VINCE GIRONDA'S 6-WEEK AB SPECIALISATION COURSE.

This course does exactly what it says on the tin: it provides you with a six-week course focused on abdominal development. Add it to your normal weight-training regimen. 👇 The course is not intended for absolute beginners. Vince believed beginners shouldn’t train abs at all. For beginners, according to Vince, general training, and especially compound movements, is enough to stimulate the abdominals. Only later, after the bodybuilder has gained some experience, should they then start to train abdominals specifically.

TAMPONS ARE LACED WITH HEAVY METALS.

A new study shows that tampons are laced with heavy metals including lead, arsenic and cadmium. Every single tampon tested in the study had lead in it. 👇 The researchers analysed 60 tampons representing 14 different brands from the US, UK and EU. These included name brands and store-brand products. The samples were tested using a process called inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) to identify metals present.

I'm sure you don't need me to tell you this study is absolute junk, which it is. But let me tell you one reason why, which you may not be aware of. 👇

https://twitter.com/Babygravy9/status/1798091154673512503

The study starts from the position that there must be some evolutionary reason for the persistence of genes for same-sex attraction, since they persist despite being apparently maladaptive (gay people don't reproduce).

The researchers therefore devised a "desirable dad hypothesis": that men possessing traits associated with same-sex attraction are actually more likely to be attractive to women.

Here's how the researchers describe this in the study abstract:

"Same-sex attraction, a heritable trait with a reproductive cost, lacks a comprehensive evolutionary explanation. Here we build on a hypothesis invoking antagonistic pleiotropy, which suggests that genes linked to male same-sex attraction remain in the gene pool because they have conferred some fitness advantage to heterosexual men possessing them. We posit the “desirable dad hypothesis,” which proposes that alleles linked to male non-heterosexual orientations increase traits conducive to childcare; heterosexual men possessing same-sex attracted alleles are more desirable mating partners as a function of possessing superior paternal qualities."

SUNLIGHT STOPS YOU GETTING FAT.

Apart from cholesterol, sunlight is probably the most demonised "substance" in all of health. You're told sunlight is harmful, but the opposite is true, as a new study shows. UV light makes you eat more, but it also ramps up your metabolism.👇 What the researchers found in this new study is that mice exposed to consistent UV radiation (one of the main components of sunlight) exhibited increased appetite, which could be seen not only in eating behaviours, but also in levels of the hormone leptin, which regulates appetite.

Regardless of whether or not the mice were fed a normal diet or a high-fat (i.e. junk-food diet) they didn’t gain weight. Yes, you read that right: even mice fed a junk-food diet, if they were exposed to steady UV radiation, didn’t gain weight, even when they ate more.

But how?

SOME NEW MICROPLASTIC STUDIES.

There's now massive amounts of research being conducted into microplastics and their effects. Barely a day passes without multiple new studies. Here are a few I saw on my travels today. 👇 No surprise: single-use beverage cups release significant quantities of microplastics when hot water is added to them. Interestingly, rinsing the cup with pure cold water before use reduces plastic release by over half (up to 65%).

AIR IN 99% OF CARS CONTAINS TOXIC CHEMICALS LINKED TO CANCER AND HORMONE-DISRUPTION.

A new study shows that virtually all car interiors are off-gassing harmful flame retardants. 👇 Researchers analysed the air in 101 electric, gas and hybrid cars made between 2015 and 2022, and found that 99% of the samples contained a flame retardant called TCIPP, which is being investigated as a potential carcinogen, and two others, TDCIPP and TCEP, which are already considered to be carcinogenic.

10,000 CHEMICALS LEACHING INTO FOOD FROM PLASTIC CONTAINERS.

A new study suggests that thousands of chemicals, a significant proportion of which scientists know nothing about, are leaching into foods from plastic containers. 👇 Significant numbers of these chemicals, like bisphenol A and phthalates, are linked to a variety of health problems, from reproductive issues to diabetes and even heart disease and forms of cancer.

Many, however, are totally unknown to science.

raweggstack.com/p/the-plastic-…

Eating vegetable and seed oils is bad enough, but eating them when they've been reused in deep-frying is even worse. A new study suggests that long-term consumption of food cooked in deep fryers is linked to serious neurological damage. 👇

https://twitter.com/SeedOilScout/status/1780604959211622649

Researchers divided female rats into five groups that each received either standard chow or standard chow supplemented with either a) 0.1 ml per day of unheated sesame oil, unheated sunflower oil, or b) reheated sesame oil or reheated sunflower oil for 30 days. The rats that consumed reheated sesame or sunflower oil showed increased oxidative stress and inflammation in the liver. These rats also suffered significant damage to the colon that caused changes in endotoxins and lipopolysaccharides—toxins released from certain bacteria. "As a result, liver lipid metabolism was significantly altered, and the transport of the important brain omega-3 fatty acid DHA was decreased," explains one of the researchers. "This, in turn, resulted in neurodegeneration, which was seen in the brain histology of the rats consuming the reheated oil as well as their offspring."

AUTISM AND GUT FLORA.

Yet another study has linked disturbed gut flora in early life to later onset of autism and ADHD. This one is a large-scale study of over 16,000 children born in Sweden in the late 90s. 👇 Over 16,000 Swedish children born 1997–1999 have been followed from birth into their twenties. Of these, 1,197 children, corresponding to 7.3%, have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, ADHD, communication disorder or intellectual disability.

