Horizon- sugar v fat BBC2

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pauljsaunders
pauljsaunders Posts: 79
in Food and Nutrition
If you get a chance to see this documentry it would be informative at least, it seems that it's not just fat or sugar on its own that puts weight on but a 50/50 combination that processed food manufacturers know about that sets off a craving function in our brain...

If anyone had seen the program it would be great to hear your take on it... :smile:
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  • Akimajuktuq
    Akimajuktuq Posts: 3,037 Member
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    If that's the "study" that those twins did on themselves: meaningless and stupid. No high fat diet ever should exclude all carbs (vegetables!) and no high carb diet should only have 2% fat. The only thing I agree on is their conclusion that processed foods suck (my words, not theirs) and that the sugar/fat combination and quality (lack of) IS carefully designed for a "bliss point" ensuring maximized sales.

    Maybe I'm on about the wrong thing (but it was England and they are twin guys) but a friend sent me a link to it this morning. Not impressed. Not at all.
  • pauljsaunders
    pauljsaunders Posts: 79
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    I agree, not a very scientific study, but as they put it, it was what they experienced from it.....
  • nomeejerome
    nomeejerome Posts: 2,616 Member
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    If you get a chance to see this documentry it would be informative at least, it seems that it's not just fat or sugar on its own that puts weight on but a 50/50 combination that processed food manufacturers know about that sets off a craving function in our brain...

    If anyone had seen the program it would be great to hear your take on it... :smile:

    What makes people put on weight? Too many calories.
  • mrdexter1
    mrdexter1 Posts: 356 Member
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    A couple of things shone through..

    Those on full keto without carbing up once a week can expect to heads towards insulin resistance.

    ketones fuel the brain less efficiently.

    Protein is responsible for stemming hunger.

    Wasn't that fat bald lab rat a cutie !!!!!

    here is the program ....

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D-XL-zkNIY
  • deadyankee
    deadyankee Posts: 74
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    It was basic common sense dressed up as revelation
  • Schtroumpfkin
    Schtroumpfkin Posts: 123 Member
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    No high fat diet ever should exclude all carbs (vegetables!) and no high carb diet should only have 2% fat.

    You have the right program. However, while the TEST was the above, as you describe, it was only to prove a point. The conclusion was that NO fad diet works.

    Having said that - I agree with the person here who says it was common sense dressed up as revelation. The thing I most learnt is that I STILL watched it, WAITING for that revelation. Even though I know what to do (lose weight slowly, good mix of food/colours/nutrients, mix up my exercise etc), I was still tempted by a program that "gave me the REAL, scientific answer" (aka the quick/easy solution). But it doesn't exist.

    Will I ever learn?
  • mrdexter1
    mrdexter1 Posts: 356 Member
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    perhaps the revelation was...

    just be sensible and target carbs prior to energy expenditure and do the normal cut calories with a balanced diet !
  • IronSmasher
    IronSmasher Posts: 3,908 Member
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    You're underestimating how rare common sense is.

    At a time where the demonising of single macros, juice cleanses, paleo, etc is common place... I liked it.
  • Fozzi43
    Fozzi43 Posts: 2,984 Member
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    I thought it was very interesting.....and WHY was that rat bald?
  • yarwell
    yarwell Posts: 10,477 Member
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    A couple of things shone through..

    Those on full keto without carbing up once a week can expect to heads towards insulin resistance.

    the guy on the program was barely in ketosis , for some reason. Their ketone measurements are briefly visible on a flip chart in the cycling part. 0.5 mmol/litre. I guess he was eating too much protein.
  • dm38
    dm38 Posts: 2 Member
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    I had to watch it in a detached manner and not let my own personal subjectivity influence my opinion/review as the average member of society probably doesn’t train 5-6 days a week for half and full marathons, sportives and tacks and eats clean etc etc.

    For the average person who swings from the latest trend i.e. Atkins, to fat free, to slim fast, Dukan, Paleo and 5:2 or do nothing at all this probably was a bit of a revelation as so many people just don’t know much about nutrition even those working in Public Health!

    If I got a £1 for every time I heard people say I’m cutting carbs, bread, potatoes and pasta is what’s making me fat yet after they’ve had their chicken and salad they snack and snack and snack on those wonderful little diet snack packs of 80 calorie Special K bars, Yogurt covered go ahead slices, weight watchers packs of choc chip biscuits, sugar laden mullerlight yogurts, or baked not fried walkers crisps, velvet crunches or other rice cakes. They would have been better off just having that 150g portion of baby potatoes and not snacking on all that sugary rubbish. Of course when I tell them that as they’re swigging away at their second Lucozade because their sugar levels are ‘crashing’.
  • yarwell
    yarwell Posts: 10,477 Member
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    I thought it was very interesting.....and WHY was that rat bald?

    it's a species ? http://www.criver.com/products-services/basic-research/find-a-model/cd-hairless-rat
  • ShoeGal78
    ShoeGal78 Posts: 35 Member
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    I enjoyed it - it was interesting but hardly ground breaking. The conclusion was the "deadly" and "addictive" combination of sugar and fat... How about we just exercise some moderation and enjoy foods as treats or work them into our daily macro allowance? It still comes down to calories in vs calories out.

    Life would be miserable without enjoying the odd slice of cheesecake and ice cream....
  • fitness_faeiry
    fitness_faeiry Posts: 354 Member
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    I watched it all and was skeptical that it wasn't going to reveal anything groundbreaking, but it was actually very interesting, particularly the experiments with the cheesecake (fat and sugar) and the rats. And who doesn't like cheesecake?

