30 Day Paleo Challenge

Kirwan

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="NTA" data-cid="412599" data-time="1391123302">
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If you aren't getting proper rest it can fuck the whole thing as well. 
Basically it comes down to what works for you
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Yep, sleep is one of the things I earn points for. I easily get 7-8 hours every day.

JK

Jealous. I'm usually 7 at best but often 5-6hrs on week days. Longer in weekends but maybe 8ish.

NTA

My wife sets her alarm for 0630 but never gets up at that time. She basically uses it to get ready for 7AM - not hitting the snooze or anything. Just to put herself in that semi-wakeful state that all the sciencey people say is the worst thing you can do for yourself.

Hooroo

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="NTA" data-cid="412635" data-time="1391135756">
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My wife sets her alarm for 0630 but never gets up at that time. She basically uses it to get ready for 7AM - not hitting the snooze or anything. Just to put herself in that semi-wakeful state that all the sciencey people say is the worst thing you can do for yourself.
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Wow!! That would give me the two-bob-bits!!
 
I set my alarm for 6 and I'm up at 6.

taniwharugby

fark I dont even use an alarm!!
 
I just wake between 6.30 and 7.10 everyday, although if tired and know I need to get up I will use it, although because I have set it, I will wake several times in the night because I am conscious of needing to wake up on time; if I sleep until 8 that is an awesome sleep in!
 
I get between 7-8 hours every night; I would rarely be able to get to sleep before 10, but equally rare do I stay up past midnight either... :)

antipodean

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="JK" data-cid="412589" data-time="1391121965">
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Pretty old school way thinking that.
 
Meal timing has been proven to be pretty much irrelevant.
 
Whether you do 6 small meals a day / eating every 3 hours (whilst awake) or do say intermittent fasting and only eat during a 6-8 hour period has very limited effect on body composition (more important though for physical performance). Total caloric intake vs expenditure is what really matters.
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Correct. Recent studies have shown that you can benefit from not eating all day and then shoving your total calories down your throat in one meal. Just before you go to bed. The only problem is different people respond in different ways.
 
Ultimately you're best off experimenting and finding what works for you.
 
I get about five - six hours sleep a night. Only eat breakfast if I have a hangover and then it's bacon and eggs, etc. My dietary habits are generally poor and they'd be much worse if it wasn't for SWMBO, but then my body has always responded very well to the slightest stimuli. Thankfully.

Nepia

So three days into my no sugars and I really do feel like a junky (or how I would expect a junky would feel) ... my whole day is spent stopping myself from going to the shops and purchasing chocolate or lollies. 
 
 
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Kirwan" data-cid="412576" data-time="1391117632">
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Sometimes when you feel hungry you are actually thirsty. I weaned myself off of snacking by drinking more water, rule of thumb is to have about 2 litres per day - more if you exercise.
 
Start with that would be my advice, a big glass of water will fill up your stomach too. Then find vegetables you like to snack on, and eat as much of them as you like. If you get carbs from veges you'll feel fuller for longer, the protein won't fill you up for long.
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Unfortunately the water thing wont help me as I've always drunk bucket loads of water. But I'll definitely be buying some veges to snack on when I do my shopping tomorrow.
 
 
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="taniwharugby" data-cid="412570" data-time="1391116346">
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this should help you out Nepia ;)
 
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.mensfitness.com/nutrition/what-to-eat/12-healthy-foods-and-drinks-that-can-make-you-fat?page=4'>http://www.mensfitness.com/nutrition/what-to-eat/12-healthy-foods-and-drinks-that-can-make-you-fat?page=4</a>
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:) I don't need any help finding foods to make me fat, I can do that remarkably well all by myself.

Kirwan

Holy fuckarola, hit the wall ONE DAY IN. Got to be the embodiment of "hangry" (Hungry and Angry) on Sunday. I came right in the evening, had to up my portion sizes and add an extra meal, and then I felt normal.
 
So far have not cheated, have hit all my points that they are tracking on the challenge. Lost a 1kg in one weekend as well :)
 
I was avoiding fruit, but I've added back in Bananas and Melon to have 40mins before a workout. Going to be interesting to see how tonight's WOD goes, I see lots of people struggle with exercise int he first week.

JK

hang in there bud. First few days of change are often the hardest

Kirwan

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="JK" data-cid="412972" data-time="1391379927">
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hang in there bud. First few days of change are often the hardest
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Thanks, the trick so far has been to up the portion sizes. The advice so far has been if you are hungry, eat something (from the good list) and that should settle down. It's a big difference from the calorie restriction I've just been on, which just didn't work for - mainly because of the poor food choices I was making.
 
I'm not too bad today, the next challenge is the week of exercise.

Nepia

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Kirwan" data-cid="412957" data-time="1391374047">
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Holy fuckarola, hit the wall ONE DAY IN. Got to be the embodiment of "hangry" (Hungry and Angry) on Sunday. I came right in the evening, had to up my portion sizes and add an extra meal, and then I felt normal.
 
