Courtesy of Mark Sisson of Mark’s Daily Apple:

By now you know I have a biased point of view that rigorous endurance training is antithetical to health. Yes, I competed and loved it for 20 years, so I get the appeal it has for so many, but these days my personal focus is on maintaining the highest level of fitness and health on the least amount of work and sacrifice. I want to play and have fun.

Still, I get asked a lot by endurance athletes whether there’s any chance they can continue to compete at a high level while eating andtraining Primally. I used to think it probably wasn’t feasible if you wanted to be world class, assuming as I did (erroneously) that you just couldn’t overcome the need for copious amounts of carbs on a daily basis without crashing and burning. However, recent research into the concept of “train low-race high” (vis a vis glycogen) and modified approaches to low level aerobic training that focus largely on reprogramming genes to more preferentially burn fat AS WELL AS the use of techniques like HIIT and barefoot training now all seem to show that training and eating Primalcould not only maximize performance, but extend your career.

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Mark from the Mark’s Daily Apple Blog has recently written a great post on how to save money on feed. 99 ways to be exact. A selection of our favorite ones are listed below:

• Shop the perimeter. Don’t buy processed/branded food items.
• Don’t buy things just because they are cheap. If you don’t end up using it no matter how cheap it was it’s lost money.
• Don’t shop hungry.
• Shop alone.
• Do all your grocery shopping on one day of the week, and don’t spend money on food the rest of the week, no matter what.
• Prepare your own food. Clean and chop your own greens instead of buying pre-packaged. Grate your own cheese. Dice your own veggies. Make your own ice. Food manufacturers charge a premium for convenience.
• Avoid Starbucks at all costs.
• Eat the entire animal.
• Stock up on free condiments from fast food joints, truck stops, cafeterias, and yes, churches.
• Go to funerals. There’s always food at funerals.
• Want cheap eggs? Buy a chicken. You’ll be surprised at how many they can pop out.
• Make like Ghandi and fast for a cause.

And our favorite?

• 1 Beer at an L.A. Bar = 24 beers from the Liquormart = 48 generic cans of vegetables. Just stand around with a glass of water in your hand and pretend to be drunk.

For the full list click here…

Written by Gina Kolata and published in the New York Times, March 25, 2009

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WELDON JOHNSON first tried caffeine as a performance enhancer in 1998. He was not a coffee drinker but had heard that caffeine could make him run faster. So he went to a convenience store before a race and drank a cup of coffee.

For the first time in his life, he ran 10 kilometers in less than 30 minutes.

“I remember being really wired before the race,” he said in an e-mail message. “My body was shaking.”

From then on, he was a convert.

Mr. Johnson, a founder of LetsRun.com, would avoid caffeine, even in soft drinks, for a few weeks before he competed in a race, wanting to have the full stimulant effect.

“It may have been a huge placebo effect, but I swore by it,” Mr. Johnson said. “Having a cup of coffee exactly one hour before the race was part of my routine.”

Or maybe it was not a placebo effect.

Caffeine, it turns out, actually works. And it is legal, one of the few performance enhancers that is not banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Continue reading…

From the New York Times — For people who are trying to lose weight, it does not matter if they are counting carbohydrates, protein or fat. All that matters is that they are counting something. This is what researchers from Boston have found and have reported in a recently published study in the New England Journal of Medicine.

In summary, more than 800 overweight adults were assigned to one of four diets that reduced calories through different combinations of fat, carbohydrates and protein. Each plan cut about 750 calories from a participant’s normal diet, but no one ate fewer than 1,200 calories a day.

After two years, every diet group had lost — and regained — about the same amount of weight regardless of what diet had been assigned.

The New York Times article on the study can be read here. Or, if you’re more interested in reading the research paper itself it can be accessed here.

Mark Sisson (of Mark’s Daily Apple ) has just posted a very interested article on some of the world’s healthiest countries and what we can learn from them.

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More than anything, the Primal Blueprint is a pragmatic approach to diet and lifestyle. It is not dogma; rather, it is based on empirical evidence suggesting that following the diet and many lifestyle behaviors of our early ancestors is the healthiest way to live. Though we keep abreast of the latest scientific news, how we feel when we eat, exercise, and live Primally is what motivates us to follow the Primal Blueprint. Results matter, and so we feel it might be useful to take a look at some of the healthiest countries in the world and understand what works for them.

We’ve drawn from several recent surveys of the healthiest countries. The Forbes survey, for example, focused almost entirely on healthcare, life expectancy, and air quality, which are certainly important issues – but how much can we really learn when the top ten countries all make the list for the same reasons? The Foreign Policy and Men’s Health lists offered different perspectives, tending to focus on nutrition and exercise. By looking at all three, I think you’ll get a fairly complete picture of what works, and what doesn’t work, to make these countries the healthiest.

Here are our top 10 countries (America not included) in no particular order:

Continue reading on Mark’s website…

Mark Sisson over at The Daily Apple (a great nutrition blog by the way) has written a post on energy drinks and the danger they can pose (think too much sugar, coffee and other stimulants). The first couple of paragraphs are included below, if you want to read the full post please visit his blog here .

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It’s impossible to walk through a bar, college campus, city park, gym(!), or even company break room without spying one. You know, those gi-normous cans with the graphics so obnoxious (e.g. lightning bolts, claw marks, neon slashes and splatters) they leave your eyes bloodshot. (Can you tell we’re in the mood for a rant?)

