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12 Weeks to Lifetime Fitness Habits

I titled this program “12 Weeks to Lifetime Fitness Habits” not becauseyou can achieve results in 12 weeks that will last you a lifetime, but becausein 12 weeks you can learn the habits and principles to live a healthy life. Totruly transform your body and lifestyle, you will need more than 12 weeks.But in 12 weeks you can begin your transformation.

That said, you may see some results in 12 weeks. The main purpose ofmy program is to get you to practice healthy eating and exercise, but 12weeks is enough time to shed 10-15lbs of fat, or build some visible muscle.

I have created this program based on coaching I have done and basedon ways I have approached fitness in my own life. My goal for you is not to

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help you achieve incredible shape, but rather to teach you to exercise rightand eat right.

Most people learn best by doing. If you follow this program, it willforce you to practice proper nutrition and it will help you develop healthyhabits around exercise and eating. I want you know understand how it feels,and what it looks like, to eat healthy, exercise regularly, and movethroughout the day. Over the course of the 12 weeks, you will begin todevelop actual habits that will carry you farther than any intensive 12-weekdiet or exercise program can.

This program will not transform your physique. Rather, it will teachyou the building blocks of exercise and nutrition that will enable you to live ahealthy lifestyle and improve your physical health and body compositionover time. I do not promise any results. But you may see visibleimprovement in your physique by the end.

Who Needs This Program:

I developed this program for beginners, people who are new to fitnessand nutrition. If you are either completely new to exercise and healthyeating, or if you have had serious trouble following diets or exerciseprograms in the past, this program is for you.1 If you typically gain back anyweight you lose on a diet, this program is for you.

Finally, this program is for adults, not children. It is intended forpeople without any serious health conditions. It is not intended for anyoneat an advanced age. Consult with a doctor if you are unsure of whether ornot you should begin any exercise program.

Outside Research:

Following this program will require a little bit of outside research onyour part. I will point you in the direction of some resources, but you mayneed to do a little searching on your own. I cannot teach you on paper howto move efficiently and with proper form, how to cook all types of nutritiousmeals, or every detail of exercise and nutrition. You will have to do someoutside learning in order to make the best use of this program.

What to Expect:

The program will ramp up in intensity over time. On both the nutritionside, and the exercise side. Your diet will grow increasingly rigorous and youwill incorporate more movement throughout each day. You will alsoexperiment with new forms of exercise.

By the end of the program, you should have learned some tools andhabits to carry you through a healthy life. While you may use those tools andhabits to improve your appearance, you can also use them to increase yourhealthspan (the portion of your life during which you remain active andhealthy).

Fitness is a long-term journey, not a one-and-done fix. My goal in thisshort program is to make it easier for you to continue that long-termjourney on your own. After 12 weeks, you will have practiced elements of ahealthy lifestyle and you should be able to continue making progress onyour own.

Shame and Virtue:

Before we begin, I need to briefly address the subject of shame andvirtue - as it relates to exercise, nutrition, and health.

Exercise, nutrition, and health do not make you a better or morevirtuous person. When I say that a certain food is “bad” or “good,” or when Iuse phrases such as “you should” or “you need,” I am not trying to shameyou in any way. All I am doing is attempting to teach you how to eat andexercise in order to improve your own health. If you are reading this, Iassume that improving your health is an important goal of yours. If you wantto improve your health, I offer my advice on how you can best do that. Feelfree to take that advice or leave it. Improving your health will not necessarilyimprove your character, but it may help you live a better life. But you arethe ultimate judge of that.

All of that is to say: I am not preaching to you. When I use directlanguage about certain bad habits or misconceptions, I am not making amoral value judgement. Instead, I am trying to be clear and honest so thatyou can easily understand my meaning. Eating a “bad food” does not haveanything to do with whether or not you are a bad person. It is only “bad” inthe context of your health.

Disclaimer:

By no means am I an expert on health and fitness, but I have learned athing or two over the years. I hope to impart to you some of the principlesthat I have learned. This program that I have designed should help you toimprove your health if you are a beginner to exercise and nutrition.

But I cannot guarantee any results. Use your own judgement aboutfollowing any particular dietary or exercise advice. If you have any concernsabout your readiness for physical exercise, please consult with a doctorbefore beginning this program.

Exercise Overview

One key to a healthy life: stop thinking of exercise as a burdensomeactivity you do at the gym.

This program will teach you to increase your activity outside of thegym and outside of any daily workout you perform. 30-60 minutes a day inthe gym 4 days a week, will not determine your health and appearance.What you do with the rest of your time will impact both your health andappearance at least as much – perhaps more. You can quite easily sabotageall your efforts in the gym with a poor lifestyle outside of the gym. Thisprogram will teach you how you can begin increasing your daily activity tomaximize your gym gains. Even with difficult work and childcare

responsibilities, you can find ways to move more every day.

The goal of exercise is not just to improve your appearance, but toactually improve your physical health. Physical health does not simply meanstaying out of the obese range. In order to avoid chronic pain, injuries, andmany biomechanical maladies, you will want to improve your posture, learnproper movement (lifting, carrying, etc.), strengthen your muscles andbones, and incorporate a variety of movements and positions into your dailylife. In order to reduce your risk of illness (including COVID-19) and chronicdisease, you will want to eat and exercise properly.

I approach this subject from an evolutionary angle. Human beings didnot evolve to sit inside a cubicle, staring at a screen for 12 hours a day. Thehuman body evolved to move, exercise, and engage in physical activity. Whywould we think that we could place our bodies into unnatural environmentsand activities without consequence? When you realize that the human bodyevolved for activity, you will understand that in order to avoid poor healthconsequences, you will need to avoid long periods of inactivity andsedentary positions (even if you run for an hour every single day).

Daily Minimum:

I developed the daily minimum in my life and coaching. I include it inevery plan I give out. The goal of the daily minimum is to establish habitsand grease the groove.2 The daily minimum is a set of bodyweight exercisesyou perform every single day, whether or not you work out (in fact Irecommend separating it from your daily workout).

Choose 3-5 exercises from the following: bodyweight squats, pushups,

lunges, and pullups (if you have access to a pullup bar). You will practice themovements below the level of true exertion. The daily minimum should beeasy. It should take close to zero time. You should not work up a sweat. Youwill instantly recover.

Choose the number of repetitions for each exercise based on what youcan accomplish easily. Maybe you can do 5 pullups, 10 lunges on each leg,15 bodyweight squats, and 15 pushups. But maybe you can only do 5 lungeson each leg, 10 squats, and 5 pushups (and maybe you skip the pullups orhang from a bar for 30 seconds). The goal is to practice form, maintain habit,and maintain functional strength. If you can only do 1 repetition of eachexercise, that is your daily minimum.

You do not have to do the exercises all at once. You can do them atany time during the day. I recommend as soon as you wake up or early inthe morning (to get them out of the way).

The main reason for the daily minimum: if you do it every day, even ifyou get zero exercise the rest of the day, you will still have accomplishedsomething. You will still have exercised, even if it was so short and easy thatit did not feel like exercise. This will help you build the habit of exercise andmovement. Over time, you may find yourself organically incorporating moreeasy exercise at random points in your day. A friend of mine decided on hisown to add daily dips. Perhaps you will add other random exercises on yourown.

Daily Activity:

I also want you to incorporate as much non-exercise activity into yourday as possible. You hopefully already know some strategies for achievingthis:

- Take the stairs- Walk instead of driving- Park further from your destination (including the grocery store)- Stand up or walk around while on phone calls- Alternate periods of sitting and standing throughout your workday

These actually work.

I recommend going further and making a game out of trying to movemore, in new ways, every day. You will want to develop a mindset of activityover sedentariness, and of movement over ease. Stop taking the shortcut, orthe easy way. Carry your own bags. Walk the long way. Take the stairs, evenif you have to climb 10 flights.

You should also try to incorporate more non-sitting positions into yourdaily routine. By all means get a standing desk and alternate between sittingand standing while at work. But you should also sit in different positions,squat down, kneel, lie on the floor, and even hang from a bar or a tree limb.Get creative about the different positions you try. Not only can you increaseyour metabolism, but you can also improve your biomechanical health andavoid surgery down the road. Over time, avoid sitting as much as possible.Increase not only the range and type of your movement, but the range andtype of your daily positions as well.

Two Other Factors:

Get outside as much as possible. Humans evolved to live outside.Sunlight, fresh air, fluctuating temperatures, and natural environments playcritical roles in human health. Exercise outside when you can. Walk outsidemore frequently. Go outside even in inclement weather and uncomfortabletemperatures. Try to spend at least 30 minutes outside every single day.3 Orspend your whole day outside. You will improve your immune health andeven your psychological health.

Also, as much as possible, try to get 7-9 hours of sleep (or more), everysingle night. Very few people can actually function well on much less. Lack ofsleep has drastic effects on your physical and mental health. It can sabotageyour efforts to eat healthy and exercise properly.

Lack of sleep can impact not only your health, but the health of thosearound you. If you drive a car after sleeping 4 hours the previous night, yourisk causing an accident and potentially killing other motorists orpedestrians. If you would not drive while inebriated, you should not drivewhen sleep deprived. After texting and drinking, sleep deprivation is theleading cause of motor vehicle accidents.

Get outdoors and get more sleep. In addition to daily physical activity,

these two factors will have major impacts on your physical and mentalhealth.

Working Out:

Over the course of 12 weeks, you will ramp up the intensity,frequency, and duration of your daily workouts. You will also vary the formsof exercise you perform, and purposefully engage in new and differentforms. I want you to combine aerobic exercise and strength training, highintensity exercise and endurance exercise. But I will generally leave thespecifics up to you (other than walking). Choose forms of exercise that youenjoy, but also experiment outside of your comfort zone. Among my goals, Ihope to help you find new forms of exercise you will actually stick with long-term. You may find that you really enjoy swimming, or rowing, or kettlebells,even if you have never tried them before. Working out does not have to feelonerous. If you find activities you truly enjoy, you will have far less troublecontinuing them.

Image Credit: “Fresh broccoli” by Colorado State University Extension, PublicDomain, via https://www.flickr.com

Nutrition Overview

Nutrition will determine the majority of your success in health andfitness. It plays a decisive role in body composition.4 No matter your goal,nutrition will heavily impact your outcome in following any fitness plan. Apoor diet will wreck your exercise gains, while an excellent diet can make upfor a comparative lack of strenuous exercise.5

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Over the course of 12 weeks, your diet will grow progressively stricter.Along the way, you will experiment and learn about eating properly.Learning how to eat healthy means learning to eat nutrient-dense foods thatfuel your body while avoiding unhealthy foods. While you may find the lastfew weeks of the program strenuous, I do not recommend continuing arestrictive diet indefinitely. Instead, I recommend using the basic principlesyou learn during the program to inform your nutrition choices movingforward. Ideally, you will find healthy eating much less complicated thanmany fitness gurus make it appear.

