Duchess Kate turns 30 years old on Monday. She’s six months older than William – and I believe Camilla Parker-Bowles is older than Charles as well, right? So, given that Kate is now a member of the royal family and given that she has pretty much spent the first 30 years of her life unemployed, wandering around getting her hair done and doing a spot of shopping, you’d think that everyone would be going all out for her birthday party. Not so! A palace spokesman said that Kate’s birthday plans are going to be on the DL: “Whatever is planned will be low-key and private.” I have a theory – Kate doesn’t want to remind people that she’s older than William. She doesn’t want to remind people that she’s 30 years old, yet gets treated like a lay-about teenager, praised for doing the bare minimum. She doesn’t want to remind people that she’s not pregnant yet as she’s entering her 30s, which makes her an oddity in the royal family (the royal women tend to get knocked up in their 20s).

Really, though, I’m just writing this post because I wanted to talk about this article that Us Weekly published yesterday. It’s all about how we too can stay “fit” like Duchess Kate.

She may be a Duchess, but Kate Middleton is a commoner when it comes to her workouts.

“For as long as I’ve known her, she’s never had a trainer,” says an aide of the royal, who squeezes in three 40-minute workouts each week.

When in London, the slim, 5-foot-10 beauty visits Clarence House’s small private gym for rowing, running and weight training. But when she’s home in Anglesey, Wales, with hubby Prince William, 29, “she never works out indoors, regardless of how rough the weather is. She likes to go on hikes, carrying small weights for her arms. She says it kills two birds with one stone,” says the palace aide, adding, “William joins her on weekends.”

Kate, 29, keeps eating simple too. Though one pal says, “she hates dieting,” she sticks to healthy picks like oatmeal, dried fruit and almonds. “Kate’s not much into sweets,” says the aide, “but she does love Kettle chips!”

[From Us Weekly]

BULLS–T. Kate didn’t go from a pleasantly athletic, healthy figure to a really, really skinny figure by just doing three workouts a week and eating oatmeal. Yes, Kate was already thinning herself out circa 2008-10, but she still had an athletic, healthy-looking build. Then when the engagement came, it seemed like she was losing weight for the wedding, and then it just kept coming off until she looked like she could snap like a twig. She was on diet, and my guess is that it was an intense one. She’s also a smoker, although she doesn’t want you to know that – she was allegedly smoking a lot to keep the weight off all of last year.

Last Kate story, I swear – People Magazine has a lengthy interview with Diana’s former protection officer Ken Wharfe, who often comments about the security concerns of the royal family. Wharfe says that it’s horrible that Kate and William’s security plans for their multi-million-dollar Kensington Palace renovation were made public. I don’t know why we should be upset, though. Aren’t we being sold an image of William and Kate as simple country folk who are happiest in Wales? Why would they ever need to be in London, right? Oh, what’s that? That’s just a BS image that the palace is trying to sell?

Photos courtesy of Fame, WENN.

I’m not a fan of former “Biggest Loser” trainer Jillian Michaels, but I’m starting to admire her ability to talk smack. Last year, when starting her own weight loss reality show called “Losing it with Jillian Michaels,” Michaels said that we’d see if she could do a better job than “Biggest Loser.” She’s complained in the past that the game show aspect of “Biggest Loser” was potentially detrimental to obese contestants’ health, and that she “hates it.” “I hate every second of it. ‘Biggest Loser’ and I have a love-hate thing. I love what it does for the contestants, I hate the process.” Well Michaels didn’t end up liking her own show much, either. She has an interview with this month’s Prevention Magazine where she says that she was pressured into an accelerated filming schedule that wasn’t beneficial to the overweight people whose lives she was trying to change. Jillian’s show was canceled after one season and now she’s moving on to participate in “The Doctors”

The One Thing She’ll Miss About Biggest Loser:
I’m going to miss one thing about Biggest Loser, and that’s Bob. Period. I mean I’m still going to be working with people who need help getting healthy or need help losing weight, or whether it’s through my books, DVDs, podcast….or even segments on The Doctors or Dr Phil, but there’s one thing about Biggest Loser that’s irreplaceable, and that’s Bob.

