Men and Weight: Food Vices - The Shortcut to Weight Management

By Russ Klettke

Modern man is a creature of habit. He has predictable ways of grooming, getting dressed in the morning, commuting to work, working out and, of course, eating and drinking.

The problem for a lot of guys is many of those habits are bad. Particularly in what we eat, where certain foods contribute calories that are way out of proportion to their nutrients. Let’s call them food vices.

The food-vice culprits are well known: sugary sodas, salty snacks, fat-drenched main meals (burgers, extra-cheese pizza, deep-fried anything). Or, maybe it’s not so much the food itself – for example, peanut butter with its heart- and skin-healthy oils and protein – but the quantity at which we eat them (e.g., sitting in front of the television, eating one spoonful of peanut butter after another).

There’s an upside to having a vice: It can be the low-hanging fruit of weight management. Cut out that one bad thing, maybe replace it with something healthier, and you can actually drop a few pounds without a lot of effort.

It’s basic math
Say your vice is regular soda. Each can has about 150 calories. If you drank four per day, but then just switched over to diet soda, you would reduce your daily intake by 600 calories. Do that five days a week for three, six or 12 months and here’s what would happen:

• 3 months: 36,000 calories reduced = 10 pound weight loss
• 6 months: 72,000 calories reduced = 20 pound weight loss
• 12 months: 144,0000 calories reduced = 41 pound weight loss

It really is that simple. If instead you cut out a daily bowl of ice cream (400+ calories), two alcoholic drinks (300+ calories) or a bag of snack foods (variable by type and size; read the label), you get similar results, albeit less if it’s fewer than 600 calories (or, more if it is more).

In my book, “A Guy’s Gotta Eat, the regular guy’s guide to eating smart,” I suggest a six-step process for assessing and eliminating vices:

1. Acknowledge your sins: Keep a diary (it can be the back of an envelope) of what you eat and drink for a week.
2. Confront the enemy: Think about vending machines, local fast food joints or office donut fairies (e.g., the receptionist who wants you to be co-dependent with her on Krispy Kremes) that tempt you daily.
3. Avert: Remove a food or beverage vice from your life (i.e., have no vice foods in the house; re-route your drive away from temptation).
4. Don’t be a fanatic: If you try to never ever eat something again, that thing can turn into an obsession. Allow yourself that vice once in a while, but set limits on how often that would be.
5. Shift gears: If you can’t control your portions (e.g., a plate of cookies in a meeting), divert your taste buds to something different (eat a pickle). Sometimes it’s enough to shake a craving.
6. Dilute it: Say you figure out your worst vice is frozen hamburgers – 350 calories, 16 grams of saturated fat each – and you eat two every night. Make one only, chop it up and mix it with a pile of broccoli (frozen, steamed), lemon juice and a little parmesan cheese.

The point is to control your vice so it doesn’t control you. That’s a great habit to get into.

Men and Weight: The Three Meals You Must Know How To Make

By Russ Klettke

There are two words, and only two words, that are the secret to managing your weight: Make dinner.

Here’s why: The Center for Science in the Public Interest – an objective, if not scoldy group of people who advocate for a healthier world – studied the nutritional content found at a representative sample of restaurants, not just fast food. They then compared that data to meals people make at home. They found that meals made outside the home, on average, have 55 percent more calories than those made at home.

How? It’s easier to make tasty food with fat and salt. In fact, without fat and salt most restaurants, takeouts and frozen meal manufacturers would go out of business. Example: five crispy chicken strips with a creamy sauce, large fries and a regular soda from your nearest burger house has 1700 calories. Any guy who exercises with intensity should eat about 2500-3000 calories per day (less if he’s trying to lose weight).

Note that meals made at home are not prepared meals found in a freezer case. They mean stuff you whip together yourself.

Crazy, you say? No time and no kitchen skills, you protest? Listen up. We’re not talking Julie Child gourmet meals. This is about respecting yourself and your bodyweight enough to make a healthy meal in about 15 minutes. You can listen to music and down a cold beverage while doing it.

Following are three healthy, balanced dinners that use ingredients that store well: frozen, canned and dried goods. You can stock up a few months’ worth and eat them whenever you want. No need to run to the grocery store three times a week.

By the way, these meals are 500-800 calories and packed with quality nutrition and fiber. Substitute these for three dinners eaten out each week and you’ll lose weight within one month.

Spicy meat stew
• Canned, cooked roast beef (12-16 ounces)
• 2 cups of water (substitute with one cup of soup stock if you have any)
• Frozen vegetables (fresh is ok too)
• Gardinera (spicy pickled vegetables; they come in large jars at warehouse stores)
• Canned beans (Garbanzo, black and pinto beans all work)
• Taste options: oregano, bay leaf, basil, turmeric
Directions: Mix all ingredients in a small soup pot, use medium heat for 5-10 minutes.

