thoughts on low carb diets?
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Both your examples are flawed.
It should be clear from the examples given that I'm comparing two persons, same level of fitness, different loads (weight). If you want to compare different persons at different levels of fitness why are we having a conversation on an inane premise? Even at 255 I could beat some 150 pound chain smokers. That is not the point of this discussion, a discussion you launched, not I.
As a very fit mountaineer in my day I can assure you the examples are not flawed. I could cover two or three times the ground carrying nothing but a day pack (often running while doing so) than I could if carrying an expedition pack fully laden. No amount of additional training would close that delta. I don't have to imagine this, I've lived this.
At the risk of boring you with yet another example, you can demonstrate the impact of weight on yourself tomorrow. Carry a car tire around the block five times and time yourself. Repeat, only this time with a bicycle tire. Let us know the result. Go ahead and train all you want for a year and repeat. Let us know how that goes.
The primary determinant in energy expenditure is not fitness but weight. Fitness and training can impact speed, but the major factor in energy consumption is weight.
As for basic physics... Simply moving 40 or 60 or 100 extra pounds consumes a great deal (roughly linear) more energy. If the number of calories required to run 1km is roughly equal to body weight in kg, to run the marathon:- Heavier me: 115 * 42.195km = 4852 calories
- Current me: 86 * 42.195km = 3629 calories
- Goal me: 68 * 42.195km = 2869 calories
Just fuelling the larger mass machine is a problem let alone anything else.
Of course it is worse than it seems, since the heavier person is almost undoubtedly less aerobically fit than the lighter person (even if the same person) and thus energy expenditure will be correspondingly higher. Moving a lumbering body will impact running economy (form / gait / stride length ) where the more lithe runner can and almost certainly will gain in this area.
Regardless of fitness, the body expends energy to activate muscles to arrange its frame to support the weight of the load (body) and this is the primary factor in energy expenditure in determining the cost of running; not speed, not training.
Conversely, as the fatter person becomes less fat, they burn less calories covering the same distance. And as that same person becomes more aerobically fit, energy expenditure likewise drops.
Running performance improvements due to weight loss are not solely the concern of the heavy - elite runners trimming body fat in advance of racing season look to see roughly a 1 minute marathon time gain per pound of body fat reduced. For an already lean bunch, a couple of pounds matter. (Matt Fitzgerald, Racing Weight and innumerable elite runner blogs. Check. It. Out.).
For a not so lean person (but on his way), you bet 40 pounds matters. You need to argue against the laws of physics to argue otherwise.0 -
Sabine_Stroehm wrote: »iluvstrwbrries wrote: »Those food pyramids are just wrong.
This is the Nutrition Australia Healthy Eating Pyramid.
http://nutritionaustralia.org/national/resource/healthy-eating-pyramid
That's because it's not the standard food pyramid...it's a low carb food pyramid.
This is low carb? How?
My response was regarding MY low carb food pyramid. Not their standard food pyramid
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iluvstrwbrries wrote: »Those food pyramids are just wrong.
This is the Nutrition Australia Healthy Eating Pyramid.
http://nutritionaustralia.org/national/resource/healthy-eating-pyramid
That's because it's not the standard food pyramid...it's a low carb food pyramid.
Why would you say that this is a low carb pyramid ?
Are you aware that the two lower levels are ALL carbohydrates....albeit complex and not the processed simple sugar, doughnut, white bread and other processed ones ?
This is when reading an entire thread is a good thing... The Aussie post was responding to my food pyramid post ...I advising them that my post was low carb not the standard she/he posted.0 -
iluvstrwbrries wrote: »iluvstrwbrries wrote: »Those food pyramids are just wrong.
This is the Nutrition Australia Healthy Eating Pyramid.
http://nutritionaustralia.org/national/resource/healthy-eating-pyramid
That's because it's not the standard food pyramid...it's a low carb food pyramid.
Why would you say that this is a low carb pyramid ?
Are you aware that the two lower levels are ALL carbohydrates....albeit complex and not the processed simple sugar, doughnut, white bread and other processed ones ?
This is when reading an entire thread is a good thing... The Aussie post was responding to my food pyramid post ...I advising them that my post was low carb not the standard she/he posted.
And I was posting my "thoughts on low carb" (the thread topic).
