You are what you eat...and it isn't looking good (Part II)

Ok, so I was out of town for a while and then got bogged down with moving so that, unfortunately, it's taken me this long to write the second installment of this three part series. If you missed Part I, you can find it here


The large scale meat industry is killing us! (Figuratively and literally)

I'm sure we've all had an experience where we're driving down the highway in one of the many armpits of America - its hot, muggy, unpleasing to the eye, and smells like your old college roommate after a long night which neither of you really remember - when all of a sudden you experience an olfactory overload! "Oh my god, it smells like shit!" you tell yourself. Then, a couple miles down the road you realize what it is you're smelling: thousands of cows stacked on top of each other, surrounded by metal fences and standing ankle deep in their own feces. I think many people fail to make the connection that the very burger they may be chomping on while driving down the highway or the steak they ate last night for dinner came from a cow which was raised on one of these very types of "farms." These "farms" are called CAFO's, or Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations and they are where the majority of the meat we consume, worldwide, comes from. According to the Worldwatch Institute, a research organization based in Washington D.C. with a global focus on environmental sustainability, 74 percent of the world's poultry, 43 percent of beef, and 68 percent of eggs are produced on farms of this type. Unfortunately, the food industry has tactfully designed our agricultural industrial complex in a way which minimizes transparency and purposefully isolates the consumer from the site of production. In April 2002 the Illinois House passed House Bill 5793 with a vote of 118-0 which seeks to make illegal the act of photographing or videotaping any animal on a factory farm without the operation owner's consent. Other States and agencies are lobbying for similar regulations. Factory farmers and operators as well as executives from the food companies which rely on these types of farms for their products have mostly and on numerous occasions, denied interviews. Hmmmm, do you think these people have nothing to hide? Highly doubt it! Everything from the amount of times the meat changes hands to the way the meat is packaged is a way for food companies to blind the consumer to the facts that the steak they're eating actually came from a live animal that someone had to kill. These food companies skillfully position metaphorical (and in some ways literal) obstacles between the consumer and the production facility because they know that if the average consumer knew what was going on at these "farms" they wouldn't want to eat their product. It's absolutely disgraceful what's going on at these production facilities. And the result has a direct impact on the health of our environment, our food and consequently us. First off, the raising of the animals is shameful. These animals are confined in spaces much too small for healthy growth. A report by the Compassion in World Farming Trust outlines some of the main welfare problems associated with factory farming. The following is an excerpt from this report which outlines the usual treatment of hens in an industrial farming production facility: "The battery cage [which houses hens] is so small that the hens are unable to stretch their wings or turn around without difficulty...The barren environment and close proximity of other hens can lead to feather pecking and cannibalism. Many hens therefore have part of their beak removed, causing severe and often lasting pain. In some countries, such as the US, hens may be subjected to forced moulting, where they are deprived of food for up to two weeks in order to extend their productive lifespan by shocking them into another cycle of egg laying...Modern broiler chickens have been bred to grow so quickly that they can reach slaughter weight in just 40 to 42 days, twice as fast as 30 years ago. This puts such enormous strain on their heart and lungs that around five percent die of heart failure whilst still in their infancy; and their legs are unable to support their overdeveloped bodies..." And, the treatment of pigs and cows is no better. Many dairy cows, for instance, are pumped full of a growth hormone called recombinant bovine growth hormone, or rBGH (also called rBST or recombinant bovine somatotropin) in order to increase yields. This, many times, leads to a condition referred to as mastitis, where inflammation of the mammary gland leads to infection and secretion of puss, which ends up in the cow's milk. This growth hormone also has a direct effect on the cow, increasing levels of insulin-like growth factor 1, of IGF-1, which is a naturally occurring hormone in the human body but, in high levels, has been linked to various cancer's including breast and colon. These cows are also subjected to a diet which is extremely unnatural. Cows, which naturally feed on grass, are being fed corn based diets (that damned corn again!). The reason for this is that corn is a very calorically dense grain and allows farmers to fatten their cows in order to produce higher yields. The problem with this is that because these cows are eating unnatural diets, getting very little (if any) exercise, standing in confined, dirty pens up to their ankles in their own feces and being pumped full of hormones, these cows are consequently very unhealthy. To combat this, these cows are pumped full of antibiotics. However, this only acts to subdue the problem and by no means solves the problem. These nutritionally unhealthy, antibiotic and hormone filled, shit-covered cows are yielding meat which is also nutritionally unhealthy, filled with antibiotics and hormones and covered in shit. Go figure on that one, right?! Furthermore, the impact that these operations are having on our environment is sickening. Have you ever wondered what happens to all the shit these cows are standing in? Well, the answer isn't pretty. These factory farms store huge amounts of manure in what has been deemed a "manure lagoon." These massive pools of urine and feces often times leech into ground water and have been known to overflow and pollute surrounding water sources. The factoryfarm.org website references an incident in which this type of situation recently occurred. The website states that "In August 2005, a massive manure spill occurred at a dairy in western New York after a wall of its manure lagoon collapsed. As a result, three million gallons of animal waste spilled into the Black River, killing 200,000 to 250,000 fish, disrupting recreational tourism, and forcing Watertown, NY to temporarily suspend use of the river as a source of its public water supply." Crazy, right? Well it doesn't end there! This water ends up on our crops as well! In 2006, E. coli contaminated spinach was being sold at grocery stores in states nationwide. The discovery of the E. coli contamination warrented a largescale spinach recall and subsequent investigation. E. coli and other similar infectious bacterium are generally only found in animal products and only recently have we had to worry about finding these types of bacteria on our produce. So why is that? It can't possibly be because our crops are being sprayed with manure from these supremely unhealthy factory farmed cattle is it?! Well think again! "Samples of cattle manure on pastures surrounding a spinach field ... tested positive for the same strain of E. coli bacteria that killed at least three people and sickened nearly 200 others," according to an article published on the San Francisco Chronicle website just after the outbreak was discovered. The article went on to state that "health officials ... have not ruled out contamination of irrigation water ... or bacteria spread through tainted fertilizer." This, along with many other similar issues, contributes to the overall unsustainability of these factory farms. It seems ridiculous that we would use a system like this when we have a completely sustainable option that we have been cultivating for thousands of years. When you look at a farm with pastured animals, which uses rotational grazing, nothing goes to waste. The soil feeds the grass; the grass feeds the cow; the cow manure feeds the soil. A sustainable ecosystem which we can cultivate for food, where the health of everything involved, from the fields to the meat-eating consumer, is endlessly superior.


