It’s not just about hard work. It’s about doing and achieving things!

I hope that you are all getting lean and mean for the summer.

If you have not started getting into shape don’t leave it any later. The magazines with the headlines flat stomach in 2 week or a 6 pack in 6 days is lying to you…!

I have started my own summer regime, Monday was drop sets, Tuesday 10 rounds of hard boxing and today metabolic circuit training! If it wasn’t for the stiff and sore muscles I’d feeling fighting fit!!!

Our boot camps are about more than just weight loss and fitness this weekend was a big weekend for 12 of our campers!

On the Friday the 25^th a group of excited and slightly anxious Absolute Bootcamp Berkhamsted Bootcampers embarked on a 5 hour journey to North Wales.

For some of it was going to be an event of a lifetime, other a celebration of how far they have come in less than a year!

Joining last September some have gone from sedentary to mountain conqueror in just 9 short months!

We took 15 including me up and brought 15 back. I can’t say for sure that they are the same 15 people as many when through some changes as they conquered fatigue and fears.

We all arrived at the hotel at the bottom of mount Snowdon on Friday evening after a long 5 hour drive. Obviously there were only 2 things on people’s minds…

1)      A good meal

2)      Hitting the bar!

Some of us hit the bar harder than others but a good time was had by all.

By 2.30 most were in bed getting the necessary shut eye for the climb ahead… others (Amy) where still up trying to sober up a little before bed!

Here she is the following morning not looking ready to go????

I think she may have been still drunk as it was not long before she looked like this!

The alarm went off all too soon at 7 for a 7.30 breakfast, then we splint into 2 groups, a fast and a slower group.

The fast group had an extra job to do.

Drop the cars off on the other side of Snowdon and then get back and catch up the other group who would have about an hour head start.

I led the faster group and we quickly got our kit together and got off to the drop point. My dad (Tony in this photo) led the slower group who then signed out the hotel and started their climb up the mountain.

I don’t know if you like driving, but if you do I can recommend the Snowdon area, but make sure that you have someone who knows where they are going or a good satnav!

I thought we were trouble…. As I heard my co-pilot come out with the quote of the weekend…. She (Susan) was doing the map reading…

“I think we’re in trouble. There does not seem to be a wiggle for the wiggle that we are on!!!!…..

Possibly not what you want to hear when you are throwing your car through the lanes of Snowdonia we 3 other cars following you rely on you to not get lost!

All was good though the map just needed turning round so that all the wiggles matched up.

We quickly got back from the dropping off of the car and started our assent. The pace was brisk and I have to give congratulation to Angie White, Neil Williams, Susan Beddal and Gale Jackson as they kept the pace and stormed the mountain!

We caught the up with the other team at about 12.30.

It was then a hard climb to the top as we were climbing in 25+ degree heat without a cooling wind.

We regrouped before the top….

Amy had to regroup mentally as well as physically, hangover in full swing in 25 degree heat!!!!

The top was gained in 4 hours so we had celebratory nibbles, water and a photo. After we all used the new toilets and congratulating ourselves for getting there regardless of painful bits and medical conditions it was time to start back down.

We started in good sprit’s knowing lunch was going to be an hour or less away and that we were on our way home….  The happy campers soon learned that down is a lot harder than up. For those of you who have never climbed a mountain, the down part is harder for 2 reasons. 1) The strain on the leg muscle and knee joints is far greater and 2) uneven ground covered in lose pebbles becomes treacherous.

Although people knees and leg were getting tired after lunch everyone battled on. Strong breeze was cooling us and our bellies were full again. Amy’s hang over was subsiding and she was starting to look positively perky!

We got to the car park on the other side of Snowdon about 8 hours after the first group had left the hotel.

Time for a finishers photo a good congratulatory slap on the back!

Well done to everyone one who climbed, I really enjoyed myself. We’ll choose a different mountain next year for some more climbing and photo taking.

I have heard mention and interest for doing the 3 peaks challenge I’ll be asking those of you interested soon. But for the time being it’s time to look forward to the summer BBQ in July and then the next activity weekend in September.

Hope to see you all there,

Keith

P.S – You see Absolute Bootcamp Berkhamsted is not just about the exercise and the weight loss, we are also about the experience and friendship that can only be gained through experiencing things together.

Trust a scientist? Not as far as I can throw him, and I have strained ligaments in my back at the moment!

This is a true, on Monday at 5am, yes 5am! Lifted a weight at a funny angle, quite a heavy one I might add and I have strained the ligaments in the middle of my back. For those of you in the know, my thoracic spine!

So I’m not superman, which up till this point I was thoroughly convinced that I was, but according to clients I’m still a Disney character! Mmmmm…..

Enough about me! On to the lipid hypothesis and scientists!

