We talk a fair amount about nutrition around the Zone, often with a heavy focus on the Paleo Diet. For those of you who are familiar with Paleo eating, you will know that grains are on the naughty list for mealtimes. Why is that, you may ask? Well, have a look at this blog I came across by Mark Sisson of Mark’s Daily Apple, called, “Why Grains Are Unhealthy”. It’s a fairly lengthy post, so I’m only including an excerpt. But I would encourage you all to click on the link provided at the end here, and read this information in its entirety. Then, let us know YOUR opinion about grains and their involvement in a healthy diet!
“Apart from maintaining social conventions in certain situations and obtaining cheap sugar calories, there is absolutely no reason to eat grains. Believe me – I’ve searched far and wide and asked everyone I can for just one good reason to eat cereal grains, but no one can do it. They may have answers, but they just aren’t good enough. For fun, though, let’s see take a look at some of the assertions:
“You need the fiber!” Okay, for one: no, I don’t. If you’re referring to its oft-touted ability to move things along in the inner sanctum, fiber has some unintended consequences. A few years back, scientists found that high-fiber foods “bang up against the cells lining the gastrointestinal tract, rupturing their outer covering” which “increases the level of lubricating mucus.” Err, that sounds positively awful. Banging and tearing? Rupturing? These are not the words I like to hear. But wait! The study’s authors say, “It’s a good thing.” Fantastic! So when all those sticks and twigs rub up against my fleshy interior and literally rupture my intestinal lining, I’ve got nothing to worry about. It’s all part of the plan, right?
Somehow, I’m not convinced that a massive daily infusion of insoluble grain fiber is all that essential. And that “lubricating mucus” sounds an awful lot like the mucus people with irritable bowel syndrome complain about. From personal experience I can tell you that once I completed my exodus from grains, the IBS completely stopped. If you’re not yet convinced on the fiber issue I’ll refer you to Konstantin Monastyrsky’s Fiber Menace. Anyway, there’s plenty of fiber in the vegetables and fruit I eat. Which takes me to the next claim:
“You need the vitamins and minerals!” You got me. I do need vitamins and minerals, like B1 and B2, magnesium and iron, zinc and potassium. But do I need to obtain them by eating a carb-heavy, bulky grain? No, no I don’t. You show me a serving of “healthy whole grains” that can compete – nutrient, vitamin, and mineral-wise – with a Big Ass Salad. What’s that? Can’t do it? Thought so.
“But it forms the foundation of the governmental food pyramid!” You know, I should have just started the entire post with this one. I could have saved my fingers the trouble of typing and your eyes the trouble of reading. Governmental endorsements are not points in your favor, grain-eater; they are strikes against you. An appeal to authority (unless that “authority” is actually a preponderance of scientific evidence, of course) does not an effective argument make. Conventional Wisdom requires consistent, steady dissection and criticism if it is to be of any value.
There’s a reason grains are first and foremost on the list of foods to avoid when following the Primal Blueprint: they are completely and utterly pointless in the context of a healthy diet. In fact, if your average unhealthy person were to ask for the top three things to avoid in order to get healthy, I would tell them to stop smoking, to stop drinking their calories (as soda or juice), and to stop eating grains. Period. Full stop. They really are that bad.”
To read the rest of this in-depth post from Mark’s Daily Apple about some of the fundamental reasons why grains and their toxic anti-nutrients may not be good for you, click here … Then post to comments with your opinions!
Today’s Workout:
Buy-in: 10 minutes of thruster and floor-to-overhead practice
WOD: The Crucible
Strap on your courage hats gang and let’s dig in. Should be a toughie but a goodie.
Elite – 4 rounds for time of:
- 400m run
- 10 thrusters (65/95)
- 10 floor to overhead (65/95) – can be one movement (snatch) or two movements (clean to push press) or anywhere in between – if new to this, focus on clean to push press.
- 10 knees to elbows
Zone 4: scale number of reps to 6 of everything each round
Zone 3: scale weight to 45/65, substitute double crunch for kte
Zone 2: scale thrusters as needed, remove fto (i.e. just do thrusters for 10 reps every round)
Zone 1: scale workout weight, exercises, and/or rounds as needed
Cash-out: Hip mobility stretches (coaches’ choice)
phew this one looks like a good’er. I wish I could make it tomorrow! Maybe catch the end of the 6:30pm with all you hard-cores rocking it out! Be strong… and pull out the “I can attitude”. XO HBomb.
