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13 Weeks Sugar-Free Update

Aug08
2011 1 Comment Written by Rick

On January 31st, I started the Slow-Carb Diet as outlined in Tim Ferriss’ book, The Four Hour Body.  It was very successful, as I dropped 20 pounds in 6 weeks.  I took a few weeks off of eating rules, then gave myself a new challenge: go sugar-free for the summer. 13 weeks into that experiment, I’m free of gout symptoms and free of a daily medication used to control my body’s uric acid production (which leads to gout symptoms).  Also, as of today, I’ve dropped an additional 11 pounds down to 217.  217 is the lowest weight I’ve seen in at least the last 15 years.  My previous lowest from 2006 had been 218 following a nasty stomach flu.

Even though I’m turning 43 next week, I’m still setting new personal bests.  I’ve now hit 25 consecutive pullups, up two from my previous and I’m down to 21:04 on my favorite 2.5 mile course.  To crank up the core work, I made myself a slosh pipe last week and can now be seen carrying a 40 pound, 9′ hard-to-control pipe, up and down the hill in my neighborhood.

7 weeks ago, I posted some progress pics so you could see the changes over the first 6 weeks of the Sugar-Free Summer.  I’ll post the first pic again, then add today’s 13 week progress pic.  Just like before, if you don’t want to see a nearly 43 year-old guy in shirtless pics, go ahead and move along now.  Also, no need to critique the bad and unbalanced posing.  I already know.  Come back later for another post on some other subject. There’s your warning.

13 weeks ago:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

13 weeks ago:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The two main differences in the pictures are (1) 11 additional pounds lost and (2) my pasty white skin has been exposed to the sun.  Both help a lot!

I’m already thinking about my next experiment in health improvement after the sugar-free summer ends on Labor Day. At this point, it’s hard to imagine adding sugar back in after feeling so much better, so I’m not really thinking of any sort of sugar-filled celebration to cap it off. But, I am considering a 10 day juice fast (as seen in the film Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead), then following that with a full-on 30 days of Paleo eating.  Both seem like daunting tasks.  No solid food (and especially no meat!) for 10 days is a scary thought. Giving up dairy to go full Paleo scares me too.  I like butter, cheese, cottage cheese, sour cream, and half-and-half, but if it results in another significant health improvement, it’ll be worth it.

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Milestone!

Jul22
2011 Leave a Comment Written by Rick

I returned from almost 2 weeks of road trip vacation this week.  Everybody gains a little weight over vacation, right?  Even though I’d been vacation, there was no break from my Sugar-Free Summer Experiment.  I skipped birthday cake.  I skipped a slice of carrot cake from a conference at the Marriott. Well, let me be fully honest – I had a bite the size of about 1/2 teaspoon just to taste it and found it way too sweet. I skipped the ample supply of cookies available during the conference. I skipped cookies and cake and other processed foods, but ate well.  Again, let me be fully honest – there’s a restaurant called Prasad in downtown Portland, which had raw food, unprocessed desserts – like sweetened with agave syrup, chopped dates, or raw honey.  My wife and I split a cookie on each of the two visits there.  Call it a cheat on the Sugar-Free Summer Experiment if you want. When I checked back in at the office scale, it said 218.6.

The last time I weighed under 220 pounds was in December of 2006, just after I finished a battle with the stomach flu. Since then, I’ve fluctuated a bit – mostly staying in the 235-240 range.  In late January when I started the change to my eating habits, I was as high as 248 and now I’m down 30 pounds since then.  Being under 220 may actually be the leanest I’ve been in the last 20 years.  So, in recognition of this milestone, check out some of the worst pictures I could find of myself to one from vacation:

 

One of my biggest keys to being successful in this change of eating habits was to change how I viewed food. I love to eat and I would happily eat anything in any amount if I thought it tasted good. Then I watched the comedy-documentary Fat Head, which absolutely blew my mind. I started looking into the key concepts of the movie, particularly insulin resistance/metabolic syndrome. After doing some research on the effects of different foods on the body, something changed. I started to look at food as a body fuel source first, and something to enjoy second. You can easily have both high-quality fuel AND enjoyment, but that first involves eliminating choices that damage your body. For example, high-fructose corn syrup may taste good to you now, but once you realize that this highly processed sweetener is damaging to your body, you simply take it off the list of things to ingest. As you eliminate these types of choices, you simply find foods that meet your new criteria. Ask, is it the best food for my body? If yes, then move to the second question: Does it taste good? If yes, you’ve found a winner! For a more technical and detailed view of this concept, check out The Framework of Common Sense.

