Jeff Volek - The Many Facets of Keto-Adaptation:

[JEY100]

New video from The IHMC https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GC1vMBRFiwE#t=68

Jeff Volek - The Many Facets of Keto-Adaptation: Health, Performance, and Beyond

Published on Dec 3, 2013
Obesity is a condition of excess fat accumulation in adipocytes where the person is literally stuck in storage mode diverting a disproportionate amount of calories into fat cells as opposed to oxidation. Thus it is more productive to think of obesity as a problem in 'energy flow' rather than energy expenditure (i.e., calories in, calories out). The most efficient approach to accelerate the body's ability to access and burn body fat is to restrict dietary carbohydrate while increasing fat intake for a period of several weeks, after which fatty acids and ketones become the primary fuel at rest and during submaximal exercise. The coordinated set of metabolic adaptations that ensure proper inter-organ fuel supply in the face of low carbohydrate availability is referred to as keto- adaptation. This unique metabolic state has recently been shown to have widespread and profound therapeutic and performance-enhancing effects ranging from reversing type 2 diabetes to shrinking tumors to allowing ultra-endurance runners to set course records. This presentation will discuss the physiologic effects of very low carbohydrate diets with an emphasis on their unique effects on both features of metabolic syndrome and human performance.

Check the sidebar for other IHMC videos…the Dr. Davis one is good too: William Davis - Wheatlessness: A 21st Century Health Strategy

[Franziska]

Thanks, Janet. I can't wait to listen! I'll admit to getting excited whenever I see the names Volek or Phinney. Definitely my favorite LC authors. I really enjoyed this interview they did a few months back: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFD2q5iqevY

[inflammabl]

New video from The IHMC https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GC1vMBRFiwE#t=68

Jeff Volek - The Many Facets of Keto-Adaptation: Health, Performance, and Beyond



Check the sidebar for other IHMC videos…the Dr. Davis one is good too: William Davis - Wheatlessness: A 21st Century Health Strategy

Great find.

I'm going to forward it to my 23yo daughter who is starting to show the same carb problems my sister and I had when we reached our mid twenties.

[CarolynC]

Thanks, Janet! I'd never heard Dr. Volek speak. I enjoyed that. I found his statements (starting at about 40 minutes) about the different ways a body handles dietary saturated fat on low carb versus low fat diets to be particularly interesting.

[Mrs.K]

This is amazing! Thanks for sharing!

[JEY100]

I like all the JumpStart interviews and lectures too. One of Volek's talks from the low-carb cruise is available on-line, but this lecture is far and away better organized and produced, and very current with the Swedish dietary recommendations noted.

[WereBear]

Check the sidebar for other IHMC videos…the Dr. Davis one is good too: William Davis - Wheatlessness: A 21st Century Health Strategy

I loved that one! Dr. Davis has such an infectious enthusiasm! And a great sense of humor :)

[Nancy LC]

Fascinating stuff at 31 minutes. They talked about giving people in deep ketosis (from starvation) insulin and dropping their blood sugar to 25 mg/dL and they didn't have any of the symptoms of low blood sugar.

So... I'm wondering if folks who are suffering from reactive hypoglycemia would do better if they were deeper in ketosis.

[inflammabl]

Fascinating stuff at 31 minutes. They talked about giving people in deep ketosis (from starvation) insulin and dropping their blood sugar to 25 mg/dL and they didn't have any of the symptoms of low blood sugar.

So... I'm wondering if folks who are suffering from reactive hypoglycemia would do better if they were deeper in ketosis.

That's a good question. In my ongoing battle against stalls and hypoglycemia, I recently did a fat fast. On day four (or five) I upped my protein and my BG jumped up to 118. Keto's have stayed constant in the 80mg/L range. It's all very confusing and counter intuitive.

[Nancy LC]

I take it those aren't blood ketones you're measuring. Urinary ketones are different.

Anyway, I believe it that your bg jumped when you eat more protein. It does for me too.

[inflammabl]

You're right, urine. I was doing blood ketones for a month and found that when my blood ketone were above 1.0 my urine ketones were consistently >=40. Jimmy Moore had much the same result (although he didn't notice it) for all his blogs I read, about six or eight of them.

