Countdown to Promotion: Penultimate Week

My promotion for sandan (third degree black belt) starts next Friday (July 8).  I wish I had another six months to prepare, or better yet a year, but I don't.  If you're new to the blog, here are the important details:  Promotions in my style are fairly rigorous physically (but not insanely so - we don't regularly hospitalize people during promotions or anything) and are taking place this year over a three day weekend.  I've been training since 1988, but I took a 12 year break from 1994 - 2006, and another year from late 2008 to late 2009, so I'm nowhere near as skilled as I should be.

Assuming you're trying to peak for an event like a promotion, a major tournament, or whatever kind of karate event you're participating in, there are a few things you should be doing.  Note that I'm going to assume that you: a) are not a professional athlete - no 3/day workout schemes here, I assume you have a real life that can't be put totally on hold; b) not a beginner - if you've been training for 3 months and you're testing for your first yellow stripe or whatever in two weeks, you need to just keep on training, not peaking; and c) not injured.  If you're hurt then you need to be dealing with that injury.

The first thing is to come to terms with what you can and cannot do in the last two weeks before a promotion.  If you've been training for years you're not going to get siginificantly better, skill-wise, in two weeks - you're not getting any better at kicking and punching.  You might be ablea to fix some technical errors of memory - for example, suppose you tend to punch with the wrong hand at a certain point in a kata - that's something you can work on, but if you just suck at something, you're probably still going to suck when the test date arrives.

You're also not going to get significantly stronger in two weeks.  Unless you are brand new to strength training (which you shouldn't be) neurological adaptions are slow to come by, and you can't build much muscle tissue at all in such a short time.  Getting stronger takes years, not weeks.

Your'e also not going to get much leaner in two weeks.  If you still have bodyfat to lose it's not going to happen now - putting yourself into a serious energy deficit at this point in time will leave you depleted and weak for your test, which is NOT how you want to present yourself.  If you're competing in a weight class event that's another story, but otherwise don't run yourself down by cutting back on food.

What you can do is improve your conditioning.  Maybe not by miles, but you still have time to add a few extra percent to your endurance while maintaining your skill and strength.  Here's what you have to do:

This week do some planned overtraining (sometimes called over-reaching).  Here's how:

• Every day do a hard session of skill training.  Don't focus on any one thing - remember, you're not going to improve much.  Do a few reps of everything in your syllabus - every kata, every combination, etc.  This is the time to make sure there aren't any kinks in your skills.  You're not going to develop wicked spinning kicks now, but if you haven't done any in three months you can sharpen them up quite a bit.  If you want to devote some time to really focusing on one thing, like your punches, do it after the test.  If you are sparring keep the pace high but the contact very controlled - this is NOT the time to do hard full contact sparring (because of the injury risk).
• Follow each skill session with a serious conditioning session.  As always, think in terms of doing high intensity intervals - work very hard for 10-45 seconds, rest, repeat.  Jump rope, sprint, do kettlebell swings, air squats, thrusters, burpees, bike sprints, etc.  Rotate your efforts - don't choose the same thing every day.  And don't do exercises that you've never done before - the soreness from starting swings for the first time can really hamper your efforts the rest of the week.  Also, do more than you think is probably good for you - really toast yourself.  And DON'T use karate skills for this part of your workout - don't do kicks until you're gasping for air.  It's bad for your kicks.
• Do just enough strength work to maintain your strength levels.  Maybe twice this week do an even more abbreviated session than usual - and follow it with skill training and more conditioning.
• If you can handle it, add a second conditioning session in the morning.  I try to get in a 4 minute workout - Tabata style sets of swings and thrusters with a kettlebell (Tabata protocol means 20s work/ 10 s of rest/ repeat).
• Do light stretching every day.  You're not going to work yourself into a split for the first time, but you want to work near the limits of your range of motion for all your muscles every day to stay limber and help with recovery.
• Eat plenty of clean food.  DON'T cheat by chowing down on ice cream and candy - instead eat plenty of protein and carbs in the form of meat, protein shakes, and starchy root vegetables - think lots of steak and sweet potatoes - to keep glycogen stores high and to improve muscle recovery.  This is NOT the time to try to trim off some excess weight - for two reasons.  First, cutting calories will hamper your body's ability to adapt to the training and make it more likely that you stay sore or get some mild injuries.  Second, if you managed to change your body composition now you'd throw off your balance and technique and you won't have time to adjust before the test.
• Make a special effort to cut back on possibly inflammatory foods.  Even if you think you're okay with dairy, this is not the time to push it.  Cut back on dairy, grains like rice and corn (you shouldn't be eating wheat ever anyway), vegetable oils (again, you shouldn't ever eat them, but...) and peanuts. 
• Do a TON of recovery work.  Foam roll yourself, use a self - massaging tool on sore spots (even better, get a massage or two, if you can afford them), sleep extra, eat more often (this is the week to be less than strict on your intermittent fasting schedule).
• Supplement with creatine, beta alanine, and acetyl-l carnitine to improve endurance.  Will they help?  Maybe, maybe not, but if you have the money this is the time to splurge.  Remember, we're peaking!

I'll write another post about the last week before promotion, but the general idea is we're going to taper off our training a lot and give our bodies a few days to heal, recover, and adapt to all the training.  If you time it right you can come into your test in the best shape you've ever been - and that's pretty much all you can ask for.

Spirit Training

I"m not sure how common this is (though I suspect it is pretty common) but my style tends to get together for extra - intense workouts every so often in a large group setting.  We do it for the new year (Kagami Biraki), an annual beach training, an occasional black belt only training - maybe 2-4 times per year.  Not every person attends every workout, but if you're in the area you're expected to make it to most of them.

The workouts are ineveitably preceeded and postceeded by some social interactions, as people are gathering who don't normally train together, and usually some meeting type stuff - announcements, administrative stuff, etc.  Then the workout.

These workouts are not very technical - there are usually a lot of people involved with a broad cross-section of skills, and communication is often difficult due to the size of the group.  The goal here is not fine tuning anybody's technique.  We're also usually packed nearly shoulder to shoulder, so nobody's going to do much in the way of moving - think lots of punches, lots of blocks, lots of squats/ knees, lots of pushups and crunches, and lots of kiais.

