War Zone Marines Eating Like Cavemen

From the Marine Corps Times.

"Lt. Col. Sean Riordan used to consider himself chubby. It never kept him from meeting the Marine Corps’ height and weight standards or from scoring in the 280-plus echelon on his physical fitness test. He just chalked up his less-than-desirable physique to genetics.

But Riordan’s not chubby anymore, and he has one man to thank for inspiring him to change: a portly Iraqi sergeant major who smiled broadly and remarked to Riordan that he was getting fat, patting his own round belly to accentuate the point.

That was in 2008, after a yearlong deployment in Iraq. Today, Riordan has washboard abs and says he feels healthier than ever. His secret lies in a new fitness regimen — and a drastic dietary shift that calls for cutting out grains, legumes, sugar and dairy products, and eating more protein, fruit and greens. It’s called the caveman, or paleo, diet.

“I’ve been doing CrossFit and following a Paleolithic approach to my nutrition since I returned from Iraq,” said Riordan, who took command of 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines, at Marine Corps Base Hawaii on Dec. 2 and promptly issued this message: Adhere to the Marine Corps standard for physical fitness and appearance or you’ll be placed in the Body Composition Program immediately.

In a memo, he admonished his Marines that if they come within either 5 pounds or 2 percent of their maximum body weight and fat allowance, they would get a warning letter and a talking-to. When the battalion arrived in Afghanistan in April, 158 of Riordan’s Marines received the letter along with individual counseling sessions about diet, nutrition and exercise, and a requirement to visit several websites about health and nutrition. Some followed his lead and hopped on the caveman diet, too.

The foundation is fresh, unprocessed foods eaten thousands of years ago during the Paleolithic era — think hunter-gatherers, stone tools and so on. They stayed lean, and diseases such as diabetes were nonexistent.

Meat is in. Cheese is out. Berries are OK, but beans aren’t. Nuts and seeds are good to go, but ditch the milk, sports drinks and cake.

Sounds tough, but plenty are doing it. The paleo diet continues to gain followers throughout the Marine Corps, according to Riordan and to nutritional experts with the Marine Corps’ Semper Fit program.

“That really is the one I’m asked a lot about,” said Lauren King, one of two registered dieticians in the Semper Fit program, a resource Marines can turn to for advice, classes and information on fitness and health. In the year she has worked at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va., she said, King has seen an increase in the number of Marines asking for advice on high-protein, low-carbohydrate regimens, mostly athletic Marines who also prefer CrossFit-style exercising, which comprises high-intensity daily workout routines. But she cautions that eating this way is not advisable for all Marines all of the time.

“When they come to see me and say they’re following a paleo diet, we explain you have to have carbohydrates for fuel and too few carbs can hurt performance,” King said.

As alternatives to pasta and grains, she suggests taking in carbohydrates from plant sources such as fruits, legumes and starchy vegetables like potatoes, corn and yams.

For Marines trying to lose weight, cutting carbohydrates altogether isn’t practical, she said, because any diet they adopt will have to be sustainable. Ultimately, King said, good carbohydrates are fuel for active Marines.

“For the war fighters who are engaged in activity, carbohydrates are important to have in a diet,” she said.

Semper Fit’s nutritional guidelines are based closely on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2010 and the new Choose My Plate site that offers tips on healthy eating. The guidelines advocate a balance of vegetables and fruits but also whole grains and low-fat or fat-free dairy products, which the paleo diet eschews.

Riordan swears by it, though. Since he issued his edict, about 60 percent of his officers have adopted the same diet and exercise regimen. Many of his young enlisted Marines are giving it a go, too — to the extent possible. Downrange, sugary Pop-Tarts, soft drinks and muffins are everywhere.

“I live on jerky and nuts for snacks. I get enough fruit … but I miss vegetables terribly,” said Riordan, who has instructed his cooks to minimize the non-paleo temptations provided through the supply chain. “I am much more lenient at the smaller [combat outposts] and patrol bases, where selections can be a little more limited. I am fanatical about pushing good food down to the lowest level and have largely succeeded here.”

Battling body fat

Riordan’s aggressive stance on food choices and appearance was slightly ahead of — and very much in line with — Commandant Gen. Jim Amos’ assessment of Marines. After he assumed the top post last October, Amos traveled extensively throughout the Corps and observed what he suspected was widespread noncompliance with the service’s appearance standards, particularly those that govern body fat. As a result, he ordered his inspectors general to audit every command and conduct surprise weigh-ins to ensure compliance.

The results of that survey are on the commandant’s desk, he told Marine Corps Times in September. And although Amos said he is pleased to see that the number of Marines enrolled in the Corps’ Body Composition Program is lower than he expected, he is keeping a close eye on compliance, so much so that he will be personally tracking it and calling on leaders who aren’t enforcing the regs.

From the looks of it, Riordan won’t be getting a call from the commandant any time soon, though some of his Marines are finding it hard to stick to the paleo diet even after losing some weight.

“I can’t do that for too long,” said Sgt. William Pierce, who is in charge of the battalion’s chow hall on Forward Operating Base Delhi. He received a pat on the back from Riordan and a word of encouragement for having lost 10 pounds three months into the deployment. Pierce tries to keep up on the diet, and he provides starchy menus for Marines who want it, he said, but being around food all the time makes it hard.

“I eat with my eyes,” Pierce said.

The battalion’s executive officer, Maj. John Black, said that when the unit deployed, their families were encouraged in newsletters to send care packages containing healthful goodies such as nuts, dried fruits and beef jerky. That’s worked to a limited degree, he added.

“The families are still sending lots of treats,” Black said, popping a handful of freeze-dried blueberries into his mouth, “but that’s OK once in a while.”

Initially, as part of his effort to expose his Marines to the paleo diet, Riordan ordered more than 1,000 packets of food produced by Steve’s Original, a New Jersey-based company that caters to paleo diet enthusiasts. These “paleo kits” are vacuum-sealed pouches filled with dried fruits, nuts, meats and seeds. Every Marine in the battalion received one during Enhanced Mojave Viper pre-deployment training in Twentynine Palms, Calif.

“It gave me the opportunity to talk to the Marines about nutrition and how it would affect their performance during combat,” Riordan said.

Many of his officers followed suit and ordered their own supplies of paleokits to take downrange, but the kits are pricey. A month’s supply could cost upward of $500. And for that, you get variety and a mix of calorie counts. A 4.3-ounce packet of beef jerky, coconut and strawberries, for example, has 360 calories. A 1.5-ounce paleo crunch bar made with coconut, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, almonds and honey racks up 200 calories. One ounce of dried wild blueberries has 89 calories. The products can be ordered in groupings, too, and the variety includes “paleo MREs.”

“Steve’s Original is an awesome product. It’s packable and nonperishable,” said 1st Lt. Charles Eberly, commander of 1/3’s 4th Platoon, Alpha Company. However, after a while, he added, the company stopped mailing the packets to Afghanistan because of the slow and unreliable mail system. To compensate, the Marines riffle through their field rations, keeping the most healthful items and dumping everything else. The majority of his platoon, Eberly said, eats a diet of tuna, chicken and vegetables.

“They all take the chicken and tuna out of First Strike Rations and throw out the rest. Literally. They throw out every other item. We trade all the Pop-Tarts and Cokes with kids and shopkeepers [in the village] for homegrown vegetables.”

Riordan expects that his focus on fitness, health and appearance will stick with his Marines beyond the deployment and believes that his personal success with it will be a catalyst.

“I issued the letter of warning because there are so many people on the line, like I was,” he said. “I am convinced that I can motivate just about anyone to change his personal nutrition and improve his physical fitness.”