AFC 2013: Updates (Part 2)

More snapshots and videos during the convention in BITEC, Bangkok.

AFC 2013: Updates (Part 1)

AFC2013, yet another awesome fitness convention in Thailand. It was an awesome event, yet a tiring one. Great presenters, great workout sessions, great lectures, an event where so many world class fitness professionals are gathered all in one single event. More then 1000 delegates this year, some of the workshops are not as organized as last year, but it was double thumbs up, all in all, a very good convention in general.

Check out the snapshots and videos below. 

Jonathan Ross workout session. 

Dr. Evan Osar workshop

Opening ceremony - Day 1

Convention hall 

Dynamax Med Ball workshop

Dynamax training - Alot of fun

Vipr high intensity workout session

AFC kettlebells competition

Shannon Fable workshop

Shannon Fable workshop

TRX Fraser Quelch's workout session

Diane Vives plyometrics workshop - awesome

BootyCamp

AFC kettlebells competition

Thyroid Home Test: Body Temperature & Pulse

Ever wonder why you often feel cold? How about trying so many exercise programs and diet protocols but you just can't seem to lose weight. Going to gym and attending regular bootcamp classes accompanied by dieting and dropping the calories off your foods, your body is finding it hard to lose weight or body fat. You step on that weighing machine every morning when you wake up, feeling miserable and confuse, what is going on, what else can I do to lose weight or feel better. You are always tired and low in energy, feeling lousy and fatigue most of the time. What next? 

Imagine, you walk in to a health screening department (after the medical doctor told you to go for a health check up), and the medical officer tells you that all looks 'normal' and there is nothing wrong with you. When the thyroid profiling results is reviewed, all looks normal and TSH is 'within range'. Question is, why am I still having thyroid symptoms and feeling lousy, overweight and tired all the time?

I will be writing a full blown posts about thyroid soon, but as for today, I will reveal the symptoms of hypothyroid and hyperthyroid symptoms, as well as hashimotos and graves disease (both autoimmune diseases for thyroid). Also, I share with you the home tests anyone can do by your own self, to manually measure the status of your thyroid, apart from performing functional lab tests to further investigate what is going on with the thyroid pathways. 

Hypothyroid Symptoms (underactive) -  most common

- Feels cold easily, also cold hands and feet

- Feeling depressed or stressed out

- Constipation (regularly)

- Poor memory (absent minded, tend to forget things)

- Poor concentration 

- Fine hair and nails

- Difficult to lose weight, gain weight easily

- Puffy eyes

- Often fatigue and exhausted, tired easily

Hyperthyroid Symptoms (over-active) 

- Diarheaa

- Anxiety

- Rapid weight loss

- Sensitive eyes

- High Blood Pressure

- Elevated heart rate

Graves & Hashimotos disease - (Autoimmune)

- Similiar to hypothyroid symptoms

- Thinning of the eyebrows

- Insomnia due to high cortisol levels nighttime. Poor sleep quality. 

Thyroid Home Tests

Test body temperature and pulse 5 times a day, when wakes up in the morning, 20 mins after each meal, and before bed during night time. Body temperature should be around 37 degrees celcius, and if it's below 36.3 degrees celcius, it is an indicator of underactive thyroid. If your metabolism if responding to each meal, the temperature should rise after 20 minutes. Meanwhile, ensure pulse is measured the same time whenever the body temperature measurement is performed too. The pulse should be around 75-80, ideally slightly above 80. 

Before I sign off, I compiled some of the questions which everyone should be asking themselves which regards to thyroid related problems.

- I have high total body fat, but why am I still feeling cold easily? E.g in office, cinema.

- I cut down calories in my diet and foods, why am I still not losing weight? 

- I exercise regularly, I'm still not losing weight or body fat, why is that so?

- My doctor said my thyroid status and profile is normal. Does that mean my thyroid is working normally?

- If my digestion is poor or having gut dsyfunction, will it affect my thyroid function?

- I sleep more then 7 hours a day, why do I often feel tired and fatigue daily?

- I have poor memory and often forgetfulness, could it be due to aging or thyroid related problems? 

- Will my metabolism be optimal or efficient, if perform regular exercise, but without finding out the health of my thyroid? 

