A recent article that appeared on the New York Times blog revealed the “secrets” of a new treatment that should make those who suffer from tennis elbow very happy.
For many people who play racquet sports, tennis elbow has been the bane of their existence. This painful – and in many cases chronic – condition is characterized by pain and inflammation, typically in the area of the upper arm near the elbow. It a classic overuse injury and one that has been really tough to treat. For years athletic trainers and physical therapists, along with their patients, have struggled to contend with tennis elbow.
Even though the condition is associated with tennis, those who have never come within a country mile of a tennis court, or a racquet of any kind, have suffered the pain and discomfort experienced by the racquet toting crowd. The treatments are varied and range from acupuncture to surgery, but the only thing these treatments have in common is their limited success.
So anyway, a group of researchers from the Nicholas Institute of Sports Medicine and Athletic Trauma at Lennox Hill Hospital in New York City have developed a cheap and effective way of treating tennis elbow. It’s a simple series of exercises using eccentric contractions (when the muscle lengthens as it tenses) and an 8-inch rubber bar.
The researchers at Lennox Hill Hospital had such phenomenal success with this series of exercises that they stopped the study early, as subjects were improving as early as three weeks into the treatment, showing increased strength and decreased pain.
The best thing about this tennis elbow protocol is that you don’t have to be a doctor, physical therapist or athletic trainer in order to perform this series of exercises. If you are a tennis elbow sufferer you need to check out the story on the New York Times blog.
Incorporate upper body movements when doing flexibility exercises, use medicine balls and sticks and bend, twist, lean, lunge and squat.
The best flexibility routines will get boring. Plain and simple. It doesn’t matter what kind of exercise, they will get stale if they are overused and/or always performed they same way and same order. You can avoid making the extraordinary, ordinary by constantly adding variations to your stretching routine.
Here’s an example to get you started.
• Lunge with the right foot and rotate upper body with arms extended to the front and held at shoulder height
• Turn the head to the right
• Repeat with the left and alternate for 10 total repetitions
Add variety to the move by doing the following.
• When lunging with the right leg turn your shoulders as you reach across the right knee with the left hand
• Repeat leading with the left leg and alternate
• For added degree of difficulty move arms out of sync – one arm held in front while the other arm is held over head – while rotating your torso
Progress to doing the lunge while holding an un-weighted stick directly overhead or extended in front of the body and perform a variety of reaches and bends; to the side, over head, rotate towards and away from lunge leg, etc.
There are many different kinds of lunges and when you add a variety of upper body movements there is a practically unlimited supply of flexibility exercises that you can perform. Consistently change the order of these movements and even perform several different moves in a series to add more variety and complexity to your flexibility routines.
Keep these simple rules in mind and add movement to your flexibility exercises to keep your routines fresh, challenging and effective.
Our favorite, most ridiculous fitness gadget of all time has made the big time, as the Shake Weight was parodied on a recent episode of Saturday Night Live.
My review of the Shake Weight has been very popular, has drawn a lot of people to the site and has generated some pretty unintentionally funny comments over the past several months. This gadget really serves as a great example of what is wrong with the fitness equipment business, just how ill-informed the general public is and how desperate too many people are to get the benefits of exercise without actually doing any work.
Even though I understand the people are the way they are – willing to spend money on gimmicks – I am still amazed that people are willing to spend money on this kind of dreck. Rather than buy a few pairs of dumbbells that allow an almost unlimited variety of real exercises to be performed through a full-range of motion people want to believe holding a vibrator is legit exercise.
Oh well…I’m sure there will continue to be many more successful exercise gimmicks of dubious effectiveness to hit the market for as long people are looking for quick fixes. However, I’ll bet that none of these devices will provide for as much unintentional humor – and intentional humor – as the Shake Weight. So watch and enjoy!
The Jersey Shore is well-known for its Guidos and Guidettes, but there are more horrific things down at the beach than Snooki and “The Situation.” “Painful Jogger Syndrome” is on display everywhere you look this Fourth of July weekend.
