Follow up to yesterday's post

I am keto adapted.  That means I am adapted to a ketogenic diet.  So, the fat burning machinery in my body is elevated compared to what it would be if I was eating the standard high carb American diet laced with high glycemic load pseudo food made by Satan's helpers. 

As a result, I can eat the following meal from 5AM to 6AM yesterday:
1 quart of hard boiled eggs
1 tin of sardines in olive oil
a small package (about the size of a deck of cards) of duck liver mousse (high fat yum!)
for dessert natural style peanut butter (that has had the oil poured off) mixed with salted cows milk butter (about 1:1 ratio) and unsweetened coco powder to taste
all was washed down with a large mug of salted black coffee and as much water as was needed
supplements were C500, B50, and a slow mag

I did not get hungry until 4:30 ish PM.  That is a solid 10 hours of no hunger after one meal.  The sensation was more like an awareness that my stomach was emptying out rather than a raging need to eat NOW!  I did have another large mug of salted black coffee at lunch time (appetite suppressant?) to wash down more water soluble vitamin supplements (C500 and B50).  The rest of the day, I drank plain water only. 

That was my only meal of the day.  hunger pangs during the rest of the evening were mild and temporary.  I did not feel hungry when I went to bed and I did not feel hungry this morning when I got up. 

I feel mildly hungry now as I write this, so I will eat another high fat low carb meal soon, as my pre workout meal.  I'm looking forward to doing eccentric work with heavy squats and pull ups. 

Peace

Better Ramadan through suhoor only sawm

I am not Muslim, but I can appreciate the desire to become more in tune with one's creator.  The daily fasting or sawm of the holy month of Ramadan is a major way that Muslims use to become more in tune.  Sawm is one of the five pillars of Islam. 

The way sawm of Ramadan is usually done can be detrimental to the practitioner because it decreases night time sleep quality.  As a result, day time alertness is compromised. This can interfere with effective daily prayers (salat another of the five pillars).

If sawm is done by eating only a predawn meal then night time sleep quality will be improved.  Better sleep will result i n better day time alertness and better prayer.  Also, the food that is not eaten in the evening during iftar can be donated to the needy thus improving one's alms giving or zakat, yet another of the five pillars.  Iftar should be a water only fast breaking to avoid dehydration.  

To make one meal per day through the month of Ramadan more feasible, a low carbohydrate high fat ketogenic diet would do the trick.  So meat, nuts, greens, olives (olive oil), and high fat dairy would be the main menu items.  Go savory and salt to taste.  Avoid sweets.  Plain black coffee could be used to wash it all down. 

When hunger comes (usually by the afternoon) it will come and go.  When the hunger is present, contemplate the plight of the less fortunate.  If you are hungry at bed time, know that suhoor awaits at the end of sleep and be thankful.  You may not even be hungry when you wake up, but eat the predawn meal anyway so that you can be better able to sustain good works and good prayer throughout the holy month. 

Peace,
Paul

Peril of pride

It seems to me that Lucifer became Satan as a result of pride.  He wanted to be the biggest noise at the party.  He wanted to be bigger than God.  Because his desire was and is doomed to failure, he is envious of all that is of God. 

As a result, it seems to me that Satan hates God's creation and would do anything he could to vitiate or pervert creation. 

Also, it seems to me that Satan's power is derived through tempting beings that have free will (humans) with increased power of their own.  So, he relies on us to destroy creation by tempting us with the knowledge of good and evil or the power to control our own destinies independently from God's designs. 

One such temptation is manifested in the form of monoculture agriculture.  Monoculturing gives us more food to fuel increased population growth.  This has given us bigger armies throughout civilized history and thus more power to defeat our enemies.  Monoculturing requires the destruction of entire ecosystems (parts of God's creation) in order to grow one  species of plant.  This is a perversion of creation caused by Satan successfully tempting us. 

How can we avoid this temptation of power?

Perennial polyculture is a better way to do agriculture that more closely mimics God's creation.  Eating foods derived from perennial plants that grow with other species of perennial plants is a good way to go.  My favorite example of this is pastured meat (grass fed beef).  Remember, Abel, the shepherd, was favored over Cain, the tiller of the land. 

I must worship creation now by going outside to exercise with the help of God's gravity.  After that, I will move the goats that are helping me to manage a pasture. 

Thanks be to God

Genesis 1:31

New International Version (NIV)

³¹ God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

John 3:16

New International Version (NIV)

¹⁶ For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

 

1 Corinthians 6:19-20

New International Version (NIV)

¹⁹ Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; ²⁰ you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.

