ReVibe Fitness and Wellness

Blog 85: Benefits of Strength Training and Exercise.

It is interesting that the elderly population have a tendency to avoid exercise, when they are, in fact, the population that needs the most help.

Contrary to popular belief, the elderly should start to exercise if they have not done so, and then continue if they have already started. Believe it or not, there are great benefits to exercise, especially strength training, for the elderly.

We all know that exercise reduces the risk of disease. This is not new. But the biggest problem with seniors is their risk of slips and falls. Not only does it take longer to recover from these accidents, but often they are not agile enough or strong enough to stop a more serious injury from occurring.

Strength training reduces that risk, not only because it builds muscle. Strength training also stimulates the proprioceptor’s, which are your balance stimulators throughout your body.

Certainly, balance exercises can help too, balance comes from three specific areas of the body; the middle ear, the proprioceptors and vision.

Loss of vision can greatly affect balance because of the connection to the brain. Loss of vision can also change the posture by redirecting the line of sight, and the head downwards. This rounds out the upper spine and creates a perfect condition for falling forwards.

Add that postural change and strength loss to failing mental abilities such as decision-making skills, and you have a recipe for falls.

Studies find at least a 22% reduction or more in fall risk with more cardio activities.

Studies also find that strength improves with resistance training at any age!

If we back up for a moment and talk about muscle, we find that most books categorize them as being slow twitch or fast twitch. In reality there are far more types than that, the last estimation was around 17 subgroups. However, for the purpose of discussion, slow and fast twitch works.

As we age, we tend to lose fast twitch fibers. These are the fibers used for power and strength. In contrast, we keep the endurance muscle, although it too atrophies with disuse, something we call sarcopenia.

Most seniors are told to keep moving. Walk, stand, march in place, but these activities do little for fast twitch muscle. Consequently, as we age we lose speed, strength and agility because we fail to stimulate the fast twitch muscle though strength training.

Those fast twitch muscles are particularly important for balance reactions and require the fast twitch muscles power for corrections in center of gravity. Interestingly, we also need that fast twitch muscle to prevent osteoporosis.

A 2004 study which looked at bone mass in the elderly found that strength conditioning reduced the risk of falling by 57%. So, while cardio activities reduce the fall risk by 22%, strength training is clearly superior.

Strength Training to Prevent Falls in Older Adults: A Systematic Review with Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials We performed a systematic review with meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to assess the effects of strength training (ST), as compared to alternative multimodal or unimodal exercise programs, on the number of falls in older adults (≥60 ...

Do you have trouble sleeping? Everyone one does now and again.

Here's a few things to try:

1. Try to go to bed at the same time every night. Sometimes getting into a schedule of sleep promotes better sleep.

2. Use black out curtains or a mask to limit light.

3. A compound called 5-HTP. 5-hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP), is from the amino acid L-tryptophan, converts melatonin to serotonin.
Ultimately, this increases serotonin levels in your brain, and serotonin, a neurotransmitter, regulates sleep. 5-HTP works well because it easily moves from the blood to the brain.

4. Magnesium and Taurine. These nutrients helps to maintain proper and healthy nerve and muscle function, heart rhythm, blood pressure, blood sugar levels, strong bones, and immune system.
Without proper magnesium (mg) levels, nerve cell communication is hampered. This can excite cells, causing stress and anxiety.
Magnesium should not only help you sleep better, but it should also reduce the frequency of waking up throughout the night, as will taurine.

5. Melatonin. This hormone regulates your sleep/wake cycle and is naturally produced by your body when the sun sets. Research shows that melatonin helps you fall asleep, enhances sleep quality, and can also help ease jet lag.

6. Theanine. This amino acid is derived naturally from green tea. It's known to trigger the release of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in the brain, which prevents nerve impulses from being transmitted.
This brings on relaxation and lowers anxiety. It's hard to absorb GABA-synthesized supplements, however, making theanine — which the body easily absorbs — is a good alternative. It works by raising GABA levels and should relax you, as well as decrease stress. Green tea contains about 1 to 3 percent theanine.

