exercise – BJJ Caveman

Box Jumps and Achilles – Not Aging Gracefully

Posted on January 18, 2014October 9, 2014 by BJJ Caveman

Given my recent finger fracture, I’ve been trying to stay active by doing some weightlifting and Crossfitting with an emphasis on activities that don’t require too much use of my fingers.

Well, in my most recent workout the WOD included a series of 20 box jumps for time. I felt great at the time… even though the workout killed me, but the day after I felt some soreness in my right achilles.

Ever since what happened to Kobe Bryant… the NBAs must durable athlete, I’ve been hyper-aware of achilles issues.… Read More

Nutritional Ketosis and Testosterone

Posted on March 25, 2013December 5, 2016 by BJJ Caveman

One of my favorite blogs to follow is Mark’s Daily Apple, and when I came across this post, one of the letters really caught my attention. One of his reader’s was wondering about his “gynoid” pattern of fat deposition. A gynoid pattern is when there is increased fat in the hips, buttocks, and thighs as compared to an “android” pattern where the fat is increased in the chest and belly. Here is part of Mark Sisson’s response:

“…For you, a male with a more “feminine” pattern of fat deposition, I would suspect low testosterone levels.

The Effect of a Ketogenic Diet on Cholesterol Part 1

Posted on March 10, 2013February 18, 2015 by BJJ Caveman

Before I go into what my lipid results were, I thought it would be a interesting to do a literature search to find what data there is in the academic literature looking into the effect of a ketogenic diet on cholesterol.

This is a pretty comprehensive list going back 15 years to 1998. I limited it to papers that either provided enough information in their abstracts and those that I could actually access the entire paper for free. I didn’t want to actually shell out money for papers that required payment since they typically cost around $30 per article!… Read More

What Happens When I Try To Cut My Protein Intake Out of Ketone Envy?

Posted on March 2, 2013February 18, 2015 by BJJ Caveman

Despite making good progress and seeing new lows in weight and body circumference I still had some ketone envy seeing how other consistently have ketones greater than 2.0 mmol/L and even upwards of 3.0 or 4.0 mmol/L! I’m not sure how accurate or inaccurate this is, but in my mind I equate a greater ketone number to more fat burning.

I’ve been following the blog of Dr. Georgia Ede who has been doing her own n=1 experiment with nutritional ketosis. One of the things she observed is that when her protein intake was around 75-80 gm/day her blood ketones consistently stayed around 1.0-1.4 mmol/L. … Read More

Days 61-68 – Nutritional Ketosis

Posted on February 23, 2013October 9, 2014 by BJJ Caveman

I spent this week in Park City, Utah snowboarding with a good friend of mine. I was interested to see how nutritional ketosis affected my performance on the slopes! I’d characterize my self as a beginning intermediate level snowboarder. I can heel and toe edge on the board pretty comfortably but I still get nervous at high speeds and I don’t do any jumps or tricks. I’m content just going up and down and taking in the scenery. Until this trip, I hadn’t boarded in about 2 years so I was definitely rusty.… Read More

Mauricio Costa, Rickson Gracie Black Belt

Posted on February 19, 2013February 19, 2013 by BJJ Caveman

I was organizing the contacts in my cell phone a few weeks ago and came across the contact info for my first BJJ instructor, Mauricio Costa. I first met him over 10 years ago when I first became interested in BJJ. At the time he was a brown belt under Rickson Gracie, who at the time, and probably currently still is the most respected and skilled Gracie practicioner. In the BJJ community he’s regarded almost mythically and conferred a god-like status, with a reported undefeated record of over 400 – 0. … Read More