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Speed at which glucose is absorbed into the bloodstream.

Low GI is best for diabetes and fat loss

High GI is best for athletes to store glycogen post exercise

Some examples

In carbohydrates/plants and there are two types

Soluble Fibre helps to lower blood cholesterol levels and includes fruits,veggies,oat bran, barley psyllium lentils, peas, soy milk and soy product.

Insoluble Fibre adds bulk to faeces prevent constipation and problems such as haemorrhoids and includes wheat, corn, rice, bran fruit and vegetable skins, nuts seeds dried beans and wholegrain foods.

There is a lot of conjecture as to whether you should restrict your intake of these nutrients, as mentioned earlier the recommended daily intake of carbohydrates is less than 100 grams. However it all depends on what your goals are as to what amounts of carbohydrates you need.

If you are building muscle you need to engage in a vigorous strength training program, this requires a lot of energy and the best source is carbohydrate. A diet dense in carbohydrates aids the recovery of muscle glycogen stores on a daily basis. Research has shown that carbohydrate dense diets give strength trained athletes the edge they need in their workouts, and it is true to say that the harder you train the more muscle you can build,of course you also need adequate rest and sleep.

If you are in a sedentary occupation, a little overweight and planning to shed some then the best advice would be to restrict your levels to the minimum and also adhere to the recommended levels of protein and fat. The first step for someone who is looking to lose weight is to reduce the calories intake from carbohydrates.

The best type of carbohydrates comes from unrefined whole foods such as fruits, vegetable, legumes and whole grains. You should stay away from processed foods such as sugar, corn syrup, white flour, commercially baked goods (some breads are good) packaged foods and alcohol.

Most of the important nutrients such as fiber have been taken from processed foods hence you can eat greater quantities of this type of food without feeling full a factor that leads to weight gain. In general try to eat foods that come straight from the ground so to speak,

Should you steer clear of or be worried about eating pasta, rice, or bread?  The answer is no, the key however is to eat a variety of whole-carbohydrate foods like beans , whole grains, fruits and vegetables in addition to pasta, rice or bread.

Another debate that will ebb on into eternity is whether insulin and carbohydrates are the bad guys when it comes to body fat, lets just say that calories from all sources and poor diet planning are the major culprits.

Don’t forget that you gain body fat when you make poor choices and consume more calories than you burn, it’s that simple.

• Energy
• Insulation
• Cushioning
• Protection

Trans fat is the worst type of fat, it is used in foods to extend the shelf life, avoid this type of fat in your daily eating.

For health – it is recommended to have 0.8-1.1grams per kg of body weight per day.

In training up to 1.8 grams per kg is recommended however no organization will state a healthy upper limit.

Some examples (cooked)

1/2 chicken breast 80grams = 22 grams

Fillet steak 80 grams = 23 grams

Sardine 35 grams = 9 grams

Canned tuna 100 grams = 29 grams

Walnuts 30 grams = 7 grams

Follow the grams per day guidelines and check that in percentages as follows

Fats 20-30%

Carbohydrates 45-60%

Protein 15-30%

The pyramid below used here with permission from oldwayspt.org, is a snapshot of a healthy, traditional Mediterranean diet, of Greece in particular Crete, and southern Italy circa 1960, built on current nutrition research. These regions and this time period has been chosen because for the following:

The rates of chronic diseases were among the lowest in the world and life expectancy was among the highest for these populations at that time, notwithstanding limited medical services.

The availability of data describing the type food consumption patterns of the areas at that time;

The representation of dietary patterns revealed by the data and current understanding of optimal nutrition based on universal medical studies and clinical trial.

Harvard studies have shown that people who followed a Mediterranean Diet had dramatic reduction in death rates among those who used the diet’s guidelines.  The reduction is mainly attributed to the high percentage of heart healthy monounsaturated fats from olive oil and nuts.  These foods rather than raising cholesterol and damaging blood vessels with the build up of plaque can lower bad cholesterol in the blood.

The participants following the Mediterranean diet in the study did not necessarily lose weight suggesting that these benefits are not directly related to obesity.  If your are interested in weight loss also, the New Mediterranean Diet puts the same emphasis on the staples of the Mediterranean Diet while teaching you to maintain a healthy weight PERMANENTLY.

Mediterranean olive oil is also rich in antioxidant phyto-nutrients. These “plant”-nutrients protect the body from harmful free radicals which can damage cells throughout the body. The damage can lead to plaques within the arteries, cancers, diabetes, arthritis, and many other diseases.  These nutrients work together with vitamins and minerals to prevent damage by free radicals, thus it is important to eat a variety of whole foods in various combinations to help prevent free radical damage.

Whole grains are another category of foods important in the Mediterranean Diet.  Many popular diets such as the Atkins Diet prohibit carbohydrate consumption however in the Mediterranean Diet they are at the very base of the pyramid.  The key point is that these grains need to be WHOLE grains and not refined white-flour foods.

Processing whole grains into white flour based products takes out all of the beneficial nutrients and fiber. Eating refined carbohydrates such as white bread, white rice and sweets raises your blood sugar and causes surges insulin.  In the short term, insulin eventually causes your sugar to drop again leading to hunger and overeating.  But in the long term it causes your body to become resistant to insulin increasing your risk of diabetes.

Whole grains boost your metabolism and are absorbed slowly thus control blood sugar reducing your risk of insulin resistance and diabetes.  The fiber in WHOLE grains slows cholesterol absorption and lowers blood fat levels.  When buying whole grain products look for whole grain or whole wheat as the first ingredient.  Try to pick products with the highest amount of dietary fiber per serving. Keep in mind that whole grains like other carbohydrates are still high in calories so they still need to be eaten in moderation.

