Bodybuilding Forums

Hello to all,
Started the mans diet about 3 weeks ago and just want to clarify a couple of points.
If i need a bit more energy i eat some more protein OR fat ???
I am averaging about 45g of carbs a day, is this ok ?? I have lean weight of 82.5kgs.
Correct me if i am wrong, but do i just eat any time any time i feel hungry, but not an
excessive amount ??

Thanks for your help.
Tallguy

tallguy wrote:Hello to all,
Started the mans diet about 3 weeks ago and just want to clarify a couple of points.
If i need a bit more energy i eat some more protein OR fat ???

Fat. Overeating protein is not what you want on a ketogenic diet.
http://audioboo.fm/boos/28759
http://audioboo.fm/boos/29043
These sound bites will explain why, and also how to calculate your protein requirements.

tallguy wrote:I am averaging about 45g of carbs a day, is this ok ??

If that's how many you need in order to have awesome workouts, then yes.

tallguy wrote:I have lean weight of 82.5kgs.

Then your protein requirement is 227 grams per day. That coupled with your 45-ish grams of carbs is about 1100 calories. The remainder of your diet needs to be fats.

tallguy wrote:Correct me if i am wrong, but do i just eat any time any time i feel hungry, but not an excessive amount ??

Yes, except that you should try not to go more than 3 hours w/o eating.

Hope this helps!

marochka_raduga (great name btw) Thanks for the info - think i better eat a little less protein, and
i thought i was low carbing - seems i am but not as low as i think !!! Guess i need to get some heavy
cream to get my fats up a little !!!! May have to cut down on my beloved peanut butter - eating about
250g per day !!!!

Just one other thing - I am starting to feel hungry a lot more this past week - is this because i
have upped my protein a little to much causing my body to convert it to glucose which has
upped my blood sugar causing me to be more hungry - does this sound right ?????
FYI I have been been overeating protein about 80g more than you suggested every day this
week.

Another thing - if i need to drop a few pounds of body fat do i eat less dietary fat ??

Thanks once again

tallguy wrote:marochka_raduga (great name btw) Thanks for the info - think i better eat a little less protein, and
i thought i was low carbing - seems i am but not as low as i think !!! Guess i need to get some heavy
cream to get my fats up a little !!!! May have to cut down on my beloved peanut butter - eating about
250g per day !!!!

You're welcome, and by the way, don't forget that peanut butter has carbs, and if you're not careful, many brands have added sugar. I limit myself to about 1-2 tablespoons per day of low carb soy nut butter, which is 90-190-ish calories, 5-10 grams of protein, 0.5-1 gram carb, 8-16 grams of fat. Heavy cream is sometimes a staller for people, too, so you might need to avoid that in the future. Just be aware of any developing pattern with the addition of heavy cream.

tallguy wrote:Just one other thing - I am starting to feel hungry a lot more this past week - is this because i
have upped my protein a little to much causing my body to convert it to glucose which has
upped my blood sugar causing me to be more hungry - does this sound right ?????
FYI I have been been overeating protein about 80g more than you suggested every day this
week.

Yeah, that'd be about equivalent to 45-50 grams of carbs, so double your carb intake that you thought. That'd probably kick most people out of ketosis and allow the hunger to come back. Hypocrite alert-- I overeat protein too, and I think it's because I do not get the magical satiety response from fat that everyone insists occurs.

tallguy wrote:Another thing - if i need to drop a few pounds of body fat do i eat less dietary fat ??

No, you exercise extreme patience and remain in slight caloric deficit. When you're just starting out, you can get away with bigger deficits I think, but as you get closer to your goal weight, it gets much much harder to create substantial caloric deficits. And taking drastic measures to achieve them becomes counterproductive and your body throws up all kinds of roadblocks to sabotage your efforts. That's where the patience comes in, because if you're sneaky, your body might not notice that it's getting, say, 200 calories fewer than it needs and has to grab them from fat. I think if you go trying to cut 750-1000 calories from your daily intake your body sits up and takes notice in a hurry and starts spewing out the hungry, hungry hormones to make you stop all that mess and eat something already!

So if your protein needs are unchangeable, you have two choices. You can cut back on the carbs a little more (making sure you continue to get plenty of leafy green vegetables for their fiber, vitamin and mineral content), say 5 daily grams per week until you start losing fat, until you get down to 20 grams. Or, you can cut dietary fat. You want to start with the carbs first, because they're the ones that allow the hormonal state for fat storage to obtain. If you still need to cut calories, then you can cut out a little dietary fat, like omitting that cream or using 1 T. less butter, etc. Obviously, since fat has 9 calories per gram and carbs/protein only 4 calories per gram, the easiest way to slash more calories and still eat nearly the same food volume is to crank down the dietary fat. You don't want to start off with the fats low though, because where do you have to go then when you stall out?

Something else i've noticed is brain fog when carbing up - is this usual ???
Thanks again

Sorry to butt in, but on the subject of peanut butter. The brand I use has 10 grams of carbs per 100g, but 7 grams of fibre. So 3g net carbs. Also no added sugar. Is that acceptable because I make protein bars with it. 500 calorie bar with 9g carbs, 6.5g fibre, so net carbs of 2.5g per 500 cals?

tallguy wrote:Something else i've noticed is brain fog when carbing up - is this usual ???

Huge. It's a by-product of vacillating blood sugar.

If you like, the basic kits to measure blood sugar are like $10.00 at Wal-Mart, and another $10 for a week's worth of test strips. Why not measure your blood sugar during these swings to see what it's actually doing? If you, like me, have blood sugar wildly swinging between 50-something a couple of hours after carbs and 120-something (or higher) immediately after a binge, you may have unstable blood sugar that helps cause the brain fog, moodiness, and exhaustion.

--Matt B.

Par2 wrote:Sorry to butt in, but on the subject of peanut butter. The brand I use has 10 grams of carbs per 100g, but 7 grams of fibre. So 3g net carbs. Also no added sugar. Is that acceptable because I make protein bars with it. 500 calorie bar with 9g carbs, 6.5g fibre, so net carbs of 2.5g per 500 cals?

Not butting in-- it's a good question!! Well, 3 grams of net carbs is usually pretty easy to work into your diet. However, be careful. You seem to be measuring things in 100 gram portions and you spelled it "fibre", not "fiber". That is generally a good indication that you are in Europe somewhere. If so, you probably do NOT subtract the fibre from the total carbs, as it is already done for you. In the UK, fibre does not count in the total carbs. Total carbs = net carbs.

par2 - marochka is on the ball about your peanut butter - sounds like "Whole Earth" brand, same as mine. total / net carbs = 10.1g per 100g. I found this out a few weeks ago - i was gutted !! I too thought 10.1g - fibre 7.3g = 2.8g net wow happy days indeed, but then found out that in U.K. they do the maths for us and total carbs = net carbs, and i thought i'd found the 'backbone' of my new diet !!!!!
Regards

redgiki - vacillating blood sugar, i am assuming this is not a good thing !!! Today, saturday is my 24 hour carb up day. I have just had a bowl of porrige oats for breakfast and i can already feel the brain fog decending !! Even on my carb day i only ever eat simple carbs apart from fruit. What can i do about vacillating blood sugar levels, if anything or does it just mean i have to have a steely resolve to withstand the attraction of Krispy Kreme !!!!

Regards
Tallguy