Filed under: Training
Yesterday in my Stuff You Should Read post I finished it off with a congratulations to CP client Tim Collins, who went from an undrafted free-agent signee to a major league rookie this year. Well EC just wrote up a tremendous piece of Timmy’s whole story, and I highly suggest you check it out – Tim Collins: Why Everyone Should be a Kansas City Royals Fan (at least for a day).
One more quick note is to let you all know that today is the last day to get 14% off ALL Prograde Nutrition products. The sale ends tonight at midnight, so get on it!
Filed under: General Health, Nutrition, Training
While my blog reading has been lagging a little bit lately, I was able to read a few gems recently that I wanted to share with you guys. Check them out!
Success Tips From Cressey Performance – by Jay Bonn. This is an excellent piece by Jay about the how successful people in all walks of life (though in this case CP and Precision Nutrition) tend to do things in similar fashions. He finds the common threads among these successful places, and shows how success really boils down to simple actions. Great stuff.
Oblique Strains in Baseball: 2011 Update – by Eric Cressey. I think this one of Eric’s best posts ever. While that is a bold statement as he has written probably close to 1000 blog posts, I found this to be a quick and easy read with tons of really interesting information. While I worked for him for 3 years and know his core training philosophy like the back of my hand, this was an enlightening refresher that applies even if you are not or do not train baseball players.
3. While not an article, I thought I should note that CP client Tim Collins has officially made the Kansas City Royals major league roster. Tim is a 21 year old reliever who went undrafted out of high school. He walked into CP right when I first started as an intern there. He was 18 years old and all 5’5″ and 135lbs throwing mid-80′s. He now stands 5’7″ and 170lbs, and throws low to mid 90′s.
This is a testament to good training, good nutrition (ahem), and Tim’s tremendous work ethic. He practically lived at CP in the off-season, as he would be there the day after his season ended ready to begin anew. I couldn’t be happier for him and wish him all the best this season.
Filed under: General Health, Nutrition
Aren’t sensationalist titles fun? While yes that might be a bit of a stretch, it really isn’t too far off.
In November of 2010 in the journal Diabetes Care there was a study published that pretty much made such a declaration. In the study, involving over 300,000 people, they found that drinking only one or two sugary drinks per day increased your risk of developing diabetes by 26%!
Surprisingly to some, this risk was apparent regardless of bodyweight. Just because you are thin does not mean you are healthy or not at risk for diseases like diabetes.
This also brings me to another point about all of those Naked and Odwalla “protein shakes” and fruit smoothie concoctions. Would I put them in the same class as soda? No not entirely as they do contain a wee bit of fiber, some vitamins and minerals as well as phytonutrients and antioxidants.
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Filed under: General Health, Nutrition
As promised yesterday, today’s post is going to be an epic one. The You Asked, I Answered posts are some of my favorites, and today is going to be a great one. I have three great questions that I think a lot of people wonder about, and I provide some pretty thorough responses. Enjoy!
Q. Hi Brian-
I have a follow-up question to one of your recent postings (you can use this question on your blog if you want); you mentioned that you have ‘a probiotic’ at breakfast. I know this word, but really don’t understand the term. When I think of probiotic, I think kefir, yogurt, sauerkraut and/or kimchee. I’ve also seen the term ‘prebiotic.’ Can you maybe expound on this topic (or if you have addressed this in a previous posting, maybe you can direct me to it).
As always, HUGE THANKS for your time and thoughts:-)
A. First off, thinking of whole food sources of probiotics is a great thing! Probiotics are simply live bacteria/microorganisms that are thought to beneficial to the organism in which they reside. Probiotic literally means “for life.”
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Filed under: Nutrition, Recipes
I will admit, I have been absolutely swamped today, so I wasn’t able to pull together the awesomeness that was going to be my blog post today. However, it will be done for tomorrow, so keep your eyes peeled!
I guess that is the one downside to going on vacation – the absolute mountain of work to tackle when you get home.
Anyway, I didn’t want to leave you guys hanging, so check out this new article I had posted over at getprograde.com!
5 Quick and Easy Lunch Ideas
I pulled together some of my very own original recipes, as well as tips and ideas on how to give yourself the quickest and easiest ways to have a healthy lunch every day. I know I say it all the time, especially to my clients, but food prep is king!
