FREE SEMINARS!

Hey Guys,

As its Monday and I feel like being generous I am going to give away 3 FREE NUTRITION SEMINARS FOR YOUR CLUB OR GYM!!

All you need to do is click on this link, fill out the form and say I WANT A FREE SEMINAR in the comments.

3 gyms will then be chosen at random on Friday!

For the seminar I can cover whatever nutrition topic you like or simply have it as a Q&A format. Some of the topics I have covered in the past,

• Setting up a nutrition plan
• Weight cutting
• Gaining muscle
• Health
• What foods work best
• Workout Nutrition
• Contest Prep
• Reducing soreness
• Preparing for competition
• The difference between same day weigh ins and day before weigh ins.
• Refuelling after weigh ins
• Hydration
• Weight cutting tips and how to do it safely 

To get the free seminar all you need to do is click on the link above and fill in the form on the website!

The seminar will be completely free, however if you are a fair distance away from the North East of England there will be a slight cost for travel (whatever the cheapest train ticket is).

Stay Healthy,

Mike

Getting a bit too serious.

Healthy eating is always a little tricky.

I'm not going to go into details of cravings, energy and what foods do what. I'm talking about the ever moving goal posts of what is healthy for you and what isn't.

Every week people are rabbiting on about the next super food while telling everyone that yesterdays super food is going to kill you.

99% of the time it is never these extremes and it is most probably somewhere in the middle. What we need to do, as people that care about our long term health, is look at the big picture, try things out and take what people say with a grain of salt (that includes me).

What you often find (especially in nutrition) is that people go wild over a particular food or method then label everything else as the devil.

It's simply not that black and white.

HERE is an interesting article on the topic.

Stay Healthy,

Mike

Great article on Weight Cutting.

Hey Guys,

Following the trend of sharing good information from other sources, here is a great article on cutting weight from YourMMA.

Weight cutting is a very hot topic at all times in combat sports (see what I did there...). I only ever weight cut a few clients and it is always on a day before weight in. Either way, this article will give you some tips and ideas on your next cut (please speak to a Doctor and your coach before trying anything).

You can find the article HERE

Stay Healthy,

Mike

Interesting read.

Hey Guys,

Here is an interesting eBook/article that was done by Nate Green.

It focuses on gaining weight, then losing weight, then gaining it again in a short time period.

There are a few flaws in it, and certain thing are left out, but as it is quite interesting (especially to combat athletes or anyone who competes in a weight class sport), I thought I would post it up.

Think I'm going to do this on a more regular basis to spread cool stuff. If you've got a link to some other cool stuff, let me know about it!

Find the article HERE

Stay Healthy,

Mike

Product Review - MaxiNutrition Cyclone (also known as maxi muscle Cyclone)

Today I am going to be talking about MaxiNutrition Cyclone.

Back in the day when I first got into health and fitness MaxiNutrition was called MaxiMuscle, and back then, Cyclone was the shit!

I remember first trying the product when it was recommended to me by a friend telling me how massive and ripped I would get if I took it (he was bigger and more ripped than me and I was fat so I believed him). Cyclone was considered the premium product back then and you were considered serious if you were taking it.

Unfortunately I did not gain the super hero physique that was promised me (probably something to do with the beer and pasta I was consuming. Hey, Arnold did it so it must be legit...).

Since then Maximuscle changed its name to MaxiNutrition and have vastly broadened their range to cover just about every type of supplement that you could imagine. However Cyclone is still part of their range ten years later, with the formula taking a few tweaks and improvements but essentially staying the same.

Cyclone was one of the best all rounder shakes back in the day covering your carb, protein, creatine etc needs in one shake. This core idea has stayed the same for the product as it is still marketed as an all round shake to cover most needs. So what does it cover? Here are the main points,

• 30g BioMAX Protein
• 5g MaxPure Creatine
• 1.5g Calcium HMB
• 5.8g Glutamine

Here are the nutritional breakdowns,

Typical Values	Per 100g	Per 60g
Energy	1793kJ 425kcal	1076kJ 255kcal
Protein	50g	30g
Carbohydrate of which sugars	34.9g 32.2g	20.9g 19.3g
Fat of which saturates of which MCTs of which EFAs	8.7g 3.6g 1.4g 2.6g	5.2g 2.2g 0.9g 1.6g
Fibre	3.7g	2.2g
Sodium	0.4g	0.2g
Minerals
Potassium	60mg (30% RDA)	360mg (18% RDA)
Calcium	820mg (102% RDA)	492mg (61% RDA)
Phosphorous	298mg (42% RDA)	178mg (25% RDA)
Zinc	8.4mg (84% RDA)	5.0mg (50% RDA)
Chromium	48µg (120% RDA)	29µg (74% RDA)

Looks ok right?

