Bill

Interesting point. God knows eating a few chicken breasts and downing a few whey shakes chocked full of hormones and antibiotics (so that you get several hundred grams of animal protein per day) must but additional stress on your heart, kidneys, intestines....etc, compared to eating salads, legumes, fruits, nuts, hemp protein….etc.

I wonder to what degree these high organ failure rates are related to diet, and not just to steroids (although I'm sure that's a big factor)? From reading Dr. Fuhrman's "Eat to Live" and listening to his podcasts, he mentions that many people on kidney transplant lists were able to turn their disease around by going on a nutrient dense diet that are also low in protein. It just seems to me that eating excessively large amounts of protein for years on end must be hard on one's liver and kidneys. Also, if one is not eating the foods that are high in phytochemicals and vitamins, that will help your organs run well, then you also face increassed risk. To sustain a 300 pound body with unnatural amounts of muscle (due to roids), requiring more protein than one's poor little kidneys and liver were ever meant to process, just seems a bit dangerous. But then again, I'm not a nutrition expert.

I support Ronnie on this one. I like the fact that bodybuilding is his hobby and what he loves to do,and not so much a "career".

That's good news. If nothing else, it makes people aware that even macho men can get grossed out by how meat is "made".

I think it'd be lats for me. I always admire guys with good lats. That's also how Igot into lifting weights, building arms and lats for swimming.

I agree, gkleinman. It's pretty horrible that they wouldn't allow your reply to go through too.

Wow! Good luck! This is great news!

Just to play the devil's advocate, I don't know if it's such a horrible article. Many people do have relationship stresses because of dietary reasons. The articles biggest weakness is not exploring why people have "dietary" prefrences that might be as important to them as a relationship with another human being might. In other words, it doesn't go far enough in exploring why some people may not view animals as simple commodities to be used for human exploitation, but rather, gives the impression that not eating cheese is in the same ballpark as people who are "picky" and don't like spicy food, or something. Because it doesn't do that, it winds up giving the tone that it's mocking these silly, superficial people (which maybe some of them deserve). As far as the NYTimes, I don't really think it's fair to bash the paper. They have hundreds of articles per day, many of which are very good. The magazine goes into depth on a lot of important issues. They are one of the few papers that maintains a wide-spread foreign bureau, and that takes foreign politics seriously. On any given day they will have articles that are offensive to some. Rush Limbaugh always gives daily examples of their supposed "liberal" bias, but then any NYT article that supports his world-view is automatically factual because it's written by "liberals", which he's already proven. Anybody who has a ideological or religious issue that is genuinely important to them will tend to see a pattern of bias, even if that correctly-identified pattern is outweighed by a greater amount of relatively objective reporting, in my opinion. Of course, they have had a bad string of unfavorable/biased vegan-related articles, and that should take away from the overall reputation of the paper. But still, I think its pretty good.

I was listening to the podcast "Pro Bodybuilding Weekly", the episode "Tribute to Ronnie Coleman", and they had an interview with one of Ronnie's workout buddies from from when he first started. In the middle of the interview, one of the hosts asked him why Ronnie made such huge gains in '96 (or it might have been '95), did he change his nutrition? Training style? Rest? What? The guy said that he did change up his nutrition, and he also said something like, "one thing people just don't believe is that Ronnie was natural for the longest time". So, it might be the case that Ronnie was a natural and able to make it to the IFBB as a natural. I think his genetics and raw strength are second to none. As far as steroids, personally, I don't use them and never would, for fear of long-term side effects. But I really don't care if other people want to use them. There's no life-destroying side effects that you see with crack or heroine. They don't impair people's driving abilities, like with booze. If people are willing to take them knowing the possible risks, it causes no harm to me, and I don't really think the government should criminalize the use of steroids. Similarly, I kind of like that aspect about the IFBB, in the sense that its an known fact that evrybody is juicing. Thus, nobody is cheating. That's way different from other sports that theoretically ban 'roids but have extremelly lax enforcement, putting clean athletes at a disadvantage.

That's a lot of weight! Congrats!

I listen to a lot of podcasts, and one of my favorite shows, NPR's Talk of the Nation, had an interesting, nuanced segment on zoos. They were interviewing journalist Thomas French, and he has a series about zoos that you can find below: http://www.sptimes.com/2007/webspecials07/special_reports/zoo/ You can also get the podcasts on iTunes Talk of the Nation (01-14-2008). Anyway, some of the issues brought up in the piece (in no particular order): -how animals often suffer due to lack of real, natural habitat, and not enough space. -how animals lose their freedom -how zoo keepers pasionately care about the animals -how the natural space that the animals would normally inhabit in the wild is being encroached upon by increasing human population, and therefore poses a dilemma towards the survival of their species -how zoos often are the last place to keep a species alive -how human animals at zoos (the customers) often disrespect the animals Anyway, it's worth reading in my opinion. I especially like the way the author describes the individual personalities of certain animals, and talks about their individual problems.

I wonder about that too. There have been guys who have lifted heavy weights for years (like Jonny Jackson) who then do the Supersetting/BCAA thing with relatively light weight and make good progress because it shocks their system. But is that shock due to this method being the best, or is it due to giving the body something that is unfamiliar? I don't know.

Agree! I love his book "Eat To Live", and it has changed the way I see a lot of nutrition-reated issues, even though I thought I knew a lot before.

