If you are in the Central US on Sunday, September 19th you MUST check out Prof. Loren Cordain’s talk at Pike’s Peak Crossfit. Paleo Shenanigans will run from 12:00-4:00pm and will cover:

1) The Origins and Evolution of the Western Diet: Health Implications for the 21st Century

2) Implementing the Paleo Diet with Contemporary Foods.

Theory, application…what more can you ask for?! Sign up here and be ready to learn about the most effective nutritional approach known, from the researcher who launched the revolution.

I LOVE Atlanta! Awesome town, great food and now lots of good friends. A huge thank-you to everyone who came out and a thank you specifically to Jeff, Melissa, Jules and Charles for not only hosting a kick-ass, back-to-back nutrition freak out, but for also making some damn good  curry on Saturday night! The NorCal Margaritas were righteous too!

This week we are in Austin, TX at CrossFit Central for the Black Box Summit!

CrossFit Nutrition Cert: BTB Atlanta, Day 1

CrossFit Nutrition Cert: BTB Atlanta, Day 2

Thank you to the Serranos for hosting the cert and a big thank you to everyone who came out for the day! Great questions and good energy make the day a lot more fun and educational for everyone.

UPDATE:

Here is the pre-cert reading that many folks did not get. Also, the shopping and food guide and the blank 30 day food log can be found in the FAQ.

Next stop: Back to back days in Atlanta!!

CrossFit Nutrition Cert: CrossFit Marina

Check out the email I received from Hans:

Robb-
I have had loads of clients lives changed from Paleo eating and CrossFit.  Much of it do to your site and work.  I have been stoked to get to see lives changed for real.  As for me personally, when I adopted paleo (Oct 2008 after your cert at GSX) in place of decent success from the zone, and I too was pleased.  Much leaner, much stronger, performance took huge leaps after being flat lined for some time.  I noticed sleep quality increased and common allergies went away.  This was cool no doubt.
However in April of this year I contracted the very rare Group A Streptococcus blood infection leading to streptococcal toxic shock syndrome.  This is the same shiz Oprah did her big “Super Bugs” episode on. (this actually aired while I was in the hospital leading to a near breakdown by my wife and family)  The first double hand transplant recipient lost both hands from this nasty stuff.
Long story short I was moments from being placed on a ventilator due to my lungs shutting down from the infection.  My liver was nearly non-functioning and my kidney’s were enlarging.  I was under the care of numerous specialists who collectively told my wife I most likely wouldn’t pull through.  She was preparing to tell my 8 and 6 year old boys daddy isn’t going to be around anymore when I made a turn for the positive.  After 3 day’s in ICU and a week in the hospital I was released to go home.  My infectious disease specialist visited me before I left.  He asked my about the foods I ate.  I explained the paleo deal and asked him “why do you ask?”  He said, “because I have no doubt this saved your life.  I have seen very fit, healthy people die from this stuff (10,000 people a year get this bugger and over a 1/3 die) and you are the first patient that didn’t need insulin during your stay in the hospital. (I’m unsure of the significance of this, but he explained when under serious infections most people are given insulin…)  Then he said while I was in a delirious state in ICU I must of heard him talking about administering insulin to which I argued “I don’t need insulin!  I eat in a way to control insulin sensitivity.  It’s why I don’t eat any freaking grains”  My wife was shaking her head thinking “even while he’s dieing he’s telling people to cut the grains.  he is crazy!”  What can I say, I believe it!
My pulmonary specialist was the next to visit.  He asked if I exercised.  I then told him about CrossFit and my recent love with oly lifting.  He said, “it’s a miracle you don’t have any permanent damage to your lungs.  The capacity and strength of them is quite impressive and your fitness is the reason you survived this.”  He said once you recover get back to it!  He actually may drop in our box and try CrossFit out for himself…
So I entered the ER at 203#’s and 8% body fat.  No weighing or measuring.  The few weeks before had PR’d C&J, Fran, Mile time trial, and max height box jumps.  I left at 178#’s a non functioning right shoulder (still rehabbing and getting functionality back) and a bit of pneumonia.  Now I am not complaining about the shoulder, since I have ALL my limbs and digits still!
From all my medical folks, I was lucky to be alive.
From myself and my wife and kids THANK YOU FOR WHAT YOU ARE DOING!
-Hans

One of the most interesting things about this is the profoundly improved insulin/blood glucose control Hans displayed while sick. LPS (lipopolysachride) is shed by bacteria and it seriously arouses the immune system. Sometimes to such a degree that the subsequent cascades of cytokines end of killing the individual. All of this represents a form of inflammation that has gone wildly out of control. If we have attenuated our basal inflammation by controlling insulin levels, reducing gut irritation, and keeping our n-3/n-6 fats in balance we are not only protecting ourselves from chronic disease but also acute illness such as bacterial infection and I’d wager things like the H1N1 flu strains. Rip appears to be spot on:

“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”.

A huge thank-you to all the folks who attended this cert and to Tyson and John of CrossFit 4800 for hosting the event.

I have to say, this was one of he sharpest crowds I’ve had. Folks obviously did their homework as questions were focussed on the next step or application of the material at hand, not just trying to clarify what was in the assigned reading. It really makes the day cook along when folks take the time to read the preparatory material and are ready to learn and engage in smart, informed Q & A.

