Several months ago I sat in front of a nurse at my place of work after she received my report on my cholesterol, triglyceride levels and blood pressure. I work at a Bank, and it’s pretty cool that they offer free cholesterol screening and all kinds of other nice benefits. Anyways, she looked very puzzled. She was comparing my results from 2 years prior, to my most recent results. She finally blurted out “what did you do to improve this profile so much.” My answer nearly floored her.
Well Nancy, I started:
1. Cooking in virgin coconut oil, and grass-fed butter
2. I also switched out all the store bought grain fed beef I was consuming with grass fed beef I procure from a local farmer. I eat 8 ounces every single day.
3. I switched out my 99-cent a dozen eggs with true organic free range eggs, and eat 6 of these whole every single day.
4. Lastly (and probably most importantly), I reduced refined sugars in my diet and foods that contain excessive levels of Omega 6 Polyunsaturated fats (bye bye Tostitos – dang corn oil), as I believe those things create arterial inflammation resulting in increased cholesterol levels. Cholesterol is an anti-oxidant and repair agent in your body.
I knew what her next question would be, “but isn’t all that saturated fat bad?” I said well you tell me, my cholesterol went from 212 down to 167. My HDL went up 11 points (something I struggled with for years), and my LDL and Triglyceride levels were at the bottom end of the range. Even my blood pressure was a startling 104/70. She finally asked if I had any reading material I recommended, as these concepts were not taught to her in her days of studying health and nutrition.
So why do I mention that story? Well, the diet that I recommend usually freaks people out initially, but it’s rooted in sound science and facts, and not influenced by flawed studies funded by companies with ulterior motives. Most people have always heard and believe in the “Lipid Hypothesis.” This is the outdated theory that saturated fat and cholesterol intake increases cholesterol levels in the blood, which increase your chance of heart disease. This theory is simply not true, as long as the saturates are of a certain type, and the cholesterol is not oxidized. You have to accept that to fully embrace the Mountain Dog Diet.
I have formulated this diet based on a few things.
1. Mentorship with Dr Eric Serrano. Eric is revered in the athletic community as a top expert in training, nutrition, rehabilitation and many other things. Eric has been a big influence on me and a great mentor.
2. The teachings of the Weston A. Price Foundation. A fantastic resource for correct nutritional information can be found at the Weston A. Price foundation’s website www.westonaprice.org. It’s a not-for-profit organization with no hidden agendas, and one of the most brilliant Lipid Experts in the country, Mary Enig, has written numerous articles we could all benefit from on it. If you go to this website and spend a few hours on it, you will thank me for recommending it. I’ll be referencing this site many times over in this article.
3. Personal experience. I have competed in 30 bodybuilding contests, that I can remember, won 13 of them, and placed in six of nine pro qualifying national level events. Experience is a great teacher, and you have to know when to make adjustments in diets, and what to do, for the best results. As solid as the Mountain Dog diet is, it can still only take you to a certain point. Only experience can get you past that.
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So, you are taking the ideas behind the Paleo diet, renaming it and claiming this was your hard work that discovered this? This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever read.
And ‘mountain dog diet”? Dumb. I am glad more people are catching on to the positive effects from eating Paleo, but someone hijacking the diet as their own is just absurd.
If you go to the end of the article you will see that we credit John Meadows for this diet. Also you are probably not reading well since you say it’s paleo diet. John never said he stopped eating salt, grain, legumes, and dairy like the paleo believers do. The only thing he cut is the refined foods and simple sugars.
Glad someone said it because it was exactly the same thing I was thinking. As each point came up I was like wow this sounds like Paleo but there must be something setting it apart… The only thing is the name