7. Valerian. This herb has been reported to reduce the time it takes to fall asleep and increase the overall quality of sleep. It works better over time, so don't be discouraged if you don't notice much change after using it for just a few nights. Do not take valerian for longer than six weeks at a time.

8. L-Glycine. Glycine, is a naturally-occurring non-essential amino acid, and is a new addition to the spectrum of non-pharmaceutical options for people with disordered sleep, especially those prone to waking up in the middle of the night. In high concentrations, it promotes the prolongation of stage 3-4 sleep in the first sleep cycle and prevents sleep fragmentation, without sedative or hypnotic effects. Try about 3 grams 1-2 hours before you go to bed. You can increase to 4 grams

9. Don't watch TV right up until bed time, it does mess with your brain waves, changing them back to a more alert state. Instead, try reading for an hour before you go to bed.

10. Stop looking at your phone, place it at least 2 feet from where you sleep or turn it to airplane mode.

Sleep well....

Lately I have see commercials on TV with doctors telling you that you need to take Coenzyme Q10 if you are on statins. I've been telling you this for 20 years, but it's nice that the medical doctors are finally getting on board, albeit late.

CoQ10 is cool stuff. A prospective, double-blind, placebo-controlled study was published in the International Journal of Cardiology (May 12, 2012) and is worth a mention even today.

Subjects of the study were 443 Swedes between the ages of 70 and 88. They were given either a placebo or a combination of selenium and CoQ10. They were examined every six months, and given echocardiograms over the five year course of the study.

The group taking the supplements had a significant reduction of death from cardiovascular disease and overall better cardiac function than the placebo group! Co-Q10 is well known for its benefits to the heart.

But it is also a strong anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant too. Not only that, the heart is naturally high in Co-Q10, but levels do drop as we age and especially if you are taking that statin drug I mentioned earlier.

If you're over 50 take ubiquinol instead, but don't neglect your exercise.

Question of the week: I have plantar fasciitis; how do I treat it?

It’s a great question, and one which usually comes from wearing ill-fitting or poorly supportive shoes. But it comes from areas that you don’t usually think it would.

First, plantar fasciitis is considered an inflammation of the fibrous tissue which runs along the bottom of the foot and which connects the heel to the base of the toes and the Achilles tendon.

Your plantar fascia, along with the bones, ligaments and muscles, form the arch of your foot. When they become stressed, the fascia begins to stretch and tear, and you feel pain. Literature says that this condition is from mostly running and jumping, but clearly this is inaccurate. The condition is a culmination of several factors, mostly spurred by unsupportive foot wear, which may or may not include running or jumping.

As a general rule, plantar fasciitis is usually worse on the first few steps, then eases up. But overuse can increase it.

Your first step, (pun intended) is to get a pair of shoes which supports the arch. No flip flops! You may have to invest in special orthotics if you cannot find a pair of shoes which properly support the arch and corrects the pronation or supination.

Second, stretch the calf. Stretch it every hour, all day. If you feel your calf and it is tight or tender, consider including magnesium glycinate, 400 mg a day taken in 200 mg doses.

Next, get your ankle adjusted. A competent chiropractor should also check your knee and pelvis too. Finally, whole body and targeted vibration to the plantar fascia is needed to fully resolve the issue.

A prospective, double-blind, placebo-controlled study was published in the International Journal of Cardiology (May 12, 2012) and is worth a mention even today.

Subjects of the study were 443 Swedes between the ages of 70 and 88. They were given either a placebo or a combination of selenium and CoQ10. They were examined every six months, and given echocardiograms over the five year course of the study.

The group taking the supplements had a significant reduction of death from cardiovascular disease and overall better cardiac function than the placebo group! Co-Q10 is well known for its benefits to the heart.

But it is also a strong anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant too. Not only that, the heart is naturally high in Co-Q10, but levels do drop as we age and especially if you are taking a statin drug.

If you're over 50 take ubiquinol instead.

Blog 84: Benefits of Strength Training and Exercise.

Yet another benefit of strength training is with children. Sure, you have to avoid power lifting or heavy weights until the growth plates have fully formed (about 13), but activity for kids in an inactive society is going to be paramount for moving them safely into a healthy adulthood, and to develop lasting habits.

