Happy birthday for the other day strong guy!
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@simo74 Absolutely. I wasnāt at all shocked to discover that he didnāt actually read about something that doesnāt happen, haha. Hearing Jon Andersen put away 700g of protein a day had me doubt any human can really OD on protein.
@The_Myth Your kid has wisdom beyond his years. Meanwhile, Iām fortunate that my parents defer to me on matters of nutrition. But, in turn, I have to really watch what I say around them, because theyāll take the ball and REALLY run with it, haha.
@wiseman83 Thanks man!
AM WORKOUT (0400 wake up via alarm)
OPERATION CONAN Occupation Phase
Tactical Barbell Mass Protocol Grey Man-Cycle 3, Week 1, Workout 2
WARM UP
Roll out on a LAX ball
50x180 reverse hypers
Sets of 175, 225 and 315 on low handle trap bar lift
MAIN WORK
Low handle trap bar pull
4x8x405
SUPERSET
Axle bench press
4x8x196
SUPPLEMENTAL CLUSTER giant set
Lever belt squat
4x8x190 loaded
Weighted dips
4x8x25lb
Axle curls
4x8x58lb
ASSISTANCE
Standing ab wheels
3x10
Lateral raises
65x5lb
TOTAL TRAINING TIME: 56 minutes
BREAKFAST
Long walk w/dogs
Notes:
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Came into this feeling very pain free. Recovery is going well. Right knee is still buggy, but thatās just a forever thing, and all the jump kicks and similar stuff from Tang Soo Do last night wasnāt too helpful there, but through out the hard and heavy lifting of today I felt fantastic.
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Kept rest periods closer to 1 minute where possible
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Moved slow on the initial pull of 405, and after that focused on trying to move quicker on the following sets. Also focused on getting my hips under me on the initial pull, which seemed to go a long way. Was running into an issue where keeping chow down on the latter reps seemed challenging.
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Based on math, my bench didnāt move up on this workout, but it was still challenging enough.
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Ab wheel didnāt explode my hips, so I feel like it still has some room for post deadlift workout.
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Forgot my fit tracker for my walk with the dogs, so wonāt get an accurate step count today, but weāll be trick-or-treating tonight, so Iāll get in even more activity.
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Diet question for you - not in a challenging way, just genuinely curious.
What is your rationale for excluding milk but including cottage cheese/butter/sour cream/ghee/etc?
I have an opportunity to get some grassfed milk near me, and I think that would fit well into the āeat animal products that are fed their natural dietā ideaā¦
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For myself, itās the goal of keeping carbs limited. I prefer functioning as a fat adapted trainee vs a carb adapted trainee. I DO have milk on the one meal a week that I include carbs, but itās not a regular feature. I also donāt like to drink calories. I find it interferes with hunger and satiety signaling.
But as far as health/harm goes, I see nothing wrong with raw grassfed milk.
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Thanks for taking the time to answer that. That makes sense within your framework.
I donāt mind me some carbs (very much on the meat & potatoes diet), so I think Iām gonna buy some and give it a try.
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@BrandonCrawford No problem dude. Always happy to chat. I did the gallon of milk a day thing back in the day: no stranger to itās goodness, haha.
Nightly Operation Conan SITREP.
Had to do a speedy leftovers night, since I came home late and we were going to go Trick or Treating.
2 leftover venison meatballs, a tin of sardines (grassfed sour cream on both), some leftover scrambled eggs mixed with egg whites topped with ghee, cottage cheese, and too much cracklin. Went a little overboard on it: the bag was nearly empty, so I just finished it off. Cut up my mouth a bit speed eating it. I need to back down from that.
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AM WORKOUT (0400 wake up via alarm)
Roll out on LAX ball
90x320 reverse hypers
3.5 mile/60 minute treadmill walk at 3.5 pace. Started at 4.0 incline and increased it by .5 every .25 miles, ending at 10.0 at the 13th lap, then dropping it down to 4.0 for the final quarter mile
2:30 hang from bar (pull up every 30 seconds)
BREAKFAST
Short walk w/dogs
Notes:
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Trick or treating out in the cold last night had me feeling pretty beat up, and I was originally going to just make this another recover walk, but I got bit by a bug after the first lap and decided to see what I could do playing with the incline. It was a decent enough challenge.
