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Science May Have Identified Pterostilbene as the Fat-Torching Compound in Blueberries

A new study out of Japan appears to have identified how pterostilbene, an enzyme found in fruits like blueberries, bilberries, grapes, and cranberries, could be helping to burn excess fat stored inside the muscles. Experts have long known that pterostilbene is a powerful antioxidant that could offer several benefits including reduced inflammation and even DNA repair but this breakthrough study, led by Shinshu University in Japan, has cast new light on previous theories that suggest this enzyme could also be a vital tool for the war against excess fat. Until now, little was understood about the way that pterostilbene (a naturally occurring polyphenol) might accelerate fat metabolism in skeletal muscle. But among the compounds tested during the study on cultured mouse cells, pterostilbene was hailed as producing the most dramatic reduction of “intracellular lipid accumulation.” And, while pterostilbene was shown to reduce fat within the muscle cells, the enzyme had no detrimental eff...
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‘Eternally Yours’ Star Parker Young’s Training Tweaks to Add 8 Pounds of Lean Mass

As a model and actor, Parker Young has stayed in consistently great shape for scenes that require few clothes, but when the opportunity to play a vampire in the new CBS comedy, Eternally Yours came his way, Young decided to pack on some mass to fill the role. Taking off his fangs to talk fitness, the star sat down with M&F to share his love of weights, passion for the great outdoors , and why he’s a team player at heart. As an ectomorph , or “hard gainer,” who has modeled for Tommy Hilfiger and sent pulses racing with his six-pack on shows like Suburgatory, Young set himself a serious challenge to get bigger for the role of “Jesse,” a 30-something-year-old man turned vampire. “This character is a little bit older than the younger, high school guys I’ve been playing,” says the actor. “He’s a personal trainer by trade, so I felt I wanted to put on a little bit of size, just to look more like the trainers that I see out in the real world.” Young explains that he began ramping up h...
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Having a Consistent Routine May Be a Key Factor for Developing Better Overall Health

While our preference for maintaining a predictable routine is often seen as an individual choice, new research coming out of the University of Missouri suggests that chaos can be counterproductive for health and longevity. Apparently, consistency really is key for increasing our sleep, reducing pain, heightening moods, and supporting a healthier aging process. Here’s why. How Does a Consistent Daily Routine Improve Health and Longevity? The recent study  identified that daily routines helped to regulate the body’s circadian rhythm, a process that influences sleep, mood, and many other biological functions. “Regardless of sleep quality, those who reported having a regular daily routine had lower levels of physical pain and less depression compared to those without a daily routine,” said Eunjin Tracy, who is an assistant professor at the College of Education & Human Development, at the University of Missouri. What Is Social Jetlag and How Does It Hurt Fitness and Recovery? Insom...
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Editor’s Choice: 9 Products That Will Get You Through the Holiday Season

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The holidays have a way of turning even the steadiest wellness routine into a moving target of new and bigger goals. Between travel, busy calendars, and an overflow meals and snacks that mess with your macros, the best tools are the ones that make showing up feel more manageable and guilt-free: a simple creatine gummy, an easy protein shake, or a sleep setup that helps recovery happen overnight. This season’s picks also make room for a more personal view of health, with individualized nutrition insights, a discreet way to track hormone patterns and thoughtful ways to check in on loved ones. From small daily rituals to smarter recovery and family care, these are useful additions for keeping a little momentum through the holiday rush. Allswifit Your training doesn’t always fit neatly into one category. One day might mean heavy squats and sled pushes; the next, a tempo run, intervals, or a long conditioning session. And for athletes training for HYROX-style events, being able to move ...
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2026 Olympia Sumo Championships Results: Joshua Wade Upsets Heavyweight Field in Las Vegas

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The 2026 Olympia Sumo championships were held as part of the 2026 Olympia World Fitness Expo in the Las Vegas Convention Center in Las Vegas, NV on September 25-26. Hosted by “Sumo Dan” Kalbfleisch for the 21st year, athletes from around the country and internationally gathered to take part in this annual Olympia tradition with hopes to leave Las Vegas as champions. Kalbfleisch shared that the event was a success and was thankful for the athletes who competed, the fans who watched, sponsors, and the Olympia promoters for their support in making this event happen. Kalbfleisch said, “I would like to thank all the sumo athletes who came out and fought hard to show the true athleticism of the sport of sumo, the crew who worked hard to set up our tournament and helped it run as smooth as possible, the fans of sumo, old and new, who cheered for our athletes during every match, our sponsors who helped produce the tournament and gave our athletes some goodies and prizes, and the crew of Mr O...
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Is there a Best Time of Day to Work Out? Science May Have Figured Out Whether Timing Matters

