Each issue of Biiofit will take a look at the latest appliance of science to health and fitness.

This issue, we are winging our way off to the land of the Rising Sun, where Sumo wrestlers and Ninja warriors rub shoulders, and our modern day Samurai Fitness hero is Professor Izumi Tabata, of the National Institute of Sports Fitness in Tokyo, Japan.

Mad Professor
You can use this structure with almost any exercise. The secret to making this effective is in your first 20 second interval. You have to go all out, so do as many reps as you can in the 20 seconds, put the weight down for 10, then pick it up again and go hell for leather for another 20 seconds. I would suggest getting some sort of tabata timer like a sports watch with a repeating alarm, where you can see exactly at what point you are at in the workout, you dont want to have to think too much, all of your concentration will be on the exercise. What do I need to do? Some example tabata intervals are: Skipping Rope Pushups Squats Medicine ball slams Where applicable, try without weights first of all, and then gradually add weights or a weighted vest if you need more intensity. If it works so well, why isnt Professor Tabata ripped like Brad Pitt in Fight club? Dont be so judgemental, he might be hiding his Bruce Lee physique underneath that grey suit, his academic colleagues might not respect him, if he flexes his pecs all the time!

Professor Tabata made the amazing discovery that you can make huge gains in fitness and lose large amounts of body fat by exercising only 4 minutes a day! Sounds too good to be true? Well its actually scientifically tested and the results are proven and thousands of athletes are adopting his training method around the world, so you may ask what the catch is? How do I get started? What do I need to do? If it works so well, why isnt Professor Tabata ripped like Brad Pitt in fight club? Whats the catch? Well it is actually very difficult, it will probably feel like the longest four minutes of your life! How do I get started? If you are going to try it, we would recommend going without weights or going light with the weights until you find your range, theres an overwhelming probability you will severely underestimate this workout and be begging people around you to help you off the floor. Tabata intervals follow this structure: Work hard for 20 seconds Rest for 10 seconds. Repeat this eight times. Tabata Interval training Study

Tabata performed a detailed study, comparing the effects of moderate intensity endurance (aerobics) and high endurance intermittent training (tabata training intervals) on VO2 max (see below) and anaerobic capacity. To cut to the results of the study: the moderate intensity group training program produced a significant increase in VO2 max of about 10%, but had no effect on anaerobic capacity. The high intensity group improved their VO2 max by about 14% while anaerobic capacity improved by 28%. The study was done over a six week period. Both groups working out 5 days per week VO2max is the maximum amount of oxygen in millilitres, one can use in one minute per kilogram of body weight. Those who are fit have higher VO2max values and can exercise more intensely than those who are not as well conditioned. Numerous studies show that you can increase your VO2max by working out at an intensity that raises your heart rate to between 65 and 85% of its maximum.
Effects of moderate-intensity endurance and high-intensity intermittent training on anaerobic capacity and VO2max. Tabata I, Nishimura K, Kouzaki M, Hirai Y, Ogita F, Miyachi M, Yamamoto K. Department of Physiology and Biomechanics, National Institute of Fitness and Sports, Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. anaerobic apacity and VO2max. Tabata I, Nishimura K, Kouzaki M, Hirai Y, Ogita F, Miyachi M, Yamamoto K.

Issue 1 Summer 2011 BIIOFIT 1

Yoga ABC
Every issue we will be working our way through the yoga Alphabet, with a variety of Yoga principles and poses, this issue we start with the letter A. A is for Astavakrasana

(ahsh-tah-vah-krahs-anna), commonly called the eight angle curve pose. asta = eight vakra = bent, curved

Step By Step
Stand upright and with your feet separated a bit wider than shoulder width. Exhale, bend forward, and then press your hands to the floor outside your feet. Then with your knees slightly bent, slip your right arm to the inside and then behind your right leg, and finally press the hand on the floor just outside your right foot. Gently move your right arm across the back of the right knee, until the knee is hitched high up on the back of your right shoulder.

