Real Life Fitness – Getting Fit With Brent

Here I am, a week and a half into my paleo/primal style of eating, and I am considering moving away from it and back to something closer to a more traditional style diet.

Why would I do that?

No real good reason. I think the paleo/primal philosophy is fairly sound. However, I never had the issues with grains and beans that others did. In fact, I lost more over a long period of time on “The Abs Diet” style eating than I did on primal.

There are a lot of things I will carry forward with me, though.

For starters, I will still keep a decent fat intake (30-35% or so). I know a lot more about the types of fats that are good for me. I know the oils to use and the ones to avoid. And I still plan to start making my own condiments and dressings using paleo principles.

The other reason is this: I have already decided when I return to P90X that I will follow its nutrition plan. I had awesome results doing this. Why argue with results?

Finally, honestly, I miss certain grains. Wheat, not as much (although bread does make a great delivery device for meats, but that is about it). But I miss oatmeal and brown rice and the various things I can do with it. Oh yeah, beans. And peanut butter.

Plus, Shakeology is not super primal but I hate going without it.

Those are my reasons. No need to argue, no need to explain. I am simply doing what has worked the best for me in the past.

Brent Nutrition And Diet, P90X, Primal/Paleo Eating, Shoulder Surgery, The Abs Diet abs diet, P90X, paleo, primal

After spending my first week at my club’s gym, I now remember my attraction to P90X and why I miss it so much.  Let me review:

1.  Cardio sucks.  Well, at least typical “gym” cardio.  I’m limited on what I can do because of the shoulder surgery, so running is still out.  Exercise bike and elliptical are truly worse than running.

2.  Focus.  P90X lasers me into what I’m doing.  I’m 100% with my workout.  I”m in the moment, and I’m enjoying it (well, for most of the workouts at least.  Not a big fan of a couple of the routines, but whatever).

3.  Intensity.  No doubt when I’m going P90X I’m getting a heckava workout.  I can feel it same day, next day, day after.  In the gym, with as much cardio as I am doing, I’m simply not feeling it as much.

4.  Results.  Again, I can feel when my body got a good workout.  I felt a bit of soreness from leg curls last week, but that was about it.

Needless to say, I’m ready for rehab to be done, full use of my upper body, and back to some serious X time.

Brent P90X, Shoulder Surgery P90X, shoulder surgery, why i miss p90x

It has been a LONG time since I’ve blogged about my nutrition, exercise, etc, so I thought I would catch everyone up on what is going on.

First, I’m on my last week of Insanity.  I’m glad, too!  I love the workout, but month 2 really starts to get to me after a while.  I think what I’ve learned about month 2 is what it really takes, nutritionally, to survive.  Remember, I’ve been eating Paleo, which is a higher fat, lower carb style of eating if you eat traditional Paleo.

The problem I’ve hit is in month 2 the carb cravings have been intense!  Even with taking the Results and Recovery formula (not Paleo, but I needed a recovery drink in a desperate way) and Shakeology, I still found that 100g of carbs and 80-100g of fat did not give me the energy I needed to strive in the days.  I found myself with INTENSE cravings at night.  And I cheated some because of it.

What I think I’ve discovered is that you really need carbs.  Mark Sisson talks about “chronic cardio” and its affect on the carb cravings in the body, and I believe it now.  While Insanity is more than just cardio, it still pushes your heart rate up in a high zone and pushes your body through your anabolic threshold as well as you aerobic thresholds.

My thought is if I ever do Insanity + Paleo again, month 1 I will not change, but month 2 I will need to carb cycle or simply go to a “zone” style 40/30/30 plan.

I’ve also learned that with Paleo, it is really hard for me to eat enough.  I needed to be getting 2100-2400 calories/day in, and I simply could not hit near that most days.  Another reason for intense carb cravings (when I get depleted, my body craves sugars as a quick and easy energy source)

With this knowledge, and the fact that month 2 was starting to beat on me, I had to make a decision:  To continue, or do something else.

I’ve decided that I’m going to move on to P90X2 (finally) instead of repeating Insanity.

And what that means is a transition off of Paleo/Primal eating….somewhat.

