What is the Ketogenic Diet?

 What is the Ketogenic Diet?

Foreword

The ketogenic diet is one of the most popular diets recently. 70% of people use it to lose weight , and 30% use it to take care of their health. Most people will fall in love with this diet after using it, but in the fitness industry 90% of people in China will oppose the ketogenic diet. Is the ketogenic diet really such an effective weight loss diet ? Is ketogenic really so bad for bodybuilders?

I need to ask you to let go of all your prejudices against ketogenic diets and look at this article on ketogenic diets from a neutral perspective. I will honestly use research papers and personal experience to analyze the good and bad of ketogenic diets.

Introducing the Ketogenic Diet

People often ask me how to eat on a ketogenic diet, then we can first see the picture below, half of the plate in a ketogenic diet will be lean meat or eggs, and half will be vegetables, and it will probably look like this. (This meat looks very lean, but I use a lot of oil for cooking)

You may see on the Internet that the ketogenic diet is an appropriate amount of protein , good enough fat, and low enough sugar, such as 70% fat, 25% protein, 5% sugar and so on. Ketogenic means a diet that allows the body to produce "produced" and more " ketone" bodies , with the goal of staying in a stable nutritional ketosis (Nutritional Ketosis).

So why are ketone bodies produced? Because ketone bodies are metabolites after burning fat when the body’s sugar (Note 1) content is low enough, a high blood ketone level means that you know you are burning fat as energy. In order for the body to produce enough ketone bodies and know that it is burning fat, there must be two key points, that is, the glycogen is low enough (Note 2) and the insulin is low enough (Note 3) . If you want to know more, there will be a long explanation later, but to put it simply, try not to eat high-sugar foods, such as starch and sugar, and then eat more meat and eggs.

* Note 1: Carbohydrates are collectively referred to as sugars in this article, including starches, such as noodles, rice noodles, bread, etc., as well as refined sugars, which are sweet sugars. After being eaten into the body, it will be stored in the blood in the form of glucose, or become glycogen and stored in the muscles and liver.

* Note 2: Glycogen can only produce ketone bodies when it is at its lowest.

In terms of a normal diet, it takes about 12 hours for glycogen to be consumed. Therefore, normal people can produce ketone bodies after fasting for a while, but they lose their power as soon as they eat breakfast. When there is a lot of glycogen, even if there is a lot of free fat ready to be broken down by the liver, it is difficult to produce ketone bodies. When glycogen is low enough, ketone bodies are produced very quickly. Usually after the third day of the ketogenic diet, the amount of ketone bodies will be determined by the amount of free fat.

*Note 3: The ratio of Insulin to Glucagon

Insulin = storage lipase is stimulated and fat cannot be broken down in fat cells. No insulin plus high catecholamine = fat can be broken down. Breaking down fat is a very troublesome thing, and there are many slow steps. When fat can be decomposed, triglycerides in fat cells will be decomposed into glycerol + three free fatty acids. Free fat will stick to albumin (Albumin) and transport it to the place where it is needed in the blood to provide energy. If there is sufficient energy in other parts of the body, it will be sent to the liver for decomposition and produce ketone bodies, which are transported in the blood to the organs in need as energy.

Nutritional Ketosis

In the absence of sugar, since the brain and some other organs cannot use fat as energy, the liver will metabolize fat and convert it into ketone bodies. When the concentration of ketone bodies in the blood increases (Note 4), we call it ketosis (Ketosis), and the ketosis caused by diet , we call it Nutritional Ketosis (Nutritional Ketosis) .

* Note 4: The concentration of ketone bodies in the blood of people with a mixed diet (starch, vegetables, and meat) will be less than 0.5mmol/L, and the blood ketone concentration will be about 0.6~3mmo/L under a stable ketogenic diet .

In the process of normal eating, the body will also produce ketone bodies, but there are not many opportunities for production, and the production volume is not enough to reach the concentration of nutritional ketosis. The ketogenic diet is low in sugar, moderate, and high in protein, in order to keep the body in nutritional ketosis for a longer time, to increase the blood ketone concentration (representing fat burning), and to determine the effect of the body on burning fat again.

After entering stable ketosis, you can enjoy the advantages that the ketogenic diet brings to your body, such as improving hormones, appetite, anti-oxidation, etc., and weight loss is usually a side effect.

Ketogenic Adaptation Period

But before entering stable ketosis, there will be a "ketogenic adaptation period" . During this period, the body will feel very uncomfortable due to the inability to convert energy. The main reason is that ordinary people usually eat too much sugar, so the body is only used to using sugar as an energy source , not used to burning fat.

The time it takes for each person to fully enter stable ketosis is different. For ordinary people, it takes about a week. If you eat high sugar for a long time, it may take longer. Entering stable ketosis means that your body's main energy source has been replaced by fat and ketone bodies instead of glucose. It also means that the fat has gone through many difficulties and has been successfully decomposed and utilized.

