If you are in good enough shape to need to carb load for an athletic
event you are not on a diet and do not need to worry about what Atkins
has to say to begin with.

Interesting article.  Never read that.  I personally feel that carbs help in
long distance cycling and running, but I never really tried to increase my
fat intake instead and would be willing to give that a try.  For me, I can
low carb and go 40 or 50 hilly miles on my bicycle and am okay, but after
that, I really am toast.  I will give a high fat diet a try on my next ride
over 50 and see.  That will be interesting.

As far as carbing up before an endurance event, I don't think that would
ever be wrong.  It is proven to work.  I think the article is just brining
up another possible way to go about fueling for a endurance event.  I will
try it this weekend.  I'll do a 60 or 70 mile ride on a high fat diet
instead.

Enjoy,
Curt

I'm quite surprised that anyone would find this article surprising...
considering the source. It's a load of bull... just like the diet.

Marketing ploy is what I think.

You cannot compair marathon runners and competitive weight lifters who
carb load to your average joe who is dieting.   And you certainly
cannot compair them to your average obese couch potato who isn't used
to exercising at all.

Its about as bad as the current gatorade commercial showing the
decreased performance will happen if you drink just water instead of
gatorade.   But truth be told, for the *average* person under normal
conditions, water is just fine.  

See, there are indeed studies to prove the point that if the *average*
person carbloads they can actually gain weight.  

These companies will take those studies and twist them so that it
makes their product more appealing.

As the article said, there's been very little research. My personal
experience has been that, while not a competition level athlete at any point
in my life, my performance in terms of both intensity and endurance has been
notably better on a relatively high-fat low-carb diet than any other way of
eating. I'd have to caution, however, that it took a fair amount of time and
effort to become adapted to exercising on a low-carb, Atkins-type diet. A
couple months at least. I doubt that this type of adaptation has ever been
rigorously studied.

I found the book "Slow Burn", by Stu Mittleman, interesting. Nobody could
fault his ability or accomplishments, he may be one of the best
ultramarathoners ever. And his advice is to train your body to burn fat, not
carbs, so you don't "hit the wall" when your glycogen stores run out. His
diet, as described in the book, isn't as low carb as an Atkins diet, but
it's high in fat ("good fats" especially), relatively low in carbs, and the
carbs he recommends are the unrefined ones that don't trigger huge insulin
spikes. He does not recommend carb loading, that I know of. What's good for
Stu is good enough for me. Sprinters may have different needs, however, but
the majority of hobby runners, bikers, etc. seem to be more interested in
distance than top speed.

HG

Runners need *more* carbs than the average sedentary Joe.
Doesnt mean you can load up on the highly processed junk food.
The usual advise about lots of veggies, fruit, minimal sugar,
yada, yada, yada still applies.

I know this ...when I am low carbing on days that I lift I my bench press
( and all my other lifts) is about 20lbs LESS than when I have some carbs
before working out or through the day.  I usually try and eat some fruit for
breakfast or have a low-carb smoothie w/ some fruit added to it.  even
having 20 grams of carbs extra help a great deal.

Alok

To me the problem is actual carb-loading by people who really know
what it is doesn't much resemble people who read the words in a
magazine article think it means.  Much like people who read in a
magazine article that Atkins is low carb so they imagine eating no
veggies.  The reality and the uneducated guess don't bear much
resemblence:

As opposed to the actual carb-loading as practiced by knowledgible
folks.

See, inhaling gargantuan amounts of pasta isn't what carb loading
really is.  Folks who take it seriously do the calculations to
figure out what portion size to have, and it is far smaller than
"gargantuan".

So Atkins is opposed to the myth not to the reality.  The reality
involves a carefully calibrated amount of carbs.  Funny thing,
but the reality of Atkins involves  carefully calibrated amounts
of carbs!

Folks on Atkins find their CCLL (their custom personal level for
loss) by finding the point they fall out of ketosis.  Loss is
best just barely in ketosis not deep into ketosis.  The body has
defenses against going deeply into dietary changes, so Atkins is
a method to find the point of least defenses.  Here's the key -
Folks who start a new exercise program and keep at it consistantly
discover that their CCLL goes up.  And it goes up by an amount
that can be carefully calibrated to match their exercise efforts.
If this sounds like carb loading to you, there's a good reason for
it.  Atkins does it's increased carbs averaged over the week based
on exercise averaged over the week.  Carb loading does it's
increased carbs once based on exercise once.  Same thing different
time to average across.

I would put myself in the same boat on Atkins but I'd never do it
myself***.

I'm always amused by research that is conducted on 5 or 6 folks.  This
is far, far too common in nutrition (and likely explains why official
advice is always changing) and is the case in both of the linked
articles.

It's also important to note that none of these people are on a carb
restricted diet.  All groups have at least 30% carbs and fairly low
protein consumption (12%).  The question is one of carb/fat ratios not
carb/protein.

Overall, I'm not surprised by the research.  People with more fat in
their diet can run longer.  Makes sense because fat is usually thought
of a long term energy source.  Think about the women running the 6
hour marathons...or women that successfully swim the channel.

So, if everyone only studies 6 people, somebody has to come together
and put 3 or 4 articles in obscure journals together into a worthwhile
review.  Here's nice review from Hargreaves in the "Journal of Sports
Science" on carb loading and fat loading compare:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstra
ct&list_uids=14971431

And here's a link to an older review by Hegle in the journal "Sports
Medicine":

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstra
ct&list_uids=11103848

The last sentence wraps it up well:
However, in most cases muscle glycogen storage is compromised, and
although muscle glycogen breakdown is diminished to a certain extent,
this is probably part of the explanation for the lack of performance
enhancement after adaptation to a fat-rich diet.

So my interperatation is you see the same or decreased performance
despite an increase in some physiological factors.  This is because
the high fat diet compromises muscle glycogen stores.

Now, if you start with 3 times as many folks in your study, you might
have more statistically significant results.  Check out this old but
statistically valid research by Bosch from the "Journal of Applied
Physiology":

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstra
ct&list_uids=8514712

Another good one from Bosch in "Metabolism" about why you carb load
the night before and not just right before:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstra
ct&list_uids=8609825

***And finally, my $0.02 as a sprinter.  On a carbo starve diet to
prep for loading (no simple or complex sugars but lots and lots of
protein and fat), I had to swim a race and then had to swim an
unexpected second race.

I warmed up for the first for 45 minutes (typical wu) and then raced
the 200m butterfly.  One of the more painful races in my memory, so I
followed it with a long cool down (20+ min).

Then I was informed that I had to swim the 400m IM.  I had to return
to the water to warm-up/count strokes for turns and swam for only
about 15 minutes with a focus on slowly warming up all the muscles.

Then I raced the 400m IM.  This would be the most painful race I ever
experienced.  By the end of the first 50, I was seeing red (happens
when all blood vessels are dilated due to extertion).  At the 300
mark, I was experiencing mild hallucinations (believed I was still far
from the wall up until the moment I smacked my hands into it).  Short
"blink outs" (like a black out but quicker) occurred during my final
100.  I had to be assisted from the pool because I did not have the
upper body strength to get out of the water (assistance is common
after a marathon but not after a 3 minute race).

That experience is the reason why I won't do Atkins.  It's not that I
don't think he's on the right track with increased protein
consumption.  And I don't think my experience is common or
representative of the diet.  It's just that even thinking about a high
protein/high fat diet gives me flashbacks of that race.

~becca

Give it a try before a marathon.  Yeah, avoid those carbs and see how you
do.