Bluebird

food bedevils us all, especially those who like it...

My interjections are below in bolded blue...

 

March 19, 2012, 2:57 PM

Calories Are Everywhere, Yet Hard to Track

By JANE E. BRODY, Columnist

Yvetta Fedorova

Americans are having a passionate love affair with something they cannot see, hear, feel, touch or taste. That something is calories, billions upon billions of which are consumed every day, often unwittingly, at and between meals.

Certainly calories are talked about constantly, and information about them appears with increasing frequency on food labels, menus, recipes and Web sites. But few people understand what they are and how they work — especially how they have worked to create a population in which 64 percent of adults and a third of children are overweight or obese, or how they thwart the efforts of so many people to shed those unwanted pounds and keep them off once and for all.

Enter two experts: Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at New York University; and Malden Nesheim, professor emeritus of nutritional sciences at Cornell University. Together they have written a new book, “Why Calories Count: From Science to Politics,” to be published April 1, which explains what calories are, where they come from, how different sources affect the body, and why it is so easy to consume more of them than most people need to achieve and maintain a healthy weight.

“The human body does a superb job of making sure that it gets enough calories to meet biological needs but is much less effective at knowing when calories are in excess,” they wrote. “The result is that it is much easier to overeat than to stop eating when you are no longer hungry.”

Out of Control

People living in affluent societies today swim in a sea of redundant calories. Food is everywhere, and it is relatively inexpensive, accounting for about 10 percent of Americans’ disposable income on average, Dr. Nestle said in an interview.

“When did it become O.K. to eat in bookstores?” she asked. “Or in Staples? Bed, Bath and Beyond, or drugstores?”

I do not allow this...

Portion sizes — especially restaurant portions — have mushroomed out of control, she noted.

“People who pay attention to calorie labels on menus are shocked, for example, to discover that a single cookie contains 700 calories,” Dr. Nestle said. “You may want that cookie, but then you can’t eat anything else. Cookies didn’t used to be this big.”

Nor were bagels, now 500 or 600 calories each, or sodas, available in sizes as large as 64 ounces.

The shock extends to those supposedly in the know. Recently Lisa Young, a colleague of Dr. Nestle at New York University, asked the students in her nutrition class how many calories were in a Double Gulp, a 64-ounce soda available at 7-Eleven convenience stores. She’d already told them that an eight-ounce soda has 100 calories, but the students guessed a Double Gulp contains less than 400 calories.

We drink very little soda. 

When Dr. Young asked why their estimate was off by 100 percent, they simply said, “800 calories — that can’t be!”

Who eats/drinks at 7/11?

People who do check calorie information on nutrition labels often fail to note the size of the serving it applies to. A serving of ice cream is just a half-cup, a burger is three ounces, and uncooked pasta is merely two ounces. A pound of pasta, therefore, should feed eight people, not two or four; two ounces per serving is about what Italians consume as a first course.

A typical American restaurant meal is more like dinner for two. Dr. Nestle said restaurants have resisted her suggestion to serve half the amount of food for about a third the price. She recently found at one New York restaurant that a “personal-size pizza” contained 2,100 calories, the amount the average woman needs in a day.

“And that didn’t include the soda and dessert,” she said. “Unless you’re in the kitchen watching what the chef is doing, you have no idea how many calories are being packed into a given dish.”

Health claims for foods are another seductive factor encouraging overconsumption, Dr. Nestle said. She’s found that words imparting “a health aura — like ‘organic’ or ‘low-fat’ or ‘heart-healthy’ — can prompt people to forget about calories.”

Ending Excess

The human body has a very complex and redundant system to make sure the brain gets the sugar calories it needs to function, Dr. Nestle and Dr. Nesheim explain in their book. At least 100 different hormones, enzymes and other chemicals — with more likely to be discovered — act to regulate appetite and to assure that people eat enough to maintain brain function.

But it is these very systems that go into overdrive during starvation (translation: a reduced-calorie diet), making it so difficult for people to lose weight.

As seductive as the current food environment is, it is still easier not to gain excess weight in the first place. Most people seriously underestimate how much they eat. For example, participants in the Nurses’ Health Study report consuming 1,600 calories a day, but their body mass index on average is 26 or higher — well into the overweight range and supported by many more calories than the women seem to think they are eating.

