Apple is not known for “being” a social type company, far from it really, but that doesn’t stop it from recognizing potential for making money but incorporating the new social world within its products. We saw this with the baking in of Twitter to its news iOS offering and it seems that they are also looking into something called social fitness technology.

According to SlashGear this research was tipped off due to a patent filing titled “Interfacing Portable Media Devices And Sports Equipment”. The patent was originally filed back in October of 2011 but only surfaced this week in the trademark and patent office database. Additionally one of the names on the filing is Donald Ginsberg who heads up the Apple Made for iPod program.

The patent apparently outlines a way that your realtime work out data can be shared with any of your friends who are working out with you or on the same type of equipment. I guess the idea that you will be able to compare your data with friends anywhere in the world as you work out is something that Apple feels you will want to do. Personally if you are my friend you are the last person I would want to know how badly I am cheating on my exercise plan.

image courtesy of SlashGear

New Apple patent points to a social exercising technology is a post from: The Inquisitr

Taking a half-hour walk 12 to 16 hours before your big thanksgiving meal is the best way to stay healthy says a new study.

Researchers found that people who take a walk 12 to 16 hours before their big meal see a significant reduction in the type of fat known as triglycerides.

According to the Wall Street Journal Triglycerides push their way through arterial walls and increased levels have been linked to a high risk of heart attack.

Researcher are not sure why such a long period between working out and eating helps the body but they point to cellular changes in the body during exercise that can last up to 48 hours.

While a brisk walk half a day before your big meal is a good idea the researchers point out that consistently exercising is still the best way to avoid dangerous fats that can cause heart and other problems.

According to director of Baylor University’s Center for Healthy Living:

“Those people wishing to start an exercise regimen can see beneficial effects on postprandial lipids with just one session.”

Do you find that exercising before big meals leaves you feeling better about your overall health hours after the meal has been consumed and digested?

[Image via ShutterStock.com]

Walking 12 Hours Before Thanksgiving Dinner Can Help Avoid Heart Attacks [Study] is a post from: The Inquisitr

Jay Wornick of New York never thought that he can lose 200 pounds. A bet with his wife, however, urged him to shed the weight from 366 pounds to just 166 pounds.

The bet went like this: Wornick’s wife, Angela, challenged him last January 1 on who can lose the highest percentage of body weight with the loser having the winner’s name tattooed on his or her body.

In just a little more than 10 months, Wornick lost weight by cutting on eating big servings of steaks, lesser meat, switched to water than soda, and working out without any personal trainer. At the end of the first month, he lost 40 pounds. To compensate for the lack of trainer, he consulted the web for diet tips, including that of Dr. Oz.

Wornick recalled his old eating habits, saying:

“There were times when Angela would go to bed and I would get two large pizzas, a box of Ho Hos and a 12-pack of soda. I would eat it all by myself at like 1 in the morning after eating huge meals all day. She never knew.”

He issued a call to overweight people to change their lifestyle:

“I never thought I’d be able to stay with it, but I have not cheated in over 10 months, not once. I’ve turned it into my lifestyle. It’s not a diet. To me, it’s just how I live now. I want overweight people to know that there’s hope. You don’t have to give up or settle, you can be healthy and active. I know what you feel like.”

Angela will have Jay’s name tattooed on her back soon.

Man loses 200 pounds, wins bet is a post from: The Inquisitr

Harvard scientists recently conducted a study in which they learned that vigorous exercise raises the levels of vitamin D in a persons body.

Scientists stated “vigorous activity” as running, jogging, playing basketball or soccer and other similar sports for at least three hours per week significantly raise vitiman D levels.

According to the study exercising reduced the risk of heart attack by 22% by creating higher levels of good cholesterol and vitamin D.

According to Andrea Chomistek, a researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health:

“The fact that vitamin D plays a role in the relationship between exercise and risk of heart disease is a new finding.” Chomistek went on to add, ”This likely comes from being outside more. People who exercise tend to be out in the sun, which raises their vitamin D level. I don’t think you’d get the same increase in vitamin D by staying inside and running on the treadmill.”

USA Today revealed that:

Chomistek and colleagues analyzed the activity levels and the blood work of men in the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study. During 10 years of follow-up, 412 men had a heart attack and were matched to a control group of 827 men who did not have heart disease.

