What do we think of slow carb diet?

[Vegemighty]

So if anyone read The Four Hour body by Tim Ferriss, they've heard of this.

Rule #1: Avoid “white†starchy carbohydrates (or those that can be white). This means all bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, and grains. If you have to ask, don’t eat it.

Rule #2: Eat the same few meals over and over again, especially for breakfast and lunch. You already do this; you’re just picking new default meals.

Rule #3: Don’t drink calories. Exception: 1-2 glasses of dry red wine per night is allowed.

Rule #4: Don’t eat fruit. (Fructose –> glycerol phosphate –> more bodyfat, more or less.) Avocado and tomatoes are excepted.

Rule #5: Take one day off per week and go nuts. I choose and recommend Saturday.

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2012/07/12/how-to-lose-100-pounds/

Seems like a good plan to me. He's also big into adding beans and other legumes to add calories, which paleo is against I believe. It also makes sense to me to binge once a week to keep up metabolism. Has anyone had any success with this plan?

[Kirkor]

I think the binging is more for psychological benefit than physiological benefit ... also I think people can easily take the 'refeed' day to be a 'fuck up my diet' day and wipe out the week's progress. This of course isn't specific to the 4HB diet plan (term 'slow carb' makes me eyeroll but I respect Ferriss's marketing skill) ... many diet plans have a cheat day/meal structure, it's just a big potential "1 step forward and 2 steps back" situation.

Good comment: http://rippedbody.jp/2011/10/01/frequently-asked-questions/#cheatdays

[Philociraptor]

I tried it for a few months a year ago and didn't make any progress. Works for some folks though.

[Gainsdalf the Whey]

I did it for 3-4 months a year and a half ago and dropped about 25 lb. It's bacially low carb paleo but allowing beans, which don't cause the blood sugar spikes due to the slow burning nature of them. If you know you don't have any gluten issues, it can work great. After the first few cheat days I realized I felt like shit the next day and toned them down.

[Rogue]

I did this once, for a couple of weeks. Don't remember how much I actually lost, but I went from being Holiday-weight chubby to flat stomach. I think about 4kgs. However, I think that might have been primarily because of a strong calorie reduction - my appetite disappears if I don't eat grains or rice or potatoes. I quit because it just didn't fit me, but I found it to be a good "emergency intervention" after the holidays.

[PrincessHeather]

I think the binging is more for psychological benefit than physiological benefit ... also I think people can easily take the 'refeed' day to be a 'fuck up my diet' day and wipe out the week's progress. This of course isn't specific to the 4HB diet plan (term 'slow carb' makes me eyeroll but I respect Ferriss's marketing skill) ... many diet plans have a cheat day/meal structure, it's just a big potential "1 step forward and 2 steps back" situation.

Good comment: http://rippedbody.jp/2011/10/01/frequently-asked-questions/#cheatdays

I prefer to look at it the way the Whole9/30 folks do. You don't schedule chat meals or days, you look at things on a case by case basis and allow yourself some treats once in awhile. For instance, it was my anniversary the other night, and I happen to know that the creme brule' at the restaraunt we went to is AMAZING, so I viewed that as a special meal and a treat of something outstanding! And then I can go right back to making good choices. I don't think there is any benefit to having a day dedicated to eating monster amounts of calories, not if you're keeping yourself thoroughly nourished all the time with good food.

[65thbfuj]

Adding a little late, but it seems that this diet is a lot more successful for men than it is for women.

I tried it and no joke gained 15 lbs, most of it fat. I stuck with it faithfully, everything in moderation, even got to the point where I started counting calories, doing a deficit/surplus, no nuts/fruit/etc, followed staunchly to the T, everything. I still gained weight AND fat like crazy.

Afterwards I just decided to go paleo/primal, and the weight has come off since. Might have been all the beans? Idk.

[Shaun1105]

I just started the slow-carb diet on Aug 11 so I will report back with what types of gains/losses I am making. Maybe it will be in it's own thread if I stick with it.

I'm coming to it as a previously very strict primal eater, who lapsed into merely being mostly gluten-free out of convenience with the rest of my family.

So the slow-carb approach isn't much different from how I used to eat with the major exception of eating legumes. This time I've also cut out all dairy (except cream in coffee) so we'll see how that goes too.

[clinzy]

My husband and I both did this religiously for about 6 weeks last summer. He lost about 25 lbs. I lost 1.5. Yes. That's 1 and a half pounds. I did look leaner, but I definitely didn't lose any weight. This may be because I already ate mostly paleo anyway, so it just sort of tweaked what I had already been doing.

I personally found the cheat days terrible. It really messed with the way that I think about food. If I'm just eating paleo, I really don't think about food. If I'm out and want something that's not paleo (hi, cheese fries!), I just have it. With the slow carb diet, I didn't cheat at all, but found myself really planning for the cheat day. I didn't like how much I was coveting foods. It felt really unnatural to me. This is probably a bit of a hangup of mine because I train in two different sports with weight classes so I'm already really aware of food issues and how easy it is to get yourself totally messed up with thoughts like "eight more pounds isn't that much - you could make that if you remove X from your diet". Then, you do that and it's "well, it's only 9 more pounds to the next weight class", which starts this dangerous gaining/cutting cycle that I just didn't want to experience. I'd much rather just eat clean all the time and not have a cheat day or cheat meal looming ahead. It's not worth the weird way it changes how I think about food, and it's not worth feeling like hammered crap for 48 hours afterwards. If Sunday was the cheat day, my workout suffered through Tuesday.

With all of that feeeeeelings stuff out of the way, I would probably do this again and eliminate the cheat day. I understand all of the reasons Ferriss says you have to have it (especially women), but I think going back to that or paleo and just having something (one thing, mind you) that's not paleo from time to time would suit me just fine.