Thank You, RC Science

WHILE THE CURRENT study is by no means exemplary (frankly, it sucks), it is still far preferable to the anecdotal evidence rampant across the Internet. What's truly needed is a longitudinal study that tracks CrossFitters from various demographics and levels of experience over a long period of time -- at least six months.

"This should not be difficult to do, given the vast popularity of the sport," Strength and Conditioning Research's Chris Beardsley wrote.

While we wait for that, both CrossFit's opponents and proponents need to be more reasonable. CrossFit, like any form of exercise, is not without risk. But the benefits far, far outweigh them. CrossFit coaches and trainers need to look out for the health of their athletes, and take care not to push them beyond the bounds of what is safe. That means dialing back intensity, when necessary, and ensuring that participants always utilize proper lifting form. Dying for fitness just doesn't make much sense. Getting fit and living to one's fullest potential; now that does.

http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2014/04/no_crossfit_wont_kill_you.html

I wonder about what it means when they say "coaches shouldn't push."  In my experience, CrossFit is the opposite of the "drill instructor" model.  Coaches don't push, they set the stage and let the athletes choose their level of exertion.  Encourage?  Heck yes!  Reward and acknowledge outstanding effort and courage?  Frock yes, like you read about.  Celebrate PRs?  DUH!!  But the point of the CrossFit system - measuring the work and noting improvement over time on benchmark workouts - is that the coach doesn't have to "push" athletes.  The athletes take their own stock of how hard to work each day based on a multitude of factors no coach could ever know.  How much water did they athlete drink the 23 hours a day they are not in the coach's arena?  How have they slept and eaten?  Did they have a bad day at work?  A family issue?  A bad hair day?  A coach in CrossFit isn't getting paid to "push" they are getting paid to help you move well, in a group setting that is intrinsically motivating, and to help you celebrate your wins.  

I appreciate the write up in "real clear science" but saying "CrossFit coaches and trainers need to look out for the health of their athletes" is like saying "the sun needs to come up."  Really dude, that's all you have to say?

Exercise and Mental Health?

The Cochrane Review (the most influential review of its kind in the world) has produced a landmark metaanalysis of studies on exercise and depression. They picked 23 rigorous studies out of a pool of more than one hundred. The conclusion was that exercise had a “large clinical impact” on depression.

Among the studies that support the theory that exercise directly causes improved mental well-being (as opposed to vice-versa) is one that looked at the effect of exercise on older adults with clinical depression (Blumenthal et al., 1999). The authors compared exercise to a commonly prescribed anti-depressant medication (Zoloft), and found that both were equally effective in reducing depressive symptoms. In contrast to these results, a group of researchers from the Netherlands found that exercise may not be nearly as important as genetics in determining one’s mental well-being (Stubbe et al., 2007). These researchers looked at pairs of identical twins in which one twin exercised significantly more than the other, and found that there was no significant difference in their levels of happiness.

Diet and nutrition can be beneficial to psychological well-being. A supporting study by Hakkarainen et al. in 2004 observed 29,133 older male smokers. Participants in the study recorded their meals, and the researchers examined those men who consumed more fatty acids from margarine and junk food. The researchers found that ingestion of those foods was associated with increased depression, anxiety, and insomnia. However, in contrast to these results, a group of researchers examined the improvements in well-being associated with exercise or micronutrient supplementation. After 17 weeks, the researchers followed up with study participants and found that neither supplementation nor exercise had a significant impact upon the well-being of the participants.

http://www.pursuit-of-happiness.org/science-of-happiness/exercise/

Take it for what it's worth.  I can say with confidence that the best times of my life included physical training.  

Butter Back, But Where's the Apology?

Julia Child, goddess of fat, is beaming somewhere. Butter is back, and when you’re looking for a few chunks of pork for a stew, you can resume searching for the best pieces — the ones with the most fat. Eventually, your friends will stop glaring at you as if you’re trying to kill them.