What she learned from ‘Losing it with Jillian’:
I learned never to go against my gut instinct, I think the show had really good intentions, I think in its inception it was a great idea, but it was rushed and botched and squeezed into an impossible schedule. The show was literally picked up three weeks before we were about to start shooting it and we had no show runner…I do what I do, but I don’t produce television…I knew it was wrong, I knew it was wrong the entire time, I knew it wasn’t ready. They were casting people that were 300-400 pounds and saying ‘ok you have six weeks’ and I was saying you can’t take people on this journey and come back and people are going to look the same after only 6 weeks. And I got bullied and threatened into it…lesson is…if you know it’s wrong…be strong enough to put your foot down.

[From Prevention, November, 2011 print edition received via e-mail]

I’m sure that plenty of reality shows are like what Michaels is describing; they’re rushed and pushed and the participants feel steamrolled into something that they weren’t able to prepare for. There are shooting schedules, some sort of plot needs to be built up, and producers have an angle they’re going for that’s not always reflected in reality. It’s rare that people complain about it, though, as they have careers to consider and they don’t want to burn bridges. Not Michaels, though. I wonder what she’ll have to say about The Doctors in a few months.

Also, Michaels is in the process of adopting a baby from the Congo. It’s been such a long and difficult process for her that she advises people to consider fostering a child int he US. “I regret saying this now, but I think for anyone pursuing this [I’d advise them] to explore foster care in this country. In the US, you get your referral, you bring the kid home. They’re already American citizens. I don’t want to tell people to adopt internationally – but I’ve learned that you’ve got to have tremendous patience and financial resources because it’s going to cost a lot of money. If you don’t have those two things, go domestic.” Surely if she did foster a child she’d be complaining about that, too.

Photo credit: Fame and WENN

First of all, I’d like to apologize that we didn’t have a Hot Guy Friday this week. Both Kaiser and I are burnt out doing it every week, and while it is a nice stress reliever on one side, on the other it takes hours to do that post. You’d be surprised how much effort it is, and Kaiser does the bulk of it and doesn’t complain. This was basically my idea after the Royal Wedding last Friday and the insanity that was the Met Gala earlier this week. We’re bringing it back next Friday and HGF will be on an every-other-Friday schedule from then on, just to give ourselves a break. Plus we were running out of guys to do every week. Anyway check out the archives for HGF, they go back a few months and they should help you get this image of Vin Diesel’s robot arms out of your head. In no way am I suggesting this guy as a substitute for HGF, unless you’re into that, and in that case bless you.

So here’s Vin Diesel in all his bald-headed roided glory on the cover of Men’s Fitness. I’ll admit this made me bust out laughing. It’s the look on his face, which is supposed to be serious and kick-ass but just falls flat. Unlike Vin’s costar The Rock, he doesn’t make a bald head sexy and his muscles make him look more like some kind of centaur. Like don’t you expect to scroll down and see that no-neck torso attached to a non-human body?

Inside, Diesel talk about how he used to work as a bouncer in New York and how he first got super fit because “you have to decide at a young age whether you’re going to be predator or prey.” Unlike past Men’s Fitness cover boys, he doesn’t have a specific program he touts but just says he loves to mountain bike and that he switches up his routine to fit whatever character he’s playing. Here are some quotes from his interview:

On being predator or prey
“When you grow up in New York City, you have to decide at a young age whether you’re going to be predator or prey,” he says. “Especially growing up at that time in the city, especially being a little homeboy, especially when you were trying to f*#@ every girl int he city.”

On being a bouncer in his late teens and twenties
“I learned so much in bouncing that I bring to these characters. You have to be able to read people. Speak with a New York City cop, and they talk about having to read people. Bouncing is like that but without the badge and the law. You’re a gunslinger for hire, basically. And you learn a lot in that field of work.”

