In my ten plus years of research and studies, here is my opinion on high vs low carb diets:
Low carb is good for someone who is very overweight. Lets say you have 40 pounds of FAT or more to lose or you have high blood pressure, pre-diabetes or other ailments surrounding your obesity.
Low carb is good for someone who is sedentary. Let’s say your life is a lot of sitting at work and you don’t have a regular activity schedule. If you’re constantly running around with kids, go to the gym most days, walks or bikes a lot… keep reading bc you, my friend, aren’t sedentary.
Low carb is good for someone with health issues or your body is impaired due to inflammation. This includes cancer, asthma, chronic IBS, severe allergies, etc. Low carb can really decrease inflammation and be helpful.
High carb can be good for someone with a thin and wiry frame that just can’t sit still. Generally that “body type,” needs more carbs.
High carb is good for someone who does a lot of activity or exercise. This would include an avid runner, competitive CrossFit athlete, someone doing two-a-days. Your body is CRUSHING carbs, and it needs to be fueled properly.
When you eat carbohydrates, they get stored in the liver or muscle as glycogen. This is bad if you have a lot of fat to lose because your body will use what’s readily available first, and carbs are the easiest to burn. This is good if you want to perform well (like doing 10k training runs or 15 minute metcons) or do glycolytic activity like short bursts in spin class or 3×10 deadlifts.
Your body will burn fat if it’s available, so even if you do eat carbs, you can still burn fat. Your body will also burn protein (the kind you eat as well as muscle) of it doesn’t have anything else to burn. So those of you doing an hour of cardio… you need to eat!!
To sum things up, I read SO MUCH holistic health info and there’s fantastic research showing low carb really is great for us, but remember two major things:
- If you are active or you want to build muscle, your body REQUIRES carbohydrates to make this happen. Please don’t think you’re gonna train for a half marathon or PR your Fran time on a low carb diet.
- If you choose to go low carb, remember how restrictive that is and what happens when you restrict… you rebound. So how is that sustainable?
What each person needs is highly individualistic, and not only do we vary person to person, but what you need will likely change based on your goals and what worked for you once may not work for you now.
If you are ready to just get some help once and for all, let’s work together!
Head to Kyrawilliamsfitness.com/signup and join online training. Then shoot me an email so we can discuss putting a clean eating meal plan together for you.
Your Coach,
Kyra