 

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6 Weeks Sugar Free Update (Including Pics)

Jun27
2011 Leave a Comment Written by Rick

Yesterday, I hit the 6 week mark of my sugar-free eating.  Results have been very positive so far! Since February, when I originally started the slow-carb diet, I’ve dropped 27 pounds.  I started at 248, lost 20 pounds in the first 40 days, slacked off for a little while, then restarted as a full-on sugar-free experiment over the last 6 weeks, and have now lost an additional 7 pounds.

The first four weeks of sugar-free eating didn’t seem to make much difference in the way of additional weight loss, with me hanging around the 225-228 range.  In the last 2 weeks, I’ve also gone off of diet soda, which seemed to restart fat loss, dropping me as low as 221 this weekend!

The original intent of going sugar-free was to eliminate taking allopurinol, a medication designed to limit uric acid production.  The theory is that ingesting fructose increases uric acid production, which leads to my gout symptoms, so if I cut out the source of uric acid overproduction instead of taking a medication to limit it, I’d be better off.  That part of the experiment has gone well too.  I’ve been off of allopurinol for the last 5 weeks with no ill effects.

Athletically, I continue to improve with new personal records.  I’ve hit 23 pullups in a row (in high school I couldn’t even do one).  I improved my 5K time by another 1:09 down to 27:08.  And, this weekend, I set a new personal best on Crossfit’s “Murph” workout by improving by 3:28 to 38:50. That’s run a mile, do 100 pullups, 200 pushups, 300 squats, and run another mile.

Now, for some pictures.  I hesitate to post them because it’s pretty awkward to post a couple of shirtless flex poses.  So, if you don’t want want to see shirtless pictures of a 42 year-old guy that’s still in process of losing fat, stop here.

This picture from 2004 is probably the peak of my shame, probably weighing in at about 270-275.  My typical day had virtually unrestricted access to regular Coke, candy, and processed foods.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This one is from Labor Day Weekend in 2005. My wife and I hadn’t yet started the South Beach Diet style of eating. Ample moobs and muffin top pressing against my rash guard. Mmmmm. Muffin top.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Over the next couple of years, I leaned out using the South Beach Diet and had this picture taken to contrast the first one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Since 2008, I had slacked off, bouncing around with my weight and peaking at 248 back in January 2011. It was time to change. I started the Slow-Carb Diet, but didn’t take any pictures. Then, in May 2011, with courage gained in nutrition experimentation gained from Tim Ferriss’ book, The Four Hour Body, I started my sugar-free experiment. The following pictures are 1 month apart, after going sugar-free (again, please forgive the goofy flex poses):

Before:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And After:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Before:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And After:

 

 

 

 

 

 

The differences are fairly subtle, and at 7 pounds apart, not nearly as dramatic as they would have been had I taken pictures earlier in the year and 27 pounds ago. Whatever. I’ll call it successful so far and continue to eat sugar-free for the remainder of the summer, since that was my original experiment. We’ll see what happens next.

Related Posts:

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4 Weeks Sugar-Free

Jun12
2011 1 Comment Written by Rick

Recently, some people have ended up at rickknowles.net searching for information about allopurinol and gout.  Here’s an update:

It’s been 4 weeks since I stopped consuming added sugar as an experiment in eliminating allopurinol.  Scientists say that ingesting fructose leads to increased uric acid production. Excess uric acid can lead to gout.  Since I had been taking allopurinol to limit uric production, it made sense to try and cut it off at the source by not taking in sugar instead of taking a medication to support a bad habit.  You can read more about it in the post: The Sugar Free Summer Experiment.