Lots of fancy sounding terms and numbers.

So what does this mean to normal people?

Firstly the good stuff. The shake tastes bloody amazing, its probably one of the best tasting shakes I have ever tried. The nutritional list is solid and provides loads of goodies for those training on a regular basis. Some I would consider over kill but at least you know you have just about every need covered in one shake (it even has MCTs in it for gods sake!).

I like the shake and it worked great for a meal replacement. It made me feel full and a bit like I had a treat rather than a protein shake (which is good for most people). However this meant that it was no good for me around training. I just felt bloated and horrible. A bit to heavy for me.

Also while we are given a nutritional break down for the product, there is no ingredient list available? What kind of whey protein is used? What type of carb? Are sweeteners added? Is sugar added? there is no way to know the quality of the ingredients that have been used if they don't list them. I suppose they use terms like 'BioMAX Protein' etc but that is no good in the market which is known for being deceptive. Now I'm not saying that they ingredients that they have used are fantastic or sub par, simply because I (as a customer) have no idea because they are not listed.

The product is priced at £37.99 for 1.32kg which is about average for the type of product that it is. Personally I think this is a bit high for a shake that doesn't have a specialised use. It would be better if they removed some of the goodies and brought the price down a bit.

All round this is an OK product. Nothing terrible but nothing amazing. You won't do yourself any harm taking it and it will probably do you some good as you are most probably lacking one of the ingredients. Will I keep using it or recommend it to clients? No sorry.

Stay healthy,

Mike

At Unorthodox Nutrition we pride ourselves on recommending the very best products to clients and everyone else! With so many bad and irresponsible products on the market, we are going to help you sift through them and pick the very best ones!

All of the reviews are;

• Impartial. We are not affiliated with any of the companies we review. If we have worked for the company on a consult bases, it will be high lighted in the review.
• We are not paid for any reviews. Each product has been either bought by ourselves or has been sent for test by the manufactuer.

If you would like to have a product reviewed please drop us a line via the contact form on this site or E Mail 

All of the product reviews are displayed on the site, blog, instagram, twitter and facebook.

A bit about my current diet.

Hey Guys,

One of the questions I get asked quite a bit is what does my own nutrition looks like?

People assume that, because I do this for a living, my diet must be perfect and the holy grail for anyone wanting to sort out their own nutrition.

This isn't the case at all.

While it is true that I have a very good idea on what works for me when I am trying to accomplish certain things (lose a bit of fat, gain some muscle), I am often trying out different things in the hopes of expanding my tool box to help my clients. Because of this I don't post my diet much as I would just get asked questions like,

• Why is he eating cereal?
• Why isn't he eating any protein?
• Why so much fibre?
• Why does he cheat and then fast?

Plus a whole load of other things. The simple is answer is that I like to experiment on myself to find solutions to problems. Some of them work well (adding LISS in for fighters), some of them bad (drinking just protein shakes for a month).

However even with all of that in mind, here is what my diet looks like at the moment. Bare in mind that this is for me, and doesn't remotely look like what many of my clients are doing. Everyone is different and has different needs and solutions.

These meals are generally dated 3 hours apart with either of the workout nutritions added depending on when I train.

Meal 1  

4 whole eggs, handful of mixed peppers, handful of onions, 1 tomato, 1 tbsp grass fed butter (to cook with), 34g whey protein, 5g added fibre, 1 probiotic, 1 multi vit, 2 fish oil

Meal 2 

100g chicken breast, large green salad, 20 almonds, 2 fish oil

Meal 3 

100g chicken breast, large green salad, 20 almonds, 2 fish oil

Meal 4

100g chicken breast, 100g steak, large portion of green veg

Meal 5

100g chicken breast, 60g natural peanut butter, lots of celery, 2 fish oil, 3 ZMA

Workout Nutrition

Biotest Indigo 3G taken 30 mins prior to workout, 6 caps

Weights

15 mins before - 30g (65g on Deadlift and squat days) Biotest Plazma

During - 30g Biotest MAG 10

NoGi/BJJ

30g MAG 10 during.

