the right foods to eat. Great read.

Foods That Make You Look Good Nekid
…and foods that make you look nasty even while wearin’ a parka!
by the editors



We’re about to tell you the real secret to building a lean, muscular physique. This dark secret has been guarded for over one hundred years by a secret society made up of magazine publishers and supplement manufacturers. We’re risking life and limb to share this secret with you. Are you ready? Okay, here goes:

The secret is, there is no secret.

Okay, so this isn’t really a secret; it’s more like a piece of wisdom you only develop after at least ten years of hard training and proper dieting. But the fact remains, there are no quick fixes and no miracle training programs.

If there is a real "secret" out there, it’s simply this: A great body results from the consistent application of smart training and proper eating. It’s a four step process: 1) train hard, 2) eat right, 3) use supplementation when necessary, and 4) repeat for many, many years.

Of these four factors, most people screw up when it comes to eating right. So, what the heck is "proper eating?" That depends on your goals. T-mag is full of different diets designed to fit whatever your physique goals may be. The basic differences in these diets are calorie requirements and macronutrient ratios. The funny thing is, bodybuilders tend to eat the same foods every day, regardless of what particular diet they’re using. They just switch around the amounts of protein, carbs and fat, and toy with their daily caloric intakes.

This seems strange to the "normal" Taco Bell eatin’ Oprah fans out there, but there’s a logical reason for this. Mainly, most of the food choices available at your local supermarket are crap! In fact, if there were such a thing as a bodybuilder’s grocery store, you wouldn’t need that much shelf space. Come on, do you really need 234 different kinds of breakfast cereal? No! In fact, I propose you don’t need any breakfast cereal!

The more you learn about what constitutes a good diet, the more you realize that 90% of what’s in the supermarket is garbage, a pure distraction from building the body you want.

With all this in mind, we called up a bunch of T-mag staffers like Cy Willson, Brock Strasser, Bill Roberts, John Berardi, John Koenig, and John Davies and asked them about their diets. With their help, we put together a list of the best and worst bodybuilding foods, plus a few that fall somewhere in the middle.

Pull up a chair and strap on a bib. Let’s dig in!


The Good Stuff

Old Fashioned Oatmeal — Make no mistake about it, oatmeal is the carb of choice for many bodybuilders. Even if you’re on a reduced carb diet, there’s nothing wrong with a serving of oatmeal (27g of carbs) to go along with your morning protein. Your body has been deprived of food all night, so some slow-acting carbs to replenish stores, plus some protein, make for a great bodybuilding breakfast.

Oatmeal has about three grams of natural unsaturated fats, five grams of protein, and two grams each of soluble and insoluble fiber. The fiber not only helps keep your pooper working properly, the soluble variety can help improve cholesterol levels, thus earning the American Heart Association’s "heart healthy" seal of approval.

Only buy oatmeal that lists "100% natural rolled oats" in the ingredients. That’s it! Oats should be the one and only ingredient. Do not purchase those individually packaged, flavored oatmeal products! (More on that in our "Bad Stuff" section.) Also, don’t screw up a good thing by adding milk and sugar. Eat your oatmeal like a man. And by the way, old fashioned oats cook up just fine in the microwave, no need to boil the water in a pot.

Oatmeal rocks. Make it a staple of your diet.

Fat Free Cottage Cheese — We hate the taste and texture of cottage cheese. Most of us also eat at least five pounds of those chunky curds a week. Our secret for making this stuff palatable? We blend it with protein powders and make puddings and thick shakes out of it. Why do we go through all that trouble? Easy, cottage cheese is a great source of casein, one of the best proteins for bodybuilders.

Casein gets props because of its slow digestion and absorption rates. A snack involving cottage cheese will provide a steady, slow paced release of amino acids into the bloodstream. Cottage cheese is also low in carbs. Combine that with its slow digesting protein and it makes an ideal bedtime snack to help prevent any possible nighttime catabolism (muscle wasting caused by an eight hour fast.)

You’ll want to stick to the fat free kind and avoid the creamed varieties because of their "bad" fat content. Sure, the fat free kind is a little bitter, but if you use it as a base for other foods like we do, then that doesn’t matter much. Besides, if you can bang out high rep squats or inject yourself with steroids, you can certainly eat cottage cheese, ya big wuss!

Tuna and Other Fish — You just can’t beat a high protein food that tastes like your girlfriend. (Okay, maybe we’ve just dated some skanky chicks.) If oatmeal is a staple carb source for bodybuilders, then tuna is a staple protein source. It’s cheap, low in fat, carb-free, and packs 13 grams of protein into just two ounces.