I still eat fruit, but not much.  Fruit, despite the fructose, is okay because of the blunting effects of the fiber that comes from eating the whole fruit.  Other than that, I don’t take in added sugar.  Beyond eliminating added sugar, I’ve been gluten-free as well, almost by default of going low-carb.  If you read up on low-carb/high fat, Atkins, Paleo, South Beach, etc – I’m eating a hybrid of those styles.

I’ve been off of allopurinol completely for the last 3 weeks.  I felt some gouty stiffness in my knee and heel during the first week of dropping to half-dosing.  I also experienced a couple days of what seemed to be gouty stiffness in my knee and heel early last week. With no medication beyond a dose of ibuprofen, the symptoms resolved on their own quickly.

So far, the experiment appears to be successful.  Although I haven’t dropped any additional weight – holding steady at about 224, I feel better than ever, and after an initial period around day 10 of flagging energy, my energy level has been great and very steady. Like I mentioned in the Sugar Free Summer Update, my tastes have been changing too.  I switched to unsweetened iced tea, which I hadn’t been able to stand before and as of today, I drank my first-ever full cup of plain black coffee and actually enjoyed it.  My next step is to try and eliminate diet soda.  Why? I went for a run last week, weighing myself before and after, just for curiosity’s sake.  Over the 4 mile run, I dropped 3 pounds in water weight, so I went to McDonald’s to get a 42 oz Diet Coke to rehydrate after.  My wife kindly pointed out how ridiculous it was to eat clean and rehydrate myself with a chemical concoction with unknown long-term effects.  Point taken.

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Sugar Free Summer Update

Jun03
2011 Leave a Comment Written by Rick

Going sugar-free isn’t easy. And, I can’t claim that this will be a fully sugar-free summer because my wife’s birthday was this week and I did have cake. This wasn’t your typical cake, though.  It’s the Raw Cashew Dreamcake and it does have some agave sweetener. It’s a lower glycemic load than table sugar, but it’s still a processed sweetener.  So, other than than a weird, all-natural vegan birthday cake and one small square of ultra-dark 85% cacao chocolate, I’m closing in on three sugar-free weeks.

So what’s changed?  My weight is down a couple more pounds to 224.  I’ve stopped taking allopurinol for gout with no ill effects after stopping completely.  I did, however, have a few days of knee stiffness after I initially cut the dose in half.  That has since gone away.  I’ve learned a little more about sports nutrition after trying to go for a run on glycogen-depleted muscles.  I had a carb-free morning last week, set a new personal best for a crossfit workout, then tried to go for a run afterward.  The crossfit workout drained me and I had nothing left in the tank, so I ended up with the worst run I’ve had in a long time (it also turns out that I had a virus for a couple of days, so that may have also been a contributor).  I’ve since recovered and I’m back on track.

Breaking the sugar addiction has also changed my tastes quite a bit.  The chocolate square I mentioned above?  Prior to going sugar-free, I tried a square and it was practically inedible.  Did you ever sneak into the pantry as a kid and grab a square of baker’s chocolate because you thought you would be in for a treat?  Yeah, it was like that.  After two weeks of sugar-free, I enjoyed a square and the complexity of the flavors.  Really good! Also, I’ve never been able to drink a glass of unsweetened tea.  Now?  No big deal.  I’m not quite there on coffee.  Give me some unsweetened almond milk and a packet of stevia and I’m good.

And, for my blood chemistry, I had a lipid panel drawn after 2 sugar-free weeks and using the Slow-Carb Diet since January 27th.  This is what happens when you cut carbs and increase meats, vegetables, and fats:

  • Cholesterol 142
  • HDL-Cholesterol 48
  • LDL-Chol (Calc) 82
  • Triglycerides 60

All in range and ratios looking good.  I’ll take it and keep on going.  And, assuming this all goes well, later on I’ll post some before and after pictures.  I have the awkward and uncomfortable before pictures locked away on a password-protected, triple-encrypted drive in an undisclosed location.  Those will come out only if there’s some dramatic, visible difference to show.  Otherwise, you’ll just have to come to the beach this summer to see the man-flesh in person.

