 Horray! It's deadlift day Spring is here and With it a 30-Day Checklist of Spring CleaningI don't know about you, but I really want to declutter and get rid of anything that no longer serves me. April is a great month to spend a little time every day making your home a place that calms your spirit. There is strong evidence that clutter, old stuff, and accumulation of stuff we no longer need and use can be detrimental to our mental health. Oftentimes, when faced with a big project like "spring cleaning," I get overwhelmed with how to start. That's why I LOVE this 30-day checklist. Go in order each day, or complete the tasks that resonate most with you. It doesn't matter how you start or how you finish. Something is better than nothing and momentum creates motivation. Good luck and let me know how your spring cleaning goes!  Download and print a pdf of the checklist below.
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 Today is a heavy day. Eat a bit more protein today and be sure to take your creatine. How to do "Your Own Research" on SupplementsAs athletes I want us all to train hard, eat to support our training and not fall prey to fitness influencers trying to sell us magic pills, powders, elixirs and tonics promising to cleanse, detoxify and do all manner of magical things.
One of the reasons I'm critical of supplements is that they are COMPLETELY UNREGULATED. They do not have to be rigorously tested for efficacy by anyone, not the FDA, not the USDA, NO ONE SINGLE entity of oversight or testing is legally required for supplements. Within the industry there is no requirement of testing for purity, no requirement for testing of what's actually included in the bottle. No testing for if the supplement actually does what it claims to do. A recent study of 57 "sport enhancing" supplements found that 40% DID NOT contain the active ingredient listed on the label. This lack of regulation is the result of a giant multi-billion dollar lobbying force that successfully manipulated congress to pass the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994. This act reclassified supplements as FOOD and removed all regulatory oversight the FDA had in ensuring that what you put in your mouth actually contains what the big-supplement company says it does and that it actually does what the big-supplement company says it will do. I think we deserve better. I think we should be fully confident that what we take to improve our health should actually be tested. Call me crazy, but I want science to show me the money. There are three supplements that have a rigorous tome of scientific research and I have explored them in previous blogs. These are, Creatine, Caffeine, and Protein. I encourage everyone to "do their own research." In the very basic sense of this idea it means reading scientific literature and the actual words of laws, bills, etc. In the case of supplements I think everyone should have a solid understanding of the DSHEA and how the giant supplement industry successfully lobbied for removing regulatory oversight of their industry. That's a cool trick, indeed. Other resources for doing your own research include: Examine.com - Independent group of researchers who do exhaustive literature surveys of supplement efficacy and safety. Operation Supplement Safety - Department of Defense dietary supplement efficacy and safety program Consumer Reports - Third party reporting on the efficacy and safety of supplements.  You get to carry sandbags outside today! "Sunshine on My Shoulders Makes Me Happy...and Produces Vitamin D"I am not a big promoter of supplements and magic pills. This has cost me some business, and I'm totally good with that. I strongly believe in the power of our food, if we focus on eating meat, vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar, to provide us with all of the micronutrients we need. However, there is one micronutrient that is difficult for us to obtain through our diet, not because we don't have access to eating the right foods, but rather that we don't get enough time in the sun. That micronutrient is Vitamin D.