Big multinationals are taking our food supply hostage!

It's really amazing what kind of control big multinational food corporations have, in recent years, either seized or were allowed to possess. I'm not exactly sure how they came to be so powerful but I'm going to guess that it's through both seizing and being permitted the power they possess. These companies will stop at nothing to ascertain additional power, as is the case with Monsanto. Monsanto is a multinational giant highly entrenched within the manufacturing of the worldwide food supply - and will be the main focus of the following dialogue. Monsanto is a century-old biotechnology company which made a name for itself with the invention of many well-known chemicals, most notably, in recent years, the pesticide known as RoundUp. (Monsanto is also responsible for creating the very controversial chemicals known as DDT and Agent Orange. The former being a well-known synthetic pesticide discovered during World War II and the latter being an herbicide used during the Vietnam War, both with devastating consequences. They are also responsible for the introduction of rBST under the name Posilac). Though Monsanto has been involved, as a defendant, in numerous legal actions for everything from illegally dumping toxic waste to false advertising, they continue to do business with a tyrannic mentality, intimidating and manipulating at every step of the way. This type of attitude is apparent when you look into Monsanto's treatment of genetically modified organisms, or GMO's. For the first time in history, through the invention of GMO's, it's possible to own a food supply. Over the past few decades, Monsanto has diligently been working to genetically modify the worlds largest crops. Amazingly, when you "invent" a genetically modified food, it can be patented and the rights to that crop can be owned. The largest example of this is Monsanto's RoundUp-ready soybeans. Monsanto has created a soybean seed which is completely resistant to their pesticide product, RoundUp. The use of this seed allows farmers to spray their fields liberally with RoundUp pesticide with no worry of the crop being lost. The pesticide kills everything except their soybean crop, effectively eliminating the need to weed and tend their crops, reducing labor costs. The problems with this growing technique are many. First off, the use (often times overuse) of pesticides on this soil leads to leeching of the pesticides into groundwater, often times ending up in drinking and irrigation supplies. Not to mention that the foods we eat are now covered in pesticide residue (keep in mind that RoundUp is toxic enough to kill everything in a field except the GMO soybeans). The other, potentially larger, issue with this type of farming is that because Monsanto owns the rights to these types of seed they have the legal right to take action against any farmer who has not bought seed from them yet who's fields contain any trace of RoundUp-ready soybean seed. This allows Monsanto the legal right to bully, intimidate and prosecute even those farmers who's crops are polluted, through unintentional cross-contamination, by neighboring farms using RoundUp-ready soybeans. Monsanto has a team of private investigators who follow the farmers on the Monsanto blacklist (yes, they have a blacklist! If that doesn't sound devious and scary, I don't know what would) and periodically test their fields for RoundUp-ready soybean residues. If these farmers, who generally wash and reuse their own seed, have any trace of the RoundUp-ready seed in their fields, Monsanto is quick to force them into a settlement or risk legal fees which will likely shut these, typically small, farmers down. These are just a few of the many problems associated with this type of business. Ultimately, this type of action by big multinational corporations such as Monsanto is leading to what will eventually, if not corrected, be a monopoly of our food supply created by and consisting of genetically modified food products.

