Beach Workout

When I was on vacation in NC a few weeks ago I wanted to still exercise (partly to burn off all the beer I knew I would be drinking!) Of course there are gyms on the beach there, but why pay to exercise in some air conditioned stuffy gym when you can get a free workout just on the beach that is more fun and interesting (and low entropy of course)?

I wanted to do both cardio and weight bearing exercises using only the beach and what stuff was available. I believe in the Gym Jones and Crossfit philosophy that mixing up different weight bearing exercises in different combinations is good for your body (although Crossfit's unofficial obsession with meat and hatred of carbs is off the mark along with their mostly dismissal of the benefits of long distance cardio training. However, I am very happy to see that their July 30 WOD was a 15K run. Nice!).

Some of the exercises I did while on the beach are:

Running on sand: Running on sand works a lot more secondary support muscles around the ankles, calves and feet. It also burns a lot of energy as you have to work more to push off the ever shifting sand under your feet.

Running backwards on sand: Running backwards not only uses different muscles than regular running forward but it burns extra calories as well. And how often do you get to run backwards on the sand? In fact, I will admit right here that I love barefeet and think it is sad that more people aren't obsessed with barefeet like I am.

Regular pullups: Pullups is probably my favorite exercise of all time. Very little equipment needed other than some sort of bar or board. The house we were staying in had an elevated boardwalk to the beach with boards that were utilized for pullups. Def. good for grip muscles too as half the work in these pullups was from trying to figure out how to hold onto the board.

Towel pullups: Throw a towel around something and you're ready to go. Again a great wrist and forearm workout from trying to hold onto the towel.

Pushups: My second favorite exercise only to pullups. The pushup is so ingenious because you can do it anywhere, don't need any special equipment (you don't need these fancy doo-hickeys), it works a whole bunch of muscles efficiently, and there are a number of fun ways to mix it up.

Sumo deadlift high pulls: This is an exercise I picked up from the Crossfit website. You basically do a deadlift and then pull weights up to your shoulders and down again in a controlled motion. I used random heavy blocks of wood.

Dips: No dip bars available but steps were available. Place hands on 2nd from bottom steps and rest feet on ground in front of steps. Dip down until arms make 90 degree angle and lift body up. The load is lower than using a traditional dip bar but that's what more reps. are for.

Overhead Press: Cinderblocks are great for building and construction apparently and also great for lifting over your head and working out the shoulders.

Digging in the sand with a shovel: I seem to be obsessed with digging fortresses in the sand to fight the incoming tide even though I am an no longer a child. Great workout and it's really cool to dig until you hit water.

Tabata Squat: This one's simple. Just squat down while keeping your back arched until your upper legs are parallel to the ground. Sound easy? Do multiple sets of 50 with good form and the legs are screaming for you to stop.

Shoulder Side Lifts: While standing up lift bricks in a controlled circular movement from hips to straight overhead. Burns in the shoulders big time after a bit.

Lunges: Great workout for the legs and hips. Body weight is all that is required.

Front Shoulder Lifts: Bricks used again. Like side lifts but start in front of body and lift until overhead.

Horseshoes: OK, this isn't really a workout, but an example of just a simple game that is good exercise. Tossing that horseshoe the 30 or 40 feet works the shoulder and arms pretty well.

Wind Powered Brewery in North Carolina

On my 4th of July trip to the Outerbanks of North Carolina a few weeks ago we heard about a local brewpub, Outerbanks Brewing Station. As I love beer and tasting beer at its brewery source, I was excited to try the place out. I was even more excited when I found out the place has a big ass wind turbine! For those that don't know it is super windy down on the OuterBanks so it is really a great fit to have a wind turbine there. Of course, homeowners who try to apply to have them installed aren't allowed as at least one local town council considers them an eyesore...