1 2 3

Brace your shoulder against the knee and now gradually slip your left foot to the right, try not to use jerky movements. Now comes the tricky part.try to cross your left ankle in front of the right and hook round the ankles. Experiment with leaning slightly to your left, this takes some of the weight off your left arm, then begin to lift raise your feet a few inches off the floor. With the right leg supported on the shoulder, exhale and bend your elbows. Lean your torso forward and lower it toward parallel to the floor; at the same time, straighten your knees and extend your legs out to the right, parallel to the floor (and at ninety degrees to your torso). Now position your upper right arm by squeezing it between your thighs. Use the squeezing pressure to help twist your torso to the left, this may take a couple of tries. Keep your elbows in close to the torso. Focus your gaze with open eyes on the floor in front of you, about the distance of your eye to navel in front of you is the right position to focus your gaze, dont look straight forward as you may hurt your neck. Now try to hold for 30-60 seconds, work up gradually to where you can hold without straining to 60 seconds. Then straighten your arms slowly, lift your torso back to upright, bend your knees, unhook your ankles, and return your feet to the floor. Stand back and rest for a few breaths. Now repeat the pose for the same length of time to the left side (as in the photo).

BIIOFIT READER COMPETITION We are offering TWO free BIIOFIT organic ENDURA shirts worth 50 to the best readers photo for this Yoga pose, please send your photos by email to yogacomp@biiofit.com, image sizes must be less than 2MB, the winner will be announced on the 30th September 2011 (subject to a minimum of 50 entries). 2
Issue 1 Summer 2011 BIIOFIT 2

Hi Im Lee Carnaby, co-founder of Biiofit organic activewear, each issue in this Trekker Book column Ill be sharing some of my personal experiences on health and fitness or life in general , focussing on some of the places Ive been. Last year I spent an inspiring week raising money for the Starlight Childrens Foundation charity by climbing Africas highest, and the worlds highest free standing mountain - Kilimanjaro. The slopes of Kilimanjaro had been beckoning me for six months, from February to July Id talked about nothing else, wed been preparing, training, purchasing equipment, asking what if questions and considering every eventuality. Before we left we were ready. We were fit and had all possibilities covered. I was with fifteen friends and we had all trained together to conquer this challenge. Then came the day and we left with excitement in our hearts and just a little trepidation in our minds. What would we find when we get there? Well it was nothing like our expectations. We had enjoyed the training but the hike was nothing short of stunning. We started in thick tropical rainforest, and over the following 4 days wound our way through fern forests, stark rocky valleys and finally frozen desolate glaciers. Each day we pushed ourselves harder than we ever thought possible, reaching and surpassing personal boundaries. We experienced wild extremes of weather conditions from hot sun through rain, biting cold, sleet and at the summit, deep snow. I was lucky not to get altitude sickness, and the inability to get enough oxygen into my lungs was quite disabling. But, after 13 hours of gruelling hiking we all managed to summit at Uhuru Peak (a fantastic achievement at 5896m). I wore my reliable Biiofit Endura shirts through the rainforest and then as a base layer under my thermal and windproof outer wear as we hit the glaciers near the top, and it worked perfectly. Climbing Kilimanjaro wasnt the hardest thing Ive ever done in my life but it was one of the most rewarding. People told me that it would change my life and theyve been proved right. All I want to do now is have adventures, climb mountains and make new friends. Ill miss the sense of adventure, the breath-taking natural scenery, Ill miss the inspiring comradeship. I dont want Kilimanjaro to be a once in a lifetime experience, I want it to be the start of many more lifechanging experiences to come. You can see more of my exploits on http://vimeo.com/channels/ biiofit

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Biiofit Perspectives
Every issue we will be taking a look at some of the issues we are fighting for in the environment or looking at an aspect of what we do. Biiofit was the first retail company to exclusively produce organic only sportswear, the first to manufacture a recyclable organic shirt under 25 and the first organic sportswear company to get unsponsored athlete endorsements, in other words we didnt pay them to back our products. But these achievements havent been without some sacrifice, we ask Biiofits founders about their journey so far and the road ahead. What was the most difficult issue Biiofit had to tackle? Establishing an organic only grown fibres business was a really big deal. Once we found out that many fabrics were some of the most damaging environmentally products known to man, except for cars and coal fired power stations (by weight polyester produces more than 33 times its weight in carbon emissions!) We knew we had to make a change, we wanted our clothing to be an ethical product that minimised the harm to the environment, we gave ourselves 12 months to go out there and discover if there was any way of making high performance clothing whilst minimising the usage of synthetics. But you cant just call the fabric manufacturer and say, Give me a thousand yards of organic clothing! We had to revolutionize the industry. We had to provide a dependable income stream for farmers because if they went organic they dont find it easy to get a loan from the bank, because the banks dont like the risks, if the farmer stops using pesticides then a swarm of locusts eats the crop the bank loan doesnt get repaid, so the banks are effectively tied in with the chemical companies. We had to convince processors to completely clean their chemical vats and then process our stuff when we needed it. We had to find the right mills, we did not want any unethical labour practices or anyone taking any shortcuts, it was the same with tailoring. It was a really big process and it took over 18 months. We finally started trading in 2010. But weve never made a single product using polyester or polyamide (nylon) and its working out amazingly well. It put us on a whole different level from our competitors. Where else are you tackling issues? I mean after you had set the company up? Well one of the intriguing things about a fabrics own carbon footprint, was that about 30% of its invisible and its completely missing from the figures usually quoted. When I say invisible, its incurred outside outside the factory gate, the part that you dont see is in the transport element, but we only found this out, once we had made our first production run! What happens in a typical sportswear firm, is that the crop is harvested on a mass scale, for instance in industrial cotton plantations, the raw cotton is often shipped by trains for thousands of miles to be processed after har-