This post is article 3 in my cholesterol series. Today we are going to look at fat and it’s role in health and heart disease. If you have not already you may wish to read articles 1 and 2 first so that you don’t miss out anything.

Article 1 – The-truth-about-cholesterol-part1

Article 2 – The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

Ready?

Let us then look at the lipid hypothesis

What is a hypothesis?

A hypothesis is a theory, suggestion or supposition. It is what somebody thinks should happen and it is then either up to them or others to prove whether this theory is right or wrong. This is how a scientific experiment is started. The scientist starts with a theory and then does a test to see if his theory is correct.

If he/she was correct then the theory becomes a fact, if they weren’t then it is a disprove theory and the result’s become the fact.

Or so you would think, but not in the case of cholesterol and the lipid hypothesis. This is the theory that can’t die no matter how many time’s it is disproved!

What is the lipid Hypothesis?

This is the theory that Saturated (animal) Fat intake is directly linked to blood cholesterol levels, this in turn causes arthrosclerosis (build up of plaque in the arteries), resulting in a heart attack or coronary heart disease (CHD).

This theory sound’s great, right and accurate, but remember it’s a theory until proven to be fact.

And this is where it falls apart…..

We can start by looking at the archaeological record and evidence gathered from surviving hunter gathers. Here we find that animal products, fats have been consumed in far higher quantities as we evolved for the last 3 million years than are consumed now. In fact an average 80% of our daily calories used to come from animal fats.

Dr Weston A Price studied the health and diets of un-modernised tribes back in the 1920 making very detailed findings of diet, health, disease, bone structure and longevity and found time and time again that tribes had a high fat, high protein diet but very low levels of illness and almost no incidences of premature heart disease or stroke. (1/2)

We look slightly deeper at this research in these 2 books on the Personal Nutrition Course

We can trace the origins of the Lipid Hypothesis theory back to 1953 and a study performed by Ancel Keys at the University of Minnesota. Ancel Keys constructed a graph that compared death rates from heart disease with total fat intake in from 6 countries and plotted a correlation between the 2 factors. What he did NOT do was publish the data from all 22 countries that was available to him.

Why not I hear you ask….. Because if you used all the data, it does not show a correlation between high fat intake and coronary heart disease!

Population comparison studies are often fatally flawed.

Calories from fat tend to be more expensive, so the countries that eat more fat also eat more sugar, smoke, drive cars and have DVD players and satellite television. If you look at the studies you could plot the incidences of heart attack against number of TV’s owned and you’ll see that in countries where a high % of the population own TV’s they also have high incidences of heart disease.

Does that mean that having a TV is a risk factor for heart disease?

I have to be honest and say that personally I think the haunted fish tank (TV) is a risk factor of heart disease due to lifestyle decisions it makes us make! But just owning one is not and does not cause heart disease.

So In summary, population comparison studies are great for highlighting RISK FACTORS, but do not prove a hypothesis. They are even less usable when 17 out of 22 (77% of the available data), is left out.

But let’s not stop with one study, let us take a look at some others.

Experts assure us that the lipid hypothesis is backed by scientific proof, but there is very little evidence to support a connection between fat, cholesterol and health problems such as heart disease and stroke.

Before we hit the studies consider this for a moment;

Before the 1920’s heart disease was rare, so rare that when the electrocardiograph was invented the inventor (Paul Dudley White) was told to concentrate on something more profitable.

By the mid 1950’s heart disease had become one of the leading causes of deaths particularly in America.

Today, up to 40% of all deaths are from heart disease. If it was caused by animal/saturated fat you would expect to see a similar rise in the amount consumed, but we don’t. We see a drop of about 20 – 25%, but an increase in the use of refined vegetable oils of about 400% and an increase of sugar and processed foods of about 60%.

Are you ready for some studies?

Framingham Heart Study

This is often quoted as being the study that proves the lipid hypothesis. It is a long range study which started in 1948 and involved 6,000 people who all lived in the town of Framingham, Massachusetts. The participants of this study were split into 2 groups, those that consumed little saturated fat and cholesterol and those that consumed large amounts of saturated fat and cholesterol. The 2 groups were compared at 5 year intervals over 40 years!

After 40 years the director of the study stated;

“In Framingham, Massachusetts, the more saturated fat one eats, the more cholesterol one eats, the more calories one eats, the lower the person’s serum cholesterol….. We found that the people that ate the most cholesterol, ate the most saturated fat, ate the most calories, weighed the LEAST and were the most physically active “

What the Framingham study did show was that people who weighed more had abnormally high blood cholesterol levels and were at slightly more risk for future heart problems. The study also showed that there was an inverse correlation between weight gain and cholesterol levels and the amount of fat and cholesterol intake.

This means people who ate more fat and cholesterol were thinner and had lower cholesterol levels than those that ate less saturated fat and ate less cholesterol!

