Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Simplified Meal Plan

I want to streamline my life.  I also want to streamline the life of my clients and friends and really feel like I stumbled upon the right way to do it.  When I was starting the journey down the path to healthy eating and fitness, I certainly took the long road.  I've documented that a few different places, but just for added simplicity, I'll sum it up.

Sept 1, 2008
I started going to the gym.  I was 235 and had never exercised before in my life.  I would go two times a day, mostly hitting random machines and doing as long as I could for cardio.  Usually this was about 10-12 minutes per session at a very slow pace.  Nutritionally - the only thing I heard is I'm supposed to eat every 3 hours.  I went to the store and bought a whole freezer full of Michealina's Lean Gourmet frozen dinners.  I would eat one of these 200-300 calorie boxes every 3 hours, on a precise schedule (I would set my phone alarm - seriously...) and stop everything when it was time to eat.  My daily total was usually about 1200 calories.  This included 2 workouts a day.  I lost weight - really fast.  I turned into a flabby, skinny, pale, sickly looking wimp.

Feb 22, 2009
Started P90X and learned about protein!  Oh man did I learn about protein.  Well, honestly, mostly I learned about grilled chicken breast.  I would eat grilled chicken breast for about 3-4 of my 6 meals a day.  My protein numbers were often around 300g of protein a day, with the rest of my calories coming from extremely low fat, instant microwavable food.  Basically, one step better, but still junk.  I was still losing weight, but not adding any real muscle.

My binges during this time were mostly under control due to my excitement from P90X and starting to really get fit.  It wasn't until I finished my first 90 day round that my Binge Eating Disorder truly came back, with a vengeance.  After I finished my first round, after many attempts to stop binging, I reentered therapy.

Feb 22, 2010
I celebrated a year of doing Beachbody programs with a 4 day binge (very typical) of pizza, ice cream, doughnuts, and all the rest.  I just couldn't stop binging out on everything I could get my hands on.  The 24 hour gas station was my worst enemy.  I would go out in middle of the night and buy 6-10 king size candy bars, 2-4 quarts of cookie dough ice cream, several 2 liters of pop, and 2 big bags of doritos in a single haul.  I was working my ass off in the gym, under-eating, stupid low fat, fairly healthy food for maybe 10 days to 2 weeks, then binge like a maniac for 3-4 days.  UGLY.  I was spinning out of control and starting to get chubby again.  By mid summer, I had ballooned from 168 to 190 again and was heading down the path of relapsing.

I kept trying to get back to the hard P90X workouts, and eating super low calorie meals every 3 hours, but something wasn't working.  I couldn't keep it up for long stretches of time.  Finally, things changed.

April 1, 2010
I found out about www.MarksDailyApple.com.  This started to make sense, but it went against so much of what I had come to believe.  Eating fat makes us fat!  Carbs are needed for energy!  etc.  I butted my head against it for a while, but after binge after binge, decided that I HAD to change something up, or I would keep falling off the wagon.

I took the Primal Plunge.

I started eating a lot of fat and pretty lowish carbs.  It was terrifying.  I expected to blow up like a freaking balloon - yet after the first couple weeks, I actually lost a couple pounds.  After a month, I was down about 10.  More importantly, I hadn't had a major, fall off the wagon binge in over a month!  I was slowly starting to believe.

It wasn't until I bought in completely that the real effects started to happen.  I started getting leaner and building muscle at the same time.  I started having more energy while I ate more fat.  I continued to learn about the really good effects of eating animal fat along with tons of veggies.  Everything was coming together.

Now, I believe I found the last part of the puzzle.  It's time to simplify things even more.  No more 6 meals a day.  No more stupid cardio all the time.  Here's the simplified plan:

Nutrition:
3 meals a day in a limited feeding window.  Eat whenever you want for the first meal, then eat a second a few hours later, and a third a few hours after that.  Then shut it down until the next day.  Ideally, this should create a 16 hour fast every day.  More on the reasons why down below.

