Brian (1s):
Coming up on the GET LEAN, Eat Clean Podcast.
Trevor (3s):
So my whole thesis with Dr. Cordain was about the impact of wheat on our diet and our immune system. And I would say yes, we have done a lot of breeding of these grains in ways that are a little negative for our health. So to give you one example, and if I'm getting too science, he'll let me know. But there's something in wheat called amylase trypsin inhibitors, which are actually a really good natural pesticide. So you've heard about, hey, the wheat over in Europe seems to be different from the wheat here. That's the big difference over here. They really tried to breed more of these amylase trypsin inhibitors into the wheat. What we've discovered is that particular molecule activates our dendritic cells, which are these cells that sit around the lining of our gut and kind of have these arms that reach into your digestive tract to sample what's in there.
Trevor (49s):
And when they see the amylase trypsin inhibitors, it sets them off and they activate the immune system. So that's one way, but there's multiple ways we can really inappropriately activate our immune system, keep it inflamed, and that can ultimately over time lead to a whole host of inflammatory conditions.
Brian (1m 6s):
This week I interviewed endurance athlete, CEO of the Paleo diet and podcast host of Fast Talk podcast, Trevor Connor. We discussed how to get into endurance sports along with what is the paleo diet, the problems with grains, the ideal sodium to potassium ratio, nutrient-dense foods, and his one tip to get your body back to what it once was. Really enjoyed my interview with Trevor. I know you will too. Thanks so much for listening and enjoy the show. Alright. Welcome to the Get Lean, Eat Clean podcast. My name is Brian Gryn and I have Trevor Connor on welcome to the show. Thank
Trevor (1m 42s):
You. Looking forward to this.
Brian (1m 44s):
Yeah, thanks for coming on. CEO of the Paleo Diet. Also have a podcast. What's the name of your podcast?
Trevor (1m 51s):
Fast Talk.
Brian (1m 52s):
Fast Talk. Love it. And that's about Endurance Sports, correct?
Trevor (1m 55s):
It is. So science of Endurance Sports training. Have a lot of coaches that listen to us. A lot of cyclists, a lot of triathletes.
Brian (2m 3s):
And what made you start that?
Trevor (2m 4s):
I was writing for a magazine called Venu, which is one of the big cycling magazines. They had a, a coach section at the back of the magazine that I wrote every month. And people started mentioning this podcast thing to me. So I I finally went to the magazine and said, Hey, do you want to give this a try? And their answer was, we don't see the value in this podcast thing, but if you want to do it.
Brian (2m 27s):
Yeah. Well, and, and you, were you professionally trained? You were a cyclist?
Trevor (2m 32s):
I was for many years.
Brian (2m 34s):
Yeah. And hung it up. What, like when you were 38.
Trevor (2m 38s):
Interesting. I, yes, I hung it up when I was 38 and then actually went back to Racing Pro in my forties. Oh. And still I'm 53 Now. I, I'm certainly not contesting the win, but I, I still periodically hop in races and remind myself what it feels like.
Brian (2m 54s):
Well that's cool. 'cause it's, I guess it's similar to golf in a sense. Like you can, you can compete until you're, you know, I mean I know guys that compete in their sixties and they're still pretty, pretty darn good. I have a buddy who just turned 50 who, who's trying out for the senior tour, which is very difficult to make. But I think that's what's so great about golf is like you can just play it your whole life and still stay competitive. I'm assuming cycling's probably similar, maybe not quite as, as old as maybe you can play golf till, well, you could probably cycle, but I don't know how, I'm sure they have senior cycling events as well, right?
Trevor (3m 27s):
Oh, they do. So yeah, no, I, I forget the movie that had this joke, but the problem is I keep getting older and slower every year and the young guys stay the same age, So they beat up on me a lot more than they used to.
Brian (3m 39s):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The, with golf it's, you know, it's like the game has changed. I mean the young, these I I coach high school golf, I mean, but it's just the speed, the speed is just continually gets faster and faster I feel like. Yeah. Year after year. And like if you look on tour, these guys just keep hitting it farther and farther.
Trevor (3m 57s):
Yeah, no, you're cycling's been a little bit different. If anything you've actually seen, there's not as many races in the US as there used to be. So something that's been kind of nice for me is, and if anything, it's gotten a little bit slower so I can still, still hang on when I, I really shouldn't be hanging on anymore.
Brian (4m 15s):
Yeah, yeah. Well what, I guess let's go down the right route of like Endurance Sports because it's not something we talk a lot about. I'm not a big runner or cycler myself, but what are some of the, what if someone wanted to get into endurance cycling, what types of tips would you give them?
Trevor (4m 32s):
You know, just getting into it, just have fun, go out, don't kill yourself. You know, there's that mentality of if it doesn't hurt, I'm not getting any gains. And particularly in Endurance Sports, that's not the case at all. Most of your training should actually be relatively easy. The nice thing when you're brand new is anything you do is going to make you faster. It's not until you get to a fairly high level that you really have to start worrying about how exactly do I train to get those little extra gains. So, you know, I always tell people when they're starting out, just the only mistake you can make is train so hard that you overcook yourself. As long as you're not doing that, go have some fun.
Trevor (5m 14s):
You know, there's what are called grand fondos, which are these events that can be anywhere from 25 miles to a hundred miles. You'll have people racing them, you'll have people riding them. If you want to get into that more structured race type situation, go try a couple grand fondos. There's usually little local races every week that you can go to a lot to just kinda give it a try and see what it's like.
