ExRx.net

Hi All,

The last post in the Carb-cycling sticky at the top of this forum, links to http://www.cheatyourwaythin.com .

This is a diet plan called "cheat your way thin" by a "Joel Marion". He also has another similar plan called "Xtreme Fat Loss Diet".

The selling point of his plan is it's focus on Leptin. Arguing that low carb diet slowly reduces Leptin in our system causing reduced metabolism, he suggests that one should have recurring cheat days when they eat high carb to get the leptin levels back up to boost metabolism.

I would like to know if the people here have any thoughts on this, but more importantly I haven't been able to find out any specifics on the Cheat Days. How often should you have cheat days? Every week? Every two weeks? Every month? How many cheat days at a time? 1,2, more? Also how much carbs should be consumed? Should all the meals have high carbs on cheat days?

I'd love to see people discuss this here.

Thanks

Most recommend cheat days once or twice a week, and a carb refeed window of 1 meal up to 2 days. You need to try out what works for you. I like random carb meals, once every few days. "The Anabolic Diet" calls for 36 hours of high carb once a week. Your body will go into starvation mode if you go low-carb too long. This slows your metabolism and can limit muscle growth.

Thanks Stu,

Can you tell me what exactly you mean by "carb refeed window"? My wife is trying to lose weight. On a cheat day can you eat pastas and pizzas all three meals? Are you supposed to have a cheat day like that AND a "carb refeed window" ? I'm sure the optimal plan varies from person to person, but what is typical? and what is a good starting point?

I use the term "Carb refeed window" as a general term to mean a high carb meal, a cheat day, or whatever the plan calls for. It's going to vary by person. If you find 3 high carb meals too much, as in "you're getting fatter", cut back. I find 1 high carb meal to be enough for me. "Anabolic Diet" calls for 36 hours of high carb(which is really 2 days) but that assumes you're putting on muscle and the rest of your diet and training is dialed in precisely. In general if you're trying to lose weight, keep the refeeds short, if you're trying to gain weight, keep them longer.

I think most experts believe that it takes leptin at least 36 hours of refeeding to have a positive effect.

Also, when you do a carb refeed, you should keep fat low. As in below ~50g.

There are low fat pizzas you can get which are perfect for this, if she enjoys pizza.

Pasta is okay as well, just like I said make sure any sauce you use is low fat.. such as a tomato based sauce.

The key to a carb refeed is to increase glycogen stores and boost hormones such as leptin which are the biggest factor in fat oxidation from what I understand. The reason you keep fat low is because you SHOULD be in a surplus calorie wise during this time frame - and it's very difficult for carbs to be stored as fat, they simply block the burning of fat. Meaning any fat you eat will most likely be stored.

Assuming you're on a strict ketogenic diet, yes, 36 hour refeeds, and it could be as infrequent as once a month, but if you're carb cycling or just normal low carb, you don't need a long refeed. "The Anabolic Diet" is an example of the type of diet where a 36 hour refeed is appropriate.

Unless we know how your wife's diet is before the cheat days we really can't say how she should structure the refeeds or even if refeeds are appropriate.

It doesn't appear the fat intake should be limited.

The Anabolic Solution
Dr Maurio DiPasquale

Other Hormones and Compounds p 38

1) Leptin levels are regulated...by higher level caloric and carb intake

2) Increase you food intake and you leptin levels promptly rise doing a lot of good things like decreasing hunger and increasing metabolic rate

3) The intersting thing about leptin, at least from out view point, is that it reacts much faster than any significant changes in body composition. That is leptin will increase or decrease before there are any changes in bodyfat.

4) Increasing carbs and calories jumps the leptin levels back up for the weekend carb phase, with all the benefits of leptin but without the adverse effects on bodyfat.

DiPasquale's information indicates that a higher consumtion of calories, no matter the source increase leptin levels along with carbohydrate intake.

DiPasquale goes on to state that some individuals may do fine on a two "cheat" days in a row. Other may need to limit it to one "cheat" day during the week.

In other words, some individuals leptin levels may respond in approximately 24 hours.

This brings us back what experts and what sources state it take 36 hours for leptin to respond?

Kenny Croxdale

I'm not sure where all I read it, but I've read it multiple times. Of course, most of the time I read it, it came from authors/experts who have closely related views. (Lyle McDonald, Leangains, etc)

I just read something on Berardi's website that says 24h refeeds bring baseline back to 100%, though. So, I'm sure it's possible a 24h refeed would work - I've just always been confused on what a 24h refeed was - single day?

Also, the reason for keeping fat low is to keep you from having excess calories stored as bodyfat.

It's actually fairly difficult for carbs to be stored as body fat, from what I understand, even when you're overeating them.

I think where the fat gain can come from, if I've read correctly, is that basically while having such a large carb intake - your body stops fat oxidation, meaning all dietary fat is then stored as adipose tissue, etc.

I'm not saying you can't have fat/carbs and have a refeed that boosts leptin, just that from what I understand it's entirely possible that it will set you back substantially if both carbs and fats are high on a day that's well over maintenance.


To give an example, when I'm low carbing, my refeeds look like this:

Day 1:

600g carbs
30g fat
200g protein
= 3470 calories

Assuming I'm glycogen depleted, much of this will go in to glycogen stores which means it's possible I don't store any fat at all, even though 3470 is probably over maintenance (Since I only lift, no cardio). I also would become glycogen supercompensated, most likely, after 2 days of this.


