Hope you've had a great summer so far!  I have…

My birthday was last week and I have a Luau every year to celebrate.  Boy it was a good one this year!

It's great to get together with friends and family and celebrate but you know what that inevitably means… eating and drinking a lot of great-tasting food that isn't so great for your waistline!  Here are a few pictures from the night:

Now that it's over, it's time to get back into a healthy mindset.  And Athlon client, Nancy Loe, sent me an interesting article out of the New York Times last week about exercise that you should know about.

Exercise Makes You Smarter!

What goes on inside your brain when you exercise?  The New York times reported on some interesting new research on that topic.

First, it has been thought for years that you were born with a certain number of brain cells and that's all you we're ever going to have.  "Better take care of 'em 'cause that's all you get," I was told in high school and college biology classes.

But In the late 1990s, Dr. Fred Gage and his colleagues at the Laboratory of Genetics at the Salk Institute in San Diego elegantly proved that human and animal brains produce new brain cells (a process called neurogenesis) and that exercise increases neurogenesis

Yes!  The brains of mice and rats that were allowed to run on wheels "pulsed with vigorous, newly born neurons, and those animals then breezed through mazes and other tests of rodent I.Q., showing that neurogenesis improves thinking."

How this happens is what the New York times article is all about, which you can read here:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/07/your-brain-on-exercise/?em&exprod=myyahoo

I'll spare you the details for now other than to tell you that your brain is packed with adult stem cells which given the right stimulus divide and differentiate into either additional stem cells or baby neurons.

As we age these stem cells become less active, less nimble, "older" because of a certain chemical called BMP.  And yes, you guessed it, exercise encourages other chemicals that inhibit this BMP and hence encourage stem cell activity.  In Dr. Gage's laboratory, mice given access to running wheels had 50% less BMP-related brain activity within a week.  Here's the study:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19841742

Now it is still not clear how much exercise one must do to stimulate this neurogenisis but it is clear that you "have to do something."  Possibly "even a fairly short period" of exercise produces results, says Dr. Gage.

So, if you want to become smarter and you want to finish out this summer with an amazingly fit body come into Athlon Elite today and get your training in.  As our governor used to say,

"a day missed can never be made up."

And now a day missed may even make you more dense!

If you're not already a member/client of Athlon's call us today and take advantage of your FREE fitness and nutrition consultation (an $85 value):  (805) 440-0215.  We'll get you started right!!!.

During this consult, you'll receive detailed information on how to get fit that's tailored to YOUR body.

This means that you'll be on the path to burning fat, getting the slim body you've always wanted and actually becoming smarter in no time at all.

There's no obligation and it's totally and completely free. To sign up, click here.

Until next time,

Ryan

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