Is the Paleo Diet the Answer?

These days I find that most of my meals break down in the following manner.  A piece of protein, usually fish, chicken, beef, and sometimes as a treat pork, a large heaping pile of green vegetables, mushrooms, and a little fruit to sweeten things up.  When I started to make my own meals I realized that in a 2000 calorie daily allowance for meals I had to keep my meals between 450 and 600 calories.  Most of those calories in any given meal are used predominantly by the protein I choose, which leaves only enough room for low calorie high nutrient foods such as spinach, broccoli, and various fungi.  There was no calculated theory or methodology behind this practice other than to create meals which can satiated my hunger, and keep the calories below my daily allowance. 

So when I started reading the “Paleo Solution” by Robb Wolf, it was like meeting a kindred spirit.  I could not believe what I was reading.  I’ve written briefly about the Paleo Diet before, yet all I knew was just a modest definition of the concept. 

The general theory behind the idea is that from an anthropological stand point human evolutionary existence is like a football field where the previous 3 million years is like the 99.9 yards leading up to the agricultural revolution, and our modern times which only account for the final .1.  So for those many generations of existence man didn’t farm or process his foods, man hunted wild animals and gathered what grew out of the ground or on trees. 

Rob Wolf’s story is almost like that of an informational, in fact after the first chapter, I found myself doing that gesture that all guys do, cup my hand like I’m holding my “otherself” and stroke it up and down in the air to say, yeah ok I believe you.  As a younger man growing up in Northern California he gravitated towards becoming a vegetarian, to woo the “hippy girls”.  Over time he found himself getting sick, gaining weight, and generally not healthy.  With his doctors telling him to eat right, he found himself following the governments food pyramid for his diet yet the more he adhered to the pyramid the sicker he got.    

In 1999 his mother ended up in the hospital ill, virtually on her death bed when it was discovered that she had celiac disease, which is an allergy to gluten found in grains.  Once the doctors told her, and she removed gluten from her diet her health improved dramatically.  This was the moment for Wolf that made him reflect on his own diet, thus started to research eating habits, which eventually lead him to Professor Loren Corain of Colorado State University “who is the world’s leading expert on the topic of ancestral diets as it relates to health and wellness”.  

The part in the first chapter which is very much an informational is when he goes how dramatically his health improved, and the testimonials of people who have bettered their overall well being while working with him and his team.

Link to health benefits of Paleo Diet.

Chat from his website.

Wolf provides ample arguments steering you towards his way of thinking, the one extremely compelling piece of information is when he explains the research done comparing the remains of a group of hunter gathers (HG’s) found near the Ohio River Valley who lived 3000-5000 years ago to those of a group of villagers who farmed the same area 500 years ago. 

This is directly from the book:

• The HGs show almost no cavities, whereas the farmers showed almost 7 cavities on average per person.
• The HGs show significantly less bone malformations consistent with malnutrition. That is—the HG’s were much better fed.
• The HGs showed a remarkably lower rate of infant mortality relative to the farmers. The most significant difference was between the ages of two and four when malnutrition is particularly damaging to children.
• The HGs were, on average, healthier, as evidenced by decreased rates of bone malformations typical of infectious disease.
• The HGs on average lived longer than the farmers.
• The HGs showed little to no sign of iron, calcium, and protein deficiencies, whereas this was common in the farmers.

Rob Wolf was a research biochemist.  He writes in a manner which is easy to read, almost conversational, he is also good at taking complex scientific concepts and breaking them down in a manner which you could teach your children.   I am half way through the chapter on the human digestive functions, he goes into an in-depth look at what hormones, and chemicals in the body need to be released in order to digest what we consume, and also needed to utilize the resources garnered from the foods we eat which go beyond just calories for energy.  I fast realized the questions I had about the notion that weight loss is just calories in versus calories out, could be partly answered just in this one chapter.  There are more than a half dozen hormones which play a role in either telling our body we are satiated, or deciding to convert sugar into energy or fat.

The book is broken up into a few parts, first the theory, then the science, and finally the exercise to go with the diet and implantation of the Paleo Solution (the practice).  As I learn more from the book, I’m sure I will post those things which I feel bring me a moment of epiphany.

This book is beginning to feel like the missing link to the puzzle which I have been trying to put together.  I many points in the book won’t register with me, but the overall intention and direction have already struck a chord in me.  It just makes sense.  As a believer in evolutionary theory and one who likes to think logically the pieces just fit together. 

Perhaps it could be a big white elephant, but after the first three chapters I feel strongly it will teach me far more about nutrition than anything else that I have learned. 

Daily Recap

My morning workout on a scale of 1 to 10 was easily a 5 or less.  When I woke up this morning I still felt a bit of the stomach pain from the night before, in fact half an hour into the workout I was still burping up the previous day’s meals.   Add a bit of sleep deprivation to the mix, and we have a perfect party of athletic mediocrity. 

The bulk of my session with Ali was spent working the chest muscles, with the last 10 minutes spent working the triceps.  We started with dumbbell chest presses, warming up with 45 lbs dumbbells on the flat bench.  I did three more sets of dumbbell chest presses moving up to 50, 55, and 65 lbs dumbbells.  In between each set I did assisted push ups on a bench. 

After the flat bench I moved to the incline bench, I did three sets of incline presses with dumbbell flies immediately after the incline press.  I also did a few sets of incline bench presses with my palms turned towards each other.  

I’ll spare the rest of the details of the workout, because it was somewhat of a stinker, a less than memorable session.  At the end the areas that we worked today were sore, and we did work the muscles to failure yet I in terms of overall intensity it was less than inspiring.

For my cardio session I did a Monday Morning Session of Mountain on the Arc Trainer.  I started with a 5 minute warm up, and started my first step on mountain with the incline set to 20, and the resistance set to 45.  From the start of the first leg my goal was to keep the intensity as high as I could.  I was not concerned about my heart rate, as much as I was focused on strides per minute or I should say the relationship between the strides per minute and my heart rate.  If I felt that my heart rate was dropping further than I wanted, I worked to increase the number of strides per minute to a level which was more difficult to maintain.

Every three minutes I found myself trying to reset my level of effort.  The first minute in each step was used to adjust to the higher level of resistance, the second minute was used to push myself as hard as I could while I used the third minute preparing my body for the next increase.  With each step I increased the resistance by 5 levels, and on steps 11 and 12 I held the levels for 5 minutes instead of 3. 

At the end of the 12^th stage I had finished 45 minutes of cardio.  It felt as if I had been on for more than hour.  I actually needed all of the two minutes I used to recover before my final 2 sprints. 

This is my second cardio session with a strong focus on intensity.  I do believe the harder you push in your cardio sessions the shorter they can be, as long as they more than 20 minutes long.  I have no scientific data to back this up, but it’s what my body tells me is right.

This week I am going to focus quite a bit of thought on simplifying my workouts and making them intense, and perhaps going to 5 or 6 wokrouts a week.  Perhaps that will actually accelerate my weight loss and increase my bodies ability to build muscle.  To be continued…