Let’s delve into ketogenic diets and their $33 billion hack.
The carbohydrate-insulin model of obesity, the underlying theory that ketogenic diets have some kind of metabolic advantage, has been experimentally falsified. Own studies from proponents of the ketogenic diet presented The exact opposite: Ketogenic diets actually put you at a metabolic disadvantage and slow down body fat loss. How much does a low carb diet slow fat loss?
As I analyze it in my video. Ketogenic diet results for weight lossif you cut If you eliminate approximately 800 calories of carbohydrates from your diet per day, you lose 53 grams of body fat per day. But if you cut the same number of fat calories, you lose 89 grams of fat per day. You reduce the same amount of calories, but on a low-fat diet you melt nine servings of extra fat butter each day, compared to a low-carb diet. The same amount of calories, but about 80 percent more fat loss when you reduce your consumption of fats instead of carbohydrates. You can see a graph of these results below and at 1:07 in my video. The title of the study. speaks by itself: “Calorie for calorie, dietary fat restriction results in greater body fat loss than carbohydrate restriction in people with obesity.”
However, just looking at the bathroom scale would make you think otherwise. After six days on a low-carb diet, study subjects lost four pounds. On the low-fat diet, they lost less than three pounds, as you can see in the graph below and at 1:40 in my video. So according to the scale, I look as if the low carb diet won without a doubt. You can see why low carb diets are so popular. What was happening inside Their bodies, however, tell the real story. The low carb group was losing mostly lean mass: water and protein. This water weight loss helps explain why low-carb diets have “been such a persistent topic for diet book authors and a ‘cash cow’ for publishers,” going more than 150 years ago. That’s his secret. As a weight loss expert noted“Rapid water loss is the $33 billion diet trick.”
When you eat carbohydrates, your body bulks up your muscles with glycogen for quick energy. Follow a high carb diet for three days and you can add about three pounds of muscle mass to your arms and legs, as you can see below and at 2:34 in my video. Those glycogen reserves to drain with a low carbohydrate diet and draw water with it. (Ketones also need to be removed from the kidneys, drawing out even more water.) On the scale, that may show up as four more pounds lost in ten days, but that “was due to losses in total body water.” ”—That is water loss.
The bottom line: Ketogenic diets simply don’t hold up.
The excitement of seeing the kilos come Going down so quickly on the scale makes many return to the altar of low-carb diets. When the diet fails, dieters often blame themselves, but the intoxication of that rapid, initial weight loss can tempt them back, like getting drunk again after forgetting how terrible the last hangover was. This has been called the “false hope syndrome.” “The diet industry thrives for two reasons: big promises and repeat customers,” something low-carb diets were created for, given the rapid initial loss of water.
What we care about is body fat. In six days, the low-fat diet extracted a total of 80 percent more body fat than the low-carb diet. It’s not just a study either. As you can see below and at minute 3:54 in my videoYou can consult all the controlled feeding trials in which researchers compared low-carbohydrate diets to low-fat diets, exchanging the same number of carbohydrate calories for fat calories or vice versa. If a calorie is just a calorie, then all the studies should have crossed that zero line in the middle, straddling “favors low-fat diet” and “favors low-carbohydrate diet,” and in fact six did. One study showed greater fat loss on a low-carb diet, but all other studies favored the low-fat diet: more body fat loss for the same amount of calories. When you put all the studies together, we’re talking about 16 more grams of daily body fat lost on low-fat diets. That’s like four more servings of butter melting off your body daily. Less fat in your mouth means less fat on your hips, even when you eat the same amount of calories.
This is the third installment of my seven-part series on ketogenic diets.
This keto research came out of the deep dive I did for my book. How not to diet. (All proceeds I receive from my books are donated to charity.) You can get more information about How not to diet and order it here. Also, feel free to check out some of my popular weight loss videos in the related videos below.
