Your Daily Fat Loss Manager for 2010

Get My Fitness Hut's Daily Fat Loss Manager for 2010 because, well, you need to manage your fat loss! That's right! You can manage your fat loss and weight loss just like you do everything else in your life....and you will be more successful with your fat loss and weight loss efforts!You get: 1. Daily fat loss guidance, 2. FREE MEAL PLAN, 3. Fat Blaster Workouts,4. Daily Food Journal,5. Weight and Body Fat Log and6. Numerous Fat Loss Tips Stop playing a guessing game with your fat loss, fitness and health! This Daily Fat Loss Manager will take you through the process!Happy New Year and all...

Read more »

The Hygiene Hypothesis

A study on mice may explain why it's not so bad to get lots of infections when you are young. Many studies show that children raised on farms are less likely to develop allergies than those raised in cities. If your immune cells and proteins do not get a lot of practice and learn how to recognize bacteria and viruses, they may attack pollen, mold, dust and other particles that are not bacteria to cause allergies that show up as skin rashes, nasal and lung obstruction and irritation.Researchers at The University of Marburg in Germany worked with a line of mice that had been genetically programmed to develop asthma. They sprayed Acinetobacter lwoffii, a type of bacteria found in farmyards. into the noses of pregnant mice, and this prevented their...

Read more »

Walk Every Day Until January

If you just have to wait until January to start your exercise program, walk every day until then! This way, it will make your transition into workouts easier. It will also get you on an exercise routine. Walking 30 minutes every day has great health benefits too.Walk and you will make getting fit and staying fit much easier! You don't have to wait until "your workout" to exercise. You have plenty of opportunities during the day to walk.Keep your walking/running shoes with you! Walk as much as possible during the day! Take advantage of every opportunity to walk. This one tip should be used...

Read more »

Merry Christmas From My Fitness Hut!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all of us at My Fitness Hut!Here is a gift for you!M...

Read more »

Burn More Fat With Weight Training

If you want to burn more fat, do more weight training exercises! Do more weight training exercises that test your balance, coordination, strength and flexibility! This might require that you put that old favorite workout on the shelf and try something new! If you do, I guarantee you will burn more fat and lose more weight!Try some of these weight training exercises:1. Incorporate many one-legged exercises such as power step ups, single leg squats, single leg good mornings, single leg medicine ball exercises, etc. These types of exercises are more intense than two-legged exercises.2. Include...

Read more »

Stress Fractures Caused by Weak Muscles and Over-Striding

One of the most common injuries in runners is a stress fracture of the lower leg (tibia) because running fast causes the foot to hit the ground with tremendous force that can shatter bones. A study from the University of Minnesota shows that women with stress fractures do not have weaker bones, they have smaller and weaker calf muscles (Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, December 2009). Another study from Iowa State University in Ames, in the same journal, shows that longer strides cause the greatest foot strike forces that increase bone fracture risk.Strong muscles may help to prevent bones from breaking by absorbing more force from the foot hitting the ground during running. Most distance runners do not use weight machines to...

Read more »

Your Fat Loss Year In Review

This time of year, you need to review your year of fat loss. How did you do? Do you have less body fat and weigh less? Or, did you gain weight and your body fat increased? Are you eating healthier than you did last year? Is your health better (schedule that physical exam!)? Did you have a good meal plan to follow? Honestly answer these questions! If you have not made progress with your fat loss and weight loss, you need to determine the reasons why. Your clothes should be fitting looser, your body should be more toned, you should be able to do some type of interval cardio (instead of slow-paced cardio), you should be able to get through a 30 minute circuit weight training workout, etc. Here are some observations that I see in some...

Read more »

Burn Fat And Lose Weight Before January

You have 2 weeks to burn fat and lose weight before January! Don't let these 2 weeks go to waste! You can make alot of progress with your fitness, fat loss and weight loss before January. In other words, don't make a New Year's resolution. Start today and make a lifetime commitment to health and fitness. You will like the long-term results much better.There are some medical exceptions but the cause of weight gain for most of us is that we love food too much. Don't blame your weight gain on your "slow metabolism!".......A slow or sluggish metabolism is not the major cause of weight gain.A caloric imbalance is the cause of weight gain (consuming more calories than you burn in a day). If you want to speed up your metabolism and burn more...

Read more »

Stabilize Deep Core Muscles

Stabilize your deep core muscles with exercises like the stability ball plank, a great core exercise to advance you from the plank exercise on the floor. The ball plank strengthens and stabilizes your deep, foundational core muscles even more than the regular plank. Balancing on the ball while holding the plank position is not easy! Your deep, foundational core muscles are more important than your "six pack abs!"1. Place your elbows on the ball and balance on your toes while keeping your body in a straight line.2. Hold the plank position for a count of 5-10 seconds without moving. The ball...

