To build muscle and strength, you need to consume more calories than you use. Eating lots of food can be bad for your digestion, especially if you eat the wrong kinds of food. Don't deadlift on an upset stomach.
Stan Efferding believes that he has found a solution to the problem of getting enough nutrients. The Vertical Diet is a new way of looking at nutrition that focuses on getting the most out of the food you eat. If you're a strength athlete who needs to consume a lot of calories, this system can help. 2018 World's Strongest Man and deadlift world-record holder Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson, as well as four-time World's Strongest Man Brian Shaw, have both used it with success. Although Bjo?rnsson has switched to boxing, he is still eating a lot of food.
Efferding's approach to helping with food digestion and fixing micronutrient deficiencies is also becoming more popular, attracting attention from people who want to lose weight and feel better. So, is the Vertical Diet right for you? Keep reading to find out.
What is the Vertical Diet?
The Vertical Diet is named after its appearance, looking like an upside down T. The food that provides key micronutrients necessary for things like organ health, hormones, and more is located at the bottom, underneath the bottom of the T.
Red meat and white rice are two foods that are high in macronutrients and calories. The amount you eat will be different depending on your goals for strength and physique.
Why red meat and white rice? According to Efferding, the best way to consume a high number of calories without disrupting the body's digestion system is by consuming certain foods. The food at the bottom of the pyramid helps with digestion and other body functions.
The Vertical Diet is all about eating foods that are rich in nutrients and easy to digest. This will help you lose or gain weight, get the most out of your workouts, and absorb nutrients better. The main focus should be on micronutrients such as vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants.
Efferding picks foods based on their low-FODMAP content.
Vertical vs Horizontal Dieting
Wheat, meat, and dairy are the main components of a horizontal diet. Most of us eat a “horizontal” diet every day, with wheat, meat, and dairy as the main components. We try to consume mostly whole foods that come from diverse sources and feature an array of colors. You might have eggs and oatmeal for breakfast, a sandwich with a side salad for lunch, and maybe steak, veggies, and potatoes for dinner, followed by some ice cream because you are allowed to have it based on your daily nutrient intake.
Stan Efferding gained knowledge about the Vertical Diet while training with Flex Wheeler several years ago, which led to the development of the Vertical Diet. The Vertical Diet is designed to give your body the micronutrients it needs from a limited number of easily digestible foods. These foods are high in nutrients and easy for your body to absorb.
“Going vertical” means gradually increasing the amount of calories you eat from these foods every day. The more you train, the more you will need to eat vertically (high calorie foods). Take protein and fat for example. Your body can only get so much benefit from them, but carbohydrates are what really fuels you to greater heights in muscle and performance, says Stan. This diet consists mostly of carbohydrates.
Two key foods that Stan eats are steak and rice. While Stan admits that ground meat can be tasty, he insists that it is not the same as a steak. He believes that steaks are a much more superior dish. “Ground meat” usually refers to the meat that is left over from steaks and roasts and is made up of different parts of the cow. Do not mistake “ground meat” for “ground sirloin” or “ground round”. The latter two come from a single cut of meat, not multiple cuts like ground meat.
The difference between steak and hamburger is that steak is a higher quality of beef. You should only consume the best quality of calories, so ground beef is not as good as steak.
This is the end of your allotted protein and carbs for the day.
Stan makes sure to add more easily digestible foods to his diet to get the nutrients he needs. Among these “other foods” are:
- Eggs
- Oranges or orange juice
- Carrots
- Cooked veggies (low-gas veggies)
The Vertical Diet recommends avoiding vegetables that produce a lot of gas, such as butternut squash, carrots, celery, parsley, zucchini, cucumber, bell pepper, eggplant, spinach, and small steamed potatoes. Make sure you're getting enough micronutrients, but don't rely too much on these foods to get them.
What’s a FODMAP Food?
Don’t worry. You won’t be reading an actual map. The acronym FODMAP stands for Fermentable Oligo-, Di-, Mono-saccharides, And Polyols. This refers to short-chain carbohydrates that can cause problems in many people, especially those with digestive disorders.
In other words, these compounds are responsible for the gas and bloating that can occur after eating beans. The carbohydrates and fibers from high-FODMAP foods are not digested by your body, and instead are used as fuel by your gut bacteria. This process produces hydrogen gas. If you do something that upsets people, they may avoid you for a while.
But if you eat too much of these types of foods, you'll get more than just a little gas. Some people can draw liquid into their intestines and produce diarrhea. A high-FODMAP diet can also lead to leaky gut syndrome.
If you have a sensitive stomach, a low-FODMAP diet can provide relief.
This diet can help prevent big problems for athletes who need to consume thousands of calories each day. The Vertical Diet is designed to improve digestion by eliminating high-FODMAP foods.
According to Efferding, the diet is designed to be easy on the digestive system, so high-FODMAP foods are either limited or prepared in a way that reduces digestive problems. Vegetables that don't require much gas to digest, such as spinach, cucumber, bell peppers, and potatoes, are better than cruciferous vegetables for getting positive results from the diet.
