How to Succeed with the Primal Blueprint
So you’ve decided to join the challenge. You’ve created your own Primal Challenge Journal and have publicly stated your goals for the next month. Now what? First things first. You have to know the basics. If you’re new to the Primal Blueprint the following article will be like gold to you. Revisit it again and again until you’ve committed the concepts to memory. The graphs and charts are visual representations of the principles that are at the core of the Primal health philosophy and give you a taste of what it is in my new book, The Primal Blueprint.
You’ve defined the “what”. If your goal is to lose weight, build muscle, increase energy or just generally look and feel healthier these graphics explain the basics of the “how”.
The Primal Blueprint Carbohydrate Curve
What’ll It Be? The “Sweet Spot” or the “Danger Zone”?
Carbohydrate intake is often the decisive factor in weight loss success and prevention of widespread health problems like Metabolic Syndrome, obesity and type 2 diabetes. These average daily intake levels assume that you are also getting sufficient protein and healthy fats, and are doing some amount of Primal exercise. The ranges in each zone account for individual metabolic differences.
- 0-50 grams per day: Ketosis and I.F. (Intermittent Fasting) zone. Excellent catalyst for rapid fat loss through I.F. Not recommended for prolonged periods (except in medically supervised programs for obese or Type 2 diabetics) due to unnecessary deprivation of plant foods.
- 50-100 grams per day: Sweet Spot for Weight Loss. Steadily drop excess body fat by minimizing insulin production. Enables 1-2 pounds per week of fat loss with satisfying, minimally restrictive meals.
- 100-150 grams per day: Primal Maintenance zone. Once you’ve arrived at your goal or ideal body composition, you can maintain it quite easily here while enjoying abundant vegetables, fruits and other Primal foods.
- 150-300 grams a day: Insidious Weight Gain zone. Most health conscious eaters and unsuccessful dieters end up here, due to frequent intake of sugar and grain products (breads, pastas, cereals, rice, potatoes – even whole grains). Despite trying to “do the right thing” (minimize fat, cut calories), people can still gain an average of 1.5 pounds of fat every year for decades.
- 300+ grams a day: Danger Zone of average American diet. All but the most extreme exercisers will tend to produce excessive insulin and store excessive fat over the years at this intake level. Increases risk for obesity, Metabolic Syndrome and type 2 diabetes.
The Primal Blueprint Food Pyramid
For effortless weight loss, vibrant health, and maximum longevity
General Guidelines: 80% of body composition success is determined by diet. Limit processed carb intake (hence, insulin production), and obtain sufficient protein and fat to fuel and rebuild.
- Protein: Average .7 – 1 gram per pound of lean body mass/day – depending on activity levels (more at times is fine).
- Carbs: 50-100 grams/day (or less) = accelerated fat loss. 100-150 grams/day = effortless weight maintenance. Heavy exercisers can increase carb intake as needed to replace glycogen stores.
- Fat: Enjoy freely but sensibly for balance of caloric needs and high dietary satisfaction levels.
- Avoid Poisonous Things: Conventional Wisdom’s dietary guidelines promote fat storage, type 2 diabetes, inflammation and obesity!
- Eliminate: Sugary foods and beverages, grains (wheat, corn, rice, pasta, breads, cereals, etc.), legumes (soy and other beans), trans and partially hydrogenated fats, high-risk conventional meat and produce, and excess PUFA’s (instead, increase omega-3 oils).
- Modern Adjustments: Some modern foods that Grok didn’t eat can still be included in a healthy diet
- Moderation: Certain high glycemic fruit, coffee, high-fat dairy products, starchy tuber vegetables, and wild rice.
- Supplements: Multivitamin/mineral formula, probiotics, omega-3 fish oil and protein powder.
- Herbs, spices and extracts: Offer many health benefits and enhance enjoyment of meals.
- Sensible indulgences: Dark chocolate, moderate alcohol, high-fat treats.
The Primal Blueprint Fitness Pyramid
For functional, diverse athletic ability, and a lean, proportioned physique
Exercising according to the three Primal Blueprint laws will optimize gene expression and promote Primal Fitness.
- Law #3: Move Frequently at a Slow Pace strengthens the cardiovascular and immune systems, promotes efficient fat metabolism and gives you a strong base to handle more intense workouts.
- Law: #4: Lift Heavy Things stimulates lean muscle development, improves organ reserve, accelerates fat loss, and increases energy.
- Law #5: Sprint Once in a While stimulates the production of HGH and testosterone, which help improve overall fitness and delay the aging process – without the burnout risk of excessive prolonged workouts.
The Conventional Wisdom approach to fitness is clearly not working! Stress is excessive, weight loss goals are compromised, and many are misguided to pursue narrow fitness goals that are unhealthy.
