One week disciplined macros= binge

[Robert Santana]

Based on these percentages, my fat intake is higher than I probably want at 29%. Should I adjust down with the fat and up with the carbs to get closer to your range? Currently 160 c, 50 f, and 120 p. Maybe 175 c, 43 f, 120 p?

This would depend on the goal. If you are maintaining your weight fine on what you are currently eating and progressing fine under the bar, why make it harder on yourself?

[Jennifer Williams]

This would depend on the goal. If you are maintaining your weight fine on what you are currently eating and progressing fine under the bar, why make it harder on yourself?

I’m not sure if it’s better or worse. I like to keep it close to whatever is optimal. �� Isn’t more carbs better for lifting? Sorry, I tend to fixate on numbers i.e., body weight, food grams, lifting weights, averages, you name it! It’s something tangible. ��*♀️

[Robert Santana]

I’m not sure if it’s better or worse. I like to keep it close to whatever is optimal. �� Isn’t more carbs better for lifting? Sorry, I tend to fixate on numbers i.e., body weight, food grams, lifting weights, averages, you name it! It’s something tangible. ��*♀️

What is optimal depends on what you will adhere to as well as all of the physiological variables. How optimal is something that you can't consistently stick with? I'm not suggesting that you won't rather I'm suggesting that you always consider that. High carbs in relation to fat and protein tends to work well for all sports. As the intensity of an activity increases, so does the reliance on carbohydrate. That being said, there is a threshold for all of us and I can't really say whether you've hit your threshold or not. I'm also not suggesting that its a bad idea to flip fat for carbs rather my concern is with how difficult compliance gets when absolute fat content of the diet gets lower. I'd say run it as an experiment and see if it affects your training then report back to us. I too like numbers, they are a fantastic thing.

[Brustikeln]

Hi Jennifer!

Thanks for the kind words and glad to see you again!

It sounds like you are doing pretty well with your goals. I have found that binging on carbs is quite easy to bounce back from. Binging on fats tends to be more problematic. My thought on that is because carbs are not easily stored as fat. The short of it is that one day isn't going to pack on a bunch of weight. In your case you are adding more carbs, which is probably not contributing a big caloric load due to the low caloric density of carbs (4g/kcal). So even doing this weekly isn't going to add up to anything appreciable unless you're binging on like 500-1000 extra carbs per week. Now if you were to overeat fat on a weekly basis, I'd think you'd probably see a different result over time. Anyhow, your lifts look pretty strong and if you are still making progress, happy with your body comp, and not feeling mentally distressed over food I'd say you are well on your way.

One thing you didn't mention was fiber. How much are you getting per day?

Hello and thanks for conducting this forum.

Quick piggyback question. Given an isocaloric surplus, does it make a significant difference if the excess calories come from fat or carbs. If I understand you correctly, you are saying that a fat binge will likely lead to more excessive calories than the a carb binge. Just want to make sure I understand.

[Robert Santana]

Hello and thanks for conducting this forum.

Quick piggyback question. Given an isocaloric surplus, does it make a significant difference if the excess calories come from fat or carbs. If I understand you correctly, you are saying that a fat binge will likely lead to more excessive calories than the a carb binge. Just want to make sure I understand.

Theoretically, and a general observation coaching diet, adding a surplus of fat will likely lead to more fat gain. This is because it is metabolically inefficient to convert carbohydrates into body fat and thus the body tends to burn off excess carbs as energy. So in theory, if you are on a low fat or very low fat diet and you start pushing calories from carbs or protein, it may take more calories than a diet higher in fat. However, this has not been measured long term but I have noticed that when fat is controlled body weight is also controlled much easier on a mixed diet.

[Brustikeln]

Thanks for the clarification. Apologies if my question was not very clear, but I think we understood one another. Clearly in a gram to gram surplus of fats vs carbs, fat will lead to more fat gain due to their caloric density. But your coaching experience leads you to believe that this is also true if the surplus is calorically isometric. This makes sense to me intuitively, but I can't find a why behind it...

[Robert Santana]

Thanks for the clarification. Apologies if my question was not very clear, but I think we understood one another. Clearly in a gram to gram surplus of fats vs carbs, fat will lead to more fat gain due to their caloric density. But your coaching experience leads you to believe that this is also true if the surplus is calorically isometric. This makes sense to me intuitively, but I can't find a why behind it...

Purely theoretical and without an crossover inpatient clinical trial we are SOL. As far the "why" it goes back to what we know about macronutrient partitioning. Assuming a mixed diet, when you overfeed carbohydrates, carbohydrate oxidation increases (you burn more carbs) and fat oxidation decreases (you burn less fat). In contrast, when you eat more fat, you don't see a meaningful change in either carbohydrate or fat oxidation. This is because the excess fat consumed is being stored. So the short of is that the easiest way to gain body fat is to eat a high carb high fat diet, which, surprise surprise, is characteristic of a western diet lol.

Now let's talk about extremes. When you restrict carbs to ketosis levels, fat oxidation increases (you burn more fat) and carbohydrate oxidation decreases (you burn less carbs). In a very low fat diet, nothing happens to fat oxidation and carbohydrate oxidation increases. Why? Because most of your calories are coming from carbohydrates so your body adapts to burn more carbohydrates as per what I discussed above. Side note - the increase in fax oxidation with ketosis reflects an increase in your ability to use dietary fats for fuel and does not indicate that you will burn more stored fat on a calorie restricted low carb diet. It just means you can use fat to function in daily life because remember we burn calories to perform all physiological functions.

