Thanks Al, I wasn’t trying to be provocative. Always good to chat these through.
JB! Your statements makes me curious. What does your diet look like? This is meant as a friendly question.
My default is an animal-based diet. However, I’m neither strict nor dogmatic about it. In practice, this works out at 1-2 meals a day, e.g. steak and eggs, ground beef, bacon, liver, maybe chicken and salmon less frequently. I am partial to cheese and things like salami, which I try to control given energy density and nitrates. However, I still drink coffee, have the odd mouthful of veg, bit of fruit, or meat that has been cooked in a sauce, etc. Further, I do take planned breaks and will eat other things and partake of a glass or three.
Prior to that, I ran a strict carnivore programme for months last year (minus the coffee bit) and got into close to the best condition I have ever been in. However, I did not go into it blinded by the words of others - either for or against such a protocol. I researched it and made a conscious choice to give it a proper road test in the belief it was probably both safe and effective. And apart from the positive body composition changes, I received very positive blood work results. The latter alone demonstrated to me on a very personal level just how flawed the current view is around cholesterol, CVD, etc, which I have gone into countless times before on this forum and don’t intend to drag out again.
I confess I am not as motivated these days to be as strict, however, by doing so I enjoy a better life balance. I also do not think it precludes me from commenting on what I perceive to be an inaccurate account of ketogenic diets written by a well-respected coach and endorsed by the moderator of this forum.
2 Likes
Yes, but contrary to what you’ve implied, among the many intravascular substances the body subjects to homeostasis, glucose levels are not tightly controlled–they routinely run an order of magnitude above normal in type II diabetics, for example. (Try running a K+ level 10x normal and see what happens.) Hardly the response of an evolved system to a ‘toxin’–not if the word toxin is to be anything but a scare-word, that is.
You have suggested that, in the article under discussion, CT bent the truth to suit his personal biases. Which is ironic, because you seem to be doing the same thing.
1 Like
I’m not implying anything here, I have tried to set out my understanding of what seems to be fairly well-established in physiology. If I’ve got it wrong, I’m happy to be corrected. What I am not doing is indulging in any little thought experiments, like the one you proceeded to lay out, or attempting to scaremonger by using emotive terms.
Again, ditto. I purposely copy/pasted a quote from the article presented as ‘fact’ and challenged it rationally. I don’t care who the author is and have made no mention of their motives, etc. If you want to read in some sort of agenda then that is your prerogative.
Well, so many things in the article to disagree with. Just to name a few:
- “You can use fat for fuel without being in ketosis. In fact, you could eat 1000 grams of carbs per day and still use fat for fuel.” Really? Please show me that behemoth who eats 4000 kcal in carbs only (not counting for protein and fat) and still able to mobilize, transport and oxidize fat . Insulin inhibits fat mobilization.
- “Sure, eating a caloric deficit will lead to weight loss, and – provided your protein intake is high and you train hard – most of that will be fat loss”. Wishful thinking. CT should have known better that this is not the case for those athletes who have a low bodyfat to start with and try to reduce it even further: in an attempt to go from 10% to 7% bodyfat, for instance, one will inevitably lose more muscle mass vs fat than the one who goes from 20% to 15%. It’s just how our body tries to survive.
Maybe Hafthor Bjornssen? At his peak weight, he was consuming 8,000+ calories per day while training. Certainly Micheal Phelps when he was competing. Supposedly ate 10-12,000 calories a day (and probably a huge amount of carbs).
Apparently runners fuelled on glucose have been shown to be light ketosis after a marathon. This has been explained by the fact glycogen storage capacity is relatively limited coupled with the fact they are unable to adequately refill said stores during the race, despite chugging on the gels, etc. So, while the idea of being able to burn fat while still consuming of a huge amount of carbohydrates is credible, in ‘normal’ circumstances it does not happen that way. Instead, in the presence of insulin, triglycerides are more likely to shuttled into adipose tissue while the body metabolises the glucose. Of course, again in ‘normal’ circumstances, high carbohydrate loads, where the total energy cannot be metabolised nor stored as glycogen, will result in the excess being stored as triglycerides.
Have you ever heard of a marathon runner skipping carbohydrates in favor for fat, as fuel?
A co-worker of mine is an Ironman triathlete who eats varied, but ingest lots of carbs. And yes, this person is also a dietician.
I have learned that endurance athletes develop/adapt the ability to burn fat at a greater rate than the common man. This does not rule out the necessity of carbs, but nevertheless an interesting question re fats.
Phinney and Volek have cited various individuals.
I noted recently George St Pierre has adopted an animal based diet, which was interesting given his background. He noted almost immediate improvement in a long standing injury, which was likely related to inflammation from plants.
I believe the attraction for endurance athletes is the abundance of energy from fat versus the limitations of glycogen. Another factor is digestion.
EDIT - yes, that’s one of the principal outcomes of the Volek Phinney work with low carb athletes. The rate of fat burning easily broke the previously believed ceiling of 1g a minute, and was closer to 1.6g in the fat adapted group.
I would be very skeptical accepting claims that Phelps consumed 10-12,000 kcal when competing. I don’t know about you, gentlemen, but due to the fact that I have to follow a restrictive diet with limited food items, I know exactly how much food I eat when consuming 2,100-2,200 kcal spread in 4 meals, 2,500-2,600 kcal in 5 meals and 3,000 kcal in 6 meals. 10,000-12,000 kcal means tripling and quadrupling that. Note that I opt for low volume & highly concentrated foods like dried fruit and fruits as the only source of carbs, meat, eggs, cheese and milk & egg protein as protein sources, and fatty cuts of meats, eggs, butter as the sources of fat. Such regime allows me not to feel bloated and do not stretch my stomach which is, as is commonly stated, the size of our two fists. As far as I remember, Phelps did eat a lot of more voluminous foods (including pizzas, sandwiches etc.); however, he never looked like having a bloated / extended stomach and was very slim in his midsection. I am fully aware that Olympic athletes are superhumans with top-notch physiology, digestion and pharmaceutical support, but I don’t believe in the figures cited above. That’s simply too much food, even if half of it is in liquid form. 5,000-6,000 kcal is more realistic amount. In relation to Hafthor Bjornssen: looking at his midsection I can agree that he can consume 8k+ kcal a day - his physique (midsection in particular) shows it.
10K-12K was the headline number from some articles that google pulled up, but I’m sure they were not researched well, and very likely represent a considerable exaggeration.
There was some research published recently which suggested that there is an upper limit to how much energy a human can sustainably expend, and the number was something like 2.5 times the resting metabolic rate. So a 200-250 lb muscular man could have a resting metabolic rate in excess of 2,000 which would make 5,000 calories expended a realistic possibility. With 4,000 calories of ingested carbs, there would be room for, and a need for energy from fat.
I will say that CT over-reached a bit with the 1,000 grams per day number. Certainly that would lead to serious overfeeding in most people. But probably not in some extreme cases.
During the training for the 2008 Olympics, Phelps was swimming 5 hours a day 50 miles per week and he claims during that time he was consuming 10,000 calories per day
Since his retirement, he no longer consumes this many calories as he would not need to
What’s not being accounted for in this discussion of Phelp’s daily caloric expenditure is the portion stemming from being submerged in very cold water for 6-8 hrs, which was considerable.
1 Like
Where do you get the “very cold” part? Was he swimming out in the North Atlantic Ocean?!
Yeah, that’s it.