by Sean Croxton

Here’s an alarming stat…

Researchers from Massachusetts found that the average man’s testosterone (not just older men) has dropped 22% in the last 20 years, and that one out of every four men has below average testosterone.

That’s no bueno, friends!

Testosterone is what makes men…well, men.

It is responsible for our sex drives, our ambition, our sense of well being, and a whole bunch of other important stuff.

When testosterone is low, it is almost impossible to be the best versions of ourselves. We become ordinary, not the alphas we were intended to be.

My friends Adam and Roman, co-authors of Man 2.0: Engineering the Alpha, stopped by the show last week to discuss all things alpha, including how to balance male hormones naturally through diet, lifestyle, mindset, and exercise.

To listen to our podcast, click the player at the bottom of this post.

Here are my notes…

3:30 – Another awkward live radio moment
5:45 – Redefining the alpha man
7:08 – Stop defining yourself by other people
7:45 – Alpha trait: Be prideful but not arrogant
9:34 – Alpha trait: Be dedicated but not obsessed
12:36 – Toeing the line between genius and obsession
13:12 – Alpha rule: Answer all insults with a smile
15:45 – Success is the best revenge
17:07 – Why are so many ordinary and so few alpha?
20:33 – It starts with psychology
21:51 – How hormonal dysfunction can create an ordinary life
22:20 – Sex drive and ambition come from the same place
23:50 – Your greatness threshold
25:52 – Why Todd Durkin is a beast!
26:55 – Low T: It’s not just an issue for older guys
29:17 – Lifestyle factors that offset the natural decline of testosterone
31:40 – Red meat, cholesterol, and testosterone production
33:08 – What Star Wars has to do with fitness
40:51 – Lies, Myths, and Why Men are Fat!
41:00 – Why breakfast is NOT the most important meal of the day
44:45 – Why eating at night is one of the BEST things for your body
47:50 – How cheat days keep your metabolism up while dieting
51:44 – The top 3 benefits of the feast-fast model
55:44 – How to reset your sensitivity to insulin
57:16 – Shout out to Martin Berkhan
58:18 – Caller Q: How to boost testosterone through weight training
1:02:15 – How lactic acid production increases growth hormone
1:05:53 – The final phase of fat loss
1:09:55 – Caller Q: Tips for coming off of testosterone gel
1:14:22 – Caller Q: How to keep from losing testosterone while dieting
1:18:56 – Wrapping up

In case you didn’t know, all 216 UW Radio broadcasts can be found on our Podcasts page as well as on iTunes!

Don’t miss tomorrow’s episode with Dr. Peter Glidden, author of The MD Emperor Has No Clothes.

Out.

Sean
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton and Reed Davis

By popular demand!

Last night, Functional Diagnostic Nutrition founder, Reed Davis, myself, and about 400 attendees got together for this year’s first FREE webinar. The topic: Functional Fat Loss.

What does Functional Fat Loss mean?

Well, it means that fat loss is not just a matter of diet and exercise. As Reed pointed out early in his presentation, fat accumulation can be a symptom of some underlying — and often unaddressed — dysfunction within the hormonal, digestive, detoxification, and immune systems.

Diet and exercise are just two pieces of a MUCH larger puzzle.

For example, did you know that 60-percent of your thyroid hormone is activated in your liver? This particular hormone holds great influence over your metabolism. So if your liver is clogged up — due to toxins from food, personal care and cleaning products, as well as the general environment — this can put the brakes on your fat loss goals!

As a matter of fact, another 20-percent of thyroid is activated by the bacteria in your gut. The problem is that most of us have imbalanced gut flora, thus compromised metabolisms.

Click below to WATCH last night’s webinar.

I’ll be honest with you. While we intended this webinar to be for the general population, Reed got a bit carried away and was a bit too technical and jargon-y. That’s my fault for not reviewing the slides beforehand. My bad.

Due to this, Reed and I have decided to record a simplified version of the presentation. I’ll be posting it to this blog as soon as it is done.

So if you’re relatively new to this functional stuff, this may not be the webinar for you. But if you’re a trainer, health practitioner, or a nerd like me, this will be like brain candy for you.