On being in fights as a bouncer
“I must have been in more than 500 fights. I fought every night, and I bounced for nine or 10 years. And these weren’t pretty fights.”

How he trains for each character
These days, when it comes to staying in fighting shape, Diesel’s workout schedule is strictly dictated by his next role. Practicing a physical type of method acting, Diesel always commits to realistically re-creating the body and attributes his character would possess. If that means staying away form the iron and packing on a few pounds for a project, such as the 2006 movie Find Me Guilty (in which Vin plays an out-of-shape gangster who defends himself at trial), so be it. “I don’t do a service to myself if I succumb to serious powerlifting,” he says. “I have to be somewhat mindful of being typecast. I want to be the character and not just look built.” [For that movie] “It was ‘eat lots of ic cream and get as fat as you can.’ After being so fir from a young age, it was bizarre – and liberating.”

“When I do a role like Riddick, I don’t want to look boxy. I want to be pantherlike, I want to be agile. I have to do yoga or Pilates because I’m trying to get a completely different movement with my body.”

On his future as an actor
“I don’t really give a sh*t about my everyday stock. It’s not going to improve my self esteem. I just want to knock each role out of the park.”

[From Men's Fitness, print edition, June/July 2011]

Well I find him surprisingly likable in that interview. He seems like a smart, together guy and I like his “whatever” attitude toward his career. The dude stays off the gossip radar too, you can say that for him. We’ve heard that he didn’t want to do press for his films and that he made out with Paris Hilton at some point eons ago, but that’s it. I think I remember reading that he had a baby too at some point in 2008, but that was all so vague and we didn’t hear much about it. He keeps his stuff under wraps, but not his big old arms. Those things are like two big slabs of meat hanging out. But I have to admit he’s growing on me a little.

photos courtesy of Men’s Fitness, where there are more. Photos below from PRPhotos

I was all ready to report on Matthew McConaughey’s cover for Men’s Fitness before I saw him at the Oscars. McConaughey presented the sound awards along with Scarlet Johansson and he looked awful. His face was streaky orange, like his foundation or spray tan wasn’t blended well, and he had greasy thinning hair. Now I’m sure his hair has been thinning for some time but I’m guessing that he has plugs and hides it well when it’s not slicked back from his face. Plus his girlfriend seems like a famewhore to me lately. I don’t know, I used to love McConaughey but I’m souring on him a little.

McConaughey, 41, is the cover guy for the April issue of Men’s Fitness. Unlike a lot of past cover models he’s unfortunately wearing a tank top. When his fine abs aren’t on display you can see how short his arms are relative to his torso. He looks good here though and I love to hear the guy talk. He has such a colorful way of describing everything, and in this interview he doesn’t disappoint. McConaughey is known for his outdoor workouts, and he says that comes from his childhood:

On his workout philosophy
McConaughey’s mother always told him, “If it’s light outside, you must be out of the house.” This partly wxplains why he prefers outdoor workouts (jungles and trails) instead of training in a gym, and why for years tabloid paps have snapped pics of his lean, muscular, and shirtless physique running, running and running some more – usually on a beach. “It’s always been a lifestyle,” he says. “Then it became something that was like, ‘Hey, it’s also good for my job.’ I’m not a professional athlete, but I have a job where I like to look good and be as healthy as possible.”

His weight at 5’11 tall
Depending on his gig, his weight swings from 176 to 194 pounds. On the day we meet, he’s at 186, his physical peak.

On hiking in French Polynesia with Camila Alves
“We went up 3,000 feet and I had on hiking shoes and I was all set up and ready to go and she was wearing Havaianas sandals and a white skirt. I came down to the bottom of that hill afterward and had blood on me, muddy as all get-out, and that girl didn’t have a speck of dust on her.”

On his diet
“You can’t put me in front of a buffet line and tell me to eat right. If it’s there, I’m going to fill that plate up.”

