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Summary: The way EVERYONE should eat ! Healthy and it works !
Review: Hi there !I'm a family physician who has been on "The Zone" for about 6 months now. I am 5 feet 2 inches and have dropped from 148 pounds to 128 pounds. I think this diet is healthy, and it is something that people can live with in the long term. I didn't feel like I was starving, and my workouts have improved from 3 mile runs to having the energy for 7 miles. I look great, and I am recommending this diet to my patients. My only complaint it that the book is very scientific, and I have been told by some of my patients that it is too difficult to understand. try it !
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Summary: Not that impressed
Review: I am 27, and have struggled with weight issues since high school. I have been desperately trying to lose the "last 10 pounds" for the last year, so I thought I would give The Zone a try. The plan is easy enough to follow. The most difficult thing for me was finding "good fats" to incorporate into my diet. Dr. Sears' ideas really made sense to me, and I started the diet with a real "GUNG HO" attitude. After the following the diet EXACTLY for three weeks, I stepped on the scale. I GAINED FIVE POUNDS. I appreciate that Dr. Sears has helped people to lose weight, and I applaud their success. But, I do not think this diet works for everyone. Plus, I still had hunger issues and carbohydrate cravings. The bottom line is, I think this diet may work well for people who have a great deal of weight to lose. But, I think if you are simply trying to shed a few pounds or want to lose a little excess holiday weight, this is not the way to go. Good luck.
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Summary: One Diet Does Not Fit All--Although Great Portion Control!
Review: Sears' premise is a relatively easy one to understand: eating protein with every meal helps to regulate your insulin output and hence helps the body avoid a constant craving for fattening carbohydrate intake.
I purchased this book when it first came out in 1995, used it on and off with adequate results, and was dismayed when various news magazines and dieticians panned the premise. I thought, how could regulating hormones NOT be involved in the dieting puzzle?
Recently I was reaquainted with Sears' ideas after seeing an alternative physician in my quest for better health. The doctor recommended using Sears hormone-regulating formula and portion guidelines with Peter D'Adamo's ER4YT Blood Type Diet. So far, I have had fairly good overall health-benefit results--and this with no intention of losing weight--although this has occurred.
Although Sears comes off as being a little too commercial for my taste--just check out the Zoneperfect website and you will be bombarded with all sorts of prepackaged goodies--- his premise of eating a certain amount and a certain combination of the three basic nutritional elements seems to be quite wise. In a nutshell, one's hand is utilized to decide just how much one needs to put away during one meal. The protein should be the size of one's palm--thickness taken into account. The fat is represented by the size of the fleshy part of the thumb--about a tablespoon. Carbohydrates are monitored in this way: if eating a grain, a closed fist-sized amount should be consumed. If eating a green vegetable, two handfuls are advised.
As much as I find this advice feasible, I have some criticism with regard to Sears' premise and format. Firstly most of the recipes in the book seemed to be geared for bachelors who have little time for food preparation. Anyone wanting to make a Zone meal for a family would be pretty much out of luck if using the book as a guideline. The good news here is that the website provides many many recipes to help balance out those fats, proteins and carbs and there is an Excel based tool offered online at no-cost which actually calculates a meal's components down to the gram---if you want to get that specific. Secondly, Sears reports that one could lose weight with any combination, although he suggests for example that red meat and butter are poor choices when compared to other protein and fat choices. I believe that since this book has been written,Sears has come out with other "breakthrough" diets--one revolving around soy and one around Omega-3 fats. I can only charitably think that as his theories evolve more books will ensue. But, what he doesn't seem to cover is the fact that some people simply do not do well when eating certain foods. His one-size fits all diet, does not work for everyone. There is a dieting stall reached after awhile and the optimum results that he proports one will achieve are not achieved. Case in point, when I started the Zone vigorously, 3 years ago, I found that I had to incorporate more protein with every meal. I turned to dairy as I did not feel inclined to cook a chicken breast each and every time I wanted a snack. Unfortunately, no matter what Sears says, I do not metabolize dairy well and I found that no matter how many glasses of water I drank, no matter how many fish oil capsules I consummed, or how simple and abundant my carbohydrates were, I was still constipated. After adding a fiber supplement, I found I no longer lost weight--but stayed at a plateau for so long a period of time, I eventually tried another dieting plan. After all, no one feels well if their digestive system is no working correctly. Sears speaks of the digetive hormones, but he neglects to mention the changing hormonal interplay of estrogen and progesterone in women, especially as they get older. Nevertheless, I believe that Sears book can be the cornerstone for many who do not understand that food must be balanced to achieve a hormonally balanced body. In the same sense, in order to be a certain size, you must eat a certain amount. My advise is to use this as your springboard, then decide which combinations work best for you, perhaps, as my physician advised,try the D'Adamo blood type diet as a guideline for foods one should and shouldn't eat. I have found that since doing this, I no longer need my fiber supplement, I have lost weight, I do feel better. (Oddly enough, for my type A blood, I am to gorge myself on soy products and Omega-3 rich fish! Sounds like Dr. Sears may be a blood type A himself as his latest books plug both as highly beneficial.) Bottom line: if I feel better, I must be on the right track.