vesting in China, and the chemicals used to process it are often sourced internationally at the cheapest price, in Asia the cotton mills are often located in Thailand or the Philippines where the expertise and cheap labour are located for bulk production and tailoring, so that is even more transport. This whole transport network has a huge environmental effect, but currently there is no carbon penalty for using it, it is all about economies of scale and saving costs. But Biiofit wanted to work on a small is beautiful way of doing business. We didnt want this massive supply network for the transport, we knew we had to change it, but it was too late, we had already started production without realising wed missed a big part of the picture. When we looked into transport we knew we would have to shut down and start all over again, we were running out of money and hadnt visited every farmer and every shipper, we had contracted out some crucial work to Organic Certification companies, this was heart-wrenching as we had started selling and a lot of people were relying on us, including our new customers. As it turned out, purely by chance we got lucky, in fact we were incredibly fortunate as we were able to minimise our carbon intensity for transport without breaking the company. For instance, when we chose our supplier for organic bamboo in China we got lucky, we knew they grew all their bamboo on one organic plantation and we already had gained organic certification with Oekotex for the whole process of manufacture. When we enquired on the transportation element, we got a nice surprise, we found the farmer we had paid, was only 3 miles from the factory with a small enclosed plantationOekotex had done their job properly! so we only had to go and visit the one farmer rather than find a whole new supply chain, it made things easier for us as we did not want to terminate the small farmer who had relied upon us, and we had worked so hard to get. After the first shipment, we stopped using air freight and made a few other changes. Biiofit garments are all now transported using low carbon shipping and added to that, our Organic Bamboo actually sequestrates more carbon in the soil than is produced in the manufacturing or shipping of the garment so we are actually reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere when we sell our organic bamboo range! The next step is to get a reliable, fully auditable, start to end, low carbon delivery supplier in the UK and Europe, but we have not cracked that one yet. How do you see Biiofit as helping the planet, creating a sustainable future? We can only do our bit, but if we can make a small contribution, then that might set an example for the bigger companies to follow. In terms of sustainability, in 1900 in Western Europe over 4
Issue 1 Summer 2011 BIIOFIT 4

95% of clothing was re-used, now over 95% of clothing is thrown way, it takes time for people to throw it away, but its a big issue for sustainability, and with synthetic fabrics that is a huge greenhouse gas problem. And so thats why weve partnered up with some companies to, essentially by the end of 2011, make all our clothing out of recyclable fibres wherever we can. And were going to accept responsibility of our products from end to end. So if you buy a hat from us, or a shirt, or a pair of yoga pants, when youre finished with it, we encourage you to hand it in and well recycle it, well also give customers a discount on a new product when they recycle, to give them a reason to do it. Essentially we are trying to put a twist on the idea of consuming. Right now the globe runs on endless consumption and then discarding it without accepting the consequences, and were saying that were taking responsibility for our products from end to end. Can you imagine if a kitchen company said, When youre done with your kitchen, well buy it back from you and make more kitchens out of it. Instead, they sell you a kitchen, then you have to go and buy a new more expensive one, theyre not interested in using the old kitchen, they take it down the tip or make you take it, and when theyve fitted your new kitchen you cant even get them to give you any service! Its about giving some power back to the consumer, so they can get to decide and Biiofit is taking care of the consequences, which is what we think a company should do. But Im very interested, by the idea of what Biiofit will look like ten years from now? We hope we continue to make great products that people will buy, that will naturally grow the business if people support us whenever they can. We have a kind of Buddhist philosophy towards the business, if we focus on the now, then everything will turn out well in the future. We are not really ten-year plan people with lots of MBAs and big spreadsheets!

Del Mcqueen, World Powerlifting Champion Biiofit ambassador

www.biiofit.com

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