Carb Backloading - Carb Nite Strategies for Dropping Below 10% Body Fat IAW CBL FLOW CHART DIETARY CHANGES 1. Ensure you are under 30g of Useable carbs (CHO) during ULC periods. 2. Avoid vegetable vegetable fats (ie. Olives, Olives, olive oil, etc.) switch switch to animal fats, coconut coconut oil, MCT oil 3. Decrease dietary fat during backloads earlier in evening (ie. Rice and chicken breast for dinner) Kiefer commented on this one, saying that you should focus on reloading your CHOs for a backload and not worry about adding extra fats. fats. However, he also mentioned that if you are looking flat in the morning, but ‘jacked’ you may need to add some triglycerides in the back back load period to restore restore muscle triglyceride levels. ‘Jacked I’m venturing a guess here will be appearing lean, but not hard or filled out. http://www.dangerouslyhardcore http://www.dangero uslyhardcore.com/1733/hi-tech-nu .com/1733/hi-tech-nutrient-convers trient-conversion-lessons-for ion-lessons-for-15 carb-back-loading/ Lessons carb-back-loading/ Lessons for Carb Back-Loading by Kiefer … “ OCFAs, OCFAs, on the other hand, we know convert easily into glucose. This is seen readily in animal and human studies where diets rich in even-chains lower blood glucose levels and allow a ketogenic metabolism to take over. An ultra-low carb diet that contains rich amounts of odd-chain fatty acids, however, allows the body to maintain blood glucose levels at the previous amount[28-31]. In other words, an ultra-low carb diet rich in OCFAs, is not ketogenic[31- 33]; it’s not much different than a carb-based diet, metabolically that is.
Since animal fats do contain a certain amount of OCFAs (not usually more than 5% “ Since total[34]), it’s actually a good reason to eat animal sources for the ability of the OCFAs to supply the small amount of glucose needed for the brain while preserving protein retention. ” “If the goal is absolute maximum fat loss, the back loads should be staged with the least amount of fat in the earlier meals and should be “fat back -loaded” during the refeed. Another way of saying this is that the lower-fat your meals are in the first part of the evening, the junkier they can be in the two hours before bed. ” 4. Sugar alcohols avoid them (ie. Gum, SF syrups, diet drinks)
1
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5. Eat only unprocessed foods (if available) and cook your own food (shoot for gluten free foods—like homemade baked potato fries, paleo almond bread, blah, blah, blah… 6. Count calories in order to know how to configure your back loads; (21) if you are coming in too flat your backloads are too low i n carbs, if you’re coming in too soft and are holding bodywater you overdid your backload i) Shoot for backloads of 10-20% maintenance level ii) Keep fat levels very low in backloads iii) Kiefer recommends to find your optimal backloading status by performing the initial phase of CBL, then recalibrate the CHO “requirements: I would do this for the cleanest bulk possible. Start at half your carb needs (300/2 = 150g) on training days; 5 grams at night before beg on non-training days , high glcyemic. Keep the non-training day load stable and up the post -training carbs every 2 weeks. So, two weeks at 150; if fat stable (or losing), 200 for two weeks; reassess and increase until BF holds stable. At this point, you will be building mass without fat. Use the off days as "catch ups" from then on out. Some training sessions will require more carbs than others. The off days, catch up and do it right...blow it out. After about a month, you'll probably need to start doing these recalibrations. Oddly enough, when I start smoothing out is when I do a massive carb up on an OFF night." 7. Dairy products will slow results in some people; either cut them out or limit consumption of cheese, milk products, etc. 8. Evaluate current dietary scheme for hidden calories (ie. Nuts, cheese, eggs that could be including too many Pre-WO CHO or be insulinotropic)
