Have you heard of the old saying ‘The shoemaker’s children go barefoot’? Meaning that the cobbler spends all his time and talents on his customers rather than on making and repairing shoes for his own children. And that describes me. I dedicate a lot of time and energy to my clients, ensuring they are meeting their goals, working hard, staying motivated and eating well; but, admittedly, I don’t even dedicate half of that time to my own training and nutrition.

BUT, all that changed in the past couple of months.

Why I Started Taking My Own Advice

Results. I constantly see the results achieved by my clients from following my advice and training methods, so surely I could accomplish the same.

Performance. After doing several obstacle races this summer I realized that I needed to improve my performance. I was carrying an extra 10-15 lbs.

Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired. I was tired of eating processed, sugary and unnatural foods. I was tired of feeling lethargic after a feast. Hated the bloating, the discomfort and looking like a butterball after each meal.

My Research and a Plan of Action

In one of my earlier posts I mentioned that I knew what kind of training worked for me. But I needed to clean up my nutrition. I’ve been reading up a lot on Paleo Nutrition in the past couple of years, but never gave it a go. I haven’t fully committed to Paleo, I’m only using some of the diet’s principles. However, my research and readings didn’t stop there. I’m always on a look out for well researched books and new journal articles covering the latest in human nutrition, supplementation and fat metabolism.

So, I came across four books which became very influential in my program design:

Eat Right 4 Your Type – by Peter D’Adamo.
Wheat Belly by William Davis.
Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes.
Why We Get Fat and What to Do About It by Gary Taubes.

Although I didn’t follow any specific diet plans, I subscribed to the main concepts from each text. For example, I used Eat Right 4 Your Type books to obtain a list of foods most appropriate for my blood type, which is O+. Fortunately, Type O blood type aligns nicely with the concepts learned from the other three books and some of the teachings of Paleo movement.

My Nutrition

These are my general guidelines and rules. The items on the top of the list are of the utmost importance to follow.

Consume Only Allowed Foods as per my Blood Type
No Wheat
No Sugars
Eat As Much Protein As You Want
Eat As Much Fat as You Like
No Coffee
No Alcohol
Do Not Eat 2-3 hrs Before Bed
Eat a lot of dark leafy greens
Some grain are ok
It’s ok to cheat. (which I’ll have to stop if I want to get to the next level)

Sample Daily Meal Plan

Pre-workout:

1 tbsp of Grapeseed oil OR Cod Liver Oil
Green Tea

Post Workout

3 whole eggs, scrambled with spinach, mushrooms and shrimp
1 slice Ezekiel Bread, regular butter, and apple butter

protein shake

Mid-Morning Snack

1 Black plum
1-2 cups of trail mix (minimum dried fruit content)

Lunch

2 Licks Beef Burgers OR my own homemade beef burgers
Baby Romaine Lettuce and Spinach salad with Pine nuts or random fresh veggies

Mid-Afternoon Snack

1/2 cup Walnuts
1 Peach
Green Tea

Dinner

6 oz steak
Baby Romaine Lettuce and Spinach salad
Grilled asparagus

As you can see there are no processed sugars, pop, chips, cookies, or wheat products. Although, I do not list it I drink water through out the day and with my meals.

My Training

keep rest time to a minimum between sets
use compound movements
always add more resistance each week
1 exercise consists of 5-6 sets, starting as a warm up and continuing as acclimation to final set going to near failure
switch up exercises for the training muscle group every week, returning to the same workout every 3 weeks

4 day split:

Monday: Chest, Triceps and Abs + 20 Min Run
Tuesday: Legs
Wednesday or Thursday: Back and Biceps
Friday: Shoulders and Abs + 20 Min Run
Saturday: Off
Sunday: 7-13km Run

So, What are the Results?

My intention was to post these much earlier, but I wanted to wait a few weeks and see if the body fat keeps at bay and weight stays down. Well, I managed to keep it all off even with heavy cheating this month. Just to be clear, I stuck to my rules, workouts and my meal plans throughout the week, but when the weekend comes I had a tendency to indulge, generously.

	Mid-July 2012	Mid- August 2012	Difference
Weight	171 lbs	163 lbs	8 lbs
Body Fat	15.5%	13%	2.5%
Waist	33″	31.5″	1.5″

More Work Ahead

All this sums up my short term goals. I still have a long way to go. I need a lot more discipline when it comes to nutrition, optimize my training regiment for strength and performance gains and optimize my hormonal balance to induce better muscle growth and fat metabolism.