This man seems to have a lot to say about grains. I went to his blog and found him quite contradicting when he bashes the government for endorsing grains in the food pyramid and all I could find on his website was endorsements for his books and lines of vitamins. Of course he’s posting about bad grains.. Not once on his website does he mention any nutritional or science related credentials he has, or research he’s studied. His website is all testimonials and appealing to the “surfer dude”. What he is writing is all from personal experience.. which I can understand, but his purpose seems to be to jump on the no-grains band wagon and get people to buy into his lifestyle to buy his books and supplements. Needless to say, I’ll still eat grains. I have yet to be convinced how eating grains, in moderation granted, is bad for you, not just unnecessary. Especially when the people preaching this are trying to sell you their specific product.
I’m still digging through the “science” of all of this diet stuff. And it seems like nutrition is too complicated for the way that it’s studied… by which I mean that science focuses on one little thing about say grains, their nutritional value, then misses the effects that it was on the gut lining… so there are studies saying one thing is good and the same thing is bad. Eggs being another food that goes from good to bad often.
The smartest thing that I have heard about nutrition is to try something for a month, like cutting out grains, and see if you look, feel and perform better, and if you do then you are onto something good. I definitely feel better and have energy longer without all the grains, so I say give it a try, just make sure to put some fat/oils in their place.
I too am still curious and wrestling around with why grains are bad.
It’s a nutritional minefield out there, that’s for sure. I’m with Craig, in that the best research you can do for your own diet is to cut something out for yourself, and track how you feel. Everyone’s bodies behave differently, so you have to go with how things work for YOU specifically.
I have to admit that I tend to feel better when I’m not eating grains, but at the same time, it’s mostly the highly processed and refined grains that make me feel yucky. Grains that are more in their natural and unspoiled form don’t give me as much grief, and I enjoy eating them. Perhaps the ticket is the processing of the food, rather than the food itself…?
Great discussion, guys!
I’ll take science over this guys’ inability to be convinced by science any day. The number of logical fallacies he wields here is amazing, and ironic, since he even uses “appeal to authority” against the reader.
But what really puts me off his post is how he purposely twists the adjectives used in the study to conjure mental imagery that creates sympathy for his personal argument. I’m not commenting on the validity of his conclusions, but he certainly has an agenda.
the best research you can do for your own diet is to cut something out for yourself, and track how you feel.
Agreed! It’s amazing what you can discover!
Great discussion team! I know that I read an article about 4 years ago about how our body was not built to process grains properly. Think back to caveman days, there was never any grains until agriculture began. But… I don’t know where it is to send you a link. Sorry 🙁
I know that I personally did a cleansing diet and cut out all wheat, grains, alcohol and dairy for a month. My results when adding them back in were:
Wheat – I got a canker sore (I think that was what it was) in my mouth just after eating it
Rice – A really bad stomach ache
Dairy – very bloated and stuffed up
Alcohol – very stuffed up
I know that I personally feel much better when I follow:
Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and NO sugar.
It seems that the general consensus is to cut it out and then see how your body reacts when adding it back. This is what I did when working with a naturopath:
* Add back one food 2 times in a week. ie – Dairy and see how your body reacts.
* Record any changes in your body, mood and performance.
* If there is no change then your body agrees with it.
* Wait another week until you try to add something else back in.
Some may say well I don’t have any reactions to eating sugar, dairy, grains etc! But, if you don’t cut it out and then add it back, you will never know. Your body is used to fighting off the foods that don’t agree with you. Every time that you eat it, you are creating inflammation in your body to fight it off.
Godd luck and keep the comments rolling….
ya, refined sugar is crazy stuff. It’s almost offensively sweet after you haven’t eaten in for a while. Doesn’t make me sick or anything, but I get a huge energy rush for 15 min or so and a head rush, then just feel sluggish afterwards. I find it works well on a weekend while just laying around the house, but not if I want to get anything done.
I’ve got no basis for scientific argument on the topic of grains, so I’ll leave that to the expert. However, Jess and I have recently started on the Zone diet, and our experience has been that our grain consumption has dropped big-time!
