Memorial Marathon

The Ninth Annual Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon is coming up on April 26. I already know some of you are planning to participate, so feel free to chime in on how things are going. My sister has been running every morning for the past few weeks to prepare. The marathon is for a great cause & features a marathon, half marathon, 5k walk & even a kid's marathon! For more details on the Memorial Marathon or registration info, visit their website at http://www.okcmarathon.com/.

Dr. Oz's Top 5 Healthy Tips for Women

Nearly every morning I tune into Good Morning America while I get ready for work. This morning, they had Dr. Oz doing a special piece with a group of women taking part in the "GMA Fitness Challenge" where he shared 5 Healthy Tips for Women. I found all of them very helpful and thought I pass along:

Tip 1: Ease Up on the Stress to Control Eating

"When you have stress, you'll eat more and things you wouldn't normally eat," Oz said. "That's because we are hard-wired to equate stress to famine."

Oz suggested eating a small snack, like a handful of nuts, a half an hour before eating a meal so you're not starved when mealtime arrives.

Tip 2: Don't Just Count Calories, Count Exercise

According to Oz, good eating habits mean nothing if women don't have the muscle to back it up.

"If you don't have muscle mass you can't churn through calories. Remember, muscle, when it's being used, will burn 50 times more calories than fat will. So if you don't have muscle mass, you're never going to be able to keep the weight off, especially as you go through menopause," Oz said.

Women should optimally move 10,000 steps per day, or 20 minutes of exercise, just to keep the weight off.

During menopause, Oz said a woman's ovaries stop making estrogen as well as testosterone.

"No testosterone, no muscle. No muscle, you get a little pooch, and all of the sudden all the fat begins to accumulate. As you get older, that happens more and more frequently," he said.

Tip 3: Sleep Is the Key to Building Muscle

"Of all the things in my own personal life that I do that I treasure the most it's to sleep because it is the best way for us to generate growth hormone, and without that we can't build the muscle mass," Oz said.

Along with sleep, Oz said most women have problems building muscle mass because they "don't work at it."

"I'm not talking about being a big muscle-bound weightlifter. I'm talking about developing programs that allow you to build that lean muscle, that churns through the calories and gives you a look that you want to have," he said.

If you don't have access to a gym, Oz said lifting your own body weight can be a good workout.

Also, women should "rev your engines" often.

"The body is designed to, to be sped up a little bit. What I'm talking about, literally, is you have to at some point every week run as fast as you can run, jump as high as you can jump," Oz explained. "You have to push the system and to get your heart rate up, to push the muscle mass, to stretch your limbs out. Do the things you did as a child, and continue to do them into the adulthood and you'll keep the hormones where they need to be."

Tip 4: Forgive Yourself for Mistakes and Learn to Feel Better

"Listen, when you're driving along on the road and you missed your turn, the GPS doesn't berate you. Right? It says at the next available moment, make an authorized U-turn. What's the big deal? The whole purpose of this is not to be healthier, it's to feel better," Oz said.

Forgiving mistakes and fixing habits can keep Americans healthier, like our European counterparts.

"We cost twice as much to take care of as the average European per person," Oz said. "And we're twice as sick as the average European. That's why we cost as much. So if we address these where it matters, not to prevent disease, but to live better today."

Tip 5: Make Long-Term Changes You Can Sustain

"None of this is a wind sprint," Oz said. He said there's no real benefit for people to eat what they hate to eat for the short term.

"Don't deprive yourself. And you will automatically go back to your playing weight," he said. "You will only stay there if you build the muscle mass, but at least it's a head start."

Monthly musings

Okay, we've had some bad weather but it's beautiful today, so get out and enjoy it!

My running is going great, and I wanted to share with you a piece from an interesting article in the January Briefcase, the publication of the Oklahoma County Bar Association. It's by Warren E. Jones, JD, an American College of Sports Medicine Health Fitness Specialist, etc. and so forth and is entitled, "Your Body Weight is Probably 'Normal,' But You Better Do Something About It." Here's the final paragraph, which also summarizes my journey to health:

"Finally, this: your waist circumference, under the newest peer reviewed science, may be the best tool of all, as it is reflective of "visceral" adiposity, the most telling of all body measurements relative to health risks.

Measure your waist at the level of your navel, being certain the tape is level to the ground. Relax, breathe out, and measure. Keep the tape tight to your skin, but not compressing. Per the most recent Harvard Men's Health Watch, men, if your waist, as measured as described, is at or above 37.1 inches, and women, if yours is at or above 31.6 inches, you are at elevated risks for a number of morbidities associated with obesity."