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@Lilac- You are still saying “overeating” as if too much food consumption, and that alone, is the problem. I don’t believe that. We have plenty of evidence to the contrary. What about the super thin people that struggle to put on weight even when eating vast amounts of food? What about those lean and non-overweight competitive eaters, like Kobayashi, Matt Stonie, and Joey Chesnut?
And even looking at your own reasoning….. why would food continue to be “delicious” if it were truly “overconsumed?” I think everyone has, at some point in their life, gorged on some food to the point that they actually got sick of it, and lost the taste for a while, sometimes months or years. “Deliciousness” is not an inherent property of food, it’s your body’s reaction to food. So, why aren’t hunger and taste signals regulating food intake?
And also to that point, why not just dispose of excess “calories” in some way? Generate extra heat, have some desire to run around the block a few times or go out dancing, or just excrete it as waste? Why shuttle it to fat? And if it is stored….. why not shuttle it to muscle?
I don’t know what you are referring to as the “olden” days, but being overweight or obese was not a wide scale problem until the 70s or 80s, and it’s prevalence has only increased since then. Really, prior to the 50s, the big issue with weight was being too thin. Sedentary workers used to fall victim to this by losing their appetite. And the “matronly” women you refer to tended to be a lot older, so if they were dealing with weight issues, they were in their 50s, 60s or older, not in their teens, 20s, 30s, or 40s, like so many overweight and obese people are today.
I’ll agree, it’s not easily solved, but a lot of that stems from this refusal to look at some of the conditions and foods that have created this obesity problem (again, excess PUFA and iron fortification, for example), as well as known endocrine changes that affect those who are overweight. For example, cortisol is usually very high, testosterone is usually lower in overweight men, serotonin and endotoxin are higher, fat stores are more unsaturated, enzymes like SCD1 and Fatty Acid Synthase are overactivated, thyroid hormone is at lower levels and so on. Serum levels of glucose, FFAs and BCAAs all tend to be elevated. And with all that, the “official” advice continues to basically be “eat less, move more.” That will always fail in the long run, if the underlying conditions that created the problem in the first place are never addressed.
<span class=”atwho-inserted” contenteditable=”false” data-atwho-at-query=”@lilac”>@Lilac</span> Evolution is a process, and while that process could account for some extra fat, there is no way it would be a good explanation for the amounts we see today. 50-100 extra pounds of fat is fairly common, in both men and women, and it’s not hard to find someone has something like 200 or more extra pounds. There is no evolutionary benefit to having so much extra fat that reproduction and basic functions like movement are seriously impaired.
If you looked at any of Brad Marshall’s videos, he details the diet that animals switch to when they are trying to pack on weight prior to hibernation. And pack on weight they must, or else death is guaranteed. When gaining this weight, the animals start eating a diet much higher in unsaturated fat (big surprise, I know). Which would indicate that diet, or certain components of the diet, would probably drive fat gain more than “evolution.”
And as Americans have gotten more overweight and obese, PUFA has been increasing in the food supply. We are eating a fattening diet, but hibernation never comes. Here’s a chart from the USDA that shows the PUFA increase from 1909 to 2005. It’s certainly increased in the past 20 years, as hydrogenation and trans fats got demonized. But anything high in “trans fats” was also high in PUFA. Now that the seed oils aren’t being hydrogenated, the people are no longer getting the protective effect of trans fats, and are dealing with a bigger PUFA load.
JRK- I certainly think there is a big connection between cravings and needed nutrients (be they micro or macro). Like, a craving for chips could reflect a need for more sodium, as an example. But the issue I have, and always had, with the idea of “overeating” or “over” consuming food is….. why doesn’t the body just get rid of excess calories? It doesn’t have to store them as fat. It could waste them as heat, or eliminate them in urine/feces, or just make you bounce off the walls with energy, like the stereotype of a hyperactive child. Or even just correct it with hunger signals.
