Nothing is more exciting than the week leading up to fantasy football heaven, known as THE DRAFT. Twelve guys, one room, lots of food, lots of beverages, lots of talking and yapping, but most importantly.... it's draft time! The day is finally here! Best day of the year!

Saturday August 29th will be my draft. We've been doing this for 8 years now and it gets more and more exciting every year. When we started doing this a lot of us were still in college and lived close to each other. We all have jobs now, wives, children, and very few of us still live near each other. Four live in Washington DC, 1 in Columbus, 2 in Chicago, 1 in Syria (imagine that), the rest live in the wasteland known as Michigan. Nonetheless, we are all connected by this one annual event and the message board that keeps us all in tune to each other's lives, thoughts, and ramblings. Facebook also helps, but two of our neanderthals haven't figured out how to get on facebook yet.

It's pretty amazing, that back in 2002, we thought we were throwing together a quick, short lived league. We all knew each other pretty well, but not that well. It was an interesting collection of players from different walks of life and different circles. Some of us were still in our teens and barely in college at the time. Very few of us were married, and maybe only one of us had any kids to speak of. Some of the guys had never played fantasy football before, some had been playing since it was mostly tracked on paper. When we joined the league, we didn't think it would turn into a lifelong commitment and no one thought it'd go on for so long. I thought it'd be a one year deal and then fizzle out like so many other leagues I had joined before. What an amazing ride it has been!

As time went on, we got married, had kids, got real jobs, moved out, but ultimately, we somehow maintained this strong bond and strong league. It's a very competitive league with some very intelligent people. In this league we have a PhD, two physicians, two very successful businessmen, and seven lawyers. That's what makes this league fun! It's very competitive and the collection of personalities and perspectives make it very engaging. The message board is never boring! Nearly every topic humanity can think of has been discussed. Rarely is the topic just football. It's a very active message board. I mean very active! It's not unusual to see over 200 new posts/responses a day at the peak.

The draft is this Saturday and I am as giddy and excited as ever! So much so that it's hard to maintain composure and not think about the draft every day. Rethinking strategy, re-mocking, trying to figure out who everyone will draft, looking at past drafts, looking at past draft tendencies, figuring out which direction the draft will go in, all the while trying to concentrate on not going insane and looking normal at work.

Is the draft everything?

No. But, I feel that the draft is a good third of how your team will fare. The other third being in-season management (free agents pick ups, waiver wire, and sit/start decisions), and the last third being things that are out of our control (injuries, matchups, unexpected breakouts, random scoring, etc). But out of all of these, the one that gets the juices flowing the most is the draft. It's live, it's in one room, it's unpredictable, and it is the one day a year where boys can be boys and block out the rest of society! Just Food & Football!

What makes the draft a little more complicated is that we are all fasting. The past two years the draft has landed in the middle of Ramadan. Or, Ramadan has landed in the middle of our draft. So we just hold the draft after break-fast time. Simple solution. But it does add a nice, unique flavor and touch that is rather rare. It should be another great year!

Some memorable moments from drafts in the past include the very first draft which was held by teleconference. The next year we had the draft in my living room in my apartment in Chicago. We had a lot of drafts in conference rooms of hotels around Chicago's O'Hare airport. Those were probably among the best drafts we've had. We held one at the grand offices of the Harrison Alo law firm in Columbus, Ohio. Last year's draft was held in Flint, Michigan at the home of one of the guys. This year's draft will be held in Troy, Michigan at one of the guy's homes. Can't wait!

Food has always been memorable as well. Pizza, wings, pop, nachos, samosas (occasionally), sandwiches, grilled chickens, and all kinds of delights. One year we actually had fruit (someone requested it). This year will be more of the same. I am not sure how much everyone will be able to eat due to fasting all day (your stomach shrinks), but it's an all night event, so it should be good and people have time for the stomach's to outstretch. An unforgettable memory, a few years back at O'Hare, one of the guys decided that the salsa tasted so good, that he put the remaining salsa in a cup and drank it later in the wee hours of the morning as a meal replacement. Wow!

The weeks leading up to a draft are always interesting. The message board fills up with misinformation, posts about various guy's keepers and why they were so bad, taunting guys for bad picks, quotes from websites about how certain NFL players did in preseason games, and all sorts of babbling and lying. No one wants to show their hand or tip their hat. It's fun watching all the gyrations and misinformation, and people's reaction to it.

