Keto

rlb said:
No one has mentioned how the 60's the sugar industry apparently cherry picked data to say that saturated fat caused obesity and sugar did not play a significant role. This apparently helped to shape the current view that low fat = good. The article also mentions how a lot of pro-sugar research is industry funded.
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Good points. Re: sugar - claiming all sugar is "bad" is similar to previous claims that all fats were bad. Comes down to how much you consume, what kinds, and timing. Shouldn't be consuming refined sugars tho even these can have a time and place (e.g. as a previous poster mentioned during extended effort as refueling). Fruits and vegetables that contain sugars are healthy choices and also provide micro and phyto nutrients. Our species originated in tropical east africa where fruits and starchy tubers were available year round!
 
Monkey Soup said:
For racing, shouldn’t you also be carb depleting and carb loading prior to your event?

So for those of you out there with access to Pubmed, there are some interesting journal articles out there. Most focus around the keto diet as a means to control pediatric epilepsy (interesting in and of itself). Seems like this diet has been around since the time of the ancient Greeks, who observed a cause and effect relationship between fasting and a decrease the incidence of seizures. Anyway, there is one very recent article on there where they divided a group of men into a keto diet group and western diet group and put them on a resistance training program. End of the day, the keto group saw a much bigger increase in testosterone production vs. the western diet group. So some of you fuckers that can’t get it up, maybe ease up on the fries and stop blaming the seat on your bike.
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Yeah pubmed has been my go-to source for decades. This one is interesting, looking at metabolic parameters of ultra-distance runners, hi carb vs keto. It would be interesting to see performance data on the same athletes on both diets.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26892521
 
Joe J said:
Being this is a cycling forum I'll give my .03 as it applies to cycling. If your goals are weight loss or low intensity cycling (below 60% of LT or FTP) a carb. restricted diet is fine. However if you are racing or training at high intencities you need carbs.

Think of it this way fat is a slow burning fuel like Hickory in a wood stove, carbs. are like throwing gas on that fire, they don't last long but burn hot. For the racer winter/off season is a great time for a low carb diet 50-60g of quality carb (not a Snickers bar) when training load and intensity increase so do the carbs 70-100g per day depending on body weight.

One thing I think confuses racers when reading articles about a low or no carb diet is the reference to cycling as Endurance. Endurance is generally considered a consistent effort below 70% of LT/FTP, I have no experience with the real long ultra type events like Jim V. but in events like NUE's and other events called endurance you will be consistently at or above those levels for extended periods of time.

Remember Diet is how you eat on a consistent day to day basis, Dieting is something you do for short periods of time to in a feeble attempt to reverse the effects of a bad Diet.
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@gtluke
this was my question earlier I don't think was commented on, say you are going to do a ride for 2 or 4 hours and effectively wipe out any carbs quickly is it worth doing a little carb loading prior to that activity and is that considered cheating? I'm not talking pasta bowl, more like 20g in an energy bar which maybe puts you up to 60g carb on the day. You get your intensity a little higher short term but then revert back to ketosis, or would the carb runout result in bonking maybe? Many of those energy bars(whatever brand) have 17 to 20g of carbs with only 2 of that being sugar so I don't think I'd see the harm in a pre ride meal with that. Or maybe I'm wrong.
 
gtluke said:
This is my observation on the keto diet as well. I mentioned it in one of the 5 pages but my overall peak power is down, but I can make my slightly diminished power for seemingly forever now. I don't do any actual datalogging, but I feel that because I was able to do that, that even off the diet my endurance was up. What you mentioned was basically exactly what I heard from an MMA coach on some podcast I listed to this year. Bunch of athletes tried keto and eventually added in 100-200g of carbs because the fighters felt a decrease of power. But an MMA fight is 15 minutes. I think the keto diet fits well for those doing 4+ hour races. Or those of us that don't race and just like to ride. Added benefit of being able to go on a 5 hour ride and not bring any food.
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I would think the nuromuscular demands of MMA & Cycling are every different so can't comment. For 4+ hr MTB races I personally wouldn't go low carb this could differ depending on the athletes intensity.
 
Blair said:
@gtluke
this was my question earlier I don't think was commented on, say you are going to do a ride for 2 or 4 hours and effectively wipe out any carbs quickly is it worth doing a little carb loading prior to that activity and is that considered cheating? I'm not talking pasta bowl, more like 20g in an energy bar which maybe puts you up to 60g carb on the day. You get your intensity a little higher short term but then revert back to ketosis, or would the carb runout result in bonking maybe? Many of those energy bars(whatever brand) have 17 to 20g of carbs with only 2 of that being sugar so I don't think I'd see the harm in a pre ride meal with that. Or maybe I'm wrong.
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Luke can probably add more for the person in ketosis, but depending on how hard your riding you will burn through your stored glucose and glycogen in the first 60-90 min of a ride. Your body will then have to look for an alternate source of fuel. This will mostly come from your body's stored fat (even the leanest athlete has plenty), muscle tissue (not a good thing) or ingested carbs. It's my belief that if you plan to go hard after 60-90 min you need to fuel with carbs and for real long rides some protein, if your stomach can handle it many can't . If your goal is fat burning or are keeping the intencity low just drink water maybe eat a handful of almonds.

