Going to add yet another element to the eating mix

So I was introduced to the Oly blog the iron samurai a few months ago, and one of the headlines in the margin caught my eye, "Intermittent Fasting, The Vodka Diet, OR How I Got Skinny For My Wedding Like a Real Man" I mean, after all, I was getting into wedding shape as well. He mentions intermittent fasting as his solution, and I kind of thought "yeah that's great and all but I'm not interested in learning about that right now."  Well, I've followed up on that entry and have been reading though the blog the iron samurai points to, leangains.com.  I must admit at the back of my mind the whole time I was saying "but breakfast is the most important meal of the day!!! You'll have high cortisol levels!"  But I've kind of realized that when I decided to start cutting calories I did that by not really eating breakfast.  I would have a protein shake but that was about it, not the protein shake AND sausage and vegetables.

So I've decided to try out intermittent fasting, as prescribed by leangains. It's a 16 hour fast/ 8 hour eating window.  Basically, I skip breakfast, workout around noon, and then eat after that and stop eating around 9.  I'm trying to eat three meals in that window, and am usually pretty successful.  It's not too hard, although that last hour or so the stomach gets to grumbling.  I guess you could say this week is my week one, so it should be interesting to see where I go from here.

I have to admit reading the guy's blog has made me more lenient on what I eat and be more concerned of when I eat.  I mean, this guy is RIPPED (and he used to be fat) and he talks about how he celebrates a deadlift PR with ice cream and his post workout meal is a box of cereal. Suddenly I think "oh hey if he can get away with that then maybe I can too!" and suddenly this week I've had Frozen Yogurt and Subway and Man v. Food favorite Chicken Cheddar Biscuit (delicious, btw) and peanut butter ice cream. Now as long as I have it during my eating window I'm set right?  I just fooled myself into a bit of an eating binge. I should also note that my stomach has not appreciated any of the grains I've had, but seems to be ok with the milk (I don't think I'm lactose tolerant, but it just doesn't seem to upset my stomach like grains do)

So I'm going to follow this fasting thing with paleo food.  However, it seems like there is a lot more work involved with this if I want to get like the leangains testimonials.  I will have to start looking at how much protein I'm taking in and other macronutrient ratios.  For some reason that has always been really, really difficult for me.  I know for some one of my size I should probably start taking in at least 180g of protein, and that should be whole protein too not liquid.  However, I really doubt I've eaten that much in one day in more than two days in a row.

I don't know why, but trying to eat enough protein is tough.  I love eating steak.  Like love it.  Also fish, chicken, etc.  I just need to indulge in that more I guess.  Part of it is cost, I think, but I can just start buying cheaper cuts of meat.  ...I miss my grass-fed steak, but I simply can't afford that right now.

I think it's funny that "conventional wisdom" for losing fat is really like the totally opposite of what I'm doing:

• Avoiding grains, even whole grain
• Avoiding dairy ('A great source of Calcium!")
• High fat
• And now, no breakfast and eating big meals
• no to little cardio (I do love sprinting intervals)

I feel like I have a lot of studying to do.  I need to figure out how much 180g of protein is eating-wise, and I need to then figure out the carbs/fat from there.

Now, Nick Horton (the iron samurai guy), didn't do any of this, as far as I can tell.  He just ate what he wanted as long as it was in the eating window, and saw results.  So maybe I'm making this harder then it has to be.  Regardless, I feel like it's worth a shot.