The jury is still out on whether a low-FODMAP diet is a good idea for the general public, even though researchers have found that it can be helpful for people with conditions like Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Research has revealed that following a low-FODMAP diet can lead to reduced intake of certain nutrients, as well as changes in gut bacteria which can cause other stomach problems.
The good news? One study showed that low-FODMAP foods could reduce exercise-related gastrointestinal symptoms, which is great for when you're straining to finish a strenuous lift. You should discuss the long-term effects of this diet with your doctor and nutritionist to see if it is a good option for you.
Lectins, Phytic Acid, and “Antinutrients”
Before we discuss what you can and can't eat on the Vertical Diet, we need to address “antinutrients.” Antinutrients are compounds that reduce the body's ability to absorb essential nutrients.
For example, substances like lectins and phytic acid bind to and prevent the proper digestion of minerals like magnesium, iron, and zinc.
You should avoid anything that might interfere with the absorption of vitamins and minerals by the body when on the Vertical Diet.
Or does it?
Although people try to act like these compounds are simple, the truth is more complicated. Some people takelectin and phytic acid supplements because they have been linked with lower cancer and cardiovascular disease risks, respectively. Phytic acid is also an antioxidant that has been associated with a lower risk of kidney stones.
The majority of studies investigating the effects of antinutrients on the body have a major flaw; they only look at the effects of a single compound in isolation. Researchers study meaning by taking lectin in its pure form and observing how it reacts with certain cells. Lectin is often ingested alongside Vitamin C, which can nullify the harmful effects of lectin.
The Vertical Diet includes foods that are high in “antinutrients”, but only if they are soaked and fermented, which reduces the negative effects of these compounds.
Example of The Vertical Diet used by Hafthor
When following the Vertical Diet, you would eat just enough steak and rice to meet your daily protein and carbohydrate needs. For most elite athletes, this would be four or five 6-oz portions of steak and one cup of rice. [7]
Stan's clients said they began to feel hungry within an hour of eating a meal. He then tells them to add in another meal of steak and rice. After eating, you feel hungry within seven to ten days. increase the amount of steak and rice by 2oz and 1/2 cup per meal
The athletes being referred to are high-performance and train multiple hours several times a day. They need A LOT of food.
If you keep repeating this process, you'll gradually eat more food, which will help you train more often, recover better, and see some amazing results.
The athletes are getting hungry immediately after eating because they are not properly digesting their food.
The Vertical Diet claims that your body is very efficient at digesting steak and rice, so you will not be wasting anything you eat. Any food you eat is only for repairing and building muscle.
The Vertical Diet focuses on increasing food intake, primarily from fast-digesting carbs, in order to train harder for longer periods of time and recover more quickly afterward. This leads to more frequent training and ultimately bigger, better gains in size and strength.
If you want to keep getting bigger and stronger, keep eating more carbs.
Vertical Diet Post Workout Hacks
After an intense training session, Stan has his clients load up on carbs and water, and salt, to improve insulin sensitivity and glyphogen replenishment, for better recovery. You’ll also perform better on your subsequent workouts.
George Lockhart is responsible for the “Supercompensation post-workout beverage” which consists of: [7]
- 50g fructose (for liver glycogen)
- 50g dextrose (goes to muscle glycogen)
- 600-1000mg sodium (depending on workout or athlete)
- 100mg caffeine (accelerates uptake of all the other nutrients)
What about protein post workout?
While it is important to consume protein immediately following training, the timing of your protein intake is not as important in terms of subsequent performance. Protein can help restore glycogen in the absence of sufficient carbohydrate, but it is not necessary for glycogen replenishment. Carbohydrates are essential for muscle repair. [2][3][4][5]
The quicker you consume carbs after working out, the sooner glycogen will be replenished. This not only reduces recovery time, but also decreases soreness and improves future performance.
If you're only training once per day, you don't need to worry about replenishing glycogen quickly, but remember that the Vertical Diet is designed for athletes who train multiple times per day. When it comes to future training sessions, the timing of nutrients is crucial for these individuals. If you are lifting weights only three or four times per week, it is not particularly important when you consume nutrients.
Takeaway
So, what’s the verdict on Stan Efferding’s Vertical Diet?
Well, it’s a whole lot of broscience. The diet contains some good suggestions, such as eating whole foods that contain micronutrients, but there is no scientific evidence to support his idea that you should limit the types of food you eat.
You're missing out on key nutrients by only eating a few base foods. Although some people might enjoy eating steak every day, others would find it boring and prefer variety in their diet. He sometimes advises more unusual things like adding sugar to rice to make it easier to eat more of it and get more calories.
But if the whole point of the vertical diet is to get bigger, stronger, and faster by improving digestion, eating high-quality foods is more important than sprinkling sugar on rice.
The Vertical Diet is a mix of information from unqualified sources, eating unprocessed foods, and creating a false positive image. The purpose of the diet is to make you stronger by increasing your food intake, but there are more sustainable and less expensive ways to achieve this goal than the Vertical Diet.
