A column by Bullz-Eye Fitness Editor Mike Furci that brings you research, trends and other info to help you with your fitness, health and nutritional needs.

Q: Mike,
I am a 60 year old male and love to do squats but my technique suffers at times because I always want to go heavy. I realize that you have other things to do than answer questions but I notice in the pictures that your eyes are looking straight ahead. I have been re-evaluating my squatting technique and was told that the eyes should be looking up as high as possible as you go down in the squat. The logic given was that this keeps your back straighter. Which is the right way?

Thanks for any help you can give.
Dave Patterson

A: David,
Thanks for your questions.
One doesn’t have to look up in order to attain proper form when squatting. However, looking up is an excellent way to help ensure your form is correct especially for those lacking experience. The object of looking up is to get your head to extend. By looking up it will help keep your back in the proper position by helping to prevent flexion or “rounding”. If you look up w/o extending your head slightly toward the ceiling, you won’t get a benefit. The body follows the head.

Another way to ensure your back is engaged properly is to take a deep breath right before lowering the weight. This helps ensure your chest is up and builds intra-abdominal pressure which helps stabilize the entire spine.

I look straight ahead most of the time when I squat. However, he heavier I go, the more my head extends toward the ceiling and deeper my breaths get.

To ensure proper depth, have somebody watch you while your warming up. “Parallel” is what you want to shoot for when squatting. Your femur or thigh bone should be level with the floor at the bottom of the movement. An easy way to judge this is by making sure the crease where your thigh meets your hip (at the bottom of the movement) is level with the top of your knee.

If done correctly, the squat is by far the single most taxing exercise on your body. For this reason I recommend only squatting once per week at the most. You will need this time to recover.

Keep up the good work. Let me know how you do.

Mike

Q: Mike,
My sister was raising my twin nieces as vegetarians and I read/heard somewhere that your body loses its ability to digest meat if you go long enough w/o(something to do w/ enzymes I think, I’m sure you know exactly why this happens). So I gave her tons of shit. My argument, was that they should be raised on a normal diet and then decide for themselves what kind of diet, if any, they would follow. Now they eat chicken, hey it’s a start. Thanks for providing me w/ references and another angle to argue for why they should eat meat.

Keep up the good work.

A: Andy,
I’m glad your sister has started to feed your nieces some chicken. However what about eggs, cheese, milk, fish, etc. Without protein the body can’t and won’t grow. Protein also maintains and repairs all the tissues in our bodies. When a parent deprives their children of the highest quality protein because they don’t like it, or they have an aversion to killing animals, its neglect in my opinion. That’s how important I feel protein is to the development and maintenance of the human body.

How about feeding kids a well balanced diet of vegetables, protein, and good carbs, and cutting out most of the sugar laden snacks, juices, and sodas. Notice I said MOST. Even I think ice-cream, soda, and snacks are Ok once in a while. In this country the nutritional state of affairs of our children is dismal. Obesity is at epidemic proportions, and diabetes is sky rocketing. This is all due to lazy parents feeding their kids processed convenient foods and allowing them to spend hours in front of the computer and TV instead of playing outside.

Sorry about going on a tangent.

Mike

Q: hi,
I just read the article you put up on the bullz-eye website about squats with a barbell. It’s a great article and I am just getting into body building. however when I do those squats, I do them in a slightly different way, the way I do them is that instead of coming ‘all the way down’ I tend to stop at a sort of a 75 degree angle. the reason why is that if I go lower like the ones in the pictures my legs crack as I go back up again, so I think if i’m doing them with this crack I may end up with arthritis (please excuse my spelling) which I obviously don’t want. I was just wondering if there is a way to stop this crack and go all the way down?

Cheers, Jon

A: Jon,
I’ve been told by a few prominent orthopedics that cracking is nothing to worry about as long as there is no pain associated with it. Do your knees crack every rep or just on the first few? Usually when people get warmed up the crack tends to subside.

Mike

Q: I have much success developing both size and size and strength in all muscle groups, however, I am a hard gainer as far as shoulders are concerned. What would be a good routine to promote rapid growth in that area?

Thanks

A: Try kneeling side lateral raises. Do not bring your arms above parallel to the ground, and the palms of your hands should be facing down at the top of the movement. At the bottom of the movement, try to keep your hands on the outside of the lateral part of your thigh. (Do not allow the dumbbells to x-over your thighs) Doing this allows one to build momentum. Momentum has nothing to do with exerting tension on the muscle. And if you’re an avid reader you know that tension has everything to do with building muscle and strength. Perform 2 -3 warm-ups with one working set to failure. 8-10 reps.

Next do 1 1/3rds standing lateral raises. Raise the dumbbell in the same fashion you do the above exercise. Once you reach parallel to the floor, let the dumbbells down 1/3rd of the way, and immediately raise them back to parallel. Now, lower them all the way. This is one rep.
Perform 1 warm-up with one set to failure. 10 -12 reps.

