Burnaby EA's Home Gym in a Box

For years, the public ganged up on the video game industry for creating a class of young gamers who sat around in front of consoles or screens getting fat because they exercised only their fingers and thumbs.

But since the overwhelming success of Nintendo's Wii system, where gamers get a full body workout playing boxing, baseball and other e-sports activities, gamers are no longer the couch potatoes of urban myth.

Now, Electronic Arts has introduced the first of what it promises will be a line of fitness games that gives gamers a full home workout without having to invest in a home gym or hire a personal trainer.

The debut product is EA Sports Active, a kind of electronic personal trainer designed for the Wii system. Developed at EA's studios in Burnaby and retailing for $60, EA Sports Active has workout exercises including jump lunges and bicep curls. The game comes with a leg strap to hold the Wii Nunchuk controller and to measure lower-body movements, and a resistance band which can be upped to make the player exert more effort for the weight exercises. You can watch your moves on the screen by way of your personal avatar, and messages will pop up like a CNN crawl telling you when you're doing something wrong ("Kick your leg higher! Hold the position longer!"), and a personal coach will offer encouragement. If you think you're losing your way, the game comes with instructional videos of coaches showing the right way to do an exercise.

Read more: EA runs out reality fitness

Technorati Tags: fitness, wii, nintendo, ea, burnaby

DietsInReview.com

DietsInReview.com is an incredibly informative resource sharing various tips on how to live a healthier lifestyle. I often refer to them for new, healthy meal ideas that help with weight loss. They also have a very handy Health Calculator designed to help you find your optimal calorie intake.

DietsInReview.com is dedicated to providing you with the tools to live a healthy life. We are comprised of a team of health experts and enthusiasts who are passionate about sharing our unbiased knowledge of diets, supplements, weight loss books, and fitness programs with you so that you can make the most informed and best decision for you and your lifestyle to meet your health goals.

DietsInReview.com features more than 750 objective reviews on the latest in the diet and health trends, informative and engaging blog posts that are updated daily, interviews with leading health professionals, nutritious recipes, healthy videos, several diet and wellness newsletters, and tools like the Instant Health Snapshot which calculates your BMI, Ideal Body Weight, and Basic Metabolic Rate.

As your healthy living resource, we want to support you as you start living your healthiest life - today.

Technorati Tags: diets, healthy living, healthy meals, calories

Fitness Challenge

Bob Lindo of Camel Valley spent 20 years cultivating his victorious vineyards in Cornwall.

He's just won the UK's first ever gold medal in the International Wine Challenge - the Oscars of the wine world.

"Every time anybody in the English wine industry wins something it's good for everybody," he said.

"We all gain and it raises the profile of English wine in general."

Since winning the prize, sales of his Bacchus 2007 have soared, and they're not just toasting the success of English wines in Cornwall.

A total of 24 medals were awarded to British bottles.

One of the judges, the wine critic Tim Atkin, says it's no surprise home-grown wine is going down well.

"The lovely thing about English wines is they're a bit like English apples - they've got a beautiful perfume to them, those hedgerow flavours you get in English wine are just like a beautiful Autumn afternoon," he said.

The UK is the largest importer of wines and often considered the hub of the international wine trade. But only 0.3% of the bottles we buy are British.

There are currently 383 vineyards in the UK. And every year they produce 2.2 million bottles of wine.

But that's nothing compared to France which makes nearly seven billion.

English Wine Bacchus 2007 By Bob Lindo Wins Industry Oscar Gold | Business | Sky News

Technorati Tags: fitness, diabetes, prevention

Strectching Your Fitness

Stretching can set you right

I work with a lot of runners, helping them to undo the muscle imbalances and alignment problems that develop from all those miles of pounding the pavement. There's no shortage of injuries and pain syndromes experienced by this group, and one of the more common conditions I see are related to their overall structural alignment, or posture.

Runners tend to develop imbalances in the musculature around the hips and pelvis, as well as the upper back and shoulders. The forward-leaning, round- shouldered posture that seems to accompany distance running can be very detrimental to a runner's performance and health, not to mention his appearance.

When the spine and extremities are poorly aligned, there are many unfortunate side-effects. Nerve conduction, respiration and circulation can be compromised, joint range of motion may become limited, and biomechanical stress is increased, often leading to pain and injury.

Technorati Tags: fitness, trfaining, running, stretching

Benign Essential Tremor

Some people seek personal training to help with Tremors. Benign Essential Tremor can cause a lot of trouble in your life but tremors can be helped by strengthening muscles. See more info on Benign Essential Tremor here:

http://www.essentialtremorinfo.com/

Technorati Tags: tremor, benign essential tremor, personal training

Cycling for Mental Health

A special cycling trek from Vancouver to St. John's begins on May 20th, when 60-year-old Mel Thompson dips his wheels in the Pacific Ocean and starts to pedal eastward. During his 100 day journey across Canada, Thompson hopes The Ride for Mental Health will raise awareness about mental illness and get people talking about the issues surrounding it. Although mental illness affects one in five Canadians at some point in their lives, there is still a social stigma attached to mental illness that keeps many people from seeking the help they need. It is the disease that no one likes to talk about, but it has a devastating impact on people who suffer from it, their families and society in general. The Ride for Mental Health aims to bring the issues of mental illness out in the open, get people to share their own experiences with it, and debunk the myths and misconceptions of mental illness.

CNW Group | XEROX CANADA | Canadian Cyclist to Cross the Country in 100 Day Ride to Raise Awareness for Mental Health

Technorati Tags: cycling, mental health, vancouver, canada