Have you ever looked at the back of most fish oil containers? They recommend taking about two to four capsules a day.
Yeah, right. I like to eat between 20 and 40 grams of fish oil every day. It’s funny, when I see that amount, I don’t think twice, but the average person absolutely freaks out. “That’s crazy! Isn’t that way too much!?” And then they go back to eating their slice of pizza containing 20 grams of fat alone.
What I’m trying to spell out is: 20 grams of fish oil is not much at all. 40 is the maximum of what I’ll go to, but it’s really not that much more — especially when you’re on a diet that requires eating
200-plus grams of fat a day.
My reasoning behind eating this much fish oil is simple. Evolutionarily speaking, we ate a diet much higher in omega 3s than what is consumed today. Not only were wild meats naturally much higher in omega 3 content (as is the case with any naturally “grass-fed” meat sold in a supermarket), but our eating habits led to consuming more omega 3-rich parts of animals. Our early human ancestors would often be subjugated to eating the scraps left by other predators, which included bone marrow and brains, both very high in omega 3.
We would consume from 300 to 400 grams of omega 3 fatty acids every week as hunter-gatherers, all from natural sources. Corn-fed meats today, as well as farm-raised fish, contain a minuscule fraction of the omega 3 content of their natural, grass-fed (or wild) counterparts. What this means is that, now, naturally occurring omega 3s in our diets are very, very rare.
And most people scoff at supplementing with more than 20 grams of fish oil per week?
When I eat 20 to 45 grams of fish oil a day, I feel absolutely fantastic. My body reacts very well. You can’t go anywhere on any nutritional web site without reading about the benefits of omega 3s, so I won’t spell it out here, but I will tell you this: eating what are considered large doses of it will only benefit you, not harm you. I personally argue that eating small doses is more likely to cause you harm than anything else.
I recommend using Carlson’s Fish Oil, which is a lemon-flavored oil, not a capsule-based product. I use two or three tablespoons of it a day. Without Carlson’s, I would be having to down a lot of capsules.
My thoughts on fish oil are based on material I’ve read by the great coach Charles Poliquin. Much of this post is paraphrased from some of his material found here.
