CrossFit Journey Part III: Paleo? A typical daily diet from some of the best

By Guy Lawrence

If you were looking to improve your finances, would you rather take advise from Richard Branson or a financial advisor who is struggling to pay off his credit card and mortgage (not that they are all like this, but you get the gist), who would you prefer?

When it comes to health and weight loss, I hear a lot of opinions along the lines of ‘I eat a healthy diet but I just can’t seem to shift this flab’. If you want real results it would make sense to learn from people who are living and breathing examples of where you would like to be, then simply copy them. Many people talk it, but the best advise comes from people who walk it.

My fellow CrossFit Bare comrades Josh and Stacey are fine examples of health and athleticism. Stacey also happens to be a CrossFit HQ coach and  has her own nutritional business – Paleo Star – She’s also a qualified dietitian. Even if your not much of a CrossFit or exercise enthusiast, there’s a lot to be learned by simply looking at their typical daily eating habits listed below.

In Josh’s own words

My general eating philosophy is that I eat from natural & unprocessed sources. Grass-fed red meat, hormone free chicken and eggs, and the most notable change in the past 6 months is the elimination of processed sugar. A lot of fresh veggies and dark leafy salads. Fresh (cold pressed) juice every morning and fibrous pulp saved for 180 Nutrition carrot slices (no plug intended).

Generally I control what I eat for just about every meal with the exception of one cheat meal on Sundays (not a reward, just a deviation). I don’t follow any specific diet as such (Paleo, Zone etc), and I still eat some brown rice, rye bread and wraps without any digestive trouble.

Typical Day

05:00 –  (Wake) Drink cold pressed juice (organic carrot, celery, cucumber, lemon, tomato, ginger, kale, wheatgrass) makes about 400-500ml & 2 pieces of rye toast with home made almond butter.

05:10 – Mobilise (more on this in another post)

06:00 – Train at Crossfit Bare

08:30 – Main breakfast – Fat and protein rich meal (usually a few slices of bacon 2 x 800g free range hormone free eggs, cheese mushroom, baby spinach avocado in a warm wholemeal wrap)

09:00 –  Sleep 1/2 hour

Lunch time’ish – Carb (usually yoghurt with org/no sugar muesli, inca berries and goji berries)

Mid afternoon (14:00-16:00) – Graze (canned tuna, carrot/protein slice, fruit etc.)

Evening (18:00-20:00) – Dinner (usually working at this time so a pre-prepared meal is usually what is eaten, either salmon or chicken salad, or a chicken, pork or beef dish with brown rice).

21:00 – Mobilise

22:00 – Bed ‘zzzzz’

These changes have made such a serious impact to my daily energy levels and given me a greater mental clarity. I wish I wasn’t so dismissive about the ‘importance of nutrition’ message and made these changes a lot more than 6 months ago. Better late than never 🙂

In Stacey’s own words

I agree with Josh in that I try not to label a way of eating with a title (like Paleo diet/Zone etc). It’s a good way to help people find research on the topic, but try not to think of this change as a set of rules and foods we ‘must not eat’.

As we mentioned in the video – we want to focus on ‘cleaning up’ the diet and eating more ‘real food’. This just means removing as much processed food from you daily intake as possible and taking time to prepare you own food. It doesn’t have to be long or time consuming, the key is knowing your options and having them available to you.

My main priority when helping people make changes to their nutrition is to think about swapping foods. Having a list of the foods that will help us function at our best and knowing when and what to eat is important. And the big take away is variety… so many of the people I talk to tell me they have ‘started eating pale diet’, but are eating the same 3 foods at every meal, every day.

There are so many great choices, make sure you mix it up and balance out your meals so you don’t miss out on important vitamins and minerals (in plain English, don’t just eat heaps of protein. Veggies and good fats are as important, if not more!

Typical Day

05:15 Breakfast – mushrooms, baby spinach and coleslaw mix veggies (carrot, cabbage, celery and onion) from Coles with 150g smoked salmon and ~8 olives

07:15 Snack – protein snack ball made with 180 protein powder

09:00 Snack – small tin of tuna in olive oil with an apple and small handful of cashews and macadamias (Pre-training).

