Is That Really Healthy?

I have been guilty of this too. Of course I knew I shouldn't be eating pizza, french fries and ice cream every day but sometimes things you think are healthy and good for you pack just as many useless calories as the above mentioned foods. Only until I really started to do some research and some trial and error have I learned what my body likes and doesn't like, how much better it performs when I eat certain things and when I don't, how much better I feel when I get more nutrients out of my food.

Are Those "Healthy" Snacks Actually Good For You?

Every so-called healthy snack has had its time in the spotlight-remember rice cakes? Even though they tasted like cardboard, they were the "it" healthy snack for a while. But are rice cakes and other similar munchies actually good for you-or are they more like treats? 
Strictly speaking, a snack should be a mini-meal that offers a nutritious pick-me-up, while a treat is often high in fat, sugar and/or calories and has little nutritional benefits to speak of. In some cases, "a snack may be no better for you than a cookie or candy bar," says Paula Meyer, R.D., a dietitian in Westport, C.T.

Read on as we rate eight popular snacks and whether you should stick with them or ditch them. 

Snack #1: Rice cakes This once uber-popular "diet" snack has a mere 35 calories, but consists of high-glycemic, puffed-up white rice with a low nutritional profile. "They're mostly made of air," says Sharon Palmer, R.D., a dietitian and author of "The Plant-Powered Diet: The Lifelong Eating Plan For Achieving Optimal Health, Beginning Today." "You're better off choosing a low-glycemic snack that keeps you feeling full longer."
Verdict: Ditch it. "You want to get as many nutrients as you can with your calories," Palmer says. "You can enjoy a cup of fresh strawberries for those same 35 calories and you'll get more flavor and nutrients." 

Snack #2: Kale chips The latest "it" snack is a mixed bag, nutritionally speaking. While kale itself is rich in vitamin A, C and K, your bag of kale chips may contain more additives than you'd think. "With oils, flavorings and salts, some kale chips contain as many calories as potato chips-160 calories per ounce-and loads of salt," Palmer says. "Also, some veggie chips contain nothing but dehydrated potatoes and tiny amounts of dehydrated vegetables."
Verdict: Ditch it and make your own. Roast kale with a small amount of olive oil and seasonings to get the maximum benefit. Or if you're going to buy kale chips, look at the label and make sure kale is listed as the number one ingredient. 

Snack #3: Sweet potato chips If you think that swapping regular spuds for sweet potatoes would be a healthy upgrade-you'd be right. Sweet potatoes contain more fiber and vitamins A and C than regular potatoes. Just be sure to read the label of those sweet potato chips you're snacking on to make sure you're not getting some unwanted ingredients. "These chips should contain only sweet potatoes, vegetable oil, salt and maybe some seasoning," says Rachel Begun, a registered dietitian and spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
Verdict: Stick with it. 

Snack #4: Protein bars Just because protein bars are stocked in the health food aisle, doesn't mean they're any better for you than a Snickers bar. "Most protein bars on the market are glorified candy bars, with chocolate coatings and lots of added sugars and processed ingredients," says Begun. "Consider a protein bar something that should be eaten on occasion as a convenience food when other options aren't available."
Verdict: Ditch it-unless you're in a pinch. 

Snack #5: Granola For years, granola has been portrayed as a health food, but it's actually loaded with calories and fat. "Most people don't realize that a quarter-cup of granola contains up to 149 calories," says Gina Keatley, a chef and nutritionist in New York City.
Verdict: Ditch it. Although granola has heart-healthy whole grains that can help lower cholesterol, it's not a low-calorie option. 

Snack #6: Baked chips and crackers Just because a chip is labeled "baked" doesn't make it better for you. For example, baked potato chips often contain cornstarch and added sugar. "These products are very processed and tend to be high in calories, fat and sodium," says Keatley.
Verdict: Ditch it. 

Snack #7: Popchips When you 'pop' a snack, you skip the frying or baking process. Although Popchips are low in fiber, they have zero trans fats, 0 to 0.5 grams of saturated fat (depending on the flavor) and are lower in calories per ounce than traditional chips, notes Lauren Schmitt, a registered dietitian in Studio City, C.A.
Verdict: Stick with it-but watch your portion sizes. "Popchips are a better crunchy snack than a bag of Doritos," Schmitt says. "Still, I'd prefer to see people snacking on non-fat Greek yogurt or low-fat string cheese." 