Do you know what a Painful Jogger is? My bet is you do, but just never thought of the term. A Painful Jogger is the typical jogger, you see them on the roads and beaches, boardwalks and tracks all across the country. It’s really hard to know where to start as far as picking the biggest flaw in the Painful Jogger’s “form.” The general “bad stride” kind of sums it up, but there are many elements that contribute to this designation.
The Painful Jogger (PJ) has a heavy stride and you can hear them running even if they weigh 100-pounds, doesn’t lift their knees, swings their leg from the hip, has poor upper body mechanics, displays Valgus deformity, “runs” with a short stride (my kids say PJs run like they have to go to the bathroom). World-class sprint/jump coach and biomechanics expert Frans Bosch says, “Distance runners are sprinters with bad form,” so send him your hate email. But I agree.
Frans also likes to point out that humans are the only animals who choose to run more than 100 meters. He says other animals are smart enough to give up the chase after running a short distance. I agree, but remember, look him up and send him your disagreements.
Jogging, yogging or slogging doesn’t help you, doesn’t improve your fitness. It just beats you up. Impact forces on the body are three times that of body weight with every step you take, every move you make. So if you weigh 100-pounds, every step results in at least 300-pounds of force being applied to your bones, ligaments and tendons. Take 140 strides per minute for 30-minutes and you’re stressing your body to the tune of 1,260,000 pounds. A Boeing 747 weighs 900,000 pounds when it’s all loaded up for take-off.
Look at Tiger Woods jogging in the picture. One of the biggest unanswered questions in the whole Tiger Woods saga – his injuries, not his personal life – is just why in hell was he doing distance running? I defy any so-called “expert” to explain why Woods should distance run. But that’s grist for a different mill.
So this Fourth of July holiday weekend go for a nice brisk walk instead of jogging. Whether or not you are down the Jersey shore, your body will thank you and you’ll look – and feel – much better for doing it.
The old saying that, “Everything old is new again,” is really appropriate when it comes to exercises. There are so many old school exercises that have been forgotten and forsaken and replaced with new, “exciting” but not necessarily better versions. People looking for a way to get their children to exercise and off the Playstation and XBox need to look no further.
I’m very lucky in that I have active kids, kids who love to run, jump, hop, skip, fall and roll. At ages 10 and twin sixes, my boys love sports and look forward to exercising. They are interested in what I have my clients doing at the gym and on their frequent trips to visit me at work or at practice, my kids love to imitate what they see the grown-ups doing and are always looking to show me what they learned in gym class. Not one to leave well enough alone, I’m always looking for different ways to engage and challenge my boys.
Enter the Pogo Stick. I think you’d be hard pressed to come up with a piece of exercise equipment/kids toy more old school. Almost 100 years old, the Pogo Stick is a great way for kids of all ages to get exercise. You don’t have to be an exercise expert to watch a kid work a Pogo Stick and see all the different ways in which the body has to work in order to perform the task.
In case you can’t figure it out, the Pogo Stick is a great way for kids to develop balance, agility and strength. They can be used almost anywhere – unlike skateboards and Razor scooters – and there are endless variations that kids can perform; on one leg, with one hand, no hands, change directions, change elevation, etc. And the best thing is that they aren’t very expensive.
The Pogo Stick is a great old school piece of equipment – it’s not really a toy, is it? – that can get kids to enjoy exercise and develop skills that will help them to be healthier and more capable.
If you’re in the market for a fun and challenging way to get your child healthier, take a look at some of the examples below. My son has the first one.
I have just come back from the finest professional educational event of my 20+ year career. I was fortunate enough to be accepted into Vern Gambetta’s GAIN Apprentorship/Mentorship program earlier this year and last week ventured to Florida a 6-days extravaganza; to say it was a learning experience would be a massive understatement.
