Pink Slime in School Lunch

This is important:

"Pink slime" is the term used for a mixture of beef scraps and connective tissue (formerly used only for pet food and rendering) that is treated with ammonia hydroxide to remove pathogens like salmonella and E coli. These so-called "Lean Beef Trimmings," are produced by Beef Products, Inc.

Two former government microbiologists claim that, for political reasons, pink slime was approved for human consumption by USDA over serious safety concerns.  (http://bit.ly/waMMni)

Government and industry records obtained by The New York Times in 2009 showed that "in testing for the school lunch program, E. coli and salmonella pathogens have been found dozens of times in Beef Products meat, challenging claims by the company and the U.S.D.A. about the effectiveness of the treatment. Since 2005, E. coli has been found 3 times and salmonella 48 times, including back-to-back incidents in August in which two 27,000-pound batches were found to be contaminated. The meat was caught before reaching lunch-rooms trays."

Even apart from safety concerns, it is simply wrong to feed our children connective tissues and beef scraps that were, in the past, destined for use in pet food and rendering and were not considered fit for human consumption.

Due to public outcry, fast food giants like McDonald's and Burger King have stopped using pink slime in their food.  But the federal government continues to allow its use in school food and has just authorized the purchase of ground beef which collectively contains an additional 7 million pounds of pink slime for consumption by our nation's children.

Tell the USDA to STOP the use of ground beef containing pink slime in the National School Lunch Program!

[You can follow the progress of this petition, including the latest media coverage and more information on pink slime, on my daily blog -- The Lunch Tray (www.thelunchtray.com)]

Another Sugary Experience

I have to expand on a portion of my post on StrongGirlsWin.com from yesterday: the 3-Hour Glucose Tolerance Test. So, the test is screening for Gestational Diabetes and you only have to take this version if you fail the 1-Hour Tolerance Test (which I did).

There are, of course, strict rules to follow to keep the test valid:

1. Eat a diet containing at least 150g of carbohydrates per day for 3 days prior to testing.
2. Fast for 8-hours before consuming glucose solution.
3. Drink solution containing 100g of glucose within 5-minutes. Think throwing back about 4 shots in 5-minutes… maybe not the best idea.

Then you sit for 3-hours that are interspersed with blood drawing every hour.

Doesn’t sound too bad does it?

Well, for me, this is about as bad as it gets in terms of medical testing. I have strong dislike for fasting, having my blood drawn, being forced to drink huge amounts of sugar, and sitting still for long periods of time. I’m not trying to exaggerate or be funny, I really don’t like any of those things.

In fact, I almost didn’t get the test done at all. After all, I’ve “been there, done that” with my first pregnancy. So, why should I put myself through this hellish experience again?

Aside from simply “getting over myself” and acting like an adult, I pulled up some research to educate myself on the risk factors associated with babies who are born to women with gestational diabetes and decided I did, in fact, need to get over myself.

A couple of the most notable risk factors for the child that I didn’t know include: increased likelihood of becoming diabetic at some point in their future life and falling into a coma if the doctors don’t know they need to monitor the newborn’s blood sugar levels. Those were the two points that resonated with me.

Well, anyway, this got me thinking about how absurd it is to consume so much sugar in one sitting, much less in one single day. But, that’s exactly what people do ALL the time!

Here are a number of popular beverages you or a loved one probably consumes regularly. All have around 100g of sugar:

You may think I'm being a bit dramatic about this whole thing. It's just a standard test, after all. But diabetes has a history in my family and I recognize my body's own regulation of its blood sugar levels as a natural challenge - pregnant or not. I've actively been trying to provide myself the best quality foods for about 10 years now and the idea of failing any sort of glucose test is frightening for me!

The good news is I passed my second test and the doctor assured me failing the first version is NOT a sign of things to come... not sure if I totally believe her. I think I'll just keep my head down, focused on continuing to consume high-quality whole foods and will have to enjoy Shamrock Shake commercials instead of indulging in the real thing:

Reducing Dietary Salt

I've never been one to worry much about my salt intake, but for this pregnancy I made the decision to really crack down on the added sodium in my diet. Why? Well, two reasons:

1. When pregnant with my daughter, I found that often my blood pressure was very low (this is usual for me). But, about 35% of the time it would inexplicably sky-rocket to a borderline high area. I don't know whether it was stress, anxiety, diet, or weight gain that caused this problem.