Snack #8: Rice crackers For people with gluten allergies, rice crackers are a great option, according to Schmitt. "Rice crackers have little-to-no saturated fat, so they're healthier than other snack foods," she says. The downside: They're essentially all carbohydrate with very little fiber.
Verdict: Ditch it. If you don't have wheat allergies, opt for a multi-grain cracker and pair it with a hummus, bean or yogurt dip. 
http://shine.yahoo.com/healthy-living/those-healthy-snacks-actually-bad-132900494.html

Who Doesn't Have Time?

I have always been an active person my whole life. Whether it was sports, dance, hiking, running, gym and so on. As much as love doing all these things, sometimes life gets in the way. Sometimes you have to work late, you woke up late, you're not feeling well, the kids are sick, etc. I have found that as long as I do something every day even if I can't get my usual sweat session in, I feel better, I feel accomplished, I feel strong and motivated to keep going. That's also why I love my workout DVDs because even if its 10pm and you don't want to leave the house for the gym, your DVD player never let's you down.
Here are some of my favorite mini workouts that you can do anywhere without equipment.
I promise you, no one ever said "Man, I wish I hadn't done that workout. I feel terrible!"
No more excuses! Get up and get moving every day even if its for only 10 minutes. You won't regret it.

Short Exercises to Burn 200 Calories

I just came across this short article and had to share. In previous blogs I have mentioned that it's been months since I have been able to train and workout normally, so for me, every little bit helps right now to stay active and focused on recovery!

If you find it hard to lose weight with your busy schedule, the news keeps getting better. First, just 20 minutes of exercise was proven to help increase your metabolism. Now, a recent study has found that working out intensely for just 2.5 minutes can spur calorie burn throughout the day — an extra 200 calories' worth.

In the latest study, five healthy men performed sprint interval training on a stationary bicycle (five 30-second intense intervals with four minutes of easy cycling in between). Although the men were sedentary the rest of the day, they ended up burning 200 more calories during the days they did the short bout of exercise than the days they didn't exercise at all.

Even though this was a small study, the encouraging results are reason enough to add intense intervals into your workout routine. It's also good news for those of you who can never seem to fit a full workout into your day. Read on for ideas on intense exercises you can do anywhere for 2.5 minutes so you too can reap the afterburn benefits.

Perform these at maximum intensity; you can break them into 30-second or one-minute intervals to make it more manageable.

1. Jumping jacks. These do-anywhere moves pump up your heart rate in no time.
2. Mountain climbers. This cardio move helps strengthen leg and core muscles as well.
3. Burpees. Swiftly moving from standing to squatting to push-up position challenges all your muscles.
4. Running up stairs. Run up and down the stairs at home or at your office — you'll get the added bonus of a toned backside.
5. Walking lunges. These lunges help you develop balance while strengthening your core and lower body. Do these briskly, but make sure your form stays correct to prevent knee or ankle strain.

Don't stop at just 2.5 minutes, though. Besides upping your total calorie burn, longer exercise helps you stay healthy and prevent disease. Aim for at least 150 minutes a week! NO MORE EXCUSES.

http://www.fitsugar.com/Short-Exercises-Burn-200-Calories-25455818

5 Reasons You Could be Gaining Weight

The cool part about signing up with Beachbody, even if you never buy any of the programs or supplements, is that you get a free membership to their site that has cool recipes, message boards and articles like this one. I get this question a lot by friends and clients. I even ask it myself sometimes!
There are always factors that we may not even think of when starting or continuing a program.
Don't get discouraged! Push through, stay motivated and you will achieve the goals that you set for yourself.
 

5 Reasons You Could Be Gaining Weight

By Steve Edwards

Nothing taps your panic button quite like gaining weight, especially when you're on a weight loss program. Unfortunately, it's an inevitable fact of life. Luckily, you've got me here to tell you that, as long as you're following a solid program, results will come. It's a physiological certainty (unless you have an underlying issue, like hypothyroidism).

I realize this might take further convincing, considering our instant-gratification society. But this ain't my first weight loss rodeo. I've seen almost every scenario you can dream up, most of which were solved by patience. That said, there are some strategies you can use to ensure you're getting the most out of both your diet and exercise program. Let's tackle five of the most common weight loss conundrums.