    We all know fat doesn't make us fat and we all know the body NEEDS carbs in order to simply function. I found it ironic that these so called bodybuilding ridiculously low carb diets, that they are actually burning muscle mass as well as fat!
  • geebusuk
    geebusuk Posts: 3,348 Member
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    Link for UK people on iplayer: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b03t8r4h/Horizon_20132014_Sugar_v_Fat/
    I watched it all and was skeptical that it wasn't going to reveal anything groundbreaking, but it was actually very interesting, particularly the experiments with the cheesecake (fat and sugar) and the rats. And who doesn't like cheesecake?
    Same here; not sure there was much new it in for me, but I was getting all ready to get annoyed, then they'd come back with what was actually a decent reasoned argument (ie, one I agree with. :))
    If that's the "study" that those twins did on themselves: meaningless and stupid. No high fat diet ever should exclude all carbs (vegetables!) and no high carb diet should only have 2% fat. The only thing I agree on is their conclusion that processed foods suck (my words, not theirs) and that the sugar/fat combination and quality (lack of) IS carefully designed for a "bliss point" ensuring maximized sales.
    That was my initial thought, but they also didn't make a massive thing of it and showed plenty of other research and the like.
    ALSO, it does make a rather good point against the 'sugar is evil'/'fat is evil' brigade, some of which DO take it to pretty silly extremes, though generally not THAT silly.
    As for the processed food bit, that was the one bit that DID annoy me.
    Annoy me because processed commonly means prepackaged.
    If I make a home made cheesecake with 50% fat and 50% carbs, is it somehow going to be less bad for me? The opposite, I'd suggest - it's probably going to be even nicer, so I'm going to want to eat more!
  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
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    Interesting program, but I agree with a previous comments, what was the point at looking at eating just Fat or just sugar. It would have been much better to look at either a high sugar low fat diet V a high protein LOW carb diet.

    Also unless you are heavily into cardio what is the point of using glycogen as a fuel source? Surely it is much better to burn body fat as fuel and only carb up if you are going to do some high level exercise.

    It was a bit disappointing as well that they did not follow up on the fact that at the end of the experiment their cholesterol levels had barely changed, unfortunately cholesterol has been given a bad name over the years by results from out of date science.

    Cholesterol is essential to our physical and cognitive well being. It does things such as insulating neurons, building and maintaining cellular membranes, metabolizing fat soluble vitamins, produces bile and promotes synthesis of many hormones.

    The reason why their levels were the same is because our bodies self-regulate. We naturally produce our own Cholesterol so when we consume more of it we produce less and it produces more when we eat less.

    Old science blamed cholesterol for clogging arteries, resent science shows that our bodies us use cholesterol as internal plasters to cover lesions in our arteries, therefore clogged arteries will always have higher levels of cholesterol.
  • ndj1979
    ndj1979 Posts: 29,136 Member
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    in…to re-hash this again...
  • ndj1979
    ndj1979 Posts: 29,136 Member
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    If you get a chance to see this documentry it would be informative at least, it seems that it's not just fat or sugar on its own that puts weight on but a 50/50 combination that processed food manufacturers know about that sets off a craving function in our brain...

    If anyone had seen the program it would be great to hear your take on it... :smile:

    here is what puts on weight….wait for it..drum roll….

    overeating in a caloric surplus puts on weight….

    if you eat in a deficit you will lose weight the combination of foods does not really matter when factoring this in ..

    you can eat processed foods, sugar, be in a calorie deficit and lose weight..

    you can eat clean, overeat, and put on weight...
  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
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    You can lose weight eating a calorie deficit diet consisting of processed foods and sugars, however it would not be (long term) good for your health as you would not be getting nearly enough of the vitamins and nutrients you would naturally source from high fat food (not trans fats) and clean carbs,
  • csmccord
    csmccord Posts: 272 Member
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    I watched it all and was skeptical that it wasn't going to reveal anything groundbreaking, but it was actually very interesting, particularly the experiments with the cheesecake (fat and sugar) and the rats. And who doesn't like cheesecake?

    We all know fat doesn't make us fat and we all know the body NEEDS carbs in order to simply function. I found it ironic that these so called bodybuilding ridiculously low carb diets, that they are actually burning muscle mass as well as fat!

    Yes, the body needs carbs to survive, however it needs the "correct" carbs to really get adequate nutrition. Carbs exist in all veggies, and these are much better options that what most of us reach for. Bread, pasta, chips, crackers, cookies, snack packs, etc. Sure, carbs from breads, pasta, rice etc are fine in the short term. But the vast majority of us choose to eat those products consisting of refined carbs. The germ is stripped off the wheat before being ground into flour, thus stripping off the fiber and other nutrients. Most times you see vitamin additives on the label, it signals that the carbs have been processed and nutrients stripped out. Those processed carbs are easily digested, spiking blood sugar and causing an insulin reaction. The insulin will cause the body to dump all that sugar into fat stores quickly to keep the blood sugar level down. Once the blood sugar crashes due to overproduction of insulin, the brain will signal that it's hungry and needs more energy, which then causes the person to look for more snack containing carbs. It ends up being a downward spiral. Over time, insulin over-production will eventually cause the person to become insulin resistant, and may end up causing pre-diabetes or even full blown diabetes if left unchecked.

    So, in the end, the statement, "Carbs are bad!" is over generalized. It should read, "Refined carbs are bad!"

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