“I don’t count calories, and I don’t recommend counting calories,” Dr. Nestle said. “I recommend eating food. You have to pay attention to eating better and in moderation: plenty of fruits and vegetables, lean meats, and whole grains in reasonable portions, and not too much junk food.”

She applauded the current campaign by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene to get people to stop “pouring on the calories” by consuming fewer sugar-sweetened soft drinks.

Dr. Nestle and Dr. Nesheim also review the weight-regulating effects of different sources of calories. Is it high-fructose corn syrup that makes so many people fat? Are other carbohydrates to blame, or fat — or what?

They found scant evidence to support the popular notion that any one nutrient is responsible for our obesity, or that a low-carbohydrate diet is everyone’s secret to success.

Although a diet low in carbs and high in fats and protein may enhance satiety and curb snacking, few people seem able to refrain indefinitely from the carbohydrate-rich foods they love. The long-term effectiveness of low-carb diets for a vast majority of people who try them has yet to be assessed.

If I do all protein, I crave carbs and binge. So I do a half-starve during the day. A banana, boot camp, Think Thin protein bar in the morning. Later, I'll have low fat string cheese, two sticks, and a small bowl of pretzels. Or a hard-boiled egg on a mess of greens rossed in olive oil. But I have to keep it light and a mix of protein and carbs--or else I can't/won't stop eating.

“The source of the calories may make a small difference in weight maintenance or loss, but it appears to be much less important than the ability to resist pressures to overeat calories in general,” the authors wrote.

And since most people cannot come close to estimating how many calories they consume or expend in a day, a better way to monitor intake and output, Dr. Nestle said, is to regularly check the notches on one’s belt or numbers on the scale.

“It’s much easier to lose a pound or two than 20 or 30,” she said.

Of course, the amount of calories consumed is not the only factor influencing weight. Calories expended count as well, and the more active people are, even if they are simply fidgety, the better able they are to balance intake with output.

Dinner with mi familia is muy importante, so I cook most nights and we eat together. I eat what we all eat. It's my reward, yay. And more often than not, I'm satisfied with one helping and no dessert. But it's been a slog getting to this point, for sure.

Bring it on!

Migraine-ready with three packs stocked up, eight pills in each. It's almost enough to make a headache girl relax!

Campbell's to stop using BPA in soup cans

By Jennifer Kho

Published March 06, 2012

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Tags: Chemicals, Consumer Products, More...

You won't find it on the list of ingredients, but many cans of Campbell's soup come with a bit of bisphenol-A, which helps keep can linings from leaking. The widespread use of chemical, also known as BPA, has raised concerns from parentgroups, cancer groups and the Food and Drug Administration. This week, the Campbell Soup Co. said it will stop using BPA in its cans.

BPA-free advocates hailed the news as a big step for the canned-foods industry. The world's largestsoup maker had been a holdout on this issue:Brands such as Eden Foods, Muir Glen, Trader Joe's, Heinz and ConAgra already have committed to phasing out the chemical.

But it could take some time to dispense with BPA  for good. While BPA-free liners are available, they cost more and don't work well for some foods, like tomatoes, that have higher acidity levels. Campbell's didn't say when it plans to stop using BPA. "We have already started using packaging lined with a BPA alternative in some of our soups, and we are working to phase out the use of BPA in can linings in the rest of our canned products," the company says in its updated corporate sustainability report.

While the food and chemical industries – and, until 2010, the FDA – maintain that BPA is safe for humans, some studies have linked it to a variety of health ailments, such as cancer, obesity, heart disease and diabetes, in animals. The chemical mimics the hormone estrogen.

The FDA is expected to make a decision about whether to ban or regulate the chemical at the end of this month. Meanwhile, France in February upheld a ban on BPA in packaged foods, and California last year banned the use of BPA (above 0.1 part per billion) in baby bottles and infant cups.

The move comes less than a week after the Campbell Soup Co. won one of the Environmental Protection Agency's inaugural Climate Leadership Awards.

You can read more about Campbell's moves toward sustainability in these GreenBiz interviews:

• Campbell's former CEO, Doug Conant, and current CEO, Denise Morrison, share their thoughts on sustainability with GreenBiz columnist Heather King.  
• Dave Stangis, the company's vice president of corporate social responsibility, discusses "the evolution of sustainability" with "Nature of Business" radio host Crissy Coughlin.
• Stangis talks about tips for making sustainability everyone's job at the State of Green Business Forum.

