Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Nightmare on Elm Street’s Dinner Table. Thank you, Monsanto!
Just in case you thought it was fine to eat Genetically Modified foods (better identified as “FrankenFoods”), along comes a study which makes it clear that you are eating this make believe non-food at your own peril and, worse yet, you are feeding it to your kids at their peril as well. It is important to note that Codex Alimentarius, which sets standards for the international trade of food, permits genetically modified foods and makes no effort to limit, control or eliminate them. In fact, the US has been trying for years to prevent the labeling of GM foods and seed in international trade to emulate its domestic policy which prohibits any label indication that foods contain GM ingredients, as 75-80% of all foods sold in the US do.
Now it appears that the increasingly prevalent nightmare of a disease called “Morgellon’s Disease” may be a result of GM crops and food.
Morgellon’s Disease was first described when a woman’s 3 year old son developed rashes and intensely itchy sores which produced weird multicolor fibers emerging from his skin. She put up a website about the condition in 2001 and named it “Morgellons Disease” after a 17th century report of a similar affliction.
As it always does, the allopathic community of Western, drug-oriented physicians labeled sufferers as delusional. As a physician, I have a great deal of difficulty explaining how a delusion can produce colored fibers which protrude from the skin and continue to grow in a petri dish. Be that as it may, the multicolored fibers produced by the “delusion” have been analyzed and we now know that Morgellon’s Disease is no longer rare, nor is it mysterious any longer. A study of the fibers shows that they contain DNA from both a fungus and a bacterium which are used in the commercial preparation of genetically modified foods and non-food crops (such as cotton). The fibers themselves are primarily cellulose, which the human body cannot breakdown or manufacture. So GM technology apparently has, like Professor Frankenstein, found a way to animate the non living. These fibers twist and twine, grow and divide. In short, living beneath the skin of people, they form parasitic lesions out of what should be non-living material but which, through the horror of genetic modification, has taken on the characteristics of a living thing.
The symptoms are so unbearable that a number of people suffering from the disorder have committed suicide rather than deal with the unbearable pain, constant feeling of something very much like an insect crawling without stop beneath the skin and unbearable itching any longer. Of course, it is possible to speculate that the attitude of most physicians that the condition is a mental aberration rather than a physical one may not have helped these poor souls to cope with their affliction.
How wide spread is Morgellon’s Disease? Some registries have 1200 or more people but these registrants only represent those who have access to the internet and have stumbled across the registry sites. The disease produces material unlike anything most people have ever seen. Morgellon's fibers (http://www.morgellons.org/) and
These pictures show fibers removed from lesions on the skin of Morgellon’s Disease sufferers.
No picture, however, can show you the insects crawling under my skin day and night torment of the victims. Frighteningly, some researchers say that every person they have tested has some level of Morgellon’s type pathology in their skin.
If the hypothesis is accurate and the disease is caused by sowing, growing and eating FrankenFood, that would, however, make sense. 75-80 % of all US food contains unlabeled GM ingredients. We have no enzymes or other mechanisms to digest these unnatural components of the materials which the FDA says are the same as food and prohibits labeling of. We have no way of getting rid of the indigestible, toxic or even lethal materials injected into the nucleus of our food by high energy guns and biochemical tricks that nature never thought of.

Monday, August 30, 2010

Split Jerk
1-1-1-1-1

Nice job Cindy ... 105lbs! Way to go!


This video is from the mainsite of Dave Lipson working up to a 500lb back squat. Oh Yeah! But I'm not sure what would happen to the "spotter" if that 500lbs came tumbling down :)

Wednesday, August 25, 2010


"Cardiorespiratory endurance, stamina, strength, power, speed, balance, flexibility, agility, accuracy, coordination... you are only as strong as your weakest link"
Coach Greg Glassman

Monday, August 23, 2010

work your cleans

2MU
10RPU
10PU
20GHDSU
20GHBE

3rounds for time thanks Sunday Funday

Arthritis Pinned to Nutrition in Childhood and Beyond
Moose study supports evidence from human populations; Findings suggest that the standard American diet generates joint problems
by Craig Weatherby

Click for full story and printer friendly version
We were bemused – because moose are inherently funny – then intrigued by a report in The New York Times, titled “Moose Offer Trail of Clues on Arthritis”.
 
New and prior research covered in the article assigns partial blame for arthritis to the standard American diet … which is already linked to everything from diabetes, cancer, and dementia to heart disease and obesity.
 
The news reported in the article is that a 50-year research project among the moose of Canada’s Isle Royale finds that the animals with osteoarthritis were put at greater risk by poor nutrition early in life (Peterson RO et al. 2010).
 
The scientists involved say their findings may help explain human osteoarthritis, for which clear risk factors have remained elusive ... even thought it is the most common type, afflicting one out of every seven adults.
 
What makes the moose study especially significant is that it dovetails with evidence from human populations that have suffered sharp declines in nutrition, followed by rises in rates of osteoarthritis.
 
That could mean that some people’s arthritis can be linked in part to nutritional deficits in the womb, childhood, and adolescence.
 