- Avoid Chronic Cardio (frequent medium-to-high intensity sustained workouts)
- Avoid Chronic Strength Training (frequent and/or prolonged sub-maximal lifting sessions ending in exhaustion)
- Avoid Regimented Schedules (instead, allow for spontaneous, intuitive variation in type, difficulty and frequency of workouts)
All this and much more can be found in my new book, The Primal Blueprint. Order a copy today and start getting Primal!
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Posted By: Mark Sisson
What are some examples of a “high Fat treat” at the bottom of the pyramid?
After a decade of circling through everything from zero-carb fat fast Atkins to 100% Raw Veganism these diagrams are genius.
Its what I do – fruits & vege first (though from your recipes/etc. it seems like meat/fish/fowl/eggs is actually on the bottom rung!?) I eat 80%+ raw veges (green juices, sprouted seedss, microgreens, wheatgrass, etc.). Roasted beetroot & steamed veg once in a while. Low GI fruits for treats and a few times a week I’ll have wild salmon or wagyu.
For me its an ethical thing – so its wild meats once or twice a week – rather than “hunting” & gorging on giant serves of meat three times a day every day. Unsure if we did that in the primal era.
Oh, and I also do organic fresh coconuts & avocado and pinches of the wild superfoods (goji, spirulina, etc)…
We are a gaggle of volunteers and starting a brand new scheme in our community. Your site provided us with useful information to work on. You have done a formidable activity and our entire neighborhood can be thankful to you.
I say to you, I definitely get annoyed while people think about worries that they just do not know about.
You managed to hit the nail upon the top and defined out the whole thing without having side-effects , people could take a signal.
Hey there! I just wanted to ask if you ever have any trouble with hackers? My last blog (wordpress) was hacked and I ended up losing many months of hard work due to no data backup. Do you have any solutions to stop hackers?
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I would suggest trying to get away from the yogurt with added sugar though. Now I eat plain greek yogurt with some added berries. While I was transitioning from sugared yogurt I added a small amount of jam, and gradually decreased the jam until I didnt need it any more. When fresh berries are out of season (or just too expensive) I use frozen ones thawed in the fridge overnight.
This man hacks my email and facebook accounts daily hacked my website and is generally made my life hell any time i touch a computer for the last seven years. his latest prank was to use someones account that I was romantically interested in and interfere in our relationship eh even went as far as to get someone to pretend to be him on the phone and try to tell me horrible things.
My own take on privacy is that at least with Facebook, Twitter, etc. I CHOOSE to put data up there, and am careful in selecting what I do commit to tehse people. After 20 years online in one form or another (I go back to the days of dialup BBS and FIDONETs) I work on the principle that everything I commit online may come back and bite my bottom anyway.
I am more concerned about the invasion of privacy conducted by Google with its Street View, its keeping of search records to build its database of intentions, etc.
And ultimately Hell, Im MUCH more worried (living in the UK) about the authoritarian laws of personal liberties that my Government is still introducing.
As I understand it you have full capacity to delete information and their rights to your information ends with the deletion (not to be confused with deactivation) of your account, except for that data which has already been distributed. Also they note that it may persist in backup for a reasonable length of time, which I can only assume is until the backup is phased out.
The parts about facebook applications seems more troubling to me than facebooks stake in the matter.
The problem is when they have castrated, cut-off, and self-mutilated genitalia on their brains and think they are doing people a favor when they try and put this self-projecting morbidity on theirs!
Im sure Im not the only one to happily refuse to let every healthy, natural, genital impulse be associated and over-coded in advance with pallid, sickly ideations of incest & castration.
Much better orgasms that way! And dating becomes both a self-affirmation and an affirmation of earthly, somatic, natural-biological life!
Lacan in Seminar XVII broadens the concept of castration that much, that a change of terminology is more than just a little justified
I gained more muscle in the off-season,
lost more fat in the contest season (as low as 3.4%) and stayed leaner all year round,
maintaining a 7-9% body fat percentage without much difficulty. I also moved up a full
weight class. My energy was better. I was leaner. I was stronger.
My small adjustment to 50-30-20 might have worked well for me simply because
I have an endo mesomorph body type and Im a bit carbohydrate sensitive, but it also
worked for the vast majority of my 600+ personal coaching protgs.
- Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle p. 163
Everything else is solid, but this Carb curve is not telling the whole story, in terms of weight maintenance.
I’m with you on this. I still consider myself new to the blogging world and can still (at times) be insecure with my posts and writing. When someone takes the time to at least acknowledge that they read it and leave a positive..thanks for sharing. It helps encourage newbies
Mark,
I’m past the point where I’m going to sprint anywhere anytime anymore. I walk daily and sometimes work out on an incline treadmill, do yoga and use the weight machines at the gym. What can I do to replace the sprinting? I also don’t Play much. Never have.
