Are you out of breath going up the stairs? Or do you feel like your exercise routine winds you more than it should?

Gather ‘round kids, and I’ll tell you the story of one of my favourite clients.

Jack is a 69-year old male. He started personal training because he needed help losing weight. Having a waist circumference of 51 inches wasn’t helping his health either. Within the first 6 months, his strength improved dramatically, but more than anything, his recovery time between exercises improved.

Original source: here.

            With Jack, we used a circuit approach, where he moves from one exercise to another, with as little rest as possible. When he just started, “as little rest as possible” meant about 4 minutes and 18 seconds. So he did a series of 4 exercises, and then had to wait 4 minutes and 18 seconds to catch his breath before repeating the circuit. That’s a very slow recovery.

Then, we identified his food sensitivities, and saw that gluten was one of them. So he cut out wheat, rye and barley. And very quickly, his recovery time fell to an average of 1 minute and 48 seconds. Now, I know what you’re thinking. “That’s not because you cut out gluten. The improvement can be attributed to just getting better.” Fair enough. And yes, that’s partially true. But interestingly enough, when Jack “cheats” and has gluten-containing food again, once again, his recovery time increases dramatically.

Yesterday, he had Chinese dumplings. Today, he did a workout. His recovery time: 3:41. His recovery time 2 workouts ago: 1:48. Such a dramatic difference.

This is just one example. We’ve tested this consistently, so that we know it can’t be attributed to other factors that would slow down his recovery, like travel, poor sleep, time of day, etc.

The simple addition of gluten to his diet inflames his cardiovascular system. The simple removal of gluten from his diet makes the inflammation go away, and his recovery time is much faster. Not to mention that his energy levels are much better, and he gets more work done.

Does that mean it would affect you the same way? Maybe. But maybe not. You may be sensitive to gluten. Or you may not be. With Jack we tested. In his case, elimination of gluten improved his cardiovascular system in a significant way, and over time, he dropped 4 inches off his waist so far. There’s more work to do, but he’s already come a long way.

If you’d like help with this as well, let me know.