As the draft nears, everyone will be reviewing their cheatsheets, perusing websites, clinging to radio broadcasts of NFL news to see if they can gain any kind of advantage before Saturday. Then Saturday will come, and all of that is out the door. The weeks of smokescreens and misinformation and taunting will all be over. You will finally see who everyone wanted to draft and who they will draft.

The draft itself brings lots of memorable moments as well. Although, the first few rounds are fairly predictable, it really starts to get interesting after round 4. Of course, people will always reach, but it's interesting to see who reaches and on which players they reach. We have a lot of Detroit Lion fans, and every year someone reaches on Detroit Lion players, thinking that this is going to be the magical year where they take off. I am sure someone will reach this year on Stafford, Best, Smith, Burleson, and Scheffler. Of course, we have guys that like the Bengals and Browns, due to a strong Ohio contingent, and someone will reach on those players. We have a number of guys from the DC area, so expect a lot of Redskin players to come off the board where they shouldn't be. And of course, I like the Broncos, and will probably draft one at some point.

This group of guys, the comradery, the friendships, the uniqueness, the attitudes, the personalities, the bonds, and the clashes will all come to a head this weekend in epic format in a live fantasy football draft! Should be an awesome extravaganza! Can't wait! 

(Stay tuned for a draft wrap up on how I think I did and the team I end up with.)

Ramadan is an excellent opportunity to shed some extra pounds. You are already resetting your metabolism by the protracted, long overnight fast, as well as the daily fasting. Your metabolism resets and your body begins to change the way it does things.

Weight loss during the first few days is just dehydration. It may be exciting to see that you lost 2-3 pounds in the first day or two, but that's all water loss and dehydration. No human can lose 2 pounds of fat overnight. It's just water. But it's still exciting!

So how can we maximize weight loss during Ramadan?

The most important factor is to avoid gorging or "binge eating" at night. We have found that gorging once a day is the fastest way to gain weight. Your body thinks it's in a state of famine, and will store everything you eat as fat, because it is worried about food supply. Further, eating once a day scares your body and your body starts to shut down and slow down your metabolism. You don't want to slow down your metabolism or you will gain weight.

Eating small meals through out the evening and morning (after sunset) is the best way to maintain an adequate metabolism level and avoid the highs and lows of blood sugar associated with eating one massive meal. After eating a large meal, our blood sugar level increases. In response to this, our pancreas secretes a ton of insulin to bring the levels back down. That extra sugar is stored as fat. That is very bad. We want to eat small, well proportioned meals and snacks throughout the evening to avoid the sudden rise in blood sugar. We want to maintain an even and balanced level of blood sugar. Certain foods raise blood sugar levels more than others, and we will discuss that thoroughly.

Why do I feel hungry?

A lot of people ask why they don't feel hungry throughout the day if they skip Suhoor (breakfast meal before dawn), but are starving by 9AM if they eat Suhoor. It all comes down to blood sugar levels.

Eating a massive meal in the early morning hours (before dawn) leads to a large surge in blood sugar and a subsequent secretion of a lot of insulin to help bring down your sugar level. In about 2-3 hours your blood sugar levels will drop to lower than normal, and this triggers a hunger response. By 9AM you will feel like you are starving. And you have the whole day left. By noon that feeling will go away, but why do you want to do that to yourself? You can avoid that problem by eating the right things throughout the evening and early morning and you can avoid this feeling of hunger. Later on I will discuss what you can eat to minimize the hunger response.

The other option is to just skip Suhoor. If you can't do that or you want to fulfill the religious recommendation (not obligation), just wake up and drink some water. Water has no consequences in terms of blood sugar levels. You could also just skip it altogether and continue the overnight fast into the day, you are already living off your fat stores, and can continue to do so throughout the day. You won't feel hungry. Overnight, your liver makes sugar for you to live off of, but can only do so for a limited period of time. If you continue this overnight fast into the day, you can start living off your fat stores. Isn't that the best way to lose weight? By burning fat?

So what can you eat?

What we are talking about is "Glycemic Index". This is a measurement of your blood sugar response to certain foods. For example, consuming 50 grams of pure white sugar, has a glycemic index of 111. That's really high. The idea is to eat foods that don't raise your blood sugar level. This will keep you from feeling hungry and will fill you up with very healthy food choices.