My next comments are not at you in particular:
No, I don't think "low carb will kill you".
I posted the food pyramid to show what is considered generally healthy by Nutrition Australia, whose purpose is nutrition, not shilling for industry, nor population-control or chemtrail-spraying.
If you need to eat low carb for medical reasons (such as diabetes) then THAT is healthy.
But I personally wouldn't be eating low carb unless a doctor advised that it would be better for me.
/my thoughts.0 -
I'd write post cards to random strangers to tell them about it.
LOL!
That's what I thought 65 pounds ago as it seemed like too steep a hill to climb at the time. It'll be much easier 40 pounds from now.
I don't think weight has anything to do with it or at least little to do with it. It's strength and training IMO. I watched a woman finish the Boston Marathon who looked to be overweight if not obese. She put in the time and the training. I like running sometimes but I would much prefer other kinds of activity. I run to accomplish it, but I am not a natural runner.
She'd have completed it faster if she hadn't been overweight.
For the same level of fitness, the lighter person will go farther, faster, when it comes to pretty much anything longer than sprinting distances.0 -
- Heavier me: 115 * 42.195km = 4852 calories
- Current me: 86 * 42.195km = 3629 calories
- Goal me: 68 * 42.195km = 2869 calories
Just fuelling the larger mass machine is a problem let alone anything else.
Factor in the speed at which the body can metabolize food intake - call it 300 calories/hour if sucking down Gu or etc - and you quickly run real hard into the painful realities of running out of energy if trying to go fast at size.
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I am definitely in the pro "lower carb" camp. I'm aiming for 30 - 35% total but try not to eat any highly refined carbs... as much as possible at least. That means no plain ol' bread and very little bread at all over the course of a week. I think I had three slices this week after many weeks of zero. No bagels (and I used to live on bagels). No tortillas as a rule. I will have some whole grain multi-grain porridge once in a while. Carbs from vegetables are ok and fruits too but more veges than fruits.
Fats I let float wherever they will go; they are usually my biggest macro. This doesn't worry me as they are generally healthy fats.
I'm losing 2kg a week, and have been for quite some time. I'm not finding the reduced carbs gets in the way of my running (I'll run more than 200km this month). I feel satiated... full even and I don't crave carbs at all.
So far the mix is working very well for me.
200km a month is nothing to write home about as a runner. It is not even at a competitive (for a rec runner) level. A lot of the studies on LCHF diets and endurance seem to use a very low V02 max.
Why so negative ?
It adds up to a little more than 6.6 km a day and is a heck of a lot more than most of the world's population runs every day. That it does not fit into the class of a High Performance Athlete does not matter, it is an excellent achievement on it's own. I would be very proud of every km/mile I ran and bet I am not the only one.
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I agree completely. This isn't a competitive thing. Most people, other than professional athletes and Olympians, run for health, fitness, or because they enjoy it.I am definitely in the pro "lower carb" camp. I'm aiming for 30 - 35% total but try not to eat any highly refined carbs... as much as possible at least. That means no plain ol' bread and very little bread at all over the course of a week. I think I had three slices this week after many weeks of zero. No bagels (and I used to live on bagels). No tortillas as a rule. I will have some whole grain multi-grain porridge once in a while. Carbs from vegetables are ok and fruits too but more veges than fruits.
Fats I let float wherever they will go; they are usually my biggest macro. This doesn't worry me as they are generally healthy fats.
I'm losing 2kg a week, and have been for quite some time. I'm not finding the reduced carbs gets in the way of my running (I'll run more than 200km this month). I feel satiated... full even and I don't crave carbs at all.
So far the mix is working very well for me.
200km a month is nothing to write home about as a runner. It is not even at a competitive (for a rec runner) level. A lot of the studies on LCHF diets and endurance seem to use a very low V02 max.
Why so negative ?
It adds up to a little more than 6.6 km a day and is a heck of a lot more than most of the world's population runs every day. That it does not fit into the class of a High Performance Athlete does not matter, it is an excellent achievement on it's own. I would be very proud for every km/mile I ran and bet I am not the only one.
FYI, there are some professional athletes on low carb diets. If Lebron James and Ray Allen can compete at the level they do while doing low carb, I think that proves you can do low carb and not have athletic performance suffer.
