A No Bullshit Formula

I'm not talking about Christmas. I'm talking about Super Christmassacre 2010.

This time my cheesecake mastery will be pushed to its utmost limits. I can sense the ominous presence of the cheesecake that awaits me tomorrow from miles ahead. Its dark and brooding power is not to be trifled with.

However, I will not come unprepared. I have honed my skills. Mastered new techniques. Just a few weeks ago, I made quick work of a cheesecake that had teamed up with a goose. I ate them both. Whole.

No one knows how this battle will go down. Anything can happen. One thing is for sure; I'll give em hell.

Some folks have reported issues with viewing or loading my site. Such as: site takes a long time to load, site freezes or the browser is spazzing out.

Going by some feedback, it seems to be mainly Internet Explorer (7.0 or lower) and Firefox with tons of extensions causing trouble.

It seems my site is best viewed with Google Chrome and Safari. I'm personally using Chrome, which in my opinion is the fastest and most user friendly browser, and I've never had any issues with it.

Either way, I'd appreciate if people who's having issues, or has had issues, took the time to fill in the poll I'm running. It's located right below "About the author" on the right sidebar. That would allow me to identify the culprits and give recommendations on what browsers this site is best viewed with.



Results


Here are the results from the poll.

Text: "Popular over here, but really popular abroad."


According to the Swedish fitness and bodybuilding magazine "Body". It ain't the Nobel Prize but it's something.

Client and former Nordic bodybuilding champ Andreaz Engström took a very respectable third place with his blog "No Sugar Added."

For those of you who haven't read the interviews with me over at Richard Nikoley's site, head over there and check them out.

Here's the first part: "Martin Berkhan Means It."

Second part: "Martin Berkhan's Workout Approach."

Third part: "Leangains: The Dietary Approach." This is the latest one where I talk about net metabolizable energy of protein, the benefits of post-workout carbs, insulin sensitivity and more.

You'll also find a great deal of ideas for Paleo-friendly and Leangains-certified meals over at Richard's site.




Richard is a skilled practitioner of meat mastery.

I'm thrilled to have such an enthusiastic and loyal following. Thanks to a few of them, two of my most popular articles have been translated into several languages. You'll find links to the various translations in this post.

Swedish translations of "Top Ten Fasting Myths Debunked" and "The Truth About Alcohol, Fat Loss and Muscle Growth" are confirmed, as is a Dutch version of the former. I'll need to double-check with the Czech translation, so it'll be "unconfirmed" until further notice.

If you're interested in translating an article to put on your blog or forum, let me know. I'll be adding your translation to this post and notify people whenever a new translation is available.

My demands are:

1. That you do a decent job. It goes without saying that you can't just run it through "Google Translate" and hope to get a coherent article.

2. That you keep the hyperlinks intact.

3. That you link back to the original article.

So apparently I'm nominated for "Role Model of The Year" in "Healthy Business Awards 2010". I guess you could say it's the Swedish fitness industry's version of the Emmy's.

Here's what it says for nominations in my category:

"This award goes to the person that during the past year has made an effort or an achievement which has been positive for the business. In our evaluation we also take into consideration whether the nominee has contributed to increased mass media interest in the business."

I'm not sure how highly they value the people's vote, but I thought I'd ask you to put in a vote for me if you've benefited from the information I've provided on my site.

Then again you could always argue that I'm not much of a role model, as I like to drink and eat cheesecake...




If I win I promise to continue my work to improve the health and living conditions of cheesecakes everywhere.

Note: Voting is closed. Thanks to everyone who voted.

Anyway, the page where you vote is in Swedish, so here's what you do:

* Click here to go the page.

* Scroll down to "Årets förebild," or whatever it says when you run Google translate, and you'll see my name and my site.

(Or just hit Ctrl + F on your keyboard and type in "leangains", and you'll find me.)

* Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the button ("Rösta!" or whatever it'll say once translated). And that's it.

Easy peasy. Should take less than 30 seconds of your time. The poll closes on Monday, so please go do it now rather than wait till it's too late.

After you've voted, here's a few good reads you should check out.


A Few Good Reads


1. A new study on the Paleo diet came out two days ago: "A Paleolithic diet is more satiating per calorie than a Mediterranean-like diet in individuals with ischemic heart disease." You can download the full text free.

This was a Swedish study and most of the authors actually live nearby. Staffan Lindeberg is a long-time and fairly well known proponent of the paleo diet. The name should ring a bell for anyone who's done their reading on paleolithic nutrition.

The diet approach used in this study was "ad libitum", meaning that participants could eat as much as they wanted out of a few food groups. Based on the food logs, protein intake was estimated to be 27% and 20% in the paleo and Mediterranean diet respectively. The results aren't really that surprising, as high-protein diets always come out on top. I've talked about the effects of various macronutrients in "Cheat Day Strategies for The Hedonist."

2. In a fascinating video, "D3hundred" showcases his transformation from a 300 lbs powerlifter to a 300 lbs body weight training specialist. The gap between powerlifting, which relies on high maximum or relative strength (in his weight class it would be maximum more than relative), and calisthenics (strength-endurance) is huge.

3. Lyle McDonald talks about choosing the right diet and training approach in "Does the Training Determine the Diet or the Diet Determine the Training?"

4. In this talk on why we overeat, David Kessler explains the effect of food on reward circuits and much more. I just found this among my old bookmarks, which goes back about a year or so, so I can't quite recall the talk in detail but I remember it being very good. I watched it after a friend recommend Kessler's book: "The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite". I haven't gotten around to reading it but the recommendation was from a person who's opinion I value.

Another book that's on my "stuff I want to read"-list is "Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human". Lyle gave it two thumbs up, so it's likely a good read.

By the way, if you're planning to order from Amazon and want a good book on training, I recommend "Beyond Brawn: The Insider's Encyclopedia on How to Build Muscle and Might". This was the book that set me straight with regards to weight training and I've talked about it in this old post.




Still have my old copy of Beyond Brawn. Great book, especially if you're just starting out or want to get serious about making progress.

5. Some humor from The Oatmeal: "Why I Don't Cook at Home". Hilarious... :D Excellent contrast to Jonah Lehrer's "Why Making Dinner is a Good Idea", which I mentioned in the last round of good reads.

That's it for tonight. Keep up with me on Twitter if you want to get more tips on read-worthy material.