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What I learned from 365 days of perfect nutrition.

What I learned from 365 days of perfect nutrition

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It all started with a little experiment that is described in a blog I wrote about a year ago called “My no carbs, no running 5K program”. Check that one out HERE.

At the end of that blog I mentioned that I was going to go a little further down the rabbit hole and see where it took me. The rabbit hole did lead me to an encounter with Dr. Evil in Las Vegas…but we will get to that later. I’m back to blogging one year later to talk about what I learned.

Here are the basics of the nutrition plan that I followed:

  • I broke up my nutritional program into two phases.
    • Phase One would be a no carb and no cheat day/meal diet plan. The only “carbs” I ate were from green vegetables and nuts.
      • In this phase I focused on protein, healthy fats, and veggies. I did allow myself to have grass fed beef to help me up my healthy fat and overall calorie content as I was not trying to lose weight.
      • I was going to stick to this phase until I felt like I was not performing well with my workouts and needed to add in some carbs.
      • I ended up using this plan for the first 9 months of the program.
    • Phase Two is the same as Phase One except I added in one healthy carb (fruit only) load day on Saturdays.
      • So on Saturdays I was allowed to eat fruit with each meal.
    • During this entire 365 day experiment I was 100% gluten free and 100% artificial sweetener free. Just by doing these two simple things I saw some amazing results with my energy levels, digestive tract, quality of my sleep, and my workouts.

So what the heck was the point of this? I obviously enjoy eating healthy and reaping the benefits of that. I also enjoy being able to lead by example with our clients. The REAL driving force behind this 365 day experiment was that I really enjoy a good challenge. I feel like, as human beings we have to consistently push ourselves outside of our comfort zone and do things that are difficult. We GROW and get better or we become weak and slowly die each day. I have always enjoyed doing things that other people would never do. When I was in college I competed in powerlifting and the squat was my weakest lift. I did some research and found a crazy Russian program that involved squatting almost every day of the week. All of my buddies and coaches said it was a bad idea but I was up for the challenge. I couldn’t walk correctly for about 6 weeks but when I tested my squat again I had added about 60lbs to my max and I was a lot mentally stronger as well.

So I attacked this nutritional challenge with the mindset that I was going to learn everything I could along the way and come out the other end better. I didn’t weigh myself or track any stats because my goals weren’t oriented towards those things. I can tell what I look like in the mirror when I weigh between 220lbs and 225lbs with low body fat and that was all the verification I needed this past year. I mainly wanted to focus on attacking each obstacle as it presented itself. I know that this is a huge issue for people that are trying to follow a nutritional plan. What to do when “life happens”. A few times a year I will get a client email that sounds something like this:

“I need to put my program on pause because “XYZ” has happened. I’m under a lot of stress right now and something had to give and that is going to be my nutrition for now.”

We are always there to support clients in this situation but when I read emails like this I always think “WHY?”. Is eating poorly going to help you deal with stress? Aren’t you going to have to eat anyway? Doesn’t it take the exact same amount of time to eat something healthy as it does something that is not healthy?

So with this 365 day challenge I wanted to really analyze each life situation that popped up and learn from it. I had to figure out how to stay on my plan no matter what came my way. I kept track of some of the things that I had to learn how to deal with. Here is the summary list:

