It must feel great to have not only saved your own life, but then to turn it around so well. Super Bowl Sunday will always have a special meaning for you. Kind of ironic that 3 years ago you were literally on a death ride, and now your goal is to do a ride that is so hard it's known as "The Death Ride".

Warren G, you cranky dogmatic blowhard (hey, this childish insult thing is kinda fun, who knew?)




if they are so widely available, let's see them. back up your stand. remember, they must involve athletes that have had time to acclimate. you demanded studies from me, but seem rather reluctant to produce your own.

meanwhile, this article references some studies you might find of interest: https://www.lowcarbportal.com/archive...cise/index.php



I'll refer you back to the studies posted regarding increased mitochondriia and triglycerides in the muscle after just a few weeks training on a high fat diet...

I think we already agreed on the role carbs can play for a competive athlete. OP's situation doesn't have much in common with the Lance Armstrongs of the world.



um, once again, what does my situation have to do with anything? that said, I'll be sure to give you an update in six months... btw, dont want to defend the age based guestimater for MHR, but it's interesting how it did accurately predict the MHR for the poster above. in my case, I suspect it's at least 10 beats low, but I wont know till I get into good enough shape to figure it out myself.


imo, so do you. You've offered no valid reason why OP should change his diet. also, I really dont care about your opinion of my training methods, so shut the f*** up already.


once again, go f*** yourself. yawn.

NO! What has made our society so overweight is a major change for the worse in diet. It has nothing to do with old thinking. In fact if we all still thought that way we wouldnt have car companies putting bigger seats in their cars for the growing american bottom.

In 1950 the most popular beverage for the US teenager was milk. Beleive it or not. At the emerging fastfood restaurants the "large" soda was 8 us ounces. Now the "Kiddie" soda is 10 us ounces! A Coke and Fries are among the worst things you can eat, yet many of us do it daily, and in far greater quantities than we should. THAT IS WHY WE ARE FAT!

OK I've just got back from a 80 km (50 mile) ride in 3 hours and 18 minutes so it wasn't super fast but not that bad for my beater bike. Breakfast was my usual dandelion tea followed by sour milk and cream and a little chicken liver pate. Heaps of fat! I took some dates and cashews with me just in case but I intended to go for as long as I could without eating to see how far I got.

2 hours into the ride I started feeling a little tired and unhappy. Heck, 2 hours isn't bad for a fat fuelled ride and I was going at a reasonable pace. Not super fast but as usual faster than I intended to go. So I started with a couple of dates to see what happened. 10 minutes later I started to feel a little more energy so I gradually ate on the way home and by the time I got home I wasn't feeling that bad and I was pulling along nicely.

So a little carbs helped but I wasn't carbo-loading. Starting the day in my usual high fat way worked for me and ONLY consuming the carbs while I was working was a good stratergy for me too. Natural foods only for me as well. No proccessed sugars. If I'm racing it would be a good idea to start eating carbs a little earlier.

So anyway. How many of you carbo-loaders could have got past 2 hours anyway before needing to eat and how well would you have recovered if you let it get to that point.

Regards, Anthony

I start my rides fasting. I've found that if I eat too much blood is diverted from my system to my gut to deal with the meal. I routinely ride 2-3 hours with just water and come home and eat oatmeal or shredded wheat for breakfast. I'll then wait an hour or two and then eat a regular meal and then wait until supper. I keep my heart rate in the 75% zone for the time that I ride. I've never bonked. I've felt fine after my rides. Sometimes, I'll lie down for a little nap in the afternoon.

You know, bottom line is this, calories in have to be less than calories out to lose weight. This is the modern dilema. We have never had this much food to eat in our history as a species.

I've been eating vegetarian with a high carbohydrate diet. I've lost weight. My wife is getting frustrated with having me prepare my own food while the family eats her good cooking. This is the reason I was overweight. She says I have a problem with portion control. This is true. If you ate her cooking you'd be looking for ways to take a little off too! She is a very good cook.

So, we've reached a little deal, I am going to eat her cooking and not make her upset and she'll prepare less and help me with portion control. I am going to try this for six months and still ride as hard as I have been and see if I can keep the weight off. If I can then good for me and where I get to sleep! If not, I'll just have to get my jaw wired shut!

Don't y'all have any real food down there?!


2 hours in you noticed a problem. Perhaps you might have ridden even faster or stronger up to that point if you'd given yourself some carbs earlier. General rule of thumb is to drink before you're thirsty and eat before you're hungry, because by then you've already waited too long and you're going to have to wait 10+ minutes to get back up to speed after eating something.

