Month: April 2018

I just got back from the dentist. I go every 3-4 months to get a cleaning, scaling and general checkup. This time they did an annual check of the depth of the pockets around the gums. Deeper pockets is a sign of bone regression and is not a good thing at all. The results got me thinking of the many benefits of keto beyond weight.

The dental hygienist has always harped on me about flossing and how deep the pockets are around my teeth. Now I have been low carb/paleo for well over a decade I still had periods where I was eating less than optimal foods, sugar, teh occasional grains and sweeteners. I always had pretty good plaque buildup around my teeth and always had at least one cavity every year. The last few visits have been very different.

I have been very strict CSK style keto for the last 2 years. In this time I have not had a single cavity. The last 3 visits to the dentist she has noted that my plaque is dramatically reduced and my cleanings are getting faster and faster. What used to take 40 minutes is now down to 15. Today we did the measurements of the gums and after she showed me the difference from 2 years ago to today. Between 1 and 3 is normal depth. 2 years ago I had 75% of the pockets at a 4 or higher. Today, I had only 5 teeth with pockets above a 3. She was somewhat amazed as she said she has never really seen anyone get better. The best she hopes for is no progression. Not only has mine not progressed but it has actually improved dramatically. She said “You must be flossing like crazy and taking some kind of supplement I have never heard of.” Nope, just keto.

Next time you get discouraged because the weight is not doing what you would like, remember that there is more to being healthy than just weight. The benefits of this way of life never cease to amaze me.

Keto ON!

Coach Jack

If you want to get your Ketogenic Diet back to a place of Common Sense and learn how to heal your metabolism you can get personalized coaching from Coach Jack.

Check the details here:

Personalized Coaching with Coach Jack

Glycine is an amino acid that seems to have some interesting effects.

It seems to have a huge impact on glucagon secretion when taken in isolation from food. See study below. It had some interesting impacts on blood glucose and insulin levels as well but my primary focus was on glucagon secretion and the added fat burning and ketones it can generate.

https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/76/6/1302/4689577

I found a study on the effects of glucagon infusions from the 70s. It showed that in Type 1 Diabetic people high glucagon levels increased both lipogenesis and ketogenesis but in non diabetics it had the opposite effect. It stopped both processes and dropped ketones. I tested this on myself and found I had the same reaction to ketones as the Diabetics in respect to ketones increasing. Furthermore I had another person try this and they had the same result. Increased ketones. Mine went from 1.4 mmol/L to 2.9. The other person went from 1.6 mmol/L to 2.7. That is a significant rise in only 60 minutes. Better even then those touted by exogenous ketone companies.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/…/P…/pdf/jcinvest00157-0198.pdf

I went digging to figure out why it completely dropped the ketones in the normal people in the study but raised them for me. What I found was that the people in the study were not ket or low carb so they would have glucose stored in the liver and muscles. So when they had the glucagon spike the first thing it would do is dump all of the glucose from these stores causing an insulin response. The diabetics don’t make insulin so they saw a rise in glucose but no decrease in fat burning and a rise in ketones. This was the beauty and danger simultaneously of the 70s. They could do something like this even though it was clearly dangerous. The Diabetics where dangerously close to ketoacidosis as their ketones and blood glucose was rising at the same time. It was dangerous but what insight it gives.

Where we differ from both of these situations is that we don’t have any stored glucose. Being keto we don’t consume enough carbs to have any. Because of this when we take the glycine, the resultant glucagon spike can’t dump glucose and can’t spike insulin. Thus we get a rise in ketones and increased fat burning. 🙂

I tested this by trying the glycine after I went to the gym. After an intense workout I have very high blood glucose due to gluconeogenesis. This glucose gets stored in the liver and muscles. This was demonstrated by the FASTER study by Phinney and Volek. They tested muscle glycogen after an intense workout and found it was as high in low carb athletes as it was in carb fuelled athletes. When I took the glycine after my workout, my ketones dropped dramatically. This is because I had stored glucose that the glucagon could dump to the blood thus causing an insulin spike. This mimicked the results the normal people in the study had to the glucagon infusion further confirming my theory that if you have no stored glucose you will have the ketone and lipolysis increases as the diabetic people from the study.

There are so many intricate facets to the physiology behind everything we do. It is pretty amazing. How we can better utilize various compounds to effect fat burning and ketogenesis needs to be further investigated but it is fascinating none the less.

Keto ON!

Coach Jack

If you want to get your Ketogenic Diet back to a place of Common Sense and learn how to heal your metabolism you can get personalized coaching from Coach Jack.

Check the details here:

Personalized Coaching with Coach Jack

All those people that keep saying that weight is a simple matter of eating less calories than you expend are completely full of shit. This has been shown again and again over the last 50 years. Weight watchers lives and breaths this model. This is also why they have a less than 2% success rate. A great model for continued revenue stream but not so great for those of us wanting to keep the weight off.

This blog post will be a chronicle of how I can eat double my regular caloric intake for 21 days, that is all I can imagine handling of this much food, and demonstrating that it is not about the calories but about the type of calories.

I have made 2 menus and will rotate through them for the 21 days. These are the menus.