In the next installment, the discussion will turn towards larger health implications of this type of food industry and what we can do to stop, or atleast slow, the progression of these atrocities.

Remember: Buy organic and buy local!


notes:
1."State of the World 2006," Worldwatch Institute, p. 26.
2.http://www.ciwf.org.uk/includes/documents/cm_docs/2008/i/industrial_animal_farming_booklet.pdf
3.http://www.factoryfarm.org/?page_id=19
4.http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/10/13/MNG71LOT711.DTL

You are what you eat...and it isn't looking good (Part I)

by Dan Weiss, B.S., ACE, CSCS

Sorry for the long delay but I'm finally back with another posting. I've spent the past few months doing a lot of research on this topic (and there is still so much more I am trying to do) so I'm really excited about this one.

Now, I'm going to switch gears a little with this post. This post wont be about fitness or exercise but will instead be about diet. This will be the first of a three part series in which I will address some key issues with the food we eat.

I think we will all agree that one of the main reasons we exercise is to stay healthy. But exercise isn't the only component to a healthy body and a healthy mind - diet is just as important. There are many reasons why I've chosen to talk about diet, as opposed to exercise, with this post. First, as I just mentioned, it's important to a healthy you! And above all, the reason I am a fitness professional is because I have a passionate affiliation with health. Second, I'm passionate about good food, not just for health reasons but for food in and of itself. And, lastly (and maybe most importantly) our food is not what it should be and not enough people know what kind of crap they are putting in their body.

So, let me start off by saying that our health and our environment is under siege by the food industry! Unfortunately, It appears that a large majority of our country rarely thinks twice about the food they pile into their shopping carts when they make a stop at their local grocery store. It's truly amazing how many products there are to choose from when we walk into a modern grocery store - its almost overwhelming. Where do I start?! Certainly this is a common concern! And there are so many questions to be answered when you try to make a decision about what ends up in your cart: Do I buy the farmed fish or the wild fish? Do I buy low sodium crackers or low fat crackers? Is that "heart healthy" Kellogg's cereal really better for me than the store brand wheat flakes? Where did this ground beef come from? There are so many different stimuli being thrown at us from every direction on every package down every isle that, unfortunately, most of our food decisions are based off of unsubstantiated, general claims stamped all over the package or, even worse, by price! Now, you may be one of the people falling into this trap. Ultimately, it's not really your fault. It's the fault of the food industry and the bodies which govern it. This is the way they like it...complicated. This way, they can to hide the facts from their consumers while spreading their own lies and slander in an effort to convince you to buy their products. Anyway, I wanted to touch on a few of the glaring issues that have been created by the food industry in America. They aren't pretty but people need to know about them. So grab a cup of (uh hum, free trade organic) coffee and prepare to have your mind blown and your eyes opened!