2. I also had a tough time with swollen feet/ankles by the last trimester of pregnancy 1, so I'll pretty much do anything to avoid that again.

Something to check out and consider: This morning Fooducate posted a blog called 9 Ways to Reduce Your Salt Intake.

I'm only just now reaching my third trimester of this pregnancy, so I don't know if my approach will be effective for the swelling. But, I do know that my blood pressure readings have been quite a bit more consistent and reasonable up to this point.

Coaching Nutrition and Exercise For the Win: Keep it Simple, Stupid

Last weekend, my wife and I were able to take advantage of a great opportunity. In short, some good friends of mine recently had their "Harajuku Moment" (or personal tipping point) with regards to personal health. They requested that Kelsey and I provide them with some nutrition lessons and give their current dietary regimen a "makeover," if you will. Given that they have a beautiful lakehouse - and offered to lodge us there for the weekend on top of providing all the food - we replied, "When do we start?!"

Needless to say, the experience was very rewarding. Throughout the weekend, we prepped+cooked meals with them, along with putting together a “mini packet” comprised of easy recipes, quick & dirty checklists to run through every time they prepare a meal, a sample grocery list, and a brief chart of healthy fats, proteins, carbs, and supplements. We were also able to answer some questions and debunk some myths for them:

Should I avoid eating close to bedtime? What should I eat before/after a workout? How much red meat should I consume/avoid consuming? Should I avoid egg yolks like the bubonic plague?

Kelsey and I were able to provide this family with some very practical strategies they could begin applying to their lives immediately. Strategies that would allow them to experience greater mental clarity and energy levels, lower blood sugar, reduce the risk of heart disease, and all-in-all fix a lot of “stuff” going on in their bodies. And these strategies were all very uncomplicated.

We didn’t tell them to count calories. We didn’t tell them to weigh their food. We didn’t tell them they had to buy everything “organic” (whatever that means anymore). We didn't them them if they failed to eat Paleo then their world would be over immediately.

This entire process got me thinking….many of us – whether we are the teacher or the student - tend to overcomplicate topics in the exercise and nutrition realm. Given that I’m a strength & conditioning coach, I often fall on the teaching side of things, so I’ll briefly touch on this subject from that perspective.

When I first started in this industry as a personal trainer, I made things way, way, WAY too complicated. Whether it was coaching someone through a squat or something as simple as a X-Band Walk, I practically gave the poor client a short essay on how to perform the exercise.

The same thing with regards to nutrition advice. I gave them wayyy too much information. All this ended up doing was overloading the person and didn’t actually help them get on their feet toward reaching their goals.

My heart was in the right place, but my head was not.

For those of you reading who teach exercise (be it in a professional setting or simply to a friend or family member), please learn from my mistakes. Don’t overwhelm the person who is listening to you. Give them one cue and explain why they should care.

When you teach someone a squat for the first time, they don’t care if you know that the rectus femoris is the only quadricep that crosses both the hip and knee joints, or that you understand the biceps femoris is the only hamstring that externally rotates the femur along with extending the hip.

Please.....let's get over ourselves.

Practical Application

Let’s put this into a practical scenario, shall we? Pretend that your teaching someone to squat for the first time. I’ll provide the “fail” version, along with a strategy you could take that will lesson the odds of your student completely hating you and being overwhelmed.

Female Volleyball Player. First Session.

Fail: "Okay, next, we’re going to squat. First, we’re going to hold the weight at our chest, or “goblet position” because if you don’t, your body will likely shut down and move like a pregnant seal, creating aberrant movement as a result of a perceived threat due to lack of stability…although you might still suck due to poor ankle dorsiflexion, inhibited glutes via reciprocal inhibition of the hip flexors, and/or tight lats. You’re then going to turn your feet out, point the big toe up, but keep your weight distributed evenly on your feet, then sit BACK, don’t fall forward!, keep those shoulder blades down and back into your back pockets, pull yourself down via your hip flexors, CHEST TALL! don’t slouch now, act like your sitting on an egg so you don’t slam into the box, then EXPLODE up so you can access your fast twitch motor units and improve your rate of force development."

Win: "Okay, first, we’re going to squat. This is going to help improve your vertical jump and allow you to move faster on the court. Watch how I do it, and then do your best to replicate it." *Coach then demonstrates a few reps of the goblet squat to box*

See the difference?

