The Chill Pill: The One Drug You Should Be Taking

I review studies almost everyday. Most are on food, exercise, or supplements and how they might better your life. But there’s one topic, far less popular, that’s a constant theme running through many of these, which leads to better results 100% of the time: chilling out.

Today’s post highlights an article from Dan Buettner and NY Times on some of the longest living populations in the world. The main character left the US for his native home on an island in Greece to die when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer nearly four decades ago. The laid back agrarian lifestyle not only cured his cancer but allowed him to out live all of his doctors.

Six months came and went. Moraitis didn’t die. Instead, he reaped his garden and, feeling emboldened, cleaned up the family vineyard as well. Easing himself into the island routine, he woke up when he felt like it, worked in the vineyards until midafternoon, made himself lunch and then took a long nap. In the evenings, he often walked to the local tavern, where he played dominoes past midnight. The years passed. His health continued to improve. He added a couple of rooms to his parents’ home so his children could visit. He built up the vineyard until it produced 400 gallons of wine a year. Today, three and a half decades later, he’s 97 years old — according to an official document he disputes; he says he’s 102 — and cancer-free. He never went through chemotherapy, took drugs or sought therapy of any sort. All he did was move home to Ikaria.

It’s an amazing story that’s less unique that you might think. I can’t recall how many instances I’ve noticed the common theme of improvement in a study is linked more to a lifestyle change than whatever was being studied, especially when that change led to less stress.

Of course we can’t all move to an island. We can, however, chill out. It’s entirely within our scope, no matter what we do and where we live. Remember the Seinfeld (the show about nothing, aka everything) when George becomes the “opposite of every man you’ve ever met” and his casual dismissal of a car cutting him off turns on the woman he’s with? That was more than self-deprecating humor. It was a lesson.

We’ve become a nation of control freaks in the world that can’t be controlled. It’s a no win scenario. We look for distractions to ignore it but these things, like sports, TV, political nonsense et al, make it worse as they too are uncontrollable. We need to focus inward, on our day-to-day lives and what makes them rich, which is not money but our relationship with others around us. "It's not the end of the world," is a cliche we too often ignore. What are we in such a hurry to do, anyway?

In Samos, they care about money. Here, we don’t. For the many religious and cultural holidays, people pool their money and buy food and wine. If there is money left over, they give it to the poor. It’s not a ‘me’ place. It’s an ‘us’ place.”

You don’t need to move to an island to do this. All you need to do is find a way to relax. Exercise and diet, both major elements in the story, are the best place to start because they force your body into a more relaxed and healthy-functioning state. The rest is completely within your control and you can start right now, by reading the article, which sufficed as my daily dose of chill. Now maybe I'll unplug my clocks.

Seeking to learn more about the island’s reputation for long-lived residents, I called on Dr. Ilias Leriadis, one of Ikaria’s few physicians, in 2009. On an outdoor patio at his weekend house, he set a table with Kalamata olives, hummus, heavy Ikarian bread and wine. “People stay up late here,” Leriadis said. “We wake up late and always take naps. I don’t even open my office until 11 a.m. because no one comes before then.” He took a sip of his wine. “Have you noticed that no one wears a watch here? No clock is working correctly. When you invite someone to lunch, they might come at 10 a.m. or 6 p.m. We simply don’t care about the clock here.

stamatis moraitis tending his vineyard and olive grove on ikaria. andrea Frazzetta/LUZphoto for The New York Times

62,000 Bad Things and 6 Good Things

Dr. Mercola can be an alarmist wanker but he spins a plenty of good advice as well. And when I say spin I mean it in a myriad of ways. Two of those involve him trying to sell you stuff and ranting like a spinning top. But I love a good rant so, for today’s entertainment, I present his version of 62,000 bad things and 6 good things.

First, as his article is titled, we’ll look at the bad. Did you know that drugs were 62,000 times more likely to kill you than supplements? Well, it’s true, apparently, though I didn’t dig too deep into how he did the math. I mean, when every single drug ad on TV has a running list of possible side effects, often including death, that barely squeeze into the allotted time slot I don’t think bickering about numbers is necessary. But just in case you didn’t get the memo, our favorite hippy doctor hammers you with plenty of statistics, and enough conspiracy theories to make Robert Ludlum proud.

