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The Benefits of a Carnivore Diet for Cardio Performance
When you’re training your cardiovascular system, it’s not just about aerobic volume or intervals. It’s about fuelling, repairing and sustaining the lifeline of your performance: your heart, lungs and blood. At Homegrown Primal, we believe that an animal-based approach provides deep targeted support, especially when you include organ blends that nourish tissues often overlooked. Why It Matters: Your heart isn’t just a muscle; it’s a metabolic engine. It demands intense nutrient support: from saturated fats for mitochondrial resilience, to organ-derived compounds for cell repair and circulation. Your lungs and the oxygen-exchange system depend on cellular membranes, phospholipids, and clean vascular walls. Animal-based nutrients provide the building blocks of these vital structures. Your blood carries energy as well as immunity and recovery signals throughout your body. Supporting whole-blood health means we’re supporting cardiovascular capacity, endurance, and recovery. Ruminant Organ Advantage: Our Heart & Lung and Blood+ products are designed to feed these systems directly: Heart & Lung delivers organ-derived tissue support, rich in peptides, which your cardiovascular system can use for resilience and efficiency. Blood+ provides nutrients geared toward red-blood-cell membrane integrity, haemoglobin function, and immune cell health, all critical for oxygen delivery, clearing waste, and regenerating tissue under cardiovascular load. What The Experts Say: Dr Ben Bikman emphasises that metabolic health, insulin sensitivity, lipid quality, and mitochondrial efficiency are key to cardiovascular integrity. He questions the idea that saturated fat alone causes heart disease, instead pointing to issues such as carb load, inflammation and vascular stress. Dr Paul Saladino promotes an animal-based, nutrient-dense, organ-rich diet as the foundation for lasting health. Though his model has evolved beyond strict carnivore, his core focus remains: feed the body with bioavailable nutrients to support structure and function from within. Together, their work supports a simple idea: organs aren’t just fuel, they’re tissue support for performance. How To Apply It: Before training: Eat saturated-fat-rich animal foods plus one serving of an organ product 1–2 hours before a long cardio workout. This primes mitochondrial capacity and supports blood flow. After training: Use Blood+, which can help repair red-cell membranes, replenish immune cells, and enhance circulation, reducing vascular load and supporting recovery. On rest days: Organ blends can serve as foundational nutrition because your heart and lungs don’t take a day off. Regular use ensures your cardiovascular system isn’t just surviving, it’s thriving. Track markers beyond HR and VO₂: Monitor blood pressure variability, heart-rate recovery, red-cell quality and subjective recovery (less fatigue, better sleep). Key Takeaways: Modern cardiovascular training means: Stress the system (intervals, endurance, load) Fuel the system (saturated fats, organ blends, animal-based nutrients) Recover the system (blood health, tissue repair, mitochondrial support) Organ-based nutrition gives your body more than calories; it provides structure, support and the building blocks for repair. That’s the primal edge: a cardiovascular system built for resilience, endurance and longevity. FAQs For Animal-Based Cardio Support Can An Animal-based Diet Really Support Heart Health? Yes, when done right. Animal-based diets rich in saturated fats, organ nutrients, and clean protein can strengthen the cardiovascular system by improving mitochondrial efficiency, metabolic flexibility, and inflammation control. Experts like Dr Ben Bikman and Dr Paul Mason remind us that context matters; saturated fats behave differently in a low-carb, low-inflammation diet than in a high-carb, seed-oil-driven one. It’s about fuelling your heart with ancestral nutrition, not fear-based modern guidelines. What Does The Heart & Lung Blend Actually Do? Our Heart & Lung formula nourishes the tissues that keep you alive and moving. Each serving delivers organ-specific nutrients, including peptides, coenzymes, and tissue proteins, that the heart and lungs use for resilience, oxygen uptake, and energy regulation. Think of it as feeding your internal engine with the parts it’s made from. How Does Blood+ Help With Endurance And Recovery? Blood+ was formulated to support red and white blood cell integrity, the carriers of oxygen, nutrients, and immune defence. By nourishing blood cells with heme-iron, B vitamins, and natural cofactors from organ sources, you’re improving: Oxygen delivery to muscles Waste removal and recovery speed Overall cardiovascular performance Better blood means better endurance. How Do These Organ Blends Support Cardiovascular Training Specifically? Training puts your cardiovascular system under intense oxidative and metabolic stress. Organ blends like Heart & Lung and Blood+ feed that system at the cellular level, giving your heart mitochondria the nutrients they need to stay strong, while supporting the oxygen-carrying capacity of your blood. It’s nutrition that trains with you, rebuilding the system as you challenge it. Do I Still Need To Do Cardio Training If I Take These Products? Absolutely. These blends don’t replace movement; they enhance adaptation. Cardio training strengthens the heart through load and demand. Organ-based nutrition provides the raw materials to recover, rebuild, and perform under pressure. One fuels the work. The other makes the work worth doing. Can I Combine Tallow Or Bone & Marrow With These Blends? Yes, that’s where you’ll feel the biggest benefit. Tallow Capsules provide the stearic and palmitic acids that power mitochondria. Bone & Marrow supplies the collagen and minerals that support vascular elasticity. Heart & Lung and Blood+ nourish the cardiovascular tissues and the blood itself. Together, they feed strength, endurance, and recovery at every level. In Summary: Your cardiovascular system isn’t just a pump. It’s a living network of muscle, blood, and oxygen. When you fuel it with organ-based nutrition, you’re not guessing; you’re giving your body the fuel it’s biologically built for.
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Train Like a Carnivore - the metabolic edge of animal fats
For decades, we've been told that fitness runs on carbs, powders, and seed oils. But nature says otherwise. Real cellular, muscular, and mental strength are built on animal fats.When you train like a carnivore, you're not just working out your body; you're restoring the energy systems your ancestors thrived on. At Homegrown Primal, we believe fitness begins with your metabolism, not your macros. And to fuel that fire, there's nothing cleaner or more powerful than the fats nature designed for humans: beef liver, organ blends, tallow, bone marrow, and brain are all full of species-appropriate nutrients. What Makes Saturated Fat The Ultimate Fitness Fuel? Modern diets have demonised saturated fat, but science says otherwise.In 2018, researchers published a Nature Communications study showing that stearic acid (C18:0), a major component of animal fats, literally activates your mitochondria, the powerhouses of your cells. Within hours of consumption, subjects experienced mitochondrial fusion, a process that boosts fat burning and energy production. In primal terms: Stearic acid wakes up your metabolism It helps your body burn fat cleanly and efficiently It builds endurance from the inside out Kiwiburn delivers this exact fatty acid profile, rich in stearic and palmitic acids, tested at over 40% saturated fat content. These aren't empty calories. They're structured energy, the kind your body was built to thrive on. Why Does True Training Start Inside Your Cells? Most people focus on the gym. Few train their cells. Your mitochondria decide how efficiently you produce energy, recover, and burn fat. When powered by saturated fats instead of seed oils, they perform cleaner and stronger, like running your engine on premium fuel instead of sludge. This is where Ignition and Kiwiburn come in: Ignition is rich in phospholipids, especially phosphatidylserine (PS) and phosphatidylethanolamine (PE), vital for brain and muscle cell membranes. Kiwiburn delivers stearic-rich fats and micronutrients that regulate hormones and rebuild tissues. Together, they don't just feed your muscles, they feed your entire system. Why Should You Skip Nuts, Seeds, And Powders? Nuts and seeds may look "healthy," but in nature, they're naturally defended. They are also often grown in mono-crop environments where sprays are used. They're loaded with anti-nutrients like phytic acid, compounds that can bind minerals and block absorption. For athletes, that means slower recovery and weaker performance. Animal-based fats are different. They're bioavailable, mineral-rich, and free from plant defence chemicals. That's why our philosophy is primal and simple: Skip the nuts. Eat as nature intended. Train like a carnivore. How Do Animal Fats Support Recovery And Hormones? Training hard is easy. Recovering well is the art. Essential fats like stearic acid support: Hormone production (testosterone, growth hormone) Joint health and tissue repair Inflammation control and