Meals will consist of plenty of protein, plenty of fat, and plenty of veggies. 

No grains. (Wheat, Rice, Rorn)
No sugar.
No fruit.
No legumes.

A typical day might be this:
Noon: Meat Omelet, coffee
3pm: Ground Beef Salad
4:30pm -workout-
6pm: Sweet Potato, Steak/Fish Salad

Done.  I'll only have the sweet potato on workout days, none on rest days.  Easy right?

Workouts:
3 strength sessions per week, using mostly compound full body moves. (Deadlift, Bench, Military Press, Row, etc.)
1 hard cardio sprint session/Insanity type workout a week for cardiovascular performance.
lots of walking.

That's it!  Easy stuff!  Every time you eat - eat lots of veggies and meat.  No bread, no pasta, no sugar - whatever.  It's junk, it's stupid calories.  It's stupid insulin-creating junk.  If you're very lean, you may have some fruit, if not, skip it.

Why the small feeding window with the intermittent fast?


Check out Martin Burkhan's amazing site - Leangains.com
http://www.leangains.com/2011/03/intermittent-fasting-for-weight-loss.html

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

How to Lose Fat on Paleo/Primal

I was doing some research on Leptin tonight and came across this very well written article by celticcavegirl over at cavemanforum.com - I think it's well said and short enough for a quick read.
 How to lose fat on the Paleo WOE, or Endocrinology for Dummies
« on: March 24, 2011, 03:54:20 PM »
This post is written for the benefit of stumblers and newcomers  ;D

The paleo way of eating is about optimising health, and that's what we should all ultimately be aiming for.  But the fact remains a lot of people start the paleo diet because they want to lose weight, so as we have a lot of new people on the forum these past few weeks (hi guys!) I thought I would write a little endocrinology 101

When I first started paleo I read quite a short, simple article online about insulin, carbohydrates and weight.  I don't remember where it was but I do remember that as a person who knew little about the subject, it really clarified it for me and made me finally understnad why it is important to cut carbs to lose weight.  So to help others, I will attempt to reproduce it!

 The below is all very basic common knowledge for anyone who knows much about diet and biology, but not necessarily such common knowledge for the average stumbler starting out on the paleo diet.


Part 1 - what happens in the body when you consume carbohydrates, a very simplified version
- Consumption of carbohydrates results in an increase in blood sugar.  The more refined the carbohydrate, the faster and higher the rise
- Glucose is a fuel when it's in the muscles, but when it's in the blood stream in high levels it is essential a toxin.  Yes, a toxin.
- The body wants reduce the amount of this toxin in the blood, so the pancreas produces a load of insulin.  Again, the higher volume and refinedness of the carb ingested, the more insulin is produced.
- Muscle cells are covered in insulin receptors; insulin binds to these and prompts them to take in glucose to remove it from the bloodstream.  It is stored in the muscles as glycogen, to be used as energy when necessary (e.g. anaerobic exercise)
- if the muscles are 'full', the excess is converted into triglycerides and stored in adipocytes i.e/ turned into fat.  (this is why athletes, whose muscle cells have 'space', can eat a lot of carbs and not get fat.  But they can still get diabetes on route to winning 5 olympic gold medals - see Redgrave, Sir Steve).  -
- This is not a problem in and of itself, because the body is creating and burning fat constantly.  However because of the spike in insulin, some of the glucose that was already in the blood is also converted to fat as well.  So you end up with slightly more energy stored as fat than the energy from the carbs you just ate.
- Additionally, this leaves you with low blood sugar and makes you more likely to snack or overeat, as you are hungry!