You can get it in cans or those new waterless "no-drain" packages, which are even more convenient (though a little more expensive.) You can also buy it packed in water or oil, the latter being very handy for those diets that require a lot of protein plus fat meals. Albacore tuna has 450 milligrams of omega-3 fatty acids per two ounce serving, even more if you’re lucky enough to get some of that yummy dolphin meat as a bonus!

We’ve heard rumors that there are other kinds of fish besides tuna, but they probably require cooking and only gay guys cook. (We’re kidding. Please stop typing those hate letters now.) Salmon is another good source and you can buy it in cans like tuna. Most of us think canned salmon is just plain nasty, but T-mag contributors John and Steve Berardi live off the stuff. That and breath mints.

However, there is a guy who runs a small company in California that makes one helluva’ canned fish. His name is Dave and his product is simply called Dave’s Albacore (or Dave’s Salmon, as the case may be). This guy sells unbleached albacore that’s hand caught, bled right at the boat, and never frozen. The stuff is packed in its own oils and damn if ain’t tasty! Trouble is, it’s pretty expensive. Six 6-ounce cans of albacore sell for about 18 bucks, and six 7 3/4 ounce cans of dee-licious salmon sell for almost 34 dollars. If fish is a staple of your healthy diet, though, it’s worth it.

You can check out his stuff at Davesalbacore.com.

Beef and Poultry — Let’s hear it for dead animal flesh, nature’s protein with feet! (Vegans love us, can’t ya tell?) This category includes beef, chicken, and turkey, although anything you can catch counts too. T-mag contributor Coach Davies even recommends large quantities of buffalo and ostrich to his athletes.

First, let’s hunker down on some juicy steak. Red meat got a bad rap back in the "ass-backwards 80’s" but things have started to swing in the other direction. The beef proponents were usually fat-free fanatics and animal rights activists who thought that eating bagels and soybeans all day was the enlightened path to health and thinness. They were wrong.

Beef is chocked full of protein and nutrients; it’s even been dubbed "nature’s multi-vitamin" by some. Sure, it has some fat, but fat ain’t bad in the right amounts. In fact, a very low fat diet can lead to low Testosterone levels. A proper amount of fat in your diet, even some saturated fat, is necessary and healthy.

Always go for steaks that have the words "round" or "loin" in the name. These are the leanest cuts. Avoid the fatty meats with the word "rib" in the name. For us, that simply means ordering sirloin instead of prime rib. At the grocery store, choose cuts that are over 90% lean and trim any excess fat. Beef jerky is good when you’re on the run, but avoid those processed and chemical-laden deli meats, along with bologna and franks.

White meat chicken and turkey are great too. Since they’re high in protein and carb-free, chicken breasts are one of bodybuilding’s most versatile foods. Eat ‘em up!

Eggs — Before the popularity of protein powders, bodybuilders relied largely on eggs to bump up their protein intake. A large egg has seven grams of protein, 80 calories, and a great BV (biological value).

Again, you may be wondering about the fat and cholesterol, and again I can tell you that the media has over-hyped the issues. Fact: cholesterol is the basic structure for all anabolic hormones. Without it, your body can't produce Testosterone. If you’re following a good diet and working out, a few whole eggs aren’t going to hurt you. Even the very conservative American Heart Association says it’s okay to have four whole eggs per week.

Still, most bodybuilders use egg whites in their meals with only one or two yolks thrown in. You can even buy pasteurized egg products with the yolks removed. Add a whole egg to a carton of egg substitute and you have a great bodybuilder omelet.

Just remember that despite how buff Rocky was, raw eggs suck, and we’re not talking about salmonella poisoning (although that risk does still exist to some extent despite improvements made by egg distributors over the last few years). According to a study found by John Berardi, the body can only utilize about half of the protein found in raw egg products. So not only are you risking getting sick, you’re wasting your money. Lesson: Cook your eggs!

Fruits and Veggies — There are about a hundred reasons that fruit can be a healthy part of a bodybuilder’s diet. Instead of going over them all again, we’ll just refer you to Cy Willson’s great article, The Forbidden Fruit. Bottom line: Fruit provides you with vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals, certain flavones, fiber and may even have some protein-sparing effects. Eat some fruit, but avoid most fruit juices. (More on that below.)

As for veggies, what can we say? Mom said to eat them and mom was right. There are some things out there that only nature can provide, and many of those goodies are packed into fruits and vegetables.