recovery When your mitochondria burn clean animal fats, you recover faster, think sharper, and perform stronger, without the crash. So, Why Train Like A Carnivore? Because fitness isn't about chasing calories or macros, it's about aligning your fuel with your biology. Animal fats aren't the enemy; they're the original endurance fuel. So next time you hit the gym, the trail, or the barbell, remember: You're not just building muscle, you're reviving a primal metabolism. You're training like a carnivore. FAQ's To Train Like a Carnivore Is Saturated Fat Actually Good For Fitness? Yes, when it comes from natural animal-based sources like beef tallow, saturated fat enhances metabolic health. Essential fats like stearic acid activate your mitochondria, your body's engines, to increase endurance and improve fat burning. Unlike seed oils, these fats burn clean, support hormones, and provide long-lasting power. What Makes Stearic Acid Different From Other Fats? Stearic acid is unique. It's the only known fat that signals your body to fuse mitochondria, improving energy production and fat metabolism It's found abundantly in beef tallow (Kiwiburn) and beef brain (Ignition). This is energy your body recognises. Can Animal Fats Improve Recovery After Workouts? Absolutely. Healthy saturated fats support hormone balance and help repair cell membranes. Ignition provides phospholipids that enhance neural recovery and reduce inflammation. Should I Replace Carbs With Fats For Energy? You don't have to cut carbs completely. When you do exercise that requires fast anaerobic activity, carbs are the body's preferred fuel for performance. Here, fruits or honey may support your training. But you should reclaim fat as your primary fuel. When your metabolism runs on animal fats, you gain metabolic flexibility, the ability to burn both fat and glucose with ease. That means no crashes. No slumps. Just clean, primal energy. Which Foods Or Supplements Help Me Train Like A Carnivore? Start with nutrient-dense animal fats and organ-based nutrition: Eggs, meat, and organs. Raw dairy and some supplementation with our products will help you be the best carnivore athlete possible. No powders. No plants. Just ancestral strength in capsule form. When Training Like A Carnivore, We Recommend: Protein and fat for breakfast Cut refined carbs and snacking throughout the day A 10 am - 6 pm eating window Daily walks after meals Train hard. Recover harder. Eat like your ancestors.
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Embracing Discomfort: The Path to Growth and Resilience
Over time, the extreme temperatures, physical challenges, nutritional discipline and intermittent fasting forged robust, adaptable humans whose bodies and minds were finely tuned to the rhythms of nature.
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Hot and Cold Therapy
Maintaining my health, now that I'm on the right track. Now that you are enjoying good robust health keep doing what you are doing. Thinking always about our ancestral principles to tune in and maintain this amazing healthy body that you have.
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Cholesterol and the Animal Based Diet
I often get asked if our supplements affect cholesterol. While it is tempting to simply say 'no', it's more complex than that. An animal-based diet will influence cholesterol levels, so the real question is whether cholesterol negatively impacts us? This is an age old argument that has been debunked by many scholars. Dr. Paul Mason, a researcher and advocate for low-carb animal-based diets, recently shared insights in his lecture titled 'Decoding Atherosclerosis: The Clotting Theory and Seed Oil Toxicity'. Watch it here. Oxidative stress in the blood can trigger clotting, a significant risk factor for heart attacks. This condition often involves blood clots forming in the presence of oxidised LDL, influenced by: Plant sterols (phytosterols) from seed oils, which oxidize quickly and become toxic in the blood Pollution particles Smoking Lead Animal fats help maintain healthy blood membranes and support red blood cells, contributing to overall bodily health. Additionally, nitric oxide production, boosted by exercise, promotes healthy arteries. A diet and lifestyle that minimise plant sterols and enhance nitric oxide levels in the blood lead to healthier blood and arteries. So, Do our supplements contribute to cholesterol? No. Does an animal-based diet contribute to cholesterol? Yes. Is this a bad thing? No. Poor diets and lack of exercise can cause blood clots. Like many experts, I advocate for reducing plant intake and maintaining an active lifestyle that will keep you healthy and full of life.
