healthyliving

6 Guidelines For Positive Health Outcomes

Julia Basso – PhD The main message:  sedentary behavior is associated with poor cardiovascular health outcomes.  Exercise is important and we need to get people active as it improves a range of cardiovascular health issues, such as improved blood pressures and decreased levels of triglycerides and cholesterol. These “guidelines for tomorrow” are recommended by the American College

Can Interval Training Help Mitigate Obesity?

Evan Stevens This session really just was in addition to all of the information we’ve already seen at the conference so far. Interval training is very important to health and can increase the palatability of exercise. The first study conducted a perceived exertion and ranked enjoyment test on continuous versus interval exercise when matched for

Food vs Protein Supplements

Evan Stevens The final talk in this session was a breath of fresh air for a lot of us. It dealt with the comparison of regular foods versus the use of protein supplements. What researchers wanted to know was if regular food was as good, if not better, than supplementing with protein powders and drinks

meditation

The Surprising Benefits of Meditation

Julia C. Basso, PhD Using Meditation to Enhance Attention, Emotional Regulation, and Self-Awareness Here at fasttwitchgrandma.com, we are a group of people who love to exercise and are interested in the beneficial effects of exercise on the brain and body.  Most of us, however, cannot (and do not want to) devote our entire day to

Parkinson's Disease and Exercise

Will Exercise Help Prevent Parkinson’s Disease?

Julia Basso, PhD Affiliation: New York University, Center for Neural Science Parkinson’s disease is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by loss of dopamine neurons in the substantia nigra pars compacta, a part of the brain’s basal ganglia system.  The symptoms of this disease are motoric in nature and include tremor, or a shaking of the extremities;

Strength As A Safety Net

Jon Carlock As time passes and we age, we naturally become more vulnerable to injury. Somewhat of a numbers game, the longer we spend on this planet, the odds increase that we will get hurt at some point. When we get older, we also become more prone to balance-related injuries that can result in significant

women running

Exercise Motivation to Prevent Age-Related Body Changes

Julia Basso – PhD As we age, the body goes through many changes.  These include widespread changes in body composition including loss of muscle mass and bone mass.  With this loss, there is marked a reduction in physical capacity or our ability to perform physical movements. During our 20s, we are at the peak of

Tired Of The Same Exercise Routine? Try Tai Chi!

Sara Thompson – MSc in Exercise Sciences, University of Toronto As Evan Stevens discussed in a recent FTG article, osteoporosis occurs naturally with age as individuals tap into their bone reservoirs to absorb nutrients. This causes a decrease in bone mass and strength, which ultimately leads to increased risk of falls and fractures. In fact,

Exercise Induced Sleep Improvements

Julia Basso Getting a good night’s rest is important for so many aspects of our lives including our overall sense of wellbeing.  The fact that we spend on average 33% of our lives sleeping is an indicator that sleep must serve a very important purpose.  Not surprisingly, research has shown that a variety of physiological

The Truth About Carbo Loading

Evan Stevens Carbo Loading Carb loading, for those who haven’t been around sport for the past 40 years or so, is when you workout really hard, deplete a lot of your glycogen, and then stuff your face full of CHOs so you boost your glycogen levels up past your baseline amount of glycogen. Known as

Managing Chronic Pain

Manage Chronic Pain with Exercise

 Julia Basso, PhD Chronic pain is a serious and debilitating condition for many people. It affects more Americans than diabetes, heart disease and cancer combined (American Academy of Pain Medicine).  An initial incident such as a broken bone or physical injury, surgery, infection, or traumatic brain injury can initiate chronic pain. Or, it may be a

Quick Facts

Quick Facts For A Healthier You

Evan Stevens Each day between the morning and afternoon sessions of the conference there was a two hour period of mini presentations. These were short, two-minute talks given by people who just wanted to present their research (they were not necessarily invited speakers). These rapid-fire talks came fast. Some were familiar as they had been