I read an awful lot of studies on nutrition, supplements, and so forth per my job, most not really worth noting here on BZ. Not that they are bad studies per se, but they don’t really tend to tell us anything we don’t already know or add much to the body of knowledge. Once in a while a study comes out that really deserves some discussion, and this is one of those. The most common criticisms of such nutritional studies are they don’t run long enough to really see the differences between diets, and or, they’re not large enough to see differences between groups. Other criticisms are a lack of focus on the quality of the foods ingested. These and other criticisms often result in people ignoring the findings of various studies that examine say one dietary approach vs another on end points such as weight loss.
One of the big debates in nutrition is a low carb vs low fat diet on weight loss. This recent study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA. 2018;319(7):667-679) had over 600 adults, attempted to focus on the quality of the food, and ran 12 months! The study also examined genotype pattern and insulin secretion. Frankly, I’m surprised this one has not gotten more attention than it did, but I suspect that’s due to the results, but I digress…
The mean macronutrient distributions in the healthy low fat was diet (HLF) vs the healthy low carb diet (HLC), respectively, were 48% vs 30% for carbohydrates, 29% vs 45% for fat, and 21% vs 23% for protein. So obviously not a keto diet per se, but still a substantial macro nutrient difference in F/C to parse out the differences. It’s also important to note the protein intakes were essentially the same. Another common criticism of nutritional studies is they often fail to match protein intakes between groups, then claim the effects were due to the differences in fat or carbs!
So what were the results? Pretty much what I had expected. When the source calories are healthy, isocaloric, and protein the same between groups, the effects are essentially the same. The HLF diet group lost 5.3 kg vs the HLC diet group that lost 6.0 kg, “…and there was no significant diet-genotype interaction or diet-insulin interaction with 12-month weight loss.”
That is what most people don’t understand. 80% of weight loss is eating a healthy diet. 1 1/2 years ago I started a macro diet and lost 60 lbs in a year. Maintaining but still watching what I eat.
A large well controlled study that runs a year, is a very expensive study, and that’s not including all the secondary measures tested, etc. There’s a lot to be gleaned from that study, but the answer not what many want to hear and or does not sell fad diets to people unwilling to take the essential simple steps needed to make the long term progress they want.
Personally, I think it`s quite hard to give general advices to people. People are different. Aged people need special ways of losing waight, for example. I belive that diets must be ranged by ages
If you search macro calculator online it will take in your age and gender. I did not think that I would loose the weight. It even takes in your activity level from nothing to very active. If my calorie intake for the day is 2500 you don’t eat 3000.
In the beginning it is hard and I wanted to quit. But after about one month it got easier. One of the problems I had was that I was not eating enough protein for the day. Then I had to cut down on my fat and started to replace things that were low fat.
There are to many diet fads that are either unhealthy or stupid. Keto is a good example of this. But society don’t want to do the hard work. They want a pill that works over night.
On TV there are commercials for special meals that can be sent to you and you just eat what they give you. This is the same thing but you are being held responsible for and accountable if you don’t lose the weight.
Everyone wants to complain how they don’t have time or it is to have. That is BS there are things that have happened in my life in the last 2 years that it has made it hard. But I sucked it up and moved forward with it. I also am very happy with my results. All it takes is commitment.
Anyone interested in Keto I would encourage to look up Dr. Dom D’Agostino. He is a professor at the University of South Florida and does research on ketosis for the DOD.
There’s a few caveats with this post. Age and activity level being huge ones. I’d say that diet becomes increasingly more important as you age, because your ability to recover diminishes. When you’re young, you can out work a bad diet and recover fast enough to do it again the next day. As you age though, this changes drastically. Bad habits stack up over years and you find yourself in a place where you can’t recover fast enough to outdo a poor diet.
I think the importance of a healthy diet in young people is in establishing a behavior pattern to take them later in life, not so much an acute effect, not that there won’t be one.
To say someone lost 60lbs in a year, without qualifying that statement with a weight, height and age stat is misleading. Losing 10lbs at 40 years old at a reasonable BMI is much harder than losing 50lbs at 20 at an inflated BMI. I’ve very much come to appreciate and respect of aging on the active person. I would encourage all young guys, those under 40, so seriously check their habits and see where changes need to be made.
