What is a Ketogenic Diet?

That is probably the most asked question of me over the last month. It has been a lot of fun to answer too. Most of the time it stems off of what I am eating, as the foods are typically higher in fat content, or because I ask for heavy whipping cream in my diet soda (one of my favorite treats when I am having a rough day).

I have gotten a lot of help from my health coach at Elevate Fitness in understanding the process. So to answer the question, a Ketogenic Diet (aka the Keto Diet for short), is known for being a high fat, low carb diet. Our body switches from consuming carbs for energy and starts burning fat instead.

Our bodies have become very efficient at burning carbs or glucose for our source of energy. And because glucose is the easiest substance to use for energy, our body uses it over anything else.

Because our society is so carb heavy, breads, sugars, etc...we have become very insulin dependent. Our body produces insulin to process all of the glucose in our bloodstreams and delivers it around our body for energy. And since we consume so many carbs/glucose, our fat isn't needed and so our body stores it.

When we reduce the number of carbs that we intake, it places our body into a phase called Ketosis. Ketosis is a natural process where our body creates ketones to breakdown the fats in our liver. I don't starve myself of calories, as I consume about 2100 calories a day. But what I have done is starved myself of carbs, and have become fat adaptive, and now my body feeds off of my excess fats.

Hopefully understanding this process will help more people become healthy. I have heard that some doctors feel that it is more for elite athletes, but I am here to tell you that I am not an elite athlete, and it works for me.

In the coming posts, I will go over some of the things that I eat, and share some recipes that I have found. If you have any questions, please leave them in the comments below, and I will be happy to answer them. I will look forward to seeing you on the next post.

Image Credit to http://www.bodybuilding.com/

What are YOU made of?

So it has been about a month now since I began down the road of reclaiming my health. I have to share with you one of the coolest new toys at Elevate Fitness & Rehab. It is called InBody created by InBody Co., Ltd. It is basically a weight scale on steroids that provides you with a comprehensive view of your body composition.

                          

Here are some of the analysis' I get when I weigh in each week:

Body Composition Analysis

Our body weight is basically the sum of Body Fat Mass and Lean Body Mass. This is comprised of Dry Lean Mass and Total Body Water. 

With most diets, what we don't see is that most of the weight we lose is most likely water weight. 

Total Body Water weight is even broken into two types, Intracellular and Extracellular. I won't get all geeky on you, but if you want to read more just head to the links that I included and you can find out more. What we want to see is as our weight goes down, our water weight stays the same or increases. If we see that it is dropping then we aren't hydrating enough.

Along with maintaining or increasing our Total Body Water weight, we want to see our Lean Mass increase, and obviously our Fat Mass decrease. This scale does just that and breaks it all down for you.

Obesity Analysis

Let's be honest here, we all know that we as people have become more obese in the last few decades. I had taken a class in college called Fitness for Life. We were taught that looking at the BMI or Body Mass Index was a way to get an idea on how obese we were. I never really liked that test at all, as I didn't feel that the tools that were used to test it was all that accurate. The InBody Test shows not just the BMI, but also the PBF or Percentage of Body Fat. I like the Body Fat test way more, but to get both is great. 

One thing that the Body Fat Test helps us understand, is whether or not our diet is really working. Are we losing body fat? Or again, are we just losing water weight or even muscle mass? Initially, our body will say, here have some of the fat for your energy. But if we are starving ourselves, then the body says, "Oh no, you can't have that fat, I need it to survive." One of the things I love about the Body Fat test too, is that it lets me know that I am doing the weight loss correctly. It shows that I am losing fat, not water or muscle.

Segmental Lean and Fat Analysis

This is an interesting reading, as it evaluates whether our muscles are adequately developed in our body. The reading tells you what your muscle mass is based on your current weight, but also shows you what it should be based on your ideal weight.

Another part of the document even shows you how much fat you have in basically every limb, right and left arm, right and left leg, and the trunk of your body. I have loved this one, as I can see where I may need to work a little harder on losing the weight, like in my case it is my abdomen.

Basal Metabolic Rate

Ever wonder how many calories your body burns just because it is running? That is exactly what this reading tells you. I love it because it tells me what I should be basing my calorie intake off of. Like right now, my reading tells me that my body burns 2146 calories a day, not including what ever exercise I do. 3500 calories equals a pound, so if you can shave off 500 calories or exercise to burn that many calories, then you can see that you can lose a pound a week, or 4 pounds a month. This information is very useful in your weight loss journey.