If you're not a martial artist you might not appreciate how taxing it is to, say, throw a thousand punches into the air, but if you're really executing with full force that's quite a workout.  Obviously it's possible to pace yourself and kind of half-ass the whole thing, but we try not to.  After all, you're surrounded by your senpai - your seniors - and you don't want to be the guy slacking off in the middle of the group when everybody else is giving 100%.

Now if you're a regular reader of this blog you know I'm not a fan of marathon workouts.  Long workouts lead to two results - either you pace yourself, which means spending a lot of time practicing half speed techniques, or you don't pace yourself and wind up exhausted, which means spending a lot of time practicing sloppy techniques.  Either way it's the wrong kind of neurological programming.

So why do I go to these events?  There are a few reasons.  There's a social dimension to them, of course (funny story - I'm lined up, randomly, next to this guy who seems familiar.  I vaguely remember him having been around when I went for my nidan promotion four years ago.  I talk to him, and he agrees that we saw each other then, but he knows me from elsewhere.  Turns out he was a year ahead of me in high school and we were on the football team together!)  There's a certain amount of social pressure to show up - the seniors like it when you attend these events.  But there's also a useful training aspect to the workouts.

Training to exhaustion, if you do it right (and by "do it right" I mean put real effort into every technique - I mean don't pace yourself) you're going to get a few benefits.  First, you're going to practice executing technique while exhausted - there are compensations you have to make, and it's not going to hurt to be familiar with them.  Should that be a primary focus of your training?  Of course not.  But once in a while you should remember what it feels like to throw a knee when you're exhausted, and practice mustering up force in your techniques while gasping for air.

This kind of training has an effect on your spirit - your will.  Think about the euphoria people express after finishing their first marathon or climbing a mountain.  Some of it is probably endorphins, sure.  But you also gain confidence in your ability to push through adversity, to push your own body to extremes, to work at your limit.  Most of your training should be done when you're fresh, in short bursts, which is great for developing skill, but it doesn't tell you anything about your ability to push the limits of your endurance.

Making it through these workouts is a bonding experience and a confidence building experience.  There might be an endurance training effect, but I wouldn't swear to it - not if you're doing these things infrequently, which is all you should be doing.

Here are the secrets to benefiting from spirit training:

• Don't pace yourself.  Really work - put everything you have into the first punch, even if you know that you'll pay for it later. 
• Focus on technique.  Don't get too, too sloppy - you want to be sore afterwards but not injured.  You're not going to be crisp on kick #273 - but don't throw your back out either.
• Sleep as much as you can the night before and after.
• Double your protein intake for the two days after the workout.  I recommend my magic recovery formula - 12 oz. milk, 2 scoops MetRx chocolate protein powder (not the meal replacement, just the protein), Rice Krispies to taste, once or twice a day.  Any animal based protein will do.  Probably not a good idea long term, but for a day or two it really helps with recovery.  If you normally do intermittent fasting, don't schedule any fasts for the days after the workout.  You need to be in full anabolism to recover.
• Double your fish oil for the same two days to control the inflammation.
• A little bit is good; a lot is not.  If you run a dojo and you try to do these, for example, every Sunday, you're doing the wrong kind of training.  Your students will start to pace themselves, and if they don't, they'll deeply ingrain sloppy karate into their nervous systems.  In my style we do these at most maybe 4 times a year - which seems about perfect to me.

The leader of our style always exhorts us to show "strong spirit" during these events.  It took me twenty years, but I think I understand at least part of what he means when he says that. 

Osu.

You are NOT a Pap Smear: The Fallacy of "Normal"

It's not normal to eat just once a day.

It is normal to eat a diet based on grains, with bread or cereal at every meal.

It's not normal to exercise five or six times a week, getting your heart rate over 180 each time and soaking through your shirt with sweat.


It is normal to have a few beers with your buddies every weekend.


It's not normal to spend your "free" time poring over nutrition and strength and conditioning books, videos, and blogs.

It is normal to gradually gain body fat as you age.

It's not normal to eat only grass fed beef, wild caught fish, and fresh fruits and vegetables.

It is normal to get most of your exercise by chasing your kids or playing some sports on the weekend.


It's not normal to turn down birthday cake at parties, beer at sporting events, and bread at nice restaurants.

It is normal to gradually lose muscle mass as you age.

It's not normal to have a cabinet full of powder, pills, and bottles of fish oil you chow through every day.

It is normal to build up a repertoire of drugs to control your blood cholesterol levels, pressure, and sugar levels as you age.

It's not normal to be 40 and able to knock out one arm pushups, one leg squats, handstand pushups, and dead hang chinups at any time.

The word "normal," like many words, is polysemous (has multiple meanings).  Normal can mean typical or average - when we say people "normally" lose muscle as they age, nobody is claiming that it is preferable or ideal to lose muscle, they just mean that it happens to most people.  But in other contexts "normal" can

mean adhering to some norm - some standard of correctness.  Like the result of a Pap smear.  An abnormal Pap smear isn't a good thing.  An abnormality on a CT scan of your brain doesn't make anybody happy - it's not a sign that you're super smart, it means you might have a tumor or a brain injury.  In those cases "normal" confers judgment on its object - to be normal is good; to be abnormal is bad.

A significant problem is that because we think with words, when those words are ambiguous or have multiple meanings our thoughts can become confused.  If we don't keep in mind that the different senses of the word "normal' are unrelated we can get caught up in various fallacies.  We can start to think that since eating bread is normal (in the sense that it is typical, or that most people do it) that it is good (in the sense that a normal Pap smear is good) or acceptable. 

I'm not just talking about uneducated people - the medical profession commits this fallacy all the time.  Ask most physicians about what you should do if you are over 40 and your hormone levels are significantly lower than they were when you were a teenager.  Most will say that your condition is normal - meaning that it is typical of an aging American - therefore they will not treat it.  The same way they wouldn't treat a "normal" Pap smear result - there's nothing to treat.  The problem is that while dropping hormone levels IS typical, it IS NOT good or healthy.  There IS something to treat there - an illness that happens to be shared by the majority of the population is still an illness.