Regular exercise improves overall fitness and gives children a boost of energy too, just like adults.

The most meaningful studies show that children who exercise in earlier life live longer and have less risk of cancer later on.

One study, published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, looked at a million Swedish males between the ages of 16-25 and followed then for 33 years. Their assessment was simple. After 33 years those who exercised had a 42% reduction in cases of lung cancer, 40% lower rate of liver cancer and a 39% reduction in esophageal cancer.

This study did not take into account other factors such as better posture, better self-image and confidence, better academic scores and problem-solving abilities.

Physical Activity in Early- and Mid-Adulthood Are Independently Associated With Longitudinal Memory Trajectories in Later Life Physical activity (PA) in later life may reduce dementia risk, but little is known regarding long-term cognitive effects of PA that occurred earlier in adulthood or mechanisms underlying associations. PA patterns at different ages may independently contribute ...

Happy Flag Day, may the Pledge of Allegiance run through your mind today.

The Pledge Of Allegiance was originally written by Christian socialist minister Francis Bellamy and published in a magazine for young people called The Youth’s Companion. It was published anonymously under the title “The Pledge” and the magazine in which it appeared was published on September 8, 1892. In its original form, the pledge read “I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

The words “the Flag of the United States of America” would be added to the pledge in 1923. And that’s how it remained until 1954.

On Flag Day 1954, as a response to the perceived threat of Communism, U.S President Eisenhower encouraged Congress to add the words “under God” to the pledge. After these alterations, the pledge would now read:

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

It has remained this way ever since. For many years, the Pledge of Allegiance was required to be spoken by most public school students in the U.S, but this is becoming less common as the years wear on. But make no mistake, it should be added back into the school system. It was removed mainly due to a legal challenge that ended up before the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court ruled that children could not be compelled to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, which is strange, and should be revisited.

Although there were several attempts to make Pledge of Allegiance Day a confirmed U.S holiday, it wouldn’t be until after 2004 that Pledge Of Allegiance Day was commemorated. The date chosen for it was the anniversary of the date on which the pledge of allegiance was officially recognized on December 28, 1945, by the U.S Congress.

So, although the day to celebrate it is not until December 28th, I think it would be good to remind ourselves about it half way through the year. Heaven knows we need to!

Anyway, happy Flag Day to one and all. May the Pledge of Allegiance run strong through your thoughts on this day.

Blog 83: Benefits of Strength Training and Exercise.

One of the most interesting benefits of exercise is that it helps you connect with others in your community. At Revibe, since people exercise by appointment, they usually run into others who have similar appointments. Over time they develop friendships, which strengthen social ties and certainly alleviate loneliness and often depression.

In addition, everyone is around other people with similar goals and that helps everyone.

Social reward and support effects on exercise experiences and performance: Evidence from parkrun There is growing academic, civic and policy interest in the public health benefits of community-based exercise events. Shifting the emphasis from competitive sport to communal activity, these events have wide appeal. In addition to physical health benefits, ...

Hippocrates famously wrote, “That which if used develops, and that which if not used wastes away.”

It’s important to realize that by the time you’re in your 70s, your muscle strength and tone will have declined by roughly 25-35 percent from what you had in your mid-30s, if you neglect your strength. So, yes, if you don't use it, you lose it.

You’ll lose up to 50-65 percent once you approach your 90s. Most of this loss will come from your fast twitch muscle fibers. Therefore your strength, power and agility will be lost along with that muscle, and your ability to get up from a chair or the floor.

What that means is that starting in your mid 30’s you will (without strength training) lose 5-7 pounds of muscle per decade of life, which will be replaced by 15 pounds of fat.

After the age of 50, this rate of loss can double.

If we add into the mix medications such as statins, other drugs and vaccines that have heavy metals, and foods with excitotoxins within them, then this rate of loss accelerates above what would be normal.

Light walking workouts will not suffice. Endurance exercise improves our cardiovascular fitness, it does not prevent the loss of muscle tissue because it does not provide enough of a stimulus.

Only strength exercise maintains our muscle mass and strength throughout our mid-life years. Technically you need to be lifting at least 65 percent of your maximum lift, or around 12 repetitions to muscle failure per set, or doing a strength exercise for 30-60 seconds, also to failure. It's also known as time under tension.

