Nutrition is the most overlooked aspect in fitness. Your nutrition is the foundation of your health. I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “you can’t out train a shitty diet”. It’s true. You may lose some weight in the beginning but it will catch up to you. You can be an elite athlete and in “great” shape and still develop type II diabetes. Bottom line is what you eat has a direct correlation on how you look, feel, and perform in life.

One of the most frequent questions I hear is

“How do I know what diet to follow?”

You don’t know until you try. Most are afraid to try because of a fear that they are going to failure. But what if you find out that it works for you!?

I feel like us as humans seem to have this built in, automatic device whose only purpose is to explain away failure. Think about it, how many times have you heard a laundry list of excuses for why something failed? My guess is, a lot. The problem is, the first and most often used excuses or “reasons” (as some like to call it) always seem to be something other than their activity level.  The reasons (excuses) seem to be more emotional than logical. The excuses are rarely, “I didn’t work hard enough” or “I didn’t have a good enough plan”.  The most common excuses all pass the blame onto someone or something else, “I didn’t have enough time.”, “My dog didn’t want to run”, “Something else came up.”  Big results require big action. The truth is, it takes more control to be successful than you probably think. Once you understand that and accept the truth you can move on.

So where to start? Almost 10 years ago I started playing around with different diet styles. I actually hate the word diet. When you say diet most people instantly think you’re trying to lose weight and not just change the way you eat.

Per Merriam-Webster, definition of diet is (a) food and drink regularly provided or consumed, (b) habitual nourishment, (c) the kind and amount of food prescribed for a person or animal for a special reason, and (d) a regimen of eating and drinking sparingly so as to reduce one’s weight.

From Merriam-Webster, Did You Know? The word diet first appeared in English in the 13th century. Its original meaning was the same as in modern English, “habitually taken food and drink.” But diet was used in another sense too in the Middle and early modern English periods to mean “way of living.” This is, in fact, the original meaning of diet’s Greek ancestor diaita, which is derived from the verb diaitasthan, meaning “to lead one’s life.” In Greek, diaita, had already come to be used more specifically for a way of living prescribed by a physician, a diet, or other regimen.

In the past 10 years I’ve been intrigued with many eating regimens. I started trying different ones to see what’s the affect they had on me. With a scientific and now analytically background for my day job, I like to experiment. Here’s a list of what I’ve tried:

• Vegetarian
• Cutting calories too low
• Sear’s Zone Diet
• Mediterranean Diet
• Paleo
• Primal
• Macro counting/ If it fits your macros (IIFYM)
• Renaissance Periodization Diet
• Precision Nutrition plate method
• Intermittent Fasting
• Fat Fasting
• Low Carb
• Keto
• Elimination Diet (Ultra Simple Diet)
• Intuitive eating

Nobody is the same, and nothing is the same throughout our lives.  Experimenting with how food fuels the body and what works best in a given scenario is the best route to long term health.  There are some common principles to hold true to, but we all have different needs and sensitivities and understanding those facilitates a health and happy relationship with food.

-Jess

• AFPA Certified Nutrition and Wellness Consultant
• WAG Certified Coach
• Precision Nutrition L-1
• CrossFit Nutrition,