Something to be aware of as we enter the holiday season: You may not be the person you think you are. Or more to the point, you may be more of a person than you think you are.
A study in the December issue of Obstetrics & Gynecology reports that of 2,224 women taking part in an assessment of “perceptions of body weight and weight-related behaviors,” just one in four considered themselves overweight. In fact, when the 2,224 women had their BMI calculated, 1,162 — that’s over half — surpassed the BMI’s overweight barrier of 25. (Curiously, of the 1,062 women who were normal weight, 16 percent perceived themselves as being overweight.)read more
Sunday, I returned from Colorado where I noticed more people riding bikes, more people hiking and walking than they do here in North Carolina. I also noticed that there was a whole let less of the people there than there is of the folks here. Hmm, I wondered. Is there a connection?read more
From the research world comes more incentive to stay active — or become so — as you age.
From the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University comes “preliminary evidence” that keeping your brain sharp can help you physically. Einstein researchers took a group of 20 “frail” seniors (age 70 or older who walk less than a meter per second) and divided them into two groups. Ten went about their normal routines, 10 participated in the MindFit brain fitness program: For 45 to 60 minutes a day, three days a week for eight weeks, they carried out tasks that honed their cognitive abilities: focusing, planning, organizing, problem solving. After eight weeks, the MindFit folks walked slightly faster, but their ability to walk and talk at the same time improved significantly.read more
Back in the spring, Andy Cole would have been happy to just keep up with his 5-year-old and almost 2-year-old at the local playground, let alone squat-lift 285 pounds and run two miles without stopping.read more