That's Fit

Curious to know how celebrities squeeze fitness into their daily lives? Want to know the secrets of the stars? Bi-weekly our That's Fit fitness expert Fitz sits down with the celebs we want to know more about, and digs out their great and not-so-great methods to staying healthy.

I recently had the opportunity to spend time with Shane "Scooter" Christensen of the World Famous Harlem Globetrotters. Now, when handed the opportunity to pick the brain of a Globetrotter....I had to learn some skills! Cause quite frankly, when it comes to basketball....I have none. Well, I had none until I met Scooter. Now I know how to dunk.

Curious to know how celebrities squeeze fitness into their daily lives? Want to know the secrets of the stars? Bi-weekly our That's Fit fitness expert Fitz sits down with the celebs we want to know more about, and digs out their great and not-so-great methods to staying healthy.

This week I got to sit down on a beautiful sunny day, in The Swamp with the very sweet, smart and athletic ESPN College GameDay Analyst Mr. Kirk Herbstreit. No, we weren't knee deep in mucky water. We were in the heart of Gator Country enjoying the breeze after Kirk completed his workout, running zillions of steps at the University of Florida football stadium, The Swamp. Kirk retired from playing football more than 15 years ago, after four years at quarterback for the Ohio State Buckeyes. But now, he's one of the major faces of college football. Pandemonium strikes college campuses across the country when he -- along with host Chris Fowler and analyst Lee Corso -- set up shop outside the biggest games of each week.

Kirk brings something unique to the team. Every time the GameDay crew heads to the University of Florida, I find more than just the expected crowd of rowdy football fans swarming their booth. There is always an unusual amount of females in a frenzy to get as close a look as possible into Kirk's pretty blue eyes. He's definitely worthy of the attention. From my interaction with Kirk, I think he's a genuinely nice and genuinely thoughtful person. Before we started talking fitness, Kirk shared concerns over all the violence taking place on college campuses. He's a protective father and husband who tries to excel in his career while taking care of his family. He is just plain old sweet! And even though his professional life has been built around sports, he works hard to squeeze in fitness and manage nutritious eating just like the rest of us. Kirk seems to be an expert juggler of life and shares some great tricks for staying fit on the go. He also dishes a few doozies on football.

Fitz: What types of things do you do to stay in shape?

Kirk: It's kind of a lifestyle really. As an athlete I worked out so hard, I could eat anything without paying the price for it. As I got older, I still had that appetite and I was not able to work out as hard as I did when I was playing football. What I really try to do is control my portions, and mix in cardio and strength training workouts four to five days a week. If I can do that, I feel like I'm in a pretty good place. It's just about doing it though!

Fitz: What do you do while you're on the road?

Our nation's states have gotten their grades back for an Anti-smoking Report Card of sorts. It checks their effort to curb the nicotine habit among residents. Maine takes the cake as the #1 state for its anti-smoking efforts.

Thanks to the high excise tax of $2 per pack, plus a series of bans such as no smoking in the workplace, Maine was praised for encouraging people to live healthy lifestyles. Interestingly enough, they also banned the sale of flavored cigarettes and cigars.

New York also had good marks as they work on programs to help people quit smoking. Want to know the states that didn't pass? South Carolina, North Carolina, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, and Virginia received F's on their report card. Having passed no anti-smoking measures and low spending on programs to help smokers quit, it's easy to see why. More information on the results can be found here.

FitSpirit explores the mind-body connection and the intangible benefits we gain from our efforts to stay physically fit.

Do you engage in "fat" talk? Many women do. It's the norm, actually, for women to regularly say negative things about their bodies. Research proves it.

A study from Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina -- home to great white water rafting, by the way -- reveals that "fat talk" is social currency for women. It goes something like this:

"I'm so fat."

"Oh, no, you look great, but my thighs are HUGE."

"YOUR thighs are huge? Look at MINE!"

And so on.

"Fat" talk is not all bad. It creates a solidarity among females. It allows them to open up. It's a way of sharing, disclosing, and receiving reassurance. But wouldn't it be great if we could bond as women without trashing our bodies in the process?

