I was listening to an interesting podcast about the effect of strength training on glucose control and insulin resistance. As you probably know maintaining steady blood sugar levels and reversing insulin resistance are crucial for curing acne.
Here’s the link to the podcast. It’s a direct link to the mp3-file.
Fat, Muscle, and the Benefits of Exercise for People With Diabetes
Though this discussion and the research they referred to was done with obese diabetic I think we all can learn something from there.
One of the discussed studies concluded that combined aerobic and resistance training program gives the best results for diabetics.
"Although aerobic exercise is what is typically recommended for treating people with diabetes, this study shows that adding a high-force strength training component has significant advantages," says APTA spokesperson Robin L Marcus, PT, PhD, OCS, assistant professor at the University’s Department of Physical Therapy and the study’s lead researcher.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081031161255.htm
It didn’t take long to find other studies done on a wide variety of individual that support this conclusion.
They also said few interesting things about fat. Among other things they said that fat cells produce this retinol-binding protein that attaches to the insulin receptors. Since there are less insulin receptor sites available for insulin it creates insulin resistance. They also said that fat cells produce inflammatory cells that, when in excess, create both localized and body-wide inflammation.
So there’s a direct link to how carrying too much fat can lead to acne.
What’s even more interesting is that this discussion was not limited to what people normally perceive as extra fat. They talked a lot about the fat around and within muscles. Many of us carry a lot of fat within and around our muscles. It gives an illusion that our muscles are bigger than they actually are, and so we don’t perceive it as an extra fat.
They concluded this in the study quite explicitly. This is a quite from the podcast:
Patients with diabetes are much, much weaker, even though they have large muscles.
This issue comes up with many of my customers when they email me telling about all the muscle they’ve ‘lost’. In most cases it’s just this extra fat and water within and around the muscles that’s melting away (just one of the complications of the healing process).
The main benefit of resistance training was changes in muscle composition. Leans muscle tissue increased whereas the amount of fat in and around the muscle decreased. So the muscles actually turned muscles!
This is the main reason why the soon to be updated version of Clear for Life recommends a combination of aerobic and resistance training.
Brief side note. The researchers said that diabetes really was never meant to be a disease because it was never meant to be a permanent state. Diabetes was meant as a protective mechanism to store energy when food is abundant and thus help us to survive through lean times. Just one more example of how all diseases are protective mechanisms.
Of course strength training has other benefits also. It makes you look better and so improves your self-esteem. It makes you look more attractive (unless you take it over the top). I usually do my strength training in the morning. And I just love how my body feels like steel for the whole day. Nice feeling.
One issue with resistance training is that it can be a hassle. You gotta buy a gym membership and spend time driving to and from the gym. So many people just drop it.
If you enjoy going to the gym, good for you, but if you don’t nobody said you have to do it the hard way.
I do my resistance training in the morning and it usually takes me less than 15 minutes to complete. In many days not even that long. I don’t even touch the weights at gym anymore. They just don’t serve my purpose anymore.
The secret? Bodyweight exercises. You know, pushups and the like. You can get an incredibly effective whole body workout in as little as 10 minutes. Plus using your own body as a gym is much more fun than hauling weights at gym - at least for me. And it teaches your muscles to work together instead of one or few muscles at a time like most gym machines do.
If you are interested of starting or learning more about bodyweight exercises I can’t recommend Roger Haeske’s Lightning Speed Fitness Program highly enough.
Lightning Speed Fitness Program simply eliminates time as an excuse. It shows how you can workout your entire body with just two simple exercises. That’s why in many days it only takes me 10 to 15 minutes to do my strength training routine. Lightning Speed Fitness Program also showed me how working out little bit through out the day can be as effective, or even more so, than one longer exercise. Some days I just take five minutes here and there to do my bodyweight exercises. So time is no excuse anymore.
Some days I like to vary my routine and I learned a bunch of other bodyweight exercises from Lightning Speed Fitness Program to do that. Roger also shows how to vary these exercises to make them easier or more challenging. Nice thing is that I also got a bunch of videos where Roger shows how to do these exercises. So it’s easy to get started.
Roger is also a raw food author and educator. He’s one of those guys who really get health and practice what they preach. And he’s a motivating fellow to listen to also.
So I really recommend you get Lightning Speed Fitness Program and check out his other products also.
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Clear for Life - The lifestyle for health, happiness and clear skin