was recently informed that I had finished in second place in this year’s Mr. Fitness competition. I will write some more about it when I find the time, when I put online the results and when I take a photo of the trophy I am about to receive (shown about is last year’s trophy). The award ceremony is due soon.

Mike Coogan was this year’s winner. He was last year’s winner as well. I won the competition for two consecutive years prior to that.

Here is some crazy little scientific development.

Scientists have found a way to turn on deep sleep using a machine that magnetically stimulates the brain.

Such a device worn on the head could in future squeeze the benefit of eight hours’ sleep into just two or three hours.

Some months ago I read about medication that has the same effect, but anyone brave enough to consider this probably just plays a role in some big experiment. With Second Life gaining traction and now this, the future could soon become bizarre. The press is getting filled with the negative effects of cutting-edge science such this on people’s lives.

Interesting article about a clinical study at Columbia:

Columbia-Led Study Finds Exercise Benefits Area of Brain Involved in Aging

Neuron-Growth First Observed in Living Brain

Good news to those of us who take a break from work in order to engage in physical activity. The image above, by the way, is my own brain.

have finally put behind me some chores that I have been escaping and postponing for almost a year. First of foremost, I needed to spend many hours converting documents and papers of mine to HTML, then filing them sensibly under the Web site (here is the largest one among about 10). It was like opening a Pandora’s box, taking a glance at old papers and trying to figure out what fits where. The mind slips when it is no longer familiar with old material that got mis-filed.

Photo from

The second thing which I finally finished is the rowing competition. I did fairly well at it, given the circumstances, but it had my throat in a bad state for almost a day. I will soon report about. I can’t do so now because it is too early to announce the results. If I win, there will be an excellent prize and it will count as a personal achievement which is becoming hard to replicate as not only do I age, but I also seem to spend less time at the gym nowadays. I am not entirely certain what impact my career will have on my physique, but I am not worried (yet!). I’m probably in a better shape than I have ever been, but it varies depending on exercise. Some things I have neglected while others, which do not count as ‘dirty laundry’, I just carry on doing.

Photo captured in July 2005

month ago I mentioned the fitness competition which took place right here in Manchester. I may have neglected to properly acknowledge and give attribution to the winner, Mike Coogan. He beat me by 20 points (a small gap) and snatched the Mr. Fitness title for 2006. For what it’s worth, here is a detailed list outlining of the different stages of the competition, which spanned a period of approximately 5 months.

1. Rowing 3000 meters, ‘Concept’ ergo level 10 (slow equipment)
2. Bench press (Scott machine), 1 repetition maximum
3. 800 meters on treadmill, 10 degrees horizontal incline
4. Shoulder press (Scott machine), 1 repetition maximum
5. Crosstrainer 3,000 strides at level 5, no grip on bars
6. Maximum pushups (120-second limit)
7. Step-ups 200 repetitions (with two 6 KG dumbbells)
8. Squats on Smith machine, 1 repetition maximum
9. 10.15 KM run (treadmill)
10. Mini-triathlon (3-mile run, 1,000 strides (level 5) on crosstrainer, 1-mile row on ergo (level 5))

Beware of the ‘marketing cowboys’

ARKETING can be a rather sick ‘science’. The story that I present here should hopefully illustrate this. The other day, after I had played my 3^rd game of squash in this year’s competition, I got a free running technique (or stride) examination. This was conduced with a laptop (runs Winders, quite sadly) and a video camera.

Needless to mention, the intent was to sell me corrective footware by suggesting there will be horrible consequences without it. It’s the fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) method to marketing some medicine or other remedies. Say to someone “there is problem with you”, then offer the cure. Moreover, part of the techniue is put the elixir close to one’s reach using, e.g. some leaflet. Some would argue this explains the separation between a doctor (who can’t/won’t directly sell) and the pharmacy where nothing is being prescribed. It’s like a self-supervising/moderating system; a peer-review framework if you like, and one which involves more than one person or practice.

Insurance companies like to take advantage of this sleazy marketing approach. I can recall a funny robots clip which aired on Saturday Night Live. In the video, robots are said to steal seniors’ pills and terrorise them. In turn, naive citizens are advised to buy insurance that covers no concrete threat. Greedy companies essentially cash in on ignorance.

Returning to my story which demonstates this case, I was advised to change sneakers every x miles (3-4 months). I was offered ‘special’ shoes that would suit me and was even pointed towards a shop that is run by the examiners. Being a computer-oriented person, I could not help thinking of ‘waste culture’ in this context, much like Vista’s steep hardware requirements. There’s also that old advice which says businesses should throw away malware-infected workstation. Go figure… or come to think of Live OneCare, which is a security product which Microsoft sells in order to protect its already-broken product.

I thank the folks who did the test for teaching me a lesson about myself (as useless as it was), as well as the (sort of) self-branded gift and leaflet. However, I am unlikely to fall for that marketing trap. As a child I saw my parent almost falling victim the the highly prevalent vacuum cleaner salesman tactic — reveal a lot of filth, spend many hours working without pay, then offer a pricey electronic appliance. I can’t recall if it was a Hoover or a Dyson.

[A non-Novell blog post for a change:]

ORE schools have recently begun banning wireless networks. I cannot say that I am surprised. We already know that cellphones emit radiation and their antennas (the larger frameworks which support them and emit even more radiation) can truly become a menace. Wi-Fi-supported laptops and routers have radiative residues as well, although the scale might be different (probably significantly reduced).

Is all the fuss justified at all? It the radiation significant enough to be harmful? Therein lies this debate. There are not enough m studies to provide strong evidence, I suspect.

I wrote about this in more considerable length in the past. The context was similar. This included a discussion about another university that banned Wi-Fi. As I said before, some would dislike the fact that I point out such stories which I have read. Last year I read a study which concluded that heavy cellphone use (an hour a day roughly) can increase the chance of developing brain tumour. The side of the brain that’s closer to the phone (depending on whether you are left- or right-handed) is 260% more likely to develop tumours. That in its own right was enough to persuade me to boycott cellphones.