I was just listening to Milos Sarcev's interview (part 2) on Pro Bodybuilding Weekly podcast, and he certainly had some interesting ideas. Basically, he believes in Super Setting, in which you might do many related, but slightly different exercises all in a row, with fairly high reps, low weight, with only 5-10 seconds rest in between sets. So, you might do Incline Bench Press, Flat Dumbells, Decline Press, Flat Flyes, Cable Cross-overs- all in a row- then take a two minute rest. Do that a few times. That seems a bit odd for bodybuilders, and somewhat counterproductive. I mean, some of the other bigs guys, like Dorian Yates, believed in rep ranges from 5-8, with insane weight, doing the compound movements (as written above). Then getting good rest (a week), for the body to repair and recover. So, I always thought that was a good formula, and it has worked for me (obviously to a much, much smaller degree) . But, Milos's idea hinges on his theory (which he can't scientifically prove, but can prove anecdotally), that the muscle's best time to get bigger is not after the breakdown (the workout) and the recovery (afterwards with good protein), but rather during the workout, because that is when the cells in your muscles that you want to make bigger are absorbing and using the most nutrients in your blood, and are therefore most prone towards growth. Therefore, he has created a shake, with the essential BCAA and other nutrients that you should take either just before working out, or working out. He points out that it is amino acids, as opposed to just raw protein in whey form (or whatever vegan form) that does the trick. So, his idea of using Supersets to give you maximum blood flow, helps in this process of making you huge, and not just aerobically fit. Anyway, he sounded very smart and sincere (not like he was just trying to sell his shake). So, it'd be worth it to go check out that podcast, where he explains it better and in more detail than I did. Personally, I haven't put his theories to use yet, but I hope to soon, once I get my hands on some vegan BCAA's.

Interesting. I was listening to the most recent episode of the Vegan Freak podcast, and Bob (one of the hosts, along with Jena) was saying something to the effect that he has troubles calling vegans who don't do it for animal rights-related reasons real vegans because, if they are doing it for their personal health or the environment, those reasons don't really have a solid foundation, and could therefore change down the road. (I'm probably slightly mis-characterizing his thoughts on this though). Anyway, I think for me at least, it's a mix of animal rights related issues, combined with environmental issues, and the way I feel when eating primarily raw foods (fruits and veggies). I feel like I could fight Mike Tyson, so to speak.

Right now I just kind of go into the gym with a general goal for the workout, and then carry it out based on what type of equipment is open and how I'm feeling. On the other hand, if I were trying to compete (which I'm not even thinking of right now), I'd probably log down all my workouts and everything I'd eat. That might help in trying to assess why you have/haven't made progress in certain areas or why you lost or gained weight. I know people like Rich Gaspari were like that. Personally, I've found it useful to log down all my running. On the other hand, lifting-wise, that might run the risk of getting too obessed with making sure that you get better on specific rep totals compared to previous wokouts, or increasing the weight used....in other words, moving the bar from point A to point B, without really concentrating on on the mind-muscle connection.

My wild guess: 1) Victor Martinez 2) Dexter Jackson 3)Branch Warren 4) Melvin Anthony 5) Johnnie Jackson

I was listening to one of Dr. Joel Fuhrman's podcasts, and he had an interview with a patient who was a Master's Swimming Champion (ie. the guy was in his 50's, was a national swimming champ, great shape) but he also had a heart attack and massive heart problems because of his diet. After going on Fuhrman's diet, he got better (from the point of view of his heart health). I don't know. I think the lesson might be that you may have low body fat and you might look and feel great, but that may not necassarily mean that your organs are in great shape, especially if you are eating two chicken breasts five times a day, and downing tons of other animal protein that contains a lot of saturated fat and cholesterol. That would just seem to be horrible for your liver, kidneys and heart. Maybe I'm wrong though.

I had Kucinich 48, Clinton 45, Dodd 43, Biden 43, Richardson 38, Obama...etc. Personally, I support Obama, but I also like (liked) Biden, and Clinton is fine with me as well. The Republican field is also fairly decent this time around (although I can't see myself voting for any of them).

To be honest, I'm not quite sure. I'd roughly say, 20 or more. There are vegetarian Indian, and Chinese style restaurants. I really haven't explored the whole scene because i got here only five months ago, and I am on a fairly tight budget. Before that, I lived in Shanghai, Beijing, and Henan province. Shanghai, these days, has some decent vegetarian restaurants. Anyway, what type of biking do you do veganpotter?

Thanks andesuma. I think that is what I was looking for. I think I'll try sprouting my own beans pretty soon here.

Thanks for the welcome everyone! Hey Trev, I went to the "Light Vegetarian Restaurant" only yesterday (I live only five minutes away in TST)! But generally, I can't afford to eat out, so I mainly cook at home.

My best was 11 pull-ups with 10 pounds strapped onto me, or three with 45 strapped on (weighing around 190). That was about 10 years ago. (Of course, that doesn't seem like much reading some of these replies and seeing some of the crazy videos on YouTube). Back then, I used the strategy the Arnold Schwarzenegger laid out. Basically do sets of reps of 5-8 (or whatever) until you evetually get to the point where you are doing just sets made up of a few reps, or even one rep. But the idea is to get to a set number of total reps for the workout, like 50. The idea is also to build brute strength in the lats (and other areas). So, i did that, and after a month or two, you can easily get to 50 total reps. After a while you can raise that to 100 or whatever. Anyway, right now, I'm in the process of losing weight and getting back into good pull-ups form. I'm up to about 8 right now. But I hope to be up to 15 or so by the Spring.

Thanks for the reply DV. I read the posts in this section (Raw), and I think I will soon give sprouting a try. I also listened to the Raw Vegan Radio podcast by the "Sproutman", and that also peaked my interest.