So far have not cheated, have hit all my points that they are tracking on the challenge. Lost a 1kg in one weekend as well :)
 
I was avoiding fruit, but I've added back in Bananas and Melon to have 40mins before a workout. Going to be interesting to see how tonight's WOD goes, I see lots of people struggle with exercise int he first week.
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I know how you feel ... at the moment I'm dreaming about frakken bread and, at the most in the past I'd have only maybe two slices a day.

Kirwan

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Nepia" data-cid="412989" data-time="1391386948">
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I know how you feel ... at the moment I'm dreaming about frakken bread and, at the most in the past I'd have only maybe two slices a day. 
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Yeah, even after this challenge I'm not eating bread again. Love it, but it's just crap.

JK

Nice one Kirwan!
 
I would have 2 bits max per week and that is in the weekend where I may be too lazy to have my oats so have a couple of bits of vogels.
 
That hardest bit about bread is with burgers. Lettuce for buns is OK and big portobello mushrooms also make good buns but still the winner for me is using chicken breast as the bun.....double down style but salad in the middle rather than crap.

Nepia

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Kirwan" data-cid="412334" data-time="1390980410">
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Have signed up for this at the new gym, figured the team environment with stop me from giving up early.
 
Have been tracking calories for the past 50 days, using MyFItnessPal, and while that has lost me 2.6kg, the quality of the food hasn't been great and I've not lost as much as I should have. Currently just under 83kg. So instead of killing myself in the gym and ignoring the 70% part of the diet, I'm going to make a shift to a healthier diet. The Paelo challenge is a kick start to more veges, meat and variety in what I eat.
 
So if anybody has suggestions for meals that someone useless in the kitchen can whip up, and a Paelo friendly please suggest away. I know a few of you have some talent in this area.
 
Should be interesting to see what the body looks like after this radical a diet change. Starts on the 1st, also have a benchmark WOD to compare the result with at the end of Feb. Will post that result here too.
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I've just signed up for My FitnessPal - it could become a handy food diary for me. One thing in my goals it's geared towards 50% carbohydrates - is that changeable?

Hooroo

But I love my vogels!!!

taniwharugby

I love fruit too much, especially with all the great fruits about at the moment; peaches, nectarines, plums, grapes!

Nepia

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="taniwharugby" data-cid="413015" data-time="1391393793">
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I love fruit too much, especially with all the great fruits about at the moment; peaches, nectarines, plums, grapes!
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Despite being from HB I can take or leave fruit ... I'm all about the processed sugar.
 
Just wanted to reply so that my question to Kirwan about MyFitnessPal doesn't get lost in the page change.

Kirwan

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Nepia" data-cid="413009" data-time="1391393195">
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I've just signed up for My FitnessPal - it could become a handy food diary for me. One thing in my goals it's geared towards 50% carbohydrates - is that changeable?
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Yep, under settings and Goals. I had changed mine to the zone-ish 40% Carbs, 30% Protein and 30% Fats.
 
I found the app good for getting rid of snacks, but to be honest it was massive chore (I logged everything I ate for 50 days). If you like stats though, it's interesting and they make as easy as possible to log your food. The bar code scanner was great.

Nepia

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Kirwan" data-cid="413018" data-time="1391394256">
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Yep, under settings and Goals. I had changed mine to the zone-ish 40% Carbs, 30% Protein and 30% Fats.
 
I found the app good for getting rid of snacks, but to be honest it was massive chore (I logged everything I ate for 50 days). If you like stats though, it's interesting and they make as easy as possible to log your food. The bar code scanner was great.
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Cheers.
 
I'm a pretty plain eater, I'll mostly eat the same dinner for 5 nights and a combination of 2 or 3 lunches so hopefully I can just save those settings. I find it quite interesting how they set you a calorie limit, and then add exercise earned calories to the limit ... is that a normal way of doing it (for weight loss in general)?
 
I'm going to need to up my weight loss weekly goal as my limits seem a bit high at the moment.

Kirwan

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Nepia" data-cid="413023" data-time="1391395294">
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Cheers.
 
I'm a pretty plain eater, I'll mostly eat the same dinner for 5 nights and a combination of 2 or 3 lunches so hopefully I can just save those settings. I find it quite interesting how they set you a calorie limit, and then add exercise earned calories to the limit ... is that a normal way of doing it (for weight loss in general)?
 
I'm going to need to up my weight loss weekly goal as my limits seem a bit high at the moment.
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They are working on the theory that you can "earn" extra calories during the day by exercising. So they set a target calorie goal to stay under (ludicrously low IMO), and you have to exercise if you want to eat more that a day. 
 
It's a guide more than anything, because you can't really accurately tell how many calories are in what you eat or how much you have burned by exercise. But you can approximate it and use it as structure for your eating.
 
What I did was use this site;
 
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/'>http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/</a>
 
to calculate my BMR, then took off 500 calories from that to set my own target in MyFitnessPal (including the macro targets of carbs/proteins & fats). It was successful for a while, and I lost weight over the holiday period instead of my normal gain, but it only got me so far.
 
Worth a go though, the improvement in my habits from it has made the Paleo challenge way easier than if I had gone fully cold turnkey on my November diet. I would have killed my neighbours going that route.

The Silver Fern

30 Day Paleo Challenge