If you’re not engaging in strength or resistance training, chances are you’ll become increasingly less functional with age, which can and will take a toll on your quality of life, your functionality and your ability.

The gradual loss of strength due to inactivity and age is called sarcopenia. We find that, among other things, aging is characterized by a loss in motor neurons (especially white fast twitch) due to cell death (apoptosis) which accelerates beyond cell reproduction, mitochondrial dysfunction (due to free radical damage and muscle loss) and poor lifestyle.

Can we change this? Yes. Strength training, and especially whole body vibration training has a unique ability to slow this loss down, as long as the food intake (quality) is addressed.

Now, we understand that there is little need to lose strength at this rate as we age. In other words, function can be maintained throughout life, even if there is a loss over time.

The real tragedy with the whole idea of losing strength as we age is the fact that it can immediately influence our independence. Most inactive adults however are dangerously close to their functional strength base line. Any injury, whether large or small can quickly drop them below this line from which few recover. It is not unusual for an elderly person to die within a year of breaking their hip for instance. In most cases it was not the hip that killed them, but their loss of functional strength and ability to function at even barely normal physiological levels.

Hippocrates also said, All parts of the body which have a function, if used in moderation and exercised in labors in which each is accustomed, become thereby healthy, well developed and age more slowly, but if unused they become liable to disease, defective in growth and age quickly.

A wise man indeed.

Wow, we sure do live in a calcium obsessed society. Every health expert tells us to supplement with more and more calcium! Every doctor talking to their patient tells them to do more calcium for bones too.

And they are all dead wrong! The simple truth is that the vast majority of people get more than enough calcium in their diets. In fact, most people get too much, way too much.

Do you realize that the the average American consumes 600 pounds of dairy products a year - that's almost 2 pounds per day - Did you read that correctly? I said TWO POUNDS PER DAY! Hmm, and yet osteoporosis rates in the United States are among the highest in the world!

Wouldn't you think that 2 pounds of calcium rich foods a day would have an impact on osteoporosis?

Not long ago, researchers at Yale University analyzed thirty-four published studies from sixteen different countries and found that the countries with the highest rates of osteoporosis (including the United States, Sweden, and Finland) were those in which people consumed the most milk, dairy and other animal-based foods.

Wow, what are we saying here? No need to read between the lines, calcium rich dairy is not doing the job!

The study also showed that African-Americans, who consume, on average, more than 1,000 milligrams (mg) of calcium per day, are nine times more likely to experience hip fractures than are South African blacks, whose daily calcium intake is only about 196 mg.

On a nation-by-nation basis, people who consume the most calcium have the weakest bones and the highest rates of osteoporosis!

Few people know that our worldwide obsession with calcium started in the 1950s under pressure from the American Dairy Association. Before then, historically, people didn't consume much calcium and had very few problems with osteoporosis. What they did consume was magnesium - almost five times as much magnesium as we consume today.

The key point is that the health of our bones depends far more on other factors such as magnesium, boron, and vitamin D than it does on calcium.

Consumption of too much calcium is just plain damaging to your bones and your health in general. But the ADA wanted to make money, so they made up a bunch of lies about the connection between weak bones and dairy calcium to make you drink more milk and eat more cheese......and most everyone fell for it. Now add in a major obsession with pop and you have a perfect storm for bone problems.

So here's the problem, bones are made up of over 100 different minerals, so, adding just one back just doesn't do it. But if you wanted one only, it's not calcium, it's magnesium - Now let's be clear, without calcium, you cannot live, but without adequate amounts of magnesium (and K2) to balance that calcium, you will find yourself falling victim to hardening of the arteries, arthritis, diabetes, and senility.

Magnesium is the activating mineral for close to 400 different enzyme reactions in the body (that we know about) - more than any other mineral. So, too little magnesium impacts your body negatively in hundreds of ways. And what makes the problem even worse is that magnesium is much harder for your body to absorb and utilize than calcium. This fact alone makes a joke of the standard 2:1 ratio of calcium to magnesium found in most supplements. Based on absorption, the ratio provided by most supplements is much closer to 6:1 or even 8:1 in favor or calcium - a very unhealthy ratio.

