Pink Shares Gym Selfie, Says She's 'Obese' by 'Regular Standards': 'Stay Off That Scale, Ladies!'. You want to control your diabetes as much as possible. So you regularly check your A1C level. 16 Week Pre-Contest Preparation Bodyfat Reduction Program. Written by - Gary "Hulkster Jr." Becker. This program is dedicated to the individuals that helped me get. Most steroid users are not athletes. Between 1 million and 3 million people (1% of the population) are thought to have misused AAS in the United States. Exercise Health Myths About Running, Jogging, Biking, Marathons, and Triathlons. Click here to read the "Medical Disclaimer." Guidelines for Healthy Exercise. The AXS Cookie Policy. This website, like most others, uses cookies in order to give you a great online experience. By continuing to use our website you accept to our. Post Workout Nutrition: High or Low Carb? My previous post seems to have stirred some interest and a fair amount of confusion. Should one use carbs post workout or not? If so how much, and when? Like a great number of situations, how we manage our post workout nutrition depends on where we are and where we want to go. If you have followed my previous ramblings you might be familiar with the orientation I use for most of my decision making: How does a given decision affect Performance, Health and Longevity. Similarly, how does a given decision affect how one looks, feels and performs? For many people insulin resistance is more important to deal with than performance, at least initially. If one is sick, or just less than optimally well, it. Also, from a purely aesthetics (gasp!) perspective we might want to lean out for summer and not be a fatty. That was certainly my situation and I feel a good bit better at sub 1. Chico is a balmy 1. F. I have tinkered with higher carbs PWO for several months and my signs of insulin resistance were simply not budging. I still have some cortisol issues that are likely driving some of this! So I finally wised up and went back to what has worked so well for me in the past. I re- read the article by Mauro Dipasquale, and thought back a bit to what Poliquin had recommended to me at the Biosignature seminar last year: No carbs PWO, not till one is LEAN. For men that is below 1. The Purpose of the PWO meal can vary based upon desired effects. Fasting produces a different effect from both low carb and high carb PWO meals. In this situation the PWO meal of whey protein + coconut milk is providing quickly digested protein which will reverse catabolic actions of training, with just a bit of fat to suppress the normal glucose release of a large protein meal via glucagon. This would not be the end of the world but part of what we want with this PWO meal is the MAINTENANCE of insulin sensitivity. If we totally top off our glycogen stores PWO we impair insulin sensitivity and make it damn tough to lean out. So, one way to look at this is the a LC- PWO meal is focusing on muscular recovery and growth, while minimizing or limiting the effects of insulin or carbohydrate. This is in stark contrast with what we will see in the case of the high carb PWO meal. From my perspective this is THE PWO meal of choice from a health promotion standpoint. Insulin management, cellular stress mechanisms, hormesis. I ran with a vanilla flavor that is sweetened with sucralose. To this I added about . I shot this concoction down as soon as I wrapped up my Cross. Fit Football or ME- Black Box session. Recovery was good as in I was not particularly sore and miraculously, I started to lean out again, especially when I upped my fish oil to about 1. Kirkland brand). Overall I was getting in less than 5. Strength was solid, short met- cons were . Low carb in general, one or two higher carb meals per week (or maybe not). You will NOT however win the Cross. Fit Games or optimize performance in longer Met- con oriented activities. Several of the folks in the comments section were a little startled by the protein+fat PWO meal which seems completely at odds with what I talk about in 4. Ways to Skin the Zone. It is simply a different tool for a different situation. If one is overweight or showing signs of insulin resistance, a low carb PWO meal is the way to go. Solid food is just fine and likely even better. Can. In general, I think there are activities/work outputs that just run better with SOME glycogen. I have noticed in myself and in some other people a surprising level of work output while in ketosis. This article from the Journal of. Keep in mind, even if you do not EAT carbs, your body makes some. This might be a natural