That's it really. As you can see I don't really eat that much at the moment and I'm using high protein, high fat, low carb. This is working great for my recovery and sleep at the moment and I'm going to continue with this but add in a few more calories as the weeks go on.

Got any questions? Please post them below or contact me via the SITE

pPlease feel free to post any questions in a constructive way. Want to be a dick about what I'm doing in an unconstructive way? I'll remove your posts.

Stay healthy,

Mike

Interview - Physique Prep Coach Shelby Starnes

Hey Guys,

Today I am Talking to Shelby Starnes.

Shelby is a Bodybuilding prep coach based over in the USA.

I have been lucky enough to talk to Shelby before (you can find that HERE) and review his latest eBook The Healthy Body Builder which you can find HERE.

Shelby is a great guy with a fantastic reputation of getting his clients in shape with great condition. 

Here is what he had to say!

Hi Shelby,

Thanks for taking the time to talk to me.

1    Since we last talked you achieved one of your goals of obtaining a pro card. Has your out look to your training and nutrition altered at all?

I’m constantly striving to improve my methods, but I’m getting close to my personal “ceiling effect” in terms of how much better my physique can get. It took me 7 years at the national level to finally turn pro, and that was at a Master’s show. I’ll be 37 this year and the gains have certainly slowed down – every year they get a little slower, even with improved diet and training methods. At this point I’m just looking for ways to improve my longevity in the sport so I can stay healthy and continue competing for another handful of years. This involves stuff like smarter training methodologies, less fluctuation in body weight during the year, and keeping a close eye on health markers on a regular basis.

My focus now is more on being a coach than a competitor.

2.     With you recent eBook The Healthy Body Builder, you cover some off these methods extensively (especially in regards to health). What specific ones have you found that work best for you personally and what would you recommend to people in Europe and the UK that don't have easy access to blood tests on a regular basis, regular health check etc?

Blood pressure is the most important to keep an eye on. It’s a smart move to get your own blood pressure monitor so you can check it regularly. Make sure you get a large cuff one if you’re carrying much muscle – a cuff that’s too tight will give an incorrect reading. After blood pressure, the big ones to pay attention to are lipids, liver and kidney values, and RBCs. I would recommend figuring out a way to get these checked at least twice a year. C-reactive protein is another cool one I like to get, it’s an indicator of inflammation levels in the body.

3.     One of Clients Jamie Pinder recently took to the Olympia stage and looked phenomenal. Many female competitors have a hard time getting really lean and losing the last bit of fat on the glutes and quads. Any tips for the people out there?

Thanks for the compliment! Jamie is one of the hardest working clients I have and I was very happy with the look she achieved this year. She isn’t a naturally lean person so to get that look took a ton of dedication and sacrifice, for an extended period of time. One method that works extremely well for helping females get lean is high intensity interval cardio. I often have Jamie do 15 to 18 minutes of high intensity sprint intervals, directly followed by 20 to 30 minutes of moderate intensity cardio.  This is a great way to etch in detail, assuming diet and other factors are in line.

4.     You’re known as a coach that doesn’t use fancy diets or techniques to get people into shape, but rather as a man who relies on solid principles to achieve the best conditioning possible. How (if at all) has this changed over the years? Are they things that you have abandoned or revised?

Any good coach is constantly learning and revising their methods to help their clients and athletes achieve their best. All the time I’m adding new tools to my toolbox, by way of new training methods and exercises (thanks John Meadows), nutrition science advances, new supplements, etc.  I haven’t abandoned any methods, but I’m always adding new ones to my toolbox.

With that said though, the biggest factor in progress will always be hard, intelligent work. We always want to make the most of our efforts though: science and experience help accomplish that.

5.     In your opinion, what are the biggest changes you have seen in regard to the science of nutrition, have had the biggest impact in the last 5 years on health and all round performance?

