You don't "burn" your food off through exercise. You burn most of the energy you get from food simply by being alive. You will burn way more energy (calories) during your 22-23 hours a day sleeping, thinking and moving around when you are simply living life. The energy burned during simply living your life is much higher than the energy burned during the 1-2 hours a day you may spend in training.
When you overeat regularly in an effort to "fuel" your body your are sending a signal to release higher and higher levels of insulin to help you store and manage this food as energy. Insulin is the primary hormone that helps us process food and turn it into energy for later use. When you overeat regularly your body can not release enough insulin to help you store this food as fuel. This in turn causes excess nutrients (mainly sugars) to pour into the bloodstream. This is how Type 2 diabetes gets a hold on your body. Type 2 diabetes is a progressive disease that gets worse when you continue to overeat, particularly overeating carbohydrates.
Your fuel for training is stored primarily in your musculature. Think of your muscles as sponges. When you pour more water into a sponge than it can hold what happens? The water spills out of the sponge. When you eat more food (primarily carbohydrates) than your insulin can handle the sugars pour into your bloodstream. This is the primary cause of bellyfat accumulation, low daily energy levels, headaches, allergy-like symptoms, foul mood, etc.
I teach Yoga, Hardstyle Kettlebells and barbells.
Wednesday, April 16, 2014
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
Pros and Cons of Ketogenic Diet
I look at the ketogenic diet the same way I look at the vegan diet, it is a diet that should only be followed to fix certain health problems and is not a balanced long-term diet.
For my clients who are trying to lose bodyfat I recommend they start with a 2 week ketogenic diet followed by 2 weeks ketogenic diet + 1-2 starches/day depending on activity levels. We follow the ketogenic diet until the body is fat-adapted and our appetite for sweets is diminished. Once we reach these goals it is time to start following a more balanced diet. The only time I recommend a person stay on the ketogenic diet more than 2 weeks is if they are more than 15-20 lbs overweight. Once a person is this many lbs overweight they qualify as sick and unhealthy, the health benefits of the keto diet outweigh the negatives for these folks. For these people getting the excess weight off becomes our #1 priority.
Pro: You will lose weight quickly on this diet, many people lose 5-10 lbs during their first 10 days following this plan.
Con: You will probably lose at least some muscle mass from this quick weight loss. Clients who are 20 lbs or more overweight can afford to lose a small amount of muscle mass as they lose fat but for clients trying to lose mainly bellyfat this can be disastrous.
Pro: Your appetite will change so drastically by the 10-14th day it will feel like you have no appetite at all. This is a beneficial thing when trying to change eating habits BUT
Con: This "no-appetite" feeling can be addictive for some folks so they stay on the pure ketogenic diet for more than 2 weeks. This almost always causes people to undereat. If you undereat on the keto diet you are missing the point and the body will react as it always does to nutritional stress, mainly by storing calories as bellyfat instead of burning this fat for fuel.
Pro: The diet is simple to follow. Meats, eggs, vegetables. That's it!
Cons: The ketogenic diet does not teach a person how to eat a balanced diet. Many people try to turn this into a beef and bacon diet but this is not the proper way to do it. Digestion will be poor and a 0% carbohydrate diet followed in the long run will make some folks feel terrible. A true ketogenic diet has some carbohydrates but all of these carbs must come from above-ground/low-glycemic load (no starch) vegetables. Vegetables have almost nothing in them energy-wise so even on the keto diet you can eat them almost unrestricted. It is not as easy as most people thing getting a couple hundred calories a day from vegetables only!
For my clients who are trying to lose bodyfat I recommend they start with a 2 week ketogenic diet followed by 2 weeks ketogenic diet + 1-2 starches/day depending on activity levels. We follow the ketogenic diet until the body is fat-adapted and our appetite for sweets is diminished. Once we reach these goals it is time to start following a more balanced diet. The only time I recommend a person stay on the ketogenic diet more than 2 weeks is if they are more than 15-20 lbs overweight. Once a person is this many lbs overweight they qualify as sick and unhealthy, the health benefits of the keto diet outweigh the negatives for these folks. For these people getting the excess weight off becomes our #1 priority.
Pro: You will lose weight quickly on this diet, many people lose 5-10 lbs during their first 10 days following this plan.
Con: You will probably lose at least some muscle mass from this quick weight loss. Clients who are 20 lbs or more overweight can afford to lose a small amount of muscle mass as they lose fat but for clients trying to lose mainly bellyfat this can be disastrous.
Pro: Your appetite will change so drastically by the 10-14th day it will feel like you have no appetite at all. This is a beneficial thing when trying to change eating habits BUT
Con: This "no-appetite" feeling can be addictive for some folks so they stay on the pure ketogenic diet for more than 2 weeks. This almost always causes people to undereat. If you undereat on the keto diet you are missing the point and the body will react as it always does to nutritional stress, mainly by storing calories as bellyfat instead of burning this fat for fuel.
Pro: The diet is simple to follow. Meats, eggs, vegetables. That's it!
Cons: The ketogenic diet does not teach a person how to eat a balanced diet. Many people try to turn this into a beef and bacon diet but this is not the proper way to do it. Digestion will be poor and a 0% carbohydrate diet followed in the long run will make some folks feel terrible. A true ketogenic diet has some carbohydrates but all of these carbs must come from above-ground/low-glycemic load (no starch) vegetables. Vegetables have almost nothing in them energy-wise so even on the keto diet you can eat them almost unrestricted. It is not as easy as most people thing getting a couple hundred calories a day from vegetables only!
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