In striking contrast, drugs are known to cause well over 125,000 deaths per year in the US when taken correctly as prescribed – yet the FDA allows fast-track approvals and countless new additions of poorly tested drugs to the marketplace that must later be withdrawn due to their lethal consequences.

Obviously that statement is a little off the cuff since, well, we still have law enforcement in this county. But it’s worth reading, even with a skeptical eye, because much of what he’s saying makes too much sense not to be at least somewhat true.

He then leaves us with a shiny, happy ending so he can sell us some of his stuff. But, hey, a guy’s got to make a living and his 6-lifestyle recommendations to avoid meds are worth reiterating. I’m not sold they’ll mean that you’ll “never need medication” but they’ll certainly stack the odds in your favor. I’ve presented them here abridged but click anywhere for the full rant. I mean report.

1. Proper Food Choices Generally speaking, you should be looking to focus your diet on whole, unprocessed foods (vegetables, meats, raw dairy, nuts, and so forth) that come from healthy, sustainable, local sources, such as a small organic farm not far from your home....

2. Comprehensive Exercise Program, including High-Intensity Exercise High-intensity interval-type training boosts human growth hormone (HGH) production, which is essential for optimal health, strength and vigor...

3. Stress Reduction and Positive Thinking You cannot be optimally healthy if you avoid addressing the emotional component of your health and longevity, as your emotional state plays a role in nearly every physical disease -- from heart disease and depression, to arthritis and cancer...

4. Proper Sun Exposure to Optimize Vitamin D We have long known that it is best to get your vitamin D from sun exposure, and if at all possible, I strongly urge you to make sure you're getting out in the sun on a daily basis...

5. Take High Quality Animal-Based Omega-3 Fats Animal-based omega-3 found helps fight and prevent heart disease, cancer, depression, Alzheimer's, arthritis, diabetes, hyperactivity and many other diseases...

6. Avoid as Many Chemicals, Toxins, and Pollutants as Possible This includes tossing out your toxic household cleaners, soaps, personal hygiene products, air fresheners, bug sprays, lawn pesticides, and insecticides, just to name a few, and replacing them with non-toxic alternatives...

The Problem With “Calories In, Calories Out”

One of my themes this year at Summit was “TMI” or too much information when it came to how to best educate coaches. Clichés can be helpful but, when the root is not understood, can also lead to stagnations or regressions in your fitness. One of the worst offenders is the saying “calories in, calories out”.

This is not an untrue statement. The problem is that no watch made records the information you need to know. People are constantly rattling off numbers to me that they’ve used to assess their training that are not only wrong, but crippling their ability to evaluate the program.

In the name of the free market, you can now purchase all sorts of training apparatus that provide TMI when it comes to evaluating your training program. There are many important physiological responses at work that aren’t recorded by your Polar. To ignore them in the name of numbers will lead to an exercise plateau or worse. A deeper explanation will help you understand why we create fitness programs the way that we do.

In order to keep this short and simple I’m going to gloss over some science in the name of clarity. “Calories in, calories out” is correct in that it’s how you calculate weight loss or gain. The issue is that your monitor can’t see most of the factors involved. It cannot assess hormonal and nervous system responses to training or nutritional factors that affect recovery and all three things are arguably the most important aspect of your training.

Nutritional factors are the easiest to understand. Proper foods and nutrient timing, as you’ve heard in any spiel about Recovery Formula or Shakeology, enhance the body’s recovery process. The faster you recover the harder you can train. As those of you who are P90X Certified know results are based on adaptation to stimulus, and the only place you might be able to gauge this on a watch is with morning resting heart rate.

just some of the stuff your watch doesn't understand

Even more important are hormonal factors. If you’ve read the guidebook for Turbo Fire you’ll see something that we call the AfterBurn Effect, which is your body’s metabolic adaptations to high intensity training. As our training programs get more advanced one of the main factors we’re targeting is hormonal response. In a nutshell, as we age our body shuts down its hormone production (eventually leading to death). Intense exercise is one of the few things that force you to keep producing these. Intensity is relative, of course, which is why we progress from say, squats to squat jumps to X jumps as you move up the Beachbody food chain of programs. But what’s called a “hormonal cascade” in response to training is even more important than what your heart is doing during exercise, and it’s something else you can’t see on your monitor.

