Weightlifting

Aajonus stated consistently that fat produces two and a half times more energy than carbohydrate or protein, and that this ratio explains everything visible about the bodies of the world's strongest athletes. He phrased this as a challenge to conventional thinking: have you ever seen a skinny weightlifter? The answer, he said, is no, and that absence is the proof. Weightlifters carry substantial body fat not as a byproduct of poor diet but as the essential fuel source for moving extreme weight. The fat is not merely around the muscles but within them, and that intramuscular fat is what gives the lifter both the power and the endurance to perform.

He placed the energy breakdown of the body's metabolic cycle at 80% fat, 15% protein in the form of pyruvate, and 5% carbohydrate. This is the ratio that operates in the citric acid cycle when the body is running on proper fuel. When fat is removed from the equation and the body is forced to derive energy from carbohydrate or protein, it must first convert those substrates into acetates and acetone, which are fat-like bodies but very low in actual energy. The process is complex, the energy yield is poor, and there is no endurance. When pure fat is used directly, the energy is two and a half times greater and long-lasting.

He extended this to a general principle about body fat percentage. Weightlifters in competition carry fat at levels that conventional sports medicine considers excessive, and yet that fat is precisely what allows them to lift what they lift. Wrestlers operate at 24 to 30% body fat. Sumo wrestlers carry far more. Aajonus cited an experience of a sumo wrestler picking him up by the collar with a little finger, a demonstration of the kind of strength that fat-fueled bodies can generate. He was approximately 170 pounds at the time.

Aajonus used Arnold Schwarzenegger as his most detailed and frequently repeated case study because Schwarzenegger was someone he had observed directly at Gold's Gym in Los Angeles during the 1970s, and because Schwarzenegger's pre-competition fat stripping created a measurable, dramatic, and repeated demonstration of fat's role in strength.

The core account, with some variation in specific numbers across different seminar transcripts, is consistent in structure. During his training periods, Schwarzenegger ate tremendous amounts of raw eggs, raw meat, raw milk, raw cream, and raw dairy. This was described by Aajonus as normal for Austrian athletes, with Aajonus claiming that up to 90% of Austrian athletes ate raw meat and raw eggs on a daily basis through at least the mid-1990s. On this diet, Schwarzenegger could lift approximately 400 to 600 pounds depending on the exercise, with figures across transcripts ranging from 437 to 600 pounds for various lifts. He would get quite fat during these training periods, which Aajonus described not as a side effect but as the necessary condition for the strength he was demonstrating.

Then, approximately three to seven weeks before an exhibition or competition, Schwarzenegger would stop eating fat entirely or nearly entirely, eat only protein with minimal dairy, and reduce his body fat dramatically to display musculature. The number cited most consistently is that he achieved around 7 to 8% body fat for competition, with the goal of reaching as low as 2 to 3%. During this fat-depleted state, his lifting capacity dropped dramatically. Across the transcripts, the numbers vary: from 600 down to 200 to 300 pounds, from 476 down to 275, from 437 down to 237, from 470 down to 270, from 350 down to 275, from 535 down to 440. The range of loss cited is 100 to 300 pounds depending on the account, with Aajonus most frequently describing a loss of approximately 200 pounds of lifting capacity. He summarized this on one occasion by saying that Schwarzenegger lost nearly half his strength simply by removing fat from his body.

Aajonus noted that if Schwarzenegger had continued the fat-stripped state beyond the exhibition period, the losses would have continued. He suggested that extended fat deprivation would have pushed him down to lifting only 350 or even 50 pounds. He also noted that beyond strength loss, the muscle itself would eventually begin to disappear if fat remained absent long enough. The science of competitive bodybuilding, from Aajonus's view, was the science of timing fat removal precisely to expose musculature without losing too much strength and without allowing the muscle tissue to begin breaking down.

Aajonus also commented on Schwarzenegger's post-career condition, describing a photograph of Schwarzenegger in a bathing suit taken years after his competitive career ended, in which his skin was sagging and the muscles had collapsed, as evidence that muscle built on processed or cooked food does not maintain itself without ongoing exercise. He contrasted this with the muscle he himself maintained without exercising for over twenty years on raw meat.

