You Have Options as to What Kind of Squats You Start With.
You can do:

• Body Weight Squats —>Great to start out with in the beginning.

• Door Squats —> Good for those with balance problems

• Smith Machine Squats —-> For serious results without the need for spotters

• Barbell Squats —> The king of leg and butt builders. Your goal should be these.

Body Weight Squats: These will get you ready for the barbell with less soreness.
Look for barbell and door squats below in this post.

THE PERFECT BODY WEIGHT SQUAT

1. Stand with feet 1-2 foot widths wider than shoulders
2. Feet should be pointing straight forward or turned a little out to the sides
3. Arms in front for balance
4. Inhale as you go down
5. Drive through your heels and exhale as you stand up
6. Do not lock knees out completely

Do up to 3 sets of as many as you can do comfortably. Start with 3 sets 15 or 20, then move up to 30 per set, then 50 when you feel you can perform easily. Both men and women athletes can perform hundreds.

**You will see your best progress though by using a barbell in my opinion but these are great to start with.

Squats are “whole body” exercise, and you should ultimately perform them with some added weight. There is a lot to keep track of while doing squats and it is extremely helpful to do them in front of a mirror to make sure your form is good.
Video thanks to the very good people at Crossfit.

Exercise Is the Key Cheating the Age Clock

New research from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology’s K.G. Jebsen Center of Exercise in Medicine provides statistical evidence that the 50-year-old can be just as physically fit as a 20 year old. But couch potatoes need not apply. Exercise — hard and often is essential to truly staying young. Say the researchers from Jebsen Center.

Middle-aged guys can take heart in research from the Center. They have determined that activity is far more important than age as far as fitness levels — and an active 50-year-old can be every bit as fit as a sedentary 20-year-old, says Ulrik Wisloff, Jebsen Center director and principle investigator of the study.

The study shows that by increasing the intensity of your exercise, you can avert the list of diseases that plaque today’s middle aged male.

“Physical condition is the most important factor in describing an individual’s overall health, almost like a report card,” says Stian Thoresen Aspenes of the center.

Training Intensity is Much More Important than Length

Interval training involves performing short periods of high intensity exercise followed by periods of  low intensity exercise of the same length. Such as: Sprint for 1 min. – walk for 1 min. that would be one interval. Depending on your level of fitness to do 3 to 10 intervals and structure them dozens of ways to fit your purposes. Look out for a special report on interval training coming up soon right here.

You might think your procrastination to exercise is caused by laziness, but researchers at McMaster University think that you might be missing crucial genes. This was found during an experiment with mice. (you’d be surprised how similar we are, which is why meesses are used in these studies.)

Scientists made the discovery while studying mice that had two genes in muscle vital for exercise removed. The genes manipulate an enzyme that is turned on as you exercise.

Gregory Steinberg says “Mice love to run,”. He is an associate professor of medicine at Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine as well as Canada Research Chair in Obesity and Metabolism.

“While the normal mice could run for miles, those without the genes in their muscle could only run the same distance as down the hall and back. It was remarkable. The mice looked identical to their brothers or sisters but within seconds we knew which ones had the genes and which one didn’t.”

The scientists established that the mice without the genes had an impaired ability for their muscles to take up glucose while they exercise.

They also had inferior levels of mitochondria. 

Steinberg stated, “When you exercise you get more mitochondria growing in your muscle. If you don’t exercise, the number of mitochondria goes down. By removing these genes we identified the key regulator of the mitochondria is the enzyme AMPK,” .

Scores of researchers on the planet are studying the enzyme involved, AMPK, however the McMaster University group is first to show this essential function in exercise. Their study is featured in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Steinberg thinks the findings are crucial for people who find it tough to exercise, like the obese, asthmatics and people in wheelchairs. Their lack of ability toward physical exercise could cause other problems such as heart disease or diabetes.

Steinberg himself runs or bikes to work. “It is the only way that I can manage to make sure I stay fit.” and says that, “As we remove activity from our lives due to emerging technology, the base level of fitness in the population is going down and that is reducing the mitochondria in people’s muscles. This in turn makes it so much harder for people to start exercising.”