A few facts about their wind turbine: They claim to be the only "wind powered brewery in the country". The max output of the turbine is 10kW at 31mph. That's pretty good! The turbine cost $45,000 and the brewery estimates it saves them $200-$300 per month. As the cost of energy goes up in the future this will only increase. The turbine has a 30+ year operating life. I as I am really tuned into saving energy lately just looking around the brewpub it is obvious there are many other minor things they could do to save lots of energy...

Not only does the brewery have a sweet wind turbine they have pretty decent beer too. We heard from a local that there was a cool 80's night on one of the nights (not for old people, but 80's music.) As I freakin' love (cheesey) 80's music, this was a great chance to rock out while wearing my sunglasses at night and try a couple good beers at the same time.

I tried two beers while at 80's night:

Stout: Only had a couple tastes of my cousin-in-law's beer but from what I remember it was amazing. Everything I like in a stout without any nasty coffee taste (I hate coffee!)

Tripel: Don't remember much about this other than the fact that I don't remember much. Boring and didn't taste like the Tripels I'm used to. This has nothing on one of my favorite Tripels of all time, Victory Golden Monkey Triple.

I went back a few days later with my lovely wife and was able to get a 4 sampler at lunch:

Olsch: This is a Kolsch style beer and claims to be 'The Thirst Quencher!'. It is pale and has a 'Budweiser' color. Not much smell. It is light and pretty refreshing if you're thirsty. Not much flavor. Better than some macrobrew, but not very good. Def. a lawnmower beer.

Hugh Hefeweizen: Named after the Playboy founder? Pretty decent hef. Lemony taste, light and refreshing, decent. Usually not a huge hef. fan but this one is pretty tasty.

LemonGrass Wheat Ale: Another hef. with more oomph than the Hugh version with a nice slightly bitter taste. Def. better than the previously tasted beer with same cloudy and light orange/yellow appearance. Well balanced with more complex mouth feel.

Hop Candy ESB: Very Niice! Nice bitter maltiness. Light amber color, not cloudy. Not 'bitter beer face' bitter but just a bit to smack you in the face and say YES! Best of the four beers I tried that day.

The funny thing about the brewery was that they served the regular cheap American beers too and most people were drinking them! Most people had a Bud Light in their hands! Nothing against Bud Light, but I at least feel that when given a chance to try something local whether its food or drink or music or whatever, you try it. I guess some people just like their Bud Light which is fine. More actual tasty beer for me.

Peak Oil- It's Happening!

Peak Oil- It's Happening! It's not just a bunch of environmentalists or geologists anymore, this story appeared on CNBC yesterday basically talking about how the EIA is cutting its oil output forecast for 2010.

The fact that the world is running out of oil is pretty scary. Add to the fact that world demand for oil and energy is growing and it's really scary. Oil is used in everything. It has been responsible for the ridiculous population boom over the past century. Without oil there would a much lower world population. It is used extensively in food production (~10 calories of energy are used for every calorie of food produced on average), transportation, chemicals, heating, lubrications, energy, pharmaceuticals, everywhere. If the world ran out of oil today, or even in 20 years, we would all be f*cked big time. I am pessimistic that there will be any type of technology fix that will save the day or be able to match the energy output of oil. What about renewable clean energy? You need oil (or other hydrocarbons) to manufacture wind turbines. You need oil to manufacture solar panels. Hydrogen economy? Don't think so. Hydrogen is actually not a form of energy, it is merely an energy storage method, and an efficient one. Most hydrogen produced now is from natural gas, which is also running out big time. There are some crazy alternative energy ideas out there but a lot of them sound a bit unbelievable and the energy inputs to them often don't match the energy you get back.

Why is this on this blog? Why am I being so negative? That's not the theme of this blog! Well, there are many ways the common person can conserve energy and deal with this coming energy shortage that are related to this blog. Some easy ways to conserve energy and at least delay us running out of gas and oil are to lose weight, exercise in low energy ways (why drive to a gym to walk on a treadmill when you can just walk outside, or even better, walk to the store?), skip the elevator and take the stairs, eat more seasonally and locally and less meat (especially red meat). Buy organic food when possible. Not only are those healthier ways to eat, but they are less reliant on cheap energy. As energy gets more expensive and rarer in the future, more people will eat local seasonal food as transporting food that relied on lots of chemical fertilizers that was shipped from far away out of season will become prohibitively expensive.