9. DON’T fast longer than 14-20 hours and breakfast with protein : fat at usual ratio (1:1); this is to keep leptin levels high. Your overall levels of BF are regulated within the body by leptin and several other functions of the body (still a lot of research needs to be done here). The longer you remain in a fasted state at the lower levels of BF will cause leptin values to fall, thus slowing metabolism (ie. T3/T4 production) and inhibiting further lipolysis. In most cases trust your body, it will tell you when you need to feed—but be honest with the signals! i) (still under review ) 14-18 for 10-8%BF 5, 10 ii) 12-14 hours under 6-8%BF
10. WORKOUT NUTRITION will have a lot of variability depending on when you workout, your volume, and whether your consuming carbs (CHO) peri, intra, or post. For this section we will focus on just the nutrition portion. a) Late night workouts may require you to start CHO loading earlier, with a PB&J sandwich and a pre-WO shake. Determined by how you feel. b) For long workouts in the usual time frame (ie. 3PM-6PM) >120 minutes, including some CHO from 30min in will decrease the cortisol response and also help activated MPS before you’re done with your workout. c) For optimal mass gains, consume at least 20g high glycemic CHO post- WO within the usual parameters (ie. 5g leucine, 20g whey isolate, 20g dextrose, 5 Creatine, caffeine). d) For lower BF trainees, include intra-WO CHO with whey i solate to stave of MPB and increase MPS a longer overall time period, or for extremely heavy, lengthy workouts (>120min) Mentioned in the DH podcast with Kiefer and John Meadows, who is the pinnacle of high volume training. e) Biojacked Podcast—Kiefer and John Meadows: The general formula: ULC until training (I wouldn't even worry about vegetables, but would supplement heavily with coconut oil and make beef your main source of protein); With training, consume 200-250 grams of pure carbs with hydrolysates mixed in during and post training. If you choose during, wait 15 to 30 minutes into the training to do so. Obviously, there's more to it than this, but this is 90% of the way there. 11. For high volume and/or lengthy workouts (>120min) plan your Backloads to accommodate higher CHO loads; while downgrading your Backloads for lighter workouts (ie. arms, shoulders, core, etc). Unsure of optimal ratios for this—requires further research. 12. Initiate shorter backloads (2 hour anabolic window) Kiefer states it is very difficult to store bodyfat in this post workout period due to tGLUT and muscle functions, providing your workout was enough intensity to stimulate a response.
13. If stalled out on CNS switch to CBL to enhance metabolism and gain muscle mass or back to CNS from CBL. Muscle mass increase amount of calorie burned/day (negligible amount) and all dependent upon goals at the time. Instead of Backloading have a Carb 4 Nite every 4-5 days to replenish the body. This is done to decrease or inhibit fatty acid synthase (FAS), which downregulates after 3-4day window w/o eating CHOs. Within 4 hours the body upregulates FAS to beyond normal levels, so monitor Carb Nite if fat loss is ultimate goal. 14. Your carbohydrate types that you are consuming for your Backloads will help or hinder your progress. Unprocessed foods appear to work better, although high glycemic carbs are what we are trying to shoot for. Unprocessed, High glycemic > Processed, High glycemic.
