Here are three easy, home remedies you can employ to help nip a cold in the bud, ease your premenstrual cramps, and relieve you of that hangover nausea.

Remedy #1 – Scallions and Your Cold

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) believes when you have a “cold,” the attacking pathogen is actually stuck in the outer layers of your body. This is why all of the symptoms you feel are also on the outer areas of your body – your runny nose, your achy neck, your cough and sore throat are all happening externally as opposed to deep inside of you. In order to release the pathogens from your body, TCM needs to open up your pores and let the evil out! To do this we use a number of diaphoretic, or sweat-inducing, herbs and food products.

An easy fix as soon as you feel the symptoms of a cold coming on is to gather two stalks of scallions and some hot water. Cut the green end of the scallions up into small pieces (an ⅛^th of an inch long) and put them in the bottom of a bowl. Pour in two cups of piping hot water and let the mix steep for 10 minutes.

Drink this mixture down, wrap yourself up in a warm blanket, and break out the last season of Desperate Housewives on Netflix – you’ve now taken the first step towards thwarting that pesky bug.

Related: 3 All-Natural, Home Remedies For Colds: Do They Work?

Remedy #2 – A Spoonful of Cinnamon Makes the Cramps Go Away

Although I’ve never experienced the joyful physical effects of PMS personally, I have successfully treated hundreds of woman with PMS symptoms through acupuncture and herbs. TCM views the cramping and pain caused by premenstrual tension to be due primarily to an attack of “coldness” on the uterus.

We have to give the ancient healers a little bit of leeway here, as they didn’t have the same imaging equipment and hormonal testing that we do now. All they needed to know, however, was that applying heat to the lower abdomen of a woman in pain was far more effective than applying an ice pack. Seeing my significant other doubled over on the couch with a hot water bottle and a blanket every 28 days is all the confirmation I need.

An easy home remedy for the cramping and pain of PMS is a spoonful of cinnamon added to hot water, hot milk, or hot almond milk. The warming effect of cinnamon is said to enter into the meridians of our body relieve the cold that’s trapped within them.

Add a spoonful to your warm morning beverage next time you’re feeling the monthly tension.

Related: Easy, Natural, Home Remedies For Your Monthly Visitor

Remedy #3 – Ginger for Nausea

Some good times without a hangover may seem like Christmas trees without presents under them – something’s amiss! When you wake up after the big party and try to sort out exactly what was said to whom, worry not about the upcoming wave of queasiness and nausea that’s surely on its way. Cutting up a piece of fresh ginger, no bigger than your thumbnail, and adding that into a cup of steaming hot water will help immensely in keeping your breakfast where it belongs.

Ginger is a fantastic remedy for a number of ailments, ranging from the prevention of food poisoning for its antiparasitic effects (ever wonder why it often accompanies pieces of raw seafood?) to clearing up a phlegmy cough in children. Its harmonizing effects on the stomach have long made it a favorite of pregnant women and the hung-over men who got them there.

Related: Avoid The Puke Fairy: How To Curb Nausea In Training

Give any of the above three home remedies a try next time something ails you and see for yourself why they’ve survived the test of time.

The post 3 Common Health Complaints & 3 Remedies You Already Have appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

I went on to explain that although there are different locker room and scientific views on the subject, I had personally found when it came time to walk down to the cage, despite being nervous, nauseous, and slightly terrified, having abstained from sex also had me feel like killing someone with my bare hands. This lent more towards winning than losing. Although it was made very clear to me that “Mama has needs,” I also explained to my wife that we could still technically have sex, I just wouldn’t be participating in the grand finale.

CrossFit Games competitor Matt Chan is also an advocate of refraining pre-competition and was quoted on the subject after last year’s games. In a video question and answer session, Chan said, “From what I understand, there’s something called ‘chi.’ You can’t give it away to everybody every day or else you lose your chi and all of a sudden everything falls apart. I hold on to my chi until the Games are over.”¹

Matt Chan was not alone in his thoughts, anyone who grew up in the 1980s remember Rocky Balboa having it clearly laid out for him by the ever-wise Mickey, “Women weaken legs.” The real life Rocky Marciano was said to keep away from bedroom activities pre-fight, and he was the only heavyweight ever to retire undefeated. Coincidence?

So given the prevalence of this belief, let’s look at this subject from both an Eastern and Western perspective so you can make the individual decision of whether to gift your qi (sometimes spelled chi) or keep it to yourself prior to a big competition. I’m sorry to say I could not find a single study done on female athletic performance and sex, which is odd for a number of reasons but mostly because of the prevalence of women in both activities. So for the purposes of this article we’re going to pretend that Harry never lunched with Sally at Katz’s and male ejaculation is still considered the standard definition of “sex.”

Modern Science and Sex

Most people have heard the notion from fighters that “sex kills your legs” or “women weaken legs,” but is there any truth to the matter? A study by the University Hospital in Geneva found that “sexual activity had no detrimental influence on the maximal workload achieved and on the athletes’ mental concentration. However, the higher post effort HR [heart rate] values after the maximal stress test on the morning of sexual intercourse suggest that the recovery capacity of an athlete could be affected if he had sexual intercourse approximately 2 hours before a competition event.” (Note: the study was performed on male athletes.) Fortunately for most athletes I know, the two hours before big events are usually spent in and out of the bathroom evacuating everything but our sexual fluids.

Another study went on to say, “the results from a 1995 randomized cross-over study suggested that sexual intercourse 12 hours prior to the test had no significant effects on maximal aerobic power, oxygen pulse, or double product.” So, if modern Western science says there’s no danger in having sex before a competition, where does this notion of sex being bad for the legs come from? Is it simply a wives’ tale used to keep up-and-coming (no pun intended) athletes home at night and not out philandering until the wee hours of the morning with the fairer sex?

