Enter the Digits.

This is Fu Bingli, a 39-year-old martial arts master who just set a new world record for doing 12 push-ups on one finger. Bad-ass.

What I find even more stupefying is that no one took a video of him doing this, so all I have to show you are these photos.

photos: CEN/EUROPICS

Christmas Fit.

With Christmas approaching, the British Department of Health is suggesting a new holiday tradition for all the Queen's Subjects. Go for a walk. From BBC News:

The Department of Health, which has teamed up with the Ramblers charity to promote Christmas Day walking, said a stroll of just one mile could make a difference.

Public health minister Gillian Merron said: "Whatever the weather, a traditional festive walk is a great way for families and friends to avoid that sluggish feeling and have a more active Christmas.

"Being more physically active can make a real difference to your health - taking that extra walk is something we can all enjoy as a family."

It's a little sad when a government is compelled to offer this kind of no-brainer advice. Only slightly sadder was their recent campaign, "Stop shooting yourself in the forehead with a staple gun."

A Christmas stroll is a forgone conclusion chez moi. My dog Bruce doesn't care who was born on December 25th, be it Jesus Christ or Rin Tin Tin; he's getting his constitutional (or Brucestitutional, as we call it) either way. And, of course, you don't need to limit yourself to walks. Before the birth of my daughter, a Christmas Day surf was a must-do, especially considering how few people paddle out that day. Now, however, I'd rather hang out with her, but I make a point of having something physical-activity-inducing under the tree. I'll probably spend a bigger part of this Christmas chasing a 5-year-old on a Razor, followed by an even bigger part of the day bandaging knees and elbows and explaining to her that she asked for the scooter, therefore she can't hold Santa liable for personal injury.

We'd like to hear what you do to stay active on the big day. How do you work off your ham and mashed potatoes?

New flash! Two wrongs actually do make a right!

I'm a little late posting today because I had a major ethical dilemma. I wasn't sure whether or not I was going to share this next bit o' nutrition science news with you, given it spits in the face of all that I find healthy, righteous and good.

But this is a news site. As you know, we offer the latest fitness and nutrition news in a completely unbiased, objective fashion, so it is my duty to report thusly.

A study in the December issue of Diabetes Care suggests that mixing artificial sweeteners and sugar can actually increase a body's feeling of "fullness," thanks to the increased secretion of a peptide called GLP-1.

To investigate further, Brown's team had 22 healthy normal-weight young people take two glucose challenge tests. These tests, which measure how well the body metabolizes glucose, require a person to drink a sugar-filled beverage after fasting for several hours.

Ten minutes before consuming the "glucose load," study participants drank either roughly two-thirds of a diet soda containing an artificial sweetener or the same amount of carbonated water.

In both cases, the increase in a person's blood glucose was the same. But the researchers did find that people secreted significantly more GLP-1 when they drank diet soda before the glucose challenge compared to when they drank carbonated water.

Someday in the future, researchers will figure out why this is good information. They may even come up with a sane solution for raising obesity rates that trumps such antiquated cures as "diet" and "exercise." But for now, this is the worst news, ever. As I write this, exactly 1432 overweight 7-11 customers are cutting their daily Diet Coke Super Big Gulps with real Coke -- or maybe Mountain Dew -- claiming this is the latest diet craze, thus bringing us one step closer to the end of days.

Hopefully, it's darkest before the dawn.

Krunches with Kris Kringle

This weekend is your last big push to get all your shopping done. Are you ready? Maybe these guys can help get you ready.

Athletes mouth off.

If you've been searching for the perfect shoe to increase athletic performance, it looks like you may have been focusing on the wrong end. According to The New York Times, mouthpieces are the new black.

Mr. Gillis is among a small but growing number of athletes wearing what manufacturers like to call “performance mouthpieces” while cycling, running or weight training. One of the newest tools in a performance-enhancement arsenal, these mouthpieces are light, flexible pieces of molded plastic that fit over the teeth — and are only vaguely reminiscent of that retainer from junior high school or the bulky mouth guards worn by football players.

Dentists say these high-end mouth guards can open up the airways, prevent teeth-clenching and align the jaw. Being able to take in more air while exercising has obvious benefits — more oxygen for working muscles — while a relaxed jaw can decrease stress and help an athlete’s body function more efficiently.

The article then goes on to try to back up these claims and does so badly. One study, sponsored by mouthpiece manufacturer Makkar, showed that performance improved slightly, but endurance did not. Another study from the military college The Citidel "showed that using the mouth guards helped improve endurance and air flow," but the article doesn't explain the results of this study. Instead, it waffles around with a bunch of anecdotal evidence.

The whole thing reminds me of a brief period in the nineties when the exercise junkies I ran with all started wearing Breathe Right adhesive strips across their noses, the theory being they would open up our airways and increase performance. Unfortunately, we looked like a bunch of rejects from a Three Stooges film wearing the same facial band-aid, as though we had simultaneously walked into a 5-foot high horizontal pole and broken our noses.

Only thing is, our little band-aids cost a buck at most, whereas these fancy mouthpieces cost $500-$1200, not including dental fees. If you can afford that much for a dodgy piece of plastic just to run slightly faster, you might as well just hire someone to run for you instead.