For an interesting example of this, read about what happened to Cuba after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. This period of Cuba's history is called the Special Period. Basically, imports of gas and oil to Cuba essentially stopped after the USSR collapse. As Wikipedia states, "the period radically transformed Cuban society and the economy, as it necessitated the successful introduction of sustainable agriculture, decreased use of automobiles, and overhauled industry, health, and diet countrywide." People actually became healthier there as they had to walk or bike a lot more than before.
They lost weight and got in shape. People started eating mostly organic vegetarian diets and eating locally produced food free of chemical fertilizers. Preventative medicine was stressed as there was little money for treating illnesses and buying expensive equipment. There is a documentary movie about this I'd like to see that is called The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil.

It's a brave new world out there. Although it often seems (to me at least) like one person, or a bunch of people, cannot do anything about the coming scary future, we can make small steps now that not only will make us healthier but will save energy and ease the transition in the future to less consumption, more human powered transport and work, and local organic food systems.

New Hampshire Big Lake Half Marathon

On Saturday May 10 I ran the New Hampshire Big Lake Half Marathon. This was the 2nd race in the Tri-state half marathon series which I'm running in.

Official Time 1:38:46, chip time 1:38:23. Finished 137 out of 1200. A bit slower than last race of 1:37:10, but not too shabby considering this one was pretty hilly and I got a pretty bad cramp at mile 5, which flared up again around mile 10. Also, I've been a lazy ass lately about running training, so considering these factors I think I did pretty well.

This was definitely the most fun half marathon I have ever run, and probably the most fun race as well. Despite having to fight a cramp for some of the race, the entertainment and sites were definitely worth it.

The scenery was really beautiful including views of Lake Wininnipesaukee and the surrounding woods, including some streams and ponds. There were locals playing great music at various points along the course including a Barbershop Quartet, a banjoe playing family, a fiddler, crazy 'party women', guitars and singing. Despite this race being in relatively rural New Hampshire with banjoes playing, it wasn't creepy at all like something out of Deliverance, it was just really neat. There were also amusing signs posted along the route that were meant to elitic a smile I guess- "Why is the word 'abbreviation' so long", "Should vegetarians eat animal crackers?", "When you lose weight- where does it go?", "Did Adam and Eve have bellybuttons?", and some other amusing signs.


There were a lot of people running for charity, the Leukemia and Lymphoma folks really had a strong presence. I should really do a race for charity one of these days.

I wore my 'Powered by Veggies' shirt again, this time without the cape though. I only got one comment on my shirt, by a volunteer as I was getting some post race food. She didn't seem to get it. She just commented that it was an amusing shirt.

One little personal thing I have been doing the past couple of months is avoiding all bottled water, as I think bottle water is wasteful. I kept that up for this race and didn't take any bottles of water at any point during the race including afterwards when they were handing them out like crazy. I did take some paper cups of water and gatorade, but not as wasteful as plastic bottles in my opinion.

This race was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to doing it next year!

Next long race is Portland, ME Half Marathon in October. That is a pretty easy, relatively flat race so my goal right now for that race will be to break 1:35. That would be a PR for me, one that I believe is reachable if I keep up training. Time to hit the bricks! (I'm actually not sure what the expression means, I think it means better get to work?!)

Beer Review: Ommegang Three Philosphers

I first drank this on draft at the Publick House a few months back and thought it was delicious. When I saw a big bottle at Trader Joe's, I had to purchase it for home consumption to see how it compared to on draft.

This beer is 98% Ale and 2% Ale with cherries added (couldn't they just say 100% ale with minimal cherries added?). 9.8% ABV. 25.4 oz. bottle with champagne top purchased at Trader Joe's for $6.99. Pours a dark brown-orange-red color with dark foam. There is a wonderful sweet malty aroma. Upon drinking a malty delicious taste with fruit backbone of cherries, raisins, and a hint of orange. Despite the high ABV there is no excessive alcohol taste. Incredible.