- I can't sleep at night and having poor sleep quality, am I deficient in sleeping pills or is it related to my thyroid? 

- I'm often low in energy levels, will consuming caffeine or energy drinks ideal for this fix, or is it my thyroid? 

- Finally, the most important question of all. Which lab test to perform to investigate comprehensive thyroid functions? Is conventional medical health screening for thyroid sufficient? Would testing TSH and T4, T3 accurate enough to find out what is wrong with the thyroid? 

Are all eggs the same? - Purity tests 101

Eggs, have always a topic of discussion when it comes to health, diet, fitness and even bodybuilding. It has been eaten by humans and animals by as long as we all have step foot on this planet earth. In this post, I will mainly discuss about chicken eggs, one of my favorite foods, and arguably one of the healthiest cheapest foods one can consume and incorporate them in their daily diet.

This nutritional food, has been unfairly labeled and gotten a bad reputation from the media not long ago. To be exact, the newsplash came directly from a group of Canadian researchers. As always, there are bad science and good science, like what Gary Taubes mentioned. I won't discuss about the lipid hypothesis in this post, but I will share with you a few methods you could use to determine the quality of the chicken eggs you invested from supermarket, organic health store or fresh market. I call them eggs purity test.

Now, some of us may have been tricked into buying organic free range eggs. A recent local newspaper has published that chemical is used to make the chickens look 'yellow skinned', scamming the buyers to think it is free range 'kampung' breed. Again, it's all about the money. Me myself, was scammed a couple of times into buying so called free range chicken eggs by the market sellers, but I did not go back to these sellers, after these eggs failed the purity test badly multiple times.

Before you invest your money on so called free range eggs, try to 'interview' and get to know the seller in the fresh market, asking questions like "Where does the eggs come from?", or "How many chickens are breed in that farm/kampung?" or "Which does these chickens eat?". These questions will help you identify if the chickens are healthy and eating their natural diet, instead of soy, corn, wheat and other garbage which is not meant for these poor little birds. A healthy chicken lay a healthy egg. No rocket science here. 

We have been told to avoid eating egg yolks, since statins (cholesterol lowering drugs) is endorsed and commercially prescribed? Cholesterol has been labeled as a villain since Ancel Keys made a terrible biased study on saturated fats and cholesterol. "Don't eat that yolk, your cholesterol will go off the roof!". Everyone knows cholesterol is bad, and consuming eggs to it's minimum would be ideal. How come cardiovascular disease rates is increasing yearly? Why are we dropping like flies from heart attacks? How can an old food cause a new disease? That totally does not make any sense at all. I mean seriously folks, a little common sense here? Does anyone even know why an egg has so much cholesterol? Yes, it is because in order to grow and develop a healthy chicken, that much amount of cholesterol is required, same apply with humans. So, eat your eggs, eat the yolk, half boil it, or scramble it with coconut oil, it is one of the best foods one can consume. And it will not give you heart attack, but it may help you to lose weight, boost your libido and provide you tons of valuable nutrition. 

Anyway, let's get on with the egg purity test.

1) When preparing for half boil egg, ensure the egg DOES NOT tilt in any direction once it is in the boiling water. If you notice the tip of the egg tilt upward, or the whole egg floats, there is a very high chance that the egg is no longer fresh and partially rotten or contaminated. 

2) Once the egg is ready (half boiled), ensure the egg does not smell awkward, funny or nasty. A clean quality egg should not have any unpleasant nor nasty smell.

3) When the egg is cracked open to a small bowl or cup, the egg yolk and egg should be attached together (at least most of it), and not splattered into the bowl like fluid or watery form. Also, the egg shell should be fairly hard and strong, instead of flimsy and soft.  

4) Lastly, the egg yolk should look dark strong orange or mild orange, and not pale yellow. That will determine how much carotene the chicken has ingested from clean pesticide-free grass. 

One of the few free range eggs sold locally, and they are sold in small bulk, unlike hundreds of pile up eggs available for sale in fresh markets and supermarkets. 

One of the purity tests, clearly shows that the egg yolks has different colors, yellow base and dark rich orange. Two different eggs have been selected for this test, a genuine free range organic egg and a so called 'kampung' or free range eggs. Don't guess, test them yourself.