Men's Health Australia February 2022

IN THE LATE 1970S a researcher from the University of Chicago, Salvatore Maddi, was studying the psychological motivations of 26,000 employees working at a local phone company. Soon after the study began, there were major disruptions to the business as deregulation of the US phone industry caused mass changes to resourcing and operations. Unsurprisingly, there were many employees who rejected the changes, experiencing feelings of victimisation and a yearning for the ‘good old days’. These employees struggled, resisting forces of change that were largely outside of their control. What was surprising to Maddi and his researchers was the flow-on effects of this resistance, most strikingly in the form of serious health conditions: heart attack, stroke, obesity, depression and substance abuse, as well as relationship breakdown, were common among the downtrodden. Maddi’s study…

THE BIG QUESTION Q Squatting hurts my back. What am I doing wrong?” – DW GLAD YOU ASKED. Because the alternative to improving your form – ditching the exercise altogether – would be a wrong move. We squat from the moment we learn to walk. It’s an innate skill you should not relinquish easily. We squat when we drive, sit down for a meeting, use the bathroom, go to dinner. To squat is to live, and vice versa. Nailing the basics to keep your bones and joints in the correct alignment ensures muscles are being used properly, and abnormal wearing of joint surfaces is decreased. Here’s the deal. Your chest should be upright to avoid rounding your back, which can cause lower-back pain during and after squatting. Another fix: elevate your heels. Squatting with…

YOUR MONTHLY DOWNLOAD OF THE LATEST LIFE ENHANCING RESEARCH WHILE IT DOESN’T seem as though 2020/21 will be the hottest summer on record for Australia’s eastern states – thanks, La Niña; do come again – it’s still plenty warm (and soggy) enough to justify taking your training indoors until the cool of autumn arrives. Since the sun started climbing ever higher in the midday sky, park workouts have become less appealing by the day, and every sweat-drenched T-shirt and sun-kissed neck has had you longing for the comfort, good food and airconditioned cool of your living room, sapping your motivation. So it’s perhaps ironic that, according to a longitudinal study recently published in the World Journal Of Biological Psychiatry, the cure to your stay-at-home malaise may be to bite the bullet and…

FROM HOLOTROPIC hyperventilation to Wim Hof’s power breathing, manipulating your respiration has lately been sold as a way to enhance your exercise performance, quicken your mind, or even enter altered states of consciousness. But while breathwork may seem like yet another passing trend, many of its principles are ancient and supported by the latest science. To take one example, alternate nostril breathing – inhale through one side, exhale through the other – is both a staple of traditional Ayurvedic medicine and a technique proven to lower anxiety by Indian researchers at Guru Nanak Dev University. It’s deployed by Navy Seals – and apparently worked for Hillary Clinton when she learned she’d lost the presidential race to Donald Trump in 2016. Potent stuff. Steadying your nerves in the face of an encroaching…

ACROSS WESTERN culture and society, red meat is the undisputed macho, biceps-flexing man food – or so a paper in the Journal of Consumer Research claims. The HuffPost’s rundown of “14 of the Manliest Foods Ever Known to Man” is a carnival of death, which involves barbecues, ribs and even edible shot glasses – Ed Geinishly made out of beef. Yet, despite the association of animal flesh with male potency, a recent study in the Biology Of Sport journal suggests that the ultimate fuel for your long-term virility is a food our caveman ancestors would have gathered, rather than hunted. Walnuts are a curious nut. First, they’re imposters – though a staple of your festive nut bowl, these bitter husks are drupe seeds and not botanical nuts at all. Second, they…

ALEX RUSSELL is apologising profusely for being a little late to our scheduled Zoom interview. He’s been trying to track down some medication for his partner, Diana, who’s suffering from back pain, perhaps brought on by the long-haul flight from LA the two took the day before. Thanks to the new Omicron COVID variant, they’re now holed up in an Airbnb apartment in Sydney’s Tamarama, where they’re isolating for three days. As iso stints go, this one in a pretty beachside locale isn’t too bad, Russell says. The last time he was back here in June he had to do two weeks’ quarantine in a city hotel. “Some ocean breeze is a little nicer, a little more palatable,” he says, smiling. Dressed in a black crew neck, with short hair, a hint…