15. Keep your overall level of sugar (ie. sucrose 50:50 ratio of fructose to glucose) with a 60g max total of fructose. Kiefer’s article “Lessons for Carb Back-Loading”, “To break the ketogenic cycle, we should use as pure of glucose as possible . For example, immediately post training (or the first meal that breaks the ketogenic part of the diet) , we should ingest primarily glucose (not sucrose and not honey, as it’s possible that the disaccharides can be more lipogenic than fructose alone[35]). The body fails to convert glucose into fat at any appreciable rate but we should probably avoid ingesting it with fast-acting fats (like MCT) as this has some potential to increase triglyceride storage.” http://www.dangerouslyhardcore.com/1733/hi-tech-nutrient-conversion-lessons-for15 carb-back-loading/ Additionally, Naomi has commented on fructose loads here: http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=523.msg4781#msg4781
16. “After the completion of training, stopping the proteolysis that occurs requires a large insulin spike: the larger, the better. Achieving a big spike takes high-glycemic, highinsulinemic carbs, which we can enhance by adding the right proteins and amino acids. “ See Chapter 18 —16oz Carb Curls, Post Training in CBL. In order to achieve the desired effect you want from CBL and consume unprocessed foods, you have to find the high glycemic carbohydrate foods that will work with your body (ie. white rice, sweet potatoes, white potatoes, etc). 17. “Again, save the dirtiest treats—my favorites, like cherry turnovers—for the last meal because of the fat content wrapped up with the disaccharide sugar load. Although these may, theoretically, aid lipogenesis, the insulin load is worth the small amount that might 15 be converted to fat or stored in fat cells.” Kiefer’s article again . *Incorporate a high glycemic carbohydrate and whey isolate before bed (1) Have a high glycemic carbohydrate before bed to spike insulin levels (2) If you’re on a ULC day have 1sc whey isolate + 1T coconut oil (optional) before bed 18. When your body weight becomes stalled the best case scenario is to just wait it out. Often times you will stall and continue losing fat if you keep on the same track, it just may take the body a while to accommodate you. Best case scenario, if you have two weeks, continue as normal, monitor and check. If you still are stalled evaluate progress. One quick switch is too look at your overall level of protein: fats within the diet. If you’re not fueling your body enough, you will not lose weight. In a Podcast with Kiefer and Jim Laird (Round 2), “When your overall calories are too low, your metabolism shuts down systems that utilize too much energy. Your body becomes more efficient with the calories that it has and burns less overall calories. Intaking higher protein and fat intake will help keep the body running and allow it to become more inefficient at burning fat.” Comparison—inner city driving (inefficient burning of gas) versus highway driving (fuel
economy)—you want to have the body burning up more fuel, so help it be more inefficient by giving it the right macros to accomplish the job, without the ability to store them. 19. From current interviews and article from Kiefer Low Gl ycemic meals will halt progress on CBL due to the length of time it takes for your insulin levels to drop at night; furthermore in relationship to the amount of dietary fat you have in your diet will also slow your progress. For those that are going extremely high on fat, this is for you: “A quick back-of-the-envelope calculation, from the plan you included, puts your caloric load per day in excess of 6000 calories and probably around 7000. For example, one cup of oil is 2000 calories. Now, your metabolic rate plus training is probably about half of that. Now, I know I emphasize that calories don't matter, but the fine print is that calories don't matter with swings of several hundred extra calories high or low on any given day--but you're overeating by several thousand. Your diet should be adequate to prevent just about anyone from losing weight. Also, note, that on ANY OTHER DIET, you would have gained weight. And, seriously, a cup of oil? The last person I knew who tried that literally shit his pants driving home from work on day three. This was enough to convince him that drinking large amounts of oil might not be a good idea for digestion. It is, after all, a lubricant. Did you experience these problems at all, or anything unpleasant enough to indicate something might be wrong? The body has several ways of communicating when something is wrong. It's important to listen. Cut the caloric load in half and sit back and wait. You'll halve calories simply by cutting the morning cream and the cups of oil. If hunger is a problem, mix in some fibrous vegetables.” Per Kiefer’s posting in the forums. The diet will work, but if you’re overdoing it fat kid, yeah, you’re not going to make progress. If all the macros are in alignment you can get above the normal load for a while, but your body can’t process everything and will stall you out if you’re eating too much.
20. If you’re still stalled in a two week period with numerous tweeks it may be time to start from scratch. Increase vitamins that may deficient (ie. Calcium, vitamin D3, fish oil, ZMA (for sleep and recovery), GABA (sleep and hGH increase)
21. You can often judge the quality of your backloads by how you look in the AM period. a) If you wakeup feeling bloated or holding onto excess subcutaneous water (ie. spillage) you may have to dial down the amount of CHO in the backload (ie. if you
keep good records you should be able to find your own sweetspot—although this will also be linked to your workout and activity levels too). b) If you wakeup and feel flat, your muscle are not full, and your skin is loose—you didn’t get enough CHO in your backload. Kiefer recommends that you go overboard once in a while just to see how it feels and you can backtrack your diet from there. c) If you wakeup and your tight, no subcutaneous water you’re right where you want to be in CBL. 22. If you’re still stalled on bodyfat loss, go on the DETOX DIET; link: http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=3586.0;topicseen (Thanks to Dmunnee!)
