Conditioning Research

Watching football is bad for you? This study, says that men with known coronary heart disease should be really really careful about watching a stressful football match.....it could finish them off! Cardiovascular Events during World Cup Soccer Background The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) World Cup, held in Germany from June 9 to July 9, 2006, provided an opportunity to examine the relation between emotional stress and the incidence of cardiovascular events. Methods Cardiovascular events occurring in patients in the greater Munich area were prospectively assessed by emergency physicians during the World Cup. We compared those events with events that occurred during the control period: May 1 to June 8 and July 10 to July 31, 2006, and May 1 to July 31 in 2003 and 2005. Results Acute cardiovascular events were assessed in 4279 patients. On days of matches involving the German team, the incidence of cardiac emergencies was 2.66 times that during the control ...

Are you good at chins? Here is a good one - following statistical analysis, this study indicates that short individuals are more likely to achieve maximum chin-up test scores. I am over 6 foot, so that is my excuse for being a bit rubbish at pullups. I can do singles with an extra 20kg, but with no added weight I struggle to get to 6. Chin-up strength tests: does stature matter? AIM : Many organizations place high value on employee physical fitness and use standardized physical fitness tests (PFT) to quantify it. The chin-up strength test is an example of such a test. Participants' anecdotal reports raise some concern that the latter is inherently biased against tall individuals. A demonstration that tall individuals are less likely than short individuals to achieve maximum score on a chin-up strength test, and modified scoring tables that equalize this likelihood across the stature range are sought. METHODS : A statistical summary of 85 chin-up test outcomes is analyzed for lik...

If you want to maximise the fat burning effect of effect of exercise, what should you eat after a workout? This study - and the full paper is currently available here - seems to indicate that you should keep away from a carbohydrate rich meal. It is a really interesting paper to read and what I get from it is that having a carb rich meal after a workout blunts the fat burning effect generated by the exercise. Have a read - see what you think. Devany gives another reason not to eat carbs after the workout Does prior acute exercise affect postexercise substrate oxidation in response to a high carbohydrate meal? BACKGROUND : Consumption of a mixed meal increases postprandial carbohydrate utilization and decreases fat oxidation. On the other hand, acute endurance exercise increases fat oxidation and decreases carbohydrate utilization during the post-exercise recovery period. It is possible that the resulting post-exercise increase in circulating nonesterified fatty acids could atte...

Peter over at the Hyperlipid blog has put up a good post tracking through some recent papers showing again and again that scientists keep reporting that low cholesterol levels are associated with cancer and indeed "with all-cause mortality, showing significant associations with death through cancer, liver diseases, and mental diseases." Of course, the scientists really don't like to admit this..... Check it out at Colorectal cancer and cholesterol

Richard has an excellent post on the whole "Is a Calorie just a Calorie" controversy! 180 Degree Errors Read the whole thing, but his conclusion is worth repeating: So I think we have a 180 degree error and Taubes is right: hyper caloric intake, in itself, does not cause us to be fat. Hyper insulin causes us to be fat, and that issues forth a whole cascade of problems (effects), one of which is hyper caloric intake. Repeat. And the effect of that cause is that very nearly everyone in the diet and nutrition establishment has been [conveniently] fooled. Incidentally, Richard has arrived somewhere close to my current practice - low carb diet plus intermittent fasting . Before anyone wades back in on this debate, take the time to watch Taubes lecture at Berkeley . You do not have to buy the book - he explains the key issues in the lecture. Art Devany has also commented on Taubes: Energy Balance is Dynamic This isn't really metabolic advantage, but Alwyn Cosgrove mentions a...

Just a couple of videos today: first off some bodyweight stuff: then Ross Enamait demonstrates several movements with a pair of homemade ab wheels. A more detailed discussion (with pictures) is provided at the link here . Nice bit of Pantera on the soundtrack too!

Just a quick note of a number of things I've been reading in the last day or so: Cholesterol - I'm still a sceptic What’s Cholesterol Got to Do With It? - Gary Taubes looks at the recent news that the drug Vytorin had fared no better in clinical trials than the statin therapy it was meant to supplant. Trial results forced out of drug company support the concept that cholesterol may not ’cause’ cardiovascular disease - Dr John Briffa comments on the same topic Do Cholesterol Drugs Do Any Good? - Research suggests that, except among high-risk heart patients, the benefits of statins such as Lipitor are overstated - similar article from Business Week and on a different subject: Cutting caffeine may help control diabetes - “We’re not sure what it is about caffeine that drives glucose levels up, but we have a couple of theories,” says Lane, who is the lead author of the study. “It could be that caffeine interferes with the process that moves glucose from the blood and into musc...