Sun Damage Experiment

We have had excellent weather here where I live, and can expect at least another week if weather reports are correct :) I wish it was like this all the time, as I said before it really gives me a big energy boost and I generally feel really happy.

So anyway, I seen something in the news paper the other day that suggested tomatoes protect against sun burn and act as a low level sun screen when 50g are consumed with some olive oil. The protective compound is thought to be Lycopene. Cooked/processed tomatoes give you more. I posted something on the Calorie Restriction Society email lists early on in my CR where I noticed that I have much increased protection from sun damage, DESPITE being very pale person. For an experiment (and before I done this I was quite confident of my observations) I decided to go out in the garden and sun bathe for three hours in mid day sun when the sun index was rather high and putting me at risk of sun burn. So my sister was out there too trying to get a tan and the result was;

I never got sun burned one bit, no redness, very slightly brown... however it was a totally difference case for my sister who eats a normal western diet and is not CR'd. She ended up red and burned, even though she lightly tanned all over to start with!

Is is all that green tea I drink? Is it the tomatoes, is it the CR? It's probably all of them reducing the inflammation response and clearing up those free radicals. I repeated this experiment the next day and got exactly the same result. I noticed this over the last 3 years now but never did this test.... casual sun exposure before used to make me go red, however now it didn't.

I don't expect to see quite the same result if I lived in another country where I would probably roast within 5 minutes... however it shows a nice protective effect WITHOUT sun screen and might contribute to the general anti aging effect of the skin.

I don't actually go in the sun that often, after getting my sunshine vitamin I mostly avoid it to stay looking young. I actually had a nice comments over the past few days , my friend think I could probably do another 3 years in high school because I look so young, and this other guy thought I was still in high school LOL. That's great because I left high school over 7+ years ago now! And would you believe it, there are some people that hate looking younger than their age and want to look older! Haha :)

See the study here:

Tomatoes found to fight sun damage
Tomatoes could be the new weapon in the fight against sun damage to the skin, research at the Universities of Newcastle and Manchester has revealed. According to a study presented at the British Society for Investigative Dermatology this month, eating tomato paste could help protect against sunburn and sun-induced skin ageing.
READ FULL HERE

I DON'T RECOMMEND TRY AND SPEND HOURS IN THE SUN AND GET BADLY SUN BURNED. BUT WOULD APPRECIATE ANY FEEDBACK IF OTHERS HAVE NOTICED CASUAL SUN EXPOSURE DON'T MAKE THEM SUN BURN AS EASILY.