Thought I’d go ahead and knock out my review on the Velocity Diet whilst I have a few moments. @T3hPwnisher wrote up a great one, and we had a lot of similar experiences, but my path was slightly different and maybe helps folks taking a look at this. I’m also not the writer he is, so that’s a fun contrast. I’ll lay this out in a series of rambling paragraphs loosely following a Simon Sinek formula. We’ll start with why I began the diet, how it went for me in real life, and wrap up with what I’m taking away from the experience.
Why
Why did I begin the Velocity Diet in the first place? Really, it boiled down to wanting to get better control over my nutritional habits without being obsessive. For a little bit of context, I’ve gotten pretty lean a handful of times in different scenarios (wrestling, Army schools and deployments, considering getting on stage and then bailing out before things got really hard…). The only times I’ve been successful when it wasn’t forced (i.e. there simply wasn’t food), I’ve meticulously weighed and counted every calorie that goes into my mouth. As my daughter grows, and is absolutely daddy’s girl (which is, hands-down, the highlight of my life), I’ve noticed her noticing me. I am no longer willing to weigh or count calories, because I think it’s a terrible example for a young lady still establishing her healthy habits. We will lift, we will run and jump, and we will eat nutrient-dense foods.
Trying to diet down to impress my wife’s friends at the pool on Memorial Day (like mature adults do) with this new constraint of not calorie-counting was a struggle this year! I’m 41, so I know it gets a little harder, but I felt like I wasn’t controlling things very well. I’d either eat nothing, and have terrible gym performances/ be a jerk at work (neither of those is good!), or I’d overdo it by justifying a little more of this or that. @QuadQueen was very helpful with meal “rules” suggestions, but I just didn’t feel like I was managing myself very well. What really ended up happening was I was just sick of thinking about food every day - I just didn’t want to deal with it.
The Velocity Diet seemed to fit the bill here. My kids don’t notice that I’m drinking shakes all day, because they’re at school, and we eat a dinner together every night (that was super important to me) and I don’t have to be weird about it. There was no thought process for me to put in - drink the shakes, eat a normal dinner, get on with your life. Sold.
How
So I went with it pretty much sticking to the script, although I’ll talk about where I loosened up.
I work out first thing in the morning, and have long been a fan of Surge Workout Fuel, so I stuck with that. I did stick with one scoop instead of the recommended 2, and let that replace one Metabolic Drive shake. After training I immediately had my first Metabolic Drive shake, which was so 90s it was awesome. I put Super Food in this one and I felt like it kept me full just a little longer (along with the recommended Flameout).
My training stayed moderately high-volume bodybuilding stuff, because that’s my go-to and I didn’t feel like I wanted to throw in a bunch of variables. I did 20-40 minutes of steady-state cardio 4 times a week, and something like sled pushes or KB swings or whatever twice a week. I have been focusing on chest/ shoulders the last couple weeks and do feel like I’m onto something here with specialization while in a deficit. I tend to remember to write it down in my training log about 1/3 of the time, so at least a good sampling of the days is in there.
During the day was super easy, because I don’t feel like eating while I’m at work anyway. I did tend to get hungry if I had my shakes too early, so after the post-training one I tended to push those later in the day. I ended up having two more shakes before dinner, and none after, because the kids are in sports/ theater and dinner almost always ends up being after 8pm (and this old guy has to get to bed after that).
Each of my shakes was two scoops of Metabolic Drive and - this is critical - one vanilla, one chocolate… way more delicious than a single flavor.
Take-aways
This will just be a bulleted list in no order of importance:
- I lost 7-8 lbs, which isn’t incredible, but I wasn’t losing at all to begin with.
- It’s possible I’ve actually put on a little lean tissue the last couple years (which you don’t know until you lean out), so what was a win.
- I was not perfectly compliant: midway through the 2nd week we took the kids on a little vacation for their spring break. I kept up with the shakes during the day, but I ate ice cream and pizza with them at mealtime for two days. At the end of week 3, I went to a Luke Combs concert with my wife (and, yes, it was fun), and drank about as much as you’d think I did.
- I wasn’t hungry at all for a couple days. I think the novelty plus still having some food in me kept it going. Then I was really hungry for a few days, but that always happens when starting a diet. After awhile my stomach “shrinks” (I know that’s not what really happens), and I stop panicking about being hungry and am more easily satisfied. That was a HUGE win on this diet.
- It was unbelievably simple to follow - exactly what I wanted.
- I feel more in control of my eating habits - another win.
- We tried, as much as possible, to cook together (that usually meant me and one kid at a time, just because of the way the activities work out). I can’t recommend this highly enough. It’s a great experience, plus, by the time you eat, you’re not really hungry - it’s like you’re satisfied from the family activity.
- I tried one of the recipe delivery services during this (Every Plate) and it’s a pretty good option - it takes away another decision and gives you new recipes you wouldn’t otherwise try.
- The V-Diet turns out to be pretty darn economical; have you been to a grocery store lately??
- I do miss some meals, mainly breakfast, but not every day. @T3hPwnisher did a few things I didn’t do (made some “oatmeal,” had a couple lunches with his wife) that I think are outstanding modifications for sustainability.
- I did notice I still got sleepy after my afternoon shake, just like I do if I eat lunch. That was disappointing. Maybe I just get sleepy in the afternoon?
- I got a better handle on just how many carbs I was eating, and my cravings changed. I went through a “I need all the cheese!” phase around late week 3.
- I started noticing pumps in the gym again. How is this possible? I dunno, but it is both awesome and really demonstrative that we aren’t all losing all our muscle every time we eat a little less.
- I tend to be all or nothing, and I really think this helped trend toward middle.
This has gotten crazy long. What does all this mean for me going forward?
I feel like the major advantage here is just getting your portions and thought process down around the meals. It’s really not an extremely low calorie diet (and I even think you could use it to gain weight). It really helped me simplify and just eat.
I am likely to keep some pieces of this diet going forward - like 3 days a week totally doing it, a couple days where I eat breakfast, and then a day or two I eat the old-school “cheat meal” with the kids.
I also like how much it simplified my thought process. I don’t like thinking about my training, and this was a similar run with nutrition, so I really think it kind of frees everything up. So, what if we all:
- Lifted 3-4x a week
- Did 1-2 “hard” and 2-3 “easy” cardio sessions a week
- Ate nutrient-dense meals in reasonable portions?
I’ll bet our questions would be answered.
In summary: the Velocity Diet was a fantastic reset, I leaned down a bit, it’s easily economical vs. today’s grocery prices, and (while I was hungry at times) I never felt terrible or stressed about it.