Insulin sensitivity and Insulin Resistance
- if someone is described as being insulin resistant, this means that their muscle cells are not as sensitive to the effects of insulin and do not uptake glucose from the bloodstream so readily; the excess glucose is more likely to be stored as fat rather than stored in the muscle cells.
- this turns into a vicious cycle of the pancreas producing more and more insulin in response to the same carbohydrate intake.  Diabetes and obesity are the eventual results.
- Someone who is insulin sensitive has muscles that are good at taking up glucose from the bloodstream.  Exercise increases insulin sensitivity, as does intermittent fasting.

How to lose weight on the paleo diet
- first one must understand that to lose weight, one must minimise the production of insulin
- rule 1 - every time you eat, insulin is produced.  So to lose weight, eat less frequently, and don't snack
- rule 2 - carbohydrates result in the largest insulin response, followed by protein, followed by fat.  So to lose weight, the intake of carbs (especially sugar) must be minimised and the intake of fat must be maximised.  This is one of the many reasons why so many people on the forum will say 'eat more fat'.  Remember that protein still has an insulinogenic effect - http://www.paleonu.com/panu-weblog/2010/1/11/insulinogenic-is-not-hyperglycemic.html
- rule 3 - anaerobic exercise uses glycogen for fuel and increases insulin sensitivity = less of the energy from your carbohydrate food will end up in fat cells, because it will either be burned, or taken into the muscles.  It will also liberate body fats for use as energy, which can then be burned off via LOW INTENSITY aerobic exercise. Lifting heavy things is also crucial
- rule 4 - In terms of minimising the insulin spike, **Carbs from leafy green veg > carbs from roots and bulbs > sugars in fruit**

Paleo doesn't have to be very low carb - you can eat 30/30/40 as carb/protein/fat or 5/30/65.  But the *less* carbohydrates (especially sugar) you eat and the *more* fat you eat, the more easily you will loose weight.

Paleo is not a weight-loss diet, it's a way of eating

Sidenote 1 - leptin
- Leptin is a hormone that inhibits the appetite.  It is (mainly) produced in the adipose (fat) tissue
- Wheat germ agglutinin is a protein found in wheat and contributes to leptin resistance
- obesity results in overproduction of leptin and thus leptin resistance
- one who is leptin resistant does not feel 'full' so readily so is more likely to overeat
- this is one of the many why it is very important to cut out gluten grains

Sidenote 2 - Fasting Induced Adipocyte Factor - simplified
(I believe the the below is still a theory rather than a fact)
- FIAF is another hormone, produced by the gut wall, liver and muscles.
- FIAF is mainly produced in times of starvation and prompts the body to burn fat by blocking the action of another hormone (lipoprotein lipase)
- active gut bacteria inhibit the production of FIAF, inactive (hungry) bacteria cannot do this
- gut bacteria live on carbohydrate and fibre.  They cannot 'feed' on fat and protein, become inactive, and stop blocking the production of FIAF
- for a proper explanation see http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2007/12/fiaf-whos-fat-is-it-anyway.html

Further reading
1) Good Calories, Bad Calories, Gary Taubes
2) http://www.paleonu.com/panu-weblog/2009/8/27/how-to-lose-weight.html
3) http://www.paleonu.com/panu-weblog/2009/8/27/can-protein-turn-into-fat.html
4) http://www.marksdailyapple.com/what-happens-to-your-body-when-you-carb-binge/
5) http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/07/magazine/what-if-it-s-all-been-a-big-fat-lie.html
« Last Edit: March 24, 2011, 06:33:57 PM by celticcavegirl »

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Big Ass Primal Salad Take 3

Not a lot to post here, but I wanted to show pictures of probably the very most epic salad I've ever made.  It wouldn't fit on one plate, I had to get a second plate.  The whole meal took me nearly 35 minutes to eat.





OK,  Here's the damage.

8oz Pork (left all the delicious saturated fat on baby!)
1 Green Bell Pepper
1 Small Tomato
1/2 Onion
1/2 Cucumber
2 TBSN Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt/Pepper

621 Calories   51g Protein 19g Carbs 36 Fat

It was one of the biggest single meals I've ever put down (this coming from a former Binge Eater....)

