May 22 is both a perfectly ordinary Tuesday in your life and the global 'International Day for Biological Diversity'.
But that is not all this week is all about. We also have the endangered wildlife day, which happened on May 18, and birthday number 70 for IUCN. And, as such this entire week represents an opportunity for each of us to make it a healthy fit day for the entire planet and our individual self.


Also, if you are present in the incredibly lush and beautiful high coast area of Scandinavia, Sweden next Tuesday you are more than welcome to join me and my coworker from Scandinavian.Fitness for a sweaty fit workout at the gym, lifting weights and grunting at Friskis, Örnsköldsvik at 0730. Once we are done at the gym, we will head outside for a walk at 0830 and hopefully enjoy beautiful weather together with the pristine nature of Scandinavia.

Question number 33 in our School of Fitness.
Legs and ass and back. That is the holy trinity ( together with the fourth pillar, our abs ) of building a strong and capable and athletic body.
But what about the makeup of our upper legs?
We have the backside of our legs, which we call the hamstrings, and on the front, there´s the thing most people simply call the quads.
But let us dig deeper down into those mighty looking quadriceps and the rest of the anterior side of our legs.
Here is my question:
Can you specify which muscles make up the bulk of what we call our quadriceps and anterior leg muscles?.

Question number 31 in our School of Fitness.
When we are talking and thinking about muscles and keeping fit, Biceps is not just one of the more iconic names in the world of fitness and the human anatomy, it is also a very visible muscle that truly pops on people that keep healthy fit. But where on your body can you actually locate your biceps muscle and more importantly is the name biceps only referring to one muscle or do we have more than one biceps on our body?
And so, my question for you is as follows:
Can you tell us if the human anatomy have one or more muscles with the name biceps, and where are they/it located?.

The following is a rudimentary overview of my health & fitness life from Jan 1, 2018, to Jan 1, 2019. Some fitness folks think the world of planning ahead, and some absolutely do need a firm plan for the months and even year ahead.
Short term goals firmly lined up and long-term goal posts holding their own further out make a world of difference for some. And your own goals can be about certain PB´s, they can involve reaching a certain body fat % or strength goal. Other common goals have to do with cardiovascular performance and might be focused on improving your lactate levels, running speed, zone levels or maximum heart rate. And for competitive pro athletes, those goals usually involve specific competitions and championships.

So yes, setting up a rough schedule in advance of your fitness year can make a lot of sense.
Just as how a lot of people count daily steps and calories.

Question number 30 in our School of Fitness.
You all know that I have been a vocal proponent of how we do not simply grow old like some archaic fairy tale myth where people are doomed to live fat and unhealthy and frail once they leave their 20´s behind them.
No instead, my science-backed message has for years been that we simply create and manage our own aging process according to our own choices in food, life, and fitness.
Be it lean muscle mass, body fat, bone health, even our brain and plenty of natural hormones. Our daily choices carry such incredible weight when it comes down to all these aspects of our own wellbeing and health, much more so than the number of years we have lived or the genes we inherit. And Science proves me right on all these things, over and over, and over again.

But, how about our immune system? In sedentary people, our thymus slowly becomes less capable as we mature beyond our 20´s. That is a simple fact.
And so, my question for you:
Will regular fitness stomp aging in the face or is the thymus and the stuff it does for us destined to go wry as we age no matter our fitness and food choices?.

Question number 27 in our School of Fitness.
From a healthy fit perspective, both short & long term, what we need to sculpt is a life of daily physical activity in the right amount and the right intensity coupled with healthy food choices and the proper amount of nutrients.
And those healthy choices include making sure that we get enough of those healthy nutrients in order to perform, in the gym and daily life, and we need enough of them in order for our body and mind to stay healthy, happy, capable and fit.
Eat too little protein and you will start losing lean muscle mass, and your health will start to decline too since proteins are not just the major building blocks of our muscles, they are in fact the mud and water, wood and concrete that builds our entire body, be it your internal organs, your skin, hair, muscles, cells, or our brain.
And the total amount of daily calories we consume is, of course, pretty much the same thing, eat too little in total, and you will start noticing how your health and fitness level slowly deteriorate. And if you do the opposite and stuff your tummy full with too many daily calories you will start gaining pure body fat in excessive amounts and it will continue to build unless you change your daily choices.
So, here is my question:
How big do you need to make your daily calorie deficit in order to lose 250g of body fat per week ( roughly ) while eating enough protein to preserve your lean muscle mass?.