Visceral Fat Levels

Visceral Fat. This is crazy bad stuff for you. Your Visceral Fat Level is an indicator based on the estimated amount of fat surrounding our internal organs in our abdomen. The more we have the more dangerous it is to our health. We can be more susceptible to strokes and heart attacks. To maintain a health lifestyle, we want to keep our level below a 10 rating. Right now, mine is still high. I started at a 20 and am now down to a 19. Most of my fat that I have lost so far are on my arms and legs according to my fat analysis that the InBody Test has given me.

Want to Know What You are Made of?

So here is the deal, if you live in Utah and you want to know what YOU are made of, go visit Elevate Fitness and let them know that you heard about them from me. When you do that, they will give you a 50% discount of your initial consultation.

Triathlon Training Update

April 2, 2013

I don't even remember the last time that I had posted on the blog. Who would have thought that I would not have much time to train, live my day to day life and not be able to blog about it...

Time has gone so fast, and here we are almost 1 month away from the St. George Half Ironman. It has been a crazy ride to say the least! I am just anxious to get to race day and then to finish the race! For the better part of 3 months, workouts have been about an hour a day, Saturdays being a little longer. Now, the intensity is beginning to go up, as workouts turn into two a days, with swimming about every day.

I am currently down about 70 pounds, and have been for the better part of a month. I haven't really lost anything to speak of and I haven't gained anything either. I have grown somewhat frustrated with the diet program, as I don't feel like I have progressed through the program as I feel it has been or was designed. I am not saying that it is entirely the program or the person pushing me to stay on that is entirely a fault here. I put a lot of the blame upon myself for not pushing back and following the program for the planned time frame. As it is though, I have lost 70 POUNDS, and I haven't felt this good about my health in a really long time!

Recently, I completed a book, Born to Run. The book has really inspired me to love running again. I can recall back in high school, loving every opportunity I could get to run. I wasn't fast, I didn't win races, but I loved being out and running in nature.Running in Utah is quite a bit different than running in Washington State. I am completely unfamiliar with places to trail run here in Utah, but am anxious to find ways to start incorporating trail running into my reinvigorated lifestyle.

30 Day Challenge

As many of you know, I have been working hard at taking control of my life and getting healthy again. In the last year, I found out that I had Type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease, high cholesterol, and borderline high blood pressure. Of course I knew I was obese, but I was naive about the rest of it until I met with my doctor. Having any one of the two of these symptoms is what some people call metabolic syndrome. When you have metabolic syndrome, it is incredibly hard to lose weight. Three months ago to the day, I started a program called the Weight is Over (WiO). The whole idea behind it is to give your pancreas, liver and stomach a reboot. Rebooting your pancreas, liver and stomach isn't a medical term, just a great description of what it does.

I decided to do the WiO program because I knew that my health was deteriorating, and I didn't want to leave my wife and my daughter without a husband and a father. Every time I feel like I want to quit, I think of my reason why I am doing this, and it makes me stay strong. In the three months since I have been doing this program, I have seen great success! With a total weight loss of over 60 pounds and nearly 50 total inches lost, I haven't felt this good in a long time. I now only have one more month before the program is over, and I am hoping to be down another 30 pounds!

So, to the title of this post . . . The 30 Day Challenge! I want to challenge anyone that has any of the following symptoms to look into this program and try it for 30 days.

• Overweight
• High Blood Pressure
• Elevated Cholesterol
• High Glucose levels or Diabetes
• Fatty Liver

If you live in Utah, specifically Utah County, you can contact Rich at Elevate Fitness in Orem by calling:

801-221-9060

Let Rich know that I referred you over to him, and that you want to take part in the 30 Day Challenge. If you don't live in Utah, or in Utah County, you can still contact Rich and he will be able to set you up to participate in the 30 Day Challenge.

Below is a video that I had been asked to participate in, and elaborates more on the 30 Day Challenge from my point of view.

ELEVATE :: 30-DAY CHALLENGE from justin ahlmann on Vimeo.

Elevate Indoor Triathlon

January 26, 2013

Last night, I went to sleep thinking, I was going to pass on competing in the Elevate Indoor Triathlon. I guess that is what I get for thinking. Instead I woke up, and started getting all of my gear together to go and compete!

Competing in the triathlon was a lot of fun. April and Ellie had even come to support me. The indoor triathlon had a swim in two endless pools with staggered starts. The swim was 10 minutes at a minimum of 800 psi's. I swam at 1100 psi, and it gave me a time bonus.

After the swim, you ran from the pool room to the Computrainer room. I got to use my own bike, and everyone rode the same course for 13 miles. I had a really great ride, especially for being on the WiO diet where I don't get to eat any carbs at all. That being said, I still felt like I was able to maintain a decent pace, but not using all the energy that I was going to need for the run. After the triathlon was over, Greg, who is the triathlon coach at Elevate Fitness, came up and told me that I had one of the fastest bike times at 32 minutes.