Multi-year British Heart Study

This study involved several thousand British males who were split into equal half’s. The first half were asked to reduce their saturated fat and cholesterol consumption, to stop smoking and increase their consumption of vegetable oils and margarine. After 1 year those on the lower fat and cholesterol diet had 100% more deaths even though the high fat dieters continued to smoke! The publishers of the study ignored the studies finding and published the following;

“The implication for a public health policy in the UK is that a preventive programme such as we evaluated in this trial is PROBABLY effective…..”

Now I don’t know about you, but I don’t think that ignoring the results in favour of a politically correct answer is particularly scientific and I sure as hell don’t see the word probably as being a good word to base a nation’s health policy on.

But let’s move on and have a look at another trial, MRFIT.

The Multiple Risk Intervention Trial (MRFIT)

Ok, this one was sponsored by the National Heart, Lung and Blood institute (USA), and compared mortality rates and eating habits of over 12,000 men.  Again we have 2 groups those that reduced their intake of saturated fats, cholesterol and smoking and those that didn’t. This study did show a marginal decrease in Heart disease in those that reduced fat cholesterol and stopped smoking, BUT and it is a big BUT their overall mortality rate (Death rate), was a lot higher.

They died from cancer, brain tumours, suicide and violent death (We’ll talk a different day as to why they died of these things on a low cholesterol diet). So the reduction in fats did not mean that they lived longer healthier more full filling lives they just died of something else.

At this point I’d like to tell you about a diet Guru that you may have heard of, Nathan Pritkin of the Pritkin diet.

Nathan Pritkin was a well know advocate of the low fat diet. His diet also focused on whole natural foods eliminating sugar and processed foods and included a strict intensive exercise regime. This diet had a great success rate for lowering blood pressure , cholesterol levels and losing weight, but…

Have you noticed that there always seem to be a but?

BUT,

People had problems staying on it due to low energy, difficulty in concentration, depression, weight gain and mineral deficiencies.

Using this diet Pritkin did manage to save himself from heart disease but it could not help him recover from leukemia. Sadly, he died in the prime of his life of suicide when he realised that his diet was not working.

You may call me old fashioned but I don’t really want to die of heart disease, cancer or depression leading to suicide.

Let’s move on and look at some other population studies;

Population 1 – Yemen/Israel

Jews living in Yemen with diets consisting solely of fats from animal origin V.s Yemenite Jews living in Israel eat margarine and vegetable fats. (4)

This study revealed little heart disease or diabetes in the animal fats group but high levels of both disease in the vegetable oil and margarine group. It was also noted that this group also consumed a high level of sugar.

Population 2 – India

North V.s South India. The population in northern India consume on average 17 times more animal fat but their incidences of coronary heart disease is 7 times lower than that of southern Indians. (4)

Population 3 – Africa

The Masai of Africa mainly eat and drink milk, blood and beef which is all high in fat but they are free from heart disease and have low cholesterol levels. (4)

Population 4 – Eskimo

Eskimo’s when on their native diet of animal fats from Fish and marine animals are free from disease. (4)

Population 5 – Chinese

In a study of 65 Chinese counties it was found that those that consumed large amounts of whole milk had half the rate of heart disease as areas that consumed less animal product. (4)

Population 6 – Mediterranean

We are often told to follow the Mediterranean diet as there is a lower incidence of heart disease. For some reason we think that just adding olive oil to everything is the key ingredient….?

70% of the calories that are consumed are from saturated fat sources coming from goat’s cheese, lamb and sausage. The population of Crete is a great example as they are known for their good health and longevity and their native diet is primarily made from the above ingredients. (4)

Population 7 – Puerto Ricans

Matines. I. Et al (1975) looked at the correlation between cancer and high fat intake. It was found that Puerto Ricans consumed large amounts of animal fat but have very low incidences of colon and breast cancer. (4)

Population 8 – Japanese

The Japanese have the longest life span of any population in the world. This is largely attributed to a low fat diet. The Japanese eat little dairy, but their diet is not low fat! It possible that the Japanese consume more cholesterol than we do in the UK or the Americans! This is due to the amounts of shellfish and fish broth they consume on a daily basis. The diet also contain moderate amounts of egg, beef, pork, chicken, seafood and organ meats. What the Japanese do NOT do is consume a lot of vegetable oil, white flour or processed foods. Since WWII the life span of the Japanese has increase in line with the increase of the amount of animal fat and protein in their diet. (4)

Population 9 – France

The French diet is loaded with saturated fat in the form of butter, eggs, cheese, cream, liver and meats. In Gascony Goose and duck liver for a staple part of the diet. In this region 80 out of 100,000 middle aged men get heart disease. Across France it about 145 in every 100,000 in middle aged men and in America 315 out of every 100,000 middle aged men get heart disease.