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Still just kinda playing whack-a-mole with the hips. Pain bounces from left to right, and from nerve to muscle. This is still excellent recovery.
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Grip is getting better.
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Nightly Operation Conan SITREP
th
Had another coupon for Texas Roadhouse (not my free steak dinner, but a free sidekick), so I got 2 sidekicks of ribs, no sauce, topped with grassfed ghee and sour cream, alongside 5 pastured hard boiled eggs, grassfed cottage cheese and some cracklin. My first time hard boiling the eggs in the air fryer. It works, but the instant pot does a better job.
BONUS report though: my piedmontese order came in. @freshyfresh and @tlgains , here is āpart 2ā of my exciting saga
2 rack of grassfed bone in chuck short/dino ribs, and 2 grassfed 14oz ribeyes that I got free with my purchase. My wife brought in the case from the front door and commented on how heavy it was, and then, upon opening it, commented: āDid you buy a whole COW?!ā
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Thatās a steal!
One day the answer will be yes lol
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This was a disaster for me, completely misjudged the time and over āboiledā them. Nigh on impossible to peel and tasted foul, my dogs were happy mindā¦ Iāve been boiling eggs in a pan of water for 20 years, donāt know why I tried to shortcut it now!
That is a plate of awesomeness right there, though.
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You did not simply buy a whole cow.
The cow was kind enough to sacrifice its nutrients for the sake of the Pwnisher.
We thank the cow in its humble offering to the greater good.
(Lol jk, enjoy your protein haul dude!!)
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@freshyfresh I gotta get a few more freezers to one day pull that off, haha.
@tlgains Thanks bro! I am VERY grateful for how these animals give their lives for me. I try not to waste it.
@Greyhound90 Yeah, the shells didnāt come off as easy as they do when I use the instant pot. The yolks were a little runnier, which I liked. And thanks so much!
PM WORKOUT (1230)
OPERATION CONAN Occupation Phase
Tactical Barbell Mass Protocol Grey Man, Cycle 3, Week 1, Workout 3
WARM UP
Roll out on LAX ball
50x180 reverse hypers
Warm up squats
Buffalo Bar Squat
8x275
2x8x280
9x280
SUPERSET
Axle strict press
4x8x123
SUPPLEMENTAL CLUSTER
Incline DB bench
4x12x60s
NG chins
4x12 (rest as long as needed)
Hanging leg raise
3x10
OFF CAMERA
GHRs
4x27
TOTAL TRAINING TIME: 45 minutes
Notes:
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Managed to have some time to get this knocked out today, so Iām back on schedule, which is awesome.
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Realized I misloaded the squats after the first set, so did an extra rep on the final set to make up for it.
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Training in the afternoon is definitely different. Iām a lot more limber and in less pain, so I can move faster. And since Iām moving faster, Iām in less pain FROM the training.
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Getting all the DB presses done was pretty awesome. Clear progress.
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NG chins didnāt have as good a showing as last time, but I can always attribute that to bodyweight gains and the HLR fatiguing them.
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Which, on THAT note, switching to hanging leg raises was definitely a money move here. I genuinely wonder if the ab wheel has been the culprit this whole time. I HAVE been training that movement exclusively for abs for a LONG time now: I may just be experiencing overuse issues.
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Last couple blog posts have been great reads man. I especially enjoyed the āLessons from Conan: Build the Baseā one. I can see myself revisiting that whenever I get too narrowly focused on something.
Iāve seen you mention that youāve lost a lot of readers over the carnivore stuff, and I find that kind of hilarious. It was when you were talking about eating every hour with keto this, sunbutter that, that there was no way I could keep up. Now weāre feasting on ribs and deviled eggs? Letās party!