Let's try to minimize our own "fat" talk and see what happens. I predict we'll boost our moods and may even secure a better chance at making healthy choices, perhaps even trimming down.

A positive attitude can do wonders for mental health. So compliment yourself next time you're about to slip into "fat" talk. Surely, you've got a few redeeming qualities you can acknowledge. I know, it seems like bragging, but give a try. I'll go first. I won't tell you about my least favorite body part, although it's tempting. I'll only tell you this: I like my calf muscles. I consider them my best feature, in fact.

That wasn't so hard. Your turn.

FitSpirit explores the mind-body connection and the intangible benefits we gain from our efforts to stay physically fit.

I'm getting the hang of this mind-over-matter thing. You know, that ideal state that is so hard to master at times -- like when I'm running and the urge to quit is so strong. I'd stop in my tracks in an instant if it weren't for finding that right frame of mind that allows me to push on through. Sometimes I don't find that perfect place. Lately, though, I've been doing pretty good -- when it comes to candy anyway.

A big bowl of Halloween candy sits in my kitchen pantry at this very moment. It's a combination of the junk my two little boys begged off our neighbors during trick-or-treat on Wednesday, and it's ooey, gooey, and oh so sweet. There's a little bit of everything in that gigantic orange bowl. There's chocolate, lollipops, chewy candy, hard candy, and lots of sugary gum. And I promise you, despite the temptation that will flutter through my brain on occasion, not one piece of that stuff will pass through my lips. I've been eating Halloween candy every year for as long as I can remember but this year, I just won't do it. It's a mind-over-matter thing.

I haven't eaten sweets since May. The longer I go without indulging, the easier it gets. It's become my personal challenge. Staying away from sugar makes me feel like I'm winning a challenge. And I guess I am. I'm winning a personal health match, and I don't want to get knocked out the game. If I stay focused -- and keep memories of sugar-induced headaches alive -- I won't cave in. The candy is merely matter. My mind is so much more than that. Yours is too. Put it to work and you'll see just how much you can overcome.

Researchers from Penn State discussed at the Experimental Biology Conference in May their own little experimental study, featuring some pasta, some veggies, and some 61 preschoolers. It went like this:

Researchers cooked up two versions of a pasta dish. One was made from a traditional recipe, and the other had pureed broccoli and cauliflower hidden in the sauce. The researchers then served up their creations, along with carrots, applesauce, and milk to the kids at a child care center. It turns out the children liked both versions the same. And guess what? When they ate the veggie pasta, they consumed more vegetables and 17 percent fewer calories.

The moral of the story is this: Slip your kids some extra veggies and they may never know it. The researchers do urge parents to still push not-so-hidden vegetables. Because ultimately, the goal is for kids to eat their veggies -- and like them too.

Milk does a kid's body good, according to a Penn State study concerning American children and their consumption of the dairy drink. Yet the only youngsters reportedly drinking enough milk are 2 and 3 year olds. All others are falling short on the U.S. Department of Agriculture's My Pyramid dairy recommendations which suggest two cups of milk for 1 to 3 year olds, two to three cups for 4 to 8 year olds, and three to four cups for 9 to 18 year olds.

Also noteworthy per the same study, published in the online Journal of Pediatrics, is that children are consuming more of the highest fat varieties of cheese, yogurt, ice cream, and dairy-based toppings. It's not smart to make up for missed calcium from milk by stocking up on high-fat dairy sources, says one researcher who notes these additional calories will only add to the current problem of childhood obesity. So stick to good old fashioned milk for your kids -- and make it low-fat while you're at it.

Although physicians once recommended that children receive whole milk during the first year of life, that recommendation has changed. Doctors now recommend baby formula if the child is not nursing. And for the second year of life, reduced-fat or fat-free milk is appropriate.

Yeah, that's right, some good news on the smoking front. The number of smokers in Washington has been dropping steadily since 1999 and has reached an all-time low (so far, anyway) of 17%.