Total dishes: 1 skillet, 1 plate, 1 fork, 1 knife.

That's how I roll.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Big Ass Primal Salad Take 2

I've learned a couple things that have improved my Mark Sisson Big Ass Primal Salad.  First - I learned that I don't really like salad in the traditional sense.  The cold, crunchy veggies just don't really do it for me.  Second - I could never find a salad dressing that is Primal/Paleo and that I actually liked.  You know what I do like?  Beef.  Third - I really don't like doing dishes.  I cook for one (plus the dog) about 99% of the time and hate spending more time cleaning than I need to.  Thus - here are the changes for my BIG ASS PRIMAL SALAD MARK 2!
 
 1.  1 pound of ground beef.  I like 85% lean.  It has enough fat in it to brown on the skillet and have left over fat for the veggies.
 2. 1 Bell Pepper, 1 Small Tomato, 1/2 Onion  Cut them up and throw them in the skillet right after you flip the beef over.
 3.  A lot of organic baby spinach.  A lot - seriously.  Fiber dude.

4
4. Pour the beef and veggies over the spinach.  ps.  Always use baby spinach instead of lettuce - lettuce has almost nothing in it.  Get those nutrients.  Scrape all the fat over top for your dressing.  It's delicious.  I use a bit of salt and pepper over top and take my time to eat this beast.

5.  Temp the dog with the scraps.

For the calorie counters out there.

1005 Calories 92g Protein, 16 Carbs, 64 Fat

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm..... This is really good - I ate it right after my really hard leg workout and it was amazing.  Going for a walk with the dog to let this bad boy settle.

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Nutrition Simplified

I get so many people telling me that eating healthy is hard.  "It's so complicated!"  Ugh.  It's not hard.  There are many things in life that are hard.  Dealing with a family member's death is hard.  Battling cancer is hard.  Beating Super Mario Bros 1 is hard.  Eating healthy is not. 

I think in the huge web out there, and today's instant fad diet world, we see conflicting opinions as information overflow.  Low carb vs. high carb vs. high protein vs. the cookie diet vs. emotional eating vs. whatever.  Today's post is not going to explain anything.  It's going to give you a very simple plan of how to get lean, stay lean, stay healthy, and have energy.  There is endless information out there - and even here on my site that will explain it, but for now, if you just do this, your life will improve. 

Eat Meat, Fish, Poultry, Eggs. 
Don't Eat Grain. (wheat, rice, corn) 
Eat Veggies. 
Don't Eat Sugar. 

That's it.  No macro-nutrient talk, no calorie intake.  I'll get to the sciency-stuff later, but take it like this.  If you follow these rules - you will certainly lose fat and get more fit. 

It's not exercise. 

It's not calories in vs. calories out. 

You don't have to weigh your food or count your grams of protein. 

Simple right?

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

BodyBlitz 1 Leg is Enough Workout

This week's BodyBlitz workout is all about 1 leg and some serious Core strength.  Eat your Wheaties before this one.  (Actually - don't, that stuff is junk.  Eat your veggies and meat.)

Sugar is the Devil

Alright - time for a technical post.  Probably not going to be the most entertaining thing you've ever read, but it's science time.

Carbs are grass, wheat, veggies, fruit, bread, and everything in between.  Good Carbs vs. Bad Carbs... ugh.  Not quite that easy.  There are 3 types of sugar that carbs are broken into.

  • Monosaccharides: The two that are most common are Glucose and Fructose.  More on this later.
  • Disaccharides: It litterally means two sugars.  Glucose and Fructose meet and start a band.
  • Polysaccharides: "Many Sugars"  The main two types here are starch and fiber.
 Once you eat a carb that is broken down to glucose by digestion it goes through the intestines and liver.  Free glucose causes the release of insulin from the pancreas when it's in your blood.  Then, the glucose is stored as a starch called glycogen.

