18 days and counting...

Thought I'd do a little update on progress, its been approximately 18 days since I first started this project. I have been sticking to the slow-carb diet as closely as I can. A few notes regarding the diet I explained in the previous post, first off, food becomes something you just eat, you don't really think about food at all since you only have a few choices to eat. Less choices = food becomes an afterthought. You just try to remember to eat every 4 hours (4 meals a day) and that is it. This is probably why having the same few meals over and over again is one of the 5 rules. You are tempted less as you aren't constantly thinking about food and don't binge. ONE HUGE drawback is that when you are eating out, you have almost no choices in terms of restaurants. So a little compromise is neccessary. For example unless you live beside a Chipotle and can afford to eat their Fajita Bowls everyday (its over $10 for the meal pictured above in Canada), you have to start looking elsewhere. I have been 'comprising' the legumes (beans) in meals when I eat out and opting for Chicken/Steak Salads in restaurants (pictured below). Not slow-carb friendly but you have to do what you have to do. I figure its better then eating McDonalds. So the first thing you'll notice when dining out is the lack of legumes as sides in restaurants. Almost no major chains in Canada provide beans as a regular side along with your protein.

So moving along to the progress, I have in my personal experiment have decided to do the first few weeks with zero exercise. This way I can evaluate how well the diet itself works.
Here are my results (after 18 days on slow-carb):
Weight Loss: 7lbs
Inches off Waist: 1.5
Inches off Hip: 1.5
Inches off Neck: 0
TOTAL BODYFAT Lost: 4%
(using the circumference US NAVY Method)

I feel this is a very good indication that the diet itself works very well. Now that I have a good baseline of numbers to start, I am now incorporating the 4 Hour Body Exercise Routine that is outlined in the "Perfect Posterior" chapter in the book. It consists of 3 very workouts a week, utilizing a few tools. One of which is the Kettlebell. (I'll post about this in more detail later) These happen to be very popular and VERY expensive weights that you can purchase online or in local fitness shops. Be wary of the quality of the bells you purchase as you don't want the handle snapping off and flying through a wall. I am planning to build a homemade one as suggested in the book first, to both save some money and find out which weight is best for me. More on that later...

The 4-Hour Body, a deeper look.

I thought I'd post a little more about the book (and diet) before I just get into the project I am doing based on it. The 4-Hour body book is not your regular book. Tim Ferris (pictured above) recommends you read it like a buffet, not from start to finish, but to pick at it depending on what you want your final outcome to be. What he means is he's broken the book into 4 streams to read the book.

- Rapid Fat-loss
- Rapid Muscle Gain
- Rapid Strength Gain
- Rapid Sense of total well-being

Now I can be a skeptical person, so of course I decided to do background research on the things Tim recommends. So far...MOST of the stuff he lists to do in the book seems to check out. Although when it does come to health, there is always a study to prove another wrong. One quote I love from the book is "Don't use skepticism as an excuse for inaction." and that is how I am going to approach this project. Although I am highly skeptical of some of the things he says, it is not a reason for me to quit the project. At least not without seeing what kind of results it gives.
So back to the 4 streams, I am currently doing the first Rapid Fat-loss stream. Although I plan to read entire book while doing the one stream while taking notes. So Fat-loss = diet. Here is some details on the "Slow-Carb Diet" and a basic overlook on the rules and recommendations.

Rule #1: Avoid "white carbohydrates"
- This includes brown carbs that USED to be white, such as brown rice, whole wheat bread, oats!
Rule #2: Eat the same few meals over and over again
Rule #3: Don't drink calories
- No soft drinks, fruit juices, beer, you know all the good stuff. Drink tons of water though!
Rule #4: Don't eat fruit
- I researched this and fruit is proven to be NO GOOD as it is mostly frutose which is a NO NO especially if you have a family history of diabetes in the family
Rule #5: Take 1 day off per week to binge
- Apparently it creates a response in the body that is beneficial to weight loss if you eat junk on a schedule once a week (example: Every Saturday eat poutines & burgers & beer)

Also keep note that he also says to stay away from diary of any kind, milk, soy, cheese (except cottage). So no brown bread, brown rice, Kashi cereal, oats, soy milk, pretty much all the stuff I was taught to eat for a healthy lifestyle. More research into this has shown there is a premise in which all these things can do harm to the body. How much harm, well studies are still not 100% conclusive.

So this is the diet I will be sticking to during this project. With the addition of protein shakes, some vitamins, and very short interval training exercises (I'll get into that in another post), I will record the results and see how this Slow-Carbing works out in a real life setting. The book says you can lose 20lbs in 30 days without exercise through the use of this type of meal plan, so the results should be interesting.