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The fitness industry has a remarkable ability to take something simple and futz with it until you need a spreadsheet. Apparently, just going to the gym wasn’t complicated enough. Now we have optimal meal timing , optimal sleep timing, optimal supplement timing, optimal carbohydrate timing and, of course, optimal training timing. Your biological clock must be consulted before squats. God forbid you train legs at 10:30 a.m. when your circadian rhythm had you scheduled for 4 p.m. Well, some researchers actually put this one to the test, and they did it considerably better than the usual exercise study involving eleven college kids and a leg-extension machine. A randomized controlled trial published Sept. 25 in the Journal of Cachexia, Sarcopenia and Muscle took 108 men and women between 60 and 80 years old and first figured out when each person was actually strongest. They tested them at 8 a.m., noon, 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. on separate days. Then they assigned them to train either around the...
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‘Starting Strength’ Remains a Time-Tested Program for All Lifters To Get Bigger and Stronger

Today you’ll find no shortage of complicated ways to get strong. Apps track your every move, algorithms determine your training split, and a fancy watch tells you the rest. But the Starting Strength program takes a different approach: learn the big barbell lifts, perform them well, recover, add a little weight, and repeat. Starting Strength centers on the big barbell lifts. You perform these lifts through a full range of motion, with small weight increases driving progress from workout to workout. That’s why Starting Strength is still relevant—and why it’s worth reviewing here. Strength training knowledge has evolved, but the core idea of doing the basics well and progressively asking your body to do a little more never goes out of style. So, does this old-school strength method still deliver, or has modern-day programming passed it by? Let’s load the bar and find out.   What Is the Starting Strength Novice Linear Progression? Starting Strength is the brainchild of Mark Rippeto...
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Keto Diet Slashes Liver Fat by 67%: New Study Reveals Massive Advantage Over Low-Fat Diets

With more than 40% of adults in the U.S. suffering from obesity , medical experts often tout different diets to aid with weight loss. But when it comes to cutting liver fat, keto is king according to a new report. The study recently published in the Cell Press journal, found that low carbohydrate diets triggered the largest rise in glucagon, which is the hormone responsible for burning the fat stored inside the liver. Keto also offered the largest decline in blood insulin levels. “The most surprising finding was that participants in the ketogenic diet group didn’t experience an increase in blood fat or cholesterol levels,” said Max Petersen, the study’s first author at Washington University School of Medicine. “Despite consuming the most fat.” How Was the Study Carried Out? 42 obese adults with prediabetes and fatty liver disease were randomly assigned to one of three diets: Low carbohydrate / ketogenic Low fat Mediterranean To make sure that participants followed their parti...
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Exercise Is Doing More Than Building Muscle: It May Also Be Rewiring Your DNA

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We’ve been saying exercise is good for your immune system for so long that the sentence barely means anything anymore. It’s right up there with vegetables are good for you and smoking is bad. Okay. Thanks. Anything else? Then somebody finally starts looking under the hood. A study published September 18 in Science Advances used some fairly sophisticated molecular tools to compare regular exercisers with sedentary people and found differences not merely in cholesterol, blood sugar or some other number your doctor circles in red. The differences went all the way down into metabolism, immune-cell gene activity and the accessibility of the genetic machinery those cells use to do their jobs. That’s considerably more interesting than telling us people who exercise tend to be healthier. The researchers pulled data from the Chinese Immune Multi-omics Atlas , an enormous project that has profiled more than 10 million circulating immune cells from 428 adults. For this particular exercise ana...
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How Much Better Could Nick Walker Get for next year’s Arnold Classic?

On Episode 305 of The Menace Podcast, host Dennis James was joined by Milos Sarcev and Jose Raymond, and with the 2027 Arnold Classic set for March 5 and 6, the panel discussed how much better the current Mr. Olympia, Nick Walker could get as he vies for the $750k prize.  Walker brought his best physique yet to Las Vegas in September, winning his first Mr. Olympia title a nd confirming his interest in treading the boards at the Arnold Classic in March. And why wouldn’t he? Having picked up the $600,000 check for first place in Sin City, “The Mutant” could add another $750,000 to his bulging bank balance if he is successful in Columbus. Recently, Walker has stated that he wants to put even more distance between himself and top contenders like Derek Lunsford, Samson Dauda, and Andrew Jacked. But how much bigger and better could Walker realistically get in the next few months?   View this post on Instagram   A post shared by Nick “The Mutant” Walker...
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