Do you throw up after a very intense workout?

It hasn’t happened to me but I know of a few people who would run to the locker room after several heavy sets of squats, and would throw up. Why is that? Is it a sigh of a good workout?

It turns out vomiting after a workout can be a sigh of a blood lactate build up. Lactate is a by-product of the anaerobic/glycolytic energy pathway. Obviously you should choose a level of intensity that corresponds to your body’s ability to effectively metabolize it. So, slow down if your lactate threshold is not high enough.

Explosive exercise increases power

Study showed that explosive exercise (like hang clean) caused subjects to exert more power in their second exercise (squat in this study). Scientists speculated that the effect is achieved through chemical changes, occurring in the muscle during the first (explosive) exercise, which cause more of the muscle fibers to contract in the following exercise.

When you should use a training belt and when you shouldn’t

A research on spinal biomechanics showed that wearing a lifting belt doesn’t decrease the possibility for back injury. That is why it is very important to train the core muscles as a complete package and not only the 6-pack (the rectus abdominis).

It is appropriate to wear a belt when doing heavy and maximal lifts. It will increase the core stability, allowing for better performance. However, you will not need your belt in regular training sessions.

Insulin resistance and the waist circumference correlation

What is insulin resistance? In a few words if your body is often manipulated, through high GI carbohydrates, to release high quantities of insulin, your tissues will eventually become insulin resistant, that is they will stop responding to insulin stimulus. This is the first step in developing diabetes type II.

Scientists discovered that the fat build up in the middle section is a better predictor of insulin resistance than Body Mass Index (BMI), aerobic capacity or fat percentage. The abdominal fat was measured as waist circumference.

Aminogen - the hottest ingredient in protein formulas

I few supplement companies started adding Aminogen – a natural protein digestive enzyme – in their whey protein formulas. One recent double-blind placebo study demonstrated that aminogen increased nitrogen retention by 32 %( nitrogen is what separates proteins from carbs and fats)! It also increased that total amount of amino acids, absorbed in the muscle by 82%.

What does this mean? It means that if aminogen is added to your protein formula, the possibilities for muscle gains are more solid with almost double the aminos absorbed! And you know well that amino acids are the muscle building blocks;-)

Click here to find out which protein formula contains aminogen (it is the whey protein I am currently taking;-)

Foods don’t contain what they once used to

Facts came out this year to expose the shocking truth: fruit, vegetables, grains, meat and even milk contain significantly fewer vitamins, minerals and even protein compared to what the levels were 50 years ago.

One study demonstrated that the iron content in 15 different meats decreased with 47%, cooper dropped 60%, and magnesium was about 10% lower.

Leucine – the muscle builder

In a study training subjects were given placebo, only carbohydrate meal, only leucine meal or carbohydrate and leucine meal (leucine is the main amino acid, responsible for the muscle building effect of protein). Researchers found that the carbohydrate meal didn’t produce any anabolic effect; the meal with leucine had an anabolic effect on the skeletal muscle but the meal with carbohydrates and leucine had the greatest anabolic effect.

Conclusion – take some carbohydrates in your post-workout meal if you want to gain lean muscle mass. Protein by itself will work some but it will do its job a lot better if combined with carbs.