It used to be if you were tired you grabbed a morning/afternoon cup of joe. Nothing fancy. It was simple, “old school” (if you will), and mercifully cheap. (Relatively bland and weak by today’s standards, but did most of us know any different back then?) Then came the Starbucks/Seattle revolution, and suddenly coffee – and all manner of coffee related drinks – were practically an official American accessory. Seemingly more omnipresent (or at least obviously visible). More potent. Decked out. Pricier to be sure. Not only did the cost and flair go up with this new wave, the caffeine and sugar content of our coffee did as well. (Ever wonder what’s in that special syrup that makes a mochachino a mochachino?)

Continue reading ….

The following was written from Christopher Kelsall and originally posted on Flotrack . Thanks again Chris!

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As I understand it and because I may have made this up, for us long distance runners, each pound we are over our optimum weight, we are penalized 2 seconds per-mile when racing. If my calculations stand up to the scrutiny and you happen to be in the unfortunate position of being say 10 pounds over optimum weight, you would race 20 seconds per mile slower than your best. Multiply that by 6.2 miles and you have…well you do the math, I can’t concentrate.

Speaking of weight, refined carbohydrates are after me. They are relentless in their pursuit. Everywhere I go, I am accosted by flour products gone wild, there is no escape from them. I spend my nights trying to avoid refined carbohydrate damnation by the dim stovetop light.

Forced to tip-toe into the kitchen, (because the family is sleeping), during unmerciful and slickly produced commercial breaks, which command me to drink Coke, eat white bread and Oreos; I search for something healthy. By the time the first commercial is half finished, panicking, I give up the healthy food search and look for something in the newly adjusted category of ‘not completely unhealthy’. Further into the cupboard I climb; my standards dropping, the deeper I go. Picture in your mind the historic movie Trainspotting and the legendary toilet dive, only I am slithering through dustbunnies.

I settle for the least unhealthy choice of what remains, potato chips prepared free of hydrogenated oil. On the packaging it states the following fine print: may have come in contact with human feces, during processing.

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Victoria athlete packs pill that’s said to ease stress and boost endurance

Paul Luke, The Province

Olympic athletes groaning under the weight of overstuffed suitcases may envy Victoria’s Lauren Groves when she arrives in Beijing this week for the triathlon.

Groves will be lighter on her feet than rival triathletes who have crammed dozens of bottles of vitamins and minerals in their bags to see them through their gruelling event.

Groves, 26, avoided supplement angst by finding pretty much everything she wants in a new product called 7systems.

Aspire Sports Supplements, the company behind 7systems, has promoted the endurance sports supplement as a way to blunt the impact of Beijing smog by goosing athletes’ immune systems.

But 7systems’ long-term mainstream appeal may lie less in any smog-easing properties and more in its stress-busting simplicity.

"When we started, we targeted the endurance sports market but it’s really for anybody whose life involves excess amounts of stress," says Aspire co-founder Jasper Blake, also of Victoria.

"It’s a potent multi-vitamin, multi-mineral, multi-nutrient product designed to cover all your bases."

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Written by Leslie Beck and published in Wednesday’s Globe and Mail (March 12, 2008)

It’s a meal that’s long been a favorite of kids, athletes and connoisseurs of Italian cuisine. Even weight-conscious Canadians, no longer cutting carbohydrates from their diet, are eating it more often. Judging by the proliferation of pasta choices in the grocery store, this high-carb fare has moved from dieter’s downfall to health food.

It’s no longer a simple choice between spaghetti, penne or macaroni. You can buy pasta made from whole wheat, brown rice, spelt, rye and flaxseed. You’ll also find pasta enriched with omega-3 fats, soy and protein. Some brands even have added vegetables such as spinach and tomato.

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A great article (or rant if you want to call it that) written by Chris Kelsall (here’s a link to his blog). A warning however, it may be considered offensive – reader discretion recommended.

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The B$ factor explodes this time of year; wicked fulminations of unadulterated bovine excrement are disgorged, exciting the masses. Myths are created, lies are spewed and the marketing that festered all year in the advertising cesspool, may now be leeching into your television set, internet, radio, billboards, magazines, competitive events, newspapers, buses, windows of mini-vans (as tax write-offs) and anywhere, where messaging may be promulgated.

I am fully in support of creative advertising methods and stimulating marketing concepts, it’s become a bit of an art, Andy Warhol notwithstanding. For all of you who made a New Years resolution a couple months ago, centered on weight loss, exercise increase or breaking a vice, here are just a few prevaricators to avoid:

Jenny Craig

Jenny Craig is one of the good players in the mastodonic weight reduction racket. However; the nicest of the scammers, is still a scammer.

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With These Nutrition Bars, Every Order Is Special

An article written by Lisa Napoli and published February 20, 2008 in the New York Times.

At You Bar’s kitchen in Los Angeles, Marcia Monterroza, a worker, and Dennis and Anthony Flynn. Anthony and his mother are the owners. AVA BISE and Anthony Flynn share more than a typical mother and son: a birthday, a love of healthy food and a devotion to athletics. Ms. Bise, who teaches belly dancing and practices yoga, taught Mr. Flynn how to snowboard after she learned at age 44. Both mother and son faced a challenge common to many active, health-conscious people: how to eat well during a busy day. In theory, a nutrition bar could be eaten between more substantial meals, but the dozens of bars on the market did not appeal to either of them.

“They disguise it as healthy,” said Mr. Flynn, 24. “It’s like, how is that healthy? It’s sugar, low-quality sugar, even.”

Ten years ago, Ms. Bise started making her own nutrition bars at home, using pure, mostly organic ingredients like soy-nut butters, nuts, granolas and dried fruits. Her son began making his own when he was around 18, and the two would swap recipes. Friends had asked them to customize the bars to individual tastes, and Mr. Flynn and Ms. Bise complied, sealing their creations in wax paper.

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