John McCallum’s Definition Diet

 

     There really is nothing new under the bodybuilding, strength-gaining sun.  One of the proofs of that is John McCallum’s Definition Diet, which he wrote about in 1968 (at least, that’s where the information for this article comes from).  Actually, John McCallum himself is proof.  All you have to do is read his “The Complete Keys to Progress,” a compilation of his articles from Strength and Health that he wrote throughout the ‘60s, and discover that McCallum wrote about every single training theory, technique, program, or bodybuilding diet more than 50 years ago.  Randall J. Strossen—of “Super Squats” fame and the founder of IronMind Enterprises—said that if you were to only read one book, ever, on how to train, that book would be it.  I think he wrote that in the ‘90s, but I seriously doubt that he’s changed his opinion in 2024.

     When I started bodybuilding in the ‘80s, I think it’s safe to say that pretty much everyone who aspired to have an aesthetic physique—to have some muscle mass but also some definition—ate a diet of 60% carbohydrates, 30% protein, and 10% fat.  There were probably still some bodybuilders around who didn’t eat in such a manner, guys who began their training in the ‘60s or the ‘70s when physique athletes were less concerned with fat intake.  Occasionally you might hear, or read, about a high-fat, low-carb diet, but these were considered, by and large, a remnant of a bodybuilding past that was best forgotten.

     Then, sometime in 1992, I came across an article in IronMan magazine written by Greg Zulak called the “The Pork Chop Diet.”  In it, you ate an extremely high-fat, high-protein, and zero carbohydrate diet Monday through Friday, followed by a “refeed” of high-carb eating on Saturday and Sunday.  The diet was the brainchild of Dr. Mauro di Pasquale (who at that time was the doctor for the athletes in the World Bodybuilding Federation, Vince McMahon’s attempt to compete with the IFBB).  Later, the good doctor renamed the diet to the much more appealing “Anabolic Diet,” which is what it’s still known as today.

     I got fantastic results with the Anabolic Diet.  My training partner Dusty got even better results.  I had already been experimenting with adding a little more fat to some of my meals, anyway, and was probably eating at that point a diet closer to 50% carbs, 30% protein, and 20% fat.  It turns out that you need more than 10% of your daily caloric intake from fat in order for your hormones, testosterone being one of them, to function properly.  But the Anabolic Diet seemed like a revelation.  It shouldn’t have.  Vince Gironda had long touted this form of eating, and so had—it turns out—John McCallum.  I just didn’t read much McCallum until this century, which is a real shame, because he is everything that Strossen chalked him up to be.

     Here is McCallum’s advice for getting ripped from the March, 1968 issue of Strength and Health magazine:

     The secret of the diet is this—eliminate carbohydrates. Don’t reduce them. Eliminate them. Eliminate them completely.

     There are several diets around—the Air Force diet, the drinking man's diet, etc—based on the idea of reducing your carbohydrate intake to 55 or 60 grams per day. I'm not talking about that. I mean eliminate carbohydrates completely while you're on the diet.

     You don't cut calories. You don't even count them. You don't restrict the amount of food you eat. You simply don't eat any carbohydrates at all.

     So much for what you don't eat. Let's talk now about what you do eat.

     You can eat beef. All you want. Steaks, roasts, hamburger; boiled, fried, chipped, dried, corned, raw if you like it that way; short ribs, sweetbreads, tongue, tripe. Any kind of beef you like and as much as you want.

     You can eat pork. Chops, roast, sausage, ham, bacon, spareribs. Eat all you want.

     You can eat poultry. Chicken, turkey, goose, pheasant, duck. Fry it, roast it, any way you like it.

     You can eat most seafood. Salmon, fresh or canned. Catfish, codfish, flounder, halibut, haddock, pickerel, mackerel, tuna, herring, perch, shad, sturgeon. trout. Clams, lobster, crab, shrimp, mussels. Squid, if you can gag it down.

     You can eat lamb if you want. Or veal if you like it. Butter, eggs, bulk cheese. Frog legs if they appeal to you. Caviar if you can afford it.

     You can have rabbit, mutton, unsaturated oils, and black tea or coffee.

     As you can see, the foods without carbohydrates, with the exception of the tea and coffee, are mostly protein and highly nutritious. They're also fairly high in calories. You'll stay well nourished on the definition diet. Your energy level will stay high and there'll be none of the discomforts that go with a straight low calorie diet.

     Some people find the diet a bit monotonous after a while. That's something you'll just have to put up with. Actually, if you're imaginative enough, the diet can be quite varied and very satisfying.

     Let me give you some sample menus:

Breakfast - Ham or bacon: All you want. Eggs: As many as you like; boiled, fried, poached, scrambled, it doesn't matter.

Lunch - Alaska black cod: Boiled. Pour melted butter over it and eat all you want. Black tea.

Supper - Steamed clams: Drink the nectar and eat as many as you like. Steak: The biggest one you can afford with a side order of spareribs. Bulk cheese. Black coffee.

     Remember that condiments and sauces are classed here as carbohydrates.

     Don't eat between meals. Eat enough at mealtime and you won't have to.

     You don't have to eat the most expensive cuts of meat. The cheaper cuts are just as good. Play around with various combinations of food. You should be able to come up with enough interesting meals to keep boredom from setting in.

     Take protein, vitamin-mineral, some form of wheat germ oil, and supplements. Get the best quality you can afford. You'll find enough variety in the supplements listed in this magazine to fill the bill quite nicely.

     Don't fudge on the supplements. They're very important. Take the protein in the recommended amounts. Take the vitamin-mineral and the oil in three times the recommended amounts.

     The carbohydrate-free diet, like running, is a new wrinkle among weight trainees. It's not widely known yet. Don't waste any time getting on the bandwagon. Start the diet tomorrow and see the results for yourself.*

     McCallum’s other key to fat loss was sprinting.  He wrote in one of his articles—and it appears in “The Complete Keys to Progress”—that the key to getting ripped is to combine sprinting with his definition diet.

     And if you’re wondering what the “drinking man’s diet” is, it’s exactly what it sounds like.  In fact, it might be the original “popular” low-carb diet.  A book with the same name was written in 1964 and, with it, all you have to do is keep your carbs low, eat all the protein in sight, and then, of course, wash it down with some low-carb booze to end the day.

     The Air Force diet—also known as the military diet—is a diet used at one time by, you guessed it, our boys in fatigues to get in shape relatively fast.  With it, you basically ate low-calorie, low-carb, high-protein for 3 days out of the week, followed by a more sensible diet the remaining four.  You continued this way until you got down the weight you, or the military, desired.

     McCallum didn’t recommend that you stay on his definition diet indefinitely.  As with Gironda’s “steak and eggs diet” (or even Gironda’s “36-eggs-a-day diet”) before and after him, McCallum wanted you to use this to get really lean periodically throughout the year, and then return to a more “traditional” strength diet that included some wholesome carbohydrates.  But as with all of McCallum’s programs and writings, it’s still just as effective today as it was when he first penned it.

*All italicized quotes of McCallum’s are from the article “The Definition Diet,” in the March, 1968 edition of Strength and Health magazine.