An simpler way to say it would be “you use it or you lose it”, speaking of physical prowess, and that’s been widely known as a truism by many for many many moons. And it’s a good reason to get of the couch, or run five instead of three this evening.

Barbara Gower, PhD, a professor of nutrition sciences at the University of Alabama at Birmingham says that even a moderate reduction in carbs can help you get rid of this deep belly fat even with little change in actual body weight.

Results of her research will be presented at The Endocrine Society’s 93rd Annual Meeting in Boston, Mass.

Gower and her people performed the study with money from the National Institutes of Health. The guinea pigs were 69 overweight but healthy men and women. The individuals were fed for two back to back eight-week intervals: each person ate 1,000 less calories than usual each day.

They were fed either a lower-fat diet or a lower carb diet with slightly higher in fat than the standard diet. The moderately low carb diet was made up of foods that had a somewhat low glycemic value, (a gauge of the level that the food raises blood sugar levels). The lower carb diet contained 43% calories from carbohydrates, 18% from protein and a whopping 39 percent calories from fat. In our opinion, with protein at only 18%, this diet could be called the low protein diet. This would be for sedentary people.

The scientists measured the fat deep inside the abdomen and the total body fat of the subjects at the beginning and end of each study phase, using computed tomography (CT) and dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA) scans. This kind of bodyfat measurement is not available down at the local Gold’s gym.

After the first phase of the experiment the people on the carb-restricted diet had 11 percent less deep abdominal fat than the subjects on the standard diet. But when they analyzed the results by race, they found that the benefit was exclusive to the Caucasians in the study. The white people in the study apparently had more deep abdominal fat than blacks even when matched for body weight or percent body fat. This would seem to go against empirical evidence that black people suffer from Type 2 diabetes at a much greater rate than White people, so take these results with a grain of sodium.

During the second phase, the guinea pigs on both diet types lost weight. But, the carb-restricted diet caused a 4 percent greater loss of total body fat, Gower said. “For individuals willing to go on a weight-loss diet, a modest reduction in carbohydrate-containing foods may help them preferentially lose fat, rather than lean tissue,” she said. “The moderately reduced carbohydrate diet allows a variety of foods to meet personal preferences.”

As always, look at these results from your own perspective.
We have proven that our diet programs and methods are the most effective for healthy adults, lean meats, veggies and fruits. I’ll put a detailed rapid fat loss diet up soon.

Important Note: If you’re just going to stay with body weight only, you can work your way up to several hundred squats per day. Some people have done 500 squats regularly every day for various training such as skiing, MMA training etc. There is a lot to keep track of while doing squats and it is extremely helpful to do them in front of a mirror to make sure your form is good.

Squats are the ultimate lower body exercise because they use more of your large leg muscles than any other exercise and are also great butt toners. You can do squats in the gym or at home. You can do them with your own body weight, while holding dumbbells in your hands and for serious trainers, with a barbell across the back of your shoulders (use a spotter when you do this).

The truth is that squats are the best exercise for toning the glutes (butt muscles) and building them up a little if you want that. You can get a really beautiful shape by doing squats the right way and I’m going to give you easy instructions below.

Here’s how to do a proper squat to accentuate the butt muscles (Caution you will probably have to buy new jeans after a few weeks of doing this):

Remember – Foot Placement is Very Important to Get the Effects that You Want
First, start with your feet slightly wider than shoulder width apart and your feet slightly turned out.The wider you place your feet apart, the more you will be working your glutes (butt). But it is possible to go too far, so use some common sense when finding your best placement and start with a moderate stance then go wider as you get used to it.

You Have Options as to What to Do With Your Arms During the Squat. You can:
You can hold your arms out in front of you the first few sets to keep your balance. (Like you are pushing someone away)
Or you can hold your arms tucked in closer as in the picture below “the Perfect Bodysquat”.