Dates are good though. Still used by some pros. When I ride less than 3+ hours I don't need to eat- and those rides will always include some climbs and other hard periods. My two hour rides are on one bottle of Gatorade and include LOTS of intervals, 3-4 days each week. The other days will be a little shorter or longer. For rides of 3-4 hours I drink about 20 ounces of Gatorade each of the first two hours or so. If I find myself feeling like I need to eat then some bread with jam is good, or honey, and I'm not sure why but chocolate brownies work well for me for the rides that go past 3 hours.

I should have said that I didn't have gatorade or anything like that. Just water with a little celtic sea salt so it was no calories at all for 2 hours. It was a bit of an experiment anyway so on future long rides I will start eating earlier as I have no intention of using sugary drinks. There too hard on my digestion apart from anything else.

This ride wasn't a bad effort as I was riding a 24" wheeled mountain bike with slicks and a few nice parts.

Regards, Anthony

https://www.findarticles.com/p/articl...19/ai_64714683

https://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol27/vol27n26/n3.html

Exibit A
Tour De France
Carbs carbs and more carbs

Thanks for playing, please drive thru

Edit: Going thru your sudies i see 2 things. Low fat may have faults. Which is what ive always said. Its also why the 'recomended' fat is 30%. In the studies, 30% seems to be the best. With problems in both extremes of HC and HF.

Observation 2. When an athelete is trainign hard he can survive on damn near anything.

I stilll say the recomended balanced diet is best, and thats what I get from your studies also

Well I didn't read any downside from "high" fat diets in those studies.

As I've said before i don't disagree with balance and in my view 45% fat is perfectly balanced and due to the calorie dense nature of fats its not realy a lot. OK I don't count anything but I would expect my fat intake to be around 60% of calories and I could hit 80% of calories on some days but not every day!

EDIT: OK the TDF example. I'm always reading here that the TDF riders cant eat enough to keep the weight on so maybe that's the answer. More fat! It takes someone to break away from the orthodoxy before you can see the difference in athletes performance and with companies who make high sugar sports foods sponsoring teams there probably a disincentive for any team to try something different.

Regards, Anthony

Maybe the companies that make Slim Jims and Mazola can sponser a team.

High-Carbohydrate Vs. High-Fat Diets In Trained Cyclists - Brief Article - Statistical Data Included...

Even the "high fat" people ate 30-40% carbs. Number of training hours per week of only 6 hours at the low end indicates a person who isn't really much of a bike racer. Eat only 30-40% carbs on that amount of hours and it wouldn't matter much.

Measured performance by measuring VO2max. This is really poor because even with NO training VO2max does not drop very much. Measuring race performances would be much more appropriate, or at least measuring performance at a variety of intensities.

Study shows a low-fat diet may hinder, not help, athletes

By LOIS BAKER

The athletes couldn't consume enough calories to meet the energy needs of their training on the low-fat diet.

<This is really poor methodology. Some of the athletes were simply not given enough to eat. Of course this would result in lower performances compared to a group that was given enough to eat.>


Results of the performance tests on the medium-fat diet compared to the low-fat diet showed that endurance time increased 14 percent while the decrease in force after the endurance run was significantly less-11 percent. While endurance time did not increase on the high-fat diet, lactate levels were lower, indicating more efficient energy metabolism.


<Increasing endurance time... is that a goal? Go slower, but longer? Lower lactate levels do not mean more efficient energy levels. It's very possible it means you went SLOWER. If you're not producing lactate then you will have a very hard time going reasonably fast.>

"The dietary intake of vitamin E, calcium, magnesium and zinc were at or below the recommended levels on the low-fat diet. As individuals increased their total calories and dietary fat, levels of zinc, magnesium, calcium and vitamin E also increased,"

<This is stupid methodology. Simply have them take some vitamins like so many athletes do. >

The study was funded in part by an educational grant from Mars, Inc.

<NO surprise they got what they wanted.>

Next...

Do you really think with millions of dollars at stake the athletes won't be eating the best they possibly can? It doesn't matter who sponsors them because they'll eat whatever they want and need and the public will never know.

Riddle me this Anthony, how long do you think it would take a partially dehydrated racer in the Tour to digest 4000 calories of fat each night? During the races they stop eating fat with about 2-3 hours to go because the fatty foods don't mix well with the intensities they have to deal with during those periods. Before then, they'll get maybe 30-40% of their calories from fat.

still waiting for one, just one, study proving sub anaerobic exercise (let's say anywhere between 80 - 85% effort level) performance is impaired by a trained athlete who has been given time to adapt to a high fat diet. just one reliable, well controlled study.