That the worm is turning became increasingly evident a couple of weeks ago, when a meta-analysis published in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine found that there’s just no evidence to support the notion that saturated fat increases the risk of heart disease. (In fact, there’s some evidence that a lack of saturated fat may be damaging.) The researchers looked at 72 different studies and, as usual, said more work — including more clinical studies — is needed. For sure. But the days of skinless chicken breasts and tubs of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter may finally be drawing to a close.

The tip of this iceberg has been visible for years, and we’re finally beginning to see the base. Of course, no study is perfect and few are definitive. But the real villains in our diet — sugar and ultra-processed foods — are becoming increasingly apparent. You can go back to eating butter, if you haven’t already.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/03/26/opinion/bittman-butter-is-back.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0&referrer=

Bittman recently called Dean Ornish one of the most knowledgeable men in the world about heart disease (or something like that), an unabashed kiss of the derriere, so for him to come up with a column like this is noteworthy.

The rest of the article is a good read, but I could beat up every line from one angle or another.  Mostly, I wonder "where's the apology?"  Bittman participated with the government and all the hip wannabe scientists to pretend they knew that saturated fat was bad for us, and the in process had a bunch of eating truly wretched levels of sugar and grains and processed foods laden with industrially produced "vegetable oils" - and that crap has been killing people.  More people than wars, more people than drugs.  As this huge super-tanker full of tortured dietary science makes it's long turn away from the saturated fat scare, few will admit to what they did to their fellow humans based on their arrogance and willingness to bank on immature and incomplete science.  Some days that has me boiling mad.

And I think I'm just going to have to get over it.

Jogging Delusion?

Okay, here's my justification behind that insensitive comment that got everyone's panties in a wad. While gender is biologically determined, the concept of masculinity is a socially constructed notion. And while the idea of masculinity varies somewhat from era to era and from one region of the world to another, masculinity is usually associated with superior strength, muscularity, speed, and power. The human body, as it turns out, isn't a very good multi-tasker when it comes to "S.A.I.D." (specific adaptation to imposed demand). It prefers to be either big and strong, or small and weak, (albeit with good endurance). True, some guys can manage to have it both ways, but if you find it challenging to gain muscle or strength, you're not one of them.

Jogging, as the bulk of studies have repeatedly shown, reduces, or at the very least, makes it more difficult to maintain or develop all of the masculine traits I just described. This is why national and World-level powerlifters and weightlifters - most of whom are jaw-droppingly jacked and three times stronger than you are - rarely jog or do anything resembling it. Maybe you're willing to risk minimizing your manhood to obtain the supposed benefits of jogging.

http://www.t-nation.com/training/jogging-delusion

Interesting topic!

The Pro: it's both cheap and easy to "jog" or engage in running for endurance training.  I think running is in our DNA - there's a case to be made that we differentiated ourselves as hot summer running scavengers, in which we could reach the dead animals on the savannah faster than other predators since we have the best cooling system in the animal planet.

I ran for fun and fitness all over the planet for many years.  I didn't log huge miles, and I didn't often get to be very "fast" at running.  My life was always better as a runner than when I didn't run.

If you are a foot soldier, you must be able to run long and slow.

Running is better than nothing and in terms of being able to do work, better than walking - if you don't take it too far.

The Con:  He's right, taken too far endurance running makes most of us weak and frail.  Running confers no special benefit to heart health, it does not help most people sustain a fat loss, and it is not a boost to performance for most sport.  Which is to say, if you play soccer, lacrosse, football, baseball, basketball, or other sports which place a premium on top end speed and explosive power, you'd be far better off skipping the long running sessions and focusing on speed and explosive power training.

If you like to run - cool!  I hope you enjoy the heck out of it.  I also hope you are not doing it because you think it's the bees knees for fat loss, heart health or sports performance.

Why We Got Fatter During The Fat-Free Food Boom

"In an informal survey, we asked readers of The Salt if they bought packaged food labeled as fat-free during the fat-free marketing craze. 76 percent said yes, and 70 percent told us they ate more refined carbohydrates and sugars as a result."
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/03/28/295332576/why-we-got-fatter-during-the-fat-free-food-boom?sc=17&f=1001

This is another telling of how the government intervened in the diet of americans, and killed many, based on immature science, good intentions and arrogance.  If folks could sue the government, the settlement would be far larger than the tobacco industry settlement as so many more were killed and sickened.