PERFECT BODYWEIGHT SQUAT

DOOR SQUATS
You can use a bedroom door by wrapping a bath towel over both door knobs and hold onto the ends of the towel while squatting. It easier for beginners to go down all the way using the doorsquat.

Alternatively, you can start out with a broomstick or something similar resting on the back of your shoulders . The objective for the future is to have you using dumbbells or a barbell with light weights on each end.

Inhale as you squat down and go no lower than the point where the tops of your thighs are parallel to the floor. Keep your head up and your back straight. An excellent way to keep your head up is to focus on some point high on the wall, near where it meets the ceiling and keep your eyes there. (when you’re not checking out your form in the mirror)

Exhale as you straighten up. Straighten your legs completely, but don’t lock your knees out. Also, make sure your knees don’t extend out beyond the tips of your toes. This avoids knee damage (which is also the reason for not going lower than knees parallel to the ground).

One trick I learned early from one of my coaches is to drive through your heels up to the standing position.

Note: If you’re working your butt, squeeze the glutes as you stand so that you feel it in the muscle. Your glutes are the largest muscles in the body.

OK let’s put it all together. We’ll start with body weight squats.

1. Stand with feet slightly wider than shoulders
2. Feet should be pointing straight forward or turned a little out to the sides
3. Arms in front for balance
4. Inhale as you go down
5. Go down at least as far as parallel to the floor. The farther you go down, the more it will work your glutes(butt).
6. Drive through your heels and exhale as you extend you legs to stand up while squeezing the glute muscles.
7. Do not lock knees out completely

Your first goal should be to easily complete 3 sets of up to 50 repetitions with body weight alone. Then when you’re comfortable with this amount of work you should graduate to a barbell or dumbbells so that you can add some weight to your squats and get more results out of them.

We’ve been watching this supplement for a while now and I’m not surprised that the researchers are finding numerous positive effects. We are taking this Biotivia 500mg tablet. Biotivia is the first and most respected manufacturer and you can get a bottle of 60 for about $52 on Amazon.

A new study finds that resveratrol, a substance in red wine and grapes, does in fact prevent the growth of fat cells in number. This is as opposed to the reduction in size where the size of cells can be reduced by dieting or the restriction of sugars. The results spell good news for dieters because the reduction of fat cells in number has long been only achieved by liposuction.

German researchers tested a strain of human fat cell precursors that develop into mature fat cells in the body (pre-adipocytes) to find out if resveratrol would change the size and function of human cells. The study showed that resveratrol did indeed change the function of these cells in that it prevented the cells from growing into mature fat cells!

“Resveratrol has anti-obesity properties by exerting its effects directly on the fat cells,” Pamela Fischer-Posovszky, the head researcher of the study said. “Thus, resveratrol might help to prevent development of obesity or might be suited to treating obesity.”

The study also showed that resveratrol slowed or stopped fat storage and reduced the production of interleukins 6 and 8, substances that may be linked to the development of diabetes. Resveratrol also stimulates a certain protein, adiponectin, that is known to decrease the risk of having heart attacks

Researchers have previously found that resveratrol protected mice from health problems related to obesity when they were fed a high calorie diet. Resveratrol has also been shown to mimic calorie restriction in monkeys and turn on a sort of “survival mechanism” causing the animals to appear and act younger than control animals (animals not given resveratrol supplements) of the same age.

Results found in the study:

• Reduces Fat Cells in Number
• Stops Growth of New Fat Cells
• Slows or Stops Fat Storage
• Reduces Production of Compounds Linked to Diabetes

This information is consistent with the long held belief that the “French Paradox” is explained by resveratrol in the wine consumed by the French population. The French Paradox springs from the fact that French people, who eat a very high fat diet, have low death rates from heart disease.Although cautioning that the long term effects have yet to be determined, Fischer-Posovszky said that a study has already shown that a single dose of 5000 milligrams of resveratrol had no ill effects in volunteers. Detailed results will be presented at The Endocrine Society’s 90th Annual Meeting in San Francisco. The study was funded partially by the German Research Association (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) and the Ministry of Science, Research and Arts (Ministerium fuer Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst), Baden-Wuerttemberg.

