Supplement Review

I have received a lot of questions lately on what supplements I take while I do P90X and INSANITY. For this reason I decided to make a blog to explain to everyone what supplements I take and the benefits of these supplements.

OMEGA 3 FISH OIL

What is it?

Omega 3 is an essential fatty acid, which means it cannot be manufactured by our own body and therefore must be obtained through our diet alone. Most people's diet's contain an insufficient amount of omega 3. Because of the lack of omega 3 in our body we take omega 3 fish oils to meet this daily requirements.   

What are the benefits?

- lowers blood triglyceride levels
- reduces the risk of heart attack
- reduces the risk of dangerous abnormal heart rhythms
- reduces the risk of strokes
- slows the buildup of atherosclerotic plaques
- lowers blood pressure
- reduces stiffness and joint tenderness associated with Rheumatoid arthritis

  Omega 3 fish oil have also been suggested to help prevent

- Alzheimer's disease and dementia
- depression
- heart disease
- cancer
- arthritis
- diabetes
- hyperactivity
- ADHD

Creatine

Creatine monohydrate is used to increase lean muscle mass, strength and energy. The human body naturally makes creatine to supply energy to the muscles. Creatine is made in the liver, pancreas and kidneys and is transported to the body’s muscles through the bloodstream. Once it reaches the muscles, it is converted into creatine phosphate. This is then used to help restrengthen your muscles and give you more energy and streangh to perform your workouts.

Creatine is 100% natural and is found in small amounts in some foods. Some foods that contain creatine are red meat, salmon, herring and tuna. The amount of creatine in these foods is minimal, and most is lost when the food is cooked.The best source of creatine monohydrate is creatine powders. These supplements are 99.9% pure creatine and only a small daily dose is required to raise the creatine levels in muscle your muscles.

The one thing that Creatine Monohydrate does is it withholds water in your body. This can be a good or a bad thing.  It can be a good thing if you are looking to put on weight and do not care if it is water weight and not 100% lean muscle weight. The bad thing is If you are trying to gain weight and have it be 100% lean muscle and not have the water weight contribute to your actual body weight, then you might run into some problems. Though the amount of water creatine withholds is not substantial, it can still be noticed by some.

I personally take the Creatine Monohydrate from GNC it’s cheap and does the job. I have recently come across a highly effective creatine that does not withhold the water. The name of this product is CE2 HI-DEF I have found that works much faster then regular Creatine Monohydrate and is more effective at what it does. The only down side is the price a bottle of 180 tablets cost around $65.00.        

L-Glutimine

L-Glutimine is the most abundant amino acid in the body. It's found in high-protein foods - fish, beans, meat and dairy products. Research shows that L-Glutamine helps facilitate the release of growth hormone. L-Glutamine is released when your muscle are under stress (when you are working out). Due to this release your L-Glutamine levels become lower and need to be replaced. By using L-Glutamine you begin to replace this L-Glutamine lost during workouts, and also speeds up normal naturally occurring Glutamine in your body.

Some of the things L-Glutamine does are the following

Regulation of protein synthesis (this is one of the ways in which steroids exert their muscle building effects).

Accelerating glycogen synthesis after a workout.

Sparing the use of the glycogen stored in the muscle cell (recall that the glycogen stored in the muscle cell is what gives the cell the healthy volume and firmness that you seek).

Faster recuperation from weight training workouts.

The type of L-Glutamine that I use is the L-Glutamine pill form by GNC.

The one other supplement that I take that I highly recommend to everyone is a multi-vitamin.

Multi-vitamins are a very effective way of replaces vital vitamins and minerals essential to your buy. By taking a Multi-vitamin each day will increase energy levels and better protect you from becoming sick.

Choices

In life there are two roads you can take there's the easy road most traveled. There's no obstacles just a strait road to an ordinary life. Then there's the road less traveled. This road is full of obstacles and road blocks. But those who travel this road and overcome these obstacles will find it will lead them to an extraordinary life. Life is all about making choices. so what road are you going to choose the easy road or the hard road? Why settle for ordinary when you can have extraordinary.

My P90X Transformation

      I thought that I would share my P90X transformation story with everyone. Unlike most people I started P90X not to lose weight but to gain weight. Growing up for me was tough I was always considered the little guy. In school I got picked on because of it and it truly got to me sometimes. I was 5'8 120lbs it was awful! After dealing with this for as long as I did I decided to do something about it and join the gym. I thought I would just go lift some weights, eat a lot of food, and I would get bigger right? WRONG! I did start to gain some weight but then I hit the dreaded platue effect. I started lifting even more, spent longer hours at the gym, eating more food, and you know where it got me no where. I ended up losing most of what I had gain because I was over training. At this point I got so frustrated about it I gave up and stopped going to the gym. I thought why should I waste all my time at the gym when it is getting me no where. So that's what I did I gave up thinking I'm always going to be like this and just deal with it.

