21 Day Fix Extreme Nutrition

Today starts a new BeachBody program for me!  21 Day Fix Extreme:

Yes, it is that program with “all those little containers”.  I chose to get the 21 Day Fix Extreme because 1) my friend Kristen was getting Extreme and 2) I am used to exercising so I thought the harder workouts would be more engaging.  If you are new to exercise or just getting back into things, maybe consider the original 21 Day Fix program.  I had an issue with my order so it won’t be here until this afternoon but I am excited to start!  Let’s go over some things…

Basic Concepts:

• The program is 21 days long.
• Exercise, using the provided workouts, every day.
• Use the containers to portion out your food.
• Eat according to your calorie range.
• The host is Autumn Calabrese (so when I say “she” you know who I am talking about!)

There are a lot of little details in the booklet but the basic concept is easy if you don’t stress out about it!

Nutrition

First, you use their formula to calculate your calorie range.

In the original 21 Day Fix, the Daily Activity Rate = 11.  For 21 Day Fix Extreme, it allows for sedentary (11), moderately active (12) or extremely active (13).  You add 450 calories because she assumes that is how much you will burn doing her workouts.  You subtract 750 calories because that is the usual amount to lose 1.5lbs per week.  Don’t going changing that number because you want to lose more.  If you don’t eat enough, you won’t have the energy for the workouts and you will probably burn muscle instead of just fat.  Trust the program!

So, since I don’t do much outside of workouts, I chose a Daily Activity Rate of 11 which resulted in 1834 Daily Calories for me.  That puts me in the 1800-2099 range.  Using her handy chart, I found out how many of each color container I would eat per day.

1800-2099 Calorie Range Container Values

Since I have my gym membership, I might continue doing extra workouts.  If I find that I am sluggish or hungry (or burning a lot of extra calories), I will bump up to the next calorie range.

In the booklet is a list of acceptable foods for each container but they are basically as I labeled above: vegetables, proteins, fruits, carbohydrates, healthy fats, seeds, and oils.  The oils category did not come with a cup but you use a teaspoon to measure out your portions.  Also, there are some confusing things like yogurt is a red container, tomatoes go in green while tomato sauce is a purple.  See how it can be a little tricky?  Just use the booklet and follow it!

It also gives you some tips about eating out which is AWESOME.  I was worried that this program would be super strict, don’t eat out for the next 21 days, which is just not gonna happen for me.  So I was glad to see that she gives some container equivalents and portion sizes for eating out for things like lasagna, pizza, tacos, etc.  You don’t have to stay cooped up in the house!

That’s it for today.  I’ll leave the discussion about workouts and such for another day since I don’t actually have the DVDs yet.  Right now, I am just working with container size estimates I found online until my package gets here.  I will write more once I have everything in hand!

Have you ever done the 21 Day Fix?  Are you interested in trying it?

I am not a Beach Body coach so I’m not trying to sell you anything.  I just like the products and like to review things!