In the second scenario, we gave the athlete a reason to care, and then coached them by showing them. Ninety nine times out of a hundred, the athlete/client will perform the movement better in the second scenario rather than the first.

Is it still going to be perfect? No. But you can tweak and help them throughout the subsequent sets, adding just one or two coaching cues and keeping it there for that day. Throughout the following weeks, you help them with one small improvement at a time. Rome wasn't built in a day, ya know?

Now, I realize there are exceptions. Some people are more “audible learners” as opposed to visual learners, and others actually do want a lot of detail (usually those are people who already have some lifting experience and are involved in the field in some form or another). But I hope you get the point.

The same thing can apply to fat loss clients, someone dealing with knee pain, or those seeking some extra help in the kitchen.

Keep it simple FTW.

When You Can’t Sleep

So, you’re not sleeping? Ahh – neither am I.

Here’s a list of things to keep your busy mind occupied and focused on something positive instead of dwelling on the issues that are probably keeping you up in the first place:

1. Eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Why not? Who cares that it’s 2AM? They’re delicious and will probably make you feel a little bit better about being awake.
2. Take the bull by the horns: address whatever is keeping you from falling back to sleep. Returning emails, addressing little projects, addressing little parts of big projects, etc. Can’t hurt, right?
3. Listen to music.
4. Turn on SportsCenter. It’s sports, it’s on 24-hours a day, it’s usually pretty positive and inspiring.
5. Do something enjoyable/out of the ordinary.

Here’s my early morning play-by-play after Arabella woke up at 1:17AM (you start remembering the exact time after about the 300^th occasion you’ve been roused by crying in the dead of night):

1. Lay awake in bed for approximately 60-minutes mulling over small, but important and irritating, “issues.” Eventually, I officially acknowledged I’m not going back to sleep.
2. Go downstairs and make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (see #1 above). It was delicious.
3. Return a few emails.
4. Fill out SAPT product survey: I filled out a review on one of SAPT’s excellent products (if you’re reading between the lines, yes, that means I buy them, too… at full price). They actually are excellent and I actually enjoyed pouring some positivity out in a way, which for me is very non-traditional.
5. Rediscover my love for Britney Spears. I'm totally serious right now.

   

6. Make adjustments to my program for women’s basketball (Mason).
7. Realize I can do a blog post on not sleeping – begin that.
8. Fill out testing roster for women’s soccer (Mason) and go over testing protocol and setup one more time to ensure things go smoothly in the morning.
9. Finalize this blog post while watching highlights of Pro Bowl players on SportsCenter.

Seriously though, here are some Actual Recommendations for Improving Sleep Patterns:

1. Exercise daily: this helps reduce stress and expend the extra energy that may be stored up.
2. Eat sensibly: throughout the day and before going to bed. It’s best to steer clear of large, dense meals right before trying to sleep.
3. Set yourself up for some relaxing wind-down time: take a shower, drink some water, and get into bed with a good book (again, something relaxing).
4. Allot 7-9 hours for uninterrupted sleep.
5. Avoid allowing young, fitful sleepers occupancy near your bedroom. I’m hoping to surmount this problem in about 5 years.

Good LUCK!

For Your Reading Enjoyment

Unfortunately I'm quite short on time today, so I'm going to pass on a couple reads I think you'll enjoy. Both two-part series come from Brian St. Pierre, who keeps a fantastic website that primarily centers around nutrition. I check his site a couple times a month, and there were a few I found over the past four weeks or so that really hit home.

1. Why Pointing the Finger at Carbs is Missing the Point: Part 1 and Part 2

Here Brian does a fantastic job directing people away from idiocy and brings us back to seeing things with a clear lens. As Alwyn Cosgrove once exclaimed: "Regardless of pesticides, fructose levels, etc., people who eat the most fruits and vegetables are healthier than those who eat the least. You're going to have a hard time convincing me that the current obesity epidemic is a result of people eating too many apples!"

2. Tips for Time Management: Part 1 and Part 2

Given that I deleted my Facebook account in college to help me manage my time better, on top of the fact that my wife and I don't even pay for basic cable due to TV being an utter time-vacuum, I felt this short series really hit the nail on the head and offered some very practical+effective tools to improve one's sense of well-being.

That will do it for today. Be back soon!