| Official BFL submission | Week 7 of 12, Day 46 of 84
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These are the pictures that were officially submitted for my challenge.
Jeremy
posted by Jeremy on 8/21/2003 8:23:46 AM | | Advice on research supplements (Buzz, this was prompted by the bee jelly) | Week 7 of 12, Day 44 of 84
Let's face it. In America, at least, 99% of our nutrition knowledge comes from supplement companies or other entities with a vested profit interest in the things we buy to place in our mouths.
For example, the dairy industry embarks on multi-BILLION dollar campaigns to drive fear deep into women's hearts that they will break every bone in their bodies by the age of 35 unless they suck down milk, and, oh, by the way, did you know it will hep you LOSE FAT even though we've been drinking GALLONS of it as a society and obesity is on the rise? Did you know that the government has to buy back surplus dairy from the farmers, so do you think their ideas behind pushing dairy products are unbiased?
Then we have the department of AGRICULTURE coming up with the FOOD PYRAMID which has ... WOW, wait, look at that! AGRICULTURE (7 - 11 servings of grains) as the BASE of the pyramid! Whoo! I bet the meat industry wasn't happy about being the smaller step on that ladder! Private industry is quite clever as well. You will have an industry like the dairy industry that produces a waste product which is then illegally dumped in land fills. The government considers this a HAZARD and commissions them to dispose of it through other means, which could potentially cost millions of dollars and kill profit. CLEVER CLEVER people decide to take this waste product and market it to supplement companies as protein powders, and POW now everybody in the world thinks that WHEY PROTEIN should be sucked down every 5 minutes and you'll end up like the cover of a MuscleMag issue.
SO ... let's say you want to research something like queen bee royal jelly. The internet USED to be a beautiful place to search for information. I was using it in 1992 and reading studies about aboriginal societies and oohing and ahhhing over going to the University of Minnesota web site which had weather reports from around the world (I could actually find out if it was raining in Florida from a little computer lab tucked under the dormitories at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology!). So, let's hit that awesome search engine we know and love, GOOGLE, and find out about this jelly.
I'll skip over the PDF document. Eagle Marketing, Inc. wants us to know that their products promote better health. They've put bee pollen in about every type of bottle and tablet you could imagine. American Royal Jelly promises health, longetivity, and beauty - heck, you do not even have to visit the site to see these claims, it is right there in the title! We find out it contains all essential amino acids, many vitamins, hormones, something to transmit nerve messages, nucleic acids, and things that stimulate the immune system. WOWZA!
FINALLY we find an article by someone not trying to sell it to us - on MSN, no doubt. In this article we find out people have died taking it (of course, people die eating peanuts, too). There are 40 cases from a product probably being used by billions, so your odds are good .... albeit your wallet might be lighter.
But let's get back to the crux of the matter. WHAT IS IT and WHAT WILL IT DO FOR ME? Let's try tip #1:
Search tip #1 - limit initial searches to .edu and .gov domains!
I am not saying .com or .net or other sites do not have valid information. And some .edu sites are personal web sites with college kids trying to pay their tuition by selling quack remedies, so it doesn't mean it is GOOD advice either (read my message above about the government and their non-bias in building dairy recommendations or the food pyramid). However, you are more likely to land on a biochemistry page or some study that is by someone not interested in making a buck but learning more about the world.
Just click on advanced search, and scroll down to where it says "Domain" with "Only" in the select box, and type ".edu, .gov" in the text box next to it, and click search.
OOOPS nothing there! Ouch. Let's narrow the search ... instead of queen bee royal jelly, let's just look at bee and jelly ...
WOW. Nothing there.
Okay, let's try "royal jelly" ... AH-HAH! Now we get some sites ... for the refined search of "royal jelly" restricted to .edu and .gov sites.
The first site gives us some insight ... many supplements are manufactured overseas in facilities that have substandard quality controls. Turns out the many royal jelly products contain a chemical that is NOT ADVISED for consumption. Ooops.
In fact, the Food Standards Agency says, if you are going to eat something meant for queen bees, make sure it is meant for queen bees who do not live in China.
We find a letter posted to a site by the FDA indicating their claims are not legal. We find another site indicating products with royal jelly contain alcohol.
Okay ... now ... let us go to the true source of information, in my opinion, PubMed, a government gateway to clinical trials and research:
PubMed can be accessed by clicking here.
