9.12.11

My roomate has left town for about a week to go work at one of his job sites, leaving the apartment all to me. No more competition for the stove in the morning, woot!

The days are growing shorter here and somewhat darker it seems. Every day I add 2 minutes to sunrise and subtract 2 minutes from sunset. The beginning of October signals the beginning of the rainy season here. I believe that next week summer is over, ha, the temperature drops like 20 degrees for a new high of 60. I can’t wait!

Today I was in the gym shadowing my apprentice again learning while he coaches his one on one clients. We ended up coaching the 5pm class together then trained at the 6pm. I will post the WOD at the end of todays post. After our workout Shep and I discussed in short detail how he programs his week of WODs for the gym. Next weekend the “Executive Diploma Program” will be taking place at Crossfit Vancouver, which I will be attending. They basically teach their business model from the ground up; at least that’s what I think they do, ha.

Cheers,
WipFit

9.11.11

What a long day it was, again, procrastination has bitten me in the ass. I recently mentioned that I was going to be writing a research article on intermittent fasting. Well little did I know there has only been one research article written on human testings.

You see there are two main types of articles, research articles and review articles. Research articles are primary sources of information, the article is written by one of the individuals who actually conducted the experiment. On the other hand, we have review articles which is a secondary source of information meaning these articles were written taking information and findings from a research article.

There is so much that goes into research articles it is amazing. I simply thought I was going to be able to find 10 peer-reviewed research articles involving humans in regards to intermittent fasting. Needless to say that did not happen, I spent 12 hours in a chair looking for articles and only found one that would apply. Sadly I think I am going to have to change my topic to meet this professors requirements.

Something interesting did catch my eye while I was devouring the databases for articles I noticed that every article regarding intermittent fasting the mention of caloric restriction was also talked about. From the research I read it seems that combining a caloric restricted diet with times of intermittent fasting, the duration of life increases dramatically. Since I am at the coffee shop writing this on my tablet, I will see if I can dig up some of the articles to share with those of you whom are interested.

9.10.11

     Before I even say anything you need to watch the video above, it is hysterical.

     Today was spent at the beach with several Crossfitters and their kids. I had a blast, I ended up digging the biggest whole I have ever seen with 5 kids, ha. The water is fairly cold here, I am not sure of an exact temperature but all I can say is it was nippy. Once in the water your greeted with tons of rocks, makes wearing water shoes a smart idea, it seems that most of the beaches around here have lots of rocks in the water, I ended up being alright with nothing on my feet. Even though the sun isn’t as strong up here as in Florida, I learned sunscreen is still needed.

Not a bad view from the beach, eh?

It’s sure nice to have a scenery change.

     Tomorrow marks the second day I will be conducting an intermittent fast. I am going to try and fast from the time of waking to the time of sleeping again. So technically it will be around a 24 hour fast or so. I will be spending most of the day tomorrow gathering research articles for my research paper I will be writing very soon on intermittent fasting. During tomorrows fast I plan on drinking lots of water, and green tea most likely. No food of any sort will be taken in during the fast, no juice fasting (something people cheat with, it defeats the purpose).

     One more thing, Laurie had previously asked if the cows I was purchasing a share in for their milk had names. Well Laurie I had browsed through my emails and found a list of all the names of all the cows who have shares for sale. Our Cows Cowshare currently owns 24 Jerseys: Maple, Amber, Marlene, Friska, Holly, Fawn, Emerald, Marcie, Sadie, Rosie, Allysa, Pearl, Honey, Cocoa, Tess, Vanessa, Frances, Diamond, Tamika, Garda, Irene, Kalee, Teal, October as well as 1 Guernsey, Caramel, and Ayrshire, Belle. They also have 7 goats: Tasha, Jewel, Fauna, Mariah, Blossom, Willow & Molly.

Cheers,
WipFit

9.9.11

     Day started early for me, trying to go to bed earlier now and get up earlier, this allows me more productive time to get my school work done.