Chicken, broccoli and sweet potato
• 1-2 slices frozen chicken breast (boneless, skinless)
• 1 4-portion packet of frozen broccoli
• 1 medium sized sweet potato
• Olive oil, lemon juice and a tiny bit of butter (1-2 pats)
• Salt and dry chilis to taste
Directions: In a microwavable bowl, mix a small amount of oil, lemon juice, chilis and salt with the frozen chicken. Cover and microwave, about seven minutes per breast, turning the chicken over midway through. Add frozen broccoli on top the chicken and microwave another two minutes, then leave covered for about five minutes. Wash but do not peel the sweet potato; as the chicken and broccoli are cooking, slice the potato into cubes, mix with oil and lemon and stir fry on the stove.

Bean-egg salad
• 2-3 hardboiled eggs, chopped/diced
• 1 can black beans
• 1 green apple, chopped
• 1 cup of frozen corn
• Olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, Tabasco sauce and oregano to taste
Directions: Throw everything together in a bowl and eat. OK with rice, or on bread for a great messy sandwich.

Best Fit in Swim Trunks - Parke and Ronen

Here are three of favorite styles:

photos from parke & ronen. www.parkeandronen.com

Men and Weight: Exercise To Drop The Pounds?

By Russ Klettke

Ask a woman what she does to lose weight, and chances are she’ll say, “I go on a diet.” Ask a guy and you get one of two answers: “I’ve never try to lose weight,” or, “I work out.”

A few years ago the Atkins diet challenged that assumption. Men everywhere loved this idea: eat all the crazy-rich meats you want – prime rib, bacon, hamburgers, pork rinds – as long as you stay away from carbohydrates (bread, pasta, French fries, rice, desserts) that are usually served alongside those dishes. It was a small sacrifice to make, and like magic, a lot of guys lost some weight.

For a while, anyway. But not too many stuck with it long term. Just try to think of one person you know who today continues eating by the Atkins method (just as well – missing nutrients from forgoing carbohydrates can cause a separate set of health problems).

But the fact this happened is pretty amusing. First, it demonstrated that a large segment of the male population really did want to lose weight. Second, they were willing to try tinkering with how they ate, even to the point of calling it a diet.

Where exercise works and where it doesn’t
Since the fall of Atkins, it’s been back to the gym for most men. This is practically male instinct. If you played sports in school, you probably remember what that first month of training did to tighten you up.

No mystery there: any time you engage in new and strenuous activity – playing basketball, swimming, lifting weights (it’s all good) – you are increasing your muscle mass. That revs up the metabolism because muscle is metabolically active tissue, much more so than fat. Just to exist, not counting the exercise, a pound of muscle burns through 50 to 70 calories per day. A pound of fat needs just 3 calories.

But are you really going to train as hard as an adult, with a job and other life responsibilities, as you did when you were in high school? Ninety minutes a day, maybe twice on Saturdays? Do you have a coached workout program, and teammates who will bury you in peer pressure if you slack off?

Perhaps not. Which is the reason just joining a gym (or ordering something off a fitness infomercial for home workouts) is a good start, but not always sufficient for managing weight.

Instead, we go back to the “d” word (diet). But this time, rethink it. A balanced meal of low-fat proteins (chicken, fish, legumes and meats that end with the word “loin,” because they’re the leanest), fiber- and water-rich vegetables, whole grain and other unprocessed carbohydrates, and even a little bit of sweet fruit in place of desserts, all can go a long way. You’ll have the energy you need to continue working out.

But “eating right” takes a little bit of life engineering. The next few blogs will go into this in detail, with ways to manage weight through a combination of exercise and diet. They both matter, and they work.