  One day I was watching T.V and I came across this infomercial for P90X. I watched it and saw how ripped and how good of shape everyone was in it. Like everyone else in the world I was skeptical about it. You know it's just another one of those T.V infomercial products that promise you the world but end up being a total waste of money because they don't work. For some reason I decided to give it a try thinking hey what do I have to lose right. Let me tell you it was the best decision I ever made. Once I got P90X I looked over the program and started the first workout chest and back. I saw that it was pretty much all push ups and pull ups and thought it was going to be so easy. I was very wrong! It was one one the toughest workouts I had ever done and I knew from that P90X was the real deal. I continued pushing play for the 90 days sticking with the diet and by day 90 I could not believe what I saw in the mirror. In just 90 days I had gotten into the best shape of my life and was totally ripped! I have always wanted a 6 pack like every guy does. I didn't get one from P90X I got an 8pack! I didn't even know there was such a thing as an 8 pack before that! After the 90 days I had everyone asking me what in the world did I do to get in such great shape and I told them. After then I have so much more confidence in myself and have a new and healthily look on life. Before I thought I could not accomplish anything in my life, but now I feel like I can accomplish anything. P90X didn't just give me a great physique, but it also gave me the confidence to tackle anything that life throws in front me because I know now I can face it head on with no fear. 

Mike

Dare to be extraordinary TEAM XBODY

P90X Diet

One of the most common questions that I get from people about P90X is about the diet. Everyone always tells me that it is hard to follow or they do not like any of the foods in the nutrition guide. I thought I would make a blog to show people how simple the diet can be.

FAT SHREDDER the first phase is the fat shredder diet. durning this phase you are going to want to take in a high protein low carb diet. The reason for this is your body is going to be burning off all the extra fat in your body and build muscle with this diet. The high protein will help build muscle where the low carbs will help you not put that fat back on. You are going to want to have a intake ratio of 20% fat 30% carbs 50% protein a 20%/30%/50% ratio. a very easy way to do this is by logging everything you eat into a website called www.fitday.com this is a great website where you can log your food intake for each day and at the bottom of the page will give you a pie chart with the ration i talked about above so you can see the percentages. it's that easy!

ENERGY BOOSTER The next phase is the energy booster. Durning this phase your are still going to have a high protein intake, but you will be upping your carb intake just a bit. the new ratio for this phase is 20% fat 40% carbs 40% protein. a 20%/40%/40% ratio. Durning this phase you will be upping your carb intake because with the previous fat shredder phase you have burned off a lot of fat from your body and build muscle. Now that you are in the second phase of the workout and diet plan you will be taking in a higher carb intake to help you with your energy durning your workouts. Carbs help you gain energy and helps improve workouts due to the increased energy in the body.

ENDURANCE MAXIMIZER The next and final phase of the workout is the endurance maximizer phase. Durning this phase you are going to be upping the carb intake once more to a ratio of 20% fat 30% protein 50% carbs a 20%/30%/50% ratio. At this point your body have burned off most of the fat in your body that you are trying to get rid of. The final phase of P90X is the toughest because it is constantly changing workouts each week, and your body needs the extra carbs for the energy. Durning this phase you are still going to be building muscle and burning fat even though you are increasing you carb intake.

One final thing about the diet and this has to do about the foods in the nutrition guide. If you are one of those people out there like me who looked at the guide and said I don't like any of these foods don't worry you can change it to fit your likings!! All you have to do is substitute the foods that you do not like with foods that you do like that are equal in nutritional vale and fall under the category that food falls under like proteins, vegetables, etc. For example I do not like fish and the nutrition guide called for fish as a meal. All Idid was replace it with a high protein rich meat such as grilled chicken. I love grilled chicken and eat it all the time. There is nothing wrong with substituting foods in the diet with foods that you like I don't care what anyone tells you!! Just make sure though you still FOLLOW THE DIET PLAN AND FOOD RATIO INTAKE!! A good friend and fellow coach of mine told me it is 80% diet 20% workouts to obtain the best results and I could not agree more with him. You can lift weights and do pull ups and push ups all day, but if you don't have the proper nutrition then you will not see the results you are looking for and become very frustrated period!

again here is the website to log your daily food intake in and I HIGHLY RECOMMEND you do this! I promise it will make it so much easier for you to keep up with the diet and get the results you are looking for.
http://www.fitday.com/