Protein Powders — We can hear some of the crybabies now, "Wait a minute, protein powder ain’t food! It’s a supplement!" We understand what you mean, but we consider quality protein powders and MRPs to be food. Look at the labels and you’ll see protein, fat, carbs, vitamins, and minerals. Sounds like food to us, just in a concentrated form.

Protein powders make the list because they’re nutrient rich, fast and convenient. They’ve truly revolutionized the bodybuilding industry and have allowed regular people with jobs and families to get the nutrition they need to add muscle. Try to work at least eight hours a day, train, spend time with friends and family and still fit in five or six nutritious, protein-packed meals a day. Hard to do, especially if you’re shooting for at least 1.5 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight. Protein powders fix that problem. Those low carb protein powders are especially good because you can use them in cutting and bulking diets.


The Okay Stuff

This category includes foods that are generally considered pretty good for the bodybuilder, but may not be perfect for everyone. Just play around with these foods and see how they work for you. We think most of these choices below lean toward the "good" side anyway.

Nuts and Natural Peanut Butter — Nuts make the "okay" list (instead of the "good" list) for one specific reason: they’re very calorically dense. For that reason, they’re often recommended to those supposed "hard gainers" out there. One ounce of peanuts (about 32 nuts to be precise) has 160 calories, eight grams of protein and five grams of carbs. Nuts are high in fat, but only a small part of that is saturated (two out of fourteen grams for peanuts.)

Now, since nuts are so calorically dense, you have to be careful. Just snacking on a can of party peanuts can quickly add a thousand calories to your daily intake. But overall, nuts make a good high fat, low carb food. (Cashews have the highest amount of carbs, about eight grams per serving, so be careful there.) They’re filling, portable and can be a healthy part of any diet.

We’re also a big fan of natural peanut butter, and yes, it has to be natural! Regular peanut butter is full of nasty stuff like corn syrup solids, hydrogenated oils, and sugar. The ingredients should read "peanuts and salt," period. And don’t be fooled by those reduced fat varieties. These are still full of unhealthy ingredients with the added benefit of soy protein! And if you’re still worried about the fat content, natural peanut butter allows you to pour off the excess oil before you stir and refrigerate it.

A piece of advice for those with fast metabolisms: drop two servings of natural PB into your protein shakes for a healthy and calorically dense "weight gainer." That’ll add 400 calories to your shake, with none of it coming from sugar.

Rice, Pasta, Potatoes, Yams, and Whole Grain Bread — We admit it. We put all these foods into the same category because of their carb content. These are good bodybuilding eats, but you carb sensitive types have to be careful with them.

Judging these foods strictly by their glycemic index, choose sweet potatoes (yams) over white Russet potatoes; whole wheat pasta over white pasta; and long grain brown rice over short grain or white rice (the stickier the rice, the higher the GI.) As for bread, avoid the highly processed white breads and go for multigrain dark bread. If it looks like it has wood chips baked into it, it’s good to go. Our personal favorite is called Heathnut, a grainy bread filled with nuts and seeds. Others prefer flax bread.

These foods are cool, just watch those carbs if you’re sensitive and be careful with toppings, especially with pasta and potatoes. Adding a fatty topping to a "carby" food is a recipe for rapid fat gain.

Milk and Yogurt — Milk is a two-faced monster. To some, it’s a cheap source of protein and the ultimate "weight gainer" for bony teenagers. Some old-timers even recommend drinking a gallon of whole milk per day! Suffice it to say, that would leave most of us quite fat. Much of the fat in whole milk falls in the "bad" category. Saturated fat mixed with a high sugar, high-carb food does not a healthy body make.

Also, somewhere around 10 to 20 percent of the population is lactose intolerant, meaning they can’t digest milk sugar. (There are even a few studies that show that non-whites, particularly Asians and blacks, have a much higher rate of lactose intolerance.) This can be helped some by using lactose-free milk and digestive aids. On the other hand, if you have no problems with lactose, skim milk can be a good source of protein. Still, unless you’re an extremely active teenager with the metabolism of a humming bird on ephedrine, we’d limit milk intake.

Yogurt is a better option in our opinion. It has many of the benefits of milk without most of the drawbacks. One of the really cool things about yogurt is the live active cultures it contains. Yep, we’re talking about bacteria, nice friendly bacteria that keep your digestion system running properly. (That’s why yogurt can help with both constipation and diarrhea.)

Some substances actually feed bacteria and as such, may even help you absorb all that protein you’re taking in. One in particular, called GDL, reduces bloating and gas and increases nitrogen retention. That means it’s a perfect addition to protein powders. The only American company that uses it, as far as we know, is Biotest in our Advanced Protein product.