Be sure to stick around to the end, when Reed and I offer you a $300 discount on the Functional Diagnostic Nutrition certification course. Use the coupon code UW300 at www.fdncourse.com.

If you’re interested in finding an FDN practitioner to work with, you may locate one HERE.

And last but not least, I will be hosting a Q&A session with Reed TOMORROW morning at 8am PT/11am ET on the radio show.

Here’s THE LINK.

Happy Friday, friends.

Sean
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

I’m not going to lie to you.

In just a few hours, I’m planning on partying like I’ve never partied before. I’m talking about complete removal of my “health guy” hat.

Dancing. Drinking. Eating. I may even have a slice of pizza or two. Hey it’s just one night!

New Year’s Eve are usually a downer for me — they remind me of all the things I planned on achieving but did not.

But this year, I crushed it. Thanks to your support, 2012 was by far the BEST year of my life. And I refuse to let it end without a bang. A big bang!

This time next year, I want every single one of my readers to feel like I feel today — to look back on the year with a profound sense of pride and esteem. To feel like a major celebration is in order.

If your New Year’s resolutions are finance-related, I’m super pumped to share some killer tips from the best-of-the-best experts on my new website and radio show, both of which will FINALLY be launching next month.

If your resolutions are health- and fat loss-related, I’ve got all kinds of goodies for you this week to help you cover all of your bases. I’m calling it your New Year’s Toolbox.

Here’s what’s inside…

Mindset. I say 90-percent of success is driven by your mindset. On tomorrow’s LIVE radio show, our good friend Dean Dwyer will be sharing his wisdom on how you can get your mind right to achieve your goals for 2013. Learn more at the link below.

www.deansaudiocourse.com

Use the discount code 201325 to save 25% on the one-year course option!

Exercise. My partner-in-crime Brett Klika will be running a BIG sale on his Underground Workout Manual, complete with 12 weeks of workouts you can do at home and over 100 instructional videos. More below.

www.uwworkoutmanual.com

The H.I.D.D.E.N. Factors. As you know, health and fat loss go well beyond diet and exercise. On Thursday night at 5pm PT/8pm ET, Reed Davis and I are hosting a LIVE Functional Fat Loss webinar to show you the role your hormonal, digestive, detoxification, and immune systems play in becoming a healthier, slimmer you. Register below.

www.FREEfatlosswebinar.com

Cleansing. The very BEST time to cleanse your body is at the turn of the New Year, after all of the holiday goodies and NYE partying. My buddy Yuri Elkaim put together an amazing food-based cleanse for you called the Total Wellness Cleanse.

Yuri was on the radio show last week telling you all about it. If you missed it, here’s THE LINK.

In a nutshell, Yuri has a plan for you to remove toxins, chemicals, metals, and more from your body through food.

After tonight’s bash, I’m gonna need this one myself!! Click the link below to learn more.

www.elkaimcleanse.com

While I plan on getting wild and crazy tonight, I should say that I’ll be one block from my place — close enough to walk/stumble home.

If you’re celebrating away from home, be sure to have a designated driver.

Be safe, my friends.

Sean
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

Where does fitness end and disease begin?

The line separating the two can be a fine one and, for most, a blur. In fact, crossing this line is often perceived as admirable, even worthy of envy.

From the outside an ultra-lean, sculptured female physique may be looked upon by her peers as a body to die for. However, from the inside it may be a body she is dying for.

Okay, maybe that’s a bit of an overstatement.

Then again, maybe not.

Working as a personal trainer for eight years and then as a diet and lifestyle coach for three, I learned many lessons. The lesson I will share with you today is this:

Looks can be deceiving.

In every gym exists at least one woman rocking a bra top to show off all eight of her abs. The one who seems to be there no matter what time you go. The one who women gawk at more than the men.

My female training clients would often express envy over this woman, however unbeknownst to the damage taking place beneath the hard-bodied surface.

Looks can kill you.

