Recent Posts

The TRUTH About Artificial Sweeteners

Posted by Joel Marion on July 26, 2010 666 Comments

Time: 7:12 AM.

Location: a little “fitness” event I attended a few weeks back in Austin, TX.

State: tired.

So what did I do? What 99% of the rest of the world does in that type of situation – I got myself a cup of coffee.

And THEN—believe it or not—I proceeded to pour the contents of two little blue packets to my morning cup of joe.

You should have seen the stares from the fitness crowd.

I immediately checked my zipper, but surprisingly, I was already all-systems-go on that front.

Hmmm.

Why then the stares?

Well, it wasn’t but a couple seconds later when a friend of mine blurted out “you use that stuff??” as if I had committed some moral sin.

My reply?

Click here to continue reading

Win a FREE copy of Ninja Nutrition Tactics!

Posted by Joel Marion on July 16, 2010 505 Comments

I’m going to make this post extremely quick and easy.

To enter to win one of TEN copies of Ninja Nutrition Tactics system that I’m GIVING AWAY today, simply reply in the comments section below this post (reply form is at the bottom of the page) with the following information:

In 250 words or less, I want you to tell me exactly why YOU should be chosen to win a copy over all the others replys.  Essentially, tell me why you deserve to win more than the next person.

I want to make sure that these FREE copies are going in to the hands of individuals who will USE them.  Convince me that you’re an action taker!

I will keep the contest open for a full 24 hours, and then will go through the replies and notify the winners via email sometime on Saturday!

Reply below!

Good luck!

Joel

NOTE:  THIS CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED AND THE WINNERS HAVE BEEN NOTIFIED VIA EMAIL.

Ninja Nutrition Tactic #8 – Macronutrient and Carb Cycling

Posted by Joel Marion on July 15, 2010 43 Comments

The below is an excerpt from my brand new info-packed ebook, Ninja Nutrition Tactics.

Macronutrient and Carbohydrate Cycling

There are like a bajillion ways to do this, and I’ll give quite a few examples, but here’s a little background on why it works:

Remember leptin?  Yeah, the dictator hormone that controls everything—even Fidel Castro.

Respect.

Wellllll…just so happens that leptin has yet another thing that controls IT (he’s not really as powerful as he thinks, when you’re a ninja, that is).

We already know that leptin levels are dictated by two things:  body fat levels and calorie intake.  A third thing that has been shown to have a significant effect on leptin levels is carbohydrate intake (even independent of calorie intake), or more specifically, the insulin response resulting from said carbohydrate intake.

For instance, check out this study:

Boden G et al.  J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 1996 Sep;81(9):3419-23.

Effect of fasting on serum leptin in normal human subjects.

In this study, researchers at the Temple University School of Medicine monitored leptin levels while a group of participants fasted.

The result, leptin levels droped off to their nadir after about 36 hours as expected.

But then they did something very interesting:  they intravenously maintained insulin levels in these individuals, in the face of fasting, just to see what would happen.  And the results were pretty crazy.

Despite the fact that these people were STILL fasting, leptin levels shot right back up to baseline (as well as other important metabolism related hormones) just because of the normal presence of insulin.

This was a HUGE discovery.  Yes, leptin does control appetite to a large degree and leptin is heavily involved in that feedback circle, but there seems to be one thing that trumps everything else when it comes to leptin regulation:  insulin.

So how do we capitalize on this information?

Using what we’ve learned from this study, we can begin to implement carbohydrate cycling strategies—even within our reduced calorie diets—to keep leptin happy, bust through plateaus, and fat loss a’comin.

Another tool in the toolbox (and after reading this manual, you’re going to have a heck of a lot of tools).