Traditional Chinese Medicine and Sex

To get back to Matt Chan’s comments specifically, let’s look at Traditional Chinese Medicine’s view of qi with relation to sex. First, some basics. What the heck is qi? This is a great question and one that people significantly smarter than I am have been trying to put into layman’s terms for centuries. The best explanation I have heard is from fellow acupuncturist Tom Boldt. He said, “When you wake up in the morning and you feel like getting out of bed – you have qi. When you wake up in the morning and you don’t want to get out of bed – you don’t have enough qi.”

Pretty straightforward, if you ask me. Energy is the ethereal substance we all use to power our lives and we know when we’ve got more of it than less. I like to think of qi as a daily allowance of energy that we all get. When we rest, it builds up and we’ve got some extra for the next day. When we overspend today, we have to borrow from tomorrow’s amount and will soon find ourselves overdrawn, and most likely coming down with something or just flat-out tired.

This daily energy deposit of qi comes to us from our savings accounts of jing. In Traditional Chinese Medicine, jing is the term used for the overall amount of root energy that we come into the world with. This energy is passed on to us by our parents and when you hear the statement, “He comes from good stock,” it is a hearty supply of jing that is being spoken of. When we run out of jing, then we also run out of time on Earth – so use both wisely. Lastly, jing contains a different quality to it than qi. Jing is considered richer, bolder, and more powerful. Think gold in comparison to cash. One gets you a cab ride n New York. The other backs the entire currency of nations.

Since sperm contains the seed of life, it is ripe with jing and therefore one of the many reasons that Taoist masters recommended keeping it to ourselves. Therefore, it makes sense that ejaculation is not only a release of qi but also a release of jing. Not only are we spending some of our daily cash, but we’re also dipping a bit into the savings account passing on some of the higher quality loot.

Classic Chinese texts give us sexual frequency guidelines in regards to health, but do not touch as much on sex and the proximity to athletic endeavors. However, the texts do demonstrate concerns around frequency when it involves too much of something leading to a negative outcome. Since Traditional Chinese Medicine is generally conservative with their view on the release of any precious substances, I think it’s safe to extrapolate that they’d be of the same view as old Mickey. They’d just word it in a more poetic manner.

As both an athletic trainer and a Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner, I’d personally say you’re pretty safe knocking boots with your significant other the night before a competition. If having sex leaves you so lacking qi and feeling adversely affected in your athletic performance the next day, then there’s more than likely a larger problem with your health and conditioning. Like all human performance aspects, it’s also safe to defer to common sense and a little fun self-experimentation. There’s nothing stopping any serious athlete from taking note in their training log as to their perceived energy levels (on a scale of one to ten) on workout days both post- and sans coitus. (Hopefully more post than sans. Get some.)

Plus, there are more than adequate studies correlating a good night’s sleep to an enhanced athletic performance – and nothing puts this author to sleep faster than grabbing the Mrs. and attempting to make up for the six weeks we missed a few years back.

References:

1. “Schooling the Press,” CrossFit Games website, CrossFit, Inc.

2. J. Sztajzel, et al., “Effect of sexual activity on cycle ergometer stress test parameters, on plasmatic testosterone levels and on concentration capacity. A study in high-level male athletes performed in the laboratory,” Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness, 40(3), 2000.

3. T. Boone, et al., “Effects of sexual intercourse on maximal aerobic power, oxygen pulse, and double product in male sedentary subjects,” Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness, 35(3), 1995.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post No Sex Before Competition? The Medicine Behind the Myth appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

But putting moral and ethical thoughts to the side for a moment, today I want to concentrate on testosterone deficiency itself. As an acupuncturist and practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine, I’ve treated a number of people for the symptoms of low testosterone – fatigue, low libido, depression, weight gain, and insomnia. If you came to me as a patient, I would use acupuncture and herbs, and prescribe natural ways to boost your T and keep your training at its peak.

But before I did any of that I would tell you first what not to do:

1. Don’t buy stupid stuff.

Don’t buy or take any supplement with EXTREME, XXX, or any ridiculous play on the word steroids. I know, the guy in the picture is huge and the product says that it’s actually banned in some countries. Amazing. It’s most likely filled with enough caffeine and other stimulants to make you feel great during your workout, once you get over your shaky hands and grinding teeth, but will wear you out over time and keep you awake at night. If I could get all of the money back I spent on supplements with tough sounding names in my twenties, I’d be writing this from my own private island. Save your money; buy vegetables.

2. Don’t skip sleep.

I’m sleep challenged, so I feel your pain if you’re in the same boat. Sleep is glaringly important for all health markers, but for some of us it’s just tough to come by. A quick Google search will load you up with studies showing the benefits of sleep for testosterone and the detriment of lack of sleep as well. One such study stated, “Men who slept less than 4 hours in a 24-hour period had about 60 percent less total testosterone and 55 percent less bioavailable testosterone than men who slept longer than 8 hours.” Although four hours versus eight hours is a big difference, skipping sleep is bound to affect you in a number of negative ways, especially in testosterone production.

3. Don’t eat sugar.

One of my favorite teachers in acupuncture school stopped our whole class when the subject of sugar came up and he proudly exclaimed, “I’d rather my kid get hooked on heroin than on sugar.” He was obviously joking but making a strong point. Sugar is the devil. Per Liver Doctor, “Research presented at The Endocrine Society’s 91st Annual Meeting in Washington D.C found that sugar ingestion can cause a man’s testosterone level to drop by up to 25 percent.” Sounds like one more reason to ditch sugar for good.

