What do you do for exercise? Do you bike or walk? Why not do that on the way or at least part of the way to work.

Walking or biking to work, even part way, is linked with fitness, but very few Americans do it, according to a study of more than 2,000 middle-aged city dwellers.

In what may be the first large U.S. study of health and commuting, the researchers found only about 17 percent of workers walked or bicycled any portion of their commute.

The new study is based on tests and questionnaires from 2,364 workers who were part of a larger federally funded study on heart disease risk. The participants lived in Chicago, Minneapolis, Birmingham, Ala., and Oakland, Calif. They were asked in 2005-2006 about their commuting habits in the past 12 months. Read the rest of this entry »

Looking to make a change and lose some weight? I have reviewed the top diet on the internet and you can go and read over 200 comments people have made about why this diet has worked well for them, as well as some of the problems.

Tags: Alabama, Archives of Internal Medicine, Birmingham, California, Chapel Hill, Chicago, heart disease, James Sallis, Minneapolis, North Carolina, Oakland, obesity, Oregon, Penny Gordon-Larsen, Portland, San Diego State University, United States, University of North Carolina

Here is a great story from the associated press. An 88 yerar old lady that loves to do Triathalons:

88-year-old woman loves triathlons despite aches and pains

The Associated Press
An 88-year-old Madison, Wisconsin, woman is gearing up for her 12th triathlon.

Mary Stroebe (stroh’ bee) plans to run in the Life Time Fitness triathlon in Minneapolis next month.

Marilyn Franzen is the director the athletic events for Life Time Fitness. She says Stroebe has run a truncated version of the three-stage swimming-biking-running race each of the past three years, finishing in under three hours each time.

But it hasn’t been easy for Stroebe. A breast cancer survivor, she was hit by car while biking in 1993, fell off her bike and cut her hand during the 2003 Life Time and broke her leg this past January skiing.

Stroebe says she doesn’t realize how old she is and still thinks she’s young.

Who says that you are too old, too unhealthy, have bad genes, are too fat, eat too much, are a binger, have bad knees (my running excuse). You can always make the first step to getting into shape

Tags: aches, breast cancer, breast cancer survivor, director the athletic events for Life Time Fitness, life time fitness, Madison, Marilyn Franzen, Mary Stroebe, Minneapolis, triathalons, triathlon, Wisconsin

A couple years ago my wife was considering weight loss surgery as her years off dieting and exercise and the yoyo weight loss/gain nightmare had mad her tired of the whole weight loss industry. Using Weight Watchers and getting the exercise to a more moderate lvel have helped Michelle lose three pounds or so per week and she is quickly dropping the weight that was so stubborn just a couple of years back. Yesterday Michelle got a call for the gastric bypass surgery consultation which here in Alberta Canada takes 19 months, I am happy to say that she turned it down because a healthy lifestyle has maed the difference for her. As you probably know there are a lot of instances where this surgery is really helpful for people but only in cases where there is a risk of imminent death by now doing something as drastic as this surgery is.

I have found an article from Bloomberg that I think really shows the importance of this surgery and the possible implications. Below are some exerpts from that article.
Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: American Medical Association, arthritis, associate professor, back surgery, bariatric surgeries, bariatric surgery, Bloomberg, Bruce M. Wolfe, California, David R. Flum, David S. Zingmond, diabetes, food, Gastric bypass, gastric bypass surgery, GBP, health care services, heart surgery, high blood pressure, hip replacement, insurance, John M. Morton, Journal of the American Medical Association, knee surgery, lead researcher, Los Angeles, Medicare, Michelle Fay Cortez, Minneapolis, obesity, obesity surgery, Oregon Health Science University in Portland, plastic surgery, Portland, professor of medicine, professor of surgery, reporter, Seattle, Stanford University in California, surgeries, surgery, UCLA's School of Medicine, United States, University of California at Los Angeles, University of Washington in Seattle, weight loss surgery