Native iPhone App - Sneak Peek 1

Posted by Stephen - 02/16/09 at 04:02:40 pm

We’re very excited to finally have something to show on our upcoming native iPhone application. In this sneak peek I’ll give an overview of the Nutrition section - which gives you the ability to track the foods you eat using Gyminee’s database of nearly 100,000 food items. Without further ado, here is a quick showcase of what’s in store. Enjoy!

Our three main focuses while designing the native iPhone app are usability, usability, and usability. Removing the number of steps necessary to perform common actions is our main goal. When you first enter the Nutrition section you immediately see the most pertinent information - your daily nutrient intakes and goals. Throughout the day, you can easily view this information with 1 simple tap.

Also, you will notice that the Food Search is right there at the top of the screen. Type in what you ate, and click go.

Here’s an example of Food Search results. All the important information is right there - Calories, Fat, Carbs, Protein, and Serving Size. If you found an exact match, recording what you ate is as simple as tapping the “+1″ button. Streamlining the process of entering your daily food intake is something we’re really focused on - it’s something you will usually do multiple times per day, and it needs to be as easy as possible.

Of course you can still drill down to see the full Nutrition Facts, add it to your Favorite Foods, and customize the date and serving size for your food entry.

Having your Favorite Foods one tap away is very valuable. Here we utilize the iPhone’s alphabetizing functionality (similar to what you see in your iPhone’s Contacts) for quick scrolling through your favorites.

While you can see your daily totals from the main Nutrition page, drilling down into your Nutrition Log will show you the specific foods you have eaten for a particular day. From here you can remove and modify food entries, drill down to view full nutrition facts, and the Food Search control is still right there at the top of the page only 1 tap away.

So, that wraps up this first sneak peek of the upcoming native iPhone application. We’re excited about how the iPhone and other mobile devices will allow us to make tracking your fitness activities much easier. Stay tuned for the next sneak peek!

Ask Adam: How Often Should I Stretch?

Posted by Adam - 02/16/09 at 12:02:33 pm

I have found that stretching is one of the most underrated forms of exercise there is. Even I used to scoff at the time put into lengthy stretching that I have seen people do. Only when I began to realize that my muscles were becoming too big, and I had a difficult time scratching my back did I realize that I needed to take action. After just 3 weeks in a twice a week power-yoga class, I began to notice serious improvements in not only my flexibility, but also my strength gains, and lack of soreness after exercise. Impressed as I was, I needed to find out more information.

There is loads of information related to stretching in health journals and on the internet that I had consistently overlooked before. Mainly because at some point it had been engrained into my mind that I just didn’t have the flexible gene (no one in my family can touch their toes) and yoga was just too girly for a weightlifter like myself. Oh, how I was wrong…

Before we begin, keep in mind that there are several important factors that can affect your flexible abilities. The first is age: flexibility increases through adolescence up until the age of 20, after which it gradually decreases over time. The second is gender: women are generally more flexible than men. The third and the one that this post will focus on is activity: obviously people who remain active throughout their lives will generally be more supple than those who are sedentary. Being flexible is extremely important to in regards to exercise and general health, and this blog will cover the basic premises of stretching and how to do it safely and effectively.

Flexibility is defined as the ability of a joint to move through its full range of motion. Flexibility is specific to each joint, therefore having “good” flexibility implies that you have good range of motion in all your joints, not just one joint. Thankfully, flexibility is highly adaptable, and will increase with regular activity and stretching exercises. However, flexibility also has quick reversibility and decreases without inactivity. It is extremely important to any sort of physical activity especially in terms of skill-related fitness. A runner who has tight hamstrings will have restricted flexion in the hip joint, resulting in shorter stride length. Regardless of whether you are running competitively, increased flexibility in the hamstrings and other leg muscles will increase your speed and reduce the amount of energy used while running. For general well being, how easily, smoothly, and painlessly you can bend, reach, twist, and turn depends on how flexible your body is. Benefits of flexibility include:

• more efficient body movement
• increased performance capabilities in sports
• reduction of muscle soreness after exercise
• improvement and maintenance of food posture (reduces lower back problems)
• reduces chance of injury
• relaxation and relief from aches and pains from sitting too long while reducing blood pressure and mental tension.