way to structure training. This MAY play towards performance if our game is strength oriented but it will likely NOT do us many favors if we desire to be the Cross. Fit Kid or some other glycogen dependant athlete. The HC- PWO meal becomes appealing when we need to replenish not only damaged muscle tissue but also the glycogen stores that fire intense activity. We can do this a dumb way (perfectly balanced protein/carb/fat meals the same proportion, every day, all the time) or we can be smart and take advantage of heightened insulin sensitivity PWO to fly protein and carbs into our muscles with less of a hit from insulin. In this scenario we should see not only solid muscular recovery due to our protein intake, but also rapid glycogen repletion due to the smart carbs we throw into the PWO meal. How much carb/protein is a great question and I honestly do not have a perfect answer. That friends, is damn smart. I know of some fairly technical formulas that involve weight, duration of activity and some other factors, but it all relates to fairly static state endurance activities. I find it tough to extrapolate much to the Cross. Fit world from this information. A nice rule of thumb I have found effective is find your Zone block allotment. This does not mean you need to weigh and measure every meal, just use this as a tool to find a nice PWO carb/protein level. By the numbers this would look like: My block allotment would be 1. PWO protein would be 4- 5 blocks, PWO carbs would be 4- 8 blocks. You bet, you need to pay attention to how much carbs you need to recover from a given beating. This IS where writing down what you eat pays big returns. What about Multi- event days? Glad you asked, I hear there is this thing, the Cross. Fit Games looming in the near future. How should one fuel/refuel for events? You should have figured a bunch of this out already. If you have three WOD! You should have easy to digest foods (yams+ applesauce is a goody) as is a shake you know you tolerate well. A little protein is good for balancing things out, nuts are good for between event snacks. Whey protein in the yam+applesauce=damn yummy and very useful. Nothing new on game- day. This is where people need to understand a little of the theory and then just get in and tinker. I also had an asterisk* up above. It denotes the fact that although a low carb PWO meal is preferable for health, for longevity I think an OCCASIONAL HC- PWO meal is of benefit for a variety of reasons. Some of what I will cover in the book relates to two facts which seem at odds: What is the metabolic profile most associated with EFFECTIVE aging? Answer: the ability to metabolize fat for energy. What Helps to ensure this profile? OCCASIONAL bouts of glycolysis (large amounts of carbs). To this end, once one is healthy, but following a low- carb approach drop in one HC- PWO meal every 5- 7 days. Post burner is a perfect time. Grab my Paleo Troubleshooting Guides. This printable, infographic- style download that will help you troubleshoot some common problems with the Paleo diet. This has been requested literally hundreds of times from readers and podcast listeners, and we. It has a special section on fueling for athletes. How to use these guides. On the main page, select what area you need help with: Fat loss. Eating for autoimmunity. Fueling for endurance. Fueling for power athletics. Then follow the easy- to- read flowchart to help troubleshoot or structure your individual approach to the Paleo diet. Download the guides. Robb Wolf. Robb Wolf, author of The Paleo Solution, is a former research biochemist and one of the world. Wolf has transformed the lives of tens of thousands of people around the world via his top ranked i. Tunes podcast and wildly popular seminar series. Experimenting with the Paleo Diet for Vegetarians. Post written by Susan Lacke. I’m never one to back down from a challenge. If you tell me I “can’t” do something, you’ve guaranteed I’ll set out to do it. So when my buddy Joel Runyon bragged about a new diet plan of his, I was intrigued and wanted to give it a shot for myself.“Aww, that’s cute,” Joel smirked, “but you can’t do it.”“Why?” I retorted.“It’s based on the principles of a paleo diet plan. You’re one of THOSE people. It’s possible for the paleo diet to be adapted to the vegetarian lifestyle.”“Prove it.”