Sugar Consumption Problems

Sugar Consumption

Sugar Consumption via Shay Aaron

Sugar consumption is a major factor in the dramatic rise in childhood obesity. Research also indicates that an over-consumption of white, refined sugar also has the following harsh effects on the body:

  • weakens the immune system,
  • can trigger behavioral problems,
  • cause tooth decay and
  • robs the body of precious vitamins and minerals.

Checking to see if a food item contains white sugar is fairly easy. When reading a label, look for words ending in the suffix ???ose???, such as high fructose corn syrup, maltose and sucrose. White table sugar is called sucrose and is derived from sugar cane or sugar beet. White sugar is stripped of vitamins, minerals and fibre and is basically empty calories.

After eating a food product that is filled with white sugar, the sugar enters the bloodstream very quickly making it very difficult for the body to assimilate. The body reacts to the increase in glucose levels in the bloodstream by over-secreting the hormone insulin. Excess insulin secretion leads to blood sugar levels dropping to a critical low, resulting in a state of hypoglycemia (low blood sugar levels). This can cause fatigue, irritability and cravings. This often leads to excess sugar consumption again as people then look to consume more sugar to combat these feelings which starts the cycle all over.

One other major issue with excess insulin secretion is that is triggers the excess storage of fat and this leads to weight gain. Overall, refined white sugar is something you should avoid in your diet as much as possible. For more nutrition tips and information on our online workout programs please visit www.blog.cardioblast.com.

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, strength training programs, 50 page meal plan, fitness tracking and personal training included with their membership.

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Train like an athlete for optimal fitness

Train like an athlete for optimal fitness

Train like an athlete for optimal fitness

If you want to get in the best shape of your life you need to train like an athlete for optimal fitness. Training like an athlete will take your fitness level to new heights that you just won’t experience with the average training program.

Athletes train for power, speed, agility, coordination, balance, strength and endurance. Imagine bringing this intensity and overall conditioning to your workout. This type of training just doesn???t happen with the average trainer.?? If you take a look at the top athletes in professional sports most of them have lean, powerful physiques. Their training styles are unique.

You won’t find top athletes sitting on a bike and then doing your standard circuit training exercises in the weight room. Their full workout routine includes training for everything they need to optimize their performance in sport. Exercises for power include many different types of plyometric jumping drills. They’ll work on speed through acceleration and deceleration drills. Coordination involves moving your body in multiple planes with moving objects coming at you. This is key to all sports and is helpful in everyday life as well.

Balance of course is key to any sport as athletes cannot execute their movements properly without being in a balanced position. Strength is also important in order to fend off or move through opponents. Finally, endurance is essential for those times when an athlete must endure a longer shift than normal and still compete at a high level.

The average person should keep all of these key components in mind when designing their own workout routine. There is an athlete in all of us and we could use all of these attributes in being successful in our daily lives.

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, strength training programs, 50 page meal plan, fitness tracking and personal training included with their membership.

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Exercise in movement patterns not isolation

Exercise in movement patterns not isolation

Exercise in movement patterns not isolation

Whether you are doing strength or cardio training it is important to exercise in movement patterns not isolation.This means you should combine one or more exercises together or train with a specific movement for whatever activity or sport that you are training for. Isolation exercises are good for building strength but don’t really work on overall function.

The human body rarely works in isolation like when we stand or sit in the weight room and do a plain old bicep curl. In most things we do both our upper and lower body are involved at the same time, especially when training for sports. The human body moves in multiple planes with multiple joints at a time and it is a rarity where it only works using one muscle group at a time so you shouldn’t train like this.

Your goal should be to train with multi-joint exercises and movement patterns that mimic your sport/activity or everyday life. An example of this is a squat where you pick up a bar off of the ground in front of you, then lift the bar up and over your head and then bring it back down and put it back on the ground. This exercise involves many muscle groups and is appropriate for your daily activities and many sports. This will give you true functional strength rather than just big muscles!

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and customized online workout programs.

Exercises for bad weather

Exercises for Bad Weather

Exercises for Bad Weather

There are many exercises for bad weather out there. People often use the excuse of bad weather as a reason they can???t get to the gym or to workout. There are many ways to work out besides going to the gym so that you can still stay healthy and in top shape.