Salmon day:


Beef day:

These are the macros for each of these days:

Beef Day:

Salmon Day:

My current daily average intake of calories is 2500. Now some days this is 2,000 and some days 3,000 but on average it is 2,500. I will be doubling this to 5,000 every day for the next 21 days.

My starting weight is 208.4 lbs. I was actually 212lbs 3 days ago and had been floating between 210-212lbs for the last 2 weeks while playing with extended fasting of 26-48 hours and calorie restricting. I had not lost a single pound even though my calories were very low and I had been fasting. I only dropped close to 4 lbs after eating over 3,000 cals a day for 3 days straight. Interesting isn’t it.

Here are some ground rules:

1. My eating times will be 7am, 1:30pm and 7pm daily.
2. I will continue my exact same exercise routine of 1 hour crossfit class 4 times per week with 1 hour olympic lifting. 3 rest days per week. The only variable therefore will be 2500 extra calories in.
3. I will eat only the menus posted above and nothing else. No deviations.
4. I will record weight on my bluetooth scale as well as by picture each day.

I also have at least one female also doing 5,000 cals a day. She will have her own ground rules but will eat 5,000 cals every day. You can follow her on the facebook group with the hashtag #5000caloriechallenge.

Updates will come. I will post new weight each day to this blog. Wish me luck.

Update:

Day 2 weight is 207.6lbs

That is down 0.8lbs in one day of eating 5,000 calories. Keep in mind I was 212 lbs just 4 days ago and lost 4lbs eating above 3,000 cals.

Update:

Day 3 weight is 208.4 so back to baseline. Bodyfat measure still shows the same as yesterday so according to my not so accurate Bio-Impedence scale, I gained weight but not fat. I won’t take much stock in this as these scales are notoriously inaccurate.

A few struggles from day 2.

1. I found my workout hard on day 1 from eating 2200 cals for breakfast so I cut the breakfast back and had a big lunch. This was rough. My workout was better but eating that much right after was hard. It took me 2 hours to get through the salmon from the salmon menu. I don’t know if I can do the salmon. May have to just do the ground beef every day. Since I took 2 hours to eat the lunch I didn’t ahve any downtime for isnulin between lunch and dinner.

2. I had a very hard time eating dinner as well since I took 2 hours to eat lunch. Barely made it though and was feeling pretty ill for about 3 hours after finishing.

I have made a modification to todays menu. I will see how this goes. Still 5,000 cals.

Update:

Day 4 weight is 207.6 so back down again. Like a roller coaster but not gaining over baseline. This is also interesting since I normally sit between 211-212 at 2500 cals average intake and also sat there during my low cal and fasting week.

Last night I had to chew up my hamburg and wash it down with water. I could not swallow it. Every time I tried I would gag. This was not this hard last time and I think it has something to do with the food choices. There is something called palate fatigue that keeps you from eating the same foods repeatedly to try and avoid nutrient deficiencies from eating just one food type.

This morning I made my eggs and took one bite and almost threw up. I was hungry but couldn’t do it. I had to make a choice. I decided to make a fat shake instead. It was that or quit. I hate quitting so I made the shake it went down well and I felt ok after and had a great workout at noon. I am very much hoping I do not ruin eggs for myself as they are my favorite food and make up the bulk of my diet. Lunch went ok. I managed to get it down as prescribed. I’m nervous for dinner.

This is the fat shake I had.

This is my weight so far:

Update:

Day 5 weight is 208.6. So up 0.2 pound increase from base. Oddly enough, I have not had a bowel movement in a few days which is very strange since I have consumed about 40lbs of food. I assume one is coming any time and hopefully that will bring the weight down. 🙂

Everything went smooth last night with dinner and today was a good but I added bacon in. I can’t do the same menu everyday. I can’t seem to swallow the hamburg and the shooting olive oil 3 times a day is not working either. Here is what I have had today so far:

Todays Weight:

Update: Day 8

Weight is currently 209.2lbs. Up 0.8lbs from baseline.

Total calories eaten: 35,000 plus a couple hundred
Calories above maintenance: 17,500
CICO calculated gain: 5 pounds
Actual Weight gain: 0.8 pounds

The only issue I have been having is eating the foods I set out to eat. I was not able to physically get it down without getting sick. I have started just eating various things to get the calories in but have stuck to roughly the following macros:

3% or less carbs
13-16% Protein
80-85% fat

It has gone much better since changing the foods up. Not as controlled as I would have liked but it was this or quit from being sick.

Current tracking of weight as of today:

Day 8 weight

Update Day 11:

Halfway home. It has been pretty easy getting the cals in the last few days strangely enough. Since starting to change the foods up it has been really quite easy. I am still full but not sickly full. My workouts have been great and energy has been amazing. Sex drive is out of this world. 🙂

Weight is up slightly again but still not even to my normal maintenance weight of 212-215ish lbs.

Starting weight: 208.4
Current weight: 210.0
Total calories eaten: 50,790
Calories above maintenance: 25,790
CICO calculated gain: 7.4 pounds
Actual Weight gain: 1.6 pounds

Current tracking of weight as of today:

Update Day 16:

Only 5 days left to go!!