Once I told you to stop doing those three things, here are four more things I would tell you. These are four things that you can do to naturally boost your testosterone levels:

1. Add a little horny goat weed to your life.

Yin yang huo or horny goat weed is a great herb used by traditional Chinese medicine practitioners for boosting testosterone in both men and women. The herb comes in a leaf form and makes an easy morning tea. Often prescribed for low libido on it’s own, the other benefits of yin yang huo include increasing memory, combating frequent urination, helping numbness and tingling in the limbs, and regulating menstruation. 3 to 9 grams in a tea is all it takes.

2. Get some sunlight.

Vitamin D is a great natural booster of testosterone, but most people need more than they’re getting. Having some in your multivitamin is most likely not sufficient for a training athlete. Supplementing to get your intake of vitamin D up to 800-1000 mgs per day has been shown to increase testosterone and overall strength markers. Plus, it’s an excuse to spend some time with Mother Nature. With your shirt off.

3. Pick up heavy shit.

Lifting weights is a regular part of most of our lives, but if it’s not and you feel that your testosterone levels are low, then give it a go. Properly performed heavy squats and deadlifts have been shown to raise testosterone levels in both men and women. Follow that with throwing down a post-workout steak while watching Rocky IV and you’re bound to see your testosterone levels go through the roof.

4. Work on your body language.

Based on this TEDTalk, you might want to assess and adjust your body language, as it can have an impact on both your testosterone and cortisol levels.

Whether testosterone supplements, natural or otherwise, are right for you is still going to be a very personal decision. If you’re a competing athlete then even more thought should go into the equation. For many people, feeling their best is their number one goal and a worthy one at that. Give the above advice a try and if you still feel like you’re not where you should be, reach out to a professional who specializes in endocrinology and testosterone replacement.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post 4 Things to Do and 3 Things to Stop to Naturally Increase Your Testosterone appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

The concept of testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) has reentered the national conversation. At least it has resurfaced in my life, as a number of my main training partners are on it. It’s also come up with better-known athletes, such as fighters Rich Franklin, Chael Sonnen, and Vitor Belfort.

I have always been against the idea of using “steroids” and never did take them in high school for a number of reasons. However, those reasons were not scientifically based, but more personal. I thought, “I don’t want to look back and think that my athletic success was due to synthetic help rather than from hard work and a smidgen of God-given talent.”

Herein lies my dilemma, though. I will admit to having a negative view of people who use anabolic steroids probably since the first time my Mom told me they were “cheaters.” However, since the age of thirteen, I have also been regularly using and competing while using a substance that for a long time was banned by the USADA. I am an asthmatic and have been inhaling Albuterol for my entire athletic career.

“That’s a stupid comparison,” people have told me. “Albuterol is medicine, steroids aren’t.”

Or are they? Doctors have been prescribing steroids for years for such medical concerns as chronic asthma, inflammatory issues, failure to thrive, bone breaks, surgical recovery, and the like. And if my friend John has hypogonadism and needs to use TRT to get his testosterone levels back up to where mine are naturally, is it any different than me having asthma and needing to use Albuterol to get my lungs to open up to the point where his are naturally? Aren’t we both just getting ourselves back to a level playing field?

This article isn’t about the stacks of testosterone, growth hormone, and litany of other drugs that the professionals are using. Nor is it about the subsequent health woes or lack of health that comes with these substances. It’s a relatively free country after all. People can do most things to their bodies without question. This article is about the controversy surrounding TRT. Is it something men need or is it just another form of cheating?

I had the pleasure of sitting down with Santa Barbara’s Ageless Men’s Health director and Paragon BJJ black belt, Jason Fairburn last week to talk about TRT. Jason’s clinic treats men from age primarily between ages 35 – 55 and he told me that the initial process works like this:

“Men come in to see us for any number of reasons. Many of them are having trouble sleeping, or are dealing with fatigue and depression. Their sex life isn’t what it used to be, they have low energy, or they’ve had blood work done by their doctors for other reasons and have been found to have low testosterone levels.

No matter what the initial reason, we do our own blood work on everyone who walks in the door. The average range of testosterone in men is between 400 and 1200 ng/dl (nano grams per deciliter) Then we sit down with them and go over everything. If their range is under 400ng/dl, we recommend that they begin testosterone replacement therapy. If their numbers are below 200 ng/dl, then we do further testing to rule out further complications involving the pituitary gland. They may need to see an endocrinologist, as their case may be more complicated.”

Due to my own bias and lack of true understanding of TRT, I figured that once people got their initial shot they’d be in the gym the next morning deadlifting with a throbbing erection (as if deadlifting isn’t awesome enough on its own). Jason cleared this up immediately:

“People so often confuse what we’re doing here with unregulated, gym locker room steroid use. My job is to get people to the optimal testosterone level for their age, not to double that level, triple that level, or more.

Most men report a very mild increase in daily energy. Many patients report having a clearer head and positive mood, being able to sleep straight through the night for the first time in years, and of course, there are increases in sexual desire and ability, as well as strength gains, faster muscle recovery, and sometimes muscle growth in our athletic clients.

The greatest benefit we see is simply that our clients report that they feel better. They don’t need four cups of coffee to make it through a workday, and because of this their mood and general outlook is greatly increased.”

Sounds like all positive doesn’t it? But what happens if you stop taking your TRT? Isn’t your pituitary gland going to stay dormant after not having to produce its own hormones?

“Along with testosterone, we give our patients human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG). It is used for male infertility by urologists as well and mimics the actions of luteinizing hormone and follicle-stimulating hormone, both of which are hormones secreted by the pituitary gland to maintain testicular function. This keeps their own bodies producing testosterone as well. This way if they come off of TRT there’s not a complete shutdown of their endocrine system. This is why it is vital that TRT patients undergo their treatment under the care of trained professionals and not by themselves.