And, according to some scientists the Times spoke to, nutritional quality through adulthood may continue to affect arthritis risk.
 
Human history suggests poor nutrition as a key risk factor
Even more than the moose report, three passages in the Times article stood out to us (Belluck P 2010):
  • “Bones of 16th-century American Indians in Florida and Georgia showed significant increases in osteoarthritis after Spanish missionaries arrived and tribes adopted farming, increasing their workload but also shifting their diet from fish and wild plants to corn … similar patterns occurred when an earlier American Indian population in the Midwest began farming maize [corn].”
  • “British scientists studying people born in the 1940s found low birth weight (indicating poor prenatal nutrition) linked to osteoarthritis in the men’s hands.”
  • “… Dr. David Barker, a British expert on how nutrition and early development influence cardiac and other conditions, said ‘studies of people [who were] in utero [still in the womb] during the Great Chinese Famine’ of the late 1950s found that ‘40, 50 years later, those people [developed arthritic] disabilities.’”
Interestingly, the Times spoke with a veterinarian who said she saw ‘abnormal joint and tendon development from excessive nutrition’ in horses overfed ‘in utero or in the postnatal life,’ probably ingesting ‘too much of the wrong type of sugar that may cause levels of inflammation.’”
 
Excess sugar degrades joints and skin
That finding fits perfectly with the fact that excess dietary sugar of any kind promotes inflammation and a process called “protein glycation”. (We do not know why the vet said “wrong types of sugar”, because they’re all unhealthful when eaten in excess.)
 
Protein glycation yields compounds called advanced glycation end products or AGEs, which generate free radicals that attack joint and other connective tissue cells.
 
Sugar-driven protein glycation also causes “cross-linking” of the collagen fibers that constitute cartilage and other connective tissues, including skin. Collagen cross-linking stiffens cartilage and makes it less resilient. (Antioxidants found in grape skin/seeds and pine bark – called OPCs or pycnogenol – can help prevent cross-linking.)
 
Genes likely play a role
Of course, as in all things biological there is more to arthritis risk than diet.
 
As the Times wrote, paraphrasing orthopedic surgeon Dr. Peter Bales from the University of California, “Much is unknown about nutrition’s relevance. Isle Royale moose, for example, also seem to have genetic predispositions for arthritis, suggesting that nutrition might be amplifying or jump-starting the genes.” (Belluck P 2010)
 
It’s no doubt true that genes play a role in risk for osteoarthritis.
 
But since we don’t know which genes help or hurt, or who has them at birth, it only makes sense to get all Americans on a better diet … from childhood on.
 
Dr. David Felson, an arthritis expert at Boston University School of Medicine, made this cogent comment:  “It would be helpful to know if we want to make sure pregnant moms are taking certain vitamins or if you need to supplement with such and such nutrition.” (Belluck P 2010)
 
Given that we know that omega-3s are important to bones, the article in today’s issue concerning the lack of them in toddler’s diets is even more cause for alarm.
 
 
Sources
  • Belluck P. Moose Offer Trail of Clues on Arthritis. The New York Times. August 16, 2010. Accessed at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/health/research/17moose.html
  • Peterson RO, Vucetich JA, Fenton G, , Drummer TD, Larsen CS. Ecology of arthritis. Ecol Lett. 2010 Jul 7. [Epub ahead of print]

Sunday, August 22, 2010

"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds"
Albert Einstein

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

5 rounds for time:

500m run
10 ring dips
10 OVHS 95/65

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

WallBall Fran

21-15-9

Wallball shots
Pull ups

Monday, August 16, 2010

 max shoulder press
 max push press

Friday, August 13, 2010

Kaine Kong

AMRAP in 4 minutes:

1 Deadlift  295/195
2 Muscle ups
3 HSPU
4 Burpies
immediately after the four minutes:
Run 500m
Rest 3 minutes repeat for a total of 3 rounds!

Term of the Day

GPP...

If you have been paying attention this week you would have heard Tom throw out the term GPP several times. Do you remember what it stands for?

General Physical Preparedness

If your goal is optimum physical competence then all the general physical skills must be considered. There are ten ...do you remember them? Better review... test on Monday! :)

A good GPP program will improve all these skills and therefore raise your general fitness level preparing you for the unknown and unknowable.


" Strong people are harder to kill than weak people... and more useful in general"

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Short but not so Sweet!