Definitely the advances in peri-workout nutrition. Improved nutrient timing is helping tons of people have better workouts and recover from them more quickly

6.     Cardio is a funny subject in the industry. Some say that LISS is a waste of time and cardio needs to be short and fast, while other think that LISS is a great way to increase calorific expenditure while not taxing recovery. As athletes (especially fighters) schedules are already pretty damn full, adding extra cardio can be a pain on the time wallet not to mention further taxing the system. How do you go about setting cardio up for clients with varying schedules?

For those with a busy schedule, HIIT cardio is definitely the way to go.  I wouldn’t go nuts with it though – 3 to 4 sessions per week would be a max. Additional calories could be pulled from the diet, if needed.

7.     While it is highly individual, do you add cardio in at the beginning with the majority of clients?

If they are overweight and looking for fast results, cardio is usually part of the initial plan. If they are getting ready for a competition and are relatively lean to begin with, I wait to add cardio until it’s needed. I especially wait if we have a long time line to play with (i.e. a contest that’s 20 weeks away, versus 8 weeks away).

8.     I have found that having some clients do low impact cardio has a real positive effect on their results, especially when it comes to metabolism etc. Do you think that cardio is beneficial for most people even if they aren't looking for a massive calorie burn? 

Its health benefits cannot be denied.  If you’re looking to gain as much muscle as possible in the shortest time frame possible though, cardio should probably be limited. That’s not necessarily the healthiest approach though.

9.     Micronutrients are often something that fighters over look during their diet prep, especially towards the end, and many suffer for it. Is there anything that you like to add to your clients nutrition plans to cover the bases or do you focus on it right through the prep?

I recommend using a variety of whole food sources, and when dieting “hardcore” (hypocaloric for an extended period of time), a fruit and veggie supplement (like Biotest Superfoods) is probably a wise addition, as well as a multi-vitamin / multi-mineral. Those that really want to know if their bases are covered should look into micronutrient testing (http://www.spectracell.com/patients/patient-micronutrient-testing/) 

10. As a man who has not only tried just about every supplement out there, plus advised people from average Joe's right up to Olympians, are they any brands out there that you recommend? Obviously supplements are just that, but everyone knows some brands present a more honest opinion of what people can achieve and what they products actually provide.

I’m sponsored by 360CUT nutrition, and also Truenutrition.  I wouldn’t be associated with either of these companies if I didn’t believe their products are what they say they are, and provide a good bang for your buck. Others I use are NOW brand (mainly for health related stuff) and Puritans Pride.

Thanks for your time Shelby!

You can find Shelby and contact him through his site HERE

Stay Healthy,

Mike

Unorthodox Superfoods for BJJ

Hey Guys,

Here is an article that I wrote for the last issue of JiuJitsu Style Magazine. Make sure to have a nip over and look at my online articles for them (plus loads of great BJJ content). Also check out the latest issue, its got a great article on protein in there...

Here is the article,

Unknown Superfoods for BJJ

Food is good.

Whether you want to call it nutrition, a diet, fuel or some munch, we all love to eat a bit of food. And why wouldn’t we? We all train hard, taking care of business on and off the mat, we deserve a bit of nice, tasty nourishment right?

However it doesn’t stop there, many of us look at our food to give us better results. Whether it be a leaner body, more muscle or recovering quicker from the beatings that are handed out in tough sparring, BJJ athletes are starting to realise that their food is important to their success on the mat.

Unlike many other sports, health is often one of the top priorities of the BJJ athlete. Because of this, the term ‘superfoods’ often comes up. So what is a ‘superfood’? Well a superfood is a certain type (or types) of food that can dramatically increase our health, recovery or aid in our physique goals.

Many people know of the standard superfoods, but if you don’t here is a brief list of commonly known ones,

·      Broccoli

·      Grass fed beef

·      Wild caught Alaskan Salmon

·      Avocado

·      Extra Virgin Olive Oil

·      Natural Raw Honey

·      Blueberries

·      Turkey

·      Quinoa

There are many more (a quick Google will give you hundreds of lists), but often there are many great and slightly unusual ones that are left out from the list. With that in mind, here is a quick list of some of the lesser known, but amazing superfoods that you can add to your diet to help you stay healthy and recover quicker!

Sauerkraut

Sauerkraut is German for ‘sour cabbage’.