So why are we not flexible? What makes us unable to bend over and touch our toes or tie our legs into a pretzel? There are five main structural limitations:

• Bone: can restrict the endpoint in range of motion, mostly due to past injury.
• Fat: gets in the way of limbs moving
• Skin: may restrict range of motion if there is old scar tissue
• Muscle: muscles are highly elastic and it is possible to increase the length the amount muscles can be stretched.
• Tendons: though not nearly as lithe as muscles, tendons may also stretch
• Ligaments: have very limited flexibility, but are majorly affected by long periods of inactivity and injury.

Now that you know the basics, understand this: stretching is NOT beneficial BEFORE you exercise. “Whoa,” you say, “why have I constantly been taught to stretch before my workout?” The answer is not so simple, but it’s largely due to lack of research and understanding of beneficial stretching in previous decades. Yes, decades. That is how overlooked stretching was for some time. Until only recently, the past 10-20 years, has there been a large focus on stretching for exercise. This means that all of your parents, coaches, and friends were fed incorrect information in regards to stretch technique (albeit, to not fault of theirs).

Stretching should never be the first part of your workout. Stretching cold, or resting muscles, can actually cause more harm than good. This is why having a short cardio warm up is highly recommended before any sort of exercise, even over traditional stretching. The best time to stretch, get this, is AFTER you have completed your workout. Your muscles are warm, loosened up, and already elongated. Stretching at this stage is crucial if you want to see improvement. Immediately after exercise, before you hit the shower, spend at minimum 10 minutes stretching. Here are some guidelines to follow:

• It is recommended that your stretch at minimum 2-3 days a week to maintain your flexibility, 5-6 days a week for best results.
• When stretching, your intensity is very important. You should create a stretch that causes mild discomfort in the muscle surrounding the joint being stretched. Do not stretch so hard that it causes pain.
• 2-3 repetitions of each stretch, holding each for 10-20 seconds.

There are three basic types of stretching: Static Stretching, Ballistic Stretching, & PNF (proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation).

This is a highly effective method that involves gradually stretching a muscle by placing it in a maximal stretch position and holding that position for 10-30 seconds. This is the safest method of stretching, particularly for untrained or sedentary people.

This involves short, bouncing movements such as touching your toes in rapid succession. Because the bouncing movements may be greater than the muscle’s extensibility, injury may occur, and caution is absolutely necessary (I personally would never recommend this type).

PNF (proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation):

This is the most effective method of stretching, but requires the use of a partner to help. PNF involves a series of pushing and relaxing movements by you and your partner. Using a hamstring stretch as an example, you would lie on your back with your leg extended and your partner would push against your leg until you feel a slight discomfort in your muscle. At this point you would push against your partner’s resistance by contracting the hamstring. After 10 seconds of this, you would relax your muscle, and your partner would apply even more pressure for another 10 seconds. This push-relax technique should be repeated at least 3 times.

Remember again, that these should be done after the workout, never before to avoid injury. A short cardio warm up should be done before any exercise.

As for yoga, it certainly is not girly. I joined a power yoga class that focuses more on stretching than on meditation. I can happily say that it was one of the best decisions of my health life in the past year. It may be intimidating at first (the first day of my class my instructor stood on her head with her arms crossed over her chest while talking to the class) but you will get better, and you will see improvements.

On Gyminee, feel free to join the flexibility exercise group or a number of the yoga groups that have been created. Wii fit has some fantastic yoga exercises, and is very popular among Gyminee users. You can also download weekly or daily podcasts on iTunes for free if you cannot afford either Wii Fit or a yoga class. Good quality yoga mats can be bought for as little as $10.

The most important thing is to start adding complimentary stretching to your workout routine as soon as possible.

Fun Nutrition Fact of the Week:

Did you know that one of America’s most famous snacks, Tortilla Chips, has had the same recipe for over a millenia?  The ancient Aztecs invented the now popular food, using the same 3 ingredients as today: corn meal, water, and salt.  Today, companies such as Frito-Lay produce the food on a much larger scale, but there has never been an a change to the oringal recipe.  The only thing that separates the different varieties are the types of corn and the shape of the chip.

