Your Personal Paleo Code: The 3-Step Plan to Lose Weight, Reverse Disease, and Stay Fit and Healthy for Life (35 page)

I often see patients who are competitive athletes, CrossFit enthusiasts, or just very active physically who are suffering from fatigue, hair loss, low libido, and other problems. Almost inevitably, they are on low-carb diets. Back in the 1980s, fat-phobia was the norm. Athletes who wanted to stay lean and competitive adopted the low-fat dogma just as most other health-conscious people did. Unfortunately, many found that dramatically restricting fat intake—particularly cutting out healthy traditional fats like butter, coconut oil, and lard—had a negative impact on their health. Rates of obesity, metabolic disease, and other problems continued to rise as unsuspecting people trying to do the right thing switched out their steak-and-eggs breakfasts for cold cereal, dry wheat toast, and orange juice. Then, in the mid-1990s, the pendulum swung back in the other direction as people realized the folly of avoiding dietary fat and the perils of processed carbohydrates. Suddenly low-carb diets were all
the rage, and members of the athletic community, which is often on the forefront of nutritional changes, began to shun all carbohydrates (not just processed, refined carbs) with the same zeal with which they had previously shunned fat.

While some people are able to thrive for long periods, and even indefinitely, on a very low-carb diet, serious competitive athletes, martial artists, cyclists, runners, boxers, and high-intensity trainers like CrossFitters almost always begin to experience problems when they dramatically restrict carbohydrates. Why? Because intense physical activity is dependent on a steady supply of glucose to replace the muscle glycogen that is depleted during glucose-fueled activity. And studies have consistently shown that low-carbohydrate diets are not capable of maintaining optimal glycogen levels during intense exercise.

Lack of carbohydrate during this type of exercise causes glycogen depletion, which in turn leaves muscles unable to get the glucose they need to produce ATP (adenosine triphosphate), the fundamental energy unit of the cell. Glycogen depletion can be a good thing in certain circumstances, such as if you have diabetes or are trying to lose weight. But this is another example that there’s no one-size-fits-all approach and demonstrates the key principle behind the Personal Paleo Code. Just because something is appropriate for treating a disease or a specific problem doesn’t mean it’s appropriate for healthy people, especially serious athletes.

It’s interesting to note that very low-carb diets (under 10 percent of total calories) never caught on among professional athletes whose livelihoods depend on consistently high performance. And while very low-carb diets were adopted by topflight bodybuilders for a short time, the trend has recently started moving in the other direction. A recent article in
Muscle Development
magazine chronicled this change, pointing out that Jay Cutler and Branch Warren, the number-one and number-two finishers in the 2009 Mr. Olympia, ate, respectively, 700 and 1,000 grams of carbohydrates per day! I’d say that’s a pretty far cry from a low-carb diet.

Here’s the bottom line: very low-carb diets are usually not a good idea
for people who regularly perform strenuous exercise. That said, in keeping with the principle of this program, I don’t want you to take my word for this. I want you to experiment and see what is true for you. Even the best theories are useless if they don’t produce practical results. I’d recommend 25 percent of total calories from carbohydrates as an absolute minimum for anyone doing frequent, intense exercise. If you’re training at a very high level, you may need much more than this. Keep in mind that a Mr. Olympia bodybuilder got up to 1,000 grams per day, which accounted for between 50 and 60 percent of his total caloric intake. Granted, few people are competing at that level, and few people will need that much; I mention it simply to illustrate the range.

Another important consideration when you’re highly active is to make sure you’re eating enough overall. I often see patients in my practice who are doing CrossFit or another intense physical activity and are simply not eating enough calories to sustain their activity level. This is a great formula for fat loss, but once your body fat reaches a low level, muscle will be broken down in order to provide the fuel your body needs to function properly.

With all of this in mind, here are some guidelines for highly active people (meaning those who are training at least three to five times a week at moderate to high intensity). The guidelines vary depending on whether the goal is fat loss, maintenance, or muscle gain.

Goal
: Fat loss

Carbohydrate
^*
(% of Total Calories)
: 7–20

Calories (per LB. of Body Weight)
: 15–16

Protein (G/LB. of Body Weight)
: 0.8–1.0

Goal
: Maintenance

Carbohydrate
^*
(% of Total Calories)
: 25–60

Calories (per LB. of Body Weight)
: 17–18

Protein (G/LB. of Body Weight)
: 0.8–1.0

Goal
: Muscle gain

Carbohydrate
^*
(% of Total Calories)
: 25–60

Calories (per LB. of Body Weight)
: 19–21

Protein (G/LB. of Body Weight)
: 1.0–1.25

Let’s look at two examples of how this might work out in practice:

In addition to matching your overall carbohydrate intake with your activity level and goals, eating your carbs at specific times may provide additional benefit. After a workout is an ideal time to eat more carbohydrates, and carbohydrate intake should be higher on workout days than on nonworkout days. This will help with recovery and preserving (or adding) muscle mass, if that’s your goal.

