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Post by willblack on Jun 7, 2018 12:11:14 GMT -7
I wanted to write and share my experience with a keto diet, which I started as a means to cut weight for a sport climbing trip coming up in a few weeks. In terms of what I've been eating, I typically start the day with coffee with MCT oil and butter and then fast until 1pm or so when I start snacking, mostly hard boiled eggs, avocado, sometimes celery and goat cheese. I'll generally have a salad for dinner and on days when I'm climbing I'll drink BCAAs for their anticatabolic properties. Most days I eat around 1600 calories 60-70% fat, 20-30% protein, and less than 10% carbs. One day a week (typically my heaviest climbing day) I give myself a cheat day where I'll eat a bagel with cream cheese for breakfast, snack on sweet potatoes and dark chocolate throughout the day, and finish with a rice bowl at Miguel's. I don't keep strict track of calories or macronutrients that day but I assume it's 70% carbs or so and significantly more calories than I eat the rest of the week. This is the first time I've experimented with a ketogenic diet to cut weight for climbing, and I have to say it's been a game changer for me. I'm tall and not naturally lean, so dieting has always been a valuable way for me to get an extra bump in performance periodically, and I've always eaten really high quality food when I'm dieting but have nonetheless had difficulties with motivation, feeling crappy while training/climbing, low energy/brain fog, being a dick to my wife, etc. This time around I've felt spectacular. Don't get me wrong, I'm hungry sometimes and it takes a certain amount of self control and lots of planning to stick to this diet, but overall it's been so much easier than dieting without restricting carbs. The first week was hard but since then I've had great energy levels, felt mentally clear, been climbing hard (for me), and I've lost ten pounds going from 174-164 at 6'5" in two weeks. I've had hard climbing days when I come back and don't even eat as much as I could because I feel so satisfied. My senses of smell and taste feel more sensitive and even though I'm mostly eating the same few foods, I feel like I'm really savoring and enjoying my food more. This past weekend despite not having climbed at the red for a while and temps in the mid 80s I sent two "red river gorge style" low 5.12s second try each. 12a/b is a grade that I climb regularly, but the fitness climbing at the red has always felt like the hardest style of climbing I've ever tried and so aside from the grade it was really cool to have the energy to send and come so close on so many pitches in that style. I think on my standard weight loss diet I would not have had the energy to send or put in so many pitches of enduro 5.12 over the weekend. I know the keto/paleo thing has a culty/judgemental kind of vibe in a lot of circles, and I don't buy into the idea that we should all eat like cavemen or that carbs cause cancer or whatever, and I haven't looked into the science supporting high/vs low carb diets for performance, but just in my subjective opinion the keto diet has been super super helpful for my climbing performance and I thought others might want to give it a try and see how they respond.
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Post by Chris W on Jun 8, 2018 2:16:06 GMT -7
Some of the foods you mentioned, like butter, cheese and avocado are fairly calorie dense. They also, in theory, would provide a more sustained absorption and energy release than carbohydrates. Also, in general, the foods you're eating sound like quality, "healthy" foods.
1) What did your weight loss diet prior to this look like? Are you simply consuming more "quality" food this way than prior? 2) Is it possible you're consuming more calories this way than prior, just absorbing them differently? 3) Any thoughts on the hormonal response to your diet contributing to the weight loss and sense of well being?
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Post by willblack on Jun 8, 2018 4:06:02 GMT -7
1: I wouldn't say I'm consuming more quality foods than before, I have always eaten really well when dieting but this time around I'm just not eating any of the quality carbs like rice and sweet potatoes that I used to, except on my carb day every week.
2: I use an app to keep track of my calories, with both my previous diet and this keto thing I allow myself up to 1800 calories a day so that has stayed constant. Lately I've been averaging 1600 calories a day or so.
3: nope, I listened to a podcast with an MD and keto researcher who said something about the keto diet producing higher levels of HGH and allowing testosterone to be used by the body more easily, but I don't really know anything about that or how I could confirm it. He also mentioned that in people in ketosis blood sugar levels are commonly as low as in the 60s but without any of the symptoms one would expect. I don't know how significant that is but it's interesting
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Post by stahax on Jun 8, 2018 7:17:21 GMT -7
My experience has been similar to willblack's - it's much easier to cut weight while limiting carb intake significantly. The most noticeable subjective difference for me is that after several days of eating keto/paleo, craving is reduced. When I'm eating carbs, I eat a bowl of oatmeal around 10 am for breakfast. If I haven't eaten that by 10:30 or 11, I'm very hungry. When I'm not eating carbs, I still eat breakfast around the same time, but the desire to eat isn't urgent. I haven't measured anything, but I speculate it's anticipatory insulin release that drives this craving, and it declines after carbs are eliminated.
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Post by Chris W on Jun 8, 2018 17:55:11 GMT -7
Insulin is one of the main hormones I was thinking of. It doesn't seem as though the medical community has a good handle on the role the body's hormones play in the diets of otherwise healthy people.
It's interesting to hear your thoughts on the keto diet. It seems some people do very well with it, and others absolutely hate it. Not much in between. I had a bit of trouble with getting down to my fighting weight this spring. I followed a similar low carb diet to get where I needed, but not quite to the same extent.