 

 

My interpretation of these verses is that God loves all of creation, not just select parts of it.  We humans are a part of this wonderful creation.  Also, treating any part of creation badly is a show of disrespect, an act of desecration, and an act of hatred toward the creator.  

 

I assert that an individual can begin to honor creation and the creator by being sure to take good care of oneself.  Like pebbles cast into water, the effects of taking good care of ourselves will emanate outward like the ripples.  We will provide better examples to our loved ones.  We can teach by better example, and as a result,produce better fruits.  I believe our children are our most important fruits that we pass on to the world.  

Matthew 12:33

New International Version (NIV)

³³ “Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit.

 

Also, I believe if we take good care of ourselves as part of creation then we are more likely to treat the rest of creation honorably as well.  This is another form that the ripples can take.  

 

So, my mission is to be the best example that I can be for my three teenaged children and to be the best example that I can be for my someday grandchildren and great grands.  Also, I hope that this blog will inspire others to strive to be good trees as well.  All of my posts in this blog will relate to how I believe we can provide better examples of creation/temple care and thereby honor God all the better.  

Thanks be to God. 

16Moreover when you fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance: for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.

17But you, when you fast, anoint your head, and wash your face;

18That you appear not unto men to fast, but unto your Father who is in secret: and your Father, who sees in secret, shall reward you openly.

This is how I fast in order to avoid the sad countenance and disfigured face.  I eat one large high fat, high protein, low carb meal in the morning.  On workout days, I do my workout first and then eat the meal.  I then eat nothing for the rest of the day.  I drink only plain water throughout the day after the meal.  I go to bed with an empty stomach.   I have been maintaining this feeding schedule for a couple of weeks now and I've been feeling fine.  My mood is fairly stable (on the positive side) and my exercise performances have been improving throughout this experiment.  

The rewards of this feed/fast schedule have been lower bodyfat %, higher quality sleep at night, and did I mention good stable mood and improving workout performances?  

Going to bed with an empty stomach does not necessarily mean going to bed hungry.  Due to the hormonal context I am in (low insulin resulting from being keto adapted) my body is easily able to mobilize fatty acids from adipocytes thus reducing hormonal hunger pangs.  Because the one meal in the morning is high in fat, my stomach does not completely empty out for as many as twelve hours... yet another reason why hunger is not much of an issue throughout the day. 

I will enter workouts and meal menus and sleep times in the future.  Questions and comments are welcome. 

Peace

My way to do strength/hypertrophy training and why

I have decided upon a way to train for strength and hypertrophy that sort of has precedents but not exactly the way I am going to describe.  This way of training is one that is kinder to my forty six year old joints and yet still takes advantage of some well established stressors that are known to cause the adaptations that I seek. 

It is well established that supramaximal eccentric muscle actions cause microtrauma to the myofibril elements (actin and myosin) which in turn induces satellite cells to donate their nuclei to the damaged muscle fibers thereby increasing the protein synthesis that does the repair and supercompensation of the fibers.  But, all of the definitions of supramaximal eccentric training that I have seen only include loads greater than the 1RM.  I cannot sustain that kind of training for very long without rupturing something. 

It is pretty well established that occlusion training with cuffs with loads as light as 20 to 40 % of 1RM can cause hypertrophy and even strength gains in type II fibers all without any observable microtrauma.  It seems that the low oxygen environment caused by the occluding cuffs takes the oxidative type I fibers out of the recruitment menu and leaves only the type II’s to carry the load.  I think that generating a pump (intramuscular occlusion) causes this same effect.  Also, occlusion training that does not involve any eccentric muscle actions (such as cycling) does not induce hypertrophy.  Hmmm…

It is well established that actin myosin cross bridges require ATP to detach.  It is also well established that creatine phosphate regenerates ATP faster than anaerobic glycolysis does, and anaerobic glycolysis regenerates ATP faster than aerobic glycolysis. 

The problem is that when intensity is high enough the first work set ends just when intramuscular occlusion is achieved.  Also, no supramaximal eccentric work is getting done when the set stops at concentric failure.  Multiple sets with short rests between sets get around the lack of occlusion during the first work set but there is still no suprmaximal eccentric work getting done.  But, if you are like me, a drug free normal gainer, and you want to minimize workout volume, then getting the desired stimulation done with one work set per exercise would be preferable. 

