A few other points I didn’t touch on in the video…
I think fruits and starchy vegetables are perfectly fine foods but they’re not very macro-nutrient dense and thus not a good sole source of carbohydrates for physically active people.
People who cannot eat wheat due to gluten allergies can substitute it for plenty of other healthy grains like brown rice, wild rice, amaranth, quinoa and many others.
This video is not a condemnation of the paleo diet but rather an analysis of why it may not be ideal for all population types, particularly physically active people who rely on glycogen as a fuel source.
To give some further analysis which I didn’t cover in this video, I think theoretically if you live a lightly active or sedentary lifestyle then a low carb diet is a viable option. Our body can convert other substrates like fat and protein into glucose in the liver via gluconeogenesis to ensure we have at least minimal glucose and glyocgen stores in our body for basal metabolism.
When we break down glycogen it forms a byproduct, pyruvate which can be recycled back into ATP through the kreb cycle. Problem is, you need oxygen to do that so if you’re exercising above the lactate threshold (the point which you can no longer use oxygen, anaerobic exercise) then you need glycogen to generate ATP.
If you’re doing anaerobic exercise and you have sufficient glycogen stores then lactate build up can be moved to the liver and converted back into glucose, if you run out of glycogen though then it turns into lactic acid. For those who don’t know what that is, it’s the burn you feel at the gym that prevents you from lifting more.
So I really think looking at bioenergetics you really cannot effectively neglect carbs if you’re an athlete. I think the majority of people whose health improved when switching to the paleo diet probably had an objectively bad diet and would’ve lost weight all the same if they had chosen better sources of carbohydrates, and used a better training program.
For bodybuilders in the cutting phase I think a paleo diet could be useful though since for every gram of carbs you need 3-4 grams of water for retention so a low carb diet can give you a harder look.
Lactic acid burn is bro-science. If a person actually exceeded their bodies ability to metabolize it, they have more problems than strength training will solve.
[quote]Nards wrote:
I tried eating paleo, or at least low carb, for a few weeks about 10 years ago.
Now I know why cavemen were so angry and hostile all the time, because they hadn’t had pasta or bread since the beginning of time.[/quote]
Paleo =/= Low Carb
But I get that you were just trying to make a joke.
Sorry for ruining it.
Good joke.
[quote]Nards wrote:
It’s true, I never really did paleo, that’s because I couldn’t even do low carb…so paleo would extinct me right out of the picture.[/quote]
Lol
You don’t have to be low carb to be paleo
