Keto, Low Carb, Atkins, IF Thread

[Tony Storaro]

In other news, I'm down 30 lbs. in 3 months. Nothing else works as well or easily for me as keto.

Road cycling?

You do your 300 km a week and you can get back to cheesburgers and cakes.

BUT the catch is you DO your 300 km. Every single week. No excuses, no skipping, no cheating. You do them no matter what.

 

[cantunamunch]

Mmmm....cake

 

[Noodler]

Road cycling?

You do your 300 km a week and you can get back to cheesburgers and cakes.

BUT the catch is you DO your 300 km. Every single week. No excuses, no skipping, no cheating. You do them no matter what.

For me, I gain weight with heavy exercise. It's the old adage that "you work up an appetite". I have to be very careful with my exercise levels or I will derail weight loss efforts. At the end of the day, weight loss is about what you put in your mouth.

 

[Tony Storaro]

For me, I gain weight with heavy exercise. It's the old adage that "you work up an appetite". I have to be very careful with my exercise levels or I will derail weight loss efforts. At the end of the day, weight loss is about what you put in your mouth.

I am not talking heavy, I am talking LONG. In fact at the beginning of the season, during base training, the computer should show: Anaerobic effect: 0. These 300 km/week you can do with only 1000 meters or even less up, depending where you live.
It is almost impossible to outeat this sort of activity, you will have neither the time nor the desire to eat a lot if you do this.
But again, it is imperative that you do it no matter what. You feel good-you do it, feel bad or lazy-you do it all the same. And then what type of food you eat wont matter one bit.

Heavy anaerobic exercise is a proven way of gaining weight, I end every skiing season quite a lot heavier than I start at. This year I am extremely happy to have gained only 4 kg, there were years this was between 10-15 kilos.
These 4 will be a distant memory just 3 weeks into the cycling season.
Road cycling keeps your weight in check like nothing else.

 

[Noodler]

I am not talking heavy, I am talking LONG. In fact at the beginning of the season, during base training, the computer should show: Anaerobic effect: 0. These 300 km/week you can do with only 1000 meters or even less up, depending where you live.
It is almost impossible to outeat this sort of activity, you will have neither the time nor the desire to eat a lot if you do this.
But again, it is imperative that you do it no matter what. You feel good-you do it, feel bad or lazy-you do it all the same. And then what type of food you eat wont matter one bit.

Heavy anaerobic exercise is a proven way of gaining weight, I end every skiing season quite a lot heavier than I start at. This year I am extremely happy to have gained only 4 kg, there were years this was between 10-15 kilos.
These 4 will be a distant memory just 3 weeks into the cycling season.
Road cycling keeps your weight in check like nothing else.

Maybe it's a translation thing. I just used "heavy" to mean a lot of exercise. For me it doesn't matter whether its aerobic or anaerobic. The point is that it makes me hungrier than normal and then I will end up eating stuff I will regret. I don't believe in CICO (Calories In/Calories Out); way too much evidence that our bodies do not work that way; we are not thermodynamic engines. The type and quality of the calories are what counts and the real key for me is the management of our weight control hormones (insulin, glucagon, leptin, grehlin, cortisol, etc.). The real power of keto is how it handles those hormones. What I've found is that high levels of exercise can work against the hormone controls. I can ski all day and everything is fine. I can lift weights for 30 minutes (Body by Science) and everything is fine. But if I do a marathon lifting session (2 hours) or get on my elliptical for an hour (heart rate kept above 120), I will upset the apple cart.

 

[cantunamunch]

For me, I gain weight with heavy exercise. It's the old adage that "you work up an appetite". I have to be very careful with my exercise levels or I will derail weight loss efforts. At the end of the day, weight loss is about what you put in your mouth.

And how much you exhale. Carbon can't leave your body unless you exhale it.




If you're gaining weight with exercise, your exercise intervals are not long enough for your liver to do triglyceride conversion during exercise. Get rid of the less-than-2hour rides. 2hours is the barest of minimums.

 

[Tony Storaro]

Get rid of the less-than-2hour rides. 2hours is the barest of minimums.

Absolutely.

For me, the engine really warms up and is ready to up the revs no sooner than an hour into the ride.

 

[Tony Storaro]

The point is that it makes me hungrier than normal and then I will end up eating stuff I will regret.

No, you wont when you know the next day you will burn all that you have just eaten.
You can eat 5000 kcal if you want, but if the next day you burn 6000 you will be so exhausted you wont want to eat even 3000.
That's what I mean. Constant, persevering, uncompromising grind. Your body has no chance against your willpower.

 

[cantunamunch]

For me, the engine really warms up and is ready to up the revs no sooner than an hour into the ride.