Despite being from Ommengang Brewery and therefore brewed in upstate New York, this beer transports the consumer to Belgium. You can almost hear the flemish arguments and laughs in the air while drinking this (I'm being a bit cheesy, but this beer really is awesome). I say flemish instead of french or dutch (the two other main languages spoken in Belgium) as the beverage I associate with french is wine and I don't know what I think of when I hear dutch, but flemish is undeniably beer. (Walloon is also spoken in Belgium by a minority, but I don't know anything about that language).

As an extra plus my wife really likes this beer too! Hiiigh Fiive! She hardly likes any beer!

I poured this beer into my 'Het Kapittel Watou' chalis glass I picked up in Belgium in 2002 and it was awesome. Highly recommended. The only flaw/complaint I could possibly give about this beer is the bottle has a champagne top so cannot be reused for home beer brewing (although now that I think about it, maybe there is a way...) Very minor complaint indeed, this beer is still fantastic.
3.5 beer bottles out of 4

Alec bikes to work!

Happy Bike to Work Week! This past Thursday, May 15, I finally biked to work from home. Normally it is a 20 mile drive each way for me (mainly highway), but thanks to 'the Google' I was able to map out a 16 mile route that would avoid major roads. Google Maps is great, in that it allows one to drag the route and it snaps to another road. My one complaint about the program is there is no 'shortest route' option. They do have a 'avoid highways' option but it still includes local highways. When I map out the route from my house to work and select 'avoid highways' it directs me onto the death trap of Route 1. That road is dangerous to drive a car on, there is absolutely no way I would ride a bike along it. I drove the route to work three times last week to familiarize myself with it. Driving it took between 50 minutes to an hour.

I left at 6AM with my packback sitting in the milk crate on the back of my Trek bike and arrived at work at 7:15AM. I think that's pretty good time considering it is a pretty hill 16 miles and I was actually following all traffic signals unlike some bikers. I also have a 'hybrid' bike which isn't as bad as a mountain bike for street riding but is still more work than a true street bike. The only tough part was right at the very end as my work is at the top of a big ass hill. My legs were really screaming at me at that point, but the rest was pretty easy. What's nice is my work has a shower, so after arriving I showered up, changed, and was at my desk before I normally am anyway.

The ride home was a bit tougher as it was rush hour and I had to deal with more cars (and people after a tough day of work ready to get home), but it still was pretty easy. I left at 5:15 and arrived home at 6:35. The extra five minutes were from a wrong turn near the end which I stupidly made. Not to be smug, but it is pretty satisfying when there is a huuuge line of cars waiting and you can fly by on your bike.

How much gasoline and money did I save? I avoided driving 40 miles. Assuming 30mpg for my car, that's 1.33 gallons of gas. At $3.72 for a gallon (around average price now), that's $4.96 direct savings. Not a lot, but that also does not add in the 'hidden costs' of driving like maintenance, oil changes, depreciation, etc. If I can start biking once a week for 30 weeks per year, that would be $149 per year savings gasoline alone (assuming same gasoline price). With the price of gasoline only going up, the direct savings will be more. Accounting for the indirect costs, the savings will be even higher. This will also save 1200 miles from my car per year.

I can't see myself biking to work every day. But for now one day a week should be good. Maybe I can increase that to two days a week. It really was fun, and great exercise. I don't have to go to the gym or go running before/after work when I have ridden 32 miles that day! One thing I need to work out though is putting less weight up high on my bike. Maybe some of those paneer bags that ride low on the back of the bike would be a good purchase, along with carrying less extra weight. Despite the load I carrided not being a lot of weight, I could still feel it when I was going to go over a big bump in the road and stood up on the pedals. The bike really moved differently with an extra load up high than with just the bike weight. Calculating how the bike would behave going over a bump with that extra load up high would be a good system dynamics problem to solve!

