For those of you in the San Francisco Bay Area, you ought to check out WHOLE MOVES! It's new a fitness class for dancers and others with embodied professions and hobbies brought to you by Sebastian Grubb.
Details: Wednesdays, 12-1pm in Berkeley at the Finnish Hall. $15-30 sliding.
Whole Moves is not your typical exercise class. Instead of focusing on brute strength or basic cardio, Whole Moves fitness is about learning and practicing complex movement patterns, while training all athletic and functional fitness components: strength, endurance, agility, balance and coordination. Extra attention will be paid to learning proper form, safe joint range of motion and building up mobility and dynamic stability.
In this class we will push, pull, jump, throw, run and balance our way to victory and healthier, more athletic bodies.
Using machines to workout has become commonplace in our culture. For many people they are irreplaceable. But let's pause for a moment: is there anything strange about using machinery to train our bodies? Well, it's certainly a good way to become proficient at using machines! But what about high-dynamic or everyday activities that use our full body in a coordinated way? Workout machines (with a few exceptions) just don't replicate that. And relying on them can actually detrain your nervous system and its ability to coordinate many muscle groups efficiently and effectively. Not only that, but machines do such a great job of creating a stable environment that little-to-no balance is required on your part. And that means you need far fewer muscle groups to accomplish a given task. In the end that means you do less work in a machine-based activity and hence less you get benefit for your muscles and overall fitness.
Many such machines were developed in the 20th century and are a mainstay for physical therapy and helping patients recover from injuries. For these patients, having a more stable environment is often necessary because of a previous injury and the need to isolate a specific muscle or muscle group. But for the rest of us what we need is actually a less stable environment and less isolation! (Not to mention that many people recovering from injuries can benefit from stability training too.) I see the popularity of workout machines being due to a few things: increased comfort from an indoor workout environment; sense of satisfaction in knowing that you are working a single muscle and what that muscle is; sedentary workouts - most machines require that you sit down to use them; and simplicity of participation, e.g. press a button or move a weight pin and adjust seat height, then begin. Simplicity is good, but maybe we would benefit from taking some time to learn more complex, non-machine-based movements. In fact, I wholeheartedly believe that traditional exercises without machines are better for you and more worth your time. And in the end, what is so complicated about a push-up?
VITAMIN D DETAILS 
The less one exercises, the more one is likely to develop weak bones. This is especially true for women because of their particular hormone levels and patterns. Bones that weaken tend to do so as one ages. However, this may not be due to age itself but rather to the propensity for reduced activity later in life. What kind of exercise is best? Weight-bearing exercise. This category includes those activities that place a stress on bones, which in turn causes a strengthening response in those bones, just like muscles. Examples of such activities are walking, running, dancing, muscular strength-training, and sports based on any of these. Examples of non-weight-bearing activities are swimming and bike-riding, because in these activities one's relation to the ground remains relatively constant and so the bones bear less stress. If the bones are needed less for bearing stress such as one's own weight, they tend to weaken over time, which is why astronauts lose bone mass while in outer space.
I first heard about Scott through a friend who basically said, ‘You should work with this guy. He likes using athletic dancers in his pieces.’ At that time I wasn’t living in San Francisco, but I commuted from Santa Cruz every day for a week to take his summer workshop. The workshop was great and afterward I was sure I wanted to work with him. A few months later I moved to San Francisco. We ran into each other again and he invited me to perform in his annual home season. That was three years ago and I’ve been dancing with him ever since.
A Walk in the Parkour displays a new hybrid form mixing contemporary dance, contact improv, and parkour. Parkour is an athletic discipline based on efficiently traversing an environment with one’s body. The roots of parkour are in the urban landscape and moving through it with high dynamic. In the past 10 years or so, parkour has gained popularity and become well-known enough to be featured in a number of big budget films. Most cities around the world now have parkour crews practicing together.
CALCIUM BALANCE: DIETARY INTAKE
Vitamin D. This is in part because inadequate levels of Vitamin D in the body have recently been linked to higher risk for a host of diseases (including multiple sclerosis, dementia, Alzheimer's, certain cancers, heart disease, and all-cause mortality). It is also because many populations living in wealthy areas such as the EU, UK and U.S. have been seeing a decrease in their bone-strength (e.g. osteoporosis). And it is calcium (with the help of Vitamin D, Magnesium, and other nutrients) that is the primary raw material for making and maintaining strong bones.
