Here's one of the recipes our 21-Day Challengers will be trying out this week. 

Granola – Make it into bars or a cereal with whatever ingredients you like.  When you make it yourself you’re probably taking in much less salt than in a store-bought bar and you’re generating less trash from wrappers which is great for the planet!  Granola is also a good source of protein, particularly if you add nuts in the mix.  The key here is to try a couple of different combinations until you find the consistency and flavors you like best.

Recipe
Ingredients

• 3 cups of oats
  
• ¼ cup of vegetable oil
  
• ¼ cup of nut butter
  
• ½ cup of honey
  

Optional:

• ¾ cup of nuts
  
• ½ cup of chocolate chips or cacao nibs
  
• ¾ cup of raisins or other dried fruits
  
• ¾ cup of sunflower seeds

The base formula:

• Spread oats on a baking sheet and bake at 300⁰F for 15 min, stirring occasionally.
  
• Meanwhile, add all of your choice ingredients to a mixing bowl and set aside.
  
• A few minutes before the oats are done add vegetable oil, peanut butter, and honey to a sauce pan.   Heat and stir the ingredients until they are well mixed.
  
• Pour the liquid into the mixing bowl and stir together.
  
• Add the oats to the bowl and stir together.  
  
• Place the granola into your pan of choice (flat or cupcake) and bake at 300⁰F for 10 min.  If you’re making bars I suggest putting the pan in the fridge or freezer after it cools a bit and then cutting to make the bars.

Mixers:

• Savory: Nuts! Sunflower seeds, peanut butter (we use the hippie kind with no sugar added, if you use Jif or the like you may need to add less honey)
  
• Sweet: Chocolate chips, protein powder, dried fruit, whatever you find in the bulk section of the grocery store
  
• Get creative!

Modifying the consistency:

• If you want bars, you gotta make that stuff stick together.  Less oil, more honey, and definitely keep them in the fridge.
  
• If you want cereal, you gotta relax the binding agents.  More oil, less honey, and think about keeping it out of the fridge, but it will go stale faster.
  
• Chocolate is a great binding agent.  If you put the chips in with the hot oil and granola they melt and help lock the finished bars together.  If you want whole chips when you’re done, either sprinkle them on top before baking or throw them in the cereal after it’s cooled down.
  
• Experiment and find what works for you!

July's monthly challenge is to improve your standing long jump.
This move, also called the broad jump, is a measure of whole-body explosive power/coordination.  Formerly an Olympic event (now eclipsed by the running long jump), this jump is a staple of fitness assessment tests for a variety of organizations including the NFL and the Air Force. 

The current world record stands at 11 feet and 4.5 inches.
Let's beat it!

Our first Community Service Run was a success!  Thanks to everyone who came out and made the work go so quickly.  We even found the energy after for a four-miler jog to a scenic marsh nearby.  
Photo credits to Jennifer Plusch (Boom Boom Kitty), kick ass derby player and photographer extraordinaire!
Thanks to Julie Lovely for having us out to The Wild Hearts Therapeutic Equestrian Center! 

Got an idea for a Community Service Run?  Let us know!
ShockYard@gmail.com
508-808-9699
Join our Community Service Run Mailing List to hear about upcoming volunteer opportunities.

Hamstring tears are a common injury for soccer players, dancers, runners...really anyone who goes for a brisk dash.  Try this quick workout supplement from The New York Times to bolster your hamstring confidence out on the field of life.

The Movement:
"After warming up, kneel on the ground, with a spotter securing your ankles. Then, as slowly and smoothly as possible, lean forward so that your chest approaches the ground. Use your hamstrings to put the brakes on your forward momentum until you can no longer resist gravity. Put out your arms at that point to stop your fall. Allow your chest to touch the ground, then push yourself upright to repeat the exercise."

The Program:
"Week 1: 1 session; 10 repetitions
Week 2: 2 sessions; 12 repetitions each
Week 3: 3 sessions; 18 to 24 repetitions each
Week 4: 3 sessions; 24 to 30 repetitions each
Weeks 5: 10 – 3 sessions; 30 repetitions each (divided into 3 sets of 12, then 10, then 8 repetitions)
After 10 weeks, try to perform one weekly maintenance session of 30 repetitions."

Click here to see the full post by Gretchen Reynolds.

     Here at the ShockYard, we strive to help our clients improve their health in all aspects of their lives. This goal, in addition to the desire to give back to our community, has led us to develop a series of Social Club events centered on active community service projects. 

     A wealth of scientific studies show that volunteering is good for your health. Many of them are reviewed in this article from the Corporation for National & Community Service. For example volunteering results in lower mortality rates, even after controlling for other demographic factors. Those who volunteer also report lower levels of depression as well as higher levels of happiness, life-satisfaction, self-esteem, a  sense of control over life, and physical health. 

