Raw eggs for life

If you have ever watched some of the old Rocky movies you would probably remember how he eats his eggs raw :)
In my search for my own optimal diet, I have stumbled across the idea of eating raw eggs.
Yes you heard me, raw eggs!
The health benefits from eating raw eggs are phenomenal, and much healthier than eating cooked eggs because cooking changes the chemical three dimensional shape of protein which can easily lead to allergies. They are also a great source of protein and fat, and are quite inexpensive compared to organic meet or fish.
Another great thing about eating raw eggs is, that you don't have to cook the them and therefore a real time-saver! (Especially after training!)

Now, like myself, the first question people ask is: "Won't you get salmonella if you eat raw eggs?"
Salmonella is of course a serious infection, but not many people know the risk of getting it.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture earlier this year published an analysis on this subject http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12022671?dopt=Abstract showed that only one of every
30,000 eggs are contaminated with salmonella. This shows that the risk is actually quite low, and the experiment was made with conventionally farmed eggs too, which means that if one eats organic eggs the risk virtually disappears.

I personally eat two raw organic eggs every morning, and then some more after training if necessary. I do also take my precautions and always carefully analyze the egg before consuming it. This is the guidelines given by Dr. Mercola on www.mercola.com

Guidelines To Ensure That You Are Consuming Fresh High- Quality Eggs

1. Always check the freshness of the egg right before you consume the yolk.
   
2. If you are uncertain about the freshness of an egg, don't eat it. This is one of the best safeguards against salmonella infection.
   
3. If there is a crack in the shell, don't eat it. You can easily check for this by immersing the egg in a pan of cool, salted water. If the egg emits a tiny stream of bubbles, don't consume it as the shell is porous/contains a hole.
   
4. If you are getting your eggs fresh from a farmer it is best to not refrigerate them. This is the way most of the world stores their eggs; they do not refrigerate them. To properly judge the freshness of an egg, its contents need to be at room temperature. Eggs that are stored in the fridge and opened immediately after taking them out will seem fresher than they actually are. Eggs that you want to check the freshness of should be kept outside the fridge for at least an hour prior to opening them.
   
5. First, check all the eggs by rolling them across a flat surface. Only consume them if they roll wobbly.
   
6. Open the egg. If the egg white is watery instead of gel-like, don't consume the egg. If the egg yolk is not convex and firm, don't consume the egg. If the egg yolk easily bursts, don't consume the egg.
   
7. After opening the egg you can put it up to your nose and smell it. If it smells foul you will certainly not want to consume it.

If you would like to start eating eggs ROCKY-STYLE, your body must adapt to it.
DON'T eat a whole raw egg if you have never done it before. Start out small with about a half teaspoon of egg yolk the first 3 days, and then gradually increase it.

Raw egg is THE SHIT!!! :)


Sources:

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2002/11/13/eggs-part-two.aspx

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12022671?dopt=Abstract

Nutrition an physical degeneration by Weston A. Price

Stretching for optimal performance?

Why should you do stretching? Do you really know why you should stretch? And if so, which kind of muscles are important to be stretched?

Today there is a big discussion going on at the subject. Some say that stretching is good for you and can prevent injury because muscles don't snap when they are longer and more flexible.
This has been the general view for a long time now.
Recently some scientists and has come up with the idea that stretching doesn't reduce injury or even make things better. They say that it's not worth the effort and hard work, when there's no need after all.

For many athletes, this is just what they wanna hear when they're sweating their but of trying to get their splits. They stop their stretching completely and from that point only rely on strength training.
In my oppinion, if you are an athlete and want to prevent yourself from getting injured, YOU HAVE TO STRETCH. People often migrate towards activities they are good at, and I know lots of people who’s not very flexible say "That's no problem, it doesn't really matter anyway". But it does.

There are of course many different approaches and different kinds of sport which all have their different demands on how flexible an athlete should be. ex. a gymnast require a higher flexibility than a soccer player but still the soccer player still have to stretch some muscles if he want to stay in the game. The demands of flexibility of the soccer player is obviously much smaller that it is of a gymnast and the soccer player doesn't have to master full splits !


In other words peoples flexibility demands are different and we don't all need the flexibility of a yoga master. You do, however still need a certain level of flexibility, which many people lack, in order to prevent injuries, balancing your body, and to obtain a nice posture. On top of that, you will, as a traceur, achieve grace and beauty in your movements, which I think is something that has been forgotten by many peolpe today.

There are still some people out there performing their stretches - which is good.
Unfortunately, many of them don’t know much about the basics and keeps on doing the same exercises they’re used to.
In order to prevent injury, there should be a balance between these to basic kinds of muscles.


Tonic (postural muscles)
Phasic (mover muscles)


These two differs in the way they are used. When exposed to faulty loading they react opposite of each other. The Tonic muscles become hyperactive or workaholics and tend to tighten and become shorter. The Phasic muscles do the opposite, they become longer and weaker when exposed to the same kind of stress (which is just as bad as muscles that are too short).