Magnesium is the most important major mineral needed by your body, and unfortunately, the one that is most often depleted.
So, go out and get yourself some magnesium glycinate (because the others only soften the stool) and enjoy a little energy, less headaches and far fewer muscle knots......

And if you want stronger bones, you need to do resistance training too. That's because muscles, which attach to the bones by tendons, strengthen bone when they are stressed.

You may not know this, but recent studies (2010) have suggested that Whole Body low frequency vibration may elicit an acute post-activation potentiation response, leading to acute improvements in power and force development. That's right sports fans, whole body vibration training makes your explosive strength better.

This study used vibration between sets of resistance training rather than during training itself and postulated that this method may lead to increased recruitment and synchronization of higher threshold motor units, minimize fatigue potential, and facilitate the chronic adaptation to resistance exercise. They obviously don't know about our training at Revibe, because we develop high end, fast and agile athletes here, using WBVT techniques exclusively.

Conclusion: The data suggests that there was a significant benefit afforded by adding Whole Body Low Frequency Vibration to a short-term resistance training protocol with regard to ''explosive'' strength expression. The addition of vibration prior to and between sets of resistance exercise may be a viable alternative to vibration applied during resistance exercise when trying to improve ''explosive'' isometric strength. But of course, we know better now don't we!

The results of exclusive WBVT with resistance is astronomical.

The aspartame found in Diet Pepsi is nasty stuff.

In case you were not aware, aspartame is linked to neuropsychiatric reactions: Headaches, migraines, convulsions, depression, anxiety, irritable moods, and insomnia.

It is also associated with gastrointestinal distress: Allergic reactions
Other symptoms include dizziness, blurred vision, temporary blindness, twitching, and numbness or tingling of extremities.

Did you know: People on statin cholesterol lowering drugs have more muscle pain when their vitamin D levels are low? Get them up to 50 and see the pain go away!

Blog 81: Benefits of Strength Training and Exercise.

Exercise reduces your afternoon fatigue. True. Now most people who eat a high carb lunch will not be able to avoid that three o’clock slump, not until you lower the carbs and up the protein anyway. However, exercisers are less likely to have that slump, studies find.

Seriously, there are some crazy articles out there on how to avoid the slump, but fact is, your lifestyle will determine whether you have one or not. However, some factors are known to contribute to the afternoon slump. These include:

1. High carb lunches
2. Dehydration
3. Lack of adequate sleep
4. High stress

The number one way to overcome the slump is to stop eating heavy carb lunches, but physical activity also increases alertness and energy levels. So, taking a lunch time jog or doing some office calisthenics can go a long way to helping you stay focused and awake. Also, if you can, get outside and do the exercises in the sun.

Your body will respond by upping your vitamin D production and lowering your melatonin levels.

Did you Know: About one in three American adults have hypertension (high blood pressure), which increases your risk for heart attack, stroke, congestive heart failure, end-stage kidney disease, and more? Yeah, you likely did huh, because you read these posts. But can you guess what triggers BP increases?

Elevated insulin and leptin levels are typically the cause of hypertension, so implementing strategies to normalize these levels are the first step to resolving hypertension.

You want to lower your BP? Avoid processed foods, as most are loaded with sugar/fructose, processed salt, and harmful fats like trans fat and damaged omega-6-rich vegetable oils, called seed oils.

If you're deficient in vitamin D, your arteries are likely stiffer than they should be, and your blood pressure may run high as a result.

This holds true even if you're considered generally "healthy", but you need to mix your D with K2. Take about 90mcg for every 5000IU's.

Blog 80: Benefits of Strength Training and Exercise.

The information in this blog is amazing! Not because I wrote it, but because of what I am writing about. You see, emerging evidence is suggesting that fat (also called adipose) has a functional role in maintaining whole-body metabolic health. Wow, yes! Mind blown.

It is well understood that excess fat causes health issues. But the fat cell size as well as its distribution and degree of inflammation can significantly impact your health too, even if you are thin!

