FullGas

hmm, not familiar with that brand...

a pint of HD vanilla is 945 calories...at 6' / 143 lbs, I don't really care about calories...actually more is better. currently have 7 QUARTS in the freezer, might need to re-stock soon.

wolfchild

The point I was trying to make was that: carbohydrates from whole foods which take longer time to break down and be converted into glucose are healthier then carbohydrates which break down very fast or carbs which don't need to be broken down such as pure sugar.

Seattle Forrest

Ok I agree with that. Honestly, I'm not a big fan of cane sugar. I loved everything sweet when I was younger but I can't remember the last time I had a piece of chocolate or candy. I'm getting most of my carbs from rice (I love Indian food), and from raspberry smoothies I make. I don't put any in my coffee, cream is sweet enough. I eat a pack of peanut M&Ms on the bike when I plan to ride more than three hours. My weakness is salty crunchy savory, like potato chips.

Sixty Fiver

If you want to argue biochemistry and cellular biology you should be better informed.

Quite simply, fat does not turn into sugar.

Sixty Fiver

Lots of research and testing has shown that performance does not change very much, if any when one switches their fuel source from carbs to fats.

When I went lower carb (with no calorie restriction) my already great checkup numbers got even better, my wife's results were far more profound as she lost 80 pounds (and has maintained a healthy weight) and has no markers for diabetes anymore.

This was a lady who was eating a very healthy diet and getting more exercise than most but something still wasn't working... it was the carbs that were messing her up.

She has other health conditions that made a very low carb diet a necessity.

At 50 I am till wearing the same clothing size as when I was 20 after addressing some minor weight gains prior to knocking back the carbs and bumping up the fats in my diet with no caloric restriction.

wolfchild

No, human body can't convert fat into sugar...On a very high-fat low carb or ketogenic diet fat gets converted into ketones or ketone bodies which are then used for energy instead of sugar.

nycphotography

I dunno, I'm not a biochemist or a cellular biologist. All I know is what I read. I do know that glucose is sugar. And I see about 30 versions of the following statement of basic fact when I search google.

"Your body cannot convert fats directly into muscle-ready glycogen. However, through a series of metabolic processes that result from conditions of depleted carbohydrates, it is possible for stored fats to be broken down into glucose, which can then be converted into glycogen."

Are you claiming that everyone on the whole internet has it wrong except for you? Because if you are in possession of some deeper knowledge of the facts, why not share them rather than keep them to yourself while claiming the above is false?

Carbonfiberboy 

Behold a whimsical explanation of the biochemistry of turning fatty acids into glucose - by a biochemist:
How We Convert Fat to Glucose In This Little-Known Pathway

There are more explanations of this process if one looks around.

Sixty Fiver

I live with a woman who has a background in biochemistry and cellular biology... her aunt worked on the team that won the Nobel prize for discovering the Citric Acid Cycle. I have good teachers and wehave been practicing this lower carb lifestyle for some years.

Protein can be converted to glucose/ glycogen through gluconeogenesis but our bodies convert fat into energy by producing ketone bodies which our bodies can also use as fuel (ketosis).

Our glycogen reserve is very low and can be used up in a day while our normal fat reserves can sustain us for almost month before we risk actual starvation and in these case our bodies utilize those ketone bodies and not glycogen as fuel.

Basically, if you want to burn fat you have to stop burning carbs as this triggers an insulin response, and insulin turns off our ability to burn fats.

We can only burn one kind of fuel at a time... problem with lots of folks is that they live in a state of elevated blood sugar and elevated insulin levels and do not burn any fat.

prathmann

Yes, fat can be utilized more directly through ketosis, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluconeogenesis
indicates that gluconeogenesis can operate on either proteins or lipids/triglycerides (fat) to form glucose (sugar).

gregf83 

How much fat you burn while riding is mainly determined by intensity. Riding at low to moderate intensity will increase the rate of burning fats. Increase the intensity and carbs become more important. Other than high intensity levels we burn a combination of fat and carbohydrates not one or the other.

Machka 

How is she doing? How is her weight loss "journey" going?

Seattle Forrest

OBoile

All too often people seem to get caught making the mistake that if too much of something is bad, then eliminating it completely must be good. Our bodies generally don't work that way.

Too much sun is bad. Cutting out sunlight completely is a terrible idea.
Too much salt is bad. Cutting out salt completely is a terrible idea.
Too much water will kill you. But obviously cutting out water completely is a very, very bad idea.
Eating too much food is bad. Eating none is obviously not good either.

A lot of people eat too much sugar. But, if you're already eating a low to moderate amount, cutting out the rest isn't likely to benefit you at all.

nycphotography

^ ASSUMING you are at (and maintaining) your optimal weight, correct.

Carbonfiberboy 

A friend was visiting us yesterday and told an interesting story. His cholesterol was a little high, so of course he went to a naturopath. The doc drew blood and sent it off for analysis. The results were said to indicate that he was sensitive to wheat, dairy, eggs, and meat and he should eliminate them from his diet, which he did. A couple months later, his cholesterol was much better! And guess what? He'd lost a bunch of weight, duh. And whaddya bet that his blood work had nothing to do with it . . .