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The Sugar-Free Summer Experiment

May26
2011 1 Comment Written by Rick

I’ve been setting new personal records lately.

My personal best (set sometime last year) on pullups was 19 in a row, an improvement of 6 over my previous best. It seemed like a fluke, because after I did the 19, I was nowhere close until last week.  I came home after a long day, still in my jeans from work, stepped up to the bar with no warmup, and pulled 20.  The 20th rep looked terrible, as I practically threw myself at the bar, but I was too excited to not count it.  The next morning, I pulled 21. 2 days later, I pulled 20 again.  No fluke this time. (Now updated for 5/27: 22 in a row)

I’ve been running for most of the last year, and most of my runs are along a beautiful trail near my house that happens to be exactly 2.5 miles.  I run with my Blackberry in my pocket so I can track my stats with the built-in GPS.  Back in September, I ran the course in 26:07.  Last week, after months of continuous improvement, I set a new personal best at 21:33.

When I do strength training, my favorite style is Crossfit.  And, one of the common workouts that I do, because it requires no equipment other than a pullup bar and a timer, is Cindy.  Cindy is an AMRAP (As Many Reps/Rounds As Possible) lasting 20 minutes where each round is 5 pullups, 10 pushups, and 15 squats.  My previous best had been 18 rounds.  Last week, I hit 21 rounds.

And, as of this morning, I hit another personal best with Crossfit’s Fran workout. 5:57 for rounds of pullups and 95# squat thrusters of 21, 15, and 9 reps. 45 reps of each, under 6 minutes total. My previous best was 6:35.

So what’s been happening?

I’d have to say the greatest contributor to each of these improvements has to be weight loss.  From January 31st until now, I’ve dropped 22 pounds – 20 in the first 6 weeks.  And, despite the stall on total weight loss of only an additional 2 pounds, I’ve continued to lose fat.  Clothes that couldn’t be worn with a 20 pound loss could be worn with a 22 pounds loss – a clear indication of additional fat loss.

How did I do it?  Simply following the eating principles of Tim Ferriss’ Slow Carb Diet as outlined in his book The Four Hour Body.

Now I’m ready for the next step in the body experiment: The Sugar-Free Summer.

I’ve already essentially eliminated sugar for 6 days a week just following the Slow Carb Diet rules.  7 days a week is a huge step, so why would I do it?  For me, the challenge is simple: It’s entirely possible that I could eliminate taking a daily medication if I eliminated fructose from my diet.  Dr. Robert Lustig explains the science behind it in the following long but extremely informative video.

Somewhere around the 56 minute mark, Dr. Lustig explains the body chemistry that takes place when sugar hits the digestive system, making a strong argument that fructose is actually a toxin.  Around the 58 minute mark, he identifies the reaction in the liver as the fructose is metabolized, which results in an increase of the waste product uric acid.

That’s the part that put me over the edge to wanting to try going sugar free.  I take a daily medication, allopurinol, to control my body’s output of uric acid.  Left uncontrolled, excess uric acid settles in my joints, causing an extraordinarily painful arthritic condition called gout.  If I could solve the problem at the source instead of taking a medication to control it, wouldn’t that be a smart thing to do?  After all, if I were diabetic, I would surely change my eating habits to avoid insulin therapy.  Why not do the same thing with gout?

So, this week I started on the next phase of sugar elimination with 2 goals in mind:

1. Eliminating gout without the aid of drugs. Allopurinol has helped decrease the gout attack frequency, but it certainly hasn’t eliminated the disease.  I’ve already cut my dosage in half and will stop taking it altogether after a couple of weeks of ramping down.