An example of the tonic muscles is the hamstrings, neck, shoulders, chest and both calf muscles - they often tend to tighten
An example of Phasic muscles is the abdominals (specially the deep ones), the butt and the hips - they often tend to weaken
Muscles always work together in groups and never in isolation!!!
That means that if one muscle is too tight, it will dominate the others in the group and disrupt the natural movement of the joint and create an imbalance in the body.

Paul Chek makes a great comparison in his book "Eat, move and be healthy" where he compares a muscle imbalance to a bent and unstable wheel. Imagine the stress of riding a bicycle with such a wheel. It will get the wheel to fall apart in the long run.
If you want to ride you bicycle with a balanced wheel, you must tighten the loose muscles and loosen the tight ones. It's as simple as that.

I very often see traceurs with bad posture, and if your not one of them - you probably know one or seen one in a video.
Bad posture is a result to muscles imbalances in the body.
If you have bad posture, you muscles can’t effectively pump fluids through your body which will certainly leed to injury in the long run. Especially for a traceur who frekvently puts his body under big pressure!

The point with this is article is simply, to make people understand the importance of stretching and that stretching should be something prior to strenght! It means that if are stiff as a board - you should strongly consider doing more stretches that strenght to balance out your unstable wheel of a body.
You cannot build anything strong on a weak foundation!
Stretching should not be a burden - and you don’t have to be a yoga-master. You should just pay extra attention to the muscles in your body that are really tight - not just your legs.


Muslces that are often forgotten are: Neck, chest, shoulders, back, abdominals, lower back, hips, groin, calfs, butt, IT bands, harmstrings and quads.

Try to incorporate some new stretches, and don’t get the habit to only do the ones you’re good at. The tighter the muscle is - the more it’s proberbly in need to be stretched!


Sources: “How to eat move and be healthy” by paul check
“What to Stretch – What to Strengthen” by Stephen Holt

Isometrics - The key to supernatural strength

I have been during strength training all of my life. Ever since I could walk, my father always took me to places like “Tarzan land” and gyms on Sundays etc. I have been during gymnastics and martial arts the most of my life, which has given me some kind of basic form and strength, and was something I could apply to Tricking and Parkour.

If you search the internet today, you won’t find a respected Parkour website or community who doesn’t clearly encourage conditioning and strength training.
And that’s a good thing! People, who are new to the discipline, have to learn how to build their bodies to become stronger, faster and more efficient in every aspect. Everybody agrees on that! The only thing is just HOW? What is the best way to get the strength of David Belle? Are there some kinds of quick exercise programs, which can give you super-strength in no time? Or is it something that you can only get from years and years of training and constant conditioning? There are a lot of different opinions towards this subject; some people think heavy weight training is the best solution while others supports the idea of just using their own bodyweight.

Lately, I have been riding this conditioning wave along with everybody else. I have of been paying a lot of attention to Will Wayland’s articles on world wide jam’s community, and apart from that, I have been reading tons of articles from other websites like t-nation and trickstutorials (mostly nutrition).

Regarding what I have learned, and what seems natural and obvious to me, I made up my own training regime consisting of a nice mix between; Bodyweight exercises (you name it), heavy weight exercises (max 5 reps of 3-5 sets), and endurance exercises (added lately; cat-crawl).

But during the last year, where I have been conditioning like crazy, - I still didn’t feel like I had the same basic kind of speed and body control, like when I did martial arts. I couldn’t figure out what the problem was and it irritated me like hell. Really! It was annoying to see Adam getting stronger and stronger without really doing anything.

Then suddenly in all my frustration, I stumbled across good old Bruce, and ISOMETRIC training or resistance training, and now at last all my prayers have been heard. I think I have found the key. !!

Isometrics will gain the most, if you mix it up with other kinds of exercises, so i think I will experiment a bit with this, and return with the good ones.. :)

Now I also know why Adam was getting so strong! The only thing Adam does to become stronger is simply by isometric training (without knowing it himself) He does a lot of static holds and levers etc. and its amazing how strong and powerful he has become just by doing that. No additional weights, only isometrics. Martial arts also incorporate a lot of this kind of training, and that’s why I felt so strong back then. Therefore I KNOW this works, because I have felt it on my own body, and by watching Adam. (Why does gymnast become so strong? They do tons of isometrics and static holds..! )

Isometrics was responsible for;

- The lightening speed and superhuman strength of the old karate masters
- The infinite stamina and mountainous muscle of the legendary Indian Wrestlers such as the Great Gama (undefeated in over 5,000 battles!)
- The lean, wiry, phenomenal physique of Bruce Lee
- The Greek statue proportioned body of the worlds most perfect man Charles Atlas
- The colossal powerhouse that is Arnold Schwarzenegger
- The unbelievable definition of the worlds greatest gymnasts
- The tight toned physiques of the great dancers
- The astounding physical development of the old school strongmen – who NEVER lifted weights!
- The continual revolutionary performance of Russian Athletes during the Olympics

(Paul J. O’Brian)

By adding isometrics to my training, I think I will gain so much more and get that old feeling of basic strength back which I have lost! YES..!!!

I cant really teach you about isometrics the same way experts can. So here's a link to the best website there is on the internet about this subject.


www.isometric-training.com

Good luck with this!!!


Thomas Videbaek