The "Irongeezer" & "Irongeezelle"

The Irongeezer Motto - "Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being,
while movement and methodical physical exercise save it and preserve it." Plato 427 - 345 BC

7 easy steps to a healthier life:

Eat before you get too hungry.  Don't skip breakfast. Stop eating when you are full.

Snack on fruits and vegetables. Top your favorite cereal with apples or bananas.

Try brown rice or whole-wheat pasta. Include several servings of whole grain food daily.

On the 5 pages of this webzine you will find information about:
short runs, weight loss, intensity, core, cardio, 5K, 10K, 10 minute strength programs,

at home workouts, sprint triathlon, yoga, beginner swimming, how to burn calories, open water swimming,
workouts for all levels of fitness, easy workouts, Ironman swimming, injury prevention, workouts for runners,

obesity, and everything for beginners.

Winter Olympic Games

From Wikipedia

 
Sports

Alpine skiing • Biathlon • Bobsled

Cross‑country skiing • Curling • Figure skating

Freestyle skiing • Ice hockey • Luge

Nordic combined • Short track speed skating

Skeleton • Ski jumping • Snowboarding

Speed skating

The Winter Olympic Games are a winter multi-sport event held every four years. They feature winter sports held on snow or ice, such as Alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, figure skating, bobsledding and ice hockey. Cross-country skiing, figure skating, ice hockey, Nordic combined, ski jumping, and speed skating have been competed at every Winter Olympics since 1924. Other athletic events have been added as the Games have progressed. Some of these events, such as luge, short track speed skating, and freestyle skiing have earned a permanent spot on the Olympic programme. Others, like speed skiing, bandy, and skijöring have been demonstration sports but never incorporated officially as an Olympic sport.

Fewer countries participate in the Winter Olympics than the Summer Olympics. The first Winter Olympics were held in Chamonix, France. Figure skating and ice hockey had been events at the Summer Olympics prior to 1924. The Games were held every four years from 1924 until 1940 when they were interrupted by World War II. The Winter and Summer Games resumed in 1948 and were celebrated on the same year until 1992. At that time the Winter Games split from the Summer Games, and were begun to be celebrated on alternating even years. The first Winter Olympic Games to be held on this new schedule was in 1994 in Lillehammer, Norway.

The Winter Games have undergone significant changes since their inception. The rise of television as a global medium for communication has greatly enhanced the profile of the Games. It has also created an income stream, in the form of the sale of broadcast rights, and advertising, which has become very lucrative. This has also allowed outside interests, such as television companies and corporate sponsors, to influence the various aspects of the Games. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has had to address several internal scandals, and the use of performance enhancing drugs by Winter Olympic athletes. The Winter Games have also been used by countries to demonstrate the superiority of their political systems.

Many countries have played home to the Winter Olympics. France has been host to the Games three times. The United States has hosted the Games four times, more than any other country. Several countries including Italy, Japan, Austria and Norway have hosted the Games twice. The next host city will be Vancouver, Canada in 2010. This will be the second time the Games will be held in Canada. The Games will then be hosted by Sochi, Russia in 2014. This will be the first time that Russia has hosted a Winter Olympic Games.
For More: www.wikipedia.org  

Eating and exercise:

Time it right to maximize your workout 

 Knowing when and how much to eat and drink before you exercise can make a big difference in how you feel during and after your workout. Here are some tips.

When you eat and what you eat can affect your performance and the way you feel while you're exercising. Coordinate your meals, snacks and what you drink to make the most of your exercise routine.

Eating a lot before exercise can slow you down

When you exercise after a large meal, you may feel sluggish or have an upset stomach, cramping and diarrhea. That's because your muscles and your digestive system are competing with each other for energy resources.

"Your body can digest food while you're active, but not as well as it can when you're not exercising," notes Stephen DeBoer, a registered dietitian at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. This is partly because your body is trying to do two things requiring blood supply and energy simultaneously — digesting the food you just ate and providing fuel to keep your muscles active.

 Time it right: Before, during and after your workout

On the flip side, not eating before you exercise can be just as bad as eating too much. Low blood sugar levels that result from not eating can make you feel weak, faint or tired, and your mental abilities may be affected as well, making you slower to react. So what can you do?

 Eat a full breakfast. Wake up early enough to eat a full breakfast. "Most of the energy you got from dinner last night is used up by morning," says DeBoer. "Your blood sugar is low. If you don't eat, you may feel sluggish or lightheaded while exercising." If you plan to exercise within an hour after breakfast, eat a smaller breakfast or drink something to raise your blood sugar, such as a sports drink.

Time your meals. Eat large meals at least three to four hours before exercising. If you're having a small meal, eat two to three hours before exercising.