Facebook + Challenges = More Fun

Posted by Stephen - 02/09/09 at 10:02:40 am

A cool new feature was added over this past weekend. Facebook provides some amazing tools that allow other web applications to integrate their site with facebook.com. We have started to take advantage of these tools and believe it will help users better share their fitness activity, and also begin to help solve the problems that arise with having multiple accounts on multiple social networks.

After joining a Challenge you will now see a link towards the top of the page like the following.

Clicking this link will display a window - one that should look familiar to you if you have used Facebook before (and who hasn’t?).

From here you may customize what the story will look like and choose whether or not you would like to post this to your Facebook Profile. If you have friends on Facebook who may be interested in either competing with you in a challenge or in simply keeping up with your progress, then this is a very quick and easy way to let them know about what you’re doing.

Of course this is all optional and nothing will be posted to your Facebook account without your explicit permission. Depending on how well-received this feature is, we plan to add more Facebook integration down the road, so be sure to let us know what you think about Facebook integration (and also post one or more of your challenges to Facebook).

P.S. We plan to post to our Twitter account more often. Click here to follow us if you would like to stay posted about some of the smaller development updates that don’t necessarily make it to the blog.

Thanks and have a great day!

The High Fructose Corn Syrup Controversy

Posted by Susan - 02/03/09 at 09:02:14 am

I find myself struggling lately with the High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) topic.

Don’t get me wrong; I get that sugar is bad for a variety of reasons. I rarely, if ever, exceed more than 40 grams of sugar in a day. What I’ve been struggling with is whether or not HFCS is really any different than sucrose (table sugar)?

Chemistry Refresher

Sugar is a simple carbohydrate which means it is broken down quickly by the body and used as a source of energy. Sugars include monosaccharides, disaccharides, trisaccharides and oligosaccharides. As the names suggest, multiple sugar molecules (monosacharides) can be combined.

Monosaccharides are the simplest form of carbohydrates. They consist of one sugar and include glucose, fructose, galactose, xylose and ribose.

Disaccharides are made up of two monosaccharides and include sucrose (table sugar), lactose and maltose.

Like other carbohydrates, sugar contributes 4 calories per gram.

HFCS Versus Other Sugars

The Corn Refiners Association will argue that HFCS is similar in composition to sucrose (table sugar). A recent article by Lyle McDonald compared the percentage of fructose and glucose content across different sweeteners and indeed, the composition of HFCS is similar to its counterparts:

Health Concerns Surrounding HFCS

I was listening to a podcast the other day that quickly demonized HFCS by referring to a study that indicates that un-bound fructose causes extremely elevated levels of reactive carbonyls - compounds that are typically elevated in the blood of people with diabetes.

Specifically, here is what was said during the podcast:

It is true that, in fact, high fructose corn syrup is far more sinister than regular sugar. They were doing a study with diabetics and they were finding a compound called carbonyl at extremely elevated levels in diabetics.

When high fructose corn syrup is manufactured there’s a reaction with fructose and glucose molecules where they become unbound and they elevate the level of carbonyls and this is obviously what’s going on with your soda.

With regular sugar, sucrose does not become unbound. The way that it’s processed is totally different.

The podcast in question is one that is hosted by an individual that I feel is extremely intelligent and well versed in many areas of health and fitness. Unfortunately, the information reported is simply incorrect.

The study being referenced is a 2007 research paper by Dr. Chi-Tang Ho, a professor of food science at Rutgers University. Dr. Ho’s study did not use diabetics as a control base. Rather, it was a laboratory study of commonly consumed carbonated beverages. If you read on you’ll better understand as to why sucrose does indeed become unbound if used in the manufacturing of soda.

For full disclosure, I requested Lyle McDonald’s assistance in deciphering Dr. Ho’s research and, as always, Lyle’s input was very insightful.