Calories:6

Counting calories gets a bad rap these days. People look down on it infavor of more complicated diets. They will claim that counting calories overlysimplifies dieting and ignores many complicated factors. While those claimshave some truth to them, decades of rigorous study have shown that energybalance determines weight gain and weight loss. In other words, caloricintake has evaded every attempt to disprove its role in body composition.

I looked down on calorie counting too, for a while. However, I havecome to value it as a tool for manipulating body composition, and as a toolfor teaching proper portion control. Calorie counting has its downsides,which I will address. I do not recommend you count calories for the rest ofyour life.7 But during this program, you will count calories. If you have nevercounted calories before, you may learn some surprising facts about portioncontrol.

The energy balance equation determines whether a person gains orloses weight. In other words, you consume and absorb more calories thanyou burn, you will gain weight. And vice versa.

The calorie is simply a unit used to measure energy. Most people knowthat “if you eat too much, you will get fat.” Calories (actually kilocalories)8

are used to measure the amount of energy in food and the amount ofenergy a person expends each day. Counting calories is a useful tool forhelping you determine whether you are “eating too much,” or taking inmore energy than you expend each day. Calories are just the numbers usedto measure energy intake and expenditure.

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Of course, many complicated factors influence both sides of theenergy balance equation. Hormones, exercise, daily activity outside ofexercise, and adaptive thermogenesis can affect the number of calories aperson burns each day. Other factors can affect the number of calories aperson absorbs from the food they eat each day. So, you should not treatcalorie counting as a panacea or an overly precise method. It does notmatter if you calculated that you ate 7.5 calories more than you burned on agiven day. But counting calories will help you determine whether you areovereating, undereating, or eating enough food to maintain weight.

I also find that counting calories teaches you some important lessonsabout portion control. You will learn that the volume of food you consumehas less to do with “eating too much” than it does with the energy density ofthe food you consume. You could eat ten pounds of spinach a day and loseweight, or a pound of butter a day and gain weight. Yet one would fill you upfar more than the other.

Some examples to illustrate the lessons you might learn from caloriecounting:

- 1lb of 95% lean/5% fat ground beef has half the calories of 1lb of80% lean/20% fat ground beef (80/20 is the more common andless expensive option at the store).

- We often get portion sizes backwards. Instead of a small bowl ofgreen beans with a large bowl of mac and cheese, you should eata large bowl (maybe 1lb) of green beans and a small bowl of macand cheese.

- Beverage choices can have a massive impact on daily caloricintake. Black coffee has essentially zero calories, whereas a 16ozpumpkin spice latte might have 380.9 If you drink a couple sodasand a couple beers each day, you could easily cancel out the effectof even a very long workout.

- You can eat a very high calorie diet and still feel hungry, or a low-calorie diet and feel full.

- You can cut plenty of calories from your diet by eating leanermeats and less sugar, by avoiding certain condiments(mayonnaise) and some sauces (alfredo sauce), and by eating

fewer processed snacks.- Salad dressing can contain up to 90% of the calories in the salad,

depending on what else you put in it.One final word on calories. Calorie counting has its downsides. Among

the most pernicious is the myth it creates that “calories are bad.” In moregeneral terms, counting calories sometimes causes people to fear calories,or to think that lower calorie foods are automatically good, or that highcalorie foods are automatically bad, or that the best diet is a low-caloriediet. None of these are true.

You need to eat calories. They are simply a tool for measuring theamount of energy in the food you consume. Tracking them can helpdetermine whether you eat too much (or too little). Rather than fearcalories, you should view them as a way to ensure you eat the right amountto fuel the activity you do. If you want to maintain weight, you should try toeat roughly the same number of calories you expend each day. If you wantto gain weight, you should eat more calories. And if you want to lose weight,you should try to create a caloric deficit by eating fewer calories than youburn. However, extreme caloric deficits can cause health problems. The bestdiet is not necessarily the lowest calorie diet.

Furthermore, certain low-calorie foods lack nutrients, while certainhigh calorie foods are nutrient dense. Iceberg lettuce has very few calories,but it also has very few nutrients your body needs. Avocados, raw nuts, andred meats contain plenty of calories, but they also contain plenty ofnecessary nutrients. So, calories do not make a food either good or bad.

In this program, you will count calories in order to learn properportion sizes and gain control over your energy balance. But you will use thecalorie contained in foods as only one piece of information when makingchoices about what to eat.

Protein:

In addition to tracking your calories during the 12 weeks, you will alsotrack your protein consumption. Protein is the most importantmacronutrient. It plays a deterministic role building and preserving muscle.Athletes need to consume much higher amounts of protein than the FDA

recommends.

When dieting to lose weight (meaning maintaining a caloric deficitover a period of time), you need to eat high amounts of protein in order topreserve muscle. I assume that if you want to lose weight, you want to losefat while preserving as much muscle as possible, instead of losing a largeamount of muscle in order to lower the number on the scale (while stillremaining flabby). In order to successfully do that, you need to eat a highprotein diet. Furthermore, you will find a high-protein diet more satiating,which will in turn make it easier to maintain the caloric deficit (i.e., you areless likely to feel hungry all the time).

If you want to gain muscle, you also need to eat a high protein diet. Ifyou eat a low-protein diet and do not strength train, you will only get fat(assuming you are eating more calories than you burn each day).

If you have cancer, you should not eat a high protein diet. If you haveother severe illnesses or health conditions, you may need to follow a veryspecific diet, which could mean a low-protein diet. This program is not forpeople who have serious illnesses or health conditions. Your age and risk-factor for a variety of illnesses also play a role in the type of diet and activitylevel that is best for you. Please consult with a doctor or a licensednutritionist about your own health and dietary needs.

Image Credit: Image Credit: “Roasted Carrots” by Colorado State University

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Carbohydrates and Fat:10

You can pay less attention to the ratio of carbohydrates to fat in yourdiet as long as you get protein consumption right. Despite what you mayhave heard, neither carbohydrates, nor dietary fat, make you fat. Eating toomuch food makes you fat. I recommend following neither a low-carb diet,nor a low-fat diet. The diet I eat has moderate amounts of both carbs andfat.

You will find it far easier to overeat on fat than carbohydrates orprotein. Fat has more calories per gram. However, you can still easilyovereat on carbohydrates, especially sugar. You need a balance of bothcarbohydrates and fat in your diet.

Two of the most prevalent health myths are the myth thatcarbohydrates are bad and the myth that dietary fat is bad. Both low-carbdiets, and low-fat diets, are based on myths. You can lose weight on both alow-carb diet and a low-fat diet. You can also gain weight on both diets. Intruth, there are both good types of fat and bad types of fat, goodcarbohydrates and bad carbohydrates. Meaning that you need to eat certainhighly nutritious types of fat and you need to eat certain nutritiouscarbohydrates. And you should avoid certain unhealthy fats and certainunhealthy carbohydrates. I especially recommend you avoid trans fats andrefined sugar.

Also, important to note, most foods contain a mixture of variousmacronutrients. Meat has protein, and varying amounts of fat. Rice hascarbohydrates, and a little protein. Milk has fat, and also some protein.Which means that very rarely would you consume purely fat, or purelyprotein, or purely carbohydrates unless you try to do so. When I say youneed to eat certain highly nutritious types of fat or carbohydrate, I meanthat you need to eat certain foods that are highly nutritious and high ineither fat or carbohydrate.

And, when I say that you will find it easier to overeat on fat than oncarbohydrates, I mean that you will find it easier to overeat on foods thatare high in fat. But it is also easy to overeat on foods that are high in sugar.

Actually, the easiest foods to overeat are high in both carbs and fats (usuallythe bad kinds of both), and low in protein. The Standard American Diet(SAD) is high in “bad” carbs, high in “bad” fat, low in protein, and low inmicronutrients.

Micronutrients:

One of the most important components of healthy eating that you willlearn from this program is how to include more micronutrients in your diet.A healthy diet does not simply mean avoiding “bad” foods, it meanschoosing the foods that will actually have positive effects on your health andwill fuel your body. This means eating nutritious foods.

What do we mean when we say a food is nutritious? Typically, wemean that it contains micronutrients (vitamins and minerals).Micronutrients include vitamins A, B, C, D, E, and K, and minerals such aszinc, iron, magnesium, and selenium. Unless your genetics predispose youfor micronutrient deficiencies, you can get the vitamins and minerals youneed from food (and sunlight), without supplementing with pills. Forget yourmultivitamin. Even if you do supplement with specific pills, you should aimto get high amounts of micronutrients from your diet. This program willteach you how to incorporate more micronutrients into your diet by seekingout nutritious foods.

Other Considerations:

In addition to vitamins, minerals, and protein, you need to eat plentyof fiber and essential fatty acids, as well as probiotics. These also help makeup a nutritious diet. You need fiber for proper digestive (and bowel)health.11 Probiotics help ensure you have good gut health and a healthymicrobiome. Fatty acids are crucial for brain development and cognitivefunction. You will learn more about these components of a healthy diet atcertain points in this program.

Overview:

Over the course of 12 weeks, you will learn how to eat a healthy dietthrough practice. The program will start out less strenuous and growprogressively more difficult. Certain practices will remain the same

throughout the program, while others will only matter for a short time.12

Each week will have a specific focus and typically that focus will only matterfor that week.

Again, healthy eating means not only avoiding potentially harmfulfoods, but actively seeking out foods that fuel your body. In fact, it is moreimportant to eat nutritious foods that have crucial health benefits than it isto remove all traces of unhealthy foods from your diet.13

At no point during this program will I force you to eat at any setfrequency or at specific times during the day. Eat whenever you want. Youcan fast and eat one or two meals a day, eat small meals throughout theday, or even graze (as long as you track every single calorie you eat or drinkand do not “forget” snacks). Some diets will force you to follow specific mealplans, but I find that approach too restrictive. Eat based on your ownschedule.

Week 1

Exercise:

Start performing your daily minimum every day. Start with squats,lunges, and pushups. If you have a pullup bar, add pullups or a timed hang(i.e., a dead hang from the bar for 15 seconds, or 60 seconds, etc.). If youwant to add dips or another exercise you can, but I prefer to only have 3 or 4exercises, because one of the points of the daily minimum is that it does nottake any time at all. Even the busiest professional has 60 seconds a day fortheir daily minimum. If you do pushups, you probably do not need to adddips. Dips and pushups involve the same muscles: chest and triceps. Whenchoosing the number of repetitions for each exercise, remember to keep itvery easy.

