Diet and Fitness Dish: Katy Perry's Favorite Exercise
Plus: 'The Biggest Loser' Resort, competitive pole-dancing and more!
- Jane Farrell, BettyConfidential.com
Why scour the web for the latest useful, funny or scary diet and fitness news? Betty is happy to do it for you every Friday!
What's Katy Perry's Secret Exercise?
Whatever saucy reply you thought of is so wrong. "I like to skip rope," the 25-year-old pop star said in an interview with ContactMusic. Fitness experts say it's one of the best cardio exercises around: All you need is a jump rope, and you can burn up to 600 calories per hour if you do it really vigorously. We're not sure how often, or for how long, Katy does it, but she's got a few other calorie-burning activities in her life, what with performing, keeping up with her manic boyfriend, Russell Brand, and shooting frosting out of her boobs for her "California Gurls" video. Maybe she should do a workout DVD!
The Biggest Loser Experience Is Yours - for $2, 695 per week
Next week is an enormous week for The Biggest Loser franchise. The groundbreaking show's 11th season begins on Sept. 21, and five days later, The Biggest Loser Resort at Fitness Ridge in Malibu welcomes its first guests. (There's already a Biggest Loser resort in Utah). Unlike the show, where contestants must be at least 100 lbs. overweight, the resorts cater to people at all fitness levels who want to "start or maintain a healthy lifestyle." The prices are steep, but you're guided through a twelve-hour day that includes hiking, aerobics, kickboxing, meals and cooking classes. Besides, if you pay more, chances are you'll be more committed. That's what we like to think, anyway.
\Well, It Does Require A Lot of Flexibility
Tammy Morris, the owner of Tantra Fitness (two gyms in British Columbia, Canada), wants pole-dancing to be taken seriously as a competitive activity. So the fact that the Miss Pole Dance Canada competition, which Morris organized, was held at a strip club didn't help much. Still, the local newspaper, the Times Colonist, of Victoria and Vancouver Island, reported that there were no "provocative gestures" or "nudity." The winner: former chemistry major Crystal Lai, who got $1,000 and an all-expenses-paid trip to the world championships in Switzerland next month. Next time, Morris said, she'd like the competition to be held at someplace other than a strip joint so that people would stop thinking of pole dancing as, well, exotic dancing. Best of luck to her.
Read Celeb Workout: Kettlebells
How Unsafe Is The Diet Pill Meridia?
Because nothing is perfect, including medicine, treating illnesses often involves a risk-vs.-benefit calculation. Is the condition being cured worse than the condition that may be triggered? That's especially true with prescription diet drugs, and even the experts are divided on the usefulness of a particular obesity medication: Meridia. This week a panel advising the federal Food and Drug Administration couldn't agree on whether the drug, which is expected to rack up $30 million in sales by the end of this year, should be taken off the market or just given a stronger warning label. Experts opposed to keeping the drug on the market said the risk of heart attack and strokes associated with Meridia were too serious to compensate for any weight loss. The FDA will evaluate the panel's report before deciding whether the drug, which has been banned in Europe, should still be available.
Locker-Room Thief Alert
Good news for the patrons of LA Fitness gyms in southern Florida: the thief who's been targeting the facilities for the past several months has been caught. Police in Boca Raton arrested Jeremiah Jean, 30, and charged him in a string of thefts of both cash and property. Crimes like this can pay off big time for thieves, who often buy one-day passes and target gym patrons who look as though they might be carrying money, or who are wearing a lot of bling. Advice from the police: Leave the jewelry at home. Don't leave your locker open (incredibly, some people do) and invest in the most expensive lock you can find. Your $3.99 one from high school isn't going to cut it anymore.
Jane Farrell is a senior editor at BettyConfidential.
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