Weight Loss Archives

Sugar is NOT sugar! I’m looking at you Corn Refiners Association…

When I was a kid, I believed in Santa Claus. I believed that a jolly, fat man in a red outfit with black boots and a long, white beard would fly around in a magic sleigh.

The story didn’t stop there. You would think a sleigh that could fly would have rockets on it, right? No, not this one. It was yanked around by special flying reindeer. But wait…it didn’t stop there.

That story gets even bigger. I was told those flying reindeer would pull that sleigh and that fat man around the globe once a year on Dec. 25. Why? He would deliver gifts to children everywhere.

Now here’s the crazy part. I really did buy into the whole thing. Why? Everyone around me seemed to believe it.

By the time I was 6 years old, my belief started to wane. The world seemed too big. I had a problem with the concept of the chimney he supposedly slid down. By age 7, I was almost certain he didn’t exist.

I wasn’t going to say anything. I was on the dole. I couldn’t have the toys and gifts stop. I just went along with the rhetoric of St. Claus as a magical man.

By the time I was 8, I couldn’t take it much longer. I went to my parents and told them I couldn’t play the charade anymore. I needed to know the truth.

I learned two things that day. First, I learned that the gifts wouldn’t stop, whether I believed or not. I also learned that to make it in this world, you have to question everything.

I told you that to tell you this.

I’m afraid that your good intentions have been stolen. As Americans, we’re fatter than ever. It’s not our fault.

There are many places to point the finger. Since I’m America’s Angriest Trainer (at least that’s what I call myself), this blog will take you through several scenarios on why we get fat and stay fat against our better wishes.

There’s a huge debate that high fructose corn syrup (which comes from corn) is no more fattening than sugar. True, they both offer the same number of calories and their molecular structures are similar. There’s real studies that prove that not all sugars are the same. High fructose corn syrup can make you fatter than sugar.

As a matter of fact, the Corn Refiners Association (they also know this to be true) has been spending bundles of money on huge advertising campaigns to make us believe otherwise. You may have seen these ads. They claim sugar and high fructose corn syrup are the same. Trust me, high fructose corn syrup and sugar are not the same.

The Corn Refiners Association has spent tons of money lying to us that both are equal. “Sugar is sugar,” they claim. They do it in an All-American, wholesome way. Everyone in the ad is lean and good looking.

They claim they have the research to back it up. They even tell us to do our own research. Listen to the experts, and “get the facts.”

They’re basically telling people to Google it. So what happens after a quick Web search? We find an unassuming Ph.D (not a professor, but an associate professor) named Kristine Clark who shills for high fructose corn syrup.

How do we know she’s a shill? The Corn Refiners Association actually uploaded all of her videos.

Do you know the difference between a nurse and a nurse’s aide? A nurse is a step away from a doctor, while a nurse’s aide mainly cleans bedpans. Just like a nurse and a nurse’s aide have differing job descriptions, the same goes for a professor and an associate professor.

Clark also uses a condescending tone, treating us like babies who are wrong. According to her, high fructose corn syrup is not only equal to sugar – it’s better.

What kind of idiots do they think we are?

Keep in mind, she comes from Penn State. Remember that school? Apparently they think football is more important than child molestation.

See the video for yourself:

Kristine Clark – The Truth About Sweeteners Like High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS), Sugar and Honey

I’m not asking you to take my word for it. I’ll put a link so you can find a guy who really knows what he’s talking about – Dr. Robert H. Lustig, M.D. He’s an endocrinologist at the University of California San Francisco Center for Obesity. He’s a foremost authority on obesity in the world. Last I checked, he wasn’t “cleaning bedpans” at a state school. Here is a link to a video where for 89 minutes he spells it all out in great detail. Who’s he speaking to? A room full of doctors.

Dr. Robert H. Lustig, M.D. – Sugar: The Bitter Truth

Truth be known, if you’re trying to lose weight, too much sugar is not your friend.

