by Dr. Lonnie Lowery

There are a lot of facts bombarding our gray matter nowadays. Pretty much everyone realizes that we live in an age of information overload. This certainly holds true with bodybuilding and nutrition. Yet with all the science and speculation, practical applications of the information are sometimes hard to come by.

Take dietary fat, for example. You may read on one site how fish oils are important (they are), while on another site you're reading about the wonders of flax oil (flax is also good). But how do you incorporate these lipids into your daily meal plan without turning into a human equivalent of a crankcase?

While you ponder how to make better dietary fat choices, the information blitzkrieg continues. On the nightly news you may see health blurbs about the benefits of mono unsaturated fats. Those centenarian Mediterranean folk are indeed onto something, aren't they? On the radio, a similar message reaches your ears: "Garlic oil was found to have beneficial effects  But my question remains, do you include these lipids into your eating schedule? And if not, why not?

Christina Vargas Fitness Model, Singer, Figure Competitor

by John M. Berardi

"Oh come on, live a little!"

"Don't you ever eat anything that's bad for you?"

"I could never do what you guys do, I like food waaaayyyy to much for that!"

Those quotes sound familiar, don't they? I know I've heard them hundreds of times. But don't take my word for it. Studies have shown that every 60 seconds, someone, somewhere in the world, is uttering some permutation of one of these phrases. (1) The most annoying part is that the perpetrators don't seem to "get it."

Now, my normal response is to smile and chuckle it off while deliberately and noticeably glancing down at the extra pounds of "life" around their midsection. But what I really feel like doing is snapping back with something like, "Oh, so what you're telling me is that stale, chocolate brownies are the secret to what you call 'living.' That's interesting. You know, in all honesty, my brethren and I do eat stuff that's 'bad' for us from time to time; we just eat it less frequently than you do, chubby. And this, my opponent of self discipline, is what makes our enjoyment of food waaaayyyy superior to yours!"

by Charles Poliquin

For some reason unbeknownst to me or probably anyone else (with the possible exception of those TV psychics who, for a small fee, will tell you that your wife is cheating on you with the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker), back training is an enigma. Given the form that I see most trainees use in the gym, it's a wonder that any of them can start a lawnmower without throwing their entire lumbar spine out of alignment.

I'm equally puzzled by most of the exercises performed by the majority of trainees. If they were enrolled in a mime class, they would no doubt get high grades for their impression of a man lifting a fat woman out of mud puddle. I, however, would give them a failing grade for their workout technique.

It doesn't have to be difficult, though. Take the following exercises, for instance. In my estimation, they are the top seven upper back exercises that should make up the core of your upper back training. They are the exercises that give you the most bang for your training buck.

Without further ado, here they are:

Angela Segovia Fitness Model

by Michael Boyle

It's interesting, ask a strength coach what a good bench press is for a 200 pound male and chances are you'll get a reasonable answer. Maybe everyone won't be in agreement, but surely they'll all have an opinion.

Now, try asking a reputable strength coach what constitutes superior single-leg strength or first-class vertical pulling strength. Good luck finding the same level of agreement, if you get an answer at all. It might seem like you just asked a youngster about foreign trade. "Say what?"

Last spring and summer, I set out on a mission to answer both questions. What are the limits of single-leg and upper back strength? If you're going to train, you need a goal. If we're going to train for strength, we need to know what strong actually is.

The four-minute mile is a great example of breaking down athletic barriers. In 1957, Roger Bannister became the first to run a mile in under four minutes. On that day, he broke a twelve-year old record. By the end of 1957, sixteen other runners had added their names to the list. It's amazing what someone will do once they've seen what's possible.

GTx, Inc. and Merck & Co., Inc. Enter Global Strategic Collaboration for the Development of SARMs, a Novel Investigational Class of Drugs to Treat Muscle Loss and other Musculoskeletal Conditions

MEMPHIS, Tenn., and WHITEHOUSE STATION, N.J., Nov. 6, 2007 - GTx, Inc. (NASDAQ: GTXI) and Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE: MRK) today announced an agreement providing for a research and development and global strategic collaboration for selective androgen receptor modulators (SARMs), a new class of drugs with the potential to treat age-related muscle loss (sarcopenia) as well as other musculoskeletal conditions. This collaboration includes GTx's lead SARM candidate, OstarineTM, which is currently being evaluated in a Phase II clinical trial for the treatment of muscle loss in patients with cancer, and establishes a broad SARM collaboration under which GTx and Merck will pool their programs and partner to discover, develop, and commercialize current as well as future SARM molecules. As part of this global agreement, Merck will be responsible for all future costs associated with ongoing development and, if approved, commercialization of Ostarine and other investigational SARMs resulting from the collaboration.