It’s time for the second Quick Tip of the year! This one goes out to all those people who you see in the gym cycling/treading/stepping away to glory as sweat drips down by the bucketful from their bodies! (Not a very pleasant sight is it?!). If you ever wondered why you don’t sweat as much (or you are actually one of them), then know this:
“You Don’t Have To Sweat To Get A Good Workout”

Smart Fitness on MSNBC Health has the scoop:

Everyone doesn’t sweat the same amount or under the same circumstances. Some people sweat just sitting at their desks and others don’t bead up until they’re midway through a high-impact aerobics class.

The topic arose when answering an question on the optimal gym temperature (it’s about 68-72 F, by the way). The fact is that perspiration is just the body’s natural reaction to increased temperature as is sensed by the individual. The body is able to achieve a certain level of cooling by the evaporation of sweat from the surface of the skin – a natural phenomenon known as thermoregulation.

Now, of course everyone perceives temperature a little differently and consequently, different people sweat differently. The amount of sweating has no bearing on the success of the workout and in fact, a person who sweats excessively has to be particularly careful that he/she remains well hydrated with plenty of water.

So just forget about how much you are sweating when you workout and focus instead on high-intensity, shorter duration cardio-vascular exercises and don’t forget to hit the weights as well!

At the risk of making you feel selfish, I want to give you this piece of fitness advice today in the form of a Quick Tip:

“Pay Yourself First”

What does that mean? Well, ever found that the reason you are not able to spend more (any?) time in the gym, visit more produce stores for fresh foods, read a book or even just sit still for a few minutes and meditate (if you are that kind of person) is simply because you have no time? Pay Yourself First just means that you have to make some time just for yourself everyday to get those things done that are important to you.

Think about how most of us save for retirement: We pay ourselves first! A portion of our paycheck is deducted at source and automatically squirreled away for the future. And guess what – we somehow manage to make do with what is remaining. Yes, if we didn’t save for retirement, we could have that car right now or that house a year earlier. Yet somehow, at least in the finance world, we seem to be making the right choices and realizing what is more important. There will always be needs and desires, but a steady consistent approach to saving for our future is of paramount importance!

So why then don’t we take that same approach toward health and fitness – which are of even more importance because, honestly, without them what’s the use of saving for the future? There will always be chores that need to be finished, lawns that need to be mowed, snow that needs to be shoveled, deadlines that need to be met and in general “tasks that need to get done”. Ten years down the raod, you certainly don’t want to look back and think “Didn’t I have half-an-hour a day back then to take better care of my body”?

So take some time off today for yourself. Get outdoors, get to that gym, take the time to eat and live well.

“Pay Yourself First”

(More QuickTips)

This quick-tip falls under the you’ll-never-know-unless-you-ask category. Ever been to a restaurant and been less than thrilled by the regular fare of refined carbs or butter-filled baked goods? Well …

“Ask The Restaurant If It Offers A Healthier Alternative”

I know for a fact that restaurants like Olive Garden will substitute whole-grain linguine for their regular pasta in most of their dishes and many restaurants also offer whole-wheat breads as an alternative.

Low-fat versions of the same dishes, vegetable-substitutions for red-meat, dividing portions into two before bringing a dish to the table … the list of things a restaurant may be able to do to improve the dietary value of your meal is potentially endless.

Try it the next time you are eating out – your restaurant might just surprise you!

[tags]health, nutrition, whole-grains, whole-wheat, restaurants[/tags]

“Skim milk? It’s just glorified water!”
“Plain Oatmeal? Do humans eat that?”
“Plain Cheerios? Bleecchhhh!”