Still, McConaughey says his clan eats healthy whenever possible. He and Camila do their own cooking, often with fresh ingredients from their backyard garden. For a snack, Matthew might eat a red pepper or an avocado, which quells the urge for chocolate. Come mealtime, he usually allows himself unlimited amounts of salad, topped with a dressing made with white vinegar, honey, Dijon mustard, shallots and garlic. He rounds out the meal with brown or Indian rice, plus a touch of pickled pepper sauce. For protein, the family may have grilled fish or chicken breasts four days in a row, but homemade sauces and seasonings from three different continents give the main course distinctive tastes.

On his relationship with Camila
“It’s all working out good, man. Working out real good.” The time just had to be right, he says.

[From Men's Fitness, print edition, April, 2010]

Matthew lost a lot of appeal for me with his orange face at the Oscars, but all he has to do is wash his hair, take a shower, and go out jogging without a shirt again and I’ll forgive him. Seeing these photos of him working out reminds me of the hot guy with the drawl I used to adore. He missed a real opportunity to pose shirtless here, but maybe he wants to lose some pounds first so he looks extra ripped.

McConaughey’s next film, The Lincoln Lawyer, is out on March 18. Here’s a link to the trailer. It also stars Ryan Phillippe. It looks cheesy and overwrought but it might be decent.

For more from Matthew McConaughey, including workout tips from his trainer, check out the April issue of Men’s Fitness.

Last week the National Enquirer reported that Jessica Simpson was trying to lose weight for her wedding and that her fiance Eric Johnson was telling her to drop some pounds or the wedding was off. I said that it was likely that Simpson was trying to lose weight for her wedding because that’s what most women do, but that I doubted that Eric had issued an ultimatum or was particularly concerned with Jessica’s weight. He looks like he’s gained a few since hooking up with Jessica anyway.

In this week’s US Weekly, fraud celebrity trainer Tracy Anderson claims that she’s training Jessica and that “this is a big, forever lifestyle shift” for the accidental fashion mogul. Anderson recommends diets that are around the 800 calorie mark a day, well below the 1200 minimum calories recommended by nutritionists. Anderson has no certification or background in nutrition. To be fair, this article doesn’t say that Anderson is giving Simpson diet advice, it’s just implied. Simpson did go on a “cleanse” before starting the program.

Jessica Simpson, 30, has enlisted the help of celeb trainer Tracy Anders, who’s customized a routine that includes dance aerobics, ab work and strength training. After a few weeks of 75-minute, four-day-a-week workouts, “she’s seeing results,” says a pal. “She really loves it. She thinks it’s so much fun.”

The 5-foot-3 margarita and guacamole-loving star even went on a weeklong cleanse to kick start the regime and intends to cut back on fatty favorites for good. “She is in the mind set that this is a big, forever lifestyle shift,” Anderson tells US, adding that she plans to ramp up Simpson’s workouts. “Jessica has a killer body, but when she goes up to two hours, six days a week, then you will really see her transform.”

[From US Weekly, print edition, February 28, 2011]

What the hell is Jessica thinking? She used to work with Harley Pasternak, whose 5-Factor Diet and 5-Factor Fitness programs are actually sensible and easy to follow. (From what I’ve read, I haven’t done them.) She doesn’t need to get caught up with Tracy’s starvation and overexercise program. Everyone else is doing it, so I guess she’s on the bandwagon now. Good luck keeping it up once the big event is over.

Jessica and Eric are shown on 12/31/10. Credit: Fame. Tracy Anderson is shown showing off her bolt ons on 4/20/09. Credit: PRPhotos

Ashton Kutcher is the cover boy for the February issue of Men’s Fitness. Unlike past cover models, like Rob Lowe, Charlie Hunnam and The Situation, Kutcher does not deign to pose shirtless either on the cover or in his pictorial. (Boo!) They only use a shirtless picture of Kutcher from that terrible Killers movie, with what’s her face – Katherine Heigl. Inside, Kutcher discusses why he works out like a fiend, and it’s all because he wants to be able to save his family in the event of an apocalypse. The journalist claims that Kutcher discusses this in all seriousness, and the way that he goes on about it suggests he really does think some massive world-crushing event will happen in his lifetime and that only the quickest and strongest will survive.