Regarding food cravings, I've noticed a similar phenomenon with sugar. It's much easier to stay away than it is to consume them in moderation (although I had a very large and tasty chocolate chip cookie when my spring season ended).
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Post by Chris W on Jun 11, 2018 4:44:15 GMT -7
Will
1) How did you feel before, during and after your days of increased carbohydrate intake?
2) Is this a diet you plan on maintaining indefinitely, or will you cycle in and out of this depending on your training phase?
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Post by willblack on Jun 11, 2018 22:29:32 GMT -7
I don't feel markedly different on or after my carb days. I always schedule my carb day on my heaviest climbing day of the week, which the past two weeks has been the middle day of a 3 day trip to the red. Beforehand I start to crave carbs but one day of eating carbs and not restricting calories tides me over for the rest of the week.
When I started this thing I thought I was just gonna use it to cut weight and then go back to my normal diet, but now I think I might see how I respond to a non calorie restricted keto diet on my climbing trip in a couple weeks and possibly after the fact as well. I think it would actually be pretty easy to stick with this diet with 2 carb days and no calorie restriction, but we'll see.
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Post by Chris W on Jun 12, 2018 4:28:09 GMT -7
The keto diet is interesting and a bit perplexing to me, and I'm a bit skeptical it work the way people think it works. it's likely a more complex interaction of brain and body chemistry and hormones leading to changes in appetite and metabolism.
Many people go in and out of a state of ketosis on a regular basis, depending on their level of activity and their food intake. It's pretty common to see it in construction workers who missed their lunch break or people with nausea who skipped a meal. There are occasional cases where young children are put on a keto diet to control a seizure disorder, but those diets tend to be very strict. No carb cheat days for those kids.
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Post by stahax on Jun 12, 2018 14:22:16 GMT -7
>> It's pretty common to see it in construction workers who missed their lunch break or people with nausea who skipped a meal.
Hmm... seems much more frequent than what my casual browsing in the paleo literature would suggest. Seems like it takes a pretty focused effort to decrease carb intake sufficiently to reach ketosis. If glycogen stores in liver and muscle provide at least a couple thousand calories, then it'd take at least a day of 0 carb intake to get there, if you're burning calories at some semi-basal rate (ie, not running a marathon).
Agree that the keto diet for seizure control is fascinating, especially because it works well and doesn't seem to be understood much at all, despite being around for many years. Also, kids on that diet generally don't develop heart issues, despite eating tons of saturated fat for years on end.
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Post by Chris W on Jun 12, 2018 20:04:44 GMT -7
Hmm... seems much more frequent than what my casual browsing in the paleo literature would suggest. It's a bit more complicated than it may seem after casually browsing paleo literature.
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Post by willblack on Jun 13, 2018 0:24:25 GMT -7
On the topic of going in and out of ketosis,I highly doubt many people go into ketosis without a concerted effort. I personally used ketone urine test strips initially to see when I flipped into ketosis and it took about 3 days to get a positive strip, and my first positive strip correlated with a day when I felt a serious crash and bad low blood sugar symptoms. Interestingly, my urine has been negative for ketones since then which from what I've read is actually normal since now my body is using the ketones efficiently and not spilling any via urine. I've not even had a positive strip or any hypoglycemia symptoms on the days after my carb days, which I have taken to mean that I've gotten well enough adapted to ketosis that a day of eating more carbs doesn't make it harder for me to go back into ketosis.
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Post by stahax on Jun 13, 2018 8:00:24 GMT -7
Hmm... seems much more frequent than what my casual browsing in the paleo literature would suggest. It's a bit more complicated than it may seem after casually browsing paleo literature. I don't doubt that it's complicated, but I'm skeptical. Why would skipping a meal send someone into ketosis? You've got lots of glucose stored for just such occasions.
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Post by Chris W on Jun 14, 2018 2:06:49 GMT -7
It's a bit of an oversimplification, but if you burn more calories than you consume, even if you're consuming carbohydrates, you will lose weight. Performance oriented climbers, cyclists, new years resolution folks and overweight soccer moms will all go through periods where they're trying to lose weight. If you're burning excess calories, you often do this by using body fat as fuel. The fat gets broken down, among other things, into ketones.
If you get up in the morning in a rush to get to work, don't make a lunch since you don't have time, eat a pop tart on your way out the door, lay brick all day, then go to the doctor's office for your DOT physical, you'll probably have ketones in your urine.
Again, that's an oversimplification.
Now we're getting past the point of the thread in the beginning. My point, regarding the keto diet, is that the reason it has worked may not be specifically because of entering a state of ketosis. I'm interested in why it worked, not just that it worked.
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Post by RobF on Oct 19, 2018 15:50:04 GMT -7
For me it's taking ownership of what's going in my body. Cooking things from scratch (but also having a lot more raw foods: for their increased enzymatic, vitamin & mineral content). Being organised and preparing the next days meals the night before, having an awareness of the content of peri exercise nutrition (before / during / after) with protein and carbs adjusted in relation to the energy systems being utilised. Also keto fat bombs have been useful for stopping carb cravings / avoiding eating between meals. I need to get some more recipies but a simple one I use that takes 10 min to prep is with coconut oil / peanut butter / vanilla essence / splash of salt / cranberries...
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Post by KarlWalters on Oct 24, 2018 19:20:47 GMT -7
How long was your adaptation period?
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