So that's the good news. The bad news is that of those 17% remaining smokers most are lower-income less-educated adults, and although they are interested in quitting they seem to be having a harder time doing it than the rest of the population.

But Washington seems to be on the right track, currently sitting with the 5th lowest smoking rate in the country. There's talk of routing funds towards giving the low-income population some help to quit smoking, in addition to their already successful approaches of an indoor smoking ban and increased tobacco taxes.

Gotta love top 10 lists, right? Even if they're on gross topics, like which American city could fill an Olympic sized swimming pool with sweat in less than three hours? Well here's a list that couldn't be more appropriate for the height of summer: the top 10 sweatiest cities in America (and yes, #1 can fill the pool -- yuck!).

1) Phoenix, AZ
2) Las Vegas, NV
3) Tucson, AZ
4) Dallas, TX
5) Corpus Christi, TX
6) San Antonio, TX
7) Austin, TX
8) Shreveport, LA
9) Houston, TX
10) Waco, TX

An Arizona city may have the #1 spot, but looking at this list Texas is the sweatiest state by far!



Via Gadling

Since the United States does not have federal smoking control legislation and each individual state must determine legislative bans, only about half of Americans are covered by a smoke free ordinance of some degree. Efforts to ban smoking have been developing since the early 1990s when research showed that secondhand smoke not only was an annoyance to nonsmokers, but actually was contributing to their death from lung cancer.

So I know some of you feel this subject is beat up but I have to speak out as a cancer survivor and also someone who is presently battling cancer and I am not a smoker. This is my two minutes. Moving back home to Virginia was nice to be around family members and old friends, but it has put a damper on how many times I will actually go out to eat or even go enjoy bowling or other social events. Because it means breathing second hand smoke. Going to a bar or even to a coffee shop to listen to live music is even a health risk and I just won't do it. As a songwriter and performer if I want to get paid shows in this state I have to breathe the smoke that comes with the places I would perform like restaurants, bars, or coffee shops. Could it be the fact that the largest manufacturer of cigarettes, Phillip Morris, is located in the state capital of Virginia in Richmond?

And coincidence or not, to even go south of me 15 minutes into North Carolina is not any relief either because North Carolina is the home of R.J. Reynolds tobacco company located in Winston Salem and legislation to ban smoking in public places has not passed in that state either.

When people talk about freedoms and being able to smoke in public, I think somebody else's freedom ends when it enters my lungs and causes serious health risks and forces me to give up the freedoms of going to places that I enjoy or need to work in to survive. Looking at research it seems for people to escape smoking in public places they have to move to northern states or to the west coast. The R.J Reynolds website states "Adults who smoke should avoid exposing minors to secondhand smoke." Well what about adults? See a map of the states with smoking bans by clicking here.

12 states are fighting to have a deadly disease lab facility built on their land. The research center would house killers like anthrax, avian flu, and foot and mouth disease, plus (I'm guessing) a whole bunch of dangerously fun "experiments." This new project is intended to replace a smaller lab at Plum Island, N.Y., where some questionable security practices back in 2001 required investigation.

Although the states themselves seem eager to "win" and get the lab, not all the residents in the proposed areas are that excited. And who can blame them? A lab test gone wrong, or even something as simple as an experiment with unpredicted results, could potentially infect the entire surrounding area. No, I'm not thinking I want a deadly disease lab in my area. Thanks, but no thanks.

Most of the time a purple-colored tomato should give off some warning signs. After all, red is the preferable shade of this particular culinary vegetable. However, researchers at Oregon State University have been tweaking a different variety of tomato that isn't unlike a blueberry!

This dark-skinned purple version comes from six years of mad science, but is actually traceable from a wild type out of South America. So what's in the new color anyway? Well it's not all aesthetics, believe it or not. The new tone brings with it a phytochemical that fights the risk of cancer and heart disease.

Don't go out looking just yet: it could be another two years before we actually see them. How the public will react to a radically different color of a popular salad ingredient has yet to be seen. Would you be receptive to a purple tomato? It would be interesting to see other varieties of vegetables or fruit undergo a paint job as well!