Paleo Diet, now for athletes

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Let’s recap the Paleo Diet quickly…

The Paleo Diet is based on the principle that less than 10,000 years ago (and for the 2.5m years before that), every single humanoid on the planet ate the same diet.  The diet is basically what we ate before the development of agriculture, which is what we could hunt or gather.

This meant that we ate mainly meat, fruits and vegetables.

And by inspecting their bony remains, scientists observed that these stone-age humans were almost entirely free from obesity, heart disease, tooth decay and many other ailments that best modern people.  They therefore concluded that the diet could be the secret to health and longevity.

Consequently, they hypothesised that we actually evolved to absorb these foods better and more efficiently than any other foods.  It makes for a compelling thesis.

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OK, what can we find in the Paleo Diet for Athletes?

Right, let’s get down to business!  And let’s get the dirty linen out in the open straight away…

The first and most important thing to note is that the Paleo Diet for Athletes (co-written by Loren Cordain and Joe Friel) has an important focus.  It is designed to discuss the nutritional needs first and foremost of the modern (endurance) athlete and how they can be met by a (modified) paleo diet.

You can go back and read that paragraph again if you don’t believe it.  I mean, when I think of the definition of athlete, I don’t imagine marathon runners and iron-man competitors.  I have great respect for people who put themselves through what must be incredibly man-makingly arduous events but I just can’t bring myself to imagine them as the standard archetype for athletes.

It just feels horribly 1980′s to try and reduce athleticism to the ability to run/cycle/swim for long periods of time.

It’s not like I am being strength-biased or anything (which I am).  In my defence, I don’t automatically imagine powerlifters when I think of athletes either.  I think of sportsmen and women that have agility, skill and explosive power.  I think of team plays.  I think of decathletes, throwers and rugby players (backs only, sorry).

If I am discussing marathon runners or cyclists, I might specify them by talking about endurance athletes. Or if I were referring to powerlifters, I might refer to them as strength athletes, just to be clear.  In fact, I often talk about powerlifters, Olympic lifters and other strength sports competitors by the collective of strength athletes, so I know I’m not being biased.

But that doesn’t mean the book isn’t relevant to the needs of strength athletes.  They just aren’t first in the authors’ minds…

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So is the paleo diet any good for athletes then?

Absolutely!  Cordain explains:

• A diet high in animal protein, like the paleo diet, has plenty of Branch Chain Amino Acids (BCAAs), which are potent stimulants for building and repairing muscle
• By being rich in fruits and vegetables, the paleo diet reduces blood acidity and therefore prevents muscle protein breakdown
• Similarly, the fruits and vegetables are rich sources of antioxidants, which promote optimal immune system functioning and thereby reduce the likelihood of illnesses
• Glycogen stores can be filled using fruits and vegetables in the post-exercise window

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But it’s great for endurance athletes?

Indeed.

This would be a great book to give a triathlete friend who eats nothing but bagels and bananas.  You know the type.  The ones who look peeky all the time and keep getting colds and flu.

It’s cast in the mould of the sort of book that triathletes buy to help them with their race preparation.  The kind of book that goes through the changeovers and the different ways that the athletes need to prepare.

The Paleo Diet for Athletes has sections on how to plan your diet for eating before, during and after exercise sessions, as well as how to plan your food intake for before, during and after a race.

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So how might strength athletes modify the standard paleo diet?

Well, the Paleo Diet for Athletes doesn’t cover this but Robb Wolf recently did an interview at T-Nation, where he espoused a paleo diet plus milk for gaining muscle.

I prefer a paleo diet plus cottage cheese because I have found it easier to digest and it doesn’t make me bloated like milk does.

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Who else might like this book?

It probably looks like I’ve come down quite hard on the Paleo Diet for Athletes but I don’t feel that way personally.  I just think that it doesn’t entirely do what it says on the cover…

On the plus side, it has some great narrative sections where the authors explain various concepts in plain language, including:

• Why the standard USDA food pyramid is incorrect
• How we know what paleolithic people ate
• Why fat is an important part of our diet
• How fat can be used as a fuel for endurance work

In summary, I find that the Paleo Diet for Athletes is slightly more readable than the Paleo Diet but doesn’t live up to expectations.  It has some great explanations and goes into a lot of detail that will be very helpful to endurance athletes but falls down on muscle-building and the needs of strength athletes.  Probably one to borrow (unless you are an endurance athlete in which case buy it immediately!).

The original and best work

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Before you start: remind me, what is the Paleo Diet again?

*Sighs* The Paleo Diet is based on the principle that less than 10,000 years ago (and for the 2.5m years before that), every single human(-oid) on the planet ate the same diet.  The diet is basically what we ate before the development of agriculture, which is what we could hunt or gather.

This meant that we ate mainly lean meat, fruits and vegetables.

And by inspecting their bony remains, scientists observed that these stone-age humans were almost entirely free from obesity, heart disease, tooth decay and many other ailments that best modern people.  They therefore concluded that the diet could be the secret to health and longevity.  Consequently, they hypothesised that we actually evolved to absorb these foods better and more efficiently than any other foods.  It makes for a compelling thesis.

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And why is this diet so radical if everyone used to eat it?

Well, notably absent from the list of foods eaten by ancient humans is the foundation of the modern food pyramid, all 6-11 servings of it:

The Food Pyramid: adopted by the US Department of Agriculture in 1992

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This means that the Paleo Diet flies in the face of modern nutritional wisdom.  If you’re interested in reading more about food groups according to the US Government, you can read about their selection of research papers on macronutrients here and you can read their recommendations here.

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OK, I’m with you now.  Hit me.

My pleasure.  The Paleo Diet is the fundamental work on the diet of our ancient ancestors and the diet that our bodies are designed to eat.  It’s set out in three main sections but it’s really not that strongly subdivided (which really bothers me as an anally-retentive, analytical type).  I guess in order to appeal to a wider, less boring audience, it’s been written as more of a chatty sort of book that covers the material in a loose structure.

At it’s most basic, the Paleo Diet has six rules, which are laid out in chapter two:

1. All the lean meats, fish and seafood you can eat
2. All the fruits and vegetables you can eat
3. No cereals
4. No legumes
5. No diary products
6. No processed foods

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Yeah, I’ve heard all that before.  What’s new?

Well, you’re right.  Not much is new.  In fact, it’s about 2.5m years old.  You can summarise the Paleo Diet down to a very simple formula.  I mean, how complicated can it be if a caveman can understand it?

And, yes, having read the book from cover to cover, I think that 90% of the book is explained just by those six rules.  So if you’re the laid-back type and you’re happy you’ve understood those rules then read no more.

However, Cordain makes a number of fundamental points that differentiate him from popular mainstream writers such as Mark’s Daily Apple (and I use Mark’s Daily Apple as an example simply because his site is great and it’s easy to navigate and find things).

Check out these examples:

• The Paleo Diet isn’t the same as a low-carb, high-fat diet.  Cheese, butter and bacon are not staples of the Paleo Diet (c.f. Mark’s Daily Apple on saturated fat)
• Saturated fat is bad for you and causes high cholesterol (c.f. Mark’s Daily Apple on cholesterol)
• Hunter-gatherer diets were rich in fruits and vegetables (but not starchy potatoes) and The Paleo Diet not therefore a low-carb diet (c.f. Mark’s Daily Apple on low-carb diets)
• Stone-age humans ate very little salt (c.f. Mark’s Daily Apple on salt, which is similar but less militant)
• The Paleo Diet is based on lean meat (55% of total calories), which increases the metabolism and reduces the risk of heart disease (c.f Mark’s Daily Apple, which assumes 1g of protein per lb bodyweight (maybe 25% of total calories)

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What else is interesting?

Well, if you enjoy getting under the skin of our ancient ancestral diets and the whys and the wherefores, Cordain goes into some of the scientific theories that have been constructed around the development of the human body in conjunction with its diet:

• Lean meat is the reason that humans developed larger brains
• Grains are what cause health problems: the fossil record shows that the early farmers were plagued with vitamin and mineral deficiences and they are the first to show tooth decay
• Farming cultures lack Vitamin C because cereals have zero Vitamin C
• Cereals are also poor sources of the B vitamins, despite what cereal packets will claim (I’ve always thought cereals had to be bad for you.  I mean, why would they have to add so many extra vitamins to it if it were naturally good for you?)
• Syndrome X diseases (type 2 diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, obesity, myopia, acne and breast, prostate and colon cancers) are linked to elevated levels of insulin in the bloodstream

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Why should I read it again?

This is the fundamental work on the diet of our ancestors.  If you accept the theory that our bodies are designed to run on paleolithic foods, just like a petrol engine is designed to run on petrol and a diesel engine is designed to run on diesel, then you will want to read it.

There are enough differences between this book and the mainstream advice on healthy eating to make you sit up and think.