There is no way the events of GAIN can be summed up in a single post. At GAIN there were less than 20 new attendees, about a dozen returnees and 10 fantastic faculty members. The days were long but exhilarating. I was honored to be among Athletic Development Coaches, Physical Therapists and Athletic Trainers that work on the international, professional, collegiate and Olympic stages. I learned from, and with, some of the best men and women in the business, and will pass on this knowledge to you in the coming weeks and months. My clients have already started to reap the benefits of my GAIN experience.
As best I can, I will help you to learn how important it is to follow the functional path on your way to living a healthier life. The info, videos and pictures on HealthAndFitnessAdvice.com, even on old posts, will reflect my desire to offer the best functional training guidance possible.
For years I, and many of my colleagues, have been disappointed with the term personal trainer. Over 20 years ago when I got started in the business the term meant something more than it does today. Actually, the term really doesn’t mean anything.
Inspired by the events of GAIN, I have decided from now on to use the term Fitness Development Coach rather than Personal Trainer. It’s time for a change and frankly, someone who is doing their job correctly is developing their clients’ fitness through coaching. I haven’t called myself a personal trainer for more years than I can remember, except on the web where the term “personal trainer” gets eyeballs to the site. And just as Strength and Conditioning is being replaced by Athletic Development, Fitness Development Coach is replacing Personal Trainer.
Even though I’ve been following the functional path for the better part of 2 decades, going to GAIN was an invigorating experience and I’m excited to bring to you more of the things that will make your workouts better.
An eight-year study that looked at the effects of multivitamin use in older women found that the pills did nothing to prevent heart disease and cancer. The collected data is of an observational nature and not the result of rigorous scientific research, yet being that these results echo similar results found in a study with men, there’s less reason to think that vitamins offer any protection from serious diseases.
According to the study’s lead researcher Marian Neuhouser from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, “Get nutrients from food. Whole foods are better than dietary supplements.” Other researchers feel that multivitamins can still be helpful for those folks who have poor eating habits. But, on the heels of a study that found a similar lack of efficacy for older men and multivitamins, it seems that you shouldn’t count on multivitamins for any preventative powers against diseases.
After eight years, there was almost no difference in disease rates and death rates among the 162,000 50+ years old women in the study. The large number of subjects in the study makes the results noteworthy. Based on the results of this study people should re-evaluate whether or not they want to spend the money on multivitamins, especially if the rational for taking them is disease prevention. Certainly, if you’ve never bothered to take multivitamins the results of this study won’t have you running out to the store to buy any.
The results of this study illustrates just how much is still “unknown” when it comes to nutritional supplements as information can be found to support both sides of the argument. Fitness consumers need to keep this in mind when making decisions about what they want to include in their supplement regimen, especially when trying to stay on a budget.
As more research is done, there are fewer and fewer nutritional supplements that have a bona fide, scientifically sound track record of success. Keep in mind that there are no magic bullet nutritional supplements and that the proven key to health and longevity is engaging in regular exercise and following a balanced diet.
It kind of amazes me that some people get so freaked out by a tiny teaspoon of sugar. Fifteen calories has never gotten such a bad rap. In the rush to place blame for the so-called obesity epidemic, this basic carbohydrate that every body needs for fuel, has become a scapegoat.
Nobody has ever gained weight because they put a teaspoon of sugar in their two cups of coffee every morning. And despite what the Food Police will have you believe, there is no reliable science that indicates that sugar causes obesity or has some extra-caloric superpower that causes people to gain weight.
But some people still don’t get that it’s a simple formula of “calories in, calories out,” and if you eat more calories than you need for energy you will gain weight, and those calories can be in the form of carbohydrates, protein, fat or a combination of all three. A person can eat the “healthiest” foods imaginable, but if they eat more than they need they will gain weight. And for the record, one gram of sugar provides 4 calories, one gram of protein and one gram of fat provides 9 calories each.
