15 minute AMRAP:
250 meter row
30 Abmat sit-ups
30 squats

Saturday morning crew after the Samurai push for time!

Fuel Your Journey Challenge Options

Paleo Kit Pre-Order

With the school year back in session next week we had a number of requests for another Paleo Kit order.  We’re happy to help out.  Read below for all of the details.

Paleo Kit pre-order starts today!  We will run the pre-order from Wednesday, August 10th through Friday, August 19th. After the pre-order, we will stock a select variety of Paleo Kits at the shop for purchase.

What is a Paleo Kit?
Paleo Kits are pre-packed meals of grass fed beef jerky, dried strawberries and cranberries, and nuts including pecans, macademia nuts, and almonds.  For the pre-order we’ll also have available the coconut Paleo Kits, Just Jerky Kits, as well as the PaleoKrunch bars.

How do I pre-order?
Click here to place your order. Fill in your name and the quantity of each item you would like.  All pre-orders will receive a 5% discount. There is a 5 order minimum per item type.

What’s the cost on these babies? Here are the pre-order prices.  After pre-order prices listed in parenthesis.

Paleo Kits
Grass Fed Large: $6.18 (also available after pre-order, cost: $6.50)
Grass Fed Small: $4.70 (available for pre-order only)
Coconut Large: $5.65 (available for pre-order only)
Coconut Small: $3.75 (available for pre-order only)
Meat Only Kits
Just Jerky: $5.45 (also available after pre-order, cost: $5.75)
PaleoStix: $5.25 (available for pre-order only)
Bars
PaleoKrunch Bar – $2.70 (available for pre-order only)

Expensive you say?
Oh please.  Let’s compare the costs of a salad on the Pearl Street Mall, a grab and go lunch from Whole Foods, and a Paleo Kit. All meals bought for a Paleo female eating lunch…and never doubling the meat which is hard to believe!:)
1. Pearl Street Mall salad: $7.95 
2. Grab and go lunch from Whole Foods: $7.02 (1 avocado, 1 peach, 1/2 cup bluberries, 3 ounces meat from the salad bar) 
3. Large Paleo Kit: $6.15 (DING DING DING, WINNER!)

Not only are you making an economically informed decision when selecting a Paleo Kit over other “fast food” options, you are eating high quality ingredients, making a conscious decision to eat well even when on the run, and you’re supporting the youth athletes at Steve’s Club in Camden, NJ.  Take the time to click through and read about Steve’s Club.

When will they be here?
Paleo Kits will arrive the first week in September.  You will receive an email when they are available for pick-up.

What are the different kinds?
The Grass Fed are the “original” – beef jerky, nuts, and dried fruit
The Coconut are the “tropical” – beef jerky, coconut, and dried fruit (no nuts)
Just Jerky – beef jerky only
PaleoStix – think grassfed SlimJims!
PaleoKrunch Bar - think a grainless and gluten-free granola bar

What do I use them for?  Here are a few ideas:
- a solid meal on the go
- help in a pinch
- long bike rides
- camping/hiking trips
- plane rides to avoid airport food

Bodyweight front squat

Knees to elbows

Ben and Piper move through the final phase of the Saturday workout. We hear Ben's Mom is coming back to Boulder for a visit. Keep an eye folks, this woman rocks it!

Cooke during max rep back squats on Saturday. Many said the max effort back squats was more mentally than physically challenging. Did you exceed the number you thought you'd do?

Food Chalk Talk Tomorrow at 7PM

Whether you joined Roots in the past few months or need a refresher on all things fuel, this session is for YOU.  Come get back on track or steer a new course.  Want a better Fran time, a smaller dress size, or a better night sleep?  Your FUEL is responsible for all three and many more.  MOTIVATE.

Gluten: What You Don’t Know Might Kill You – a must read!  Thanks for this one G’Pa Mojo.

Our very own Alex Chaux started BooBars.

BooBars!

Remember those amazing little Paleo nuggets of tasty goodness at the Roots Holiday Party?  Well, they’re now available as BooBars and are available for purchase at the shop.

