Homeweight lossKeto Diet vs Low Carb Diet for Weight Loss: What Works Best

Keto Diet vs Low Carb Diet for Weight Loss: What Works Best

Keto Diet vs Low Carb Diet for Weight Loss: What Works Best

 

See On YouTube: Keto vs Low Carb Diets For Fat Loss: Insights From Natural Bodybuilding Contest Prep

Transcript:

So in this video we’ll be talking about

zero carb and ketogenic diets, versus a low carb diets,

and I’m going to share with you my experience

and what I’ve seen, over the past several decades.

Working not just with my regular clients,

but also the very special group of athletes.

Insight that should help you make your decision

as to which one you should be using for your weight loss.

And most importantly, which one you should

be avoiding completely stay tuned.

So today we’re talking about ketogenic

or keto carb diets versus low carb diets.

And before I go any further,

I’d like to first thank every single person for tuning in,

do be sure to like, and subscribe,

the support for this channel so far has been tremendous.

And I really appreciate it.

I also if you subscribe, you’ll to be first in line

to get all the new content that’ll be coming out

on a very regular basis.

So, on to the topic.

One of the hardest things to be able to

measure when someone is on a low carb diet,

versus a zero carb diet,

is exactly what the body composition changes are.

First off, there aren’t that many instances

where you’re going to have two people more or less

on similar diets with similar goals

who are training the same way that you can use

as a controlled experiment to see which one works best.

natural bodybuilder contest prep example

 

Natural Bodybuilders Contest Prep with Keto vs Low Carb Diets

However, thankfully, because I have worked

with so many natural bodybuilding competitors,

I actually have a group of people

with whom it’s really easy to see the differences

in body composition.

Now you can look at the numbers all you want,

at the end of the day, nobody cares about the numbers.

You care about what you look like,

and you also care about how long you’re able

to maintain whatever progress, it is that you’ve made.

And from this population,

we can really see the changes in the body.

 

And really see which one was successful long-term

or longer-term, and which one was not successful

long term or longer term.

So, the big problem is when people talk about

their friends who are on a keto diet

and, they lost some weight, they look better.

It’s really hard to really know what’s going on

because first off, most people are in the 20 percentile

in terms of body fat.

female natural competitors

So, the average person losing weight

is probably going to go from, let’s say, 22, 23% body fat

to maybe, 21 or 20% body fat

if they’re lost, let’s say 10, 15 pounds.

It’s really hard with that kind of composition

to see what’s going on muscle wise,

what’s going on fat wise,

what’s going on water retention wise.

It’s really difficult.

Glycogen depletion from keto vs low carb diets

How Keto Diets Create Misleading Weight Loss Through Glycogen Depletion

And the problem is, the second you cut your carbs,

you are going to see the numbers on the scale drop.

The numbers on the scale are going to drop

because your body holds on to carbohydrates as fuel

in what’s called glycogen.

And glycogen is a combination of glucose,

sugar from the carbohydrates, plus water.

So you put your carbs over the course of even a day or two,

you’re going to see a drop in the scale,

because you’re basically retaining less water.

Now, the bigger you are, the more water you retain.

So the bigger you are when you initially start a low carb

or zero carb diet, let’s stick to zero carb diet,

you’re going to see a drop in the numbers,

and you’re going to be excited about how great that is.

 

But the good thing about working and looking

at how [Natural] bodybuilders respond,

is that at the end of the day,

they’re all going to be at a point, for a competition,

where they’ve done everything to get rid

of as much fluid as possible.

So, the fluid isn’t a problem.

It’s not something you need to take into consideration,

and because they’re going to be so lean,

10% or lower than 10% body fat for the men.

And somewhere between, I’d say 14 to 11, 12% for the women,

you can really see the differences

in terms of what they look like.

 

And here’s what I saw;

First off let’s explain how it came,

that people were eating differently

and doing different things.

Back in the days, I would coach a number of competitors

at the same time.

I’d trained them all at the same time,

I’d coached them all at the same time.

Carbohydrate intakes for keto and low carb diet contest prep

Some of them would want to do their own thing.

And this is a good thing for us because it gives us

an ability, and give me back then as a young coach coming up

[a Chance] to see what works and what didn’t work.

And everyone was on more or less the same diet,

but some in the name of expediency,

and because they thought that going on a zero carb diet

would help them lose body fat faster,

elected to go on zero carb diets while dieting.

So you had group A, who was zero carb.

Then you had group B who were following my recommendations,

where they were consuming some carbohydrates.

Somewhere around, I would say between 150 to 200 grams

of carbohydrates per day, which is not high.

Some of them as high as 250,

depending on their activity levels.

But they were getting enough carbohydrates to do exactly

what they needed.

And also very importantly, they were getting

enough carbohydrates that are going to

not make the dieting process as severe.

