Fitness Reads: Are CrossFit fears renewed? Does Jillian Michaels hate working out?

What did the SNEWS team read this week that other industry insiders might find interesting? Read on to find out!

• Jillian Michaels is famous for her rockin’ bod and wicked personal training skills. She must love working out, right? Actually, no, she doesn’t. In this story the famed trainer said that she doesn’t ever say that she’s enjoying a workout while she’s in the thick of it, rather she loves the feeling of being healthy and being able to fit in her skinny jeans. She has some good advice for your customers and us.

• Maybe it’s just not in Jillian Michaels’ genetics to like working out but it seems like she’s hard-wired with the will to work out. According to this story, some people have genetic variants that make them trainable and responsive to exercise while others do not. According to the research, people with the intrinsic motivation to work out generally produce more dopamine when they exercise, leading them to love the high they get. The study might lead to perhaps one day developing a pill that could give people the will to work out.

• Type 2 diabetes seems to be more prevalent these days, and if any of your customers are in danger of being diagnosed with it, you might want to tell them to invest in some free weights and yoga supplies. According to this CBS News story, women in particular who practice yoga, combined with aerobic exercise and weight training, are at lower risk for type 2 diabetes than those who don’t.
  

• Maybe the fact that strength training for women reduces their risk of being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes is why more and more members of the fairer sex are hitting the free weight sections at the gym. According to this story, more ladies are proving that they believe the saying, “strong is the new skinny,” as gym owners see a rise in the number of females engaging in weight workouts.

• With all these high-intensity workouts so popular, some people pride themselves on working out so hard they have to use puke buckets. According to this story, that could put people at danger for developing rhabdomyolysis, a condition where the muscles break down. In some cases, the condition results in death. But the doctor quoted in the story said that you’re not in danger if you gradually and intelligently increase your workout intensity — so no training for a 10K and then trying to run a marathon.

• In order to avoid rhabdomyolysis, you have to ease into a new workout and gradually build up to where you want to be. If you were bench-pressing hundreds of pounds six months ago but have been engaging in Ho-Ho binging and Netflix binge watching, then you need to start over. This Men’s Fitness story gives you the perfect “comeback workout.”

• Lots of people have fears about CrossFit and this recent story about a CrossFit athlete who was performing a “snatch” exercise at a competition when the dropped the weight behind him, it hit another set of weights, bounced up and hit him in the back, paralyzing him. It’s definitely sad news but it seems to have been an isolated case. 

• The flu is nothing to mess with. If you didn’t get the flu shot, you should heed the advice to skip working out if and when you get the flu. It could lead to other problems, like pneumonia. This article explains that the muscle soreness you feel when you have the flu is the breakdown of muscle tissue. When you lift weights and break down that muscle further, it makes it harder for your immune system to battle the illness.

• This is what we’ve been looking for all our lives: office-appropriate yoga pants. Consumers want multifunctionality these days and don’t want to look like a slob when they wear their yoga pants to work in order to hit a lunchtime yoga class. These new pants from Betabrand look like nice business casual pants you could pair with a button-down shirt and a cardigan and feel pretty.

• Not all activities are as compatible as running and yoga. According to this post, the pair are a match made in heaven. If you have customers training for any distance of race, suggest they incorporate some yoga. The athlete who wrote the post said she practices yoga to increase her balance, flexibility, muscle strength and focus.

Did you read anything awesome this week? Email us because we want to read it, too!