Also BMI is a outdated! I weigh 205 lbs. By BMI standards I am overweight! I had two nephews finish usmc basic in January. They entered at 205 lbs (18 years old) they finished and weighed 225 lbs. By BMI they are overweight.
But they lost inches. Muscle is heavier than fat! BMI does not take this in consideration. Everyone uses excuses and want to blame something other than themselves for the poor results or the lack of.
BMI is not outdated, it’s just misused. It’s useful for large numbers of people, it’s of lesser to no value to individuals and actually penalizes those who workout regularly. That’s were they went wrong, bu fact remains, few in the population are outside the BMI due to higher levels of muscle mass. I’m obese by BMI standards. More have woken up to the fact the BMI should not be applied to individuals in isolation and are looking at actual body comp, but yes it’s been frustrating trying to educate people, some who have the education to know better, about the BMI.
IIRC, 205lbs is the border line of overweight for someone who is 6’-3". But, you can be 205 lbs skinny fat, or you can be 205 lbs muscular and cut. You’re going off on a tangent about BMI but you missed my point. If you’re a sedentary fat person who has lots of weight to loose, you will drop weight with a lot less effort than someone who is active and relatively lean who is trying to drop the last few percentage points of body fat.
This is where the importance of diet really comes into it, especially as you get older.
By your own admittance you’re a not very active middle age man who was heavy and likely carrying a high percentage of body fat. Managing your food resulted in weight loss. Of course it did. You were basically doing nothing, then you did the most important thing you could to loose weight, manage your food intake, which resulted in weight loss.
A pound of muscle and a pound of fat weigh the same. They’re both a pound.
I just turned 35 last week. I tried the RP diet about 18 months ago and while I wasn’t a fan of the macro structure around meals, it did offer me the introduction I needed when it came to what foods I should be eating and when, based around my workout times.
As of now, I simply count Macro’s using the MFP app and I pretty much eat what I want but track it as honestly as I can. I’m 6’1” and lately I’ve been between 201-205 lbs, playing the long game when it comes to weight loss. Right now, I get 2255 cals/day broken down into a 40%c/30%p/30%f ratio (226g/C; 170g/P; 75g/F) and I leave quite a bit of the fat on the table most days and I eat pretty close to the same meals day in day out during the week. I’m pretty lenient with what I eat/drink on the weekends.
As a side note, when I was still diving commercially, for my height I was allowed to get as heavy as 238# before Doc Serio would have recommended that I be pulled out of rotation to lose weight. Granted, I’ve never been that fat in my life, but a little over a year ago I was 220 and I felt like a complete slob. For now, I’m simply dieting to reboot my eating habits for the longhaul and be more aware of what category most foods fall into so I can make better eating decisions at meal times. My goal is to weight between 195-200 without much effort through “maintenance” eating.
DID YOU KNOW: The weight loss industry is worth roughly $66 billion ?
And this site says that I can lose it with a help of cannabis .
They https://www.marijuanabreak.com/cbd/cbdistillery-review say
Cannabinoids such as CBD work on the body’s Endocannabinoid System (ECS), which has been said to be one of the most crucial physiological systems in the human body. It organizes and mediates multiple important functions, including mood, sleep, and yes – appetite.
Just finished week 1 on keto. Already feel fuller longer, lost 4 pounds, and I get to eat cheesy eggs with bacon and avocado every morning. I call that winning.
Keto dropped me ten pounds over two weeks (a couple cheats too many put half back on, need to stand closer to the salad bowl as I start Week 3), and going reduced-carb moving toward keto has taken my arthritic, Hutt-like mother from almost 360 to just under 320 over the past six months.
Anybody here tried Stephanie Laska’s “Dirty Lazy Keto” cookbooks? I’m thinking it’ll be an easier time to keep the Evil Old One herded down the right path if we can get her to thinking of those high-carb things she’s addicted to as “something that she can have once in a while for special occasions” rather than a “you have to give up everything all the time”–after all, we all get the craving for a burger and fries or a milkshake every now and again, right?