The other group however, had zero carbohydrates.

A completely keto diet as they elected to eat pretty much protein

with some vegetables in there, no fruits.

And at the end of the day,

over a period of about

four to three months,

here’s what I saw;

natural bodybuilding contest prep results on low carb diet

Weight Loss & Fat Loss Results In Natural Bodybuilders On Keto vs Low Carb Diets

The group that went zero carb, completely ketogenic diet,

lost slightly more weight

than the group that went

low carbohydrate.

Slight differences with people who weighed

more or less the same,

who were about four,

to five pounds difference.

Now that doesn’t sound like much,

but what was dramatic was the way they looked.

small amounts of carbohydrates prevents muscle wasting in low carb diets

Increase Muscle Losses On The Keto Diet vs The Low Carb Diet

The ones on the zero carb diet,

even when they carbed back up to put some carbohydrates

back into your system, so you fill up with glycogen,

so you look harder and fuller,

this is a technique that bodybuilders use.

They were still significantly smaller

in terms of retained muscle mass than those who had elected

to keep some carbohydrates in their diets.

Now it was noticeable,

noticeable also in the placings.

The ones who went on the low carb diet,

all did better than those who went on the zero carb diet.

 

 

So from an aesthetic point of view,

if you’re trying to get that lean muscular look,

you kind of want to go low carb.

You do not want to take all the carbohydrate

out of your diet.

And I’m going to explain exactly why,

because there is some science behind that.

 

Increased Weight Gain And Uncontrollable Eating Post Contest From The Keto Diet

But also what was really troubling and really disturbing

was what happened after the competition.

Everyone in group A, who was on a zero carb diet

struggled to not put on large amounts of excess body fat

because their eating was,

as they described it “uncontrollable.”

Now in group B, there were some

who also experienced some difficulty

in terms of going back to some equilibrium with their diets.

And there were some who exhibited some issues

with eating uncontrollably as well,

but they didn’t put on as much body fat

as those in the other group.

And the numbers were really small in comparison.

Whereas everyone in group A all had problems eating

regularly after going on a zero carb diet.

Glucose sources on keto diet

Why Carbohydrates Are Important To Preserve Muscle Mass And Maintain Healthy Metabolism

Now the science of it. The science of it is,

that carbohydrates spares protein.

And what that means is,

from a biological perspective,

[is that] your body will always do whatever it takes

to make sure that your brain has the fuel it needs.

Without a certain amount of glucose,

which is the fuel that your brain uses

and the fuel that your muscles use, everything stops.

And your body gets glucose from different places.

Now, by going on a zero carb or ketogenic diet,

what you’re doing is you’re taking all the carbohydrates

out of the equation more or less.

So your body is taking in a diet of protein and fat

and through something called ketosis,

your body adapts and says,

“Well, we don’t have any carbohydrates coming in. So what

we’re going to do is start tapping into

fats as the way that we are going to fuel our body.”

So, your body takes the fats and convert the fats

into sugars, which helps fuel your brain,

fuel your muscles and everything else.

But there’s a problem there.

The problem is, your body from an evolutionary point of view

is designed to do everything possible,

to maintain fat stores.

It doesn’t want to go to a place where fat stores are zero.

It doesn’t want you to be completely ripped to shreds

if you’re not ripped to shreds.

It doesn’t want you to lose ridiculous amounts of body fat.

It does not want that at all.

It’s going to do everything possible to be as conservative

as possible.

And that’s very important! Our bodies are conservative.

And as such, what your body’s going to do,

it’s going to start tapping into other sources.

Now whenever someone talks about low carb, zero carb diets,

or ketosis, anything like that,

they tend to kind of omit the fact that you can’t have

someone in ketosis, who is taking in almost

no carbohydrates whatsoever,

who is not going to be experiencing

some decrease in muscle mass.

Because your body, just like I said,

doesn’t want to burn all the fat.

We all know this, we all know how hard it is

to get rid of body fat.

And we all know as well that the leaner you get

the harder it is to lose body fat

because your body wants to hold onto it.

So it taps into the other huge reservoir

of potential glucose

that it can convert, which is skeletal muscle.

Muscle loss among natural bodybuilders on keto diets

Skeletal muscle is, first and foremost,

the most metabolically active tissue in your body.

It burns more calories, uses more energy to maintain

than anything else [tissue-wise].

But if you’re on a completely zero carb diet,

your body is going to start tapping into your muscle mass,

your skeletal muscle mass in a process called

gluconeogenesis, where it’s going to convert the protein

in your muscles into glucose.

It’s not only going to come from fat,

and from your fat stores.

It’s also going to come from your skeletal muscle.

Which is going to make you, number one, flabbier.

Number two, weaker. And number three, and really important,

it’s going to reduce your resting metabolic rate. [RMR]

The amount of calories your body burns,

doing nothing over the course of a day,

is going to plummet.