This has honestly been pretty easy once I found the right combo of foods that was easy to do. I will however not keep doing it. I have found that my heart rate stays elevated now where it had not before. It is also uncomfortable to sleep as my body temperature is always high. Both signs that my metabolism is running very high and this is theorized to cause more rapid ageing. A fast metabolism is great but you can always have too much of a good thing right.

Weight dropped to 208.8 on Saturday then went up to 209.2 and has been there for the last couple days. Still well below my normal weight of 212-215ish.

Starting weight: 208.4
Current weight: 209.2
Total calories eaten: 76,120
Calories above maintenance: 38,620
CICO calculated gain: 11.0 pounds
Actual Weight gain: 0.8 pounds

I think it is pretty clear that the calorie math does not work. 🙂

Today’s weight:

Final Update: day 22

Yay I made it. Its over!

I have not updated in a few days but here is the final breakdown.

Starting weight: 208.4
Current weight: 209.2
Total calories eaten: 107,221
Calories above maintenance: 54,721
CICO calculated gain: 15.6 pounds
Actual Weight gain: 0.8 pounds

Weight on day 20 actually dropped below 208.4 to 208.2 which was exciting but it jumped back up to 209.2 this morning. I am curious to see what it will be tomorrow morning after only eating 2500 cals again.

Day 20 weight:

Day 22 final weight:

Graph of all weigh ins:

Anyone who wants to see my food log can check it out here:

Food Log

Keto ON!

Coach Jack

If you want to get your Ketogenic Diet back to a place of Common Sense and learn how to heal your metabolism you can get personalized coaching from Coach Jack.

Check the details here:

Personalized Coaching with Coach Jack

There is one amazing and definitive example of why calories don’t matter and why insulin is the main factor in weight.

Type 1 diabetes.

Before the discovery of insulin a type 1 Diabetic could eat and eat and eat and still waste away to nothing. There are actually many stories of Type 1 diabetics today that intentionally restrict their insulin to lose weight. This is extremely dangerous and is not advisable. This dangerous and potentially life threatening practice is called Diabulimia. Always for with your doctor to make sure your medications are properly dosed.

The Truth about Diabulimia

The truth of the matter is that insulin is what controls fat storage. If you have low, or in the case of a type 1 no, insulin you will not and cannot store fat. Glucagon, the counter hormone to insulin will be constantly pushing energy out of cells regardless of need. It is literally impossible to store fat without insulin.

To show the importance of glucagon I have attached a video explaining an experiment done on mice that have been genetically modified to be type 1 diabetic. Without giving them insulin they excrete energy through urine at an accelerated rate and become very ill, but simply by giving them a glucagon suppressing drug, they are able to survive rather well with almost no adverse effects. How interesting is that.

Effect of glucagon on Type 1 Mice

I can’t possibly think of how to make it more straight forward. Why would a type 1 diabetic waste away to nothing without insulin regardless of how much they ate if calories mattered and insulin was not the factor. Can you?

Keto ON!

Coach Jack

If you want to get your Ketogenic Diet back to a place of Common Sense and learn how to heal your metabolism you can get personalized coaching from Coach Jack.

Check the details here:

Personalized Coaching with Coach Jack

There are people who just can’t seem to get into ketosis or just can’t seem to lose weight on Keto. There may be a reason but it is rare.

There is a gene called PPAR-Alpha that is responsible for fat metabolism and ketogenesis. There is approximately 2% of the population that has a mutation of this gene that makes it difficult for them to achieve and maintain ketosis.

What is PPAR-Alpha

Some of the symptoms that may be present in these people are:

1. Trouble fasting without feeling absolutely terrible and potentially gaining while fasting
2. Trouble getting into ketosis all together
3. not losing weight at all

Now being that this is so very rare, don’t automatically assume you are one of these people. Make sure you’ve got your macros down and are doing this right. In addition, check ketones. If you are following the Common Sense Keto plan you will have ketones well above 0.5 mmol/L. If you are following the plan to a T and still cannot achieve over 0.5 mmol/L then potentially you have this mutation. If you have above 0.5 mmol/L yet still aren’t losing weight, this is likely not your issue.

How can you find out if you have this mutation? You can do testing through a company called 23andMe.

https://www.23andme.com/en-ca/

This only gives you the raw data then you will have to use a 3rd party to map the gene. You can use one like this:

https://promethease.com

Once you figure out if you have this rare mutation then it is up to you to decide if you want to continue keto. There are ways around it potentially.

There are 3 supplements that seem to stimulate ketogenesis even in people with this mutation.

TTA – TTA Supplement from Amazon

CLA – CLA supplement from Amazon

Sesamin – Sesamin supplement from Amazon

TTA seems to be the most effective of the 3 but the 3 combined may be beneficial.

Remember, just because you are not losing as fast as you like does not mean you have this mutation and just because you have this mutation does not mean you can’t find success with Keto.

#ketoOn

Coach Jack McAnespy

If you want to get your Ketogenic Diet back to a place of Common Sense and learn how to heal your metabolism you can get personalized coaching from Coach Jack.

Check the details here:

Personalized Coaching with Coach Jack