P90X2 does include a “grain free” option meant to help the caveman eaters, but it is not the high fat, low carb plan (just simply grain free).  Since this is my first time through the program, I plan on following the nutrition plan as it is laid out.  I think this is important for my Beachbody business as well as seeing how I feel and learning a bit more about my body.

June 3rd (Sunday) will be my official start date.  After I finish this round of Insanity, I am taking a week off to do nothing but stretch and recovery and get ready to push hard with X2.

And, of course, I’ll be forming a P90X/X2 Challenge Group.

Brent insanity, Nutrition And Diet, P90X2, Primal/Paleo Eating insanity, P90X, p90x2, paleo, primal, results and recovery, Shakeology

I’m 12 days into my Insanity + Shakeology + Paleo Diet challenge and I’ve got to share a bit of my results and tell you why this happened:

In my first 10 days, I dropped just under 10 pounds.  That’s right, an average of one pound a day.

Even better than the weight loss is the changing of my body.  Things are fitting a lot looser now than what they did just 2 weeks ago.  Needless to say, I’m thrilled.

But, while Insanity is my chosen path for exercise, it’s not really Insanity that I believe is making the difference, but rather the consistent focus I am putting on my nutrition.  I am not cheating.  I’m eating strict paleo, which also means no butter or cheese (two things that I would incorporate into my more Primal Blueprint style diet).

In my opinion, Insanity is just the catalyst for my nutrition.  I could be doing anything with a level of intensity, be it P90X, X2, Crossfit, whatever, and probably get the same results.  The reason why is this:  You can exercise all you want, but if you do not keep aware of what you put into your mouth, you may be defeating the purpose of exercise.

Just from my personal experience, and maybe you can relate:  When I exercise, especially lifting heavy weights, I get a lot hungrier over the day.  It’s easy to go into the panty and find junk and put it into your body just to satisfy the hunger.  But what did you just do?  Most likely, you took in empty calories.  You just put something into your body that will provide no real nutritional benefit.

Change that around to having things planned and knowing exactly what you’ll eat:  If you have a nutrient rich snack on hand, such as almonds, you know what you are eating.  You know the calories.  You know the nutritional detail.  You know whether that fits into your plan or not.

The great thing about the paleo/primal way of eating is knowing what you put into your body.  Instead of purchasing products that have a lot of additives, chemicals, preservatives, etc, you eat something that is usually a single ingredient or just a few.  But you know they are whole food sources, good for you, nutrient rich for the calories, and will keep you on track with your goals.

Now you could any reasonable whole food diet and produce results.  Maybe you cannot break free of starches, so you decide to do a lower fat, higher carb diet.  If you are focusing on good carb sources, you could get results.  Any diet that provides single ingredient, non-processed foods or foods that are good for you will produce results.

Now, I can already hear people saying:  “But Brent, Shakeology is NOT a single ingredient food!”

You’re right, and the strict paleo’s would denounce me as not eating true paleo for drinking it.  And that’s fine.  So be it.  I’m pseudo-paleo, and fine with that.

But this is (as I’ve mentioned before) a situation of not throwing the baby out with the bathwater.  Shakeology is a collection of whole food ingredients.  Similar to making a big salad with lots of little things, Shakeology is the same.  It is good for me, and that’s why I drink it.

But it fits into my overall diet.  It is my main carb source when mixed the way I like.

It’s part of my focused nutrition plan.

So let’s do this:  What are you currently eating?  Tell me:  Does it fit into your plan, or does it detract from it?  Use the comments section below to answer.

Brent insanity, Nutrition And Diet insanity, P90X, p90x2, paleo, primal, Shakeology

So while not technically day “60″ I consider this my P90X 60 day measurments and photos using The Abs Diet as my nutritional regiment.

I had a better rate of body fat loss during this phase and shed some additional inches.  I’m going to list my starting/current measurements to give a perspective of progress made so far during this round of P90X.