The Research Study De-Constructed

The original news report entitled Soda Warning? New Study Supports Link Between Diabetes, High-Fructose Corn Syrup points out that Dr. Ho’s team tested 11 carbonated soft drinks that contained HFCS and found

‘astonishingly high’ levels of reactive carbonyls in those beverages. These undesirable and highly-reactive compounds associated with “unbound” fructose and glucose molecules are believed to cause tissue damage, says Ho, a professor of food science at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J. By contrast, reactive carbonyls are not present in table sugar, whose fructose and glucose components are “bound” and chemically stable, the research notes.

Keep that last sentence in mind as we’re going to get back to that point later on in this posting.

The news article goes on to point out that

Ho’s group is also probing the mechanisms by which carbonation increases the amount of reactive carbonyls formed in sodas containing HFCS. They note that non-carbonated fruit juices containing HFCS have one-third the amount of reactive carbonyl species found in carbonated sodas with HFCS.

The diabetes connection is that reactive carbonyls are elevated in the blood of individuals with diabetes.

The question begs to be asked, is HFCS the problem, or is it carbonation plus HFCS that is the real issue?

Lyle was able to pinpoint a blog posting with the following information:

First, Chi-Tang Ho et al did not compare the HFCS sodas to sucrose sodas. They compared 11 HFCS sodas to a diet soda control. There was no sucrose soda control, so this research does not allows us to make comparisons.

Second, though the article states that sucrose does not have reactive carbonyls by virtue of the fact that fructose and glucose are bound together in sucrose, this overlooks the fact that sucrose is in fact hydrolyzed in soft drinks into - you guessed it - fructose and glucose.

For instance, The Soft Drinks Companion: A Technical Handbook for the Beverage Industry, Maurice Shachman, pp. 81 - 82, states:

The sugar inversion process takes place under acidic conditions and speeds up with a decrease in pH. Soft drinks are flavored with acids to achieve the sourness notes essential for their taste profiles. They are therefore acidic drinks, usually in the pH+3 range. This is especially true of the sour fruit flavors, such as lemon and other citrus fruit species. Cola beverages that often use phosphoric acid as the acidulant are at even lower pH values. In carbonated soft drinks, the dissolved carbon dioxide is converted to carbonic acid, which further adds to the acidification of these drinks. Regardless of the exact acid content of such beverages, they can all be considered to a lesser or greater degree, as acidic solutions. As such, some inversion of the sucrose in these beverages will take place.

So, even if the drinks starts with sucrose, much if not most of it will be broken down into unbound fructose and glucse by the acid in the soda. In fact, according to Marov and Dowling (1990)*, at typical storage times and temperatures, more than 90% of the sucrose in soft drinks can by hydrolyzed. Therefore, even if a soft drink is sweetened with sucrose, unbound glucose and fructose will start to appear immediately and be available to participate in carbonyl forming reactions.

* Marov, G. J., Dowling, J.F., 1990. Sugar in beverages. In: Pennington, N.L., Baker, C.W. (Eds.(, Sugar: A User’s Guide to Sucrose, vol. 13. Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York, pp. 189 - 211.

Based on this information, Lyle drew the following conclusion and I concur -

There is still NO functional difference in a soda sweetened with HFCS vs. sucrose vs. invert sugar vs. anything else. Put them in acid and they become unbound; carbonate them and you generate carbonyls.

My Two Cents

I myself was on the anti-HFCS bandwagon. The fact is, several times I started to compose seething postings in regards to the commercials run by The Corn Refiners Association.

However, the more I have researched the topic, the more questions I have. Ultimately, it seems as if current research is inconclusive and High Fructose Corn Syrup is simply today’s whipping-boy, same as dietary fat and carbohydrates have been in the past.

We live in a sound-bite era where context is often missing and it becomes easy to draw conclusions without having reviewed all the evidence.

I read a statistic that stated that the per-capita consumption of soft drinks is in excess of 150 quarts per year, or about three quarts per week in the U.S. When you consider that a 20 oz bottle of soda contains 250 calories and the equivalent of 16 teaspoons of sugar, it seems to me that we’re kidding ourselves by focusing on HFCS as being the problem.

My opinion on HFCS is the same as it is in regards to all simple carbohydrates - they should be limited as they are wasted calories, void of any nutritional value.

Train hard; stay strong.

Peace.

Susan

www.catapultfitnessblog.com

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