“Fine. I will.”The principles of paleo. If you’re unfamiliar with the paleo diet, it’s a diet that encourages “eating like a caveman.” In other words, only foods that our ancestors would have hunted or gathered. It’s what we’re “meant” to eat, say proponents, and for many, that idea translates to the notion that we’re “meant” to eat meat — lots of it. A quick search for “vegetarian paleo” doesn’t yield much of use, other than Matt’s long post about three ways to make it work. In fact, an overwhelming majority of sources said it’d be almost impossible to sustain a paleo- vegetarian lifestyle. Some even claimed that, like our cavemen ancestors, a person would die of nutritional deficiencies if they didn’t get their hands on animal protein. Though a dramatic assertion, it does underscore the reason animal protein is so important to the paleo diet. Most plant- based protein sources are considered inflammatory to the body to paleos, and therefore off- limits: No beans. No soy. No rice. No quinoa. No grains of any kind. Further, there’s no starchy foods, no dairy, no alcohol, no sugars (except those found naturally in fruit), and no convenience foods of any sort. I finally understood why there were so few resources on paleo for vegetarians. Flustered, I began to wonder if I had met my match in this challenge. What the hell was I supposed to eat for the next eight weeks? Paleo for vegetarians. Let’s mark this one in the “win” column: I survived 8 weeks as a paleo- vegetarian, and I didn’t die from protein deficiency. Meticulous tracking of my food intake allowed me to see if I was meeting my daily nutritional needs. Yes, even protein. As it turns out, the veggie- caveman- death theory was wrong on a lot of counts. Yes, protein sources are particularly important in a paleo diet. However, animal protein is perhaps given too much prominence. Some paleo followers claim that cavemen consumed 6. But recent research shows that cavemen likely got 4. More importantly, where should today’s No Meat Athletes look if they want to take on a paleo diet? During my 8- week paleo experiment, I centered my diet around vegetarian, paleo- friendly staples offering the highest amounts of protein and healthy fats: Almonds. Avocado. Broccoli. Eggs. Hemp Seed. Pistachios. Potatoes. Spinach. Spirulina. Walnuts. A rather short list, yes, but keep in mind they’re not the only foods I ate. There were plenty of other plant- based foods in my diet, but I tried to include at least two of the above items in every meal or snack. A smoothie would include hemp seed, almonds, and spinach along with frozen berries. My dinner would be a salad would be loaded with vegetables, including avocado and broccoli. A snack would be apples with almond butter and a hard- boiled egg white. Off to a rocky start . In all my time as a vegetarian, I’ve never felt restricted because I “can’t” eat meat. Instead, I’ve chosen to focus on the things I can eat – which is a whole heck of a lot. But adding paleo meant learning to live without grains, dairy, and convenience foods. Suddenly, food felt incredibly constricting. Also, my initiation into the Caveman Club meant I had to endure a nasty transition in what my body was utilizing as fuel. When your carbohydrate intake drops, your body learns to burn fat instead of sugar. It’s actually a great thing for endurance athletes to harness, since it allows for a body to use fat for fuel instead of relying on glycogen reserves, which are easily depleted. But holy geez, the process of getting there is hard. For the first week of the diet, I felt like I had a case of the flu. I was plagued with fatigue, incoherent thoughts, pounding headache, and a lot of bonking during my workouts. All of my research told me to expect a crash, but my body didn’t just crash — it dive- bombed. And then, on the seventh day, I woke up and felt good. Actually, I felt great. Why being paleo- vegetarian was shockingly easy. As I adjusted to the new diet, I realized something surprising: This isn’t so hard after all. Yes, it was an adjustment to learn how to get enough protein without my go- to sources, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I was certain I’d constantly crave baked goods (my comfort food), but as it turns out, I could be just as satisfied with healthier, real- food alternatives. I couldn’t imagine a breakfast without oatmeal, cereal, or pancakes, but smoothies, fruit salads, and egg- white omelets loaded with fresh veggies gave me more energy than the grain- based foods. And though it was a “diet,” I was never ravenously hungry. I always felt satiated. The nice thing about paleo diet is that it only provides guidelines for what to eat, not how much of it. In other words, if I was hungry, I could eat as much as I wanted. Only this time, instead of reaching for a nutrition bar or a coffeehouse muffin, I’d grab some