Carb day?

[ndw]

Has anyone tried pp and then thrown in one carb day a week (more like a carb meal and one dessert)?

I was working on my diet last year and lost about 25 pounds in 4 months. Then I started working graveyard shift and had a LOT of difficulty staying on the diet (and awake, and human....) so I gave up.

I got off graveyard shifts this spring and went back on the diet at the end of May. Was losing about 1 pd a week. But then the last 3 or 4 weeks I started having one day a week where I just didnt worry about how many carbs. I am finding that I cant eat much without feeling sick (ie bloated and full like I just had thanksgiving dinner) on those days and I am not having as much trouble maintaining about 75 grams of carbs on the following day and then 30 grams or less the next 5 days. AND, I have been losing more--5 pounds in 2 wks. and feeling better, not to mention more motivated on those low carb days.

So, I have one free carb day (Sat) one maint carb day (75 g on Sun) followed by 5 low carb (30 g) and I am avoiding fatty and salty/processed foods. I am thinking that this type of cycle may be a way of keeping my metabolism from slowing down when I feed it less cals/carbs over a longer period of time(helping me avoid plateaus). It seems to be working, and I wonder if anyone else has tried something similar.

[isisrose]

Personally I wouldn't dare, it would probably undue everything that I have done to get my BS close to normal (Just a few more points lower and it will be).

[crunchymonkey]

I find it almost impossible to hit exactly the same amount of carbs day after day. Some days are more than others, although I have always stayed below 60 net grams a day since I restarted the first of July.
Your plan sounds interesting to me though. May give it a go when I get to goal.

[Spruce Goose]

I haven't tried it and am not confident I personally could pull it off. The carb day would most likely trigger carb cravings the other days for me. Heck, too much artificial sweeteners sometimes gives me cravings :P

[maxlharris]

Generally tolerated by some people, but not really serving a purpose other than reinforcing the bad habits that got you in need of a dietary intervention in the first place.

That is my conclusion from my experiments with this type of regime. It worked from a weight loss perspective, as long as I made sure to get back in the flow promptly, but it wasn't working towards anything sustainable. And if it's not sustainable, it's not worth it for me. Maybe some other people have events or something they want to crash for, but that's not really what protein power is about.

[Northpole]

Hi

I think you should do what works for you. Everyone is different in terms of cravings. Some people just cannot go near too many carbs otherwise they just binge.
Others find a carb meal or day on a weekly basis helps them feel less deprived and are therefore more able to stay low carb the rest of the week.

If you are interested in exploring carb cycling and want more info about it, I would recommend 'The Carb cycling Diet' by Dr Roman Malkov. He was nutritional consultant to the Russian Athletics team, and the book discusses both the science behind and application of this method.

Hope this helps.

[maxlharris]

Dr. Malkov's book and the other carb cycling programs are designed for high intensity workouts by athletes who are looking to low carb and still carb load. If you are not working out very hard, after your high carb day, you are kicking yourself out of fat burning and slowing your overall loss.

As always, it is your science experiment.

[Northpole]

Dr. Malkov's book and the other carb cycling programs are designed for high intensity workouts by athletes who are looking to low carb and still carb load. If you are not working out very hard, after your high carb day, you are kicking yourself out of fat burning and slowing your overall loss.

As always, it is your science experiment.

I have to disagree with you on that. I have read the book and its not targeted at athletes at all, its written as a diet for anyone. The book offers a range of carb levels for those who do or do not work out.

What I would say is that the carb levels are very high - at least to most low carbers.

[robschott]

I'd be interested to see what kind of longer term results you get from this..like a 6 week stint or something..to see the cyclical loss and possible gains???

[ndw]

Down another 4 pounds in the last 2 weeks. Still having carbs on Sat followed by about 50 g of carb on Sunday and under 30 the rest of the week. I have been pleasantly surprised by how easy it is becoming for me to go back to the low carb days. As for my Sat--the amount of carbs I am eating on a "high carb" day are about a third of what I would have eaten on a regular day in the past. The thing that hindered me the most on the low carb diet in the past was plateuing. It happened to me often no matter what I did I would lose weight one week and then for 2 weeks, nothing. That was very discouraging. Then, after depriving myself for so long, I found that when I did indulge, I couldnt stop. Everyone is individual so having a carb day may each week may not work. BUt, i think in my case it is keeping my body from plateuing and it is teaching me how to change my habits--and I have zero carb cravings!

[Omlette]

Sounds to me that even when you say are you are have a free carb day, you are only going to a maintenance level of carbs or a little higher. Still probably a lot lower, as you said, than you would have eaten in the past. I think it also depends on what kind of carbs. Evidently, they are not carbs that set you off in a tizzy to eat and eat carbs.

It's good that you can have this one day, drop to 50, then go back to the 30 and keep losing. Kudos to you for trying. Yay for it working.