Start trying to incorporate more activity into your routine every day.For now, you do not need to have a set goal or structure. Just start standingmore, walking more, taking the stairs more often, sitting less, and evenfidgeting more. Get up and stretch halfway through your day. Be creative.

Walk for at least ten minutes every day. If you want to walk more, youcan. If you already go to the gym, or bike, or run, feel free to continue doing

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that. But this program will ramp up in intensity over the course of the 12weeks, which means you may want to start slow this week.

Nutrition:

Start tracking your calories. You do not need to restrict them yet. Eatand drink what you want. Just log every single item you eat or drink duringthe day. Try to count your calories as accurately as reasonably possible. Youdo not need to weigh your food on a food scale, but you should measureevery item you cook or eat.14 Count the calories you drink, too. Keepyourself honest. Log items at the moment you ingest them. If you wait untillater, you may forget. This exercise will hopefully help you eat and drinkmore mindfully, rather than munching without thinking, or drinking andforgetting.

You will need to read the nutrition labels for every item you buy in thestore. For items that lack nutrition labels, you will need to use Google. Again,strive for accuracy. For example, if you buy a potato at the store, youtypically have to weigh it in order to pay for it. Look up, “Potato, Calories perOunce.” You will discover that a yellow potato has 22 calories per ounce. Ifyour potato weighs 1.12lbs, you will multiply 1.12lbs x 16oz x 22 to arrive at394.24 calories. Round up to 395 calories, or even 400 calories. (Alwaysround up.)

If you go out to eat, look up the nutrition facts for the food you order.Fast food places usually have them listed on the menu. Most chain

restaurants will have them on the website somewhere. For everywhere else,you can just look up the name of the dish and try to find a ballpark estimate.For example, if you ordered mac and cheese and pulled pork, you wouldGoogle calorie estimates for those items (with an estimate of the weight andvolume of the food you ate). You might want to try a few different websitesto get a feel for the different numbers out there. Unless you want to gainweight, I would err on the side of overestimating the number of calories youate, not underestimating.

Note: Your estimates will likely be wildly off here. For strict caloriecounting, avoid eating out much. Did your calzone have 900 calories or1500? Probably 1800. If you are new to calorie counting, you will probablyassume you ate 1 serving of peanut butter when you ate 3. Being very strictin your measurements throughout this program will teach you how toeyeball portion sizes (a little) better for the rest of your life.

I want you to log the number of calories you eat each day and find theaverage over the course of the week. Is there any consistency? Do you findyou typically eat within a specific range? Or is your number all over themap?

When you buy meat (and some other foods), you will often find anuncooked vs. cooked calorie number on the nutrition label. This assumesyou drain the fat off. I would err on the side of overestimating and alwayschoose the larger number (typically the uncooked number), even if it ismuch higher. When you read a nutrition label in the store and it says,“Serving Size: 4oz, Calories per Serving: 100, Servings per Container: About3,” I want you to do some basic math to determine the exact number ofcalories. If the package weights 14oz, it has more than 3 servings. Divide 14by 4 and multiply by 100 to arrive at 350 calories per package.

At the end of the week, I want you to come up with an estimate ofyour daily metabolic rate (BMR). Go online and do a little research. Usemultiple sources (NerdFitness, MyFitnessPal, etc.) to calculate your BMR.You will input your height, weight, activity level, and a few other numbers. Ifyou do not exercise much, assume “sedentary” for your activity level. Youmay receive different numbers from different calculators. Determine theaverage, or trend. You will also want to compare the estimate you receive

with the amount you typically eat (which you can now estimate because youhave tracked your calories for 7 days). After tracking your calories all weekand coming up with an average, ask yourself whether you are gainingweight, losing weight, or staying about the same. If you have gained weightrecently, you are likely overeating. If you have lost weight recently, you arelikely undereating. If you have stayed about the same, you are likely eatingabout the amount you need to eat each day. Reconcile the number youcome up with from your research with the number you come up with fromyour calorie-counting experiment this past week. You will want one numbergoing forward. This is your target number. You do not need a perfect BMRestimate at first. You can revise it as you go along. If you start gainingweight, lower your estimated BMR.

Week 2

Exercise:

Continue performing your daily minimum. Do not add any extraexercises to it. If you want to do more random exercise throughout the day,feel free. In fact, I encourage it. But only do extra as you see fit and as youfeel inclined. The daily minimum is a requirement. The point of keeping iteasy and short is so that you have zero excuse to skip it. You have to do yourdaily minimum every single day. If you want to do a few extra sets of squatsor lunges or pushups or any other exercises, you can. But keep that separatefrom your daily minimum. If your daily minimum gets longer and longer, youwill eventually be more tempted to skip it.

Consider the daily minimum the most important part of the exercisepillar in this program. If you skip everything else, do the daily minimum.Why? I am guessing that if you are starting this program, you do not have anestablished exercise habit. Perhaps you have tried to get into running, orbiking, or lifting weights in the past, and every time you fell off thebandwagon after an initial period of enthusiasm. In this program, you aredeveloping lifetime fitness habits. Which requires starting slow. Many of youprobably think the daily minimum is pointless. You are the ones most likelyto benefit from it. The daily minimum is something that everybody hasenough time, willpower, energy, and wherewithal to do. That is why it is the fundamental building block to developing lifetime habits of movement and

exercise.

Continue walking frequently, moving throughout the day, andattempting to stay active below the threshold of exercise.

I also want you to begin exercising more seriously. For now, chooseexercise you enjoy. You could run, bike, go to the gym, play basketball, oreven backcountry ski. You can combine multiple forms of exercise. Eitherwork out for 45 minutes 3 times per week (minimum), or work out for 30minutes 5 times per week (minimum). Again, you can always go above andbeyond. If you skip your workout, or fail to complete 3 weekly workouts, youstill must do your daily minimum every day. Daily minimums do not counttowards weekly workouts.

Stay active each day. Even on rest days, try to walk for ten minutes orotherwise get some light exercise. If you walk for your workouts, go for ashorter walk on rest days. The human body can walk every day withoutinjury or illness. (In fact, many people would argue that the human bodycannot go without walking every day without injury and illness.)

Nutrition:

Continue counting your calories. This week, you are not just keepingtrack of the number of calories you eat, you are going to limit that number.In other words, instead of observing your daily caloric intake, you willcontrol it.

Remember your BMR from last week? This week, I want you to have atarget number. That is either your BMR, or a number lower than it(depending on your goals).

If you want to lose weight, take your target number and subtract 500calories. That is your new target number. Each day, you will strive for a 500-calorie deficit (i.e. 500 calories below your estimated BMR). That shouldresult in roughly 1lb of weight lost per week, a steady, safe, and sustainabletrajectory. If you want to maintain weight, you will want to eat about thenumber of calories you burn each day.

(Note: if you want to build muscle and gain weight, you need adifferent plan and much stricter attention to nutrition and strength training.

Theoretically, though, you would eat a very high protein diet, very cleandiet, and about 300-500 calories over your BMR.)

This week, I want you to hit your target number every day. As close asyou can. Neither above it, nor below it. Of course, if you come within 10-50calories, it will not really matter. That said, if you always eat 50 caloriesabove your target, you should consider balancing it out by eating below yourtarget for a day or two.

For Example: If you want to maintain weight and your BMR is ~2300,eat ~2300 calories every day, or ~2250 one day and ~2350 the next. Or~2290 every day. If you want to lose weight and your BMR is 2300, yourdaily number is 1800.

(Yes, I realize that both your estimate for the number of calories youburn each day, and the estimate for the number of calories you eat eachday, are only rough estimates. That is fine. You do not have to be precise tomaintain weight, as long as you are not drastically off every single day.Weigh yourself frequently and if you start gaining weight, you are eatingmore than you burn each day. If you start losing weight, you are eating less.)

To make this easier, I recommend you plan out your meals in advance.You can plan your whole week before going to the grocery store. Or you canplan a couple days in advance. Do not eat or drink anything you did not planto eat or drink.

Or, if you do eat or drink something you did not plan for, you will needto revise your plan for that day. If one day you eat an unplanned 400-caloriedonut at work, you have to skip the 400-calorie bowl of ice cream later thatnight. It may take work and practice to achieve calorie discipline. Over time,you will find it easier. I want you to take your calorie target very seriously.Why? Because it will help you develop discipline in your nutrition habits overtime.

A process to make it easier:

- Plan your meals in advance to add up to just under your targetnumber (ex. if your BMR is 2000, your meals add to 2270)

- Have on hand a few items you can add to make up the difference

(30 calories): some carrots, tomatoes, celery, salad, or similar low-calorie vegetables you can grab.

- I find Brazil nuts (roughly ~30 calories per nut) a good item to haveon hand. One of the most nutritious foods you can eat, treat themlike vitamins: only 1-4 a day. One or two Brazil nuts can help youmake up the difference (30-60 calories) to arrive at your targetnumber. And they will give you a good dose of criticalmicronutrients such as selenium.

- When in doubt, err on the side of eating less than your targetnumber, unless you want to gain weight.

- Example: Target 2000 calories a dayBreakfast: 1 cup uncooked of oatmeal (300 calories),15 3boiled eggs (70x3=210 calories), 1 90-calorie apple; total= 600 caloriesLunch: 60 calorie salad (spinach, carrots, celery,tomatoes, no dressing), 100 calorie banana; total = 160caloriesDinner: 1lb of 94% lean/6% fat ground turkey (640calories), 1lb of frozen onions and peppers (120calories), ¾ cup uncooked rice (480 calories); total =1240 caloriesTotal: 1240+600+160=2000

- A modified version of the above example: Target 2100 calories aday

Breakfast: Same + 2 Brazil nuts (60 calories)Lunch: Same + 1 small Mandarin orange (40 calories)Dinner: Same

- In the second example, the Brazil nuts help you make up thedifference. You add them to your planned meals last (meaningafter you planned everything else, you add them in order to makeup the difference).

Week 3

Image Credit: “Numbers of starting line track” by Santeri Viinamaki under CCBY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia

Commons

Exercise:

Continue with the daily minimum. Continue moving throughout theday. Continue walking as much as possible, especially outside.