Aside from criticism over BPA, Campbell's also has taken fire for using genetically modified ingredients.

Photo courtesy of profzucker via a Flickr Creative Commons license.

 

February 6, 2012, 12:01 AM

How Massage Heals Sore Muscles

By NICHOLAS BAKALAR

Barbara P. Fernandez for The New York TimesResearchers are learning how massage soothes aching muscles.

A massage after vigorous exercise unquestionably feels good, and it seems to reduce pain and help muscles recover. Many people — both athletes and health professionals – have long contended it eases inflammation, improves blood flow and reduces muscle tightness. But until now no one has understood why massage has this apparently beneficial effect.

Now researchers have found what happens to muscles when a masseur goes to work on them.

Their experiment required having people exercise to exhaustion and undergo five incisions in their legs in order to obtain muscle tissue for analysis. Despite the hurdles, the scientists still managed to find 11 brave young male volunteers. The study was published in the Feb. 1 issue of Science Translational Medicine.

On a first visit, they biopsied one leg of each subject at rest. At a second session, they had them vigorously exercise on a stationary bicycle for more than an hour until they could go no further. Then they massaged one thigh of each subject for 10 minutes, leaving the other to recover on its own. Immediately after the massage, they biopsied the thigh muscle in each leg again. After allowing another two-and-a-half hours of rest, they did a third biopsy to track the process of muscle injury and repair.

Vigorous exercise causes tiny tears in muscle fibers, leading to an immune reaction — inflammation — as the body gets to work repairing the injured cells. So the researchers screened the tissue from the massaged and unmassaged legs to compare their repair processes, and find out what difference massage would make.

They found that massage reduced the production of compounds called cytokines, which play a critical role in inflammation. Massage also stimulated mitochondria, the tiny powerhouses inside cells that convert glucose into the energy essential for cell function and repair. “The bottom line is that there appears to be a suppression of pathways in inflammation and an increase in mitochondrial biogenesis,” helping the muscle adapt to the demands of increased exercise, said the senior author, Dr. Mark A. Tarnopolsky.

Dr. Tarnopolsky, a professor of pediatrics and medicine at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said that massage works quite differently from Nsaids and other anti-inflammatory drugs, which reduce inflammation and pain but may actually retard healing. Many people, for instance, pop an aspirin or Aleve at the first sign of muscle soreness. “There’s some theoretical concern that there is a maladaptive response in the long run if you’re constantly suppressing inflammation with drugs,” he said. “With massage, you can have your cake and eat it too—massage can suppress inflammation and actually enhance cell recovery.”

“This is important research, because it is the first to show that massage can reduce pro-inflammatory cytokines which may be involved in pain,” said Tiffany Field, director of the Touch Research Institute at the University of Miami Medical School. She was not involved in the study. “We have known from many studies that pain can be reduced by massage based on self-report, but this is the first demonstration that the pain-related pro-inflammatory cytokines can be reduced.” she said.

Getting a massage from a professional masseur is obviously more expensive than taking an aspirin. But, as Dr. Field points out, massage techniques can be taught. “People within families can learn to massage each other,” she said. “If you can teach parents to massage kids, couples to massage each other. This can be cost effective.”

Dr. Tarnopolsky suggests that, in the long run, a professional massage may even be a better bargain than a pill. “If someone says “This is free and it might make you feel better, but it may slow down your recovery, do you still want it?” he asked. “Or would you rather spend the 50 bucks for a post-exercise massage that also might enhance your recovery?”

 

RECIPES FOR HEALTH

Egg Salad and Greens Wrap

Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Egg Salad and Greens Wrap

By MARTHA ROSE SHULMAN

Published: January 24, 2012

I make these delicious wraps with the whole-wheat lavash that I buy in Middle Eastern markets. Beet greens and Swiss chard are both good choices.

Recipes for Health

Martha Rose Shulman presents food that is vibrant and light, full of nutrients but by no means ascetic, fun to cook and to eat.

 

4 large eggs, hard-boiled (see below)

1/2 cup finely chopped fresh herbs, like parsley, dill, tarragon, chervil, chives

1/2 cup finely chopped bulb fennel or celery

Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar or sherry vinegar

1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 tablespoon Hellmann’s or Best Foods mayonnaise

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

1/4 cup plain low-fat yogurt

1 bunch beet greens or Swiss chard (about 3/4 pound), stemmed and washed thoroughly in 2 changes of water

3 whole-wheat lavash

To hard-boil the eggs, place in a saucepan, cover with cold water, and bring to a rolling boil. Cover the pan tightly and turn off the heat. Let sit for 12 minutes. Fill a bowl with ice water, drain the eggs and chill immediately in the ice water until completely cool.