Vegetables like celery, lettuce, cucumbers, onions, and spinach have a glycemic index of less than 15. They have almost no effect on your blood sugar levels. Berries like strawberries, blue berries, raspberries as well as apples, have a glycemic index of 20-30 and are better than other fruit options. Some fruits like mangos and bananas have a glycemic index in 40-55 range. The fruit with the highest glycemic index is a pineapple with a GI (glycemic index) of about 66. This is still better than eating bread and baked goods.

Some vegetables are higher in sugar than others and have a higher glycemic index. Potatos, corn, tomatos (really a fruit), and carrots are all higher in simple sugars than other more fibrous vegetables. In fact, a baked potato has a GI of 115! That's about as high as it gets. The reason is that a baked potato is so processed, that it is very easy for our stomach to get at the simple sugars. The stomach has to do almost no work at all to get to the sugars. They are all there and readily accessible. Leaving the skin on and eating the baked potato with the skin, decreases the GI to 98, but it's still high. The skin acts as a fibrous buffer that keeps some of the sugars away from the stomach. The more fiber you eat, the harder it is for the stomach to get at the sugars. Leave the peel on apples, cucumbers, peaches, apricots, dates, kiwis, and other edible peels. Eat a lot of fiber!

Foods with the highest glycemic index are baked goods and simlpe carbohydrates like bread, cake, desserts, pasta, rice, potatos, fruit juices, candy, soda, pop, and coffee and tea that you put a lot of sugar into. Some of these have glycemic indices as high as 100 or more. The food with the highest glycemic index is Corn Flakes breakfast cereal with a GI of 132. Breakfast cereals have some of the highest GIs. Instead eat real oatmeal with fruits slices! Real oatmeal doesn''t have as high of a GI as the prepackaged ready to eat stuff. Or make your own yogurt parfait with real fruit slices and sprinkle oat meal on top.

The sugar maltose, which is found in beer, has a GI of over 150 and signals to the body to start storing the extra calories as fat right away! That's why you see a "beer belly" in people who drink a lot of beer.

There is an entire section on Glycemic Index on the Alo Diet Website. Check it out!

What can I eat?

The key is to eat foods that have a minimal glycemic index impact, yet still eat healthy and nutritious foods. Fruits, vegetables, nuts, beans, eggs, and lean meats are all very natural and very good for you. They also don't cause a significant increase in blood sugar levels.

Timing of meals

Here in the US, most Muslims indulge after sunset and don't wake up to have an early meal. Busy work schedules and busy lifestyles promote this bad eating behavior. This is a major contributor to gaining weight. The human body is very smart. The body figures out that it is only getting one meal a day and decides that it needs to store everything. So everything you eat gets stored as fat.

Normally, we tell our patients to eat small frequent meals throughout the day. Well, you can't do that in Ramadan. So you have to eat small, frequent meals throughout the night. This helps avoid the spikes in blood sugar levels and will keep you even and balanced.

So what do you eat?

At Iftar time (break-fast time), eat the traditional three dates and drink plenty of water. If you are really concerned about the amount of sugar in the dates, eat one date, but take three bites (or skip the date). Then take a break, go pray Maghrib (sunset prayer) and come back for the actual meal. For your meal, drink plenty of water, start with soup and salad, and pace yourself. It takes 20 minutes for your stomach to tell your brain that it is full. So slow down your process. Drinking plenty of water also starts stretching the stomach earlier and lets you know you are full earlier.

Then you can go to Taraweeh (the Ramadan nightly prayers), afterwards eat a small snack like a cheese stick or a handful of almonds or a bowl strawberries and light whip cream. You could even drink some unsweetened tea or coffee (or use a sugar substitute). Then you can go to sleep.

Wake up before dawn, and do not eat cereal! Eat an omlette with spinach, mushroooms, onions, brocholli, and some other healthy alternatives. Even a few nuts and an apple is fine. Or you could eat a banana and dark chocolate. Or another bowl of strawberries and bananas and light whip cream, but put some cocoa powder on the whip cream this time!

What should I avoid?

Avoiding simple sugars, processed foods, and baked goods will go a long way towards improving your metabolism, your health, and your well being. You will also feel more energetic and feel happier. Simple sugars (carbohydrates) are the culprits we discussed above; sugar, bread, potatos, pasta, rice, ice cream, sweets, candy, dessert, baked goods like cakes, muffins, and many others.

