2 questions for a newbie thinking about switching


(Jawshoewah) #1

Question1) So Im currently eating where Im already below 40 carbs per day with one day where I eat High carb. My fats are low and protein is higher than my fats.

What would be the benefit if any by switching to keto where I drop my poteins (not below 1gr/lb of body weight) and raise my fat levels?

Question 2) Ive read description ls of keto diets that say 15 to 20 grams of fast digesting carbs is ok before and directly after a workout. Is this true and explain how this won’t throw you out of ketosis. Does this 15 to 20 grams count towards your daily total of carbs or do you just omit this in your calculations?

Thanks in advance


(Chris W) #2

So first I will say that it entirely depends upon what you mean by high and low in your frame of reference.
The next question would be what is your goal from seeking this WOE(way of eating).

High proteins are not really the issue as much the energy source you choose which is either fat or carbs.
For instance:
If you are medium to low carb and high protein and low fat you may benefit but the key to a diet like that is insulin management. The liver will produce glucose if your blood glucose goes low via GNG. If you add exogenous glucose in the form of carbs you don’t need the liver and it will shut down the process and insulin will rise trying to force the glucose to storage if the level gets too high. Any extra fats in the form of triglycerides would be stored as well. The whole problem with that scenario is that you really have to manage intake of carbs to not become insulin resistant. Not ideal but not impossible to live under if you monitor things.
I would be concerned long term about kidney issues and IR but probably not as bad as the Standard American Diet of high fat high carbs medium protein. GNG is not an efficient process and I would tend think over time that you would become gouty.

In your way of eating, the one day a week you are spiking your glucose/insulin and when you do that your body tries to store the glucose as fat (LCT) via the liver. Not having extra fats floating around helps this process, but because you may have been using gluconeogenisis (GNG) instead of ketosis, because of your higher proteins you will probably never burn much of that fat off. Its hard to say for certain, some people are sensitive enough that you could be in keto already based on your carb intake level. Until you have that high carb day then you get knocked out. The benefit to ketosis is that you are shutting down the fat storage cycle and turning on the fat burning cycle, This releases ketones as a byproduct which is a also a form of energy that is used by the brain among other cells.

In an ideal setup you either want high carb very low fat, or very low carb and high fat with protein medium to medium low. The fat or the carbs are your energy and such you should not really intermingle them IMHO now that I understand how this energy management works. If I were to choose, for no other reason outstanding I would pick LCHF(keto) every time, because of the insulin spikes and the whole host of issues it causes.

As for your second question, carb loading or carb back loading. The overall 20g macro is designed to be low enough that more or less anyone will not be knocked out of ketosis, some people skirt that macro some people are nowhere near it like me, I am on the order of 55g. If you are actively exercising the loading of carbs at that level will not likely shut down ketosis, Because your body will be using them more or less right of way so the blood glucose level will not rise enough to get a major insulin response other than the ingestion of the carbs itself. Its also possible that someone who has enough protein in there blood stream and starts to exercise may use GNG more than ketosis if they have that available. So in your case having high protein and trying to back load could knock you out if you are even int ketosis. A that level though you are really going to have to experiment and figure it out. Also I will make big note and say once you are fat adapted most all of that it is not an issue unless you really like to do heavy duty lifting. I hope this helps.


(Jawshoewah) #3

Well i appreciate the lengthy and informative response. Much of which I understood and some of which went over my head.

I understand how more detail is needed so here goes.

Im 39
176 lbs on average. Floating somewhere around 13%BF.

My goal: I want to lean down to 10% I want to get my abs out. This goal is a major one for me since I’ve not had that since I was 18.

After that I will bulk

Ive been training hard at the gym for about a year and a half. Currently i do IF with carb cycling

My macros were just dropped to this:
Calories: 1431
Proteins: 218
Carbs: 43
Fats: 43

After reading about keto and looking for calculators online And coming up with different results I came up with these KETO macros:

Calories: 2024
Proteins: 178
Carbs: 40
Fats: 128

Im concerned that those numbers will cause weight gain since I was down to 1400. Ive done the KETO macros for a few days and have gained some weight already.

Thanks for your response guys


(Chris W) #4

well I am 44, I am 5’9’ my macros are about 2800(very active) a day although I am actually consuming a Little more than that to get my BMR up currently. I started at 32%BF and 247 pounds, I am now 193-194 and at my current rate of loss I should hit 9.5% BF around mid September that is my goal pretty much the same as yours I want to look good now. But that is not why I started, and its not why I stayed with it. The feeling of energy and no inflammation are worth it, and I am never hungry.