Why did I do this? Well the exercise is a plus, I love being outdoors as much as possible, and the money savings is nice too. But another big reason is trying to reduce my negative environmental impact. Despite my various actions to reduce my impact, I really could do a whole lot more. If everyone in the world lived my lifestyle, there would still have to be a number of Earths to support us all. Knowing I'm doing one more thing is great. Plus, I'm sending less of my money to big oil companies and overseas to other countries whose politics and policies don't always jive with me well (I saw a woman on a bike last year who had a sign mounted on it that said something to the effect of "Biking- one small way to protest oil wars" That's a great political statement right there). Unlike that old Boston Area car dealership ad that prices are going "Down, Down, Down, Doo-oown", the price of gasoline and fuel is going up up up. Oil is around $125/barrel and gasoline is near $4/gallon. What can we do? Our genius president wants Saudi Arabia to produce more oil and to open up more of Alaska to oil drilling. Is that really the solution? Why not reduce oil and energy consumption? Isn't that much smarter solution in terms of pollution, long term sustainability, keeping more money in America instead of sending it to the Middle East, etc.?

Another great thing about me biking to work is related to my having been talking it up a lot to coworkers about how excited I was to do it, how I'd be getting exercise and saving money, etc. It is probably not all because of me, but one coworker who lives 5 miles away biked to work the other day for the first time and says he will keep it up! Two other coworkers have at least mapped out the route and are considering it also. Fantastic! Now if only more of America could be convinced to bike more often, that could really make a difference.

Gas Tax Holiday = Wasted Opportunity

I sometimes wonder if politicians actually have any brain cells in their heads. Then I realize that most of them are probably very smart people but they say what they say and do what they do because they pander to that which helps them earn money and get re-elected; corporations and the general masses.

One of the latest ideas that certain politicians (Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and probably others) are pushing for is so stupid it got me again wondering if these politicians have any brain cells in their noggins (like the Family Guy episode where Peter has one brain cell left in his brain which has just broken its glasses, which is actually a reference to an old Twilight Zone episode). This idea is for a federal gas tax holiday this summer (gas is currently taxed by the government at 18 cents a gallon). I haven't done out the math myself, but the number being thrown around is that the average family will save $30 from the government not charging this tax over the summer.

This is one of those ideas that may sound attractive at first, but is really just dumb. It does absolutely nothing to address the fundamental problem of our addiction to gasoline and other fossil fuels. Most economists think this will do nothing to lower gas prices, as the cut in price will slightly increase demand, driving prices even higher! It's Econ 101, supply, demand, and pricing. Historically, when there have been gas tax breaks, the price did not drop the same amount as the tax break. For example, quoting the New York Times here,

When Illinois and Indiana suspended about 7 cents of their state gas taxes in the summer of 2000, prices fell by an average of only 4 cents, according to a study by the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, which opposed the plans. Drivers saved no more than $2.50 a month, while each state lost tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue

At least Barack O'Bama has the balls to say that he does not support this gas tax break, and that it is stupid and does nothing to address the root of the problem. In addition to this, not charging this tax will take away something like $9 billion in tax income from the federal government, increasing further the national debt. At least not all politicians are proposing stupid measures like this one. Again, quoting the same NYT article,

And Georgia, which briefly shelved its gas tax after Hurricane Katrina, has no plans for a sequel. Instead, Gov. Sonny Perdue, a Republican, has pushed to expand state bus service and is relying on new tax incentives for telecommuting that give people “the option not to buy gas,” said Bert Brantley, his spokesman.