I don’t know if you ever saw Mike Fave’s breakdown on this 2003 paper by Wlodek, but I think it makes a lot of sense-
It posits that there is a “block” in energy production (during a part of the Krebs cycle), and this block is what drives fat storage in excess. It can happen at lower calorie intakes (like when people seem to starve themselves, have no energy, and still seem to gain weight), and can also drive so called “overeating” (as leptin signals that there is lots of energy available, but the cells can’t access it, sending out counter signals to drive hunger).
The “block” in energy can be caused by lots of things (like endotoxin, for example), and would go right back to the many of the problematic substances in the food supply that Peat always cautioned about (PUFA, excess iron, estrogenic substances, the inflammatory aminos, and so on). Brad Marshall also suggested that MUFA and high serum BCAAs could also be a part of this sort of “block.” To the degree that something like “The Sugar Fast,” and maybe also the Potato Hack can help to lower things like PUFA, FFAs, serum BCAAs and such, means they could be both good short term tools, that also pay dividends after the fast/hack. Even William Brown experienced this after his no fat diet experiment. He used to suffer from migranes, and they went away during the experiment, and apparently did not return after he resumed a normal diet.
JRK- It’s going pretty well. It does feel like my new sort of IF “weapon.” I can do it for a day or two, and this how Mark Bell said he uses it, too. Sounds like Cari did something similar (I remember the Lemonade Diet, I think I tried it and went half a day or so). It’s great after a sort of “non-peaty” meal, like if you go out to a restaurant, which happens more frequently now that I live closer to my family.
While I like the IF nature of this, I completely agree that you wouldn’t want to go too long on low fat and/or low protein. I do think that holding those macros down for a day or two (or possibly longer, for some people), drive the benefits. By lowering things like serum BCAAs, inflammatory aminos, FFAs, and oxylipins and other acetylated fats, I think that can help improve metabolism, both in the short and long term. I am finding that if I try to push the “Sugar Fast” too much, I start getting to hungry for something other just fruit or candy.
Funny, now Cole Robinson has dropped the “Sugar Diet,” and is now all about low fat, low fat. I did low fat for about 2 months last year, and did see some interesting benefits, but was getting bored with it after two months. I always had at least one “cheat meal” a week, to help the gallbladder turn over, but all the people on the old RPF that did super low fat seemed to note that it was somewhere between 6-12 months when problems started to show up. I wasn’t even going to tempt that time frame.
Here is a study Maurito posted, showing that a low protein diet over 12 weeks did not impair muscle synthesis in humans. The low protein group ate 0.4g/kg of bodyweight, which translates to about 45 grams for a 250 pound man. This is in line with some of the studies Brad Marshall posted. I do think there could be issues with going this low in protein for periods longer than this (say, 6 months to years or more), but it does seem to suggest that using the Sugar Diet aggressively for 2-3 months would be okay. Also, the low protein group ate 60% of food as carbs, so this would apply to high carb diets-
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0137183
I might have mentioned this elsewhere, but it’s also worth nothing that we can’t directly measure bodyfat or muscle. These are always estimates. Someone like Mark Bell obviously has a high amount of muscle and lower amount of bodyfat, just from looking at him. I think this is the goal, we all want to look and feel better. Cari pointed out many times she is more compact and looks better at higher weights.
This is to say that no study is perfect. I like Cole’s idea of pushing the limits on some ideas, like sugar fasting, and also respect Mike Fave’s words of caution. I do think some of Fave’s diet setups are overly cautious during a “cutting” phase, but think they are better for the long term and maybe even a slower weight loss.
Still, there might be benefits to a more aggressive cutting phase, like Latchkey Genxer, who lost 30 pounds in a month. After that month, he deliberately added more protein and slowed weight loss, but he was still losing weight at a high rate. Maybe the “cutting” phase really helped improve his metabolism, so that even the diet he was eating previously would lead to better weight loss than it did before the aggressive month. TheBigPeatoski reported something similar after her two 6 week low fat diet stints on the old RPF.