Yes, readers – I totally understand! I hear similar outbursts a lot at home (mostly from guests but sometimes even from that person in the mirror). Simply knowing the good effects of a raw/plain/unsweetened/low-fat food does not make it any more palatable. If wolfing down raw broccoli and natural oatmeal is difficult at first then today’s quick tip is perfect for you:

“Mix And Match Healthful And Not-As-Healthful Foods”

You can improve the healthfulness of a food by mixing different varieties together. You can begin with equal quantities of the two and then slowly reduce the less healthy variety until you get used to the taste of the healthy food. Here are some practical examples:

1. Milk: Mix 1/2 cup skim milk with 1/2 cup 2% milk. Slowly make the other half 1% and then reduce the quantity to 1/4 cup and so on until skim milk doesn’t taste too bad.
2. Oatmeal: Mix about 3 or 4 servings of regular oatmeal with a single serving pouch of sweetened oatmeal (you might as well get your favorite flavor – the fruit varieties rule in our home!) and store in a container. Use this “mixed bag” to begin with and as usual slowly reduce the ratio of the sweetened variety.
3. Cheerios: Mix in Honey Nut Cheerios (or Fruit-flavored Cheerios) with Plain Cheerios and store in a … you get the idea.

Note that none of the flavored or sweetened foods mentioned above are really that bad for you (that’s why I say “Not As Healthful” – there are far worse things you could be eating) – but if you have made up your mind to reduce your dependence on sugary/sweetened foods or would like to switch to skim milk, this idea will help you in achieving that goal.
The bottomline is that by doing this you are simply training your tongue to discover, extract and relish the flavor of natural, low-fat or unsweetened foods (believe me, it’s not as impossible as you might think – like anything else taste can be trained with a little effort).

What ideas do you use at home to make eating healthy that much easier? Do share your stories in the comments section for everyone to enjoy and benefit from!

[tags]health, nutrition, foods, quick tips[/tags]

You may have often heard “Hearty Breakfast, Moderate Lunch, Light Dinner” and if you really think about it, it makes a lot of sense.

When your day is just beginning and you have the most crucial hours of your 24 hour day ahead of you, it makes sense to fill up with a healthful breakfast, especially one that not only fills you up after your long fast while sleeping, but also provides you with your requirements of whole grains, dairy and vitamins/minerals. And don’t you go believing the naysayers.

With the day progressing and after your mid-morning snack, a moderate lunch followed by a late afternoon snack should satisfy most hunger cravings and keep a steady stream of nutrients supplied to your body while also maintaining a steady level of sugar in the bloodstream. This has the added benefit of also helping you feel full for a longer period of time.

Finally, a light dinner with a greater emphasis on proteins than carbohydrates or fats will prepare the body for the period of rest that follows when most muscle-building takes place (you don’t build muscles in the gym, you break them down there and rebuild most of them during sleep and rest periods) and fewer need for carbohydrates exists. A heavy intake of food when you need it the least has the most obvious and direct consequence: fat storage of the excess, unwanted calories.

“Distribute And Progressively Reduce Your Calorie Intake Throughout The Day”

This quick tip will help you manage your weight by not simply starving yourself of calories, which can have quite the opposite effect, but rather by intelligently redistributing them so you supply your body with the right quantity of fuel at the right times.

[tags]health, nutrition, calories, quick tips[/tags]

Today morning I had a peanut butter on whole-wheat bread sandwich for breakfast (on weekdays it’s either that or oatmeal with flax seed – I can be quite boring sometimes). As is my wont I just happened glanced at the nutrition label of the peanut-butter jar for no apparent reason when suddenly “16 of fat” jumped out at me. Two teaspoons had 16g of fat and that was 25% of my daily requirement! For a second I panicked.

And then it hit me. With a recommended intake of 65 g of fat (infact a little more since I am trying to gain weight) I still needed to get about 50+ more grams during the rest of the day. I better have a good plan for that.

Know where you are getting your daily requirement of fat from.

This is not to be taken lightly, since as you might already know, fat is crucial for the essential functioning of your body and several myths regarding fat are just that: myths. The key is knowing not only where you are getting your recommended daily allowance of fat from but more importantly, what kind of fat it is. Fats from sources like almonds, walnuts, peanut-butter and olive oil are of the mono-unsaturated variety which are much healthier for your body than fat from sources like dairy products (butter, milk, cheese), pastries (cakes, cookies, chocolates) or vegetable oils.

