

What's the Deal with Eating Clean?
The other day, a good friend asked me to write about the validity of "eating clean" and if all food is equal when it comes to fitness. The reason for his question is you always hear about fit people who only eat oatmeal and broccoli but on the other hand have stories of elite athletes eating burgers or chicken nuggets while training. What's the deal? First, we have to define what "clean eating" even means. For the purposes of this post, we'll just go with only eating whole fo


When Counting Calories Kills You
How many times have you heard someone complain that no matter how perfectly they log their calories and stick to their number (1200, argh!!) every single day, they can't seem to lose weight? Maybe, unless you're also a personal trainer or you just have friends who complain a lot, you haven't heard that very much. Or perhaps, you're someone who has complained of that very thing! Never fear, today I'm going to tell you why that happens so your caloric complaints will come to an


Macros Made Simple Part 3: Protein
And now, for the final part of this series on the macronutrients, I'm dishing on the macronutrient of choice for bodybuilders, toners, and carnivores everywhere: protein. Protein, when broken down into amino acids, is used to make hormones, enzymes, immune response proteins, hair and nails, tendons, and many more goodies your body is always producing. However, people tend to only associate protein with its role in building muscle. It's like a girl or guy you only like for the


Macros Made Simple Part 2: Fats
Fats. We all need them, but we don't think we want them. Well, some of us do, and we're trying to get everyone else to want them, too. Fats are probably the most misunderstood and feared of the macronutrients, due to their being incriminated in past decades as a cause of obesity and the subsequent fat-free craze that swept all your local grocery stores. Thankfully, those days are moving behind us and people are open to throwing this macronutrient back in their diets. But now


Macros Made Simple Part 1: Carbohydrates
So I notice there is a lot of misinformation and confusion about nutrition and what to eat and how to eat it, where to eat it, who to eat it with, and what to wear when you're eating it... Unfortunately, I can't help with ALL of that - personal trainers usually don't win awards for fashion sense - but I CAN break down your diet breakdown :) This is the beginning of a three-part series explaining the macronutrients. Now, you might have heard one of your gym friends talking abo

Why Crunches Don't Guarantee a Six-Pack
Picture this: You're on a mat at the gym, crunch, crunch, crunching away. You don't mind the burn, because you're laser-focused on one thing: beach-perfect-superhero-body-Ryan-Reynolds-ripped abs. After your seventh set, you add some planks for good measure. Because that six-pack is right around the corner. You first just have to melt the fat off your stomach with one more set of sit ups... Ehh. I'll grant that doing a lot of ab workouts will give anyone really strong abs, wh
Grocery Store Tricks #1
I decided to shoot this when I was going through a store with my friend to make sure no one falls for any kind of misleading information while trying to shop smarter. Keep in mind, this is just an example, and there are instances where certain shakes or drinks with a higher carb/fat content can be useful (though still keep an eye on sugars). I'm thinking I might do more of these because grocery stores can be tricky places... *Note* I hid the brand name on purpose because the


Am I Cutting Calories Properly?
Most people know that, in general, if you want to lose weight, you're going to have to eat less - and at that, eat less junk food and more whole foods. If weight loss is a function of how many calories you consume versus how many calories you expend, it makes sense to simply eat less and exercise more, right? The big problem with all this is, as humans who don't have built-in calorie calculators, we have a tendency to underestimate how much we eat and overestimate how much we