The Pizza Diet

It's every pizza lovers dream come true, losing weight and staying fit by eating only... slices of pizza? It sounds insane, but one guy is serious about proving pizza-diet doubters wrong.

Matt McClellan is the first guy we know that's ever been on the pizza-only diet, in fact, he invented it. You see he is sort of a "dough boy," not in the overweight way, he's actually a pizza maker with a fire that burned inside him hotter than his pizza shop's oven.

"I'm going to prove to America that pizza is healthy," McClellan proclaims.

To make his pizza point, he recently committed to eating nothing but pizza, including the crust! The whole idea started after getting scorned at his local gym for offering free samples to promote his pizza shop.

"They were mad. They couldn't believe I would bring pizza to a gym," McClellan says. "They thought I was the most evil thing that they've seen."

McClellan set out to prove pizza is not just round, but that it could also be a well rounded diet. So he invented the "Pizza Diet," a 30-day "pizza-only" meal plan to stay healthy and fit.

He says it's actually pretty simple, "Eight slices total. This is one full day of nutrition right here."

The 8 slices a day stack up to 2,500 calories. He was so serious about the whole thing, McClellan even consulted with a diet and nutrition team to watch over him. Christopher Jackson, PhD, DOM, a nutrition specialist assured him: "You're getting the food groups of protein, carbs, and fat."

Over the 30 days, McClellan says his pizza plan was pretty precise, he carefully chose the toppings and ate them like clockwork, "First slice would be about 9am in the morning. And, my last slice would be at 9pm at night."

Sure sounds like a tasty dieting option but The American Dietetic Association's "Good Food and Nutrition Guide" dismisses eating "one-food-only diets." It says they flat out don't work in keeping weight off.

But unlike other one-food diets, the pizza-only plan has some serious diversity, McClellan started with plain cheese, two slices of chicken and meat at mid-day, broccoli-chicken at two, BBQ chicken at six, a veggie slice at seven, and wrap-up with tomato-mozzarella at nine. He says, "It was about a twelve hour process for eight slices. About two-and-a-half hours per slice."

McClellan says his goal is to just deliver a strong message from his pizza pulpit, "I preached, and I preached about balance and nutrition, portion control."

But enough preaching pizza... what about the results? Well here's the skinny, literally:

During the diet McClellan says he routinely had his blood tested. And some of the results shocked even his nutrition consultant, Christopher Jackson, PhD, DOM.

"I was really surprised, especially after the first 30-day period at the results," Dr. Jackson says. "Not just the weight loss, but the cholesterol results."

Pound for pound, pizza faired pretty well, McClellan says he actually raised his good cholesterol and lowered the bad, and claims he dropped 25 pounds.

"I lowered my cholesterol 86 points, lowered blood pressure, lost 10 percent body fat," he happily announces.

But before all you pizza lovers rejoice, there is a caveat and it's bigger than an extra large pie.

McClellan wasn't just lifting slices; he was also lifting weights and doing lots of cardio. During the 30-day pizza diet, he boosted his workouts to a whopping 60 minutes a day, alternating a day of cardio with a day of weight-lifting. Plus, along with all the pies, there was McClellan's Zen-like focus. He describes it as: "Mind control. It's commitment to yourself, and its execution, following through with your plans."

In the end, the whole Pizza Diet experiment may have won him some converts. McClellan says he's no longer shooed away at the gym. And now he wants to publish a book on his pizza diet plan, sounds like a real page turner!

And one day he wants to tour the country in an RV promoting it... which sounds a little cheesy. His grand plan is to one day rival Subway's Jared, and finally prove pizza is healthier than eating a sub, which frankly sounds even cheesier.

Matt McClellan owns a pizzeria in St. Petersburg, Fla. If you're not in his neighborhood you can visit him at www.tourdepizza.com where he has a blog about his 30-day pizza binge.

Full disclosure: Writer Ray Parisi is obsessed with pizza, but not diets. And from NYC to Naples he's eaten a lot of pizza in his life, and for some reason he even records it on video: http://bit.ly/2fAfZU