nutrition- training and trying to loose some serious weight

[ZANewbie]

Hi Guys was wondering if I could get some practical adivise on loosing weight but at the same time keeping energy levels up to train.  I have read on another site that Carbs are to be used before training and after training as part of the recovery.  After your 2hour window no carbs and no carbs with dinner.  Would this be practical? and would fruit salad be ok for lunch and late afternoon?  I have 2 training session in the morning due to the fact that I am unable to train in the afternoons or evening.
Thanks

[Joseph]

Best advise to loosing weight is to not focus on loosing weight. Focus on eating healthy instead and build good nutrition habits. Don't care about carbs or fat or whatever. Just eat real food, nothing what is packed - or if it's packed, nothing what has more than 5 ingredients, maximum.

Weight is not an eating problem but more a life style problem. More than a diet for 2 or 4 weeks you need good yearlong eating habits.

[Matthieu O’Halloran - "M@"]

Hey ZANewbie! Like Jo sayed, theres no short cut to it...

Variety and disipine in your diet with consistent training is key!
Make sure to never be to full or never feel to hungry through out the day.

And stay off that bathroom scale

[doc]

hi ,
the boys are right and give excellent advise ,

its about  eating habits not diets .

hiwever you know that and are looking for short cuts.

you naughty boy ,
but any way , while you learn to do as matty and jo do
2 of the healthiest eaters i everseen .
here the lazy man version
dont drink calories
and drop the carbs ,  dont eat em  after 1pm

do more protein ,  after 1 pm
now watch the  nutrition gurus   have a frenzy where you live
hihihi

[Sugar]

now doc,

isn't that a short cut, no carbs after 1pm?

are you talking simple sugar carbs or complex carbs?

you know the brain only use carbs as fuel...

[Joseph]

Sugar,

not exactly: You can train your body and brain to use ketones (from beta fat oxidation) instead of carbs. Every baby is born with that ability. However, this is a whole different story.

You generally should have a diet as low in sugar as possible. But doc is talking about normal high carb foods, such as rice, bread, pasta, cereals, etc. Skip it. For a meal eat veggies, protein and fat instead. For a snack eat nuts or seeds together with some dried fruits. This gives you enough carbs. Fresh fruits is always a good idea except for dinner.

[Matthieu O’Halloran - "M@"]

Hey my favorite bed time snack, appart from Joyette is a hand full of almonds or cashews!

The will fill me up quickly, have some good stuff inside and they dont spike my blood sugar levels in the evening! And of course, they keep me regular in the mornings 

[Brandon Marsh - "-Tex"]

I think that especially if you have 2 sessions in the AM and none in the PM, you can eat more carbs early and then cut them out in the PM.  A big salad with protein and olive oil dressing or a protein/veggie stir fry would be a great PM meal.

I also like to think about what type of session I am completing.  If it is a hard interval session, then definitely some carbs after for recovery.  If it is an easier aerobic session, maybe fewer carbs.  A 'recovery' drink or 'meal' is not necessary right after every single workout if it is not that hard of a workout.  That was one of the best things that Robert from First Endurance said at a short session in Austin last year...a recovery drink is not necessary after EVERY workout!

[Sugar]

brandon,

totally agree with the recovery carb thing.  most don't realize the study was done with athlete's exercising over 90 mins above threshold.

adding 1/2-1cup of whole grain quioua would help in the salad, especially if your AM training session is a long one. eat today for tomorrow, is one of my sayings for when training a lot.

jo,
 i'm talking about, quioua, spelt, kamut pasta or breads or grain, un-processed,high in protein and B vitamins. low glycemic,complex carbs,  some fruit choices are better than others... low glycemic in evening.  you can goggle a glycemic index chart.

and as you know, you can 'train' the body to do just about anything. it's not the normal source of fuel for the brain to use fat. it's glucose.

[doc]

never worried about my brain,
just my fat arse.

[Joseph]

Sugar, I think the glycemik index is highly overrated. I used to select my foods by their glycemic index. A long time ago. But at the end, it makes no difference if it's high or low glycemic. It's carbs and by the body treated and stored as such. Fruits make a difference, because preferrably used to refill liver not muscle glycogen.