This is a great opportunity for politicians to tell Americans to get out and walk more, take the bus, ride a bike, get exercise, stop driving so much, change their wasteful habits. Instead, some of these politicians want a temporary tax break that will do nothing to curb demand. Americans are addicted to gasoline and fuel (I'm no exception, I still drive my Honda Civic almost 20 miles each way to work each day, but I'm planning to start biking 1 - 2 days per week). Urging people to get outside out of their cars will also encourage people to exercise, which judging by the fact that 30% of Americans are obese, collectively as a country we could use it! Why not promote Bike to Work Week? If 10% of those who drive to work regularly switched to walking/bicycling/taking public transportation, it would have a ginormous effect on national fuel consumption and pricing. If Americans did get some transportation exercise, this would in turn save a lot of fuel as well. As I described in this post, if every American lost one pound, 39 million gallons of fuel would be saved per year.

What happens when the gas tax holiday ends? The price goes up again and demand has not fallen! I personally think the gas tax needs to increase! The extra money can go to programs to promote alternative energy and energy efficiency increases, promoting public transportation and bicycling, etc. For really poor Americans who cannot afford increased pricing there can be gas vouchers, etc. like food stamps to help them out, or slightly lowered taxes for low income Americnas.

The politicians could be talking about how this is a great opportunity for America to save energy by increasing fuel economy standards for cars + trucks, promoting local and organic food, buying less crap from China and more high quality stuff from USA, promoting walking/biking/taking more public transportation instead of driving everywhere, promoting renewable energy alternatives and increased efficieny requirements for everything. Instead, because of their corporate interests and pandering, this stupid ass idea is being promoted to solve our problems. And no, using corn to make ethanol is not a solution to our gasoline addiction/problem. It has only exacerbated already high food and fuel prices in the US and around the world (and actually increased global pollution instead of reducing it). People are starving so Americans can fill up their SUV's with ethanol (I have read that the amount of corn used to make enough ethanol to fill up an SUV can feed a person for a year. That's really sad).

I really do worry what the energy and food situation will be like in American in the future. Without politicians to step up to the plate to promote real solutions that will solve the real problems, there won't be much real progress. At least there's grass roots people, like the Dervaes at the Path to Freedom, who really are getting people to change their lives. Individual people and grassroots organizations can make a difference, but federal mandates can be the real kick that is needed to get everyone moving.

Organic Beer Goes Mainstream

Organic food and 'natural' products are all the rage now a days. As mentioned on this blog before, organic is almost always better than 'conventional' for a whole number of reasons. One of the original selling points about organic was that it was only being produced by small, local, independent people and businesses. Recently however, big business has gotten onto the organic bandwagon as they realize their is money to be made.

The same thing applies to beer. Until recently, organic beer was only available from small, local breweries across the US. Not anymore however. Budweiser now sells organic beer. As discussed in this article, organic beer has now gone mainstream (thanks to my friend P for sending this to me a couple months ago.)

Of course, 'Organic Bud' is not sold under such a name, it is sold under the Green Valley Brewing company label, with the beer name of Wild Hop Organic.

Is this a bad thing? Well, yes and no. It is a good thing in that organic ingredients are vastly superior for the environement, people's health, soil quality, etc. over conventionally grown crops. Having a beer giant like Anheuser Busch push the product into the mainstream may force more crops to be grown organically, which is a good thing.

However, like a lot of things that have started locally with a good cause by people actually dedicated to the movement, having big business jump on the organic bandwagon will probably water the cause down and change it for the negative. One of the original positive aspects of organic farming was the fact that only small, local farmers would grow food organically. By buying organic food you therefore would almost always be supporting small, local farmers and/or independent businesses. Is it likely that the organic food that Wal-mart now sells is from local, small farmers and businesses? Not likely. Like almost all big business they will look to buy from the cheapest sources possible. The same thing will most likely happen with organic beer. Instead of trying to buy locally like most of the small independent breweries try to do, 'Organic Bud' will most likely be made with the cheapest organic ingredients possible, whether that's local or from farmers halfway around the world.

Because big business exerts so much political power, they can change national food policy pretty easily. This has happened with organic food labelling. Food no longer has to be 100% organic to be labelled organic. If food is 100% organic it can be labelled '100% organic'. If it is 95% organic it can be labelled 'organic'. If it is 70% organic it can be labelled 'Made with organic ingredients'. Personally, I think that is a bit deceptive. Because big companies like Walmart or Anheuser Busch are so powerful, they can lobby to drop these percentages even lower, exempt certain ingredients, or change what the definition of organic is (maybe they'll push GMO food to be labelled organic? That would be scary).