Read more »

Top 10 Eating Tips To Live Healthier

Live healthier by following my Top 10 Eating Tips!Your fat loss and weight loss success or failure will depend on what you eat and how much.1. Make the commitment to change your eating habits no matter what it takes...this commitment will help you overcome the stumbles and setbacks along the way. Get and follow a healthy meal plan as soon as possible!2. Start keeping a food journal as soon as possible! Research has proven that you will have a better chance of succeeding with your nutrition plan and fat loss if you keep a food journal! By logging your actual food choices, you are holding yourself accountable throughout the day. You will also be forced to plan your meals better and avoid binge eating and emotional eating.3. Get an accountability...

Read more »

Fat-Burning Bodyweight Workout

Use bodyweight workouts to burn fat. A bodyweight workout is always waiting to happen because you take your body everywhere you go. You don't need exercise equipment to burn fat so you don't need a gym membership. You don't need much time to burn fat (a 30 minute workout will do the trick). You need to consistently work hard and eat right to burn more fat and lose more weight. Here is a great little 30-minute bodyweight workout that you can do at home, at the park or at work. This workout is a strength and cardio workout so it will save you even more time during your busy day. If you have...

Read more »

Fat Loss Management

Fat loss management is a simple process---if you do it day in and day out! Its a process like any goal you are trying to reach. You don't reach your fat loss goals overnight! And, you didn't gain that fat and weight overnight---it was a process too!Fat loss management works along with weight loss management. Regular strength training, cardio exercise and a good meal plan will help you burn fat (lose inches), speed up your metabolism and lose the fat and weight for good! No more yo-yo dieting and regaining that weight!How many times have you followed your meal plan and exercise program all week and then blown it on the weekend by going on an eating binge? If that's you, then you need a daily fat loss and weight loss plan to follow!And,...

Read more »

Exercise Relieves Stress During Holidays

The holidays bring on extra stress so use exercise to relieve your stress. A certain amount of stress and tension helps you take on challenges and perform better. Too much stress (left unchecked) over a prolonged period is not good for you and it causes health problems and affects your metabolism. Also, some people respond to stress better than others. One person might crumble under the same workload that causes another person to thrive. Your body's normal state (homeostasis) is changed by stress. The hormones, adrenaline and cortisol, are secreted in response to a stressful situation. The "fight or flight" response to stress is intended to give you the energy to take on or run away from a particular situation. Stressful situations...

Read more »

Weight Loss Helped By Exercise, Rest And Recovery

Exercise, rest and recovery are all important for weight loss and fat loss! If you don't allow your body to rest and recover, it will affect your metabolism, weight loss and fat loss efforts! Do no more than 3 weight training workouts in a week and take a break from exercise 1-2 days a week. You don't want to end up injured because of over-training. And, a healthy meal plan goes without saying. You will gain weight if you maintain a caloric surplus (eat more calories than you burn).Oh yeah, most people need 7-8 hours of sleep a night! Your metabolism will be "out of wack" if you don't sleep enough.Here are some training tips:This might sound elementary but..... warm-up properly to avoid injuries.... walking for 2 minutes is not a good...

Read more »

BOSU Ball Exercises Do Not Activate More Core Muscles

BOSU ball exercises DO NOT activate more core muscles! You can do your squats, deadlifts and shoulders presses on stable ground. Researchers from Eastern Illinois University found that doing squats, deadlifts and shoulders presses on BOSU balls was not more effective for core muscle activation. Doing these exercises on stable ground activated more core muscles. There are tons of fitness gadgets on the market. In general, you can save your money. Do your exercises with free weights or use bodyweight workouts and you will get maximum muscle activation. Limit machine exercises unless you are...

Read more »

Prevent Weight Gain During Holiday Travel

Its easy to gain weight while you travel during the holidays. Pack your food and your clothes when you travel this holiday season. Some of you travel 4-5 days a week, every week! Eating all the holiday treats can add pounds to your body in a hurry! So, just plan your meals like always and you can enjoy your holiday treats too!If you are a frequent flyer or driver, you know the food traps found in airport or roadside restaurants! The food choices are usually high-calorie, high-carb and high-fat. You have even more high-calorie food and dessert choices during the holidays. Try to stay with your meal plan as much as possible while traveling during the holidays. Haphazard eating or grazing will skyrocket your calories and pack pounds on...

