Hi, Tea!

Sitting here drinking a nice cup of Oolong Tea and I'm reminded of something.  I freakin' love tea!  Wait wait wait, bear with me I'm going somewhere with this.  Whenever I drink tea I become addicted again, and wonder why I stop drinking it in the first place!  When I was at my peak as an athlete (running and lifting every day along with plyometrics and hurdles/jump/throw training) I would regularly consume around 17 cups of tea a day.  The reason I started was because of my man-crush on Bruce Lee, so that sounds like a good place to start.

Bruce (can I call him Bruce?) would drink thermos after thermos of tea while filming, training, or just relaxing.  He never consumed alcohol or anything that he deemed useless to fuel his body.  Chinese tea comes in almost countless varieties and he tried them all, but would regularly drink Lipton tea, same as anyone else.  When I graduated from college I weighed 284lbs in August.  By February I trimmed down to 192lbs before bottoming out at 187 around August.  Not that it played a HUGE part in me trimming down (not going to sheetz and eating at 3am was a huge part of it, as was laying off the crown royal along with my increase in training) but when researching Bruce and also the benefits of tea it's impossible to say that it played no role at all.  The three main types of tea I drink and recommend are Green, Oolong and White.  I'm gonna give some background on all three as well as the benefits.

Green Tea:  Ok first of all, all teas that I drink come from the same plant (Camellia sinensis ). What determines what type of tea you have is the process of growing and fermenting.  Regular black tea is fully fermented and processed.  Black tea is all good and well, but a lot of the benefits found in tea are lost in this process.  If you're going for Green Tea, don't get the decaffeinated it kind of defeats the purpose!  Green tea also contains HGCG, one of the most powerful antioxidants known!  Aside from the metabolism boost, this reason is the biggest benefit of Green Tea.

Oolong Tea:  If you've eaten in an authentic Chinese Restraunt (not buffet or an "americanized" Chinese food place), and ordered tea, Oolong is probably what you were served.  Many Chinese like to drink Oolong after meals to aid with digestion.  If you aren't a tea drinker chances are you never even heard of this type of tea let along drink it regularly, but if you don't you should!  Oolong is somewhere in the middle of Green and Black Teas (sometimes called brown tea).  It is partially fermented so it's caffeine can be slightly higher than green, but not as high as black.  It does not contain the amount of HGCG as Green Tea due to this process however it contains more polymerized polyphenols. It is the combination of HGCG and caffeine that some research links to weight loss, which is why some really really really bad companies are selling oolong as "weight loss tea" and charging insane amounts of money for it.  If you pay more for this style than you do any other, you're getting jipped.  Research has shown that drinking 3 cups a day will burn an extra 70 calories per day, doesn't sound like much but over a year that's 7 pounds!  Oolong Tea also tastes pretty darn good, and gives you a full feeling.  If you are in between meals or training, chug some Oolong Tea to fight off cravings.

White Tea-  Pretty simple.  It's a baby green tea leaf.  It contains a great amount of polyphenols and other chemicals.  All of these teas but especially Green and White help lower blood pressure, cholesterol and aid in cardiovascular health.  White tea was saved only for the emperors, but lately has become much more mainstream.  Some question the current quality of white tea, or if it's basically just a green tea blend mostly.  If you are going to try it, spend a little extra and make SURE it's ONLY white tea leaves.

Well that about wraps it up.  Tea is awesome, especially if someone is trying to get back into shape, fight off hunger, or just looking for something good to drink.  The amount of caffeine is also good for athletes as it raises your EE (energy expenditure) prior to workouts. Make sure you don't drink TOO much of it (yes I used to drink 17 cups a day, that's prolly not recommended), but if you're used to Coffee and lattes for your caffeine fix (oh my god I loved the pumpkin spice latte it was really good, but I actually tried a peppermint white chocolate latte too and it was bangin!, but anyway) try tea instead.  Now that I decided to back off of lifting for a while and get back into running to trim back down, I'm gonna get back on my tea regimen.  Take it for what you will, but if you need more convincing read some of the research!