Kutcher says he trains because he believes all hell is going to break loose someday, and when it does, only the meanest, smartest and strongest will survive. He intends to be among them.

That’s why, as he jogs up the steepest of grades at Runyon Canyon near his Los Angeles home, he pretends he is being chased by wild boars or aliens, whatever civilization-crushing beings the 32-year-old mentally conjures up that day. It’s why he endures hours of blazing hot Bikram yoga, pretending he’s in the desert with no water. And it’s why he started learning Krav Maga, a hand-to-hand combat technique developed by the Israeli army and taught to special elite forces around the world. All of it in order to be prepared – for anything. “If the sh*t hits the fan,” Kutcher says, “you can get out of the sh*t…”

He says that in the practice [of Krav] he found his purpose: saving his loved ones from Armageddon.

“It won’t take very much, I’m telling you,” he says passionately. “It will not take much for people to hit the panic button. The amount of convenience that people rely on based on electricity alone. You start taking out electricity and satellites, and people are going to lose their noodle.” He continues with exasperation. “People don’t have maps anymore,” he says, his voice rising with incredulity. “People use their iPhones or GPS systems, so if there’s no electricity, nobody has maps.

“And people are going to go, ‘That land’s not yours, prove that it’s yours,’ and the only thing you have to prove it’s yours is on an electric file. Then it’s like, ‘What’s the value of currency, and whose food is whose?’ People’s alarm systems at their homes will no longer work. Neither will our heating, our garbage disposals, hot-water heaters that run on gas but depend on electricity – what happens when all our modern conveniences fail? I’m going to be ready to take myself and my family to a safe place where they don’t have to worry.”

Talking to Kutcher, it’s easy to think that maybe his end-of-the-world rant is just another big Punk’d prank, but he’s serious. So serious, in fact, that one of his favorite memories in years was last Christmas, when he and his family lost power for 14 hours at their Southern California mountain cabin. “It was 20 below zero,” he says. “I got my guns out. We made a fire. We went to the grocery store, and the doors were open because they’re all electronic. People were rolling in and out, clearing out the shelves.

“I’m telling you, it was like a preview [of what's to come]… All of my physical fitness regimen is completely tailored around the end of day. I stay fit for no other reason than to save the people I care about.”

[From Men's Fitness, print edition, February, 2011]

People should use whatever works for them and motivates them to work out. I picture myself in a bikini by the pool. It’s probably not as vivid a scenario as running away from a pack of flesh-eating zombies, hence the easy excuses I make for skipping the gym. I get how scary an apocalypse seems. For me the more I watched Walking Dead and read the comics the more realistic an end-days type of situation seemed. Now that it’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve seen a Hollywood zombie, I realize that it’s totally foolish to be scared by a creative story and some excellent special effects. But I did look closely at this one year emergency supply of dried food at Costco. It was $3,000 for four people and has since sold out. That would last Ashton and Demi over a decade. They probably purchased enough food for 30 years and have a whole underground bunker prepared, complete with stockpiled Kabbalah water, a gym and a backup personal trainer who lives down there waiting to be of service when the world as we know it ends. Maybe it will end up being a big cosmic joke to Kutcher when only the fattest people are immune to the “virus” leaked by the secret biodefense lab.

Photos from Men’s Fitness print edition, where there are more.

True Blood’s Ryan Kwanten is the wet t-shirt cover boy for the November issue of Men’s Health. In the interview, Australian hottie Kwanten, 33, brags that he’s showed up to triathlons drunk and done “very well.” Sometimes I exercise hung over and I invariably feel like crap so I can’t imagine running, biking and swimming for a few hours in that condition. The worst I’ve done is try and get through an hour spinning class after a hard night out and not try to fake like I’m doing the work. I still end up faking it.