1. Cut the eggs in half and remove and discard two of the yolks if desired. Combine the chopped eggs, herbs, and fennel or celery in a large bowl and season to taste with salt and pepper.

2. Whisk together the vinegar, lemon juice, mayonnaise, mustard and yogurt. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Toss with the egg mixture. Set aside.

3. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, salt generously and add the greens. Blanch for 1 to 2 minutes and transfer to a bowl of cold water, drain and squeeze out excess water. Alternatively, steam the greens in a steamer basket over an inch of boiling water for 2 to 3 minutes, until tender. Remove from the heat, rinse and squeeze out excess water.

4. Lay a piece of lavash on your work surface horizontally (the long edge is closest to you). Measure about 2 inches in from the left edge and arrange 1/3 of the greens in a 1-inch wide line, leaving a 1 1/2-inch margin at the top and bottom. Spoon a third of the egg mixture over the greens. Fold the left edge of the lavash over the filling, then fold in the top and bottom edges. Grip the filling in the folded-over lavash and roll up tightly like a burrito, so that the filling is secure. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate until ready to take to work or to eat.

Yield: 3 wraps.

Advance preparation: The egg salad keeps well for a couple of days in the refrigerator, but you’ll want to toss it again before making the wraps. The cooked greens keep for 4 days in the refrigerator, and the assembled wraps keep for a day.

Nutritional information per serving: 327 calories; 3 grams saturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 3 grams monounsaturated fat; 251 milligrams cholesterol; 38 grams carbohydrates; 8 grams dietary fiber; 639 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste); 18 grams protein

Note: If you want to cut out some of the carbs and calories in this wrap, cut off the very ends of the wrap. This is mostly bread and once the wrap is chilled, it will cut away cleanly.

 

New Year's resolutions in the works?

Small steps are best

If you're aiming to get healthy in the new year, be realistic about the changes you can make in diet and exercise. Often, starting small can lead to big things

Allan Marion works out at Muscle Under Fitness in West Hollywood. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times / December 23, 2011)

By Jeannine Stein, Los Angeles Times

December 31, 2011, 8:52 p.m.

So, you've made a New Year's resolution to get healthy. No doubt you've banished all cookies and chips from the house and plan to hit the gym every single day.

Let's get real. In three months, you're going to be comatose on the sofa with a telltale ring of orange Cheetos crumbs around your mouth.

Most people start off the new year by making grand, sweeping changes — and the changes never stick. What does stick? Thinking small: setting modest, attainable goals and slowly chalking up petite successes as you steadily build confidence. It's a strategy that can lead to substantial and sustainable health improvements over time, as fitness and nutrition experts well know.

Not that there's anything wrong with wanting to run a marathon or lose 50 pounds — but it's not going to happen in a month, and when it doesn't, people often feel a huge letdown and then throw in the towel.

"We're guilty of that all-or-nothing mentality in so many areas of our lives," says Jessica Matthews, an exercise physiologist and spokeswoman for the San Diego-based American Council on Exercise. "We have to be doing something at 100 miles an hour or not at all."

If you want to ramp up physical activity but are currently about as energetic as a tree sloth on a slow day, you'd be better off adding easy routines — even something as minor as parking far away from your destination. "Every step really adds up," Matthews says.

Or just take a walk while at work. If you can't afford the luxury of a 40-minute march, do it in manageable five-minute batches every hour, says Felicia Stoler, a New York-based registered dietitian and exercise physiologist and author of "Living Skinny in Fat Genes: The Healthy Way toLose Weight and Feel Great." You'll still increase your physical activity by 40 minutes a day.

Dietary first steps can also be ridiculously small, says San Francisco-based registered dietitian Manuel Villacorta, a spokesman for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (formerly the American Dietetic Assn.). The person who eats no fruits or vegetables might add one serving a week. Those who never cook can make a simple, healthful meal from a prepared roasted chicken, frozen rice and canned beans.

"Start with things you can measure — amounts, frequency," he says. "Once you know you've done it, then you can go to the next level."