Obviously, everyone understands the role of exercise in reducing fat accumulate. But not everyone knows that we have three types of fat (currently identified). Yep, three types. That’s the nasty white fat that we all want to shed, brown fat, that we want to increase, and beige fat which appears to be white fat in the process of switching into brown fat.

First of all, having too much white fat is of growing concern to our health, no question it messes with our good health, promotes heart disease, cancer and organ failure through its inflammation. But turns out, white fat is perfectly ok if the cells are small, that is, you have less of it! But as those cells grow and divide, they become predictors of disease, especially type II diabetes.

We have traditionally thought of fat as an energy storage depot, there to store energy until we need it. But this is no longer the case.

We now understand that fat is a powerful endocrine organ, able to secrete more than a dozen hormones which control key processes such as adipogenesis (making more fat cells), adipokine secretions and inflammatory responses.

Turns out that the actual function of storing future energy as fat is only 20% of the functions of a fat cell. Mind blown twice now!

Wow!!

Let’s look at this a little closer. First of all, exercise has been found to shrink the size of fat cells which leads to less inflammation and a more protective cell than one that promotes disease. Interestingly, rat studies find that although exercise reduces fat cell size, the cessation of exercise leads to more hypertrophy of fat cells (get bigger), more hyperplasia of fat cells (split into more cells), and reduced apoptosis (turnover of old cells for new).

Exercise on the other hand is known to stimulate the release of fat from the fat cell, a process called lipolysis. But it also reduces a lipogenic gene, which essentially allows the fat cell to reverse what it does in a sedentary person. In other words, it absorbs and stores less fat and more readily releases fat when you do exercise.

Essentially, we now know that fat cells can be “re-modeled” with exercise in many ways. As endocrine organs fat can be instructed to give up its fat content by exercise, but then a re-modeled fat cell is less likely to store fat in ways that sedentary fat cells can. Second, white fat can be turned in brown fat. Here’s where it gets interesting.

Brown fat is thought to be metabolically active fat. It’s important for regulation of body temperature for instance, generating heat from non-shivering thermogenesis. The tissue itself has a lot of mitochondria, which make energy and neutralizes free radicals.

Some people sell cold plunge baths to stimulate the increased energy output, but while newborns have the most brown fat (2-5%) it diminishes in adults. It is especially low in sedentary people, higher in athletes. Thus, cold plunge is unlikely to induce much in the way of weight loss in sedentary individuals UNLESS you couple it with exercise.

One more thing. Exercise also promotes the release of irisin and FGF21, an as yet unnamed hormone. Irisin promotes the browning of white fat, but only exercise can secrete it. FGF21 we are finding regulates glucose-lipid metabolism. this has made it a promising therapeutic target for metabolic disease. However, some studies have shown that administrating FGF21 prevents diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance in mice and humans! And, since it's released with exercise, it means that exercise is a powerful protector against obesity and diabetes!

FGF21 as Modulator of Metabolism in Health and Disease Fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21) is a hormone that regulates important metabolic pathways. FGF21 is expressed in several metabolically active organs and interacts with different tissues. The FGF21 function is complicated and well debated due to its ...

Not so long ago the AHA defined cardiovascular health with 7 markers:

1. Never smoked or quit a year plus ago,
2: BMI less than 25
3: exercise 150 minutes a week of moderate intensity;
4: 4-5 key ingredients of a healthy diet consistent with AHA guidelines
5: total cholesterol under 200
6: BP below 120/80 and
7: fasting glucose >100mg/dL

It sounded like a good idea at the time, but it did lack a little in foresight and certainly has not changed with the times.

The BMI for instance does not take into account muscular weight. The BMI number just assumes you are overweight because you are overfat. Thus, since exercise makes you more muscular, which is good, it also changes the relative body composition while seeming to ignore the BMI. But the AHA uses the number as a general guideline only. Uh huh.

They do promote low sugar and low processed carbs, but they are still fixated on the cholesterol issue rather than the particle analysis and underlying inflammation factors, both of which are more important than any cholesterol reading under 300.

They also ignore the slight variation on blood pressure with age, assuming that 120/80 and above is bad.

Nonetheless, the guidelines are not bad, but how many of them do you achieve?