True Blood star Ryan Kwanten isn’t shirtless on the cover of the new issue of Men’s Health, but he does wear a wet T-shirt. In the interview he shares his thoughts on working out, something he does every day, sometimes for as long as 2.5 hours.

He has an unusual drinking habit: He’ll toss back a few, start to feel bold and then sign up for an organized athletic competition: “I’ve been known to turn up drunk at triathlons and do very well.”

On his ability to bounce back: “I have that sporting background where I want to be the best, I want to be the champion. If I’m knocked down, you’re damn sure I’m getting back up again. A lot of actors who may very well be more talented than me don’t have that kind of tenacity in the face of rejection. That resilience gives me a distinct advantage.”

On working out: “I’m not one of those actors who gets physically fit for a role and then loses it all again. I’m very rarely in the gym. My workouts are predominantly outside, in nature.”

On yoga: “I used to laugh at anyone suggesting it. Guys fear not being the best in these classes, but over time, you learn how to spend an hour not worrying about what anyone else is thinking. For guys especially, that’s a good thing.”

[From Men's Health via USA Today]

See I can’t relate to that nature exercise thing either and prefer to go to the gym where other people are around and I don’t have to worry about making my way back to civilization after pushing my body to the limits. Plus I feel like an ass when I run outside, but that’s just me and my issues. I guess I don’t have the fortitude to do triathlons wasted and run on outdoor trails for hours.

Men’s Health has an earlier article with Ryan where he gives fitness tips. The guy pretty much works out all day. No wonder he can drink so much and still stay ripped. The hot bastard.

Photos are from 10/10, 9/18 and 9/12/10. Credit: WENN.com

Jillian Michaels has fired back at a scathing LA Times op-ed by an experienced personal trainer who critiques her education, her techniques and her claim that people can lose five pounds a week with her fitness DVDs. The entire LA Times piece is here, and it’s worth a read if you’ve purchased any of Michaels’ DVDs and especially if you’re considering doing her kettle bell workout. The author quotes several other personal trainers who take issue with her form on her new kettle bell DVD, calling it both difficult to follow and potentially dangerous. It’s not a measured critique and gets pretty nasty and personal at times. Here’s some of the article:

I don’t know much about proper kettle bell techniques. Neither does Jillian Michaels.

I have an internationally respected fitness certification and 17 years’ experience with free weights, yet I lack the audacity to pretend I am qualified to teach kettle bells.

Jillian Michaels, on the other hand, is lacking in shame. At least that’s what I thought until I realized Michaels is not actually a real fitness trainer — she’s an actress playing the role of fitness trainer on TV and in a line of popular DVDs.

It’s analogous to Jesse Ventura’s choice of a Gatling-style minigun to mow down guerrillas in the 1987 movie “Predator.” Most viewers thought it was way cool, but real soldiers shook their heads in disbelief that anyone would schlep such an ungainly weapon through the jungle.

Same thing with Jillian Michaels. Typical viewers think she’s great, yet the collective jaws of professional trainers hit the floor after witnessing her regular displays of poor technique and unsafe training practices.

Michaels obtained some introductory fitness certifications (National Exercise & Sports Trainers Assn. and Aerobics and Fitness Assn. of America) 17 years ago and does not seem to ever have recertified. The biography on her website goes on and on about her multimedia endeavors, but there is not a single mention of any health-and-fitness education or credentials.

And now, seemingly without any qualifications, Michaels is teaching amateurs how to use kettle bells in her latest DVD, “Shred-It With Weights.” Her toned, tanned and possibly Photoshopped physique stands proudly on the cover holding a kettle bell, while a bubble on the cover exclaims, “Lose up to 5 pounds a week!”

Lose 5 pounds a week? Sure, if you start off weighing more than a Smart Car.