Brian (5m 38s):
You know, IIII would say that resistance training is very similar, right? Like you don't have to worry so much about the nuance of, of like lifting when you're starting out. Just like start like it could be, you know, it could, you could do 40 reps, you could do, you know, three reps, but like, just like, just starting out. 'cause you'll see gains right off the bat. It's like, it's not until like you're doing it for maybe a few years, maybe, you know, until you have to maybe start switching things up and making, getting a little bit more granular. Granular regarding your training.
Trevor (6m 9s):
Well, exactly. Yeah. I, I got my PT certificate a long time ago. I know how to build weight plans. But in October, when I get back in the weight room and I haven't been in there for six months, it's so much fun. 'cause you just, you don't care. You just go and pick up a bunch of weights, do a bunch of exercises and, and you're gonna be pretty sore for the next couple days. And it, it's really easy. It's not till January that I have to actually start worrying about a formal program.
Brian (6m 33s):
Right. And do you think there's a different type of lifting should be done for, you know, cyclists just 'cause I would imagine, you know, you wanna stay sort of light and nimble but you know, obviously strong. I would imagine that lower bodies and glutes are obviously should be at the forefront of the training program. You know,
Trevor (6m 52s):
I don't know how much you've been looking at the research. I've been really fascinated by it because they've done so little on should you be doing lighter weights, more kind of power explosive type lifts, or should you just be doing heavy weights? Hmm. And they're still debating that for endurance athletes. But I've noticed even for people that are strength athletes, the research isn't conclusive about that. Hmm. But what you're, you're really seeing in the endurance world is that question of should athletes be lifting at all? And I think mostly we've gone in the direction of yeah, you should be lifting. So now the big debate is do you just lift in the off season and then get outta the weight room or do you lift all year round? Mm.
Trevor (7m 32s):
And from the research I've been reading in my own personal experience, I'm a big fan of, of lift all year round. It's not, if you're an endurance athlete, it's not gonna hurt your sport and it is going to help avoid injuries and I think it's actually gonna keep you stronger on the bike. Yeah,
Brian (7m 47s):
I think that makes sense intuitively because you know, if you're, I mean, I know you took some, you're taking, you've taken some time off from the weight room, but I just think, like you said, doing it all year round, even if it's there, sort of like a maintenance mode during your, during your season, you know, I think like golf sort of similar in that sense. Like for me, like in the summer, it's more of a maintenance mode when, you know, when I'm playing more golf and playing competitive and then in the winter I can maybe go a little bit heavier and not necessarily worry about being sore as much or like, you know, taxing the body and, and, and it's not gonna have a negative effect on my golf game 'cause I'm not really playing during the off season. So I think probably cycling would, would probably be fairly similar.
Trevor (8m 29s):
Yep. You know, another thing we have in cycling, I, I don't hesitant to say this because it might discourage people. This is more at the professional or the high level. It's a dangerous sport. You're gonna crash. You know, I went into every season saying, not asking am I gonna crash this season? It's how many times and how bad. And you see the athletes who spend a lot of time in the weight room, they hit the pavement hard, they take off some skin, but they walk away. The, the guys who don't spend time in the weight room that you can tell, they just look a little different. And when they hit the pavement, they end up in the hospital. So, you know, that's part of why I'm a big believer. It just, it keeps your body more functional, it keeps your body more resistant.
Trevor (9m 10s):
You can handle a lot more.
Brian (9m 11s):
What's like the thought around like, like doping in in cycling? Is it like it, I mean I'm assuming it still goes on. Does it still go on at like a high level or like, I know obviously with the, obviously the whole Lance Armstrong Yeah. I don't know ish, you know, like, I don't know what what you want to call it, but you know, that whole debacle to some degree. What, what, what what's sort of like, like in the, in the cycling world now as far as doping and is it sort of just something that still goes on? Oh boy,
Trevor (9m 42s):
This is where I'm gonna get myself in trouble. 'cause working for Vela News, I have a lot of the inside information that I, that you know, shouldn't be sharing. But that was a while ago. You know what I tell people it is different now. The big trick that Armstrong pulled, and like I said, this is what's gonna get me in trouble, but I'm gonna give you the honest answer, wasn't that he got away with it. He didn't, he actually tested positive twice and they, they buried it. Hmm. The trick that he pulled was he turned the clean guys into the bad guys. So, I mean, I have an, an old teammate who lives here in Colorado. We get together all the time to go out for rides. He raced in Europe for a bit and he actually got a contract offer with US Postal and when they found out he wouldn't dope, they rescinded the contract and, and they drove 'em out of Europe basically.
Trevor (10m 29s):
So it's not like that anymore. I'm not gonna delude myself and say everybody's clean. I'm sure there's guys who are still doping, but you don't see that culture anymore. I think riders who are clean can race and race at the top level.
Brian (10m 42s):
Okay. Yeah. So back then, like, gosh, so the, the the sponsors and the team or the team per se, it was so prevalent that if the guys wouldn't do it, they wouldn't want them on the team.
Trevor (10m 55s):
Yeah. You know, there was just a, you can't trust the clean guys. So
Brian (10m 58s):
To
Trevor (10m 59s):
Ask, look, you know, I knew this, I'm, I'm two months older than Lance Armstrong. I never even tried to go over to Europe. I I wasn't gonna dope. I wanted to stay clean. And I just knew that, knew there was no opportunity for me over there at that time. So I mean, that, that was that era. I don't think I, I think that era is over.
Brian (11m 15s):
Yeah. Okay. And so transitioning from riding an Endurance Sports to the paleo diet Yeah. Bit
Trevor (11m 23s):
Of a
Brian (11m 24s):
Switch. Yeah. Now, now you, you're helping run the company, the paleo diet. When did you start doing this?