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I always found your writing interesting and fantastically high in quality, but I too found myself real engaged when you switched to carnivore - for me precisely because it was so different from what I was doing. I wanted to see how it worked out for someone I trust and what your notes on it would be. Itās strange to me that others didnāt have the same reaction, but not surprising. People often like to have what they already believe further validated.
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@BrandonCrawford Hey I appreciate that feedback dude! Itās crazy how obvious that thought process is, but we choose to forget it.
And Iām 100% with you: itās the whole reason I adopted carnivore in the first place. After my last run of Super Squats, which I fueled ON all that keto junk, I adopted a āhigh speed/low dragā mentality on training AND nutrition, and carnivore became the most logical outcome. Iām so grateful for the Velocity Diet for getting me there, stripping everything away and teaching me what I REALLY needed vs what I thought I needed. But people see/hear carnivore and they immediately just call it āfad dietā and fall back on so many superstitions. From day 1 Iāve been saying, if you do what everyone else is doing, you get the results that everyone else is getting.
@PowPowPunishment Always a joy when you swing by, and your words hold a lot of weight with me: thanks for that. And I love getting to be a living n=1 on so much stuff. I feel like itās my one āgiftā to this iron world: Iām willing to be a living experiment and report my findings, and I feel itās made a lot of things obtainable to others. I found out you can do Building the Monolith in under an hour, I found out you can do Deep Waterā¦in general, haha (that program is STILL nuts), I found out how to survive Super Squats, etc. It means so much youāve been reading along for so long.
And on the topic of nutrition, hereās the nightly Operation Conan SITREP
We went to our favorite buffet/hibachi place, and it was the night that they have New York strip on the line, so I got 2 of those (cooked STUPIDLY rare, I loved it), 4 eggs, and a whole lotta shrimp, crab and beef for my first pass.
After that, I did 2 more passes, not nearly as full, primarily focused on seafood. Got a decent amount of shrimp, octopus, squid, some flounder and bass, and a little bit of crab. I managed to NOT eat like an a-hole, and walked out feeling satiated but not stuffed to the point of illness, so thatās cool, especially as this was technically my āpost workout mealā, though there was a 2 hour delta between them.
In fact, with that, Iāll give the daily summary: we woke up at 0700 but got out of bed around 0800, just slow rolling the morning. Got in my 50 squats and push ups, Valkryie made me a wonderful weekend breakfast of the usual suspects, I took the dogs for a 2 mile walk before we headed out for lunch (I fasted through it), came home, got that workout knocked out, then took the dogs for another 1.5 mile walk, went and saw my kid performed in a show choir performance (they did āBreakdownā from Beverly Hills Cop II, how awesome is that?), to which we celebrated with that dinner.
Just a totally clutch day. And my Valkyrie is making us kalua pork using Truebridge Farms porkbutt I bought a while back for tomorrowās dinner, since itās going to be raining and a bad day to run the smoker. Life is absolutely fantastic.
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Operation Conan nightly SITREP
Sweet talked my Valkyrie into tapping into her Maui roots and making me kalua pig today out of a Truebridge Foods Pork shoulder. For sides, I went with 4 pastured eggs, topped with grassfed ghee, along with some grassfed cottage cheese and cracklin, which, yes, is redundant given I was eating pig.
That was the first plate. I then filled up 3/4 of the plate with pig for the second round, and threw a little grassfed sour cream on the side for a little variety.
I still have PLENTY of leftovers.
Iām excited for how that bodes for the week. Iām willing to break my āruminant animals preferredā approach in the face of this amazing feast.
For a quick sum of the day, daylight savings had us get up around 0700, another wonderful breakfast from the Valkyrie, walked the dogs, fasted through lunch, watched the Cowboys lose (boo), walked the dog again, and then that fantastic dinner. My body is feeling pretty healed up and Iām ready to tear up training tomorrow. I think I may have actually underate at dinner tonight: with fasting through lunch I most likely needed to gorge a little. Iāll see how my bodyweight reflects in the morning.
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Operation Conan nightly SITREP
Sweet talked my Valkyrie into tapping into her Maui roots and making me kalua pig today out of a Truebridge Foods Pork shoulder. For sides, I went with 4 pastured eggs, topped with grassfed ghee, along with some grassfed cottage cheese and cracklin, which, yes, is redundant given I was eating pig.