It’s not the first time she’s made such a claim. Even though it takes hundreds of hours for a serious professional to become certified as a yoga instructor, Michaels made a yoga DVD that also promises you can lose up to 5 pounds a week, which is about as likely as Paris Hilton winning the Nobel Prize in physics…

I asked Mark Cheng, chief instructor at Kettlebells Los Angeles, to critique her form for me.

“Her technique is appalling,” Cheng told me. “What she says in the video and what she demonstrates are two different things. She doesn’t break things down into manageable pieces that prompt people to get the correct form, so instead she is enabling bad form… I would not recommend this from a safety perspective.”

Cheng also added that he thought Michaels “is simply trying to capitalize on the popularity of kettle bells without going through her due diligence.”…

If you dismiss Cheng’s comments as those of someone jealous of Michaels’ fame and riches, consider that he is far from the only certified kettle bell instructor disconcerted with her technique. Denver-based instructor Josh Hillis had this to say in a blog post regarding her technique: “It’s just wrong … in every way. All of it. Every single thing she does is wrong.”

Austin, Texas, trainer Jude Howe was so disgusted with Michaels’ kettle bell movements that he posted a YouTube video showing how they really should be done. “Her technique and approach was so off the mark,” he told me. “It couldn’t have been more dangerous, and I felt the need to show people proper form.”

[From The LA Times]

The article goes on to slam Michaels’ claim that you can lose five pounds a week with her workout, and explains the many ways this is both unhealthy and unrealistic.

Here’s a link to the YouTube kettle bell demonstration (mentioned in the article above) showing how to properly train with kettle bells. The trainer in that video, Jude Howe, says Michaels’ technique is poor and relatively unsafe, and discusses the technical reasons why you shouldn’t do the workout the way she shows it. And here’s a link to the blog mentioned in the article that discusses how Michaels’ kettle bell workout puts people at high risk for back injury. I’ve never worked out with kettle bells but they seem really dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing. These are very heavy weights you’re swinging around and you have to maintain proper form in order to avoid hurting yourself. After watching these videos I definitely want to give them a try, though.

In response to this article, Jillian says that of course she’s well trained and keeps up with her continuing education classes. She also threatened to sue the LA Times for publishing that piece. She said it’s “libel” and “defamation. “Shame on the Los Angeles Times for saying I’m a fraud and not a trainer. I currently own two certifications, one of which doesn’t expire. I developed my own continuing education program for trainers, with sports medicine doctors. I’ve been a trainer since I was 17-years old for 19 years.”

That article had a lot of very specific critiques of Michaels’ form while teaching kettlebells and it wasn’t about her lack of training in general, although it did take some cheap shots in that direction. Is she going to sue all the trainers who gave quotes saying she’s doing it wrong? It seems like they’re on to something. She may not exactly be acting the part of a personal trainer and she’s surely experienced in that field. If she doesn’t know how to teach kettlebells properly she shouldn’t be making DVDs with dangerous moves that could potentially injure people, is all.

Michaels is currently facing several lawsuits over false claims on her dietary supplements, weight loss pills, and “detox” powders.

Photo below via Joshs’ garage

Here are some photos of Jennifer Aniston out last night in London. According to the Daily Mail, it was “all work and no play” because she went out to dinner with her publicist instead of “a night out on the town with some friends.” Okay, is it just weird lighting or the design of the dress? Or does Jennifer look like she peed down the front of her dress? It looks wet down the front. Maybe she spilled something? (Urine?) Did she meet up with John Mayer?!? Maybe it’s just the design?

Meanwhile, while Jennifer was promoting her fragrance (“Aniston: The Perfume”), she gave an interview to The Daily Mirror, and she ended up pulling a GOOP and discussing her diet and exercise habits in detail:

It takes a brave star to stand before their tone-perfect, heavily airbrushed publicity shots. But Jennifer Aniston proved she is every bit as lean and glamorous in the flesh, as she posed beside posters for her new perfume campaign yesterday.

Sadly for women everywhere, she also revealed the secret to her toned size six figure – hardcore gym workouts SEVEN days a week.