This is because carbohydrates prevent energy from being released from fat cells.

We know that the body uses mainly fat as fuel at exercise intensities below 65% of maximum effort. In this study overweight people exercised for one half hour at moderate intensity and then consumed either a protein meal or a carbohydrate meal afterward. The protein meal actually increased fat burning while the carbohydrate meal prevented it. What is interesting is that eating a carbohydrate rich meal two hours before the exercise promoted fat burning just as well as the protein rich after-exercise meal.

The moral of the story is that you can help your fat burning efforts by eating carbohydrate meals two hours before exercise, or protein meals after exercise.

Just try to remember that eating is for fuel. If you see eating as an event, or pleasure,
you are going to have a harder time shedding the fat.

Hormone and Metabolic Research
1-21-2010

The results of two new studies on fish oil and fat loss were just released earlier this year. In one study published by the International Journal of Obesity, researchers from Reykjavik Iceland tested the effects of fish or fish oil consumption equivalent to 1.5 grams of combined EPA/DHA on body weight and body composition as part of a calorie restricted diet. (1)

The subjects were 324 young overweight men and women who followed one of four experimental protocols for 8 weeks:

(1) sunflower oil capsules (control)

(2) lean fish

(3) fatty fish (salmon)

(4) fish oil capsules

The researchers reported the following results:

“In young, overweight men, the inclusion of either lean or fatty fish, or fish oil as part of a hypoenergetic diet resulted in 1 kilogram more weight loss after 4 weeks than a similar diet without seafood or supplement of marine origin. The addition of seafood to a nutritionally balanced energy-restricted diet may boost weight loss.”

It should be noted that the study was supported by the Seafood Plus organization and there were some limitations in the design that could have influenced the subject’s compliance.

The second study, conducted at the University of South Australia and published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (2) investigated the effect of combining fish oil supplements with regular aerobic exercise.

In a 12-week, placebo-controlled study, the subjects were divided into four groups:

(1) sunflower oil

(2) sunflower oil plus exercise

(3) fish oil

(4) fish oil plus exercise.

The fish oil groups were given 6 grams of high DHA fish oil per day, which contained a total of 1.9 grams of long chain omega-3 fatty acids. The exercising groups performed aerobic exercise three days per week for 45 minutes.

As you might expect, the fish oil plus exercise group came out with the best results:

* minus 1.2% body fat (compared to no decrease in the other groups)

* minus 2 kilograms/4.4 lbs (compared to no decrease in the non exercise group).

Unfortunately, there was a limitation in this study as well: The food intake of the subjects was self reported, which is known to be notoriously inaccurate.

There have been several other human studies on fish oil and fat loss in the last ten years or so and the majority of the findings have been positive. The research is compelling and there have been numerous, and very plausible mechanisms of action proposed.

However, more and more often, I am hearing people in the health, fitness and nutrition industries making some pretty bold and I daresay, premature and outrageous claims about what fish oil can do for fat loss; claims which are not supported by the research.

The studies on fish oil and fat loss are encouraging, but the vast majority of research has been on animals (rats, mice and hamsters) and there have been limitations in nearly all the human studies so far, including:

Small sample sizes, short study durations, statistically insignificant results, lack of randomization, no control groups, imprecise body composition testing, measurement errors, self-reporting of food intake, low compliance control and fish industry or supplement industry-sponsored bias.

Even if you take the results of the existing research at face value, the fat loss really isn’t all that impressive – an extra pound here, an extra kilo there.

Many of the research results barely reach statistical significance, and you even have to wonder if these small improvements in fat loss are simply correcting omega-3 deficiency or fixing omega-3 and omega-6 imbalance… therefore, will they continue over a longer time period or is this a one time improvement?

One of the earlier studies showed the same kind of measurable but modest results: The fish oil group that took 1.8 grams of combined EPA/DHA daily lost 2 pounds and the non fish oil group lost only 0.7 pounds after 3 weeks (3).