TRAINING CHANGES As we should already know resistance training is key for CBL to work correctly; however, depending upon your goals and individual training styles you may have to make certain changes that will affect your overall level of performance on CBL. Now, Kiefer will have his own recommendations, but for those of us that want answers now I will put up the best information that I have collected on the forums and personal experience (if that accounts for much). As stated before this is a draft and is simply designed to consider different scenarios and solutions to optimizing your training to achieve your goals within the confines of CBL and CN principles. Length of Workouts
1. High Volume training (>120min in duration) is going to affect your backloads and how you train. If you’re doing ultra marathon workouts, your results are going to be affected by your recovery. Are you sleeping enough? Are you getting enough carbs to sustain results? 2. Moderate Volume (=60 min in duration) is about average and there shouldn’t be any problems incorporating any principles of CBL or CN for that matter. If you’re on CN though, you may have some trouble once you get into the lower tiers of bodyfat with energy and stamina. CN may have to get shifted a few days to accommodate faltering energy levels—or perhaps a simple CBL meal midway through the week. 3. Low Volume/Circuit training (<60 min in duration) may not elicit a strong enough tGLUT 17 response, unless the intensity is high. This may be a factor in some peoples training. (reference) 4. Too little training—increase training days, switch training programs, change sets x reps a) Advanced athletes 5-6 days /week; 2-3 days/week b) Intermediate athletes 3-4 days/week; HIIT 2-3 days/week c) Beginners 2-3 days/week resistance training; HIIT 1-2 days/week Time of Workout
5. If you fall into the 4AM-11AM training block you may want to check out this link: http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=2944.msg30222#msg30222
http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=2969.msg30648#msg30648 This should help you to figure out the right things to do in the AM Training process. 6. If you fall into the 11AM-2PM workout group, see: http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=3394.msg36736#msg36736 7. What are you whining about this is the sweetspot! 8. For shift workers and travelers this is going to get complicated—it depends (I’m stealing that from Kiefer, because a lot of this stuff depends). Here are some threads that may help you out: http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=3458.msg37367#msg37367 http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=2571.msg39272#msg39272 http://dangerouslyhardcore.com/forum/index.php?topic=688.msg6289#msg6289 Type of Workouts
9. Strength training or powerlifting workout should have optimal effects on CBL. Powerlifters seem to love it, and still manage to make great progress in as far as fat loss 18 goes. 10. Bodybuilders or hypertrophic type workouts seem to stimulate tGLUT optimally. Kiefer recommends repetitions in this range for optimal stimulation. Muscle contractions of 16, 18 70-80% 1RM have large MPS responses, with a 1 -4 hour stimulus window. 11. Endurance workouts may encourage some response from tGLUT and MPS, but the affect may be limited by the type I muscle fibers and you may not get the full effect. Try 16, 19, 20 enhancing workouts will some hypertrophy or strength sets x reps. 12. Mixed or hybrid styles I will refer you to the Rogue section of the DH forums. There’s some good info there to help you figure out your way. Experimental: I’ve been conducting Full Body workouts in order to stimulate the most GLUT4 response within the muscles (ie. Bodybuilding style glycogen depletion training) just to see if it has an 20 effect versus traditional resistance training methods.
CARDIO?
