How your lifestyle influences your anabolic hormones

Steroids work, it's a fact, just look at a modern body builder. Assuming that you take the time to eat well and train hard enough, injecting yourself with synthetic hormones is guaranteed to produce a supraphysiological growth in lean muscle tissue. There are many well documented side effects, but the rewards don't seem to dissuade many competitors at all. 



Short of heading down to your local dealer and grabbing a few needles' worth of drugs, how can you manipulate your hormones? 

Firstly you can improve your Zinc levels through diet and supplementation, which has been shown to normalise testosterone levels in those who don't get enough of the mineral in their diet, which is almost everyone. 

Research seems to suggest that you also need to take a vitamin D supplement - 35,000 IU's a week - it is critical for those living outside the tropics. We don't get enough and it affects our hormones. .

You probably will have heard this before but you should also refrain from a carbohydrate based diet, especially simple sugars which have been shown to acutely reduce testosterone and promote insulin resistance. 

Having got a grip on the diet side of your life it all comes down to training. Every body builder knows that high volume or high intensity exercise performed by large muscle groups results in a rise in anabolic hormones. The practical application of this knowledge is to perform squats on the same day as biceps, so the biceps can bathe in a sea of anabolic hormones, allowing them to grow. 

But does this work in practice?

Well, a group of scientists in Canada performed a study on just this topic. They asked a group of participants to train their elbow flexors (biceps) on alternate days. When they exercised one arm they would perform a set of leg exercises alongside it, to produce the hormone response. They labelled this arm the high hormone arm (HH). With the other am they trained it on its own and called it the low hormone arm (LH).

The results of the study were as follows, there was a significant acute rise in growth hormone, IGF-1 and testosterone following the HH workout compared to the LH workout. However the HH arm did not grow significantly more than the LH arm. 

This contradicts the hypothesis that acute rises in anabolic hormones influence muscle protein synthesis. 

Limitations
- This was a within groups study
- Diet was not controlled 
- The exercise performed to produce the anabolic response was not particularly high volume.

So after a lot of contradictory information, here's my opinion. 

• Still back off the steroids, they work but at a cost. They work because the allow an unnaturally high level of anabolic hormones to be maintained over long periods. 
• Supplement your diet, you can't gain optimal results by simply eating well.
• Eat lots of protein and control carbohydrate intake 

• The reasons the HH training didn't work 
• The increase in anabolic hormones is short lived, usually less than an hour. However the muscle protein synthesis can last for up to 48 hours, so it may only make a small difference.  
• The diet may have been carb based, limiting results
• The volume of training may need to be higher and more frequent to produce significant results.

Drinking Coffee is really good for you

I'm never shy to jump on a bandwagon, and this article is no different. This week the UK celebrates 'UK Coffee Week', and so I will enlighten you on all of the wonderful benefits that come from drink. 

Personally I love coffee, and have found it to be both a delicious drink and a great tool to get the most out of myself for training. It is one of the most drunk beverages in the world, and despite a huge amount of negative press from our media, consumption continues to rise. 

Is this a bad thing? Or is coffee drinking actually something which people can both enjoy and benefit from?

Last year a study was published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine, relating to coffee and it relationship to all cause mortality. They took a large cohort of people and then looked at the impact drinking coffee had on their likelihood of dying. After eliminating other factors which could confound the findings their conclusion sounded like this: 

"In summary, this large prospective cohort study showed significant inverse associations of coffee consumption with deaths from all causes and specifically with deaths due to heart disease, respiratory disease, stroke, injuries and accidents, diabetes, and infections. Our results provide reassurance with respect to the concern that coffee drinking might adversely affect health."

Basically, drinking coffee seems to be linked with morbidity free longevity. Great news. 

The reasons suggested for these effects are the caffeine within the coffee and potentially the antioxidant properties of the drink, in the form of polyphenols. 

However coffee isn't all sunshine and rainbows, because there are numerous side effects of  the acute impact that coffee has on the body. For example, caffeine stimulates the nervous system causing the adrenal glands to release stress hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol. 

Picture this; stress hormones cause the body to release energy into the blood stream in the form of fat and carbohydrate. This is so there is enough available fuel to deal with the stressor or run away. Theoretically this is good if you want to lose weight, because it mobilises the stored energy reserves and elevates your resting metabolism. 

So far so good...

On the other hand these same stress hormones and their subsequent energy release into the blood reduces insulin sensitivity long term. So if you are either a regular caffeine drinker, live stressful lifestyle or have a poor diet, coffee may in fact be hindering your body composition goals. 