I think it’s really misleading to have the “base” of the food pyramid made up entirely of grains. The old pyramid that we’ve all learned growing up seems to suggest (at least visually) that half our food should come from grain! With the zone diet, less than 10% of our calories are consumed from grain products, and definitely no sugars.
Big changes I’ve noticed is that I haven’t been nauseous/dizzy during workouts, and my energy level is almost constant throughout the day. No more 10AM post-“sugar breakfast” crashes.
All in all, my experience tells me that my work in the kitchen is equally important as my work in the gym.
Brett, I find the same thing with the Zone as well. Those kinds of foods seem to end up weeding themselves out of your diet, and it’s very true that the results are noticeable across the board when this happens. Less energy crashes and more consistent performance overall. It’s undeniable that Nutrition is the base of our CrossFit “Fitness Pyramid” for good reason!
I’ve been gluten/corn/dairy/soy intolerant for a long time but cetainly did eat rice type products (bread/pasta/treats). I have been doing (not strictly) paleo for some time. I have eliminate all grains/breads etc and feel much much better for it. And WAY WAY WAY better with A LOT of fish oil. We use carbs (toast, pasta) as comfort food, and when that can be eliminated, it works for me. I feel THE BEST with a breakfast of meat and nuts. Lasts the longest, best digestion. But I agree with what others are saying. I still don’t grasp why a nice plate of brown rice/quinoa (not gluten) is supposedly bad. I feel my strength is very good with LOTS OF PROTEIN and little sugar. That’s my experience anyway. Love the discussion. But seriously, everything in moderation, I still figure we have to enjoy ourselves, our lives….
I love lively discussion! You guys all rock.
To follow up on my previous post, I looked at the 2005 US Food Pyramid. I assumed a person eating at the top end of the suggested servings (so 26 total daily servings), and that one each “serving” from each group has the same number of calories. The breakdown of calories by food group in this suggested diet is as follows:
US Food Pyramid:
Grains – 42%
Meat/Eggs/Nuts – 12%
Dairy – 12% (Same as meat!!!!!)
Veggies – 19%
Fruits – 15%
Now if I do the same with the Zone Diet I’ve been using:
Grains – 10%
Meats/Nuts – 61%
Dairy – 4%
Veggies – 18%
Fruits – 8% (Want to bump this up, but it’s hard on a student budget!)
Anyways, thought it was interesting. I like when people challenge conventional thinking. It may not always be right, but it’s a first step towards positive change!
just thought I would recommend http://www.robbwolf.com, haven’t dug through the webpage much, but I bought his book and listened to some 50 hours of podcasts about nutrition and exercise and it’s entertaining and interesting. couldn’t find an article about it, but on episode 38 he talks about quinoa the “non grain” and how it has something close to soap in it and basically leaves wholes in your gut, which can cause auto immune problems.. but again, dig around the site to find the actual references… I’m just too lazy.. and it’s my bed time.
Re: Mark Sisson’s credentials, no, he doesn’t have any formal degrees in nutrition. However, I’ve been reading stuff on his site for over a year, and I think in general, there is a basis for what he recommends. I do think he’s commercially-oriented (see recent hubbub about his protein powder–Google for “Primal Fuel”) but hey, everyone’s gotta make a living. No one’s forcing you to buy his products, and he gives away tons of information on his site.
Regarding grains: I would say that the (good*) science clearly points to grains being detrimental to our health. Robb Wolf covers grains in his book, The Paleo Solution, in an easy-to-understand manner. He also (most importantly) lists citations for the research at the back of the book. The summary is that grains contain substances that are either irritating or harmful to the human body. These substances have been linked to about 50 autoimmune diseases, including MS, arthritis, and Crohn’s. Here are a couple links about the specific ways in which grains mess you up:
Robb Wolf, guest poster on Tim Ferriss’ Blog (http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2010/09/19/paleo-diet-solution/)
Wheat Is A Cause of Many Diseases, I: Leaky Gut (http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=873)
Why Wheat Is A Concealed Cause of Many Diseases, II: Auto-Antibody Generation (http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=882)
If anyone is interested in taking a look at more links, I have a decent collection. I would highly recommend reading Wolf’s book and checking out his site (robbwolf.com).
* See this link to an article in The Atlantic on the percentage of medical studies that are later shown to be false: http://bit.ly/bUUGgF