veggie sticks or a bowl of fruit. Even eating out at restaurants wasn’t all that hard, so long as I planned ahead. If friends wanted to get together for dinner, I’d suggest we meet up at a Mexican restaurant. There, I could order a veggie fajita salad with salsa and avocado instead of cheese or sour cream (which I never really liked anyway). While traveling, I could grab some nuts and fruit at convenience stores for a quick snack. Was I perfect? If I was hungry and unable able to get my hands on something that fit within the diet, I ate the sandwich or the granola bar. And when my partner brought home a cupcake one night, I devoured every single crumb, cavemen be damned. Overall, though, my consumption was healthier than it was previously. Aside from the sporadic indiscretions, it was a completely clean diet. I thought I did a pretty good job of eating healthy before, but taking away convenience foods forced me to eat more fruit in the morning, or to snack on vegetables instead of a Luna bar. The surprising results (1. Let me be very clear: I did not take on this challenge to lose weight. I tend to be anti- diet, advocating healthy lifestyle changes instead of temporary food restrictions. My purpose for doing this for 8 weeks was to prove that it was possible for a vegetarian to be paleo, just to quiet the peanut gallery (including Joel). I did lose weight, though. Nineteen pounds, to be exact. As of this writing, I am at the same weight I like to be at when I race an Ironman, only I didn’t have to take on the volume of Ironman training to get there. My body fat percentage also dropped from 2. I didn’t get the six- pack abs that launched off this whole experiment, probably because I didn’t follow certain principles of Joel’s diet, including the accompanying exercise plan. Perhaps most surprising was that I was able to sustain my long workouts on a vegetarian paleo diet. Instead of needing to rely on carbs to fuel my workouts, I burned fat. Instead of carrying gels and sugary drinks on a long ride, I carried water. A modern- day caveman? Lest you think I’ve gone off the deep end, I’ll have you know that I’m about to head out on a date. We’re going out for pizza, which is, well . Though it’s not impossible, it’s still a lot of work. There’s so much planning involved, and I’d like to spend less time thinking about food and more time eating it. I’ll certainly take some principles away from these past eight weeks. For example, I’ve decided not to purchase dairy products for my home anymore. I’m also stocking my fridge and pantry with many of the same foods I had consumed during the experiment – turns out if I don’t buy crappy processed foods, I don’t eat crappy processed foods (imagine that!). I don’t plan on going back to my old breakfasts of oatmeal, since paleo- friendly breakfasts give me sustained energy every morning. I’ll also place fresh, raw fruits and vegetables high on the list of priorities, remembering how much better I feel when I opt for those instead of convenience foods. But if, on a cold day, I want to make a bowl of chili, filled to the brim with lentils and topped with crackers, I’m going to. If I’m making a salad and want to throw some grilled tofu on top, I’m going to. And gosh darn it, if I want to eat a cupcake, I’m going to. However, the next time someone tells me vegetarians can’t follow a paleo diet, I’ll be quick to share my eight- week experiment. It’s not as impossible as they might imagine.“I know,” I’ll say, “because I’m one of THOSE people. When she isn’t subjecting herself to ridiculous experiments in the name of good storytelling, she can be found filling up Matt’s inbox with annoying e- mails and training for Ironman Arizona. Female Fitness Contest Prep – Borge Fagerli. A normal contest prep for a male bodybuilder is usually in the 1. I recommend) you can probably get away with half that. It doesn’t need to be all that complicated. Drop carbs, up the protein and add some daily treadmill or stepmill sessions of 3. Throw some fat burners in the mix. Rinse and repeat until lean. Ok, maybe not that easy all the time, so let. If they try to emulate this strategy it usually doesn. And more pleasurable to be around as an added bonus. So how do I go about solving the puzzle of contest dieting? First of all, patience! This goes for both first time competitors and women in general. Unless you stay really lean year- round, double the time you THINK you need for a contest prep. The first half of the diet might seem like piece of cake (even if you can’t have any), and the upper body usually leans out nicely, but the