Sauces and Spices — Sauces and spices make the "okay" list because some are good and some are bad. On the good side you have a plethora of calorie-free pepper sauces, Worcestershire sauce, and just about every herb and spice on the shelf. Many of those fancy mustards fall into this category too, but read the labels just in case. Our suggestions: Beer ‘N Brat horseradish mustard, Cajun Sunshine hot pepper sauce, Hell on the Red salsa, and McCormick herb chicken seasoning.

On the bad side is anything made with high fructose corn syrup (BBQ sauce, ketchup etc.), mayo, and most creamy salad dressings. Stick to something like fat free Miracle Whip if you must use mayo and if you just have to have some barbecue sauce on your chicken breasts, measure out one serving and spread thinly.


The Bad Stuff

We all visit the Dark Side on occasion, but if you want to be muscular and ripped, you’d better stay on the side of the Force 95% of the time. Here’s a list of foods that you’d better avoid if you want to take your shirt off in public again.

High Fat/High Carb Foods — The prototypical Western diet consists of foods that are both high in bad fats and high in carbs. In America, that diet has lead to a climbing rate of obesity and obesity-related diseases. It’s also lead to fat girls who insist on showing off their bellybutton rings by wearing cropped shirts, thus exposing blubbery parts of their bodies best left covered by ample amounts of clothing. The madness must be stopped!

Now, what were we talking about again? Oh yeah, fat and carb meals. John Berardi sums it up in his Massing Eating articles: "Meals with a high carbohydrate content in combination with high-fat meals can actually promote a synergistic insulin release when

compared to the two alone. High fat with high-carb meals represent the worst possible case scenario. ….you’ll promote high blood levels of fats, carbs, and insulin."

What foods are the real bad boys here? Unfortunately, most of the really tasty ones! Except for a rare treat, it’s best to avoid fried foods, pizza, lasagna, pancakes, whole milk, ice cream, cookies, hamburgers, most Mexican food, most Chinese food, and a bunch of other delicious stuff. But you already knew that.

Our coveted "Most Evil Food Known to Man" award goes to the lowly glazed donut, who just barely beats out French fries and fettuccini alfredo.

Fruit Juice and Non-Diet Sodas — Repeat after us: fruit good, fruit juice bad. Cy "Mr. Big Britches" Willson sums it up best:

"Processed fruit juice is worthless in my opinion. Before I would’ve said to use it as a post-workout source of carbs, but with Biotest Surge, that isn't necessary and besides, it’s less efficient. Also, with whole fruit, you get so much more: more fiber, more phytochemicals (way more), more nutrients, etc. Plus, whole fruit is more filling.

"Fruit juice is an easy way to over-consume calories and increase body fat. Now remember, I'm talking about fruit juice concentrate. The processing is what reduces the amount of these special phytochemicals and other compounds. If you're going to consume juice, then you should make it yourself."

We also have a real problem with soft drinks, which Americans consume more of than water. Face it, Cokes are liquid candy and they’re designed especially to make you more thirsty. Add a little caffeine to get you addicted and help dehydrate you, and you have legal crack. Okay, we’re exaggerating just a bit, but we think excessive intake of soft drinks is in the same class as cigarettes when it comes to the destruction of your health and physique. Soda is the epitome of the empty calorie and void of anything your body needs. Okay, rant over.

What about diet sodas, you say? Well, we’d still rather see people drinking exactly what the body needs and wants — water — but diet sodas are okay if you don’t mind the artificial sweeteners and sodium. (And despite some of the internet rumors and media hype, both are fine if used in human quantities.)

Candy — Oh, come on! You know you’re not supposed to be eating candy, right?

Flavored Oatmeal — Go to your pantry right now and get out your oatmeal. If you took out a colorful box full of little kiddy packets of peaches ‘n cream oatmeal, do yourself a favor and kick that shit to the curb! As stated above, we think oatmeal is one the best carb sources for bodybuilders, but the flavored, prepackaged variety sucks.

Look at the ingredients, which are listed in order of quantity. Sugar is usually the second ingredient in these girly oatmeal packets. Then you have other crap like salt, hydrogenated vegetable oils, maltodextrin, and partially hydrogenated soybean oil.

To top it off, the oats used in flavored oatmeal are usually more finely ground than healthy, old fashioned oatmeal. This means the GI could be higher based on the extra processing. The list of ugly ingredients goes on and varies a little with flavoring, but the lesson is simple: don’t eat this stuff if you want to look good nekid.