Winning the Open!

Look, I don’t know who you are. Maybe you are one of the fire-breathers who might dethrone Froning. Totally possible. But most of us aren’t. And we need to keep this thing in perspective.

This isn’t about winning a contest, it’s about winning your life. If CrossFit is making your life better, then by all means, go in and go deep. But if it’s making you stressed-out because you’re not achieving some external goal about kicking someone else’s ass, dude, then you’re doing it wrong.

Which is why I love The Open so much. It’s a great time to come together, and get perspective. Sure, when one of our guys got 189 reps in 14.4, we were psyched. But if I’m being honest, I was more psyched about that woman’s first Toes-To-Bar. And I was even more proud of the way my daughter hit a wall, shed a few tears, tore some blisters open, and kept going.

http://alyssaroyse.wordpress.com/2014/03/24/top-8-tips-for-winning-the-crossfit-open-gaming-the-games/
This lady is a great writer, take a stroll through the whole article and enjoy.

Dr. Mike about Denise and Death by Food Pyramid

She discusses the notion that the meat eaten by our Paleo ancestors was different than the meat we eat today, and implies that those following a Paleo type of eating regimen aren't really eating Paleo. Why? Because Paleo man ate from nose to tail. He ate the entire animal, including all the parts modern man avoids, such as the viscera, offal, and organs. Typically, if reports from contact with contemporary hunting societies are indicative of how Paleo man behaved, the muscle meats — the ones most of us Westernized folk eat — were not prized as much as the organs and offal and were often fed to the dogs.

I have a little different perspective.

The organs, offal and viscera supposedly contain a lot more nutrients than the muscle meat. And, compared to muscle meat, they are filled with considerably more fat, much of which is saturated. Consequently, those following an ancestral diet are encouraged to limit muscle meat and increase consumption of organs, offal, and viscera, i.e., eat nose to tail. I have no argument with this other than it's often difficult to find organs, viscera, and offal unless you are on a farm or in a major city. Santa Barbara, where we live part of the time, is an upscale small city with three or four natural food grocers, including Whole Foods, and about the most exotic organ meat I can regularly find is liver. I suspect it's the same in most other places. Those of you who live in foodie towns, such as Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, Chicago, and New York can probably find all kinds of organ meats, but the rest of us either have to resort to ordering online, butchering our own, or doing without.

But all is not lost. First, although organ meats have more nutrients than muscle meats, it's not all that much more. Run a search on the USDA Database of Foods, and you'll see what I mean. Compare beef steak to beef liver or kidneys. Not a lot of difference except for the vitamin A in the liver.

A muscle meat diet can provide most, if not all, of what you need nutrient-wise. If you're worried, supplement with a multi vitamin.

I suspect our ancient ancestors were drawn to the organ meats and offal not because they knew they were more nutrient dense (how did they know?), but because of their greater fat content. Thankfully, agricultural science has come to our rescue. We modern folk enjoy steaks and chops and roasts more than we do the inner organs of beasts and fowls, so modern farmers now produce muscle meats that contain more fat than wild game. So we can get the fat of the organ meats while at the same time getting almost the same level of nutrients.

Many purists consider the muscle meats to be overloaded with fat and turn to the organ meats and offal instead. I say, what's the difference? I would much prefer a juicy, medium rare ribeye steak than I would a kidney or spleen or lung (and I've eaten them all), so why not get the fat in my steak?

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/low-carb-library/death-food-pyramid/

Denise's book is a great read for several reasons, I highly recommend it as a foundational book in understanding the diet wars, and several nuances in the science of diet and health that are not well articulated elsewhere.

I like Dr. Mike Eades' point also - organ meats from grass fed and healthy animals are very potent in nutrients, but modern and unusually fat muscle meat is a more reasonable substitute than many would think.