This may have been mentioned earlier but it's important. Ketosis has a tendency to dehydrate you so your going to have to drink more water especially was it gets hotter out.
 
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Generally you don't want to start with sugar when you ride endurance on keto as you'll start off burning sugar vs fat. Starting off with fat your body will be primarily using fat as the energy source.

Keto is a bad for the most part in short therm glycolytic activities. Weight Lifting, Sprinting, Cyclocross, etc. However *training* in a ketogenic or fasted state has huge benefits for efficiency. In those short/hard sports having the glycogen stores topped off during an event is important as that's what your body is going to use primarily and you need it available.

Only issue with riding endurance with no food/fasted is going catabolic, which is why people use BCAAs when lifting/riding/etc. Z1/Z2 type stuff really benefits from being fasted.
 
gtluke said:
Good summary.
The comments pointed out a mistake I made earlier in this thread.
Apparently Chris Froom is winning TdF on keto.
That's a pretty solid endorsement and middle finger to the know it alls in this thread (who coincidentally none have actually tried the diet)
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Super fat adapted! Fat for fuel is a concept that only recently in 2010 a guy named Peter Defty introduced me too. I didn't take to the idea. Now I really enjoy it. I'm not opposed to carbs either but the source has to be what I look for.

For people like @Blair its worth looking at TKD (Targeted Jeto Diet) as well.
 
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If you want to carry food fir a ride a good one is a cut avocado (pitted), stuffed with coconut flakes and Almond butter. Keep the skin on, close it up and keep it closed with a rubber band.


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gtluke said:
Good summary.
The comments pointed out a mistake I made earlier in this thread.
Apparently Chris Froom is winning TdF on keto.
That's a pretty solid endorsement and middle finger to the know it alls in this thread (who coincidentally none have actually tried the diet)
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From what I've read so far, going on a periodic strict keto diet definitely has weight loss benefits, you just need to watch your LDLs, that went high in a lot of studies. And yes, it seems like it's beneficial in certain types of training. Chris Froome is winning the TDF on EPO and HgH. The only interesting thing is how he's doing it and not getting caught, which is another conversation entirely.
 
The Kalmyk said:
I love Brazil nuts. From a tree
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don't all nuts grow on trees?
Or have you been lucky enough to have them fresh?

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As an aside, i've enjoyed reading this thread.

I'd like to point out something that Rick has mentioned before. One must be careful using their own experience/feeling as the measuring stick of the
success or failure of a diet. Statements such as, "I can tell when i go off my diet, my energy is down, and i feel...." - might be related to guilt (or other factors)
for letting yourself stray, and the opposite for strict coherence. Anecdotal.

Recognizing that medically required restrictions, where some foods cause distress (or worse,) are legit.

So i've been thinking about my recent experience with weight loss - that i was just taking in way too many calories with the beer and all that goes with it
(remember it isn't just the beer, it is raiding the refrigerator at midnight instead of going to bed) - most likely any sustained reduction in calories was going to bring me down
to a more "normal" weight, because I was so far off the normal. doesn't matter if the claim is calories, carbs, fat - just the reduction is a plausible
explanation.

Luke and Spence are coming at keto from two different body types. so that is interesting in itself.
Fasting is also interesting - seem the studies are split on adding fasting to a reduced calorie diet. But that adding fasting to a regular diet is beneficial (or is it just a way to reduce
calories at a macro level?)

i'm still thinking about one of those structured cleanse diets for a month. Although i could go all steak-n-eggs all the time.....but that wouldn't maximize happiness!

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GMO -

This might be good for next winter discussion.

so it is obvious that corn, modified to withstand the effects of round-up, is GMO. I'm sure they could spray field-after-field, and eventually find one stalk that is naturally
resistant, and propagate that - that would not be GMO ? I don't think we call selective breeding GMO (plants, animals?). What about accidental mutations (seedless grapes)?
(as an aside, i think the seedless thing is a gmo conspiracy. they hid the fact to make the product acceptable - #altFacts) - i've posted that before, cause i like to get Luke all worked up.😉
 
The Kalmyk said:
Super fat adapted! Fat for fuel is a concept that only recently in 2010 a guy named Peter Defty introduced me too. I didn't take to the idea. Now I really enjoy it. I'm not opposed to carbs either but the source has to be what I look for.

For people like @Blair its worth looking at TKD (Targeted Jeto Diet) as well.
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Thanks, this is what I was looking for to compliment intense exercise days only.
 
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