That being said, our patients do have to realize that not only will their bodies be producing less testosterone than they’ve been living with while on TRT, but also realize if they started treatment at age 31 and are now 35, they’re going to wind up with lower levels than when they first walked in the door. Most of our patients stay on TRT indefinitely but some do decide to cycle themselves off periodically – both are perfectly safe and truly are a matter of patient preference.”

Common side effects of being on TRT can range from mild acne and an increase in body hair to an increase in male pattern baldness – but only if the individual is predisposed to the symptoms to begin with. Men that were already going to go bald without TRT (in addition to being extremely handsome) will simply find themselves in this state earlier on in their follicle career. Common side effects of coming off of TRT include a decrease in energy and sexual desire, and possibly a return of the patient’s initial symptoms.

Why are businesses such as Jason’s flourishing? And why are American men finding themselves with lower levels of testosterone to begin with?

Environmental factors such as fluoride and a litany of female hormones passed from birth control pills to urine to our public water supply, as well as a decrease in vitamins and minerals in our fruits and vegetables from conventional farming methods, coupled with an abundance of chemicals and hormones in our meats and fish, all have led to a decrease in testosterone levels in men. No matter the factor or combination of factors, something is lowering male testosterone levels.

To T or not to T is still a very personal question, and one that should be considered with input from a physician that has no financial stake in your final decision, as well as some personal introspection on the possible benefits and hazards of long term endocrine manipulation. As a competitive athlete the moral dilemma is more complex, but for most of us who are just trying to get through our day in the best way that we can, opening up an honest conversation is step one.

In a follow up article, I’ll be sharing with you some natural ways to boost your testosterone.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

Albuterol photo by ParentingPatch (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

The post To T or Not to T: The Controversy Over Testosterone Replacement Therapy appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

I love kettlebells, love ‘em. The first time I saw one was when I walked into Petranek Fitness years ago as a fledging CrossFitter. For most Americans, it’s only in the last ten years that the word kettlebell has entered into our lexicon.

Spurred on by the growth of CrossFit and the hard work of the good people at the RKC and World Kettlebell Club, more and more Americans are realizing the benefits that can be gained with this simple, yet highly effective tool. So, when the opportunity to speak with kettlebell legend and founder of the World Kettlebell Club, Valery Fedorenko presented itself, I jumped on it.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Valery Federenko, his accomplishments in the sport of kettlebells are not lacking. At the age of 17 he began his professional lifting career and went on to become the first 80 kilo (176 pounds) World Champion. He was later awarded the uber-prestigious Honored Master of Sport by the USSR. The Honored Master of Sport is kind of like being the National Champion, World Champion, and Olympic Champion, all wrapped into one.

Given that Valery started his kettlebell training at the age of 12, I began my conversation with him under the assumption that most of the young men in his home country of Kyrgyzstan were training with kettlebells. Valery quickly corrected me:

Kettlebells were not that popular. Before I started training with kettlebells at age twelve, I was doing boxing, martial arts, and gymnastics. I saw that the people using kettlebells were really skinny guys like I was, but they were also very strong given their size and that was a surprise to me. I wanted to be able to surprise people myself with these same displays of strength. I even thought to myself that someday I’m going to have to stop using kettlebells and start bodybuilding in order to meet girls. Just not in this lifetime though, since I love kettlebells.

Winning over girls aside, one of the main reasons that Valery enjoyed training with kettlebells is their practicality. “If you go to the gym, you have to get there, warm up, and then usually people work each body part separately. That can take you one or two hours,” explained Valery. “With a kettlebell, you can kill yourself in ten to fifteen minutes!” It is for this reason Valery has become such an advocate of kettlebell training.

Many kettlebell enthusiasts, myself included, are big fans of both the two-arm swing, and the Turkish get up. I was surprised to learn that Valery was not a fan of either and asked him to explain why.

The one-arm swing is much more beneficial athletically. First of all, not many kettlebell handles were designed to have two hands wrapped around them and this can create problems in and of itself. With a two-arm swing you usually also have to have a much wider stance, turning it into more of a squat than a swing. My version of the one-arm swing has a bit of a rotation in it making it much more of a dynamic, ballistic movement. Through training with this one-arm swing I was able to do a one-arm deadlift of 175 kilos (385 pounds) at 75 kilograms (165 pounds) of bodyweight with no straps.

For accuracy’s sake, and since I also currently weigh in at 165 pounds, I asked Valery to tell me those numbers a second time. He did, and I might have sworn to never touch a kettlebell with two hands ever again. Ever.

As for the Turkish get up, Valery added:

This movement is more of a demonstration of strength than a training tool. You already have to be strong to do this correctly and safely, as there are so many opportunities for your shoulder to be at an angle or position where it could get injured. I am also not going to put my sixty-year old mother onto the floor with a kettlebell and make her stand up and lie back down. It just doesn’t make sense from a training standpoint.

The get up is also too slow. Why spend two minutes doing six repetitions when you can do one hundred? We are humans, and humans have to do repetitions all day. How many one-step repetitions does a baby do in a day, ten thousand? I would rather have someone do many jerks, push presses, or snatches in that time and see more benefit.

And while the difference in philosophies in regards to the swing, the get up, and the number of repetitions may be rooted in differences in the Russian styles of kettlebell, there is always the highly debated topic here in the United States – Russian swing versus American swing. Valery shed some light on this as well:

Once the kettlebell has reached my chest, it is floating, why do I need to make it go any higher? I have already engaged my legs, my back, and my shoulders, why do I need to spend more time making it do something that will not give me much in return?

