A few years ago, a 52 year old Tarahumara Indian from the Copper Canyon region of Mexico named Ciraldo Chacarito was among the top finishers in a 200 mile race.

He competed against the worlds best young endurance runners who had daily access to the latest training facilities, leading trainers and scientifically designed running equipment.

Ciraldo just showed up for the race.

He had not prepared and was not conditioned for it.

Ciraldo wore hand made sandals and all he attributed his energy and stamina to was a food his people had been eating for 800 years previously.

He ate it before and during the race.

It was Chia. And it worked because Chia contains insane amounts of OMEGA 3 fatty acids.

Read the rest of this entry »

I just finished a huge meal with my family today — ham, yams, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, and ice cream & cake as dessert…

Yeah, I know… how could a fitness professional like myself ever consider gorging on such a huge calorie-dense meal?

What if I told you that you can still eat your favorite foods while simultaneously shedding body fat like crazy! Yes, it’s true… but only IF you understand how to manipulate a few KEY aspects of your diet.

Today I want to introduce you to a unique dietary trick that actually allows you to eat your favorite foods while simultaneously boosting your metabolism so that you can shed off body fat easier.

It involves a little bit of rotation of foods in your diet but is actually quite easy and fun to do once you get it right.

In fact, if you do this right, you’ll actually boost your metabolism and make it easier to burn body fat.

Read the rest of this entry »

I don’t know about you, but I love a good hamburger on the BBQ.

I love them so much that I need to be careful of the ingredients I use or I have a tough time staying lean.

I’ve come up with a really healthy, delicious burger recipe that you’ve got to try – it’s absolutely delicious. And it only has 6 grams of fat, with 24 grams of protein! … and I’ve gotten creative and snuck in some vegetables
as well. Enjoy! Read the rest of this entry »

We need to understand that virtually all unhealthy eating is NOT motivated by anything we’re consciously aware of. Instead, it is the result of “self-sabotaging” thoughts, beliefs, and attitudes that may be lurking just below our conscious awareness.

This negative thinking is invariably the product of negative “programming” we picked up in childhood from parents, teachers, etc., but for many reasons, the unhealthy eating that results may not become a serious problem until we reach adulthood.

As you might guess, will power is a very ineffective tool for solving this problem, since our unconscious motivations are much more powerful and persistent than our conscious desire to “behave.” That’s why the only real solution to our unhealthy eating habits is to “find and fix” the toxic thinking that created our bad habits in the first place–and will keep on creating them until we solve our unhealthy eating problem at its root. Read the rest of this entry »

This is a simple exercise which works by strengthening your deeper transversus abdominis muscles. The results will be “pulling in” your lazy stomach. His does NOT increase fat burning, but it give your stomach that FIRM appearance.

It involves doing something called “ab vacuums“.

I find it a good time to get in the habit of doing daily ab vacuums while driving on your daily commute or another time that would get you in the habit of doing them regularly.

Of course, ab vacuums can be done anywhere and don’t have to be just for work or driving, but I’ve found that it helps me to remember to do them if I do them at a specific time when driving regularly. Read the rest of this entry »

Are you eating at least 25 grams of fiber a day?

I’m sure you’ve heard all the benefits of improving heart and digestive health, but did you know fiber can help you lose fat as well?

Fiber has the ability to expand up to 10 times its weight and size in the stomach. Thus, they make you feel full and satisfied for a longer period. And fiber helps not only by satisfying your appetite, but also by slowing down calorie absorption and keeping energy levels up.Here are some really easy ways to get more fiber into your diet … Read the rest of this entry »

I recently heard a quote from Will Smith, an actor who I admire greatly for his hard work ethic, both in the gym and in his career. It went something like this:

“I will NOT be outworked. Period… You might have more talent than me, you might be smarter than me, you might be sexier than me, you might be all of those things. You got it on me in nine categories. But if we get on the treadmill together, there’s two things: Either you’re getting off first, or I’m gonna die. It’s really that simple.”

-Will Smith, on his work ethic Read the rest of this entry »

Do you know what “sugar alcohols” are? More and more food manufacturers are using it in their products to “hide” the sugars used in their products.

If you’re trying to lose fat, or just improve your overall health in general, it’s important that you understand  that these are and how they may affect your progress.

A member of our program just submitted the question, “what are sugar alcohols,” to our expert panel, and pasted below is Laura Spanbaurer’s reply.

