Energy Drinks - Do They Give You Energy or Just a Fat Gut
June 7th, 2008 by ryhan
I receive a ton of questions about all of these new “energy” drinks that have hit the market over the last few years. They seem to be all the rage, especially with the youth, and they promise you the world with outrageous claims of all of the super energy that you are going to have, and how you’ll be crushing the competition in your sport, and so on.
So a couple questions arise:
Are these “energy” drinks really any good for you?
Do they actually increase your energy?
Do they really have some sort of magical energy formula?
Will they help you lose weight?
First of all, let’s look at what most of these energy drinks are usually made of. Most of them are simply carbonated water loaded with gut-fattening high fructose corn syrup, caffeine, the amino acid taurine, and a few random B-vitamins thrown in for show to trick you into thinking there’s something healthy about these concoctions.
Let’s start with the high fructose corn syrup. Well, here we’ve got empty calories that will go straight to your belly fat, and that are actually even WORSE for you than plain old refined sugar.
Ok, so you say that they have low-sugar or sugar-free varieties as an alternative to the HFCS-laden energy drinks. Yes, but now you have the problem of the harmful chemicals in the artificial sweeteners.
Another problem with artificial sweeteners is that there are some researchers that believe artificial sweetener use leads people to inadvertently consume more calories and gain more weight in the long run. I won’t go into the details on that because that would fill up an entire discussion by itself. Just trust me that artificial sweeteners and artificial chemicals in food in general, are all bad news for your body!
What about the caffeine? Well, first of all, caffeine in itself doesn’t provide “energy”. Technically, the only substances that actually provide energy are calories (from carbs, protein, and fat).
However, caffeine can be an aid for livening or waking some people up, by means of stimulating the central nervous system. Keep in mind though, if you’re a regular coffee drinker, you’re probably addicted to caffeine and probably wouldn’t receive too much benefit from the caffeine in an energy drink anyway.
Besides, instead of caffeine added to some carbonated drink, I’d rather get my caffeine from a natural source like green, white, or oolong teas, which actually provide healthful antioxidants too!
Now what about that so called magical blend of taurine and B-vitamins that they load into these energy drinks? Well, big deal…you can get taurine in almost any protein source. And the vast majority of those B-vitamins are simply coming right out into the toilet in your pee. Vitamins are best obtained naturally from real food sources, not artificially added to some carbonated drink. Your body just doesn’t use fake sources of vitamins as readily as natural sources from real food.
So as you can see, in my opinion, I give all of these energy drinks a big time THUMBS DOWN! You’re better off mixing up your own homemade energy drink with some iced unsweetened green, white, and oolong teas, a little bit of 100% pure berry or pomegranate juice, and maybe a touch of a non-denatured whey protein.
Well, I hope this article cleared up some of the confusion about these energy drinks that are being so heavily marketed these days, and will help you make more informed decisions for your health.
Visit http://truthaboutabs.com/freenewsletter.html to receive a free copy of the innovative ebook, Training & Nutrition Secrets for a Lean-Body, as well as your own free personalized metabolic rate calculator.
Michael Geary (CPT) is a recognized Fitness Expert, owner of http://BusyDadWorkouts.com, contributing writer for Muscle & Fitness Magazine, and author of the internationally-selling book, The Truth about Six Pack Abs.
Tags: energy, energy drinks, Fat Loss, lose body fat, lose fat, stamina, weight lossHow Many Reps and Sets To Build Muscle
March 31st, 2008 by ryhan
One of the most asked questions I get while training others is how many reps and sets of an exercise are needed to achieve lean muscle growth, strength increase, and an overall improvement in body composition.
Reps
The desired repetition range for both men and women for just about all exercises is four to six repetitions for your last, heavy sets.
That doesn’t include warm-ups or acclimation sets, just your last sets.
There is one and only one reason a muscle has for gaining lean muscle tissue and getting stronger….
….Progressively increased overload.
You need to progressively “force” the muscle into growing and getting stronger or it will not.
In order to increase overload, you need to increase resistance. In order to increase resistance, you need to increase the amount of weight, or work, you are doing.
Lower repetitions of an exercise will allow you to increase the overload to that muscle instantaneously. This forces the stimulation of new muscle fibers that will be recruited to handle the additional stresses that will be placed upon the muscle.
The repetition range for optimal muscle fiber stimulation will be between four and six repetitions for just about every heavy set of an exercise you do.
Low reps will not cause women to “bulk” up. Low reps will
strengthen and “tone” your muscles quicker than higher reps.
Lighter weights and higher reps will basically keep you from making optimal gains. If you can do ten repetitions of an exercise, the weight is too light to achieve overload.
How do you know what weight to use? If you can do more than six repetitions on your heavy sets for an exercise, the weight is too light. If you cannot do at least four, the weight is too heavy.
So the low down on reps is 4 to 6 for all heavy sets. Warm up sets and intermediate can be 8 to 10 reps, but to get the muscle stimulating benefit of weight training, you must use lower reps to create enough of an overload.
Sets
The amount of heavy, intense sets per exercise will be between one and three sets, depending on the order of the exercise.
When you are warmed up, the number of all-out, intense sets will be three at the most, and on some exercises, just one or two sets.
It is the overload that causes the muscle to grow, not the
amount of sets you do. There is no “universal law” which states that if you double the amount of sets you perform, you also double the results.
The key is to stimulate, not annihilate, the muscle into
responding and growing. You do this with two, very intense sets of four to six repetitions. This will efficiently stimulate the muscles more than doing more sets with more reps at a lighter weight.
If we were doing bicep curls, we would do our warm-ups and then two heavy, intense sets of four to six repetitions. This exercise is now done. You have effectively overloaded the bicep muscles and will then proceed to the next exercise, if there is one.
As you can see, it is all about quality over quantity when it comes to producing results.
It is so much better to do one or two heavy sets at maximum intensity than 3 or more at an easier level.
More is not better….better is better.
Fitness Consultant Shawn Lebrun has helped over 13,000 individuals lose fat and build muscle in less time. To
read more about what he can do for you, please check out
his site at Shawn Lebrun Fitness.com