Looking stunning in a beige, bow-detail minidress, the actress, 41, spent an hour chatting to fans and signing autographs at Harrods, promoting her new scent, Jennifer Aniston: The Debut Fragrance.

Asked about the secret to her honed bod, the American star told us: “It’s simple. Run, work out every day. I do a lot of running – exercise is so important. Plus it’s all about balance. Work, exercise, diet, you need balance.”

“I am, perhaps, fortunate in that my career, the public awareness it brings, gives me a certain freedom in this way. But, of course, there are positives and negatives in any career, it’s not all going to be perfect.”

As she met fans, who had all bought her perfume starting at £23.50, on the fourth floor of the famous department store in West London, the Friends star sipped mineral water – through a straw – from a large wine glass.

She then doused herself in more perfume, which was two years in the making, and spoke about joining celebrities including Kylie Minogue, Jennifer Lopez and Victoria Beckham in bringing out a scent.

“Firstly, I knew how I didn’t want it to smell,” she said. “There are a lot of bad scents and I wanted this one to be right so I was very involved in it all.

“It is fresh, it’s sexy, it’s natural and there’s a hint of ocean which reminds me of home. I am really proud of it.”

[From The Daily Mirror]

I don‘t understand the sentence, “I am, perhaps, fortunate in that my career, the public awareness it brings, gives me a certain freedom in this way.” Is she saying that because she’s a celebrity, she’s more aware of how she looks, or that celebrity means she focuses on her “balance” more? Or that exercise is freedom? Sorry to nit-pick, I truly didn’t understand that.

Aniston on July 21, 2010. Credit: WENN. Additional “Jennifer Aniston: The Perfume” ads courtesy of The Daily Mirror.

I swear to God, I thought these Gwyneth Paltrow quotes were repeats. You know why? Because all this bitch will talk about is exercising, diets, what she eats and how much weight she gains or loses. Not only do I believe that Gwyneth has serious issues with her own (and other people’s) body image, and that all of endless detoxing is actually harmful to her health, I now believe that Gwyneth has some sort of obsessive-compulsive tick where it’s always in the back of her mind, it’s all she ever thinks about constantly, day after mind numbing day: “Food, food, exercise, kale, detox, weight, exercise, food, detox, juice, weight, detox, detox, exercise” on and on and on.

So Gwyneth was interviewed for fraud trainer Tracy Anderson’s new workout DVD, which comes out in another week. And Gwyneth got to talk freely about her favorite subject: herself. More specifically, her weight and how much she exercises. Of course.

Gwyneth Paltrow has revealed how she lost her baby weight.

The Oscar-winning actress, who is married to Coldplay singer Chris Martin, gave birth to their second child in 2006 and found it hard to regain her figure – but she said every woman could make time to burn off post-natal pounds.

“After my first pregnancy, the weight had come off a little bit better but after the second one it was really stubborn. It was really hanging on,” said the 37-year-old.

“It was not easy and, when I started it, it was by far the hardest thing I have ever done – but I really was seeing results so it motivated me to just work through it.”

Gwyn’s personal trainer, Tracy Anderson, helped her lose weight after giving birth – but she said it was something every mother could achieve.

“Every woman can make time – every woman – and you can do it with your baby in the room,” she said.

“There’ve been countless times where I’ve worked out with my kids crawling around all over the place. You just make it work, and if it’s important to you, it’ll be important to them.”

Gwyneth reveals how she lost her baby weight in the Tracy Anderson Post-Pregnancy Workout which is released on DVD on Monday July 19.

[From The Press Association]

“You just make it work, and if it’s important to you, it’ll be important to them.” What? Because no child is too young to learn that their mother is totally OCD about working out two hours a day and doing juice detoxes every month and having fragile little bird bones from vitamin deficiency. Ladies and gentlemen, Gwyneth “I Do It All For The Children” Paltrow.

Header: Gwyneth on May 26, 2010. Credit: WENN.