I'm following the program perfectly. Why isn't it working?! Cortisol is a word you should become familiar with, as it's a key factor here. You've probably heard that it makes you fat, but you have no idea why "they" say that. What is cortisol? It's actually a performance-enhancing stress hormone that serves an important function in survival situations. Unfortunately, when we force too much daily stress on our bodies, we shift into a state of chronic cortisol release. This can cause us to store excess fat as a survival instinct. While it sounds pretty dire, it's generally only a serious problem in those with poor lifestyle habits.

The beginning of a diet and/or exercise program, however, is a survival situation. In a very simplistic sense, your body releases cortisol, which, in turn, causes excess water retention to help you rebuild broken down muscle tissue. While this is cortisol functioning properly, it does lead to a period of water weight gain as you adjust to a new program. It's nothing to worry about. By following a solid plan, your body will adapt by repairing this muscle tissue. This results in an increase in your metabolism and leads to weight loss if that's your goal.

The trick is that there is no hard line on how long this adaptation takes. It's based on your individual parameters. Just rest easy in the fact that it will happen, unless you force it not to, leading us to . . .

 

 

I'm barely eating.Severe under eating causes cortisol release, as it's the definition of a bodily emergency. Beachbody® offers many kick-start (or express) eating plans where you under eat for a few days, but you're always encouraged to get back to a solid maintenance calorie level quickly. A short period of strategic under eating with proper hydration will help your body dispense of unneeded food (most of us chronically overeat) and regulate bodily functions. Go too long, however, and chronic cortisol release is the result.

This is a tough situation because our natural reaction to weight gain is to eat less. When you're exercising, it's important to keep your eye on workout performance, as opposed to how much weight you're losing. You should be eating enough so that your daily workouts improve over time. As long as that's happening, your body is adapting, your metabolism is increasing, and you will lose weight provided you also don't overeat.

 

 

I've been doing hard workouts for weeks. On the performance theme, you need to continually improve, which is why workouts get harder as you move through any of Beachbody's programs. It's also why we add resistance (via added weight or gravity, as is the case with jumping) to workouts. If you're doing the same workouts at the same intensity constantly, you are not forcing adaptations that lead to changes in your metabolism. This is called a plateau.

A plateau, technically, isn't gaining weight—it's remaining the same—but a proper diet and exercise program should continually force improvements (in the form of adaptations). Otherwise, your metabolism won't continue to increase, which is the goal of most weight loss programs.

 

 

My friend and I are doing the exact same thing and she's losing. Back to adaptation. We all react differently. The only absolute is that our bodies will change over time with a healthy program. A fitness rule called the Specificity of Adaptation states that it takes the body between 3 and 12 weeks to adapt to new stimuli, which is a very broad range. This is why it's vital that you stick to your program and not change it repeatedly based on your daily results!

In our test groups, two-week results have almost no bearing on who does best in the end. In fact, many people that under eat early and get off to a fast start will stagnate, while those who stick to the plan and eat as advised will start slower but train harder over time, leading to rapid weight loss as the program wears on.

 

 

I lost weight for a while but now it's stopped. For ages on the Team Beachbody® Message Boards, this was our most frequently asked question. You eat less to lose weight. Things are going great, but suddenly you plateau—or start gaining. Odds are, your metabolism has slowed down in order to deal with the decreased calories. You're starving your now fit body, so it's doing what it needs to do to survive. The answer to this problem is pretty simple: eat more.

Again, this is a tough sell, so here's an example. One of our early Success Stories lost 40 pounds during a round of Power 90®, eating only 1,200 calories a day. He then stagnated for a long time and was very resistant to eating more, fearing it would kick-start a regression. We talked him into adding calories until, finally at around 2,000 calories, weight loss resumed. It then became so rapid he dropped through his goal, and about 20 pounds below, until finally, at around 3,000 calories, he leveled out. Then a daily diet of around 3,500 calories a day got him to a ripped 175.

 

So the moral of today's lesson is to trust your exercise program—at least if it's a Beachbody program. We've been doing this a long time and we know what works. There are no magic bullets. Body transformation is based on making consistent, healthy lifestyle changes. Do that and you'll never need to ask yourself why you're gaining weight again.

 

http://www.teambeachbody.com/about/newsletters/-/nli/280#253636558