I received this first comment from Julianne a few days ago and asked if I could post her experience. Part two I received this morning and added to the post. Here is the basic order of operations:

She adopted the Zone and saw significant improvements in a number of issues including blood sugar regulation and performance. She ate this way for 12 YEARS, but still suffered from some inflammatory issues and mild autoimmunity. She found the Paleo concept, removed grains, legumes and dairy, supplemented with vit-D…and has none of the issues a mixed Zone diet addressed.  This sounds vaguely reminiscent of Laura Demarco’s experience of seeing good performance on  a Zone diet, markedly BETTER performance on a Paleo approach. As an aside: I now have HUNDREDS of examples along this line. The interesting thing is all I did was ask these folks to “try it, tell me your results”.

So, how does one respond to this type of information? One way is to  dig in one’s heels, ignore the fact that food quality matters,  and insist elite athletic performance and optimum health await some kind of  perfect food proportionality. It’s like numerology, only with food. It also implies a type of attempted strangle-hold on the truth reminiscent of the Inquisition and Church during the Dark Ages. Galileo anyone?

The alternate approach is to recognize food quality is your most important issue with regards to nutrition. A food quality approach fixes issues that no amount of slicing and dicing proportions will fix. Once you have a handle on food quality (Paleo)  THEN, if and when you need more fine tuning, break out the weighing and measuring to see if that can give you more juice  in your desired endeavors.

Here is Julianne’s experience:

As someone who started on my passion for nutrition on the Zone diet (about 13 years ago) I would have agree with your evaluation of Sears work. Just as a little background, my journey began with reading books to try to help my cousin who was dying of cancer. One of those books was the zone diet just published. At that time I was a designer (designing equipment for people with severe disabilities). Once I started the zone diet, I was hooked on nutrition, blown away by the difference it made.

However my swollen knees (auto immune) and stiff neck and a few other problems (constipation and PMS) continued to a minor degree even with all the anti-inflammatory fish oil I was taking.
I recently completed nutrition science (on top of my RN qualification) to degree level, and gained a much better understanding of the biochemistry underlying nutrition.
Recently (amazingly only this year) was I introduced to CrossFit and as a result paleo eating – which I have been devouring both literally and the information and books. I had to take notice when I read Cordain’s papers on auto immune issues and grains / legumes.

It really is the key – my joint problems and gut problems and PMS have gone, completely. Also I would have to agree with vitamin D – I wasn’t until last year that I started taking vit D supplements regularly and have been virus free for 2 years now, it also contributed to less joint inflammation. I had a blood test after taking 1000iu per day for some months and it was only in the normal but low range, I’ve since increased it to 5000iu per day. Retesting will be interesting. We are just coming into spring and cold wet days are not condusive to getting sun on the body.

I too like to help people, my dad who had a bipass at age 55, is still tramping, working and has amazing bloodwork just short of 80. He would probalby have been back for more bipass surgery if he hadn’t changed his diet from the recommended high carb he was religiously doing after his bipass. 5 years ago my brother survived a bone marrow transplant with very little GVHD thanks to swallowing large amounts of high quality omega 3 which dampens the cytokine storm underlying bone marrow transplant reactions.
So personally my life is way better for knowing about nutrition. Still I feel like there is SO much to learn. (Masters degree in Nutrition science next).
And sadly – at the beginning of my learning journey I didn’t know nearly enough to help my cousin.

So I will keep learning as much as I can, continue doing Zone /Paleo (bit lower on the carbs though) plus Crossfit – I LOVE this combination!

I am looking forward to hearing more on your thoughts behind your disagreement with Sears on very low carb diets.

Robb – you are an inspiration for me – I hope I can touch as many lives as you do!
Julianne

You are welcome to use my post.
With regards to the effects of the Zone Diet, going on to Paleo, here is a short run down of how I progressed:
When I started the Zone Diet in 1996 I was around 54 kg (I’m 5? 1.5?) tall.
I had bad PMS (breast pain) and severe menstrual pain. Poor recovery after exercise, reactive hypoglycemia. One or other of my knees would swell at regular intervals especially after a long brisk walk. Stiff sore neck (joint problems that I have exactly the same as my mother, she was diagnosed with a mild form of lupus. I did have a postitive blood test, anti-nuclear factor postive 1 in 64, speckled pattern, however this is not conclusive.)

The Zone diet caused dramatic changes, PMT disappeared, big energy increase and great recovery after exercise. Stable blood sugar, weight loss down to 49 kg. However severe menstrual pain continued, joint swelling continued, PMS came back if I wasn’t super strict. I was eating grains and legumes most days on the Zone diet although not a lot.

Added Omega 3 some months down the track, joint and menstrual pain hugely decreased, still regular knee swelling though. It also decreased PMS. Still constipated – which I had wheat bran for – although it grated in my stomach.
I managed to control the knee swelling with megadoses (tablespoon full of high concentrate) Omega 3. If I didn’t it would come back.

After reading Loren Cordain’s work, by now I have been doing the Zone diet, (I also became a zone diet instructor) and taking omega 3 for 12 or so years – I cut grains and legumes out completely 4 months ago. Added vitamin D as well about 18 months ago.
A large ganglion cyst that had been getting bigger over the last 7 years started to shrink. – It is now almost undetectable, no knee swelling at all for 4 months despite all the squats at running at CrossFit. Interestingly I had a Pizza meal one night as an experiment and the next day the ganglion cyst was tender. Re constipation – all is good now, although I do add a little ground flax seed, have kiwifruit and lots of salads – works way better than wheat bran. I don’t have to take nearly the same amount of omega 3 to control inflammation, as I just don’t have any joint inflammation.

Even though my auto-immune / constipation / PMS etc were not all that severe, just a big annoyance that I had to live with, to get rid of them completely is absolutely amazing. I never imagined that it was possible. And certainly in all my training as a nurse, and more recently as a nutritionist, I hadn’t seen this kind of research – mainstream education just doesn’t teach you most of this stuff.