Peter Beck Kim's Other Blog

142/82 and 206.6 lbs - stronger and bigger with KBs and off BP meds, but...

Kwap! 7 lbs down but only 2 lbs fat. Back to the #4HB drawing board :)

If you look really closely, you can see the BodPod reading on % fat has dropped a mere 0.2% units, from 23.8% to 23.6%, after 4 weeks on the 4HB Slow-Carb Diet. I was expecting a drop into the teens at least, as well as a weight drop of around 15 lbs. Time to roll up the sleeves and see what da heck happened.

• Total wt lost: 6.8 lbs (had lost a bit over 3 lbs in the week prior to formally getting measured, so closer to 10 lbs since starting SCD)
• Fat lost: 2.1 lbs
• Fat free mass lost (e.g. muscle): 4.7 lbs

By any stretch of the imagination, these are pretty poor #s for a month on Slow-Carb -- from a weight and fat loss standpoint. I was thrilled to be under 200 lbs for the first time since college, and most thrilled with the 30 point BP drop that prompted this endeavor in the first place. But I'd expected double the drop, and losing nearly 5 lbs of muscle surprised me ("You're getting lighter," my wife kept saying, "and not in a good way").

Should it have been a shocker?

Previous exercise regimen:

1. The Five Tibetans yoga poses, every night, 19 reps per exercise
2. Rings One routines, M/W/F, a progressive and intensive bodyweight strength + agility program
3. FlowFit twice weekly, at low to moderate intensity as a joint mobility and compensation routine
4. Walking, 20-60 minutes, 3-6 days a week

Exercise during these last 4 weeks:

1. Kettlebell swings, 24 kg, 2-hand swings, 75-102 reps, 2-3 days per week

With that drop in exercise volume, it's a wonder I didn't lose more muscle mass.

I'll be re-measuring and reporting the change in TI -- total inches -- on my cheat day this Saturday; I have lost inches, but noticed that the waist slimming, while ongoing, had slowed in the last 2 weeks, and that I'd also lost fractional inches from my arms, legs, and already flat butt.

Clearly, am hitting an equilibrium point between three forces:

1. Decreased overall muscle stimulation from exercise (less muscle), resulting in
2. Decreased caloric expenditure compared to previously (plateaued fat loss)
3. Different type and lesser amount of caloric intake (drop in BP and hunger -- yesss!)

This raises some interesting questions about my primary focus, which was and still is blood pressure reduction. Losing "just" 2 pounds of fat is chump change on paper, but is a surprising real-world volume -- about four and a half cups, or a little over a quart. Was the fat loss itself responsible for the BP drop? [Research topic: check with Plastic Surgeons who do lipo on hypertensive patients, and compare pre-op BPs to daily post-op readings for a week in folks with a small amount of removed fat (around 2 lbs)]. Did the decreased exercise volume help the BP by reducing overtraining stress? Or was it more the sodium reduction plus potassium rich food intake (green smoothies)?

Next direction queries:

Can the 23.6% body fat -- 24% -- be lowered into the teens, while pursuing total weaning off BP medication? Probably; there's no intrinsic reason why lowering body fat percentage should raise blood pressure.

Has the muscle mass loss plateaued? Also, probably; the weight has been stable within 2 lbs for the last 1-2 weeks. Ergo, the current dietary habits, including a cheat day per week, equate to daily activities plus 2 brief kettebell swing sessions per week.

So which way to go, reduce calories, increase metabolic burn rate, or both?

Easiest would be to reduce calories a tidge, by one of the intermittent fasting protocols. Skip lunch a couple days a week, or for longevity and protein restriction purposes, turn the cheat day breakfast into a protein-free green smoothie, and ditto for one other dinner during the week.

Increasing metabolic burn rate would mean ramping up the exercise burn and/or building muscle, and or invoking other aides: the thermogenic cold therapy protocol from 4HB, or the PAGG stack. For efficiency and the minimizing of pills, I'm leaning towards the cold showers and ice packs on the traps, and adding one KB grind day a week: more frequent and drawn out exercise may not be needed, and might raise the BP, which I've seen before. Isometric gymnastics and total body bodyweight programs are also candidates, just less standardizable than KB lifting.

So, here's to Round Two!

Chronic Tacos low carb tostada bowl for #4HB Slow-Carb lunch...and Gumby

Never gets old:

• chicken
• lettuce
• pinto beans this time
• ladle thwock of guac
• cilantro, onions, pico de gallo and medium green salsa
• no tostada shell, chips, rice, tortilla, etc.

For breakfast, had a quick 3 egg in-skillet scramble, after sauteeing 2 clawfuls of organic spinach in a glop of olive oil with a little Dairygold butter. No added salt, lots of ground pepper, and some leftover black beans heated up with some sprinkled cayenne pepper on top. Protein, potassium, magnesium, fiber, and testosterone enahncement all in one.

Hibiscus tea through the morning.

Still exploring the exercise options...will be studying Tracy Reifkind's DVD, Programming The Kettlebell Swing, this weekend. Have a line out to a local kinesiologist for an exercise physiology update. Both should help direct the next phase of personal testing: which exercise types are either blood pressure neutral, or hypertension reducing.

One senior RKC gave a shout out to Gumby: get flexible like Gumby before focusing on any other moves, if you've got elevated BP. I was more flexible than most, though no pal to Pokey, when my BP was 30 points higher a month ago, but I see his point. Hard to lower your pump pressure if you're tight and clenched all the time.

Love the KB swings, but miss the adeptness of moving up, down, and around. Even if they don't lower the BP, it's time to re-introduce the joint mobility and movement training.

Slow Carb lunch at Charo Chicken, yum. #4HB progress continues.