Some recent studies suggest that eating the majority (around 60 to 80 percent) of your carbohydrates at dinner leads to hormonal changes that promote fat loss and improve metabolic function. However, this can be difficult to do if you’re eating a large amount of carbohydrates. For example, if you’re eating three hundred grams of carbohydrate a day, and you aim for eating 60 percent of those at dinner, you’ll have to eat three large baked potatoes! In practice, if you aim for eating a larger percentage of your carbohydrates after workouts, on workout days, and in the later part of the day, you’ll get most of the benefit of carbohydrate timing.

You hear a lot these days about superfoods that people promise will boost vitality, improve mood, increase libido, burn fat, lengthen your life, and turn you into a millionaire. Okay, maybe their proponents don’t make that last claim exactly, but just about. I’m talking about protein powders, green drinks, energy bars, sports goo, bee pollen, maca root, acai berries, and all kinds of other stuff you’ve probably never heard of or have heard of but know nothing about.

In some cases, I think the sellers of these products make legitimate claims. Maca root does have a history of medicinal use (primarily to increase libido and improve sperm quality) in South America, where it is native. However, it contains glucosinolates, which in combination with a diet low in iodine can cause thyroid problems. It suppresses the function of the thyroid gland by interfering with iodine uptake, possibly leading to the development of a swelling of the thyroid gland, called a goiter.

This single example highlights one of the problems I have with most so-called superfoods. In general, they are:

You might not be surprised, then, to learn that I’m not generally a fan of these superfoods. Some of them, like protein powder and spirulina, probably won’t hurt when used in moderate amounts in the context of an
overall nutrient-dense diet. This is especially true for bodybuilders who are trying to put on significant amounts of muscle and are having trouble getting enough protein in their diets. However, I am a big fan of nature’s own superfoods, and I believe they should be incorporated into every diet.

Another way of thinking of them is as nature’s multivitamins. These are the foods that are densely packed with micronutrients that fuel our cellular machinery and keep us healthy and strong. I’ve mentioned these foods and their benefits throughout this book, but here’s an all-in-one listing.

The best way to obtain nutrients is from food. That’s how we’ve naturally evolved to get them. Most nutrients require enzymes, synergistic cofactors, and organic-mineral activators to be properly absorbed. While these are naturally present in foods, they are often not included in synthetic vitamins with isolated nutrients.

That said, no matter how well we eat, some nutrients are difficult to
obtain in significant quantities from food alone. For example, magnesium is found in many foods, but as soil quality has declined over the past several decades, so have magnesium levels in fresh produce. And with the exception of cold-water, fatty fish, food has never been a primary source of vitamin D; our ancestors produced it from exposure to sunlight. In addition, modern eating habits affect the amount of valuable nutrients we consume. Vitamin A (retinol) is present in high amounts only in organ meats, which our Paleolithic ancestors and many traditional cultures considered superior to muscle meats (which they are, from a nutritional perspective). However, organ meats have fallen out of favor, and few people eat them today.

The information below lists the nutrients that are not abundant even in a typical Paleo diet, one that doesn’t include organ meats, fish-liver oils, seaweed, and grass-fed-animal dairy, along with my recommendations for how to obtain them. Please see the website for a bonus chapter on supplementation with more detailed information about these nutrients as well as quizzes to help you determine which of them you may need to supplement. I also include specific, up-to-date brand recommendations for the supplements listed below.

Nutrient
: Vitamin A

Recommendation
: 10,000–15,000 IU per day

Best obtained from 1/2–1 tsp per day of high-vitamin cod-liver oil

Nutrient
: Vitamin D

Recommendation
: It is difficult to make a blanket recommendation for vitamin D because the optimal dose depends on so many factors.

That said, 1/2–1 tsp per day of high-vitamin cod-liver oil is often sufficient to meet vitamin D needs, and it’s an excellent choice since it also contains vitamin A, which works synergistically with vitamin D.

Nutrient
: Magnesium

Recommendation
: Most Americans are deficient in magnesium, and most people benefit from supplementing it because it’s difficult to obtain from food.

I suggest a dose of 300–500 mg/day in either malate or glycinate form.

Nutrient
: Vitamin K
₂

Recommendation
: Vitamin K
₂
improves bone health and protects against cardiovascular disease, among other benefits. Many people don’t get enough of this important vitamin.

You can meet vitamin K
₂
needs by eating foods that are rich in it, such as natto, eggs and cheese from grass-fed cows, and fermented foods. See
chapter 9
for a complete list.

If you don’t eat these foods, if you have low bone density, or if you are at risk for or have cardiovascular disease, I suggest taking 100–1,000 mcg/day of vitamin K
₂
in MK-7 or MK-4 form. Doses as high as 45 mg/d have been used for osteoporosis, and vitamin K
₂
appears to be safe and well tolerated even at that amount.