While I wouldn’t recommend spending hours per day preparing your food, set aside 5-10 minutes everyday to make and or pack yourself 2 quality meals. It is amazing how much more consistent your intake will be when you do this, and consistency is key to long-lasting results. Period.
So check it out.
Plus don’t forget Prograde is having a 14% off sale on ALL of their products. Just a small reminder for those interested.
Filed under: General Health, Nutrition
I just wanted to give you guys a quick heads up that Prograde is offering a 14% discount on ALL of their products over the next few days.
Jayson Hunter’s daughter is turning 4, so to celebrate her birthday they are offering this tremendous discount!
To get the discount, click HERE <———
I particularly like their multivitamins, so be sure to check those out! I will also note that if you sign up for their Smart Ship program (where the item is shipped to you automatically every month), you save the most money by far.
Filed under: Movie Review
Well we are back from our little get-away to California. I must say if it wasn’t for the traffic and $4.20/gal for gas, I think I would love to live near the San Diego area. It is absolutely beautiful, and I could definitely get used to 60-75 degrees year round! Especially since it is actually snowing in Maine right now!
While out relaxing in CA I was able to get some sunshine and catch up on some reading that I have wanted to do for months and months. I was pumped about that.
What was also cool was on the flight out there, they showed True Grit on the plane. While I haven’t taken a flight where a movie was provided in a long time, somehow I don’t remember them playing recent Oscar nominees!
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Filed under: Nutrition
I recently posted a new Day in the Life blog about what my diet looks like on a non-training day. A reader asked in the comment section how this would differ on a day where I was training, especially since I have cut down my intake to 4 meals a day, rather than 5.
To be honest it is not tremendously different. If I was trying to gain some mass, or get leaner then that might change things a bit, but since I am just maintaining my current state, most of my days look relatively similar.
In addition I thought this would also be a good time to point out that you will notice I don’t eat immediately before or after I train. Insane nutrient timing protocols are highly overrated, and newer research, especially in trained persons, is finding them to provide no extra benefit.
This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t bookend your training with high quality proteins, carbs, fats and produce, I am simply pointing out that the exact timing pales drastically in comparison to overall intake.
Anyway, on to the good stuff!
Wake @ 5:15
Breakfast @ 5:30
- ½ tbsp grass-fed butter from a local farm
- 5 whole pastured eggs from a local farm
- 1 Ezekiel sprouted grain English muffin, toasted
- 2 tsp Betsy’s of Maine Organic Apple Butter (organic – apples, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves)
- 1 banana
- 2oz POM Wonderful pomegranate juice
- 1 glass water
- 10oz black coffee
- 1 multivitamin
- 2,000IU vitamin D
- 1 tsp Carlson’s fish oil
- 1 probiotic Read the rest of this entry »
Filed under: Nutrition, Training
There are always interesting new developments in the research world, and I wanted to share a few fun ones with you guys today.
Many of you know how I dislike unstable surface training – ie. training on a Bosu ball or physioball, etc. EC’s Master’s thesis showed that unstable surface training actually decreased strength in athlete’s who were only using it for a very small percentage of their training.
Bosu for the Core?
Well, many people argue, these exercises are not about strength, they are about increasing the activity of your core and improving balance. However, Spanish researchers recently tested this theory and they found that performing total-body movements on an unstable surface (Bosu in this case) actually worked the core muscles less than doing the exercises on the floor. This was due to the fact that doing the exercises on the Bosu ball forced the exercisers to use less weight, requiring the core to work less hard.
If you want to read more about this, check out EC’s Truth About Unstable Surface Training.
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Filed under: Nutrition
Grilled cheese is an American staple. Who didn’t love a super buttery grilled cheese on white toast, with gobs of Kraft singles when they were a kid? It was delicious!
Unfortunately, white bread, Kraft singles made from dubious sources, and butter with annato (added to provide color because corn-based diets don’t provide adequate nutrition to do so) don’t exactly make for a top-notch health statement. Neither did adding several slices of poorly produces, massively processed deli meat.
However, last night I was determined to make a healthy grilled cheese where I felt satisfied enough in its integrity to feed it to my pregnant wife.
Using a local grass-fed butter, I buttered up our grill pan and set to work. I dropped in 4 slices of Ezekiel sesame bread and let those toast for several minutes. I flipped them for a minute to get both sides a little action.
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Posted on March 31st, 2011 by Brian St. Pierre
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