Fitness And Healthy Blog

I recently got a phone call that was rather shocking. A friend of mine had just died of a heart attack. “So what?” you might ask, “People die every day from heart attacks.” Well, that’s true but most of them aren’t my friend’s age. He was only 45.

A definition of cardiovascular disease doesn’t include an age. In fact, early signs of cardiovascular disease have been noted during surgeries performed on young soldiers wounded in battle. It has been estimated that plaque build-up was seen in the arteries of nearly 90% of the troops wounded in Vietnam. That’s pretty amazing when one considers that these soldiers were in their teens and early twenties. So, we need to take a good look at exactly what cardiovascular disease is, what causes it, and how we can prevent it.

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Home workouts can be just as effective as going to the community gym. In considering a home gym,you want to have as a complete a workout session as you would in the community gym. What equipment does this take? You will need something for cardiovascular exercise. And, you will need equipment for weight and strength training.

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Fish is one of the best foods for you, and has even been approved by the American Heart Association as being part of a healthy heart diet. There are more varieties of seafood than any other class of food. Tastes in seafood vary from the strong pungent taste of the English Kipper to the delicate taste of Alaskan crab. There is something for everyone, and comes with lots of health benefits:

1. Fish is high in protein. Protein is essential for maintaining and building muscle. Protein helps your body repair damaged muscle and aids you in developing muscle. It is good for those involved with bodybuilding, muscle strengthening and lots of aerobic exercise.

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Everyone wants flat abs, and if you’re reading this now, my guess is you do too. But it’s difficult to get flat abs though, right? Wrong. Flat abs are a combination of three key ingredients:

1. Eat right.

This is the crux of flat abs really. You see, the reason people don’t have flat abs is because of the stored body fat that sits over their stomachs. For men, this is naturally where the body deposits long term energy storage (fat). For women, the body stores fat on the stomach, but mostly on the thighs and hips. Unfortunately for us, it’s impossible to reduce fat in specific areas - your body will burn the fat evenly all over.

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Unfortunately, America ranks to be one of the highest
competitors on the list of obesity. It kind of makes you
wonder if Americans are getting used to the idea of
being fat, or has their perception of what fat is, changed
in the past couple of decades.

I mean, honestly, think about it. Everywhere you go, you
see that extra spare tire and man boobs on people
passing by, and the sad thing is, that we see this so
often, that it has become acceptable in our society and
we hardly think twice about it, and sometimes don’t
even notice it.

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The human body requires a daily intake of seven essential groups of nutrients for it to obtain the nourishment that it needs, in order to maintain health and vitality. The essential groups of nutrients consist of carbohydrates, fats, fiber, minerals, proteins, vitamins, and water. Each one of these groups are made up of many different components, the excess or lack of one or more of these nutrients, can have devastating affects on the body’s performance.

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Fresh, canned or frozen, artichokes are one of my favorite vegetables. A big fresh artichoke, steamed and served with lemon juice, stands on its own as a starter course. Far more often, I’ll just open a jar of marinated artichokes and use them to dress up a tossed salad. Here are some of my favorite recipes that feature artichokes.

Artichoke-Wild Rice Salad

1 16-ounce can black beans, drained and rinsed

2 cups cooked wild rice

2 6-ounce jars of marinated artichoke hearts, drained

1 red bell pepper, chopped

1 small sweet onion, chopped

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Omega 3’s are ‘good fats’. Omegas are not stored by the body as excess fat, they are absorbed and utilised by the body in a number of extremely beneficial ways. Omega 3 fatty acids are important for brain function and research has showed that they may play an important role in vision, co-ordination, learning ability, memory, concentration and behaviour. When our mothers told us that fish was ‘brain food’, she wasn’t kidding! Omega 3 fatty acids cannot be produced by the body so we must obtain them through diet.

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I promised a simple menu for a client that continues to work hard taking two steps forward at training but falls back three steps - through her eating habits - and finds no gain is accomplished.

In fact, most of us struggle with the same issue. I encourage people to make a selection and commit to a nutritional support program that you can live with - daily - for at least two months and then stand back and see the results of your work. For example, my website provides a link to eDiets which provides an array of diet and nutrition choices. Pick one, sign up and work with it.

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This is it: The big Thanksgiving Feast is tomorrow! Many of us will be sitting around a table of epic proportions, filled with everything from Grandma’s cornbread to Uncle Bob’s store-bought pie (plus that “mystery dish” that you politely skip over, forcing someone else to take the bullet).

You will have complete and free access to all of the fat-laden, sugar-filled (but oh so savory) treats you try to avoid every other day of the year. The good news is: You don’t have to completely deprive yourself of these magnificent morsels.

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