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lauraesh0384 wrote: »Personally, I love low carb and the benefits. I get to lose weight by eating delicious food. I don't experience that carb coma after eating. I have more energy. But the thing with low carb is you have to make it a change in lifestyle. You can't expect to drop x amount of weight and revert back to your old eating habits and not gain weight back. Honestly, I don't really miss bread, rice, pasta, pizza, etc. But even when I'm thinking, "pizza sounds really good right now", there's a low carb option for that. Low carb works, end of story. I went from 240 lbs to my current 175. The hardest part is being around people who eat carbs. You tell them you can't have something because it's high in carbs. "Oh, you're allowed a cheat day". Yes I am, but it's not worth it to throw away a few days of hard work, and then feeling like *kitten* afterwards because you ate a carb loaded meal.
Why do so many people when they speak of carbs only think of rice, pasta, processed white bread and pizza ? There is much more to carbohydrates. When I think of them I usually think of vegetables, fruit, legumes, pulses artesanal bread made from minimally and not chemically processed grains ( with that I think mostly of grain being ground into flour ) and without chemical additives.
Now after reading all of this thread I wonder if people speaking of lower or low carb diets actually all refer to the absence of rice, pasta, processed white bread and pizza, but otherwise eat carbs at the statistically normal rate ?
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iluvstrwbrries wrote: »iluvstrwbrries wrote: »Those food pyramids are just wrong.
This is the Nutrition Australia Healthy Eating Pyramid.
http://nutritionaustralia.org/national/resource/healthy-eating-pyramid
That's because it's not the standard food pyramid...it's a low carb food pyramid.
Why would you say that this is a low carb pyramid ?
Are you aware that the two lower levels are ALL carbohydrates....albeit complex and not the processed simple sugar, doughnut, white bread and other processed ones ?
This is when reading an entire thread is a good thing... The Aussie post was responding to my food pyramid post ...I advising them that my post was low carb not the standard she/he posted.
I have read the whole thread.
This is what you said:
" That's because it's not the standard food pyramid...it's a low carb food pyramid ".
There is no way to know that you were referring to your own low carb food pyramid. It is a general statement and to make it personal any of the words like " I, my, mine " are missing.
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Maybe after reading the on-topic posts the original poster, @jsands755, could come back to their thread and follow up with more info on their concern or more questions.0
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lauraesh0384 wrote: »Personally, I love low carb and the benefits. I get to lose weight by eating delicious food. I don't experience that carb coma after eating. I have more energy. But the thing with low carb is you have to make it a change in lifestyle. You can't expect to drop x amount of weight and revert back to your old eating habits and not gain weight back. Honestly, I don't really miss bread, rice, pasta, pizza, etc. But even when I'm thinking, "pizza sounds really good right now", there's a low carb option for that. Low carb works, end of story. I went from 240 lbs to my current 175. The hardest part is being around people who eat carbs. You tell them you can't have something because it's high in carbs. "Oh, you're allowed a cheat day". Yes I am, but it's not worth it to throw away a few days of hard work, and then feeling like *kitten* afterwards because you ate a carb loaded meal.
Why do so many people when they speak of carbs only think of rice, pasta, processed white bread and pizza ? There is much more to carbohydrates. When I think of them I usually think of vegetables, fruit, legumes, pulses artesanal bread made from minimally and not chemically processed grains ( with that I think mostly of grain being ground into flour ) and without chemical additives.
Now after reading all of this thread I wonder if people speaking of lower or low carb diets actually all refer to the absence of rice, pasta, processed white bread and pizza, but otherwise eat carbs at the statistically normal rate ?
I think some of the "low carb" people are really just moderate carb.
I think others switched to low carb from the SAD, so probably never really ate much in the way of fruits and veggies or whole grains or legumes, etc. That's why I find the constant claim that low carb is healthier slightly irritating--it might be healthier than the way they used to eat, but it's not healthier than the higher carb diets that are typically recommended or that many of us here prefer.
And there are definitely some low carb and paleo types on MFP who are anti legumes and whole grains (as well as refined) and fruit, and even some extreme low carbers who seem to be anti veggie (one I think of who seems to get an insane percentage of his diet from coconut oil and yet slam eating carbs as unhealthy).0 -
The original post:
thoughts on low carb diets?I lose weight easily, but i'm worried about health effects.