Although the French are not suffering from Heart disease they do have a high incidence of degenerative diseases from the large amount of sugar, white flour and the time saving processed foods. (4)

Just to finish I would like to look at the 3 longest living populations in the developed world. First place goes to the Japanese, second to the Swiss and third place is a tie between Austria and Greece. All of the countries have moderate to high saturated fat intakes.

We could go on to look at animal studies but I have to ask you if you were a rabbit would you not keel over and die if you were force fed meats and cholesterol that you body has no idea how to digest because you are designed to process grass and dandelion leaves? I think your own common sense can put that one together without any pushing from me!

Lol

Committed to your health and success

Keith

Here’s how eating regularly can help you to lose weight or stay in the best shape of your life

I hope that you are feeling awesome!

Did you know that regularly missing meals can scupper your weight loss results?

Most people think and the press would have you believe that weight loss is a simple process of calories in and calories out but this is simply not true. If it were half of my client base would never have called or emailed me or even looked for my services.

I know lots of people who miss meals to lose weight and others who miss meals due to busy schedules or bad planning. I know all of these people because they are trying to lose weight, but most are struggling and many are moving in the wrong direction.

But why?

Why are they putting on weight or at best staying stable?

This is a question that I’m asked by these people all the time?

I want to share with you the reasons why, why people starve themselves and missing meal only to find that the scales are not showing them what they want to see.

To explore why calorie restriction does not work we have to look at our position on the planet and our evolutionary path to it.

We are the most dominant species on the planet, we are number 1 the top of the food chain. To get to this point we have under gone millions of years of evolution. During this time our ancestors have been through some real hard times such as ice ages, droughts and famines. To allow us to survive the trials and tribulations that nature throws at us we have evolved mechanisms to help us to cope.

When it comes to a lack of food the body has the ability to reduce its metabolic rate which means it can reduce the amount of calories that it uses for the various functions that are required for you to survive.

Your body also looks to store food so that you have reserves in case the famine is going to be prolonged due to seasonal conditions or natural disasters.

Missing meals and or dramatically reducing your calorie consumption leads to your body thinking that food is scarce and that you are in a period of famine.

So it slows down your metabolism and stores the food that you eat for later.

The next problem that you are going to face on low calorie diets or he regular missing of meals is the resumption of your normal eating pattern.

It will take a couple of days for your body to realise that you are no longer in a state of famine and food is now readily available again. During this time your body is going to store everything that you consume, especially as your metabolism is slow and you do not need the extra calories that you are now consuming. You therefore pile the pounds back on often becoming heavier then you were to start with!

It’s important for you to eat 3 meals a day, breakfast, lunch and dinner to make sure that your metabolism is running well and you are supplying it with all the nutrients that it needs.

Over the next couple of posts I’m going to talk more about the problems of low calorie diets or missing meal and I’m going to give you strategies to overcome your problems with meals.

The regular problems that clients bring to me are;

• I don’t feel like breakfast in the morning / it makes me feel sick / I’m not hungry
• I don’t have time for meal X because Y

So, eat 3 meal a day!

And I’ll be back with some more pitfalls and solutions for you.

Committed to your success

Keith

Serena Bauldreay

Quite simply, the Absolute Training Team of Keith, Clare and Amy are just brilliant. If like me, you loathe gyms full of Lycra clad beauties – come to Boot Camp and be trained by a team who really care about YOU and what YOU are trying to achieve.  You will sweat more than you have ever sweated before, and yes, at first you will ache like never before BUT, within three weeks I have re-discovered muscles that had been lost to me since childbirth some 14 years ago!!!!

The motivation which you get from them is amazing – it is friendly, great fun, very hard work but so worth it.  I’ve met some really genuinely great people and I absolutely love coming to every session.

Serena

Meal in a Glass

Hi Everyone,

I’m really pleased that you all enjoyed the smoothies tonight. This will make life a lot better and easier when you have an early start or are going to find it difficult to get lunch.

1. 2 eggs, 1/2 banana, goats milk, walnuts
2. 2 eggs, mixed fresh berries (black berry, blue berries, raspberries), goats yogurt
3. 2 eggs, strawberries, rice milk
4. 2 eggs, mixed berries, coconut milk
5. 2 eggs, mixed berries, goats yogurt, rice milk

The most important thing is to experiment with the recipes and the amounts to make a smoothie that you like and keeps you full for a couple of hours.

If you find that raw egg causes you a problem (as some people do), then use a protein powder and if you’re not sure about this then ask me.

Thanks for a great session and I hope that these help you all.

Keith Tucker

P.S. I often add a little oil to mine so that I increase the omega 3 content. Hemp oil, Odo’s oil, flax oil. Keeps me fuller for longer as well but can sometimes spoil the taste.