Here are two of my favorite carbohydrate cycling strategies:

Method #1: The Reverse Taper

With this approach, you gradually increase carbohydrate content AND type throughout the week:

Day 1: Low carb
Day 2: Same as day 1
Day 3: More carbs, but Low GI
Day 4: Same as day 3
Day 5: Even more carbs, but mostly High GI
Day 6: Same as day 5
Day 7: Cheat Day

We already know that leptin tends to fall off gradually over the course of a week of dieting—this single approach combats that in 3 ways.

1.  The weekly leptin-boosting cheat day
2.  More carbs are progressively added throughout the week when leptin when normally be dropping off
3.  Higher GI carbs are added (to produce more insulin) deeper into the week

And all this is done while still remaining in a caloric deficit and being a fat burning machine.  This is the main approach that we use in the Cheat Your Way Thin program.

==> You DO own Cheat Your Way Thin, right? :)

Method #2 – For the Lower-carb Dieter

I would not use this method during a low-carb prime (to reset leptin/insulin sensitivity), but for those who do well and enjoy the low carb approach, and choose to transition into that type of approach for the “main” diet, here’s an awesome way to set it up.

Day 1: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 2: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 3: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 4: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 5: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 6: Higher carb with carbs at 50% of daily cals (maintenance level cals)
Day 7: Higher carb with carbs at 50% of daily cals (maintenance level cals)

OR

Day 1: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 2: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 3: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 4: Higher carb with carbs at 50% of daily cals (maintenance level cals)
Day 5: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 6: Low carb (diet level cals)
Day 7: Higher carb with carbs at 50% of daily cals (maintenance level cals)

With this approach, I’d include a full blown Cheat Day once every 2 weeks in place of one of the higher carb days.

NINJA HINT:  As your shogun, I’d recommend the second approach.  But, some people prefer to have back to back high carb days, which is cool, but slightly less stealth (read: effective).

Again, there are so many different ways to cycle carbs and macronutrients as a whole.  The above just happen to be two (well, actually 3) of my most favorite options.  And just so you know, they’re my favorites because they work the best. :)

And this is just one of ELEVEN ninja plateau-busting strategies that I share in the Ninja Nutrition Tactics manual.  And then there’s a whole other chapter with even more killer strategies that I don’t even count as part of the 11.

To date, I’ve never made Ninja Nutrition Tactics available for direct purchase…ever.  It is without a doubt the best ebook I’ve ever written.  I don’t say that to hype it up; I say that because it’s that good.  That said, in the next few weeks I’ll be launching Ninja Nutrition Tactics with a full promotional website, but if you want to grab your copy early, I’ll give it to you today for 1/2 price:

==> Ninja Nutrition Tactics early bird price

I’ll keep the above link active for a day or two.  You’ll get immediate access to the full ebook today (no waiting) just for taking action.

==> Ninja Nutrition Tactics early bird price

Keep rockin’,

Joel

How much protein do you really NEED?

Posted by Joel Marion on July 8, 2010 71 Comments

After a day of flying across the country, I’m finally getting the opportunity to write this newsletter.

Straight from…what’s this place called?  Ah yes, the Gibson Guitar Lounge in Orange County airport.

I was actually planning on sending this during my last flight, because, that plane was COOL and had the internet, but alas, my middle seating assignment amongst two individuals even larger than I made that an impossibility.

But here I am, making it a point to deliver on my promise to you, my loyal subscriber, even before I check in to my hotel.

Alright, enough of that…moving on to what you really want to know:  How much protein do you really NEED?

Ha!  Trick question, because that’s actually not the question you should be asking anyway.  You see, when you ask the question about “need”, one needs to examine the context of the question.

How much protein do you need for what?

To build muscle?  To improve body composition?  To improve performance?  To enhance recovery?  To live?

In most cases, people are asking how much protein should I intake to enhance my body composition and performance related goals.

And with that question, it’s important to take a look at things not from a “need” standpoint, but from an “optimization” standpoint.