CrossFit Nutrition Cert: Bozeman, MT

We had a BLAST at Team CrossFit: Elite Fitness Academy in Monrovia, CA. When Eric Leclair started this program he was (I think) the 20th CrossFit Affiliate. He and his program have been producing stand-out athletes and creating a culture of safe, progressive training for YEARS. Eric and his coaches know what they are doing, they are passionate about helping people and they make me proud to be associated with them. I cannot wait to come back!

CrossFit Nutrition Certification: Team CrossFit Academy

Update-

I’ve been taken to task on what I wrote and I need to address that. I mention below a “50-60% adherence” number and really tore it apart. When Tony wrote that originally he qualified that as being an arbitrary number, not a claim of accuracy. I was pretty spun up about all that and managed to remember what I wanted to remember to suit my needs. Not very professional, not an accurate portrayal of how the discussion really played out. 

Chris put up a good post in the mmmgood thread that I wanted to tackle on the front page. Some of you might have followed the spirited debate that followed one of the recent Zone Chronicles over at the CrossFit Journal site. Here is what Chris had to say:

This whole thing seems really odd to me. I thought the standard CF nutrition line (eat meat, veggies, nuts seeds, etc) WAS a paleo prescription and then the eat this in a 40/30/30 ratio bit was listed secondary?? Maybe that’s changed.

A few thoughts though…

The top performers when interviewed about the Zone seem to add fat and drop back carbs. Crunching numbers puts this broadly line with what is naturally achieved by going Paleo.

Pat Sherwood might resort to burgers etc when on the road if needed, but his home routine is pretty tight paleo excl the weekly cheat meal.

I doubt that the top performers are doing zone purely on bread, shitty cuts of meats and trans fats – I’ll bet they’re keeping the quality pretty high and minimising exposure to sugar, white flour and trans fats. Hmmm… Paleo-ish??

So, my thought would be that both approaches when used by those trying to max out performance leads to the same place – a higher fat, lower carb, 80-90% paleo-zone diet.

Converging paths based upon separate protocols. If you look at this from the CrossFit perspective where using multiple paths to the same goal is encouraged (see the 2K Rowing article from one of the earlty CFJs) its seems odd that you wouldn’t use both paleo and zone to minimise the amount of time it takes you to hit your goal of elite performance.

Moving on from performance to health, Paleo seems a sensible plan to adopt 90% of the time. With first hand experience of the benefits to health that paleo gives, I find it hard to swallow when people dismiss it.

Oh yeah – Chris – I’m UK based and run Crossfit Westcountry. I have firsthand experience with UC and a paleo/zone approach to management – drop me an email if you or your brother need anything.

End.

Chris, thanks for the thoughtful post and YES, a paleo (quality first) followed by Zone (proportionality) is the likely best route to optimum health and performance. I’m not sure what the disconnect is with this in HQ but it starts feeling a lot like “We are going to argue this point until we are the winners” regardless of the content of the argument. On the one hand I have this sense that I’m being portrayed as some kind of tee-totaler who advocates we never go off the paleo-reservation. When I make the point this is not the case but that food quality IS important the argument shifts to “Elite performance only requires adherance to quality foods 50-60% of the time…”

Come again? When I hear numbers like this thrown around to a COMPLETELY unquantified situation it really raises my hackles. Interestingly THIS is the realm of pseudo science, citing hard numbers for a very soft scenario. This does BTW remind me of the apparent “20% slop” we are supposed to be embracing within CrossFit…that will be another popular blog post…

Anyway, like Chris mentioned, folks who are turning top numbers are eating “clean” much more than 50% of the time…this is just a fact. If we wanted to get SLIGHTLY scientific about it I could send out a nutrition survey to all the qualifiers to the games, but this is only as good as people’s memories and honesty, so not super, but it would be something. The reality is people notice when they eat like shit too frequently, that frequency varies from person to person, and based on what the particular nature of the crappy food is. That’s actually a much more accurate portrayal of elite fueling than some arbitrary percentage. This also reflects what people actually experience especially with regards to the quality piece. In the nutrition cert  the topic of cheat meals is always a popular piece. I lay out two different scenarios. The first is a beer+pizza bender, the second is a nachos+tequila schwa-re. I tell people to try each one and let me know which one they feel like more shit from. Inevitably, the nachos+tequila leaves people much happier the next day than the pizza+beer. Why? Pizza+ beer is a truck-load of gluten. Coach Glassman told me he does not really buy the gluten gig. I also remember Coach talking about dropping a stack of research literally 2-3 feet thick on the desk of some physician who was decrying the Zone as dangerous….but the doctor would simply ignore the literature and still damn the Zone. I’m certainly feeling like that with regards tot he gut-health gluten gig. I guess the response is the same as what they used with the static about hyperinsulinsim…ignore it and press on.

A big thank you to Dave and Nancy of CrossFit Seattle for hosting this event! Seattle was just like I remember it: Cold, rainy…a little snow and boat loads of coffee! Thank you to everyone who braved the weather! Next stop: CrossFit Central in Austin, TX…Yeeeeeeeee haaaawww!

A belated thank-you to the folks who braved the weather and came out for the cert last weekend. Sorry for the late posting of the photo AND sorry for the missing pages of the lecture guide. Let me know if you have not received that by tomorrow via email.