Also, do you ever feel the need to drink caffeine post workout? Well consuming coffee after exercise prevents your body from changing to the anabolic state necessary to adapt to your training, again all down to the stress hormones. 

Whether or not drinking coffee helps to improve body composition is up for debate. However, if your goal is long term health the take home message is that in moderation and accompanying a healthy lifestyle, coffee is something you should consider including in your diet. 

UK Coffee Week™ is the nation’s biggest celebration of coffee. It provides an opportunity for the coffee and food service industry to unite while raising money for Project Waterfall, the charity providing vital clean water projects in African coffee-growing countries in partnership with WaterAid.

My gut feeling on the gluten debate

How do you feel about gluten intolerance? It is a heated argument where everyone seems to have an opinion. Many avoid gluten fanatically, but the vast majority don't even feel it's worth worrying about. So before anyone pulls you either way, I believe it is important to get a good grasp of the basics surrounding the issue. 

My general recommendation is for people avoid bread, pasta, cereals and other wheat products. For my clients, the message on gluten products is loud and clear, 

"Avoid gluten products if you want to improve your body composition and performance". 

It may sound extreme, but the reason for avoiding these foods is not primarily the gluten content, but the fact that these products contain lots of calories and not a lot of nutrition. Reducing the amount of gluten in their diet is just a happy coincidence.




Let's get a grip on the difference between a gluten allergy (Coeliac disease) and gluten intolerance.

Coeliac Disease 

• An autoimmune disorder of the lower intestine where the consumption of gluten causes substantial destruction of tissue. Depending on where you get your information around 1% of the population suffer from it.

Gluten Sensitivity

• It is a relatively misunderstood and altogether more common condition.
• It is a reaction to gluten which causes a level of stress to the gut, resulting in inflammation with symptoms such as diarrhoea and bloating. 
• It is temporary, and results from a poorly functioning gut, which can be caused by a combination of:
• Antibiotic, anti-inflammatories and other medications
• Too much processed food
• High sugar diet
• Stress
• Inadequate sleep
• Not enough dietary fiber
• Low protein intake
• Over consumption of gluten

I hope I have made it clear that the reason there is so much debate surrounding gluten products is because everyone is different, and people can change. Ensure you understand how your body handles gluten and then act accordingly. 

If you feel that the consumption of gluten affects your mood, or your digestion then I would suggest cutting it out. Improve your health cleaning up your diet and by taking pro-biotics, glutamine and fiber. 

If the consumption of gluten products doesn't appear to cause you any problems then don't let it concern you. Focus on getting the right nutrition for your goals. Take preventative measures by limiting your exposure to gluten and by maintaining a clean diet. 




My gut feeling is this: 

There are far more reasons than gluten intolerance to avoid bread, pasta, processed foods.

Why men make such a fuss in the gym and women shouldn't rest so much

The idea that men and women should be treated the same in every respect is baffling. Even though there are many justifiable examples such as pay and job opportunities where there is no good reason one should discriminate, there are times where I would treat a women differently to a man. 

If a woman asked to borrow my coat because she felt cold, then I would oblige. On the other hand if a man asked the same question I wouldn't be so sympathetic. I guess I'm just sexist.



Men and women are different, and one of the places where this is important is in the gym. 

There are no gender specific exercises, we all have the same muscles which move in the same way. The important point is that the way in which you train should depend on your gender. 

Men have more powerful muscles per unit of volume than women and their maximum intensity of exercise is higher. Women's muscles are more tuned to endurance and are more fatigue resistant meaning they recover more quickly from exercise. This is due to muscle composition, where women have more of the less powerful aerobic fibers and men have more of the more powerful anaerobic fibers.

So men can move more weight but can't handle it for as long. 

Notice people doing high intensity training, or finishers at the end of their session. Women never move as fast as men but very rarely fall over crying at the end like we do.

Also if women lift relatively lighter weights than men, they won't produce the same level of metabolic response from the same number of reps.This means that if the main goal is fat loss then more reps and sets, and shorter breaks are required to train at the required intensity. 




Sorry ladies. 

This does not mean that women can't put the same amount of effort into their training, they just need a different training approach to get the most out of it. 

All of the points discussed above are general points and do not apply to everyone. For example, a well trained female will be more capable than most men at performing high intensity training. Resistance training increases the power of your muscles through changing the fiber ratios. So the physiology of a trained woman will be more power based than an untrained man. 

It's a controversial topic, but one that needs to be addressed to get the most out of your training. 

