1) Medpoint athlete in the news!
Listen to the Podcast
*Medpoint Special Olympics athlete Gordie Michie has been selected to compete in the Can-Am Para Swimming Championships in California this December! He is lightning quick, easily swimming 50m freestyle races in under 28 seconds!
2) We had a great client question the other day, “how much time do you need to benefit from a weight training session?”
* As I prepare for these TV commercials and magazine shoots, my time in the gym gets shorter. For instance, last week I averaged 40 minutes per workout!
*Training with weights comes down to a few fundamental factors: tension applied to the muscle, time under tension and the “volume” of training, which is essentially how many repetitions you perform on a muscle group over the course of a workout.
*If you make every repetition count, focus on squeezing at peak contraction, keep your heart rate elevated and lift heavy enough weights to apply reasonable tension, you DO NOT need to spend more than 60 minutes in the gym! In fact, in a rush a 30 minute circuit style of training session can be very effective!
*Training is about quality, not how long you sit in the gym. Stay focused and make every effort to take advantage of each exercise.
NOTE: NUTRITION, is what takes over for the other 23hrs of the day, training just primes your body to adapt via muscle growth, strength gains, fat loss etc.
3) Often healthy eaters find it hard to relate to the challenges of “bingers”. But is it true that binge eating can be similar to a cocaine addiction and a very difficult habit to break??
*This is TRUE and not a myth!
*Excuse the pun, but a growing body of evidence is showing that binge eating and even the sight/smell of those foods stimulates similar brain activity to drug use!
*Dopamine is a brain chemical that creates sensations of pleasure and satisfaction, we release it when we encounter favourite foods.
NOTE: this dopamine is released in normal-weight and obese people, hence it appears to be the food itself and not our body composition that determines the addiction.
SOLUTION: A lot of this appears to come down to what gives us pleasure, which is often a matter of perspective! Find a way to salivate at the sight/smell of a plate loaded with seasoned veggies, fish and brown rice and you can enjoy the best of both worlds! Spiked dopamine levels while also nourishing your body!
*This involves changing habits and placing enough value in a healthy lifestyle to the point where these new healthy foods also become favourites that you cannot wait to consume!
