With the silly season over and a new year beginning we are going to kick off with a nutrition challenge! It has been a while since we have done one of these and we are tweaking it a little bit. The goal is to create a challenge that is both achievable to stick to in the short term and a sustainable option in the long term. We want to keep the experience as positive as possible to not associate eating well with suffering. Making significant change isn't easy but it will be easier together. The challenge will run for the whole month of February. THE LOW DOWN: Following up on the video posted last week, the challenge will be based around the following outline: Eat real food, Not too much, Mostly plants. Eat Real Food: The food was once alive and doesn't come from a box or a container. Most likely has a short shelf life. Not too Much: 3 Meals a day if you are under 75kg, 4 meals a day if you are over. Each meal is comprised of - A palm size serving of Protein (eg. Meat, Fish, Eggs). - A palm size serving of Starchy Carbs (eg. Fruit, Sweet Potato). - A thumb size serving of Fat (eg. Nuts & Seeds, Avocado, Olive Oil, Coconut Oil). - The rest of your plate (Unlimited) Vegetables. Mostly Plants: This should be majority serving of each meal. Use it to fill your plate, you can go unlimited here. TRACK PROGRESS: If we have sufficient interest we will get the mobile truck from Metabolic Measures out to do Dexa body fat scans. This will just be an option to track progress. Scans are $75 each or you can lock in the before and after scan for $140. The truck also also do metabolic testing and VO2 Max testing if you are interested. We encourage people to track all the food they eat through My Fitness Pal, before and after photos are always a great marker too. GROUP SUPPORT: The challenge will be based around group support for both help with ideas, motivation and inspiration. There will be a private Facebook group created which you will be added to. If you don't have Facebook we advise for the month just create an account under a fake name and then just delete the account at the end of the month. We are using facebook just due to most people using it currently along with ease of use and notifications if desired. We will also try to organise a catch up mid way through. PRIZES: We will have a couple of prizes at the end of the challenge. One prize will be a be a points system winner. The points will be counted with an honesty system. You can get 6 points each day by meeting the following guidelines: 1 point: Eating real food. 1 point: Not eating too much. 1 point: Mostly plants 1 point: 7 hours of sleep a night 1 point: Drink 3% of your bodyweight in water a day 1 point: 30 or more minutes of movement a day..... FINER POINTS: Supplements? One of the goals of the month is to reset the system and get the metabolism primed. You can achieve low levels of body fat without using supplements, think of supplements as that final 2% once everything else is in line. It's always something you can add back in later, a month isn't long. FAQ Foods: - If it’s a vegetable eat it, if it’s meat eat it. - No cold cuts or cured meats - No almond or coconut flour - No canola or vegetable oil - No honey, agave, maple syrup or sweeteners of any kind - No oatmeal or Rice (these lack the nutrients you would get from other carbohydrate sources or fruit). - No Bars - Nut butters must have no added ingredients other than salt - Up to one cup of unsweetened almond milk per day - Up to two pieces of gum a day - Bacon will be classified as a fat The challenge will be a $10 buy in to go towards prizes and to to help make the commitment. If you are interested in doing the Challenge please just send an email here. Please include if you would like to get a Dexa Scan as I need to know if we are going to have enough people to get them to come. If you have any questions please let us know!
