Low-carb diet and insulin:
Low-carb diets are supposed to decreasing insulin levels -- which can help the body to burn stored fat for energy. If the diet works correctly, your body should be in a near-constant state of fat burning, which can be an effective way to lose weight.
I have been experimenting with Carb Night and Carb Back
loading recently. The basic idea is to eat ultra-low carb (less than 30 gm) to induce
ketosis which primes your body to burn fat while preserving muscle. Then on one day of the week, during a 6-8
hours window in the evening, after your weight workout load up on a massive
amount of high glycemic index carb. This
will incite a large insulin spike which tells the body that there is plenty of
food around, preventing the typical down-regulation of metabolism seen in
starvation.
In this method, if you raise insulin even slightly by eating
carbs—30 or more grams will do it—you seriously impair your body’s ability to
burn fat for the rest of the day. Worse, you may even get fatter because of the
presence of another hormone—cortisol. A stress hormone, cortisol will break
down fat all morning, but combined with raised insulin, it can actually cause
your body to create new fat cells.
Carb Night:
For six days of the week, you eat ultra low-carb (30 gram or
less) then on Sunday night, from about 6 p.m. until you go to bed, you can
pretty much eat whatever you want, including sugary food like donuts and ice
cream. Carb Nite works by keeping your body in a fat-burning state for the
majority of the week. Then, because you're so sensitized to any insulin
release, the rush of carbs and sugar on Sunday gets used more efficiently. This
means more glucose in your muscles, where it belongs, and less chub around your
waist. If you are losing weight then
increase two carbs night in a week.
Carb backloading:
Carb back loading is a diet where you eat carbohydrates at
the end of the day. The first part of the day is spent in a ketogenic
state—almost no carbs allowed. After an evening workout and a protein shake
comes the flood of carbohydrates. The glycogen helps your muscles repair and
will keep your body from being catabolic as you sleep. Don't go crazy and eat a
donut or two every night. Try to keep your carbs clean. Instead of pizza try
sweet potatoes and rice.
Which is effective?
This depends on your goal. If you just want to lose weight
then carb night works well. But if you want to lose fat keeping the muscle mass
then carb backloading works better.
Carb Nite can be effective without training. Carb
backloading, on the other hand, requires resistance exercise to work.
Ideal setup if you workout in the Evening:
Until the after noon, keep your
carbs low— 30 grams or fewer. Begin your weight workout at some point between 3
p.m. and 6 p.m. Afterward, ingest a postworkout shake that’s rich in carbs, and
keep eating carbs until you go to bed. The same foods prescribed on Carb Nite
apply here—pizza, ice cream, and so on. It is not uncommon for followers of the
plan to eat 400 grams of carbs and still lose body fat while gaining muscle
mass.
and if you work out in the Morning. If you train in the morning, you’ll
need to eat a small amount of carbs after your workout and take advantage of
supplements that help spike insulin so that you can recover from your workout
without throwing off the hormonal rhythms of back-loading. That night, around
six, eat your carbs, but go mainly with less sugary sources like rice and
potatoes.
Non-Training Days On days you don’t lift (this
includes days you just do cardio), limit carbs to a single late-day meal.