Question number 26 in our School of Fitness.
Black coffee, the mere words are capable of sending hundreds of millions of people into a state of Nirvana filled with transcending bliss and harmony :).
But black coffee is also a cup of rejuvenating health for our entire system. It calms the mind with its slowly rising aroma, helps us keep cancer and diabetes at bay, harnesses our creative focus like an arrow in flight, and in enough quantities, it can even boost peoples gym going efforts.
But is there all there is to it?. Well, here is my question:
Is the old saying true that your daily coffee drives so much fluid out of your body that you need to supplement your coffee intake with equal measures water too in order to stay hydrated?.

Question number 25 in our School of Fitness.
Outside of our legs and ass, there is no other muscle group that comes close to sheer size, strength, health impact and lean muscle mass potential than our back. So as exhausting as a proper back workout is, this is one big and essential muscle group you should never skimp out on, no matter if your own goals are all in on health and wellness, sports or just sheer looks, or all of the above.
Here is my question:
Tell me the major muscles that makes up our back. Straight and simple folks.

Question number 24 in our School of Fitness.
Chemotherapy is one of those crucial things that no one ever hoped to one day experience. But when the going gets real tough in life, its a life saver.
However, undergoing Chemotherapy is no walk in the park and while it can save your life and defeat cancer, it will also take its toll on your body. So much so that a recent study from Australia revealed that just 13 weeks of chemotherapy caused the heart to age by an equivalent of six years.
Here is my question:
Can maintained fitness exercise during chemotherapy prevent the now established cardiovascular aging associated with chemotherapy?.

Question number 22 in our School of Fitness.
2017 came and went in a glorious display of Northern lights. But now that we are all one year older. Let us take a look at that age-old saying that we recover worse and slower after a hard workout in the gym as we grow beyond our 30´s.
Is there any truth to this at all? Or is this just one more thing that people got wrong in the name of lacking insight, age-related fears, and youth-obsessed peer pressure?.
To put it simply.
Will the 22-year-old you recover better after a kick-ass weight lifting workout in the gym doing intense deadlifts than the 50 year old you will be able to do, or can you safely go at it just as hard knowing that you will recover and improve just as good?.

Enjoy a healthy fit, and happy 2018 people, but before I start our shiny new year by giving you the single best health & fitness advice you´ll ever get in life, a tiny little micro-short story to welcome you to the rest of your life.
"the dragon that climbed the world of ice"
'I watched it climb
the world of ice that towered us both
its mighty tail stung the icy cavern beneath us, like a spear it was thrust into the chest of the icy mountain, sending splatter of man-sized ice blocks and snow that bled into the bottomless pit, while it drove its left and right limbs into the frosty mountain above us

and slowly
over the endless void of time

the dragon climbed its way upward
through a world of ice that tried to hold us captive

we climbed
endless step by endless step towards the moon and the stars to hunt them one by one'.

And in some ways, I can not think about a much better and more current way to emphasize our individual and globally shared responsibility than the Kenyan Ultra Marathon taking place in 2018.
It's like all the other sports competitions ever done about the individual responsibility to shape and form your ongoing life and fitness journey so that you can endure and conquer that particular challenge.
But it is equally much a team effort, to better our planet and to save the Rhino.
As such it serves as a proxy for our own health, and our modern day pollution, the local and global poverty, the gender and class-based inequality, the competition itself, and the endangered wildlife and all the species rapidly going extinct across the entire world.
We are all responsible. Individually and globally.
And in that spirit, this ultramarathon is not just about bringing together runners from all around the world, it is also a marathon to save the endangered Rhino from going extinct, and to better the entire world.

Question number 21 in our School of Fitness.
Doing the daily grind behind a healthy fit life will always continue to do wonders for our well being and physical health in body and mind.
But air pollution is another key factor that is greatly influencing our wellbeing and longterm health. And how do these two modern-day pillars clash and collide?
Will living in heavy air polluted cities flat out destroy all the health benefits you should be reaping thanks to your daily fitness regime?.

