The Four Week Paleo Challenge

The Four Week Paleo Challenge
Written by Nuno Costa

In the early days of CrossFit there used to be a nutrition seminar offered and I was lucky enough to have taken it. At that point I had been coaching for almost a year and most of my nutrition education had been self-taught. I had sought out information, read and researched what people were doing when I learned about the Paleo diet. Back then I was still doing triathlons, so my first impression was that it may not fit for me and my individual needs as an athlete. What I learned through experience and guiding others to give it a shot has been invaluable.

What I learned at the CrossFit Nutrition seminar reassured me of what I had read and learned – that the Paleo diet was effective! You might ask, what does the Paleo diet consist of and how do I do it? The Paleolithic diet is based on how our ancestors ate thousands of years ago. The main concept is that you eat real foods, things that aren’t processed, things that weren’t made in a factory, and things that are not man-made. Robb Wolf does a great job of going more in depth on the Paleo diet and its health benefits on his website.

Where do I begin though? The first suggestion I would make is to get rid of everything you have that is not real food – if you have it in your house, you will most likely reach for it when you are hungry. Once you clean out your fridge and your cupboards your next job is to go to the grocery store and stock up. Some general advice would be to stay out of the aisles – that’s where all the processed food is stored. Upon entering your shopping spree stick to the perimeter of the grocery store.

Make a commitment to try it for four weeks. Take before and after pictures so that you can see any changes that might happen in your body composition. I’d also suggest tracking some things such as your performance in your workouts, how you feel, how you look and how you are sleeping. Initially you may not feel great – this is normal with any sort of dietary changes, as your body needs time to change, adapt, and learn where to get its energy.

What is the big deal about Paleo? Most people have a hard time cutting out certain food group such as dairy, grains, legumes and SUGAR, of all things. We can have an entire discussion about cutting sugar out but we will do that on a separate blog post. Why cut out these food groups in particular? Most people find they may have an allergic or autoimmune response to these specific food groups. Some people are deathly allergic to certain foods/food groups and some people may have some milder responses to them such as runny noses, congestion, etc.  The health benefits of the Paleo diet range from stabilizing your energy levels, burning stored fat, reducing your allergies, reducing inflammation, improving sleep, clearing skin and potentially even providing more energy for your workouts [1].

We suggest you cut out these food groups from your diet for the four-week challenge and track the things mentioned above. Did your performance improve or get worse? What about how you look naked in front of a mirror? After the four weeks if you want to add these things back in you can do so but our recommendation would be to only add one of the groups at a time so you can see how you tolerate them and whether or not that group in particular is worth keeping in your diet. If you add them all back in at once you may not know which one negatively affects you.

Lastly, what about alcohol? More than likely our ancestors did not have this available – which means cut it out for four weeks and see what happens. This might be a huge challenge in itself, and if it is so then we strongly recommend you doing it as you will gain tons from leaving it out.

Before you embark on your four week Paleo challenge come up with a plan; this could include planning out your meals, deciding what you will choose if you go out to eat, and making sure that you always have healthy food available. I strongly recommend looking at different websites for recipe ideas – there’s some great links here and, lastly, here are some ground rules from Paleo Leap for embarking on your four week Paleo Challenge. Good luck!

Reference

[1] RobbWolf.com – “What is the Paleo Diet”