Thanks. I’m using your cookbook on a regular basis and gave it to friends for Christmas.
Mark,
Quick question, there are more and more diets out there that are restrictive diets, and as I have been with PB for just under a month (and WOW has my life improved already! I am currently 6’1” 230lbs, down from 240lbs) but I digress. My question is that there are diets out there that are specific to bloodtype, do you support these diets within the PB food map? e.g. I am A+ and it suggests that I avoid mushrooms, peppers, and other awesome things like citrus fruits. This restricts me even fruther, yet, I am seeing amazing losses on the scale without cutting these from my diet. Should I continue to stick with PB’s recommendations and say NUTS! to their suggestions?
It really is confusing with the myriad of nutrition suggestions, and I have never felt so energetic before switching to PB. A little insight from your vast wisdom would be very much appreciated!
~Jason
Should athletes follow the same guidelines considering they need to be even more fit? Obviously runners need to have the endurance and therefore do a lot of cardio….?
About coffee – I don’t drink caffeine, so I only drink decaffeinated coffee (and black or with coconut milk). Is there something specific about coffee to consider, or is it just the caffeine intake?
Is organic raw sugar alright to use in replace of regualar sugar, or is it just as bad.
I know this may be silly but what would lentils count as?
I put a link to this info graphic in my latest “I’m finally going paleo blog” post. Surely this has got to be one of the most helpful pages in the history of the net.
I also referred to Mark as the “pop-king of primal”. Woo-whoo. Wee-hee.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/feb/18/fasting-protect-brain-diseases-scientists?CMP=twt_gu. Interesting report on possible health benefits of IF…..
I would put fat grams instead of carb grams in that graph:
carb-g fat-g
300 77 danger
250 100
200 122 gain
150 144 maintain
100 166 lose
50 188 keto
0 211
Assuming 2000 calories/day & 100 grams protein. Otherwise you’ll end up in hibernation.
Mark,
When you say you should not stay under 50 carbs per day for very long are you referring to total carbs or net? I just started Atkins and my total carbs are @ 40, but it’s 20 net. I’m perfectly happy in this zone: losing weight, not hungry, not craving. What’s the probem with staying here? I’m getting lots of veggies (tons) but no fruit yet. The only reason I’ve been able to get from Atkins that it’s important to steadily increase carbs is because you’ll get bored if you don’t.
Well, I don’t think the addition of a cup of milk, a few nuts and some strawberries is going to make much of a difference for me either way if I don’t desire them. Is it really unhealthy to stay in the “induction” phase if you’re doing well with it? Why does my body NEED more carbs when I already feel like I’m about to burst with the many and varied veggies I already consume?
From what I can tell..there really is no such thing as a “Net Carb”. A carb is a carb is a carb. It seems like Atkins gets you a little closer to a PB than the regular American diet, but doesn’t take you home, so to speak.
If you are smaller, maybe you are closer to your optimal than it would appear…the amounts in the chart, from what i have read, are ranges…and those ranges can vary a little I would guess.
The blueprint is about the optimal way to achieve a healthier lifestyle. The best thing to do, is listen to Your body.
Don’t forget that protein’s insulinogenic effects are largely counterbalanced by the release of glucagon, a hormone that helps us burn previously stored fat, after protein consumption.
This is in contrast to carbs, which unapologetically raise insulin, and fat which is essentially biologically inert.
I calculated that my lean body mass is about 135 lbs. So even if I use the 1 gram/lb per day of protein as a guideline, this means I should be having less than 5 ounces of protein a day? How can it be so little when protein is the bulk of what I should be consuming in a day?
Adam, it’s the amount of protein in the food, not the weight of the food.
So, I know it’s somewhere on your site, but short of sitting at my computer longer than I need to hunting down info, how can fruit be so unhealthy for you. I have a pretty big salad for dinner every day and it includes apples, strawberries, blueberries, and other various veggies. Plus, I eat other fruits here and there. Yes, I know it has sugar, but it’s natural sugar as opposed to table sugar. What other info do have to offer on a low to no fruit option in your diet? I just don’t see cutting out the fruit.
Mark, I just don’t think this diet is healthy with protein at the bottom of the pyramid. Too much protein will lead to a highly acid forming diet which is not healthy. Surely vegetables should be at the bottom of the pyramid. FYI I do agree with you about carbohydrates. Maybe this diet helps you stay thin, but you are doing long term damage to your organs. Why not just reduce the amount of protein to that which you need to maintain muscle mass etc?
I look forward to your reply (if you have one).
is there a no exercise diet plan? What if you are disabled or paralized?