Of course, you’ll probably take all the fat loss help that you can get, and since there are already enough good reasons to eat fatty fish for cardiovascular disease prevention and other health benefits, it’s really a no brainer to eat fish such as salmon, trout, mackerel or sardines at least twice a week. (By the way, with the exception of King Mackerel, these are species which have not been reported as having problems with mercury contamination).

Alternately, you can use a fish oil supplement to get the equivalent in omega-3 fatty acids as found in the fish. Non fish eaters or vegetarians can use flaxseed oil, a plant-based source of Alpha Linolenic Acid (ALA) which converts in the body to EPA and DHA (the efficiency and amount of conversion has been a subject of controversy, however).

Based on the three studies cited above, it looks like 1.5 to 2.0 grams per day of combined DHA/EPA is the right dose when fat loss is the goal (although some suggest you should consider body weight when choosing the dosage, i.e., 1 gram total fish oil for each 20 lbs body weight, so a big guy might go with as much as 3.0 grams)

Most fish oil capsules come in 1,000 mg size at a 30% concentration, so if you took five 1000mg capsules a day, that would give you 1.5 grams of EPA/DHA; about the same as you’d get in 3 ounces (85 g) of salmon.

Note: other studies on fish oil and fat loss tested 3.0 to 4.0 g/day of EPA/DHA, but the American Heart Association has warned against taking more than 3 g EPA/DHA per day without a physicians supervision, as there may be potential contraindications and side effects such as increased bleeding time. Based on the research, more fish oil will NOT burn more fat, so be wary of the “mega dose gurus.”

Another tip: Don’t fall for the “premium price” necessarily means better quality party line. Quality and purity are important, but you can get molecularly-distilled, mercury, PCB, Dioxin, Organochlorine-free, 3rd party tested-to-meet-label-claims fish oil for less than ten bucks per bottle of 400 (one gram) capsules… yet I have seen “fish oil gurus” selling the exact same thing for $50 to $60 claiming that everyone else’s products are “contaminated” and “inferior” in quality. If that’s true, then I’d like to see those products submitted to consumer lab for voluntary 3rd party independent analysis and head to head comparison on purity AND cost effectiveness. If they come out superior and cost effective, I will gladly publicize the results myself.

The bottom line is it looks like fish oil may be a legitimate help to your fat loss efforts, especially when combined with exercise, as there may be an important synergy there. However, the idea that fish oil is some kind of miracle fat burner is just not true.

Like Mulder on the X-files, “I want to believe”… but we need much, much more research before we can say for certain exactly how much body composition improvement you can really expect from eating fatty fish or taking fish oil supplements.

The phrase “use it or lose it” could not be more accurate in regards to the human body and aging. As we age, we naturally lose muscle mass, our joints get all creaky and either we move around a lot less, or stop moving altogether because it doesn’t feel good. The sinews and tendons grow weak, the fluids dry up, and a dangerous cycle is started. This cycle is all too common in our older population in the US.

Many physicians today believe that the causes of many of the physical changes we manifest as we age, such as osteoporosis, loss of muscle tone, and organ deterioration, cannot be tied to either inactivity or age. This means that they believe at least some of the changes attributed to aging are really caused by disuse. Male weight trainees in their 40s and up often have physiques that shame men half their age. And the same holds true for women. Weight training has formed almost as many stunning female physiques as it has for males.

Your body will continuously adapt to exercise until you die, and weight training causes a certain type of adaptation that virtually erases the usual sagging of advanced age. There is apparently something about weight training that goes beyond mere jogging or cardio allowing older adults to retain less fat and more flexibility.

The Centers for Disease Control reported in 2003 that strength training “can be very powerful in reducing the signs and symptoms of numerous diseases and chronic conditions, among them: arthritis, diabetes, osteoporosis, obesity, back pain and depression.” Those benefits apply to all ages. A study in New Zealand showed a 40% decrease in falls by women 80 years of age and older after basic strength training.

A basic guide would be to start with compound basic exercises, using light weights, three days a week. Start with doing 8 to 10 exercises with 8 to 12 repetitions. Excellent information on basic strength training can be found in any library or online, as well as how to set up a routine. A great resource on the subject is the book Getting Stronger. Weight Training for Men and Women by Bill Pearl and Gary Moore.