The American swing is also done with straight arms like Pinocchio and it can often become an issue of flexibility as to whether it can be done correctly. I know a 300-plus-pound NFL lineman who was injured swinging a 35-pound kettlebell this way – because he was inflexible, not because he was not strong. Swinging this way also adds a shock to your back when the bell comes down between your legs.

Mostly though, it takes too much time. Too much time means fewer reps. Tell me how many reps and I’ll tell you who you are!

So how do you find out who you are when it comes to kettlebells? When asked if he had any advice for a novice kettlebell athlete, Valery was adamant. These are the five things to consider before each workout:

1. What are you hoping to get out of your training? If you want bigger biceps, the kettlebell is not for you.
2. How long do you have? Are you going to do a four-minute workout, or a twenty-minute workout? The length of time is very important.
3. How fast do you want to be going? Do you want to do 15 reps per minute or 100 reps per minute?
4. What exercise will you be performing? Will you be snatching, pressing, jerking, or something else?
5. After answering the above questions, then you pick your weight. A 48kg bell is not as advised for 100 reps as a 24kg bell. Choose wisely.

But don’t think you have to be able to do a million reps to partake in Valery’s kettlebell philosophy. Valery is driven by a passion to get more people in shape through kettlebells, and not just coach to the elite.

“I am not interested in training a world champion only,” he shared. “Why spend so much of my time making one person into a champion, who does that help? I would rather spend that time helping ten thousand people understand fitness and better their lives. That’s what I’m going to do.”

Personally, I believe that a man with the dedication and work ethic to turn himself into a world champion before the age of twenty can do anything he sets his mind to, and this case will be no different.

The post Interview with Valery Fedorenko, Founder of the World Kettlebell Club appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

I don’t believe CrossFit is inherently dangerous, especially if taught by intelligent, experienced coaches. However, CrossFit is brilliant at pointing out people’s natural, athletic, structural, and muscular deficiencies. As coach Eric Malzone says, “CrossFit is going to let you know all of the ways that your regular life has screwed you up physically.” Unfortunately, it often does this through an injury.

Malzone and I actually own a CrossFit gym together, and we’ve had our fair share of “gurus” walk in and present their new-fangled gadgets and modalities. Oh wow, you’ve combined muay Thai, Zumba, yoga, and hypnosis into an eight-minute workout my clients will love? Fantastic, leave your flier on the counter and try not to disturb anyone who’s actually training on your way out. Thus, when Dr. Eric Goodman came in and asked us if we’d heard about his Foundation Training, I smiled a lot, batted my eyelashes a few times – since, well, he is kind of dreamy – and listened to what the man had to say. With a heavy dose of skepticism we let him run a few of us through an abbreviated version of his usual hour class.

I believe Malzone and I were both sold on what Dr. Goodman had to offer about thirty seconds into that first Foundation session when we couldn’t get our legs to stop shaking nor our sweat glands to close. To this day it infuriates me that with my current physical skill set I can’t hold the proper Founder position for more than about fifteen seconds without wanting to cry just a little bit.

So what the heck is Foundation Training and why should it be making its way into the lives of CrossFitters? Per Dr. Goodman:

Foundations Training is a set of movements and positions designed specifically to teach our individual muscles to act within strong, flexible chains of muscles. This allows us to disperse weight more evenly and keep our postural alignment, even under load.

Dr. Goodman spends his day teaching people how to change the movement patterns that are breaking them down – the patterns setting them up for injury in CrossFit.

As a coach, I have found the positions and movements of Foundation to be invaluable training tools. Telling an athlete to engage their lumbar is one thing. Putting them into a physical position where they are forced to engage their lumbar and therefore have the tangible experience of it being engaged is exponentially more powerful. Repeatedly putting people into that position until they are not only engaging their lumbar consistently, but additionally building the necessarily strength in the corresponding muscles is the best way to keep them out of the chiropractor’s office.

The Founder Position is the core of the training:

To enter into a proper Founder:

1. Stand with your feet facing straight forward, legs about 3 feet apart. Stand tall with your chest held high and chin pulling back towards your neck.
2. Press your body weight into the heels and pull your hips back behind you with knees ever so slightly bent. Be sure to continue your chest lifting and chin pulling towards the neck throughout the whole movement sequence.
3. As the hips pull back bring the arms, with palms up, straight ahead of you. Lift your arms as high as you can and keep your eyes on the horizon. Your lower back should be on fire within 20 seconds if in the right position.
4. After 20-40 seconds of the founder position you are going to stretch to the ground or to a chair height object I’m front of you. As you stretch, be sure to keep your weight behind your heels, knees slightly bent and hips as far back as possible.
5. If you feel the stretch in your hamstrings, calves, glutes, and low back you are nailing the exercise. Hold it for 20-40 seconds.
6. SLOWLY begin to return to the founder position by pressing your hands to the shins and lift your chest up with a tight, braced lower spine. WATCH THE VIDEO AT LEAST ONCE THROUGH BEFORE ATTEMPTING THE FULL EXERCISE.
7. As soon as your chest is high enough to look forward and your weight is pressed firmly into the heels you can bring the arms behind you, making your chest as wide as possible. Your goal is to recreate the dense muscle tension at the low back muscles while stretching the hamstrings. That will make a lot more sense after practicing a bit.
8. The finishing move is bring the arms forward and up as high as possible while keeping the hips hinged, the weight on the heels and the chest as high as possible.
9. Do this a lot.

As an active athlete in CrossFit competitions, Malzone had this to say, after trying the protocol for a while:

It’s easy when I do Foundation consistently – my back doesn’t hurt at all and I can throw around a lot of weight in workouts. When I don’t do it consistently, my back starts to hurt and I have to spend my training time icing down. For me, that’s not really a choice.