[teaser]

roy baumeister- willpower; self-control, decision fatigue, and energy depletion (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfnUicHDNM8)

I ended up watching this video as well. I've got Baumeister's book called Willpower, so it was just a refresher for me. The basic schtick is that if your tempted by something, but resist it, this depletes energy somewhere in the brain, probably in the frontal cortex. And the next temptation becomes harder to resist. It also becomes harder to make decisions (and really, deciding not to do something that you really want to do is just a difficult sort of decision, so the overlap makes sense). Some of Baumeister's studies show a little bit of glucose reversing the effect, but Baumeister suggests a high-protein diet for people playing the home game. It's the old sugar puts you on the rollercoaster, protein provides a steady, sustained source of glucose idea.

One test of willpower was the ability to put your hand in some ice-water--the longer a subject could sustain this, the greater the willpower. The point he made there was that in the will-power depleted state, not only were the subjects unable to hold their hands in the water as long--they also perceived the water as somewhat colder than non-depleted subjects did. He also spoke about other effects, on emotion--sadness, anger--deepening in the depleted state.

On this board, the idea of willpower hasn't always been popular. The idea that naturally lean-types just have greater willpower seems silly--they don't stop at half a slice of pie and insist they're not hungry because they have greater willpower than someone like me (who would finish his pie, and then their half a slice), they do it because half a slice genuinely satisfied their hunger. It's considerably easier for me to not eat pie then to eat a little bit of pie. Moderation is its own worst enemy.

Getting the social-anxiety urge to delete this post as rambling and off-topic, so I'd better get to the point I wanted to post in the first place.

Jimmy Moore--on the higher-protein, low carb diet, he ended up slipping up in weight, he puts it down to the protein. People who followed his story often put it down to the frankenfoods--many of which were high in glycerol. Some high in actual carbohydrate--the breads and pastas made of starches that were supposed to be indigestible, but weren't. But when he was eating these foods, he seemed to have a bit of a sweet-tooth. Once he went ketogenic, even sweet things like diet pop (which he could easily have rationalized, since they were unlikely to drive him out of ketosis), he was able to resist. And he had that bit of chocolate every day the whole time--a perfectly good trigger for a binge, that's sure been enough to trigger me in the past, and I don't have anywhere near Jimmy's sweet-tooth.

You could think this is specific to sweet--but I'm finding if my diet is ketogenic enough (60-80 grams protein, carbs as spinach, lettuce, maybe half an onion a day) binging goes away. Not well tested--I was prone to binges, cut the protein, and haven't binged in the three or four weeks since. It isn't that I'm having urges to binge, and resisting them--the urges went away. Reminds me of the icewater thing--if the people who weren't ego-depleted experienced the water as less uncomfortable--it isn't that they resisted the urge better--it took longer for the urge to build up to the point where it was irresistible. I don't think my binging was caused by the drive to consume glucose, since flax seed really isn't a very good glucose source--but maybe the urge for something vaguely nutty was ramped up, and flax was the closest thing I had.

[teaser]

You're right, urine. I was doing blood ketones for a month and found that when my blood ketone were above 1.0 my urine ketones were consistently >=40. Jimmy Moore had much the same result (although he didn't notice it) for all his blogs I read, about six or eight of them.

Thanks for mentioning Jimmy while I was typing out my little essay. Almost makes me seem on-topic. :lol:

Atkins seemed to think the urine strips were worth using. I've been using blood glucose strips, strict protein control, and the faith that if blood glucose is below a certain point, and protein and carbs are low enough, I'm probably in some degree of ketosis.

[Nancy LC]

That willpower depletion thing was disproven in later experiments, I believe.

[teaser]

News to me if it has. I'd like to see the studies.

Went to wikipedia to look at ego depletion, saw this study (just the abstract);


The Impact of Illusory Fatigue on Executive Control
Do Perceptions of Depletion Impair Working Memory Capacity?

The human mind is quite adept at modifying and regulating thoughts, judgments, and behaviors. Recent research has demonstrated that depletion of self-regulatory resources can impair executive function through restriction of working memory capacity. The current work explored whether the mere perception of resource depletion (i.e., illusory fatigue) is sufficient to directly produce these deficits in executive control. To manipulate illusory fatigue, participants were exposed to a depleting or nondepleting task before being presented with false feedback about the effects of the initial task on their state of resource depletion. Participants then completed a well-established index of working memory capacity. Findings revealed that individuals provided with feedback that led to perceptions of low depletion exhibited greater working memory capacity. This effect was independent of individuals' actual state of depletion and was furthermore mediated by their perceived level of depletion. Implications for spontaneous resource replenishment are discussed.


