Rules: Choosing Your Level

Choosing Your Level

You can participate in the Challenge at one of three levels. Your level determines the nutrition rules you will follow. You will begin each day with 5 points, and you will lose a point  each time you eat a serving of food that is non-compliant based on your nutrition level.

You cannot change levels once the Challenge begins, so choose wisely. For a comparison chart of the three nutrition levels and all the food lists, both omnivore and vegan/vegetarian, click here.

The three nutrition levels are:

Performance—The strictest level of the WLC. If you already have good eating habits that you just want to fine tune, have athletic or performance-related goals, or have a pressing health or inflammation condition that you'd like to address, choose this level. The basic rules for this level (with a couple exceptions) are: no grains, no sugar, no dairy, no soda, no alcohol, and no artificial ingredients.

So what can you eat? Fish, poultry, beef, vegetables, fruit, nuts, seeds, oils and sweet potatoes. Think of it as a short-term acceleration program. While elements of it can be adapted to your daily life post-Challenge, maintaining it over the long term would be difficult and maybe not even necessary.

Lifestyle—A good choice if you are looking for a long-term lifestyle nutrition program. This is a great start to a sustainable practice of living a healthy lifestyle. Maintaining it to a "T" post-Challenge might be difficult, but it represents something much more adaptable to a long-term program than the Performance Level. It will allow additional options in each of the five main WLC nutrition categories. Long-term compliance will still be challenging, but sticking to the nutrition requirements for 6 weeks is manageable for most.

Kick Start—A great place to start if you're new to the health and fitness game and need to make some big moves, to get started going in the right direction. Kickstart cuts out what your mom might call “junk.” This level gives you one or two things to eliminate in each of the five main WLC nutrition categories. You can eliminate more, but by starting with these over six weeks, you’ll be off to a great start. If you are just starting to make a lifestyle change, this level will definitely be a challenge that can deliver amazing results.

For a complete list of foods that are non-compliant at each level, see the Nutrition Comparison Chart.