Question number 19 in our School of Fitness.
A healthy Fit life keeps the risk of developing Alzheimer as much as possible at bay. But how about Parkinson´s?.
Will keeping fit & healthy help people reduce the onslaught of Parkinson´s or is this one degenerative neurological condition that´s all about genetics and bad luck?.

New research once again showcases how exercise improves muscle health and, exercise capacity and how that positive mechanism with perpetual fitness regimes in the end greatly improves general health and longevity for each individual.
Allowing continued fitness activity to become one of the finest predictors we have of general mortality and biological health and wellbeing in any given population and individual.
This particular study was published in the journal Nature Communications and it digs deep down inside our bodies as it takes a long look at how exercise helps the body and mind keep healthy and strong by transforming and maintaining our body on a cellular level.

Question number 15 in our School of Fitness.
I like to say that 'Individual health is planetary health & planetary health is individual health'. So today's question will focus a bit on that simple fact.
Here goes. Can something as trivial as adding salt to your food expose you to unhealthy plastic litter ( on top of the many well established unhealthy aspects of consuming too much salt )?

Question number 13 in our School of Fitness.
Today's question, there is a polite saying that goes like this,"fat but fit". And that is certainly a wonderfully inclusive phrase, and as such worth repeating, and respecting, this world has far too much of fat, fit and slut shaming as it is. But how is the simple truth of being fat but metabolically healthy actually looking?

Question number 12 in our School of Fitness.
Today's question, running is a super healthy aspect of any fit & healthy lifestyle. But the brunt of running too often also put intense pressure and wear on feet and knees and tibia since our lower body absorbs almost all of the impact while we run.
So how often do the average runner ( in general ) smash their delicate feet's and shin bone into that immovable ground per minute while they are ramping up the miles.

Question number 11 in our School of Fitness.
Today's question is as follows, which muscles are activated when you are busy killing it in the gym with the majestic "Deadlift" exercise.
A lot of people rightfully think of Deadlift as the great full-body exercise. But what do you actually engage and stimulate when you go at it with this bad boy.

Question number 9 in our School of Fitness.
Explain the difference between our chronological age and our biological age.
The question is this, Is it true that you can physically change the real age of your physical system ( body & mind ) depending on the amount of fit and healthy choices you make in your life vs opting for a more sedentary life?.

Question number 8 in our School of Fitness.
Making daily progressive lifestyle choices matters incredibly much for maintaining and improving our health and fitness. But genetics also play a role in our fitness capacity.
The question is this, just how much impact do those genetics play vs our own daily fitness choices?. Will the girl next to you at the gym always crush you in every exercise there is. And if so, is that all down to her being lucky in the genetics department?.

Question number 7 in our School of Fitness.
Run Forrest run. Forrest Gump, fictional as he was, had this amazing gift not just for ending up in great moments with people of historical importance, but he also had this natural gift for running.
The question is this, do you have to be taught to run as biologically efficient as possible, or are you naturally born with the gift of how to run in the most efficient way possible for you.

Question number 6 in our School of Fitness.
Please explain the difference between the two terms, Physiologic hypotrophy & Atrophy.

Question number 5 in our School of Fitness.
What is the role of Creatine and can Creatine supplementation have additional health benefits for fitness and health conscious vegans?.

This is a short and quick educational Q&A category regarding the science of health and fitness. Each article in the "fitness school" category will provide you with a short question and three possible answers.
Make your choice and click to reveal the correct answer to see if you are as well informed about the science of fitness and health as you believe you are.

In a small but important step towards a better world and healthier people EU is launching a positive step forward to promote and subsidize sustainable and locally produced food that is healthy. Such as fruits and greens in schools across all of Europe
The new Europe-wide initiative will help fund up to three-quarters of the cost of serving fruit and greens, locally produced and sustainable food to school students.

Organic food will receive up to 75% help, while traditionally grown fruit and greens will receive up to 65%.

When it comes down to health and fitness, and the cerebral battlefield of chess the simple truth is that they are very much alike.
There are no unearthly and illogical surprises waiting in the dark of night that will upend and change the actual fabric of the landscape.
Your opponent can not cast fiery magic and summon demons from the netherworld to do their bidding.
Instead what we have is a beautifully defined field of known and still developing, yet for now, unknown for you and me facts and variables, and the vast amount of personal choices those known, but evolving facts allows us to make.