  • Every single holiday and holiday parties
    • What I learned: When you aren’t focused on feeding your face during a holiday meal it helps you focus on the people. I had the best holiday season in recent memory because I was 100% focused on the experience of connecting with the people around me. This was truly awesome!
  • My birthday, my son’s birthday, everyone else’s birthdays, and kid birthday parties.
    • What I learned: In this category the most intense situation was taking my kid to other kid’s birthday parties. Large groups of small humans STRESS ME OUT. That added stress factor combined with the seductive aroma of unlimited pizza was a test….at first. Then something happened. My four year old Henry was offered some pizza at one party and he said “NO, but can I have a bowl of broccoli?”….NOW I SWEAR that I didn’t put him up to this…the kid actually hates pizza! So that inspired me to stay strong and then it was no problem from then on.
  • Sickness and injury
    • What I learned: I push the limits pretty hard with my body and when I’m sick or injured I become a super wimp. I was only sick once, nearly puking during a Wednesday 6am FBI class (Shout out to Coach Kerri for taking over mid class!). Once I was able to resume eating I just found some organic/all natural chicken and veggie soup. I’ve been dealing with back spasms for about the entire year also. Injuries can stress some people out but they really just motivate me to go into super recovery mode and be extra healthy to speed up the process.
  • The health of friends and family
    • What I learned: I had two pretty scary incidents of having to make visits to the emergency room. I sat and watched my father get his heart zapped back into rhythm on one occasion and the other was a great client and friend who had a seizure. Traumatic events like this can drive some people to eat due to the stress. Again, I had to look at the situation and consider “Will eating poorly in this situation help or hurt?”. Do I need to spike my blood sugar and go into a food coma?…..HELL NO! It is moments like these that your friends and family members need you to be sharp and at your best so eat accordingly.
  • Travel (Chicago/Las Vegas)
    • What I learned: I take a business trip to Chicago four times per year. This trip is easy because I know my surroundings, where I can score some food, and I can bring lots of supplies because I drive and have a fridge in my room. Vegas was a different animal altogether. This trip was during my last week of my challenge also so that made me extra motivated to dominate the experience! I just had to really plan each day and learn as much as possible. I had plenty of protein shakes, bars, almonds, jerky, etc to get me through as needed. Then I found places to eat where I could get veggies and meat. Not even Dr. Evil could stop me from eating healthy!
  • Work Stress
    • What I learned: Any business owner will tell you how stressful it can be to run the show. Stuff happens all of the time that needs to be taken care of. I admit that I do have a huge advantage that my work environment is 100% healthy so that helps tremendously. I’m always motivated to be a product of the product so work stress is never really an obstacle to me staying on my nutritional plan.
  • The birth of baby Hannah
    • What I learned: This would have been a very easy time to break the rules and everyone would have understood, but I just couldn’t go there! We lived in the hospital for four days and welcomed our new daughter to the world. I just had to make some trips back home or to the gym to pick up supplies because the hospital food was always questionable. I kept a cooler in our room and once again…I was able to focus on the experience….the WONDERFUL experience…instead of stress eating.

Here are a few takeaway thoughts:

  1. The concept of food addiction is tricky. Food addiction is unlike any other addiction because you HAVE TO EAT in order to survive. We can’t just quit eating like we can with smoking, drugs, etc. After this experience I feel a little differently about the word “food addiction” though. I kind of feel like it is more of a combination of having cravings, some low willpower, low self esteem, and high stress more than being addicted to things like oreo cookies. The good news is that one thing can fix all of those things and that is POSITIVE MOMENTUM. The further I went along with no cheat days/meals the easier it got. To tell the truth…I kicked this challenge’s ASS!
  2. I know that some of you are starting to think about how you can apply all of this info to you. My advice would be to start small, make it low pressure, and include someone else. A great example would be to do a no cheat challenge with a family member or workout buddy for one month. Build from there once you have positive momentum established.
  3. What happened on day 366? Protein and veggies baby! It would defeat the entire purpose of this challenge if I broke the rules on the first day after the challenge was done. That would be like going through rehab or alcoholics anonymous and then celebrating with a beer at the end. Day 366 just meant that I had successfully completed what I set out to do and I was pretty damn proud of myself. Onward I go!

If you have read this deep into my little manifesto I thank you! Here’s one last little take away for you. Your nutrition, and really life in general, all come down to choices. When you come to an obstacle or a fork in the road will you choose to make the strong minded decision or the weak minded decision? With each strong decision made your willpower muscle builds and life gets easier. I challenge you all to challenge yourselves and push outside of your comfort zone every chance that you get. THAT my friends will enable you to truly LIVE and have amazing experiences along the way!

