Personal Trainer Journal

Welcome to my fitness journal where I address a wide variety of topics from nutrition, to techniques, to theories, to gym etiquette, and who knows what else? Send in your questions and I'll be happy to answer them.

My Latest Entry: Portions
Today more and more people are instead eating out for the sake of convenience and time, but how do we still maintain a healthy balance when eating out? There are a few simple things we can do to improve our overall health when eating out, whether we eat out once a month or twice a day. Portion size is a huge problem in eating out that can often lead to weight gain. Most restaurants provide larger meals than you should be eating in one sitting. These meals are also different than the ones you would prepare for yourself in a healthy way. They are often loaded with extra calories, so while you could eat three bowls of whole grain cereal at home and get a moderate amount of calories, one large, rich hamburger might fill your calorie quota for the day. So a basic key to eating out is eating less of your main meal. One way to control this if you are at a restaurant is to ask only half your meal to be brought out and the other half boxed to take home for later. If you are eating fast food, a smart way to go is ordering a kids meal which has more appropriate portions. Andy Bruchey: Personal Trainer Austin, TX: 8-31-2010

Entry 492: Walk Before You Run
Getting a good exercise doesn’t involve a massive gym or even a miracle workout program that you see on television. The only thing that is required is a good pair of running shoes and a desire to lose weight. There are plenty of paths that provide a workout that is just as good as any workout that you would get on a treadmill or elliptical machine. One of those paths is the sidewalk in front of your house. Many people are reluctant to start any sort of aerobic workout because they aren’t able to maintain a high and steady pace. They don’t like to have the stops and starts of a jog, or they can’t run as fast as the other people they see running around the neighborhood. Yet, for a person that is just starting out, it might actually be more productive for them to walk before they run. When you are getting a cardiovascular workout it is important to control your heart rate. Your heart rate will indicate to you when you are burning fat calories. When you are trying to burn fat calories you should try not to have a high impact workout. When you have a high impact workout you are building your endurance, but your body uses your short term energy supply to help your body have energy. Andy Bruchey: Personal Trainer Austin, TX: 8-27-2010

Entry 491: Acid
Our typical mode of focusing on the outward physique and less on our insides tends to ruin most attempts for a stronger, leaner, healthier body. Out of all of the processes essential to a head turning physique, a well functioning body is likely the most important, and neglecting your health at the expense of a temporary gain is a recipe for sure failure. In order to keep your body functioning at its peak you must make sure that all of the processes involved aren't overloaded with toxins and overwhelmed by bad lifestyle choices. It is funny how most of us get so frustrated when our bodies do not respond how we want them to when all we have to do is just listen to what the body needs. Similar to a high performance race car, the human body must be given the proper fuel, maintenance, and service in order to ensure high performance and longevity. If we take care of the body, the body will take care of the rest. First the basics. Water has a pH (measured according to the potential of hydrogen scale) of 7.0. This range is considered neutral, as water is neither alkaline nor acid. Any substance with a pH greater than 7.0 is alkaline, and any substance with a pH lower than 7.0 is acidic. For a human to maintain a proper balance, it is best to shoot for a range between 6.0 and 6.8. The acid-alkaline balance of the blood must be stabilized via the food we eat and, as such, we must give the body a constant supply of potassium, magnesium, calcium, and sodium because these important minerals help neutralize the acid wastes that accumulate when we consume proteins, sugars, and starches. Acid wastes can also be especially dangerous because they are believed to cause a variety of health problems and chronic diseases. If you have suffered with chronic symptoms such as water retention, migraines, low blood pressure, insomnia, sunken eyes, bad breath, tooth sensitivity to acidic fruits, and/or alternating diarrhea and constipation, you may be suffering from acidosis. This term (acidosis) means that your body chemistry is likely imbalanced and overly acidic. Various changes within the body can also throw off the natural acid balance, which can cause an acidic surge in body fluids and cause metabolic acidosis. Various disorders and diseases like stomach ulcers, obesity, kidney disease, liver problems, anorexia, adrenal disorders, diabetes, and fever can rob the body of its natural alkaline base, but typically, a bad diet plays the key role in creating an acidic environment within the body. Studies have shown that the over consumption of aspirin and vitamin C can also deplete the natural alkaline base. When training to build a great physique, we so often get caught up in eating proteins and trying to build lean muscle, that in the process we disrupt the natural acid/alkaline balance in the body and become overly acidic. It is hard to train and recover effectively when suffering with the annoying effects of acidosis. proteins are acid forming foods and we must eat alkaline forming foods to neutralize the acid wastes from protein consumption. This means that you should probably be eating a bunch more veggies with that chicken breast than you usually do. Finding a perfect balance can be challenging and confusing at first, but a good way to approach it is to try to maintain an 80% alkaline and 20% acid ratio. That means that in order to maintain a healthy, balanced pH, you need to eat a diet that consists of 80% alkaline forming foods and 20% acid forming foods. Proteins and starches are acid, vegetables and fruits are alkaline. Just about all of the metabolic wastes of the body are acids so we need to eat alkaline forming foods like fruits and vegetables to help neutralize these acid wastes. Recent studies have shown that the average American diet only consists of about 15-20% fruits and vegetables. This means that most people in this country are getting the majority of their calories from acid forming foods. For optimal health, fruits and vegetables should make up 80% of your diet. Starches and proteins should make up the last 20%. This guarantees your diet will be 80% alkaline and 20% acid. Andy Bruchey: Personal Trainer Austin, TX: 8-23-2010

Entry 490: Micro Planning
Planning diets around key micronutrients like amino acids could be the future of diet design and a way to help the fight against obesity, says research published in Science. Over 300m adults are obese worldwide, according to latest statistics from the WHO and the International Obesity Task Force. About one-quarter of the US adult population is said to be obese, with rates in Western Europe on the rise although not yet at similar levels. While macronutrients like fats and carbohydrates have traditionally been the focus of diet design, the new research suggests that micronutrients like specific amino acids could be used in the future. Rather than basing our diets only on macronutrients like fat and carbohydrates, we might one day be designing diets based on micronutrients like amino acids. Scientists from the University of Cincinnati’s Genome Research Institute have reported that a signaling pathway of the protein, mammalian Target of Rapamycin (mTOR), previously linked to the development of diabetes and cancer, could play a key role in food intake. We take in calories to maintain levels of stored fuel (energy) and adequate available fuel. The signals that tell our brain about both the stored and the available energy in our body can activate the mTOR pathway in key parts of the brain that control appetite. The researchers found that injection of the amino acid L-leucine into the hypothalamus of rats, the animals ate less. In fact, the researchers found that L-leucine (1.1 micrograms in 2 microlitres of a phosphate-buffered saline solution) caused a decrease in food intake four hours after administration, and lasted for 24 hours. Interestingly, similar results were not observed when similar branched chain amino acids like L-valine were used. The ability of L-leucine to activate mTOR in the hypothalamus and to inhibit food intake may be an example of central nervous system circuits using an evolutionary conserved signalling mechanism as a fuel sensor rather than as an amino acid sensor. This fuel-sensitive pathway, said the researchers, could eventually lead to a better understanding of obesity and type 2 diabetes. Andy Bruchey: Personal Trainer Austin, TX: 8-20-2010