Imagine a 19 year old college athlete went to the doctor and complained that they weren't as athletic, lean, explosive, or able to recover as quickly as they "used" to.  Contrast that with a 45 year old with the exact same litany of complaints.  How do you think their treatment would differ?  I bet the 19 year old would be offered a battery of tests and treatments.  The 45 year old would be told to rest more and take up some less strenuous sports.

It's NOT normal to eschew sugar and grains; to train hard while aging; to seek mastery of a physical discipline while still working a job and supporting a family; to train for extreme performance; to expect the health of a teenager as you pass 30 or 40 or 50.  It's not normal in the sense of being typical or average.  But it's not abnormal either, not in the sense of an abnormal Pap smear. 

Be un-normal.  Embrace it.  Strive to achieve physical goals that leave others shaking their heads; live a lifestyle that makes people think you're a freak. 

And if you doubt yourself - if the thoughts that being abnormal is bad start to creep into your head - go down to the nearest mall, sit near the food court, and take half an hour to watch "normal people" waddle around the tables.  Listen to them wheeze and huff and snort.  Then ask yourself if you really want to be normal after all.

The Paleo Bachelor: White Sweet Potato Fries

Single serving of Paleo Bachelor Sweet Potato Fries

To be clear, I'm not actually a bachelor.  I am, however, like a bachelor in that: a) nobody in my house cooks meals for me regularly; and b) I don't like to cook.  There are bachelors who like to cook, even some who are also straight, but they're few and far between.

If you're a good cook, the type of person who gets pleasure out of making a perfect wine reduction and who has more than 3 spices (salt, pepper, and chile powder) in your cupboard, the type who knows how to cut vegetables without losing fingertips, that's fantastic for you -you're well on your way to being a successful paleo dieter.  If, however, you'r elike me and find the idea of cooking a dish that takes more than 15 minutes, has more than 3 or so ingredients, or requires using a thermometer horrifying, then you might be a paleo bachelor.

The secret to succeeding as a paleo bachelor is to develop a list of easy to make, low prep time recipes that don't require too many fresh ingredients, too much cooking skill to create, or dirty too many dishes, yet still fit the paleo prescription.  How many recipes?  That's your call, but I'd say more than one.  I'm pretty tolerant of food boredom and even I get bored eating the same thing every day.

Every meal should start with a large portion of meat or eggs.  I personally also function better on a moderate amount of carbs - which means a nice load of sweet potato or some other tuber most days.  Occasionally I'll cook up a bowl of rice, but I try to save the grains for special occasions.

I was eating white sweet potato (there are many varieties, I have no idea how they differ) mashed and mixed in with ground beef most days.  Lately I got into the idea of eating steaks instead or mixing my ground beef with onions.  I don't like roasted or mashed sweet potato too much as a side dish, so I needed another relatively quick way to get it in. 

Store-bought sweet potato chips or fries would be a nice choice except they're usually cooked in horrific oils.  I tried to find a frozen sweet potato fry cooked in coconut or palm oil, to no avail.  So I decided to make my own.

The recipe is simple:
Tools:

• Vegetable peeler
• Knife
• Spoon
• Baking tray or dish
• Bowl
• Plate for serving

Ingredients:

• 1 or more sweet potatoes
• Melted coconut oil (enough to coat the fries)
• Seasonings - at least salt and pepper (I especially like garlic powder on these)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 Fahrenheit.
2. Stick coconut oil in bowl in microwave or over heat (depending on the bowl you're using) until liquid.
3. Peel sweet potato.
4. Cut sweet potato into slices, wedges, or fry shapes as you prefer.
5. Toss in bowl with coconut oil, salt, pepper, and any other seasonings you want - chile powder, garlic, whatever.
6. Spread "fries" evenly across the bottom of your baking dish/ tray.
7. Cook for about 15 minutes.
8. Turn over "fries" - use spoon.
9. Cook for another 10 minutes or until outside has reached desired crispiness.
10. Serve.

1 large sweet potato makes a single serving for me or enough for 2-3 normal people.  Experiment.  Cook the potatoes at least long enough to lightly brown the outside, maybe enough to slightly blacken it.

Yeah, I know, AGE's, blah blah, early death, blah blah.  You could steam these or cook them at a lower temperature.  But they're just sooo yummy blackened!

That's my first paleo bachelor recipe.  You can make these even if you aren't a bachelor, and even if you don't eat paleo.  But if you are a paleo bachelor they might be part of the cure for a lifetime of boring eating!

Reasons NOT to go Paleo

Check out this week's Paleo rodeo; some good stuff in there, as usual, from all over the paleo blogging world.

I'm continuing the Great Leucine Experiment.  Some thoughts:

1. The leucine tastes much better if it's dissolved in at least 12 oz. of warm water.
2. It still tastes pretty bad.  It also smells bad.  
3. I think it's working, but I've been less than perfect diet-wise, so it's hard to tell.  I'm also handicapped by my libraphobia.  Since I can't get on a scale it's hard to discern small fluctuations in bodyfat, especially when you add in the problem of my salt intake varying so widely (I don't watch my sodium intake very much).  If I eat a few ounces of prosciutto on occasion I'm pretty sure I'm going to retain water the next day, so that's going to disguise any visual evidence of fat loss.  Overall, it's hard to tell what's working and what isn't when you have an experimental population of 1.