And because my very good friend and nutritional biochemist and all around bad ass Dr. John Berardi already covered this in another article, I’ll just quote him here:

“Asking ‘How much protein does an athlete need?’ is much like asking the question ‘How much does a student need to study for an exam?’ Since a student only needs to pass their exam to remain a student, the proper answer would be ‘however much it takes to score a 60%.’  However, very few students want to earn only a 60%. Therefore the best question would be ‘How much does a student need to study to get an A on their exam?’

Now, the truth is, there are MANY reasons beyond “need” to increase protein intake to boost body composition and performance related results, here are just a few:

Reason #1

Increased Thermic Effect of Feeding — While all macronutrients require metabolic processing for digestion, absorption, and storage or oxidation, the thermic effect of protein is significantly higher than that of carbohydrates and fat. In fact, protein requires 25-30% of the energy it provides just for digestion, absorption, and assimilation while carbs only require 6-8% and fat requires 2-3%. That means that eating protein is actually thermogenic and can lead to a higher metabolic rate. This means greater fat loss when dieting and less fat gain during hypercaloric diets.

Reason #2

Increased Glucagon — Protein consumption increases plasma concentrations of the hormone glucagon. Glucagon is responsible for antagonizing the effects of insulin in adipose tissue, leading to greater fat mobilization. In addition, glucagon also decreases the amounts and activities of the enzymes responsible for making and storing fat in adipose and liver cells. Again, this leads to greater fat loss during dieting and less fat gain during overfeeding.

Reason #3

Increased IGF-1 — Protein and amino-acid supplementation has been shown to increase the IGF-1 response to both exercise and feeding. Since IGF-1 is an anabolic hormone that’s related to muscle growth, another advantage associated with consuming more protein is more muscle growth when overfeeding and/or muscle sparing when dieting.

Reason #4

Reduction in Cardiovascular Risk — Several studies have shown that increasing the percentage of protein in the diet (from 11% to 23%) while decreasing the percentage of carbohydrate (from 63% to 48%) lowers LDL cholesterol and triglyceride concentrations with concomitant increases in HDL cholesterol concentrations.

Reason #5

Improved Weight-Loss Profile — Research from Layman and colleagues has demonstrated that reducing the carbohydrate ratio from 3.5 – 1 to 1.4 – 1 increases body fat loss, spares muscle mass, reduces triglyceride concentrations, improves satiety, and improves blood glucose management.

Reason #6

Increased Protein Turnover — All tissues of the body, including muscle, go through a regular program of turnover. Since the balance between protein breakdown and protein synthesis governs muscle protein turnover, you need to increase your protein turnover rates in order to best improve your muscle quality. A high protein diet does just this. By increasing both protein synthesis and protein breakdown, a high protein diet helps you get rid of the old muscle more quickly and build up new, more functional muscle to take its place.

Reason #7

Increased Nitrogen Status — Earlier I indicated that a positive nitrogen status means that more protein is entering the body than is leaving the body. High protein diets cause a strong positive protein status and when this increased protein availability is coupled with an exercise program that increases the body’s anabolic efficiency, the growth process may be accelerated.

Reason #8

Increased Provision of Auxiliary Nutrients — Although the benefits mentioned above have related specifically to protein and amino acids, it’s important to recognize that we don’t just eat protein and amino acids — we eat food. Therefore, high protein diets often provide auxiliary nutrients that could enhance performance and/or muscle growth. These nutrients include creatine, branched chain amino acids, conjugated linoleic acids, and/or additional nutrients that are important but remain to be discovered. This illustrates the need to get most of your protein from food, rather than supplements alone.

So, looking over this list of benefits, isn’t it clear that for many individuals, an increase in protein intake would be advantageous for most people’s training goals?”

Hmmmm, indeed it does, Johnny boy, indeed it does.

So rather than looking at “need”, when talking about protein intake, let’s talk optimization.

Based on my experiences (and many others), that level is around 1 g per pound of lean body mass in most cases.

In some situations, for very specific purposes (like the protein depletion day of the XFLD), higher protein intake may be warranted.

