​Wine and beer have some health benefits, but alcohol can also have detrimental effects on weight loss and muscle growth.  Other than empty calories and reduced will power, alcohol also effects your hormones, your quality of sleep, protein synthesis (needed to build muscle) and fat burning.
 
So can you drink alcohol and still lose weight?

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Or should you even do cardio at all? 

Some say the answer is simple, I say, it depends on your goals. 

When we exercise we either perform aerobic or anaerobic exercise, and often, a blend of the two.  We also either use our fast twitch muscle, slow twitch muscles, or a combination of both.   These variables will effect our results, and deciding upon performing cardio before or after lifting (or not at all) is a choice that could make a difference to help us achieve our goals.​
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If you have one single goal, to increase muscle mass, then yes, the simple answer would be to do cardio separately from lifting, or maybe not at all.  But what if your goal is not so singular; ie. gain muscle mass while losing fat?  Then you need to analyse the pros and cons for each approach. 

Chronic inflammation wreaks havoc on the body, contributing to fatigue, depression, weight gain and many diseases.  Insulin, sex hormones (estrogen, progesterone, testosterone) and cortisol play big roles in how the body controls inflammation.  So how to you control these hormones?

​​You have goals and train for them, so make sure that you have the best pre, post (and perhaps peri) workout nutrition to help you achieve your goals. 

We have all taken some kind of pain reliever to help us recover from an injury, get though a grueling workout, or perhaps even prepare us to face another one; but what if doing so can actually delay healing, halt muscle growth and cause unwanted side effects? 

​Should you be taking them?  If so, what should you look for?
 
Branched Chain Amino Acids, or BCAA’s have been shown to help prevent the breakdown of muscle during intense exercise, preserve muscle while fasting or on a low carb diet, ameliorate protein synthesis to help build muscle, and may even help reduce DOMS after training.  So what exactly are they?

​Ask my kids what my favourite vegetable is, and they will tell you broccoli.  I call it the wonder food and preach its glory in an attempt to get them to love broccoli as much as I do; sadly, to no avail! 

​If I’m being 100% honest, taste wise, broccoli is not my favourite vegetable, but I eat it almost daily as I truly believe it when I call it a wonder food and know how many benefits it has.  

​Build muscle, lose fat, and improve endurance:
 
Cardio has its place, steady state, HIIT, Zone 2; I love to do them all and reap benefits from them all.  Its what people think of first when they think about loosing fat.  While cardio can definitely help, I am also a big believer in Metabolic Conditioning and make sure to schedule it into my training program every week.  I know that it will help me stay lean by burning calories and increasing my Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR) (read more: Metabolism: Can You Change It?), improve my cardiovascular endurance, and build muscle at the same time.  

​Cardio used to be simple; the most complicated decision you had to make was which machine you preferred.  But it turns out that cardio is not a one-size-fits-all approach and should be tailored to each individual and their goals.   
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Learn about the different kinds of cardio and how to include them in your training regime. 

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​Insulin: how do we control it to to our advantage?
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​I first learned about insulin when I read a book called Sugar Busters shortly after it was originally published in 1995.  I have to admit, it changed my whole perception of food, what I put into my body as fuel, and helped shape my path towards a fit lifestyle.  It taught me the basics of how insulin is produced, how it acts within our bodies and how to control it in order to not gain body fat. 
 
Skip forward about 20 years and I still control my insulin daily, however I now also know how to use it to help me build muscle.  With correct nutrition, insulin can help you control your body fat, as well as enhance muscle gain. ​

​There has been a lot of talk over the last few years about the fat burning potential of doing cardio in a fasted state.  There are a few questions that should come to mind when considering this as an option:

• What exactly is fasted (vs fed)?
• Why is fasted cardio beneficial for fat loss?
• What about fasted weight training?
• How much difference can it actually make?
• What are the potential downsides?
• Considering the pros and cons, is there a better way?

​What we use to fuel our bodies can either enhance all our fitness efforts in order to help us achieve our body composition goals, or it can render all our hard work redundant.  In-depth nutrition analyses can get complicated, even confusing, so here is an overview of the basics you need to know to get started.