In my case, let’s see, that’s

• breakfast: 16g from the peanut butter and 3g from two slices of my favorite bread
• snack: about 3g from cottage cheese
• snack: virtually nothing from the loads of milk I drink since it’s all skim
• lunch: about 7g from whole-grain flat bread and about 8g from the vegetable side-dish (from about 1/2 tbsp of olive oil per serving)
• snack: virtually nothing from a medium apple
• snack: about 5g from 1 medium egg
• dinner: similar to lunch but could be made up of rice or cous-cous with vegetables – say about 15g

Add that all up and you get a grand total of 57g. A tempting piece of candy here, a succumbing to a half-a-cookie there and I’ll probably be pushed into range.

Food diaries like FitDay (I think this is the best out there and the online version is free – will review this soon with tips on how to use it), MyFoodDiary or the online pantry from NutritionData are excellent ways to keep track of your daily consumption trends and help you stay within your requirements. They all offer easy ways to save your favorite foods and even enter nutrition data for foods that are not in their databases.

Updated: Finally it’s important to remember that while this post talks only about your intake of fat, any calories you consume in excess of your daily requirement (on average, about 2000) will be stored as fat too. It’s as equally imperative to keep track of total calorie consumption as it is of individual food-groups like carbs, proteins or fats.

What techniques do you use to track your food consumption? Do you know where you are getting your fat from?

[tags]health, nutrition, calories, food journal, food diary, fat[/tags]

After a long time, another quick tip! Just to refresh your memory, here’s the description of quick-tips from my first post in this category:

Typically these [(quick tips)] will be no more than a couple of sentences and it will always be about making a minor change in your lifestyle leading to a huge change in your health and fitness levels.

Today’s quick tip deals with signal clothes, so a quick definition is in order:

Signal Clothes: I would like to define signal clothes as those that signal to you that you are within your normal weight range (typically plus/minus 3-5 pounds) and also serve as the first warning if you are either losing/gaining weight outside this range. These clothes typically fit comfortably without the need for a belt and are never made of elastic materials or of the wrap-around type. The best kind of signal clothes is a pair of nicely-fitting trousers that do not have any form of elastic at the waist (I have noticed that jeans sometimes have a habit of stretching out an inch or two and so they make poor signal clothes).

Make sure you regularly use signal clothes.

Wearing your designated signal dress atleast once a week will not only ensure that you are on the right-track with your fitness regimen, but will also serve as an instant warning should your holiday diet have put you slightly off track. Why is this technique so effective? The answer is simple: 99% of the time excess weight is first stored in your abdominal region. What was looked upon as the bane of over-eating can quickly be turned around to our advantage: your abdomen can now be your warning signal!

I am just back from a short vacation to India and looking at it now from my newly acquired pair of “Fitness Mantra” eyes, I quickly realised several reasons for the amount of obesity prevalent in many big Indian cities: for one, the clothes are all wrong! (Well, so is the kind of food and lack of activity, but that is fodder for another post). There is one common thread among the obese in India: many men gain weight once they retire and many housewives are overweight.

Now if you thought lack of activity was the only factor to blame, think again: clothes play a major role here too. The typical Indian clothes for retired men are wraparound skirt-like pieces of white cloth called dhoties. And you might be familiar with the female version: the wraparound multi-colored garments called sarees. The common feature between these clothes? They are almost infinitely expandable – just wrap around and fasten wherever is most comfortable! For men, as long as they are working in desk jobs that require trousers, there was atleast some form of check and awareness about the “growing” problem in their middle. But retired men and housewives have no idea when they move from lean to chubby/venus-like to overweight and then to obese: they have/use no signal clothes!

What signal clothes do you use and what other signs warn you when you move out of your normal weight range? Do comment about your techniques.