Remember folks, I don’t have a horse in this race. I’m not trying to sell you anything. I’m just trying to sell you on the fact that you don’t have to go into your old age any heavier than when you were a teenager.

Think of me as your trainer now. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to share them on this site.

Sophia Loren…sweet

Can you be fit and fat?

by Vinnie Tortorich

I was finishing up dinner tonight when my phone rang. I looked at the caller ID thing and realized it was my buddy Steve, the one we call the Jewish Rambo here at Vinnie’s Blog and Country Club. We chatted about meaningless stuff for a while, then he said, “I haven’t seen a blog from you lately. What’s the matter?” I reminded Steve that we put up something new every day on the blog. Beside Andy’s Recipes, we also put up items from around the internet. I guess he forgets I have a day job. We went on to talk about a few other things. Before we got off the phone, I told Steve to throw out a subject for my next blog. The phone went silent for a few seconds. Then he uttered these words: “Can a person be both fit and fat?” The example he gave was a lineman in the NFL. I told you that to tell you this. I’ve defined fitness before on this blog, but it’s always good to define it again. I mean, what does “fit” really mean? It means “fit” to do the activity at hand. An example is a fit swimmer. If you get caught in a flood or get thrown from a boat, you have a greater chance of survival than a person who is a fit jogger who never swims. Getting back to the NFL. The guy who is fit to play on the line is not fit to be a running back or wide receiver. Each position is a specialty position. The wide receiver has to be fast and nimble. A lineman needs to have quick feet and enough girth to stop opposing linemen. To this point, I think the NFL is running into a real problem, not to add to the problems it already has. But I digress. The average lineman during the first Super Bowl in the late 1960s weighed around 240 pounds. Remember Jerry Kramer and the boys? The average lineman now tips the scales at over 300 pounds. These guys are literally becoming sumo wrestlers without the fancy diaper. Is it healthy? Hell no. As a matter of fact I saw a report on this on Bryant Gumbel’s Real Sports. Some of these guys die before they reach 50. Under Vinnie’s definition of whether you can be fit and fat at the same time, I say yes. And yes I used myself in the third person. Will a fat person have the same quality of life and longevity as their thin counterparts? I think the answer is definitely no.

The Japan syndrome

by Vinnie Tortorich

What I’ve realized in life is that people are effing crazy. Take for instance the earthquake/tsunami in Japan. I can’t think of an event in my life time that’s anywhere near what’s going on in that country right now. As Americans, we don’t care about that. Yeah, we pay lip service to it, but all we care about is how it affects us. Since I live in California, several hours after the event, we got tsunami warnings here. The thought pattern was the ripple wave would make its way to our shores. The government did what it was supposed to do and closed the beaches. I personally stayed as far as I could from the coast. But a lot of idiots went to the beach to see the tsunami. What were they thinking? Have they not seen the devastation on television and online from other tsunamis? I’m not an expert, but I don’t think you can out run a tsunami from the beach. The story gets better. Remember, my first sentence was that people are crazy. We would do anything to look young and healthy…even if it’s not healthy. Here in L.A., women use restylane and botox to look younger. Then there’s collagen, and silicone for breast implants. There are all sorts of augmentations. Years ago when women wanted to lose weight, they would go get “The Shot,” or gonadotropin. All of these things are proof that we may be the nuttiest nation on the planet. And we can’t figure out why the Europeans are always laughing at us. I told you that to tell you this. The situation in Japan has gotten hairier than a Persian’s bath bar. It’s not bad enough that their whole world was crumbled. It’s not bad enough that what may be tens of thousands of their people were killed. Now it seems their nuclear reactors are failing and exploding. This is a crisis of biblical proportions. Apparently with the nuclear reactor, people need iodine to counteract the radiation. True to form, over 5,000 miles away in California, there is now a run on the market for iodine. It seems our narcissistic friends somehow feel that radiation will float through the air 5,000 miles and affect us here. You really want to do something? Ship that iodine to the people who really need it…the folks in Japan.