The ketogenic diet is one of the hottest diets today. The keto diet requires you to drastically reduce your carb intake and focus on a high-fat diet. While this weight loss approach is effective, experts say it is not sustainable and may not always be healthy. Carb cycling keto diet could be the solution to long sustained keto weight loss.
What is the Keto Diet?
The keto (ketogenic) diet refers to a low-carb diet in which the body produces ketones within the liver to be used as energy. It is similar to other diets such as, the “low-carb diet”, or the “low-carb high-fat” LCHF diet. However, the keto diet allows for an extremely low amount of carbohydrates.
The keto diet helps to lose weight by switching your body into a perpetual fat burning mode. When you eat something rich in carbs, your body starts producing glucose. Because glucose is the primary fuel for energy, fats are not needed so they get stored making you gain or hold excess fat. In a normal high-carb diet, the body preferably uses glucose but when you start lowering your carb intake, the body starts burning fat for fuel by entering ketosis.
Ketosis refers to a natural process that the body utilizes to survive when food intake is little. During this state, the body’s fat is broken down to form ketones which are then used to derive energy.
The end goal of a ketogenic diet is to maintain your body in this metabolic state by strict carb restriction leading to a reduction in overall body weight.
What is Carb Cycling Keto or Keto Cycling?
Carb cycling keto diet, also known as the cyclical ketogenic diet, refers to a diet program in which you follow the keto diet six days a week but have a higher carb day on any one of the days. This type of carb cycling keto diet has surprising health benefits for people who are unable to follow the strict guidelines of the keto diet.
Simply put, you will be following the normal keto diet for 5-6 days followed by a day or two when you can eat carbs without any restriction. While some people restrict their high carb day to once or twice a week, others have longer cycles extending over weeks.
Extended carb consumption within keto cycling is usually performed by people performing physical training (weight or resistance training) to refill their muscle glycogen stores and target muscle growth. In such cases, the keto cycling must be supervised by a medical professional or some type of sports nutrition training expert.
Benefits Carb Cycling Keto Diet
While following the carb cycling keto diet, you have to focus on a high-fat diet and eat carbs less than 50 total grams or 30 net carbs, 5-6 days a week. On the 7th day, try eating more than 150 grams of carbs.
What are the benefits of following a carb cycling keto diet?
- It keeps you slim
- It enhances your immune function
- It improves your sleep
- It satisfies your carb cravings making it easier to follow the diet on a long-term basis
- It keeps keto flu at bay
- It balances your gut bacteria which, in turn, improves your mood
Full ketosis is not suitable for everyone. Cycling the carbohydrates by adding clean carbs like sweet potatoes and white rice once a week will provide your body with carbs to function properly. Your body, brain, and the joints will all benefit from this.
Integrating Carb Cycling Keto and Intermittent Fasting
Performing intermittent fasting in some form or fashion can prove to be very beneficial to maintaining health and longevity. Combining it with the ketogenic diet will increase these benefits ten-fold.
As mentioned before, the keto diet induces a state of ketosis in which you burn fat as your main fuel instead of glucose. Before this happens, the liver glycogen stores need depletion which requires about 16 to 24 hours. This process can be sped up if you combine intermittent fasting with your usual keto diet approach.
Ketosis can be achieved through a low-carb diet or by fasting for a few days. Keto follows the physiology of a fasted state and enhances the ability of your body to use its own fat stores for energy.
If you wish to fast on a high-carb diet when you are not keto-adapted, you will likely benefit from the ketosis metabolism. However, it would not be as effective as it would be if you were already following a keto diet. Because your body and brain would not be able to burn fat immediately, the body will start compensating for this lack of energy by deriving glucose from the breakdown of organ and muscle tissue.
In short, combining intermittent fasting with the ketogenic diet further improves your overall health than doing either of them alone.
Foods to Eat on a Carb Cycling Keto (Cyclical Ketogenic Diet)
Following a carb cycling keto diet does not mean you should completely fall off the wagon and start eating pizzas, fries, or an entire tub of ice cream. Good carbs are what you should aim for in order to achieve a balance in your diets.
Endurance athletes must focus on consuming complex nutritious carbs that will stabilize the sugar levels and sustain energy.
The following three features are the characteristics of a good carbohydrate:
- They must be slowly digested
- They must be high in fiber
- They must not be processed.
Some common examples of good carbohydrates include:
- Quinoa
- Brown rice
- Sweet potatoes
- Fruits (every morning)
- Whole grain starches
- Legumes, lentils, and split peas
- Vegetables
Foods to Avoid on a Carb Cycling Keto (Cyclical Ketogenic Diet)
All types of bad carbs must be avoided at all costs. These types of carbs include:
- Highly-processed foods
- Low in fiber
- Contain sugar and/or white flour
Try avoiding simple carbohydrates as much as you can, irrespective of what day it is. Examples of these carbs include cereals, sugary snacks, cookies, soda, and white bread.
Conclusion
Carb cycling keto diet is highly recommended by experts as it makes the ketogenic diet less restrictive and more sustainable on a long-term basis. It is something to look forward to as it will speed up your journey towards a leaner, healthier body without much side effects. In the meantime, learn more about intermittent fasting and how you can easily start it with crescendo fasting.