Trevor (11m 31s):
I took over the company from Dr. Cordain in 2018, but I've been involved with him since I was a student of his starting in 2009. So for any of your listeners that don't know, Dr. Cordain wrote the first book about the paleo diet. He created the paleo diet. I had retired from professional cycling at 38 and went back to school. So I went to Colorado State University, I wanted to study exercise science. And my first semester there, I took Dr. Cordain's class, and I'll admit to you, I'd been studying traditional sports nutrition for 10 years and I sat in his class going, this guy is full of it. I just didn't believe anything he was telling me. He, his class actually made me angry, tell the truth.
Trevor (12m 12s):
And I got involved with him because I actually spent an entire summer trying to prove him wrong. Going through the research and trying to find everything that was wrong And what he was saying. And as I went through the research, I kind of went, well that makes sense. And then I'd get to the next thing and go, well, he can't be right about this. And I'd look at the research and go, well actually that makes sense too. And as I was doing this, I started changing my diet. I wasn't even fully aware of it to, by the point of this was December, 2009, I was pretty much on the paleo diet And you know, I had left full-time cycling because I was just starting to get sick all the time.
Trevor (12m 53s):
And it was these weird kinda low grade bugs that would be there for weeks that, you know, if I was sitting at a desk I wouldn't really notice. But they were affecting my, my training and my racing. And after I made the switch in my diet, that went away. So I just ended up, you know, even though I was full-time in school, I was training better and better than I, I had in years and basically went back to, to racing in the, the pro peloton for a few more years.
Brian (13m 18s):
And just so people listening know, like maybe give a quick recap of like, what exactly is the paleo diet? You know, what it consists of,
Trevor (13m 27s):
You know, the, the simplest, I always like to keep this really simple for people. It's just eating lots of fruits, vegetables, natural meats, fish, and then nuts and seeds sparingly. So where it gets controversial is we believe you should really limit or remove grains from your diet. And as adults we really shouldn't be consuming dairy. And that's where people take a lot of issue with the diet and happy to dive into any of those directions to explain why we believe that. But I'm, I'm sure you've been hearing now there's this big trend towards getting ultra processed foods outta your diet And you know, that's how I've, I've really been explaining the diet to people. It's really just eating minimally processed and unprocessed foods.
Trevor (14m 10s):
So that's really what it comes down to. Yeah,
Brian (14m 12s):
I mean I think like with any diet it like getting caught up in the nuance of it, but when, when I was looking at the paleo diet, I'm like, this is like pretty intuitive. Like it's not like Yes. Yeah. There, there might be some, you know, the dairy, you know, I'm sure some people, you know, we can talk, some people obviously can tolerate dairy more, more than others. And, and obviously with grains, I think especially now just the way grains are, have become industrialized and processed that like, that's probably hurt like the grains in general, right? Like I'm sure like back, I don't know how many years, 30, 40, 50 years, you know, if you're making your own bread, it's a big difference between going out and buying it commercially as well.
Trevor (14m 52s):
It, it still is though. You know, I'm, so my whole thesis with Dr. Cordain was about the impact of wheat on our diet and, and our immune system. And I would say yes, we have done a lot of breeding of these grains in ways that are a little negative for our health. So to give you one example, and if I'm getting too sciencey, let me know, but there's something in wheat called amylase trypsin inhibitors, which are actually a really good natural pesticides. So you've heard about, hey the, the wheat over in Europe seems to be different from the wheat here. That's the big difference over here. They really tried to breed more of these amylase trypsin inhibitors into the wheat.
Trevor (15m 33s):
What we discovered is that particular molecule activates our dendritic cells, which are these cells that sit around the, the lining of our gut and kind of have these arms that reach into your digestive tract to sample what's in there. And when they see the amylase trypsin inhibitors, it sets them off and they activate the immune system. So we, that's one way, but there's multiple ways we can really inappropriately activate our immune system, keep it inflamed and that can ultimately over time lead to a whole host of inflammatory conditions.
Brian (16m 7s):
Yeah. And that, that makes sense. I mean, I mean I, I think like grains are something that is not necessarily essential for the diet. Yes. You know, and you can get sort of, you know, you talk about like gluten-free options that might, you know, might be a good alternative. I see. 'cause I, I do gut testing like a GI map and a lot of people are high in IGAs and sensitive to, to gluten. So this is a common thing. And you know, you can think have things like rice and probably quinoa and, and buck, you know, buckwheat or milit, you know, these things are, you could probably use as alternatives, you
Trevor (16m 46s):
Know. I agree though. So if anybody ever asked me, Hey, I really wanna eat some grains, what would you recommend? Rice would be my number one,
Brian (16m 53s):
Right. White rice. There's
Trevor (16m 55s):
There, well there's a lot of antinutrients in other grains, right? Rice is the one of the few grains that we don't see most of these antinutrients. And the issue with rice is it just doesn't have a lot of nutrient value to it. And it, if you're eating white rice fairly processed right? It rice, it's got a high glycemic index, but otherwise, you know, it's, it's a lot better than the others, you know. So quinoa, that one I'm gonna actually warn you against a little bit.
Brian (17m 21s):
Yeah.
Trevor (17m 22s):
There's an anti nutrient called saponins, which you get in a lot of grains and saponin is just the Latin word for soap. And so when you're in the shower and you're taking, you know, you're trying to clean yourself, soap is great 'cause it gets all the oily residue off your body. But when you're talking about your gut, we have this lipid bilayer that is designed to protect our gut. And saponins, when you digest them, they do just what soap does on your skin. They foam and they break down those lipids and So they break down one of the really important barriers in our, or protective barriers in our gut. And quinoa has the highest concentration of saponins of any food you can buy.