Now I can type this: "royal jelly" [ti]
Which instructs pubmed to give me all abstracts that have the word "royal jelly" in the title. I actually want something better, so I click on the LIMITS link and check only items with abstracts, human only, and click on GO.
ALL that I find are studies about adverse reactions to people taking royal jelly!
That is the end of this lesson ... restrict the searches to reputable sites. Remember that supplement companies WILL set up "independent" sites without their logos or names, and have articles that promote their own products, so unless you KNOW the source, it is going to be a shaky connection. If you are up for the technical read, go to PubMed and find out what HARD science has to say. Finally, even hard science is no substitute for the field. If in doubt, try it yourself, keep a detailed journal, and decide for yourself!
-J
posted by Jeremy on 8/19/2003 2:26:38 PM | | No thunder lost, Marie! | Week 7 of 12, Day 43 of 84
Wasn't looking for thunder. Just wanted to introduce myself, and am looking forward to the advice and learning from the others. Felt that since I would be learning from their advice, that I should at least introduce myself and not be a lurker!
Jeremy
posted by Jeremy on 8/18/2003 4:50:41 PM | | Mo' better shoutz - the EAGLE has LANDED! | Week 6 of 12, Day 40 of 84
First off, thank you all for the kind comments. It is invigorating and only helps me explode towards my goals in the future.
I just checked with FedEx, and my 2003 Body-for-LIFE™ Challenge Competitor Guide has arrived in Golden, CO! Now I just need to wait for the magic January 15th date to find out how I fared!
Bad news. My daughter called me in tears yesterday. One of her fish, Nemo, died. She was very upset and told me she would miss him dearly. When I came home, she threw herself into my arms and cried a little. The she got very excited, smiled, and ...
Good news. ... showed me her replacement, Elmo. Elmo is red, Nemo was blue. They did not get another blue betta because "the blue ones always die." Let's hope Elmo's consitution is superior and he holds out.
Great news ... my wife has started her new challenge. She is following new nutrition which probably isn't her favorite but something we're experimenting with to see how a short 6 week cycle will fare. The program is mine and she has been moaning about this or that party part every day now. I love it. She may come to Bodyblog, she asked me about it but I'll confirm with her. We are meating for a steak and potato lunch date.
Brock - thanks for the advice! Yes, I have bulked many times in the past, so I know the joys of it. I do cook most of my food and have become quite adept at seasoning. I really don't get bored with nutrition ... it's just no longer a real issue with me. This program is less flexible than how I leaned down but I'm happy with it and will see. Obviously I will be tweaking based on results. This is not going to be a huge waistline grabber. I am keeping body fat in single digits. Yes, I know, the great old argument - to put on muscle you gotta EAT. But I disagree that you gotta put on fat. I've seen people who stay relatively lean and I've seen those who bulk. It seems the ones who bulk lose so much lean mass when they trim, that while they might gain 20 pounds in 6 months by the time the competition rolls around, they've gained a net of 5, yet these same guys tease the lean person for only gaining 5 pounds in a year! At any rate, still learning my body. I've done the bulking thing 4 times now and it's time to try the slow, methodic approach and see how I wear it.
I love my daughter's school ... we have a camera in the classroom so that I can check in on her. Great stuff. I could watch her all day.
I am very intrigued by Friendster. While it is mainly geared towards singles/dating and there are not quite 100% PG-rated profiles, the concept is very interesting as it connects you to other people through your friends - the entire concept of "6 degrees of separation" - I've already connected with a few old friends because they knew a friend who connected to me, and it is amazing that through only 8 direct contacts I am 5 degrees of separation from 2,700 people who have chosen to join the site. Cool stuff - check it out if you like to have some fun in your free time.
That's it. My bodybuilding book recommendation for the day ... this is not for the TWILD types who can train from instinct (and does a GREAT job at it, I might add) but those interested in more scientific foundations .... three books by Fleick and Kraemer: Periodization Breakthrough, Designing Resistance Training Programs, and Strength Training for Adolescents.
WORD. Hopefully I'll hear back about my treadmill repair today. No insightful scientific posts out of me, yet.
Werd.
posted by Jeremy on 8/15/2003 10:45:23 AM | | OH, NO! Zach is HUMAN! | Week 6 of 12, Day 38 of 84
And here I thought he was a clean eating muscle machine. And then he goes and visits the Colonel. Harumph!
Jeremy
posted by Jeremy on 8/13/2003 2:13:14 PM |
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