White Bread, Bagels and Rice Cakes — It’s hard to believe, but back in the 80s and early 90s, diet "experts" told people to eat as much of this stuff as they wanted. Since rice cakes are fat free, you can’t get fat, right? Wrong! Now the country is full of overweight diabetics. Coincidence? I don’t think so!

One representative of the Glycemic Research Institute even stated that eating a plain rice cake stimulated fat storage like ten bowls of sugar. Bagels aren’t quite as bad but are best avoided. Don’t fool yourself into thinking you’re eating healthy by consuming these things.

Most Breakfast Cereals — To us, cold breakfast cereals, even many of the brands touted as "healthy," are pure physique killers. Cereal is breakfast candy, nothing more, nothing less. In fact, corn flakes have a GI rating even worse than white bread! And how about these cereals that give you "energy", like Grape Nuts? Yep, at 47 carbs per teeny tiny serving (and what bodybuilder would eat one serving anyway?), most people would be in an insulin-induced coma by lunch.

Here’s a piece of trivia for you. John Harvey Kellogg, the founder of Kellogg’s cereal, invented Corn Flakes to reduce sexual desire and curb the "epidemic" of masturbation. Besides "castrating" people with shitty, high-carb breakfast foods, Kellogg also recommended that small boys (not infants) be circumcised without anesthetic so they would forever associate the penis with pain. He also thought that women should have their clitorises treated with carbolic acid to prevent what he called "abnormal excitement." As a side note, Sylvester Graham invented the Graham Cracker believing it would also diminish male sexual desire.

Now tell me, do you really want to eat a food designed to make you a Testosterone-free eunuch?

All that said, there are a couple of good cereals out there, but not many. All Bran and Fiber One make decent oatmeal replacements, just eat some protein with them. All Bran Extra Fiber only has 50 calories a serving and 13 grams of fiber, almost four times as much as oatmeal!

Some "Fat Free" Snacks — Food manufacturers discovered a great trick back in the 80’s to fool people into buying their junk food. Since all fat was dubbed evil, food makers started abusing the "fat free" label. Basically, they took out the fat, added whopping amounts of sugar and called their products "healthy." Makers of snack foods are the worst culprits, with some even trying to sell fat free cookies, chocolate syrup, and solid sugar hard candies as health food simply because they have little or no fat. News flash: Sugar is the real enemy, not fat!

Alcohol — As connoisseurs of fine beers, we hate to see this one make the bad list. But let’s face the music, alcohol has a lot of empty calories, can inhibit fat loss, and in the fatal words of John "party pooper" Berardi, booze is one of the best Testosterone suppressors known to man!

Hey, have a beer or two once a week, but if you really care about what you look like and your overall progress in the gym, don’t drink to excess. For more info, read John’s "Big T" article here.

Soy protein — We won’t even try to do a better job than TC or Cy Willson when it comes to this topic. Read these two articles: Bad Protein and The Evils of Soy. If you can read those articles and still take in large quantities of soy, then you deserve that dwindling sperm count of yours!


Conclusion

Weight training and proper dieting don’t have to be as complicated as we sometimes make them. Lift, eat, rest, use supps when necessary to get you there quicker, and repeat. It’s that simple. Hopeful this article helps with the eating part.

Now go get your grub on!

Yeah go the tuna most definitely. I always eat that when working out..

Heaps of chicken/meat/potatoes/vegies..

But I am a complete lightweight now (92Kg). When I was fully into it for a while, just before the Japan trip, I hit 102Kg. Went to Japan walking around carrying my heavy bags around on and off trains for 1 month and came back 95Kg, lost 7 kegs in one month!

{Roll out soapbox and climb on!}
There's a good reason for looking after yourself: Do you want to be on the other side of 45 (or 30) and be thinking how come I look like crap?

Keep It Simple:
Eat well 3 meals per day (go the oats for brekkie and don't snack),
Exercise 3 times a week for 1 hour (decent exercise: cycling),
Stay away from junk food
(don't make eating crap food a reward: it's not, just makes it harder to get fit. Ditch the Krispy Krap donuts, follow the guide above).

The results: lose 1kg per week (I lost 12kg 85->73kg), feel healthier (pulse rate low 40s per minute), sleep better, etc.

Remember: it's okay to feel hungry before meals like when you were a kid!! Listen to your body if it tells you to eat then eat, but eat right and stop when the hunger stops! Don't starve yourself.