Sauerkraut is finely cut cabbage that has been fermented in lactic acid bacteria including Leuconostoc, Lactobacillus and Pediococcus. While the fancy names aren’t that important, it is the fact that it has been fermented in them that is.

As it has been fermented in these bacteria it has an amazing ability to improve your digestion and gut health because of the enzymes that it contains. This simply means that you can absorb more of the nutrients that you take in rather than it simply passing through your system.

It’s  low in calories, fat and carbs making it great for cutting weight.

Its is also incredibly high in vitamins C, B and K. It is also a good source of dietary fibre, folate, iron, potassium, copper and manganese. To top it all off, because of the fermentation process, it is also even more bioavailable (you digest it better and absorb more nutrients) than actual cabbage!

Kimchi

Kimchi is another fermented food.

It is made in Korea and is often a mix of vegetables that can contain tomatoes, chilli and garlic. Kimchi is often made in jars and left to ferment underground.

Just like Sauerkraut, it is very high in live bacteria (specifically lactobacillus kimchii) that to can aid digestion immensely. Just one serving of the superfood provides a person with over 50% of the daily requirement of vitamin C and carotene.

It is also highly rich in vitamin A, thiamine (vitamin B1 to me and you), riboflavin (vitamin B2), Calcium and iron!

Green Coffee Beans

I love coffee, you love coffee, everyone loves coffee. However this isn’t that type of coffee. The coffee that you are thinking of is a dark bean where these are green.

Green Coffee beans have been directly linked to help aid in fat burning (less fat helps you fit into your true weight class for competition).

Even though the beans are high in anti oxidants, it is the chlorogenic acid content that has been linked to their ability to help aid fat loss. The thing to note here are that the beans must be green.

When they are roasted the chlorogenic acid is broken down and therefore not present in normal coffee.

There have been a few concerns lately of whether it’s ok to take Green Coffee extract rather than using the bean. In a study done by the University of Scranton, they found that there was no detriment to using an extract instead of the actual bean.

Turmeric

Turmeric comes from the root of the Curcuma longa plant and has a tough brown skin and a deep orange flesh. Turmeric has long been used as a powerful anti-inflammatory in both the Chinese and Indian systems of medicine. Turmeric was traditionally called "Indian saffron" because of its deep yellow-orange color and has been used throughout history as a condiment and healing remedy.

While turmeric is a fairly well known spice found in most curries and mustard, many people still don’t seem to be using it in their dishes.

Not only will the spice make your food taste great (who doesn’t love a good curry) but it will also aid in helping reduce inflammation in the body. You know all those acting joints you get when you have a hard spar or someone viciously strips your grips? That’s inflammation. Less of this is good right?

The reason that it does this is down to the yellow, orangey colour of the spice. It contains curcumin.  Curcumin has also been linked to helping suffers of cancer, bowel disease and fibrosis suffers.

Horse

Right don’t all jump down my throats and start sending me hate E Mails because you loved My Little Pony as a kid and how dare I recommend you eat such a majestic beast etc, etc.

If we put aside the fact that most of us have great memories of riding ponies at the beach as children, and the recent scandal of horsemeat in supermarkets (which was about honesty, not what we were eating) and take a second to look at the nutritional profile of horse verses beef for a second.

Per 100g

Calories

Horse – 175g

Beef – 273g

Overall fat content

Horse – 2g

Beef - 18g

Protein

Horse – 28g

Beef – 25g.

As you can see, horsemeat is lower in calories and fat but higher in protein! This is probably due the animals diet. While most cows are fed grain to help plump them up for slaughter and sale, horses are free to roam and eat grass pretty much exclusively. Horse also contains double the amount of iron of beef and vitamins B6 and B12.

Now I’m not saying that you should run out and bump off black beauty, but if you can find horsemeat in a reputable butchers that has been slaughtered humanely and is prepared correctly (not processed) then you may want to take a look.

This is just a small list of slightly unknown superfoods that can help you recover better from training, improve your health, and add some new tastes to your food.

As with all nutrition, making sure you have a correctly balanced diet that contains everything you need is of the upmost importance. Take a few mins to see what you’re actually putting in your mouth, you may realise you can get more out of cheaper, less known food!

Stay healthy,

Mike