Regardless, the bottom line is this:  protein is the most under-rated nutrient, or at least the nutrient that most people under-consume.  If you’re looking to boost your body composition results, make sure you’re getting enough.

Comments?  Post ’em below!

But, only after you hit the facebook LIKE button below to share this with your friends.

Talk to you in the comments section!

Joel

How much protein can you digest in one sitting?

Posted by Joel Marion on July 6, 2010 143 Comments

Research is good and research is bad.

Research is good because it can teach us a LOT.

Research is bad because most people don’t understand how to take the results of a study and analyze beyond the study to see how it fits in the big picture.

Fortunately, I will help do both with regards to the below study.

So, a team of researchers sought out to discover some stuff about protein:

J Am Diet Assoc. 2009 Sep;109(9):1582-6.
A moderate serving of high-quality protein maximally stimulates skeletal muscle protein synthesis in young and elderly subjects.

Basically, they wanted to see if a 90 gram serving of protein (about the equivalent of 12 oz of grilled chicken breast) would elicit a greater muscle building response when compared to a 30 gram serving (approximately 4 oz of grilled chicken, beef, etc).

The answer:  No.

The conclusion:  Your body can utilize approximately 30 grams of protein for muscle building purposes at a time.  Elite athletes and bodybuilders, perhaps a bit more.

So, does this mean that you should only eat 30 grams of protein per meal regardless of your calorie needs?

No.

There are other factors that should be considered when determining your protein intake, independent of how much of that protein is able to fuel the muscle building process.

What we can, however, learn from this study is a very general rule:

It’s best to spread your protein intake out throughout the day, ala 6 meals with smaller protein portions than 3 meals with larger portions, because yes, there seems to be an upper limit to the amount of protein that the body can use toward rebuilding or building muscle at any one time.

Now, that number could certainly change based on whether the group was participating in regular, intense resistance training — I’m betting the amount would go up.  Perhaps 40 grams on average…maybe more.

Either way, you’re probably going to get better results by splitting it up over the course of the day.

Later this week, I’ll be back to answer the question “How much protein do I actually need anyway?”

And I think you’ll be surprised by the answer.

If you’d like to see that article, do two things for me:

1) Hit the Facebook “Like” button below, then…

2) Leave a comment in the comments section

At least 100 comments and I’ll be back later in the week with the “How much protein do I really need?” article.

Talk to you in the comments section!

Joel

Make Each Repetition 3 Times More Effective

Posted by Joel Marion on June 30, 2010 Comments Off on Make Each Repetition 3 Times More Effective

So, I was at the gym today going through a rather brutal chest/back session and couldn’t help but “observe” those working out around me as I alternated back and forth between dumbbell bench and dumbbell rows (that was just the beginning of the workout).

Did you know that 99% of the people I observed could be achieving up to 3 times the results with some simple switches in the way they perform each exercise?

As my buddy Rob Poulos often explains, it has to do with how you specifically perform the repetitions. To better understand this, let’s examine our 3 different strength levels in any resistance exercise.

Take the dumbbell bench press exercise for the pectorals for example. In this movement, you begin with the weight in the lowered position at the sides of your chest. You proceed to smoothly and slowly press the dumbbells up until they meet over your chest.

This first portion of the exercise trains your positive strength level.

Want to make the movement even more effective?  Pause briefly and contract your pectorals/chest muscles hard at the top of the movement. This trains your static strength level.

Finally, you would want to lower the dumbbells slowly back to the starting position. This trains your negative strength level.

Now the problem is that most people don’t even bother with their static or negative strength levels, and that’s VERY apparent just by sitting back and “observing” more than 50 people working out at my local gym.

They put all of the focus on the “lifting” or positive portion of the movement, while not pausing or contracting sufficiently at the top, and not taking nearly enough time on the negative portion.

In effect, doing this only gets you one third of the benefit that each exercise can provide.