Aajonus also expressed contempt for Schwarzenegger's political actions as California governor, noting that Schwarzenegger "outlawed healthy raw milk that he won on" while having built his career on precisely that food. He called him "a frickin' hypocrite."

Aajonus drew a sharp distinction between these two categories. Bodybuilders train to display muscular definition and size, and they achieve this appearance by stripping fat before competition to allow the muscle to be visible. During their training period they do eat fat, and they do build muscle using fat as fuel, but the goal is ultimately to remove that fat layer for display. Weightlifters train to move maximum weight and do not strip fat. They maintain their fat stores because those stores are the fuel they need to do their job.

The result is that bodybuilders in competition are visually impressive but physically weakened. They cannot lift as much as a comparably sized weightlifter. They are, in Aajonus's framework, sacrificing function for appearance. He said plainly that bodybuilding in competition is "a very weakened, very unhealthy state" and that it would take Schwarzenegger several months to recuperate after each competition.

Weightlifters, by contrast, may not have the visual definition that makes their musculature obvious. You cannot see the individual muscles clearly because there is so much fat over and within them. But the strength is there, and it is real and sustained. The fat within the muscles is not separable from the strength those muscles can generate.

He also applied this distinction to wrestlers, particularly professional wrestlers. He described professional wrestling as largely choreographed but pointed out that the athleticism involved is genuine and extreme. These are, in his description, gymnasts who also absorb and deliver real physical blows. They flip through the air with large bodies, land on one another, absorb impacts from ropes, chairs, tables, and other wrestlers. The fat on their bodies serves two functions simultaneously: it is the fuel for the explosive energy required to perform, and it is the cushioning that protects joints, absorbs impacts, and prevents the kind of bone damage that would otherwise result from those landings. He noted that professional wrestlers operate at 24 to 30% body fat. He also noted that a bodybuilder placed in the same context would injure himself, because the lean muscle without fat cannot buffer those impacts.

Aajonus made a consistent and emphatic distinction between muscle built on raw animal foods and muscle built on processed protein powders or cooked foods. The distinction was not merely nutritional but structural and temporal.

Muscle built on processed protein powder, he argued, is not genuine stable muscle tissue. The powders are typically solvent-extracted, often from soy, which he described as a poison in the human body. The resulting muscle tissue is mineral-deposited rather than properly structured. When the athlete who built that muscle on protein powders stops training, the muscle does not simply atrophy gradually. It collapses relatively quickly. Within six months of stopping a workout regimen built on protein powders, the muscle turns to sagging skin. He described this as a visual phenomenon, the skin hanging where the muscle used to push it out, like a dehydrated elephant.

The whey-based powders specifically, he explained, are powdered lactic acid because the processing powders the whey and concentrates its lactic acid content. Combined with the lactic acid that is naturally produced by exercise and metabolism in the muscles, this creates an excess of lactic acid in the muscle tissue. The body draws minerals to neutralize that acid, and those mineral deposits accumulate in the muscle, creating a dense but brittle structure that looks like strength but does not function like it.

Muscle built on raw meat is stable without ongoing exercise. He used himself as the primary example repeatedly. He had not formally exercised in seventeen years at one point in the transcripts, twenty-two years at another, and twenty-four years at another, depending on the seminar. Despite this, he maintained visible musculature because he was eating raw meat consistently. He noted that his muscles, felt when relaxed, were soft and flexible, unlike the permanently hard, stiff muscles of bodybuilders using fake proteins. When he contracted them, they became firm. This flexibility combined with firmness was, in his view, the hallmark of genuinely built muscle from raw food.

He also described a period earlier in his life when he was doing 250 push-ups with his feet elevated, 75 handstand push-ups against the wall per day, and running 5 to 13 miles daily. He had not been athletic before discovering this diet. After about a year of eating this way, he was able to do gymnastics and perform feats he had never been physically capable of before. He attributed this entirely to the raw food diet rather than to the exercise itself.

For people who wanted to build muscle mass on the Primal Diet, Aajonus provided a specific protocol centered on two elements: large amounts of raw meat eaten at each meal and a complete lubrication formula eaten with or shortly after each meat meal.

