Heat G Ray Allen at lightest since college thanks to paleo diet
The 'best shape of his life' stories are out in full force now that NBA training camps are underway, but perhaps the most interesting story belongs to 38-year old Ray Allen.
Allen claims to be at his lowest playing weight since his college days, way back in 1996 when he was 20. He is currently tipping the scales at 197 pounds.
The He Got Game star switched his diet to what's known as a paleolithic diet to help him trim down this offseason.
The diet, according to the website for The Paleo Diet book series, "is based upon the fundamental concept that the optimal diet is the one to which we are genetically adapted." In very basic layman terms, Allen cut out carbs and sugars to focus on meat and vegetables.
That sounds a little inconvenient but not that bad, though Allen indicated there was an adjustment period:
"The first three or four days, it was a task because I was getting headaches, my body felt like achy, but I just started living on salads and fruit and protein and salmon and chicken and I didn’t have soda, any Gatorade. I had unsweetened iced tea and water and that’s it.”
Allen has always been a fitness freak, which is probably why he's already 14th all-time in minutes played in the NBA. The extra dedication this year is with the intention of limiting the effects of aging, possibly allowing Allen to repeat last year's 79-game, 26-minute workload.
The 17-year veteran averaged a career-low 10.9 points in 2012-13 but still hit 41.9 percent on threes.
He is, in two words, the best.