rest time do you/can you take between activities? How many days a week do you perform easy-medium-heavy activities? Which muscles do you use the most to perform the activity? I could go on. If I don't learn these things about you when offering my counsel on your exercise regimen, then I am not taking into account muscle balance, tissue repair, nutrition, and about a million other things.

And another matter of extreme importance- not only must the exercises that you are performing be relevant to your goals, they must be FUNCTIONAL. That means, when performing these exercises, the mobility of the joint(s), joint angle, the muscular contraction, the force production, the bone, tendon, and muscle strain, etc MUST ALWAYS be considered. In other words, your body better be moving/working/performing in the way that it was made to move. You are much more likely to be injured if you do exercises that are not functionally stable.

Now that I've gotten that off of my chest. Let's look at some of the exercises that are unique to crossfit. I will not say that I disapprove of every exercise cross fitters do, because some of them are fantastic exercises- when done properly. And among those exercises, most of them are not unique to crossfit.  Some of the exercises found on the crossfit website are as follow: kips, squats, clean and jerks, snatches, burpees, muscle ups, box jumps, double-unders, dips, presses, lunges, etc.

I LOVE some of these exercises- the ones I think are great for a lot of people include squats, box jumps, and lunges. Some depend on the parameters of the individual and a couple should be ERASED FROM THIS WORLD. Those, my friends, are the kips and burpees.

Why the HELL would you voluntarily do something as ridiculous as a kip or a burpee to your body on a regular basis? If you do not know what these two exercises are, please educate yourself. Youtube it. Something.

Before I explain my reasoning scientifically, I want to rant. Ok. Kips. You are using momentum to do a pull-up. Wuss. Man up and do a proper pull-up. You think you look so awesome doing a fancy little jump to help you do a fancy little pull-up. Give me a break. 10 years from now, you'll be needing back surgery and I will still be showing off how many REAL and proper pull-ups I can do. And I bet my guns will be better than your guns. I know my back will be better. Now for burpees- seriously- you look silly jumping up and down like a monkey! Can you please just do some box jumps, squats and push-ups instead? You'll be doing a huge favor for your back because about 90% of you burpee-lovers are doing a stupid exercise and doing it wrong (or should I say, worse?).

Here's my scientific reasoning: Those exercises are NOT biomechanically sound. You are putting a lot of compressive forces on your spine. There is no way to avoid it, you might be able to curve the damage slightly by keeping your hips up while doing a burpee... but the damage is still going to be there. You have absolutely no way to protect and stabilize your back while performing these exercises. So why do them? Sure, there might be a couple weird circumstances where you have to do a kip, perhaps like Jackie Chan and a whole lot of other actors have done during dramatic fight scenes in movies (or perhaps as a contestant in Ninja Warrior, as there are a couple of components to this physical challenge that incorporate kips) but I should think that those instances be few and far between. I'm pretty sure that doing more efficient and functional exercises that utilize the exact same muscle groups will help you a lot more when you do come across those crazy and rare circumstances.

The Story on Vitamin E

Did you know that the use of some vitamins, hormones and other illegal products as performance enhancers is a rather popular route chosen by athletes?  Did you also know that the use of athletic performance enhancers can be traced to Ancient Greece, 776 BC where athletes in Olympic games consumed hallucinogenic mushrooms and sesame seeds to enhance performance (Silver, 2001)?! Bet ya didn’t know that Vitamin E has sometimes been used for the very same reason!  And THIS ergogenic aid (performance enhancer) happens to be completely legal and commonly utilized during competition. 

Vitamin E is a powerful antioxidant that has been shown to improve aerobic capacity by attacking free-radicals, enhance the immune system and even prevent or control some forms of cancer.  Vitamin E (also called tocopherol) is lipid soluble and is able to break chains and protect the system, specifically polyunsaturated fatty acids (FAs), against lipid peroxidation by attacking free-radicals, which are produced during metabolic reactions (Viitala & Newhouse, 2004; Packer, 1991). So basically, it “eats up” these radicals in order to prevent any damage.

            During exercise, as oxygen consumption increases (I’m sure everyone has felt a little out of breath or winded while working out!), the number of free-radicals in the system increases.  Free radicals basically cause cell damage or cell death.  This mainly takes place during moderate to high intensity aerobic exercise (so on a scale of 1-10, you are “feeling the burn” at a fatigue of somewhere between 7-10) that oxygen free-radicals can cause damage to lipid membranes (lipid peroxidation), proteins and DNA. This causes polyunsaturated fats to deteriorize, which can cause the inactivation of cell membrane enzymes and increase ion permeability across membranes. That produces a decrease in muscle function- not what we want to happen! Vitamin E supplementation during resistance training (weight-lifting), however, will protect skeletal muscle by reducing muscle damage caused by free-radicals.  And we all want our bodies to be in the best “buff up” scenario possible!

            Quick recap: vit E seems to reduce muscle damage and maintain or even increase muscle function! Whoo hooo!  The RDA for Vitamin E is 15-20mg IU/day, which researchers believe to be best because higher doses may provide little additional benefits. SO, a simple multi vitamin will do the trick J Vitamin E requirements may increase a bit with endurance training because levels of Vitamin E in the system rapidly deplete with the exercise (Packer, 1991).  Meeting the RDA for Vitamin E should be sufficient for most of us.

Whether you are a smoker is important to your intake of Vit E- Cigarette smoking creates oxygen free-radicals, so a smoker may require a greater intake of Vitamin E to combat the additional free-radicals created by the cigarette. Additionally, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) suggests that athletes suffering from nutritional deficiencies may benefit more from supplementation than their apparently healthy counterparts. ACSM further implies that only nutritionally deficient athletes will see the beneficial impacts of Vitamin E supplementation on performance.  

Again, as always, we seriously recommend consulting with a Registered Dietician because it’s important to take into account dietary intake, smoking habits and the presence of nutritional deficiencies such as malnutrition, malabsorption and genetic defects (remember last week’s discussion on Celiac Disease!!!).

            Dietary sources of Vitamin E include corn, nuts, green leafy vegetables and vegetable oils.  Consumed as an ergogenic aid Vitamin E is considered to increase overall health of athletes by decreasing cellular damage and enhancing the immune systems responses by attacking free-radicals.