adaptive stress that leads to overtraining that only can be guessed at by close evaluation of morning resting heart rate

Hormonal cascades are triggered by your central nervous system, which is the hardest training factor to gauge (why most overtraining comes from breakdown at this level). When you dissect a program like P90X2 or Asylum, one of the main things we focus on is nervous system function. All of those “weird” things like Holmsen Screamer Lunges or Shoulder Tap Push-ups work on something we call proprioceptive awareness. And while it might seem hard to understand, since it doesn’t lead directly to more sweat, the neuromuscular action of these movements force deep adaptations by your body. These changes can take a long time to register but force a massive adaptive response that lead to long-term increased changes in movement patterns that trigger hormonal responses and, thus, metabolic change. Needless to say that stuff ain’t getting registered by a chest strap or pedometer.

Sure, the cumulative effect of all these can be calculated and the number at the end would equate to calories in, calories out. But since there’s no way to measure these numbers without doing a ton of fancy testing in a lab setting you can see why doing one of our diet and exercise programs and trusting us is a better option than scarfing an “Extra Value Meal” and then walking around the neighborhood until your heart rate monitor says you’ve burned 1,500 calories.

11 Supplement FAQs

I was answering these the other day for staff training and thought they’d make a helpful post for everyone. Basically they are questions we get from most of our customers in some alliteration about taking supplements of any kind. I have no idea who actually compiled these questions but I’ve heard them all many times.

1-what should I consume before a workout?

Nothing, hopefully, but there are times when eating something makes sense. Basically if your diet is good then you have an empty stomach and fully tapped glycogen stores that will last for 1-1.5 or so hours of hard training. However, there are many scenarios (dieting, too busy to eat, etc) that mean you should eat prior to training. When this is the case nutrition follows the post-nutrition protocol in that glycogen store replenishment supersedes all other factors, meaning mainly carbs, a little protein, very little fat and a solid electrolyte profile.

2-Can I take my supplements after 6pm?

Time is irrelevant because we all have different schedules and each supplement has different parameters for its usage. In general supplements are either meant to be 1) taken with food 2) taken in the morning on an empty stomach 3) taken before bed on an empty stomach 4) taken pre-workout 5) during workouts, especially long ones 6) taken post workout. Of course this is all dependent on what it is but those are pretty much the only nutritional windows we have to consider.

3-Will creatine make me fat?

Creatine has nothing at all to do with getting fat. It works in your Kreb’s cycle improving anaerobic endurance by allowing your cells to store more phosphocreatine. When you take creatine you store more water to add volume to your cells and that adds a little bit of weight but this disappears when you stop taking it. It’s never stored as adipose tissue (body fat). Only as water to allow your body to perform better. However, even a slight bit of extra weight can matter so those in, say, gravity-dependent sports will want to monitor their creatine usage.

4-I heard chocolate milk is good to consume after a workout, is this true?

In ONE study chocolate milk outperformed Gatorade or something similar that was a carb-only electrolyte supplement and the dairy industry has made a big play out of it. It does come close to a 4 to 1 carb to protein ratio so it’s more appropriate than many options but won’t perform nearly as well as specialty formulated post-workout recovery supps.

5- Can I drink too much water and is it possible to dilute my supplements, thereby minimizing their effectiveness?

You could theoretically do this but it’s not particularly likely unless you’re exercising all day long where water can dilute your electrolyte balance and create a potentially lethal condition called hyponatremia.

6- Can i eat and take my supplements at the same time?

Depends on what you are taking. This is almost always addressed on the label. As a general rule vitamins are best taken with a meal and everything else is situational.

7- Is there anything I can take to reduce my soreness after exercise?

The best thing, by far, is a post-exercise recovery supplement because quick glycogen replenishment is the most vital factor for minimizing muscle soreness.

8- My joints hurt after lifting heavy weights. Is there any supplement I can take to make this go away?

