... from your diet, that is. I've been reading this book called "5 Essentials for a Winning Life" by Chris Carmichael, Lance Armstrong's trainer. The 5 essentials are basically fitness, nutrition, career, relationships, and health, but it's the nutrition chapter that really struck me. It may be a 9-week plan, but this isn't about going on a diet; it's about improving the way you eat for good. The following are the things that Carmichael believes everyone can, and should, live without: (this is all a direct quote, by the way, from pages 34-40)
No More Soda
The average American drinks up to 55 gallons of sweetened soda each year, and it serves absolutely no good purpose in your diet. That's nearly one 20-ounce bottle of soda and 250 calories of sugar every day of the year. Simply cut out soda, and you'll drop 1,750 calories and half a pound each week.
No More Corn Syrup
Corn syrup and its evil twin, high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), are cheap sweeteners used in thousands of products, from colas to condiments and most commercial baked goods, including some whole wheat breads (read the labels). Not only is HFCS a concentrated source of empty calories, recent research from the University of California, Davis, also suggests that it might convert more easily to body fat than other types of simple sugar, such as those derived from cane or beets. This is because fructose bypasses some of your body's normal mechanisms for controlling energy balance, basically allowing you to consume more energy than your body realizes. It's kind of like an accounting mistake that results in a warehouse full of goods you didn't know you bought and that don't show up on inventory lists.
Before HFCS, which is actually a mixture of fructose and glucose sugars, people didn't consume that much fructose because it was mostly found naturally in fruits and honey. Now fructose accounts for about 25 percent of the sugar the average American consumes - much more than the human body has evolved to be able to process. In 1966, Americans ate no HFCS, but in 2001, HFCS made up 42 percent - a full 63 pounds - of the 147 pounds of sugar eaten by the average American.
Fructose goes to the liver to be converted into glucose before your body uses it for energy. The liver is also where you produce fat and cholesterol, and recent research suggests that putting excess carbohydrate in such close proximity to fat producing machinery makes it that much easier for your body to convert it to fat.
Beware of products marketed as low fat; although cutting fat is a good idea, manufacturers often replace the fat with loads of HFCS to make the product's taste and texture seem "normal" to you.
No More Trans Fats
Only humans could create something worse for you than saturated fat. Trans fat is a product of the food industry., which takes heart-healthy unsaturated fats and chemically corrupts them into molecules that are more harmful to your health than the saturated fat dripping off the greasy bacon in a back-alley diner. For years, partially hydrogenated oils, those dreaded trans fats, have been used in commercially baked goods, chips, and fast food. If you see partially hydrogenated anything on a food's ingredient list, put it back on the shelf and walk away. If it's already in your house, give it away or toss it in the trash.
While saturated fat increases levels of LDL cholesterol - heart-stopping "bad" cholesterol - trans fat takes you even a few steps closer to a heart attack. It not only increases LDL cholesterol levels, it also lowers blood levels of beneficial HDL cholesterol, the kind that helps strip plaque off your artery walls. If that weren't bad enough, trans fat can also contribute to the stiffening of arteries. In other words, you'd be better off eating the solid fat you cut off the edge of your steak (saturated fat) than an equal portion of stick margarine (trans fat).
The FDA now requires all manufacturers to list trans fat separately on nutrition labels. So take a second to look at the labels in the grocery store and find products without trans fat. One exception to the rule is commercial peanut butter brands; they use a minimal amount of trans fat to keep the oil from separating, but not enough to worry about.
No More Alcohol
For the first 3 weeks of this program, commit to cutting the alcohol out of your diet. People don't realize that alcohol itself is a source of empty calories: 7 useless calories in every gram, or about 98 in each 1 1/2-ounce shot glass of spirits like vodka or whiskey. Liqueurs (such as Kahlua and Bailey's) have even more calories per shot because of added sugar. Cocktails made with sugary mixes and colas push the calorie counts even higher, up to more than 200 calories per drink. Besides being a source of empty calories, alcoholic beverages are diuretics and contribute to dehydration, even if you have only one or two. When you drink a lot of alcohol and feel miserable the next morning, that pounding in your head, lethargy, and cottonmouth are primarily due to dehydration. Even though your Bloody Mary mix may contain tomatoes and your White Russian contains milk, for 3 weeks I want you to stay away from alcohol, including beer and wine. I'm often asked questions such as the following regarding alcohol and the Carmichael Performance Program.
What about the benefits of red wine?
There is some evidence that regular consumption of red wine may help reduce your chance of developing heart disease, but the benefit seems to come from the antioxidants in the grape skins, not the alcohol. You can get those antioxidants from other sources, including 100 percent grape juice and a variety of fruits and vegetables.
Do I have to give up drinking forever?
During the Strengthen and Perform Periods of the program, you can return to drinking beer, wine, and cocktails, but I recommend sticking to no more than four drinks per week.
