3 Ways to Boost Your Testosterone...Naturally

As we age, keeping testosterone levels in healthy ranges is linked to better overall health. Unfortunately, life stressors, poor diet, and bad sleep tends to cause testosterone levels to drop. Aside from addressing these variables, there are supplements and dietary changes that we can make to better optimize testosterone levels (without hormone replacement).

1. Zinc: Zinc It is involved in various actions of cellular metabolism. It supports healthy growth and regulates more than 100 enzymes. It is highly related to our reproductive health system and assists in DNA synthesis. Zinc can be considered as a testosterone booster, which slows down the aromatase enzyme, decreasing the conversion of testosterone into androgen. Although dietary zinc is mostly found in animal products, zinc rich foods include some grains and nuts.

2. Vitamin D: Vitamin D is actually a hormone! In a 2011 randomized controlled study, researchers found men who were given a daily high-dose vitamin D supplement significantly increased their total testosterone from 10.7 nmol/L to 13.4 nmol/L, whereas there were hardly any changes in testosterone concentrations in the group given a placebo. These findings suggest that men deficient in vitamin D who take a proper vitamin D supplement may fix low levels of low testosterone.

3. Fats: Studies show increases in saturated and monounsaturated fats lead to increased testosterone. Saturated fats are found in foods like eggs, red meat, palm and coconut oils, and dairy products. These fats are typically hard at room temperature, and only have single bonds between carbon atoms. Monounsaturated fats are found in foods such as olive oil and avocados, are typically liquid at room temperature, and contain one double carbon bond with the rest being single bonds.

Looking to implement some of these changes but need accountability and support? I’m here to help! Click the link below to get started.

How the Paleo Diet Changed My Life...

There I was sitting in an ER with an IV in my arm writhing in pain.  I didn’t realize it then, but that trip to the hospital was a tipping point in my life.  Let’s take a look back and see how a gallbladder attack forced me to take a good hard look at the food I was putting in my body.

I had just finished up a training session at The New York Sports Club, swimming roughly a mile of intervals and running 40+ minutes on the treadmill.  I was 9 months in Ironman training and I was just hammering myself with two-a-day workouts four days per week.  I rushed home to get some food in my stomach, and an hour after downing an entire entrée of whole wheat linguini, the area just below my sternum started to ache.  I knew this wasn’t a stomach issue because of the location of the pain.  An hour went by and the ache turned into a stabbing pain.  An hour later and the pain did not let up.  I knew something was up so I drove over to the ER to get checked out.  An ultrasound and physical examination later, the ER doctor told me I was having a gallbladder attack.  He recommended that I see a gastroenterologist for a follow up.  The attack subsided later in the evening, but I booked the appointment anyway.

I followed up with the gastroenterologist and she ran tests on my liver, stomach, and blood lipids but didn’t find anything out of the ordinary.  It was recommended that I reduce the fat in my diet drastically, as the gallbladder is key in fat breakdown as it releases bile into the small intestine.  I scratched my head.  “I really don’t eat a ton of fat,”  I said to the doc.  “In fact I eat mostly whole grains. I am a triathlete,” I followed up.  She didn’t give me much else but said if the symptoms persisted, she would recommend me to a surgeon to have my gallbladder removed.  I did some research and found that approximately 20 million people in the United States have gallstones. Of these people, there are approximately 300,000 cholecystectomies performed annually.  These numbers made me think this wasn’t such a big deal, but I wasn’t in love with the idea of getting surgery.  Thankfully, my instincts were correct.

As luck would have it, my good friend at the time, Max El-Hag (Training Think Tank), recommended I read Paleo Diet for Athletes by Dr. Loren Cordain and try out a Paleo Diet.  The idea behind the Paleo Diet was that the traditional western foods I was eating contained tons of anti-nutrients and gut harming proteins that were reeking havoc on my digestion.  This systemic inflammation was causing my gallbladder issues and potentially killing my performance.  I trusted Max and gave a strict 30 day Paleo Diet a try.  Once I took wheat, legumes, and dairy out of my diet and replaced them with sweet potatoes, coconut milk, and other paleo friendly products, my gut issues disappeared (and I haven’t had them ever since).  That next April, I took 13th place out of hundreds of participants at the Nautica South Beach Olympic Distance Triathlon, winning my age group as well!  Not only was I feeling better, but my performance was great too! 

Needless to say, changing my diet was a big step, but I felt forced to.  I couldn’t live with the way I was feeling anymore.  Luckily, I had guidance and someone to give me “permission” to make the change.  That’s why I am so passionate about nutrition, and why I have helped thousands of clients over the past decade change their diets too!  If you are dealing with gut issues, chronic fatigue, or stubborn weight loss, it’s time to book a free assessment today.  The best version of you is waiting.