Laura is one of our registered dietitians on staff that helps me answer all
our members questions, and I thought you might find her reply interesting
and helpful. It’s pasted below, I think you’ll find it enlightening.

What exactly is “sugar alcohol?” I found it in the Met-Rx Protein Plus
bar. It says the bar has 32 g protein, 0 g trans fat, 4g net carbs. The
TOTAL carbohydrate is 32 g, broken down as: 2g fiber, 2g sugar, and
18g sugar alcohol (but that doesn’t equal 32?). Also, what are “net carbs”?

Read the rest of this entry »

Did you know that 95% of people who go on “diets” fail?

The reason is simple. People get tired of the complexity, the hunger, the lack of flavor, the lack of flexibility, the lack of energy, and the feelings of deprivation, and so on …

Have you ever blamed yourself for not having the willpower to stick with
your diet? You’re not alone.

But it’s not will power that you need. The problem is not personal
weakness or lack of will power.

Contrary to what fad diets have taught you, achieving your dream body
doesn’t have to be difficult. It doesn’t have to be painful or time-consuming.

With our program you get a customized program that is perfect for YOU, not
another 90-day prison sentence sure to fail. Read the rest of this entry »

Wouldn’t it be great if you could read just one tip and suddenly your evening eating habit would vanish? What if it were that easy? Would you be ready and willing to make that change, if you knew it were possible?

Think about that for a moment: What if you could change a habit, simply by changing your mind? Our minds get stuck in possibility loops, much like we tell ourselves we’re not good at math, or hate board games, or don’t like vegetables or … what are your identity
beliefs? Once you decide you are ready, then change becomes effortless.

Break The Nighttime Eating Habit

Are you an evening eater? Would you like to break the habit, once and for all? If the answer is an unqualified yes, meaning you do intend to end this habit, right here, right now, not tomorrow, not maybe someday, but now, then read on. If you’re not quite ready, read on anyway… Read the rest of this entry »

While I was visiting my parents over the weekend, I decided to revisit my youth — one of the

My backyard ab exercise

chores that I used to do in the yard growing up, that is also a great full body and abs workout. And that was…

Splitting fire wood (the old fashioned way… with an axe instead of a machine)

I saw that my dad had some big logs out in the yard that needed to be split for next winter, so I thought it would be fun and be a good workout to get out there and jump right in.

What a great full body workout… and a killer abs workout for that matter too! Read the rest of this entry »

One woman recently wrote to me and said she would do anything to have a body like Miss Fitness Olympia, Monica Brant.

The very next day, another woman e-mailed me and said, “I wanna look like Demi Moore, Sheryl Crow, Halle Berry or Jennifer Aniston, NOT Miss Olympia.”

A 19 year old wrote to me and said he wanted to get huge – absolutely massive – like the pro bodybuilders.

Other guys tell me they don’t want to get too big – they want to fit into their business suits nicely and they just want to take a few inches off their waist, and get that “Men’s Fitness” look.

I’m not sure what your idea of a “perfect body” looks like because everyone has different goals and different standards of physical attractiveness.

But there is one thing that everyone wants … Read the rest of this entry »

I have a little nutrition IQ test for you today. See if you can guess correctly which breakfast is healthier below.

Breakfast option #1:

-Special K cereal with low-fat soy milk
-Glass of Orange juice
-Half of a wheat bagel

Breakfast option #2:

-Half of a grapefruit
-Whole eggs scrambled with vegetables & organic grass-fed cheese, topped with avocado slices and salsa
-Bison sausage (grass-fed, organic)

And the winner is… breakfast #2 by a landslide!

If you picked breakfast #1… well, you’ve been fooled by clever marketing to think that soy milk, special K cereals, and wheat bagels are actually health foods. Read the rest of this entry »

All fat-burn supplements are basically the same. If you mean multi-nutrients and multi-vitamins that have special combinations of vitamins and minerals that burn fat without caffeine and stimulants, YES, they work. If you mean something that tears your system down for an outward benefit, NO.

For the records, the sole purpose of a fat burner is to help increase the metabolism. I guarantee
you each fat burner will contain at least one or more of the following ingredients:

CAFFEINE

I didn’t think there was a need to go into what caffeine is and how it works. Caffeine is by far the most popular energy and fat burn supplement on the market. Sources of caffeine include soda,coffee, chocolate. It does NOT burn fat, it simply races your heart. Read the rest of this entry »