[RSANewbie]

Thank you all for the excellent advise that is extremely helpful. , truly appreciate all the responses

[Sugar]

JO,
so you are telling me there's no difference between sucrose (white table sugar) and whole grains?  both are carbs right? sorry, i can't agree on that.

how do you feel about glycemic load? 

how do you know that fruit fills up the liver and not muscle glycogen?

[Joseph]

Dear Sugar,

for sure it's better to eat whole grain than sugar - but not because one has an high GI and the other low GI. Sugar is simply one of the most processed foods available, whole grain contains lots of minerals vitamins etc. So as suggested above, you should have a diet as less in sugar as possible. But that has really nothing to do with GI.

GI was invented for research issues in a laboratory. It's not really adequate for normal eating habits, as you almost never eat 100g of one single food at a time. You combine it with other foods and simply nobody knows how much a combination of foods changes the GI of the whole meal (fat almost always reduces the GI, protein sometimes lowers it, sometimes heightens it dramatically). For example a meal such as white sugar with saturated fat (e.g. cream) would be a "good" one in GI terms, as the high GI of sugar is lowerd significantly by the very low GI of the fat. And it would become even "better" the more fat you add. But at the same time, your energy intake will grow dramatically! And I think I must not tell you what that means for your weight loss goals, hihi ;-)
 
All the GI tables suggest that there is a single number for every special food - but the GI number of a certain food depends on it's type (different rice grains), it's procession status (raw, baked, cooked) etc. Furthermore blood sugar response to exactly the same food differs from person to person and even within the SAME person (time of consumtion, training status etc.)!

Or compare the GI numbers of cooked carrots and white bread: With a GI of of 70 these 2 foods are equally "bad". But as carrots have far less carbohydrates than white bread it really means, that 107g of white bread has the same blood sugar response as 800g of carrots. That's one of the main reasons why the GI numbers are higly missleading.

The Glycemic Load (multiplying the food's GI with the foods carbohydrate content) corrects this issue. So in this hinsight it's much better than the GI itself.

But I still think that even the GL is a misconception when it comes to dietary advise. Most of my critic before still applys to the GL as well. But what GI and GL really suggest is that for weight loss your blood sugar response is equally or more important than your actual energy intake. In my opinion, this is simply wrong. All the popular GI/GL literature promises, that if you eat the wrong food (high in GI) you will gain weight quicker (loose weight slower) than eating the right food. But firstly, the mechnism behind would not be very clear (as only glycemics suffer too low blood glucose levels, normal people almost never) and up to date the succes of a low glycemic diet was never undoubtfully scientifically proven.
And if you have an unclutterd look at it, this promise is highly unlikely. 50g carbs whether out of high or low GI food simply add 50g carbs to your energy intake. Period. What your blood sugar exactly does - you don't know exactly and you don't need to know. It doesn't matter.

In the post we were talking about something like a low carb diet, as doc suggested cutting out or lowering the carbs at some meals. Now cutting out carbs vs. eating low GI/GL carbs really makes a difference, as the first will result in far less carbohydrate (energy) intake than the latter. And remeber, a person who cuts out carbs, doesn't have to worry about GI/GL at all. ;-)

You can have a perfect diet in regards of GI/GL but that doesn't mean, 1) that it's an healthy diet, 2) that it's an well balanced diet, 3) that you will loose weight. The only good thing about the GI/GL numbers is that it normally shifts people to healthier food choices, as less processed foods and less energy dense foods most times have a lower GI and almost always a lower GL. So people are loosing weight. But not because the GI/GL concept is right but because they are simply eating healthier. It's not a casual relationship only an arbitrary - please don't confuse cause and effect here!

So in my opinion it's far easier and safer to go with occam's razor, cut the GI/GL concept away and focus on healthy eating.

[Matthieu O’Halloran - "M@"]

Hey Jo woah thats very informative!!
You comming up the mountain for the photoshot?