Carb Cycling to lose weight - doing it right?

laura1_04

I've just created a carb cycle plan for myself to follow which i'm hoping is going to help me shred fat. I am currently 165lbs with a BMI of 23.5 and probably have about another 14lbs of fat to lose until i am where i want to be.

So my plan is...

Low carb days - 6 x a week (1250 cals)
- 40g carbs (10%)
- 165g protein (55%)
- 50g fat (35%)

High Carb day - 1 x a week (1500 cals)
- 188g carbs (50%)
- 94g protein (25%)
- 42g fat (25%)

Does anyone that is experienced with carb cycling know if this will be effective at keeping my metabolism up and avoiding plateau? Obviously the food i plan to eat will all be healthy fats/complex carbs/lean protein.

Thanks in advance for the help!

kalamitykate83

Ooooh I've been looking into carb cycling and posted earlier for more info about it so will keep an eye on this page to see what people say ... at the moment I'm averaging about 70g carbs, 50g fats and 135g proteins but wondering if a few days lower carbs would be good for fat lose too.

cajuntank

As mentioned on the other post @kalamitykate83 mentioned, carb cycling is just a protocol. Just like low carb, or Paleo, or intermittent fasting, or any other diet that has shown to have success in people losing weight (conditionally). They are all bound by the premise of offering a way to eat less calories without having to count calories for most. My statement of "conditionally" is that following any diet/protocol in where you eat more than you expend, you will gain weight. So for example, if you ate low carb and your maintenance is 2000 calories and you eat 2500 calories of meat, you would gain fat from over eating calories. People have success out of these diets because they find one that gets them started on eating less that they can better adhere to. Some like low carb, because they end up eating more fat and protein that are highly satiating (feeling full) and at the end of the day, eat less calories than they expend (for a while). Some like intermittent fasting, as you eat all of your food in a small window of time for the day. When you go that long without food for a day and do that for several days, your body blunts your hunger to help with not eating. So you still eat your calories needed in that small window, but since your hunger is blunted, most can't eat 2000 calories in one meal. So again, they eat less. Carb cycling is no different in that you are just manipulating your intake different everyday; which most would find too complicated to do. You still have to be on average in a caloric deficit to lose weight.

Now what carb cycling will help in is gym performance if you focus your heaviest intake of carbs around your training. Carbs are the preferred energy substrate of the body (and as long as you are eating less calories needed, then you will lose weight), so having energy readily available for training will let you train better (thus more, so more calories burned) and offer better recovery to train again.

OP. The only thing that will drive metabolism up is exercise and eating. When you reduce either of those two variables, you reduce your metabolism. That's how the body adapts to survive. Eating the foods you describe is great and will typically offer you greater food volume for calories to help keep you full and provide better micro-nutrients. But just realize that there is no difference from a weight loss perspective in eating 250 calories of pizza or 250 calories of broccoli. That's like asking the question, which is heavier... 10lbs bowling ball or 10lbs of feathers? They weigh the same, but the volume is extremely different. The same can be said with food.

ELiCiT23

cajuntank wrote: »

As mentioned on the other post @kalamitykate83 mentioned, carb cycling is just a protocol. Just like low carb, or Paleo, or intermittent fasting, or any other diet that has shown to have success in people losing weight (conditionally). They are all bound by the premise of offering a way to eat less calories without having to count calories for most. My statement of "conditionally" is that following any diet/protocol in where you eat more than you expend, you will gain weight. So for example, if you ate low carb and your maintenance is 2000 calories and you eat 2500 calories of meat, you would gain fat from over eating calories. People have success out of these diets because they find one that gets them started on eating less that they can better adhere to. Some like low carb, because they end up eating more fat and protein that are highly satiating (feeling full) and at the end of the day, eat less calories than they expend (for a while). Some like intermittent fasting, as you eat all of your food in a small window of time for the day. When you go that long without food for a day and do that for several days, your body blunts your hunger to help with not eating. So you still eat your calories needed in that small window, but since your hunger is blunted, most can't eat 2000 calories in one meal. So again, they eat less. Carb cycling is no different in that you are just manipulating your intake different everyday; which most would find too complicated to do. You still have to be on average in a caloric deficit to lose weight.

Now what carb cycling will help in is gym performance if you focus your heaviest intake of carbs around your training. Carbs are the preferred energy substrate of the body (and as long as you are eating less calories needed, then you will lose weight), so having energy readily available for training will let you train better (thus more, so more calories burned) and offer better recovery to train again.

OP. The only thing that will drive metabolism up is exercise and eating. When you reduce either of those two variables, you reduce your metabolism. That's how the body adapts to survive. Eating the foods you describe is great and will typically offer you greater food volume for calories to help keep you full and provide better micro-nutrients. But just realize that there is no difference from a weight loss perspective in eating 250 calories of pizza or 250 calories of broccoli. That's like asking the question, which is heavier... 10lbs bowling ball or 10lbs of feathers? They weigh the same, but the volume is extremely different. The same can be said with food.

^^^ this!
I'm on a carb cycle now, and always diet doing a carb cycle to maintain the most muscle that I can. It works great for me.
High carb should be on the days of biggest muscle/intense work out. You should add one more high carb day in my opinion and maybe one moderate carb day.
Carb cycle is all I do to diet.

halaghh

I've lost about 23 pounds on the turbo cycle. I usually eat about 1100 calories on low carb days and 1300 on high carb days.