Why small steps? When you drastically cut out all fattening foods, you may bust out with a great big binge. Exercise too much and your unaccustomed muscles can suffer overuse injuries such as strains and sprains.

Or even more likely, psychological burnout sets in.

Before even the first tiny step is taken, people need to forge a plan to make sure it happens, says Marion Jacobs, a psychologist in private practice in Laguna Beach and adjunct professor emeritus ofpsychology at UCLA and author of "Take-Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life ... in Six Acts."

"Change is a process," she says. "You don't go straight from 'A' to bikini. You have to make a plan for each step you have to take [and] you also have to look at the obstacles you're going to run into for each of these steps."

So think, and plan. Want to start running? Make sure your clothes are set out before you go to bed. Want to eat more home-cooked meals? Have a grocery list, a menu and a date to go shopping. Goals should be attainable — and pragmatic. "If you're not a morning person," Matthews says, "don't schedule exercise for 6 a.m."

You should anticipate difficulties before they happen. If you're going to visit a family member who constantly pushes food, avoid a major setback by explaining beforehand that you're watching what you eat. If you need to keep tempting and potentially derailing foods in the house for your kids, figure out how you're going to handle that.

When people don't have a plan, they may decide "I'm going to the gym every day," but when that doesn't happen, they don't see the results they want and they quit, Jacobs says. "And then they say, 'It's just not my personality. Other people can do this, but I can't.'"

Making small changes can be easier and more rewarding if progress is documented, be it keeping track of food and exercise in a notebook or using smartphone apps or computer programs that track calories, nutrition and activity.

"One of the best things people can do is monitor themselves," says Villacorta, who likes the apps for their immediate feedback and instant information. "You can see your progress."

Having people in your corner is also important — but choose whom you turn to for encouragement with care. "If your husband is overweight and doesn't want to lose weight, he may not be a source of support," Jacobs says. "He could be a source of sabotage."

When you backslide, don't beat yourself up and use it as an excuse to throw everything away. Think of change as a week-to-week development, Villacorta suggests. "One [indulgent] meal isn't going to destroy your entire week."

After a while, he adds, certain once-loved treats may not taste as wonderful. "The cleaner people are eating, the more they feel it when they eat something processed or with a lot of sugar in it," Villacorta says.

You may feel you need to wait till just the right moment to make changes. But the notion that readiness is all-important is a myth, Jacobs says.

"It's unlikely you're going to feel ready to do what you need to do," she says. "If you did, you'd have already done it." If you wait until you feel motivated, you may wait forever. Get started anyway.

Feelings — the ones telling you you can't change — are tough to deny, but you can alter the way you think and behave, Jacobs says. "When you start to move forward, even in small steps, your brain starts to say, 'Well, what do you know, I can do that.'"

Soon, one walk around the block turns into two. And from there, even a marathon is possible.

"Little behavior changes count — if you count them," Jacobs says.

 

My favorite stroke

A Devoted Following for the Lord of the Breaststroke By KAREN CROUSE Danny Moloshok for The New York Times Dave Salo, the men’s and women’s coach at Southern California, has a reputation for getting the most out of breaststrokers no matter their background or swimming style.

LOS ANGELES — Dave Salo was barking “back flat!” and “heel speed!” as he crisscrossed the pool deck at the University of Southern California. Salo, the Trojans’ men’s and women’s coach and a member of the United States’ 2012 Olympic staff, has earned a reputation as a breaststroke whisperer for his success working with swimmers with different backgrounds and disparate styles.

 

Danny Moloshok for The New York Times

Michael Alexandrov uses paddles during a workout with Dave Salo, a revered breaststroke coach at the University of Southern California.

His breaststroke training contingent on a Saturday morning last month included Kosuke Kitajima, the 2008 Olympic double gold medalist; Eric Shanteau, the American record-holder in the 100 and 200 meters; Michael Alexandrov, the American record-holder in the 100 and 200 yards; Rebecca Soni, the 2008 Olympic gold medalist in the 200 meters; and Jessica Hardy, the world record-holder in the 100 meters.

Shanteau, Alexandrov, Soni and Hardy will take a break from racing one another to battle a European team of all-stars in the Duel in the Pool on Friday and Saturday in Atlanta. It will be a homecoming for Shanteau, 28, who grew up in Lilburn, 20 miles northeast of Atlanta, before pulling up his roots for fertile training grounds at Auburn University and later at Texas Aquatics in Austin.