The rule of thumb is 1 litre for every 25 kg of body weight plus 1litre for every hour of exercise.

Label Hints when shopping for food

• Fat : Less than 10 grams per 100 grams
• Sugar: Less than 10 grams per 100 grams

Watch sodium levels, the lower the better particularly for those with high blood pressure.

The following information was taken from an article in the Sydney Morning Herald Thursday September 16, 2010, it contains some important implications so please take a minute to read and absorb its contents. (Please note that only relevant parts were taken not the complete article)

By Jane Brody

Why, when I weigh the same as or less than I did when I was younger, does my waist keep getting bigger? is a common lament by the middle aged. Put another way, the question could be: “Why, when my body mass index has not changed am I fatter than I was?”

The simple answer is that the BMI is a crude measure of fatness. Calculated by dividing a person’s weight in kilogram’s by the square of their height in metres, it doesn’t differentiate between fatty and lean tissue.  Fat takes up about four times the space of muscle tissue, so it is quite possible to look and feel fatter even if your height and weight remain the same.

Degree of body fatness is a better way than body mass to classify individuals. The World Health Organisation and the National Institutes of Health define obesity as more than 25 per cent body fat in men and more than 35 per cent body fat in women.

Dr. Carl Lavie, a cardiologist a the Ochsner Heart and Vascular Insitiute in New Orleans, says therefore ” a woman who is 165 centimetres and weighs 54.4 kiolgrams could be quite fat, even though her weight and BMI seem OK”.

Among Americans in general, he said, “A 183-centimetre, 113.4 kilogram man will be obese, but if he were an NFL (football player) of 190 centimetres weighing 127 kilograms he might be solid muscle with only 2 per cent body fat.”

In an editorial in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings, Lavie and colleagues discussed what has been called the “obesity paradox” among patience with heart failure. The paradox refers to the repeated findings that while overweight people are more prone to heart failure, patients with heart failure have lower mortality rates if they are obese. The reason for this paradox is far from clear, although Lavie suggested that one explanation could be that once people become ill, having more bodily “reserve” could be to their advantage. The editorial was prepared in response to a report in the same journal by Antoine Oreopoulos of the University of Alberta, and her colleagues. The authors compared the BMI of 140 heart failure patients with a more accurate although more involved measure of fat using DEXA scan ( for dual energy X-ray absorptiometry).  They found that BMI value alone misclassified the degree of body fatness in 41 per cent of patients.

Their findings? Having more lean tissue and less fat may more accurately predict a patients survival chances.  Thus among patients with heart failure “BMI may not be a good indicator of adiposity.”

The article said: “Although BMI is the most common method to define over weight and obesity in epidemiological studies and major clinical trails, clearly this method does not necessarily reflect true body fatness, and BMI/body fatness may differ considerably among people of different age, race and sex.”

A more reliable, but still relatively simple, assessment of fatness would rely on a skin- fold score based on measurements taken with a calliper at several areas (in men, the thigh, mid chest, and abdomen and in women, the thigh, triceps and area above the hip bone). Or since abdominal fat is more hazardous, simply take a tape measure around the widest part of the abdomen and another at the hips and calculate the waist to hip ratio. For men it should be no higher than 0.90, and for women , 0.83.

An oversize abdomen is symptomatic of too much metabolically active visceral fat, which increases the risk of heart attack and premature death.  If just waist measurements are used, Lavie said. a man’s waist should be less than 101.6 centimetres and a women’s less than 89 centimetres. Exercise is the best way to minimise an age related rise in body fat, the doctor said. Aerobic exercise is not enough. You must also do weight training to build and maintain muscle. The New York Times

Waist to Hip Ratio (WHR)

1. This test is to determine the ratio of waist circumference to the hip circumference, as this has been shown to be related to the risk of coronary heart disease.
2. It is a simple calculation of  the waist girth divided by the hip girth.
3. The table below shows guidelines for acceptable levels for hip to waist ratio.

1. Building healthier and stronger bones by increasing the bone mineral density
2. Heart health improves due to the increase in blood flow
3. Reduces the chances of developing diabetes as it significantly lowers blood sugar levels
4. You will keep your body young as it wards of reduction in your fast and slow twitch muscle fibres.
5. Helps you stay in shape by increasing muscle and reducing the flab, makes a big difference to self esteem if your clothes fit you well.
6. You burn more calories as it elevates metabolism for long periods after exercise.
7. Weight training has proven to be more valuable than other forms of exercise for fat loss.
8. Helps cut the risk of developing cancer.
9. Keeps you in a happy state of mind as you feel and look better, helps alleviate symptoms of depression.
10. Helps increase muscle strength and endurance.
11. Increases flexibility as encourages full range of movement of the joints.
12. Increases oxygen uptake.
13. Reduces total body fat percentage
14. Lowers HDL and increases LDL
15. Helps lower blood pressure
16. Reduces your resting heart rate
17. Helps you sleep better
18. Refreshes your mind and keeps you sharp
19. Helps you become more productive at work and play
20. Keeps you focused on the task at hand by helping you stick to sustainable exercise and nutrition plan.

• Scapula   Retract as if you are squeezing a lemon between the blades
• Neck        Eyes directed at the horizon, chest up
• Hip           Pull Belly button to spine
• Knees      Slight bend at all times
• Feet         Hip to shoulder width apart

Stabilise Pelvis to protect it from injury

Encourages the natural curve of the spine

Protects the lumbar spine

Always remember not to lock out a joint whilst performing any exercise as this places stress on the joint/s being used. For example if you are doing squats do not straighten your legs fully on ascension.