All about abs

After what seemed like an endless winter, mercifully the sun has peeped out from behind the clouds and allowed us to warm up again. This can only mean one thing; all of a sudden people will become terribly concerned about abs. 

The fact is that a lot of hype surrounding this fabled body part has left the public woefully misinformed about techniques and benefits. It is commonplace to see people taking part in grueling ab workouts every session to get the shape they want. At the same time almost every athlete will incorporate some abdominal work into their strength sessions to help with their performance. 

So before we get into ab sculpting techniques, I'd like to discuss the myths surrounding ab workouts:

Core strength does not improve athletic performance

• The idea behind this belief is that we require a solid core so our limbs whether throwing or running can have a solid foundation. Unfortunately this does not hold true when studied and the same is the case with functional movement. However both significantly help to prevent injury so don't discount them just yet. 

Stomach crunches are not a good exercise to improve aesthetics 

• People who spend all day sitting down have shortened hip flexors, and as a result they become overactive meaning that the pelvis tilts forwards. This causes the belly to stick out and 6 pack or not they look bad. People conditioned like this who perform stomach crunches further over use their hip flexors and under use their abs complicating the situation. 

• This problem is extremely common, in fact everyone has it to an extent because of the world that we live in. It also contributes to lower back pain and weak glutes, so leave ab crunches alone. 
• I'll do another article on posture soon, as there is much more to this.

Compound exercises train your abs enough

• Assuming you have low enough body fat, compound exercises alone will give you a great six pack. In order to perform a dead lift or a squat the core needs to be fully engaged. 
• Use nature's weight belt, the thoracolumbar fascia along with your transverse abdominals and external obliques to control your intra-abdominal pressure. Suck your stomach in and squeeze your pelvic floor.
• Doing countless ab exercises in a bid to get a 6 pack is a waste of time if you have over 10% body fat, you would be far better off getting a set of squats or dead lifts in, or doing some high intensity interval training to help lose the fat. 

Abs should be trained with high volume low intensity sets

• Abs are just like every other muscle in the body and as such you should give them the same rep ranges as you would give every other muscle. For most people hypertrophy is between 8-12 reps per set for 3-4 sets. Doing 100 crunches 3 times a day is just going to make you tired and sore. 48 hours recovery is necessary if you aren't training them with compound exercises, if you are then you'll probably need even more. 

Abs are the final piece of the the puzzle and unfortunately they are also the toughest to achieve. Simply put you won't ever have a washboard stomach without paying close attention to your diet and training hard. 

However the appeal is hard to argue with and sometimes people do want to increase the size of their abs. If this is you then here is what to do. 

1. Keep the rep range moderate and the intensity high
2. Perform exercises with a full range of motion
3. Keep tempo slow, with the muscle under tension
4. A good alternative to a crunch is a frog crunch
5. Allow enough recovery time
6. Treat your abs the same as the rest of your body!

The age of the treadmill is over, long live HIIT

Aerobic exercise sucks, it's a fact masquerading as an opinion. On the other hand, being able to burn off your rivals in sport and generally having a great level of aerobic fitness is a very attractive proposition. If only there was a way in which you could get the aerobic fitness without doing the long and slow aerobic exercise? Well, there is and I promise you you'll never look back. It's called High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). 

First a quick biochemistry lesson:

As the crudely drawn out diagram shows, aerobic metabolism (exercise performed where there is enough oxygen) is a very simple process. Glucose (sugar) enters the cell and get's converted into a product called pyruvate. Each conversion only produces a small amount of energy and requires no oxygen. However, its turnover speed is unregulated and so it can potentially produce lots of energy very quickly if the turnover demand is high. 

Afterwards the new pyruvate molecules go into the mitochondria and then through a slower process get broken down releasing lots of energy, but oxygen is necessary. 

The difference between these two processes is why you can sprint very fast for a short period of time (anaerobic) or run more slowly for a long period of time (aerobic). 

Aerobic exercise works by performing exercise at a low enough intensity so the aerobic section doesn't get overwhelmed by the anaerobic section. 

With me so far? Time to mix things up and introduce some high intensity stuff. 

The crude diagram above is what your cell looks like when you are performing exercise as hard as you can. The cell is screaming for energy and so glucose conversion gets sped up hugely. The anaerobic process produces a massive amount of energy in a very short period of time. Unfortunately, as anyone who has performed HIIT will report, there are consequences. 