You pay me to starve you!

Overweight? Maybe you should take a look at LighterLife, the British company that, for around $10,000, will feed you astronaut food to the tune of 530 calories a day with the goal of massive, speedy weight loss. Conversely, you can pay me $10,000 and I'll lock you in a room for a year and toss in a bowl of milk and a banana twice a day. Nothing like a little good, old-fashion starvation to turn your life around!

CNN ran an interesting report recently about LighterLife and other "Very low calorie diet" companies. As it turns out, the secret to a proper VLCD is a magic blend of herbs and spices:

The diets use a process called ketosis to prompt the body to burn stored fat for energy while being fed anywhere from 500 to 800 calories a day. Patients may eat or drink only manufactured food, shakes, and snack bars especially created for and sold through specific programs. The products are designed to supply the patient with adequate nutrition without offering excess calories.

Oh, bummer. Well, so much for my banana and milk diet idea. That would require you to eat real foods.

Here's a little more from the CNN article.

Diets of less than 800 calories can lead to numerous complications, according to Jampolis, including heart arrhythmias, which could lead to death. Extreme dieters are also at risk of dehydration, electrolyte imbalance, low blood pressure and high uric acid, which could lead to gout or kidney stones, she says. Also, losing weight quickly could lead to gallstones and thinning hair because dieters are getting the minimum amount of nutrition, which can affect hair and bone density.

Awesome! Another fact the article doesn't go into is that after a year of completely unrealistic eating, you go right back into the real nutrition world with absolutely no knowledge of how to eat properly. Plus, given you were consuming 500 to 800 calories a day, you probably didn't have the juice (literally) to do much exercise, so you don't know how to do that either.

Sure, you could buy a healthy cookbook and try your best, but if you couldn't pull it off before LighterLife, why would you be able to do it now?

Eating properly and exercising are learned behaviors and learning experiences. If you have the willpower to submit to an 800 calorie VLCD for a year, you also have the willpower to eat 1600-1800 calories, get a little exercise and learn how to operate your body in a sustainable fashion. Yes, it'll probably take a little longer to lose the weight, but it'll also stay off a hell of a lot longer.

The only downside is that you need to take accountability for your own actions, and who wants to do that?

Why Monsanto Is Not The Nerd's Favorite Corporation

If you’re food aware you are probably well versed in the nefarious practices of Monsanto. They’ve been the unwitting stars of many books and films, including Food, Inc, Fast Food Nation, The Future of Food, and almost anything Michael Pollen writes. It seems amazing to me that the mainstream press is only now getting interested but, hey, at least they aren’t completely ignoring the company that is in control of what is arguably the biggest single variable about our future health. What remains to be seen is that if anyone is powerful enough to do anything about it.

Monsanto Squeezes Out Seed Business Competition, AP Investigation Finds

Here’s a tidbit:

With Monsanto's patented genes being inserted into roughly 95 percent of all soybeans and 80 percent of all corn grown in the U.S., the company also is using its wide reach to control the ability of new biotech firms to get wide distribution for their products, according to a review of several Monsanto licensing agreements and dozens of interviews with seed industry participants, agriculture and legal experts.

Yes, you’ve read that correctly. Monsanto patents genes. Genetically modified genes to be precise. You can’t patent your own genes, because then you could own your kids. But if your kid happened to be Frankenstein you could now legally own him.

Here’s the quickie historical rundown. For more read the article and then start digging, perhaps beginning with the above films or books.

Back in the 70s our government in its infinite wisdom allowed companies to patent living things that had been genetically modified. This meant that companies like Monsanto could patent the plant seeds they were tampering with. Alas, if only our politicians had remembered their elementary school biology they may have given pause.

Plants, if you didn’t sleep through this chapter of class like everyone in Washington apparently did, breed by dispersion; their seeds fly through the air looking for a place to prosper. This means that if you genetically modify a plant and don't keep it inside it will eventually wind up sowing its seed with something natural.

The lawyers at Monsanto, who didn’t sleep through any class except ethics, apparently, saw this as one giant business opportunity. Because as soon as their patented corn would mingle with the neighbor’s natural corn they’d find a patent infringement get to work.

Since lawyers for multi-billion dollar corporations never lose to farmers, even those who’ve done nothing but farm the way their fathers did, and pretty soon Monsanto was forcing these farmers either out of business or to buy their genetically altered seeds. The latter makes them, essentially, indentured servants (another term from elementary school if you remember your Civil War classes) because they are forced to buy Monsanto’s seeds at whatever price they ask. Last year (you know, the one with the world recession that we’re still in), Monsanto raised their corn seeds by 25% and their soy by 28%. I’m sure their farmers are livin’ large.

So Monsanto now controls an industry of their creation. If we all decided we wanted to avoid genetically modified foods we might not have a choice for much longer. Most of us don’t right now. And even if you don’t believe in the possibility of a global scale disaster involving Frankenfoods (Monsanto’s seeds have been found in indigenous crops thousands of miles from the source), and believe that Monsanto is ethical enough to keep these foods safe, you’ve got to take pause when Monsanto prohibits genetically modified foods from being served to its executives.