Cycling is good: do it early when no cars on the roads, eg 6am. Hi intensity, eg ride up Black Mountain in under 15 minutes or stand and pedal up hills, gives a strength element to your training, when on the flat spin your pedals fast for endurance to burn calories, not waste your legs. Join a cycle club and go on their rides for support and encouragement.

{Put soapbox away...}

Awesome advice LWC. So simple really.

About 2 months ago I rode up black mountain 5 times on separate days on my mountain bike (on the tar road though, not via the bush)

The first time, I realised how unfit I was. These roadie guys overtook me up the hill and I had to stop 3 times on theway up to catch air.

The second time I had to stop twice.

The third time I didn't need to stop and got up all in one go.

The fourth time I got up faster.

The fifth time I got up faster, then after getting back to the bottom, started to climb up it again - ready for more! Only got half way and then went back down again, but I was pretty surprised that after only 5 rides how much you could improve..

Yeah I reckon its pretty simple also.. There is so much crap food out there, I don't know how people can eat it. I can't stand any sugar-infested crap like Krispy Kremes. It just disgusting and unhealthy. Savoury/healthy stuff is always my favourite. Maybe I just have healthy taste buds. I am not into chocolates and crap like that either. Its all foul..

Also, get into the salmon sushi guys!

Get a couple of boxes from sushi world and pile that stuff in there.

85% of food in supermarkets is just all crap.
eat natural. the less processed it is the better it is for you.
i hardly eat any chocolate or lollies or chips anymore. after eating them you feel like crap.

Good thread.No need to go over the top.Regular exercise and just be careful of what you eat. Fats and sugar are the killers.
Do not smoke and use alcohol in moderation.
In my youth lucky if there was on fat kid in your class room. Why??
No TV, computer games etc and all your play time was outside running around. No fast ( junk) food but in some ways our diets were not all that healthy but anything that was high in fats/sugars was burnt up with exercise.
Have we progressed? I think when it comes to general health and fitness the answer is no.I read that the amount of weight being put on each day in Australia is equivalent to weight of a passanger liner sailing into Sydney harbour each day.Thats a lot of fat.
Add the drug problem including binge drinking and it does not paint a bright future.
Here endeth the sermon.

Down with the fruit n veg!!!
eat more chocolate and lollies n pizza!!!
Watch more tv n play more computer!!!

how do you think the americans became so 'big'.....
We're not far behind em over here...
if we keep it up, very soon we will be joining the list of the worlds
'biggest' nations.

'eat up fatty.....'

p.s. all my life i was fit and laughed at the idea of putting on weight. now i have a bludging job n dont get as much exercise, still eating exactly the same if anything less, n on comes the weight.
its execise. as said just previously, "in some ways our diets were not all that healthy but anything that was high in fats/sugars was burnt up with exercise." the exercise is the key. if you want to eat more, be prepared to do more exercise.

ciao
long live the fat kid

Hehe. We already 1 or 2 years ago were announced as having larger average weights than americans. I.e. we're already worse than them. We're fatter!

Its just all the stupid dumb people. You see them eating donuts and still being fat, they don't care. Survival of the fittest. Just because most Australians are fat doesn't mean I need to be. Its a problem that we don't need to solve, because they kill themselves off. Just take care of your own kids and educate them correctly so that they are smart enough to take care of themselves and be healthy, the losers will all die off and pump lots of money into medicine and stuff - doctors can rip them off by offering fat-removing surgeries and stuff like that. Don't worry about the losers who have no respect for themselves. Just makes fitter/healthier people stand out as being more serious about being healthy and having some drive and energy. I bet I never catch the Type2 fat diabetes, but I could walk down the street and point to 10 people who are going to almost definitely get it, and they are still drinking bottles of fanta.

another classic thing..

one of my mate's girlfriends, is a pretty massive unit, but only got that way in the past 3-5 years, she only slightly above weight before a few years ago. Always whinging about stupid diet issues like how she can't eat vegetables because of some problem she has with them. I honestly think its all in her brain..

But anyway, they came down here one time, and we ducked out to buy everyone dinner. She couldn't have what everyone else was having because of some latest special cleansing diet she was on, so she goes "Just get me a pizza hut garlic bread and some maccas fries, those are fine for this diet, they don't have any stuff that will clash with the program" etc. Bahahahahahahaha. I said "what about a salad", and my mate heard it, but she didn't respond. Its just idiots like that who are taking themselves down to the hole.

I can guarantee she will end up with type2 diabetes, not to mention worn out knee and hip joints (already starting to happen) and heart problems later in life. My mate will end up with a liability/parasite for a girlfriend.

