Once the new year rolls in, I’ll be trying to get back to my goal of two articles per week. Now that I have that in writing, hopefully it will become a reality. With that said, we are still in the midst of the biggest dead week of the year. Most people are still in a post-Christmas haze and haven’t checked their feed reader in over a week… a bad time to start regularly scheduled posting again.

So, without further ado, a FitHacks post from 1 year and 1 day ago.

The holidays are always a tough time of the year for fitness. The stresses of shopping, traveling, and family certainly seem to take a toll on most of our fitness routines. Personally, I’m a creature of habit so sticking to a workout plan isn’t too bad on a normal 9-5 workday 5 days a week. However, throw in several days off from work and a crazy traveling schedule and my normal diet and exercise regimen is completely shot. Does this seem to sound familiar?

link – Getting Back on Track After the Holidays

…not the most theologically accurate depiction of the Christmas story, but still cute.

“The Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity.”

As usual, I am running extremely late on my Christmas shopping. I still have several people to buy stuff for and as the time between now and Christmas morning is rapidly approaching zero, I’m starting to slightly panic. That being said, I’m going to give a (very) quick rundown of some great presents for the fitness minded geek in your life. Everything on the following list is either something I personally own and use often or something that I would very much like to receive this coming Saturday. Enjoy!

Iron Gym – Despite the cheesy infomercial, this product is genuinely great. Pull ups and chin ups are two of my favorite upper body exercises. They are both multi-joint movements that provide a thorough workout over several muscle groups in a relatively short amount of time. The Iron Gym is simple to assemble and provides a great way to squeeze in your pull ups at home.

Jogging Stroller – If you are a jogger and have at least one kid, this is a must. I just got a fixed wheel double jogging stroller from InStep for our two kiddos. The stroller is smooth, light weight and will assuredly make life easier if you struggle to find time fitting your kids into your active lifestyle.

Zappos.com Gift Card – Runners need running shoes. Zappos has some of the best and cheapest options available. No brainer.

UnderArmour – If any part of your active lifestyle takes you outdoors during the winter, then UnderArmour makes some great products for keeping warm. I love all of my UnderArmour gear and use them regularly for Ultimate Frisbee tournaments as well as for jogging.

4 Hour Body – “4 Hour Body” is the new book from lifestyle designer, Tim Ferris. He is a wild guy with crazy ideas about life that I find interesting. I devoured his first book, “4 Hour Work Week”, and am eagerly awaiting my copy of his latest work. While I haven’t read 4HB yet, I have no doubt that while I probably won’t agree with some of what is said, I will most definitely find in intriguing and challenging. With that said, I give it an honorary recommendation.

Gym Boss – This is a simple tool that enables amazing workouts. I’ve been studying high intensity interval training (HIIT) for the past few months and fully believe that they are amazingly beneficial for both fat loss and muscle gain. The Gym Boss is a simple timing device that aids you in HIIT workouts. No more; no less. But still a great gift if you’re down to the wire.

The Stick – “The Stick is a revolutionary device used to segmentally compress and stretch muscle. It is highly effective in the treatment of muscle pain and trigger points.” That is industry lingo for “a really cool massage device”. Nearly every running expo I’ve been to has a booth setup for The Stick. Let the guys there give you a 30 second demo of The Stick on your sore running legs and you’ll be as good as sold. The great thing about this product is how you can precisely target every single muscle that is giving you pain. Highly recommended.

P90X – While this is another product that I haven’t personally used, I have talked with enough people who have to give this product two enthusiastic thumbs up. If you haven’t already seen the infomercials a couple hundred times by now, P90X is simply a set of workout DVDs. However, the routines that are included in the DVDs actually work! I can’t think of another product that will give you a more complete workout or provide faster results for a cheaper amount of money. If you are interested in hearing some personal testimonies from real life people, let me know. I literally know dozens of people that simply love this super challenging workout system.