2. Additional fat loss. The leanest I’ve been in at least the last 15 years has been 218 pounds, and that was aided by a bout of the stomach flu.  But, the goal is fat loss, not necessarily weight loss so I guess I’ll have to have my wife take some awkward pictures to see if it made a difference.

Here we go…

 

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6 Weeks of the Slow Carb Diet

Mar12
2011 5 Comments Written by Rick

In February, I wrote a post called The Cheat Day.  It detailed the 5 basic rules of Tim Ferriss’ “Slow Carb Diet” from the book The Four Hour Body as well as detailing my gluttony from my first week’s cheat day.  As a side note, I later counted all of the calories from that cheat day and came up with 5300 calories consumed.  No wonder I felt sick.

I started the Slow Carb Diet as a 30 day experiment in body transformation.  The Four Hour Body book jacket says, among other claims, “How to lose 20 pounds in 30 days (without exercise) on the uber-simple Slow-Carb Diet.”  Why not give it 30 days and see what happens?  No supplements, no injections, no diet shakes, nothing extra to buy.  Just 5 simple rules.

From a scientific standpoint, I was a terrible researcher.  I didn’t take before and after measurements with a measuring tape.  I didn’t take any underwear front, side, and back shots either.  I decided that how clothes fit and the occasional weigh-in would be enough. I don’t even own a scale, so tagging a personal weigh-in on a doctor visit with my wife would have to do.  Here’s what happened:

Week 1 (starting Monday, January 31st): started the new eating plan, eating super clean for the first 6 days and using Superbowl Sunday as my first cheat day.  By Saturday of the first week, I had a noticeable difference in how things were starting to fit.

Week 2: After a couple of days of getting clean from the cheat day, I again found that clothes were fitting better.

Week 3: Others were seeing a difference from my face leaning out and starting to comment.

Week 4: I ran the longest distance that I had ever run before – 7.8 miles from Imperial Beach to Coronado.  No walks, no stops.  I felt great!  A couple of days later, I did my first weigh-in.  I was surprised that I had only lost 10 pounds down to 238, but I didn’t care because not only were clothes fitting looser, I was wearing jeans that I hadn’t put on in well over a year.

The 4 week experiment was over, but I’d learned to like eating more clean and I still had more weight to lose anyway, so I continued.

Week 5: Attended the Catalyst West conference in Irvine.  It’s not easy to eat a clean lunch from food trucks, so I had a beef gyro from Louks, eating both the pita bread wrap and the fries stuffed inside.  After, I felt my blood sugar crash and started to feel extremely sleepy during Soledad O’Brien’s talk.  Or, the sleepiness may have come from her content and delivery.  It’s hard to tell.  I felt like I did a little bit of a cheat from the Slow-Carb principles that week, so I backed way off on my Sunday cheat day.

Week 6: My daughter turned 20, so that meant birthday cake (the other reason I had backed off on the previous day’s cheat day).  We had a nice dinner at The Melting Pot, and I decided to get decked out and wear a nice suit.  I picked up a couple of suits in December of 2009, and the suit that was the tightest of the two when I bought them was actually a little bit loose now.  I had a couple slices of cake, it was awesome, then went back to the principles.

That leads me to yesterday’s weigh in.  My wife had an appointment, so I slipped in to use the scale, finding myself at 228 – the lowest I’ve been in well over a year, probably at least the last 2 years.  A 10 pound drop from 2 weeks ago, and 20 pounds down from 6 weeks ago.  Success!  It wasn’t 20 pounds in 30 days success, but it was 20 pounds in 40 days. I’ll take it.

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The Cheat Day

Feb09
2011 Leave a Comment Written by Rick

Toward the end of last summer, I began a hibernating phase, eating everything in sight and not worrying about it because I knew that I would need the extra energy found in my fat stores to sleep through the entire winter. It turns out that winter doesn’t exist in San Diego, so I’ve just waddled around with a few extra pounds all winter long. It was time to change all that.