Well, I just did my first 45 hour “Sugar Fast.” It was pretty enlightening. Similar in some ways to the “Intermittent Fasting” I used to do long ago.
One thing I noticed was that I felt much clearer and better, and seemed to be a bit more energetic afterwards. However, there was never a moment of ravenous hunger, as frequently could happen on IF back in the day. After the “Sugar Fast,” I seemed to have more energy, be more positive, and see a little clearer. Weirdly, the whites of my eyes looked the whitest in the mirror that I remember seeing them. The scale also dropped a couple pounds, might have dropped a few more if I had allowed the “Sugar Fast” to go to the normal time I weigh myself.
As for getting through the “sugar fast,” I pretty much came to the conclusion that it would be very difficult without smoothies. Which is fruit, fruit juice, and something like honey or simple syrup. This setup allowed me to go through the night without any real protein or fat.
Basically, I see three types of days with this-
Sugar Fast Days
“Super Peat” Days
Normal and Cheat Days
The Sugar Fast days are going to be just that…. pure sugar. I might do slight modifications like adding Glycine and Taurine to shakes, or adding some coconut milk to get a bit of fat in. But mostly, sugar. 95-99% sugary foods. Both protein will likely be under 10 grams, and fat under 5 these days (cronometer shows a bit of both fat and protein in most fruits).
The “Super Peat” Days are something I was kicking around in my head for a while. Based around a lot of sugar, but also using gelatin and collagen in higher amounts, and a lot of coconut oil. Like, A LOT, to point where it’s pretty much the only real fat there is. The more acceptable starched, like potatoes and rice, are allowed on these days. And also, and I know this is gonna sound weird….. vegan cheese. Ugh, why, you say? Because there are many that are made with only coconut oil, and those cheeses actually taste pretty good, and melt pretty good, as well. Kinda like Cheese Whiz. I know, this might be a bridge too far for some, but if you really want to try to up the coconut oil in your diet, it seems like a great way to do it. The collagen and potatoes usually make this a day of about 70-80 grams of protein, which is about what Ray Peat usually recommended on the low end, I may add low fat meats to these days over time.
Last is the normal and “cheat” days. These are the days I have dinner with family or friends, and can go out to restaurants. These are also the days where protein will likely be a lot higher. I usually eat about 140-150g of protein when I eat normally, and I could see these days being something like 140-200g fairly easily.
I get where Mike Fave is coming from with protein, but still not sure if the target needs to be that high. I think some of the benefits come from lowering the protein, and thus lowering serum BCAAs and the inflammatory aminos Peat talked about (if lowering these is part of the goal, getting 40-50 grams of gelatin or collagen might make a “complete” protein with the aminos floating around in your blood). Carbs spare muscle, preventing the need to break it down for gluconeogenesis, and Brad Marshall showed some studies that showed normal weight men can be in protein balance on as little as 44g of protein a day, or even just 7g of amino acids (as they are apparently absorbed better).
Next, I am going to try the 72 hour sugar fast that Cole recommends. I think I can do it, and want to see what happens. I think this could be an incredible “weight loss weapon,” as he says, and remember, Peat himself suggested that a 24 fast could be beneficial, and using sugar during that “fast” would probably be even healthier.
JRK- I don’t think anyone is suggesting this as a “one size fits all” diet. Even Cole Robinson suggested that you tailor it to what works for you, and emphasized this is a fat loss diet. Obviously, someone who doesn’t need to lose fat wouldn’t need to try this.
It also isn’t that new. Fruitarians have been trying doing this for decades now. Often with great short term results, and detrimental long term results. So, it makes a lot of sense to suggest it’s use in the short term, and return to a more balanced diet in the long term. What is new it the type of people experimenting with it. These people don’t have a fear of meat or protein in general, so it’s a lot different to, say, use a high sugar diet for a month and then go back to a more balanced diet, than it is to try and force a fruit only diet for years and decades.