At our gym, Malzone and I include Foundation Training as part of our regular class rotation not just because it is hard (hard does not mean effective – golf is hard), but we both endorse it because, very much like CrossFit, we walked away from it that first time thinking, “Well…I’m not all that sure what the hell just happened, but 1) it was awful and 2) I feel amazing and want to do it again.”

Malzone has a herniated disc at L4/L5 from a lifetime of water polo meeting a #400 deadlift. I’ve got a royally screwed up neck after from a few years of MMA. After a few weeks of Dr. Goodman’s hippie movement voodoo, we’re both training harder than ever – pain and injury free. As are our clients.

For more information feel free to check out foundationtraining.com.

The post Foundation Training: Relieve Pain and Improve Performance appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

It was a sad day when I realized that being told by my live-in girlfriend that I, my head, our bedroom, my side of the bed, the laundry room, and our apartment in general “smelled like my gi” was not a compliment. I thought all of those hours on the mat and the resulting effervescence equated to universal acceptance by the female race. Apparently not.

Two things generally take a BJJ player off of the mat: injury or a skin issue. Although most gyms do their best to keep the mats sanitary and clean, you never know if your training partner puts the same attention on his/her personal hygiene that you do – especially if you’re a competitor at a tournament. Ringworm, staph, herpes, and all manner of other festering skin issues can get passed from training partner to training partner and will derail both your daily training and your social life.

Hawaiian born and raised, owner Chad Hospodar has been a part of the Brazilian jiu jitsu world for over a decade now. His company, the Arm Bar Soap Company, has created a great natural solution – the After Training Soap. Made with all natural ingredients including five essential oils – tea tree, eucalyptus, lemongrass, bergamot, and peppermint – their soap is sure to leave you smelling significantly better than your gi, and worry free about skin rashes. The oatmeal crumbs seal the deal with their exfoliating properties.

Tea tree oil alone has long been used by the practitioners of natural medicine like myself due to its extraordinary anti-fungal and anti-microbial properties. In conjunction with eucalyptus oil, this one-two combination is a brilliant partnership for first cleansing any abrasions or cuts received in training and then reducing the inflammation and redness of the wound. With bergamot and lemongrass to give Armbar Soap’s After Training Bar a light, clean scent, you can’t go wrong with the ingredient combination that they’ve put together.

The only drawback is that as with all handmade products, availability is limited, especially for in-person retail purchase. The company has plans for expansion and the soap is currently being sold for local purchase in California, Hawaii, Texas, New York City, and Melbourne, Australia.

The post Product Review: Arm Bar Soap appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Now imagine reaching down to grab the bar for your very last thruster and without warning the bar jumps eight inches from your hand. Not only does it move, but it also tells you to, “Go f@&k yourself.” To add insult to injury, it goes on to tell you if you don’t get a hold of it and perform a legit rep, it’s going to kill you, after it slowly has its way with you for a few hours, and then again twice more once you’re dead.

That is how world-renowned, self-defense expert and CrossFitter himself Tony Blauer wants you to think about your workouts. Tony is the founder of Blauer Tactical Systems and has been studying and teaching self-defense to law enforcement, the military, and civilians for the last thirty-six years.

In the last year, Tony has developed an incredible, full-day course specifically designed for and attended by thousands of CrossFitters. The course, aptly called Be Your Own Bodyguard, has seen athletes the likes of Mikko and Kinnick, Khalipa and Starrett. The material has application for both the elite and hobbiest CrossFitter – scalability – as Blauer’s SPEAR System is functional movement applied to self-defense.

To Tony, CrossFit is a great preparedness tool for just about anyone. CrossFitters are stronger than the average bear, have spent some recent time outside of their comfort zones, have conscious contact with their physicality, and deal with some level of fear (or at least fear of their workouts) on a daily basis. But beyond the physical state of being ready for anything is a mental state of strength and readiness. That’s where Tony comes in. Tony specializes in not only the physical contact aspects of violent encounters, but even more on the psychological, emotional, reactionary aspects. The world’s greatest defensive device or choke escape left unused due to its practitioner being frozen by fear is utterly useless.

CrossFitters may have a leg up on the competition, but there are still two places Tony sees holes in their self-defense game:

1. Recognizing Pre-Contact Cues

Tony’s real goal is to teach you how to recognize the crucial moments before a violent situation takes place so you can be present, be conscious, and be ready to use your hard-earned physical traits.

Violent encounters are often preceded by telltale signs of their impending arrival: body language changes, rapid eye movements, or the cocking back of an arm. Tony wants you to recognize the stimulus behind the stimulus behind the stimulus behind your response. Think that one through for a second.

By teaching CrossFitters what to recognize in his courses, he’s allowing us them to avoid situations far more often and with far more certainty than before. (After all, none of us have ever come home to find a kettlebell blocking our front door demanding 10 perfect, unbroken swings, with potentially fatal consequences assigned as the result of any mistake.)

2. Translating Movements Across Broad Exercise Domains

When a fireman sees a clean and jerk as a training method for taking a lifeless body from the ground into the hands of help above, the bridge between training and function has been achieved. Most CrossFitters can make this mental leap and often find that after a year of training they see movements replicated from the gym into real life.

Mr. Blauer wants you to take that leap one step further and view your thruster as an upward palm strike to an attacker’s nose, your slam ball as driving an attackers face into your knee, and reaching over your shoulder to grab your seatbelt as an identical pattern to ripping your elbow across someone’s brow.