Much of this glycogen is stored in muscles, which can be used for energy.  Great right?  If you only ingest a small amount of carbs - that's it!  It goes in your muscles and is used for energy.  Awesome.

However.  (come on, you knew that was coming.)

What if your glycogen stores are completely full?  Excess carbs are converted to a little thing called palmitic acid.  FAT.  After it's formed it heads out to be used as energy or just hang out on our bellies.  Super fun stuff.

"So Steve, we can have some carbs, just not more than we require to fill our glycogen stores right?"

Ummmmm..... sure.... good luck with that.

Palmitic Acid is ubber strong and doesn't play nice with our hormones.  It decreases our sensitivity to Leptin.  When we are leptin resistant, the satiety signal that is sensed from food in our belly is LOST.  We stay hungry, even though our blood glucose levels are elevated already and thus OVEREAT.  Damn.

Robb Wolf calls this the reason behind our "sweet tooth."  We simply can't sense the signal that we're full, and keep shoving food in our mouths.  Ever see a whole bag of Doritos disappear before your eyes?  Ever notice that you keep eating or picking at food, even though maybe you're not hungry?  Here you go.

"OK, so I get it, but as long as I'm aware - I'll just keep an eye on it OK?"

Once our liver and muscle glycogen stores are full, the insulin sensitivity in our muscle tissue is lost and it can physically store no more glycogen.  Our muscles are drowning in glycogen which in turn, drives blood sugar higher, which in turn drives insulin higher..... not a fun merry-go-round.

Here's where the bad stuff starts.  (Yeah, the really bad stuff)

Once your body is totally full of glycogen, yet insulin resistant, inhibitory stystems in the liver are overwhelmed and blood glucose is convert to fats at such an incredible rate that fat can no longer escape into circulation and it begins to accumulate in the liver.

The liver is fully saturated with glucose, yet it is insulin resistant and some cells notice this perceived lack of insulin as low blood sugar.  Man, this is crazy right?  We're over flowing with sugar in our blood and body, yet, because of this insulin resistance, we don't feel that and real low blood sugar can kill us - that's bad, so our body, by misreading this signal, calls in the reserves.

Cortisol.

Once our body produces cortisol to save us from our "low blood sugar" which is actually crazy high, our body starts producing MORE GLUCOSE from our muscle and organs.  UGH - so terrible!  Muscle is so hard to build, and we're ripping it down in order to form more sugar - even though we are already filled to the brink with it.  Guess what happens to the excess sugar?  It's stored in the cells as fat.  Crappy.

"OK, I get it - sugar is bad.  Grains/Rice/Corn turns into sugar - so it's bad.  But what about fruits - it's good right?"

Fructose is not great for us.  Now fruits have many good things in them, basically huge amounts of vitamins and minerals.  Fructose will fill your liver glycogen and speed up the process in which the liver fills and leads down the road to cortisol production.  Fructose up-regulates the glucose transport molecules in the liver, making the liver hungry for more sugar.

This leads directly to increased Palmitic Acid production, and later, leptin resistance.  Remember this?  (If not, scroll up and read it again - then come back and tell me how good fructose is for you.)

Lastly, if you have 90 minutes to kill (and want to save your life - I'm serious here) watch this lecture and lose weight.

Monday, April 11, 2011

Paleo Pizza

Paleo Eggplant Pizza

I made this delicious pizza tonight that is fully Paleo/Primal.  Sure, it didn't come out exactly as I had hoped as far as holding together goes, but it was awesome tasting and I would be happy to have it again any day.  As a side note, I added 2oz of cheese to get the pizza taste.  If you want to be 100% strict Paleo, then skip the cheese, but it was delicious!