The groups findings reported in the October issue of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise found that vigorous exercise helped raises HDL levels (good cholesterol) which accounts for 38% of the decreased risk of heart disease, while higher levels of vitamin D and lower levels of hemoglobin A1c (a marker of diabetes risk), apolipoprotein B (a blood protein) than those who were inactive.

While not directly studied researchers believe that people who exercise outside in the sun likely have higher levels of vitamin D than indoor exercisers.

Vitamin D Levels Soar When Vigorous Exercise Is Used [Study] is a post from: The Inquisitr

Exercising can suck big time but for a growing number of people it is a necessary part of their daily routine. Now supposing they found out that small amounts of dark chocolate could be as good for them as all that exercising?

Well it turns out that scientists have found that could very well be the case and it all has to do with something called mitochondria, which apparently is the tiny powerhouse in our cells that generate energy. It also seems that a plant compound called epicatechin, which is found in chocolate, stimulates the same muscle responses as vigorous exercise.

Dr Moh Malek, from Wayne State University in Detroit, who led the US study on mice, said: ”Mitochondria produce energy which is used by the cells in the body. More mitochondria mean more energy is produced the more work can be performed.

”Aerobic exercise, such as running or cycling, is known to increase the number of mitochondria in muscle cells. Our study has found that epicatechin seems to bring about the same response – particularly in the heart and skeletal muscles.”

via Telegraph

The sweetness of chocolate for your health. It’s a good thing it seems. is a post from: The Inquisitr

Those who like to start off the day with a latte/coitus combo and a morning run could be upping their risk of a terrifying brain aneurysm, according to Stroke: The Journal of the American Heart Association.

Per a study conducted by Dutch researchers, there are eight main triggers that sharply increase risk of an intracranial aneurysm (IA)- blood vessels in the brain that can swell and rupture. Only 2% of the population has IAs, and fewer of than that suffer ruptures, but IAs can be serious and deadly.

Researchers ID’d the top risk factors and the percentage at which they contribute to the risk:

• Coffee consumption (10.6 percent)
• Vigorous physical exercise (7.9 percent)
• Nose blowing (5.4 percent)
• Sexual intercourse (4.3 percent)
• Straining to defecate (3.6 percent)
• Cola consumption (3.5 percent)
• Being startled (2.7 percent)
• Being angry (1.3 percent)

Sound like your to do list today? Drinking alcohol was also determined to temporarily increase risk. Study lead author Monique H.M. Vlak, M.D, said that the events were sometimes preceded by nausea or vomiting, but oftentimes did not present with any other symptom. Vlak commented:

“Reducing caffeine consumption or treating constipated patients with unruptured IAs with laxatives may lower the risk of subarachnoid hemorrhage,” Vlak said. “Whether prescribing antihypertensive drugs to patients with unruptured IAs is beneficial in terms of preventing aneurysmal rupture still needs to be further investigated.”

Information was gathered for the study via a questionnaire administered to individuals who had experienced an IA regarding their activities directly prior to the event.

[Image]

Coffee, sex and exercise can up risk of brain aneurysm is a post from: The Inquisitr

It turns out there may be some truth behind the movie cliche of an out of shape person keeling over during sex or at the gym. (Though it’s sex nine times out of ten in the films, isn’t it?)

If you’re not regularly active and engage in these activities, researchers found, you could incur a slightly higher risk of cardiac arrest. The link was examined in a wider analysis of several studies, and published in JAMA. Hitting the gym is the riskier of the two, more than tripling the risk of a sudden heart attack. Sex was still a possible trigger though, clocking in with a 2.7% increase in relative, not absolute risk.

Researcher Issa Dabareh was quick to caution people not to eschew physical fitness because of the findings:

But doing a lot more exercise — or having a lot more sex — would actually reduce the risk of one of these activity-triggered heart attacks, the researchers say.

Indeed, the researchers don’t want people to shun exercise — or sex — because of their study. “Hopefully no one misunderstands our point,” says Dahabreh. “We are a little bit worried that people will think that this is a risk for exercise.”

It was advised individuals unaccustomed to the bursts of activity to add exercise and/or exertion ”gradually.”

Infrequent sex, workouts can trigger heart attacks is a post from: The Inquisitr

Ever feel like you’re surrounded by zombies with all the repetitive, boring exercise options available at the gym?