Sadly, I basically have zero respect for my mate now who continues for some reason to go out with her. He's too nice basically and doesn't know how to break up with her. I know deep down in his guts that he can't possibly be happy, because I knew him too well before everyone got girlfriends. He's perfectly fit and healthy himself.. She's just an attention seeker and hypocondriac.

really!!! wow. beat me to it than. hahaha
we really are fat!!good on us. its not the migration of other nations that us damn aussies should be worried about.... they really arnt a threat..
very easy to belive. next time you drive by a school or happen to see school kids, stop n take a closer look and you will see just how sad a situation it is. i live just behind a school so when im home during the day i see the kids over the back fence and theres alot more body wieght going round than there used to be.

Yep the fortunes being spent on lipo suction, stapling the stomach, type 2 diabities raging etc and millions upon millions of men women and children are starving and dying by the thousands each day.
Who gives a stuff? Very few I am afraid.
How many millions being spent on trying to find the ultimate pill to swallow so you do not put on weight while millions starve plus all the other pills/surgery around just because people lack self discipline.All that money should be redirected to third world countries. The world is not a just place and all the developed countries need to hang their heads in shame.
Sorry guys I get a bit wound up on such issues.If everyone in a developed country gave $20per month to help third world countries a lot of poverty/disease would disappear.
If I was P.M. the first thing I would do would be to make smoking illegal and tell the tobacco companies to sod off out of Aussie or people that smoke have to pay a medicare weekly premium as they are the ones clogging up the health system and adding thousands of millions to the cost of health care.
Guess I am just an angry old fart.

I 100% agree with regards to smokers.

Yeah you're right. Over-eating, greed etc in the Western countries and all the money associated with that, could definitely go a long way to helping a lot of struggling places.

Any thread that contains "If I was P.M. is a good one!" haha.

Bit like "If I was Administrator of Cisco's MIcra Files" What a world that would open up.Hmm... maybe not.Have to remember that one Cisco re" a massive unit" Girl on the switch at work is one and she smokes like a chimney.Will get to about 30/35 and all the problems will set in.Shame as she is a very pleasant girl. How do you tell them what lies ahead ?? Is it a death wish or something?
Oh bloody hell its St.Valentines day and our wedding anniversary ( married 5 years to the sweetest lady on earth). The chocolates will get a bit of a work out tonight and the rest is private.

What disgusts me is how parts of new orleans are still in ruin so long after the waters went away. They're one of the richest countries in the world - how can so many people sleep at night knowing that there's thousands of their own countrymen, women and children sleeping under tarps and in community centres still because their homes haven't been repaired?

Too busy feathering their own nests. Eating cheese, smoking joints, cigarettes and getting fat.

Yeah that is definitely a shocker Yom, agree.

i think the majority of people just arent educated enough to know whats good for you.
over past few months i been reading lots and lots of articles on foods and fitness and gym routines and i have learnt so much. i am telling all my friends the thiongs i learn and they didnt know anything about it. food companies have everyone wrapped around their finger.

one basic thing i learnt is that if something has a no fat or reduced fat content guarenteed it will have double the sugar in it. so sometimes your better off eatign the full fat one. coz the excess sugar will turn to fat anyway.

and the new orleans thing is terrible. thats politics and that is just all completely screwed up. but thats another debate

+ 1 for Brendo's comment,

Its not the government, its not the individual, its a collective lack of education and marketing expertise on the distributor side of things.

Most people don't know what the RDI is for sodium, sugars, carb's.... You'd be surprised to learn that a single meusli bar can yeild alot more energy than a big mac... Healthy choices aren't always what they seem.

My advice, get out there, read pamphlets, talk to nutritionists/personal trainers.. Do something, walk to the shops instead of drive, walk the dog twice a day (it will do both of you good!) and just generally... DO MORE OF ANYTHING (except eating, that defeats the purpose)

Sean

Processed food is cheap to make, transport and lines company pockets: Avoid it.
Fruit and veg never killed anybody.
Keep riding black mountain Cisco, you're a legend!!!

Yeah but how can people reach adulthood and claim such ignorance?

There are tips for healthy eating all over TV, in magazines, hmm everywhere. How can people simply have such a narrow stuff up mind to just ignore half of the picture and only eat the crap.

I honestly think they look to the government as an excuse etc. Sure the government has a role to play, but come on, so many of these people are just lazy and literally don't even care if they are fat. They have no drive, they are bottom feeders and happy being that way.