Not really. Fish oil and other omega 3 supplements can help with inflammation but post-exercise pain in a joint, unless you have a chronic condition, is due to something more akin to an injury. Regular omega 3 supplementation can minimize the risk of such conditions to some degree and is almost always encouraged, especially for people on acidic high-protein diets.

9-How much protein do I need each day?

Daily protein intake is not nearly so important as how much you get each meal. Studies continually support that fact that large amounts of protein cannot be digested at one time, meaning that it’s important to have some protein each time you eat for best results. No consensus has been reached to upper limits as there are many factors that affect digestion but somewhere around 30 grams seems to be the range almost anyone can use. Therefore we like to recommend that all meals and snacks contain somewhere in the 30 gram range as a maximum for efficient protein utilization.

10-Is it bad to eat fat in my diet?

No. In fact you’ll die without it. There are only three macronutrients and they are all equally important for proper function and performance. Fat is every bit as vital to your diet and protein and carbohydrates, which is probably why most foods found in nature have some of each.

11- If i miss my window of consumption post exercise, should i still drink my recovery drink?

Basically yes but it depends by how much you’ve missed the one-hour window and what else you’ve eaten. When you are low on glycogen you need to replenish it if you’ve recently exercised. When you don’t exercise the template changes but after hard exercise you need to replenish your glycogen stores. Your body will do this with any food it gets but it’s much slower if you use the wrong macronutrient ratio. So if you’ve eaten after your workout a recovery formulation won’t help much but if you haven’t it will, even if it’s been more than an hour or two or three.

Doper!

I’m a doper. A cheat. An un-American scallywag who has obviously put winning ahead of the principles of our greatest athletes. You know, folks like Roger Clemens, Marion Jones, and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Wait, what?! Um, ok, never mind. Anyway, if I were subject to a drug test right now I would fail because I’ve been taking a legal substance that has recently been added to WADA’s banned list.

But here’s the rub: it does nothing. I mean, it’s complete garbage as an ergogenic aid. WADA claims it has some “anabolic properties” and, thus, they’ve banned something that’s been on the market for decades that has caused no great shakes in the performance world.

Early in the WFH I decided to dust off an old supplement strategy that I’d tried 20 years ago. It hadn’t worked then but I wanted to confirm that. One of these supps, Mesabolin, is actually a plant sterol called ecdysterone. It’s pretty common and shows up in a few plants. Anyway, I hit it hard, first with prescribed dosages and then with double that... and... nothing. Well maybe a little bit of gastric stress but not a tad of performance enhancement.

And now it’s banned, which I don’t care about at all except for the fact that it doesn’t work and I’d prefer it if WADA actually focused on things that are, well, doping and not some nutrient that you can get by eating completely natural plants.

So anyway, here’s the review of my WFH supplement strategies. Nada. I pretty well knew the argentine/pyroglutamate wouldn’t work because tests done on oral argenine have never confirmed what’s been done using injected argenine and I pretty well confirmed that. And now I've confirmed that ecdysterone does nothing, too. That is unless you are a competitive athlete. Then it will get you disgraced, turning you into a bitter scourge of society who’ll be bummed that you didn’t just suck it up and call Michele Ferrari and get on the real stuff so at least you could have gotten banned with some money in the bank.

The Curious Case Of Vitamin D & Why To Take Supplements

I got a lot of comments other day making me realize that I should blog more on supplements. I also need to do a better job explaining how they work. Using examples is often the easiest way explain things so today we’ll showcase the rising popularity of vitamin D as an example of why to take supplements.

The curious case of vitamin D is very simple. To live healthily our bodies require a certain amount of a bunch of nutrients. It’s pretty resilient, and can make do without things for a surprisingly long time but, at some point health begins to diminish without your vitals. Enter vitamin D, a “fat soluble” (meaning we can store it in our fat tissue) vitamin that’s essential for life and once was pretty much impossible to be deficient in since we get it from sunlight. All we have to do is spend a little time outdoors, soak up a few rays, and we’re golden.