What I Eat to Stay Lean, Strong, and Healthy

When I sit down with a nutrition client, the first thing I evaluate is their food log.  The food log gives me access to an important piece of the fitness puzzle.  I examine things like handwriting, number of meals recorded, how many days the client forgot to log food, and so much more.  What? You thought I care about what they eat?  I do, but the FIRST thing I look for is if this client is actually aware of what they are putting in their body, both food and drink.  A common remission I see is clients who don’t record what they drink.  This is usually due to embarrassment of consuming drinks daily after they get off of work.  Those “few beers” or “just a glass of wine” are usually a little bit more volume and often than the client even knows, but without WRITING IT DOWN we can never put the problem in front of us to change.

Just to give you an idea, this is what a one day food log from yours truly:

6am-Wake-Up

7am-12oz Cold Brew Coffee (black)

7:30am-RX Oats with 1/4 Cup Whole Lactose Free Milk, 1 Tbsp skippy peanut butter, 1/4 cup frozen blueberries

10:30am-workout

11:45am-smoothie (1/2 cup frozen mixed berries, 1/4 cup cranberry juice, 1/2 scoop protein egg white powder, 1 scoop colleen protein)

12:15pm-4 whole eggs (pastured), 2 strips thick cut bacon (nitrate/nitrite free), 1/3 cup lactose free cheese, 1/2 cup onion/peppers mix), 16oz. water

3pm-8oz. Sliced Turkey Breast (nitrate/nitrite free), 1.5 cups trader joe’s cassava chips, 16oz. Pellegrino soda water, 1/4 cup white rice, 1/4 cup pomegranate seeds

6pm-12oz Grass-fed Skirt Steak, 2 Cups White Rice, 2 TBSP Peter Lugar Steak Sauce, 16oz. Pellegrino Soda Water

Don’t worry about what I am eating, look more at the detail and clarity of the actual food log.  What it tells you is that I am aware of everything that I put into my body.  That is why logging food is so critical to making nutritional changes.  We can’t measure what we can’t change.  Up your food log game, and see your body composition change accordingly.

Need help with YOUR food logging?  Book a free assessment today, and let’s get started on the path to a better diet.

I Didn't Say It'd Be Easy, I Said It'd Be Worth It...

While on a zoom call, Charlie chirped with a smirk on his face, “Man I hate these lunges.  They are so hard for me!”  I replied, “I didn’t say it’d be easy, I said it’d be worth it.”  Charlie pondered for a moment, laughed and said, “I’m stealing that.” 

Charlie Kenney and I have been working together since the beginning of the pandemic.  First remotely as he was spending the summer in the northeast, but now in person since he is back down to south Florida for the winter.  We meet at the local park three days a week for an hour session including stretching and mobility, strength work, and conditioning.  I bring all the necessary equipment, Charlie gets a great workout, and he goes back on with his day.  However, Charlie sees it as more than just a workout.  Charlie gets to take an hour away from the grind of work and other responsibilities to work on himself.  It creates a ripple effect through the rest of his day and it will pay dividends for years to come.    

Charlie shows age is just a number, and he plans on continuing his healthy lifestyle for good!  It’s never too late to work on your own fitness.  Let’s get started today!  Click the link below to book a free assessment!

Are All Sweeteners The Same?

I commonly receive the question, “(insert sweetener) bad for me?”  My response, “It depends.”

First off, why are you using the sweetener, and how much are you using?  Secondly, what are your fitness and health goals?  After answering these questions (honestly), I can give recommendations on what an individual should do about adding sweeteners to their diet.

Let’s take a dive into some common sweeteners before I give my commendations:

1. Sucrose-Table sugar, honey, white sugar, confectioners sugar, sugar in the raw, are all made up molecularly of a glucose and fructose molecule (equally). 

2. Fructose-These include agave, maple syrup.  Though fructose has a lower glycemic index than table sugar or glucose, the gut cannot absorb fructose.  Fructose must be processed by the liver into glucose so it can be used by the body.  This reaction is called fructolysis.  If 30g or more of fructose are ingested, the excess sugar conversion causes an increase in triglycerides, a precursor for cardiovascular disease.  Moreover, fructose is also the sweetest tasting sweetener, we’ll learn why this is important later on.

3. Dextrose- Corn Syrup/Cassava Syrup-Though this is a high glycemic sugar that will affect blood sugar, it bypasses the liver. 