Most people can eat snacks right before and during exercise. The key is how you feel. Some people feel lightheaded during the first 10 to 15 minutes of their workout if they eat within the hour before exercise. Do what works best for you.

Don't skip meals. Skipping meals may cause low blood sugar, which can make you feel weak and lightheaded. If you're short on time before your workout, and your choice is candy or nothing, eat the candy because it can improve your performance, compared with eating nothing. But keep in mind, all candy is high in sugar and low on nutrients, so a snack of yogurt and a banana would be a better choice.

Eat after your workout. To help your muscles recover and to replace their glycogen stores, eat a meal that contains both protein and carbohydrates within two hours of your exercise session if possible.

What to eat: Getting the right fuel for your best performance

Food provides your body with necessary energy. To make the most of your workouts, focus on:

Carbohydrates: Your body's chief source of fuel

You'll feel better when you exercise if you eat foods high in carbohydrates and low in fat. Your body stores excess carbohydrates as glycogen — primarily in your muscles and liver. Your muscles use stored glycogen when needed for energy.

Cereals, breads, vegetables, pasta, rice and fruit are good sources of carbohydrate. But right before an intense workout, avoid carbohydrates high in fiber, such as beans and lentils, bran cereals and fruit. High-fiber foods may give you gas or cause cramping. Fructose, a simple sugar found in fruit, can increase the tendency for diarrhea with high-intensity exercise.

 If you don't like to eat solid foods before exercising, drink your carbohydrates in sports beverages or fruit juices. "Research shows it makes no difference in performance whether you drink your carbohydrates or eat them," says DeBoer. Do what feels best to you.

 A diet containing at least 40 percent to 50 percent of calories from carbohydrates allows your body to store glycogen, but if you're a long-distance runner or you exercise for long periods of time, you might want to consume more carbohydrates regularly and consider carbohydrate loading before a big athletic event.

Protein and fats: Important, but not your body's top fuel choice

Protein isn't your body's food of choice for fueling exercise, but it does play a role in muscle repair and growth. Most people can easily get the protein they need from such foods as meat, dairy products and nuts, and don't need additional protein supplements.

Fat is an important, although smaller, part of your diet. Fats, as well as carbohydrates, can provide fuel for your muscles during exercise. Try to get most of your fat from unsaturated sources such as nuts, fatty fish or vegetable oils. Avoid fatty foods just before exercising, though. Fats remain in your stomach longer, causing you to feel less comfortable.

 Water: Drink plenty to avoid dehydration

Your body uses the water in your blood to carry nutrients such as sugar (glucose) to cells and to remove waste products from the cells. The presence of water in your body ensures that you can safely sustain physical activity. As you exercise, your body produces heat. This heat leaves your body as you perspire, taking with it electrolytes — elements, such as potassium, calcium, sodium and chlorine. If you don't replace the fluid you lose during exercise, your heart rate increases and your temperature rises, putting you at risk of dehydration as well as compromising your workout.

Source: Mayo Clinic

“Obesity, be not proud”   
By Tatjana and Cliff Eggink

Two thirds of the American public is either overweight or obese. Adults and kids alike are gaining pounds and suffering dire, life altering, life threatening health consequences:  Type II diabetes, high blood pressure, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease are among those consequences. We all know the list of diseases and their outcomes. So there is no need to belabor that point, is there?
 

Yet, why are so many of us unwilling to change eating and exercise habits? The doctors don’t know. The exercise physiologists don’t know. The researchers don’t know. The government doesn’t know. Actually, no one knows what to do about this looming health care crisis that will cost all of us, not just financially in increasing health care costs for everyone, not just for the overweight and obese, in increasing insurance premiums, money lost for sick days, and loss of productivity… (and yes, Michael Moore, the nation’s gadfly on health care in his recent movie Sicko, needs to participate in that aspect of health care – the diet and exercise - and not just rant about what others need to do)…, but most importantly, beyond the dollar signs of the issue, are the misery of lives reduced to couch sitting, huffing and puffing, missing out on really delicious, nutritious, fresh food, instead gorging on synthetic, industrial tastes of, let’s say, “Twinkies.” (however, any mass produced food will do fit the bill here- as long as it is cheap, fast and satisfies fat and sugar and/or salt cravings).
 

All the “health apostles,” as some call the reasonable voices for a sensible approach to food and activity, have tried to educate, cajole, beg, plead, threaten, negotiate, but have finally resigned. Doctors do it – resigning themselves to the prescription pad, managing disease with the latest pharmaceutical – statins for high cholesterol, for instance. What often should go on that prescription pad is a simple: “Exercise and eat sensibly!” Then, let’s just see what happens. Maybe that might prompt even one person to a positive change.

