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Not sure where you got the 90-95% fat, but I've never seen anyone suggest that you should be eating anywhere near that much from fat. If you were actually tryin

by azdle 10y ago

Not sure where you got the 90-95% fat, but I've never seen anyone suggest that you should be eating anywhere near that much from fat. If you were actually trying to get that high I can understand why you'd feel like it's a "sick person diet". From what I've seen, the traditional advice for 'macros' is that you should be eating 65/30/5 for fat/protein/carbs. However people often misinterpret that to mean that that's a goal for each and if they haven't eaten that much they should force themselves to eat that. If you're serious about your diet, you should really take 5 minutes and figure out exactly what your body need. Each person is going to be a bit different, but in general (but slightly more specific than the last 'in general') you should be eating less than 20-50g of 'net' carbs, you should eat at least 1-2g/kg of lean body mass, and you should eat as much fat as it takes you to not be hungry. There are calculators that will walk you through all this, http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/ http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/ is one that I've used before, it's more targeted at weight loss, but it's only one that I've found that makes an effort to cite the calculations it does. As for working out, yes it's definitely possible. I've been lifting since December and making great progress. There are also occasionally stories of endurance athletes that swear by a ketogenic diet. My understanding of why it can be beneficial is that it basically removes your dependence on glycogen, when runners 'hit the wall' it's their body running out of glycogen their body then has to transition to running on fat. Keto-adapted runners are just running on fat from the beginning so they don't hit the wall and are more used to burning fat for energy. I'm not a runner so I don't have personal experience in any of that, but in my lifting I do find that I have to take it a bit slower than I expect others have to. When you're keto you lose a bit of the 'bursty' power that people with glycogen reserves have. I don't claim to be an expert on any of this, but I do continue with it. I've been mostly ketogenic since May of 2013, and I've had many improvements in things like mood, hair, skin, and sleep and I definitely notice a change in those things when I decide that the social aspects of eating are more important than my diet.

rpazyaquian 10y ago
I could have sworn that there was an upper limit on the amount of protein you can eat on keto. Something like, more than ~150g would mean that the protein starts getting used for energy instead of fat, which ruins the keto. Maybe that was misinformation. Does that mean that I can eat mostly stuff like steak, chicken, and eggs, then? If it's really more of an upper limit on carbs ~20-50g, a minimum of protein, and the rest is fat, then I guess that's fine. When I tried it, I was very strict on the carbs such that I couldn't go over 20g. In fact, that calculator says I shouldn't be eating above 25g, and also says this: > It is important to get enough protein to maintain your muscles, but not too much or it will kick you out of ketosis. Which confuses me. I've since moved away from keto to a mostly-protein diet with some carbs here and there via veg and bread, and it's worked alright with lifting. Does that mean that keto diets are different for weightlifters than for non-weightlifters?
- Nav_Panel 10y ago
  > more than ~150g Have you ever tried eating that much protein? It's very challenging. Protein fills you up super quickly and keeps you full, and, psychologically-speaking, that's one reason why the keto diet works well when other diets fail.
  - rpazyaquian 10y ago
    Yep - that's what I aim for now that I'm doing weight lifting. I definitely don't get as hungry/munchy as I used to, and I'm filled up pretty easily. It's certainly not impossible, but it does get kinda hard without feeling way full. Protein shakes help.
- azdle 10y ago
  Yeah, this whole thread is a pretty good summary of why specifying a diet is so hard. There's no way to get any definitive answers. People try to do good, hard studies on this, but they're almost impossible to control/fund. Because of that you'll find a bunch of different 'right' answers. You have to kinda sift through everything and figure out what seems reasonable and see what actually works for you. There's a lot of that out there and that means that what is currently true can shift back and forth a bit. It used to be 'generally known' that too much protein was bad and would kick you out of ketosis. But there was a new study released that seems to indicate that it has more to do with it being too high of a proportion rather than too much absolute quantity. Unfortunately I don't have access to the journal databases anymore, so I can't find the links. > Does that mean that keto diets are different for weightlifters than for non-weightlifters? The definition of 'ketogenic' isn't changing based on what you do outside of diet, 'ketogenic' simply means that you body is producing a ketones and your body is using them for energy, it's more that some people will use other energy sources with specific timing to enhance their athletic performance. There's something called TKD, targeted ketogenic diet, (which think is named a bit backward) which is mostly used by weightlifters and powerlifters to increase short term performance by eating small amounts of carbs just before a workout. TBH, I don't fully understand the effects of that so I haven't started doing it myself. I assume there must be benefits to staying ketogenic during my workout so I condition my body to always be used to using fat as a fuel source, but I don't have any data to prove that is actually beneficial. It also helps that I'm more focused on weight loss, baseline of strength, and general health rather than powerlifting or and goals for the super lean and large muscle look.

by azdle 10y ago

rpazyaquian 10y ago

I could have sworn that there was an upper limit on the amount of protein you can eat on keto. Something like, more than ~150g would mean that the protein starts getting used for energy instead of fat, which ruins the keto. Maybe that was misinformation. Does that mean that I can eat mostly stuff like steak, chicken, and eggs, then? If it's really more of an upper limit on carbs ~20-50g, a minimum of protein, and the rest is fat, then I guess that's fine. When I tried it, I was very strict on the carbs such that I couldn't go over 20g. In fact, that calculator says I shouldn't be eating above 25g, and also says this: > It is important to get enough protein to maintain your muscles, but not too much or it will kick you out of ketosis. Which confuses me. I've since moved away from keto to a mostly-protein diet with some carbs here and there via veg and bread, and it's worked alright with lifting. Does that mean that keto diets are different for weightlifters than for non-weightlifters?

Nav_Panel 10y ago
> more than ~150g Have you ever tried eating that much protein? It's very challenging. Protein fills you up super quickly and keeps you full, and, psychologically-speaking, that's one reason why the keto diet works well when other diets fail.
- rpazyaquian 10y ago
  Yep - that's what I aim for now that I'm doing weight lifting. I definitely don't get as hungry/munchy as I used to, and I'm filled up pretty easily. It's certainly not impossible, but it does get kinda hard without feeling way full. Protein shakes help.
azdle 10y ago
Yeah, this whole thread is a pretty good summary of why specifying a diet is so hard. There's no way to get any definitive answers. People try to do good, hard studies on this, but they're almost impossible to control/fund. Because of that you'll find a bunch of different 'right' answers. You have to kinda sift through everything and figure out what seems reasonable and see what actually works for you. There's a lot of that out there and that means that what is currently true can shift back and forth a bit. It used to be 'generally known' that too much protein was bad and would kick you out of ketosis. But there was a new study released that seems to indicate that it has more to do with it being too high of a proportion rather than too much absolute quantity. Unfortunately I don't have access to the journal databases anymore, so I can't find the links. > Does that mean that keto diets are different for weightlifters than for non-weightlifters? The definition of 'ketogenic' isn't changing based on what you do outside of diet, 'ketogenic' simply means that you body is producing a ketones and your body is using them for energy, it's more that some people will use other energy sources with specific timing to enhance their athletic performance. There's something called TKD, targeted ketogenic diet, (which think is named a bit backward) which is mostly used by weightlifters and powerlifters to increase short term performance by eating small amounts of carbs just before a workout. TBH, I don't fully understand the effects of that so I haven't started doing it myself. I assume there must be benefits to staying ketogenic during my workout so I condition my body to always be used to using fat as a fuel source, but I don't have any data to prove that is actually beneficial. It also helps that I'm more focused on weight loss, baseline of strength, and general health rather than powerlifting or and goals for the super lean and large muscle look.