I went shopping the other day (not my favorite activity) and realized that there are many good reasons not to start or continue a paleo diet.  Here are a few:

• You may receive unusual attention from the opposite sex.  This can be very disconcerting as well as being hard on your existing relationships (perhaps your marriage).  Let's face it, hotness is a curse (so I hear).
• You will likely need to buy new clothes.  I am in the midst of replacing all my size 38 pants with size 32's. I also need a new suit and some new shirts.  Thank goodness my shoes still fit.  This is time consuming, expensive, and bad for the environment (throwing away old clothes and getting new ones).  Sorry, environment!
• Many clothes off the rack will fit you poorly, if at all.  You may find the waists of regular (even loose fit) pants are too loose while the butt and thighs are tight.  Buy a belt!  Sorry, fashion!
• Some people will hate you for effortlessly losing weight - you're sabotaging their ability to excuse their own obesity.  Some will hate you overtly, others will subvert you by encouraging moderation (have just one donut!) or splurges (have some cake, it's your birthday - surely one piece of cake won't hurt!)
• As you age, your continued interest in physical activity will put you further and further out of touch with your peers.  Your old friends will gradually spend more and more time sitting in place and, eventually, in wheelchairs, while you pursue kickboxing, rock climbing, Zumba, and other high intensity activities.  This can be very alienating.  Sorry, friendship!
• Your continued mental vitality will make you acutely aware of how many stupid people there are in the world, preventing you from enjoying the relative bliss of a long, slow slide into dementia.  Sorry, peace of mind!
• You may find yourself annoyed and angry when you read articles by registered dieticians recommending that people feed their kids "heart healthy whole grains" instead of, say, bacon.  Knowledge is a difficult burden to bear.
• With your newfound energy you may find yourself doing more cleaning, home repair, and organizing, instead of living in a disintegrating craphole.  This is great as long as you enjoy cleaning, home repair, and organizing - which I don't.  
• Your doctor will try to convince you to eat more grains and vegetable oil despite the fact that your blood panels show you're in better health, by far, than (s)he is.

I could go on, but I won't.

Stick to your guns!  Eating right is difficult, but it offers serious rewards.  Try a strict paleo diet for 30 days and see how you feel.  See if that feeling is worth more to you than the joys of having toast with breakfast.  It's your body; your call.

Do as I say...

Not as I do.  Sometimes.

I seem to fairly regularly include in this blog descriptions of how I do things - how I eat, how I train, etc.  The intent isn't just to entertain people - when I say "I do X" I usually mean to say "I do X and so should you and here's why..."  Sometimes I write what I do as evidence that it's is doable - I'll write about how I eat or train to show you guys that a middle aged, untalented guy with little in the way of willpower, two young children and a full time job can make pretty good progress by acting according to the right set of plans.  Then I'm really answering somebody saying that they can't get in shape, get lean, or get better at karate.  Today I'm going to write about some things that I do because they're wrong - I shouldn't be doing them.  Because, much as I wish it were otherwise, I'm not perfect!

So here are a few areas where I'm doing the wrong thing and I know it (there are many other mistakes that I'm making and don't know about, but I can't write about them... just think about it).

• I don't eat nearly enough vegetables.  My diet is pretty good, most of the time, but I don't like veggies very much and I don't eat them enough.  You should eat like me, more or less, but with a ton more vegetables included (both in quantity and in variety).
• I don't do enough soft tissue work.  I never get massages and I rarely use the foam roller at home.  I've been working my hips and legs with a self-massaging device (kind of like a stone sphere set into a handle so you can roll it over your muscles), but I don't do it enough.
• I eat plenty of grass fed beef but not nearly enough organ meat or bone (obviously you don't eat bone, but you can make broth by boiling bones in water and get a lot of good nutrients that way).  No excuse but laziness.  If I could get a ground beef that was part liver/organ/kidney and part regular meat in 1 lb. packs I'd buy it, but I haven't found such a product (if you know of one please let me know).
• I don't do enough static stretching at night.  I don't do any before working out - which is good - but I think I'd benefit from another 20 minutes a night of stretching.  I'm just too lazy.
• I don't meditate enough.  For stress relief and improving one's concentration we should all meditate every day - at least for a while.  I don't.  No excuse.
• I don't hit stuff enough.  That's changing now that I have a Body Action System in my house.  Punching and kicking air is good but you shouldn't do it exclusively.
• I don't practice sanchin or tensho enough (should be every day).  Like I said, I'm lazy.
• I don't sleep enough.  That's probably not entirely my fault - I get a little insomnia and I'm trying to fix it, and if I slept the whole time I was in bed every night it would be enough.  So it's not like I'm up all night partying.  But, end result, not enough sleep.
• I don't work out outside enough.  Partly because I'm lazy, and it's winter, and partly because I'm allergic to grass and trees (the outside, I've noticed, is full of grass and trees).  

I'm sure there are others I couldn't think of (I"m not saying this list is the sum total of all my flaws by any stretch).  What's the point of this list?  Well, first of all, you should get that when I describe my lifestyle I'm not bragging, I'm quite aware that I fall very far short of what I ought to be doing.  I'm just doing better than I was doing, say, a year ago, and better than most people my age who don't pay attention to these things.

Keeping a list like this is also a key to making progress.  As time goes on I try to work on these things - not all of them at once, but in small groups.  This list was a lot longer a year ago.  I identified things I could fix and changed them.  I'm still doing that.

You, my reader, should write out a list like this (of your mistakes, not of mine).  Then pick a few of the items and start working to improve them.  Like my "I don't hit stuff enough."  I saw that on my list, asked for a BAS for my birthday, and now I hit it almost daily.  Every once in a while I need to re-do the list and pick new things to work on.  I'm about due now, actually!

Don't expect to eliminate the list completely, at least not in a short period of time.  Expect to add things to the list as often as you take them off, as you learn about new things you should be doing for your health and performance.  Stay on the path to perfection, don't worry about reaching perfection.

Osu.

The Great Leucine Experiment

I've managed to stay at pretty much the same level of leanness, maybe adding a touch of muscle, over the holiday season.  That's pretty good - in the past month I've had a Christmas/ New Year's vacation, my 40th birthday (with a corresponding party), and a trip to Florida to visit my in-laws.  As you can imagine, my diet has been pretty far from perfect and my training has been spotty.

Now I'm home for the foreseeable future, and I want to lean out fairly quickly.  I am going to a 3-day karate training weekend in July (with a lot of higher-ups from my style, probably including my first teacher) and I need to be able to perform well, which means lots of hard training this spring.  I'd like to be able to increase my caloric intake for that, but I don't want to do that until I'm as lean as I'd like to be.