How To Care For Your Skin As You Age

20’s –
Most can enjoy a clear, supple and line-free face and not have to worry about how badly you treat your skin, unless you are a sun worshipper. If you worship the sun, or covet the tanning booths…you will need to get on board with a strict regimen earlier than your 30’s-includind an SPF moisturizer. Using a broad-spectrum sunscreen every day will help to prevent, or slow down, age spots and fine lines caused by over-exposure to sun or ultraviolet light. This is particularly important for guys between the ages 25 – 30 when your body slows the production of proteins that help your skin bounce back from the stresses of life!
While in your 20’s, you can skimp on your daily regimen; but, at the minimum, follow Step 1»Step 2»Step 4 from our recommend daily regimen. Basically, use a cleanser twice a day and a moisturizer with sunscreen. If you have oily skin, use a toner after cleansing and skip moisturizing; although, you should use a light oil free spray-on sunscreen.
30’s –
Depending on how well you treated your skin in your 20’s, the signs of aging can catch up with you. Your bodies natural ageing process kicks in to gear with a reduction of your body producing proteins (collagen and elastin) that help your skin snap back. The process of shedding dead skin cells, called ‘sloughing’, from the surface of your skin begins slowing down at this stage. The first area to show signs of aging is around the eyes, because the skin is the thinnest.
Beginning in your 30’s, we suggest you complete all steps of our daily regimen on a regular basis.
40’s –
How you have cared for your skin in the past will be reflected on how young you look in your 40’s. Even the healthiest skin will show the signs of Time; and, by the late forties, it’s time to get serious! What you have to look forward to is: deeper wrinkles, more prevalent marks from sun damage-such as brownish age marks and broken capillaries-relaxed skin on cheeks, lips, eyelids, and jaw as well as around the eyes. It’s easy to understand the importance of adhering to a strict daily regimen, including the alternative steps for anti-aging.

Testosterone killers – And Ways To Fight Back

By Russ Klettke

As discussed in previous blogs, testosterone decline is not a happy event. It happens to all men as they age, but it is possible to fight it naturally, with foods and exercises a guy can follow that stop and even reverse the decline.

The interesting thing is that where women have a defined and distinct “change of life” in menopause, men’s change, sometimes referred to as andropause, is more a gradual process. In fact, sexual potency is possible much later in life for some men. What is their secret? For the most part, it’s being healthy.

The corollary of that is how unhealthy habits can make your T levels drop. Like a stone, actually. These habits fall into three categories:

Inactivity
Sedentary lifestyles, devoid of not just exercise but of just staying at home and not engaging with the world, can impact T levels in several ways. First, without movement muscles atrophy and lower muscle mass leads to lower testosterone. If you’re inside and not outside, you miss out on Vitamin D that is produced when your skin is exposed to sunlight. Low levels of Vitamin D contribute to depression, which in turn causes a drop in T.

It is possible to supplement with Vitamin D pills, but sun exposure in relatively light amounts (15 minutes on face and hands, three times a week) are what researchers recommend. In our car culture (i.e., very little time spent outdoors), 41 percent of American men are thought to be deficient in Vitamin D.

Excess
Too much alcohol, fatty food and cigarettes are not your friend, sorry to say.

Let’s start with the booze. A double-blind study of healthy men found that with 16 drinks daily over four weeks, testosterone levels declined in just five days. Other studies show that over time, this can lead to feminization in men. Not good.

Research has shown that obese men have about 25 percent lower testosterone levels than men of healthy body weight, all other factors being equal. Being overweight – particularly when fat is around the abdominal region – tends to raise estrogen levels. The presence of female hormones in men (we all have some, just as women also have testosterone) tends to cancel out the effects of natural T. But note that some saturated fat in the diet is essential for the production of T in the first place – such as the yolk in eggs, in good balance with the protein in the egg white.

Cigarette smoking does not have a direct effect on T levels, according to a Brazilian study reported in the Journal of Sexual Medicine (Halmenschlager, et al. 2009). But because cigarettes tend to correlate with inactivity and poor cardiovascular health, cigarette smokers tend to have lower activity levels, which leads to a T decline in the end.

Stress
The famous “flight or fight” response that is hardwired into humans facing a hostile world once worked well for us, such as when we had to run away from wild animals, invading tribes and such. Adrenaline and cortisol levels would rise at the expense of other hormonal functions because mere physical survival took precedence. The stresses of the 21st century are more financial and emotional, yet our bodies respond as if it were 10,000 B.C. T levels and other functions are impaired when we carry the stress of an impending layoff, relationship dissolution or mortgage foreclosure for months on end.

Other stressors can negatively affect our hormonal, testosterone-producing health. Inadequate sleep or insomnia can lead to a variety of physical problems. Improper and unbalanced diets – sometimes embarked upon as means to lose weight – might signal your body that it is in starvation mode, once again telling certain functions to shut down while other vital portions of your body muster energy to perform life-preserving tasks. Even over-exercising (e.g., marathon running) can reduce testosterone production – in contrast to intense weight training, which will increase T production.

If factors of libido, energy and muscularity are not your goals, you might think of testosterone levels as a predictor of health. The Endocrine Society, an international medical professional organization, conducted an 18-year study that found that men with low testosterone die younger, even after you factor out such things as diabetes, smoking, alcohol intake and physical activity.

In other words, boosting your T through preventive efforts might make you a frisky old man someday – which sure beats the alternative.