That was the first plate. I then filled up 3/4 of the plate with pig for the second round, and threw a little grassfed sour cream on the side for a little variety.
I still have PLENTY of leftovers.
I told the kiddo that we feasted like vikings tonight
Iām excited for how that bodes for the week. Iām willing to break my āruminant animals preferredā approach in the face of this amazing feast.
For a quick sum of the day, daylight savings had us get up around 0700, another wonderful breakfast from the Valkyrie, walked the dogs, fasted through lunch, watched the Cowboys lose (boo), walked the dog again, and then that fantastic dinner. My body is feeling pretty healed up and Iām ready to tear up training tomorrow. I think I may have actually underate at dinner tonight: with fasting through lunch I most likely needed to gorge a little. Iāll see how my bodyweight reflects in the morning.
What other motivation could you possibly need?
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Good thing we have such a great, highly-paid QB who believes in his team. 
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@dchris Dude, no joke: our whole family wears jerseys on Sundays, and my kid asked the Valkryie if they could get a Maher jersey to replace their Dak jersey. I was SO proud of them, and it was definitely one of those āTell me youāre a Cowboys fan without tell me youāre a Cowboys fanā sorta moments. When your kid wants to replace their QB jersey with a kicker jersey, haha.
AM WORKOUT (0359 wake up via dog)
OPERATION CONAN Occupation Phase
*Tactical Barbell Mass Protocol( Grey Man-Cycle 3, Week 2, Workout 1
WARM UP
Roll out on LAX ball
50x180 reverse hypers
Sets of 135, 225 and 315 on low handle trap bar
MAIN WORK
Low handle trap bar lift
4x6x430
SUPERSET
Axle bench press
4x6x211
SUPPLEMENTAL CLUSTER giant set
Lever belt squat
4x10x205
Weighted dips
4x10x42.5
Axle curls
3x10x58
1x16x58
ASSISTANCE
Standing ab wheel
3x10
Lateral raise dropset (35x10llb, 35x5, 35x2.5, 35xEmpty hands)
Band pull aparts
1x50
TOTAL TRAINING TIME: 58 minutes
BREAKFAST
1 mile walk w/dogs
Notes:
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This is, legit, the best I have felt in a LONG time. I have the minorest of twinges in my right hip, but I felt no pain during the workout, no pain putting the weight down, no pain post workout. I genuinely wonder if it really has been as simple as reducing the frequency of the standing ab wheel. Iāll keep playing with that and see how things go, but it felt good to feel good.
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That said, those trap bar lifts are still murderous. I blow out blood vessels in my eyelid every week. Feeling the heartburn like symptoms as well. But I also know theyāre getting me stronger.
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Kept rests close to a minute where I could. I misloaded the bench for the first set, so had a bit of a break during the reload. Also realized I misloaded the axle curls on the third set, so I pushed the 4th set for max reps to compensate. Bonehead plays here, as I had a similar issue with my last work. Measure twice, cut once.
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Seeing progress cycle to cycle here. Still just a big fan of this protocol.
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Weighed in at 81.7 kg. This is a .2 drop from 2 weeks ago, however, that was a first thing in the morning weigh in vs a post training weigh in, and it was a post carb meal for the former, whereas Iām the most depleted Iām going to be at this point (will carb up tonight on some homemade cookies: weāre actually doing a meat based meal). In general, the weight is trending in the right way, and Iām willing to keep riding out my āintermittent feastingā strategy. I DID feel like I underrate last night, but this upcoming weekend there will be ample opportunity for feasting. I also have a weight class to make on 8 Dec, so if I ease off the throttle a touch, itās not the worst thing.
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Iāll be getting in another walk later tonight, when I drop my kid off for show choir practice.
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I need to stop coming in here hungry. That Kalua pork looks amazing.
Itās awesome to watch your flexibility with your Valkyrieās meals lately, she sounds amazing and I love hearing about you two spoiling each other.
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