     In a new survey from the United Health Group, over 75% of people who volunteered in the past year reported that volunteering has made them feel healthier and lowered their stress levels, while approximately 95% said that volunteering improved their mood and enriched their sense of purpose in life.

     At our first community service event, we will be cleaning paddocks, painting fences, and grooming horses at Wild Hearts Horses for Heroes Therapeutic Equestrian Program.  The Horses for Heroes program helps veterans who are coping with PTSD by giving them a hands-on opportunity to communicate and connect with horses in a way that can help them to rebuild their relationships with family, friends, and society.  Click here to learn more about this amazing program at their website.  We will finish out the day with a short run around the property for those who are interested and still have energy to burn.

                Come volunteer with us, and get back even more than you give!

Where: Wild Hearts Therapeutic Equestrian Program in West Bridgewater
When: Saturday June, 28th 2-5PM
What to bring: Garden gloves, boots, clothes you don't mind paint on, hedge trimmers, paint brushes,
and running shoes (if joining for the run after)
Sign Up: Community Wild Hearts Service Day Facebook Event

Disclaimer: This website provides general information for educational purposes only. The information provided in this site is not intended to be medical advice and is not a substitute for medical or professional care.

Take-home Message: This article supports the idea that taking an iron supplement can improve the athletic performance of women who are iron-deficient.

     Women of reproductive age are at a high risk of iron deficiency due to menstruation. In female athletes, the risk is even higher due to factors such as low-iron diets and low levels of inflammation caused by endurance exercise. When severe enough, iron deficiency can lead to anemia (low concentrations of hemoglobin in the blood). Hemoglobin is the protein in your blood that carries oxygen to the rest of your body, including your muscles during physical exertion. Oxygen is important for muscles because it is used during aerobic (literally meaning, “with oxygen”) metabolism, which produces the energy required for your muscles to contract. A key component of hemoglobin is iron; therefore, if you are deficient in iron, your blood cannot carry as much oxygen and your physical performance may suffer.

     At least, that has been the theory of exercise scientists. Until now, however, there have been few studies that have demonstrated this relationship clearly. This article in the Journal of Nutrition, however, is a meta-analysis of 22 smaller studies.  That means that it pooled the data from smaller clinical trials. This procedure can be useful because the larger the number of patients included, the more power you have to detect a small difference between experimental and control groups.

     When data from the smaller studies were pooled, the researchers found that an oral iron supplement improved both maximal and submaximal exercise performance in the women participants. Maximal, or peak, exercise performance was measured by VO2 max, which is the highest rate at which your body can consume oxygen. Everyone has a different VO2 max, which is influenced by things like genetics and training. Imagine running on a treadmill at a sprint until you reach exhaustion – by the end, you’ll be using oxygen as fast as your body possibly can and you’ll be at your VO2 max. In general, the higher your VO2 max, the longer you can run on that treadmill before you become exhausted. The VO2 max of women given iron supplements was on average higher than that of women not on supplements, suggesting that iron improved their maximal, or peak, performance. The amount that VO2 max increased by is about the same amount that training can improve your VO2 max by, which is a fairly substantial effect. At submaximal exercise (meaning exercise at an intensity that is not going to exhaust you), iron supplementation also lowered the heart rate of the women, suggesting that they were performing better at lower intensities as well.

     Importantly, these effects were mainly seen only in women known to be iron-deficient or trained athletes (who are at a greater risk for iron deficiency). So this doesn’t mean that every woman should start taking an iron supplement. It does mean, however, that if you are a woman of reproductive age, and especially if you are an athlete, it might be a good idea to talk to your doctor about checking your iron levels. If you are found to be iron deficient, an iron supplement might very well improve your athletic performance significantly.

Zumba® Fitness in the Club! - Tues in April @ 7PM
Fundraiser for The Arc - Sat, 4/12/14, 6:30PM-8:30PM
Rollerderby Home Bout (MARD) - Sat, 4/12/14, 4:15PM
Movie Montage Workout - Sat, 4/19/14, 11AM-1PM
Plymouth Road Runners Run Club Meet Up - First Thursdays of the month, 6:30PM
Social Club Mixer @ The Speedwell Tavern - Fri, 5/30/14, 7PM

The ShockYard will be hosting Zumba® Fitness in the Club classes 
Tuesdays in April at 7PM.