I actually bought Wild Hop Beer a few months ago before learning it was 'Organic Bud'. I actually noticed when I bought the beer that the design on the six-pack bottles and packaging were pretty cheesy looking. When I drank it I was wholly unimpressed to say the least. At the time I'm not sure I thought it tasted like Budweiser, but I at least definitely remember it not having much taste. Now that I know it is by AB, I can taste the similarities. The website at least mentions it is part of AB. If it didn't say that, there are hints otherwise that it is not a small independent brewer. The biggest hint is they rather prominently advertise the beer as only having 150 calories, which most craft breweries do not mention, or if they do, not prominently. Most craft brewers brew their beer for taste, not calories which AB obviously focused on for this beer. After finding out this crappy organic beer I bought was 'Organic Bud' I had a Seinfeld moment. To quote Estelle Costanza on Seinfeld, "I was duped!"

To sum up, is organic beer going big time a good thing? As discussed, yes and no. If the big companies can keep organic pure and with its roots sourcing locally with fair prices, not trying to squeeze out small farmers who actually care about the product, and not just caring about profits then it is probably a great thing. If history is any lesson however, this will probably not happen.

Crossfit: Forging Elite Fitness

Thanks to my friend B for telling me about Crossfit. In one word, Crossfit is badass. From what I can tell, the whole concept is similar to '300' old school workout mentatility. Use simple exercises with very few, if any, machines to get in an awesome workout, vary the workout a lot, keep pounding the body and don't get into constant workout that is always repeated.

The whole thing seems a bit like a cult, but a good cult, not a Jim Jones sort of cult. Incidentally, the name of the gym where the '300' actors worked out is called Gym Jones. Coincidence? Maybe. My guess however is that the gym's founder, Mark Twight, has a slightly twisted sense of humor and named it after the cult leader because his favorite drink, Flavr-Aid, is what the Jim Jones followers drank to commit suicide (or were poisoned against their will) (laced with poison of course).

Anyhoo, to get back to Crossfit, a workout is listed for each day (the WOD, workout of the day). As stated before, most of the workouts are very simple, with little equipment or fancy machines needed. Most are designed to use multiple muscle groups and emphasize movements and function. Some power lifting is specified, and there never seems to be any single muscle training (no sets of arm curls). Like the Gym Jones folks, the goal is not to 'get big' like some weight lifters want to achieve. The goal is to gain functional strength and overall fitness. Some of these exercises are pretty advanced powerlifting, which despite my having knowlege of some proper power lifting techniques from high school football, still make me a bit nervous to perform.

Many of the exercise sets are named after women, such as 'Elizabeth' which consists of: 21-15-9 reps of Clean 135 pounds, Ring dips. (Having the exercises named after women reminds me of all the cars being named after women in the movie 'Gone in 60 seconds'). There are also a bunch of exercise sets called the 'Hero Workouts', named after some brave folks who have died in Iraq, Afghanistan, or serving the public elsewhere.

One of the workouts is called 'Fight Gone Bad'. This exercise supposedly originated as a training exercise for ultimate fighters. They fight for 3 rounds of 5 minutes each, one minute rest in between rounds. When one of the Ultimate Fighting guys tried out the workout he was asked if it mimicked the physical demands of a fight. The response was that it was like a 'fight gone bad'.

The workout consists of 3 rounds of exercises that last one minute each. After each set the next set begins immediately. There is a one minute set in between each round. I have done this at home twice but had to modify it with what I had handy.

