Dish-Houston

The kids went NUTS as the Houston Texans’ defensive end J. J. Watt and offensive end Ben Jones along with the American Heart Association kicked off the NFL PLAY 60 Challenge with more than 1,000 students on Tuesday, Oct. 8 at Pin Oak Middle School.

The NFL PLAY 60 Challenge is a six-week program sponsored by the American Heart Association, the Houston Texans and the National Football League (NFL). The program is designed to help schools create a healthy lifestyle for kids by helping them form habits that will last a lifetime.

The NFL PLAY 60 Challenge is a month-long contest aimed at encouraging children to exercise at least 60 minutes every day. Watt and Jones played “Texans Feud,” a game show focused on health and nutrition facts, with the children. Jones won and in an impromptu press conference with attending media after the game Watt joked saying Jones must have cheated somehow and they would figure it out later back at the stadium. 

With kids spending a lot of time on video games, television and computers studies are proving they’re not getting enough physical activity. Six out of 10 children 9 to 13 years old don’t participate in any kind of organized sports or physical activity outside of school. Even more alarming, only one in four kids get 30 minutes of physical activity each day.

Today, nearly one in three children and teens in the United States are overweight or obese. This epidemic is taking its toll, as more and more kids are developing conditions and diseases typically associated with adults — including hypertension, coronary artery disease and type 2 diabetes. If this trend continues, many believe this current generation will be the first in American history to live shorter lives than their parents.

It is clear these kids had an amazing time and were absolutely inspired by these hardworking and dedicated men! 

DISH posted these Top 5 FAT gain reasons... 1) Skipping Meals 2) Too Much Sugar 3) Excessive "High Glycemic" Carbs 4) Inadequate Sleep 5) Inactivity... to our TWITTER and FACEBOOK because we post thoughtful nuggets there daily! We had so many folks wanting to know more that we gave them to our contributing writer Whitney to flesh it out and help explain why these are true!

By DISH CONTRIBUTING WRITER: WHITNEY BROOKE ROBERTS:

1.)    Skipping meals has been a confusing topic as of late.  On one side, fasting has resulted in positive results for obese people, yet in other studies intermittent feeding reduces the risk of diabetes and has proven to increase cardiovascular health.

The most recent study Metabolism concluded that skipping meals during the day and eating one large meal in the evening resulted in harmful metabolic changes. More specifically, meal skippers had increased glucose levels and a delayed insulin response: two conditions that commonly lead to diabetes.

Adversely, the study Free Radical Biology & Medicine published in March of 2011, found that skipping meals could benefit health for sagnificantly overweight adults.  For 2 months, the participants followed a strict restrictive diet which resulted in an average loss of 8% loss in body weight.  

Conclusively, unless you are obese, skipping meals has more NEGATIVE results than positive.  Of course, always consult your doctor before trying any fad diets.

2 & 3)    Did you know that Americans now consume 19% more added sugar than they did in 1970? (according to recent figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture)

We all know that excess sugar can cause muffin tops, increased waistlines, and cavities.  But new studies have revealed that too much sugar can lead to high levels of blood fats which raise the risk of heart disease…YIKES!

More specifically, stay away from these toxic “ose’s”:  SUCROSE, DEXTROSE, AND GLUCOSE which are the ingredient culprits inside most vending machine treats.

The health guidelines most doctors will give you are: HDL levels below 50 mg/dL for women and 40 mg/dL for men are considered to be on the low side. According to resources 43% of the highest sugar consumers recorded low HDL, while only 22% of the lowest sugar consumers did. (NOTE: HDL is the "GOOD" cholesterol where as LDL is the "bad")

4) INADEQUATE SLEEP: William Kilgore, professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School, recently concluded,

“When you are sleepy, there's a good chance that you won't be able to control how much you eat.  You may be drawn to unhealthy foods because you are not putting the brakes on as well as you would be if you were well-rested.” 

His study followed adults aged 19-45 who were persistently “sleepy”, dozing off at daily common activities, but not falling in the more aggressive category of “sleep disorders”…in other words, these people fell into the normal range of sleepiness.  Kilgore's conclusion?  The sleepiest people felt more hungry throughout the day.  More specifically, getting less sleep leads to an increase ghrelin, a hormone which tells you when to eat, and decreases in the hormone leptin which this tells you to stop eating.

Try going to bed 30 minutes before your regular bedtime.  Snooze away and watch the pounds go away.

5) You don’t have to be a Rhodes Scholar to believe that the more calories you burn exercising will take off weight.  It’s logical, right?  But actually sticking to a routine, or lifestyle consistently is the barrier most of us can’t overcome.  Solution?  Schedule appointments in your calendar, whether electronic or manual, with your gym, yoga studio, fitness trainer, or running buddies.  The biggest key to get moving is to block out sacred time for your cardio health.  You take time to feed yourself daily, why not schedule sacred time to make your body stronger, leaner, and more healthy?  Personally, I’ve found that scheduling daily dog walks is not only beneficial to my aerobic health, but my dogs enjoy the exercise as well.  Finding a win-win easy work out regimen will motivate you to continue even if you have a hangover! You may be able to make excuses to stay in bed, but Fido has to piddle!! 

Now get moving!

To Read more about these topics, here are our SOURCES:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/26/the-risks-and-rewards-of-skipping-meals/

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1983542,00.html

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/sleep/articles/2011/06/13/sleep-deprived-people-may-crave-high-calorie-foods

http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/news/20091106/even-a-little-exercise-fights-obesity