13. Endurance cardio, probably not going to be your best option. Kiefer’s article here explains why: http://articles.elitefts.com/training-articles/women-running-into-trouble/ For those of us that have no choice (ie. military) there are some ways to work around this. Kiefer proposes (from Podcast with Laird) that CN type dieting is more condusive to endurance running with small tweaks around the long run or competition periods. a) Suggest going on CN for majority of training, then prior to an event or long run having a backload two night prior to event. b) Then having a full CN the night prior to the event. Run event like normal.
c) Walking and light cardio is not much of a problem, but anything over 65%MHR will decrease T3/T4 production by the thyroid. Need more research on how to stimulate 14 this back into gear—other than rest and recovery period. 14. Mixed training with HIIT (recommended at 2-3 x week) and long runs. Unsure as to full recommendation, but assuming from endurance runner recommendation from Kiefer that ULC days with endurance running would co-exist. Backloads would be performed after weight training days. 15. HIIT/Sprinter based training would be backloaded in accordance with Kiefer’s comments, same as a Powerlifting meet. a) Train sans CHO and then perform backloads later in the day as usual. b) If preparing for an event (ie. track race) have backload with foods that you have tested prior to be easily handled on the stomach, night prior to racing event. Race fasted or ULC. c) Training too much—HIIT may be a problem (limit to 2-3 x week) to avoid over training. 16. Doing light walking and just general movement type activities will only help with your fat loss. You just don’t want to get into the hamster wheel problems. Fasted walking in the morning is a great way to start your day and start up your metabolism. Conduct a short LISS walk in AM while fasting; add in an hour of LISS cardio on off days 17. Well there’s your problem! Seriously, just consider who has taught you certain exercises and ensure you’re using proper form and not going against common knowledge. Power cleans and snatches are not endurance exercises and should not be performed for reps. If you can’t do pull-ups without kipping, then work on your strength levels. Learn the correct way. Crossfit can be a useful tool, or it can become a nightmare. Think of your goals and incorporate useful training. Don’t follow the trendy workouts. 18. Overtraining is only going to be a problem for a few of us, as most people can’t quite get the full effect of training properly in the first place. However, if you’re on your way to 10%BF or lower and you train all the time then this is of utmost importance. This topic is quite controversial and is still a much studied topic in the sport science community. It tends to go back and forth between it’s very difficult to get into an overtrained status, unless you’re an endurance athlete; however, there are some things that you can watch out for symptom wise to monitor your progress. If you are not recovering from your workouts, your fat loss efforts will stop, as will your gains in the gym. There’s really no cookie cutter outline here for what to do, other than monitor your recovery and 21,22,23,24 progress in the gym and body composition. Things to look for: a) Lack of motivation to train b) Lack of energy to train (do not confuse this with lethargy from switching dietary protocols) c) Lack of increasing loads/intensity; strength declines; decreasing performance
d) e) f) g)
Loss of appetite Increase periods of lethargy or napping; also periods of insomnia at night Decreased morning temperature (shows T3/T4 levels dropping thermogenesis) You have to overstimulate (ie. Popping ephedra, caffeine, and aspirin like candy) just to train
This may not be all the symptoms of overtraining, but it is really too generic a term to really be applied to such a large population. Basic, bare bolts theory, you’re doing too much and you can’t recover properly from your training. Without the additional ergogenic aids most people cannot sustain severe training regimes without proper rest and nutrition. If you’re abusing your body (guilty quite often) then it will come back to bite you. Monitor and if you need a break progress as follows—listen to your body it knows what you need if you’ll follow the signals. 1. Switch the volume and loading parameters in your workouts. 2. Not working—1 week full deload of all heavy, maximal loads. Start over from scratch. 3. Still no progress—1-2 weeks of full recovery. 4. After that I’d go to a doctor to get a full blood panel done and figure out what the hell is wrong with you.