  • 1 Whole Egg Plant (get a big one!)
  • 1 Egg
  • 1/2 Almonds
  • Salt & Pepper
  • Extra Virgin Olive Oil (for greasing the parchment sheet)
  • 2 Parchment Sheets
  • 1/2 Cup Marinara
  • TOPPINGS (left out of calorie count to allow for customization)





Here's the recipe:
  1. Preheat oven to 350
  2. Skin the whole eggplant and grate it with a cheese grater.
  3. Blend/crush 1/2 cup of crushed almonds (honestly, I might use 1 cup next time)
  4. Blend the eggplant, almonds and 1 whole egg together.  (I used my magic bullet)
  5. Add salt and pepper to taste.  The "dough" should be fairly smooth by now.
  6. On a greased parchment lined baking sheet, pour batter and smooth with hands.  (OK, this is where I dropped the ball.  I didn't have parchment paper and forgot to buy it.  I had trouble flipping it because of this.
  7. Bake for 35 minutes or until cooked enough to flip.
  8. Add marinara, cheese, toppings and bake for another 5-15 minutes
  9. Flip onto another greased parchment paper
Calorie Breakdown:
Whole Pizza: 819 calories, 41 protein, 38 carbs, 59 fat
1/2 Pizza 410 calories, 21 protein, 19 carbs, 29 fat

Epic Pizza - SO GOOD!  I can't wait to make it again!

Friday, April 8, 2011

Primal Personal Training

Let's start with what I see when I go to the gym.  Heavy, out of shape people slowly turning that hamster wheel we call a treadmill or elliptical around, watching the timer count down until mercifully the 30 minutes is up.  I see average weight, out of shape people talking and taking turns on these seated machines rep after rep until they get to the 15-20 reps that someone told them is the right number.  I see a few fat guys benching as much weight as they possibly can, then resting for five minutes between sets of the same 3 exercises they've been doing for 20 years.  (Bench Press, Bicep Curl, and Lat Pull-downs)

Guys.

That's just not going to do it.

It took me years of studying, reading, learning, training, and personal experience to figure out that these well worn road is not the path to fitness. 

When I started training my clients, I was teaching them free weights, some machines, recommending 20 minutes on the treadmill and all the other usual crap.  We would talk nutrition - you know... whole grains, veggies, extra lean meat - or even better, just chicken!  They didn't get the results they were looking for, and neither did I.

It wasn't until I stepped back from the "Traditional" training systems and took a hard look at what was happening that I figured it out.  We need to go even more TRADITIONAL!  I'm talking seriously old school.

It's about getting back to our roots and relearning what we used to know very well.  Fitness is about functional fitness.  It's about being able to do the things you want to do, and as a bonus, look great doing it!  It's about feeling good every day, from the time you roll... no JUMP out of bed, until the time you sleep.

Nutrition isn't about whole grains and reduced fat.  It's not about crap that's made in factories at all.  STOP IT!  It's not about medication, not about "nutritional supplements" or any junk that was created by man.  It's about the stuff that we were meant to eat.

Since I started living the "Primal" lifestyle over a year ago - here are the changes.
  • No more back pain.
  • No more knee pain.
  • No more sugar cravings!
  • No more out of control binging for days on end.
  • I'm leaner and more muscular than ever, without dieting.
  • I'm so much happier every day than I was before.
There's so much more to the whole lifestyle.  I workout considerably less now and have lost fat and gained muscle.  I learned through experience what works and want to pass it along.  Did I have to give some stuff up?  Sure.  Just like you do when you do the "low-fat disaster" that our well-meaning government has spoon fed us for 60 years.

It's not too intense at first.  My clients move in baby steps until they fully realize how amazing a Primal lifestyle can be.  The workouts are intense, but shorter than what most of you are used to.  No more machines.  No more silly waste of time in a Curves circuit, sharing machines.  You workout at home or outdoors with me.  We get back to basics.  The real basics.

Much more coming about this new step in Primal Personal Training, contact me for more information.

Steve
412-735-0706
facebook.com/stevemcknighttpt
email: stevemcknighttpt@gmail.com