Raw Food Diet - Day 24 (Blog)

[Steve Pavlina]

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Steve Pavlina's blog:

Raw Food Diet - Day 24

[sebzzz]

Very glad to hear that you had a good day Steve.

I'm at my 21st day and still feel tired a lot, but I'm sure my irregular sleep pattern doesn't help.

Other than that, everything is find and I'm even starting to enjoy eating raw.

[Kazeko]

Only 36 push-ups? I'm a bit disappointed You're just a human, not a super-duper "karate-kid"

I know it's not unusual in martial arts environment to do at least 70 push-ups or even 100 in a row... I always wonder if it is possible.

My personal record was about 30 (when I had my best shape), so - congratulations!

[Keith]

Just for your information, the lunch doesn't look particularly colourful. It's about 95% green except for the smoothie which is a uniform (and bright!) orange.

It does have a wide variety of tonal values which, as a colourblind person, may be what you're picking up on. Interesting how "colourful" means different things to different people.

It's much the same story for breakfast and dinner - heavily dominated by green (with blue from the blueberries in the morning and largely colourless pears).

P.S. I'm impressed by the 36 pushups. At the moment I'm having trouble getting past 3.6 .

[Jake Birkett]

Yeah it's a good number. I found a lot depends on how you do you push ups, like chest right to the ground or not (or further if you do them between two chairs). I've heard people say they can do a lot but then seen that they are doing half push ups which is way easier. Similar thing for pull ups as well, as you can either hang down completely at the lowest point or just hang so arms are bent at 90 degrees.

[gettingskinny]

I've noticed that everyone is giving you tons of advice as well! Do what works best for you. I'm happy to read you are feeling better again (not that you were feeling awful, but not great). I can't wait to see your summary after the trial.

Congratulations on your new push-up record. That is very exciting!

January

[Steve Pavlina]

Originally Posted by Kazeko

Only 36 push-ups? I'm a bit disappointed You're just a human, not a super-duper "karate-kid"

I know it's not unusual in martial arts environment to do at least 70 push-ups or even 100 in a row... I always wonder if it is possible.

My personal record was about 30 (when I had my best shape), so - congratulations!

I've seen people do 100+ push-ups, and I'm sure some can do a lot more than that.

I don't do them all the way to the ground -- I aim for fist-height off the ground, which is what I was taught to use when taking tae kwon do. We would measure our push-ups by having someone put their fist on the ground beneath us, and our chest would have to touch it for the push-up to be counted.

[Jaben]

Looks like you had 600g of greens yesterday by my quick calculations. Way to go!

Igor Boutenko reported doing 1,000 push ups every day after switching to a raw food diet with lots of greens. Some Like it Raw : Seattle Times February 12, 2003

[Kazeko]

Jaben: Igor - he is Russian! I'm very proud

Steve: IMO we both need something to do with our results But I have no clear idea yet how to do it. My usual norm is 20-25 push-ups only... When i train, I get better, but when I have even a monthly break, I slip back to my 25...

And I'm very glad too to hear you are feeling better! I've changed my diet 2 weeks ago and I am experiencing bad times by myself. Today I struggled with despair and anger almost all the day...

Only 5 days to go! Hold on!

[Andrew Brunelle]

Six more days to go. I'm sure you'll be glad when this trial is over. You won't have to log everything you eat and photograph it and measure it. I'm pleased to see that your blood sugar didn't spike at all during this experiment. The guys from FIt for Life were right. At least in your case. Well, good luck, and happy fruiting.

[Jake Birkett]

I don't do them all the way to the ground -- I aim for fist-height off the ground, which is what I was taught to use when taking tae kwon do. We would measure our push-ups by having someone put their fist on the ground beneath us, and our chest would have to touch it for the push-up to be counted.

OK thanks for the clarification. I wonder what the reason behind not going to the ground is? Perhaps it's so you can do more repetitions in stead of always straining up from right on the ground? For a while once I tried mini-press ups where I was about 2 fists off the ground, they were really easy and fast and felt more aerobic than anaerobic.

[Billy Freezer]

Originally Posted by Jake Birkett

OK thanks for the clarification. I wonder what the reason behind not going to the ground is? Perhaps it's so you can do more repetitions in stead of always straining up from right on the ground? For a while once I tried mini-press ups where I was about 2 fists off the ground, they were really easy and fast and felt more aerobic than anaerobic.

I think you place a lot more stress on the shoulder joints if you go all the way, which probably doesn't matter to much in unweighted pushups. But if you look at the bench press, which is essentially the same exercise, if you are benching several 100 pounds and go all the way down, and do this for a number of years, there is a much higher chance that something is going to give.
So although it is probably not an issue with push ups , the benefit of going to the bottom is negligible.

[Jake Birkett]

OK yeah that could be it. I'm pretty healthy and young (very flexible) so I'm not too worried about going to the floor right now. I'll probably start going lower by using two chairs (one for each arm) and one for my feet soon.