Evolutionary Fitness: What do you think?

A reader sent me a link to this article in the times:

Evolutionary Fitness: the diet that really works

It’s about the diet and fitness regime espoused by 71-year old Arthur De Vany, who “has the physique of a very fit young man and the springy, energetic demeanour of somebody who has cracked most of life’s outstanding problems.” His “Evolutionary Fitness” concept draws on many qualities of the “Paleolithic Diet”, based on the diet of early man. He’s trying to create a lifestyle that blends our “primal natures” with the reality of modern life.

People in the wild – isolated tribes – do not get fat and neither do other omnivores and predators. But, of course, they die younger. We can’t drop the comforts and protection of modernity. But we can fight its sugary seductions.

His diet is heavy on meat, vegetables, fruits and exercise. Sounds interesting. Sound, at the very least, based on REAL food and our real potential as human beings who, at one point in our evolutionary history, were fit because we had to be. Still, I don’t know about this whole thing. There are a few strange habits of primal man that Arthur embraces, habits I would think we’d be happy to leave to the Neanderthals:

“Don’t eat three square meals a day. Skip meals now and then. Work towards an extended overnight period of no eating. This means eat sometime before you sleep and don’t be in a hurry to eat breakfast… Do not fear hunger. Nothing but good will come of it, but it must be episodic, not chronic.”

Given his stance on vegetarianism, I can’t say I would ever follow the way of Arthur, but I do think it’s interesting. It may not be for me, but it’s worth some consideration. There are some bits of wisdom there that everyone can take away:

“First, everybody over-trains. Don’t do it. Don’t trudge away on a treadmill, count sets or repetitions, or work out according to a top-down Soviet model. You will hate it and it does not produce results. You must let it happen. You must have a playful, intermittent form of exercise. And you must exercise. The benefits are profound…”

If you do click through to the article, I should add that I’m not posting it because the article is particularly well written: the journalist is an ass-kisser who makes me want to puke. But the concept is interesting. I’ll give him that!

Your thoughts? Post em’ in the comments!

Evolutionary Fitness: the diet that really works
Aurthor De Vany’s website

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September 3rd, 2008 at 10:39 pm

There is a much better article with him on t-nation – http://www.t-nation.com/article/features/evolutionary_fitness&cr=

The article is geared towards bodybuilders, but the concept still applies for the rest of us.

I also have a bit of a problem with his stance on training while fasted and on his avoidance of aerobic training.

I love my HIIT training, but there are benefits to cardio training that you can’t get with anaerobic training.

In a recent study (published in the Journal of Physiology) researchers have “concluded that participation in 90 days of competitive athletics produces significant training-specific changes in cardiac structure and function.”

Endurance Athletes (40 university rowers) expanded both the left and right ventricles of their hearts (bi-ventricular dilation). As well, they improved the relaxation of the heart muscle between beats (Diastolic relaxation).

In contrast, Strength Athletes (35 football players) thickened the heart muscle at the site of the left ventricle. Additionally, the football players experienced diminished diastolic relaxation.

more info – http://healthhabits.wordpress.com/2008/04/23/energy-system-training-affects-heart-function-structure/

Evita

September 4th, 2008 at 10:18 pm

Yeah, I don’t know about this one…. I am glad it works for him but I can see a big problem for many people.

I think his secret to success is that he believes in it so much and truly given the power of our thoughts, I totally see why he is where he is. For me on the other hand it would never work because I do not feel about meat the way he does. Yes i think we can learn a lot from our ancestors and nature but we also need to evolve.

Mike

September 5th, 2008 at 3:51 pm

Evita,
Like it or not, we are stuck with our evolutionary heritage of omnivory. We cannot evolve away from that heritage any more than we can evolve away from, say, being bipedal (even though we might like to; has your back ever gone out?). Our moral principles may of course “evolve,” but our fat-and-protein-hungry, insulin-sensitive genes do not care about morality. They are dumb and stuck in the past, a fact that we ignore at our peril. So eat some meat once in a while and be thankful that your ancestors did the same. Your brain will thank you.

MizFit

September 6th, 2008 at 11:41 am

for me it’s like all dietbooks and articles.

at points I thought I TOTALLY AGREE! or THATS WHAT I DO but then at others (I dont fast. ever. except once a year for religious reasons) I thought REALLY?!

and yes.

we’ve already established Im a carnivore

monica

September 7th, 2008 at 8:52 pm

DR – great point. I blogged about that research earlier this year. It’s compelling evidence that a well-rounded fitness program is essential for optimal body function. Thanks for passing on the article in t-nation. It’s an interesting interview and I like that he is not into the aesthetic appeal of big muscles but rather refers to his goals as “functional goals that will produce a body that moves easily and powerfully in the world.” Functional fitness at work!

