Know What You Eat: Know Your Nutrition Facts

I came across a new interesting website today. It's amazing and is really beneficial for your daily life and food/nutrition planning. It gives you the information that you want to know about each food item that you take on a daily basis in the simple terms that you can understand. It also tells you if the food has a positive or negative impact on our health if taken in combination with other food items or depending upon how you plan your diet. I think everyone should plan their diet properly to be fit and healthy. I am on my way to be fit and healthy :). I just hope not everyone starts so late... So if you have not been following up with your health ..not doing any exercises ... doing groceries without knowing how much nutrition value each item has ... I think it's high time you should start doing it now. It's always better starting late than never.

So I stumbled upon http://www.nutritiondata.com. It's a site where you can go and look for a particular food item including cereals, fruits, vegetables etc and check their nutrition facts. For example if you eat cooked rice ... see what nutrition it gives you for a bowl of rice...



It tells you get 169 calories per serving of one bowl with no fat and some dietary fiber and some protein. It also tells you that the fullness factor is 2.4 tells an indication of how much full you will feel after having just 1 bowl of cooked rice but at the same time it's not in green zone of target map so it might not be a great meal alone in terms of nutrition.But it's good on calorie ration which is good in terms of carb as you are not accumulating any fat. The glysmic value tells you how much impact this food will have on your blood sugar level.The inflammation factor tells you how positive is this food when eaten alone.

Similarly it also gives you an idea of what is the proten quality contained in this food item and how complete is this item in terms of nutrients gain in the body.



If you want you can also see an in-depth detail of all nutrients contained in the item.


Isn't all this information great?

Scooby's Health Exercises Are The Best

I was looking for a lot of exercises on websites for my Abs and cardio. Something simple that I could do at home and at the same time should have excellent outputs. From my previous post while watching the video of David losing 400 lbs, I came across another video of Scooby. I must say ... the exercises that Scooby shows in his videos are simply great. I tried his Abs/Cycling and it left me surprised with joy! I'm sure you'd like to watch his videos if you like exercises... Mind it, it might look like it's only for GentleMen, but if you watch it carefully, it's all meant for everyone. For example if you are a female and want to lose weight from your abs (belly) you must watch the last (third) video here in this blogpost...

Here is his basic video ...

And this one tells you how to read labels before doing your groceries ...

And this one takes your breath away ... Just navigate to 6:00 minutes ..to avoid watching the loseit program on iPOD...starting 6:00 minutes in video, he shows you how to do crunches and cycling ...that will work for your abs so much better than any other exercise that you've been doing so far ...

Check out all of Scooby's video's at http://www.youtube.com/user/scooby1961

To understand and plan your calorie needs and your food chart, I suggest you use this : http://crossfitperformance.com/images/FoodChart_Blocks.xls
To know how much calories do you need everyday check any of these :
http://www.my-calorie-counter.com/calorie_calculator.asp
or
http://nutrition.about.com/od/changeyourdiet/a/calguide.htm

You can use the following excel sheets too :
www.ironteam.net/public/nutrition/Calorie%20Calculator%20v1.2%20team.xls
or
www.brianmac.co.uk/excel/calorie.xls
or
www.chotiwalasayurveda.com/download/calories%20calculator.xls

How one man lost 400 lbs. without surgery

This is simply amazing ... How someone lost and still won ... :D ...

Fretting over memory loss makes it worse

I learnt today that fretting over memory loss will make your memory respond to your calls slower than if you remain happy with your brain cell's performance. Isn't that strange? I usually do fret over my memory specially in recent years...for about 3-4 years now ..that I have been losing memory ...And I'm still sure I do. At times I can't recall people's names... a railway station's name which I used to frequent earlier for going to office ... a restaurant chain name where I used to call every night for dinner and used to get food delivered .. a popular brand name which I used to wear when I was in my first years of job ...my latest colleague's meeting reports which they told me yesterday ...some programming concept/construct that I had thought about yesterday evening before calling it a day to resolve an ongoing problem..but failed to recall it this morning ...and many such instances/stuffs ...uncountable ...!!!