The one gram of sugar provides the same 4 calories any other form of carbohydrate provides. The difference between sugar and the other calories is that sugar is immediately converted into fuel that the body uses right away. If you are active eating carbs and sugars are a necessary part of your diet. And if you exercise carbs and sugars are a vital part of your fueling and recovery regimens.
If you enjoy sugar, use sugar. Natural sugar. I’m of the belief that it’s better to use natural sugar – or use nothing – than to use an artificial or chemically altered substance. And some believe that the taste of real sugar can help to control hunger, and as a result help people to manage their weight.
Unless you are one of the unfortunates who suffer from a peanut allergy, everyone should include nuts into their regular eating routine. Nuts are not only a great source of protein and good fat, they offer other health benefits, as well.
In recent years studies indicate that nuts may reduce cardiovascular risk for both healthy men and men who have already suffered a heart attack. The mechanism through which nuts work their magic are not yet understood, but the medical community has some ideas about why nuts are good for us.
- Because they replace foods that may be less healthy¸ nuts may help lower cholesterol
- Nuts contain heart healthy mono- and poly-unsaturated fats
- Walnuts contain omega-3 fats which have a wide-range of purported benefits, including protection against irregular heart beat
- Nuts contain a variety of nutrients – arginine, fiber, vitamin E – that may improve blood vessel function and help lower cardiovascular risk factors
Nuts make great snacks and can serve as a great replacement for some of the unhealthier snack options that many people reach for when they are hungry. Because of nuts fat and protein content, a few nuts can go a long way towards satisfying, and staving off, hunger.
Practice moderation in all things, including your intake of nuts. Over eating is over eating, regardless of how “healthy” a food may be, and excess calories from any source of food can result in a gain of body weight. Limit yourself to a handful or two of nuts at snack time and you’ll improve your chances of deriving the benefits offered by nuts.
You don’t just have to eat peanuts, as there are plenty of nut varieties available including
- Almonds
- Brazil nuts
- Cashews
- Filberts
- Pistachios
- Walnuts
Make nuts a part of your regular diet.
It’s been about a month since I signed up for the FRS Healthy Energy Drink introductory program and have been writing about my experiences with this Quercetin-fueled elixir. What interested me in this energy drink is that Quercetin is an ingredient that has shown some promise in early research and possibly can provide energy in a low-calorie package.
UPDATE: I wrote this log in real time so in reality it has been over three months since I started my FRS Energy Drink experiment. As of June 1, 2010 I am still using FRS and pay for the drink concentrate and chews with my own money every month.
I started using FRS Healthy Energy Drink back in early February and a couple of weeks ago my wife started using it, too. Where I had a bit of an issue with the taste of the low-calorie orange flavor – sweetened with Sucralose – my wife says she doesn’t think FRS has a bad taste or aftertaste. What I will say is that I do not have as much of an issue with the taste now that I’ve been using the energy drink for about a month.
I have used FRS before every workout I have done since February 9 and have found that under a wide-variety of circumstances, moods and workouts my energy levels have been sufficient to get me through the sessions. As I’ve written before, I have used a variety of traditional and non-traditional foods and drinks to give me an energy boost for my workouts; Gatorade, Snickers, granola, food bars, carbohydrate gels and nuts. I found that FRS worked as well, or better, than any of these items.
There are a couple of issues to consider with regard to my feelings that FRS was effective. There is always the possibility that the Placebo Effect could be responsible for my feeling that FRS worked. However, I have also used other products, some of which did and some which didn’t work. So in my unscientific, anecdotal experience I feel that FRS did make a difference in my workouts. Another factor to consider is that since I was taking FRS with the express purpose of writing a product review I paid more attention to how I felt and maintained a strict schedule and didn’t miss a dose.
The FRS Healthy Energy Drink is a viable option for people who are looking for a pre-workout energy boost without the calories and jitters that can come from using other brands of energy drinks. After using the drink for a month, I recommend signing up for the FRS Energy Drink trial offer.
