Dive into the world of ketogenic diets and their $33 billion gimmick. The carbohydrate-insulin model of obesity, the underlying theory of ketogenic diets, has been experimentally refuted. Studies conducted by proponents of the keto diet have shown the opposite: ketogenic diets actually disadvantage metabolism and slow down the loss of body fat. How much does fat loss slow down on a low-carb diet? As discussed in my video on ketogenic diet weight loss results, cutting about 800 calories of carbohydrates from your diet daily will result in a loss of 53 grams of body fat per day. However, cutting the same number of fat calories will result in a loss of 89 grams of fat per day. The same number of calories saved, but with a low-fat diet compared to a low-carb diet, you will melt an extra nine pats of butter from your body every day. Same calorie count, but about 80% more fat loss when cutting fat instead of carbohydrates. You can see a graph of these results below and at 1:07 in my video. The title of the study speaks for itself: „Calorie for Calorie, the Restriction of Dietary Fat Leads to a Greater Loss of Body Fat than the Restriction of Carbohydrates in Humans with Obesity.“ However, just looking at the scale would lead you to the wrong assumption. After six days of the low-carb diet, the subjects lost four pounds. With the low-fat diet, they lost less than three pounds, as you can see in the graph below and at 1:40 in my video. So, according to the scale, it seems like the low-carb diet would undoubtedly win. You can see why low-carb diets are so popular. But what’s happening inside your body tells the true story.
The low-carb group mainly lost lean mass – water and protein. This loss of water weight helps explain why low-carb diets have been „such a stubborn theme for diet book authors and such cash cows for publishers“ for more than the last 150 years. That’s their secret. As a weight loss expert noted, „Quick water loss is the $33 billion diet gimmick.“ When you eat carbohydrates, your body fills your muscles with glycogen to provide quick energy. Eat a high-carb diet for three days, and you can build about three pounds of muscle mass in your arms and legs, as you can see below and at 2:34 in my video. Draining these glycogen stores by going on a low-carb diet will cause water loss. (The ketones also have to be flushed out of the kidneys, further depleting water.) This may be reflected on the scale by losing four more pounds within ten days, but that „was all due to losses in total body water.“– that’s water loss. The conclusion: Keto diets just don’t hold up. The thrill of seeing the pounds come off so quickly may lure many back to the low-carb altar. When the diet fails, dieters often blame themselves, but the rush of initial, rapid weight loss may lure them back, as though they were getting drunk again after forgetting how terrible the last hangover was. This has been referred to as the „false hope syndrome.“ „The diet industry thrives for two reasons — big promises and repeat customers,“ for which low-carb diets were developed given the initial, rapid loss of water weight. What matters to us is body fat. In six days, the low-fat diet extracted 80% more fat from the body than the low-carb diet. And it’s not just one study. As you can see below and at 3:54 in my video, you can look at all the controlled feeding trials that researchers have conducted comparing low-carb diets to low-fat diets, with the same number of carbohydrate calories being replaced by fat calories or vice versa. If a calorie is just a calorie, then all studies should have crossed that zero line in the middle, between „prefers a low-fat diet“ and „prefers a low-carb diet,“ and indeed, there were six. One study showed greater fat loss with a low-carb diet, but all other studies favored the low-fat diet – more body fat loss with the same number of calories. When summarizing all the studies, we’re talking about losing 16 grams more body fat per day with low-fat diets. That’s as if four more pats of butter were melting off your body every day. Less fat in your mouth means less fat on your hips, even if you consume the same number of calories. This is the third part of my seven-part series on keto diets. This keto research arose from the deep insight I undertook for my book How Not to Diet. (All proceeds I receive from my books are donated to charity.) You can learn more about How Not to Diet and order it here. Feel free to also check out some of my popular weight loss videos in the corresponding videos below.
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