Why You Should Forget About ORAC Values

For the past few years if you are focused on nutrition you know that the ORAC value (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) is one way to ‘rank’ different fruits and veggies against one another.  In essence, the higher the ORAC value, the better that food source is at absorbing free radicals in your body.  Fewer free [...]

Can You Improve Your Mood with Probiotics?

Many of us know that we need to add probiotic foods (and sometimes even capsules) to make sure our digestion is working.  If you also know that probiotics are essential to having a strong immune system, consider yourself well informed.  What many of use don’t know is that probiotics may help our mood – in [...]

The Case for Flax Seed

Seems like there is a lot of buzz about Chia seeds these days.  Now chia seeds are a very healthful food but today I want to talk about the more neglected super seed: flax. I’ve been a fan of flax seed for awhile and put a tablespoon in my morning smoothie.  I use whole seed [...]

Can Probiotics Help You Lose Weight?

It seems common knowledge now that if you have taken a course of antibiotics, you need to supplement with probiotics to restore your inner gut health.  But some will tell you that as a nation, unless you are supplementing, you are most likely living with an unhealthy gut where the bad bacteria is way too [...]

Does Creatine Work for Women?

Creatine has a reputation of being a ‘guys’ supplement.  It’s preceived as helping guys get bulked up and is rumored to add water weight.  And as women, we typically don’t want to be either ‘bulked’ or carry excess water weight.  So the question becomes – are the rumors true?  Yes, but not ‘so much’ as [...]

CRON and Brain Anti-Aging

I’ve been talking here about the physical benefits of a CRON diet (calorie restricted optimal nutrition).  Pair this with intermittent fasting and you can quickly see profound health benefits – the least of which is a smaller waist.  But what about our brains?  Do they do better with less? In a study that Italian researches [...]

Update on my Current Round of P90X

About 10 weeks ago, Chris and I started a new round of P90X.  Before that, I had been doing rounds of Body Beast which I really like but decided to go back to P90X because I truely believe it’s the best workout program Beachbody has ever created.  I say that because it helps a person [...]

Can We Live Well Past 100? Does Diet Make a Difference?

If you are a regular reader here, you know I’m highly interested (try to stay short of being obsessed) by the concept of anti aging and super healthy longevity.  Again, this may just be because at 54, I realize that our time here is short and I want to live as long as possible but [...]

Getting Great Abs – A special guide for women

The key to being perceived as having a sexy body is to have toned legs, a tight booty and great abs.  In fact in our current society, abs get the most attention.  It is, instinctivley, a key to a woman’s overall health.  A waist to hip ratio of less than .8 makes you look really [...]

Why I’m Starting P90X All Over Again

I started my journey to fitness with P90X and did 3 rounds of it before I moved on to other programs.  Even then, I often did hybrid workouts where I included P90X workouts with other programs.  But for the last 2 years, I have not done a full round of P90X despite how much I [...]

What I’m Eating Now (Part of my Anti Aging Diet Series)

I’ve been talking a bit about specific foods I think are super foods and they are a key part of my diet.  But I have gotten a few requests about my daily diet recently and thought I’d share a food day. 1) CRON Diet Before I get into detailed account of what I eat in [...]

Superfood Kale – Health Benefits of Kale will Impress You

Kale is a bit of an acquired taste to eat it strait out raw due to its somewhat bitter taste.  It’s a leafy green that is part of the cruciferous family that also includes such veggies as broccoli and cabbage.  But it’s sooooo good for us that we really need to find a way to [...]

P90X vs. Body Beast – Is One Better?

Like most things in life, picking the ‘better’ workout is a matter of personal opinion.  Is P90X better than Body Beast? Well that depends on what your fitness objectives are. The truth be told, the two workouts are designed to deliver different results.  P90X is pretty much an all inclusive workout designed to increase a [...]

My Anti-Aging Diet Superfoods: Avocados

Let’s face it, when you are over 50 as I am, you start thinking more about how to live longer.  No one wants to think their time is winding down.  And even as we accept that perhaps we now have more years behind us than before us, we want every year to be full of [...]

Extreme Longevity – Supreme Health

How long can we humans live with abundant, supreme health? I’ve been thinking about this lately – which may be partly due to watching too many 100+ birthday announcements on the Today show – and partly due to having to care more for my 80 year old mom. And maybe it’s because at 53, I’d [...]

Why You’ll Do Better With a Cheat Day

One of the hardest things I frequently see in the people I work with is the ability to embrace the concept of ‘cheat’ days. They aren’t really cheats though – they are planned and have a purpose. However, the feeling bubbles up that this is cheating and therefore bad and if they just skipped the [...]

The Bigger Muscle Builder – High or Low Reps?

When muscle gains are what you are after, whether it’s building a bigger bicep or developing your glutes, knowing the most effective way to lift, is important.  After all, who wants to waste any time and effort when working out? I recently got asked this question in a comment when a gal had gotten confused [...]

What Does Muscle Failure Really Mean?

The other day one of my clients wrote me with the following question: …what does it mean to push your muscles to failure?  How do you know?  Is there a burning sensation?  Or shaking? This is a great question because I don’t typically have to think about this but what’s obvious to me isn’t always [...]

How Much Exercise Is Too Much?

If you are a ‘regular’ here, you know I’m often advising women here to cut back on the exercise volume they are doing. Meanwhile today I end up posting on Facebook that I did the P90X Arms & Shoulders workout followed by a 30 minute Les Mills Pump workout and was even considering a late [...]

What Makes Us Fat?

The easy answer would be to just say that what makes us fat is eating too much and being too sedentary.  But that would not be the whole answer.  In fact, while the energy input vs energy output (calories in vs. calories out) is important, just focusing on that could still lead to little, if [...]

My Review of P90X2

Chris and I have been doing P90X2 for our workout routine for just over 5 weeks so far.  While we are not anywhere near complete, I do have a few observations I will share.  This is intended to be a balanced review so I will highlight both what I like about P90X2 and what I [...]

P90X2 Week2 Complete

I finished off week 2 of P90X2 with Chris.  We are still in the foundation building part of the program which focuses largely on balance and core development.  The weights we’ve been lifting are much lighter than what we’d normally do for a military press or tricep kickback move but since they are paired with [...]

P90X2 Week 1 Complete!

Well this week has been a humbling experience!    I went into this thinking I was in top shape with only a few pounds of fat to peel off and to my complete surprise, found out that P90X2 had something to teach me about combining balance and power. I have felt clumsy with the moves.  [...]

Starting Over – What I’m up to now (P90X2 shred)

Well the time has come for me to do my usual winter shred.  For the last 7 months I’ve been focused entirely on strength and muscle growth and was not concerned about much else.  I did get very strong and added significant muscle.  But as I added the weight, a little fat crept on as [...]