Trevor (18m 3s):
So it is something to be a little bit careful about.
Brian (18m 5s):
Okay. Yeah. Grains are something that I cut out a while back. I've occasionally reintroduced them a little bit here and there, but like, I think you talk about it on your, on your website regarding like this 85 15 rule. Yep. Maybe talk, talk a little bit about that. You
Trevor (18m 21s):
Know, we had a lot of debate about that rule. You know, the whole idea of the pale diet is eat the way we ate during evolutionary times. So eat the foods that we are designed to eat. And yes, the, the biggest criticism I've heard of the PAL diet, which I agree with is a lot of those foods don't exist anymore. So we're trying to emulate as close as possible, but there are people that make the argument, well you should be a hundred percent my experience and, and this actually comes from my background as a, an endurance coach, my experience as you try to get people to be a hundred percent, it's really hard. It's not a lot of fun and eventually they're gonna quit. Right? Where I think what we need to be working on is just improving your diet, celebrate successes.
Trevor (19m 5s):
So like, as I was saying, I get this from my coach background because when you're working with athletes, you need to celebrate improvements. If I have somebody who's brand new to cycling, I don't sit there and go, well that's okay what you did yesterday, but you're not racing the Tour de France, so what's wrong with you? You know, they're not pro athletes. You go, Hey, you improved, you got better, you won the local race, that's fantastic. Celebrate successes. And So we really brought that into the paleo diet as well. If you're improving your diet, if you're getting better, that should be celebrated. And our feeling is once you're 85% paleo, meaning 15% of the time, go have fun. I still eat my pizza.
Trevor (19m 45s):
I love my pizza. I just don't have it every day. I have it every couple weeks. Sure. You're you're doing great. And, and don't try to be a Nazi about it. I, I've never seen, you know, I've coached ath pro athletes at the highest level and even with them, if they try to be religious about their training, they eventually burn out. So it's the same thing with diet
Brian (20m 6s):
And like fruits and vegetables. Do you know, 'cause I know some people obviously with the on, you know, sort of this carnivore craze coming a little bit Yep. You know, some people initially or you know, can't tolerate certain vegetables, especially raw. What are your thoughts around, around around those and, And you know, vegetables and the, and some of the antinutrients there as well?
Trevor (20m 29s):
Yeah, yeah. You know, it's, it's an interesting question. I, I don't know if you ever watch The Simpsons, one of my favorite episodes of the Simpsons is when Lisa, who's a vegetarian, tries to get her family to eat vegetables and they're all really sick that night because they haven't had vegetables in years.
Brian (20m 45s):
Right? Right.
Trevor (20m 46s):
Any change to the diet, your body's gonna respond negatively too. Even if you go from eating Doritos to eating a steak or eating vegetables, your, your body's gonna react a little negatively. So I always believe make the changes slowly. I eat a ton of raw vegetables. Now that doesn't have too much of an impact on me, but, you know, I did actually listen to your episode recently on Oxalate, which was a great episode. Really enjoyed that. So you were talking about that as one of the antinutrients that you see in vegetables. Was that with Sally Norton? Was Sally Norton episode. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, no, it was really enjoyable. Great episode. You know the one counter I'll give to that, she was talking about oxalate as a, as a anti nutrient that you have to be careful about.
Trevor (21m 33s):
One of our big principles on the paleo diet is it is all about balance in your diet. There are all sorts of nutrients that we haven't even identified yet that are pro our bodies probably need. We've been identifying some that most people haven't heard of. Like I could talk to you about Quinones, I'm sure most of your audience is going, what are those? Hmm. They're actually really important to longevity. You know, another could talk all about NRF two and again, I'm sure everybody's going, huh? What's that? I'm not bringing those up to, to get sciencey and bringing those up. More to say it, our bodies are very complex and we still, you know, your, your top nutritionist, your top physiologist still don't understand how everything works.
Trevor (22m 13s):
So one of the reasons I'm a big believer in the paleo diet is because it's not about a particular nutrient or anti nutrient necessarily. It's not about a particular food, it's about the balance in your diet. And so one of the things we talk a lot about is ratios, very important ratios in your diet as opposed to, hey, you just need to get this nutrient, it's no, you need to eat things in balance. So for example, sodium, potassium ratio, typical western diet, you're eating two to one sodium to potassium. What we know from looking at a more natural diet and also just the research they've done on the human body, we should be eating actually about five to one to 10 to one potassium to sodium.
Trevor (22m 56s):
So we have it flipped in a Western diet and that causes all sorts of health issues, including they're showing that's really more responsible for osteoporosis than how much calcium you're getting in the diet. But another one I'll point out is the calcium magnesium ratio. We should be eating right around two to one calcium and magnesium. If you're higher than that, that correlates with heart disease. But if you're significantly lower than that, that also correlates with heart disease. You really need to be trying to get it right in the, that, that right balance. And I brought that, sorry it took me a long time to get there, but oxalate, you know, as soon as I heard that episode, as you know, she was talking about the kidney stones, which is basically calcium binding with the oxalate.
Trevor (23m 40s):
So I went, I wonder if the ratio is a factor in this. And I, I went and looked at a bunch of research and sure enough they show when you don't get enough magnesium in your diet, that's when oxalate starts having all these negative effects. And when you start getting sufficient magnesium, when you get that ratio and balance, you see a lot of those negative effects of oxalate go away.
Brian (23m 60s):
Hmm. What would be some ways to get magnesium in your diet other than maybe supplementing?