For this week, we will focus on aerobic exercise. If your workouts fromlast week already were aerobic, this will be easy for you. Next week, we willfocus on strength training. If you prefer strength training, this week willbegin to get you outside of your comfort zone. We will keep therequirement from last week: 45 minutes 3 times per week, or 30 minutes 5times per week. This week, choose any endurance exercise for yourworkouts. Again, you can exercise beyond the minimum requirement (youcan run every day if you want, but I do not recommend it).

This week, walking no longer meets the endurance workoutrequirement. By all means, keep walking. Especially on non-workout days.But for your workouts, you need to run, or bike, or swim, or use theelliptical, or row, or go for a ruck, or cross-country ski, or even use theStairmaster. Also, for the purposes of this week, circuits of bodyweight orweighted exercises do not count as endurance workouts, even if they makeyou breath hard.

Preferably, you would try some new form(s) of exercise or engage in atleast two different kinds of endurance exercise this week. For those of youwho hate running, you do not have to run.

You can still strength train this week. It just does not count towardsthe workout requirement (3x45, or 5x30).

STUFF YOUR FACE.LOSE WEIGHT.

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The human body evolved to engage in strenuous activity for longperiods of time, especially foot-travel. For overall health, you should developsome minimal aerobic capacity. I want everyone who participates in thisprogram to develop some balance in their exercise habits betweenendurance and strength, in order to have more well-rounded athleticism.

For human health, you need both strength training and aerobicexercise. This is fairly fundamental. It does not matter if you do not want tolook big or win a 5k. If you want to avoid chronic diseases, move properly inold age, and perform a range of activities without tiring easily, you need tostrength train and you need to do some sort of endurance exercise.

Nutrition:

Continue counting your calories and restricting your daily caloricintake to meet your target number (either your estimated BMR or 500calories below BMR - if you want to lose weight). You will continue this forthe remainder of this program, applying the same level of rigor throughout.

This week, we will add a protein focus. Unlike the calorie number,which is a hard target, we will treat your protein requirement as a soft goal. Istill want you to take it seriously, but you can build up to it over time andyou do not have to worry as much if you miss it one day.

You have already learned to read nutrition labels and perform onlineresearch to find out nutrition facts about your food. In addition to thecalorie numbers, this week you will start looking at the protein numbers. Iwant you to eat a high-protein diet. The FDA recommends 50g of protein aday, a very low number for the average person. 1 gram of protein contains 4calories.16 Assuming a 2000 calorie diet, 50g of protein a day equates to 10%of daily caloric intake.

This week, I want you to start paying attention to the amount ofprotein you consume. I want you to target 1g of protein per pound ofbodyweight a day. If you weigh 175lbs, you would aim to eat around 175g ofprotein a day, or 700 calories of pure protein. Alternatively, you can try toget around 20% of your daily calories from protein.17 If you weigh more than250lbs, I do not recommend trying to eat more than 250 grams of protein aday. At a certain point, it becomes difficult to eat enough protein. Especially

if it would make up a very high a percentage of your diet. At that point youbegin to crowd out important carbohydrates and fats. Definitely keep yourprotein intake below 30% of your daily caloric intake.

You will continue this protein soft requirement for the remainder ofthe program. Prioritize the calorie target, but take the protein requirementseriously, too. For now, you can use protein bars, or even protein powder orother synthetic sources in order to meet your requirement. This may make iteasier for those of you who currently eat a low protein diet (which you may,if you follow a typical American diet). For all non-vegetarians, I recommendyou aim to eat about a pound of meat a day. This may sound like a lot, but itwill help you hit that protein requirement.

Sources of protein to help you reach your target:

- Meat (especially chicken)- Eggs- Fish- Synthetic Sources: protein bars, protein powders, etc.- Nuts (high in fat and calories)- Beans- Certain Vegetables (ex. peas)- Greek Yogurt- Other Dairy Products (check the labels for nutrition facts)18

- Quinoa (even rice has a little bit of protein)Week 4

Image Credit: “Dumbbells on rack” by Santeri Viinamaki under CC BY-SA 4.0

<https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via WikimediaCommons

Exercise:

Continue with the daily minimum and activity throughout the day(including walking).

This week, we will shift our focus to strength training. As before, youneed to meet the minimum requirement of a 45-minute workout 3 timesper week, or 5 half hour workouts per week. You can still do more exercise,including aerobic exercise, if you want to do so. But non-strength workoutsnot count towards the requirement. If you have no experience, and noaccess to a gym, I will include some bodyweight circuit workouts in theappendix for you to try.

If you do have access to a gym and have some strength trainingworkouts you prefer, go ahead and follow those. I strongly encourage you toperform at least some heavy compound lifts, for high-weight, low-repetitionsets. Heavy barbell lifts are one of the most efficient ways to develop overallstrength. Make sure to learn the form.1920

One suggestion, go to StrongLifts.com and follow the 5x5 program.You will find this an easy-to-follow, simple program for developing strength.It focuses exclusively on heavy, barbell lifts. Some beginners feel intimidatedby barbell lifts. In my opinion, most beginners should focus primarily (oreven exclusively) on barbell lifts. You can leave isolation workouts to moreadvanced lifters.

For all those biased against strength training, realize that even theleanest marathoner should strength train. Not only will strength trainingstrengthen your muscles, it will strengthen your bones and help you avoidosteoporosis in old age. Also, if you want to lose weight, you need tostrength train to avoid muscle loss. Any time you have an extended caloricdeficit, you should strength train to avoid losing muscle. Otherwise, you willlose both fat and muscle, not good for your overall fitness.

If you eat protein and strength train while dieting (to lose weight), you

will preserve muscle (as much as possible) during your weight-loss. Unlessyou want the flabby-skinny look, you will want to prioritize losing fat overlosing muscle. Terms like “unhealthy weight” and “overweight” indicateextra bodyfat. In other words, the health consequences of being at an“unhealthy weight” stem from having too much bodyfat. Someone withenough muscle mass to put them into an “unhealthy weight,” even thoughthey are very lean (they have low bodyfat), will not suffer thoseconsequences. The number on the scale matters less than overall bodycomposition. Strength training will help you improve your body composition,whether you want to lose fat, maintain a lean frame, or build muscle.

Image Credit: “Salad” by Daniel Moskowitz, Public Domain, viahttps://www.flickr.com

Nutrition:

Continue counting your calories and trying to hit your protein goal. Inaddition, this week I challenge you to eat 8 different vegetables a day. Not 8servings of vegetables. 8 different vegetables. I got this idea from the coachDan John, who eats 8-14 vegetables a day.21

Preferably, you would eat at least one serving of each vegetable. If youeat a really excellent salad every day, that can get you most of the waythere. Different colored versions of the same vegetable do not count.22 Feelfree to eat vegetables all day if you cannot put 8 vegetables into a singlemeal (you can eat vegetables for breakfast).

What might this look like? If you ate a stir fry with onions and bellpeppers, a large salad with a base of kale, arugula, and spinach, and ahandful each of carrots and cherry tomatoes on top, you would only need toeat one more vegetable that day to hit the target. By all means, eat morevegetables if you can. But aim for a minimum of 8 a day for one week. V8Juice does not count. In fact, I prefer that you do not count any juices orliquefied vegetables. Eat your vegetables, do not drink them.

Also, starches do not count as vegetables (potatoes, sweet potatoes,etc.). Fruit does not count. Corn never counts as a vegetable. Lima beanscount for the purposes of this exercise, but most other types of beans do notcount (legumes, black eyed peas, etc.).

In truth, despite all attempts to make nutrition complicated, youprobably already know the basics of a healthy diet. Your parents probablytaught you one of the most fundamental components growing up: “eat yourvegetables.” With some exceptions, vegetables tend to be some of the mostnutrient-dense foods you can eat. Most also tend to have few calories,meaning you can load up on vegetables in order to stay full withoutovereating.23 In fact, if you have trouble with hunger, while trying tomaintain your calorie target (meaning you get so hungry you want toovereat), you need to eat more vegetables. If you get more of your caloriesfrom vegetables, you will fill up without overeating.

We tend to get portion sizes backwards in America. We will eat a smallside salad, or a handful of green beans, along with some high-fat, high-sugarmain dish. Then we feel hungry again an hour later. Feel free to eat a poundof green beans and a spinach salad the size of a bowling ball. Then tell meyou need to eat a third helping of pie to fill up.

Week 5

Exercise:

This week, I want you to increase the number of workouts you do.Either 45 minutes to an hour 4-5 times per week, or 30 minutes 6-7 timesper week. Vary up the workouts. Include some endurance exercise and somestrength training. Vary up the types of endurance exercise and types ofstrength exercises that you perform - in order to avoid injury or burnout.

You can ease up a little on the difficulty of your workouts given the increasein volume. You can either alternate strength training and enduranceworkouts on different days, or combine them into single sessions (ex. yourun for 30 minutes and lift for 30 minutes).

As before, continue doing your daily minimum every day and continuetrying to move and walk throughout the day.

Note: If you are struggling with workout frequency and length, youneed to make them easier. Bike slower. Very slow. Lift lighter weights. Muchlighter. Working out does not have to be a chore. It can feel good. If it feels“too” easy, then – at this stage – you are probably doing it right.24

Nutrition:

This week, we focus on fiber. Continue eating vegetables, but no needto aim for 8 a day if you find that difficult. Continue aiming for your proteinsoft target and continue hitting your caloric intake hard target.

You need to eat fiber to have proper digestive health. If you strugglewith constipation, you may need to increase your fiber intake.25 Trust methat you will notice a difference when you add a significant amount of fiberto your diet.

How do you incorporate more fiber into your diet? Eat more foodswith fiber. Do not take a fiber supplement unless you have a medical need. Iwill not give you a set number to target, but I do want you to make aconscious effort to evaluate your current diet and attempt to increase yourfiber intake. Start by including some of the following foods into your meals:

- Beans: The most stereotypical fiber-containing food. Northernbeans, navy beans, pinto beans, black beans, chili beans, charrobeans, cannellini beans, garbanzo beans, etc.

- Fruits and vegetables with the skin: Apples, pears, figs, prunes,broccoli, Brussels sprouts, carrots, artichokes etc.

- Lentils and split peas- Berries: Strawberries, raspberries- Oats or oat bran- Quinoa

- Flax seeds and chia seedsIf you already eat a lot of fiber, keep doing what you are doing. This

week will be easy for you.

Week 6

Exercise:

This week, I want you to continue with what you did last week. Asalways, do your daily minimum and get plenty of daily movement (includingwalking). Continue trying to work out 45 minutes 4-5 times per week, or halfan hour 6-7 times per week. Again, you can take some of these workoutsfairly easy. Try to combine multiple forms of both endurance and strengthexercise.