Getting Buff: Building Muscle with No Gym

by Russ Klettke

Applying principles of resistance training, it’s possible to build muscle with just your bodyweight and objects around the home. This may not make you a competitive bodybuilder, but it’s a very good start or a maintenance program for someone who lacks access to a traditional gym.

There are all kinds of reasons not to belong to a health club. This crappy economy is one. Maybe your work and commuting schedule don’t allow for it. Lack of a decent gym nearby is another. Perhaps you’re incarcerated in a prison that doesn’t have one (don’t laugh, prisoners are credited with some great innovations in this area). Or, you simply don’t feel comfortable in a public weight room.

Or maybe, you’re just smart enough to know a health club isn’t essential for a person to exercise. Because it isn’t. It’s quite possible to do a significant amount of exercise without rooms full of iron, cables and cardiovascular equipment.

Of course, you could purchase at-home equipment in price ranges from $20 to $20,000. If you’re going to invest the dollars and space at the upper end, let’s hope you know your own personal propensity for exercise discipline. Just buying something doesn’t make it happen.

Your investment can actually involve nothing more than dedicating a 10’ by 10’ space in your home. Your equipment is largely you, gravity, a.k.a. bodyweight exercises, and perhaps a towel. Calisthenics you learned in grade school, pushups and floor crunches are perhaps the most familiar exercises, but consider trying a few others:

Rope pulls/shoulders: You don’t even need a rope, just a twisted towel. Grab at both ends, with hands separated between 4 inches to 3 feet. Pull with the right arm, resist with the left, then reverse it (pull to the left, resist with the right). Cycle through this ten to twenty times before resting. You can do this with straight arms or bent elbows, overhead, in front of your nose or low, around the hip levels.

Rope pulls/biceps: With the same rope or twisted towel, grab both ends and loop the towel behind one thigh. Standing (advanced) or sitting, engage the leg to resist the efforts of your arms in curling the towel up. Every ten reps switch legs.

Star bursts: Squat down on feet, arms wrapped around legs. “Explode” up and out off the floor with arms outstretched, then fold back into the squat position. Repeat until fatigued. Do three or four cycles of this per workout, periodically raising the heart rate to boost your workout.

Standing supermans: Stand on one foot. Keeping that leg rigid, slowly lower your shoulders forward and raise the free leg in the back. Take that as far as your stability skills allow, then extend the arms out straight in front of you. Either hold that position for 20 seconds, or if you can, pulse the arms and leg up and down in unison. Repeat on opposite leg.

Okinawan old ladies: Written about in the “The Blue Zones” by Dan Buettner, among the longest-lived people on earth are Okinawans. The author visited the homes of female centenarians in Okinawa, and noticed they largely sit on floors and are frequently required to get up with no assistance. Try doing that ten, 15 or 20 times, simply starting on a floor and rising up to a standing position. You will probably roll off one hip; try alternating hips as you do. This works the legs, core and shoulder muscles – and might help you live to be 100.

The possibilities are endless. For visual ideas on bodyweight exercises, search online videos such as YouTube. This home fitness training video is terrific and is just a start.

Essential Steps To A Proper Shave

Razor “burn” is perhaps the most annoying aspect of a man’s daily grooming ritual, and possibly the leading cause for men to go barbarian whenever social circumstance allows. Red, irritated, bumpy skin-accompanied by ingrown hairs-is a situation unpleasant to view as well as experience on your grill! Fortunately there are ways to minimize or eradicate the almost allergic response of our face meeting the blade each morning.

The first thing to remember are the essential steps to a proper shave: 1) Cleanse, 2) Apply pre-shave oil, 3) Apply shave cream,4) 1st pass of the blade going with the direction of hair growth,5) Re-lather and make 2nd pass of the blade,6) Rinse with cool water, 7) Apply after care. Simply slapping any drug or grocery store aerosol shaving cream on dry skin and weed whacking away with a dull, old blade is not going to result in a smooth finish! When it comes to the razor, keep it clean and sharp! Remember, also, that aerosol creams have propellant chemicals associated with them that may well irritate your skin…consider your shave cream wisely. Taking the time to do a shave properly, every time, will condition your skin to a much more satisfying finish.

It’s also important how we treat our skin before and after shaving. A nice steamy, but not scalding shower beforehand will soften the beard and open your pores for your pre-shave preparation. Equally important is your aftershave care. A lot of moisture is removed when you shave. If you don’t use a good moisturizer, your skin won’t be back to normal by the time you want to shave again in the morning.

Following these simple bits of advice and creating a proper regimen will take you into a much more pleasant shaving experience. You’ll be taking care of your face and looking better for it!