Chest:
Start:  42.5″
Current:  41.0″ (-1.5″)

Neck:
Start:  15.5″
Current:  14.75″ (-0.75″)

Waist:
Start:  39.0″
Current:  36.5″ (-2.5″)

R Bicep:
Start:  13.0″
Current:  13.25″ (+0.25″)

L Bicep:
Start:  13.25″
Current:  13.5″ (+0.5″)

Hips:
Start:  38.0″
Current:  37.0″ (-1.0″)

R Thigh:
Start:  21.0″
Current:  19.25″ (-1.75″)

L Thigh:
Start:  21.25″
Current:  19.9″ (-2.25″)

Weight:
Start:  183.8 lbs
Current:  173.8 lbs (-10.0 lbs)

Body Fat:
Start:  18.95%
Current:  16.17% (-2.78%)

My body fat decreased by nearly 2% in the last 4 weeks, so the muscle build/clean eating combination is starting to kick in a bit.

Here are a couple of pictures showing the difference between days 0 and 60.

So, tomorrow starts P90X Phase 3 with Chest and Back and Ab Ripper X.  My goal is going to shift from an 8-10 rep set to 12-15, with focus on 12 reps (will shoot for 15, but want to be struggling by rep number 12).  I’m hoping that doing this will increase my fat burn over the next 5 weeks.

Thanks for following my progress…this has been a fun, exciting, and humbling journey.  I’m looking forward to finishing out this round of P90X strong and seeing where my results are in 5 weeks.

Brent Fitness VIdeos P90X, P90X Results

This is my P90X Transformation in 2010.  I knew I had made a lot of progress, but reviewing these pictures several months removed from when they were taken, I’m amazed at the progress I made.  No, I didn’t have a 6 pack, but that’s hard to accomplish going from a 47″ waist (or a 44″ waistline starting in 2010) to get down small enough.

This was only 9 months of work!

I can only imagine what 9 months of working out is going to do for me this year.  Granted I did gain a little bit back while I let my shoulder heal (and ate poorly…almond bark covered pretzels became like crack in my house), I’m losing at a great rate now.

I’m proud of my P90X results video to just demonstrate what can happen if someone really focuses.  My goal for 2011 is focus for all 12 months (going on a cruise in December, so must keep on it!).

So here’s my secrets to success:

1.  Push play everyday.
2.  Use Shakeology
3. Got a lot of fat to use?  Use the Beachbody Slimming Formula.
4. Eat 90% clean, but take some cheat meals here and there to keep sanity.
5.  Track results.  Pictures, measurements, etc.  Use these to keep accountable.
6.  More than anything, enjoy the journey…embrace the journey!

Brent Fitness VIdeos P90X, P90X Results, p90x transformation

Yesterday was P90X Day 90, so that wraps up this round.  It was also the last day of my 3 day Shakeology cleanse.  Yoga was tough at the end, but glad to get through it.

Last day of the cleanse I dropped another 1.2 pounds for a total loss of 6.2 pounds.

Now, for my P90X 90 day results.

Weight:
Start:  183.8
End:  166.6

Body Fat:
Start:  18.96%
End:  14.78%

Neck:
Start:  15.5″
End:  14.5″

Chest:
Start:  42.5″
End:  39.5″

Waist:
Start:  39″
End:  35.5″

Hips:
Start:  38″
End:  36.5″

My arms stayed almost the same, just with less fat.  My legs went down about an inch each.  Overall, a solid fat burn.

Here are just a few 0/90 day comparisons:

Brent Fitness VIdeos P90X, P90X Results

Ok, anyone who just glances at my blog knows that I am a coach with Beachbody and I support all of their products.  I use a good portion of them purposely (they work).  But, one product in particular can be fairly controversial with a Primal Blueprint style diet.

Shakeology, of course.

So I decided to do an experiment on my own body:  Eat primal, do not take Shakeology often (or at all), high protein/no fat breakfast, more carbs are night, etc.  I decided to do this after reading some post out there about a study where the participants ate more carbs at night, less in the morning, and how it affected their leptin levels, their weight loss, etc.

The results:  Not pretty.  In 2 weeks, I managed to only lose .25″ off my waist, only .2% body fat.  .2%!  That’s ridiculous for someone in the 18% range.  I ate at a deficit each day, exercised at least 3x a week (first of 2 weeks was doing P90X, the second I decided to let PT do it’s job and recover some from this impingement).