One option for those who hate running: try rucking. Carry a heavypack on a forced march or hike, in order to burn significant calories withouthigh impact. Rucking will improve your load capacity, meaning that you canperform longer strength workouts and recover faster. You can ruckanywhere, as long as you have a pack and some heavy objects to put into it.

Also, this week, I want you to start performing extra sets of squats,lunges, desk pushups, dips, jumping jacks, or similar exercises at randompoints throughout the day. These do not become part of your dailyminimum. You can even simply get up every hour or so and stretch for aminute. Keep these sets short and easy. Avoid working up a sweat if you can.Use certain environmental or other triggers to cue sets of exercises. You canhang a pullup bar from the doorway to your bedroom and do a couplepullups every time you walk under it. Or you could do a set of squats or deskpushups every half hour on the half hour during your workday. Or you coulddo some lunges while waiting for water to boil or your oven to preheat. Getcreative. Avoid overexercising though. If you find yourself sore all the time,back off on the number of sets and repetitions for these random exercises.

Nutrition:

This week, continue with the protein and calorie targets. Those remainconstant throughout the program. Keep eating vegetables, but do not worryabout hitting a specific number unless you want to. This week we will focus

on a couple other considerations in a healthy diet: essential fatty acids andprobiotics.

Fatty acids are crucial for many aspects of health, but especially foryour brain and cognitive performance. While you can supplement, Irecommend you try to get fatty acids from food (omega-3 fatty acids: DHAand EPA). You can get some from meat and eggs, but likely not enough. Byfar the best sources are fish and shellfish (and seaweed). You can also getsome fatty acids from certain nuts and chia seeds and flax seeds. But Irecommend you eat fish a few times this week.26

Probiotics help ensure proper gut health. They replenish the healthybacteria in your gut. You can take probiotic supplements – usually in pillform (and if you have taken antibiotics recently or have had gastrointestinalillness, you probably should). To get more probiotics from food, you canincorporate fermented foods into your diet. Including the following: Greekyogurt, kimchi, sauerkraut, and kefir. Check labels, because you can typicallyfind some products in the grocery store containing probiotics.

If you like plain Greek yogurt and fish, you will find the nutrition focuseasy this week.

Week 7

Exercise:

As usual, continue with the daily minimum. Continue with activitythroughout the day, but feel free to stop the random exercise experimentfrom last week.

This week, we will mix up the workout schedule a bit. Perhaps youhave had trouble setting aside the time for workouts in past weeks. Or youhave had trouble working up the motivation to slog through 45 minutes ofexercise.27 In that case, you may like our experiment this week. Instead oflonger duration, low intensity workouts, we will focus on very short, veryintense workouts.

High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) can pack in a surprising amountof exercise in a very short time period. While you should still perform othertypes of exercise, including lower intensity exercise for longer periods of

time, HIIT workouts can help you stay fit when you have no time to workout. Even the busiest people have time in their day for a 5-10-minuteworkout.

The key with HIIT workouts is to keep them very intense. You need togo all out in order to get the most benefit in just a few minutes. Of course,you still need to exercise properly. HIIT workouts should not mean sloppyform and improper biomechanics.28

Try to do a 5-minute or 10-minute session every day this week. Youshould have no excuse that you lack the time. I do not care how busy youthink you are. You have 5 minutes every day for a workout. Busier peoplethan you manage to get more exercise than that. World-class surgeons,CEOs, graduate science researchers, engineers, investment bankers, and bigfirm lawyers all have.

Feel free to get creative. Try to mix it up and do not just perform thesame HIIT session each day. You can find short HIIT routines on Google andYouTube.

Some suggestions:

- Sprinting sessions: After warming up with a short walk or jog (orsome mobility drills), sprint as hard as you can for 15-60 secondintervals. Take a standing or walking rest. Perform anywhere from6-10 intervals in a session. See my appendix for some sprintingworkout suggestions.

- Hill Sprints: Even better, sprint uphill and walk back down duringyour rests.

- Bodyweight circuits: Circuits of fast bodyweight exercisesperformed continuously without rests can give you a goodworkout in 5 or 10 minutes. Remember to only exercise as fast asyou safely can while maintaining good form. Move instantlybetween different exercises to maximize the use of your time.Rest one set of muscles while exercising another. I recommendexercises such as jumping jacks, squat jumps, mountain climbers,marching planks, burpees, marching bridges, running in place (fastfeet), stair climbing, and jumping on and off a box or step.29 See

my appendix for more suggestions.- Sprinting Intervals on a Cardio Machine: Sprinting workouts can

be performed on a stationary bike, elliptical, rowing machine, oranother machine in the gym. Some machines havepreprogrammed workouts, but these may not include any HIITworkouts.

Elliptical: this may be a bit of a challenge, likewiseNordic Track and Stairmaster may not be good choicesfor these workouts – but I honestly would not knowStationary Bike: lower the resistance and pedal reallyfast, stop pedaling (or pedal very slowly) during the restTreadmill: be careful with this one, set the speed veryhigh and then jump on and off the treadmill to alternatesprints and restsRowing Machine: Only do HIIT workouts on the rowingmachine if you know how to use it properly withouthurting yourselfOther Machines: Ski Machine (pulling the handles, notevery gym has this), Rope Climb Machine, etc.

Nutrition:

Hopefully you will find this week a little easier. We will ramp up thedifficulty soon. Continue with the calorie counting and keep trying to hit

your protein goals. No new dietary requirement this week. Instead, we willfocus on hydration.

I want you to aim to drink a gallon of water (or more) every day thisweek. Most Americans walk around dehydrated, and - if you exerciseconsistently - you likely need to drink a bit more water to recover fromsweat loss. Do not drink the whole gallon all at once.

Drink water with your meals. Drinking a glass of water before and aftereach meal will help fill you up. Drinking enough water throughout the daywill help you stay satiated (and therefore it will help you avoid overeating).Oftentimes, people think they are hungry when in reality they aredehydrated. Even if you are hungry, drinking water can help fill you up andtide you over to the next meal.30

Many Americans eat a highly processed diet and therefore ingest agood amount of sodium. On the other hand, if you eat a fairly unprocesseddiet, you may not eat a lot of sodium. In this case, drinking more water willdeplete your sodium (electrolyte) levels. To counteract this, eat more salt.While salt and sodium get a bad rap, sodium is a necessary nutrient.Athletes, people who drink a lot of water, and people who eat fairlyunprocessed diets often need to eat more salt, not less salt. Generally, theill-effects of sodium come from the sodium in highly processed foods, nottable salt. In fact, some go so far as to say that the sodium to high-bloodpressure connection is a myth based on outdated and bad science, just likethe “fat makes you fat” “science.”

Week 8

Exercise:

Continue the daily minimum. Continue daily activity. Try to blend thedifferent exercise strategies we have tried thus far. Some strength. Somecardio. Some longer workouts. Some shorter. Consistency over intensity.Daily movement. Daily activity. Variety.

I want you to get some exercise every day. You can do short HIITsessions some days, longer cardio or strength sessions some days, rucks orhikes on other days, or even a day with an entire workout divided into short

sets of random exercises at intervals throughout the day.

Image Credit: “Fresh broccoli” by Colorado State University Extension, PublicDomain, via https://www.flickr.com

Nutrition:

This week, we continue our calorie and protein requirements. We willalso focus more heavily on micronutrients. You have some homework thisweek. I want you to do some reading about micronutrients andpersonalizing your diet.

- First, check out Dr. Rhonda Patrick’s website for her research onnutrition, health, genes, epigenetics, and nutrigenomics:https://www.foundmyfitness.com/genetics

If you have taken a genetic test or are willing to pay forone, you can upload your results for a personalizedgenetic report that can inform your diet (and lifestyle)Genetics plays a role in your relationship with food.Certain genes predispose you to nutrient deficienciesand you may need to supplement in order to offsetthese.

- Check out the following links about getting all of your vitamins

and minerals from food sources.https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/the-best-foods-for-vitamins-and-mineralshttps://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/guide/vitamins-and-minerals-good-food-sources#1https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/interactivenutritionfactslabel/assets/InteractiveNFL_Vitamins&MineralsChart_March2020.pdf

- Feel free to do some of your own research as well about diet andvitamins (A, B, C, D, E, and K) and minerals (iron, zinc, selenium,magnesium, sodium, calcium, potassium etc.).

Your micronutrient requirements will also vary somewhat based onyour gender. Micronutrients (and other factors) play a role in hormonehealth. For men, testosterone levels are dramatically lowered by poornutrition.31 Certain nutrient-dense foods will help men boost theirtestosterone levels.32 These include:

- Brazil Nuts (practically a vitamin): Only eat a couple at a time.Brazil nuts are especially useful for their high selenium content,but they also contain many other minerals.

- Red Meat- Eggs: Eggs get demonized in some circles, but they are actually

one of the healthiest foods you can possibly eat.- Spinach and other Dark Leafy Vegetables: High in iron and many

minerals and vitamins. Popeye the Sailor Man had it right.- Olives and Olive Oil- Almonds

I want everyone to focus heavily on micronutrients this week. Try toevaluate your current diet to identify micronutrients you may be missing (orgetting too little of). This week might look similar to the vegetable week, asvegetables tend to be some of the best sources of vitamins and minerals.

Week 9

Exercise:

So far, most of your workouts have stayed moderate. While youincreased workout intensity in your HIIT workouts, you kept them short. Thisweek, I want you to continue with everything you did last week, but I alsowant you to include one longer and more challenging workout. You can do

this on the weekend.

A few guidelines for this workout:

- Minimum duration: 1 hour- You can choose either an endurance or strength session, but if you

choose a strength workout, you will need to start with heavy liftsand move to less strenuous exercises as the workout progresses.

- You can combine multiple forms of exercise: a run, followed by alift, followed by a long walk, and perhaps even a short bike ride.

- Challenge yourself more than you have in any single workout youhave performed yet during this program.

- Only perform a workout you feel ready to perform. Keep in mindyour own abilities and limitations. Do not hurt yourself. Alwaysexercise with proper form. Ensure you hydrate properly. Takeprecautions based on weather, and avoid foolhardy situations.

- Get creative. Try to make your challenge interesting andenjoyable.

- Take it very easy the next day to recover. Keep in mind thisprogram will continue for a few more weeks and you will have toavoid destroying your body.