A 2008 Olympian, Shanteau was a seeker drawn to Southern California nearly a year ago by the cult of 20-something breaststrokers subjecting themselves to Salo’s esoteric practices.

“I felt like I needed to do something completely different to get to the next level,” Shanteau said. “If you’re in the top 99.9 percent, how do you beat that one-tenth percent? I needed to shock my body.”

Shanteau said he was still adapting to Salo’s low-mileage, high-quality, technique-driven training regimen when he placed fourth in the 200 breaststroke over the summer at the world championships in Shanghai. The second-place finisher was Kitajima, who contemplated retirement after successfully defending his Olympic breaststroke titles in the 100 and 200 at the 2008 Beijing Games.

A celebrity who is recognized everywhere he goes in his native Japan, Kitajima escaped to Los Angeles. He was renting a house in Santa Monica in the spring of 2009 when he sampled a few Salo workouts. Within weeks, Kitajima had left thoughts of retirement behind.

“There’s no stress here,” Kitajima said. “I thought, I can do this.” He added, “My breaststroke’s different from Jessica, from Eric, but Dave knows what advice to give all of us.”

Alexandrov was born in Sofia, Bulgaria. His father, Plamen Dontchev, was a 1980 Olympian in the 100-meter breaststroke. Alexandrov competed for his homeland at the 2004 and 2008 Olympics. A former Northwestern standout who has called the United States home since grade school, he gained dual citizenship in 2006. After the 2008 Olympics, Alexandrov sat out a year of international competition so he could represent this country. He trained in Tucson before joining Trojan Swim Club in April.

“Dave helps you go faster when you think you’re already peaking,” Alexandrov said. “He notices little things in your stroke that can make a big difference.”

The breaststrokers who train under Salo catch the water on their pulls in the same place, but that’s where the similarities end. Hardy, who also is expected to contend for an Olympic medal in the 50 freestyle next year in London, has a core of steel to complement her Gumby-like leg flexibility.

Her strengths are not to be confused with those of Soni, who has neither an extraordinary pull nor an extraordinary kick, but her timing when she puts the two together is exquisite. Kitajima has a powerful kick, but his technique is what makes him hard to beat. His body position is so efficient, he skims the surface like a water bug. Shanteau has a powerful kick that compensates for a weaker upper body.

Different strengths call for different approaches. At one workout last month, Shanteau was swimming a breaststroke set in the 50-meter racing pool, which was set up for short-course yards. Kitajima was in the adjacent diving well doing his best impression of a yo-yo. He was performing a drill in which he swam breaststroke while wearing a belt with a surgical tubing tail that a teammate held to create extra resistance. When he was done, the teammate reeled him in as Kitajima continued to stroke, a sensation akin to riding a wave into shore.

Soni and Hardy were in the same pool as Shanteau, but Soni was in a middle-distance group that included Shanteau, while Hardy was ensconced with the sprinters.

The breaststrokers race head-to-head plenty of times, but it is not as if a mini-Olympics breaks out at every workout. Salo has created an atmosphere that manages to be competitive and collaborative without becoming cutthroat.

“It starts with Dave because he’s able to keep everybody engaged,” Alexandrov said. “It’s addictive, actually, because there’s so much adrenaline. People don’t back down. It’s two hours of all-out swimming, going as fast as you can while maintaining your technique.”

While not a one-workout-fits-all proponent, Salo does insist on one time interval for all, which is a departure from the way other coaches typically handle those who swim the breaststroke, the slowest of the four competitive strokes. The conventional wisdom is to give breaststrokers more time to complete each distance in stroke-specific training.

Salo’s approach is to let the breaststrokers go last in the same lane with the butterfly swimmers and backstrokers and to challenge them to keep up. He adopted the method in the 1990s, when he was coaching a teenage Amanda Beard to the 1996 and 2000 Olympics.

“It helps that there’s so many of us breaststrokers out here and we’re all in the same boat,” Shanteau said.

During another workout in the fall with the other postcollegians, Soni, who graduated from Southern California in 2009, was kicking breaststroke in a lane with swimmers doing the dolphin kick, or flutter kick. After a few hundred meters, Soni looked like an iceberg that had broken away from the floe. She was several meters behind her nearest teammate.

“She’ll come in and be frustrated,” Salo said. “I know she’s working hard. That’s kind of our understanding of each other.”