stubborn fat deposits on your buttocks, hips and legs might take a full 8- 1. I won. I believe humans are biologically programmed to eat meat. Women in general should eat more animal proteins, wild game (reindeer, elk, deer) or (preferably grass- fed) beef in particular. I’ve seen women eat 3- 4lbs of veggies just because they’re so hungry all the time, and then constantly complain about bloating and constipation. I know I just pissed off a lot of vegetarians/vegans, but I feel safe knowing my meat- fed legs can outrun both you and your sharpened cucumbers any day of the week. For some women into their 3. I usually set calories at 1. Most will usually drop a pound or two in a few days just from cleaning up their diets and eliminating the sugars and junk food. Now for the macronutrient ratio management. I know low carb diets are popular among women, but in my experience this isn. The downside can be more variable hunger levels and energy, but if they get leaner and stay fuller it. This is purely observational but too much protein in the ranges commonly prescribed for fat loss diets (1. For the first part of the diet when bodyfat is higher, I find low carb dieting (in my world this is below 8. I can also get some quality weight training for the delts, back and glutes/hams in this phase (the most important muscle groups for a female competitor) by dropping cardio to just some easy walking. Meaning: no intervals or 2 hour spinning/aerobic classes . Carbs are eaten post- workout and for the final meal of the day (yes, indeed. One or two higher carb days at 1. Me and the World Champion in Bikinifitness, the awesome Christina Strom Fjaere. As the competitor leans out, 9. I transition into a more carb- based, and lower dietary fat diet. I add in some interval- based cardio at this point. I will keep carbs at a 1. This will only be for a short period, as fats are vital to proper hormone functioning and general health. I rarely do regular high- carb refeeds as they seem to be very unpredictable for women. Sometimes they work great, sometimes it takes up to a week to drop the added weight and it just feels like wasted time. I will, however, bump up carbs here and there if you get very tired or lethargic, in the range of 5. Slow, gradual adjustments are the key. Try cutting calories too hard and progress will invariably come to an abrupt halt. Try doing anything fancy, or wildly and randomly fluctuate calories, and progress will also slow or at least appear to be and frustrate both me and the competitor. Patience will be your best friend during a diet, so aim to lose only 1 lb – or 2mm average if you use skinfold calipers – every 1. Instead of worrying about daily weight fluctuations, they are not only inevitable but also normal . Take the sum of the last 5- 7 daily measurements and divide by number of days to get the average. Do the same a week later and compare . Depending on how much training and cardio is being done, I will add more training instead of dropping calories the next time an adjustment is needed. Still scared to up your carbs when low- carb diets have worked better for you in the past? Well, paranoia of getting in shape prevents most from experimenting with alternate approaches, and I can certainly understand that . They are usually the OCD type, stressing over minor details and don. They usually tolerate a lot of volume and struggle and feel burnt out if you have them do a lot of power type movements and heavy training. They beg me for the 1hr+ cardio sessions, but I prefer to take their need for volume out in the weight room . I will handle the cardio topic soon, though. The low- carb girls are the opposite: run warmer body temps and experience hot flashes, give them carbs and they get sleepy and bloated. They love intervals and lifting heavy weights, are usually more laidback, and thrive on variety. Will follow the program if you tell them to, but get bored easily and just go through the motions and lose interest if you don. Carbs should be focused around workouts and/or in the last meal of the day, give them carbs for a whole day or consecutive days and they seem to lose their conditioning almost minute by minute. Some of this tends to go away over time, though. This last contest prep her carbs were in the 1. She got into the shape of her life, and this was without ANY fat burners, thyroid meds or hormone usage. Now for the training. Women tend to think they need to do pump and toning with light weights to avoid getting too muscular. Then just to top that off, you do cardio like a long distance runner because you want to burn as