French Invasion: The Dukan Diet
Dukan’s first English book is set to come out this spring. His book will outline the diet and provide specific guidelines to the eating regime.
The basic gist of the diet is this:
Phase 1: ATTACK. During this first phase, you must only eat lean protein and oat bran (any amount that you want).
Phase 2: CRUISE. Continue to eat lean protein and oat bran, with the addition of vegetables.
Phase 3: CONSOLIDATION. Reintroduce foods like bread and cheese as well as 2 “free” meals where you can eat whatever you want.
Phase 4: STABILIZATION. This is the long-term phase, where you back to eating your regular diet with the exception of one day a week when you eat only lean protein again.
A second source for evaluating ANY fad diet is through the American Dietetic Association. They outline signs of fad diet’s to look out for. These include, rapid weight loss, quantities and limitations, specific food combinations, rigid menus and no need to exercise. If a fad diet includes any of these claims, stay away!
See this site to read a review by dietitian and public health expert, Kathleen Zelman. She agrees that you’ll definitely lose weight with the Dukan Diet at first, but it’s a hard diet to stick to, it has side-effects and since it cuts out important food groups, you do not get all the nutrients you need to be healthy. There are few reviews of this diet, as it hasn’t hit it “big” yet, but the few that are out there, seem to say the same thing as Zelman.
For another review, check out this news feature done by Good Morning America.
This video is nice, because it actually includes a testimonial from a man on the Dukan diet. The diet is working out for him although he’s only been on it for a few months. The video also includes an expert review, which is similar to Kathleen Zelmans response. One of the most interesting things in the video is when they go to a French restaurant and ask for Dukan diet. The restaurant doesn’t have any Dukan meals, but the chef claims that all their meals include healthy and fresh foods. His point seems to be that, you don’t need the Dukan diet to lose weight and be healthy. If you just eat fresh, healthy foods, you’ll be fine.
********************************************************************************
Links on Weight Training
Part of combating fad fitness is knowing good exercise regiments. Many think that this is only referring to cardio workouts like running and swimming, but weight training is also very important. Here I’ll be showing you some lively links intended to give you some background on proper weight training techniques. With these posts, I wish to convey that weight training is something you should be consulted on, yet ultimately, it is not as intimidating as you may think.
Joe Weider's Muscle & Fitness Mar2011, Vol. 72 Issue 3, p42 2p.
This article from an academic journal database focuses on developing a proper chest workout routine. The author takes a person’s chest workout routine, notices flaws, and offers an updated technique. This obviously ties into our discussion about helpful strength training routines but also addresses some important mindsets.
This brief article points out proper ways to approach working out your chest, but it also points to the idea that exercise isn’t enough, you need the right exercise. Joe clearly had a misconception that the harder the workout the better. This is not always the case. Professional opinion dictates that he augment his program. This link is useful in that it shows how one must battle ignorance to achieve a proper fitness routine. So much of fad fitness is about leveraging the public's ignorance, so we see that a strong tool in fighting that ignorance and gaining a healthy mindset is professional opinion.
It is with this mindset that I encourage all of you to consult experts or at least experienced friends before starting a weight training routine. A lot of people, including myself initially, have a mindset of no-pain-no-gain and that harder programs will yield better results. Professional opinion says otherwise. You don’t want to end up seriously hurting yourself like this guy.
The next piece I have comes from a brief how-to from a good friend of mine, Jon. He was a defensive lineman in high school as well as a renowned thrower in high school and college track. Fitness and exercise are some of his passions, so I asked him for his advice on a good fitness program. Here was his opinion on weight training.
for weights, focus on low weights, high reps. for general health, i'd guess i'd recommend trying to hit one body part a week. split it up so that you do chest and triceps on one day, back and biceps another, and legs and abs another.
chest: bench press, dumbbell bench press, dumbbell flye
triceps: tricep pushdown, close-grip bench press, straight-arm pullover, skullcrushers
back: any kind of row machine, pull-ups (assisted if you can't do them regularly), lat pull-down
biceps: curls, hammer curls, assisted pull-ups
legs: leg extensions, leg curls, step-ups, leg press
abs: crunches, russian twists, hanging leg raise
do the lifting monday wednesday friday, tuesday thursday saturday, or whatever works best for you, just take a day off in between sessions. try and do cardio on your off-days.
basically, the point of this lifting would be to rev up your metabolism. the more muscle you have, the higher your metabolism will be, and i know you're not looking to bulk up, but adding a little muscle here and there can help you burn a couple hundred calories a day. plus, lifting speeds up your metabolism for a few hours after your lift anyway.
Here Jon is describing a balanced, appropriate weight training routine. This may be similar to a routine that you try yourself. He lays out ways to workout different muscle groups, scheduling workouts, and realistic goals in weight training. Low weights and high reps are the key with a variety of exercises. The point is not to necessarily get stronger, but to build some metabolism that will aid in health. Jon’s ideas also echo those of the previous author: weight training should not be an overly strenuous or heavy endeavor. It merely needs to strengthen your metabolism.
Opinions like Jon's are particularly useful because they are a bit counter to the typical notion that exercise is difficult. A few reps in at the gym and some light cardio is all that is needed. Opinions like Jon's are also one of the key tools that we use to battle fad fitness: battling ignorance. It is a theme we are trying to argue throughout this blog, and knowledgeable advice like this goes a long way in helping people achieve realistic workout goals.
