CrossFit and Food Neurosis: ‘There is a Point in Nutrition at Which You Can Be Done’ (EP. 026)
The CrossFit Podcast
CrossFit LLC
4.3 • 757 Ratings
🗓️ 5 August 2025
⏱️ 82 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
EC Synkowski joins Denise Thomas to talk about CrossFit, food, and how to cut through the confusion. EC is the founder of OptimizeMe Nutrition and the creator of the 800g Challenge, but her insights go way beyond a single method. They cover why some of us slide into food neurosis, how to know when your diet is actually “done,” and the biggest mistakes people make when chasing health.
EC also discusses the role of processed foods, challenges common rhetoric about carbs and seed oils, and breaks down her 10 principles of nutrition, which serve as the backbone of her Three Pillars Method. This is an episode about simplifying nutrition, ditching dogma, and learning to trust what works.
Episode Topics
- Food neurosis and how to bounce back
- How to know when your nutrition is “done”
- The role of processed foods in modern health problems
- The power of simplicity and sustainability in diet design
- EC’s Three Pillars Method and how it builds on CrossFit’s foundation
- The 10 principles of nutrition
Resources Mentioned
- The Consistency Project (EC’s podcast)
- OptimizeMe Nutrition
- The 800g Challenge
- Three Pillars Method App
- Street Parking podcast episode with EC
Community Highlight
Aaron Hoff is using CrossFit to change more than lives — he’s changing an entire island.
Born and raised on Kauaʻi, Aaron knows the grip of addiction firsthand. By his early 20s, he was in active addiction and suicidal. But one Christmas Eve, he hit a turning point. He’s now 27 years sober.
In 2013, he opened his first CrossFit gym. Today, through the Keala Foundation, he runs two affiliates focused on keeping kids out of the cycle he escaped.
The gyms are free for youth. Each class starts and ends with a “word of the day” — like honesty or integrity — and a coach-led reflection. “Words are the tools that help you process trauma,” Aaron says. “If you don’t understand the language, you’re lost.”
He reaches over 500 kids a year. Some stay for years. Some become coaches.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Yeah, I mean, it's all of the stuff that I fell for. Like, again, I didn't eat a banana for three years because of blood sugar spikes. I thought grains were all killing us. I thought seed oils were a problem. And it turns out when you go to the literature, all of that is incorrect. What do we need to know about carbohydrates? The dose of carbohydrates for most Americans is entirely too high. Turns out, you actually have to like your |
| 0:21.9 | diet to stick to it. Welcome back, everyone. This is the CrossFit podcast. I'm your host, Denise Thomas, |
| 0:31.8 | and today we're joined by the founder of Optimize Me Nutrition, Eva Claire Sankowski. Now, most of you know her |
| 0:39.4 | as EC, the creator of the 800 gram challenge, but that only scratches the service to EC's |
| 0:46.0 | brilliance or effectiveness, unmatched honesty about the world of nutrition. And she has the history |
| 0:52.6 | to back it up. And as a long-serving member of the |
| 0:55.8 | CrossFit community she gets us she really understands the struggle and the neurosis that just |
| 1:03.1 | loves to accompany us on this path to optimal fitness and health but lucky for us she has all |
| 1:10.3 | the answers yes all the. And I think you're |
| 1:13.8 | going to want to hear them. So, E.C., thank you for joining us today and welcome to the show. |
| 1:18.5 | I don't know about all the answers, Denise, but I am very happy to be here and happy to be speaking |
| 1:22.2 | with you. This is your stomping grounds, really. I mean, you started not on the CrossFit podcast, but with CrossFit. |
| 1:28.8 | So welcome back in some ways. Yes. It feels like home in some ways for sure. Yeah. All right. |
| 1:34.4 | So what are we talking about today? I like to get right into it. I think we all share this common |
| 1:39.3 | feeling of we want to eat the right things to get the results we want. And in an effort to do that, we can create this whole world of neurosis behind nutrition. |
| 1:50.4 | And my first question for you would be, is this quest in, quote, getting it right, |
| 1:56.6 | making us overly neurotic about how we should be more healthy and fit? Yes. Yes, it is. End of question. Next question. No, I think there's this huge push to always be 1% better. And in fact, we even have it in the CrossFit community a little bit. Of course, we're always chasing improvements in our fitness. We always like to see the pull-ups increase. We always like to see our running times decrease, all of that stuff. And it's true and it's wonderful. But I do think there is a |
| 2:20.2 | point in nutrition in which you can be done. It doesn't mean you're done in the sense of you get to have popcorn and beer every night. You do have to continue to eat the right dose of foods. And I'm sure we're going to talk about that. But there is a point at which there is no more 1% to be |
| 2:17.2 | had in nutrition, that it's more of, |
| 2:35.4 | I've figured out the diet that works for me in CrossFitters case to optimize my fitness, |
| 2:39.7 | and I'm going to continue to do that day in and day out. And there's no more, you know, |
| 2:44.6 | most optimal combination of fruits and vegetables to be had. There's no more I now have to have |
... |
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