Not only did my fat loss nearly stop, but I was more irritable (ask my wife).  I didn’t sleep as well.  I did not feel as good.  I started having cold like symptoms.  I had cravings (MASSIVE cravings for sugar, breads, etc).

Moral of my story:  I’m not doing that again.  In fact, I’m going to revert back to how I was doing it:  More carbs in the morning post workout, veggies mainly at night.  I may mimic the Asylum style diet where no carbs at night, and a carb at lunch 2-3x a week (I’m thinking 1/2 a sweet potato at lunch every now and then).   I’m also going to log, for one week, everything I put into my mouth again to make sure I’m eating enough.

But Shakeology will be on that list everyday.

Brent Nutrition And Diet P90X, primal blueprint, Shakeology

Being one month into P90X and having dealt with shoulder issues this entire time, I feel like I can comment a bit about what causes shoulder issues with the program and modifications that have worked for me during this rehab period.

First, let me stress that you should always listen to your doctor or physical therapist.  They know best.  If you want to continue to train with P90X, ask them about it first, and then follow any modifications they may have.

Here is what I have discovered is best:

Push-ups:  Doing these from plank is okay if you can do them pain free.  But, if you are having shoulder issues, you probably are not pain free doing these.  Here’s my suggestion:  Do them from your knees.  Focus on form.  Bring your shoulder blades together, keep your body tight and straight, and only go through a pain free range of motion.

As you get stronger, incorporate medicine balls and do not go as deep.  Instead, focus on form and keeping stable.

Pull-ups:  If shoulders are bothering you, do the pull-ups to a 90 degree angle with the upper and lower arm, but never go past that until released from your doctor or therapist.  Make sure to use an assist too.  I personally use the pull-up assist Beachbody sells and it works great for this.

Bicep Curls:  You wouldn’t think that bicep work could cause shoulder issues, but if you are dealing with impingement in the front of the shoulder you may notice that bicep work causes inflammation, tenderness in the upper arm and up by the collar bone (just below it, near the shoulder actually).  You can still do curls, but you may want to lighten your load.

Triceps:  Do these through a pain free range of motion, and may want to consider less weight.

Shoulders: Overhead/Military Presses/Deep Swimmers Press – Be careful here!  If you are impinging, these will not feel good.  Talk to your doctor/therapist before attempting these.

Upright Rows – Usually pretty safe if you are in a strengthening phase of rehab.  Again, focus on pain free range of motion.

Shoulder Flys – Pain free range of motion only.  When doing straight arm shoulder flys do not go directly out to your side.  Instead bring the weights in a bit.  It puts less stress on the shoulder, will cause less injury, but still works the same muscle groups.

Back work (Lawnmowers, back flys, etc):  I have not had too much discomfort with these.  My therapist did like the idea of me working these muscle groups.  If you can do these without pain, do it.

More than anything (and read this in your best Tony Horton-esque voice):  Modify, modify, modify if you need to!  Listen to your body and do the right thing.

Brent Fitness Tips, P90X P90X, p90x impingement, p90x physical therapy, shoulder pain

I’m in my 3rd real full week of P90X (excluding the first two weeks of the year, where I just did cardio and abs) and I’m already seeing things I need to adjust, both in my diet and in my exercise.

For starters, I’m taking 2 recovery weeks.  Yes, that’s right….two.  I think it is best for my shoulders that I take a bit longer to rehab them in recovery.  Phase 2 can be brutal.  The shoulders are feeling okay minus the left bicep tendon (deep discomfort here).  I think two weeks of just doing PT and swapping in P90X2′s Recovery and Mobility will do me a lot of good.

Then I’ll hit phase 2, recovered, and hopefully stronger.

For my diet, I ran across an article from Mark’s Daily Apple forums about the effect of low/no carb breakfast with heavier carb suppers.  The results were greater weight loss, better leptin levels, better sleep, etc.  So I have started making that shift for the next 2 weeks and see how it goes.

That’s all for today.  Plyo rocked…my world again.  This routine never gets easier!

Brent P90X P90X, primal blueprint