The supplement industry is strong indeed, but few supplements actually confer health benefits. Two of the few that in many cases do are Vitamin D and Vitamin B-12, which I cover below. Nutrients work in relation with each other in order to be utilized within the body. Often nutrients are required in the right proportion in order to provide the necessary ingredients for the well-functioning of the body. The good news is that eating a variety (wider is generally better) of whole foods virtually guarantees that we get enough of what we need. This is because our bodies can, in most cases, selectively absorb varying amounts of different nutrients from the foods we consume. And the spectrum of whole foods available (at least in moderately- and very-wealthy countries) is brimming with a full array of essential nutrients. In short, the best scenario is that we get a lot of nutrients and specifically that we get them from food, not supplements.
Strength training may be defined as engaging in activities that take increasing muscular strength as their primary focus and benefit. Examples include pull-ups, push-ups, and many acrobatic movements and other specific 'moves' that train many muscle groups at once. Sprinting at top speed is a great way to improve cardiac output (how much blood the heart can put out), and it is also a great way to increase the strength of the major leg muscles.
No multivitamin can take the place of a healthy diet. That's because there are thousands of known and thousands of unidentified nutrients (a large portion are phytochemicals found in plants) in whole foods and no supplement contains these thousands. At best there will be a few dozen, but it is theorized that the real benefits from nutrients depend on how they interact together. And scientists are still guessing at how that happens. The bottom line is: get your vitamins, minerals, and the rest from food, not supplements.
It's important to note that a number of studies have been done on supplemental Vitamin A and Vitamin E. These studies have shown a *decrease* in health associated with supplementing these vitamins. Again, get your vitamins from food.
Adequate water intake is vitally important. And the more one sweats from being physically active and in hotter environments, the more one ought to drink. Water is a component of many foods and beverages; the healthier of these would be fresh vegetables, fruits, soup made from veggies, and teas. Though it's a point of contention, moderate consumption of coffee and alcohol may also be considered in this group, though these beverages are certainly not necessary for good health. In the end, drinking more pure water is obviously the most reliable way to increase the amount of water your body receives. It is possible to drink too much water, but this is rare. Generally speaking, if your urine is mostly clear or only slightly yellow, you are getting enough water. If it is dark yellow, you are dehydrated and your body is not functioning at its best.
Nuts and seeds contain many beneficial nutrients, including healthy fats that play a role in reducing the risk of heart disease. Regular consumption of nuts and seeds is often quantified at 1-2 servings daily, depending on one's level of physical activity. If you are so physically active that you have a hard time eating enough food, nuts and seeds are an energy-dense (i.e. calorically high) food. A serving is loosely defined as a small handful. Some members of this food group, such as ground flaxseeds, hemp seeds and walnuts, contain a significant amount of omega-3 fatty acids, which are an extremely important -- and an often missing--dietary component. Generally speaking, increasing one's intake of omega-3 fats is a good way to improve one's health.
In general, the more nutrient-dense the food one eats, the healthier one is. Eating more veggies, fruits, and legumes is a direct response to this principle. But since you only have so much room in your stomach, the only (comfortable) way to eat more of these foods is to eat less of other foods that contain fewer nutrients per calorie. On the spectrum of nutrient- density, unrefined plant foods are at the top and processed foods such as pastries, cookies, candy, most food bars and breakfast cereals, bread made with refined (e.g. "white") flour, oil, and others are at the bottom. Higher consumption of processed foods is associated with decreased overall health. This could be due to many reasons, but a likely one is that eating more processed food means eating less unrefined plant food, and it is the latter of the two that can actually protect your health.
Grain
world. This means, per calorie, they pack the highest concentration of vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals, and other health-promoting nutrients when compared to all other foods. This is true of vegetables and fruits that are raw or minimally cooked, and as close to their natural form as possible. (A french fry comes from a potato, but it is not a health-promoting food.) Consuming a higher quantity of nutrients from food (versus from supplementation) is considered one of the most important things you can do to protect and ensure your health. I won't get into detail here, but the science shows many exceptionally high correlations between higher consumption of these foods and increased lifespan.
benefits not listed here. But it is also important to mention that, among those populations already consuming high levels of these foods, those who consume more dark leafy greens (e.g. salad) and more legumes/pulses (i.e. beans, peas, and lentils) have even better health and live even longer. (