Have you heard of Zuu? It’s this new fitness trend where people run around imitating animals (no joke) with moves like frog squats and gorilla walks. Or how about the bone broth diet? Which is kind of like a short-term 5:2 diet as you cut your caloric intake by only having five cups of broth made from the bones of any meat – or the shells of seafood – on fasting days.
Now the question is, should you be channelling your inner beast or subsisting on liquids for two days a week or doing both? Or should you instead be trying one of the other trends promising the holy grail of health and fitness?
With so many different fitness and nutrition options, it’s difficult to know which approach is right for you, especially as our needs differ greatly as individuals. But science has made it possible to cut through the trends by mapping out your genome.
And now we’ve made that science available to you.
You see, through DNA testing, your genes can give us a picture of your unique fitness and nutritional needs. They can tell us whether your body is more oriented towards power-based exercises or if you’re more suited to endurance workouts. Your genes can tell us how well you respond to aerobic training or whether you’re prone to injuries and even how long it takes you to recover.
This information is empowering. It can form the foundations of a tailored exercise program specific to your unique needs. There’s no guesswork anymore. And it means you can get optimal results in less time.
For instance, if your DNA test shows your body doesn’t naturally produce a lot of collagen in your tendons, in real simple terms this means you’ll be prone to injury. With this in mind, you’ll need to train with quite an intense focus on correct technique.
“It doesn’t mean that you’re going to get injured if you push it too far. It just means that it’s good information because you don’t have a lot of margin for error,” our CEO at Pivot Frank Cuiuli says.
“Or you might have a gene expression that means your recovery is slower. What this tells you is that you don’t want to back up an intense session with another intense session. You want to give your body more active recovery between sessions to keep yourself in fighting-fit order.”
It’s important to remember the results don’t predetermine your skills or ability – as Frank says, it’s just another data point. “Your genes don’t determine whether you’re going to be good or bad at something. That’s very much determined on how you interact with your environment. But once we know the behaviour of the body’s system, we can customise a program based on an individual and what the data says about how the system would generally perform.”
The same goes for food.
Instead of giving up carbs because it’s trending right now, your genes reveal whether you need to go down that path by showing how your body responds to carbs. You can also find out how your body responds to saturated fats, lactose, caffeine and alcohol too.
“The good thing about the DNA test is it gives us a real clear view on how individuals respond to different kinds of food groups,” Frank says.
“At the end of the day you’re discovering how your body respond to nutrients. That’s objective. Your genetics might tell you, you have a high carbohydrate sensitivity, which means if you eat things like pasta, it will create more inflammation. Then it’s up to you to make a choice.
“I think that’s the kind of empowerment we want to give our clients. I’m not going to tell you what diet to follow. I’m going to tell you how your body responds to different foods, help show you how you can fit healthy eating habits into your current lifestyle, and then you make a decision.”
The DNA test is simple. All it takes is a saliva swab which is then sent off to Pivot’s partner lab DNAFit in the UK.
“They only test for genes that have a very solid base of controlled studies with evidence of what the gene actually means,” Frank says. “We went with them for that reason. They leave out all the genes that don’t influence your response to exercise and nutrition, or don’t have sufficient evidence and science backing them at this point, because DNA testing is a new area.”
Keen to find out how you can optimise your training and nutrition with DNA testing? We’d be happy to answer any of your questions. Just hit reply on this email.
We hope you have a great month,
The Pivot Team
UPCOMING EVENTS
Ferus Animi // Terra Nova has grown to become one of the leading research groups in the modern movement arts community. The practice seeks to examine the principles behind many of the modern movement techniques we have come to recognise, through the lens of evolutionary physiology and environmental adaptation. We look to better understand our mechanics, neurological & cognitive function, biological processes and the physical laws which govern our motion, in search of a richer range of possibilities in our movement and performative practice, as well as taking anthropological and philosophical examinations of our modern habits and lifestyles.
As a collective, FA//TN is a group of cross disciplinary artists and scientists researching in the field of human evolutionary physiology and environmental adaptation, through both a scientific and artistic lens. Founder Tomislav English‘s personal practice is informed by ongoing movement research under the teachings of Grand Master Tae Yong Lee, Moshe Feldenkrais, Wim Hof, David Zambrano, Cameron Shayne, Fighting Monkey Practice, Bruno Caverna and Ido Portal, in addition to academic research at Royal Holloway, University of London and the University of Oxford.
-2-Day Intensive-
2nd & 3rd September 2017
10am to 6pm
– LEVEL –
Open to experienced movers from all movement backgrounds
– BOOKING –
http://pivotme.us8.list-
*only 20 spaces available*
– PRICE –
AU$200