So, my trick is to decrease the rate at which ATP is regenerated at a given load by doing as continuous tension as possible reps of an exercise to concentric failure.  The concentric failure is proof that the rate of ATP regeneration has declined.  After concentric failure has been achieved then the muscle is well warmed up and ready for some eccentric work.  I assert that any negative work done with the same weight that concentric failure was achieved with constitutes supramaximal eccentric training.  The main caveat is that the negatives are done right after concentric failure such that more concentrics would be impossible during the negative work part of the set.    

Forced reps, with the help of a spotter, during the concentric phase and no help during the eccentric phase is an example of a way to accomplish this.  Cheat reps, at the end of a set of strict reps, are another way to get there provided the eccentric portion of the exercise is done as slowly and strictly as possible. 

My way of doing supramaximal eccentric training immediately following concentric failure involves doing exercises that I can do my own assisted concentrics with during the eccentric work portion of the set without a spotter.  You see, I train alone. 

The most challenging exercise that I do is high bar back squats.  I do squats with my heels on a 2x4 and go down until my rear end touches a 5 gallon bucket.  They are not full squats but they are full enough for my 6’3” frame.  When I reach concentric failure in a set, I take my hands off the bar and balance the bar on my traps while I use my arms to push off a step ladder that is right in front of me.  When I get back up, I reset for another negative rep.  I have to step backward around/over the step ladder when I move from the rack to the starting position.  My rep range for the continuous tension concentric failure has been around 11 to 13, and I have been doing around 20 to 25 negatives right after, keeping the bar on my back throughout the set. 

My full routine consists of two different abbreviated workouts. 

Workout A

Squats

Full close grip pull-ups

One arm dumbbell curls

One arm lying side delt raises

Workout B

One leg deadlifts

Three chair pushups

Barefoot heel raises

One arm French presses

I have been resting at least one day between workouts never lifting/lowering two days in a row.  I was doing workouts on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturday so that I would do each workout three times every two weeks but, recently, I decided to increase the number of rest days to at least two.  So, now I do a workout on Wednesdays and Saturdays.  Each workout is done once per week.  For cardio, I ride my bike every day as part of my commute to work. 

I strive to progress in the regular rep portion of the set and the negative rep portion too.  So, I have to measure the performance of both parts separately.  For the continuous tension to concentric failure part of the set I use the formula

Weight squared times reps

This is my approximation of what I call the work power product.  Work is weight times reps and power is weight times reps divided by time.  Since I do continuous tension reps with as steady a cadence as possible, I assume the rep velocity to be constant.  Therefore I can arbitrarily set the reps/second equal to 1.  Doing so makes the power equal to weight times 1.  So then

work times power becomes weight times reps times weight times 1 or weight squared times reps.  Got it? 

For the negative portion, measuring performance is simpler.  I merely measure the negative work of just the negatives done right after concentric failure. 

Weight times reps

If I do not progress in the “to con failure” part of the set then I add another rest day between workouts.  Progression in the negative reps part of the set is a fair certainty, so I cannot use that as a marker of overtraining. 

I think that is enough gospel to be getting on with for now. 

Peace

jump right in - better quality of life via better exercise and better nutrition

I am of the opinion that quality of life can be vastly improved by cutting out as much sugar as possible and by doing high intensity interval workouts three times per week.
Concerning sugar:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sugar-t.html?pagewanted=all
and the short version
http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2009/06/8187/obesity-and-metabolic-syndrome-driven-fructose-sugar-diet
The video is long but informative.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
Concerning HIIT
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S002604951000017X
which was linked in this site
http://quickweightloss123.com/tag/waist-circumference/
What can HIIT workouts look like?
http://www.healthhabits.ca/2008/06/09/4-steps-to-a-great-hiit-workout/
my personal favorites are:
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/CrossFit_20minBWOHS-50lbPullWOD.mov
and
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/CrossFit_DeadliftPushupWOD.mov
I also like the no rest lactic acid super setting  idea put forth here.
http://www.realsolutionsmag.com/ezine/76/issue76b.asp
What should you look like after doing a HII workout?




   
A high intensity interval workout should have you gasping for air at the end of each effort.  Therefore it is a good idea to do such workout with an empty stomach for two reasons.  1) so you do not vomit during the workout (yes, you should exercise intensely enough so that if your belly was full of food you would vomit). 
2) exercising in a fasted state boosts growth hormone production and the ensuing lipolysis. 

Peace out.  I hope you enjoyed this bit of gospel.