Check out the beautiful wood box at the shop next time you’re there.  You can purchase BooBars with cash by placing money in the box and taking a bar.  That’s right, it’s an honor system.  Be honorable.

Have you had a BooBar before?  If so, what did you think?  Post to comments or, better yet, send Alex a review!

Three rounds for time of:
12 Muscle-ups
75 Squats

Happy Paleo Valentine's Day: Grilled pork loin, sauted green cabbage with beet greens and asparagus, & boiled red beets. Compliments of Hank.

What Will You Have for Breakfast? – Going Paleo Without a Challenge, Part 1

Many folks have asked us recently when the next Paleo Challenge will take place.  We’ve got one in the works but it does not start for a month from now.  The challenges provide great frameworks for folks to start a Paleo way of eating and see the benefits, but the goal of the challenges is for folks to learn and apply a different way of eating for the longterm – not to become reliant on a challenge to enforce or enable a way of eating.

If you’ve fallen out of the Paleo way, don’t make the excuse of waiting for another challenge to set you straight. Get back at it.

How you ask?  Start with breakfast.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.  It’s where we set the tone for the day.  We can select good quality Paleo foods that will help us hold the line for lunch and dinner or we can throw in the towel from Round 1.

So if you’ve fallen out of a good Paleo practice, get back at it with breakfast.  Hold the line with breakfast!

Here are a few ideas – post to comments your ideas!

1. 2 hardboiled eggs and an apples
2. Bacon, a grapefruit, and an avocado
3. A Paleo Breakfast from The Cup
4. Dinner for Breakfast Scramble – take the meat from the night before and stir it up with some vegetables
5. Paleo muffins
6. A piece of steak and a cup of blueberries

The Total Days of Winter wrapped up last week. Did you miss The Total? Email Nicole to let her know. We will schedule a make-up in the next two weeks.

A Week of Food in Pictures Wrap-up

Last Monday Nicole committed to photographing every meal she ate for the entire week.  We called it A Week of Meals in Pictures. The goal was to get at the fact that yes, we really do eat like this 98% of the time.

The final piece of the project was to take a survey today as to whether or not the week of meals posted was something you would possibly eat.

So, what did you think?  Could you picture yourself eating this way?  Post to comments.

The comments on Monday were filled with great conversation about Paleo, feeding kids Paleo foods, and the cost of Paleo. Bones threw out an additional tweak to the project and said that I should track my cost which I made my best attempt to do. Here were my expenses, with brief explanations where necessary.  I realize this is not very specific at all but I think it is still helpful.

FOOD EXPENSES
Sunday night grocery trip for Eric and me: Whole Foods – $38.02
Monday morning Whole Foods – 5.40 (grabbed quick lunch stuff for later in the day)
Friday and Tuesday lunch and dinner at Illegal Pete’s – $6.85 x 2
midweek grocery trip to Whole Foods – $30.57
Nicole’s monthly girls-night-out dinner at the Chop House – $47.00
Whole Foods – $40.98

Total grocery bill: $114.97, but not all of it was for me, we fed 3 people in our house this week
Total eating out bill: $60.70 (normally would not include a $50 dinner)
Total ounces converted to dollars of pre-paid beef (from our 1/4 cow): $11.22 (2.5 pounds!)

GRAND TOTAL: somewhere around $84 to feed me not including the Chop House meal.

Notes: Eric’s sister moved in with us on Tuesday so our grocery bill fed three people for the week. The grocery bill obviously does not include my coffee expenses which is roughly $20/week but isn’t really food so I didn’t tally it up.  Eric never eats lunch at home so the grocery bill does not include his lunches.

Gil, Bones, and Sid on Tabata ring dips. And yes, the rumors are true, Santa doesn't visit athletes who short their ring dips! Good thing these three didn't!

It’s a HoliDAY, not a HoliWEEK (or holiMONTH)

The December newsletter kicked off by discussing the holidays and their ability to derail all the good stuff you’ve worked hard for over the past year.  Holiday parties (ok Roots can take some responsibility for that one but that was a pretty awesome Paleo centric holiday party!), school celebrations, gifts of food, and the overall feelings of anticipation and excitement can send us into a downward spiral of missed workouts and consecutive evenings of overindulgence.