What available studies exist on the topic haven't shown any negative health effects.
Of course you need to define what "low carb" means to you in the context of your question, but you've gone silent so naturally the thread is wandering as such things will do.
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MoiAussi93 wrote: »
I agree completely. This isn't a competitive thing. Most people, other than professional athletes and Olympians, run for health, fitness, or because they enjoy it.I am definitely in the pro "lower carb" camp. I'm aiming for 30 - 35% total but try not to eat any highly refined carbs... as much as possible at least. That means no plain ol' bread and very little bread at all over the course of a week. I think I had three slices this week after many weeks of zero. No bagels (and I used to live on bagels). No tortillas as a rule. I will have some whole grain multi-grain porridge once in a while. Carbs from vegetables are ok and fruits too but more veges than fruits.
Fats I let float wherever they will go; they are usually my biggest macro. This doesn't worry me as they are generally healthy fats.
I'm losing 2kg a week, and have been for quite some time. I'm not finding the reduced carbs gets in the way of my running (I'll run more than 200km this month). I feel satiated... full even and I don't crave carbs at all.
So far the mix is working very well for me.
200km a month is nothing to write home about as a runner. It is not even at a competitive (for a rec runner) level. A lot of the studies on LCHF diets and endurance seem to use a very low V02 max.
Why so negative ?
It adds up to a little more than 6.6 km a day and is a heck of a lot more than most of the world's population runs every day. That it does not fit into the class of a High Performance Athlete does not matter, it is an excellent achievement on it's own. I would be very proud for every km/mile I ran and bet I am not the only one.
FYI, there are some professional athletes on low carb diets. If Lebron James and Ray Allen can compete at the level they do while doing low carb, I think that proves you can do low carb and not have athletic performance suffer.
I don't think it proves that at all, if people are different. It proves that THEY can, and more generally that some can.
That elite athletes so overwhelmingly still fuel with carbs, though, suggests to me that there's probably on average an advantage to doing so. One part of this may just be the total amount of calories needed, but given the likelihood that elite athletes would try any way of eating if it gave them an advantage, I still think the likely conclusion is that carbs usually are superior for this purpose.
It hardly matters, of course, as few of us are elite athletes.
I have found that my own experience running and biking longer distances and training for a half ironman is that my body tends to feel better and crave more carbs when I'm extra active. I've never done full keto, though--I just don't see the point for me--so I can't compare to that. But I do think the numbers are pretty suggestive that it would not be advantageous, although probably not harmful at my recreational (just finish) to 45 year old age group competitor mostly competing with myself kind of aspirations.0 -
The original post:
thoughts on low carb diets?I lose weight easily, but i'm worried about health effects.
What available studies exist on the topic haven't shown any negative health effects.
Of course you need to define what "low carb" means to you in the context of your question, but you've gone silent so naturally the thread is wandering as such things will do.
Uh, I think the original question was answered pretty well and in the absence of follow ups the thread has moved on.
For the record, my original answer:
"I'm with the many who have said that some love it, some don't, and that I don't think there's any reason it would be bad for your health. Or at least not unless you are one of the few who go so far as to cut out veggies."0 -
lauraesh0384 wrote: »Personally, I love low carb and the benefits. I get to lose weight by eating delicious food. I don't experience that carb coma after eating. I have more energy. But the thing with low carb is you have to make it a change in lifestyle. You can't expect to drop x amount of weight and revert back to your old eating habits and not gain weight back. Honestly, I don't really miss bread, rice, pasta, pizza, etc. But even when I'm thinking, "pizza sounds really good right now", there's a low carb option for that. Low carb works, end of story. I went from 240 lbs to my current 175. The hardest part is being around people who eat carbs. You tell them you can't have something because it's high in carbs. "Oh, you're allowed a cheat day". Yes I am, but it's not worth it to throw away a few days of hard work, and then feeling like *kitten* afterwards because you ate a carb loaded meal.
Why do so many people when they speak of carbs only think of rice, pasta, processed white bread and pizza ? There is much more to carbohydrates. When I think of them I usually think of vegetables, fruit, legumes, pulses artesanal bread made from minimally and not chemically processed grains ( with that I think mostly of grain being ground into flour ) and without chemical additives.