Because muscle takes a lot to maintain.

You start losing muscle, you get into a place where

you’re going to have difficulty,

as far as dropping your calories to a point,

where you’re going to continue losing weight

and continue losing body fat safely.

The other thing is, the rebound effect.

Remember your body is going to tap into skeletal muscle

because it’s there,

it’s readily available,

and it’s deprived.

But if you’re getting some carbohydrates all the time,

and when I say some, with my people and my clients,

I make sure they get just enough.

we go through individually, how much they need to take in,

and this allows them to maintain some sort of equilibrium

as far as their energy levels,

which is a very individual thing.

And we make sure it’s enough that it’s not going to be such

that they are constantly deprived of carbohydrates.

You don’t need that much carbohydrates at all

to maintain muscle mass.

When I teach survival classes,

I talk about the importance of getting some carbs

into your system at all times,

whenever energy levels are low.

Because even a small amount, can spare muscle mass.

A small amount coming in your body says,

“Oh, we have glycogen coming in,

we have carbohydrates coming in!

We’re good, we don’t need just tap into skeletal muscle.”

If you don’t have any, it becomes a problem.

You start losing that muscle mass.

The other thing is, the rebound effect.

uncontrollable eating after keto diet in natural bodybuilders

If you haven’t consumed carbohydrates

for a really long period of time,

and you’ve dropped your calories,

at some point, because we are surrounded

by a super abundance of [hyperpalatable] carbohydrates,

you’re going to start back eating carbs.

And when you to do, you’re not going to be able

to contain yourself.

The people I’m talking about [Group A] are elite athletes,

people who are perhaps the most dedicated,

the most disciplined with their diet that you’ll ever meet.

We’re not talking about people who are, you know,

just kind of dabbling in it.

It’s their lives, it’s their careers,

and they’re really serious about it.

And they are uncontrollable after a period

of zero carb consumption when they return to eating

any amount of carbs.

It’s a problem because what happens is,

they put a lot of fat on afterwards

because number one, they lost a lot of muscle mass.

And number two, the eating [urges] they have

to go through [afterwards] is going to be hormone driven.

Which is going to make it uncontrollable.

Your body will need to keep on eating

because it perceives itself in a really bad state.

If you’re in a place where your body is in ketosis,

as far as your body is concerned,

if there’s an opportunity to get out of it,

because remember, it’s conservative,

it wants to maintain as much body fat as possible.

It’s going to do what it takes,

which is to make you eat more.

So number one, you’re going to lose muscle.

Number two, you’re not going to have that

really tight toned look.

And number three, you’re going to be more likely

to overeat afterwards.

 

Those are all pretty compelling arguments

against eating zero carb,

and some really good arguments for eating low carb.

Because as far as weight loss is concerned,

I would probably argue that all things considered

both teams,

both group lost more or less

the same amount of body fat,

but one maintained more muscle.

One had less aftereffects from the dieting.

And one group also was able to go back

to a better, more normalized way of eating after

the competition and maintain [some of] that [lean] look.

Whereas the other group who was

completely zero carb couldn’t.

This is an important thing that we need to talk about;

what happens next!

Lifestyle, long-term you need some carbs.

You also need fiber,

which we’re going to talk about in other videos.

Fiber is really, really, really important.

And going to zero carb makes it really difficult

to get the fiber that your body needs.

Just eating vegetables and salads isn’t enough.

You need a lot of fiber, a lot.

So, my recommendation to you is stick with some carbs,

as far as how much this should be for you?

It’s individual, you need to experiment to figure out

exactly how much.

You can go low carb, but do not go to zero carb.

I really and truly, you know,

am almost begging you, don’t go zero carb.

Yes, you’ll see numbers on the scale drop

but you’ll see a lot more drop in the long-term.

It’s something you’re going to pay for

and you’re not going to get that look you’re going for.

I really and truly hope this video helps you on your path.

And again, be sure to subscribe, like the video

and thanks so much for tuning in, Excelsior!

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Kevin Richardson
Kevin Richardsonhttps://www.naturallyintense.net
Featured everywhere from the Wall Street Journal to CBS News, celebrity Personal Trainer NYC and with over 2.6 million readers of his blog, Kevin Richardson is the creator of Naturally Intense High Intensity Training, one of the top lifetime drug free bodybuilders of his time, the first International Fitness & Nutrition Consultant for UNICEF, 2020 and 8 Time Winner of the Best of Manhattan Awards for Personal Training and a world recognized authority on high intensity training. Kevin has helped thousands, from celebrities to CEO's over the past 30 years achieve their fitness goals with his 10 minute high-intensity workouts done just three times a week in conjunction with his holistic nutrition approach. You can learn more about about his diet and training services at www.naturallyintense.net
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