     I went into the gym today to train one of my mentors clients for him at 11 then stuck around for the group class at 12. I mentioned in yesterdays post that I would be taking a break from Crossfit training until my back was 100%. I decided to make use of this rest time and work on my gymnastic movements. A few current goals of mine include: freestanding handstand hold, 2:00 l-sit, a front and back lever on rings, and ultimately a freestanding handstand push up.

     As usual I was on the computer today reading about nutrition and came across something that I wanted to share with you.

     Many are aware that 6:3 ratio is important, so they try to compensate by taking fish oil to balance
the 6:3 ratio. This doesn’t really work too well – you can’t realistically eat that much fish, and if you take fish oil supplements, you now exacerbate the second and more important problem with excess n-6, which is your total PUFA intake. High total PUFA, especially including the highly unstable n-3, leads to oxidative damage to your cells. Your arteries, liver and  other organs don’t appreciate extra oxidative damage.

     The way to correct the modern excess of n-6 or linoleic acid is to avoid the modern sources of it. Stop eating all temperate vegetable oils – cooking and frying oils like corn, soy, canola, flax, all of it. And go easy on the nuts and factory chicken. These are big soruces of n-6, especially the nuts and nut oils.

     Most of us cook with EVOO or coconut oil, right? I urge you to pick up some clarified ghee next time your in need of some cooking oil. It’s very similar to butter without the chance of it burning, tastes amazing with eggs, sweet potatoes, red meat, I use it for most everything now. Just another good fat source to have on deck when cooking.

Cheers, 

WipFit 

Gymnastics WOD:

10-1 Ladder

• Strict Hand-Stand-Push-Up (No Kipping)
• Strict Pull-Up (No Kipping)

9.8.11

     I am still looking at different templates for the blog so do not be surprised to log in and find it looks completely different.

     Today was spent mostly around the house, I had to be here because my friend was coming by to pick up a dresser that was in my room. Then I had a test I had to take at 4pm for school.

    I did however read the manual on how to use my new Olympus E-510 camera. Operating this thing is like trying to work on a space shuttle, so many buttons and knobs.

    Like I mentioned in recent posts I have been geeking out on some things in regards to nutrition like intermittent fasting, dairy, fish oil, ghee, etc. I am in the process of purchasing a share of a cow so that I will be able to get milk from “my” cow, it’s illegal to sell or buy raw milk so this is a way that allows people to work around that law. I am pretty excited actually.

     Do you all like me posting links to some of the readings I have been coming across? Here is a better question, are you reading the links I am posting, ha? Let me know in the comments below.

Cheers,

WipFit

 

9.7.11

It was a organic, blah, blah, blah, a super healthy pig, ha. Was delicious.

Team Under The Bus (They won best costume).

     The weather here is starting to remind me of Florida, it is getting hot man. I thought it was supposed to be cold and rainy up here, ha, all I see is clear blue skies and sunshine. I checked some websites regarding this heat and supposedly it is the hottest week of the entire year.

     I had made plans today to head down to “Pacific Spirit Regional Park, which comprises 763 hectares of forest and foreshore immediately west of Vancouver. The park’s forests stretch across Point Grey separating the city from the University of British Columbia. Its thin foreshore wraps around the tip of the peninsula and touches the Fraser River, the Strait of Georgia and Burrard Inlet. The park’s closeness to both the university and the city entices visitors to reach it by foot, bus or bike.”

     One of my favorite part of todays trip was finding out that there were blackberries growing in the sides of the trail I was walking today. At first I was curious as to what the berries were (poisonous or not), but I was super hungry so I said hell with it. Thank goodness they were blackberries! I ended up staying on this trail as long as I could eating all the berries I could find. I must have ate around 3 pounds of blackberries today… My hands were stained purple, true passion…

     I tried making my way through a series of trails to ultimately end up at the beach but was turned away by what a park ranger told me was a brush fire (starting from a campfire). Helicopters, firetrucks the whole nine yards were coming in to put out this fire. By this time I was quite a ways away from were I had locked up my bike (1 hours walk) so I headed back to get my ride and head on home.

