3... 2... 1... Rest?

Rest is something we CrossFitters aren’t good at.  In fact, we get yelled at for doing too much of it in a WOD.  When the clock is running, it’s time to go, but there is a time to rest, too.

As you ramp up your training schedule, it is imperative that you get adequate rest and nutrition.  And by rest, I don’t just mean taking a couple of days off from CrossFit every week.  I mean sleep.  Ever tried to CrossFit after a poor night’s sleep?  Doesn’t work out too well, does it?

Sleep is much more important than most people realize.  Did you know that inadequate sleep is actually linked to obesity and disease?  If you’re trying to improve your health, but not sleeping enough, then you’re ignoring a vital component to your success.

I will admit that I have a hard time consistently doing what I’m about to recommend, but I know that I feel a lot better when I do:

• Turn off all electronic devices at least 30 minutes before bedtime.  Yes, that’s right.  Get off the computer, leave the phone in the charger, turn off the television, and dim the lights in your house.  Read a book, pet the dog, talk to your spouse, or tuck in the kids.  This helps your body to unwind and prepare for rest.

• Allow at least eight hours for sleep.  Yeah, I know, that’s a hard one for me, too.  We’re all busy, but sleep is more important than you realize.  Would you skip a meal?  A workout?  Don’t cheat your body on rest.

• Sleep in a pitch-black, cool room.  This is how our bodies are designed to rest.  I leave my cell phone in another room and cover up my alarm clock with a towel.  Seriously.

Sometimes I still have a lot of trouble falling asleep.  My work day often feels like a WOD of life stuff – go, go, go, no time for rest.  As soon as my head hits the pillow, my mind starts racing and making “to-do” lists for the next day.  Here are a few things that help me relax at night:

• Epsom Salt.  Soak in the tub right before bed with a cup or two of epsom salt dissolved in your bath water.  It will help with muscle recovery, and you'll fall asleep more easily.

• Valerian Root.  I have a tea with valerian root in it.  A cup of that and a good book in a dimly-lit room and I'm out in no time.

• Sleep Works.  This AdvoCare product works great as well.  Ask Ben or your coach about it sometime.

As you’re getting into your spring routine, try to establish some new habits of rest.  See how much good rest affects how you feel.  Then see if you can rest less during that WOD.

When it’s time to go, GO.  But don’t forget to take time for proper rest.

J.E.R.F., Part II: Just Eat Real Food

"Eat meat, vegetables, nuts, and seeds, some fruit, little starch, no sugar." - Coach Greg Glassman

Earlier this week I wrote about inflammation.  Before your eyes glaze over and you navigate away, this is the more basic part of that post.  “Just tell me what to eat, and keep it practical!”  OK.  Are you ready?

Just. Eat. Real. Food.

Seriously.  It’s that simple.

Do your shopping on the outer sections of the grocery store.  Grab some fresh fruits and vegetables, eggs, plenty of meat, and coconut oil for cooking.  Look for ingredients, not products.  In the words of Jack LaLanne, “If man made it, don’t eat it.”

Real Food has certain qualities: it grew from the ground (or on a bush or a tree), or it once walked, swam, or flew.  Real Food can be hunted or gathered.  No, throwing your pizza on the floor so you can “gather” it doesn’t count...

The other thing about Real Food?  It goes bad.  Processed food-like products last an unnaturally long time.  The longer its shelf life, the shorter yours.

In case you’re wondering... here are the most inflammatory foods in the modern human diet:

1) Omega-6 fats.  More precisely, it is an imbalance of Omega-6 to Omega-3.  The biggest contributors to this imbalance are common cooking oils (vegetable, canola, etc.), and conventionally raised meat (corn-fed animals have higher levels of Omega-6 fats).  If you can’t do grass-fed meat right now, no problem.  Just look for leaner cuts and be sure to supplement with a good fish oil.

2) Grains.  Gluten-containing grains (like wheat) are the worst offenders, but all grains contain some gut-irritating anti-nutrients.

3) Sugar.  This does not include the natural sugars found in fruit.  I’m talking about the refined white stuff that’s in every processed food at your supermarket.