Typically on keto the first few weeks men loose about 10% of their weight in water if they have it. Since you are already lower carb I would not expect that maybe only a couple %.
If you follow the junk CICO model I can see how you would be concerned, but in reality that is not how it plays out. I eat great food everyday I IF everyday, I am never hungry, and pretty steady I am loosing weight.


(Jawshoewah) #5

What is the CICO model?

What is a reliable source for calculating your macros. I found several calculators and they all spit out different reaults.


(Chris W) #6

CICO calories in calories out, its an overly simple view of what you eat you need to burn to get out, and cutting calories makes you not have to burn as much. It does not take into account what is called BMR or basal metabolic rate and about half dozen other major things.

They are all a little different, they all kind of come up with the same info. One key thing I need to emphasis is that you do not have to hit the macros to the tee, they are guides on this way of eating. The big one being the 20g of carbs or under. For the first few weeks I tell people to eat fat until they are full, this gives them the feeling and allows they body to get the fat burning machinery working. Keto is adaptive and takes about 4-8 weeks on average for someone like you to get to the fat adaptation phase were you are using body fat directly into your cells. This is when hunger takes a back seat and your energy levels are constant and almost endless. I will warn you though that certain types of exercise will suffer while adapting, and heavy lifting will be a hard thing. I recommend exercise to failure that is what I am doing currently, even if you don’t go keto, it builds the slow response mucsles which are the bigger ones. This method also tend to burn more calories while resting if you build the muscles up.

I use this one, I would not recommend using anything but the maintain macro for the first 3-4 weeks until you start to fat adapt, you will most likely loose weight even on the maintain level.


I also don’t recommend long term loss, as you put your body into starvation mode and it conserves, I do much better on my maintain macro or slightly higher.


(Jawshoewah) #7

Thank you.

You mean do exercises where each exercise you push to failure correct?


(Chris W) #8

Yes sort of, I do push ups now but instead of set rep I go very slow maybe tend seconds each and I keep moving never stopping just really slow. I don’t count I keep going until I can no longer do them. I apply that to all of the ones I do on resistance, you feel it. I might do ten total this way instead of 30 and stop.


(Chris W) #9

And situps I make sure they take 8 seconds each way, I do them semi inverted if you want the burn that will do it. I have been on that a couple weeks and I see the difference already good luck.


(Jawshoewah) #10

Thanks.

Going back to one high carb day a week:
With This type of keto diet I have read is a possibility. Trying to figure out if I should continue doing it or stick strictly to keto for a couple months first than implement the one high carb day later.


(Ron) #11

I would suggest that you wait on the high carb day until your body becomes fat adapted and switched over to using ketones for fuel instead of glucose. After the conversion and using fat as a main fuel source, the carb load will be like a shot of nitrous oxide exploding your energy levels.
This will be easier for your body to return to using fat for fuel.
If you go the other way there may be a chance you never become fat adapted and are just operating in a ketosis state for short periods and reverting back to burning glucose as a main source of energy never becoming fat adapted at all.


(Jawshoewah) #13

Thank you Ron


(Jawshoewah) #14

Here’s another related question regarding what you said above.

I read something regarding keto on here but it wasnt super specific. It was regarding the combinations of macros per meal. It said essentially, as you inferred above, that higher proteins can teigger GNG which isn’t optimal for ketosis and that the best combination is Low carb, high fat, and low to medium proteins.
So… what is considered medium proteins? Anything above X grams? What would X be?


(Chris W) #15

The entire diet is structured medium protien if you use a calculator it will get you pretty close, or you can figure it if you know your lean body mass. The range is more depending upon your age and activty level in particular if you build or really exercise hard. The normal range starts at .6 and I would say in practical terms ends around 1.4-1.5 but most people should be .8-1.0. That is grams of protien to KG of lean body mass. I run in the .75-.9 range I don’t target it anymore I have a really defined way of eating so I know pretty close to what I am eating based on volume. My diet does not vary much.

Eating in general will spike insulin, what you eat is the next figure in that math and typically has way more or less impact on the rise and run of insulin and finally your metabolic condition. A piece of meat in a non IR person will be a small short lived spike. A potato in an IR person could be high and stay that way for hours. So were this plays in is in a couple spots. If you were to eat a high carb, high fat, high protien meal your glucose will go high, and you insulin will go high probably for a while. A lot of what ate will stored or try to be stored as fat.
If you eat medium protein high fat meal you will have a minimal spike in insulin and your glucose will most likely stay low because that spike is short lived. GNG will probaly kick in to keep basal rate of glucose, ketosis may shut down briefly until things equalize.

