paleo

[Edward Smith]

Ido and Robb (Wolf) often talk about a paleo style diet, I do know what it is or at least the basic principals/ideas behind it, I was just wondering (especially Ido and Robb's opions)

1. is it the end all diets (is it the best way? or just a good style diet? etc.)

2. Is there any books or websites or articles I should read on it?

3. should I follow it exactly (I would have to research it more) or could I just severly lower my grain (beans, potatoes etc) intake?

and if you have anything else to add on the paleo shoot

[Craig Miles]

Best starting place on the internet is probably here:

http://www.earth360.com/diet_paleodiet_balzer.html

followed by:

http://www.paleodiet.com/

and:

http://www.paleofood.com/

Regards,

Craig.

[George Launchbury]

The best book I read was Protein Power ...and I read a lot of books. Their website is here: http://www.proteinpower.com, and Dr Mike's blog is one of the sites on my reading list. It's a bit of a misnomer, since they advocate an adequate protein diet, not a high protein diet. I have emailed a couple of questions to him over the last year, and got a personal reply each time, which was nice.

I liked their approach in that they suggest three levels of adherence - ranging from mainly limiting carb intake, to really strict on food types. They also explain what you'll gain or miss out on by your choices.

Basically, as humans we can pretty much 'survive' eating all manner of rubbish, however if we want to thrive we should eat the foods we evolved to eat. 10,000 years of agriculture is not enough time to have made an evolutionary adaption to 'modern' foods (grain, dairy, etc) and higher carbohydrate levels. Some people think they are getting away with it because they are 'thin' ...however obesity is just another marker/symptom of poor health, and not ordinarily the cause of it.

Something I would definitely advise when reading anything is to pre-determine whether you are eating for maxmum performance, or maximum health. You will need to buck some of your body's systems to attain maximum performance (such as force-replenishing glycogen) and be able train more regularly ...which I believe is not good for your long-term health due to the additional glycaemic loads.

I have to say I've never felt so healthy as I do when I am eating Paleo, although it took me a while to get my head around the whole eat less carbs, eat more fat thing. Unfortunately I am a long-time carb-addict, and still fall off the wagon quite regularly ...and boy do I feel rough.

Roll on Easter...

George.