Here are a few options to consider if you find weather is hindering you from getting to your workout.

  • Half an hour run through your neighborhood. Even on a day when there may be a lot of rain or snow outside it is very refreshing to go outside for a run and then come back inside to a warm house and a warm shower.
  • If you have stairs in your home you can use them to intensify your cardio. Run stairs for 1 minute intervals combined with some other cardio such as running on the spot, jumping jacks or high knees. This can give you a great workout.
  • Create your own interval workout. Pick 10 exercises and write them down. Here is an example: Shuffles side to side, Squats, Pushups, Jumping Jacks, Lunges (alternating), Burpies, Tricep Dips, Flurries (quick runs on the spot), Jog with high knees, Skip side to side on the spot. Perform each exercise for 30 – 60 seconds. Then take a break for the same amount of time. Then move onto the next exercise. You can perform this circuit of 10 exercises 1 – 3 times and it will give you a great workout.
  • If you want a full complete workout you can do at home, our Cardioblast.com workouts give you a great interval training workout that you can do anywhere as long as you have internet access. The workouts are 45 minutes long and require minimal equipment.

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and customized online workout programs.

Some simple facts about Sugar

Some simple facts about Sugar

Some simple facts about Sugar

Most packaged foods on the market contain some sort of refined sugar. We end up eating quite a bit more sugar than we think we are as a result and this is contributing to more and more health issues. Here are some simple facts about sugar that you should know.

??? Sugar is the additive most often used in foods. Sugar alone is added to food 10 times more than all other food additives combined together.
??? Brown sugar is simply refined white sugar with some molasses added to it and is not any healthier for you than white sugar.
??? Most canned foods, cured meats, cereals, salad dressings, spaghetti sauce, packaged foods, mayonnaise, juices and many other products all contain sugar. Look at your labels closely for all of the forms of sugar.
??? The average soft drink contains approximately 9 teaspoons of refined white sugar.
??? 1 tablespoon of ketchup contains approximately a teaspoon of sugar.
??? Sugar comes in many forms on labels including sucrose, fructose and glucose just to name a few.
??? Corn syrup and high fructose corn syrup are two other ingredients that are basically the equivalent of sugar.

So why are we showing that sugar is in so many foods and in many different variations? This is because humans eat way more sugar then we ever have in history and excessive sugar consumption is linked to many diseases and has negative effects to your overall health. We suggest you really try to limit the amount of sugar you consume as it will improve your overall health and give you more consistent energy throughout the day.

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and personal training included with their membership.

3 things you need to know before you stop exercising

3 things you need to know before you stop exercising

3 things you need to know before you stop exercising

The average person will often go through a roller coaster ride with their exercise programs. Some weeks they exercise and other weeks they get ???busy??? or ???lazy??? and don???t exercise. Weeks can turn into months and this creates a lot of problems in terms of staying in shape and managing their weight. This is why consistency in your workouts is extremely important.

People often ask me why I am so dedicated to my workouts and why I don???t skip them. I tell them that it is actually easier to exercise regularly than it is to take breaks and start back up again. By taking days or even weeks off from exercise you make the process of staying in shape difficult. Here are 3 things you need to know before you stop exercising.

First of all, every time you stop exercising for a few days, weeks or months you take your body back into restart mode. Since you are always ???restarting??? the workout process, the body goes through its usual phase of being extremely sore. We???ve all had that feeling when we go back to an exercise program or we start a new one. There is usually a great deal of soreness and discomfort for many days. This then makes it difficult to work out in the days ahead and further hurts your motivation to workout causing you to take another so called ???break???. By exercising regularly you can avoid the extreme soreness that happens after longer breaks.

The second major problem is that it messes with your metabolism. When you work out regularly your metabolism is elevated which means you burn more calories every day both while exercising and while at rest. By stopping and starting your workouts you jerk your metabolism around which will eventually affect you long term. It speeds up and then it slows down over and over again. As people age their metabolism does not increase as easily and all the years of creating the ups and downs means a much harder time keeping the weight off. A consistent metabolism will help you keep your weight steadier over the years.

