Keep it off! New weight loss news you need to know!

Conventional wisdom says you are born with a certain number of fat cells. It is determined by genetics and there is nothing you can do about it.

Researchers just published a fascinating study that turns conventional wisdom on its head!

First the bad news.
Scientists from the University of Colorado found that rats who were put on a calorie restricted diet to lose weight developed new fat cells when they were taken off the diet! When the weight returned in rats who were sedentary, these rats ended up weighing more than they weighed before the diet. Can anyone say 'yo-yo syndrome?'

According to Science Daily, "Small, new fat cells would not only accelerate the process of regain, but also increase fat storage capacity in the abdomen. It would also explain why sedentary rats overshoot their previous weight when they relapse."


Now the good news.
Exercise appeared to prevent the increased number of fat cells seen with weight re-gain in the sedentary rats! Not only that, but exercising rats preferentially burned fat over carbs and ate less eating than the sedentary animals.

"Taken together, the exercise led to a much lower appetite and fewer calories ending up in fat tissue."

So once again, you can lose weight by diet alone. But you can't keep it off unless you exercise.

Make it a part of your daily life. Email me (Kevin@TheFitDoc.com) for help in finding the best workout program for you!

Sources:
Science Daily article
American Journal of Physiology RICP

Cancer-free and looking good!

Cut your cancer risk and look better naked!

July 27, 2009 — A study from Finland has shown that men who exercised for at least 30 minutes a day at moderate to high intensity cut their risk of dying prematurely from cancer in half!!
The results were published online July 28, 2009 in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

Physical inactivity over a person's lifespan might be a "key factor in the initiation of cancer development," the authors note.

More on diabetes and exercise

Keep checking in here to find out about the new Project You:Type 2 diabetes lifestyle solution. It is due out in August. In the meantime, here's some more support for the preventative effects of exercise. If you have diabetes, don't wait for PYT2. Get another great workout video from Beachbody, go take a walk, or jump on your bike. Just get moving. It is one of the best things you can do for your diabetes and for yourself!

From this morning's AMA Morning Rounds Newsletter:

Researchers say lifestyle changes may delay onset of type 2 diabetes.

In continuing coverage from a previous edition of Morning Rounds, MedPage Today (5/23, Neale) reported that "[i]n patients with impaired glucose tolerance, eating healthier and getting more exercise reduced the risk of diabetes for up to 20 years," according to a study published in the May 24 issue of The Lancet. Guangwei Li, M.D., of the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in Beijing, and colleagues, randomized "576 Chinese adults who had impaired glucose tolerance...to a control group (138), or one of three intervention groups (438) -- diet, exercise, or diet and exercise -- for six years as part of the China Da Qing Diabetes Prevention Study." The researchers found that during this time, "there was a 51 percent lower rate of diabetes in the intervention group than in the control group." After an additional 14 years, the authors discovered that "80 percent of the patients in the intervention group had diabetes, compared with 93 percent in the control group." Essentially, patients "in the intervention group delayed the onset of diabetes by an average of 3.6 years."

Get off the Couch! Give me 20!

20 workouts in 30 days.

It's that easy. Once you commit and do 20 in 30, you'll have made exercise a habit, and a regular part of your life. Not only that, you'll start to see RESULTS that will make you want to keep going even more!


Here's Doc's easy 4 step program for success:
1. Pick out your favorite Beachbody workout.
2. Go to WOWY and schedule your workouts for the month.
3. By the end of the month, make sure your WOWY calendar has at least 20 X's.
4. Repeat.

Do this and you can't fail.

-Doc

Pillsbury Doughboy's fitness secret!

BBD: a novel way to track fitness or hot new boy band?

I used to have a great way to follow my body fat. It is called the BBD test. I made it up myself. Periodically, I would stuff a pencil in my belly button (important safety tip: use the eraser side) and then record the depth. It went down from like 24mm to 16mm over the course of the p90x fitness program. A side effect of the test is that it kind-of tickles. Otherwise it worked great. BBD may be more accurate for guys 'cuz we tend to carry more of our flubber in the spare tire and less in the boo-tay. But it is worth a try for anyone!

Watch for my paper on "The Relationship between Body Mass Index and BBD: a longitudinal cross-sectional regressional meta-analysis" coming soon to a respected medical journal near you.

(If you are an outie you are SOL.)

Exercise improves thinking in children.

Exercise Improves Thinking, Diabetes Risk In Overweight Children

ScienceDaily (2007-10-22) -- Just three months of daily, vigorous physical activity in overweight children improves their thinking and reduces their diabetes risk, researchers say. Studies of about 200 overweight, inactive children ages 7-11 also showed that a regular exercise program reduces body fat and improves bone density. ... > read full article