An exercise program in Chicago takes the whole internet zombie fetishism thing a step further, with a more compelling twist on fitness than elliptical machines and treadmills. It’s marketed as a way to keep fit for a zombie apocalypse, and the Chicago Tribune spoke to the course’s creator Rich Gatz about the almost viral (ha!) popularity of the program:

And so, two nights a week in a gymnastics studio in St. Charles, five to a dozen people gather to run, jump, climb and vault up, over and around obstacles that stand in for the features of a city in the grip of a zombie infestation. They also undergo strength and conditioning training because zombies are relentless.

There are no actual zombies or zombie stand-ins, though Gatz says they are invoked for inspiration. A precision jump, for example, requires participants to land in an exact location, much as they would have to do if fleeing a zombie from rooftop to rooftop.

“You’ve got to land that, or the zombies are going to get you,” Gatz tells students.

Indeed. The program has a website where you can learn about the program more, and it expounds on the necessity of physical fitness if you don’t want to be zombie food:

The keys to surviving Z-day are simple: Be able to lift and throw heavy things, run fast and for long distances, and be able to navigate obstacles and urban environments in an efficient manner. By following the ZombieFit WODs (workout of the day) and practicing parkour, you will achieve increased fitness through the performance of functional movements at high intensity and find within yourself the internal discipline and mental fortitude necessary to become a traceur.

Although the gym bores the pants off me, this sounds like it would be kind of fun. Sadly for the rest of the country, Zombiefit classes are only available in Chicago.

[via Fark]

ZombieFit classes- can they help you survive the coming zombie apocalypse? is a post from: The Inquisitr

The Wii Rowing machine is possibly the most specific game controller released so far this year. How many rowing games actually exist on the Wii? I can only recall the one in Wii Sports Resort, though the video below promises compatibility with FOUR games. Uh, great?

This is currently available on Amazon for $34.99. Call me Thicky McThickpants, but I’m still utterly baffled by how this enhances anything in your Wii workout. Oh well, cheesy infomercial ahoy!

See also: New videogame comes with free exercise bike

[Amazon, via Joystiq]

Nintendo Wii gets rowing machine add-on is a post from: The Inquisitr

Obesity is one of the biggest challenges facing our society today and is becoming a a major health hazard for our young. One of the ways various agencies are trying to raise awareness of the the problem and encourage us to engage in healthier alternatives like exercise is through public service advertising spots. These are some of the cleverer ones out there.

via My Modern Metropolis

8 Great photo-manipulations to encourage us to exercise is a post from: The Inquisitr

Even though it’s been on the market for around two years, Wii Fit keeps getting the kind of publicity other games can only dream of. The woman above is Lara Roberts, a 38-year-old British mom of two who hopped on her Wii Fit Balance Board at home and turned herself into this:

Roberts used to be 252 pounds, but within twelve months was down to a svelte 140.

She was motivated to do this for her daughters, and credits most of this transformation to Nintendo’s workout game. But before you all rush out to grab a copy, she also underwent a STRICT DIET. Ugh, nothing’s easy, is it? Still, good for you, Lara. Nice to have a positive videogames-related story out there.

[Gossip Gamers, via Digg]

Wii Fit helps woman loses 112lbs is a post from: The Inquisitr

A whole one. This is on the Wii, if you can believe such a thing.

The imaginatively titled Cyberbike is, unsurprisingly, “the very first videogame that comes with an exercise bike,” and is developed by those chancers at Bigben Interactive.

The game comes out in January, and will see users riding around 18 land, sea, and air circuits on “some of the most improbable vehicles ever imagined.” Precisely what these mysterious modes of transport are isn’t specified. Maybe there’s a horse involved.

Anyway, the aim of the game is to pedal your way around and rid the in-game planet of pollution as you go, somehow. The bike itself will have adjustable saddle and handlebars, and I’m already estimating it will be the Trabi of the exercise bike world. It’s compatible with Mario Kart Wii, just in case you think Cyberbike looks crap.

Bigben also announced My Body Coach, another fitness title for the – GAAAAASP – Wii that includes two 500g (app. 1lb) dumbbells with Wii remote slots.

Usually, the dumbbells thing would be semi-interesting on its own, but it can’t trump a whole exercise bike. No word on price for either of these, but I struggle to believe Cyberbike will cost the same as a standard game.

[Via press release]

New videogame comes with a free exercise bike is a post from: The Inquisitr