Finally, by regularly working out, both your body and mind are prepared for it and it becomes a regular part of your daily routine like eating and sleeping. You end up feeling that ???high??? that you get from exercising and you look forward to it daily. This makes life much simpler and healthier. You honestly end up needing your workouts and you do it because you feel better. You have more energy, less illness, sleep better and feel better about yourself. This in turn feeds your desire to exercise again and the upward spiral continues!

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and personal training included with their membership.

Busy Moms make your workout more efficient

Busy Mom's make your workout more efficient

Busy Mom’s make your workout more efficient

Quite often we hear from stay at home Mom???s who are trying to fit a lot into their busy schedules. Between taking kids to school, preparing meals and running errands, their lives are busy and they find it tough to fit their workout program into their daily lives.

We all know how important exercise is for our physical health as well as for our emotional health. Keeping your workout in your schedule is crucial for you especially when you are busy which tends to make you a little overstressed.

To help busy moms make your workout more efficient and ensure you achieve success in maintaining them we have two suggestions for you. One is to do with the way that you do your cardio workouts and the other is to do with the way you do your strength workouts.

For your cardio, we suggest doing interval training for your workouts. Interval training involves short bursts of high intensity exercise follow by a short period of rest or moderate intensity exercise. This form of cardio has been found to be much more efficient than longer duration aerobic cardio (ie, running for an hour). Your heart rate tends to stay higher for longer periods of time which burns more calories. Also, interval training challenges your heart more than steady state training which helps it to become more efficient and will eventually help lower your resting heart rate. This means a heart that will remain healthier for more years of your life.

To make your strength training more efficient we suggest you do what are called supersets. Normally when people strength train they pick a body part or two and focus on those for the day. They end up starting on one body part and do a set of an exercise and then take a rest. With this method of training there are a lot of rest periods and this can add significant time to the length of your workout. Supersets are where you take two opposite body parts and work them at the same time to make your workout more efficient. For instance, you could work on your biceps and triceps. You can perform a set on your biceps and then while they are resting you would perform a set on your triceps. Basically you are taking your rest period and filling it in with another exercise on another body part. Both body parts still get the rest they need while the other body part is being worked. Another benefit to this style of strength training is that it tends to increase the heart rate a little more; thereby burning more calories and creating somewhat of an aerobic workout for you.

If you???re a Mom looking to make sure you fit exercise into your busy schedule we highly recommend these two tips to increase the efficiency of your workouts. You can use these ideas effectively for your home workouts, at the park or at the gym.

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and customized online workout programs.

Fix your posture before it damages you

Fix your posture before it damages you

Fix your posture before it damages you

Posture is a good overall indicator of the health of your muscles and we don???t look at it very often at all. Just by looking at someone standing up you can tell a lot about whether their muscles are weak, strong, tight or flexible.

Have someone stand up and take a look at them from the side. Here are some pointers on some things that could be going wrong with their posture and some suggestions on how to fix your posture before it damages you.

??? The top of the head is level and not dropped down at the forehead (ie. texting syndrome where people are constantly looking down at their phones). This can cause strain in the neck and possible headaches. Make sure your head is level. It may seem ackward at first but give it a couple of weeks and it will seem more natural.

??? The head should also be retracted back so that the neck is vertical and not angled forward. The ear should be aligned over the ball of the shoulder joint and not in front of it.

??? The shoulders should be rotated back and not rounded forwarded. Many people have their shoulders rounded forward (ie. in a slouched position) and this causes their chest to tighten up and their upper back muscles to weaken. You often see seniors with what looks like a ???hunched??? upper back. This is caused by tight chest muscles, weak upper back muscles and degenerating bones. Stand tall keeping your shoulders back for a strong posture.

??? The stomach and low back should be tall and strong. Often times you will see the stomach rounded, the hips tilted forward and the low back in an excessive arched position. You want your stomach and back to be tall and work as one unit. This has the effect of making you seem leaner in the stomach and will help reduce pain in your lower back.

??? The ball joint at the top of your leg (where the leg bone connects into your hip joint) should be aligned vertically under the shoulder joint.

??? The knee joint should also be aligned with hip and shoulder joint as well. The knees need to remain slightly bent and not locked.