Zumba® is a Latin-music inspired cardio class that's guaranteed to get your heart rate up! The session will be taught by Rebecca Dispoto, licensed Zumba® Instructor. 
Just $10 dollars for drop in
Discounts for purchasing more than one class upfront. (508-808-9699)

Limit 20 participants. Sign up to reserve your spot! https://shockyard.appointy.com/

Season Opener for Mass Attack Roller Derby in Taunton
Sat, 4/12
Stay tuned to our Facebook page this week for chances to win FREE TICKETS

fat
noun - any of several substances forming the chief part of adipose tissue of animals and also occurring in plants, that when pure are colorless, odorless, and tasteless and are either solid or liquid esters of glycerol with fatty acids
adjective - corpulent; obese

I hate the word “fat”. I hate it because I am a scientist and a personal trainer and the word “fat” has two very different meanings in those two different contexts. I hate it because of the fear and shame and social stigma that have become associated with the adjective “fat”. I wish I could remove the adjective version from the English language altogether, or replace the noun with a totally new and different word. There is so much confusion and misunderstanding about the noun because of most people’s negative association with the adjective. Today I hope to change that a little with this post.

First, take a second to re-read the noun form of fat above and notice that there is no negative connotation there. This is important: Fat is not a bad word. It is a compound in your body that is necessary for absorbing certain vitamins, and when consumed, it is the source of essential fatty acids, a dietary requirement. It helps you maintain healthy skin and hair, it insulates your body organs from shock, and it helps maintain your body temperature. It can even act as a buffer against diseases, storing chemical or biological toxins until they can be removed from the body. Finally, it stores energy that can later be broken down and used by your body to do things like this:

I recently watched a moving TED talk by Lizzie Velasquez, an amazing woman who has a genetic disorder that has left her with dangerously low body fat. If you have a few minutes, it is a worth a watch for many reasons, and you will hopefully gain a greater appreciation for the good, positive things that fat does for your body.

Let’s delve a little deeper into what fat is. Fat is a compound that stores energy. In your body, fat is stored in specialized fat cells. There are two main types of fat cells: white fat cells and brown fat cells. White fat cells are the ones you probably think about when you think of body fat: they store fat for later use as an energy source when needed. Around 50g of white fat cells stores more than 300 calories (technically kilocalories, for the scientists out there). Brown fat cells, on the other hand, actually break down fat to create heat. 50g of brown fat can burn up to 300 calories (kcal) in one day. Infants have a lot of brown fat (about 5% of their body mass) to keep them warm, and it was originally thought that brown fat disappeared from our bodies after infancy. Recently, however, scientists discovered that brown fat persists into adulthood and continues to help us stay warm in the cold. When we are exposed to cold temperatures, our bodies can increase the amount of brown fat cells to produce more heat, thereby burning more calories. Interestingly, shivering and endurance exercise both release a protein called irisin, which can help convert some white fat into brown fat. Some scientists think that brown fat might actually help protect against obesity. 

So the next time you look out the window and see this, think of it as a golden opportunity to increase your brown fat stores!

We have a fair number of clients who come into the gym and tell us their goal is to lose weight. What they actually mean is that they want to lose body fat and change their body composition. Usually this is for our clients’ own perceived aesthetics, though some clients might also be motivated by health factors. The truth is that people can be healthy across a large range of body fat percentages, sizes, and weights. The Health At Every Size movement promotes healthy eating and physical movement with the goal of improving one’s health, not necessarily losing weight. The movement sites numerous studies that show that weight and BMI (body mass index) are poor predictors of disease and longevity, and that being 5 pounds underweight is likely to be more harmful than being 75 pounds overweight. There is also growing evidence that increased physical activity alone, even without changes in body composition or weight, is enough to improve virtually all markers of cardiovascular health.

But what if your goal is still to lose fat for your own aesthetic or athletic performance reasons? Both exercise and nutrition are important components of that, but studies show that if you just diet, the weight that you lose will be a combination of both fat and muscle. Losing muscle means that you are slowing down your metabolism, which is the opposite of what you want to do when you are trying to lose body fat. Plus, muscle is what allows us to perform at our best in our daily lives. Two things have been shown to help preserve muscle while losing weight: doubling the recommended daily protein intake (1.6g of protein per kilogram of body weight instead of 0.8g) and regular strength training.

At The ShockYard, we focus mainly on strength training for a number of reasons, too many to go into in one blog post, but here, then, are two important ones:

1. If losing body fat is important to you, strength training ensures that you are maintaining and increasing your lean muscle mass at the same time, rather than losing muscle along with fat.
2. Our hope for all our clients is simply that they are healthy and happy. Increased physical activity through strength training improves cardiovascular health markers, decreases the risk of injury, and makes people feel stronger and more capable in their daily lives. 

So that’s the skinny on fat. Thanks for reading and have a happy, healthy day!