Some people are interested in nutrition, but I am a sports nutrition nut! Those who know me know my many experiments. In an attempt to avoid back surgery in college, I became a vegetarian. To try and be a yogi capable of standing on my head for 2.5 hours, I became a raw vegan. After college, I began my endurance athletic purists by enhancing my body’s acid blocking capacities; I started drinking alkaline water. Some confuse my smoothie concoctions with a science lab experiment.

The day I consulted with Tim Monaco of Bioletics, I found my match and embarked upon the most radical nutrition change to date that shocked my friends and loved ones. I aligned my diet with the metabolism of an endurance athlete and started making meat proteins and healthy fats the focus of my diet!

Prior to our meeting in the summer of 2009, I had been training year round preparing for my post-college love of nordic ski racing for about 5 years. My vegetarian diet of mainly carbs and minimal proteins and fats was slowly wearing down my body. After a plateau in my ski racing season in 2008, I did only 3 running races in the summer of 2009. My body wasn’t having the same energy to rebuild and recover after the hard efforts. My competitive vigor was weaning and my strength gain was flat.

The most significant part of my initial work with Bioletics was a metabolic typing assessment. It revealed my nutritional needs to be mostly protein and healthy fats, not carbohydrates. In addition, the ideal protein for me was red meat. This was evidence that supported suggestions by some professional athlete friends of mine. I had also just read the book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, which reshaped my perspective of pre-industrialized nutrition and human physiques. I was ready for my next adventure!

I remember the first feelings of eating animal protein after 9 years without it. Sensations of being full, satisfied and invigorated rippled through my body. I started with fish, then chicken and lastly red meat. The quality of the meat was a high priority as I noticed it wasn’t all created equal. Before I knew it, I bought 1/8 of a cow that was grass-fed, organic and local. I also generously covered steamed vegetables with local raw butter and put olive oil on anything that I could.

Soon after I changed my eating strategy, I lost weight which I later deemed to be carb-fat. Then I started gaining muscle. I made gains in the weight room and in my intensity workouts. I also found my body capable of handling longer efforts. The winter of 2010 showed gains in my skiing but the real proof started showing in the summer of 2010 where I did 5 half marathons and my first ultra marathon with much vigor. Then the winter of 2011 found me with improved performances in all of my Nordic races including reversing a negative trend at an annual Idaho race of 40th, 50th and 60th with a 30th place finish! And more importantly, I improved my performance in Bend’s PPP (Pole Paddle Pedal) of a few years at 10th to 4th.

The dream of winning the PPP that started my post-college pursuit of endurance athletic perfection is getting closer thanks in large part to my new nutrition plan recommended by Bioletics.