FURTHER TROUBLESHOOTING
1. Metabolism changes – body temperature dropping in the morning; decreased morning 14 heart rate; low blood levels of T3/T4 ; stalling out on BF loss with calories below BMR. 2,4,10 a) Leptin will be primary target of increasing fat loss in this period 6,7,8 2. Sleep…are you getting it! 4 a) Supplement with melatonin (3-6mg); zinc ; b) Sleep chambers dark enough, no distractions 3. Too high level stress—go to the gym, don’t beat your spouse, don’t do drugs, don’t drink alcohol to solve your problems 4. Take a Break, sometimes you just need a break in your diet to enhance your results and 11,12 let your body reset (7-14 days). This is if you have the time factor in your favor and not preparing for a bodybuilding show!
References: 1
http://www.splendatruth.com/faq#18 (although release by the manufacturer—deemed important since they claim small amounts do add up as additional kcals) 2 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12079865 (Leptin signaling, adiposity, and energy balance.)
3
http://www.jacn.org/content/17/3/270.full Zinc May Regulate Serum Leptin Concentrations in Humans) 4 http://www.marksdailyapple.com/leptin/#axzz23PB3mOpu (A good thread for Leptin regulation) 5 http://www.ejeonline.org/content/147/2/181.abstract?ijkey=8d2b43b34004a24e3440578fdc90bf65400271d2&keytyp e2=tf_ipsecsha (Fasting over 48 hours causes a fall in leptin (60%)) 6 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC508375/pdf/1001882.pdf (Diurnal rhythms and varying shifts) 7 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=historysearch&querykey=13 (Role of sleep and metabolism) 8
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18591489 (Sleep loss and obesity/diabetes associations)
9
http://physrev.physiology.org/content/79/2/451.full.pdf+html (Regulation of Body Weight in Humans)
10
http://jap.physiology.org/content/99/6/2128.full (Effect of intermittent fasting and refeeding on
insulin action in healthy men) 11
http://www.nature.com/oby/journal/v11/n2/full/oby200343a.html (Prescribed "Breaks" as a Means
to Disrupt Weight Control Efforts) 12
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/the-full-diet-break.html (The Full Diet Break)
13
http://physrev.physiology.org/content/79/2/451.full.pdf+html (Regulation of Body Weight in Humans)
14
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC371281/pdf/jcinvest00683-0196.pdf (Dietary-
induced Alterations in Thyroid Hormone Metabolism during Overnutrition) 15
http://www.dangerouslyhardcore.com/1733/hi-tech-nutrient-conversion-lessons-for-carb-
back-loading/ (Lessons for Carb Back-Loading, by Kiefer) 16
Exercise training and protein metabolism: influences of contraction, protein synthesis, protein
intake and sex-based differences. Nicholas, A. Burd, et al. J. Appl. Physio. May 2009. 17
Effects of three distinct protocols of fitness training on body composition, strength, and blood
lactate. Paoli A, et al. Mar, 2010. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20308971 18
Muscular Adaptations in response to 3-different resistance training regimines: specificity of
repetition maximum training zones. Campos, GE, et al. Eur. J. Appl. Physio., Nov, 2002. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Muscular%20Adaptations%20in%20response%20to%203different%20resistance%20training%20regemines%3A%20specificity%20of%20repetition%20maximum %20training%20zones. 19
Relationship between muscle fibre composition, glucose transporter protein 4 and exercise
training: possible consequences in non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. Daugaard JR., et al. Act. Physiol. Scand., Mar, 2001. 20
Fiber type-specific expression of GLUT4 in human skeletal muscle: influence of exercise
training. Daugaard JR., et al. Diabetes, Jul, 2000. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=historysearch&querykey=9 21
Markers for monitoring overtraining and recovery. Hooper, SL, et al. Med. Sci. Sports Exerc. Jan,
1995. 22
Effects of Overtraining on Skeletal Muscle Growth and Gene Expression. Xiao, W, et al. Int. J. Sports
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Blood hormones as markers of training stress and overtraining. Urhausen A., Sports Med, Oct, 1995.
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Diagnosis of overtraining: what tools do we have? Urhausen A., Kinderman W. Sports Med,
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