My plan is simple.  To lean out I'm going to cut back on alcohol (I was having some gluten free beer, wine, or margaritas 3-4 times a week this past month, which is a lot for me and a lot of empty calories!), cut back on sugar (I tend to overdo the sugar, in the form of chocolate mostly, when I'm not careful), and limit my fruit intake, especially dried fruit (it's just too easy to ingest a ton of calories and a ton of fructose with dried fruit).  I don't plan to do anything in particular training-wise to lose fat, as my regular routine should take care of it.  I'll probably also try to occasionally cycle my carbs - reducing my carb intake for a day or a few days at a time.  If that negatively impacts my training I'll likely stop doing it.  These are all good things to do for anybody, even lean people, but I'm going to be more careful about them.

I'm also going to experiment with leucine.  This is an idea I had that is a shot in the dark - I'm not sure at all that it will work, but I figured I'd try.  The idea isn't really mine, it's based loosely on Martin Berkham's work, but isn't exactly what he recommends.  Let me explain.

Leucine is an amino acid, one of the branched chain amino acids (BCAA's).  BCAA's have been famous for a while now (maybe 15 or 20 years) for their ability to induce some muscle protein synthesis.  That is, if you eat a ton of protein that has a lot of BCAA's in it, or even BCAA's on their own, you get a big uptick in how much muscle protein your body manufactures compared to what you get from ingesting a similar amount of protein that is relatively poor in BCAA's or other amino acids on their own.  This happens because the BCAA's were seen to directly affect the mTOR pathway.  More recently research has shown that it's not the BCAA's as a whole that do this but really leucine (which, remember, is one of the BCAA's).

What's so great about muscle protein synthesis when you want to get leaner?  Well, two things.  First, the more muscle you build the more you'll have, probably.  Muscle burns calories, makes your workouts burn more calories, and, really, who wants to be lean and un-muscled?  I mean, what's the point of that?  Second, protein synthesis is itself energy intensive.  Building a pound of muscle burns a bunch of calories. So keeping mTOR active more of the day should help us lean out, as long as we can do so without ingesting a bunch of calories.

Remember that I only usually eat at night.  I eat a nice dinner around 5:30 or 6:00, usually after training, then a small snack (a handful of Brazil nuts and a little chocolate and fish oil) at 8:15 or so.  Other than that it's just water and some supplements and some fish oil in the morning.

If I want to keep mTOR active all day I could drink a whey protein shake (whey is very high in leucine) 3-4 times a day.  The downside of doing that is I'd be spiking my insulin all day, ingesting a bunch of extra calories, and possibly be doing more harm than good.  That's not even remotely intermittent fasting anymore.

My brilliant (not really) idea was to ingest leucine alone several times a day, during a time when I'd otherwise be fasting.  Hopefully that will activate mTOR, keep my body synthesizing protein, burning lots of extra calories, and adding muscle to my frame without adding a lot of calories to my system or spiking insulin very much (you can't really burn fat while your insulin is high, so having chronically elevated insulin levels is the #1 biggest no-no if you're trying to get lean).  5g of leucine (the amount shown in research studies to activate mTOR) is only 20 calories, so using it 2-4 times per day won't add too many calories to my overall intake, nor should it do a lot to insulin levels.

How do we ingest leucine by itself?  Now we're in the world of supplements.  I bought a tub of leucine powder for about $21 that should be around 100 servings - enough for 30-50 days of use, depending on how often I use it.  As experiments go, not too bad.  The plan was to take 5 g or so of leucine every morning, and then 1-2 more times during the day, to get the protein synthesis machine rolling.

Disaster struck.  Leucine mixed with water tastes like... I'm not sure what it tastes like, as I've never before put anything so disgusting in my mouth on purpose.  It's foul.  It doesn't mix well.  It's quite bitter - enough so that I alternate wanting to tear my tongue out with my hands with wishing I was dead so the taste would go away.  And it lingers on the tongue.

I tried mixing it with tea and sucralose.  The result was a horrible tea flavored sea of bitterness.  Then I tried mixing it with a LOT of water (12 oz. for 5g leucine) in a shaker bottle, holding my nose and just downing it.  Still pretty horrible, but I managed to keep it down.

Can I stick to it?  I'm not sure.  It tastes really bad.  I certainly wouldn't make a lifelong habit out of it.

There are BCAA preparations on the market that are high in leucine and contain flavorings to mask the taste.  If I can't keep downing this stuff I might try one of them.  They are, obviously, more expensive, and I don't want to ingest a lot of artificial coloring agents and sweeteners (sweet tasting things spike insulin).  I'll let you know how things go.

This whole experiment may turn out to be a bad idea for a few reasons.  The energy costs of the active mTOR pathway may turn out to be trivial.  Having mTOR active all day may counteract some of the benefits of fasting all day - I'm not sure my cells will do what I want them doing (engaging repair mechanisms, cleaning out garbage proteins from the cytoplasm) if protein synthesis is ramped up.  Like I said, this is a shot in the dark at a fat loss strategy.  On the bonus side, we're talking about a non-stimulant method of possibly increasing both calorie usage and muscle building, which would be pretty awesome for dieters.

I'll update this blog with results and observations as time allows.

Osu.

Before and During Photos

May 2009

December 2010

I promised before and after shots by Christmas - a promise I am now regretting, I assure you - but I'm a man of my word, so here they are.

I'm nowhere close to where I want to be, so I refuse to call these before and after photos, but I'm okay with before and during.  I'm in the midst of my transformation, it's not over. I hope!

The before shot is from May 2009, and you're going to have to take my word for the fact that I probably looked mostly the same in March 2010.  Basically, in May 2009 I decided to photograph myself every day, and hopefully lean out and have a very nice photographic display of the process day by day.  Well, that was a great idea but it didn't work out.  I don't even remember what happened, but I kept eating crap and stopped photographing myself.  I have about a week's worth of pictures and then nada.

So the changes in these pictures mostly happened between May 2010 (when I gave up gluten for good) and December 2010.  I've had some obstacles - injuries, sugar addiction, kids, and various other issues, nothing much more than anybody else out there who's trying to lose weight.

How'd I do it?  Paleo diet.  Intermittent fasting (I eat 1 big meal a day, at dinnertime, and that's mostly it).  Strength training twice a week, 25 minute each.  Karate 3 times a week, either class or training on my own at Bally's.