You don't have to avoid these every day. You can have these once a week. But you must cut down on portion size. Eat a third of what you normally would eat. Cut a slice of cheese cake into thirds and eat just a small amount. You have to control your portions. Otherwise, you are just going back to your previous state of metabolism and gluttony.

Ramadan is meant to be a month where Muslims feel what poor people feel. We are supposed to empathize with the poor and needy. We are not supposed to be gorging and over-eating at night. That is the opposite of what Ramadan is supposed to be about. You aren't supposed to like Ramadan! It's supposed to be hard.

What about desserts?

Ramadan is a time when families make certain desserts and foods that they don't normally make. Kanafa, Katayif, Baklawa, special ice creams, and sweet rice puddings are all traditional Ramadan treats. You have to restrain yourself. Once a week is ok, but very small portions. Do not indulge. Otherwise, you will put weight back on. It's very hard to control yourself sometimes. But remember what Ramadan is supposed to be about.

What about after Ramadan?

Ramdan is a great time to start new good habits and stop bad habits. There is no reason why you can't continue eating this well and this healthy after Ramadan. Diets aren't temporary. You eat every day! Why not make sure you are eating the right things every day? Use this to kickstart a new way of eating and living.

If you quit smoking (or hookah) during Ramadan, use this opportunity to continue to avoid these awful habits. Make no mistake, smoking of any kind IS KILLING YOU! Use this time to reflect on that and stop smoking.

In cardiology, we know that the single biggest risk factor for heart disease is either being a current smoker or having a history of smoking in your past. If you could make one single change in your life, it should be to quit smoking. I don't mind if you put on 30 pounds of fat, just quit smoking. Smoking is far worst than being overweight. Don't do it!

Go on! Lose Weight!

If you enjoyed reading these recommendations and want a diet and life plan for the rest of your life, I highly recommend reading the Alo Diet online. It's totally free! No regsitration, no subscriptions, no fees! And it's physician approved!

You will get an in depth education on nutrition, metabolism, digestion, glycemic index, cardiology, diabetes, women and weight loss, and lots of tips and tricks for losing weight. If you are a physician, have your patients follow the diet. They can read it all online for free and download plenty of resources and pamphlets. Tell all your friends about it to!

http://www.AloDiet.com

From the website:

A free, healthy, easy to follow, physician approved diet that works!

Other diets have come along over the years and advanced our knowledge of metabolism, nutrition and weight loss. The Alo Diet aims to take all of the information from previous diets, improve on certain aspects, eliminate concepts that have been proven wrong, and bring us up to date on everything we know on diet and weight loss. The Alo Diet is a totally free and comprehensive diet and life plan!

• What have we learned from other diets?
• Why is the Alo Diet different?
• Why do women have trouble losing weight?
• Is Obesity genetic?
• Never feel hungry
• Calculating your Body Mass Index
• How to break through a weight loss plateau
• Substitution
• Losing weight year round
• Don't count calories
• You don't have to exercise to lose weight
• Things humans should never eat
• Diabetes and weight loss
• Men and weight loss
• You can eat cholesterol
• Do we need Supplements?
• Stop blaming your thyroid

While other diets require you to buy the book, pay for food, subscribe, pay fees, register for their website, The Alo Diet doesn't require any of that.

The Alo Diet doesn't require registration, fees, nor purchases. You don't even have to register for our website!

Click over to the book section and start reading and start losing weight

Totally Free!

You can avoid caffeine headaches during Ramadan. Don't fall victim to the unexplained headaches in the first few days. Find out how.

Ever wonder why you are getting a strange headache at night during the first days of Ramadan? Right around Iftar (break-fast) time? Do you think it is a caffeine headache? Do you usually drink a lot of coffee or tea?

As Muslims begin fasting in Ramadan, a lot of Muslims will complain about "caffeine headaches". Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset and not drinking coffee in the morning leads many to believe that they are having a caffeine headache. Is this possible?

Caffeine is a drug. In fact, it is the most commonly abused addictive drug in the world. It has many effects on the body. It is found in teas, coffee, diet pills, and in other foods. A weaker form is also found in chocolate. But can a lack of caffeine cause headaches?

Caffeine has a 3 to 7 hour half life. That means that after 7 hours your body still has half the caffeine you started with. After 14 hours you still have 25% of the initial caffeine concentration in your system. Of course, caffeine clearance varies, but this is the average. In pregnant women caffeine is not recommended and has a half life of over 18 hours. Women taking oral contraceptives will clear caffeine in 13 hours.

