Coffee Before Working Out?
Coffee. Espresso, latte, Starbucks, American, whatever, as long as it has caffeine. Some people can't live without it--you know who you are, drinking entire pots every day, lining up and growling in line at the local coffee joints, itching to get your hands on a cup. Others have it occasionally, only after lunch say, a delicate espresso, pinky extended. Some people drink it occasionally, or not at all, but we're all familiar with its effects. You light up, energy flows through you, you can become almost manic (full disclosure: I'm writing while under the influence of caffeine right now, a shot of espresso dumped unceremoniously in my Shakeology smoothie). Depending on your tolerance you might get energized for an hour or two, or not even register the jolt, but everybody knows how powerful a kick of caffeine can be. But what if we try to combine that boost of energy with a workout? Harness that energy so that we workout harder, longer, faster? Is that a good idea? What would the effect be on our system?
Have you ever noticed that naturally skinny people tend to pack on muscle when they overfeed, while naturally curvy people tend to pack on fat? And those naturally skinny people tend to lose fat quickly when they diet, while naturally curvy people tend to struggle to not lose as much muscle as fat? What's going on here? Why are some people naturally better at staying lean and getting ripped, while others have to fight their love handles their whole lives? It's simple really, and quite unfair: the culprit is something called your 'P-Ratio', and it's what determines what kind of body you're going to tend toward naturally. Love it or hate it, your P-Ratio determines nearly everything.
Father's Day is right around the corner, looming on Sunday, June 21. If you're planning to celebrate it, if you plan on telling your Dad how much you love him, how much he's done for you, how proud you are of him and how much you want to enjoy the future with him, then think of entering our P90X Giveaway for the chance of winning a P90X Workout to give him as a gift.
Every once in awhile you come across a tale of such inspiring magnitude that you can't help but be touched by it. Most success stories are but eye-candy, affording you glimpses of what others have accomplished, giving you fun 'Before' and 'After' shots that affirm that great change is possible. But some stories go beyond simply changing your body, or having a strong will to take control of your lives. Some stories are truly beautiful and inspiring, and such is that of Cammie Lusk. Winner of the Beachbody Million Dollar Body competition, she proved with her success that love and will power can overcome even the greatest of foes, which in this case was Multiple Sclerosis.
Go to the supermarket and you will see a hundred thousand bazillion bottles of vitamin supplements staring down at you from countless shelves. Vitamins A, B, C, D and the rest of the alphabet. Have you ever asked yourself where these vitamins come from? If you've pictured a Willy Wonka style factory where Umpa Loompa's squeeze Vitamin C from orange slices and harvest Vitamin D from the sun, then you couldn't be more wrong. In fact, vitamins are chemically synthesized from such horrendous things as mineral ores, fungi, petroleum and bacteria. The process creates a terrible amount of pollution, and until recently was overseen by a price fixing cartel that was only taken down in 1999. Vitamins: good for you, not so good for the world?
The Insanity Workout is almost complete. It's almost everything you need to effect a total body transformation in only 2 months. Including a fantastic Nutrition Plan, a host of workouts that will make you a new person if they don't break you, a wall Calendar to track your workouts, an online support community and all the information you need to begin your incredible journey, it seems like a galaxy of support and encouragement and challenge. But there's a crucial component missing. There's something that people notice a couple of weeks in, something without which leads to increased soreness, increased pain, and makes the workout harder than it needs to be. What's this crucial component? Don't laugh folks, I've received endless complaints from people who have noticed this deficiency: calf stretches.
I see it over and over and over again. Scores of people line up to begin a health and fitness challenge. Whether it's acting on a New Year's Resolution at the beginning of January or a sudden resolve to undertake the Insanity Workout, people get fired up, impatient, determined to get radical results today. They can't wait, they've got the fever, they need to start as badly as drowning people need to breath. But then, a few weeks later, they're done. Stop cold. Endless number of people go through this pattern. So what's going on?
t's hard not to think we're sliding into a nutrition-version of 1984. I saw Food Inc this weekend. Shocked and angered me. I've been learning a lot about nutrition and what's healthy and what's not over the past, year, so I don't consider myself a newbie when it comes to these issues, but to see everything put together so lucidly and for the facts to be stated so blunty was a frightening eye opener.