Random Thoughts....

.....on a holiday weekend.

• Happy July 4th every one. Doesn't seem like July 4th does it? Not when it rains 21 days during the month of June and then the first two days of July. I'm never one to be bothered by weather, but this is getting ridiculous. I feel tired constantly. I guess I now know what seasonal affective disorder is. And I think my dog, Fenway, has it to.
• I've been on the road the last month or so traveling to weddings and bachelor parties. Having a great time. Drinking a couple of beers here and there. And actually eating pretty well. Being on the road is no excuse to let your normal eating habits go to hell. There's much better options now at airports and rest stops. You don't have to rely on McDonald's or on Sbarros. But even if you did, I'm sure you could find fairly decent options there. Plus you can always prepare beforehand and bring along your own sandwich or may be some protein powder to mix up. If you're on the road and eating bad, I'm going to say it's because you chose to. It's not because you do not have other options.
• I think the next thing you'll start hearing about in regards to sports drinks is coconut water. I read something about it a couple of weeks ago. It's better than any sports drink out on the market right now. It has more electrolytes than any other sports drink and one serving has 15 times more potassium than a banana. And it's all natural. I ran into a sales rep today from Zico, one of the few companies that's distributing coconut water right now. He gave me a sample to try it out and says I could find it at at Whole foods. After trying it, I think I may have to go pick up myself a case. It's a bit more expensive than Gatorade or Vitamin water, but it's also a lot less toxic. It has 4 ingredients: coconut water, citric acid, natural orange and passion fruit flavors. Not the 20 ingredients you'd find on other sports drinks. The fewer the ingredients, the better.
• Every day in the gym I get a few chuckles from watching what ridiculous things people are doing. But yesterday topped any thing I've ever seen before. Nothing makes my eyes roll more than listening to guys talk about how much they can leg press. It tells me two things. They are to lazy to learn how to squat correctly and they are not getting enough attention at home. So yesterday I watched this guy who's about 150lbs and has forearms that are thicker than his legs load up the leg press. Not five plates on each side. Not nine plates on each side. I think there actually 12 plates on each side. Then he had to throw a 5lb plate on each end to top it off. If you had seen his earlier sets, this guy had no right to even put three plates on each side. He wasn't even coming a quarter of the way down. So now he has all this weight on and he's telling someone he's going to set a new personal record. He climbs in. He unlocks the safety mechanism. He lowers the weight about a quarter of the way and then unexpectedly that weight keeps coming lower. Crash!! Stapled by the leg press. Thank god he had some decent flexibility or his patella's would have shot across the room. And thank god the safety caught it at the bottom because he would have severed his lower half. "Almost had it", he says. Yeah, sure buddy.
• If you're suffering from low back pain one of the worst things you can do is any type of stretching that involves spinal flexion when you get out of bed in the morning. As you lie down at night, your interverbal discs become hydrated causing a good amount of pressure in your spine when you get out of the bed in the morning. If you take this pressure and add some flexion to it by reaching for your toes or tucking your knees into your chest, you're not helping yourself. Instead wait 1-2 hours after rising out of bed in order to let that intervertebral fluid dissipate causing less pressure through your discs.
• Any chance of some sun tomorrow?