Evita – I think I feel the same way. Actually, one of the reasons I don’t eat meat is because we are now capable of getting all the essential nutrients from plant sources and eating meat is no longer necessary (especially when the quality of the meat you get today is nothing like what our ancestors had). Is this evolution?

Mike – As I said in my comment to Evita, I see your point, but how do you reconcile this with the crap quality of the meat available today?

MizFit – You are a carnivore. Evita’s a veg. Mike likes meat. We’re all different. But we’ve all figured out something that works for us. And that’s pretty damn cool I think!

September 7th, 2008 at 11:30 pm

Despite the evolutionary imperative we still have to live in this world, bad meat and all. This is a point that De Vany concedes quite readily. And all I can say to this is that we have to “hunt” for the best meat we can buy. There’s good stuff out there if you know where to look.

And BTW, I think you’re thinking too narrowly about what constitutes “crap” food. IMO, cultivated grains, cereals, rice, etc is also crap food. Just look around us: those humungous keisters littering the checkout lanes at Safeway are not caused by indulgence in low-quality, feed-lot beef. Instead it’s the carbs from the grains and other junk plants that grow in profusion across our land (with help of big tax payer subsidies, thank you very much). Of course you could always say that these people are indulging in the wrong kind of carbs and that they shouldn’t be eating so much, but that’s just the point. Living off of grains is very unnatural and has no evolutionary precedent. The average grain-eating person—I’m not talking about you personally, but the average person—who is interested in health and fitness has to be too preoccupied with counting total carb intake and calories and reading labels and so on and so forth. The person not so interested in health and fitness—most of the population of course—probably doesn’t care and is just going to eat grains and its products until dying in a miserable diabetic fit at age 60. Living the evolutionary fitness life, in stark contrast, is much simpler and easier to do because the body feels sated after a meal and there’s no need for over-analyzing how much of this and that get consumed. EF is the anti-diet lifestyle!

September 9th, 2008 at 1:15 am

Well Mike I have to add that this could probably turn into a never-ending debate, but if you really want to talk evolution the very first humans before they learned how to hunt were plant eaters – look at our closest ancestors too, like most primates.

And if you really want to be specific our body plan starting from teeth right down to the gut is very similar to many herbivorous animals out there and we actually have a hard time properly digesting animal protein.

Don’t get me wrong I am not trying to convert you (as I know I can’t nor do I want to) but there are basics of biology and evolution that many people do not find out about and just go with what they see seems to be the norm in society. If you enjoy it, that is great, but I can’t agree that this is our birth calling or something we cannot evolve out of.

Yes there is a lot of garbage food whether meat or otherwise – but just like I avoid meat (for the obvious links to many disease today, I avoid those too) because like you say I do not want to die at 60 or live on to 70 or more with various health conditions.

P.S. I won’t even get into the whole other issue of how cruel and butchery we have become when it comes to slaying millions of animals each year just to satisfy basic urges when, again as Monica said we can get these nutrients from other sources

September 9th, 2008 at 5:00 am

This is what the subject of the original post, Art De Vany, has to say about vegetarianism. You’ll have a greater impact by debating him and not a nobody like me. But thanks for responding

Thursday, August 21st, 2008

I have had quite a few questions from vegetarians wanting to know if they can do EF and remain a vegetarian. Here is my take on the issue.

* Why would you want to be a vegetarian? In terms of health, function, body composition, and longevity it is not a good thing to be a vegetarian. I respect your choice, but there must be compelling reasons beyond health that cause you to make this life choice.
* 25 thousand or even 12 thousand years ago it would have been impossible to survive as a vegetarian. Wild plants would have been an insufficient source of nourishment. Your ancestors in that time frame ate meat, of that there is no doubt.
* The last all vegetable eating human precursors were A. robustus and Ramidus (if I am recalling correctly). They did not survive. Their brains could not enlarge because they had too little long chain fatty acids and protein. They had to eat all day, had large stomachs, small brains, and little mobility, rather like the gorilla, a vegetarian primate.
* If we were adapted to an all vegetable diet, then we would have very large, robust jaws, huge jaw muscles and pointed heads. The crest on top of our heads would have to be there to anchor the powerful jaw muscles we would need.
* It is only in a safe, modern world with abundant food that one could even consider being a vegetarian. With out the many benefits of civilization, particularly soft vegetables that can be consumed without a massive jaw, vegetarians would not survive or even live well. With modern knowledge it is possible to be a vegetarian and eat supplements that will make up for the lack of fatty acids, taurine, and fat soluable vitamins in a vegetarian diet.
* A baby raised as a vegetarian will have an underdeveloped nervous system and a small and poorly functioning brain.
You can read more on this subject Dr.DeVanys private blog

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