If you think I look pretty good, or at least a lot better than I used to, then thanks!  If you find yourself unimpressed, then I understand, but let me plead my case:

1. I turn 40 in 3 weeks.
2. I've been fat my whole life - this before picture isn't a guy who just let himself go suddenly, it's a guy who's been chubby and fighting it for 25+ years.  It's a lot easier to lose fat and gain muscle the first time you diet and start an exercise program than it is after 25 years of trying and failing to get lean.
3. I didn't use any of the tricks that can enhance an "after" picture.  No Photoshop, no tan, no shaving (obviously), no special effort to dehydrate.  In fact, I haven't worked out in several days - I hurt my ribs and haven't been able to train (though I doubt it would have made any difference).
4. I'm not a model.  I'm not trying to convince you that I'm worthy of the cover of Men's Fitness, just provide evidence that a certain style of training and eating can give decent results to a busy, regular, older guy without a lot of genetic advantages without taking up a huge amount of time or money.

I think that's the major point - #4 - that my physique is proof that you can make progress without doing a crazy amount of training.  My diet may be strange, but it isn't particularly hard to follow - I'm not hungry all the time or anything, I'm not doing 2 hrs. of cardio a day, I don't take any weird drugs.  These results, and better, are attainable by regular people.

Probably 75% of the reason for me to post these pictures is that I said I would, which has helped motivate me to stick to my diet the past few months.  In that spirit I'm going to try to repeat this post every month or so with fresh pictures.  Hopefully I can make some progress.  Maybe this summer I'll get a tan, so you won't be blinded by the glare off my chest.

Please comment if you wish.  I'd ask you to be kind, or gentle, but I think when you post pics like these online you have to be ready to be eviscerated , so consider me braced.  

Osu.

The Metabolism Myth(s)

There are a couple of myths - in separate categories - that I see promulgated in the fitness community and popular consciousness related to metabolism.  I thought it worthwhile to take a moment to clear them up.

Without getting overly technical, what we mean by "metabolism" is the calories burned by your body at rest - otherwise called Basal Metabolic Rate or Resting Metabolic Rate.  These things may not be exactly the same but they're close enough for our purposes. 

Basically, even if you sit on the couch and watch TV all day, your body burns bunches of calories just keeping your heart and lungs going, your body temperature normal, and maintaining itself.  This sounds like a great thing, right?  Calories burned means they're not being stored as fat.  So everybody and their mom wants a super high metabolism, which means your body is like a little furnace burning energy, and you can eat tons of food without getting chubby.

There are two general myths regarding metabolism:

1.  Eating food X or doing Y will elevate your metabolic rate.  This isn't always wrong, but it is usually wrong or overstated.  Stimulants (caffeine, green tea extract, and so on) might elevate your metabolism but only a little bit and only for a little while (you get used to them quickly).  Otherwise all coffee drinkers would be thin, and we can see that's not true.  Eating multiple meals a day won't work either - you get an energy burning effect from food (called TEF), but it's proportional to meal size, so splitting your bigger meals into smaller, more frequent meals will do all of jack for your caloric burn.

Vigorous exercise will elevate your metabolism as your body repairs itself, but it's not an enormous increase.  Would burning an extra 50 or 100 calories be nice?  Sure, but that's what, half a Twinkie's worth of calories?  It's not exactly a licence to eat junk food.

There are supplements that will significantly elevate your metabolic rate, but they tend to have serious side effects - thyroid hormone among them.  I am far from an expert on the use of pharmaceutical substances to aid fat loss, but they're out there and your nearest pro bodybuilder is probably using them.

Here's the bigger myth:

2.  Raising your metabolic rate is unequivocally good.  This isn't so much something people say as what they imply.  Marketing campaigns for various products will often tout how good they are for your "metabolism."  Diets do the same thing.  A particularly egregious exampe is the High Everything Diet (I won't provide a link because it's crap, but feel free to google it).  The HED advocates say that by eating a certain way - lots of starch, protein, and fat but no juice or artificial sweeteners - you can elevate your metabolism and eat tons of food while losing bodyfat.

Here's my question:  even if they're right (and I don't think they are), would that be a good thing?  Do you want your cells churning away, burning tons of energy more than you need, sucking calories away from your system?

Think about a car engine.  What happens when two identical engines ar run at different rates - one faster than the other?  Outside of a pretty narrow range you can count on the higher-revving engine blowing up quicker than the other one.  Trust me, Formula One engineers don't turn the revs up when they think their engine might be on its last legs.  All those processes in the cell that burn energy - what else do they do?  They result in some damage to the cell, even if it's a small amount, as they oxidize all those lovely fats and carbs to generate ATP.  I'm sure there are few short term consequences to this, but over the course of a lifetime of wear and tear, do you want your cells working hard or gently when you're at rest?

If you want to be healthy and intact for a long time a slow metabolism might be advantageous.  Calorie restriction, the one way we know of to increase a mammal's lifespan, certainly doesn't make the cells rev faster or at a higher temperature.  It makes the animals run cooler and slower. 

I certainly wouldn't argue that slowing your metabolism more is always better, either.  Being cold and lethargic all the time, whether it extends life or not, is not a fun way to live. 

Take home message:  if you're lean, or in the area of lean, and relatively healthy (have a decent amount of energy, etc.) then speeding up your "metabolism" may not be a good thing.  Be wary of diets, exercise plans, and supplements that claim to do so - they probably don't work, and if they do work they might be limiting your longevity.  Conversely, if someone criticizes your healthful lifestyle on the grounds that it might slow your metabolism, just smile, nod, and walk away.  You can have the best revenge - outliving your enemies.

Osu.

A (Too?) Merry Holiday Season

I can't speak for everybody everywhere, but in this country, among my acquaintances, the holiday season often winds up looking like a 10 week eating binge where we get fat, decondition as much as possible, get a ton of presents we don't want and struggle valiantly to buy things for our friends who don't need anything.  Oddly enough, Christmas manages to dominate my life for a considerable period of time every year despite the fact that I'm not Christian and don't actually celebrate the holiday.

Now I can't help you if the holidays force you to spend time with family members you'd rather do without, but I have a few suggestions for avoiding some of the damage that you might otherwise do to your body and psyche.