(photo credit katclay)

Let’s be honest. You don’t get all your fitness information from FitHacks. If you did, you’d probably be pretty starved over the last month. But that’s OK. Life goes in cycles. And it’s good to know that even when I’m not posting fitness information disguised as a metaphor, there are those who are. Below are a few of my favorite fitness blogs that you should be following as well.

NerdFitness

GymJunkies

ZenToFitness

MarksDailyApple

UltiTraining

Jamie Oliver is on a mission to help America and the world change the way we eat. His new docurealitydrama, Food Revolution, aired this week. I caught the replay on Hulu and it is simply a great show. His personal brand of speaking direct truths may come off as a little harsh and abrasive to some, but once you see where his heart is, you’ll realize that it is in the right place.

The show takes place in Huntington, West Virginia. A middle sized town that has been determined to be the most unhealthy city in America (and therefore, probably the world). Jamie, an English chef known for his nutritious recipes, plans to take his message of healthy eating and proper nutrition to the good people of Huntington by addressing the diet of individual families, confronting public school systems, and also by opening his own cooking school within the heart of the city. Almost immediately, Jamie is faced with hostility. It turns out that some Americans bristle at being told what to do by cocky people with British accents (wars have indeed been started this way). However, Jamie’s determination to see lives changed for the better is evident.

Here are some painful takeaways that I gleaned from the first episode.

We are ignorant about proper nutrition. In Jamie’s battles with the public school system, he is faced with the strange dietary requirements forced on the school cooks. Jamie’s first attempt at preparing a meal for the students is thwarted when his dish of grilled chicken and brown rice is short one “bread item”. Frustrated by the faulty notion that students must receive two servings of bread per meal, he is forced to add half of a hamburger bun to every plate he serves. The school cooks and administration are blindly following the dietary guidelines handed down from on high regardless of what modern nutritional information suggests. We are eating garbage, dieing from obesity, and wondering what we did wrong.

We are very resistant to change. When he first enters the school Jamie encounters Alice “Don’t call me a lunchlady” Gue. Right from the start, she is suspicious of his motives and doubts anything he has to say about nutrition. Honestly, I don’t really blame her. She is just responding the way we all do when faced with making a major change. The decision to drastically alter the way we live has to come from within. Only when we understand the dire situation we are in can any true change take place.

We are killing our kids. In one scene, Jamie looks at what his project family, the Edwards, eat on a regular basis. He takes their grocery food for the week, helps them prepare it all (mostly by using the deep fryer) and dumps the entire load on the table. The mound of golden brown fried food brings tears to the eyes of the mom who realizes that she really is sending her four kids to an early grave. Now, we can point our fingers at Mrs. Edwards and question her parenting, but we all know that this is a widespread epidemic. I believe that this really is how most of America is eating and the problem is only getting worse.

I’m really excited about the Food Revolution and hope that Jamie really experiences the success that he desires to see. We all know that this is something that America needs. You can catch the whole first episode on Hulu here.

I just picked up a race packet for the half-marathon I have coming up this Sunday. Am I pumped? Definitely! Am I prepared? Not even close Last year I completed a full marathon and spent 3 months training for it. This year, I kind of signed up for the race on a whim. I have some friends who wanted to run so I volunteered to come along. This probably isn’t the best reason to decide to run a 13.1 mile race but why pass up an opportunity to spend two hours in the freezing rain? I have a goal time of 2 hours. Since I haven’t really been in hardcore training mode, that may or may not be realistic. We’ll just have to see.

In other news, here are few of my favorite fitness articles I’ve discovered this week. If you have any you’d like to add or have found anything on FitHacks.com particularly helpful, interesting, or entertaining lately I’d be happy to discuss that too

NerdFitness.com: What Burns More Calories?

MarksDailyApple.com: 10 Real-Life Reasons Why the Primal Blueprint Works for Me

DumbLittleMan: 6 Ways You Can Eat Like an Olympian