I think I remember some time way back when we were discussing on this forum a study where glucose was supposed to replete willpower, suggesting that it could as easily be a motivator for activity, rather than repleting lost energy.

This would put it in the realm of a newly discovered process that we knew about all along... the Scooby-snack. Bravery counts as an act of willpower, doesn't it? :lol: If an activity led to glucose--of course there should be renewed interest. This is a feeding activity... keep it up. The play at home game would be tic-tacs, during the final exam.

Another study listed is named

The idea of money counteracts ego depletion effects

More evidence that what's needed is something to motivate the person, rather than a steady source of glucose. Although I think roller-coaster hunger would still "deplete" willpower in a way--in the sense that it's hard to do math when the most important thing to you at the moment is gnawing hunger

Thanks for the prod, Nancy. I feel kind of silly for forgetting that line of reasoning. I was thinking ketosis might help willpower through a steady supply of fuel to the executive centers--and still think more stable brain energy might be a factor. Decreased motivation to binge makes more sense than increased willpower, and I guess gets me to the same place.

[OregonRose]

News to me if it has. I'd like to see the studies.

Like Nancy, I know I've read about willpower depletion being, if not debunked, at least seriously challenged. Here's a reference to one such study:

http://lesswrong.com/lw/2y2/willpower_not_a_limited_resource/

[teaser]

Thanks OregonRose. Since this morning, I'm thinking in terms of motivation rather than willpower. If a bit of glucose, or a dollar pay-off gave renewed motivation, instead of repleting willpower, certain things would make sense.

Much recent research suggests that willpower—the capacity to exert self-control—is a limited resource that is depleted after exertion. We propose that whether depletion takes place or not depends on a person’s belief about whether willpower is a limited resource. Study 1 found that individual differences in lay theories about willpower moderate ego-depletion effects: People who viewed the capacity for self-control as not limited did not show diminished self-control after a depleting experience. Study 2 replicated the effect, manipulating lay theories about willpower. Study 3 addressed questions about the mechanism underlying the effect. Study 4, a longitudinal field study, found that theories about willpower predict change in eating behavior, procrastination, and self-regulated goal striving in depleting circumstances. Taken together, the findings suggest that reduced self-control after a depleting task or during demanding periods may reflect people’s beliefs about the availability of willpower rather than true resource depletion.


I'm going to go read the actual paper, but first a comment on the first point, the red;

Suppose we chose people who feel very strongly that carbohydrate is not fattening. Then we put them on two diets. Is it possible that our subject selection will be skewed towards young, insulin-sensitive, hard to fatten guys in their early twenties? We'll be looking for people in whom the effect we wish to study is rather weak.

Suppose a person grows up in an environment where the ability to concentrate pays. One person knows if they do their homework, concentrate, stick to it, they'll probably be a doctor or a lawyer like Mom or Dad. Another person has no such assurance--grew up in an environment where reward for effort is random--or backwards. A parent who hits a kid for being "smart."

The kid for whom effort tends to be rewarding will have the habit of concentration. The kid for whom it doesn't--it takes "willpower" where willpower is sort of defined as trying to do something that you're not tempted to do. Some people, used to trying to please people around them (I mean that in a positive way), may have the built-in motivation of trying to please the people administering the study. Sometimes, not eating a cookie is rewarding. Lisa Simpson syndrome. Oh, what a good girl I am. Can I have a gold star now? :lol:

[mojolissa]

Did anyone else notice that Dr. Volek had the outer third of his eyebrows missing or at least very thin?

Maybe it's just glaringly obvious to me, but I'm hypothyroid and look for this type of thing. I developed hypothyroid after starting a low carb diet, but it has not been determined that low-carb is what caused it.

I hope that down the line, we can solve the obesity epidemic without adding an epidemic of thryoid problems by switching to a strict low carb lifestyle.

[Nancy LC]

I noticed that too.

[janjfree]

Janet-
Thanks so much for posting this! So useful to me and perfect timing!

[Absy]

hi guys nice thread

can u plz help me with this:
http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthread.php?t=457187

thanx

[peacelove]

Where did you find this paper?

[peacelove]

Never mind, just opened the link at top. Interesting stuff and thanks for posting. Happy holidays!