A few suggestions to guide your thinking:

- A long, all-day hike- A multi-hour ruck- A difficult interval workout on the track: run a mile or two to

warmup, followed by a set number of 400m, 800m, or 1200mintervals with a walking or jogging recovery between eachinterval, followed by another short cooldown

- A short session on the elliptical, followed by an hour-long full-body lifting session beginning with compound lifts and finishingwith bodyweight and dumbbell exercises

- An afternoon of pickup basketball in a challenging setting (i.e., youplay hard and the people you play with play hard and take thegame seriously)

- An hour of running, followed by an hour of lifting, followed by anhour of biking, followed by an hour of walking (if you are capable

of that much activity)

Nutrition:

Continue hitting your calorie and protein targets. This week, avoid allcalorie-containing beverages. No alcohol, soda, juice, coffee-drinks, iced tea,smoothies, milkshakes, hot chocolate, milk, kefir, kombucha, or otherproducts, if they contain any calories. Sparkling water is fine. Black or greentea (without milk or sugar) is fine, as is black coffee.33 For the purposes ofthis week, diet soda is also fine (sigh), although it does have some harmfuleffects on your health.

This week should teach you that you can cut significant calories out ofyour diet without increasing your hunger by avoiding certain beverages.Also, you should always prioritize calories from food over calories frombeverages. Except in a few cases, you will get more benefit (micronutrients,fiber etc.) out of eating fruits and vegetables than you will out of drinkingthem. Some supposed health drinks (ex. Naked Juice) contain high amountsof sugar that outweigh their benefits. Better to actually eat broccoli,spinach, strawberries, and mangoes than to drink them from a juice (or eventhan to juice them yourself).

Week 10

Exercise:

Given the difficulty of the nutrition side of the program, this week youcan ease up a little on the exercise front. Essentially follow the same

guidelines you followed in week 8, but you can keep the intensity of yourworkouts a little easier.

Nutrition:

This week we begin a 3-week cycle of more difficult, more restrictivechallenges. Keep in mind that you can go back to eating what you want soon(although you should still try to eat healthy in the future). These weeks aredesigned to teach you what to avoid and what you can cut from your diet inorder to improve it. You may need to do some work in the grocery store inorder to succeed during these weeks. Keep in mind that if you do not buyjunk food and do not have junk food in your house, you will be less likely toeat it.

In addition to your caloric and protein targets, you will cut out alltrans-fat for a week. You can eat any food that does not contain trans-fat,but you cannot eat any foods that does contain trans-fat. This will requirereading all nutrition labels. You will likely have to avoid eating out. This is theeasiest of the three weeks. Check out these links for more information aboutavoiding trans-fat:

- https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/2012/07/28/tips-to-lower-trans-fat-intake/

- https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/high-blood-cholesterol/in-depth/trans-fat/art-20046114

Week 11

Exercise:

Follow the same guidelines as week 8. In addition, I want you todouble your daily minimum (for this week only) and walk a minimum of onemile each day, outside of your other workouts.

Image Credit: “Pot on Stove” by Margaret Barse, Public Domain, viahttps://www.flickr.com

Nutrition:

Instead of trans fat, this week you will cut out all refined sugar. Not“added sugar.” All refined sugar. In other words, any food or drink thatcontains processed sugars. Companies have come up with misleading namesto fool you into thinking their products do not contain harmful sugar.Refined sugar includes agave nectar, corn syrup, molasses, maple syrup,malt, cane syrup, and even honey. You will almost certainly have to cut outalmost all processed foods and avoid eating out altogether. You can still eatraw fruit, but you cannot eat canned peaches, or white bread, or most driedfruit. or the vast majority of bars, granolas, cereals, drinks, and fake-healthfoods.

Check out the following links for more information:

- https://www.precisionnutrition.com/all-about-natural-sweeteners

- https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/refined-sugar#bottom-line

Week 12

Exercise:

Since you have reached the final week, and the culmination of theprogram, I want you to plan a culminating challenge event for this week. Youcan complete it early next week, if necessary, but I would prefer that youperform it this week or this weekend. Outside of this final challenge,continue to follow everything you did in week 8 of this program.

Your culminating event should follow similar guidelines to yourchallenge in week 9. I want this culminating workout to challenge you morethan your workout in week 9 did. Ideally, your challenge would reflectthemes from each of the different weeks of this program. You would havesome longer endurance exercise, some strength training, some faster andmore intense exercise, and perhaps some load-bearing or carrying.

For example:

- A long ruck outdoors followed by some hill sprints and a shortstrength training session

- A bicycle race followed by a full-body lifting session at the gym- An hour on the elliptical followed by a heavy lift, a boxing session

on the heavy bag, and some loaded carries or sled pushes- A hard track interval workout followed by some strength exercises

and weighted carries- A weekend backpacking expedition- An obstacle race or other sufferfest event34

I also want you to begin thinking about where to go next. Have youfound exercise you enjoy? Have you built habits you plan to stick with? Doyou plan to join a gym or a martial arts studio or a team sport? How will youcontinue moving in daily life and beyond? How will you enlist others to keepyourself accountable? What are some short- and long-term goals you canbegin working towards?

Image Credit: “Nuts on white background” by Ready Elements, PublicDomain, via https://www.flickr.com

Nutrition:

This is your most difficult week. It is also your last week, so you onlyhave to eat restrictively for 7 days. This week will almost certainly requirecooking and preparing all the food you eat from scratch, as well as cuttingout most of the packaged food sold in the grocery store. You will, as usual,continue meeting your calorie and protein targets. I hope that you alsocontinue trying to drink plenty of water, eat plenty of fiber andmicronutrients, and incorporate vegetables throughout your diet.

This week, cut out all processed foods.

There is some debate over the definition of “processed food.” Mostfood is processed in some way. For the purpose of this week, we will use myworking definition of processed food, which includes most of the food foundin the grocery store,35 but excludes minimally processed foods. You will nothave to grow, hunt, or forage this week,36 but you will have to do somework at the grocery store.

It will be easier to explain what you can eat than what you cannot.Below, I will list what types of minimal processing are acceptable for ourpurposes, as well as examples of foods for each category. While I may leavea few items off this list, it will hopefully give you a good idea of how to figureout what you can and cannot eat. Then I will give you a second list of foodsand types of foods you can eat this week, so that you have a better idea ofhow to shop. I will also include a final, partial list of some items you cannot

eat, mainly to clear up misconceptions you may have about acceptablefoods.

For the purposes of this week, “processed foods” do not include:37

- Foods that have been chopped, cut, diced, sliced or ground, aslong as not much else has been done to them

Ex. Fresh chopped carrots (baby carrots)38

Ex. Ground BeefEx. Steel cut oats

- Foods that have been washed to remove dirtEx. Eggs in the supermarketEx. Bags of spinach in the supermarket

- Foods that have been frozenEx. Frozen peas or frozen peppersEx. Frozen chicken or fish

- Foods that have been canned, as long as no syrup or flavoring hasbeen added

Ex. Canned beans (not baked beans)Ex. Canned peas

- Foods that have been removed from their shellRaw peanutsPeas removed from peapods

- Foods that have had some combination of the aboveEx. Frozen mixed peas and carrotsEx. Frozen sliced chicken tenderloinsEx. Canned green beansEx. Canned beets

What you can eat this week (with examples for each category):

- Fresh produceFresh fruitFresh vegetablesPotatoes and sweet potatoesFresh corn

- Fresh meat and fishChicken

SalmonBeefPorkCod

- Eggs- Rice and quinoa- Uncooked oats39

- Uncooked beans40 and canned beans (except baked beans)41

Canned black beansA bag of pinto beans

- Raw nuts (some minimal roasting or salting is okay)Raw cashewsRoasted, unsalted peanutsSalted almonds

- Frozen vegetablesFrozen green beansFrozen onionsFrozen okra

- Canned vegetablesCanned carrotsCanned beets

Some examples of foods that you cannot eat this week:

- Bread- Pasta- Cereal and granola- Nuts roasted in honey and oil

Honey peanutsBarbecue flavored cashews

- Any precooked or cured meatsDeli meatBaconSausageCorn beef hashSlim Jims

Beef Jerky- Frozen “riced” veggies, Hot Pockets, or similar premade frozen

food productsFrozen fried okraFrozen chicken tendersFrozen fish sticks

- Pretty much any dairy you did not milk from the cow yourself- Any bars, even the ones that claim to be “paleo,” “keto,” or

“natural”- Canned fruit in heavy syrup- Almost any sauces, dressings, vinegars, and condiments- Any drink other than coffee, tea, or water- Candy, cookies, pastries, ice cream, cake, baked goods etc.- Dried fruit- Peanut butter or any similar spreads- Instant oatmeal packets with sugary flavoring

I do not recommend you follow this restrictive diet indefinitely. Butthe exercise of cutting out processed foods for a week should teach youabout nutrition and food. Keep in mind that once you finish this week, youwill have completed the program. You can return to eating what you want.

However, if you want to continue making progress on living a healthylifestyle and eating properly, you will need to use what you have learned toinform a proper diet moving forward. After completing weight lossprograms, many people gain back all the weight they lost because they donot understand the fundamentals of nutrition. Hopefully you have learnedenough over the course of this program to guide your own diet movingforward, in order to successfully meet your health goals. If you want to loseweight and keep it off, hopefully you now better understand how to do that.

Conclusion: Where to Go from Here

I hope you have learned about exercise, nutrition, and yourself duringthis program. Have you actually managed to follow every part of theprogram or did you slip up occasionally? Chances are, you slipped upoccasionally. No worries. As long as you managed to get yourself back ontrack, you do not need to worry about occasionally missing a workout or

slipping up in your diet. Life happens and successfully achieving your fitnessgoals requires overcoming setbacks and working around life circumstances.It does not require perfection so much as learning from mistakes.

Exercise:

By now, you should have built some habits around exercise andmovement. For your own good, try to keep these up. Habits will carry youfarther than any ounce of motivation. Lifetime fitness will require a lifetimehabit of exercise and movement. When you fall off the bandwagon, makesure to get back on track as soon as possible. Do not worry when you breaka good habit. Just start following it again the very next day. To maintainhabits, a little bit of exercise goes a long way. Start over with 10 minutes aday if you need to do so.

Exercise need not always exhaust you. You should try to move and toenjoy yourself, but you do not have to pound yourself into the ground.Focus more on trying to increase your daily movement and less on trying topunish yourself with difficult workouts. When you want to, you canoccasionally throw in a very challenging and stimulating workout.

Remember to move throughout your daily life. If you want to loseweight, you will need to move more and eat less. If you want to keep offweight as you age, you will need to continue moving. If you want to increaseyour healthspan and mitigate the ill effects of aging, you will need to moveas much as possible. Always take the stairs. Always park farther from thestore. Walk when you can. Exercise throughout the day. Avoid prolongedsitting. And put your body through a variety of movements and positionsevery single day.