Now, if I were to up fat substantially, I would have to lower carbs, which would hinder glycogen supercompensation and most likely cause any excess calories to be fat calories and as such stored as fat (As carbohydrates stop fat oxidation).

This is just what I understand - if glycogen super compensation isn't desired, then it probably wouldn't matter and you could just lower carbs - but glycogen supercompensation has been shown to increase work out put.

Leptin refeeds are more of an issue for bodybuilders at very low body fat levels. Here's John Berardi's opinion.

http://www.johnberardi.com/articles/qa/wannabebig_2.htm



Edit: Today's blog at Chaos & Pain was most timely.
http://chaosandpain.blogspot.com/2010/0 ... rying.html

Thanks a lot for all your replies guys.

Stu: We've just started on a diet but this week we both caught flu, so I'm not sure if we followed a strict diet. In general we have egg whites, greens including tomatoes, protein shakes, oranges and other fruits, citrucel throughout the day. We frequently ate outside at cafes, eating salads(dressing on the side) and broccoli-cheddar soup. Also we take lentils approx one meal a day.

For her cheat day yesterday she had a plate of Indian 3 item combo which had2 lentils, curd. Plus she ate half a serving of brown rice and half a "naan" (north Indian thick break).

We got married last year. I gained 20lbs and she 30 lbs over the course of the year. The honeymoon is over now I guess. My wife has always struggled with weight, her trainer measures her % body fat (using calipers) to be 37% 2 weeks ago. She's lost 5 lbs since.

Most people gain weight when they get married. Food is on of the fun things about marriage. It still can be, but the focus has to go towards meat and veg and less on breads and pasta. It doesn't mean you can't have that kind of stuff, just not a lot of it. John Berardi talks about 90% compliance and Mark Sisson talks about being 80% primal. You will never be perfect but that doesn't mean you don't try. Just don't beat yourself up over little indiscretions. As far as the Leptin thing, don't worry about it. Start reading about insulin resistance. That fat that you gained the weight quickly means that you should be able to lose it quickly that you've caught that it's something that you can control.

Yep it's all due to insulin. As well as store glucose, insulin also inhibits fat oxidation and promotes fat storage as it's an anabolic hormone. But it's a tricky one because hormones tend to overlap each other, they never work alone, so while this is happening to someone who has low levels of leptin they may not store fat as much as say someone who is a regular high carb dieter (along with high fat).

This is why foods like pizza, doughnuts, french fries etc. will cause weight gain (if eaten by the average overweight person i.e no ketogenic diet or anything). This is where the high carb, low fat diet or high fat low carb diet debate comes in. Both will cause you to lose weight but we all know which is more effective and the other advantages of higher protein intake and less grains etc.

All energy must get stored as fat. That applies to carbs too.
For carbs you can use some of it during digestion, because insulin drives the whole body to use up the glucose. The reason why it does so, lies in the fact that it is poisonous for the blood, which can hold only 4-5gms of it. Around 400gm can be stored in the liver and muscles, but most of it did not get depleted except after fast or long heavy exercises.

The rest must get stored as fat. There are no other ways to it.
The problem is not the fat storage.

The only reason people gain weight is because the fat cells are not releasing fatty acids that are stored there. The reason behind this is mostly hormonal. Testosterone and several other hormones drive fat out. Leptin is used to manage the level. But there are some fatty cells that are so damaged that they don't respond to the hormones.

Different fatty cells have different propensity to get damaged. It also depends on people. Most people get fat in the middle some get fat on the lower body others on the upper body. Some cannot get fat at all.

It is not a simple thing. There are several factors that damage the cells. The biggest of them is high omega6 to omega3 ratio. Try to bring it below 4:1 on a daily basis. Anything above is bad. Another big ones are sweeteners, fructose, artificial sweeteners also galactose. These cause glycation, and damage cells receptors. Some others are lectins, but those we don't know much about, except that the WGA (Wheat Germ Agglutinin) is pretty bad.

Whole wheat is quite deadly and is associated with increased BMI and heart disease. See the link
http://rawfoodsos.com/2010/09/02/the-ch ... ase-oh-my/

Then there are ways to force the body to lose fat, which is what low carb + weight lifting does. But it may not be entirely healthy, as it causes a lot of stress on your body. If your adrenals are strong enough handle the stress, then you are able to get to a lower point of weight. But unless the leptin accepts the lower mass, you will forever be struggling with it.

The strategies to increase leptin sensitivity will help a lot.

I'm pretty sure that China study is so flawed that you can cherry pick anything you want out of it.

Secondly, almost everything you said above is alarmist hogwash. Beyond the china study, I'd love to see any proof backing the stuff you said.

All energy must NOT get stored as fat, either. I'm really not sure where you're getting this information, but you're extremely mislead.

Also, I've slowly watched this site move from a neutral ground for information to one that's predominantly low-carb/paleo biased. I think a lot of information is starting to get skewed because of it.

Yeah, well, you have to stand on tiptoes if you like gluten and carbs. I don't want Ironman to yell at me if I admit to eating PBJ sandwiches when I'm not cutting weight.