How to eat ketogenic diet?

As I said before, as long as insulin secretion is low enough and the amount of sugar in the body is low enough, the body can produce more ketone bodies. So in fact, as long as we try to avoid foods that are too high in sugar and foods that raise too much insulin, we can keep the body stable in ketosis.

In terms of the ratio of main nutrients, 5% carbohydrates (high FII), 20-25% protein (medium FII), and 70-75% fat (low FII) will allow 99% of people to enter stable nutritional ketones proportion of symptoms. But I would recommend to slowly enter the ketogenic diet in a gradual way.

Carbohydrates are less than 40 grams a day, protein is about 1~1.4 grams of body weight a day, and fat is adjusted according to appetite. The reason for doing this is that most people cannot eat so much fat at the beginning, they will be a little scared psychologically, and they will not adapt physically, so the main thing is to eat comfortably first. If you can count the main nutrients, you can choose your own food to eat the target data, it will be a relatively simple starting point, and then fine-tune it.

If you don't count nutrients, you can refer to the following suggestions:

Can eat more

All kinds of meat (beef, chicken, duck, goose...), animal offal (heart, liver, kidney), eggs, fish (not too lean), vegetables (you can eat more except root vegetables), high-fat fruits (olives, avocados, coconuts) meat), seaweed

Can eat in moderation

Seafood (usually a high-protein, low-fat ingredient), onions, spices

You can eat less (don’t eat if you can’t lose weight during fat loss)

Blueberries, cranberries, soy products (tofu, bean curd), nuts

Do not eat

Various starchy or high-sugar foods

Macronutrient Algorithm

The main nutrients can be roughly divided into three types, carbohydrates , proteins , and fats . The ketogenic diet requires very low carbohydrates, moderate protein, and enough fat, so if you are not sure which food you can eat, you can check it in the following way. For example, if you want to look up eggs, you can google and enter: the main nutrients of eggs, so that you can find them. Basically, it is enough to see that his carbohydrates are low enough and the protein is not too high.

Raising insulin index: Food Insulin Index

Ketogenic Discomfort

After implementing the Shengtong diet, there will be some side effects, such as lack of energy, lethargy, and headaches. This is very normal, because the body is too accustomed to using sugar as the main source of energy, so it suddenly eats very little sugar, and this will happen. question. But these side effects usually improve a lot within a week, and longer for more severe people.

Cramp

Deficiency of sodium, calcium and magnesium may cause it. So salty, eating avocado, drinking big bone broth will improve a lot

Insomnia

When blood ketones become high, blood flow to the brain will increase, so it will make you feel good, and you will get used to it later

less exercise power

It's normal, it will improve after a while

Common way to improve

Drink water, replenish salt, wait for him to pass

Analysis of advantages and disadvantages of ketogenic diet

First analyze the advantages and disadvantages, let you decide whether to continue reading, the main advantage of the ketogenic diet is that it can be very effective in improving metabolic abnormalities (tuna maw, high fasting blood sugar, high blood pressure, high triglycerides, low HDL).

Advantage

Burn more fat and reduce muscle consumption

As long as the caloric intake is less than TDEE, you can lose weight, but the main nutrient allocation of the ketogenic diet can effectively lose fat and reduce muscle consumption.

appetite control

Many diet pills are advertised as "effectively suppressing appetite", but the ketogenic diet itself is very effective in controlling appetite. It is a great advantage for people (me) who are prone to gluttons and can't get enough to eat. People who are on a ketogenic diet usually do intermittent fasting naturally , which is even more important for weight loss.

Good for cardiovascular. Good cholesterol (HDL) goes up and bad cholesterol (LDL) goes down

Since the ketogenic diet recommends that everyone take in good oil quality, there has been a very good change in the data on cardiovascular disease.

Make the body more sensitive to insulin. Fasting blood glucose and insulin decreased.

Insulin sensitivity is a very important data. Whether it is for weight or physical health, good control is praise.

Good for the mind. The mind can function more efficiently when it uses ketone bodies for energy.

There are really many benefits of ketone bodies to the brain, so in recent years there have been experiments using ketogenic diets to treat brain diseases.

Effectively cut belly fat.

Lower blood pressure

Antioxidant, reduce free radical formation, protect brain nervous system, and regenerate nerve cells.

Ketone body is a histone deacetylase inhibitor (Histone deacetylase inhibitor, referred to as "HDI") The effect of HDI is to control emotions, treat cancer, parasites, inflammation and other diseases.

Ketogenic Diet Disadvantages

• need time to adapt

• Feeling bad during the adaptation period

• It is possible to maintain muscle, but the effect of muscle gain is uncertain

• Muscle strength will drop at first

• Some people eat too much oil at the beginning, and their stomach and intestines will not adapt