No rice, chips, sour cream, cheese. And by accident, no lettuce, instead of extra lettuce.

Still, very filling. Apparently the appetite killing effect of the SCD is in no small part because of the beans, not the protein: missed beans at lunch yesterday, steak and veggies, and was hungry enough to break through dinner with some almonds and dark chocolate. Beans with each meal keep those cravings non-existent.

AM body weight: 199 lbs -- for midweek, encouraging. If the few pound drop before cheat day pattern resumes, should be in the 196-197 range by Saturday, which would be pretty close to the 2nd stage goal of 195 (1st stage was under 200).

Next week: the post 4 week BodPod bodyfat % recheck. Even if the scale weight doesn't budge, should be interesting if the fat/muscle proportions have changed significantly.

On choosing exercise for BP lowering, along with #4HB

Is there an exercise better than kettlebell swings to optimize blood pressure control?

It's an interesting question -- and maybe one that doesn't need an answer. So far, my BP seems to be dropping pretty well, with a fairly modest (read: much less than before) exercise program. Mondays and Fridays, doing 75 kettelbell swings with a 24 kg RKC 'bell, two-handed, is about it. I've even forgone my prior joint mobility, FlowFit, and 5 Tibetans, and my BP hasn't apparently suffered. This morning's was the lowest systolic BP reading I can remember, ever: 118.

For some things, the most effective way to advance is to sit the hell down.

The focus has been on other, less strenuous tweaks. Diet. Supplementation. Breathing meditation. Some work within minutes, others take weeks. But none require months to significanty lower blood pressure, not even diligent exercise in the sports medicine research.

So, Possibility Numero Uno: Efficient blood pressure reduction may be 80% non-exercise dependent. Right now, it appears to be more like 90-95% due to the tweaks above.

Possibility Numero Dos: Exercise selection may be more a matter of finding a program that doesn't worsen blood pressure, instead of discovering one that lowers it. This is a better way of looking at matters if BP lowering has already occured via Non-Exercise Tweaks (NETs), and the goal is to retain those losses.

Right now, my sample size consists of myself, and the 3 weeks I've been doing Slow Carb + KB swings + NETs of my own devising -- not very generalizable. But if correct, this modified 4HB approach would have tremendous appeal from an efficiency standpoint. If the only way to reach a goal is by a daily, periodized slog, so be it -- but it's a LOT easier to eat right and sip hibiscus tea throughout the day (more on this later) than to lift a canonball or your own bodyweight hundreds of times every day, if the goal is to simply not blast holes in your arteries. The starting point for real bodywork should be a relaxed, ready place with blood pressure already under control, not a daily fight just to keep it in check.

Otherwise, every other exercise goal (strength, mass, agility, martial arts prowess) becomes a juggling act on the edge of disaster. If you must do kettebell swings for half an hour, 3-6 days a week just to keep your BP in check, I guarantee you will have issues exploring much of anything else.

Quick proteinaceous breakfast shake, #4HB style...sort of

• 50 grams of whey protein via powder
• 2 handfuls of organic spinach
• 4 inches of organic carrot
• 1.5 cups of coconut water, for an extra potassium boost
• a smidge of ice chips to chill

Yum.

Shot myself in the foot with water: on #4HB Slow-Carb diet, not enuf, then too much fluid

After coming home this evening, I drank 4 pounds of water -- 4 glasses of 16 fluid ounces, each.

Not surprisingly, my weight rose. Scrambling upstairs, I first checked my weight post voiding variously: 200.2 lbs, just like when I woke this morning. A bit unusual, I'm used to gaining water weight during the day, from carbs or sodium. My first clue to a potential problem.

Later, get a call on some labs I had drawn shortly before the end of the workday, with good news and bad news.

The good news: my potassium level is perfectly midrange normal. I'd been wondering if my ACE inhibitor BP medication might be setting me up for a potassium level spike -- something this medication class is known to do on rare occasion. With all the potassium-rich veggies I've been eating, especially spinach, this number comes as a relief.

The bad news: my serum creatinine is up by about 10%. This translates into an estimated kidney function that is in the mild-to-moderately depressed zone. Suddenly, I've got CKD, stage 3 on paper: chronic kidney disease. Whaaa?

My brain goes into hyper replay-and-review mode, and I immediately realize:

1. I had a mouthful of water accompanying my 2 hardboiled egg, sprint out the door breakfast.
2. I had maybe 12 oz. of water with lunch, a nice chicken bowl sans rice and starch from a local Mexican restaurant.
3. I'm on a diet that's well known for stimulating fluid loss, and have been peeing like a racehorse despite my lack of fluid intake.
4. Ergo, I'm something like at least 64 ounces of fluid behind. And low fluid intake drops the kidney test numbers.

And I don't want to even consider the possibility that there's something weird going on due to my BP medication, a kidney stone recurrence (have been having a bit of a flank ache, but did slip on the stairs the other night), etc.

Fast forward: reality check. Get out of my head, be sensible -- and out comes the measuring cup. 16 ounces of water, 4 servings, and a couple bladder voids later: 203.2 lbs.

And curious as to how much I'll weigh and measure tomorrow, at the start of Cheat Day, and for the next day or so.

The water will come off eventually, no worries there. The kidney function dip is very likely artificial, from decreased fluid in the plumbing, and can be easily rechecked Monday with a repeat lab set. Have gone fluidless for a whole day many times before, just never knew what the lab values were while doing so. I hope.

Sometimes, there's such a thing as too much information.

But you'd better believe I'll be drinking above normal amounts of water, regularly. Another Harajuku moment -- reality can be sobering, as well as encouraging.

And tonight, dropping to the next lower dose of my BP medication :)