I’ve been on diets before, and I know the routine. In college, I dropped nearly 50 pounds on Weight Watchers. Throughout adulthood, I’ve struggled to maintain an appropriate weight, bouncing my weight up and down (mostly up) through a 10 – 15 pound range. The greatest long-term success I’ve had has come through The South Beach Diet, and that’s been pretty solid through the last 6 years.

The bummer is: I like to eat. I like to eat whatever I want, whenever I want. I like to make poor diet choices in favor of taste. I like candy bars, donuts, ice cream, deep-fried everything, regular Coke, and chocolate chip cookies. Heck, I’d even roll around in Butter-Flavored Crisco if it weren’t socially unacceptable. But, that kind of thinking, that kind of loose, devil-may-care attitude about my body’s fuel makes my jeans uncomfortable. And not from excitement.

I decided to check out Tim Ferriss’ book, The Four Hour Body. In it, he details a variety of personal experiments in human effectiveness that become his “uncommon guide to rapid fat-loss, incredible sex, and becoming superhuman.” Sign me up for all three! For now, however, I’m focused on the section of the book on rapid fat loss.

The Slow-Carb Diet he recommends for fat loss is made up of 5 simple rules:
1. Don’t eat white food. No flours, no sugars, nothing that could be made white through processing like brown rice. Essentially, it’s carbohydrate elimination.
2. Eat the same basic meals over and over. Each meal needs a protein, a vegetable, and a legume. Have as much of that as you want, just don’t violate rule number 1.
3. Don’t drink your calories. The Trenti-sized white chocolate chip mocha isn’t helping you.
4. Don’t eat fruit. More carb elimination.
5. Have a cheat day. Eat whatever. Don’t worry about it. Caloric spikes are good for you! Once a week, just go for it. And, most people already cheat on any diet plan they’ve ever tried, so you might as well just plan it in and feel fine with it.

Naturally, I’m attracted to this idea.

The first four rules are essentially The South Beach Diet’s phase 1. Two weeks of carb elimination to kick the sugar habit before you start to gradually introduce some whole grains (phase 2). After meeting your weight loss targets, you graduate to phase 3 to maintain it for the rest of your life with great eating choices.

The fifth rule is the missing link, the one I’ve been searching for. The rule that says eating crappy food is a good thing! So, I gave it a shot.

I started on Monday, January 31st with a renewed focus. It was surprisingly easy to get back into a clean eating lifestyle. After all, I’ve been there before, I know the routine,  and I know it works. Day 1 was no problem, Day 2 found me wanting a late night snack, then days 3-6 were back to being no problem. I was very full, eating a ton of veggies and legumes, as well as plenty of proteins. Within about 3 days, I noticed that clothes were already fitting better. Success! And, Superbowl Sunday (my pre-planned cheat day) was just around the corner!

When Superbowl Sunday came, I started off with a healthy breakfast that really wasn’t that different from the other days of the week. After breakfast, here’s what I had for the rest of the day:
1 Snickers Bar (this was the beginning. I wasn’t even hungry. I just had it because I could.)
2 Chocolate Chunk cookies
1 Raised yeast donut, sugar glazed
After these things, I was really feeling the sugar slam my system. I felt buzzy and strange.
A turkey sandwich (I threw away the bread)
At the Superbowl Party, I had:
3 chili dogs (no bun)
A handful of tortilla chips and liqui-cheese
A few handfuls of regular potato chips and ranch dip
1 cookie
A couple of small handfuls of peanut M&M’s
2 lemon bar squares
1 cupcake
About 10 of the creampuff bites from Costco
I really wasn’t feeling good. In fact, I was craving clean food at this point. But, the cheat day wasn’t over, so we stopped at the grocery store on the way home to pick up some ice cream for sundaes at home. But, before I could make a sundae, I fired up the grill and cooked a chicken breast seasoned with Montreal steak seasoning. Honestly, it was the best-tasting food of the day.
Then I finished with a big bowl of Moose-Tracks ice cream.

I felt gross. I took a couple of Tums and laid in bed thinking about how crappy I felt. Maybe this was the real purpose of the cheat day. Hmmm.

Back to my six days of clean eating…

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