     I did some reading on dairy, and sent a few emails out to local farmers seeing if I could purchase part ownership on a cow to receive raw, pasture-raised, grass-fed, full fat milk. My roommate Dan and I also purchased a quarter of a cow (meat) which will be here 9.25.11, were going to go pick up a 5 liter deep freezer to store all of our meat! I am so excited!

     So were do I stand with dairy? I found this article a while ago and I feel the same way.

Cheers,
WipFit

9.6.11

Team Weiner Dog.

Team Leap Frog.

Andy’s father along with some of the soldiers Andy served with.

Words cannot even be said…

Some of the audience we had at the “Nutts Cup.”

     My camera finally arrived! Hurray! Now I just have to figure out how to use it, ha.

     I spent half of the day today running around the city looking for a compact flash disk for my camera. After yesterdays brutal workout my back was tight so I worked on it a bit, feeling much better I must say. You know I have been thinking quite thoroughly about my training, and having to deal with a tight lower back and I made the decision to avoid Crossfit training for a while until my back is back were it needs to be.

     To me there is no need to train with risk of injury. I train Crossfit, eat the way I do, practice the things I practice, because I want to live a long healthy life full of adventure not pain. Here is something I will one day end up telling you if I have not already, “listen to your body.” You know that saying, “pain is weakness leaving the body,” it’s bullshit, for the most part. Pain is there for a reason. I look at pain as a way of communication, your body is trying to tell you something, its warning you, so listen. Do not confuse this with something being “hard to do.” I am talking about pain in the sense of running with a broken foot. What is the point of that, right? Exactly, so do yourself a favor and LISTEN.

     I have been looking into a company by the name of MovNat, they are doing great things. I wont say to much about them right now, I will let you check it for yourself.

     If you guys have read that article I posted on fish oil, I also urge you to check out one of Robb Wolfs podcasts that also addresses the topic.

Cheers,
WipFit

9.5.11

I had to unload a 60-70lb bucket, 55lb kb, 35lb kb, 45lb plate, 10lb plate.

Now to figure out how to pick this thing up semi-safely…

Ok, still alive…

Ditched the sunglasses, ha.

     I apologize for being so behind on this blog, I had it all written out and then somehow I lost it… Go figure. It may of been that when I woke up this morning I was laying on top of an open and flipped over laptop, ha. Anyways, yesterday was a holiday so the box was closed, and I was working on some research regarding fish oil (omega 3).

     The gym decided to host a workout in a local park nearby @ 2pm and 4pm, I decided to attend the 2pm with my roomate. I arrived to the park early to scope out the area a little bit, crossfitters began to show up one by one, until the coach arrived with a big truck full of wheel barrels, buckets full of plaster, and some kettlebells. We had to go get some more equipment at the gym before we could set up the stations for the workout so we all hopped in the truck to go pick up the equipment. We ended up brining back bars, plates, more kettlebells. I will ink the workout below so you guys can check it out, I must say it was nasty… I had a few videos too but I have not figured out how to upload them on this website yet.

A must read article on Omega 3 Fish Oil!

If your taking it I strongly recommend you read this.

The pictures you see at the top of the blog today are from the “Nutts Cup” (More will be posted throughout the week.

Cheers,
WipFit

9.4.11

Not my picture, but, this is a sunrise in Vancouver.

     My Dad and I got up about 5:30am or to head up to the “Waterfront Skytrain Station.” We got there just in time to catch the first Canada line train down to YVR (airport). It is a pretty quick ride about 15 minutes or so once you get on the train. After walking into to the airport with my Dad and saying our see-ya-later’s (goodbye makes it sound like you will never see that person again, you know?) I walked over to the Starbucks coffee shop and grabbed a cup before I got back onto the train for the ride back. Now by this time it is about 56 degrees or so, clear blue sky, sun rising; these trains have a windshield on the front side of them so I sat there watching the sun rise over the mountains drinking my Starbucks coffee, life is good.