Now after reading all of this thread I wonder if people speaking of lower or low carb diets actually all refer to the absence of rice, pasta, processed white bread and pizza, but otherwise eat carbs at the statistically normal rate ?
I don't think only of those things, but those are the things that trigger weight gain for me. I do eat good carbs that come from vegetables, and I very rarely eat fruit. I mostly eat meat, eggs, salads, some vegetables and then the good fats. At this point in time there's no room in my low carb WOE for beans and other complex carbs. I eat under 20 grams of carbs a day. I am one of those people that are more sensitive to carbs than most people. I know what works for me. Once I get to my goal weight then I'll start slowly start adding in more complex carbs, but for weight loss 20g or less works for me and I don't feel deprived.0 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »MoiAussi93 wrote: »
I agree completely. This isn't a competitive thing. Most people, other than professional athletes and Olympians, run for health, fitness, or because they enjoy it.I am definitely in the pro "lower carb" camp. I'm aiming for 30 - 35% total but try not to eat any highly refined carbs... as much as possible at least. That means no plain ol' bread and very little bread at all over the course of a week. I think I had three slices this week after many weeks of zero. No bagels (and I used to live on bagels). No tortillas as a rule. I will have some whole grain multi-grain porridge once in a while. Carbs from vegetables are ok and fruits too but more veges than fruits.
Fats I let float wherever they will go; they are usually my biggest macro. This doesn't worry me as they are generally healthy fats.
I'm losing 2kg a week, and have been for quite some time. I'm not finding the reduced carbs gets in the way of my running (I'll run more than 200km this month). I feel satiated... full even and I don't crave carbs at all.
So far the mix is working very well for me.
200km a month is nothing to write home about as a runner. It is not even at a competitive (for a rec runner) level. A lot of the studies on LCHF diets and endurance seem to use a very low V02 max.
Why so negative ?
It adds up to a little more than 6.6 km a day and is a heck of a lot more than most of the world's population runs every day. That it does not fit into the class of a High Performance Athlete does not matter, it is an excellent achievement on it's own. I would be very proud for every km/mile I ran and bet I am not the only one.
FYI, there are some professional athletes on low carb diets. If Lebron James and Ray Allen can compete at the level they do while doing low carb, I think that proves you can do low carb and not have athletic performance suffer.
I don't think it proves that at all, if people are different. It proves that THEY can, and more generally that some can.
That elite athletes so overwhelmingly still fuel with carbs, though, suggests to me that there's probably on average an advantage to doing so. One part of this may just be the total amount of calories needed, but given the likelihood that elite athletes would try any way of eating if it gave them an advantage, I still think the likely conclusion is that carbs usually are superior for this purpose.
It hardly matters, of course, as few of us are elite athletes.
I have found that my own experience running and biking longer distances and training for a half ironman is that my body tends to feel better and crave more carbs when I'm extra active. I've never done full keto, though--I just don't see the point for me--so I can't compare to that. But I do think the numbers are pretty suggestive that it would not be advantageous, although probably not harmful at my recreational (just finish) to 45 year old age group competitor mostly competing with myself kind of aspirations.
The issue comes with people being impatient. A keto-ADAPTED athlete will perform as well or better as a carb-fueled athlete, but most people who try it don't stick with it long enough to find out. They try for a week or two, notice their stamina or strength seem to have dropped, and assume that's how it works without carbs. Reality is, your body needs time to adjust. It takes at least a month, and that's assuming the person never makes a mistake that first month and eats something without realizing it has more carbs than they accounted for (or intentionally tries a cheat day), which starts the timer over again.
In terms of individual preference, whatever anyone chooses. What's irritating is when people who give up after a week or two then take it upon themselves to evangelize that it can't work for anyone, just because they did it wrong.0 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »It hardly matters, of course, as few of us are elite athletes.
That's a very narrow view of things.
You can hardly argue that carbs are the way to go for performance because the elites do it (not all do) and then dismiss what elites do in the very next breath.
Fueling is fueling.
The caloric needs of an elite runner are not that much different than an overweight plodder on the marathon course, on the tri circuit, or on any ultra course.0 -
The issue comes with people being impatient.
This certainly seems borne out by the personal experiences of many active people who adopt a lower carb dietary regimen. Whether it is physiological adaptation or something more neurological at its core, or a combination of both, it certainly felt to me like a process of change when I dropped my carb intake.0
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