4) Dairy.  Let me be more specific and say conventional dairy.  Grass-fed dairy is a better option; raw is best.  Always get full-fat dairy.  Yes, FULL FAT.  It shouldn’t have any added sugar like the low-fat and fat-free stuff.

5) ???  Some people have trouble with eggs or nuts or tomatoes...  You have to figure out what foods you tolerate.

So when we talk about eating “Paleo”, we’re really talking about controlling systemic inflammation by eating whole, unprocessed, nutrient-dense foods.  There will be a lot of individual variation within the anti-inflammatory framework, but eating properly isn’t just about looking better or running faster.  It’s about improving the overall quality of your life and preventing disease.

Here are some things to remember:

You don’t have to be perfect.  Make the best choices available, most of the time.  Don’t sweat slip-ups, and it’s okay to have a treat once in a while.

Better is always better.  You may not be ready for full-on organic, grass-fed, locally-sourced Paleo.  That’s ok.  Get a steak and sweet potato from HEB.  Still too much?  Grab a pre-cooked rotisserie chicken and a bag of veggies to steam in the microwave.  Top it off with some fruit for dessert.  It’s just as fast as a drive-through, I promise.

Take it one meal at a time.  What good choices can you make at your next meal?  Paleo is pretty darn easy to stick to at most restaurants.  You might have to ask (nicely!) for some substitutions, but it’s usually very doable.

If you have questions or need some help getting started, hit up Ben or one of the coaches.  We’re here for more than just the WOD!

J.E.R.F., Part I: Inflammation

“Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food.” - Hippocrates

I recently read The Great Cholesterol Myth, a book that challenges the idea that dietary fat and cholesterol are the primary causes of heart disease.  There is increasing evidence that the real culprits are oxidation, inflammation, sugar, and stress.  A couple of weeks ago I wrote about stress; today I want to talk about inflammation.

in-flam-ma-tion

noun. redness, swelling, pain, tenderness, heat, and disturbed function of an area of the body, especially as a reaction of tissues to injurious agents.

As with stress, it’s important to distinguish between acute inflammation and chronic or systemic inflammation.  Acute inflammation is easy enough to understand: you twist your ankle, it swells.  We all know that, with an injury, you have to let the injury heal.  If you keep running on a sprained ankle, it will stay inflamed.

So what kind of inflammation is it that can lead to heart disease?  It’s the same inflammation that can leave you vulnerable to other diseases and conditions, from acne to obesity to cancer.  If you eat foods you're not designed to eat, you will live with chronic, systemic inflammation.  The kind that affects your internal organs, blood stream, hormones, joints, and digestion.  This is systemic inflammation caused by poor diet.  Yes, I’m going to tell you that -in most cases- any abnormal condition you are experiencing can be controlled with lifestyle, starting first and foremost with food.

Let’s talk about normal.  There are many things that are very common, but are not normal.  Diabetes, obesity, heart disease.  These are all frighteningly common today, and these conditions are affecting younger and younger populations.  None of these things is normal.  It is not normal to have to take insulin, to be excessively over-fat, or for your heart to have trouble pumping blood.  Our bodies are pretty darn remarkable, and when we fuel them properly, they will function properly (for the vast majority of us).

So... what is normal?

Personality quirks aside, “normal” will look something like this:

Clear skin
Stable energy and mood
Strong immune system
Deep sleep
Good digestion
Appetite (not “cravings”)
Healthy levels of body fat (I’m not going to open this can of worms right now.  Just know that there is such a thing as too much -and too little- body fat)

And, of course, any disease or condition is an indication that something is amiss.

So what are the inflammatory foods that cause poor digestion, unstable blood sugar, heart disease, etc.?  Your hint is in the title of this post.  Anyone know what "JERF" stands for?

Stay tuned for Part II - coming soon to a web page near you.

Don't Suck at Life

One of the things I most enjoy in life is finding other people who aren’t satisfied with just getting by.  People who expect a lot of themselves - and of me.  I think this is probably true of most of us who actually come back and sign on to CrossFit after that first WOD.  We’re not satisfied with our 30 minutes of cardio in front of the t.v.  We need challenge, competition, and yes, even soreness.  We need rabbits to chase, coaches to instruct us, and friends to yell at us when we go too light or move too slowly.  We have chosen not to suck at fitness.  How about the rest of your life?