Plan your de-load for the busiest time of year.  You should periodically back off from your training to give your body a chance to rest and recuperate.  Really ramp up your training - both intensity and volume - in the weeks leading up to the time when you'll be busiest (maybe Christmas - New Year's?)  Then, when you miss workouts, you'll be periodizing, not just slacking off.  You'll supercompensate during the "rest week" and come back stronger than ever.

Note:  I don't suggest you take a week off from training entirely.  Try to do some lower intensity strength training a couple of times and some dynamic stretching every day at least.  You want to recover, not de-train yourself.

If you're going to overeat, strength train beforehand.  People tend to think they should do tons of cardio before/after an eating binge.  Nice idea, but unless you're a real lightweight in the eating department there's no way you can burn off enough calories to outpace a good feast.  Do you know how much work it takes to burn 1,000 calories (a lot)?  Do you know how easy it is to eat 1,000 calories (well, at least for me, pretty easy)?  But if you can pack a grueling strength session before the binge you can try to shift as much of that excess energy into building muscle rather than just padding your rear end.  If you can come out of the holiday season with a little extra muscle you'll be much further along on the way back to fitness than if you gain fat and lose beef.

Blow your diet, but don't completely blow your diet.  Look, if you have the willpower to eat clean during the holidays, that's great for you.  But if you don't there are things to do to minimize the damage.  Here's my new favorite trick:

1. Figure out which food is your biggest problem.  I don't mean the one that does the most damage - I mean the food that most often leads you into an eating binge.  For me the answer is wheat.  I can overeat chocolate or ice cream easily, but the foods that really send me on a binge are all wheat based - bread, pasta, bagels, pizza.  Now wheat might not be your weakness - I'm not saying it is (although I suspect that more people have issues with wheat than realize it, because of gluten's opiate properties, but I could be wrong) - but figure out what is your weakness.  Don't forget to consider alcohol.
2. Make a rule for yourself:  Do NOT eat any of your "weakness food."  I don't mean eat it in moderation, I don't mean avoid it except in your mother's famous holiday dinner treat, I mean NONE.  Whatsoever.  
3. Make sure your rule leaves plenty of room for eating treats that aren't in your big problem area.  For example, I won't eat wheat, but I can eat chocolate and drink tequila.  See?  I'm not totally depriving myself of all that is good in the world, I am only totally depriving myself of my favoritest thing that is good in the world.  If necessary, bring treats you can eat.  Dark chocolate covered cashews are delicious.
4. People will tell you this:  "Oh, have some [food X] - it's Christmas!"  Ignore them.  If you wish, slap them.  You can say I gave you permission.  We could spend a lot of time going into the why's and wherefore's behind well meaning people trying to sabotage your diet, but I'm not going to.  Just smile, slap the person silly, and knock the cinnamon bun out of their hand.

In short:  make one single dietary rule and stick to it no matter what.  If necessary, eat yourself sick on foods that aren't forbidden by the rule - I might really pound back some ice cream or dark chocolate when I'm feeling weak - but don't violate your rule.  You'll see that over the whole season you'll end up much better off.

Ask for gifts that support your goals (think wish list).  Don't count on friends and family to buy you fitness equipment or martial arts DVD's - they're all too likely to get you pun-of-the-day toilet paper instead.  But if you're into fitness and karate most people will be happy to buy you stuff you actually want if you can let them know what it is.  Try using an online wish list - I've had great success with them over the years.

It feels weird to ask for presents - I understand this.  Try to remember that people want to get you things you'll actually appreciate.  If you need some ideas, here are a few (I have no financial relationship with any of these companies, aside from the fact that I give them money for stuff!):

• A Gymboss Timer.  Great for intervals and so forth.
• A heart rate monitor (I don't have a specific one to recommend, so no link.)  I think the next phase in my endurance training will be using a monitor to pace the workout instead of slavish devotion to a clock.  Plus, measuring resting heart rate can help you know when you're overtrained and if you're getting fitter, and who has time to stand around with their finger on their pulse for 15 s to measure it the old fashioned way?
• Get some books.  Supertraining by Mel Sif might just be the only training book you'll ever need (warning: very dense and technical.).  If you're in the mood for some martial arts philosophy try some of the books by the founder of my style, Kaicho Tadashi Nakamura (shameless plug, I guess!)  I've found value in everything I've ever read or seen from Pavel Tsatsouline - you can't go wrong with this stuff.   I have a bad habit of picking out training and technique books written by popular fighters - try some!
• Get some training equipment for the home..  Kettlebells?  Bands?  Weights?  Valslides?  A slideboard?  DVD's or books?  Spend half an hour browsing at Perform Better.  It's like porn for exercise junkies (that's like the second porn reference this week on this blog.  I'd better start cutting back).
• Get yourself a new uniform, new patches, a heavy bag, or new sparring gear.  I like Karate Depot, and Fighting Arts has awesome stuff but a small selection (disclaimer:  Fighting Arts is run by my former instructor - but he doesn't know I'm plugging it here, and as far as I know he doesn't know I blog at all).  I haven't done enough comparison shopping to promise there aren't better places to shop, so if you have time spend some of it on Google or whatever and look around.
• Pick up some martial arts movies.  Frankly, if you haven't seen Ong Bak an argument could be made that you should have your black belt taken away.  Get the movie "Black Belt," aka "Kura Obi" (again, not sure where the best deal is).  I think Kill Bill is one of the better martial arts movies of the decade, plus, hey, it's Uma Thurman - you can't go wrong.

This is far from a complete list, of course.  Depending on the situation (time where gifts will be sitting around) you might get some grass fed beef for the holiday.  You could get some supplements you've been meaning to try (which seems like a weird gift, but what the heck?) 

I'm asking for a Body Action System for myself - I am compelled by the website (I'm not saying it's good - I'll do a review after using it for a while!)  I'll also ask for Gray Cook's new book, a heart rate monitor, and a few other choice items.  The point is, anyone who feels compelled to spend money on me for some reason will have plenty of things to get me without resorting to whatever's in the bargain bin at Barnes & Noble.  Result - happy shoppers and happy me.  It's a win-win.

