Coincidentally, a Crossfit convention was just wrapping up in the same parking lot that the girlfriend and I were pulling up to. The irreverent mess they left seemed a little inconsistent with the "all natural" approach to their diets. But who am I judge?
It got me to thinking about my bike ride earlier that day. The last hour was abysmal. It got me to wondering whether or not I had eaten enough carbohydrates for breakfast. Breakfast that day consisted of oatmeal protein pancakes and low sugar jam and coffee with almond milk. I discussed this with one of the wedding guests who had coincidentally shown up from the Crossfit event. His words exactly were "why are you eating those kinds of carbs anyway?"
Gaze upon the harbinger of your dietary demise: carbohydrates (they live under your bed).
The pondering of breakfast and the conversation with the Crossfit zealot led me to this particular post: the importance of carbohydrates in your diet. Thanks to earlier readings of "Nutrition Essentials for Nursing Practice," I accumulated an extensive list of the importance of carbs.
Carbohydrates are the most efficiently burned and abundant source of energy for your body to fuel cells, thus muscles, physiological processes and the brain. Though muscles (smooth and articular) can use both glucose and fat, the brain can only use glucose. Carbohydrates also prevent ketosis. More on that later.
When you eat carbohydrates, they are converted to glucose, which is stored in the muscle as adenosine triphosphate, the main fuel for muscle contraction and, thus, all movement in the human body. Any excess of carbohydrates is stored in the liver as glycogen. When the liver is at capacity of glycogen, it becomes fat, just like any excess of protein and fat.
If there is a low amount of carbohydrates in one's diet, the body will end up stealing calories from muscle or fat to keep its biological processes going. If you are doing something like Crossfit, the indoctrination of which demands a low carbohydrate diet, you're going to find yourself using a lot of precious muscle mass to get you through a rigorous workout. All that hard work for nothing.
On a tangential note, the more rigorous a workout becomes, the more the body relies on carbohydrates as fuel. If you are doing something as sadistic as Crossfit, you better well be eating carbs.
If you opt out of carbohydrates, your body will experience the following symptoms: mood swings, nausea, dizziness, weakness and depression. As your body goes into ketosis, a bodily state in which fat and protein is burned for fuel instead of carbohydrates, your body will produce compounds called ketones that can show up in your saliva and cause bad breath. You might also notice that your thinking gets foggy as your brain runs out of glucose to fuel its normal activity.
Above: Carbohydrate Withdrawal
As ketone levels increase in your bloodstream, your blood will become more acidic, placing stress on your heart, kidneys and liver.
Because many of the foods containing carbohydrates are rich sources of other nutrients, you might also develop nutrient deficiencies if you stop eating carbohydrate-containing foods.
The importance of carbs in the diet might force one to wonder how they got such a bad rep in the first place. This is where the subject becomes complicated; there are good carbs and then there are bad carbs. Ultimately, all carbs end up as sugar in the body.
Good carbs are typically complex, meaning they contain more fiber and micronutrients and minerals and won't spike you blood sugar. These complex carbs take a longer time to digest than simple carbs.
Simple carbs are things like white flour and granulated sugar. These spike your blood sugar levels and ultimately insulin. Eventually the over consumption of simple carbs can lead to diabetes. But, sometimes even these simple carbs have a time and place, like during or immediately before a workout. We've all heard of Gatorade, right? That's a simple carbs - just sugar and water. Yet we consume it during prolonged workouts because its quick way to get glucose into the body. Even Michael Phelps will eat something sugary like chocolate chip pancakes before getting into the pool if he hasn't had time to consume a high quality carb.
Carbs have garnered controversy over the years thanks in part to Dr. Atkins' famous article "A New Concept in the Treatment of Obesity," published in 1963. He then released a book in 1972, Dr. Atkins' Diet Revolution.
Atkins hypothesized that eating carbs such as white flour and sugar were the reason for the burgeoning obesity epidemic in the states. Being overweight himself at one point, Atkins cut all starches and sugars from his diet, getting back to a normal weight. He is also the one who hypothesized the whole "carbs before bed would cause the body to store them as fat" theory. This is, however, also true of protein and fat. An excess of calories of any kind of macronutrient will cause the body to store it as fat. That's they way the Krebs Cycle works!
For the book, Atkins put a number of his test subjects on his diet. Commonly overlooked, the reason why all of Dr. Atkins' test subjects lost weight was not because they lost fat but because they lost muscle and water weight.
Ask any nutritionist and they will more than likely tell you that the best diets consist of half or slightly more of carbohydrates, 20% fat and 20% protein. There may not be a definition of what a balanced diet is, but it should at least involve carbohydrates. As a general rule, women should intake around 1600 calories a day and men 2200. Calories in, calories out, as a general rule.
Above: "Caveman Diet" Proponent
Had I not frozen on the spot and forgotten all of this valuable information, this is what I would have told that Crossfit fanatic. Instead I passively posted on my blog, where he will probably never see my retort. Revenge is sweet!
As for me, I'm going out to breakfast this morning. I'm thinking waffles before the 13 mile run.
0 comments:
Post a Comment