SPARTAN PERFORMANCE                                   CROSSFIT SUFFOLK

5X3 Snatches (full squat) @ 70% – rest 60 sec.

-then-

3 rounds for total reps of:

3 minute AMRAP of:

30 OHS @ 65/45#
30 Double-Unders

Rest 2 minutes after each round.

Today is the official start day of The Whole30 Program.  Good luck and know that you're not alone.  By now you should have a good idea of where to begin and how to keep going.  Some of you got off to an early start and have already seen and felt a difference.  Thank you for sharing.  It helps inspire the rest of us.  It's great to read testimonials from strangers, but nothing beats a testimonial from someone you see on a regular basis.

The Whole9 Seasonal Produce Guide

Melissa and Dallas Hartwig of Whole9 and the Whole30 program have put together another great resource, in their own words,

"we  realized that eating seasonally keeps people moving in the right direction from a taste, nutrition and budget perspective. However, “eating seasonal” isn’t as easy as it sounds, considering in America, we can eat whatever we want, whenever we want. Grapes in March? Asparagus in October? It’s all available (even if it has to be shipped 3,000 miles to get here). So let’s de-mystify seasonality, and talk about five reasons to go seasonal."

How Inflammation Affects Our Hypothalamus And Hunger Response   "Our hypothalamus is the part of our brain that controls our hunger response.  Leptin, and to a lesser extent, insulin are controlled from this section of the brain.  Inflammatory cytokines can cross into the hypothalamus and induce leptin and insulin resistance, which then can lead to weight gain.  One major cause of this is overeating.  Our cells have an energy limit that is preset.  Anything more or less can be detrimental to our bodies.  When excess food intake is introduced to our bodies we react via cellular inflammation.  This inflammation causes a down regulation of leptin and insulin receptors.  Both leptin and insulin are important in weight control.  Leptin signals to our brain how much body fat we need to store and insulin stores the body fat in response to what leptin tells our brains.  When the down regulation of receptors occurs our hypothalamus goes into a protective, starvation mode and increases our appetite and decreases our willingness to exercise.  This leads to weight gain, which then leads to increased leptin in the blood, which leads to more weight gain.  Eventually we reach obesity (Wisse, 2009)."—Kevin Cann for Robb Wolf.com

If the title of the above article was, You Workout And Have A Good Diet, But You're Fat Anyway!, would you be more inclined to read it?

That's what I thought.  The above Kevin Cann article is excellent, but I suspect the use of the words Inflammation and Hypothalamus in the title will cause many to turn away, but you shouldn't–it's informative.  It's not that the words are too intellectual.  It's that they make the article look, dare I say it, looooooonnnggg.  And who has a spare 3 minutes to read something that might help them?

Some might consider the title, You Train Hard and Eat Pretty Good, But You're Still Carrying Extra Fat ….and You're Unhealthy!, offensive, but you would be more inclined to read it.  And that is what the article is about!

After all this if you decide not to read the article please click on it anyway and scroll down to the photo of the author.  Now tell me Kevin Cann doesn't look like he's related to our own Joe S.?!?!  C'mon, the resemblance is uncanny–no pun intended.—-George

See what I mean?