You are into being healthy and getting in the best shape you possibly can, right? After all, you wouldn’t be reading this blog post if your nighttime favorite thing to do is “Binge Watching” TV shows on Netflix! Well, with getting healthy, besides a good regimen of physical activity and pushing your body to its limits in order to reach your true potential. Is the way to get you to that healthy, happy place.
We also know that tracking your exercise routines, so that you know exactly how your doing and when to push yourself past your old goal and onto a new one, is the key to maintaining your physical goals. Tracking correctly is important. We know, we’ve been there ourselves and we rely on accurate data to monitor our progress because we are as committed as you are to getting healthy and staying healthy! HeartRateMonitorsUSA.com is committed to providing the best Activity Monitors, GPS Trackers and Heart-Rate-Monitors that are on the market today. One of the best that is currently out there is the Vivoactive 3 Smart Activity Tracker from Garmin This watch does it all, and keeps you connected to the world around you via being connected to your smartphone. And since it’s a multi-purpose tracker, you can use it for any sports activity your currently engaged on and it will track your progress along with keeping tabs on your heart from the wrist-based heart rate monitoring functionality.
So that’s one of our recommendations for the avid health conscious individual that we know you are. But we would be remiss if we didn’t also focus on your eating right and getting the right forms of fuel to power that engine, which your body is comprised of. And eating the right forms of Nutrition has a lot to do with it!
You may have started this road to being fit a few years ago, or maybe it was just a New Year’s resolution. And it’s a little funny but that time of year will soon be upon us again. Where does the time go? Anyway, getting back to nutrition, you may have started this exercise thing just to lose some weight. And if you’re grounded in your commitments, you made a new life out of doing everything you can in order to be fit. That means the types of foods you eat and how much you need on a daily basis. You’ve heard from us before that food, is like fuel to your car. The better the grade of fuel, the better your output, or results and the distance you travel.
Diets seem to have been around forever, after all, we know most of us have been on one or more, who are we kidding, I know I’ve been on a score of diets in trying to seek out the easiest way to drop those pounds, on and off for probably 20 years or better!
Well, one diet that seems to be growing in popularity right now is the Ketogenic Diet, in fact, it was a segment on “Good Morning America” featuring Laura Spencer, who has adopted it as a way to help her body build itself up against illness. It has been described as the Atkins Diet on Steroids! If you would like to watch a clip, you can just click on this link: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/keto-diet-train-body-burn-fat-lose-weight-50316253
The Keto Diet approach is simple, It's all about following a low-carb diet where the focus is on eating real food, not just food low in carbs. It’s not that far away from the Atkins diet but it does have some twists. The object of the keto diet is to force your body to get into and stay in a glycogen deprived state and maintain a mild state of ketosis (burning fats for energy). In order to achieve this you need to increase the fat intake and restrict the carbs to a minimum. When the body does not have enough glucose for energy, it burns stored fats instead. It involves drastically reducing the carbohydrate intake, and replacing it with fat.
In short, you should eat REAL FOOD (meat, eggs, nuts, yogurt, vegetables and occasionally some fruits). Apart from the obvious limitation of net carb content in foods, it is also recommended to avoid processed food and any food that may contain preservatives and colorings. Hence it gets you back to basics in eating and that is why a lot of people that are into non GMO and organically grown foods seem to be able to adopt this diet than those that enjoy their daily dose of carbs. When you get right down to it, the KetoDiet is not just about losing weight at any cost; it's about adopting a healthier lifestyle.
Now just so you have an idea of what you can eat on this diet, we listed a few of the basics here below. Naturally, before you begin any structured diet program, consult with your physician.
Grass-fed and wild animal meat: grass-fed meat (beef, lamb, goat, venison), wild-caught fish & seafood (avoid farmed fish), pastured pork and poultry, pastured eggs, gelatin, ghee, butter - these are high in healthy omega 3 fatty acids (avoid sausages and meat covered in breadcrumbs, hot dogs, meat that comes with sugary or starchy sauces), offal, grass-fed (liver, heart, kidneys and other organ meats). Eating these types of naturally raised meats fall into the organic family very nicely. The key is to know who is providing the meat you purchase when you pick it up at your grocer. You can usually get a list of a grocer’s purveyors if you ask for them. You can then make sure that their products meet with the specifications you are looking for.
Healthy Fats: Saturated (lard, tallow, chicken fat, duck fat, goose fat, clarified butter / ghee, butter, coconut oil)
Monounsaturated (avocado, macadamia and olive oil)
Polyunsaturated omega 3s, especially from animal sources (fatty fish and seafood), Again, non-farm raised. Only because the fish food that they are given in the raising process usually contains GMO additives in order for them to grow to a larger size.
Non-Starchy Vegetables: Leafy greens (Swiss chard, bok-choy, spinach, lettuce, chard, chives, endive, radicchio, etc.)
Some Cruciferous vegetables like kale (dark leaf), kohlrabi, radishes, celery stalk, asparagus, cucumber, summer squash (zucchini, spaghetti squash), and bamboo shoots
Fruits: Very limited, again, you need to get to that Ketosis state So Avocados, yep, this is the one that you can eat freely. Rich in omega fat.
Non-Starchy Vegetables: Leafy greens (Swiss chard, bok choy, spinach, lettuce, chard, chives, endive, radicchio, etc.) some cruciferous vegetables like kale (dark leaf), kohlrabi, radishes celery stalk, asparagus, cucumber, summer squash (zucchini, spaghetti squash), bamboo shoots.
As with many trends in nutrition, the results come down to an athlete’s level of training and ability to follow strict diets. If you decide you want to try this new way of fueling, consult with a registered dietitian or your physician first. Remember that fat is higher in calories than carbs or protein, there are nine calories in a gram of fat while there are only four in a gram of carbs or protein, so if you increase your fat intake, you may actually need to eat less. Another fact to consider: saturated fats
Another fact to consider is that saturated fats have been linked to heart disease and high blood pressure, so it’s important to choose fats that are high in unsaturated fat, such as fish, nuts, oils, and avocados. As always, it’s a good idea to let your physician know what you are intending. He / She may want to follow your progress more closely as you embark on this new nutrition trend, just to make sure your body stay’s in balance.
Now, the above is just a rundown on what the Keto diet is all about. It’s still too early to come to a definitive answer if it’s good for everyone. Because each person is different and all you can do is to try it and see how it affects your daily routines.