Salo had a successful age-group career in the breaststroke, and he knows what his swimmers are feeling — sometimes better than they do.

“You’ll talk to swimmers, they’ll say they feel like they’re kicking their arms into the recovery,” he said. “But if you look at the videotape you see that the arms are leading the way. That’s the challenge of coaching breaststrokers. You have to be able to describe what you want them to do in a way that makes sense to them because they operate so much on feel.”

In July, Hardy, 24, stood atop the podium after winning the 50-meter breaststroke at the world championships. She was flanked by Russia’s Yuliya Efimova and by Soni, who was third. It was a sweet result for the United States and a clean sweep for Salo, who also works with Efimova.

“He really, really, has a technical understanding of the breaststroke better than anyone on the planet,” Hardy said, adding, “I hear in my dreams every night: ‘Back flat. Back flat.’ He sounds like the Aflac duck.”

Between Boot Camp List

No kidding...

Some kids' cereals may have way too much sugar, a report finds

Do you know how much added sugar is lurking in your kids' cereals? A new report finds some brands may contain a lot of the stuff. (Getty Images / MedioImages)

December 7, 2011, 10:23 a.m.

Before you pour your child a heapin' bowl of sugary cereal, read this: The Environmental Working Group has just come out with its list of the 10 worst children's cereals. Your child's favorite might be on it.

At No. 1 is Kellogg's Honey Smacks, coming in at 55.6% sugar by weight, followed by Post Golden Crisp at 51.9% and Kellogg's Froot Loops Marshmallow at 48.3%. The list also includes, in descending order of sugar, Quaker Oats Cap'n Crunch OOPS! All Berries (yes, that's really the name), Quaker Oats Cap'n Crunch original, Quaker Oats Oh!s, Kellogg's Smorz, Kellogg's Apple Jacks and Quaker Oats Cap'n Crunch's Crunch Berries. In last place, a somewhat dubious achievement, is Kellogg's Froot Loops original at 41.4% sugar by weight.

How much sugar is that? The report found that a cup of Kellogg's Honey Smacks, Post Golden Crisp or General Mills Wheaties Fuel has more sugar at 18.7 to 20 grams than does a Hostess Twinkie, which comes in at 17.5 grams.

Also, not all cereal brands are created equal, at least when it comes to the sweet stuff. Original Cheerios, according to the report, is 3.6% sugar, while the Apple Cinnamon, Chocolate and Fruity varieties are 33% sugar.

The group also claims that only one-fourth of 84 children's cereals tested met the voluntary proposed guidelines of the Interagency Working Group on Food Marketing, a group of federal nutrition, marketing and health experts brought together to make suggestions about the nutritional quality of food marketed to children and teens.

The voluntary proposed guidelines, says the Environmental Working Group, recommend that ready-to-eat cereals have no more than 26% added sugar by weight.

Sugar wasn't the only problem found by the Washington, D.C.-based EWG, a nonprofit research and advocacy group focused on public health and the environment. Others were found to exceed proposed government nutrition guidelines: 10 cereals had more than 210 milligrams of sodium and at least 26 cereals were not predominantly whole grain.

The EWG's report says that the Interagency Working Group's guidelines could be even a little tougher and go for a 15% cap on added sugar and making that mandatory instead of voluntary.

The amount of added sugar children consume has come under fire in recent years as obesity rates among kids remain high. Juice, cereals, snacks and desserts are being scrutinized for added sugar content as well as other nutritional pitfalls such as saturated fat and sodium.

What's a better breakfast for kids? The report says some popular brands of kids' cereals meet nutritional guidelines: Kellogg's Mini-Wheats (Unfrosted Bite Size, Frosted Big Bite, Frosted Bite Size and Frosted Little Bites), General Mills Cheerios original and General Mills Kix original.

Or you could ditch the cereal altogether and give your kids a breakfast of oatmeal with nuts and fresh fruit, plus nonfat or lowfat milk.

I Never Met a Migraine That Didn't Wanna Dance All Night

 

I used to fight them with monthly acupuncture and the pictured herbs on a daily basis until forced to administer a pricey Frova pill. I could go into a gigantic rant here about the hideous, soul-sucking insurance company that refused to give me more than four a month, but I won't, lest it give me a headache, which I haven't had without accompanying pounding cranial cavities, nausea and quivering soul since 2005. Now I just take the Frova. Our new insurance company gives me nine a month. Livin' large, people!