Exclusive: Athletes and fitness warriors are at high risk of inadvertently consuming drugs that are banned in sport and that could be putting their life at risk if they use protein shakes or other sports supplements.
Australians have died after using these products which often contain secret ingredients not listed on the labels, others have needed organ transplants.
And a University of Queensland expert says it is “highly possible” athletes like Shayna Jack could have inadvertently consumed banned drugs in a sports supplement if it was not tested before consumption.
A 2018 a study of teens in Greece who purchased sports supplements on the internet found one in 10 had banned substances including selective androgen receptor modulators (SARM), the type of drug Jack tested positive for, University Queensland doping expert Dr Betul Sekendiz said.
The Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority has issued repeated warnings to athletes about the risks of using these supplements.
And in the last seven years the nation’s medicines regulator has twice banned supplements containing the stimulants DMBA and DHMA and DMAA.
The Therapeutic Goods Administration warned the chemicals were “toxic” and were associated with high blood pressure, psychiatric disorders, bleeding in the brain and stroke.
A 2016 study by Life Science Company found one in five sports supplements for sale in Australia contained substances banned in sport including steroids that were not declared on their labels.
The most common substance found in the supplements was the stimulant 1,3-dimethylbutylamine (also known as AMP Citrate) which was identified in seven products.
This substance allows the lungs to take in more oxygen and if detected in an athlete’s urine sample could see them face up to a four year ban from sport.
WORLD ANTI-DOPING AGENCY’S LIST OF BANNED SUBSTANCES:
The testing also found anabolic steroids in various sports supplements available for sale in Australian stores.
It is common for people trying to build muscle to purchase products from overseas over the internet.
In 2017 a major review of studies around the world published in the journal Nutrients found between 12 and 58 per cent of supplements contained substances banned by the World Anti- Doping Agency.
“Non-intentional doping is a point to take into account before establishing a supplementation program,” the study said.
“Athletes and coaches must be aware of the problems related to the use of any contaminated supplement and should pay special attention before choosing a supplement, informing themselves fully and confirming the guarantees offered by the supplement,” the authors said.
Dr Sekendiz said Australians were taking great risks using sports supplements.
“It’s a worldwide issue that these products have been found to have substances banned by WADA,” she said.
Consumers who wanted to check whether the product they were using could be at risk could as to have it tested by HASTA or Informed Sport and Informed Choice organisation which carry out chemical analyses of products, she said.
“Consumers should look for the logo of these organisations on a product to ensure its safety,” she said.
THE RISKS OF TAKING SPORTS SUPPLEMENTS
2017 Australian mum Megan Hefford, a 27 year bodybuilder, died in August because a rare disorder prevented her body from breaking down her high protein diet which included protein supplements.
2016 Matthew Whitby from WA needed an emergency liver transplant after taking a protein powder containing green tea extract and a supplement with garcinia cambogia – a tropical fruit used in weight-loss supplements.
2016 National organ donor registries show since 2011 six Australians have had organ transplants after herbal supplements including those used by body builders destroyed their organs.
2015 A New England Journal Medicine study in 2015 found over 23,000 emergency department presentations in the US each year were linked to dietary supplements.
2015 British Journal of Cancer study found muscle building supplements were linked with an increased risk of germ cell testicular cancer.
2013 A British coroner found 30 year old runner Clare Squires died during the London Marathon after taking a supplement containing DMAA which in combination with extreme physical exertion, caused acute cardiac failure, which resulted in her death.
2013 The US FDA reported 72 cases of acute non-viral hepatitis linked to people using OxyElite Pro and Versa-1 which it found was adulterated with aegeline an unknown dietary ingredient.
Having a full suite of go-to website optimization tools is essential for maintaining a successful website. Without an optimized website, you won’t rank in search results or attract site visitors — and you’ll miss out on valuable leads and revenue.
But which website optimization tools actually work to make your website more visible in search and ensure that your website is converting visitors to paying customers?
On this page, we’ll talk about some of the best website optimization tools as well as website testing tools to ensure that your site is successful.
If you’d like to speak to a marketing specialist before reading on, feel free to give us a ring at 888-601-5359. Otherwise, let’s get started!
What’s the big fuss about website optimization tools and why do you need them?
Simply put, website optimization tools help to automate the process of making your website more visible to search engines in addition to making them more likely to convert.
Though most tools don’t do the job for you, they’ll help you gain valuable insight as to how you can improve your website to ensure that it’s successful.
For example, website speed optimization tools help you uncover what page elements could be slowing down your site.
Link checking tools can help you detect broken links on your pages so that you can be sure Google can properly read and index pages that you’ve linked internally.
There is a whole slew of website optimization tools that help you make your site the best it can possibly be — for both Google and your users.
There are countless web optimization tools out there that have infinite capabilities, but there are definitely a few that we favor.
Price: Free – $189 per year
Screaming Frog is a crucial part of any marketer’s toolbox. This tool has so many capabilities, it’s impossible to list them all.
It offers a plethora of beneficial information about your website that can help you find everything from broken links and duplicate content to page titles and meta descriptions.
This information is invaluable to have all in one place and helps you organize your website optimization efforts.
Not to mention, you can link Screaming Frog to your Google Analytics account and pull in metrics like site traffic, audience demographics, and more.
Price: Free
This tool packs a punch when it comes to keyword research and can help you determine what terms to use in your content to have the best chance of ranking.
Keywords are extremely important to your content and its ability to rank. KeywordsFX allows you to see a long list of related keywords, questions that include your keyword, and even modifiers of your keyword.
You also have the ability to export all the data to a CSV.
Price: $99-$999 depending on package and features you’re interested in
Ahrefs is an amazing website optimization tool that allows you to see what your competitors are up to as far as rankings, content, and target keywords.
Not only that, but it gives you a ton of beneficial metrics about your site content.
With Ahrefs, you can dig into your backlink profile, learn more about your top pages and competing domains, find content gaps, see which of your pages are performing the best, and so much more.
This tool can help you sniff out opportunities to outrank your competitors while also keeping track of your success — tipping you off to potential site issues.
Price: $89-$756 depending on how many sites you’ll use it for
If your website or any part of your website operates on WordPress, Yoast SEO is a must-have plugin.
Yoast is one of the best website optimization tools because it catches things that you might miss within your WordPress content.
With the paid version of this tool (there’s a free version, too), you’ll be able to optimize your content for target keywords, have full control of your breadcrumbs, get internal linking suggestions and content insights, and so much more.
Although the free version still packs a punch, with this tool, you’ll want to go for the paid option.
Price: Free
Google Search Console is a website optimization tool that allows you to check the technical aspects of your site.
This tool allows you to submit your sitemap to ensure there are no errors, write and check robots.txt files, check for security issues, set preferred domains, and so much more.
This website optimization tool also provides search analytics reports which include up-to-date information about the performance of your website.
Overall, Google Search Console helps you optimize your website for visibility in search engines and ensures that there are no internal errors that might keep you from ranking.
Price: Free
Our proprietary tool, SEO Checker, provides in-depth information about your site’s performance to ensure that it has everything it needs to rank at the top of search results.
You’ll get a free PDF report about your site’s performance, and insight into 12 key factors of website performance.
Your SEO audit will include:
If you’re looking for an all-encompassing tool to help you optimize your website, look no further than SEO checker.
The best part? Whatever issues you see within your free SEO audit, WebFX can help. We offer page speed optimization services as well as SEO and content marketing campaigns that can help you improve your overall page grade given in your audit.
The six tools we mentioned on this page provide extremely beneficial insights into your website, content, page speed, and even technical aspects like code and linking structure.
Without the use of website optimization tools, chances are you’re missing out on big opportunities to help your site rank better in search engine results pages.
We dare you to use all six of these website testing tools to determine a few areas where you could improve your website, and watch the results blossom.
If you’ve run your website optimization tests and aren’t sure where to get started as far as website optimization, WebFX can help.
We offer a full suite of digital marketing services that can help take your website to the next level and we can help you audit your website to identify weak spots.
Contact us online today or give us a call at 888-601-5359 to learn more about what WebFX can do for you and your online presence!
The post We Dare You to Try These 6 Marvelous Website Optimization Tools appeared first on WebFX Blog.
Everything I Know About Style Guides, Design Systems, and Component Libraries – Developer Lee Robinson shares insight on design systems and more.
Variable Font Animation with CSS and Splitting JS – Combine these two technologies to add amazing special effects to your text.
3D in Hand: Business Cards with Holographic Effects – Check out some stunning business card designs that take advantage of holographic foils.
Airframe React – A free, open source dashboard template based on React and Bootstrap.
The power of visual in product design – Visual elements can impact user perception, recognition and memory.
Should we still be selling responsive web design? – A look at why responsive design may in fact be short-sighted.
The Making of an Animated Favicon – Yes, favicons can be animated! Learn how to create a loading/progress animation with this tutorial.
The Pros and Cons of Building Websites with Third-Party Products – Why buying into third-party tools and software often means giving up control.
Chart.xkcd – A library for creating charts with a hand-drawn look.
CSS Units Explained – A guide to all of the different unit measurements available in CSS.
Minify Your SVGs – Save precious bandwidth by optimizing your SVG files.
20 Free Branding & Corporate Identity Mockup Templates – Showcase your logos and corporate identity items using this collection of free mockups.
React Slider with Parallax Hover Effects – Learn how to build a stunning slider that takes advantage of the latest JavaScript enhancements.
Efficiently load third-party JavaScript – Use these tips for improving both load time and the user experience.
MC.JS – A free, open-source Minecraft clone that you can play in your browser!
The (Upcoming) WordPress Renaissance – The latest developments with the Gutenberg block editor and how they bode for the future.
25 Free Apple Motion Templates for Videographers – Create amazing motion graphics for your projects using these templates.
The post Weekly News for Designers № 502 appeared first on Speckyboy Design Magazine.
The keto diet is essentially a high-protein diet — your meals are 70 or 80 percent fat; about 20 percent protein; and about 5 percent carbohydrate. The keto diet switches you from burning glucose (which carbs provide) to burning ketones (which fat produces) for energy. When you do this, interesting things happen:
When in a day you consume less than 50 grams of carbs, your body will later run out of fuel (blood sugar). This typically takes 3 to 4 days. Then you’ll start to break down protein and fat for energy, which can make you lose weight. This is the process that naturally occurs in the body called ketosis.
When you deprive your body of carbohydrates, which are the main fuel source for people, you’re also depriving your body of it’s ability to keep glycogen stores filled up.
When this happens it needs to find another fuel source so your body starts to transition to a metabolic state known as ketosis. When your body is in ketosis, it begins to convert fat into ketones which become your body’s new fuel source.
The ketones diet may help you lose more weight in the first 3 to 6 months better than other diets can. It could be because it takes more calories to chance fat into energy than it does to change carbs into energy. Also it is possible that you are more satisfied with a high-protein diet than a high-fat diet.
These are known to aid ketogenic dieters. Ketone supplements are not anything new for 2019, but they have been increasing in popularity over the past couple of years. Popular talk show host Dr Oz, has featured these supplements in numerous segments on his talk show. Revealing how ketones can help individuals in losing weight.
Keto Go Fit Ingredients contains Beta-hydroxybutyrate. BHB is the first substrate that kicks the metabolic state of ketosis resulting in energy.
Everything has a disclaimer to it, so nothing has been fully tested in clinical trials. But the organization explains the importance of the keto diet and argues that users on their supplement can expect to experience dramatic weight loss. However, with the absence of definitive and dedicated studies on this particular supplement, these claims are difficult to corroborate.
While the listing for Keto Go-Fit has a high number of positive reviews, its hard for us to say these are all legit product reviewers. Some may be, some may not be.
The organization requests fairly cheap prices for their supplement compared to others on the internet. As always consumers who try these supplements are encouraged to review the product online, so that they can add to the existing research-base for keto supplement products and companies.
We will try and email the Keto Go-Fit support team to find out more information and bring transparency to this ketone weight loss supplement. Be sure to check back on our website for updated information on Keto Go-Fit.
To help you reach your weight loss goals, we suggest you read our guides that link to the top products that are currently on the market; Superfood drinks, detox cleanses, prebiotics, and the best fat burners.
Article source: https://timesofhealth.com/keto-go-fit/
With Slim 4 we have continued the tradition of allowing you to use the framework in the way that best fits you and your project. You can create a Slim application entirely in a single file suitable for prototyping through to a few files for a simple web hook or serverless action all the way to fully...
The Laravel team released v5.8.33 this week with new capabilities added to the email validation rule, along with the latest changes and fixes for the Laravel v5.8 release.
The post New Email Validation Rule Options in Laravel 5.8.33 appeared first...
Amazon has never disclosed how products get its iconic “Amazon’s Choice” black label, which puts them top billing on the ecommerce service. US senators Richard Blumenthal and Bob Menendez sent a letter this week to Jeff Bezos (Amazon CEO) asking more info on the elite segmentation. The pair lifted worries that the tag might be unintentionally tricking users into purchasing inferior goods via fake reviews.
“We are worried that the badge is allocated in an arbitrary way, or worse, on the basis of fake product reviews. While, we know that Amazon has taken measures earlier to deal with fake reviews—the issue persists—and Amazon might be exacerbating the issue by actively marketing goods with fraudulent reviews,” claimed the senators. A list of queries wanted specific info on how goods get chosen for the program, comprising whether a method is notifying Amazon’s decision-making and if goods are reviewed by people to make sure they are of high quality.
A latest media probe disclosed how many inferior products by Amazon Choice thrived on a number of misleading or fake reviews. These goods comprised an AmazonBasics Security Safe that can be opened easily with a tool and a flask that converted alcohol black.
On a related note, the FTC earlier resolved its first ever case over paid false reviews on a retail platform. In the complaint by the agency, it blamed Cure Encapsulations Inc. (Amazon seller) and Naftula Jacobowitz (its owner) of paying amazonverifiedreviews.com to post and write false feedback for its weight-loss goods. Moreover, the FTC blamed the firm of making unconfirmed claims for the weight-loss supplements (garcinia cambogia) it used to sell. As per the commission, Jacobowitz informed the false review supplier that his product requires to have an average 4.3 rating out of 5 stars to sell.
Article source: https://12minutebook.com/senators-need-to-know-why-amazon-choice-suggests-junk/1126
Amber Diehl