Because caffeine takes so long to clear, your headaches are probably not being caused by a lack of caffeine. Yes, caffeine withdrawal causes painful headaches, but it may not be the culprit during Ramadan. In fact, it may take a few days to a week for your body to clear caffeine completely; hence caffeine is the least of your worries. But as the fasting period in Ramadan gets longer (longer days in the summer months), the caffeine may start to become an issue, if you are a fast metabolize of caffeine.

The most common causes of "Ramadan headaches" is dehydration. Throughout the day, you are losing water through urination, sweating, and breathing. The imbalance will usually cause a mild, tolerable headache. This is usually what you are feeling close to Iftar (break-fast) time. This is especially pronounced in the first week of Ramadan when your body hasn't yet adjusted.

Make sure you stay hydrated. If your urine is clear to slightly yellow, you are drinking enough water. If it very yellow, to dark yellow, you need to be drinking more. Hydrate really well at break-fast time.

Another common cause of headaches is not enough sleep. Make sure you get a good night's rest. People usually overlook this, but it causes headaches more often than caffeine does.

In order to avoid caffeine headaches, try to drink your caffeine in the evening. Reverse your daily routine. Caffeine stays in your body for a long time, so you should not experience any headaches. Start a few days before Ramadan by having a small cup of coffee at night.

Another suggestion is to slowly start drinking less and less caffeine, so that by the time Ramadan comes, you won't be dependent on such high levels of caffeine.

Hopefully, these tips will help you out and keep you Ramadan headache free.

It's that time of year again! Ramadan begins in less than a week. It's a great time to start good habits and stop bad ones.

While Ramadan is designed to be a month of empathy, caring, compassion, humility, piety, and many other things, it's also a great time of year to make changes. This is the month of fasting, wherein Muslims are required to fast during the daylight hours. No food, no drink, no smoke, no chewing gum, no form of oral sustenance whatsoever. Basically, you are NPO while the sun is up. The point of this month is to be able to empathize with those who are less fortunate and gain some humblitude.

But sustenance isn't the only thing you are supposed to avoid. You are also supposed to be a better human being, be kind, don't lie, cheat, steal, be more generous, and be a better person overall.

For these reasons and many others, Ramadan is a great time to do "New Year's Resolutions". I always tell Muslim friends and patients that this is the time to quit smoking, adopt a new diet regimen, make other lifestyle changes, avoid saturated fat, eat more fruits and vegetables, and so on and so forth. Ramadan is perfect in that regard. It's great for stopping bad habits.

Ramadan is also great for starting new good habits. Become more generous, donate to local food shelters, start a new diet for life (like the Alo Diet http://www.AloDiet.com), begin a nightly exercise routine, pray more, get closer to God, help a friend in need, become more humble, donate a skill you know, give a talk at a local grade school, see patients for free at a local clinic, do more "family" stuff, plant a tree, etc, etc. You get the picture.... BE A BETTER PERSON!

Let's all make a commitment to maximizing this Ramadan and making the world around us a better place!

Enjoy this Ramadan!

(stay tuned on a follow up post regard medical research that has been conducted on people who fast during Ramadan)

Reading the recent CNN article on fasting reminded me of an article I wrote a few years ago on losing weight in Ramadan.

Unfortunately, many Muslims end up gaining weight during Ramadan, as opposed to losing weight. Just the other day, myself anda few friends went to an ethnic Muslim restaurant to break our fast. They had a buffet, where at 7PM everyone could go up and fill their plates. As we were sitting around waiting for the line to die down, you saw people just loading up their plates. Old men, young women, teenagers, kids, elderly women.... all of them had over 5000 calories on each plate. I was shocked, but I should not have been.

No human, especially not the elderly, needs more than 1600-2000 calories PER DAY! I told the guys that I was with that you are gonna see a lot of leftovers on plates. Sure enough, as we were leaving, we saw piles and piles of left over food. This is really sad. Wasted food is a shame, especially when the whole point of Ramadan is to be able to empathize with those who don't have food! The problem is that people have different expectations when they are fasting. They think they can eat a mountain of food, but they don't realize how much their stomachs shrink. It would have been easy to fill only half your plate, eat, then see if you are hungry again. What a shame.

There are ways to lose weight during Ramadan and it's not that hard. Take a look at the article I wrote:

http://toledomuslims.com/Criterion/Article.asp?ID=170