In order to optimize your exercise for healthspan and longevity, youwill need to perform a variety of exercise, including strength training, loadbearing (carrying), endurance exercise (aerobic), and some high intensity(sprinting, HIIT, etc.). Focusing on any one of those, to the exclusion of theothers, may set you up for long term problems as you age.

You also need to develop, or maintain, your stability, flexibility, agility,and coordination in order to optimize your health. That requires movementvariety. If you followed this program properly, by now you have

experimented with a variety of types of exercise. Continue experimentingand continue varying up your routine. Always remember to avoidspecializing too narrowly.

Nutrition:

During this program, you have counted calories, learned how to readnutrition labels, and discovered how to incorporate more protein andmicronutrients in your diet. You do not need to continue counting caloriesfor the rest of your life. But you may find it useful to do so when trying tolose weight.

Hopefully the calorie counting has taught you some lessons aboutportion sizes. While you may not quite have the ability to simply eyeball-estimate the calories for everything you eat, you probably have a muchbetter sense of the calories contained in different foods, and how to limitportion sizes in order to maintain weight and avoid weight gain. You shouldhave learned how to cut out unnecessary calories and how to get yourcalories from quality sources.

One rule of thumb on calories and portion sizes in the future: if youstart gaining weight or growing noticeably fatter, cut back on your dailycaloric intake or portion sizes. Start substituting low-calorie foods for high-calorie ones. This should be intuitive by now. Since both the calories youtake in and the calories you burn are just estimates, this rule of thumbshould help you balance dietary fastidiousness with living a normal life.Approach your diet, and body composition, with a spirit of trial and error.Use the outcomes of your dietary choices as feedback to inform dietaryimprovement. If you start gaining weight you did not expect, think back onyour portion sizes and nutrition choices. Do the same if you unexpectedlylose weight.

You have also learned what foods you should cut out and avoid. Ingeneral, limit your intake of overly processed foods, refined sugars, andtrans fats. Avoid overcomplicating your diet. You probably already knewwhat kinds of foods you should avoid and what kinds of foods you shouldeat. You did not need this program to teach you to cut back on the candybars and the frozen pizzas. Without any guidance you probably could have

come up with a healthy diet for yourself by limiting desserts and bakedgoods.

More important than learning what to avoid, you have learned whatfoods to incorporate into your diet. Nutrition is more about what to eat thanwhat not to eat. You need to eat food that contains the nutrients that fuelyour body. Hopefully by now you have developed an idea of what that lookslike. While you may have had some surprises, overall a “healthy diet”probably looks fairly similar to what you intuitively expected: eat morevegetables, some fruit, and some raw nuts. Eat fish, eggs, meat, and somecomplex carbohydrates.

A good rule of thumb: all things in moderation. Feel free to indulgeoccasionally. You can drink alcohol and eat ice cream. But keep indulgencesinfrequent. Keep your goals in mind. You will want to balance a healthylifestyle with a lifestyle you enjoy. If you start to tip too far in eitherdirection, you can rebalance. If you start to gain fat, cut back on the beerand pizza and muffins. If you start to avoid social gatherings due to an overlystrict diet, lighten up. Now that you have the tools to improve your bodycomposition, you can make up for a weekend indulging with friends bycutting back the following week.

Final Word:

Do not waste the time and effort you have put into this program.Avoid relapsing to weekly buffets, chronic sitting, inactivity, and hours ofnightly binge-watching while binge-munching. If you do not keep up habitsyou have developed, you will lose them. If you do not use the tools you havelearned, you will lose them. If you want to live a healthy life and have a bodyyou feel proud of, you will need to have a diet and activity level that supportthose goals.

Appendix A: Workouts

For those who want some guidance or a few basic, specific workoutsto try.

Bodyweight Core Circuit:

Note: This routine is based on the amount of time you can comfortably hold

a plank for (with proper form). Not the maximum amount of time you canhold a plank, but perhaps 50-80% of that maximum time. Put that time in forX in the below circuit. Repeat the circuit as many times as you want.

Exercise Time Details

Plank X You should feel this inyour core and maybeshoulders, not your legsor low back.

Bridge X Important for postureand injury prevention.

Side Plank (each side) ½ X You can make thisharder by holding yourfree arm straight up inthe air.

Reverse Plank ½ X This is hard for mostpeople, especially if youhave inflexibleshoulders.

Single Leg Bridge (eachleg)

½ X

One Armed Plank (eachside)

¼ - ½ X Basically, a regularplank with one arm offthe ground (I put minebehind my back).

Single Leg BridgeThrusts

10 to 15 reps per leg

Single Leg Plank (eachleg)

¼ - ½ X Basically, a regularplank with one leg offthe ground.

Wall Sits ½ X If this is easier, increasethe depth of your sit.

Marching Plank (alsocalled Plank MountainClimbers)

½ X Alternate bringing eachknee across your body.

Marching Bridge ½ X Alternate extendingeach leg into the airuntil your knee isstraight.

Optional Extras

Pushup-MountainClimber

10 to 15 Alternate a pushup andthen bringing eachknee across your body.

Arm and Leg Lift Plank(also sometimes calledMarching Plank)

10 raises each side Alternate raisingopposite arm and legwhile planking.

Upper and Lower Body Circuit (Bodyweight Exercises):

Note: Choose a number of reps appropriate for you

Exercise Reps Details

BodyweightSquat

10 to 15 Watch this video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB0cOX7gePg

Leg Lifts 10 to 15 Lie on your back, put your hands beneath yourlow back or buttocks, lift your legs all the wayup, lower them all the way back down, touchyour heels to the ground but do not rest themon ground

Lunges 10 eachleg

Pushups 10 Touch your chest to the ground on each rep

GobletSquats

10 to 15 Hold any object you like – does not have to bea dumbbell or kettlebell.

Trunk Lifts 10 This should be relatively easy, good for postureand lower back.

Deadbugs 15-30

Single LegRomanianDeadlift

10 eachleg

May be difficult to balance at first. Improvingbalance is one of the reasons for doing these.

ReverseCrunches

15-30 Keep your head on the ground to avoid hurtingyour back.

Single LegBridgeThrusts

10 eachside

Lying bicyclekicks

15-30 Keep your head on the ground to avoid hurtingyour back.

BulgarianSplit Squat

5-10 eachleg

Do not let your knee extend too far forward -drop down instead of dropping forward. Feelfree to hold heavy objects in your hands tomake this exercise harder.

Trunk Liftswith armsextended

10

Single legpushup

10 witheach legoff theground

Basically, a pushup with one leg off the ground.I alternate legs on each pushup.

Single legheel raises

10-15each leg

Balance on one leg, go up on your toes, thenback down. Try to keep your balance for 10reps.

Pushup-Mountain

10 to 15 Alternate a pushup and then bringing eachknee across your body.

Climber

Side Lunges 10 eachside

FlutterKicks*

30-60 Lie on back, hold heels six inches off the floor,kick up and down like you are swimming.

OptionalExtras

Single legpistol squats

5-10 eachside

Try holding on to a doorframe if you needassistance.

Alternatingstep ups (onstairs)

10 eachleg

Step up to second step and then back down.Be careful to plant feet firmly - don't trip andhurt yourself.

* Optional: Instead of or in combination with flutter kicks, scissor your legsside to side alternating which leg is on top and bottom. Also, feel free tohold a heavy book over your chest to make this harder.

5 Minute Explosive Circuits:

Do each exercise for 30-60 seconds and move between exerciseswithout resting in between. Go fast while maintaining good form. Feel freeto repeat circuits ad-infinitum.

Version 1:

Exercise Time

Squat Jumps 60s

Jumping Jacks 30s

Burpees 60s

Marchingbridges

30s

Marching 60s

plank

Squat Jumps 30s

Burpees 30s

Version 2:

Squat Jumps 30s

MarchingPlank

30s

Burpees 30s

MarchingPlank

30s

Squat Jumps 30s

MarchingPlank

30s

Burpees 30s

MarchingPlank

30s

Squat Jumps 30s

MarchingPlank

30s

Version 3:

Squat Jumps 60s

MarchingPlank

30s

Burpees 60s

MarchingPlank

30s

Squat Jumps 60s

MarchingPlank

30s

Burpees 60s

Version 4:

Squat Jumps 60s

MarchingPlank

60s

Burpees 60s

MarchingPlank

60s

Squat Jumps 60s

Version 5:

Burpees 60s

Marching Plank 60s

Repeat adinfinitum

Sprinting Workouts:

Always warm up beforehand by running or walking. Jog a little, dosome hip swings or quick mobility drills to loosen your legs, or walk for 15-20minutes. Do not do any static stretching before sprinting (or before anyexercise really – static stretching is best done after sprinting).

Most flat or inclined surfaces work well for sprints (hill sprints aregood, but if the hill is too steep you will not be able to sprint fast enough).Sprint anywhere from 15 seconds to 1 minute. Walk a little or stand in placeto rest (if doing hill sprints, walk back down the hill). The rest should be long

enough that you feel ready to go again. Good rule of thumb is to keep therest 1.5-2 times the length of the sprint. For a 15-second sprint rest 30seconds, and for a 1-minute sprint rest at least 90 seconds.

Workout Options:

- 6-10 1-minute sprints with 60-90 second rests- Sprint ladder: Sprint for (15, 30, 45, 60, 45, 30, 15) seconds and

rest for (30, 60, 90, 90, 90, 60) seconds You can then take a longer rest and repeat the ladderIf you are confused, here is a different way of writing thesame workout. Sprints are denoted with “s” and restswith “r”

15s, 30r, 30s, 60r, 45s, 90r, 60s, 90r, 45s, 90r, 30s,60r, 15s

- 12-15 30-second sprints with 30-second rests, alternatingbetween 70% effort and 90% effort every other sprint

- 6-10 15-second all out sprints with 45-second restsThe key with high intensity intervals is to go as hard as you can

(without hurting yourself). The reason for keeping the rests long is to enableyou to keep going very hard in each interval. That will ensure you get a lot ofbang for your buck (a lot of exercise in a short period of time). If you do 8-10intervals, that could be your entire workout for the day.

Appendix B: Meal Planning (Examples and Worksheet)

You can make meal planning work with any eating schedule: fromOMAD (one meal a day) to grazing (constant snacking). Below are threeexamples.