You hear them admitting it. You hear fat people in the elevator commenting on how they know cakes are bad but they just can't say no etc. I reckon they clearly know they're doing the wrong thing, but clearly don't care at the same time. Like they are stuck in a terrible rutt and its just so hard to get out of. I reckon once you let your weight get up to a certain point, it must be bloody hard to back track and say lose 20-30Kg in one hit.

The trick is in never letting it get up to those high levels in the first place, then you never have some enormous amount of Kgs to get back off.

LWC, do you ever go up and down black mountain? You would blow me away, its been a while now. But just bought a new tire to fix a puncture, so keen to do a bit more soon.

Seano is going to give me some tips on a new weights program though..

Cisco, last went up a month before Christmas, I figure that climbing it is a mind over matter. If you don't blow up on the bottom of the climb ie before the water tank then you just keep on giving it until you ride around the tower at the top :)
LWC

This all makes for interesting reading...

Are we all social puppets?? Do we all 'suffer' from socially constructured bodily dismorphism?? We need to look at why we think we are un-happy with our bodily shape, and ask ourselves, what drives/influences this thinking??

But one must take into account the political power the an obesity discourse has on wider society, and be very very careful what one believes. Simply there is no simple answer, as their are may factors affecting the nature and social construction of certain 'cults-of-the-body'. As a society we have never lived longer 'ever'... but we have never been bigger... the firgures do not add up. The social interest in weight loss - has really got out of hand, thanks manly to an overly zelous media beatup.

Yes we need to be concerned... but by using a discourse of fear to manipulate societies understanding of weight/obesity etc is very scary... Yes we need to be concerned with the exceedengly overweight, but as such we need to be concerned the extremely under weight. A recient american study shoes that more people die in america of being extremly underweight, than the reverse. So what does this tell us?? That perhaps the current thinking on 'weight' as a social issues has not caught up with th e real underlining issues of the so called problem. One has only to question the discursive (language) that is being currently being used to describe the so called 'obesity epidemic'. The usage of the epidemic strikes fear into the social mass because of certain associations to actual diseases. And as we are well aware 'fear' is an excellent tool for social manipulation and control, just look at america and the war on terror!!

So in the end 'weight'(loss or gain) as a 'social issue' has become deeply rooted in society. However, the real issues and power (political/economical) behind it need further analysis.

Great point you bring up Nudger! I always get the feeling that society has an inability to cope with inequities because it upsets the balance of power between the rich classes and the others (us)! It talks about it, ackowledges it and then can't do anything constructive about it. Why? Media control and ownership by the rich, the profit motive and the economic and competitive mantras are peddled out as the panacea to societies problems and have only served the interests of the rich. Hence the gap between rich and poor countries has grown from 17:1 in 1952 to 72:1 in 2006 after the rich countries invented the International Money Fund (IMF ) and the World Trade Organisation(WTO).
I think we are well and truly off the intent of the first post in this thread but have really explored some ground!!! Thanks.

I find that most people I train want to lose weight/gain weight/gain strength purely for the fact that they will have a better quality of life. They'll be able to run around with their children longer, get heavy items off the top shelf without calling for someones help, be able to walk down to the shops without losing their breath.

While there are a few stererotypical egomasochistic examples of people wanting to lose weight to look good/normal in the public's view, I can tell you that over 90% of people who come to me asking for help want me to help them achieve a better quality of life, especially those who are 50+ years of age.

Also, with cisco's comments on people who know they're doing the wrong thing by eating cakes etc... That isn't an issue of education or a lack of care, its mostly due to the fact that its their lifestyle, one which they've been in for a number of years. A lifestyle habit can sometimes take years of intense alteration before they can continue that by themselves. Most people are scared of this mode of weight loss due to the fact that they will only lose 1-2kg max per month, and (typical of today's society) they want results and they wanted them yesterday (hence the introduction of the 'Atkins Diet', 'Jenny Craig' and 'Weight Watchers'). You'll notice that out of diets and personal trainers, personal trainers are around alot longer by comparison.

I don't see myself as a personal trainer, I see myself as a life coach. I'm able to help with all facets of fitness whereas diets only target the problem, not the cause (end: free plug)

Another question you should ask yourself everytime is what defines the 'normal' or 'average' person?

Anyway, if anyone does need any help with programs or advice, just ask

Sean

BWAHAHA cisco you rat you!

Change my name and I didn't even realise it!

Anyway, let me know how it all goes. Any questions or whatever, I'll sort them out

Seano

Haha yes. I love it.

No probs LC, any time :)

Will do mate, thanks a lot for today. I'm in there tomorrrow to come down hard on that gym.