Oh, there I go again…

Behind closed doors many — but not all — of these women are dealing with significant health challenges. I should know, as I have consulted with dozens of figure competitors and female bodybuilders experiencing various lifestyle-related symptoms including chronic constipation, intermittent diarrhea, poor libido, loss of menstruation, brain fog, depression, and more.

In fact, after reviewing their lab test results with me and actually seeing on paper what their ambitions (or addictions) for the perfect body had done, a handful of my figure model clients retired on the spot. To them, it just wasn’t worth it.

And that brings us today’s video. Dr. Kelly Austin, a naturopathic doctor, stopped by the studio to discuss Female Athlete Triad Syndrome. This triad involves the following three criteria:

Disordered eating. This doesn’t have to be a full-blown eating disorder — although it could. Instead it can be the woman who consumes a 1000-calorie diet but burns 800 calories on the treadmill daily and works out. There simply are not enough calories coming in to support activity. Very common.

Amenorrhea (loss of menstruation). Losing your period is a sure sign that bodyfat percentage has gone too low. A woman needs sufficient fat stores in order to maintain reproductivity. Amenorrhea involves low levels of estrogen, which can be a product of excessive stress on the body, including the stress of over-training.

Bone loss. There typically comes a point when the woman who spends too much time on the treadmill finds herself in a walking boot. This is often do to stress fractures, which may result from a combination of overtraining and the impact of low estrogen levels on bone loss.

I’ve said enough. Now, let’s hear from Dr. Austin.

Check out the video below. You may also listen to our entire radio show HERE.

Enjoy….

Sean
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton and Reed Davis

If I could turn back the hands of time and become a personal trainer again, I would do a LOT of things differently.

Of course, I would NOT have put my clients on the Food Guide Pyramid diet plan. Whoops!

But in hindsight, I think one of my biggest mistakes was pushing so much cardio on my clients. If you’ve read the intro to my ebook — which you can get for free HERE — you’re familiar with my old “cardio sign-in sheets”.

Each week, I assigned my clients a specific number of calories to burn off on their cardio machine(s) of choice. For example, if the goal was to burn 5000 calories in a week, clients were required to document each cardio session on the sign-in sheet that hung up in my office. For some, a 5000-calorie objective called for five 1000-calorie sessions over a seven-day period. This could take as long as 2 hours a day for my smaller clients. Sometimes, they even had to pull double-duty, coming in twice a day to meet their weekly goals.

Sorry…:(

What drove me bat-sh*t crazy was the fact that, despite these arduous cardio sessions in addition to severely calorie-restricted diets, most clients wouldn’t drop a single pound. Some even gained weight. It was the most perplexing thing ever!

Fast forward half a decade, and I finally learned the truth about why my approach was failing over and over again. Not only were my clients consuming the wrong foods, but the majority of them actually needed LESS exercise.

My clients were already stressed out enough as it was — emotionally, financially, socially, and spiritually. My methods of gross overtraining were only making matters worse.

While it is true that exercise can be a form of medicine, we often forget that is possible to overdose on it. With overtraining eventually comes a point of diminishing returns — and a ton of frustration.

The impact of overtraining on the hormonal system can be quite extensive. Working as a Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist, I often found — via salivary hormone testing — that the clients who spent the most time exercising had the worst markers, including late-stage adrenal dysfunction, declining cortisol level, low DHEA, and depressed testosterone scores.

Try losing fat with low testosterone. Not gonna happen!

While corrective protocols may vary from person to person, one recommendation remained the same — REST.

It seems counterintuitive to recommend to a client that he or she skip the morning spin class beatdown session in favor of a yoga, tai chi, or meditation class. Most clients are initially resistant to this recommendation. However, after a healthy dose of Croxton persuasion, they concede and agree to give it a try.

I cannot tell you how many of my long-frustrated consulting clients have FINALLY witnessed their bodies change for the better by exercising LESS.

No, I’m not saying exercise is bad – don’t get it twisted — but I am saying that if the time you’re spending in the gym does not match the results you are getting, do your body a favor and give it some time off. While you’re at it, have your hormones tested by a qualified practitioner. See what’s really going on under the hood.