So now back to your question: If you get into a caloric surplus on a very low fat diet (<10% of calories per day), would you still store fat? Yes, eventually your body will go into denovo lipogenesis, which is a metabolic process where non fat macronutrients are converted into fat. However, we do not currently know if the caloric total would be necessarily more, less, or the same as doing so on a mixed or high fat diet.

[Mike Barry]

Purely theoretical and without an crossover inpatient clinical trial we are SOL. As far the "why" it goes back to what we know about macronutrient partitioning. Assuming a mixed diet, when you overfeed carbohydrates, carbohydrate oxidation increases (you burn more carbs) and fat oxidation decreases (you burn less fat). In contrast, when you eat more fat, you don't see a meaningful change in either carbohydrate or fat oxidation. This is because the excess fat consumed is being stored. So the short of is that the easiest way to gain body fat is to eat a high carb high fat diet, which, surprise surprise, is characteristic of a western diet lol.

Now let's talk about extremes. When you restrict carbs to ketosis levels, fat oxidation increases (you burn more fat) and carbohydrate oxidation decreases (you burn less carbs). In a very low fat diet, nothing happens to fat oxidation and carbohydrate oxidation increases. Why? Because most of your calories are coming from carbohydrates so your body adapts to burn more carbohydrates as per what I discussed above. Side note - the increase in fax oxidation with ketosis reflects an increase in your ability to use dietary fats for fuel and does not indicate that you will burn more stored fat on a calorie restricted low carb diet. It just means you can use fat to function in daily life because remember we burn calories to perform all physiological functions.

Robert, this has been a really interesting thread to read. For years before recently beginning my Starting Strength journey I managed my weight by restricting carbs. The takeaway I got from books like the Atkins and South Beach diet is that sugar and carbs are easily converted to energy, but the surplus is also easily stored as fat. Also higher carbs lead to a rise and crash in blood sugar resulting in cravings. I understand this is a very simplistic explanation, but I'm just trying to articulate the theory as I understand it in as brief a way as possible. All I know is when I counted carbs, the weight fell off. This is before I did any weight training and my goals were...different.

My real question is if you can recommend any books/resources for a layman like me to read up more on the topic of carb/fat/protein consumption as it relates to training and body composition?

[Robert Santana]

Robert, this has been a really interesting thread to read. For years before recently beginning my Starting Strength journey I managed my weight by restricting carbs. The takeaway I got from books like the Atkins and South Beach diet is that sugar and carbs are easily converted to energy, but the surplus is also easily stored as fat. Also higher carbs lead to a rise and crash in blood sugar resulting in cravings. I understand this is a very simplistic explanation, but I'm just trying to articulate the theory as I understand it in as brief a way as possible. All I know is when I counted carbs, the weight fell off. This is before I did any weight training and my goals were...different.

My real question is if you can recommend any books/resources for a layman like me to read up more on the topic of carb/fat/protein consumption as it relates to training and body composition?

Thank you sir. As you eluded the Atkins/South Beach explanation is quite oversimplified. The research on denovo lipogenesis has illustrated that you have to eat an extreme excess of carbohydrates (>100% of Total Daily Energy Expenditure) to convert carbohydrates into stored body fat. It is quite simply metabolically inefficient.

Now as a practitioner what i will say is that low carb diets are attractive and effective for weight loss in non-training populations because it is extremely difficult to control fat intake in today's modern society. It's simply much easier to eat on the go and dine out when you don't have to worry about fat. This is because you can visually identify carbohydrate sources much easier than fat sources. For example, if you dine out on a low carb diet you just have to avoid starches, grains, pastries etc whereas when you are on a low fat diet you cannot effectively measure the fat content of a meal prepared at a restaurant because of the fat added from butter or oil in the cooking. In short, on a low carb/high fat diet you don't have to think about what you are eating quite as much as on a low fat diet so you tend to get more rapid and linear weight loss. The downside is that the weight loss isn't sustained because entire food groups are removed from the diet. Not that low fat has better outcomes either because of the high degree of restriction required when dining out. So if I had to simplify this I would say that low carb works better for those who dine out frequently and low fat works better for those who do not.

From a physiological perspective that ignores the practical implications above, the low fat life is much more effective for keeping the weight off while effectively training.

As far as books go, one of my favorite books on mainstream diets is "Big Fat Lies" by Glenn Gaessar. I'm not aware of any other books that directly address this topic in a simplified unbiased way. However, I wrote a nice e-book for our SSOC clients that summarizes much of this and so far the feedback has been positive.

[Geoffc]

FWIW my personal experience matches up very well with this thread. For years I was only able to lose weight on low carb (<100gr/day) diets like paleo, keto etc. but always felt flat and was more injury prone on them. Every time I tried to count and cut calories I gave up within a week due to intense hunger which I attributed to insulin/carbs etc. I finally got a HR activity monitor (fitbit charge 2) and found that I burn about 700 calories a day more than the standard recommendations for my height and weight which is why I was getting so hungry as my calorie deficit too large. I now use the activity monitor to pretty effortlessly run a 500 calorie a day deficit when needed and more importantly do it with a high carb (>300gr/day) low fat macro ratio which gives me way better energy for lifting and my recovery is vastly better.