Training & Nutrition - Riding a Century on Atkins

Don't do it!!

I'm not very overweight only about 10 pounds over my normal, but I've found losing those 10 pounds difficult.

My wife wanted to try Atkins & it would be better for menus & support if we both did it.

So I went for it big time. Very strict about following the diet. nasty headaches for first 2 days.

And then I had to ride a 200k Audax event at the end of a week on no carbohydrates. I stuck to the diet for the ride itself too. Only ate nuts & cheese. had bacon & eggs at halfway.

It was the most miserable ride of my life. I had no power at all in my legs, and was on the granny ring for slopes I'd normally zoom up. The whole ride was a struggle.

At end of week 2 I'd only lost 2 pounds! All that misery for 2 pounds!

I guess Atkins is not for me. My wife is doing great on it tho, pounds and inches coming off.

Stew

This is consistent with what I have heard/read about the Atkins diet. I was told that the diet was basically put together with sedentary folks in mind and that if you are involved in endurance sporting activities on this diet things would be difficult for you.

Fortunately, when it comes to food, you have lots of choices. For me eating lots of fresh or raw food, no meat or alcohol coupled with moderation and exercise does the trick.

I don't think there is a name for this sort of diet. I call it the "eat when you are hungry, stop when your not" plan.


Dan

Atkins works better the fatter you are. I lost 50 lbs on it and found it the easiest diet I have ever tried. My cholestrol and triglycerides are better than they have ever been including my LDL to HDL ratio. I felt fine UNTILL I started riding long distances, over 30 min., then you use energy faster than you can break down fat. I now do a modified diet, I eat low carbs on days I don't ride and eat lot's of carbs before rides and during. I have also found, for myself, that I can eat anything I want just after a long ride and it won't put a single pound on me.
I don't think it works well for someone who does lot's of physical exersize, or to lose that last 10 lbs.

There is actually an atkins type diet for active people. It is called the Cyclical Ketogenic Diet-or CKD. You bascially do the atkins thing for a week and then do a carb-up on the weekends. This ensures that muscles store of glycogen will be replenished, and you can continue to ride/work out/ be active. For more info, check out http://www.c-k-d.com.

Also, the fact that you only lost two pounds is untypical, most people shed at least 5 pounds of water weight in the first two days. Maybe you were ingesting more carbs then you realized...who knows, or maybe your body type just doesn't respond well.

I agree uciflylow's comments on this .To lose the last 10 lbs. you need a high activity level and high calorie/carb level to fuel it but still a small deficit to slowly lose the last of the fat while retaining muscle which is easier to lose at lower bodyfat levels.

I wouldn't do the atkins diet if your bike riding............... If your doing serious bike riding you should be eating like a king.

Originally posted by smelly
I wouldn't do the atkins diet if your bike riding............... If your doing serious bike riding you should be eating like a king.

I agree with you 110%. As I said in a posting the other day, my personal trainer said that an atkins diet is very dangerous for a cyclist. I was not on the Atkins diet, but I was on a high protein, low carb diet to build muscle and the coach told me that he has seen people on that and the atkins diet pass out on their bicycle. You definitely need a high carb diet. I would suggest if you are going to do a century, you need to do carb loading for three days straight before the ride. I did that the last century that I rode and made it through with no problems.

You will have to also eat high carbs every 45 minutes on your ride to keep your energy.

no carbs = no glycogen = downhill ride to Bonk City.

On Yahoo News this evening...

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=570&ncid=753&e=1&u=/nm/20030521/sc_nm/health_diet_dc