There haven’t been many vitamin D famines in history. Historically you didn’t need to worry about it unless you were in a medieval prison, in which case you probably had more pressing matters. Even in cultures where the sun is gone for much of the year we were fine because we can store vitamin D in our fat cells. Nowadays, however, many people rarely see the light of day. Hmm, perhaps this explains the recent popularity of vampires in pop culture, but I digress. Even when we do venture into the elements we’ve often slathered on so much zinc oxide the sun hasn’t a chance to do its magic.

When you lack a vital nutrient, and then get it, the effects can seem wondrous. And this is why vitamin D is currently being coined a “miracle supplement.” The main reason for taking supplements is to replace nutrients that, for some reason, you are lacking. Given the bang-up job Big Food has done with destroying edible products and then serving us boxes of sugar “fortified with [random] essential vitamins” you can see their niche right away. But you should also be able to see that the better you eat the less need you have for supplementing your diet. Taking vitamin D is great if you need vitamin D. If you don’t you are wasting your money.

The biggest problem we have is deciding which supplements we need. Even if it were reasonable to have your doctor test for everything they could think there’s almost no way to find a deficiency without an acute symptom for them to target. This is why a multi-vitamin is highly suggested for most people and, especially those who are limiting their caloric intake. Taking a good multi-vitamin will ensure that you aren’t, at least, grossly deficient in most major nutrients.

Targeted supplements are harder to figure out. You need to analyze your lifestyle and try and guess what you need. If you’re on a training program it’s easier because everybody runs a similar template when exercising. You can anticipate nutrient losses due to exercise and plan for this, which is why sports supplements are popular. Once that’s done then you can then look for lapses in performance that will give clues to a deficiency, which you can then supplement for. Exercise is the great equalizer. Not only does it improve your health but it amplifies your health problems and makes it easier to figure out what is wrong, at which point you can fix it.

Supplement “results” are misleading. Marketers have spun them out of control with ridiculous advertising schemes, most of which are out right lies. Supplements only provide miracle results when you find something that your body is starving for a feed it that nutrient. They can help you perform better at functions you do, like exercise, which can improve your quality of life. This symbiotic relationship between exercise, your diet, and supplements is the most efficient way to get your body into peak condition. No supplement can do that on its own.

Someone thought Tony Horton was bashing creatine when he posted an article showing a 4% improvement, but 4% is massive. Most banned performance enhancing drugs don’t do much better than that. If you need to improve more than this then you need to exercise and eat better. But 4% at the top of your game is the difference between an Olympic champion and not making your Olympic team. The key is getting to the top of your game first, which takes hard work. No supplement will yield results unless you are willing to work for them. They are, as their name suggests, simply a supplemental part of your overall plan.

Supplement Strategies

I’ve been asked to blog more about supplements so I’ll start with a post on what I take and why. As many of you know, I’m referred to as Beachbody’s white mouse; meaning everything we make gets tested on me first. But I don’t just test what we make. A lot of what I test ends up on the cutting room (or is it bathroom?) floor.

Over the years I’ve tried hundreds, if not thousands, of supplements. My impression is that supplements are over-hyped and most are a waste of money. There are, however, cornerstones that I use as part of my daily diet and an occasional supplement I find vital for max performance in a given situation. The problem with supplements is that we hype them the same way we do drugs. They are not drugs. The upside to this is that it’s VERY hard to hurt yourself with supplements. The down side is that our expectations tend to be too high.

Supplements are food, or condensed food. Most can be consumed in their natural state and, if we ate well, many would be unnecessary. While this means they tend to be safe it also means we don’t “need” them. However, using proper supplementation strategy can help us live healthier and perform better, especially when we train hard and even more importantly when we’re dieting and exercising.

I break my supplements into basics and situational. Basic supplements are things I take pretty much all the time. Situational are those I use depending on what I’m doing. Let’s look at these first. In the same way that your diet should reflect what you are doing, so should the supplements you take.