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Summary: Low Calorie Diet In Disguise
Review: Dr. Sears's theories on different types of food and how they are processed by the body are interesting, but misguided. Actually, people lose weight on this diet because they end up cutting calories like crazy, even past what can be considered a sane amount. Also, there are a lot of psychological factors at play here, especially Dr. Sears's marketing skills, which are excellent. This is one big infomercial. I would be concerned about the long term effects of so much protein and the strain placed upon the kidneys in dealing with it. IMHO, mindset is everything. If you believe you will feel better, exercise more and lose weight, you will because you believe that you will. It is not for nothing that bread is known as "The staff of life", and a mainstay of the human race from time immemorial. I wonder how Dr. Sears would explain my weight loss of 15 pounds in less then 4 weeks when we were very poor and subsisting mainly on pasta and canned sauce because it was a lot of food for little money. Ditto rice. Throughout all this, I exercised religiously and the weight dropped off. BTW, his insinuation about the Chinese (and Japanese) having high rates of heart attacks due to high rice consumption is ridiculous. These two people had extremely low heart disease, body fat and breast cancer etc. for centuries subsisting on a LOT of rice, fish and vegetables. They now have the same or higher rates of heart disease as Americans because unfortunately they have adopted the American high fat diet. This has been proven by following Orientals who move to the US and give up their traditional diets. Their rates of heart disease, breast cancer and diabetes soared. Dr. Sears needs to refine his research a bit. Another fad diet that promises the world.
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Summary: Absolutely Amazing!
Review: The Zone is an amazing diet plan. Imagine this: you are no longer hungry, you need less sleep, you have absolutely no cravings for pasta, bread, potatoes, etc., you have almost endless energy, and find working out effortless. Well, it's all possible if you enter the Zone. Some people may tell you that it is too hard to keep up with, or doesn't work. My sister is one of them. The Zone has changed my life. I was recovering from a fractured ankle, and got really out of shape. Now, I follow the Zone diet, which is simple, and find that I can work out as much as I need to without any discomfort. For example, breakfast in the Zone might be: 2 slices of canadian bacon, 2 eggwhites (or 1 egg), a slice of cheese, an apple, 1 cup cantaulope, and 5 almonds. Tons of food, tons of micronutrients (protein, carbs, fats), hardly any calories. The Zone is not about calories. In fact, you can run on very few calories, and never be hungry. For it is about the micronutrient balances in your diet that help you live, not the amount of calories you take in. As long as you get what your body needs, you're okay. This diet could not be easier to follow, or have better results. However, if you do not have will power, or are not willing to forever change your life, I recommend you don't waste your time reading this book. Otherwise, your life literally depends on the Zone. I mean it.