Actually, it’s less than that because the static and negative portions can actually create deeper inroads into your existing strength levels. This is something you want, as it will lead to greater progress faster, heavier weights used, more calories burned, and more fat loss.

My buddy Rob just posted a free video that shows you how you can target each strength level in a very specific way to decrease your workout time dramatically while doubling or even tripling the effectiveness of each exercise.  But in order to get the most out of the techniques, they need to be performed in VERY specific way.

You can learn about Rob’s specific methods in his free video here:

Click above to watch the video.

Catch you soon,

Joel

Derek Jeter, Bad Mexican, and the Surprise Omelet

Posted by Joel Marion on May 24, 2010 148 Comments

NOTE:  There is a BIG question at the bottom of this post that I would love for you to answer.  Looking forward to your response :)

So, yesterday Lisa (my fiance) and I decided to go for what ended up to be a rather lengthy walk along the water throughout the Davis Islands district of Tampa Bay.  Some nice houses back there, including the nearly finished skeleton of Derek Jeter’s new 30,875 square foot mansion.

It’s the one on the right.  More on Derek in just a minute.

As the walk went on, we realized 1) I was hungry and wanted Mexican food, 2) Lisa was hungry and didn’t care and 3) we both needed a break as we’d been walking way longer than anticipated.

So we stopped off at Estella’s, the supposed “go to” restaurant on Davis Islands.  We even saw Derek and his fiance Minka Kelly (best known from the NBC television show Friday Night Lights – if you don’t know about it, know about it…one of the best shows on TV) sitting outside dining there as we passed by a few weeks ago.

So, we figured it was probably pretty good.  I mean, we heard good things, and hot chicks dine there…Lisa would fit right in.

Wrong.

Place.  Was.  Awful.

From the service to the food.  Bleh.  Worst of all, I sat through my entire “meal” (if you even want to call it that) with no beverage, only to have the waiter bring me my requested Corona Light after I was finished eating.

Screw up my food, okay.  Screw up my beer…that just landed you a  ———  through the tip line of the check.  And that’s coming from someone who usually leaves a generous 20+ percent.  In fact, I can’t even remember the last time I didn’t tip…had to be when I was a broke college kid and by total accident.

But this was deliberate, and I hope they got the el message.  People want their beer with their meal.

Soooooo…this morning I was still in the mood for Mexican (because that place certainly did NOT hit the spot), leaving me to turn to my old staple “simple” Mexican Omelet Recipe.

Enjoy:

The Easiest Mexican Omelet in the World

Ingredients:

3 eggs
2 slices of organic pepper-jack cheese
3-4 tbsp salsa

You can probably figure out what to do with that, but I’ll still include directions:

Directions:

Pre-heat an omelet pan on medium heat.  Whip the eggs in a small bowl.  Transfer eggs to the omelet pan.  Allow eggs to cook, lifting the edge of the omelet throughout to allow any uncooked egg to run under.

Once mostly cooked, flip the omelet shell.  Lay the two slices of jack on one side an fold the omelet over.  Transfer to a plate and top with salsa.  If you want to get really fancy, add some sliced avocado on the side.  That’s what I did.  It was delicioso.

Alright, so here’s my question? Did you ever NOT leave a tip?  What was the service like that caused you to make that bold move?  Share your experience below!  I’m really curious.

Looking forward to the responses!

Joel

Totally Awesome Turkey Chili

Posted by Joel Marion on May 19, 2010 15 Comments

Want to truly eat and be lean and healthy for life?  Well, there’s only one way it’s going to happen – by finding healthy meals that taste GREAT so you can enjoy your daily diet without feeling the lease bit deprived.