Read more »

Maintain Muscle Or Body Fat Returns

Build and maintain your muscles, use it or lose it or however you want to say it. Your muscles will shrink (atrophy) if you don't continue to do strength training (muscle does not ever change into fat). And, the body fat will come back with a vengeance! Fat cells will shrink but they will fill up again when you are inactive for a long period of time.If you are not exercising, you could be hit with a double dose of likely bad news. First, you will probably gain weight (interpreted fat). Also, your metabolism begins to slow down in your thirties. Your metabolism will slow down even more because you are also losing muscle mass. Muscle mass speeds up your metabolism because your body has to work harder to maintain it.In your early thirties,...

Read more »

Too Much Alcohol Consumption Can Increase Body Fat

Consuming too much alcohol can cause you to gain body fat and weight. You need to know how your body responds to alcohol when you take a drink. First, one gram of alcohol provides 7 calories. Only fat (9 cal/g) provides more calories than alcohol. So, when you are planning your food and drink consumption, don't forget the calories from alcohol!When you take a drink of alcohol, your body converts a small amount of it into fat and the rest is converted (by the liver) into a substance called acetate. This acetate is then quickly released into the bloodstream and used as the body's main source of energy. So, your body is using the acetate as energy instead of the stored fat in your body. The more you drink, the more fat your body will store...

Read more »

Why Sprinting Improves Endurance

Jens Bangsbo of the University of Copenhagen has shown that if you want to run, cycle or swim faster at any distance, you have to train at a pace that is almost as fast as you can move (Journal of Applied Physiology, November 2009). He asked competitive distance runners to reduce their mileage by 25 percent, and to run 8 to 12 30-second sprints 2-3 times a week, with some additional 0.6-0.8 mile sprints 1 or 2 times per week, for 6 to 9 weeks. The control group of runners continued their regular training program, and showed no improvement. The sprint group improved both their 3K (1.8 mile) and 10K (6 mile) race times by more than three percent (more than a minute in the 10-K race). Half of them ran their best times ever, even though many had...

Read more »

Junk Food Alters Intestinal Bacteria in Just One Day

After just one day of switching from a plant-based diet to a high-fat-and-sugar diet, mice with human intestinal bacteria developed bacteria associated with obesity in humans, and soon became grossly obese (Science Translational Medicine, November 11, 2009).Dr. Jeffrey Gordon of Washington University in St Louis first showed that certain types of bacteria in the human intestinal tract can break down food more efficiently and help you absorb a greater percentage of calories from the food that you eat. He also showed that humans whose intestinal tracts are dominated by these bacteria tend to be overweight.In this new study, Dr. Gordon created germ-free mice and fed them a low-fat, plant-rich diet. Then he fed them bacteria extracted from human...

Read more »

Jumping Exercises Burn More Fat

Jumping exercise workouts will burn more fat because they are very intense! And, one-legged jumping exercises are more intense than two-legged jumping exercises. Shorten and intensify your workouts with jump training (plyometrics)! Plyometric workouts also burn more fat and calories during and after your workout!If you're having trouble sculpting your butt, hips and thighs then you need to do more jump exercises. Jump exercise workouts are advanced workouts. You need to perfect jumping and landing techniques or you will injure yourself. And, if you have knee and low back problems, high-speed...

Read more »

Thanksgiving Day-After Fat Loss Workout

I really did workout the day after Thanksgiving! I had to workout and burn those extra calories! Hopefully, you did your workout too. It's best to get right back into the exercise groove.Here's my workout:1. Sprint interval cardio, 20 minutes1. Bodyweight squats, 12 repetitions2. Pushups on medicine ball, 15 repetitions3. Bentover dumbbell rows, 10 repetitions4. Plank, 10 repetitions, 20 second hold5. Standing dumbbell shoulder press, 10 repetitions6. Medicine ball diagonal chop, 10 repetitions each side, full speed7. Dumbbell calf raises, 25 repetitions, full speedDo this circuit 2 more times. Rest 2 minutes between circuits.Burn those Thanksgiving calories! Learn how to lose weight the right way and get My Fitness Hut's 7-Day Weight...

Read more »

New Vitamin D Recommendations

At the University of Toronto School of Medicine's "Diagnosis and Treatment of Vitamin D Deficiency" conference on November 3, 2009, thirty of the world's leading researchers on vitamin D recommended 2,000 IU of vitamin D daily (the current recommendation is 600 IU). Vitamin D3 blood levels should be 100-150 nmol/L (40-60 ng/ml); the existing recommendation is 30-50 nmol/L.Vitamin D pioneer Dr. Cedric Garland presented data showing that raising vitamin D levels to 200 nmol/L decreased breast cancer risk more than 77 percent. He said: "Breast cancer is a disease so directly related to vitamin D deficiency that a woman's risk of contracting the disease can be virtually eradicated by elevating her vitamin D status to near that level." Recent work...