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Summary: Great diet - don't start with this book though
Review: After a lot of encouragement from my mother, who has been following the Zone for two years, I decided to try this diet. I've been on it for 3 months and I've lost 28 pounds and 2 clothing sizes without really changing my modest exercise habits. I eat half as many calories as I used to, but I'm not hungry. I used to have terrible insomnia, often getting no more than 4 hours of sleep a night - that has vanished along with my nearly-constant heartburn. After two months, my blood cholesterol dropped from 200 to 180. I have energy to burn. I take a Cheat Day on Sundays when I eat all the evil things I've been craving that week - croissants, Nutella, McD's sausage biscuits, creamy desserts - and by the end of the day I feel so draggy, dehydrated, sinus-y, that it's a relief to wake up Monday morning and go back onto the plan. So, why don't I recommend this book? It was the first book Barry Sears (co-)wrote about the Zone, and it reads like an infomercial. The writing style is... loud. It is also poorly organized, jumping around from biochemical jargon to little tidbits of practical advice to anecdotal evidence to health claims for different conditions. And finally, this book doesn't provide any information beyond the very basics about how to actually follow the plan. If you are already convinced (perhaps by all these glowing reviews) of the benefits of the Zone and want to jump right in, the more comprehensive Mastering the Zone with its tons of practical tips is a much better place to start. If after beginning the diet you want more background information about how it works, then pick up this book. The one good thing about the early book is the more gourmet recipes (like the lamb with herbed cheese on zucchini-and-squash "pasta" - mmmm!). There are more recipes in Mastering the Zone, but for my taste they stick too strictly to the glycemic-index guide and also try too hard for one-pot meals; I've never used them. An issue to look out for: I found that the body fat tables in the back way overestimated my fat weight, which meant an artificially low food intake level. After a couple of weeks hovering on the edge of hunger, I got my body fat percentage measured on a machine at the employee wellness office at work and got a result of ten percentage points less! I raised my food intake and continued losing weight at a healthy clip, with no more hunger pangs. I suspect that the bodyfat-table problem may be why a few reviewers here felt hungry on the Zone. The tables probably underestimated their lean weight, resulting in recommended food intakes that were too low. The bottom line: even if all the health claims aren't sound, this is a balanced low-calorie diet that's easy to follow indefinitely without hunger, and what can be wrong with that - unless you are Nabisco Foods or something? Just try to start with Mastering the Zone instead.
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Summary: Get into the zone!
Review: Well written book advocating dietary chage away from carbohydrate rich foods to a more balenced protein dominent diet. I enjoyed reading it, and followed it for a while, but sadly lapsed.... Not enough recipes to keep me going, and very americanised, as i found difficulty in obtaining some of the ingrediants. Interesting concepts though!
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Summary: Can You Say Confusing?
Review: Dr. Sears is not a medical doctor. I'm not criticizing his credentials. He seems to have paid his dues with his research in biotechnology. If I'm criticizing anything, it's the usual approach of "If you do this you will lose weight." Of course healthwise what goes in your mouth matters a great deal and I do believe carbohydrates that are high-glycemic (turn to sugar faster than others) are not as good for you as low-glycemic carbohydrates. An example of this, according to Sears, would be: broccoli is better than carrots; apples are better than bananas; stay away from grains, breads sauces and some fat (peanuts are better than sour cream). Dr. Sears has written an extremely comprehensive book (270 pages) complete with topics such as "The Hormonal Effects of Food"; "Exercise in the Zone" (He is a proponent of exercise on his diet); "Vitamins, Minerals and the Zone" recipes, body fat percentages and 8 appendices. In order to figure out how much protein, carbohydrate and fat blocks you should be eating you must do a calculation. Here's my problem with this: the calculation is based on lean body mass done with a tape measure. I'm a personal trainer. I have had my body fat done with an electronic device and calipers, never with a tape measure. A tape measure IS one way of determining body fat, but it is the most inaccurate way of all. Perhaps not having an accurate body fat number doesn't matter all that much. All I know is you take the number you come up with (and he describes how to use the tape measure to determine body fat) and that number is then looked up in the back of the book and you have your lean body mass. From there you multiply your activity factor and he gives you guidelines (8, for example would be exercising 5 times per week for one hour) and that equals your daily protein requirement. If it sounds complicated, it is. He also refers you back and forth to one of the Appendices and to tables. You aren't done, of course. That might be too easy. You now have to convert this number into how many blocks of each food you can eat a day. I can eat 12 protein blocks a day so I would schedule them as such: 3 in the morning; 2 as a snack; 3 for lunch; 1 as a snack; and 3 for dinner. You can take blocks from one meal and use them toward another BUT you must do the same for the carbohydrates. Isn't it much simpler to just know how many calories per day you should be eating? If you are happy with your weight, then count up your calories one day, divide them by 5 and you have how many calories you should eat in 5 small meals each day? I understand Dr. Sears' point, though. He isn't interested as much in calories it seems. But in reality, the calories come into these boxes big time because every block is a portion - 1 piece of fruit equals 2 blocks of carbohydrates, so if I had a nectarine for my first snack, I would have to borrow a protein from lunch since you must have protein and carbohydrates together. Unless you are prepared to be even more confused than I am probably making you, stay away from this book.