The lubrication formula, referenced as being on page 146 of his recipe book, contains raw egg, raw butter, raw lemon juice, and a small amount of raw honey. The purpose of eating fat together with the meat, rather than meat alone, is to prevent the protein from being burned as fuel. When meat is eaten without fat, the body tends to use the protein for energy rather than directing it entirely toward tissue building. When substantial fat is present simultaneously, the fat serves as the fuel and the protein is freed to be used for structural purposes, meaning actual muscle tissue construction.

The standard bodybuilding recommendation he gave was one pound of raw meat twice daily, each accompanied by a full lubrication formula. He also suggested drinking raw milk and eating raw eggs in quantity, describing the eggs as something you can "suck" between meals. For larger individuals, he indicated that up to two cups of meat at a time was appropriate for muscle building, compared to a half cup as a starting point for people with digestive difficulties.

He also discussed the timing of fat and meat for athletes preparing for competition. Rather than eating meat and fat simultaneously, he recommended eating fat approximately 20 minutes before the meat, then eating the meat alone, and then having another fat meal such as a lubrication formula 20 to 30 minutes after the meat meal. He said the stamina achieved with this timing was phenomenal.

For bodybuilders who had become fat on this diet and wanted to reduce fat before an exhibition, he gave specific guidance. They should not simply stop eating or radically alter the diet. Instead, they must continue the full regular diet of meat and fat together but reduce or completely eliminate fat consumption at other times, between meals. When protein is eaten without fat, stored fat is burned readily. There is some muscle loss involved in this process, but it is controllable. The key distinction is that it is almost impossible to get fat on this diet unless tremendous amounts of fat are eaten with meat and at other times, so the bodybuilder who finds themselves needing to reduce has typically been eating extraordinary amounts of fat throughout their training period.

Aajonus presented several specific case studies across seminars to demonstrate what the bodybuilding protocol could accomplish.

The most frequently cited case is a man who came to him at either 56 or 57 years old (Aajonus gave slightly different ages across transcripts) suffering from chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, and lifelong thinness. He had spent his entire life wanting to be a bodybuilder but had always become sick when he tried to exercise. Two to three weeks of working out would produce severe illness, sore muscles from lactic acid buildup, and continued inability to gain weight. After eleven years without help from conventional doctors, he began the Primal Diet.

After two years on the diet, having gained approximately 20 pounds, he was at approximately 150 to 155 pounds on a six-foot frame. He asked whether he could bodybuild at his age, now 58 to 61 depending on the account. Aajonus told him to eat one pound of meat twice daily with a full lubrication formula each time. In two and a half to three and a half months, he put four inches on his arms and six inches on his chest. The Gold's Gym community accused him of using steroids. He told them he was eating only raw butter, raw meat, raw eggs, and honey.

Two and a half years after that, described as him now being about 62 to 63 years old, the man had become, in Aajonus's description, huge, looking like a teenager body-wise. He had worked out for approximately one year and then stopped, but maintained his muscle. Aajonus used this case to make the point that the Primal Diet allows muscle built during a period of exercise to persist without ongoing training, which is fundamentally different from what happens with conventional protein supplements.

A second case involved a man who was approximately six foot one and very slender, who had been on the diet for two years and felt great. He asked about bodybuilding. Aajonus gave him the same protocol: a pound of meat twice daily with a full lubrication formula each time. In two and a half to three and a half months, he put four inches on his arms and six inches on his chest. He was also accused of steroid use at Gold's Gym.

Aajonus also described a man who reduced his meat intake to three quarters of a pound per day once the initial muscle building was underway, and continued to build muscle, because the fat from the lubrication formula was protecting the protein from being burned as fuel.

Aajonus referred repeatedly to his own body as demonstration that raw meat alone, without exercise, produces and maintains genuine muscle. He had not formally exercised for periods ranging from seventeen to twenty-four years depending on when the seminar was recorded. His stated exercise consisted of carrying luggage through airports, occasional walking with his girlfriend once a month or once every two months, and working at his computer. He mentioned going roller skating twice a month in one account.

Despite this level of inactivity, he described maintaining solid muscle. He distinguished the quality of this muscle from bodybuilder muscle by saying it was soft and flexible when relaxed but firm when contracted, unlike the permanently stiff, solid muscle of people who have loaded fake proteins into themselves.