And at every step of that personal journey, chess and fitness will leave you standing as the sole commander, at a vast field made up of pure facts and deductive knowledge and the cause and consequences that every single choice will give birth to.

For most people getting a bit more fit, and healthy by eating cleaner food and less calories and working out more is a great life improving choice.
And for most, that will lead to health improving reductions in unhealthy body fat levels and body weight. But as we previously talked about in another article, when you are already in shape, rocking a fit and toned body, eating healthy amounts of healthy food, doing weights and cardio, there comes a limit where dropping even more in body weight and body fat becomes damaging and unhealthy instead of health and fitness improving.

And beyond that basic reality, you have the insanity of MMA and Boxing weight cuts that far to many pro fighters go through just so they can fight in a weight class that they are to athletic and big to actually be fighting in.
I am saying that because MMA style weight cutting is not something that anyone interested in health and fitness should ever do.
Period.

Neither should pro fighters in my own opinion. In a ideal world you would be the only one doing MMA style weight cuts, allowing you to fight people 20 to 30 lbs smaller than you, with much shorter leg and arm reach, 20+lbs less muscle mass and all the disadvantage that would give them in strength, endurance, strike impact and absorption.
But you see, when every other fighter do the same weight cut, no one benefits, and everybody suffers from the exact same detrimental and unhealthy exhaustion that MMA style weight cuts are. With less fitness come fight night and potentially worse health for the long haul as the only real result.

Time and science continually march forward, and that is a thing of utmost beauty. But that simple fact also requires all of us to keep an open mind towards the way we do our own fit and healthy life so that we can continually adapt and improve as we uncover new layers of scientifically established health and fitness knowledge, and at times, accept that new health and fitness science-based knowledge might force us to change direction and toss out old established "truths".

So today we find ourselves in a brave new world where a comprehensive Swedish study covering the health impact of daily dairy and fruit consumption ended up giving us so much new scientifically based knowledge about our health and food choices that the time has come to update our "dairy for the fit and healthy guidelines".

Organic and sugar-free yogurt is still with us, while milk is completely tossed to the side, yes even lactose-free milk gets the boot out my door.
Why you might ask?
Well, the answer is simply put science baby, adapt or die :).

Milk is as far as we understand it right now causing real health issues over time that simply do not happen when you consume sugar-free yogurt or no dairy at all.
This Swedish study involved close to 200 000 people, and the accumulated data over several years indicates that a high milk consumption shortens individuals life span through increased oxidative stress and inflammation caused by that daily milk consumption.
And as such milk has to go since yogurt provides all the same high-quality nutrition as milk and thus, all the benefits of dairy can be met through organic, sugar-free yogurt without risking the by now, strongly implicated long-term health issues associated with drinking milk.

Making love, off world.
And some of the many wondrous and perhaps flat out strange things you can expect to encounter during your future romantic, space date.
In our rapidly approaching near future and a few fortunate souls present day reality, the perplexing realities of dating far away from planet Earth will no longer be confined to the silvery screens of yesterday.

Soon a rapidly growing number of people will be able to prepare and plan for romantic weekend dates out and away from Earth´s atmosphere. But beyond the tantalizing, and highly romantic aspect of kissing high up above as you look down back on this blue marble. What else is there to going off the reservate and into the dark unknown?. What about the little everyday things when you kiss, hold hands and make love beneath the stars, way out in space.

Welcome to the third version of our 7 days long, one-week workout plan for increased health, strength, lean muscle mass, and cardiovascular performance. This round is paying tribute to all those fit and brave old Norse men and women that traversed beyond the boundaries of our known world. So do it like a Viking and kill it in the gym with an unyielding will. 4 days of lifting intense, challenging weights pushing beyond your own limitations each set. Every set will have you using drop sets, and once you are done lifting weights, every workout is followed by 100% 5-minute long sprint interval rushes.

In addition, 2 days of cardio/MMA classes, and 7 days of lower every day paced cardio.  

A short, but hopefully inspirational 7 days long, one-week workout plan for increased health, strength, lean muscle mass, and cardiovascular performance. A truly tried and tested approach to not just a healthier and more fit body, but also increased healthy longevity.