Trevor (24m 5s):
Supplementing is certainly one, your best sources tend to be vegetables, green, leafy vegetables. So that goes back to your question about how do I feel about vegetables? You know, unfortunately yeah there are some antinutrients you're, you're getting at a really important point, which is all life tries to defend itself. Animals can run away or fight plants do it by having antinutrients that you shouldn't eat. Grains are really high in antinutrients, but yes, vegetables have some of them too. So there was always the argument of your best plant foods are vegetables. I've heard in discussions with people that are more on the carnivore side, that actually you should really be eating fruit because fruits defense mechanism is to actually put the seed in something that tastes really good, but the seed is indigestible.
Trevor (24m 53s):
So an animal will eat the whole fruit, eat the seeds, they'll go to another location, they'll deposit that seed somewhere where it can grow away from its parent with all this great fertilizer with it. So actually fruit has evolved in a kind of a symbiotic relationship. And I've been talking with a researcher who is spending time with one of the last true hunter gatherer societies down in South America. They eat a lot of animal food, but they also eat a lot of fruit. They don't tend to eat a lot of vegetables.
Brian (25m 25s):
Yeah. And you've seen that with like the carnivore crowd is like even, you know, they'll, they'll start out meat based and then start menting fruit. And what is your thought around like a good raw honey? Oh
Trevor (25m 35s):
Boy. Not too much of one. 'cause I actually avoid honey myself. Okay. Even though we, we have that debate all the time of whether we still wanna say honey is paleo or not. There's certainly evidence that hunter gatherers societies ate a fair amount. I will tell you personally, something you're seeing in endurance athletes is, is rise in in AFib and the belief is just years and years of beating up our bodies. You know, it, it's a tough sport and I've been an endurance athlete for decades. I've been, unfortunately the last couple years developed AFib. But I have noticed that sugar's really set off my AFib. So I've been trying to get them completely outta my diet and honey sets me off.
Trevor (26m 16s):
So I kind of avoid it myself.
Brian (26m 18s):
And then would you say is, is the payload diet more of a, a meat-based diet or like a plant-based diet would you say? If you
Trevor (26m 25s):
Had a It's a mix. Yeah. So Dr. Cordain actually did, I think one of his most important pay was looking at the ethnographic data on over 200 hunter gatherer societies. And what you saw was a, a pretty large mix. You saw no societies that were vegan. You saw very few societies that were carnivore and I think they were only carnivore at certain times of the year. If you lived in, in very northern or very southern latitudes, there were just certain times of the year where you couldn't really eat much plant food. So you didn't have much of a choice, but you saw a broad range of plant and animal ratios. So I don't try to say this is the ratio you should eat.
Trevor (27m 6s):
I think everybody has to experiment and find what works for them. And I do some, see some people that eat a lot more plant than animal food and they seem to do their best there. I see a lot of people that eat a lot more animal food than plant food and they do their best there. I'm probably somewhere about 50 50 myself.
Brian (27m 22s):
Okay. Yeah. 'cause obviously there's advantages to animal protein over, you know, plant proteins as far as just like the bioavailability of it. Yep.
Trevor (27m 31s):
But yeah, I will tell you one thing. If I could make one change in how we talk about nutrition, it's to get away from talking about simplifying everything down to macronutrient ratios. So you know, you should be eating X percent of animal food and X percent of plant food. I know, I don't wanna look at it that way. But even more importantly, all the conversation is about should we eat high carbohydrate, low carbohydrate, high fat, low fat? What's more important to me, and, and one of the principles of the paleo diet is no, it's about the foods that you should eat, you should be eating and the foods that you shouldn't be eating. Get away from those macronutrient ratios. You know, you can talk about a high carbohydrate diet and people argue it is healthy for you.
Trevor (28m 11s):
It isn't healthy for you. But the thing is, you can have a high carbohydrate diet that's based on fruits and vegetables. You can have a high carbohydrate diet that's based on eating skittles. They're completely different things. So when you just simplify diet down to high carb, low carb, you're getting away from how are you getting those nutrients? What are the foods you're eating?
Brian (28m 30s):
Yeah. Almost like just focusing on like nutrient dense foods. Right. You know, is one way to think about it. I always say like single ingredient foods are, are your, are your best bet. I mean, Skittles, I don't know how many ingredients are in ski.
Trevor (28m 44s):
Not a lot. Not
Brian (28m 45s):
A lot. No. We, I think there might be more than we think. Well
Trevor (28m 49s):
Yeah. A lot of chemical names that nobody can present or pronounce. Right. But yeah, we were, we wrote an article on that and I'm glad you went there. 'cause I think nutrient density is one of the most important things to look at. I always tell people, eat nutrient dense foods. Try to get nutrient poor foods out of your diet. And in that article we took all the food groups and we, we ranked them in order from highest nutrient density to lowest. I've actually been having this debate with Dr. Cordain. He has seafood at the top of the list. And then vegetables, I would still actually put vegetables first and then seafood. But those are your two top. Then you have fruits, meats, eggs, let's see if I can remember all this then legumes.
Trevor (29m 36s):
So beans and all those things. They're not vegetables, they're legumes and they're actually much lower nutrient density. And then you round it out with dairy grains and then nuts. Nuts actually have a lot of important nutrients, but they're so high, high in calories, they still buy cal, you know, buy a hundred calories. They're still a little nutrient poor.
Brian (29m 58s):
Yeah. It's like you can overconsume them easily.
Trevor (30m 1s):
Yeah. If you're trying to lose weight, be careful about eating nuts. Right. But when I talk to people about losing weight, we can get into the whole calorie counting thing. I always just tell people, eat from the top of that list, eat nutrient density. And I always get the same response from people. They always say, I was hungry all the time before And you know, was a killer. I was trying to count calories when I just started eating nutrient-dense foods. I stopped being hungry and I was eating half the calories.