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Everything Wrong with the Modern Diet: You are what you eat. Back to Basics
Everything Wrong with the Modern Diet. We have come such a long way from the lazy days on the farm. It seems now that the hamster wheel that is our daily life is impossible to get off but we are all searching for a respite, and a rest. Finding the answer could be the key to enabling the ‘slowdown’ and ‘breathe’. The realisation that I can step off the fast pace life, and take a breath without my life falling apart is a massive mind shift. I believe it starts with food. Deeply embedded in our psyche is the animal, who needs natural foods, warmth, and company. For many years we've been pushing this animal away and numbing it down by this fast paced life, grabbing fast food, staying up late working and not resting, all the while thinking that we've “got to keep” going. Daily releasing the fight hormones that keep us running away from the tiger!! Getting back to an ancestral diet, one that is uncluttered with additives, one that is full of whole foods, not packed and processed for longevity on the shelf, is the first key to stepping off the wheel. Fast foods have been part of our culture since the 70’s. KFC opened in Auckland in 1971!! And since then the large chains have been providing nutrient deficient foods to NZers!!! That's 50 years to create more disease and more self loathing than we have ever experienced. To undermine the health of an entire species. Easy to buy, mostly affordable and playing into our narrative of ‘not enough time to cook’. We as a nation have been afflicted with more diabetes, heart disease, gut issues, and obesity than any other time in history. We now need CHANGE. There's a new wave of healthy people, some who are thriving due to experimenting with their own food, some whose health has been so bad that they have found their own way through elimination. The ancestral diet, or getting back to basics, shows that we don't need all the additives and the processing. That we can sustain and nurture ourselves naturally, with locally sourced food its not impossible to regain our health, our birthright to radical aliveness. We are all familiar with these abbreviations; paleo, keto, fodmap, and we all know that the atkins diet was all about protein!! These diets encourage us to look beyond the food pyramid and beyond the fast food drive through. They have been birthed from a sick and unhealthy population who need answers and a change. But are they just fads?? The food pyramid wants you to think that fads don't last and that you need 5 servings of veg a day, 50% carbs, lean meat, and no saturated fats!!! FYI the food pyramid is sponsored by kellogs, big food and big pharma!! But they are not fads, they are birthed from people pushing against the standard food narrative. Getting back to basics and eating simply and local is a new movement, driven by thinkers who want more than to just exist. I believe it is the way to radical health. I Don't want to eat food that has traveled some distance and I don't want to eat food that is out of season!! Our inner animal wants warm slow cooked in the winter, when fruits are scarce and light meals when fruit is in season. When we can make yogurt from fresh milk and eat freshly slaughtered lamb chops!! Its simple and its simply nourishing. Starting is easy, clean out all the packaged food from your pantry, and fridge. Be ruthless!!! Take all the seed oils and dump them!!! That's all the processed oils from plants. These are not doing you any good!!! Remove the sugar. Start reading labels. Don't buy anything that has more than 2 ingredients!! Engaging with these guidelines the food choices get interesting!! Meat, eggs, cheese, (dairy if you can) Fish, seasonal fruit. We use salt on our food. We cook in butter or tallow. Nutrient rich foods like these can sustain you, hunger pains go and life feels bigger and more alive. Nutrients from animal foods are 100% bioavailable, this means that the body, when digesting, can use all of the food, it wastes nothing!! Liver is nature's superfood, it is dense in essential vitamins, minerals, fatty acids that keep you sated and thriving. Drinking bone broth everyday provides you with enough collagen to help you recover from exercise, keeps you hair growing lustriously and keeps your skin glowing. So if you're feeling slow, sluggish, not thriving. If your gut health could be better, if your skin and hair are dull, I suggest you try switching to the Animal based, Ancestral way of eating. Try it for a month and see if you can transform your life. https://www.loom.com/share/4aa30417aab84ab9ad69d44c8a96dbce
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