For example, two of the most proven supplements in history are creatine monohydrate and 4 parts carb to one part protein recovery formulations. Neither are daily tonics. They are for given situations. Creatine is useful when you’re training hard and trying to build muscle or anaerobic strength. If those are not your goals it’s not only a waste but can interfere with your diet by encouraging your body to retain water to increase cell volume. Recovery formulations are only for when your glycogen stores are extinguished which takes hard exercise or starvation. No one eating well and exercising 30 minutes a day or less would ever need a recovery formulation. In fact, it would be terrible for you. However, when your training hard, eating lean, and using up your body’s limited glycogen stores the stuff is more valuable than gold.

Basics are things you should take everyday, like food. Since it came out Shakeology is on the top of my list. It’s like a healthy insurance policy in a glass.

I begin every morning with three Joint Support Formula capsules, one Core Cal Mag, two Omegas, and an Activit tablet. At night I take another Cal/Mag tablet and a vitamin with my Shake. I look at this group of supplements as part of my diet and nothing more.

Besides situational supplements that I know work I’m often playing my white mouse role by experimenting with something new or different. Currently it’s this protocol, and the jury is still out on what I think of it. My next block of training (experimenting with The Workout From Hell) is going to include something different, which I’ll report on if it’s effective. I’m also playing around with coconut oil and chia seeds. The latter is just a food but hasn’t become a staple yet. I think it will become so. I’m not yet as sure about coconut oil’s status as medium chain triglyceride. As fall rolls around and I begin to care more about my performance I’ll stop experimenting and revert back to proven supplements that work for whatever my goals are.

Shakeology, Activit, and Peak Health

At the Team Beachbody Summit this weekend we launched a product we’ve been working on for a few years. It’s called Shakeology. I think it’s better served by its tag line, The Healthiest Meal of the Day.

It’s a protein shake, greens formulation, pre and probiotic supplement, anti-oxidant, phytonutrient, adaptogen, enzyme formulation all rolled into something that tastes like dessert. In short, it’s the smartest 140 calories you can put into your body.

I’ll be writing, chatting, and blogging about this formulation over the upcoming weeks. Today I’d like to begin by addressing the most popular question of the weekend: Should I keep taking my Activit (or Peak Health) along with Shakeology.

The short answer is yes, but since Shakeology has a lot of vitamins in it already, this requires further explanation.

First off, taking your vitamins with Shakeology will improve their bioavailability. It’s a perfect transport vehicle for most of your supplements. All of them, really, except for creatine, Recovery, and other sports specific supplements. As you’ve probably heard, you don’t get all the nutrients on the label of a vitamin, nor do you get all of the nutrients in the foods you eat. The better your diet is (more balanced, pH-wise, in short) the better it can utilize nutrients in the foods you eat. Shakeology will help with both.

Next we need to address the RDA. It’s important to keep in mind that the RDA for everything is targeted for a subsistence level. An active person needs more, and it can be a lot more. When we try and decide how much more we should use the example of an extreme athlete. When you’re involved in something like the Tour de France, you CAN’T consume enough nutrients in a day to recover from what you’ve done. This is why drugs are used and why doping in sports is such a problem. With this in mind it’s easy to see how someone working construction would have a vastly different RDA than a computer programmer. So you can see how RDAs have little relevance to you, especially if you’re doing something like P90X.

This is why you’ll want to continue to take your vitamins. As you get into better and better shape your nutrient needs continue to grow. The cool thing is that you get to eat more. The downside is that the harder you train the more you’re at risk for overtraining. And the best way to keep from overtraining is to eat well. The more nutrients your calories contain the better you are eating.

There’s an old sports adage that states, “There is no such thing as overtraining. There is only undereating, undersleeping, and failure of will.” With Shakeology as a component of your diet you stand a better chance of checking off, at least, one part of this equation.

Drugs or Food?

Found this on the wires today:

Food Affects Some Like Drugs

Interesting in the wake up my feature article last week:

Food, Drugs, and Supplements: What's the Difference?

Part of my piece discusses which aided/hindered the person more, Bonds' nefarious drug use or The Babe's imfamous "diet".

While I'd like to file this under the "duh files", I can't. Our society seems to become more and more disconnected to their own bodies. We really need to change our education system. This should be basic knowledge for everyone, not some elective class that most people skip. It's just about the most fundamental thing we should learn--how our body works and how to take care of it. But I'll refrain from ranting today. Just read this stuff and see if you agree.