Wednesday, July 29, 2009

August 1st Fit Club

Pat and I hold a monthly Fit Club workout with the local New Hampshire Beachbody Coaches. Typically it is on the second Saturday of the month. Because of other events we have planned in August our next Fit Club is this Saturday. Here is the information if you are interested.

Team Granite Fit Club
Time: August 1st 9am to 10:30 am
Workout: Cardio X
Location: Girls Inc.
340 Varney Street
Manchester, NH

We also hold a small workout and activites for the kids five and old so please feel free to bring them. An RSVP is requested but not required to attend. If you have any questions or to RSVP please contact us at info@teamgranitefit.com.

We hope to see you there. We always have a great time.

Fit Club

Monday, July 27, 2009

Bodybugg

My 32nd birthday was back on the 13th of this month and Pat got me a Bodybugg as a gift. Being an engineer I love numbers and I love tracking the calories I eat and the calories I burn daily. I have always tracked my calories burned during a workout with a Polar heart rate monitor. I'm sure if any of you have watched The Biggest Loser on TV you have seen a Bodybugg, its the black band all the contestants are wearing around their left arm. You just wear it on your arm daily and it uses the following five sensors to calculate your daily caloric burn(within 90% accuracy) : motion, steps, skin response (sweat), skin temperature, and heat flux from you muscles. Not only does the Bodybugg measure you caloric burn it also calculates you daily steps.

Well sounds pretty amazing but how does it really work and what do I think of it. I've only been using it for one week now and so far I'm really enjoying it. I was very surprised that once I put in all of my information it calculated that I probably burn about 2600 calories a day. I honestly thought that was way high until I started wearing it. I have averaged over the past week right around 2600 calories. Here is the graph from the calories I burned on Sunday July 26th.

Can you tell when I worked out yesterday? I guess if you can't I didn't workout hard enough. I was also surprise to find out just how many calories I burn while out shopping. I was out for a few hours yesterday afternoon doing some shopping for the house and groceries and I was burning about 5 calories a minute. Ladies just another reason to go out and shop. Here is the graph of the steps I took on Sunday.
So far I'm having a lot of fun with the Bodybugg. I can't truly give an honest opinion yet of whether it has helped me lose the last few pounds I'm looking to drop. What I have learned: I actually burn 2600 calories a day, 10,000 steps is a really hard goal to make if I don't workout during the day, I actually burn about 70 calories an hour while I sleep, and it is 12 steps from my bed to my bathroom (I can tell when I get up at night). I plan to post a full review with my results in 30 days to see if this nifty tool can help me lose those last few pounds.

Monday, July 20, 2009

What you eat...

Another great post from Mark Sisson. I would highly recommend reading this one of food labels and nutrition....food for thought as they say!

Link

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Epigenetics...say what?



Epigenetics are the "controllers" of our genes and gene expression, so what does this have to do with health and fitness? The simple answer is everything!

These epigenomes control your gene expression (def: Gene expression is the entire process that takes the information contained in genes on DNA and turns that information into proteins. Proteins are the building blocks of your body).

Science has really found that although we can't control our genes, our lifestyle, what we eat, how we live our lives has a direct impact on epigenomes and in turn on gene expression. Your body is not some machine just running on a pre-programmed course, but is dynamic and can be changed through healthy lifestyle and good nutrition.

A good book is called The Biology of Belief by Dr. Bruce Lipton.

Here is a great clip (it's about 15 mins, but worth watching) from PBS NOVA ScienceNOW that gives a great explanation of what is going on inside our cells
Clip

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Yuck!


This Nation is faced with an obesity epidemic with no end in sight. Yet people still wonder why...it's pretty simple in my book!

check this out

Ask yourself one question (thanks Mark Sisson for this one)....Do you live to eat or eat to live?

Think about it!