[tags]fitness, nutrition, signal clothes[/tags]

Salad lovers are used to having crunchy greens mixed with their favorite dressing and possibly topped with nuts or croutons. But which greens are the best? As is almost always the case with vegetables, the darker/richer the color, the better it is for you. For salads, this tip will come in handy:

Use Romaine Lettuce instead of Iceberg Lettuce.

Romaine is naturally a much darker green and its nutrition content immediately show why. A single serving of Romaine lettuce (about 3 ounces or a little less than 2 cups) contains:

• 100% of your daily requirement of Vitamin A
• 34% of your daily requirement of Vitamin C
• 2g of fiber

(from the NutritionData page for Romaine Lettuce)

Compare this with a serving of iceberg lettuce which has a paltry 9% of your required Vitamin A, 4% Vitamin C and 1g of fiber.

Romaine’s vitamin C and beta-carotene content make it a heart-healthy green. Vitamin C and beta-carotene work together to prevent the oxidation of cholesterol.

The fiber in Romaine lettuce adds another plus in its column of heart-healthy effects. In the colon, fiber binds to bile salts and removes them from the body. This forces the body to make more bile, which is helpful because it must break down cholesterol to do so. This is just one way in which fiber is able to lower high cholesterol levels.

Equally beneficial to heart health is Romaine’s folic acid content. This B vitamin is needed by the body to convert a damaging chemical called homocysteine into other, benign substances. If not converted, homocysteine can directly damage blood vessels, thus greatly increasing the risk of heart attack and stroke.

In addition, romaine lettuce is a very good source of potassium, which has been shown in numerous studies to be useful in lowering high blood pressure, another risk factor for heart disease.

With its folic acid, vitamin C, beta-carotene, potassium, and fiber content, romaine lettuce can significantly contribute to a heart-healthy diet.

-Via The World’s Healthiest Foods

So the next time you grab a salad or make one at home, use romaine lettuce instead – your body will thank you for it!

[tags]health, fitness, nutrition, romaine lettuce, salad[/tags]

Are you overly concerned about that irresistible cheesecake you ate during the weekend outing? Or the extra slice of pizza you know you should have avoided at your friend’s birthday party? The fact is that you should really be worried more about your daily eating habits that literally compound inside your body rather than the occasional succumbing to temptation.

Focus on your daily eating habits:

1. Are you getting your daily servings of fresh fruits and vegetables?
2. Do you get enough dairy products like low fat milk, yogurt and cheeses?
3. Have you switched to whole grain foods rather than refined white bread and rice?
4. Are your meals balanced to include the right amounts of carbohydrates proteins and fats (typically in a 50-30-20 ratio)?
5. Have you stopped eating fast food on a regular basis or drinking regular soda daily?

A common joke is about the guy who drives upto a fast food joint and orders an extra-large hamburger with large french fries and a large soda, and as an after-thought adds “Make sure it’s diet soda”! A typical example of a guy who does not understand that his portions are probably already way overboard and a diet soda is not going to help! Another health blog called “The Fitness Insider” has an interesting article titled Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff in which this point is elaborated.

Your daily habits really shape your eating habits for life. After all our motto should be to “Make fitness a way of life” – no extraordinary effort is required – just a regular focus on discipline. And if you occasionally eat a little more – it’s all in the game … your regular good habits will more than make up for it.

Ever had eyes rolled at you when you measure rice (brown, I presume!) in cups or count your almonds or walnuts before you eat them? Do you hear “What’s a few extra, here and there”-type comments?

I guess these comments come from the same people who then whine when the bathroom scale shows they bumped up a fraction of an ounce over their previous weighing. Oh, so now they want to be exact in measuring, don’t they!

Don’t be ashamed to count and measure calories.

It’s the only way you will really get a good idea of what you are consuming and whether you are achieving your target calorie intake value.

[tags]health, fitness, nutrition, calorie intake[/tags]