Example 1: Three Meals a Day

Target: BMR = 2400 Calories, 2400 – 500 = 1900, Goal = 1900Calories per day

Monday Tuesday Wednesday

Breakfast 1 cup uncookedoatmeal = 600calories,1 protein bar =180 calories,Total = 780calories

6 hardboiledeggs = 420calories, 1 sliceof toast = 110calories,Total = 530calories

Packagedbreakfastsandwich = 550calories

Lunch Tortilla = 190calories,5 slices of ham =100 calories,2 slices ofcheese = 160calories,Lettuce = 10calories,Total = 460calories

1 medium apple= 90 calories, 1banana = 100calories, 1 largepear = 110calories, 1 100-calorie snackpack of nuts =100 calories,Total = 400calories

Packaged frozenbean burrito =650 calories

Dinner 8oz of lean steak= 320 calories,1lb of carrots =175 calories, 1lbof green beans =125 calories,Total = 620calories

1lb 99/1 groundturkey = 480calories, 1/2 cupuncooked rice =320 calories, 1lbonion chopped =160 calories,spinach salad =10 calories, Total= 970 calories

½ meatball sub =500 calories, 1large apple = 100calories, 1/2lb ofcarrots = ~90calories, spinachsalad = 10calories,Total = 700calories

Total 1860 calories 1900 calories 1900 calories

Example 2: One Meal A Day

BMR = 2800 calories

Target = 2800 calories

Monday Tuesday Wednesday

Dinner 1lb 90/10 groundbeef = 800calories, 1 cupuncooked rice =640 calories, 1lbfrozen peas =350 calories, 6hard boiled eggs= 420 calories,salad of spinachand tomatoesand carrots = 100calories, 1 jar ofcurry sauce =490 calories

1 meatball sub =1000 calories, 1tortilla = 190calories, 3 slicesof cheese = 240calories, 10 slicesof salami = 400calories, 1lbfrozen peas andcarrots = 250calories, 1 cup ofalmonds = 680calories, spinachand tomatosalad = 40calories

1 cup plain Greekyogurt 190calories, 1lbground lamb1200 calories, 1cup mashedpotatoes = 220calories, 1lbcarrots = 175calories, 1lb peas= 350 calories,shredded cheese= 265 calories,protein bar = 200calories, 1 apple= 100 calories,salad with onionsand carrots andtomatoes = 100calories

Total 2800 calories 2800 calories 2800 calories

Example 3: Snacking All Day

BMR = 1500 calories

Target = 1500 calories

Monday Tuesday Wednesday

Snack 1 1 pack instantoats = 150calories

1 hard boiled egg= 70 calories

8oz apple juice =110 calories

Snack 2 1 apple = 80calories

¼ cup peanuts =160 calories

1 hard boiled egg= 70 calories

Snack 3 1 box of raisins =130 calories

¼ cup cashews =160 calories

Protein bar = 180calories

Snack 4 1 protein shake =400 calories

Celery sticks = 10calories

Tangerine = 40calories

Snack 5 1 granola bar =160 calories

Peanut butterand jellysandwich = 450calories

½ cup mixed nuts= 340 calories

Snack 6 1 smoothie drink= 300 calories

String cheese =85 calories

1 orange = 60calories

Snack 7 1 tangerine = 40calories

Bell peppers,chopped = 15calories

Ham sandwich =300 calories

Snack 8 1 serving low-fatyogurt = 100calories

1 banana = 100calories

1 cup broccoli =30 calories

Snack 9 1 100-caloriesnack pack ofnuts = 100calories

1 kiwi = 40calories

8 oz whole milk =150 calories

Snack 10 Spinach salad =10 calories

Spinach salad =10 calories

Celery andpeppers = 20calories

Snack 11 Celery sticks = 10calories

Bowl of milk andCheerios = 200calories

Bowl of milk andcereal = 200calories

Snack 12 Small banana =80 calories

Tiny bowl ofvanilla ice cream= 200 calories

N/A

Snack 13 Bowl of carrots =100 calories

N/A N/A

Total 1500 calories 1500 calories 1500 calories

Worksheet 1:

BMR =

Target =

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

Meal 1

Meal 2

Meal 3

MiscellaneousSnacks

Total

Worksheet 2:

BMR =

Target =

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday

Meal

1

Meal2

Meal3

Meal4

Meal5

Meal6

Total

Worksheet 3:

BMR =

Target =

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday

Meal1

Total

Worksheet 4:

BMR =

Target =

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday

Snack1

Snack

2

Snack3

Snack4

Snack5

Snack6

Snack7

Snack8

Snack9

Snack10

Total

Appendix C: Weekly Breakdown Chart

Week Nutrition Exercise

Week 1 1. Start TrackingCalories

1. Daily Minimum2. Walk 10+ Minutes

Per Day

Week 2 1. Start CountingCalories (and

restricting them)

1. Daily Minimum2. 3x45-Minute

WorkoutsOr

5x30-Minute Workouts(exercise of your choice)

Week 3 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Start Trying toEat 1g of Protein

per 1lb ofBodyweight

1. Daily Minimum2. 3x45-Minute

WorkoutsOr

3. 5x30-MinuteWorkouts (aerobic

exercise)

Week 4 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. 8 DifferentVegetables a Day

(1 serving ofeach)

1. Daily Minimum2. 3x45-Minute

WorkoutsOr

3. 5x30-MinuteWorkouts (strength

training)

Week 5 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. Eat More Fiber

1. Daily Minimum2. 4-5x45-60-Minute

WorkoutsOr

6-7x30-MinuteWorkouts

(exercise of your choice)

Week 6 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. Eat More Fatty

1. Daily Minimum2. 4-5x45-60-Minute

WorkoutsOr

6-7x30-MinuteWorkouts

(exercise of your choice)3. Random Exercise

Acids

Throughout theDay

Week 7 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. Aim to Drink 1Gallon of Water

per Day

1. Daily Minimum2. 5-10-Minute HIIT

Workout Every Day

Week 8 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. Read up onMicronutrients

and YourGenetic/Personal

Needs4. Eat More

Nutrient-DenseFoods

5. If You Suspect aNutrient-

Deficiency, StartTrying to Correct

for It

1. Daily Minimum2. Exercise Every Day,

Duration and Typeof Exercise are

Your Choice

Week 9 1. ContinueCounting

1. Daily Minimum2. Exercise Every Day,

Calories2. Keep Trying to

Hit 1gProtein/1lbBodyweight

3. Zero Calorie-containingBeverages

Duration and Typeof Exercise are

Your Choice3. 1 Very Intense

Workout (withinreason)

Week 10 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. Zero Trans Fat

1. Daily Minimum2. Exercise Every

Day, Durationand Type ofExercise areYour Choice

Week 11 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

3. Zero RefinedSugar

1. Double DailyMinimum

2. Exercise Every Day,Duration and Type

of Exercise areYour Choice

3. Walk 1 Mile PerDay (outside of

workouts)

Week 12 1. ContinueCountingCalories

2. Keep Trying toHit 1g

Protein/1lbBodyweight

1. Daily Minimum2. Exercise Every Day,

Duration and Typeof Exercise are

Your Choice3. 1 Very Intense

Culminating

Sarah used the Smoothie Diet to do a complete"Mommy Makover" - Tulsa, OK

Sarah Dropped 3 Pounds in 3 Days!"I've never seen the weight come off like this. I really LOVEthis 'diet'! It's more like a life overhaul! I have more energythan I've had in years and my skin is actually glowing! This isthe perfect "Mommy Makeover" I was looking for. In thelast few weeks I wasn't hungry at all, and it is the perfectcomplement to my busy lifestyle. I know that I am losingweight in a healthy way! My husband has started asking memore frequently if I would make him a smoothie, which iswonderful! Thank you times 10 million!"

*Your results may vary.

Jade was able to lose her stuborn belly fat and get r

id of her love handles - Buffalo, NY

Jade Kicked 12 Pounds in 21 Days!"I’ve been trying forever to lose the last 10-15 lbs. and toneup and that’s exactly what happened so I am very happy. Ifeel great about myself, I don’t find myself holding in mybelly anymore and feel confident about myself andpeople have noticed that about me too...and my lovehandles are gone! I couldn’t be happier with this wholeprogram and I definitely recommend this to anyone lookingto lose a little or lose a lot.”

*Your results may vary.

21 DAYSTO A SLIMMER, SEXIER YOU!THE SMOOTHIE DIET is a revolutionary new life-

transformation system that not only guarantees to helpyou lose weight and feel better than you have in years, it

also promises to eliminate more body fat - faster thananything you’ve tried before.

This Is NOT just a big book of smoothie recipes. You're getting thesame proven 3-Week weight loss and health improvement programI share with my private clients. The secret that makes the SmoothieDiet so effective is the Custom 3-Week Weight Loss Schedule. Allthe smoothies are given in a very specific sequence and frequency tomaximize your results. For example the nutrient and ingredient ratios vary week to week to make sure the weight keeps coming off and stays off.

WHAT MAKES THE SMOOTHIE DIET DIFFERENT?

3. Zero ProcessedFoods

Workout/Challenge(within reason)

Bibliography

(and resources to learn more)

Andrews, R. (2021). All About “Natural” Sweeteners. Precision Nutrition.https://www.precisionnutrition.com/all-about-natural-sweeteners

Attia, P. (Host). (2021, February 1). Hussein Yassine, M.D.: Deep dive into the“Alzheimer’s gene” (APOE), brain health, and omega-3s [Audiopodcast episode]. In The Peter Attia Drive. Dr. Peter Attia.https://peterattiamd.com/husseinyassine/

Berardi, J. (2021). Calories in vs. out? Or hormones? The debate is finallyover. Here’s who won. Precision Nutrition.https://www.precisionnutrition.com/calories-in-calories-out

Felson, S. (2020). Food Sources for Vitamins and Minerals. WebMD.https://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/guide/vitamins-and-minerals-good-food-sources#1

Khazan, O. (2019, September 26). Lift Weight, Not Too Much, Most of theDays. The Atlantic.https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/09/bro-do-you-even-grease-the-groove/598837/

Kollias, H. (2021). Carbs, insulin, and weight loss: What REALLY matters forgetting the results you want. Precision Nutrition.https://www.precisionnutrition.com/the-truth-about-insulin-carbs-and-weight-loss

Mayo Clinic Staff. (2020). Trans fat is double trouble for your heart health.Mayo Clinic. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/high-blood-cholesterol/in-depth/trans-fat/art-20046114

McKay, B. (Host). (2020, October 26). Simple, Excuse-Busting Advice forGetting in Shape [Audio podcast episode]. In The Art of Manliness