??? Finally, the ankle joint should also be aligned with the knee, hip and shoulder joint.

The younger you are the easier it is to correct your posture as your muscles are generally stronger and more flexible. As you age, your muscles become stiffer and smaller. This makes it more difficult to maintain a correct posture. If you find that you have any of the issues above we recommend that you undertake both a strength training and flexibility program to help you correct and maintain a strong posture. This can be implemented at any age!

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and customized online workout programs.

Warmups are key to a good workout

Warmups are key to a good workout

Warmups are key to a good workout

One of the most important keys to a successful workout is a good warm-up. People often skip or cut their warm-up short, especially if they are in a hurry. However, here are some reasons why warmups are key to a good workout and why you need to make sure you plan it into your activities.

First of all, a proper warm-up will help reduce the risk of injury. During the warm-up there is increased blood flow to the muscles. This increased blood flow increases the temperature of the muscle along with its elasticity. By increasing the elasticity, the muscles are able to stretch further during your workout without becoming injured. Your warm-up should include what is called ???dynamic stretching???. This is where you do moving stretches that stretch the muscle out and then relax it. This is repeated over and over again until the muscle is able to achieve the length needed for the activity you are going to pursue without feeling excessive strain.

The second benefit of a good warm-up is that it reduces lactic acid buildup in the muscles. When you workout intensely you get waste products (lactic acid) that build up in your muscles and this reduces the intensity with which you can workout as well as causes soreness in the muscles. By gradually increasing the intensity of your workout through a proper warm-up, you delay the process of lactic acid buildup. The muscles are better able to effectively get rid of the lactic acid and this gives you a better workout.

If you are playing sports a proper warm-up also helps facilitate the mind-muscle connection. This helps your brain send the right messages to the right muscles in the fastest way possible. If you???ve ever tried to go play a sport and feel a little ???rusty??? when you start you???ll know what this means. Your hand eye coordination and balance just don???t seem right if you go straight into activity. Therefore, a proper warm-up that gets the mind-muscle link properly established will allow you to be ready to compete right from the start of your competition. This includes footwork drills where the feet are made to move over and around objects, balance drills that challenge both sides of the body and hand eye coordination drills for sports that involve the use of objects.

Plan a proper warm-up into your exercise routine and we guarantee you will notice better results immediately.

About the Author: Alex K is an online Fitness Professional providing health and wellness to the world through his online workout program Cardio Blast. Members of www.Cardioblast.com receive new cardio workouts every week, full meal planning, fitness tracking and personal training included with their membership.

BC’s Biggest Bootcamp presented by Cardio Blast

BC's Biggest Bootcamp

BC’s Biggest Bootcamp

Join Cardio Blast Founder Alex K for a great workout in BC’s Biggest Bootcamp. For those of you living in the lower mainland of British Columbia this is a chance to workout with hundreds of fitness minded people just like yourselves.

Plus, we are supporting a great cause by donating all proceeds from the event to the Abbotsford Minor Hockey Association to help underprivileged youth play minor hockey in the upcoming season. Hockey is an expensive sport and we want to help those who can’t afford to play to have a chance as well.

The event takes place on Monday June 17th at 6:30pm. Location is Rotary Stadium in Abbotsford, BC. Cost to attend is a minimum donation of $5 which will be donated to minor hockey. There are over $1300 in door prizes for participants as well.

Deadline to register is June 7th. More information can be found on the website for BC’s Biggest Bootcamp at www.etsfitness.ca.

Hiwire Creative – www.hiwirecreative.ca
Abbotsford News – www.abbynews.com
Star FM – www.starfm.com
Theragear – www.theragear.com
Team Sharp Training – www.teamsharptraining.com
Abbotsford Heat – www.abbotsfordheat.com
PHD Nutrition – www.phdnutrition.ca
Perfect Tan – www.perfecttan.ca
Suzanne Pennell Personal Training – www.befitabbotsford.com
Vos Hockey – www.voshockey.com
Envision Financial – www.envisionfinancial.ca
Ned Athletic Wear – www.nedathleticwear.com

Get your registration forms in today. You don’t want to miss this!!

For more information on Cardio Blast programming please visit www.blog.cardioblast.com.