There's an energy hole between ~25mins and 90mins where no matter what you eat before, no matter what you eat during, no matter how sprinter-pumped your glycogen is, blood sugar goes and stays low. Stop there and *of course* appetite gets triggered - through the very cascade of hormones @Noodler was mentioning.

 

[Noodler]

There's an energy hole between ~25mins and 90mins where no matter what you eat before, no matter what you eat during, no matter how sprinter-pumped your glycogen is, blood sugar goes and stays low. Stop there and *of course* appetite gets triggered - through the very cascade of hormones @Noodler was mentioning.

This is interesting stuff. I never dug into the issue deep enough to understand what was actually at play here.

 

[Tony Storaro]

There's an energy hole between ~25mins and 90mins where no matter what you eat before, no matter what you eat during, no matter how sprinter-pumped your glycogen is, blood sugar goes and stays low.

Beta blockers don't help either...

In any case, I need at least 20 km to warm up properly and only then I can push hard.
This is why when I plan hard climbs, I make sure they start no sooner than km 30.
These 30 km I go no higher than Zone 2. 3 at most.

 

[cantunamunch]

Beta blockers don't help either...

In any case, I need at least 20 km to warm up properly and only then I can push hard.
This is why when I plan hard climbs, I make sure they start no sooner than km 30.
These 30 km I go no higher than Zone 2. 3 at most.

This is why I think e-bikes are a serious training tool. Pushing through a metabolic warmup without burning muscle and without poking-along-boredom = result.

Some years ago there was considerable Internet debate about Vonn's 3hour bike sessions. I think her coaches knew something

 

[Tony Storaro]

This is why I think e-bikes are a serious training tool. Pushing through a metabolic warmup without burning muscle and without poking-along-boredom = result.

Yep. Nothing against e-bikes. I like the Spesh Creo Evo very much and will probably buy one.

This-when Spesh finally start producing bikes in sufficient numbers again. Damn Covid.

 

[Rudi Riet]

This is why I think e-bikes are a serious training tool. Pushing through a metabolic warmup without burning muscle and without poking-along-boredom = result.

Some years ago there was considerable Internet debate about Vonn's 3hour bike sessions. I think her coaches knew something

The long efforts in the saddle work for me - though for me the magic duration is 2 hours plus. But if I put in the time the kilos stay off and the hunger doesn't spike. BP stays in a healthy range, resting HR stays in the zone where if you are admitted to hospital you'll need to remind the floor nurses to turn off the low pulse alarms.

But yes, short anaerobic efforts will build muscle mass (see: legs of track cyclist sprinters) and will also cause glycogen tanking. It's funny: this is stuff that I worked with back in my teenage ski academy days when few people were really talking about it. Let's just say that stuck.

And keeping up some time on the bike during ski season (easier to do here in the Mid Atlantic than in, say, the Rockies or Alps unless you're doing the Zwift/indoor thing) keeps the weight very much in a happy place.

 

[VickieH]

There's an energy hole between ~25mins and 90mins where no matter what you eat before, no matter what you eat during, no matter how sprinter-pumped your glycogen is, blood sugar goes and stays low. Stop there and *of course* appetite gets triggered - through the very cascade of hormones @Noodler was mentioning.

Does this apply to both aerobic and anaerobic activity?

 

[Tony Storaro]

But yes, short anaerobic efforts will build muscle mass (see: legs of track cyclist sprinters) and will also cause glycogen tanking.

Exactly! Look at the bodybuilders and powerlifters. When I was into lifting heavy-when I was young and dumb that is, 45 minutes sessions of ultra heavy lifting ( I am talking vomit inducing, hate your life heavy) produced amazing results in terms of muscle gain. I am talking going from 80 to 105kg in a period May-October.
Assisted of course by some...magic pills shall we say...

Sadly, it has also produced some less than amazing results in joints and back, which I start feeling later on in life, so if there are any kids reading this: DO NOT do this.
Be more Lee Haney than Dorian Yates. Stimulate, do not annihilate. Do not be dumb like your uncle Tony here, be smart and you will live long and prosper.

 

[cantunamunch]

Does this apply to both aerobic and anaerobic activity?

The anaerobic is going to be in spurts - because it's anaerobic. Without getting into minutiae of anaerobic metabolism, let's assume there's enough recovery from each effort but the overall intensity is high enough to burn several hundred calories in an hour. Then yes. If you want to stay with weight loss without burning muscle, either do the efforts in the first half hour or wait for long-term energy to be available*.

*Like, on a trainer behind the bus.

 

[John Webb]

 

[no edge]

25 min. would indicate low intensity.

 

[Noodler]

Well today marks 35 lbs. lost in 4 months. The weight loss has definitely slowed in recent weeks with not a lot left to lose, but this is my lowest weight since March 2016. I can definitely feel the difference in my skiing with a better strength-to-weight ratio.