Check out the video below to learn more. And although I brought up the popular workout video Insanity in this clip, I’m not saying that it is a bad program. It just may not be the right program for you right now.

Albert Einstein once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result. If you’re killing yourself with high-intensity Insanity workouts every day without seeing any results, I’d say that the program is certainly true to its name.

It’s time to try something new.

Enjoy the video!

Out.

Sean
Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

Don’t eat beaver butt.

Only in a food system this weird would the above recommendation be necessary.

Seriously, who would ever imagine that vanilla and raspberry natural flavorings were derived from secretions from the anal glands of beavers?

Maybe an even better question is who discovered this. And how?

It is a little-known fact that the natural and artificial flavors listed on ingredients labels are a whole list of chemical nastiness themselves.

Unfortunately, you don’t get to see them since they are protected by trade secret laws. To be honest, if I were a food manufacturer I’d want to keep the whole beaver anal glands thing a secret, too.

Maybe that’s the solution. Maybe we should push for the elimination of these trade secrets, thus requiring companies to include what their flavorings are really made out of. Reading a label and stumbling upon the words “beaver ass” may be exactly what we need to get people to think about what they’re putting into their bodies.

Just an idea.

Anyway, my main man and fellow podcaster, Abel James (a.k.a. The Fat-Burning Man), stopped by the show this week to discuss a ton of topics from his fantastic ebook The Wild Diet, including…

* How dairy consumption may stall fat loss

* Clean carbs to eat after a workout

* The importance of visualization in achieving long-term fat loss

* The role of genetics in body composition

* Beaver butt juice (of course!)

This was a GREAT show. I’ve been having a lot of fun doing the show lately, engaging in more discussions rather than just firing off questions.

Abel was also kind enough to answer your questions from the audience. Good questions, gang!!!

Click the player below to listen to the entire show.

You can also check out a video teaser clip of our beaver discussion below.

Oh! If you missed my appearance on Abel’s show last week, check it out HERE.

Enjoy!

And don’t eat beaver butt.

Out.

Sean Croxton
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton & Brett Klika

Memorial Day weekend is upon us.

So since you have a whole extra day to yourself, why not squeeze in a workout???

Back by popular demand, Brett Klika and I got together yesterday to shoot a new episode of our Friday Fun Day workouts.

In this episode, we keep it simple with some funky push-ups, pull-ups, and split squats.

These will get your heart rate up!!!

Try them out for yourself. You can do all three movements back-to-back-to-back in a circuit for multiple sets, or you can take your time and gear it to your own fitness level.

By the way, the 4-Day Memorial Day Sale is ON!

Now until Monday at 11:59pm PT, The Dark Side of Fat Loss (DSFL), Underground Workout Manual, and Paleo Summit are ON SALE at ridiculously discounted prices.

The Dark Side is going for just $24 — that’s $15 off!

Don’t forget that it comes with The Underground Cookbook which delivers over 80 Real Food recipes and 40 videos that show you how to cook them.

When you order DSFL, you’ll have the one-time opportunity to purchase Brett’s Underground Workout Manual — complete with 12 weeks of in-home workouts and over 80 instructional exercise videos — also for $24 ($15 OFF)!

Click HERE to order The Dark Side of Fat Loss with the discounted Workout Manual option.

And if you missed the special event-week-only Paleo Summit price of only $67, NOW is your time to take advantage.

The summit package gets you all 23 video/audio presentations and transcripts along with bonus e-books by Diane Sanfilippo, Paul Chek, and Dallas & Melissa Hartwig.

This is an INCREDIBLE deal! Presenters include:

* Chris Kresser
* Paul Chek
* Nora Gedgaudas
* Dr. Jack Kruse
* Dr. Cate Shanahan
* Dean Dwyer
* Mark Sisson
* Matt Lalonde
* Denise Minger

Spend your weekend getting your learn on with me and the whos-who of the Paleo world!

Click HERE to learn more about The Paleo Summit.

Enjoy this week’s FFD workout! And stay tuned for next week’s episode on eccentric training!

Be safe this weekend, peeps.

Out.

Sean