Another resource you should consider is a supplement called creatine. Hundreds of studies over the last 10 years have proven that creatine monohydrate increases strength and muscle size in conjunction with weight training. This compound is particularly effective in older males

A study by the University of Saskatchewan, in 2004, found that giving creatine monohydrate supplements to weight training older adults, for 12 weeks, increased muscle mass and strength more than weight training alone. Just a little tip to help you get an edge over the twentysomethings in the gym. Creatine supplements have been proven safe and effective for years now. You can buy them at your local health food store, or online if you prefer a more reasonable price.

You don’t need a gym membership or expensive equipment to get started. You can perform all the basic exercises with a good pair of adjustable dumbbells. not skimp on these though; you get what you pay for. You will want them to range from 5 pounds to 50 pounds to start off with, depending on your starting strength levels. As always, talk to your doctor before you begin any exercise program.

As to my beginning question: “Are you too old for weight training?” the answer is a qualified no! It’s up to you whether you live a healthy and active life well into your advanced years, or you can get in the car and try on one of those rolling chairs down at the local “Scooter Store”. Your choice; no excuses. The sooner you start, sooner you get results. In no time at all you can be well on your way to improving your appearance, your physique and your outlook on life, as well as doing great things for your internal health in general. Look for my upcoming guide to essential antioxidants and how they can literally extend your lifespan.

After extensive experimentation, doctors have concluded that resveratrol demonstrates the ability to reverse the effects of obesity in mice. In addition, they observed that mice placed on a diet of resveratrol supplements also exhibited higher endurance levels and longer lifespans than mice on a non-supplemented diet.

In a controlled test environment, ordinary mice will normally run approximately one kilometer on a treadmill before collapsing in exhaustion. However, mice that have been given a resveratrol supplement will run twice as far before showing evidence of tiring. In addition, subsequent tests also show that the mice on the resveratrol program demonstrate heightened muscle control and strength and have a significantly reduced resting heart rate when compared to the ordinary mice.

After the success of resveratrol supplement testing on mice and other animals, doctors at the Institute of Genetics and Molecular and Cellular Biology in Illkirch, France have now completed initial human experiments that demonstrate that similar results can be obtained in human test subjects that are placed on a program of high quality resveratrol supplementation.

The key to resveratrol’s effects on the body are in the substance’s ability to work at a cellular level to increase the production of mitochondria. Mitochondria are the organisms in the body that generate energy. The extra mitochondria in the treated mice resulted in the ability to burn more fat and to optimize muscle functions.

Dr. Ronald M. Evans, a scientist at the Salk Institute and an expert on the hormonal control of metabolic functions, stated that the report by the French genetics team had “shown very convincingly that resveratrol improves mitochondrial function” and wards off metabolic disease. Evans characterized described the study as “very important, because it is rare that we identify orally active molecules, especially natural molecules, that have such a broad-based, positive effect on a problem which is as widespread in society as metabolic disease.”

A drug that can prevent degenerative disease, promote weight loss, prolong life, and reshape an individual into a highly trained athlete sounds like the stuff of science fiction. But doctors are convinced that their work into the effects of resveratrol and resveratrol synergy have led to some surprising advancements in the area of anti-aging. They now believe that the body’s ability to utilize sirtuins, enzymes that protect and energize our systems, declines with age. This is the process that is reversed by resveratrol.

The growing evidence supporting the benefits of resveratrol has enthused scientists who do research on the aging process, several of whom are already taking resveratrol supplements. Dr. David Sinclair, a scientist at the anti-aging drug research company Sirtris, has been taking resveratrol supplements in liquid and capsule form for over three years. He claims that half the members of his laboratory do the same and that he is encouraging use of the supplements to family and friends. There are a range of views on appropriate resveratrol dosages, but this involves detailed debate around ingredient purity and potency.

Quality resveratrol supplements are designed to maximize the efficicencies of formula and dosage.