     Once I got back to my place, the rest of my day was dedicated to finishing all of my assignments, journals, and quiz’s. Not much going on kind of a lazy day of work in front of the laptop. 

     My Uncle Richard had recently asked, “Looking back on human evolution, we evolved on a diet of gorging and starvation (fasting). What are the benefits of short term fasting cycles? Can we digest or burn off the toxic, weaker, cells in our body by fasting and therefore improve our health and life span.” I choose to write a research paper on this for my “Research Methods” class, which will hopefully be completed before the due date, answering all your questions and mine on the topic. 

     This is one of those topics I have been looking into for some time now and as of yesterday, I had an intermittent fast lasting from 8pm-7pm the next day. I thought this was going to be extremely challenging not eating for a length of time like that but it was not to bad. I found myself having a straight coffee in the morning and then water and tea for the remainder of the fast. At 7pm I ate a meal like I would  normally make and it did not seem to bother me after I spent all that time fasting. Something I noticed throughout my day was I had a very clear mental state until my stomach started to grumble which seemed to disrupt that state, but I would settle back into it again. I definitely will continue to experiment with my intermittent fasting as from the research I have been doing in the school databases containing tons of studies on the subject it seems to be very beneficial for life long health. 

     Now I cannot link any of the articles from the school databases on here but I can link you a little article written by “Mark Sisson,” which gives an overview of how intermittent fasting works and the benefits it provides. 

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/fasting/

Cheers,

WipFit

9.3.11

Bump and Grind coffee shop in East Vancouver (they used to have a DJ, awesome!)

A shot from Jericho Beach.

49th Parallel a coffee shop in Kitsilano.

The artwork some of these coffee shops does just amazes me.

Enter if you dare 🙂

The market inside of Granville Island.

     Laundry day! The one day I dread, it is the folding the t-shirts part that I dislike so much, I am just so slow.

     I mentioned a day or so ago my fathers love  for coffee (espresso) and bikes, so we had to start the day off at “Bump and Grind,” a local coffee shop about 6 blocks North of were I live. My Dad was explaining to me the science behind “The Latte,” I guess the machine this coffee shop uses costs around $20,000. Sounds crazy when your thinking of cups of coffee, right? 

     After we got our morning fix we headed out to run some errands, basic stuff, trash cans, trash bags, floor cleaning supplies, hampers, that sort of stuff. Riding up a steep hill on a fixed gear bike with a large hamper under your arm is quite challenging I must say. After dropping all the supplies off at my house we headed back out this time to find an espresso machine that I could use back at home, now my Mother would say, “your turning into your Father, Alec,” but that’s alright because he’s a great man (most of the time, ha, we all have our moments).

     We then headed over to another coffee shop called the 49th Parallel which was pretty cool, if there ever was a Ritz Carlton of coffee this would be the place. I got a call while we sat outside drinking our second cup of espresso from my mentor “Shep.” A bunch of Crossfit members and coaches were down at one of the beaches for the day and we were invited to join them so rode down there to check it out. Standing on the beach staring off at the water that sits in front of us, there lay the most beautiful mountains I have seen. In the distance you could see the enormous ships carrying these containers full of something, it was pretty neat.

     After making our appearance at the beach we traveled to Granville Island which is sort of a tourist area, with a large market. We rode our bikes around exploring this new found area searching for some food to buy for dinner, we had no luck. 

    By this point my stomach was speaking to me so we hurried home and grabbed some food from one of the Asian markets and some ground espresso to use back at home. I cooked an epic dinner while my Dad went out to buy some local Canadian beer. After dinner and a drink we headed off to a local Gelato shop to grab a little treat, I got the cookie dough, and my Dad got espresso flake, I tried both and my cookie dough totally reigned superior over the espresso flake. I think it is those little cubes of cookie dough that make it so tasty… 

     Once our sweet tooth was taken care of (mostly mine I admit), we walked back home and starting watching a series on television called “Strike Back.” If you have not seen it, I definitely suggest watching it if your feeling like bumming it around the house for a few hours.

Cheers,
WipFit