Presented both as a visual daily timeline, and a long form article. 

There is, of course, nothing perfect or news worthy with what I did today. But hopefully, my workouts for the day can serve as fuel for someone to kick up their own health and activity choices for the week and days to come. And if so, me taking the time to write this little write up in the middle of my wonderful but stacked day is well worth it :). In short: Chest + abs and not just one, but 5 cardio sessions kept me one happy, fit and healthy pup today :).

Long thought of as one of few actually working sports supplements for increased anaerobic performance, more and more research is also revealing significant health benefits in body and mind for those that supplement their daily food with 5grams of creatine. Making it an especially interesting option, perhaps even essential, for the active and healthy people that have already reduced their meat consumption in order to further improve their long-term health & fitness level.

Old age. Such a terrifying word for countless of people around the world. But admittedly, up until now in the long and winded history of our mutual species, it has indeed been quite bleak to grow beyond your 20´s. Not only did people die damn early in previous centuries. But out of those that survived beyond their 30´s very few was allowed to age in a graceful and healthy way. Broken bodies and frail minds came out of an every day life made up of bad and seriously unhealthy, even toxic diets and daily living conditions. Made even worse by incredibly unequal societies. Countless of wars and actual scientific knowledge still being in it´s infancy did not help either.

A brief article of mine where I talk about a short, sweet and accurate post by Neila Rey for one of the many basic things a lot of people still get wrong about their body, health and fitness level/potential. In short, you are not held hostage by your genetic makeup.

Yesterday was all cute frost and frozen berries, and today was rain and misty autumn views being served as breakfast. Yesterday was chest and abs, and today it was all about that mighty back and triceps.

Waking up this morning, the outsides of the bedroom window where as frosty as the ground itself. Leafs and leftover blueberries looking more like frosty status than organic material when I later stepped out.

Welcome back people to part two in our MMA Cardio articles. Your body, mind and overall health benefits not just from lifting weights and eating healthy food.
Cardio is another part of the equation that will greatly enhance your joy of being alive as well as make sure that you are getting to live a long and healthy life.

MMA Cardio is a top notch fun way of getting your health on, and your body sexy lean and fit.

This is the second article to focus on the truly body shaping lower body exercises. In our first one we talked about the properly named "Deadlift", and today it is time to dig deep into its virtual twin "Squats". In many ways, an exercise that is extremely similar to both deadlift and the amazing back exercise Standing barbell row. But just like those two Squats is deserving of you doing this bad boy/girl every single week for the rest of your life.

This is part 6 in our ongoing series of articles that sees us covering all the great compound exercises that should be a permanent part of every fit and active and healthy lifestyle. In this article, it´s all about the classic bench press. A timeless chest exercise that´s stood the test of time for a reason, it works, and it works damn good when it comes down to creating a healthier and stronger upper body.

Welcome to article number five in our series of articles covering the great compound exercises that all should be a permanent part of every fit and active, and healthy life. In this article, it is time for us to talk about dips, we previously mentioned this gruffy old classic in our article about closed-grip bench press and for good reasons, they are put together pretty much everything you will ever need for developing a strong, kick ass triceps.

This is article number four in our series covering all the great compound exercises that more than deserves to be included as a permanent part of your fit and active, and healthy life. In this article, we will take a look at one of the classic back exercises that also happens to be one of the very best things you can do for a strong, well-rounded and healthy body. This apex puppy is called Chins, or perhaps you prefer to call it Pull ups, either way it is the same thing.

Yesterday had me do a 3 workout split that went like this: Morning: coffee and water + a sprint based interval run. Midday: Triceps, Biceps, Abs. Evening: Hiit MMA that consisted of Kicking and punching at a high pace at first, and then followed by body weight squats and a slower, more yoga like approach to slowly moving between various martial art stances.

I am quite sure that you guys are busy hanging out like orangutangs in the comfort of your porch, (I am) so here is a short, sweet summer summary for you to scratch that ache you feel for real, and relevant news.

Yes, Summer came around once again. Despite the changing climate, despite the weirdness of Tony Abbot (whom else then global health enemy number one would celebrate slowing down sustainable electricity production).

Health Blurbs One, quite a catchy sounding phrase now that I think about it, but it is not a new trademark or something for Nestle to package and sell on a bottle.