A good friend recently said to me, “It’s good to have friends who aren’t content to suck at life.”  You see, she and I are always working to be better, and we often hold each other accountable.  She recently started eating Paleo, so we teamed up and took our own meal to an event that would only be offering sandwiches and donuts.  When I heard about the “52 books in a year” challenge, she jumped on board with me.  Both of us have decided to limit time sucks like television and facebook.  It’s not that t.v. and social networking sites are bad in and of themselves.  A little mindless entertainment is fine now and then.  But how often do you see people getting upset over something stupid or wasting hours at a time on programs that do nothing to actually improve their life or even their mood?

There’s always something we can be doing to better ourselves.  Maybe it’s just being more consistent with nutrition.  Maybe it’s putting more weight on the bar at the gym.  What about the rest of life?  What do you suck at?  What sucks you in?  

Check out that little cartoon over there.  What's in that "Pit of Despair" for you?  It might be television or video games or even an unhealthy relationship.

I challenge you this week to look for something negative in your life that you can remove.  It could be avoiding a negative person at work or even just avoiding that chocolate chip cookie that knows your name.  Or perhaps you could ADD some positive behaviors.  Read for 15 minutes before you go to bed at night.  Go for a quick walk outside on your lunch break.  I bet you’ll be surprised how a few seemingly small behaviors can affect your overall mood.

Most of all, always accept that it’s a choice.  No one makes you do anything.  Even if there are circumstances beyond your control, you always choose how you respond.  You choose your behavior, you choose your mood, and you choose your life.  Choose not to suck at it.

Don't Just Sit There!

My horn at the Riverwalk. At least I got a good photo, right?

Sitting is evil.  Let me tell you why.

Right now I’m sitting on my couch icing an old back injury.  When did it flare up?  The day after I sat on my butt for too long.

Last week I had a performance at the TMEA Convention in San Antonio.  I wanted to be be able to teach as much as possible that week, so I chose to make the trip in a day.  Yep.  That’s 6+ hours in the car, trapped in the same position.  It really didn’t feel too bad that day - walking around San Antonio in the sunshine made me feel better after the first leg of the trip, and I stretched a bit when I got home that night.  But Friday morning’s back squats did me in.  The weight wasn’t particularly heavy for me, and I wasn’t getting sloppy on form.  My posterior chain just wanted to express its opinion of my car trip.

So enough about my booty.  Do you sit on yours too much throughout the day?  One of the worst things about our modern lives and conveniences is how much we sit.  Really.  Take a minute and calculate how much time you spend on your butt.  It might be easier to think about how much time you spend on your feet and subtract that from 24...

We know there’s the hour of CrossFit.  Do you sit at your job during the day?  Sit for meals, maybe catch happy hour, watch t.v. in the evening, etc.?  There have been tons of studies lately on how we sit a lot more than we used to, how bad it is for us, and how even daily exercise can’t always counteract the negative effects of a mostly sedentary lifestyle.  Rather than posting all of that data for you, I’m going to challenge you to a little n=1 experiment: Sit less this week.  Here are some ideas for you:

1) Take a break every hour to at least stand up.  Walk down the hall to get some water, walk up and down a flight of stairs, or heck, just bang out some air squats at your desk.

2) When you see your smoking co-workers go out for their “break”, walk outside and get a few minutes of sunshine while they suck on a cigarette.

3) Do as much work as you can standing up.  Make yourself a standing work station.  Walk around and gesture when you talk to people.  They’ll pay more attention to you, and you’ll get off your booty.

4) Take a walk on your lunch break.  The sunshine will improve your mood (and immune system), and the light movement should improve your digestion.

5) Stand during meetings.  Take a clipboard so you can still take notes if you need to.

6) Take a walk in the evening after dinner.  Turn off the t.v. and do some chores around the house.

7) Park far away.  Forget how to operate elevators and escalators.

8) Drink water throughout the day.  If nothing else, you’ll have to make a bathroom trip every couple of hours.

Pick a few things that fit your work and life situation and try them out this week.  See if you feel better.  If you must make a long car trip, be sure to stop frequently, take a foam roller, and maybe wedge a lacrosse ball between you and the seat on any of your known problem spots.  Whatever you do, don’t just sit there!!