The other factor is that if you are not in ketosis your reaction will typically much worse to any meal, even protien or fat. Conversly if you are fasted for say 48 hours and you intake protien you will have very little reaction and most likely the protein will go straight to the liver or repair. Ketosis you have a mild reaction I believe its about 8% to protein.

So the ideal circumstance is you eat one meal a day so your insulin spikes only once, and then the metabolic effect is that you have little if any spike in insulin that clamp down on keto and other catabolic processes. Windows are the next step back were the window time you can have a insulin spike. And the you progress to three squares, etc.

I can recommend a few videos that may help.


(Candy Lind) #16

If you search “protein macro” or some such in here, you’ll find different views & different recommendations based on desired results. Start out with 1 g of protein per kg (2.5 lb) lean body mass. You may need more as you start trying to bulk. I’m no good at calculating that stuff - I use a macro calculator! :crazy_face: But I bet you’ll look at the number and think it’s awfully small. Several people here will tell you that you don’t need as much as you think, and that you’ll still be able to add muscle.

When you get really bored with all of this (HA!) and want to see how keto works in the body-building world, go look on YouTube for Jason Wittrock’s 21-day 4000-calorie challenge. GOBSMACKING.


(Jawshoewah) #17

Chris and candy. Thanks for your response. Those are helpful and yes Ill take whatever links you can throw at me.

My question however was referring to what is considered medium to medium-low proteins per meal. The thing I read on her referred to making sure you have the right balance of macros ensuring carbs weren’t too high to help ensure you get to ketosis easier and not trigger GNG.

Also what does IR stand for?


(Diane) #19

IR is insulin resistance (or insulin resistant). The more insulin resistant a person is, the more insulin their body secretes when they eat carbs (and to varying degrees, protein).

I have seen recommendations for protein which vary from 0.6 (or 0.8 ) to 1.5 grams per kg of lean body mass (LBM). A person who is sedentary or very insulin resistant might be better served by eating closer to the lower end of the range. Someone who is more active or less IR might eat at the upper end of the range. An athlete who is very active or doing heavy lifting might need to go even higher. Many people start out at about 1.0 grams per kg of LBM. As their journey progresses, they may need to do a little “n= 1” self-experimentation to see what works best for them.


(Chris W) #20

IR was already answered
Don’t over read into the process too much, your body will up regulate GNG as it sees fit, it is happening most of the time when you are keto, and I would suspect you are using it alot based on your diet currently. The two big problems with early keto is that you surpass your threshold of glucose from external means to shut down the catabolic state and go to anabolic state (storage)(your cheat days), and that micro nutrients are out of whack. Only when you eat a lot of protien will you shut down ketosis in favor GNG, for me its around double my macro level. There are a whole bunch of factors that can either cumulative or individually shut down ketosis in the liver but the big bully is insulin going to high because of intake of food or glucose going high.
IMHO you would reach ketosis very quickly and probably are making ketones pretty regularly. Based on your intake i would say you could be in ketosis inside of 24 hours. The problem for you is that you don’t maintain it and that is negating a lot of the benefits like fat adaption and the mental acuity.

I really like this video it explains GNG and glucagon/insulin ratios and the difference between carb burners and keto/fasted people.


(Jawshoewah) #21

Im definitely gonna stop doing cheat days for 6-8 weeks and try to let the process take hold.

So much about the science Im struggling to grasp and I consider myself reasonably intelligent.

Do most people invest in a meter to monitor whether or not you’re in ketosis?

Also are there links to testing properly and reading results correctly?

Ty for your help guys. All so informative


(Chris W) #22

I would say that if you keep your total carbs below 30 and net carbs below 20 you will without question be in ketosis. The cheapest way to test IMHO is to by a cheap alcohol breath meter from amzaon for about $10 I use the green won at6000. It is mostly a novelty but I am numbers guy so I like to see things happening. ou really don’t need to test otherwise it will happen and for you I think quickly.

Its truly hard to know were to start, but I think the best videos to watch are from Dr. ted Naiman for an explanation of the keto diet, and watch Ivor Cummings about the effects of insulin and long term diet, Dr Fung takes on type 2 diabetics with fasting, and there are many more. I would listen to some of the dude’s podcasts they are very helpful. The first 10 or so although they don’t get it 100% they are pretty close. I have listened to almost all of them now its a little addicting and on the later ones they make corrections for errors they have made along the way.