This also ties gracefully into the idea about healthy eating. It all may seem like a daunting task, but as our post on the food pyramid shows, it is really not that difficult. Just a little time, effort, and some trustworthy advice is needed to properly stay in shape. Your may not be a strongman, but you will be all the more healthy.
The final source that I am suggesting is a large selection of different exercises from bodybuilding.com. I find that the “Exercise Guides” section is particularly useful. It basically provides an incredibly extensive toolbox of different weight training exercises that target nearly every important muscle group in your body. It is a detailed manual of the building blocks you need.
Knowledge of proper weight training starts with this. With a good regiment as described by the previous two sources, you can use these tools to truly become empowered with knowledge on proper fitness. In that respect, this is highly useful. It’s all about bringing fitness down to earth and understandable, and a cut-and-dry explanation of the very building blocks of weight training can help facilitate proper fitness and ward off the fads that we are susceptible to without this knowledge.
It should be noted though that bodybuilding.com isn’t the most useful site for everything fitness. They seem to push a lot of supplements and some fad ideas around. They also emphasize that you’ll be ripped and get a great beach bod, which is exactly the mindset we are trying to avoid. Another key part of the fad fitness industry is exploiting the public’s poor body image and standard of beauty. Fitness is not about becoming a body builder, and a lot of this blog is dedicated to also stamping out distorted body images in our society.
********************************************************************************
Eating a healthy diet
This informative citation is, as you could guess, about eating a healthy diet. Below I have provided links to two sources which will help explain to you what a healthy diet is, and a third link to a source that will help you plan for a healthier diet and stick to it. The reason I chose to group these three sources together is because I feel that, when combined, they will get you on the right path to eating a healthy diet. The first two will lay out the basic fundamentals on what a healthy diet is and the third will give you the tools to plan out your diet.
Author: Walter C. Willett, M.D., Dr. P.H.
Brief Summary: This book will show us what science is teaching us about diets and our health. It will show us that you can eat a satisfying diet that consists of whole grains, healthy oils, fruits, vegetables, and protein; and that by eating a diet like this we can live a long, healthy, and active life. Also covered in this book will be information on misleading advice on eating healthy, the new food pyramid, and weight loss strategies.
Useful Information: “The good news about the makeover is that the USDA finally took a wrecking ball to its dangerously outmoded Pyramid. The bad news is that its replacement doesn’t offer any real information to help you make healthy choices, and continues to recommend foods that aren’t essential to good health and that may even be detrimental in the quantities included in MyPyramid.”
Directions For Further Reading: The topics covered in this book breaks down the science behind foods and eating a healthy diet; which I think is a very important way to look at eating a healthy diet. It is important for us to know exactly how the food we eat affects our bodies. If the topics in this book are of interest to you I suggest you read these books titled Food Inc. and In Defense of Food, which are books I read for a class last semester that also look at the science behind food, but also look at topics such as factory farming and how to eat a healthy diet.
Authors: UC Berkeley Wellness Letter
Brief Summary: This article has just what the title suggests, 13 keys to a healthy diet. Some of the information covered in the 13 keys are: cut down on animal fat, get your vitamins and minerals from foods, eat more fish and nuts, limit your intake of sugary foods, and make sure to include green orange and yellow fruits and vegetables. These are just a brief overview of some of the 13 keys covered in article. When you go to the article you will find that the authors go into more depth.
Useful Information: “Secondly, fruits, vegetables, grains, and legumes—foods high in complex carbohydrates, fiber, vitamins, and minerals, low in fat, and free of cholesterol—should make up the bulk of the calories you consume. The rest should come from low-fat dairy products, lean meat and poultry, and fish.”
Directions For Further Reading: The 13 keys to a healthy diet covered in this article are simple but important. After taking a class about food and health last semester I can say confidently that these 13 keys are good suggestions for eating a healthy diet. As for further reading on this topic I suggest you explore other articles by the UC Berkeley Wellness Letter on their website. Other articles they’ve written have titles such as Fishing For Answers and Be Choosy About Carbs.
Authors: Helpguide.org
Brief Summary: This article introduces you how to “eat smart.” A point made in the article was “it’s not just what you eat, but how you eat.” Like the last article this one gives you a series of tips about healthy eat, but the main focus of this one is how you can implement those healthy eating strategies into your diet. One of the tips in the article is about how you can eat more healthy carbs. Rather than just saying “eat healthy carbs,” it gives you a list of foods you can eat that are healthy carbs, and also tells you what you should avoid. Lastly, one of the best tips the article offers is how to plan quick, easy, and healthy meals ahead of time. It gives small tips like planning meals for the week, shopping the perimeter of the grocery store, and cooking when you can.
Useful Information: “In general, healthy eating ingredients are found around the outer edges of most grocery stores—fresh fruits and vegetables, fish and poultry, whole grain breads and dairy products. The centers of many grocery stores are filled with overpriced, processed foods that aren’t good for you.”
Directions For Further Reading: My opinion on this article is that it is the best source out of the three I listed. While the other two are great sources I feel that this one gives you the best strategies for eating a healthy diet. Not only does it give you tips on what are healthy foods, but it also tells you how to make a plan for your diet and stick to it. At the end of the article is a long list of related/further readings. Two that I find interesting are Mastering the mindful meal and Local Harvest. The first article is about how you can eat more mindfully and the importance of that; the second is on finding local growers and farmer’s markets as a way to find healthier foods.