Brian (30m 27s):
Yeah, that makes sense. Have you heard of pet Him on my podcast, Marty Kendall
Trevor (30m 32s):
Recognize the name, but I'm not sure why he's done,
Brian (30m 33s):
He is a, yeah, optimizing nutrition. He does a nice job. He talks a lot about nutrient-dense foods and yeah, I was just curious. I had, I've had him on, that'd be, that'd be one episode to, to look at if he talks about nutrient-dense foods and I'm, I'm actually looking at the list now. And it's spinach, mus, mussels, liver. Yep. Broccoli, salmon, mackerel, you know, shrimp, bronze are all up there. And then you get into like steak, whole eggs. Yep. You know, cottage cheese. So yeah, go ahead.
Trevor (31m 5s):
I was just gonna say, you eat from the top of that list and like I said, anybody who's trying to lose weight A, it's gonna be a lot easier. B you know, you're gonna be healthier. You're getting the nutrients that your body needs. And, and that goes back to what I was saying before. We don't even know half the nutrients our bodies needs. So just focus on nutrient-dense foods and that's your best chance of getting what your body needs in the ratio that it needs.
Brian (31m 27s):
Yeah. And like I always find myself after dinner, like wanting to have something else and I typically stop eating like three hours before bed just for like digestion, you know, and better sleep quality. And I might snack on something, but like, it'll be like, I mean, it's boring to some people, but like blueberries and, and it's enjoyable. I, I think like fruit is a great way, an adjunct to have it as almost like a, a treat to some degree. Even though I do eat a lot of fruit, I've been adding fruit into my diet actually more and more. So I don't know, I always say that to people. It's like if, well for one thing, if you don't buy it, you won't eat it. So, you know, it's like if you only have certain choices, you know you're not gonna run out.
Brian (32m 12s):
Well I hope you're not gonna run out to the store at eight o'clock at night to go buy a pint of ice cream. Some people might, but if it's not in the house, I'm not gonna eat it. You know, so.
Trevor (32m 20s):
Yep. Smart way to look at it. Never go shopping when you're hungry. 'cause that's when you start buying the pet
Brian (32m 26s):
Stuff.
Trevor (32m 26s):
I made the biggest mistake a couple weeks ago. I went up for a six hour bike ride and then I went to the supermarket. When I got home, I looked at all the stuff I bought and just went, oh, that was a mistake.
Brian (32m 35s):
Yeah. Right, right. Well I would've probably just eaten stuff as I was walking through the Yep. I've done that before. I was just gonna say breakfast, you know, this is something that, you know, I've changed my tune on. I think obviously I, I went through a stage of doing a decent amount of fasting, but I've cut back a lot on that. First of off for one, I wasn't consuming enough. I didn't feel like it. And so I've added in, you know, and Now I have three meals that first meal. You know, I know you guys aren't huge fans of dairy, but you know what could be some alternatives for a, a quality nutrient-dense breakfast? Especially if you're avoiding, especially if you're avoiding dairy. I mean, I love Greek yogurt. I usually do Greek yogurt and fruit. Yeah.
Brian (33m 15s):
It agrees with me. You know, I don't seem to have any issues with it, but you know, I know you guys aren't so ProAir, so
Trevor (33m 23s):
Yeah. Yeah. I gotta start by saying I'm not a big believer that there are breakfast foods and there are dinner foods and you can't mix them up. So I will often tend to eat the, the same thing for breakfast that I might have for dinner. Again, it's just trying to get some nutrient density. So I'll get some fruits, some vegetables, some sort of protein in there. And a lot of people, you know, my, my, my partner will look at me and go, it's breakfast. Why are you eating that? But if you're a big believer in, you know, there's gotta be breakfast foods, you know, I think eggs are great. You know, I love the create an omelet, put some vegetables in there. You know, I think that's a great way to start with breakfast. Yeah. You know, the one warning I'm gonna give to people, this is something that they've got completely wrong.
Trevor (34m 7s):
This whole belief that the egg whites or the healthy part and avoid the yolks. All the research we've been seeing, it's the exact opposites. So egg whites tend to be lower in nutrient density. That's where you tend to see your antinutrients. One of the most important is something called avidan. Avidan binds very strongly to biotin, which is an important vitamin. And you know, being deficient in biotin has all sorts of negative health impacts on your body. And to give you an idea in studies where they want to look at biotin deficiency, they do it just by feeding people egg whites. Really Most. Yep. Most of the nutrient density is found in the yolks. I know they told you to avoid it because of the cholesterol, but most of the belief about cholesterol has been disproved in the, in the science.
Trevor (34m 54s):
What's more important is the type of fats you're eating, not the quantity of cholesterol you're eating.
Brian (34m 59s):
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, I don't even think I ever got on the whole egg white train. I don't like my parents' age. That was like a big thing. I feel like that's like, I don't, you don't see too many people order egg white omelets maybe a little bit. I think sometimes you'll see even like bodybuilders when maybe when they're trying to prep and they want to cut like their fat load down. So they'll just do like egg white omelets. But I'm, yeah, I'm always eating the whole egg. And I think too, like eating it, I, I do like scrambled eggs, but I think you're getting the most nutrients if you're eating that egg where the yolk is in full tack, you know, in full form if that Yep. Yeah,
Trevor (35m 37s):
No, I agree with you. And, and to tell you the truth, Dr. Cordain, after reading all this research, he now cooks eggs, but he only eats the yolk. He throws out the white.
Brian (35m 44s):
Okay.
Trevor (35m 45s):
I haven't gone that far mostly 'cause I'm lazy. But if you talk to him about the research, it's avoid the egg whites. Don't get that avid in, in your system and, and really eat the yolk. That's, that's where the health benefits are.