And that’s what I’m here for (well, at least one of the reasons) – to HOOK you up!  Enjoy today’s recipe:

Totally Awesome Turkey Chili

Ingredients:

5 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 white onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, chopped
2 turkey breasts, cubed
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp ground cumin
2 Tbsp chipotle powder
2 Tbsp paprika
1 ¾ cups crushed tomatoes
½ lb sun-dried tomatoes rehydrated and sliced
4 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 cups rinsed, uncooked brown rice
4 cups chicken stock
2lb pumpkin peeled, seeded and cubed
Salt and pepper to taste
1 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup chopped cilantro

Directions:

Coat the bottom of a large stockpot with 3 Tbsp oil and heat it on medium-high. Add the onion and garlic and cook until translucent. Add the turkey, oregano, cumin, chipotle powder, and paprika. Cook until the turkey browns. Add the tomatoes, sun-dried tomatoes, balsamic vinegar, rice and chicken stock. Bring to a boil. Then simmer for 40 minutes.

In a separate bowl, toss the pumpkin cubes with 2 Tbsp olive oil, salt and pepper, cocoa powder, and half of the chopped cilantro. Spread the cubes on a baking pan and bake them at 350 degrees F for about 20 minutes.

Add the cooked pumpkin mixture to the chili pot with some salt and pepper and the remaining cilantro.

Super easy.  Super tasty. Super healthy.  And just in time to cook up a big pot for the weekend :)

Want 197 other delicious, fat-burning recipes for a whopping $4.95?

==> http://ProgradeStore.com/cookbook

As an act of good will our friends at Prograde have put together a kick-butt fat-burning recipe book, and you can get all 197 of them for under 5 bucks.  That’s a whole 2.5 cents per recipe.

It’s a one time payment and there is NO “catch”.  197 healthy and delicious (and EASY) recipes for under $5.  That’s all there is to it.

Do you have to buy it?  No.

Is it less than $5?  Yes.

Will it give you 197 new ideas to spice up your diet?  Yes.

The rest is for you to decide.

==> http://ProgradStore.com/cookbook

Be easy and enjoy the weekend (and the pancakes!)

Your friend,

Joel

Are Body Fat Scales Useless?

Posted by Joel Marion on May 9, 2010 147 Comments

Over the weekend I got a phone call from my friend Natalie.

She was a bit frustrated, and understandably so.

You see, about a week ago (per my recommendation) she purchased an electronic body fat scale to track her progress as she attempts to diet down for “beach season”.

Unfortunately, for the last week, the readings have been all over the place.

“One day it says I’m 26% and then the very next day somehow it reads 22%. Then back up to 24% the next day. It makes no sense.”

Perhaps you can relate.

Without a doubt, these scales can seem pretty worthless if you don’t really understand a) how they work, and b) how to use them to produce reliable, consistent data.

On the other hand, when you’ve got “A” and “B” down pat, body fat scales can be an invaluable tool to easily track body composition without having to bust out a pair of calipers or set up an appointment to have your body fat evaluated at your local gym (which has its own set of accuracy problems).

Today I’ll clear up the confusion and tomorrow you’ll actually be able to use the body fat function of your scale to produce some meaningful data.

Click here to continue reading

Win a FREE copy of the Xtreme Fat Loss Diet System!

Posted by Joel Marion on April 29, 2010 3,168 Comments

I’m going to make this post extremely quick and easy.

To enter to win one of FIVE TWENTY copies of the entire Xtreme Fat Loss Diet system that I’m GIVING AWAY today, simply reply in the comments section below this post (reply form is at the bottom of the page) with the following information:

In 250 words or less, I want you to tell me exactly why this program is the perfect program for you at this point in your life.  Tell me WHY you NEED access to this information.

Again, please keep your reply less than 250 words, and please, leave finances out of your reply.  This program (via our special launch pre-sale) will be affordable for literally anyone who wants access to  it.  Anyone.

So, again, leaving the financial stuff out, I want you to tell me, based on everything you’ve learned about dieting and FAST fat loss over the last 6 updates, why this program is the perfect fit for you.

I will keep the contest open for a full 24 hours, and then will go through the replies and notify the winners via email sometime on Saturday!

Good luck!

Joel

NOTE:  THIS CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED.