Jack LaLanne
Jack LaLanne
Francois Henri "Jack" LaLannewas an American fitness, exercise, and nutritional expert and motivational speaker who is sometimes called "the godfather of fitness" and the "first fitness superhero." He described himself as being a "sugarholic" and a "junk food junkie" until he was age 15. He also had behavioral problems, but "turned his life around" after listening to a public lecture about the benefits of good nutrition by health food pioneer Paul Bragg. During his career, he came to believe that...
ProfessionEntrepreneur
Date of Birth26 September 1914
CitySan Francisco, CA
When it comes to health, diet is the Queen, but exercise is the King.
By exercise. I'll tell you one thing, you don't always have to be on the go. I sit around a lot, I read a lot, and I do watch television. But I also work out for two hours every day of my life, even when I'm on the road.
Those who begin to exercise regularly and replace white flour, sugar and devitalized foods with live, organic natural foods begin to feel better immediately. Exercise is king, nutrition is queen -- put them together and you've got a kingdom.
My goal has always been to help people help themselves. Your body is your most priceless possession; you've go to take care of it!
You can exercise vigorously and eat junk and get by. But you can't eat perfectly and not exercise. Look at many athletes today; they are human garbage cans. They eat anything, but they exercise so hard they burn it up. But why not exercise and put the right fuel in too?
I do it as a therapy. I do it as something to keep me alive. We all need a little discipline. Exercise is my discipline.
If you've got a big gut and you start doing sit-ups, you are going to get bigger because you build up the muscle. You've got to get rid of that fat! How do you get rid of fat? By changing your diet.
You should do it against the clock. Say you are going to do 30 laps in 15 minutes. Then you try to do it each day a little faster. That is putting demands on the body, and that is how you build up. You keep up your energy instead of going downhill.
Go on, have a glass of wine with dinner. What is wine, anyway? Pure grapes. A glass of wine is much better for you than a Coke.
I'd rather take a beating sometimes than get in that gym every morning. Anyone who gets up that early and says he likes it is a goddamned liar. The only good thing about it is that when I'm finished, I look at myself in the mirror and say, "Jack, you've done it again!
I eat 6 or 7 raw vegetables every day, 4 or 5 pieces of fresh fruit. I eat egg whites each day. If I eat bread, it has to be whole wheat. I eat brown rice. I don't eat between meals. I eat at 11 o'clock in the morning and 7 o'clock at night.
People thought I was a charlatan and a nut. The doctors were against me -- they said that working out with weights would give people heart attacks and they would lose their sex drive.
You need to make good health a hobby.
I don’t care how old I live! I just want to be living while I am living!