He was taken to a cardiac gym at one point where researchers attached electrodes to monitor his heart. They had him perform weight-lifting exercises on machines, starting with what appears to have been a bench press motion. They loaded the weights progressively. He went up to 253 pounds before showing strain, and noted that the exercise involved up to 280 pounds on a leg press before he showed resistance. His heart spiked briefly when approaching the higher weights but returned to normal within a second of releasing pressure. The researchers told him that their champion weightlifter, who trained constantly, performed at roughly the same level as Aajonus, who had not trained in decades. His body fat at various times was described as approximately 18% or 23 to 24%, which he noted looked more like 8% because of the way fat distributes on his frame.

He also noted that his waist fluctuated between 30 and 37 inches depending on where he was in his dietary cycle, going up to 30 to 32% body fat deliberately when he wanted the fat for cleansing and chemical detoxification purposes.

Aajonus noted that a failure to build muscle even when eating appropriate amounts of meat can signal mineral deficiency. If the body lacks sufficient minerals, it cannot construct muscle tissue even from adequate protein intake. The solution within his framework is cheese and honey eaten together, which provides a high concentration of minerals delivered with good fats to facilitate assimilation. The combination of cheese and honey allows the minerals to be digested and used for tissue building purposes. He also mentioned cheese and butter together as beneficial for bone solidity through the same mineral-fat combination mechanism.

Aajonus was openly critical of conventional standards for athletic body fat. The conventional view that men should stay at or below 18% body fat he described as fictitious, relevant perhaps to marathon runners but not to people seeking genuine strength. He noted that weightlifters, the strongest athletes in the world for their event, carry fat well above that threshold, and that this is not a problem to be corrected but the physiological basis of their strength.

Competition bodybuilding standards requiring 7 to 10% body fat for display, with goals sometimes as low as 2 to 3%, represented to Aajonus a "very weakened, very unhealthy state." The recovery period after a competition, during which the bodybuilder has to rebuild fat stores and restore normal physiology, could take several months. He suggested that this cycle of deliberate fat stripping and recovery is fundamentally hard on the body and not a practice worth pursuing.

He made the broader point that the "skinny syndrome," meaning the cultural pressure to maintain low body fat, is contrary to health. He stated that 150, 170, and 180 pounds on a woman is not too much and should be accepted. He drew the line only at body weights so extreme they prevent normal movement.

For athletes working out, Aajonus mentioned that lactic acid, the end product of muscle metabolism, accumulates in the muscles and draws minerals to it, causing stiffness. Whey, specifically fresh liquid whey, helps remove lactic acid from the muscles more rapidly because it breaks lactic acid down and carries it away without adding the mineral concentration that drives accumulation. He described a sport formula containing whey as one of the options for athletes dealing with post-exercise lactic acid buildup.

For someone who works out regularly, he also recommended tomatoes and cream together as a combination that provides strength and energy while reducing the need for large water consumption.

He noted that for intense athletic competition or events where stopping to eat is difficult, raw eggs eaten every 45 minutes to an hour maintain focus and sustain performance. A small golf-ball-sized amount of meat in between can also help. The principle is to keep a consistent intake of protein with some fat rather than relying on the reserves of a single large meal.

Aajonus expressed skepticism about carbohydrate loading as an athletic strategy. He pointed out that conventional sports nutrition directs athletes to eat carbohydrates for energy, but that this is a very low-utilized energy relative to fat. He noted that athletes who are fat-deficient, such as those on carbohydrate-heavy diets, tend to develop physical and emotional problems. He cited John McEnroe's famous temper as an example of what happens to a skinny, fat-deficient athlete under stress, contrasting McEnroe's later, fatter, calmer life as evidence that fat abundance improves temperament as well as physical performance.

The body can convert carbohydrates to acetates, which are fat-like bodies, but the energy produced through this conversion is far inferior to what direct fat use produces. There is very little energy and no endurance when the body is forced to make its fat from carbohydrate rather than consuming it directly. For bodybuilders specifically, if carbohydrates are used to try to provide energy during a fat-reduced period, the energy yield is poor and the body loses both strength and the ability to maintain muscle tissue.