Get a designated driver.  Seriously, like I need to tell you not to drink and drive?  If you're going to overindulge (color me guilty on this one - I don't drink often, but when I do, it's usually too much) get a designated driver beforehand.  Stick to clear liquors - tequila's good - or gluten free beer (hard to find but not as bad as you'd think).  Wine is also fine.  Stay away from regular beer and malt beverages (gluten).

Surviving and thriving through the holidays is a combination of damage control and keeping your eye on your long term goals.  Look, if you're the type of person who can sit through a Christmas dinner and completely forego all the treats, that's a fantastic testament to your willpower and character.  But if you're not - and I certainly am not - don't use the holiday as an excuse to completely wreck yourself either.  You can do a lot of damage to your health in 10 weeks (I count the holiday binge as starting the week before Halloween, which is the earliest I'll dip into the Halloween candy, to whenever the leftovers run out, which is early January).

Regardless, have a great holiday season!

Osu.

A Primer on Intermittent Fasting

I've mentioned before that I practice intermittent fasting.  If you're familiar with the topic, you can probably skip this post.  If not (and many people aren't), I thought I'd write a brief introduction to the idea with some basic facts about what it is and why people do it.

We all sort of know what fasting means - it means not eating for a period of time.  Most people include an 8-12 hour fast nearly every day of their lives - when they sleep.  Some people talk about juice fasts or maple syrup fasts or "cleanses" - I don't want to discuss those too much other than to say that a juice fast or a syrup fast is like an eating program designed to give you type II diabetes as quickly as possible while cannibalizing as much muscle tissue as possible.  I can't imagine a quicker way to destroy your health and performance without using illegal substances.  When I talk about a fast, I mean something like a water fast.  In other words, eat no food (or very little food) and drink water, or possibly other low or zero calorie drinks.  For some people this means they'll include diet soda or tea or coffee, sometimes even with a small amount of cream or sugar - it has to be a very small number of calories.  I, for example, drink tea sweetened with stevia during my "fast," and I take some fish oil in the middle of it.  Otherwise no calories pass my lips. 

Intermittent fasting describes a lifestyle where someone periodically fasts.  I'd say that the fasts have to be longer than 12 hours - most people fast 12 hours a day (from after dinner until the next morning), so it doesn't make much sense to call that by a special name.  Fasting periods go from 16 hours (leangains) to 36 hours (ADF, or alternate day fasting, where fast from day 1 after dinner until day 3 breakfast).  Fasts longer than 36 hours are problematic because the chance of breaking down lean body tissue is too high.  Fasting frequency varies from daily (fast 16-22 hours; condense all eating into a shortened period, which is what I do) to weekly or even monthly (usually used with all day fasts from 24-36 hours).

Intermittent fasting is done primarily for two reasons: weight loss or health/longevity.  I'll talk a little bit about each.

Fasting for weight loss is a fairly simple idea.  To lose fat you have to establish an energy deficit - your body has to burn more energy than it uses.  People usually do this by trying to reduce their energy intake on a daily basis.  You can do the same thing with fasts - going periods of time each day or each week without eating.  Some find this easier to deal with - I personally find it easier to skip meals than to eat a small amount.  I'd rather just be hungry, and eat to satiation when I do eat, than graze all day.

Fasting for health/longevity is a more complicated issue.  Forget the cleanse myth that not eating will somehow help your bowels clear out fecal matter that's been stuck there for days or weeks - that's just not how your bowels work, as every surgeon knows.  On the other hand, periodic nutrient deprivation may force your body to do a whole bunch of things that improve health and extend life.  For example, when you don't eat your insulin levels tend to go down.  Insulin is pro-inflammatory and is implicated in a whole host of health problems.  Less insulin, less inflammation, less aging.  Another example is cellular autophagy.  Your cells accumulate junk organelles - damaged proteins and other molecules that don't do anything.  This junk is also implicated in the aging process - as the junk builds up the cells run less efficiently.  How do you force your cells to break down and clear out the junk?  Stop feeding them.  Without a flow of nutrients your cells will metabolize the junk for fuel. 

The science behind fasting for health/longevity is a lot weaker than that behind fasting for weight loss.  There is some evidence that fasting can reproduce some or all of the benefits of calorie restriction (which is pretty much the gold standard for extending life in anmials) without the drawbacks (loss of muscle and energy, lethargy, etc.)  I don't want to start quoting hundreds of studies here, but trust me that the evidence is mixed, but convincing enough for me.

At this point you might be somewhat interested but worried about all the things you've heard that are bad about fasting.  Let me guess - eating less often will screw up your metabolism, cause you rmuscles to waste away, kill your energy levels, make you miserably hungry, cause you to faint, and wreak havoc with your performance.  All untrue.  If you want, check out some of the sites I'm going to include at the end of this post to read up on the science.  Or, just think about this for a minute.  We evolved from hunter gatherers.  They often went periods of time without food - they didn't have refrigerators or supermarkets to shop at, and we know they weren't always successful in their hunts.  Do you think they evolved to pass out or waste away any day they didn't manage to get in 3 (or 4 or 5) square meals?  Do you think a species that got faint and weak at the first signs of hunger, right when they needed to be able to go out and hunt effectively, would be competitive biologically? 

I fast to help manage weight, to save time (I don't cook breakfast or lunch, and cooking a big dinner is not as time consuming as cooking three separate meals), and for longevity (I believe it will extend my life).  If I have a very hard day of physical activity planned - say, an 8 hour promotion or something - I'll snack during the day, but otherwise I train all the time without having eaten anything for 16-20 hours.  There was definitely an adjustment period when I first started this (which was about 3 years ago) but now there's no problem.

Fasting is absolutely one of those things that I recommend with reservations.  I believe it's good, but I find the evidence sketchy.  That just means the subject hasn't been explored fully, not that the idea is wrong.  As I learn more I'll share, through this blog, what I learn.  In the meantime, if you want to learn more check out some of these sites and resources:

The first stops: 

http://www.leangains.com/

http://www.eatstopeat.com/


For some more help:

http://www.warriordiet.com/

http://nutritionhelp.blogspot.com/

http://norcalsc.com/


I think I'm missing some, but that's a good start.