A Power Hour Mix comes in handy when doing this...
Original: Wall-ball: 20 pound ball, 10 ft target. (Reps)
Sumo deadlift high-pull: 75 pounds (Reps)
Box Jump: 20" box (Reps)
Push-press: 75 pounds (Reps)
Row: calories (Calories)
Note: For women the weight used for the high pull and push-press is 55 lbs

Modified Home Version:
Pushups
Sumo Deadlift High Pulls (28lbs dumbells)
Modified Mountain Climbers
Push Press (28lbs. dumbells)
Weighted Squat Jumps (28lbs dumbell held at chest)

This workout is only 17 minutes long but pretty, pretty, pretty tough. The three times I've tried it at home I was pretty damn tired by the end of it. I also used the 'women's weights' when doing it, and not the men's weight.

One thing I really like about the Crossfit website is that women are often featured in the pictures and videos performing the workouts. The women that are featured on the site are really fit and strong, and they get just as much credit for their strength, agility, and athleticism as the men do.

One thing I don't like is there seems to be some negative feelings towards vegetarians and vegans on the website. It does not seem to be anything directly posted by those who run Crossfit, but if you delve into the nutrition section of the discussion board on the website, there seems to be some bad mouthing (and incorrect/ignorant information) about the benefits of a plant based diet. That's OK though, I'm not there to read about nutrition, plus people can have their own opinions (I did however read some pretty nasty comments about vegans though that don't need to be repeated here).

Overall the site is pretty cool. They have tons of video demonstrations and other information available for no cost. I don't do the workout of the day every day like some followers must do, but the exercises are good inspirations for workouts. As mentioned, I have tried the Fight Gone Bad, but none of the other ones to a T. I now often do things like 3 rounds of sets of deadlifts + then box jumps, which was inspired by one of the WOD's. For anyone who has never power lifted before however, I would still urge lots of caution in performing some of the exercises, even after watching the video demos. Without proper instruction on proper technique or supervision some of the exercises can be dangerous.

There is a CrossFit Boston, which I also separately read about in The Improper Bostonian magazine. I don't see myself ever signing up for that gym as a regular member unless I get a job right in the city, but it would be cool to go to a few single session workouts to learn some more powerlifting techniques. Giddyup.

Men Who Cook

I like to cook vegan food. I like to eat vegan food. Eat Air Blog has noticed that the vegan cooking world/ blogs are dominated by women. They put out a challenge for men who like to cook to post their recipes on their blog. As I have only posted about cooking once on this blog as that is not really what this blog is about, I figured this would be a perfect excuse to post one of my favorite vegan recipes.

Those familiar with vegan cooking know that Veganomicon kicks major ass and is in my opinion one of the best vegan cookbooks out there. One of my favorite, and luckily for me, easiest, recipes in that cookbook is Pineapple Cashew Quinoa Stir Fry. To not give away the whole recipe, it is a simple dish with the main ingredients being quinoa, cashews, pineapple juice, soy sauce, peas/edamame, green pepper.


The basic recipe is cooking the quinoa, stir fry the pepper, garlic and ginger, add soy sauce and stock and combine with the quinoa. Very simple but delicious. Like most recipes, I modified the recipe a bit for the ingredients we had available. I'm not sure if the average person has peanut oil, but we don't; olive oil substituted fine. Instead of green peas we used lima beans. White rice vinegar substituted fine for mirin. Crushed red peppers were used in place of a red chile, and the scallions were skipped (am I the only person who isn't a fan of scallions, onions, all other onion type things? I actually feel sick if I eat too many of them. Could this be a weird food allergy?)

I try to eat locally as much as possible. This meal was certainly not local. Quinoa is typically from South America, our quinoa was bought bulk, not sure of the origin. The pineapple is certainly not local. In face, probably not a single ingredient in this meal was local, except for the added water. Ah well. It was delicious at least. The beer I consumed while cooking was brewed locally at least by moi.

While this is a very simple dish and probably doesn't merit a blog post, it is incredibly delicious and healthy. Those looking to make a simple delicious healthy vegan meal should opt for this guy. The recipe claimed that it serves 4. My wife and I both ate it with no leftovers, and we ate a side salad too. I guess we just have big appetites. Happy cooking. And eating.