And you may be right about people with more active jobs, but those same people might actually benefit from a higher carb and lower protein diet during the day. Brad Marshall did some interesting videos on protein restriction and requirements, and one thing he found out was that both circulating FFAs and BCAAs compete with glucose for utilization. Also, obese and overweight folks tend to have higher fasting circulating BCAAs (and FFAs) than their lean counterparts. So, a high carb, low fat AND low protein diet may give a person the best energy during more demanding physical tasks. And maybe that protein should come more from gelatin/collagen than so called “complete” proteins, during the active period.
Here’s Brad’s video on how BCAAs and FFAs compete with glucose-
He also has one where he suggests that protein requirements might be much lower than suspected.
Maurito (one of the old school RPF posters) had an in depth response to Jay’s video you just posted, which is also worth a read-
I had never heard of FGF21 prior to the past few weeks, so I’m not sure it should be labeled a “stress hormone,” the same as cortisol or estrogen. I have no idea what “normal” levels of it would be, or if higher levels would be good or bad or neutral. Just because it can be elevated in response to stress doesn’t mean it’s causal. White blood cell counts are generally elevated in response to infection for example, but aren’t thought to be the cause. Maurito pointed out that some of it’s proposed mechanisms of action are beneficial, like an upregulation of thyroid hormone, mitochondria, and the klotho protein.
1. Milk should be fine to break the “fast,” but back in my IF days, I was never concerned with what food was best to break the fast, because it was so short. It was basically a later breakfast for me, which is a compound word of break and fast, so even the overnight fast while sleeping has been recognized traditionally. Also, the “sugar fast” isn’t a real fast, as you are consuming calorie containing foods in significant quantities. People would often use fruit to break a longer fast (that lasted days), but you can eat fruit during a “sugar fast.”
2. Additional salt is fine.
3. I don’t see any problem with using coffee and sugar. I use it, and Indigo Nili did as well. I think possible stress reactions caffeine gives you is from not having enough carbs or glycogen with any consumed coffee or caffeine.
Exercise could be done whenever. The biggest issue with any sort of exercise is usually if there is enough carbohydrate/sugar to fuel the workout. That shouldn’t be an issue during a sugar fast, or during regular eating periods. People use sugary drinks as workout beverages all the time, Gatorade built a whole company/brand on consuming sugar and salt during and after exercise. The Wall Street Journal even had an article back in 2014 talking about high level professional athletes who used soda during their training and games-
JRK- Just thinking about “The Biggest Loser” contestants…. I wonder if they might have had better outcomes if they had some sort of “Post Weight Loss Therapy,” like how bodybuilders do PCT. They probably needed some metabolic therapy previous to the show, as well. If they had gotten some things to correct metabolism (like maybe supplemental thyroid, testosterone, and something to limit stress hormones like cortisol, and such), they might not have had serious regain, and may have continued to get into better shape after the show. I think it does show that extreme weight loss methods can make broken metabolisms worse, if especially since nothing was probably done to address either before or after.
That’s one thing that was cool to hear from Cole Robinson of The Snake Diet mention…. he said the reason he finds this diet so effective is that people aren’t battling hunger, they have energy, and their body temperature goes up. He even mentioned you’re going back to your “child like self.” It’s from minutes 17-22 in the interview he did with Mark Bell (be warned, Cole does curse quite a bit in the interview). It’s cool that people are experimenting with a lot of Ray Peat’s ideas, even if they didn’t hear the idea from Peat.
The diet that Indigo Nili did was pretty close to “The Emergence Diet” that Brad Marshall was talking about, only she used lots of sugar in place of Brad’s idea to mainly use starch. I like that this is spurring on some “Peaty” type of approaches that we can potentially use ourselves, or inspire us to some use the framework with some tweaks.
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