Malcolm Gladwell says you must have 10,000 hours under your belt before claiming an expertise in any area. Tony doesn’t want us all to spend an additional 9,992 hours practicing after his course – that wouldn’t have you been the safest you can be, as soon as you can be – so he picks movements that people of all shapes and sizes have done countless times before and merely shows the transition in thinking – from seatbelt to elbow, thruster to palm strike.

As a fan of Tony’s work long before the CrossFit community found his expertise, I believe the two go naturally hand-in-hand. Tony’s Be Your Own Bodyguard course is a must for all CrossFitters. If you are a CrossFitter, read that again.

If you still have a shadow of a doubt about the course and why you need it, do this – load up a bar with two hundred pounds, lie on your back, and rest the bar so that half of the weight is between your legs and the other half sitting on your chest. Now start mentally listing your escape options. Now do it again blindfolded with a bloody nose. Now call Tony.

Tony Blauer is a man you want to meet before you need to or wish you had. Fortunately, Blauer Tactical Systems will have a booth this weekend at the 2012 CrossFit Games. Stop by, introduce yourself, and thank Tony teaching so many of us how to stay alive.

The post Tony Blauer Teaches You to “Be Your Own Bodyguard” appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Arnold Schwarzenegger used to get acupuncture to speed up his recovery in the 1970s. It’s shown in the epic documentary Pumping Iron. Acupuncture has long been used for its pain relieving qualities, among its many other positive effects. As a practitioner myself, I know it’s effectiveness, but often share in my patient’s frustration when they feel amazing leaving my office only to have their symptoms return the next day.

There are definite ways to “undo” the benefits of any holistic treatment and, conversely, there are also ways to help the desired effects of the treatment last and last.

Fortunately for me, I’m marrying someone who didn’t spend her spare time during acupuncture school getting punched and kicked in the head. I sat down with Revolution Wellness founder, the lovely and talented Alexandra Carmel and asked her to elaborate on the two most important tips she advises her patients to facilitate a longer lasting benefit to their acupuncture treatments.

Before Treatment: Eat

While it might seem obvious to eat at some point before your treatment, it’s apparently not. Alexandra explained:

Before treatments I highly recommend to my patients that they eat, and eat something they know they will tolerate. Often times I’ll have patients show up for a 1:00pm appointment and they’ll walk in and tell me that they haven’t eaten since 7:00am that morning!

In order for their body to hold the treatment, all of their energy should be available for healing. Walking into a treatment with any empty gas tank is similar to walking into a workout in the same way. It’s not going to lead to anything positive. Please, eat an apple, some other fruit, or something nutritious about thirty minutes before seeing me.

After Treatment: Be Patient

People with competitive mindsets aren’t always the best at being patient. Certainly any athlete reading this article and doing research on performance has probably struggled with the idea of doing “nothing.” Alexandra explained that being patient is essential when it comes to acupuncture treatment:

After treatments, I tell my patients to first, “Be Patient.” Often times when I’ve poked around an injury, it feels worse than it did beforehand. This is only temporary and will subside in twenty-four hours. Have patience, but also, treat yourself with kid gloves for a day or two.

Running from my office right into a workout or right back into a high stress environment will not facilitate your body staying in a state of health. If we’ve worked hard for the hour to minimize inflammation in your shoulder, surfing for three hours right afterwards is not my strongest advice. Take the afternoon, eat well, realize that your system just got recalibrated and work with your body to hold onto the treatment.

There you have it folks, two simple steps that you can take before and after your visit with your acupuncturist to ensure the treatment holds and you receive as much benefit as possible.

Much like physical training, you get to see your acupuncturist once or twice a week for an hour, but have the entire rest of the week to your own devices. Implement the action steps listed above and watch the time needed for recovery lessen and lessen. Listen to your acupuncturist like you listen to your coach.

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post 2 Tips to Make Acupuncture Benefits Last Longer appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

You might know Pure Pharma for their fish oil, but now they have added another great product to their inventory with their Vitamin D3 supplement. But let’s first talk about why we need a vitamin D supplement to begin with.

Vitamin D typically comes to us naturally, through exposure to sunlight or in our diet, through the ingestion of dairy products and egg yolks. Often we are deficient in this vitamin due to a lack of outdoor time or personal dietary restrictions. Vitamin D deficiency can manifest as bone weakness (vitamin D helps our bodies absorb calcium, needed for strong healthy bones, especially as we age).

Per Web MD, a deficiency in vitamin D has also been found to be linked to the following:

• Increased death from cardiovascular disease
• Cognitive impairment in older adults
• Severe asthma in children
• Cancer

Ideally, getting our vitamins and minerals should occur through eating a well balanced diet, as well as adequate exposure to the natural elements. Modern living often makes this a challenge and therefore the need for high-quality supplements arises. For those of you who are not fans of the sun, like vampires, and my mom, or you don’t have access to it either due to your work situation or geography, a vitamin D supplement should be an integral part of your daily regimen.

But getting vitamin D into our system does have a hitch – as a fat-soluble vitamin, your body needs the presence of fat for vitamin D’s assimilation and absorption. But, thankfully, taking a vitamin D supplement doesn’t have to be difficult. To counter the need to be taken with food, Pure Pharma has blended their vitamin D with olive oil.

Pure Pharma recommends one tablet per day for people who are able to have access to a minimum of twenty minutes of sunlight per day, and two tablets per day for those of us who often are stuck in doors from dawn until dusk producing brilliant prose.

As with their omega 3 supplement, Pure Pharma has adhered to the highest regulatory standards ensuring that their D3 supplement is a top notch. I recommend both Pure Pharma’s O3 and D3 to patients who, through dietary restrictions or lack of accessible sunlight, need extra supplementation.

