My Own Paleo Challenge
Monday, November 2, 2009 at 12:20PM Robb Wolf (www.robbwolf.com) came to CFB back in June. The day after he came, I decided to go completely, 100% Paleo. Since June, these are the cheats that I've had (almost exactly, I wrote them all down);
1 Cup of White Rice (from Sushi, my favorite cheat meal)
2 Croissants
1 Piece of American Cheese
4 Beers at the Halloween Party
1 Root Beer Float.
1 1/2 Bottles of Wine.
Robb came on June 13. I started the diet on the 14th. It is now November 2. That is pretty damn good if you ask me. What killed me the most was the Root Beer Float (Thanks Jen).
So, what have I benefited from doing this?
1) In High School, I tore my hip flexor muscle. It was regular for me to feel pain when warming up every day. This pain has been absolutely non existent. This is by far the most incredible of all the things I've benefited from so far.
2) Stomach aches. Like clockwork, I regularly experienced restricting feelings in my gut coupled with an upset stomach. I haven't had a stomach ache in months. (Surprisingly, the biggest culprit I cut out from my diet were Balance Bars. I would not be surprised if these little bastards are what caused all this stomach pain. I ate them like clockwork as a snack 5-6x a week.)
3) Sinus infections. I've always had problems with allergies, in particular fall and spring times. This fall, I have had absolutely no problems with allergies.
4) Decrease in Body Fat. For the first time in my life, I have a legit six pack. This is way cool. I also have not lost any weight.
5) Increase in alertness. Do I feel highly energetic all day? No absolutely not. Do I have swings in my energy? Nope. I don't feel tired or lethargic EVER unless it's been from drinking that root beer float or those 4 beers I had. I feel alert (but not massively high levels of energy). I just feel sustained, alert, and present throughout the entire day. There is never a fluctuation of energy levels.
I hope that you all see as wonderful results that I have seen in your Paleo Challenge. Gluten, Wheat, and Dairy suck. End of story.
Reader Comments (10)
zander! fix the page so we can see all your comments..... they arent showing up correctly!
What do you mean EC? It looks good to me!?
Alex! you forgot that you had pizza with us as well on the halloween party night....and u even stole some of my piece! but other than that....u r an inspiration to do well on this challenge!
Über busted!
Oops! Yes busted. Completely forgot that I had two slices of pizza that night.
Great post - Very inspirational & impressive
Alex -
Great post. Queastion: Why do you consider sushi a cheat? I understand the rice part of sushi would fall into the "cheat" category, but what's wrong with some raw tuna, dried kelp and other stuff by itself?
Hey Thor;
Good question. The sushi that I cheat with tends to be raw fish. I'll usually have different styles of maki as well as sashimi. Basically, the only factor of the sushi that is cheating is the white rice. Of the three main culprits (gluten, wheat, dairy) the one that crushes me the most is gluten. I have done whatever I can to ensure that I don't cheat with any gluten.
So, in answer to your query, there is nothing wrong at all with the raw tuna and dried kelp. It's legit paleo. The white rice is not. All of the other crazy styles of sushi that are out there tend to make me nauseous because of the plethora of non-paleo stuff they put in there.
I know this is a long winded answer, but if you are going to cheat with different styles of sushi, try to get it as fresh as you can. A decent amount of the pre-packaged stuff you find at Whole Foods and various supermarkets is loaded with high fructose corn syrup, gluten, wheat, soy, and is not nearly as fresh as the ones you can get from higher end sushi restaurants.
Great post Alex. Thanks for the inspiration.
Wine is not paleo? Say it ain't so. I thought red wine and 100% agave tequila were compliant.