Posted on 01/05/2012 7:50:58 AM PST by Brookhaven
I had a bit an epiphany yesterday, but it seems so contray to what I've been told about eating all my life, I'm having a hard time believing my analysis is corret.
I've been working on changing my diet. One of the things I ran across was the fact that eating carbohydrates spikes your blood sugar. Then I heard someone make the comment (and it was almost a throw-away side comment) "of course, carbohydrates are just complex forms of sugar." Really?
The following lines are pulled from here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/161547.php, my insertions are in brackets [my comment].
Saccharides, or carbohydrates, are sugars or starches.There are various types of saccharides:
Monosaccharide - this is the smallest possible sugar unit. Examples include glucose, galactose or fructose. When we talk about blood sugar we are referring to glucose in the blood; glucose is a major source of energy for a cell. In human nutrition, galactose can be found most readily in milk and dairy products, while fructose is found mostly in vegetables and fruit.
Disaccharide - two monosaccharide [simple sugar] molecules bonded together. Disaccharides are polysaccharides - "poly…" specifies any number higher than one, while "di…" specifies exactly two. Examples of disaccharides include lactose, maltose, and sucrose. If you bond one glucose molecule with a fructose molecule you get a sucrose molecule.
Sucrose is found in table sugar, and is often formed as a result of photosynthesis (sunlight absorbed by chlorophyll reacting with other compounds in plants). If you bond one glucose molecule with a galactose molecule you get lactose, which is commonly found in milk.
Polysaccharide - a chain of two or more monosaccharides [simple sugar molecule]. The chain may be branched (molecule is like a tree with branches and twigs) or unbranched (molecule is a straight line with no twigs). Polysaccharide molecule chains may be made up of hundreds or thousands of monosaccharides.
So, carbohydrates are made up of sugar or starch. Monosaccharide, disaccharide, and polysaccharide are all forms of sugar. But, what is starch?
Starch - these are glucose polymers made up of Amylose [short chains of glucose] and Amylopectin [long chains of glucose]. Rich sources of starches for humans include potatoes, rice and wheat.
So, startch is a form of glucose. And, what is glucose? Remember the paragraph above about monosaccharides?
Monosaccharide - this is the smallest possible sugar unit. Examples include glucose, galactose or fructose. When we talk about blood sugar we are referring to glucose in the blood;
So, if carbohydrates are made up of one of the three saccharides (mono, di, or poly--all a type of sugar) or starch (which is made up of glucose--a type of sugar), doesn't that mean carbohydrates are--at the end of the day--just a complex type of sugar?
That's a hard fact for me to accept, because it contradicts everything I've been taught about nutrition. The current recommendation is that at least 50% of a person's calorie intake each day come from carbohydrats (as can be seen in the food pyramid).
But, if carbohydrates are just complex forms of sugar, does that mean 50% of my calories should come from sugar (a complex form of sugar, but sugar none-the-less)?
Given sharp rise in not just childhood obesity and diabetes, but obesity and diabetes in general (all commonly called an epidemic by the medical community), I'm starting to wonder if we just didn't make a mistake. By emphasizing grains (carbohydrates) so heavily in our diets, did we unwittingly emphasize sugar in our diets and cause these epidemics?
Actually, your hypothetical scenario didn’t give enough info.
Take an athlete has who engaged repeatedly in a cyclical ketogenic diet who has had nothing but fats and proteins for two weeks. They will (more than likely) be in a state of deep ketogenesis. Furthermore, if they have engaged in repeated bouts of high-intensity, anaerobic exercise for a period of several days they will also have a severe depletion of muscular glycogen in addition to depletion of liver glycogen.
The day and night before the race, this athlete consumes 1000 grams of glucose polymers and about 50 grams of protein and NOTHING ELSE.
Athlete two on the other hand, follows the same training protocols but has also followed a somewhat “conventional” diet of roughly 50% carbohydrates, 25%, protein and 25% fat. This athlete has maintained the same diet and calorie levels consistently for weeks, without a calorie deficit. The day/night before the race, this athlete consumes two large plates of spaghetti.
ALL OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL, I would pick the first athlete to win every single time. The supercompensation of glycogen in the first athlete has been shown to improve athletic performance by a large amount.
You do realize that for centuries before man figured out how to harvest grain, he still knew how to dig up a root or tuber and eat them, right?
I get it, but many folks with diabetes DO need to lose weight - that is part of their problem. 45 to 60 carbs at each meal could mean a lot of calories. We don’t need to argue this - you have your opinion and I have mine. I just found the diabetic suggested diet to “seem” a bit heavy on carbs.
Only if you want to take a simple hypothetical and put your own little spin on it.
There were three guys, one ate no dinner, one ate pasta and one ate sugar in the form of candy bars.
This scenario illustrates a fundamental difference between dietary intake of carbohydrates and sugar - sorry the example was too difficult for you to comprehend as stated.
>>...I’ve been on a meat, water and fat only diet for over 5 years...<<
I tried that once and it worked like a charm. Two things I remember:
- Supplemental fiber is a *must* (Oh man, is it!!)
- A high protein diet is darned expensive!
Hat’s off to you for hanging in there.
Agreed. I lost 40 lbs when I was diagnosed. But the 45 carb number isn't for losing, it is for living.
In general, the more physically active you are the less you need to “count carbs”, you will “burn” more of them up before they pile up as fat and excessive “blood sugar”; and conversely the less physically active is your lifestyle, the more you might need to “count carbs” and sugar content of what you will consume.