I honestly think that in the case of holidays, food is an integral part of our celebration.  The hard part is making the distinction between the food we really love and the insane amount of holiday crap that fills our worlds during the holiday span.  The other hard part is getting back on your A game after the holiDAY. Notice I emphasized “day”, it’s not a holiWEEK.

While working out the other day a friend and I discussed how to distinguish between the worthwhile holiday pleasures and the holiday crap.

Food is fuel but food also has cultural significance and the holidays highlight this like no other.  Take for example my family whose Christmas morning holiday tradition is locks and bagels and french toast casserole (lots of bread).  Would my Christmas be the same without it?  No, for me personally, it wouldn’t at all.  And will that one morning breakfast greatly increase my chances of getting cancer or Alzheimer’s later in life?  No, because it’s not my usual pattern, far from it.

Over the years, thanks mostly to my Mom, we have tweaked and modified our holiday recipes to be gluten-free and to incorporate good quality ingredients (ie butter instead of margarine, yes, I too once ate margarine) but we still enjoy those holiday pleasures.

This holiday season, use the skills you’ve acquired over the past year to make recipes with a better twist and to identify the good stuff vs. the brightly colored enticing processed crap.  Eat Mom’s delicious breakfast casserole and avoid the grocery store holiday jelly filled red, white, and green sprinkled donuts that someone brings to your office party.

Hear are five steps to a successful holiday finish.  No, this isn’t a cheesy list for how to stay lean over the holidays and none of the items on the list are gimmicks.  That would be silly. Can you add any to the list?

Five Steps for a Respectable Holiday Season Finish

1. Make the distinction between quality holiday pleasures and pure processed brightly colored crap – you will feel like crap the next day, it’s just not worth it. 
2. Tweak and modify your holiday recipes to make them more Paleo respectable (gluten-free, no raw sugar, you get the idea)
3. Give yourself some leeway on the holiDAY, but remember, it’s a holiDAY, not a holiWEEK, or holiMONTH.  Get back with the program the VERY next day.
4. Always remember – there is never an excuse to eat large quantities of (if any, ever) Chips Ahoy Holiday themed cookies or the like – ever. It is pure crap. 
5.  Honor your wellness.  I have no idea exactly what I mean by that but the phrase just came to me and it sounded good.

For all of your holiday entertaining needs! Check out Bethany's Pecan Pie. For those of you not on the Paleo part of the challenge, I think you could work some butter into this recipe! What do you think?

Bethany’s Pecan Pie

FIRE UPDATE: We are currently still open for the 4pm class and 5pm Foundation this evening.  If anything changes, we will post here.

Front squat 1-1-1-1-1-1-1 reps

The Face of the Bench Press: Peter, Alex, Christy, Olivia, Ryan, Boone, Erik, Collin, and David.

Level 8: Eliminate All Dairy

But where will I get my calcium?

Other than humans what other animal drinks baby’s milk from a completely different animal? Kind of weird when you think about it like that, huh? Okay, but let’s get into the specifics.

First of all milk contains casein. About 80% of the protein in milk is composed of casein. Casein is very similar to gluten in that when it is broken down in the digestion process into its finer proteins it can attack the lining of the stomach ultimately leading to leaky-gut syndrome. Review the gluten post if you don’t recall how this works. It is because of this reason that many celiacs (those intolerant to gluten) cannot touch this stuff because it can further exacerbate their disease.

Also like gluten, casein has an opiate effect on our brains. This can play hell with our minds when we are trying to eliminate it from the diet. As casein is broken down it produces the peptide casomorphin. Casomorphin acts primarily as a histamine releaser which triggers an inflammatory response. You can see how quickly this can spiral out of control.

Lastly, dairy has an insulin spiking effect on our bodies. We know already how an out-of-control insulin level can wreak havoc on our bodies and our desire to shed body-fat.

How will you get all that calcium that milk has to offer back? Have no fear, veggies are HERE! That’s right, a diet high in leafy greens already contains all the calcium that your body needs. It’s almost as if nature intended it that way. Hmmm…

Resources:

Will I get enough calcium if I eliminate dairy?