The post Product Review: Pure Pharma Vitamin D3 appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Last week we took a look at what happens when your plumbing ceases to move with it’s normal ease and gusto. This week we’re going to focus on the opposite problem – when sprinting to the bathroom is your main form of your cardio. Since we are still talking about poop, let’s all take off our adult hats for a second and get our giggles out of the way. Poop is, after all, pretty funny sh*t! Okey-dokey, off we go.

Loose stools are not only an inconvenience and a potentially limiting factor in your life, they’re also a sign your body isn’t performing at its optimal level. What goes in must come out, but if it’s leaving the party too early, then you’re not getting everything you need from your food. It’s also a surefire way to end up dehydrated.

Along Came Polly brought the potential aftermath of urgent stools into the national conversation, and anyone who has spent any time in a third world country will tell you that they are a blast, but what causes them on a regular basis?

This week we’re going to break down our loose stools into two categories, urgent and non-urgent. Each situation has it’s own exciting attributes and both can be mitigated with some dietary changes.

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) views the urgency accompanying a bowel movement as coming from an element of “heat.” Quite literally, this is the effect of too much spice or anything your bowel considers an irritant. If it burns on the way in, it’s probably coming out pretty fast. The irritation triggers your body to eliminate the substance as soon and as forcefully as possible.

When there’s not a big rush to get to your pants down, but your stool is consistently watery and poorly formed, TCM views this as a case of “cold” attacking your intestines. This happens when we’ve eaten too much ice cream, ingested two watermelon smoothies, or spent the weekend eating raw salads (TCM views raw food as cold in nature).

For urgent stools, adding millet, persimmon, and pineapple will help slow down your peristalsis. Removing any spices or other known irritants is a further benefit.

For non-urgent but watery stools, adding in ginger, nutmeg, and cinnamon will warm your intestinal track up and add to the binding effect on the stool.

For both cases, adding the above ingredients to small amounts of rice, or adding barley, garlic, and yams to your diet is the best combination. The temporary elimination of honey, dairy, apricots, and the moderation of fat intake will also help. Eating a bag of cashews, along with two avocadoes will not help bulk up your stool. Fiber, especially in the form of small meals should always be your first step.

Happy pooping!

The post Everybody Poops, Part 2: Every Which Way But Loose appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Everybody poops. It’s true. I poop. Hopefully, you poop. Show me someone who doesn’t poop and I’ll show you someone who’s going to be sick very soon. Men poop. This much is obvious to anyone who has ever had to live with us. Women poop, too. This is an oft-confused fact. My future wife is the most beautiful, articulate, emotionally intelligent, kind, caring woman I’ve ever met. She also craps like a trucker. You can forget the whole “they only poop out little pink ribbons” deal too fellas, it’s complete hogwash.

Fantastic, now that we’ve all gotten our fecal focus front and center, let’s talk about one of the more taboo subjects in polite society – our bowel movements. Since what goes in must inevitably come out, the condition of your poop upon departure can be telling.

For the sake of this article we’re going to break things down into two categories and tackle constipation, hard stools, and difficulty going to the bathroom this week, while next week we look at the other, looser, more frequent, waterier side of the coin. Fair?

According to WebMd.com, you are considered constipated if you have two or more of the following for at least three months:

• Straining during a bowel movement more than 25% of the time
• Hard stools more than 25% of the time
• Incomplete evacuation more than 25% of the time
• Two or fewer bowel movements in a week

However, ask anyone who has not had a bowel movement for two days or more if they think their symptoms will be relevant in three months and they’ll answer with discomfort. In my professional opinion not having at least one bowel movement per day (given normal eating habits and minus any extraordinary personal circumstances or travel) is a warning to take a look at your diet and lifestyle.

Delayed bowel movements, hard stools, and incomplete evacuations (not pooping to your heart’s content) can all be caused by a number of factors, but more often than not, they’re a mix of the ingredients going into your mouth coupled with your own genetic predisposition.

One of the most common causes for constipation and hard stools is dehydration. During the journey through your small intestine, the last stop before blast off, your body will reabsorb necessary liquids from your stool back into your system. After this process, if there is not enough fluid left in your stool, passing it will be difficult.

If constipation is an issue for you, the first step in amelioration is increasing your water intake and decreasing any dehydrating factors such as alcohol, caffeine, and excessive exercise.

In addition to minimizing dehydration, adding the following will help increase the moisture level and maneuverability of your stool:

• Increasing your fat intake with nuts, seeds, and avocado
• Increasing your fiber intake
• Drinking liquid aloe vera

Fiber will not only add bulk to your stool, but is also capable of absorbing five times its weight in water, thus creates an easier to pass stool.

Often times it’s not the hardness or dryness of the stool that’s causing issue, it just seems like there isn’t enough “push” to get everything out in one sitting. Traditional Chinese Medicine refers to this as a lack of Qi, or simply not having enough energy to facilitate a proper elimination.

All of your body functions take energy, from breathing to thinking to walking to eliminating. Peristalsis, the motion your colon goes through to pass stool also takes energy. Some ways to increase peristalsis are:

• Light exercise (ask anyone in the Marine Corps about their morning runs)
• Eating dried fruit
• Massaging in small circles clockwise around the navel
• Drinking tea made from the Chinese Herb Da Huang or Rhubarb Root is a sure fire way to promote a bowel movement (contraindicated in pregnancy or nursing)

By managing your water intake and dietary choices, constipation can become a seldom-experienced issue, allowing you to spend more time out in the world and less time in the bathroom.

Stay tuned next week for the next exciting chapter of Everybody Poops: Part Two, where we look at constipation’s evil stepsister – loose stools.

The post Everybody Poops, Part 1: When the Going Gets Tough appeared first on Breaking Muscle.