How much will I gain when I cheat?
kiramaniac
Posts: 800 Member
So we see this question now and then. I was reading through Primal Blueprint, and he addresses it pretty well.
Let's just say that you have been going strong on keto for a while, and have no glycogen in your body. You then eat a bunch of carbs. How much will you gain? How much is water weight?
So your muscles store carbs as glycogen. Per the Primal Blueprint, an individual can store up to 400 grams of glycogen, with athletes able to store up to 600 grams. Let's assume that most of us aren't athletes and use the 400 grams. For those of us in the US and unable to deal with the metric system, that's about .88 pounds. Remember - we aren't talking fat, just stored glycogen (energy) in your muscles.
For every gram of glycogen, your body will also hold 3-4 grams of water. So with 400 grams of glycogen, that's 1200-1600 grams of water. So for just water gain, that's 2.65 - 3.5 pounds of water gain. Combined, you have 3.5 - 4.4 pounds of total gain potentially from eating those carbs.
So if you go off the wagon and see a gain in this range, don't stress it. The glycogen and water weight will come off quickly. But, if you see a gain much higher than that, you've probably back tracked a bit, and regained some fat.
If you've tended to eat a higher carb level anyway, you probably already have some stored glycogen in your muscles, and therefore wouldn't add this full amount. It also can take time to digest that food, so don't expect all of this to show up the next morning - you could have a bigger surprise waiting a day later.
Exercise - burn it off!
Hope that helps!
Let's just say that you have been going strong on keto for a while, and have no glycogen in your body. You then eat a bunch of carbs. How much will you gain? How much is water weight?
So your muscles store carbs as glycogen. Per the Primal Blueprint, an individual can store up to 400 grams of glycogen, with athletes able to store up to 600 grams. Let's assume that most of us aren't athletes and use the 400 grams. For those of us in the US and unable to deal with the metric system, that's about .88 pounds. Remember - we aren't talking fat, just stored glycogen (energy) in your muscles.
For every gram of glycogen, your body will also hold 3-4 grams of water. So with 400 grams of glycogen, that's 1200-1600 grams of water. So for just water gain, that's 2.65 - 3.5 pounds of water gain. Combined, you have 3.5 - 4.4 pounds of total gain potentially from eating those carbs.
So if you go off the wagon and see a gain in this range, don't stress it. The glycogen and water weight will come off quickly. But, if you see a gain much higher than that, you've probably back tracked a bit, and regained some fat.
If you've tended to eat a higher carb level anyway, you probably already have some stored glycogen in your muscles, and therefore wouldn't add this full amount. It also can take time to digest that food, so don't expect all of this to show up the next morning - you could have a bigger surprise waiting a day later.
Exercise - burn it off!
Hope that helps!
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Replies
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Amazing post as always, thanks, that actually was right in time for me. Thanks0
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I put on about 1.2kg when I had a cheat day of Fish & Chips and a Nando's Wrap (with fries) in desperation to break a plateau. Now almost 3 weeks later I'm 3kg lighter. If I weigh less than 96kg in the morning, plateau is broken!
Anyway, don't choose to have a cheat day. I felt weird all day, and like crap for 4 days after. It took 5 to return to ketosis at least according to Ketostix.0 -
Great info!!
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a couple of months ago, I had been going strong in Keto for over a month straight, then i feel off the wagon for 4 days, and i chowed on carbs heavy, When I got a handle on myself I weighed I had gained 20 pounds in 5 days!!!, i was shocked, i told myself it had to be allot of water, Then, after one week of being back on Keto 15 pounds of it came back off, so I figured my 5 day binge cost me 5 pounds,!!! yuck another week of keto brought me back to where i was, the cost of this event was pretty much 3 weeks of going no place but up and down, and 3 weeks of delay on my road to goal, now I only allow myself 1 cheat meal, and only on those weeks where the scale has made a great move, and only if i really feel like I need /want this said cheat meal,0