After the bike, I had my transition to the run on the treadmill. If you have never done a triathlon, the feeling in your legs because of the bike ride make it really hard to start running really quickly (at least if you aren't a professional). I knew that my best 5K time is just over 33 minutes, and that I wasn't going to hit that since I hit that PR when all I had done was a run. Knowing that, I just wanted to be under 40 minutes. As the run progressed, my legs were getting incredibly heavy. I looked at my time, and I had just a half mile to go and just a few minutes to finish before I would be going over 40 minutes. At that point, I was really happy to be running on a treadmill and bumped the speed up from 5 mph to 6 mph to 7 mph to 9 mph. By doing this, I was able to finish my run in 37:58!

Overall, this triathlon was a great motivator for me. With the St. George Half Ironman coming up, I have a lot of work to do, but I know that I will be able to do it and be ready.

10th Week on WIO

December 31, 2012 - January 7, 2013

What a week! Vacation is over, and getting back to somewhat of the normal schedule. I have been a little nervous going into the gym to weigh in, as I wasn't sure how things really went over the holidays. It has now been just over two months since I started the WiO diet. Since I am able to go to the gym next week, I knew that I needed to get into Elevate to see where I was at, so Rich and I had a workout, then I weighed in and got measured. It wasn't how I expected, however, I lost 9 pounds since the last time I had weighed in. That is an average of 3 pounds per week! I was stoked, even though I wanted to see more. Isn't it interesting how much higher we hold ourselves when it comes to things like this?

I just want to say to those that are doing the WiO protocol or any other diet, don't be so hard on yourself! I have found that it is much easier to have someone that you work with on your weight loss, even if you are self-conscience. The person you choose will be there to encourage you when you are doing great, and when you are having a hard time.

At the beginning of this process, I had mentioned that I wasn't going to mention any stats about my weight loss because I wanted my family to see me at Christmas before I said anything. So, now that we have gotten past the holidays, here you go:

It is crazy to think that it has been 10 weeks and I have already lost 54 pounds. I am incredibly grateful to my wife for supporting me through this, as well as those at Elevate Fitness. One last thing that I want to mention, is that normally when people go on diets and they lose weight, sometimes it is mostly water weight. When I weigh in at Elevate, the scale I use shows things like the body fat, water weight, bone density and a few others. I am proud to say that I have actually gained water weight through this whole process. 

Now, below is a photo comparison of a face shot from the start of this journey, it has been fun to see the transition. 

9th Week on WIO

December 24th - December 31st, 2012
I would say that this week was probably one of the toughest weeks that I have experienced being on the WiO Diet. Going home to spend Christmas was definitely great, but watching everyone eat Mom's great home cooked meals was a little more difficult that I had originally envisioned. The very first family meal was on December 23rd, and I wanted to eat what everyone else was having. The WiO folks have come out with what is called the "Inhibitor Pill", which is supposed to blog a percentage of the fats, carbs and calories. I brought 5 of them with me to Washington, but had really wanted to only use three of them. I had thought that I would take one of the pills that first Sunday dinner, and was surprised at how many of my family members were encouraging me to NOT take one and to stay strong. I didn't take one...I stayed strong, but I have to admit, I wasn't incredibly happy that night. I was pretty frustrated and didn't feel like my normal self.

When Christmas Eve came rolling around, I new that I was going to be ok, as we traditionally have foods that I was going to be able to eat. I only missed out on the potato salad and rolls, but I knew that I would have some rolls the next day.

Christmas day wasn't too bad. The smell of cinnamon rolls was definitely there, and it was tough not to eat them, along with the hot chocolate and candy canes, and the oranges. But I had in the back of my mind the dinner that I would be enjoying, as I knew that I was going to take the "Inhibitor Pill" that night. I can't even begin to describe the tastes of food that I enjoyed that night. My family traditionally has mud pies (ice cream, oreos, fudge and whipped cream) for dessert, however, a couple nights before we had a dessert that is my favorite of all, so I held out for that. The taste was amazing, it took me about 5 minutes to eat a little tiny piece, as I wanted to enjoy every single bite that I was eating. It is interesting to think back upon it and realize that I probably enjoyed the whole meal a lot more, as I really took my time eating it.

New Years Eve wasn't really that tough, as my family really went out of there way to make sure there were some great tasting snack foods that I was able to eat without having to take another pill.

Overall, I felt that the week went really well and that I had some really good workouts this week. Looking back now, I am not sure that I would recommend to anyone that is participating in the WiO Diet to take the "Inhibitor Pill" as I felt that it actually made me crave food more and I found myself justifying that I could eat something because I had taken one. Stay strong and try to stay away from taking one if it is at all possible.