4. High Fructose Corn Syrup-Found in sports drinks and soft drinks.  Think of HFCS as sucrose on overdrive.  Up until the 1970s, soft drinks used cheap sugar: corn syrup.  Corn syrup is made up of glucose, which doesn’t taste as sweet as fructose on the pallet.  Rather than using sugar, Scientists combined the sweetness of fructose with the cheap cost of corn syrup to produce a super cheap and addictive substance that runs havoc on your liver and blood sugar.  HFCS-55 contains 55% fructose and 45% glucose.

If your goal is improving body composition and long term health, then you should RARELY be consuming sweeteners. RARELY.  Notice I did not say sugar.  Sugar occurs naturally in fruits and vegetables, however it is VERY hard to over consume sugar when you eat whole foods, but EASY to over consume sugar when you are drinking juices or eating dried fruit.  For instance, to get the sugar in one 8 ounce glass of orange juice, you would have to eat 3 oranges.  Add in the fact that you are consuming a lot of fiber which slows down digestion and negates the spike in blood sugar, and you are working with two completely different scenarios.  My recommendation is to keep sugar consumption below 30g each day and consume your sugar as fibrous foods.

There is so much more to unpack about sugar, but hopefully you can look behind the BS when the next sugar company says, “Sugar is sugar,” or your buddy tries to feed you muffins and says they are healthy because she used, “Agave Syrup.”

Looking for more advice with your diet?  I’m here to help.  Click the link in my bio to set up a free assessment today!

I Wish I Knew THIS Before I Started Training...

A brand new episode of the Fitness, Wellness, and Longevity Podcast is now available! You can download now wherever you listen to your podcasts or click the link below.

Scott and I didn't always have our heads on straight when it came to intelligent training. We learned from out mistakes but we also came across influential people that allowed us to call an audible and reassess what our training looked like. Today we share some of our biggest changed that we made. If you are looking for direction in your training, you won't want to miss this!

If you have any questions for the podcast please send them my way: sean@flochfitness.com

See you next time!

Is Salt Bad For You?

Countries have fought for hundreds of years for access to salt, and for good reason.  Table salt, made up of NaCl (sodium chloride), is essential for our survival.  Sodium drives basic cellular processes of the body including nerve and muscle function and is involved in the regulation of fluids in the body. Sodium also plays a role in the body's control of blood pressure and volume.  In recent years however, it has been in vogue to avoid salt like the plague.  Where does salt=bad come from?  There are two likely sources. 

First, heart and vascular doctors see increased sodium levels in patients with cardiovascular disease.  The correlation between sodium and high blood pressure isn’t so cut and dry however.   From nutrition and performance specialist and best-selling author Robb Wolf, “We know mechanistically, that sodium is important in blood pressure, we know that blood pressure is important for cardiovascular disease. But what got missed in that story is that the reason why the body hangs on to this sodium in the first place is we're just generally over-eating and maybe over-eating too many carbs. And when our insulin levels elevate, we become insulin resistant, then we tend to retain sodium. Insulin causes an upregulation in the production of a hormone called aldosterone. Aldosterone causes the kidneys to retain sodium. And so it's interesting because there is a reason to be concerned about sodium and blood pressure, but it's not really the way that we've been looking at things.”  What Robb is saying is that high blood pressure, in most individuals, is due to overconsumption of food and increased insulin levels rather than elevated levels of sodium.  

Second, anecdotally, people feel bloated and heavier after heavy doses of sodium.  The thinking goes, if I feel bloated after meals rich in sodium, I should avoid salt all together.  This idea doesn’t pan out though.  The issue is that most people who over consume salt also, in  most cases, are eating a lot of processed foods to get that salt in their body (ie. fried foods).  If you were to salt let say, a baked potato, the body wouldn’t respond in the same way as eating deep fried chicken tenders (excess fat and refined carbohydrates).  Moreover, once you have stabilized your salt intake, after a few days the body’s osmolarity will equalize, and the excess water retention will diminish.

For my nutrition clients, I don’t spend too much time obsessing about salt, but when they ask, I recommend lightly salting their food at meals (unless they have found to be hypersensitive to sodium. Which is ~1% of the population).   I don’t spend as much time focusing on salt with clients as they usually have much bigger issues like food quality, portions, and variety to worry about.

Need help with your diet? I’m here to help! Click the link below to set up a free assessment today!

Fitness Coach Reacts to Viral Wellness Ad

My mother says, "70 is the new 50." This just cements the idea that you need to be taking better care of yourself. If you are going to be on this earth until you are 100, you want to make those years worth while and vibrant. That's why I have always advocated for aging populations to focus on exercise and nutrition. It's important now more than ever in the post Covid-19 world! In this video, I react to an advert that has been going viral. Hit me right in the feels…

Do you or someone you know need to make a change with their health and wellness? I’m here to help. Click the link below to set up a free assessment, and let’s get started today!