Doctors are not to blame though; some even try this approach, but are rebuffed by patients, who are irate that a doctor would discuss nutrition and have the audacity to suggest getting their duff moving. The government has resigned – it has tried throwing money, in the form of public education, at the problem, but no change has happened. The nation, the industrialized world as a whole, as a matter of fact, just keeps getting larger.

So, what happened? No one seems to know. We are suggesting that it is not the fault of television, the food manufacturers, the pharmaceutical companies, or any one else, but the “fault,” if we can call it that, lies within ourselves. As a people, we have an odd relationship to bodies, food, and who we admire and at what tables we worship. On the one hand, we salivate over every detail of some emaciated glamour life, and sneer at the discovery that this celebrity actually does have cellulite; that’s the euphemism for fat, by the by. All the while, as we are glued to the television screen fixated on this celebrities’ life, we are eating a bag of potato chips. On the other hand, we are willing to try most fad diets, at least once – swearing today that carbs are good, then bad; tomorrow, it’s the cabbage soup diet, the South Beach diet, and next, we discuss the “wondrous, marvelous, awesome” moment of sports television, a gluttonous, disgusting hot dog eating contest, complete with spewing vomit from one of the contestants. That’s just sick, depraved, and alarming on so many levels. What does it say about us and our culture when we award a person who can force-fed himself until he spews or wins?  Metaphorically, not historically, we have sunk to the level of a declining Rome, just before the fall of that once great civilization. The Romans, too, vomited at their lavish banquet, so that could continue eating. Interestingly enough, force-feeding geese to produce foie gras is coming under scrutiny and has been outlawed. Right or wrong? At any rate, someone is watching out for the geese. But what about the overweight children? Isn’t it abuse on some level to allow your children to eat themselves into a state of obesity? Do we sense there is a disconnect here somewhere? Our mental state, our bodies, our nature are out of sink. And that’s the essence of the problem.

Can we fix it? Yes, but the cure is hard. It worked with smoking. Yes, bigger is not better; bigger is bad. We are not talking about people either. Don’t make the cars, houses, chairs, beds, plates, portions, etc, bigger: keep ‘em normal. Once we accept larger as normal, larger becomes normal, and we can grow larger yet. Not a good idea. But that’s not going to happen until we make obesity as much as a pariah as smoking has become. Remember, in the not too distant past, smoking was normal, perfectly acceptable; now, it is marked as a “disgusting, tumor causing habit” – well, guess what, so is overeating. I already hear the politically correct choir chiming –  and yes, o course, the overweight are humans with feelings and no one suggests here that those should be ignored, or that people should be outcast, ridiculed or shamed in any way – we are all here to help. Just remember, if you think that this is tough medicine, substitute every idea about obesity in this sassy piece with smoking, and you will find, for instance, that smokers are people with feelings and rights, too, and we weren’t nearly as politically correct when it came to them. Why? Maybe because eating is a necessity, smoking isn’t. Maybe because eating is seen as benign, compared to smoking. Maybe because smoking, as in second hand smoking, affects others, but guess what, so does obesity – we all pay for that health crisis in the end.

And lest you think the authors speaks from a lack of experience: One has been a smoker, and I understand addiction, and one of us has weighed 205 pounds (now 135), so he understands being overweight.

A Challenge to You? You Can Do It! What Can Irongeezer.com Do For You?  Read On!

 Cliff "Irongeezer" Eggink, age 73, swimming & walking on the beach the day after competing in an Ironman triathlon.    "If I can be active, so can YOU!"

10 Minute Cardio Blast   Ten Minute Cardio Blast   10 Minute Cardio Blast!

What is Irongeezer.com's MISSION?  

Our mission will be posted here every month to help you get active and stay active.

The primary goal of this free healthy LifeStyle Webzine is to help, guide, and inspire YOU to live an active, healthy lifestyle.

We will never promote old wives tales, pills, quackery, or snake oils.

Our Web site will be a basic easy to use site, no sign in, free, no ads, no spam.

What can Irongeezer.com Webzine DO FOR YOU?

If you are just starting to get active, Irongeezer.com will encourage and guide you with the most current exercise and nutrition information available. We offer free online starter coaching information (as well as information on other free Web sites) to help you get started.

Perhaps the activity that you enjoyed most as a child is the activity that you want to start with?

If you are an old hand at staying fit and healthy, GREAT! Use this LifeStyle e-magazine as a review of what you have learned over a lifetime. Also, we ask you to send us your sage ideas to pass along to others. In this way, you will have the opportunity to help others live an active, healthy LifeStyle.