Be sure to kick me an email and let me know when you push yourself outside of your comfort zone and CRUSH an obstacle that life throws at you: [email protected]

Until next time…..Make Progress Not Excuses!

Adam

donovan

It’s All in Your Head - From Good to GREAT

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So Michael and I were dancing at a communal Arthur Murray event this weekend (disclaimer: the above are NOT us as no amount of Nair and spray tan for him or peroxide for me will make that happen) , and like all endeavors, some days are better than others, but overall we were feeling pretty good about our efforts. Then the “pro shows” happen. The people who do this for a living show exactly why they are the teachers and we are just hoping to get a tenth of this going on one day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=29&v=3qd-jM3JRO0

So that’s pretty intimidating! And much like a first-timer or returner to the world of fitness, you’ve got a few ways to respond to that.

(1) Completely freak out that there’s no way you’ll ever be able to do that and be bummed that you didn’t start this AGES ago and wonder why you’re here trying to pretend you can be good at something when there are all these people leaving you in the dust.

(2) Come back over into realityland and recognize that there are ALL levels of achievement. Some people came to the game earlier than others. Some people may be more naturally gifted, and some people have just worked really hard for a long time to make it look easy.

(3) Tell yourself that you are you, and you can’t really compare your journey to anyone else’s, but that with enough effort and focus, one day that CAN be you IF that’s where you choose to put your focus.

Or you might want to go through ALL those steps! Just make sure you end on number 3 :).

We had a coaching lesson with the above gentleman, and in the way of all great coaches, he showed us how we were good, but let us realize what was holding us back from being great.

So when you are freaking out that you might get called to the Golden Mat in FBI, or trying desperately not to make eye contact with Bill when he’s heading in your direction with a handful of weights, or wishing for Kerri to walk past so you can pop up out of that squat and hold really quick behind her back, just know that holding that pose and trying that weight EVEN if you put it down, and pushing just a little harder for those 90 seconds will all make YOU better. There will ALWAYS be someone stronger or faster or more flexible, but keep chasing that dream, and know that you’re inspiring someone else without even realizing who that is.

All the best,

Marcey

Coach Marcey Tidwell is started as a client with NGPT in January 2011. Joining the team as an accountability coach, she wears many hats in assisting the Meltdown Nation! Nurse Marcey by day, she brings a wealth of knowledge the program!

Five Simple Tips to Maximize Your Protein Intake

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One of the most common topics I get questions about is protein. There is so much information available on the web that a person can become easily overwhelmed. I want to provide five simple tips that can help anyone maximize their protein intake for optimal health and wellness. Anyone that works out a few times a week knows how important protein is. Our muscles are composed of protein and it is important to have a solid protein regimen to ensure proper recovery and lean muscle growth.