So the deal is that if you follow some fad diet and eliminate all the higher calorie stuff which you've been eating as a major part of your diet, you'll lose weight. Of course your blood markers will improve with weight loss no matter where and how you cut the calories. So if you eat sugar as a major part of your diet, and you cut that out, you'll probably lose weight and feel better, too. Which has nothing to do with sugar, per se, but it looks good for the theory that cutting whatever it is out of your diet will make you feel better. And lots of folks make money off it, too. I guess if it's good for the GDP it's good, right?

Ball Bearing

I don't see the problem. If he had gone to a GP I can bet that he would have been prescribed statins - end of story. I think your friend is pretty smart.

Carbonfiberboy 

Not a problem, I just found it amusing. As we know, one can also lower one's cholesterol by eating mostly meat, cream, and eggs and restricting carbs, which I also find amusing. The mechanism is the same: weight loss. If the naturopath had prescribed a rational weight loss system with a balanced diet . . . well maybe he wouldn't have lost so much weight? Somehow the fad diet thing gets people motivated? Or what?

I just find it interesting. You're right, the GP probably would have prescribed statins, but that's beside the point. My GP says that the guidelines say I should be on statins no matter what my blood lipids are, but we choose to ignore those guidelines.

OBoile

Even if you're overweight, you don't need to cut ALL the sugar from your diet. You need to reduce total calories consumed. Yes, cutting sugar can help with that, but it may be better to cut other things. For instance, if the only sugar you have is a teaspoon in your coffee a couple of times per day, and you love having sugar in your coffee, it may be better to just eat a bit less at dinner instead.

OBoile

The dishonest nature of the naturopath and all the fake allergies don't bother you?

I mean, getting people to eat less is great, but why can't it be done honestly?

T Stew

That is what I am thinking. People tend to think in extremes. usually, cutting out processed foods containing added sugars is all you need to do to 'cut sugars' out of your diet. You can still eat blueberries and tomatoes despite they contain sugar! But added processed sugar you certainly do not need at all to be a healthy active individual. I am no biology expert but it seems pretty common knowledge out there that dietary fats in the body are excellent source of fuel, and when your body is in it's aerobic burning zone should be primarily fueled by fats. Consuming excess sugars will actually hinder your fat-burning mechanism and cause your body to burn more sugars and limits your aerobic capacity. So depending on exactly what you want to do, sugars can be disadvantageous and eliminating excess can be a good thing. Of course sugars have been linked to all sorts of things like tooth decay, stripping calcium from your body, causing addictions, even fueling cancer.
Some interesting info https://philmaffetone.com/rethinking...r-performance/

In fact I'll take it a step further and say excess carbs, of any sort, can also be a problem and minimizing them can be advantageous. Many people have some degree of carbohydrate intolerance and perhaps don't know it. Take a look at this for a better explanation and how to test to see if you have any carb intolerance by eliminating carbs... https://philmaffetone.com/2-week-test/

Carbonfiberboy 

I've seen the other side, too: we used to buy honey in 60# tubs from our favorite beekeeper. My wife and I put a heaping teaspoon in our herb tea twice a day. We quit doing that, just cutting back the calories, and found that we had cut our honey consumption in half - by 30#/year!

So cut the calories where it's easiest. Unsweetened herb tea tastes just fine. The honey didn't harm us but we didn't need it either.

OBoile

Assuming you're eating a reasonably healthy diet this is 100% correct IMO. Compliance is the most important thing. The best diet in the world won't help you if you fail to follow it.

OBoile

You don't need "processed" sugar to be healthy. But a small amount won't hurt you either. I use quotes because there really is no difference between processed sugar and natural sugar. Glucose is glucose. Fructose is fructose. The molecular composition is identical. The difference is that the blueberries and tomatoes have other things like fiber that are good for you. But you'd get the same effect from eating a salad plus a small amount of table sugar.

As for burning fat vs. carbs, I've never understood why people make a big deal about this. If you're in a caloric deficit but burning carbs, your body is going to use it's fat stores to replenish your glycogen anyway. The only difference between this and burning fat directly is that it happens in the few hours after you exercise rather than immediately as you exercise.

nycphotography

I think this is the crux of how a low carb high exercise diet works. I added low fat to mine, because I wanted the calorie deficit and fats are high calorie. Basically I sought out the most protein per calorie things to eat.

I dunno all the specific biochemistry. All I know is that it was extremely, surprisingly effective. I was able to cut 20 lbs of fat very quickly (6'0 cut from 174 to 154 in around 3 months) once I got focused on the specifics.

Calorie burning rides w/ big calorie deficits, eating 1200 to 1800 calories a day, mostly protein no gratuitous carbs no gratuitous fat, and a little gym work to force muscle build.

The fat melted off. Melted.