The report suggests to think positive, especially if you want to retain a good memory as you age. That’s the advice of scientists at North Carolina State University who found that expecting to have a diminishing memory with age could be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In a study published in the journal Experimental Aging Research, they found that people who do not believe in the negative stereotype that memory loss is a natural occurrence as you age did better on tests than other people.

The negative effects were strongest in adults with the highest level of education, according to the researchers. But on the plus side, if people have a more positive view of ageing their memory performance scores are higher.
Obviously the take-home message is that you have to be happy about whatever performance you get out of your brain cells ...and get upset about it daily ... :D

My new dumbbell exercises and workouts

I always decided to exercise on a regular basis but could never actually do it probably because of lethargy. But this time around, I bought myself a pair of dumbbells and started working out. Needless to say, dumbbells are an easy way to work out and can be conveniently done everyday at home too. I chose dumbbells because dumbbell exercises form an integral part of most strength training programs. They can be used to develop the various different elements of strength such as maximal strength, hypertrophy or muscle mass, explosive power and strength endurance. Free weights such as dumbbells activate smaller stabilizing muscle groups to control the exercise. Resistance machines on the other hand, tend to work muscle groups in very strict planes of movement. The downside of this very strict movement is that while some muscle groups will become significantly stronger, other, smaller muscles are neglected.

The other advantage dumbbell exercises have over machines is that they fit around your body so the movement can be performed correctly. Although resistance machines can be adjusted, such as the seat height for example, the movement pattern is still largely governed by how the machine is built.

Athletes typically favor dumbbell exercises over machines as they can replicate sport-specific movements more accurately. They also know that they will develop a more balanced physique and structure if most of their routine employs free weight exercises.

Here are some of the exercises that I do. Hope you might also benefit from these details:

Chest Dumbbell Exercises
Flat Chest Presses

Flat chest press

1. Lying flat on bench, hold the dumbbells directly above chest, arms extended.
2. Lower dumbbells to chest in a controlled manner.
3. Press dumbbells back to starting position and repeat.
4. Avoid locking elbows.

Incline Chest Presses

Incline chest press

1. Adjust bench to an incline of 30 to 45 degrees.
2. Repeat as above.

Flat Chest Flies

Flat chest fly

1. Lying flat on bench, hold dumbbells directly above chest.
2. Bend elbows slightly and maintain throughout the exercise.
3. Open arms to sides. Elbows should remain 'locked' in a slightly flexed position.
4. When upper arms are parallel to floor, return the weights to the starting position and repeat.

Incline Chest Flies

Inlcine chest flies

1. Adjust bench to an incline of 30 to 45 degrees.
2. Repeat as above.

Shoulder Dumbbell Exercises

Seated Shoulder Presses

Seated shoulder press

1. Sit upright on bench with dumbbells over head. Make sure back is flat.
not 2. Lower dumbbells slowly to shoulders.
3. When arms are at 90 degrees, press the dumbbells back up and repeat.

Lateral Raises

Lateral raises

1. Stand upright, knees slightly bent, shoulder width apart, holding dumbbells at sides.
2. Bend elbows slightly and raise the dumbbells out to sides. Keep elbows slightly bent throughout.
3. When arms are parallel to floor, slowly lower back and repeat.

Reverse Flies

Reverse flies

1. Sit on edge of bench, feet flat on the floor. Bend over so chest is almost resting on thighs.
2. Hold dumbbells next to feet and bend arms slightly. Open arms out keeping elbows bent.
3. When arms are parallel to floor, slowly lower dumbbells back.

Front Raises

Front raises

1. Stand upright, knees slightly bent, shoulder width apart. Palms should be towards thighs.
2. Raise one dumbbell directly in front of you.
3. When arm is parallel to ground lower dumbbell slowly back. Repeat with the other arm.

Enough for today ... I'm trying to find out what all possible ways are available to do more exercises with simple dumbbells.