  1. Add a protein source to every meal or snack throughout the day. Most people struggle to consume enough protein. Getting in a little bit at every meal or snack will add up. By dispersing our protein intake throughout the day we will have a steady stream of amino acids flowing through our system as well. This will provide great recovery benefits.
  2. Consume a protein shake within 30-60 mins post workout. Protein shakes are engineered to digest easily and absorb quickly. The post workout window (30-60 minutes following a workout) is a key time to get protein into our body for recovery purposes. You want to consume a protein source that digests quirky and easily. Meat or vegetable protein will digest at a moderate to slow pace so my favorite post workout protein choice is a protein shake. My new favorite brand of protein shake is called About Time. You can check out their website at www.tryabouttime.com. This is an all natural, gluten free product, that is naturally sweetened and tastes AWESOME! There are about five ingredients on the label that you will recognize as real food. Some protein shake labels look like a science experiment! We carry this product at our NGPT studio for $38 and our bootcampers get a discount on top of that.
  3. Add vegetables and a healthy fat source to your protein for the last meal of the day. With our final meal or snack of the day we want something that will fill us up and digest slowly so that we have amino acids in our system as we sleep at night. I would recommend using a meat based protein source and you should add both a healthy fat option and a non starchy green veggie to this meal as well. A great example would be salmon(protein/healthy fat) and asparagus(green veggie). Another example would be a spinach salad topped with sliced whole eggs and avocado.
  4. Use a variety of protein sources. Not all protein sources are built the same. The nutritional profile will vary from source to source. Many people have their “go to” protein source and that is ok, but you do need to mix it up for complete nutrition.
  5. Consume enough protein to fit your fitness and recovery needs. This final tip can get a little tricky. I’m not super comfortable with recommending a specific amount that “everyone” should shoot for. Everyone will have unique protein needs. You need to get enough to allow you to recover from your workouts and allow you to make progress towards your health and fitness based goals. Most people I have worked with tend to consume too little protein. When you look at RDA recommendations the amount falls in the 60g per day range and that is way low, in my opinion, for anyone that lives an active lifestyle. That might be a good starting place for a novice but I would ramp up the intake over a few weeks to see if recovery and performance improve. My personal “protein sweet spot” is about 1g of protein per pound of bodyweight. So I take in about 225g per day. It is also important to note that I am in a bodyweight maintenance mode so if I was trying to drop weight, that amount would be a little less in order to lower my overall caloric intake. Your daily protein intake might vary a bit also. If you are super sore try adding in a little extra for recovery purposes. If you aren’t hitting the workouts very hard you may need to dial the amount back. It is a great idea to work with a physician to monitor your blood work to be sure your body is getting enough protein and digesting it properly.

I hope these five simple tips allow you to hit it hard in the gym and recover faster!

The PT Interview: How to find a personal trainer that best suits you

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I always get bummed out when one of our clients moves out of town. We all get so attached to the people in the NGPT community that it is hard to say good-bye. One of the conversations we almost always have as people leave town is how they can find a trainer/gym that will fit their needs in their new home town. I thought it might be handy to blog a bit on this topic so that you can use these tips to find yourself a high quality fitness professional to work with!

Here are five basics that you MUST look for:

1. The personal trainer should be insured. If they don’t have insurance then they aren’t serious about what they do or this could be a sign that the company isn’t in a good financial position.

2. The personal trainer should have some sort of a certification. Some good ones to look out for are the ACSM, CSCS, or the ACE certifications. The ACSM and CSCS are a couple of the toughest certifications to acquire because you must have a college degree in a health related field to even take the test and the test is TOUGH!

3. The personal trainer should have some sort of a college background in the fitness field. Sometimes people do fall into the fitness industry from other backgrounds but it is always a good indication if they went to school for this. The red flag that you need to watch out for is if someone has kind of done everything else as a job and it “didn’t work out”….then they say “Hey I’m in shape so I’m going to be a trainer now!”.

4. The personal trainer that you are working with should be a product of the product….aka…..they should be in good shape and represent their company well. They should inspire you with their own fitness!

5. Look through their website (if they don’t have a website I would consider that a red flag!). They should have some results posted like pictures and testimonials from satisfied clients. The major red flag to look out for is if the trainer only has pictures of themselves on their site with no client results to speak of. Remember that the trainer is the one that is supposed to be in great shape. It is a whole different ball game to be able to help others reach their fitness goals. Also watch out for generic testimonials like “Wow…I love these workouts” and “Man…my trainer sure is CUTE!”…… Look for someone that has achieved results that are similar to what you would like to achieve and don’t be afraid to ask to speak to current clients that fit a similar profile to you.

If they pass the test with these five key points then they are definitely worthy of consideration. In the end you need to go with someone that gets you fired up about reaching your goals and motivates you to work hard every single session!

One last note….EXPECT RESULTS! Too many people get locked into the traditional trainer/client relationship where they show up, sweat, and hand over a check but no real measurable results are presented at any time. You aren’t paying to be sweaty and tired…your are paying for tangible results so don’t be afraid to ask your fitness pro to show you what you are getting out of your time, money, and hard work!