Our diets are not as diverse as we think! Unfortunately, the fact that there are, literally, thousands of products in the average grocery store (in 2008 the national average was 46,852 according to the Food Marketing Institute's (FMI) website) seems to say that we, as Americans, eat a very diverse diet. In fact, the opposite is true! The U.S. produces nearly half the world's corn supply. According to a report by the USDA, the global production of corn totalled 791.63 million metric tons in 2007/2008. The U.S. accounted for 331.18 million metric tons of that total! Unfortunately, the average American diet consists of mostly corn and soybean products. According to the EPA, in 2000, corn and soy accounted for 15.1 and 12.5 billion dollars in sales respectively. The next largest was wheat at only 5.5 billion dollars! And it isn't the farmers who are getting rich from corn production (because our own government is subsidizing corn to the point where it sells for less than the cost of production). No, it's the companies processing and selling the products made from corn who are getting rich. They've got more money than they know what to do with. At this point, we're producing more corn than we know what to do with so we're forced to engineer new roles for corn to fill. It's amazing how much of our diet consists of both corn and soybeans. Corn has become our starch and soy has become our protein. We have engineered these two crops to play thousands of different roles within our food supply. The man-made product, high fructose corn syrup, has all but replaced natural sugar (and in extremely high quantities) in almost every processed food. This is just one role (albeit major) corn has managed to seize within our nation's food supply. The grain is used to make everything from peanut butter to most every snack food you find in the grocery store to aspirin and even batteries and car fuel! And guess what the main ingredient is in the feed that goes to all those cows and chickens and pigs we're eating? You guessed it, corn! So now you tell me, do you think were eating a very diverse diet in this country? In terms of our health, our diets must be diverse in order to obtain all of the nutrients and vitamins we need. When our diet consists of much of the same plant we miss out on many dietary needs. It becomes even worse when the foods produced from this single crop are so damn processed that they have been stripped of any nutrients they had to begin with. We aren't doing ourselves any favors here! Unfortunately, the food companies could care less because they're getting rich. Fortunately, it's up to us to make more informed food decisions and effect change on an individual level through what we decide to put in our bodies. So lets start now!

In part II of this ongoing investigation into our diet, I will talk about the dirty little (or should I say big) secrets of the meat industry and the big multinational food corporations.

I want to leave you with a little further reading or educational material at the end of every segment so I urge you, if you haven't already, to check out Michael Pollan's book "The Omnivore's Dilemma."

And don't forget to check back next week to keep up with part II!!

notes:
1. http://www.fmi.org/facts_figs/?fuseaction=superfact
2. http://www.fas.usda.gov/wap/circular/2009/09-05/productionfull05-09.pdf
3. http://www.epa.gov/oecaagct/ag101/cropmajor.html
4. http://www.ontariocorn.org/classroom/products.html

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Glute activation: The lateral band walk

Here's a new video with Dan talking about glute muscle activation and the use of lateral band walks. Check it out!

What's the real deal with Crossfit?

by: Dan Weiss B.S., ACE

It's utterly astounding how quickly Crossfit has grown over the past decade. You would think that Greg Glassman, the founder of Crossfit, has promised every Crossfit follower 75 virgins in heaven if, for the rest of their "Uncle Rhabdo"-filled lives, they follow the Crossfit "Workout of the Day." But is Crossfit really all that its cut out to be? Now, I'll start off by saying that many different programs can be effective for certain populations and it's just about finding a program that supports your goals...But, I'm not convinced. I wont say that I'm an expert on Crossfit (nowhere near in fact) but I have spoken with fellow trainers on the subject and done a little investigating of my own. Not surprisingly, within only a matter of a few minutes on their website I realized there were some things fundamentally puzzling about Crossfit. Here are a few of the major ones:

Disregard for personalization:
Crossfit lacks an ample amount of personalization. Contrary to what many might argue, these programs are not tailored to each individual. As far as I can see, programs do not start with any sort of athletic assessment (let alone an assessment of medical history - can anyone confirm if this is or isn't conducted?). Conducting an athletic assessment is one of the first steps to any legitimate strength and conditioning program. How can a trainer expect to knowledgeably select exercises for an individual without first knowing what that client needs to work on? If there are any pre-existing issues or imbalances with any of the exercisers, neither the trainer nor the client will have any idea without first conducting an assessment. The failure of conducting a pre-program athletic assessment sets up any program to not only be inefficient but unsafe. Crossfit illustrates well the failure to personalize programs by the fact that in any one Crossfit session you can likely find soccer moms performing the same exercises right next to Navy SEALs. Furthermore, an athletic assessment is the primary method of monitoring a client's progression. Without it, it is very difficult to tactfully monitor any progressions within the program.

There is also a failure to fully educate clients in proper lifting techniques. Greg Glassman even goes so far as to express outright contempt for exercise technique. Glassman states that "If you say that I will not take my intensity past where the form goes bad, what's gonna happen is that the intensity will never develop." What?! Is he serious?! Many of the exercises Crossfit prescribes are very complex movements (such as snatches and cleans). These exercises are not easy to perform and generally require extensive training periods to perform properly. Scrolling through various pages on the Crossfit website I came across many pictures of Crossfit clients performing even relatively straightforward exercises, such as the front squat, with pretty lousy form. This disregard by 'fitness professionals' to take the time to properly teach exercise form is, quite frankly, unacceptable and unsafe.

Using power exercises in circuits:
Power exercises (such as the clean and jerk) are very demanding and incorporating them into a circuit where the exerciser is already fatigued due to other high intensity exercises is both ineffective and unsafe.