Read more »

Healthy Snacks For Thanksgiving

Eating healthy snacks during the long Thanksgiving weekend is important! Why? Because you will enjoy your regular Thanksgiving meal(s). The snacks and side food items can really skyrocket your calorie count if you're not careful! What you eat between main meals can make the difference in gaining excess pounds or maintaining your weight during the long 4 day fest! First, a few common sense Thankgiving holiday eating rules:1. Use no more than a pat of butter on whole wheat bread or rolls.2. Use natural sweeteners like cinnamon instead of sugar.3. Use condiments like mustard instead of ketchup or mayonnaise.4. Drink only water or unsweetened drinks, like tea. Cranberry juice and pomegranite juice are not that healthy if they are loaded with...

Read more »

Get A Lean And Toned Body!

The way to get a lean and toned body is not very complicated! Be consistent with your fitness program and you will get and stay lean and toned! Here are some tips to get your body lean and toned: 1. If you want fat loss, weight loss and a lean and toned body then you MUST eat for fat loss! Everyone needs a meal plan! You need to have some sort of idea of what you are going to eat for the day. If you don't have a meal plan, you might eat anything at any time! If you have a plan, you are more likely to follow it or at least eat similar foods. And, record what you eat in a food journal to hold yourself accountable.2. Burn more fat by working large muscle groups, not by working out longer! Maximize your time in the gym and get the results...

Read more »

Farmer's Walk Exercise Builds Core Strength

Ever heard of the farmer's walk exercise (think farmer walking with heavy milk containers)!? Do the farmer's walk exercise to primarily improve core strength (especially back strength), grip strength and burn fat. The exercise can be done to improve maximal strength or to improve endurance strength (at a distance, timed or untimed).Do the farmer's walk exercise by picking up a dumbbell in each hand. Pick up the dumbbells by deadlifting them (to protect your back) or lifting them from the weight rack. Hold each dumbbell with your arms extended by your sides and walk! If you are doing the farmer's...

Read more »

Will avoiding dietary sugar prolong life?

Nobody has yet shown any way to extend the life span of humans. However, both exercise and calorie restriction (with adequate nutrients) have been shown to extend the life span of animals. Both of these measures apparently extend life by increasing the number and size of mitochondria in cells and making them turn food into energy more efficiently. Each cell in your body contains up to several hundred mitochondria which provide the most efficient chemical reactions in your body for converting food into energy.An exciting new study on worms offers a potential method for you to prolong life and good health. When blood sugar levels rise too high, sugar enters cells in large amounts. An earlier study showed that adding sugar to the diet of the worm,...

Read more »

Quick Weight Loss vs. Optimal Health, Part 2

Quick weight loss implies that it's something that probably won't last! Health should be stressed before weight loss and beauty! It does you no good to look great if your body is a total wreck and unhealthy!Optimal health involves making lifestyle changes to improve your:1. health2. fitness3. energy levels4. quality of lifeWe are living longer on this earth so quality of life is important! The "quick weight loss lifestyle" is narrow minded when you compare it to the "optimal health lifestyle!" Quick weight loss leads to slowed metabolism, a weaker immune system, hormonal imbalances, loss of lean mass, increased body fat, decreased energy levels, disrupted sleep patterns, short-term results and yo-yo dieting! I'll take the optimal health...

Read more »

Just Getting Old Does Not Cause Diabetes

A study from the University of Pittsburgh shows that the marked increase in diabetes in older people is caused by obesity and lack of exercise, not by aging alone (Diabetes Care, August 2009). Most cases of diabetes are caused by cells not being able to respond to insulin, rather than by lack of insulin. Inability to respond adequately to insulin is caused by being overweight, not exercising, lacking vitamin D and/or eating too many refined carbohydrates.In this study, the same insulin responses were found in young and old endurance-trained athletes, young and old normal-weight subjects, and young and old obese subjects. Regardless of age, athletes had better insulin responses than normal-weight sedentary subjects, who had better insulin responses...

Read more »

Quick Weight Loss vs. Optimal Health, Part 1

The hazzards of the quick weight loss lifestyle and the benefits of the optimal health lifestyle were on full display this past weekend at Nutrilite Health Institute! Nutrilite has been in existence for 75 years and is the only company that organically grows all its own plants which are used to produce their own nutritional products for optimal health! If you're looking for quick weight loss products, Nutrilite can't help you! Nutrilite researches, grows and produces its own scientifically healthy products! My Fitness Hut and 8 other health bloggers (pictured above) were privileged to be invited...

Read more »