5 rounds:

Sprint 50 m
10 Wallball shots to 10 ft target

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Yeah, this ones a good one :)

5 Rounds:

10 DB Burpies
10 DB Push up rows
10 DB Lunges
10 DB Squats

Rest 3 min
Row/run 500 m

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Life is not a Spectator Sport

           
We are constantly being warned to check with our physicians before beginning athletics. Play and games evidently can be risky business. What we are not told are the risks of not beginning athletics-that the most dangerous sport of all is watching it from the stands.
           The weakest among us can become some kind of athlete, but only the strongest can survive as spectators. Only the hardiest can withstand the perils of inertia, inactivity, and immobility. Only the most resilient can cope with the squandering of time, the deterioration in fitness, the loss of creativity, the frustration of emotions, and the dulling of moral sense that can afflict the dedicated spectator.
           Physiologists have suggested that only those who can pass the most rigorous physical examination can safely follow the sedentary life. Man was not made to remain at rest. Inactivity is completely unnatural to the body. And what follows is a breakdown of the body's equilibrium.
           When the beneficial effects of activity on the heart and circulation and indeed on all the body's systems are absent, everything measurable begins to go awry.
           Up goes the girth of the waist and the body weight. Up goes blood pressure and heart rate. Up goes cholesterol and triglycerides. Up goes everything you would like to go down and down everything you would like to go up. Down goes vital capacity and oxygen consumption. Down goes flexibility and efficiency, stamina and strength. Fitness fast becomes a memory.
           The seated spectator is not a thinker, he is a knower. Unlike the athlete who is still seeking his own experience, who leaves himself open to truth, the spectator has closed the ring. His thinking has become rigid knowing. He has enclosed himself in bias and partisanship and prejudice. He has ceased to grow.
           And it is growth he needs most to handle the emotions thrust upon him, emotions he cannot act out in any satisfactory way. He is , you see, an incurable distance from the athlete and participation in the effort is the athlete's release, the athlete's catharsis. He is watching people who have everything he wants and cannot get. They are having all the fun: the fun of playing, the fun of winning, even the fun of losing. They are having the physical exhaustion which is the quickest way to fraternity and equality, the exhaustion which permits you to be not only a good winner but a good loser.
           Because the spectator cannot experience what the athlete is experiencing, the fan is seldom a good loser. The emphasis on winning is therefore much more of a problem for the spectator than the athlete. The losing fan, filled with emotions which have no healthy outlet, is likely to take it out on his neighbor, the nearest inanimate object, the umpires, the stadium or the game itself. It is easier to dry out a drunk, take someone off hard drugs or watch a three-pack-a-day smoker go cold turkey than live with a fan during a long losing streak.
           Should a spectator pass all these physical and mental and emotional tests, he still has another supreme challenge to his integrity. He is part of a crowd, part of a mob. He is with those the coach in The Games called, "The nothingmen, those oafs in the stands filling their bellies." And when someone is in a crowd, out go his individual standards of conduct and morality. He acts in concert with his fellow spectators and descends two or three rungs on the evolutionary ladder. He slips backward down the development tree.
           From the moment you become a spectator, everything is downhill.

Nolan / Tom Concoction!!

2 rounds for time:

24 Deadlifts 295/195
24 Box jumps 24"
21 Floor Presses
21 Ring Push ups
18 T2B
18 GHSU
then:
15 Burpies

Monday, August 9, 2010

California Dreamin...

Tom and I recently attended the Coaches Prep Course in San Diego. We had top notch instructors, group sizes were small, and most of the participants were coaches as well. A lot of great ideas were exchanged and we can't wait to share them! Oh and yes that is Chris Spealler , 3rd fittest man in the world, sitting beside me!

After many grueling hours at the course we headed to the beach! For...


some handstand fun...



some crazy stretches...


a little body surfing...

and new friends... new discoveries (I'm holding a purple jelly fish!)

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Party Time!!!

Badlands CrossFit Potluck Party!!
Bring your family! Bring your friends!

Where:  Tom and Christy's:  40 Red Deer Drive or call 403-979-1789
Time:    5:00 pm or whenever you can get there!

Saturday, August 7, 2010

EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it!

We have hired a top notch developer from down East to put together a software program for us. This program will allow you to learn about our classes and register for them online. Payment for the classes will continue to be at the gym...
See Patsy

Now for the real exciting part... once you log in, you will have access to an online WOD journal.  This is your own personal journal-- accessible only to you. Your coach will be able to view your progress and add comments. You can make entries into your journal wherever you have access to a computer. So whether you are surfing in Nicaragua or coaching some crazy hockey team in Dallas you can enter your work outs and your coach can track/comment on your progress. Cool eh?

So... log in (click on the calendar) and mess around with it ... give us your feed back! Be patient... some links are not available yet... it still is under construction. We hope to have it fully functional by September. Oh, if you have not logged in and tried it out by the end of next week... burpies and lots of them :)
*** remember your username and password***

This is only one of the many new exciting things that are happening at Badlands Underground.... stay tuned!


Go Boatin Fool!

Friday, August 6, 2010

Party and Play Time!!

Badlands CrossFit Potluck Party!!

When:   Sunday, August 8th
Where:  At Tom and Christy's: 40 Red Deer Drive or call 403-979-1789 for directions
Time:    5:00 pm or whenever you can get there!

Met Puke

Wall Balls 15
HSPU 5
SHDP 15
T2B 5
AMRAP 15 mins
 Finish with a 500meter run or row

Thursday, August 5, 2010

How Does Heavy Sound?

Good
Max weight Milk Farmers Carry 15meters
1111111
use buckets or Bar Bell

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Push Press

Front Squat

21/15/9

pick a weight that enables you to almost go unbroken then go unbroken