Is it okay to indulge at a party?
Even when you return to consuming the occasional alcoholic drink, it's best to keep it to four drinks or fewer each week. By alternating between a drink and a tall glass of water, you can reduce your alcohol intake at parties and keep yourself hydrated. Also, hold on to your drink longer - people are less likely to offer you another if you already have a drink in your hand.
No More Tobacco
When my wife and I went to our first doctor's visit after learning we were having a baby, I was surprised to hear that Colorado is one of the leading states for underweight newborns. When I asked for the reason, I silently wondered if it had something to do with altitude or the relatively high activity level of Colorado residents. I was shocked when the doctor said the lower birth weights were due to high rates of smoking and alcohol use. "Outside the big cities, it's still the Wild West out here," she said.
On my way home, I realized that I was surprised by the doctor's answer because smoking had become so far removed from my own life. I didn't originally include "No More Tobacco" in this book, since no one in my circle of friends, business partners, and athletes smokes. Until that wake-up call in the doctor's office, I mistakenly believed that smoking was a problem of the past. In reality, according to the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 45 million Americans (roughly 21 percent of the population) smoke and expose millions more to the health risks of secondhand smoke. Nearly another 7 million Americans, mostly men, use smokeless tobacco. Across the board, tobacco contributes to more than 400,000 deaths in this country every year, and even though that number is slowly falling, aggressive marketing is still replacing a higher percentage of those who quit.
According to the CDC, adult smokers die 13 to 14 years earlier than nonsmokers do, and here's the important lesson I want you to take away from this section: You can reverse some of the negative impact smoking has had on your lungs and overall health. Think of it as reclaiming years of your life that you had already surrendered. Your lungs begin repairing themselves within a few months of quitting, and after several years, your risk of dying from lung cancer may drop by more than 50 percent.
If you use tobacco, it's going to be much more difficult to quit smoking or chewing than it will be to stop drinking sugary soft drinks or eating fast food. The physical addiction to nicotine is strong, and many smokers have deeply ingrained social habits linked with lighting up (during their commute, while on work breaks, when driving home, after meals, with alcohol) that make it even harder to quit. There are many helpful programs available, including medical interventions, patches, counseling, and group therapy. And keep in mind, very few people successfully quit the first time they try. It may take a few attempts and a few different methods, but quitting is essential; any improvement in health and longevity that you might see from building fitness or losing weight are essentially negated as long as you continue using tobacco.
No More Fancy Coffee Drinks
Recent research confirms what we have believed for decades: Caffeine improves mental performance, including short-term memory. Researchers believe it may block the action of a chemical that normally slows brain function. A more active brain allows you to focus better, find solutions faster, and come up with better ideas. Heightened brain activity also excites the entire nerve system, which may be why some caffeine improves exercise and sports performance, but too much leads to the jitters.
I spent years living in Europe, where they have had a lot more time to come to grips with their coffee habits. On a typical morning in France or Italy, you'd have coffee with milk or a 4- to 6-ounce latte with breakfast; if you had coffee later in the day, it was a double shot of espresso. Meeting for coffee was about getting out of the office or trading stories with a friend; the coffee was small and just an excuse to go for a walk.
In America, it started out innocently enough with coffee, which has virtually no calories, but now you can walk away with 700 to 1,000 calories in a single cup, thanks to the milk, cream, and sugar dumped in. I'm not saying you have to go without coffee, nor am I saying you have to go without caffeine, but it's time to stop with the fancy coffee drinks. the following are the worst offenders.
--> Lattes, mochas, macchiatos, and hot chocolates: These are rich and creamy because they're made with cream or whole milk and sugar and, therefore, loaded with excess fat and calories.
--> White hot chocolate and white chocolate mocha: White chocolate is sweetened cocoa butter and milk solids, so it has more calories and fat than darker chocolate.
If you need a java jolt, have one of these instead.
--> Espresso: A double shot delivers less caffeine than a regular cup of coffee (90 milligrams versus up to 200 milligrams).
--> Americano: Espresso and hot water make a bolder-tasting cup of coffee.
--> Cappuccino made with fat-free milk (the smaller, the better): Traditionally, a cappuccino is a 5- to 6-ounce drink; the espresso provides a bold flavor, and the steamed milk forms a foam with small, fine bubbles. It was never meant to be a 20-ounce glass of warm milk with some espresso in it.
--> Small latte with fat-free milk: A smaller size brings out more of the coffee flavor and gives you nearly a cup of calcium-rich milk yet keeps the calories in check
Carmichael goes on to say that most people are eating a lot of good, nutrient-rich foods in addition to these not-so-good-for-you foods, and that by cutting these six things out of your diet/lifestyle, you'll be able to see how much good stuff you're already eating and continue along that vein. I personally have been giving it a try for the past few days, and although I've been surprised at how many things contain one or more of the above no-nos, I've also been pleased to realize how many things don't.