Brian (35m 57s):
Have you done duck eggs? Which eggs duck?
Trevor (36m 0s):
I haven't. Oh, I don't even think I've even seen them in the store. Oh
Brian (36m 3s):
Really? Yeah, we, we have 'em here. I'm sure you have 'em in Boulder. Try 'em. They're, they're, I think they're just better. It's like more of, it's just that the consistency's a little bit different, but they're a little bit more expensive. But I I I, I almost equate it to like, you know, bison versus just, you know, industrialized like just normal meat beef that you'd get from the store as opposed to bison meat. Like there's just, there's less of 'em. And I feel like there's less like, I guess processing in, in, in, in them. So like I feel like there's maybe even more nutrient density in like duck eggs versus regular eggs. But anyways, I'm
Trevor (36m 40s):
Sure also the duck eggs are, are less processed. I'll have to check those out. I'll have to look
Brian (36m 43s):
For those. Yeah. Yeah. We have a relative who has a farm and he, he'll, he has, he'll occasionally bring us duck eggs and they're really good. So highly, highly recommend. What about raw milk? Any thoughts around raw milk?
Trevor (36m 56s):
Well, we're, you know, milk is not part of the, the paleo diet and there, there's a whole host of reasons for that. You know, milk has a fair amount of, of anti nutrient properties. It also really, you know, there's a co I, I don't want to go too much into the science of it, but I would just bring up two things about it. One is it really spikes your insulin, which is something that you wanna try to avoid. You know, the other issue with milk, you always hear people talking about, oh, they're injecting cows with hormones and so you need to avoid meat and, and dairy because of all those injected hormones, they don't quite have it. Right? There actually are a fair amount of hormones in dairy, but that's natural.
Trevor (37m 38s):
It's a really neat evolutionary trick. If you think back a hundred thousand years ago, there were times when it was very hard to get enough nutrients in our diet. You know, the people are always fighting to get enough calories in their diet. So if you had an infant and there was a time when there just wasn't enough calories around, you didn't want that infant growing because you just couldn't feed them enough to keep them growing. So the infant on their own doesn't have enough growth hormone to have their growth go at the rate you'd want it to go. There's natural growth hormones that you find in mother's milk that's basically a signal that, yes, I'm getting enough nutritional value right now so this infant can grow, grow at the, the, the proper rate.
Trevor (38m 26s):
When a mother is in a starvation mode, those hormones go away in the dairy and then the child grows slower. So same thing with cattle. You're gonna find hormones in those, and those aren't human hormones, those are cow hormones. And so it's, it's a different type of growth hormone and we're seeing all sorts of negative consequence of those on our bodies. They're just not something that we should be consuming. So we're, we're quite against consuming dairy as adults, just not good for your health.
Brian (38m 54s):
Yeah, I know there's always mixed, there's definitely mixed views on that, but, so nothing around obviously like a whey protein or even a Cain protein. Yep.
Trevor (39m 7s):
So are, are you familiar with the, the the China study? The book?
Brian (39m 12s):
Oh, the book, the China study? No, not,
Trevor (39m 15s):
So that is one of the bibles for the vegan community. That was a professor t Cole Campbell who wrote that. And basically he was trying to show in that book the incredible negative consequence of eating animal foods on your diet. And I saw the transcript of this. There was a, a big nutrition conference where Dr. Campbell was there and Dr. Cordain was there, and this, their books were released at about the same time. So this was at the height of the popularity of their books. And the organizers said, Hey, they're both here. Let's get them to come have a debate. And so Dr. Campbell, you, And you know, if you've ever met Dr.
Trevor (39m 55s):
Cordain, Dr. Cordain is a pure researcher. He showed up to this debate with a, a stack of probably 50 research studies. So Dr. Campbell showed up and he was really talking about his book and his own research And, you know, just how he could basically turn cancer on and off in mice by feeding them animal protein. And Dr. Cordain just kept citing studies and Dr. Campbell kept going back to his own research. Finally, Dr. Cordain goes, well, let's talk about your research. I've got two issues with it. One is you're feeding them dairy protein. So it's mostly whey encasing protein when what people mostly eat is, is muscle protein.
Trevor (40m 37s):
So why weren't you doing your research on acting a myosin? So that was my one issue with it. The other issue was he was feeding these mice quantities of cain and, and whey protein that in order to get that, we would have to eat like, or drink like two gallons of milk a day. So it just wasn't physiological. Right. But Dr. Cordain made the point, I agree with you, Cain is unhealthy, whey is unpro that whey is unhealthy. That has been demonstrated in the research. And when you eat large quantities of that, yes you're gonna see increases in cancer and a whole host of other conditions. We shouldn't be consuming those, but those aren't natural to our diet. When you're eating more act and myosin, when you're eating more organ meat, the research tends to show, show more health benefits.
Trevor (41m 21s):
So I always re when somebody is, it's harder, it's more expensive. But when I see athletes in the weight room and they're, they're trying to put on muscle mass, I still encourage 'em towards more natural proteins, eating meats after they've been in the weight room, avoiding the, the whey protein shakes. And again, I don't know how much you wanna dive into the research, but I've read a ton of research on the negative health impacts of whey protein. It's just not something I would ever recommend to somebody.
Brian (41m 47s):
Okay. Yeah. Yep.
Trevor (41m 48s):
And, sorry, one last thing I'll say about that is really interesting review that I read on the impacts of protein on our microbiome. And so again, if you talk to the vegan community, they're gonna tell you animal protein is really bad for a microbiome. And they'll show you all these studies where when you consume a lot of protein, you, you see a bad profile in your microflora. This really interesting review that I read showed that is true when you're doing more supplemental proteins. So you, you're drinking your casings, you're drinking your, your whey proteins. When you eliminate the supplemental proteins from your diet, you, you see most of those negative consequences go away.