"Physical exercise as a modulator of adaptation to low and high carbohydrate and low and high fat intakes.

Miller SL, Wolfe RR.

Department of Surgery, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, USA.

Quantification of the metabolic response aids in ascertaining the nature and extent of the energy requirements imposed by exercise. During high intensity exercise, virtually all of the energy is supplied by the net oxidation of glycogen while fat oxidation plays a more prominent role during lower intensity exercise. Therefore, the lower limit of carbohydrate required above resting needs is equal to the portion of the total energy cost derived from carbohydrate sources. There is no upper limit of additional carbohydrate intake that could be eaten to satisfy the extra caloric requirement since carbohydrate intake will restore any endogenous energy stores that were used during exercise, regardless of the intensity of exercise. The recommendation of a high carbohydrate intake to provide caloric balance in exercising individuals is supported by the observation that exercise performance at high intensity is improved by a high carbohydrate diet, and exercise performance at low intensity is relatively insensitive to the source of the caloric intake. Limited dietary studies are consistent with predictions based on the metabolic response. At exercise intensities below 65% VO2 max, the percent fat and carbohydrate in the diet makes little difference on exercise performance, provided adequate time is allowed to adapt to a high-fat diet. On the other hand, exercise ability during high-intensity exercise is significantly limited by a high-fat diet.

A consideration of importance beyond the aspect of energy balance is the anabolic effect of insulin on muscle protein synthesis after exercise. Provision of carbohydrate after exercise is likely to stimulate muscle protein synthesis to a greater extent than a corresponding amount of fat. Dietary fats may offer practical advantages to the athlete but if fats are consumed at the expense of carbohydrate intake, many established benefits of high carbohydrate intake in terms of performance may be sacrified."


Go back and read my posts where I've said exactly what the bold sections say, and that you could find it on PUBMED just like I did this morning.

here's the omnivore's take on this,

here's a couple of quickies...

ok, I'll take a break now, but I really would like to see actual studies that support the various knocks on a low carb diet, specifically for someone in OP's situation, just wants to lose wt. and get reasonably fit.

btw, there are LOADS more studies suggesting at the very least that the low carb avenue ought to be considered and investigated further.

as to why pro athletes prefer to carb up, it could be sort of along the lines of why does the American Diabetes Association, with lives literally in the balance, refuse to consider the low carb approach? even though it is clearly superior to their own politically correct guidelines that are sadly less effective. for more on that, read this https://weightoftheevidence.blogspot.com/

"One of the problems with many athletes is that they simply do not eat enough to meet the energy needs of their training activities. A recent review by researchers from the University at Buffalo, New York, highlighted several studies in which subjects with reduced energy intakes (500 to 800 kcal/day below estimated expenditure) showed reduced endurance exercise times. Increasing the subjects' caloric intake to match expenditure by increasing carbohydrates significantly increased their time to exhaustion by approximately 20% at exercise intensities of 70% and 80% of Vo2max. However, increasing the total caloric intake to meet expenditure by using fat brought about further significant increases in endurance time - an extra 40% over and above that produced by consuming extra carbohydrates! In these studies, the percentage of fat was raised from 15% to between 30% and 42% of total calories, while carbohydrates were limited to 35-40% of calories.(1)


Yes, so they went to a diet that included 30 and 42% fat and did better than when they weren't given enough calories to eat. WOW! And then they exercised longer and slower on the diet with 30 and 42% fat. Great! Sounds like the way to go for your 4+ hour bike rides.

More bull from the oxy-moron called mr. freddy. Athletes can have millions of dollars at stake trying to achieve the best performances possible. Some even cheat to do that yet they still won't use a high fat diet. And you think they stick what they know works best because of political correctness? That's pretty funny! and sad for you.

Next.

a perfect example of a the mindset involved here. dogmatic. childish insults. attacking the messenger. making unsupported claims.

still waiting for actual studies supporting your p.o.v. "it's all on pubmed" is sounding increasingly hollow..

To explain further...
VO2max is a specific intensity but it does not say anything about how much power or speed a person is able to produce at a given intensity. In most ways it's like saying x% of MHR. What is much more important (in terms of evaluating performance at VO2max) is how fast a person can ride/run/swim, etc. _at_ their VO2max, or at some given percentage of their VO2max.

So a study that says, "after we fed the athletes x for 6 weeks their VO2max didn't change" isn't really saying much about their performance at the intensity referred to as VO2max.

If a person says, "My VO2max is 65mg/kg", the question to ask is, "Oh, and how fast can you go at your VO2max?" Training is used to improve how fast you can go at your VO2max.