Low Carb Food Fad

Low Carb Food Fad

For Bodybuilders nutrition is very important, to build up muscle mass, to cut fat, to stay healthy and to get enough energy to train hard and after that training good foods will help them to recover.

But what is good food? Since bodybuilders starting to share their thoughts about training and nutrition, the opinions on good and bad changed frequently. Of course bodybuilders are only human and often their opinion on nutrition is influenced by the media. And in the media you can find many diet fads. It was once thought that cholesterol, like in egg yolks, would clog up your arteries. Everyone remembers the “low fat” myth and the for bodybuilders so important carb issue, the low carb diet. Carbs are said to be bad for people, it makes them fat and sick and many books, blogs, articles in magazines etc, were spreading this theory as a fact -- it turned into a dogma and even now many people including athletes, believe it.

The Atkins Diet, devised by Dr. Robert Atkins in the 1970s, is one of the most popular low-carb, high-protein fad diets, it claims to help people lose up to 15 pounds in the first two weeks of the diet. Other lower carbs diets fads were the South Beach Diet and the Ketogenic diet.

Research has showed that the Mediterranean diet, which includes generous portions of vegetables, fruits, nuts, beans and peas, unrefined grains, olive oil and fish, is associated with a lower risk of heart attack and stroke and slower brain aging.

Since pasta remains part of the classic regional diet, an Italian team of researchers decided to explore its health effects, independent of all the other Mediterranean staples.

Italian scientists analyzed data of more than 23,000 people, and found that eating some pasta is associated with a lower body mass index. Those who enjoyed their noodles were less likely to be overweight and obese. 'Association of pasta consumption with body mass index and waist-to-hip ratio'. Pounis et al 2016. Nature and Diabetes, July 2016:

“Our findings show a negative association of pasta consumption with general and central obesity” the authors wrote. In short: the more you eat pasta, the less you are likely to be overweight.

Though Americans commonly believe pasta is, in food terms, just another pretty face -- "empty calorie" carbs, which provide no nutritional benefits -- the Italians use it as the basis of their food pyramid.

In fact, a cup of regular pasta provides 6.7 grams of protein and small amounts of calcium and potassium, while the same amount of enriched whole wheat pasta also provides iron, several B vitamins and up to 25% of your daily fiber and folic acid requirements.

The results run contrary to the popular belief that servings of pasta will have you piling on the pounds, a misconception which has caused pasta consumption to fall worldwide.

Even Italians are turning away from pasta, a food which has played a central role in the country's famed Mediterranean diet since medieval times.

The traditional Italian diet, based around cereals, legumes, seasonal fruit and veg and lashings of olive oil is considered to be one of the healthiest ways to eat.

But if the traditional Italian diet is so healthy, how did pasta get such a bad reputation? The researchers lay the blame squarely at the feet of fad diets.

“Pasta consumption has decreased as the concept of adopting low-carb, high-protein diets against obesity has increased,” the authors wrote. Pasta sales have dropped by 13% in Western Europe and 6% in America. Even in Italy itself, the business plummet by a whopping 25%.

It turns out, that even among people who don't follow a healthy Mediterranean diet, pasta is still associated with a more streamlined physique. But why does pasta make you slimmer? The precise mechanisms are still a mystery, but scientists think it has to do with the foods we tend to eat pasta with.

“Pasta intake was observed as being associated with the intake of other important food groups, such as tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and onions,” - foods, which can all be helpful when losing weight.

Real Life Experience

People reading my blogs know I like to quote. In the seventies bodybuilders experimented with nutrition, training and drugs. Because the drugs where not as prevalent as today, the training and nutrition where much more important. What has by example Franco to say about this?

Franco Columbu, as a key figure in the culture since the seventies (he won Mr. World, Mr. Universe, and Mr. Olympia titles) has seen the 200-gram protein diet, as well as every other extreme food fad, come and go.

Mostly, he avoided all of it. “It didn’t come out in Pumping Iron, but Arnold and I never went on those diets,” he says. We used to eat things in front of people and they say, “You eat that???” He didn’t do the high carb, he didn’t do the low carb, and he didn’t do the “food combining” diet, either. “Remember that one? Don’t eat protein with carbohydrates. Food combining was so bad; I thought, these people are really out to lunch. How do you separate protein from string beans, pasta, potatoes, and rice? All these foods are half carbohydrate, half protein.”

“Then there was the egg-white craze. I had guests come to my house, bodybuilders, Frank Zane, Lou Ferrigno, all the guys from Pumping Iron. Arnold didn’t care about egg whites. Arnold said, “Give me the protein and let’s go to the gym.” So I would separate the eggs because the other guys only wanted the whites. We ended up drinking the yolks.”

In the ‘80s, a lot of bodybuilders switched to diets of water and meat. Frank Zane and Lou Ferrigno, a lot of those guys believed in low carbohydrates. But we realized that some of these guys had very low energy as a result. So we went with our instincts, which was that you need protein for the body and the stored glycogen and stored fat in the body for energy. The brain needs carbohydrates. Columbu and Schwarzenegger were roommates during that time. Backstage before a competition, Schwarzenegger would announce, “Franco, it’s time for pizza.”

Franco: Then we had guys like Frank Zane who says, 'I don't eat this and I don't eat that and you cannot do that.' He (Zane) would take vitamins, and fish oils, and all that. I used to call him Mr. Pills, they would go on the table, he had pills for waking up, a pill for going to the gym, a pill for sleeping. And then there were all these vitamins. Then I learned that people went on a strict diet, like Frank Zane, with a meat and water diet. I never understood that. I mean, can you image me giving Arnold water and meat? Then I noticed in the gym they were training very slow. They were training like there was no energy. It took them a long time to understand that if you wanted energy, you had to load yourself with carbohydrates or you never get going. Protein gives zero energy. It just builds the muscle. If you want to go to the gym and do stuff, you better eat carbohydrates and carbohydrates burns fat. What some people do not know too is that the brain only feeds on carbohydrates and oxygen.

Franco: The food was very different. Like Arnold liked to cook hamburgers a lot, and I said, 'I don't like hamburgers, Arnold.' And then a couple times he used to burn them and then I said, 'oh good, now I don't have to eat them. It was very funny. And I used to just cook what came in my head, for example: steaks, pasta, big plates of pasta...eat lunch for pasta and just go to the gym and not even think about it, you know?

From the Discussion Boards:

It is obvious why people believe carbs are bad for you if you read some reactions to the survey:

“So much fail, it is hard to know where to begin. Simple endocrinology here: Pasta is a high glycemic carb that is treated like SUGAR by the body. Eat pasta and you are telling INSULIN to store fat. Simple, proven, science.”

In fact, with a surprisingly low glycemic index 42 for brown, 46 for white, pasta causes less blood sugar spikes, than brown rice (50), quinoa (53) and couscous(65). (The newest food fad … Super Foods).

“Want to lose weight? Gather all the tomatoes, basil, olive oil etc. to make a nice bowl of pasta. Throw away the pasta and eat what's left.”

Another discussion board member more knowledgeable answers:

“---No... Without the complex carbs of the pasta you're going to be hungry very soon. Carbs are fine, eating them doesn't make you obese. Eating too many of them does.”

“As is true even with water, "the dose makes the poison." Paracelsus”

“The US government and medical community has pushed refined carbs, high-fructose corn syrup, etc. off on people for years. And for that entire time, people became more obese, ill and sedentary. That diet is guaranteed to produce a sick, docile population.”