Most diabetics learn that when they are looking at food content labels, they need to add the grams of carbs and sugar together.
Why the need for personal attacks?
Got any citation that athletes have moved to a high protein and fat diet to improve their performance?
How many Olympic caliber athletes are on an Atkins diet?
Where is the evidence they perform better as you proposed they would in expounding upon my rather simple point that ‘carbo loading’ was obviously not the same thing as ‘sugar loading’?
From Livestrong.com
An athlete’s diet is not one-size-fits-all, especially on the professional or Olympic level. Performance is everything, and fuel is just as important as an athlete’s training schedule. Olympic athletes that expend the most calories require the most, and swimming burns many calories. The caloric breakdown of an Olympic swimmer’s diet should be about 60 to 70 percent of calories from carbohydrates, 20 to 25 percent from protein and 15 to 20 percent from fat.
Of course they are.
Don’t you remember the experiment in school as a kid?
The one where they have a chemical that turns blue if sugar is present?
They put the stuff on a cracker and no blue.
They have one of the students start to chew up a cracker and spit it out and add the chemical and all a sudden now it’s blue.
You have enzymes in your saliva that start to break down carbs into simple sugars.
One interesting fact:
If an alien was asked to describe life on Earth, he would say we are mostly carbs.
Because the single most abundant organic chemical on the planet is a very famous, useful carbohydrate.
We call it cellulose!!
I did not say I do not eat carbs, or would never. I just believe they need to be taken in low/ moderate doses, which is not what the nutrition pyramid teaches. But go ahead, I am just saying what I think is true.
its more than just carbs...
the A1C blood test gives an AVERAGE of your blood sugar....that does not mean your blood sugar doesn’t spike or drop down too low at times....
I have a feeling that its more the quantity of what we eat, aside from lots of high sugar foods, than what we eat...
I'm trying to eat fewer carbs now, in the last few weeks...so we'll see.
I suspect that your brother had bad kidneys due to the diabetes already, but the high protein diet sent him over the edge...diabetes is sneeky that way....
Ping
Ok, if the comment that you don’t seem the type to care for published research sounded “smarmy,” then I apologize. It was not intended to be such. But it doesn’t seem that you have done much research on this issue, but you are commenting on it. As such, I can only assume that you wouldn’t be interested. You just don’t seem the type. You’re repeating an old myth about a giant plate of carbs the night before an athletic event without understanding fully the concept of carb loading.
You have to keep in mind, (I’m assuming you haven’t even bothered to look at my “about” page or you would be aware of this already) I not only research this stuff out of interest but also because I AM A COMPETITIVE ATHLETE. Moreover, I compete in sports with weight classes. It is imperative that I understand not only performance nutrition but also how that impacts my weight.
Now, to clarify the issue a bit, since you are confusing the issue from your original post.
Originally, you wrote: “There is a reason serious athletes “carbo-load” before a strenuous event - so their muscles will have energy to burn down the stretch.”
A “carbo-load” is NOT the same as the advice that you posted from Livestrong. In that advice (which is not published research by the way, just what Livestrong is writing) they are referring to the training diet, NOT a “carbo-load”.
I am not referring to the day to day regimen that athletes undergo while training. That is a different issue entirely.
And no where did I suggest that athletic performance would be enhanced by the Atkins diet. Not once. So it’s a nice straw-man that you’re trying to pin on me, but I won’t fall for it.
The science:
The original groundbreaking study that demonstrated that glycogen supercompensation does indeed occur and the conditions under which it occurs:
Ahlborg G, Bergstrom J, Edelund G, Hultman E. Muscle glycogen and muscle electrolytes during prolonged physical exercise. Acta Physiol. Scand. 1967 70:129-142.
Persistence of the supercompensated state:
J Appl Physiol. 1997 Jan;82(1):342-7.
Persistence of supercompensated muscle glycogen in trained subjects after carbohydrate loading.
Goforth HW Jr, Arnall DA, Bennett BL, Law PG.
Sugars and supercompensation:
Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1987 Oct;19(5):491-6.
Effect of different post-exercise sugar diets on the rate of muscle glycogen synthesis.
Blom PC, Høstmark AT, Vaage O, Kardel KR, Maehlum S.
Source
Department of Physiology, National Institute of Occupational Health, Oslo, Norway.
Given that there has been more than 40 years of study on this topic, there’s a ton more.
Start there, though, and educate yourself.
Personally, I’m done with this conversation. You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Old myth from my college days in 1998 conveyed to me via a former Olympic caliber athlete?
I cited Livestrong to show that an athlete should (and most Olympic caliber athletes do) have a diet high in carbohydrates.
No, you did not suggest your addition to my hypothetical that an athlete on a high protein and low card diet would perform better than the one who ate pasta or the one who ate candy bars? You had better work on your writing skills then - because your post sure seemed to indicate that your thinking was such.
Yeah, I am only a former athlete and a molecular biologist whose claims on this thread have been well substantiated.
I may not know what you are talking about, due to your inability to write clearly - but I sure as hell know what I am talking about.
J Appl Physiol. 1997 Jan;82(1):342-7.
Persistence of supercompensated muscle glycogen in trained subjects after carbohydrate loading.
Goforth HW Jr, Arnall DA, Bennett BL, Law PG.
What was that about “carbohydrate loading” again?
My point was that there was a difference between “carbohydrate loading” - which had a sound biochemical basis and was previously recommended; and “sugar loading” - which would not have a sound biochemical basis and would NOT be recommended. Again I am sorry that this simple example went so very far over your head.
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