"Our specialty is not specializing:"
Crossfit attempts to sell the idea that their program design is ideal because it allows for development of "fitness that is, by design, broad, general and inclusive." I agree with the broad and general part but the inclusive part has me a little puzzled. Their argument is based on the idea that by never specializing in one particular form of training, their program design develops every system optimally. Essentially, Crossfit programs attempt to accomplish everything and in the process don't accomplish anything. Sure, your overall conditioning may improve with Crossfit but its likely due to the fact that your level of fitness was subpar when you began the program and therefore any high intensity physical conditioning would have resulted in physical improvements. Your improvements sure as hell aren't due to Crossfit being the exclusive solution to attaining an unparalleled level of strength and conditioning. Crossfit's whole argument defending their specialty to not specialize just seems completely ass backwards. If you want to build power, for example, you train for power. You aren't training for power by supersetting 30 reps of cleans and 50 burpees. In order to effectively train for power there is no way the load would allow you to complete anywhere near 30 reps (in fact power exercises generally don't exceed 5 reps). Not to mention power exercises, by nature, demand a fairly high amount of interset rest (as much as 5 minutes). By jumping directly into a set of burpees (or whatever exercise this may be) the training stimulus has completely changed. Power is no longer a focus. Now the previous example isn't saying that if you choose to train for power you can't train for strength (or hypertrophy, or strength-endurance for that matter). On the contrary. That is the whole concept behind periodization. Periodization is something that is non-existent in the world of Crossfit however I don't know, and have never heard, of any legitimate strength coaches who don't follow some sort of periodization scheme in all their athletes programs. Periodization is essential to maximizing strength, and maximizing power, and maximizing strength-endurance. The fact of the matter is no athlete has ever gotten good on Crossfit-like training.

Crossfit Certs?!
I'm always weary of any training facility that requires trainers to obtain that facilities personal certification to be 'qualified' to train at their facility. It isn't difficult to see that this is usually just a sly way of increasing company profit. According to the FAQ page on the Crossfit website, every potential Crossfit trainer must posses at least a level 1 Crossfit certification. So let me get this straight: this means that a trainer who possesses a degree in a related field, has nationally accredited certifications and extensive strength and conditioning experience must go through the same training as the college dropout who has no strength and conditioning experience to be considered 'qualified' to teach the same principles? Really? Furthermore, the certification can be completed in a single weekend and requires no official test. The way I understand it, the level 2 certification requires a practical test of some sort, however the level 2 certification is not required to be a Crossfit Instructor. None of this makes sense to me and I can't see how it would make sense to anybody else.

Don't get me wrong, Crossfit may have its place. If you're looking for a workout that is only designed to beat your body into submission, than, depending on what kind of fitness level you enter the program with, Crossfit could very well improve your fitness levels. However, its not going to do anything more than help you attain an above average overall fitness level. It wont turn you into an athlete and it especially wont give you the tools to accomplish specific goals.

I guess Glassman hasn't convinced me to drink the Kool-Aid. But who knows, maybe it tastes better than I think.

Note: I want to note that this is not an exhaustive investigation into Crossfit. These are just my opinions and educated criticisms. I wanted to keep this short and sweet so I purposefully have not gone into the discussion too intensely. I have no intention of steering people away from Crossfit, just showing that the programs may, in fact, contain some flaws that need to be considered when deciding whether Crossfit is best for you.

New Strength and Conditioning Video!

Check out our new video! This video profiles Dan's Strength and Conditioning programs down in San Diego. Contact him at dan@djtrainingfitness.com for more info!

This video will soon be up on the Strength and Conditioning page of our official website.

Dan's got some new equipment!!

Just a few pictures of the new stuff I'll be working with. Give me a call or contact me through our website at www.djtrainingfitness.com and we can work together to maximize your strength and conditioning potential!!

Hypertension and Exercise

This is an article written by Dan Weiss concerning exercise and it's relation to and effect on hypertension. Hypertension is a widely experienced disorder which is related to many other diseases and disorders, including the number one killer in the United States: Heart Disease. Exercise, in fact, plays a huge role in controlling and even preventing hypertension. This article gives a comprehensive overview of understanding exercise and it's relation to hypertension.

Read on thy seeker of higher health intelligence...

(just click on the link below...or you can access the article under the resources page of our official website: www.djtrainingfitness.com)

Exercise and Hypertension, by Daniel Weiss

(P.S. if the link gives you an error message either reload that page or copy and paste the link into a new browser)