much fat as possible. While lengthening the muscles by doing Pilates and Yoga. In simpler terms: Try to be good at everything and you will end up being beaten every time by the specialist. Crossfit is a perfect example of this fallacy, but I already pissed off the vegetarians earlier in the article, so I won. Today. Tell your body to build its tolerance to long and slow enduring miles via a properly applied long- distance running program and you will be a good marathon runner. Tell your body to build large muscles by lifting a sufficiently heavy load, sufficiently many times (sets and reps), sufficiently often (frequency) to make the muscle adapt and grow larger and stronger and you will be a good physique competitor. Tell your body to become faster and more explosive by doing short sprints with full recovery, low rep and explosive training with some strategic plyometrics and agility drills ? Long, slow miles build endurance champions, but they tend to look completely different from sprinters or dancers, don? Because the former is telling their muscle to become more energetically efficient, i. The latter requires muscles displaying highly powerful and explosive contractions, with a highly developed ATP- CP and glycolytic system which . A typical workout for a sprinter is 1. A total distance of 2. Far from the 6. 0+ minutes of treadmill or spinning classes done by 9. And I don. Due to biomechanics, faulty technique and overuse of high- tech running shoes (read: http: //www. Funny how those 8. Mommy? Since the heart rate monitor is telling you that 3. REALLY want to burn fat. Also, this type of cardio directly inhibits muscle growth, so you. But hey, if you really want to keep that skinny- fat ass and legs, stop reading now and forget everything I just told you. Sure, you may burn more fat DURING the session itself by doing low- and moderate intensity cardio, but what happens the remaining 2. You can probably see where I. Cutting calories too much or doing too much activity will stop progress in its tracks, so don. Start off with dynamic mobility work, followed by about 5 minutes of gradual warm- ups. End with a 1. 0- 1. Total duration for the whole session will be in the 2. Start with 1- 2 sessions per week and increase up to a max of 2- 3 sessions. There are more interesting ways of killing yourself. Recommended activities for sprint intervals: hill or stair sprints, prowler/sled pushing or dragging, elliptical or rower set at high resistance, Airdyne bike. Tempo intervals, where you go at a slightly lower intensity (around 7. This is a popular type of workout for sprinters to add training volume without overtaxing the fast and explosive type II fibers. I limit total duration to 2. Get an idea of what 1. I say 7. 0- 8. 0% speed/intensity that. Elliptical, rower, Airdyne bike, skipping rope, swimming, barbell/dumbell/kettlebell complexes and soft track or grass field running (with barefoot shoes). Also, no lactate threshold training, stick to lower intensities if you insist on longer duration cardio sessions. For recovery purposes or if you. I sometimes recommend this option exclusively, meaning no intervals if you. Adding lots of intervals to this would probably destroy you and I. Watch for signs of overtraining/overreaching and sub in brisk walking if your legs begin to flatten out and feel tired. Doing too much high- intensity work when your recovery is already compromised by a caloric deficit is a seriously stupid idea, so don. Splitting it up into 2 or even 3 short sessions during a day is better than 1 long session, meaning 1. Something about stimulating the metabolism more often, as well as avoiding cortisol accumulation. Also forget about that . The same stimulus which built the muscle will be the one maintaining it. I know Crossfit is all the hype now, but I’m very ambivalent towards training complex lifts requiring both skill and coordination until failure with short rest periods. Yes, you can get strong, but in my experience you will get stronger and fitter by separating strength and cardio – and with less injury potential to boot. Also consider the fact that women in general will do more reps at a given intensity than men due to neurological inefficiency, so do 5- 8 rep training on a regular basis to keep strength levels up during a diet – even delving into 1- 3 rep territory as long as you stay explosive and use long rest periods (2- 5mins). Here. Afternoon/Evening: Sprint intervals . Easy walking for 7 minutes. Total duration 2. Wednesday: Morning: 3.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
May 2017
Categories |