The anaerobic system is producing pyruvate faster than the aerobic system can break it down, as the aerobic system is running at maximum capacity. Thankfully there is a way out,  when the aerobic system runs maximally it stimulates the pyruvate to be converted into lactate, soon to be called lactic acid; and this is why HIIT is so great. 

The lactic acid which accumulates in your muscles is dangerous, potentially damaging the functioning of the muscle and so needs to be eliminated as quickly as possible. So in an effort to clear it the liver takes on the role of lactic acid clearance. 

When multiple sets of HIIT are performed a backlog of lactate in the liver develops. This is because the muscles are cleared and ready to go again before the liver has finished the conversion. Every set you perform creates more lactate for the liver to deal with. 

This is exactly what you want because once it's in the liver it can't hurt you any more. Finally the best news of all is that converting lactate back into useful glucose requires a great deal of energy most of which comes from fat. 

Here's a quick run down of the benefits, HIIT:

1. shouldn't take much more than 5 minutes total
2. Is comparable (or better) to a much longer time on a treadmill
3. Creates an afterburn of energy long after you have finished
4. improves aerobic fitness by maximally stimulating the mitochodria
5. Improves anaerobic threshold
6. Improves insulin resistance, which can help lose fat

There is however one condition to all these great benefits, it has to be performed at 100% intensity. If it is not done in this manner then it will not have the same effects as there will not be a significant enough difference in the energy system activity. All that is happening is you are performing a small amount of sub-maximal exercise, which means you should have stuck to the treadmill. 

A great way to perform HIIT is with battle ropes. 

The way to know that you're giving enough should be apparent, after a few seconds you should be at peak power output, from then on the amount of noise you can make should decrease in a linear fashion (As you can see on crudely drawn diagram number three). 



If by the end of the set you are still producing the same amount of noise as you were 15 seconds ago, you know that you weren't going hard enough to begin with. By the end of your 30 seconds you should be struggling, but that's fine because all that matters is that you are at the limit of your capability for 30 seconds. It takes time to really appreciate how far you can push yourself, but when it comes, you'll reap the rewards. 

So if you are a client of mine and I'm shouting at you to 'Give 100%', you'll know that it's not just sadistic pleasure, I'm also looking out for you and your results. 

Steak is evil... apparently

I imagine when you turned on the news this morning you were greeted by a warning. The main headline for BBC Health News this morning (08/04/13) read as follows:

Red meat chemical 'damages heart', say US scientists

The Facts

A group of scientists in the USA have recently published a journal article entitled

Intestinal microbiota metabolism of L-carnitine, a nutrient in red meat, promotes atherosclerosis

The researchers hypothesised that a certain strain of gut bacteria, which breaks down L-carnitine releases an atherogenic byproduct in humans. The official conclusion that the study comes to is:

"under some conditions, it [Red Meat] can foster the growth of bacteria that produce TMAO [The atherogenic by product] and potentially clog arteries"

So the researchers report that although they have found a link between the two, there are other factors which affect the situation and other variables which determine the relationship. All in all, a slightly different conclusion than that portrayed by the BBC. 

I have already written a blog on the effects of saturated fat, which is typically why people avoid red meat, and how it fits into healthy eating. I suggest you read it in order to get a better picture. But for today I will focus on red meat as a gross product. 

By far and away the most comprehensive study on red meat and disease is a meta-analysis published in 2010 entitled - Red and Processed Meat Consumption and Risk of Incident Coronary Heart Disease, Stroke, and Diabetes Mellitus. 

• The study used over 1 million participants from 10 different countries. 
• It used data from 20 different studies
• It concluded that there was no link between red meat consumption and incidence of Coronary Heart Disease, Stroke and Diabetes.
• It also concluded that there was a significant link between the consumption of processed meat like deli meats, sausages and bacon and the above diseases. 

The researchers explained these claims by saying it was the high levels of salt and preservatives in processed meats which lead to the development of disease. 

In my opinion the huge problem is that processed meats also tend to be eaten with processed carbohydrates, which is a real cause for concern. 

As always seems to be the case, the final conclusion is that in order to be healthy people should avoid processed foods and stick to eating the way nature intended. Eating whole, fresh foods in a good balance. 

Why Grok probably didn't eat Paleo

The Paleo diet is one of the most successful dietary fads in recent years and the principle fueling those partaking in the diet is to eat only the foods which are most suited to our biology. This involves eliminating grains, dairy, legumes and processed foods and consuming a high protein/high fat diet/low carb diet, much like our paleolithic ancestors. 