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Summary: Love this book!
Review: I bought 'A week in the Zone' first and felt that I needed more information in order to truly understand the Zone diet. So, I bought 'Enter the Zone'. It's a wonderful book! So easy to read. So informative. I would recommend this book to anyone who truly cares about their health and longevity!
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Summary: Yes, it's good, but be careful
Review: I have read a great deal and have thought long and hard about whether the "Zone" diet is something that I can recommend to other people, and have cautiously decided that it is. I was referred to this book by two articles on gout in medical journals (Current Opinion in Rheumatology 13: 234-239 and Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases 59:539-543). Otherwise I would not have given it a second glance. There is a bizarre claim on the cover, "reset your genetic code", that would appall anyone with the slightest knowledge of biology (the author probably didn't write that). The proliferation of book titles by the same first author, and the careless editing (particularly of the recipes) also do not inspire confidence. But the ideas in the book are based on medical research and appear to have considerable potential for helping some people with chronic diseases, though my complaint about the book is that it considers only certain aspects of health. The medical problem that I have been wrestling with has been characterized as salicylate intolerance, but may also be a form of arthritis. A research paper that has been particularly helpful for me is "Phenotypic variation in xenobiotic metabolism and adverse environmental response: focus on sulfur-dependent detoxification pathways" (S.A. McFadden, Toxicology 111(43-65), 1996). This paper suggests that a diet high in protein may be quite dangerous for people with some types of environmental sensitivity, probably including my own. Keeping this in mind, I have nonetheless concluded that my natural tendency to eat foods that make me feel better has caused me to consume too little protein, and it may be beneficial to adopt some principles of the Zone diet. A benefit of the Zone diet would be that if a person with food-sensitivity can keep the amount of food that they eat to a minimum, then fewer chemical compounds will have to be detoxified, and the detoxification mechanisms might not be overloaded. By balancing carbohydrate, protein, and fat, the hunger effects of depriving the brain of glucose would be avoided, and insulin production would be kept to a minimum. One of two important ideas discussed in the book is that controlling insulin levels (for anyone, not just people with diabetes), alters the balance of eicosanoids (prostaglandins, etc) to reduce the ones that cause pain, inflammation, immune-system problems (both auto-immunity and immune-system failures such as cancer), lethargy, and even depression. The other idea about inflammation is that the type of fat that you eat is important for controlling eicosanoids: monounsaturated oils cannot be transformed into eicosanoids. If you have any of these medical problems, I recommend at least reading about this diet. This is the first of the series of Zone books, and was not readily available when I first looked for it, but it has reappeared on bookstore shelves. The diet is not easy to follow, especially if you interact with other people at mealtimes, but this might have changed somewhat in later books. There is a later book "Mastering the zone" that I think explains it better. Another book, called in paperback "The age-free zone" and in hardcover "The anti-aging zone", has a lot more information about biochemistry, but is much less helpful about how to follow the diet; it also has some chapters that cry out for an editor's pencil. The three books repeat a lot of the same material, and the elements that differ are scattered all through; reading all three, or even two, of them is an enormous task. There is another book, "The top 100 zone foods", 2001, in which the quantities of various foods required to make up a "Zone block" have altered considerably since "Enter the Zone" and "Mastering the Zone", but I cannot suggest that anyone should buy that book; it is a waste of paper and money (see my separate review).
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