Snatch 1-1-1-1-1-1-1
5 Rounds For Time:
35 Double Unders
200m Run
Last month I purchased a Blend Tec blender and it has improved my diet dramatically. I used to eat maybe 2-3 servings of fruit or vegetables a day. Now I can get 5 servings in one shake.
Here I have kale, cucumber, spinach, orange bell pepper, carrot, banana, and frozen berries. Travis made one similar and said it was like drinking a salad. Really its not that bad.
If you have trouble getting enough vegetables in your diet (Justin???), then this is the answer.
Roger
I think the main thing that blender scrambles is Justin’s brain! He can’t conceive that anyone could eat that much vegetables. I don’t think he knew so many existed in the first place!
Justin Riley
kale? sounds more like a rash or a disease than food.
travis
had one this morning: milk, coconut milk, kale, spinach, berries, bell pepper, cucumber. fucking weird, tastes like liquid bell pepper, but i have to make sure that AO isn’t kenzoing me (2 seconds!) on workouts like fran anymore, and its got to be all the weird goddamn shit he eats… seriously ask the kid he comes here with a gallon of 3 different liquids every day, partitioned into 3 separate containers.
BlakeB.
I just don’t see where I’m supposed to find the time to do all that blending when I already invest so much of the day in tugging and toning.
Scott
Blake: nice!
Kale, Chard, Beet Greens are all pretty good. Cooked in olive oil, a little garlic, salt and red wine vinegar. But I can’t say I’d make a shake out of them.
J P Carey
we drink em everyday in this household using an old school vitamix. today will be spinach, romaine, cucumber, celery, carrots, beets and a pear. drink up!
adam k
Your little passionberryguavabanana foo-foo drink is cute and all, but I think I’ll just eat more meat.
Casey
I’m a veggie juice-makin’ machine. We drink them everyday and LOVE it!!!
Matt P
Adam’s got it. I was reading all the ingredients waiting for “pork shank” or “brisket” or “bacon” to be mentioned.
Ryan Lippmann
AO – nice Barbie cupcake book…
We need to have a brisket/bacon blend-off soon. Sprinkle in some loko so it all blends well and BAM – you’ve got a winner.
brother mike
Two things-
1. There are too many juice double entendres to respond to Casey’s comment.
2. Kale, spinach and any other leafy veggie make nasty juices. To the point of making wheat grass taste good. You guys must be pretty desprate to drink that nastiness.
Roger
On a more serious note. I have to wonder whether what happened to good olde fashioned “eating” of your fruits/vegetables. I mean we are talking about basically liquifying serious amounts of greens and drinking it like water. Really? Is this really necessary?
Before any of you get all up in arms, I would ask the same question about eating 1.5-2 lbs of meat daily. I am just asking…what happened to eating whole foods in moderation.
PS- I would not propose the same limitation on beer….I mean…let’s not get crazy.
Ryan Lippmann
Wait, cavemen didn’t have blend-tecs?
They probably made the cavewomen pre-chew their food for them anyways, just like a good cavewife would.
www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1086475482
So Paleo is out and juicing is back in? I’ll just stick to beer as my liquid vegetable, thanks.
J P Carey
I wholly disagree with the leafy greens tasting bad in juice. it’s strong, earthy, and loaded with chlorophyll. I am prepared to have dinner with my chimpanzee cousins when the invitation comes.
Justin Riley
The only person I see weighing in on this conversation with any credibility is Travis, check the abs. As for the rest of you thanks for stopping by.
EAT MEAT!
AO
Alright here is how I look at it. Crossfit is about efficiency. If blending raw live vegetables allows your body to absorb more of the nutrients, then is that not more efficient? Whole food eating is awesome especially if you are trying to lose weight. Eating blended foods allows your body to use less energy digesting your food and put that extra energy into your workouts. It might be a gigantic difference but it might be one more rep or 5 seconds less time. Who knows. If that is crazy then let me know because it makes sense to me.
AO
*might not be a huge difference
John Michelmore
Matt, Adam and Ryan have it right…..and you can add bacon to just about anything. Never put it in a blender yet, but it couldn’t hurt!
Sean V.
Bullsh*t J-Mich, I’m sure Epic Meal Time has that somewhere in the archives.
Sadly, I have been rendered blender-less. Otherwise, I would have given it a try.
Blake: Sounds like you need a workout partner to help with efficiency. Consult with Brother Mike.
Saramborris
Ok I’m going to get on a soap box here..
Aaron while I can appreciate your efforts to include more vegetables and fruits in your diet, I don’t think blending increases the bio-availability of the nutrients. In fact when blending these “shakes” in batches to be consumed over the course of the day, chances are there are few nutrients left in the shake consumed at the end of the day. Further more, by “drinking” your vegetables, your skipping the mastication process which is an important part of carbohydrate digestion. Our digestive tract starts with our mouths/teeth, not our stomachs. By drinking your nutrition your stomach is doing more work than it should be, which means that you are actually using more output energy for digestion than necessary. One more thing, SOME veggies need to be cooked to release nutrients that are other wise locked by binders, ie spinach- when consumed raw provides a healthy dose of vitamin c, but in order to absorb any of the iron which spinach is known for it has to be cooked slightly to release the oxalates that bind the minerals in spinach. Kudos for trying new methods to consume more nutritionally dense foods though:)
Saramborris
oops…*you’re
Cherie Nabeta
Blended drinks may be a little more useful for the snatch than the tug toner but yeah, best way to improve your snatch is to have MORE MEAT.
Justin Riley
It is my understanding that blending things actually raises the glycemic index by breaking down fibrous carbohydrates and liquifying them (Marabito, want to weigh in on this topic?) This would suggest that the stomach and digestive tract actually do less work, and your insulin level would increase more dramatically with processed food, which if you’re trying to lose weight is a bad thing.
Also you have to be careful if you’re drinking shakes while trying to limit calories. You can put a ass load of calories into a shake and drink it without thinking twice. I personally also find liquid food less satisfying, so I get hungrier quicker after drinking Jamba juice than eating an omelet. Again, not good for fat loss.
For most elite CrossFitters, getting enough calories is a full time job and a blended shake with tons of readily available calories may help increase performance. As for the rest of you, most of you need to lose body fat, so I say cut the shakes and chew up real food for weight loss.
Justin Riley
Of course, most vegetables have very few calories so you aren’t going to gain weight overeating veggies, but fruit on the other hand can deliver a huge caloric punch, especially fruit juice. Fruit juice = yummy = fat. Vegetable juice = vomit = tough to convince most people to consume.
AO
Thanks for the input Sara. I’m no dietician that’s for sure. I do agree that drinking shakes at the end of the day decreases the amount of nutrients one gets from it. That is why I drink them immediately after I make them. I’m really glad that we are all talking about this though. Gaining new info from each other on what is our foundation of fitness is only going to make us better.
Roger
Ok Justin- To your point, blending and breaking down cell walls increases GI and raises insulin levels. So that would suggest that we ought to eat the food as whole as possible. Also, if we are going to use the “efficiency” argument, well…steroids increase efficiency. Should we use steroids? I would not advocate that, at least for myself, since I am find that being back at CF for one whole day, I have already bulked up too much!!!!
BlakeB.
Ill be the first person to say it (and I think you, Justin, will have my back on this), we ARE suggesting steroids for the sake of efficiency, Roger.
Scott
Blake: hahaha! Like.
J P Carey
If you guys want to get all technical w/ your smoothie/juice drinking, allow each sip to mix around in your mouth for 10 seconds or so before swallowing. Correct me if I’m wrong Sara, but this can help ease the digestive stress caused by skipping the initial saliva/predigestion process.