12:30 Lunch – 2 scrambled eggs with more veggies same as breakfast and half an avocado

15:00 Snack – 2 slices rare roast beef and a few slices of grilled eggplant with small handful of nuts

20:00 Dinner – Kangaroo steak with stir fried veggies (broccoli, cauliflower an carrot), sauce: olive oil, balsamic vinegar, mixed herbs, natural salt and paprika

This can work as a great starting point whether you want to lose weight, improve your training performance or just maintain a healthy lifestyle with an amazing quality of life. With the above in mind, the example day of my food intake will change daily depending on my mood or what’s in the fridge 🙂

My CrossFit Journey Part III: A typical daily diet transcript

Guy: Hi, this is Guy Lawrence of 180 Nutrition, and today I’m here at CrossFit Bare in Bondi Junction again. I’m joined with fellow CrossFitters Stacey and Josh who both train out here. The one thing I wanted to discuss quickly was nutrition. It’s a topic we find a lot of people struggle with. So starting out with bringing in Stacey, who happens to be a qualified dietician as well as my CrossFit coach, and a CrossFit HQ coach… That’s correct yeah?

Stacey: Yeah that’s correct…

Guy: The first thing I wanted to do was… ’cause people get confused a lot around the topic of nutrition, so starting off, you must get asked a lot about food. So just to give us an insight to what you eat daily, what would it be?

Stacey: Yeah cool, so I like to base my diet on things that grow, so vegetables, fruit, fresh as you can find and then anything that had parents so anything that walked. So that’s red meats, fish, chicken, eggs, all those sorts of things.

Guy: Just keeping it really clean?

Stacey: Yeah, keeping it really clean, real food.

Guy: So when you see people struggling with food, what would be the first thing that you would tell them to do or what would you tell them to cut out?

Stacey: It depends on where they are at the moment, most people’s problems would be sugar. So that would be the first thing that you would look at removing and then talking about grains and introducing them to the idea of pro/inflammatory foods aren’t so good for your bodily functions.

Guy: Yeah, ok… and Josh as well is a fantastic athlete and interesting that you mentioned to me how you changed your nutrition over the last six months. What would be the comparisons and what have you taken out?

Josh: When I first started training I had all of this information given to me about eat this, eat that. I read a lot of packaging about what was healthy and supposed to be good for me and wot-not. It wasn’t until I started CrossFit until I really started to change things and clean everything up over the last six months.

Guy: Has it been more of a case of what you are eliminating out of your daily diet over what you are bringing in?

Josh: Over the past six months I’ve implemented a lot of things. I eat clean meats, veggies, a lot of grown stuff.

Stacey: Grass-fed meats…

Josh: Yeah exactly, and just the changes in me, I just feel such a difference. In clarity and performance, just how I feel on a day to day basis. My sleeps better, everything falls into place from just changing my diet.

Guy: It’s massive, obviously I’m a big fan of that. And I know that some of you may be watching this sitting there 10 kilos overweight and wouldn’t even consider CrossFit which is fine. You’re thinking why does that apply to me? One of my beliefs is that whether you are an elite athlete or whether you’re 10 kilos overweight, generally you should be eating the same foods, it’s just the quantities that change. The moment that you cut out processed food, the moment you will start to see your diet improving. I know that you said something pretty relevant I know…

Stacey: Yeah, it’s quality of life is more important that what the number on the scales is. If you clean up your diet your life is going to be easier and the by-product of that would be looking great.

Guy: Exactly, so it’s a lifestyle at the end of the day and what we’ll do as well is to put up on the blog what these guys have eaten over the last couple of days. And if you do have any questions regarding food and things like that please stick them up on the blog and I’m sure these guys would be happy to help as well. Thanks for tuning in and we’ll see you soon.

The 1/2 a second cameo at the end of the video was The Fit Frother.

If you enjoyed this post, would appreciate a share on FaceBook and love to hear your thoughts/questions in the comments section below… Cheers, Guy.

Check out our Ultimate Guide to Post Workout Recovery for CrossFit Here