Despite the importance of vitamin D, it’s estimated that anywhere from 30% to 80% of the U.S. population is vitamin D insufficient. For us Montanans, we make make absolutely ZERO vitamin D from the sunlight between November and March. GUESS WHAT IS SPECIAL ABOUT THIS WEEK? SPRING has sprung! That means we are near enough the sun, at our latitude, that we can FINALLY get our Vitamin D from sun exposure! WOOOHOOOO! It's time to get outside people! Because Vitamin D is one of the most common micronutrient inadequacies it's also one of the most studied. A nutrient inadequacy differs from a deficiency in that a deficiency causes a disease, in the case of Vitamin D a deficiency causes rickets and osteomalacia. Vitamin D inadequacy doesn't cause a disease, but neither does it promote optimal health. Vitamin D is a fat-soluble micronutrient that promotes calcium absorption, it also modulates cell growth, neuromuscular and immune function and reduces inflammation. Can you guess what might cause cell growth and inflammation, and requires neuromuscular function? You guessed it, high-intensity workouts and weight lifting. From today through November, spending more time in the sun, like going for a walk in the middle of your day, will not only give you enough sun exposure to generate Vitamin D, it will also help you recover from CrossFit. When your skin is exposed to sunlight, it makes vitamin D from cholesterol. The sun's ultraviolet B (UVB) rays hit cholesterol in the skin cells, providing the energy for vitamin D synthesis to occur. UVB rays cannot penetrate through windows. So people who work next to sunny windows still need sun exposure to make Vitamin D. Research suggests that midday is the best time for exposure since the sun is at its highest point and your body may manufacture it most efficiently around that time of day. Taking a 30 min walk with your face, hands and/or arms exposed three times per week during the spring is enough to produce Vitamin D. In the summer, the sun is closer and we wear less clothes (shorts and short sleeved shirts) and we can get adequate Vitamin D from shorter exposure times. Just 10-15 mins, three times a week, will make all the Vitamin D we need. If you're exposed longer, you can use sunscreen to protect your skin. Let's celebrate spring by taking a walk at noon and harnessing solar power to make an essential micronutrient! You can expect that now that our parking lot is ice and snow free we will restart our post-workout cool-down walks. To your good health!  Have you noticed improvement in your shoulder mobility and stability with the half kneeling windmill press? Dexa Scan and Bone HealthI recently finished Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity by Peter Attia, M.D. Like so many books I consume, I listened to it while cleaning the gym, cooking, driving, etc. I actually listened to Outlive twice and the second time I took notes. It's one of the most important books I've read this year. I suspect I will listen to it again in a few months.
The things I learned in the book were aggravating, shocking, and inspiring. Attia does a good job of explaining what's broken with our current health system and what we can do, personally, to take control of our health and wellness. Prior to reading Outlive I had been dragging my feet on a number of diagnostic tests. It had been 3 years since my last mammogram, I was overdue on my "congrats your 50 colonoscopy," and, according to Attia, I probably needed a Dexa scan. I'm fortunate in that my health insurance will cover all of these tests and I scheduled all of them. I completed my mammogram and Dexa scan last week. I've already had 3 benign breast tumors removed so I know that annual mammograms are important for my extremely dense breast tissue. While I am not in a high risk for osteoporosis or decreased bone health, I wanted a Dexa scan because my father (NOT my mother) discovered he had decreased bone density in his 60s and I was curious to see what all these years of CrossFit had done for my bone density. TL;DR, my bone density is better than the average 30 year old woman:) Not bad for being in my 50s! A Dexa scan will give you 2 scores a T and Z score. The T score is you compared to the young normal mean, AKA average 30 year old women. The Z score is you compare to the age matched mean, AKA average woman your age. Your scores are the standard deviations from the mean. A standard deviation (SD) is a statistical number of the amount a score, in my case my Dexa scores, vary from the mean. A positive SD is higher than average and a negative SD is lower than average. My Dexa scan measured my hip and my spine. Here are my hip scores: T Score: -0.2 (Standard Deviations from the young normal mean). Z Score: 0.6 (Standard Deviations from the age matched mean). I was actually surprised my hip scores weren't higher. Compared to 30 year old women I'm ever so slightly below normal, and compare to women my age I'm ever so slightly above normal. What does this mean to me? I will continue to do my regular fitness training and probably add in more lateral agility and plyometric work. Here are my spine scores: T Score (Average): 2.9 (Standard Deviations from the young normal mean). Z Score (Average): 3.7 (Standard Deviations from the age matched mean). Obviously all of the squats, deadlifts, overhead presses, and all the other things we do that load the core (and thus the spine) have not only created kick ass core strength they have also created fantastic bone density and spinal stability. I'm in the top 2% compared to both age groups. That makes me super happy! What will I do about this? Celebrate my good health and appreciate how 15 years of CrossFit has increased my health span. Have you read Outlive? Are you inspired to schedule all of your age-related diagnostic screening? Share with us some of your wins. |
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