In their training stables in Japan, sumo wrestlers are taught to eat in a manner that leads to massive weight gain. Here's what they're taught:

1) Skip breakfast.

2) Eat lots of mostly unhealthy food and drink lots of alcohol.

3) Eat only two or three giant meals a day.

4) Go to bed right after eating a big, high carb meal.

Does that list look familiar? Yep, the average overweight American eats like a sumo wrestler whose goal is to weigh 500 pounds! And truthfully, rikishi probably get more activity than the average fat American. And their main type of meal, chankonabe, probably contains more vegetables than the typical American gets too! 

We can learn several lessons from this. First, going to sleep after eating a high carb meal is so effective at causing body fat accumulation that sumo wrestlers usually do it twice per day. Maybe, just maybe, we should avoid eating too many carbs at night if we want to have visible abs. What do ya think?

Second, if men trying to get massively fat purposefully skip breakfast, drink beer, and eat only two or three large meals a day, maybe it would be a good idea to eat breakfast, lay off the booze, and consume five or six smaller meals per day if your goal is to get shredded.

Just a thought.

Finally, I think personal trainers should relate these facts to their clients. Maybe it'll act as a wake-up call. Most average people would be pretty surprised to find out they're eating like sumo wrestlers, especially those who skip breakfast thinking that this is an effective weight loss method.   --Chris Shugart

Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of conditions typically occurring together: obesity, high blood sugar, high blood pressure, high triglycerides, insulin resistance, etc., all of which can lead to cardiovascular disease, death, or even worse: erectile dysfunction!

While responsible researchers will tell you the precise cause of metabolic syndrome is unknown, I'm going to go out on a little limb here and tell you it has pretty much everything to do with eating like crap, not exercising, and letting yourself get fat.