THE GIRONDA APPROACH TO AB TRAINING.

"Sharp, well-built abdominal muscles are worth a king's ransom. To my mind, there is no more treasured possession," said Vince Gironda. Here are the fundamentals of his approach to training the abdominals. 👇 1. NO SPOT-REDUCTION.

Sorry, but no amount of sit-ups will burn the fat off your stomach. Fat loss doesn’t work like that: it isn’t specific to the region that is being worked. Vince knew this way back when, and it’s been wholly substantiated by scientific studies as well.

BREASTFEEDING AND EXERCISE

Ladies: Want to supercharge your breast milk to provide baby with even more benefits and help stave off obesity? Exercise directly before you breastfeed and your milk will be packed with even higher levels of a powerful metabolic hormone. 👇 Researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology collected 240 samples of breast milk from 20 new mothers before and at intervals after two HIIT exercise sessions. They then compared these with samples taken at the same intervals after periods of sedentary behavior.

Eating vegetable and seed oils is bad enough, but eating them when they've been reused in deep-frying is even worse.

A new study suggests that long-term consumption of food cooked in deep fryers is linked to serious neurological damage. 👇 Researchers divided female rats into five groups that each received either standard chow or standard chow supplemented with either a) 0.1 ml per day of unheated sesame oil, unheated sunflower oil, or b) reheated sesame oil or reheated sunflower oil for 30 days.

The rats that consumed reheated sesame or sunflower oil showed increased oxidative stress and inflammation in the liver. These rats also suffered significant damage to the colon that caused changes in endotoxins and lipopolysaccharides—toxins released from certain bacteria.

"As a result, liver lipid metabolism was significantly altered, and the transport of the important brain omega-3 fatty acid DHA was decreased," explains one of the researchers. "This, in turn, resulted in neurodegeneration, which was seen in the brain histology of the rats consuming the reheated oil as well as their offspring."

New research has shown that too much exposure to a growth factor called activin A in the womb prevents the proper development of the testes in male fetuses. And what increases activin A production in women? SSRIs. Women are generally told SSRIs are safe during pregnancy. 👇 The research, published in Frontiers in Endocrinology, is the first to show that increased exposure to activin A leads to some of the worst effects caused by endocrine-disrupting substances.

VINCE GIRONDA SHOULDER TRAINING.

"Was there ever a hero who didn't have broad shoulders?" Vince Gironda knew that the shoulders could make or break a man's physique, as this image of Steve Reeves (far left) shows. Let's dig in to Vince's approach to shoulder training. 👇 The quote below is from Vince's 1984 book The Wild Physique. Vince's main emphasis with the shoulders, as with every other body part, is proportion. You need to work with your body's natural endowment to ensure you maintain balance even as you add mass.

SIMPLE MEMETIC WARFARE.

It all started with a few soyjak stickers. Here's a great recent primer from 4chan on how to wage a successful low-intensity meme warfare campaign in your local town. 👇

VINCE GIRONDA CHEST TRAINING.

One thing you probably know about Vince Gironda is that he didn't like the bench press. It's true, but he had good reason. Let's look at Vince's unique approach to chest training. 👇 Gironda believed that the bench press is more a shoulder than a chest exercise. Simply put, it's not specific enough to be used as the main exercise for building your chest--if your goal is to build a rounded, aesthetic physique. Obviously, if you're a powerlifter you have to focus on bench press.

All quotations are from Vince's book The Wild Physique (1984), by the way.

TRAIN LEGS FOR BIG ARMS!?

Vince Gironda had this one weird trick for boosting your arm development, and it looks like it really does work. 👇 Gironda claimed that training your legs before your arms could result in a 15% increase in arm size. Leg work stimulates the nervous system more, because of the size of the muscle groups involved, and that boost helps stimulate growth in smaller groups like the arms.

Two very important new studies of microplastics have just been released. They implicate microplastics in two of the main prevailing diseases of modern life: heart disease and cancer. 👇 The first study shows not only that microplastics are to be found in human arteries, but, more importantly, that the concentration of microplastics in arteries containing atherosclerotic plaques is much higher than in arteries that don't contain atherosclerotic plaques.

People sometimes ask me, "Is there anything worse than plastic?" My answer would be, "Of course!" One thing that's definitely worse than plastic is... recycled plastic. Let me tell you why. 👇

https://twitter.com/LaocoonofTroy/status/1763595054206320947

Plastic recycling is bad because it contaminates plastics with even more harmful chemicals. Paper recycling does the same. Mineral oils used in printing inks are known to be estrogenic and they contaminate all recycled paper stocks.

AGENT ORANGE AND ALZHEIMER'S

A new study reveals that Agent Orange, the "harmless defoliant" used in huge quantity inthe Vietnam War, causes neurological changes in rodents typical of Alzheimer's.

And it's not just veterans who are affected. It's 33% of the population. 👇 Agent Orange was prohibited by the US government in 1971, after concern was raised about its used in Vietnam and other parts of South-East Asia. The chemical began being used in 1965.

Having blood drawn is an extremely effective way to get harmful chemicals out of your body, and that would almost certainly include microplastics in your blood (though not necessarily microplastics in your organs). 👇 The benefits of blood donation are shown by this study of Australian firefighters. Firefighters face chronic high-level exposure to chemicals like PFAS in fire retardants.