For the last exercise do bent over lateral raises for the rear part of the deltoid. This is all too often an overlooked body-part. Sit on the end of a flat bench. Bend over so your stomach and chest lightly touch your quads. Grasp the dumbbells at your feet with your arms slightly bent. Under control slowly raise your arms up with your elbows point toward the ceiling. At the top of the movement your thumbs should be pointing down. Under control lower the weight back down to the outside of your feet. Perform 1 warm-up with one all out set to failure. 10 -12 reps.

Thanks for writing

Mike Furci

A column by Mike Furci that brings you research, trends and other info to help you with your fitness, health and nutritional needs.

…agriculture is trashing our environment. The Telegraph discusses what decades of agriculture has done to the life of our soil.

“American scientists have made an unsettling discovery. Crop farming across the Prairies since the late 19th Century has caused a collapse of the soil microbia that holds the ecosystem together.

A team at the University of Colorado under Noah Fierer used DNA gene technology to test the ‘verrucomicrobia’ in Prairie soil, contrasting tilled land with the rare pockets of ancient tallgrass found in cemeteries and reservations. The paper published in the US journal Science found that crop agriculture has “drastically altered” the biology of the land. “The soils currently found throughout the region bear little resemblance to their pre-agricultural state,” it concluded.”
(The Telegraph Nov 27, 2013)

It’s obvious what big agriculture and the government has done to our environment and food supply. It’s time to start supporting local farming.

…in the 1970s, researchers who believed our deteriorating diet had a profound effect on crime, tried to reduce crime through diet. “Research by Hippchen, Schoenthaler, Schauss, and others concluded that hypoglycemia, caused by a diet high in sugar and refined carbohydrates, could account for most of anti-social behavior, they found that hypoglycemia causes the brain to secrete glutamate, a neurotoxin, which leads to agitation, depression, anger, anxiety, panic attacks and violent behavior.”

It’s becoming more apparent that our deteriorating diet in the U.S. is cause for alarm. The meteoric increase in many disorders and diseases (i.e., autism, depression, cancer and diabetes) has a linear relationship to denatured and devitalized modern foods.
((2013). Wise Traditions, 14(1), 19-35.)

…many trainers and coaches still espouse to pre-exercise warm-up that includes stretching. The objective of a study conducted by Brazilian researchers from the University of Sao Paulo was to compare the effects of static stretching, ballistic stretching and proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation on maximal strength, number of repetitions at a sub-maximal load (endurance) and total volume. All 12 participants completed eight weight training sessions. Four were designed to stretch prior to weight training. Researchers found that all stretching protocols significantly improved range of motion, but significantly reduce leg press one leg maximum, number of repetitions at a sub-maximal load and total volume. (J Strength Cond Res 26(9): 2432–2437, 2012)

…the barbell back squat (BBS) is widely regarded as the king of all exercises. It is without question. No other exercise works as many major muscle groups as thoroughly or as intensely as the squat. It is also a highly functional and safe exercise, and is used as a key component of many strength training programs including Olympic lifting. The BBS is also a mainstay in bodybuilding routines given its record for overall leg development. Because of its efficacy and versatility, the squat has been studied repeatedly for many different purposes. A review published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research examined studies that investigated muscle activation during the BBS to clarify how the exercise can be appropriately applied for different goals. The following are some highlights of this review:

• Increasing the stance width increases the activation of the adductors and gluteus maximus, but not the quadriceps or hamstrings.
• Activation of the muscles of the legs and trunk increase as a consequence of the increase in external load not stance width.
• Free BBS elicits and higher overall EMG (muscle activation) than squats in a smith machine, leg press and leg extension.
• The squat at moderate loads is a more effective method of activating the trunk stabilizers compared with other instability trunk exercises.
• Muscle activation is not influenced by the use of a weight belt.
(The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 26(4):1169-1178, 2012)

Here’s an excellent slideshow courtesy of exotic model Adella Pasos who looks amazing in these photos. We start of the slideshow with a beautiful sunset photo as Adella sports a red bikini as she shows off her 36-24-36 figure, and then we see her in a Miami Dolphins bikini and hat as well. The we have some pics with Adella posed on a motorcycle and next to some muscle cars. Yeah – every man’s fantasy! Adella has an exotic and sultry look that jumps off the screen.

Adella was born and raised in Chicago and has been modeling since 2006, working with a wide variety of talented photographers. As she gained exposure, she branched out to organizing promotional modeling events, hosting for celebrity parties, and branding her name as a spokes model. Next, she’ll be working on her acting career. Her interests include football, cars, video games, MMA, modeling, fitness and dance.

You can follow Adella on Twitter @adellapasos and check out her Facebook page as well and website as well.

Check out our Photoshoots page for more beautiful women, and subscribe to our YouTube channel as well.