The dietary protocol allows a sense of satiety without forcing people to compromise on portion sizes because the plate is filled with nutritionally dense foods. The greatest impact on health is the diet's reported ability to tackle chronic diseases. It is dubbed as the answer to the modern obesity epidemic
 

The effectiveness of the diet is easy to see, and the claims are justifiable, but the rationale behind the diet is inconsistent. For example, did our paleolithic ancestors really eat protein with every meal and consume fruits and vegetables at will? Did they really get as much fat in their diet as we are encouraged to consume now? Would you really ever witness a paleolithic human sitting down eating a banana?


Well the American archaeogeneticist Christina Warriner thinks not.

In a fascinating lecture concerning the true dietary habits of the paleolithic humans, Christina Warriner gives a solid talk on how our diets have changed over the past few thousand years. She breaks down different aspects of the modern Paleo diet and explains why it is that our ancestors would never have even seen what we call a banana. 

Following on from her talk, it is obvious that even with the best intentions it would be challenging for anyone living in the modern era to eat in a similar fashion to our ancestors. The food available to us in our supermarkets is just not the same. This means that as hard as we try we will never have a truly Paleo diet. 


What can be taken from this short lecture is that keeping nutrition whole and unprocessed is the best bet for maintaining robust health, irrespective of calories and macronutrient ratios. Hardly a ground breaking insight. 
What is more significant is that although we cannot hold on to our dietary past as a justification of the paleo diet, the results of the intervention haven't changed. Consuming a diet based on paleo principles does lead to better short term and potentially long term health for most people as an alternative to a more average diet; high in processed foods and refined carbohydrates. 

But the greatest insight comes as a result of a different point of view. Perhaps we are now in new territory, where we have access to all the food we need and as a result we can control our intake to whatever we like. The principles are the same but the food is different. We are now able to optimise our nutrition to make ourselves healthier than we ever have been. 

Grok probably wishes he had the opportunity to eat more like we do. 

 

Why training too much can stop you from getting fitter

The word over training sounds like a swear word for some, a term used by the weak to justify inactivity. It seems that when a plateau strikes the only logical conclusion is that the volume of training needs to be increased. In the case of the majority this is true, because the majority don't train at all. In the minority who pay close attention to their diet and exercise it simply isn't the case. 

The reason for training is to invoke a positive adaptive response in your cells. All exercise does this in a different way. The way to quantitatively measure this is by recording down the amount exercise you do in each session. If by the next session there is no measurable increase in the exercise, then training has failed. That means there has been no response, because of over training.

The causes of a lack of progression are twofold:

• The intensity of training is too low
• The recovery period between sessions is inadequate

At this point, try not to think about which source you feel your plateaus are likely to be coming from, as I will elaborate further, just focus on where your training could be more effective.

Intensity  
Every exercise you complete should be done to failure on the last set. It may sound like the spiel of a masochistic coach, but there is solid grounding behind it. In order to give your cells a significant enough reason to change, they must be challenged maximally to the point where they are inadequate for the demands under which they are placed. Anything less and the results will be less apparent. 


Recovery
Assuming the intensity was correct to produce an adaptive response, the most important part is allowing your body time to recover. 

Consider this; training is not the part of your week where you get stronger, in fact it is where you aim to get as weak as possible. Muscles are broken down and emptied of fuel, leaving you exhausted and feeble. The period following training is where you can sense yourself getting stronger, given good nutrition and rest, your body rebuilds itself more capable than before. 

If recovery is inadequate then there is a constant cycle of weakening the body, and never improving.  The same goes for nutrition, if the building blocks are not there, then the body cannot adapt positively.



The largest mental obstacle to overcome is the common cultural concept that 'more is more', that training more results in greater gains.
It is good advice that in order to emulate someone, first get a grip on their habits and then imitate them. Unfortunately this isn't always the best idea, as many people looking to get bigger and stronger want to emulate bodybuilders. 

Top professional body builders are very lucky, they are part of the small percentage of people who can train an enormous volume and recover quickly. The other factor is their steroid intake which cuts recovery time dramatically, which means following the programme which Arnie did may well be too intense for you. 

The difference is exactly the same as a dark skinned person and a light skinned person undergoing the same tanning programme. The light skinned person will be unable to keep up with the rate of progression and will get sun burnt (overtraining the skin).

If you are looking simply to put on size and strength then begin by training each body part once a week, if you make gains then great. Increase the frequency and continue to do so until you start to plateau. Then reel it in a bit and carry on from there. Train as much as you can, but don't lose sight of the need for constant progression from adequate recovery.