Friday, April 22, 2011
Why are no Carb Diets not good for building muscle? Why do they usually fail?
The body uses carbs for 2 main things. The first use is energy. Carbs are stored as glycogen in muscle and when using those muscles the glycogen is burned as energy. The second is fat storage, which is where no carb diets are correct. Unused carbs are stored in the body as adipose (fat) tissue. If you eat no carbs the body will use your stored fat for energy because there are no carbs to be harvested. The problem here is that the body also uses proteins and muscle that you have for energy. On a no carb diet you will lose a lot of weight, but it won't all be fat. You may lose 30 pounds but 5 or 7 of those pounds may be muscle. The other problem is that your body needs and craves carbs when you are on this diet. So the second that you begin eating carbs again, the body will absorb more carbs than it usually would. For this reason most people gain back more weight than they lost after these no carb diets. The better way to lose fat and keep/build muscle is to carb cycle. I will provide another post about carb cycling in a couple days...
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i think you are misinformed:( fat people dont workout,build muscle,or have energy,you or young active people like you can load carbs all day long,but fat people just consume carbs non-stop and keep getting more fat,and have ZERO evergy. as you are well aware i have lost over 80 lbs and have kept it off for over a year by eating LOW CARB.....not no carb...and once you lose the weight it can easily be kept off by staying low carb.....there are tons of low carb food substitutes for higher carb offerings,and once your body DETOXS from the sugar/carb addiction you do not crave the carbs any longer....come on rob,do you really think that the majority of people are willing to commit to the workouts that you do? and do you really think that once you enter the real world of ...JOB...WIFE...KIDS...that you will maintain your workout schedule??? dont count on it
ReplyDeletethere ya go you knew i'd comment on this post:) i can argue with you all day about carbs..fact is carbs are sugar in one form or another & sugar is not good for your body....fat free foods are loaded with sugar to provide the flavor that is lost by removing the fat...also fat in foods doesnt make you fat....sugar does:)
Hi Robby, I've read all your blog posts and I think you're doing a pretty good job with your explanations. This statement though is a bit out there;
ReplyDelete"On a no carb diet you will lose a lot of weight, but it won't all be fat. You may lose 30 pounds but 5 or 7 of those pounds may be muscle. The other problem is that your body needs and craves carbs when you are on this diet. So the second that you begin eating carbs again, the body will absorb more carbs than it usually would. For this reason most people gain back more weight than they lost after these no carb diets."
Be careful what you post and make certain of your facts, once on the net, always on the net. This statement is an incorrect assumption on your part with no basis in fact.
keep up the good work and KEEP FISHIN! :)
Robby, great blog. I'll comment on the two comments above. First, you probably were actually a little to consevative on the amount of muscle lost when losing weight on low carb diets. Dr. Oz (made famous from Oprah), stated that for every 10lbs we lose through dieting, that 4 lbs is lean mass and 6 lbs is fat on average. He states this is because many of these diets are one of three things-Calories are way too low, or a major macronutrient is missing--he went on to talk about the low/no fat diets in the 1980's and the no/low carb diets in the 1990's. People lost so much muscle that the body went into a Starvation mode--leads to terrible cravings and overeating. On avearge, for every 25lbs lost through diets, within 18 months, Dr. Oz stated that 99% of people will put 30+ back on. So, I guess 1% of people can keep it off, such as the person above. But, in all fairness, I think the definition of "low Carb" needs to be stated. What one person might think is low carb diet may be high to another person. For example, the WieFit diet might keep a 150lb female, looking to lose 25 lbs, on a diet that consists of 200 carbohydrates for a few days, and then cut back to 50-80 carbohydrates for another few days (just an example). And who knows, some may state this is high, and some may state this is low...
ReplyDeleteNow, I'd like to comment on the other comment above. Yes, all carbohydrates do break down into some form of sugar in the blood (glucose, fructose, etc.---mostly glucose). But, if this is the case, why do some immediately feed the fat cell, while others are stored within the muscle cell as glycogen?? The answer to this is SO IMPORTANT, that Nutrtitionists even came up with and Index called the Glycemic Index that gives these Carbohydrates Numbers based on how fast or slow they break down into sugars. Don't want to make this anylonger and go into any more science, but basically the high glycemic foods are stored via the fat cell (except after intese workout--another good future blog), and the low glycemic carbs will be stored as glycogen.
One other thing--After we are done deveolping (going through puberty), proteins and fats no longer fuel the brain. Carbs are the major Macro that fuels the brain. This is one of the reasons that people on low/no carb diets get grumpy, sleepy, and have a hard time concentrating.
And on another note, age doesn’t have that much to do with the amount of carbs someone can eat. It’s more about lean mass. When Glycogen is fully depleted (after a touch 1.5 hour workout on a day of zero carbs), humans can hold 15 grams of carbohydrates per 2.2lbs of lean mass. This is for EVERYONE regardless of age. This is a fact. I am 38 years old, have four children and a wife that I spend a great deal of time with being a husband and father, have my own business (full time job), and still lift like I did when I was 18 years old. 1.5 hours a day, 4-5 days a week. No matter the age or circumstances, I think everyone should make it a priority to get in 5-8 hours of physical fitness in every week.
Again, I'm sure there are exceptions, and if a low/no carb diet works for someone, then that is great--but statistics and science shows it's not the best diet for the majority.