Trevor (42m 31s):
And when you start eating really natural sources of protein, you actually see positive impact on the microbiome. Got
Brian (42m 37s):
It. Okay. Yeah, I mean, we could probably have a another an hour talking. Yeah, sorry. No, no, that's fine. I, I mean, I, I think, yeah, I mean obviously there's a, there's a lot of money to be made, right? And supplementally with Waze and casings And, you know, I do use 'em from time to time. I will say that, like, I always tell people to start with Whole Foods first as far as getting protein in And, you know, I know some people who live a hectic lifestyle maybe need to find other ways quicker way, you know, easier ways to consume. And so what are your thoughts around like collagen protein?
Trevor (43m 17s):
I think it's great, you know, I've seen nothing but health benefits for that. So, and I, I will tell you, you know, as I said, I, I'm trying to keep muscle mass up. I do spend a lot of time in the, the weight room. What I do just give practical recommendations. I have what I, on Sunday nights I get my grill going and I just absolutely load my grill up with steaks, chicken, fish, whole load of just animal proteins. I cook all those on the sundae and then I put them in containers. I have one container of things I'm gonna use in my meals, breakfast and dinner, and then snacks. So, you know, if I'm, I'm looking for a good healthy snack, I'll have a piece of chicken or I'll have a couple slices of steak.
Trevor (43m 57s):
And to tell you the truth, I told you I've durings athlete, I've been struggling with AFib. I find when I have those as snacks, my AFib actually tends to be better despite all the arguments that, that meat and, and animal proteins are bad for your heart.
Brian (44m 10s):
Yeah, I mean, I think a big proponent, a big, let's see, way to sort of like maintain a healthy lifestyle is just to be prepared. Like, yes, we get food delivered every month here. Like, not like frozen meats and ground meat is a big one. And so, you know, we just, my wife and I just pull it out the night before and we, we know we're eating that for that next day. And like you said, you're just, you just, you're just prepared. I think the, I think when you get run into issues is when you're trying to eat and you're not prepared and then you start relying on, you know, fast food and things like that. Yeah.
Trevor (44m 45s):
I, I think that's actually a really important point. We all intuitively understand there's differences in quality in plant foods. You know, always, again, make the point, broccoli is a plant food, Skittles are a plant food. Nobody's gonna ever say they're the same thing. Right? But we don't make that differentiation when we're talking about proteins, when you're talking about meats. Getting a proper grass fed steak is fundamentally different from highly processed feedlot meat. And what drives me nuts is a lot of the research that shows red meat is, is bad for your heart. All these different meats are bad for your heart. They're on very low quality processed meats. Like I read one study when you finally dug into the methodology that people are eating McDonald's.
Trevor (45m 28s):
Yeah. But then they make general statements about, here's evidence that red meat's bad for you. And they go, no, here's evidence that McDonald's is bad for you. Right. And again, you're not gonna feed a bunch of people's Skittles and go look at all the health consequences, stop eating broccoli. But we do that with, with proteins and I don't understand why.
Brian (45m 45s):
Yeah. Yeah. All right, Trevor, this was great. We're, I'll ask you that one last question. Yeah, please. Yeah. If you were going to give someone advice, if they were just starting out And, you know, maybe they wanted to lose an extra 10, 15 pounds or looking to get their body back to what it once was, what, what first step would you tell that individual to do?
Trevor (46m 4s):
If they're trying to lose weight? Absolutely. Focus on nutrient density. You can count calories. It does work. It's painful. It's no fun. I recommend against it, you know, I'm an endurance athlete, which means keeping my weight down is critical. That's, that's really important to performance. I used to do the calorie counting thing. Now I don't, and I find it very easy to manage my weight, but basically if I wanna be race weight, it's making sure I have all those heavily processed foods outta my diet and just focus on nutrient density. So again, that's your fish, vegetables, fruits, and your healthy meats, not your highly processed meats.
Trevor (46m 46s):
If I'm making that the bulk of my diet, it's actually incredibly easy for me to maintain my weight to the point that I, I, I hit the point where I, I get to my race weight and I have to make myself eat more so I don't drop below it. 'cause then my performance actually suffers. So that's, that's the biggest recommendation I have to everybody just eat, you know, on that nutrient density scale, eat on the, the left side, the more nutrient dense side and it's, it's pretty easy to lose weight.
Brian (47m 13s):
Yeah. I love that. All right, Trevor, where's the best place for people to find you? So
Trevor (47m 17s):
Our website is www.thepaleodiet.com. We do have a lot of articles up there. We have articles on nutrient density. Yeah, we actually have an article on why we don't support eating dairy. So if you're interested in any of these things we were talking about, I also, I did a five part series on wheat and all the negative impacts it has on our health. So if anybody's really interested in the science of this, come to our website and check these out.
Brian (47m 41s):
Yeah, I will say, I, I was going through your website, tons of great articles, so we'll definitely put link in the show notes for that. And yeah, I appreciate the conversation today, Trevor. Thanks. Thanks so much for coming on.
Trevor (47m 52s):
I really enjoyed this. Thanks for having me on the
Brian (47m 54s):
Show. Yeah, no problem. Thanks for listening to the Get Lean Eat Clean Podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there and you've chosen to listen to mine and I appreciate that. Check out the show notes at Brian Gryn dot com for everything that was mentioned in this episode. Feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member that's looking to get their body back to what it once was. Thanks again, and have a great day.
