Raining on Tuesday

Today work got rain out! This is good and bad. The good is that I do not have work and can get other errands out of the way. The bad is that since I am paid hourly, I only get paid for when I work. No work means no money. However, the free time let me go up to the box for a workout which is always enjoyable.

Today my focus will be on nutrition. I would like to talk about shakes, the proper time to use them as well as the good way to make them. Shake I feel are one of the most misunderstood nutritional tools. People feel that since it is fruit that hey it is healthy and I can have it whenever. Shakes should not be used as a meal replacement. I repeat this shakes should NEVER be used to replace a meal. You are a human, you have evolved by eating real food. Shakes are not real food. I know there are people out there saying well yes it is, it is just blended together. However, to me it alters the way in which your body absorbs it to the extreme that it should never replace eating real food.

A shake, in this meaning is a mixture of fruits, vegetables, powders, etc. into a liquid. This means that the shake takes on the combination of all the part you put into it and then some. I am a firm believe when things are combine they become more then the sum of their parts. There for when we put all these items into a blender we are liquifying them. This has the benefit of absorbing into your body quicker. This is both good and bad. If you are sitting down and have a shake, it cause a bad insulin spike. You are consuming more food then you realize. However, if your body just finished a strenuous activity or is in the middle of one shakes can be of enormous benefit. Your body in this state is using the glycogen stored in your body as an energy source and it needs to be replenished. THIS IS WHEN YOU USE A SHAKE. A shake is only for hours of strenuous activity or after an extremely strenuous workout, not every workout. In this case strenuous means over 12 minutes at least of extreme intensity. This is why I feel a shake is great for me in the middle of my work day, it replenishes my energy sources in an easily absorbable way.

The shakes that I made today contained four simple ingredients. The four were coconut milk(2 cups), strawberries(2 cups), blackberries(1 cup), and protein powder(a bit). (yes, I know it is not exactly primal but it works a little better then liquified steak) They were put in the blender in approximate measurements, I am not a big fan of exactness. The mixture was tasty and will get the job done. I will have more shake receipts in the future and more to talk about them.

Workout: Today I had the privilege of going to workout with a friend of mine at his gym. The gym is Crossfit 908. The workout was a descending rep scheme of 50-40-30-20-10 of double unders and sit ups. These were all sandwiched by 3 deadlifts at 80% of your one rep max. For the deadlifts I did 315 lb. My total time for the workout was 9:03. I was happy with how I did. In the future I look to do more on the deadlift, but for today it was a good weight. There was an extra he threw in which was three sets of max number of push ups. I was able to do 30, 18, 13. My goal was to double my first round number, which I was able to achieve that. I look forward to working with Tim at Crossfit 908 more in the future.

Inspirational Quote: "Determination is often the first chapter of the book of excellence"