a trendy diet but which is “not good for the body”, according to a nutritionist

Sometimes adored, sometimes excluded from the diet to lose weight, carbohydrates nevertheless play an essential role on our plate and in our body. They are what provide the energy our body needs for the proper functioning of our cells, our muscles, our brain and even our heart. If they are demonized in certain regimes, the carb cycling diet gives them a place in our diet weightloss by proposing to cycle carbohydrate intake according to the level of physical activity. In short, it is possible to eat them when you exercise – on “high carb” days – and you exclude them from your meals when you are not doing physical activity – on “low carb” days. If the idea of ​​regulating your carbohydrate intake in this way according to your energy expenditure may seem clever, it is far from being judicious in the long term, as the dietitian nutritionist Pascal Nourtierweight loss expert.

When we ask him if trying the experience is worth it to lose the pounds that bother us, his answer is straightforward: “I advise you against all this. Because in fact, the body doesn’t really like repeating changes. Going from one extreme to another from one day to the next is not good for the body.”. As he explained to us more fully in an interview, this type of diet poses several problems. Already for the body, because repeated changes in eating patterns are not appreciated by our body which is disrupted, just like its response to food. Then because this “seems hard to adapt for the average consumer” according to the nutritionist, without knowing exactly “what level of physical activity are we based on and what quantity of sugar are we talking about exactly”specifies the expert.

Carb cycling diet: is carbohydrate cycling effective?

So are we really going to have to lose weight with this eating technique which invites us to eat carbohydrates according to very specific cycles which depend on physical activity? “Ultimately, no.”, decides the nutritionist. Worse still, Pascal Nourtier is even quite pessimistic about possible benefits for weight loss: “we are not necessarily going to lose weight and what’s more, I think we can create resistance”he concludes, in fact.

Carb cycling diet: a diet that can prevent weight loss in the long term

This is the main risk of trying such a restrictive diet with carbohydrates, it could even lead to “resistance to weight loss, from playing with this type of pattern” specifies the nutritionist. “At some point, the body doesn’t really know how to do it, so it will be less receptive because when we remove the carbohydrates, it will say to itself, yes, it’s okay, I’ll have them tomorrow. And actually, the carbs don’t come back,” explains the dietician. Disturbances in the eating pattern which will cause the body to become resistant and“we don’t lose too much”. In addition to increasing the difficulty of losing weight, the principles of the carb cycling diet also present a risk of increasing fat storage by the body which is disrupted by the sudden cessation of carbohydrate intake over such short periods. : “The body will have a tendency to make more reserves”, warns the nutritionist. “And since it changes all the time, the body doesn’t really know how to adapt” he adds.

Diet carb cycling: what if it was she who made me gain weight?

In addition to the physiological risk of storing fat and having more difficulty using it with this type of diet, the carb cycling diet can also have a harmful effect on your morale…and your eating behavior. “Patients feel bad about making an effort that doesn’t pay off. They get discouraged. This causes a cognitive reaction and often makes them want to eat even more.” regrets Pascal Nourtier. And since we reward our efforts with carbohydrates, there is also a risk of overconsuming these foods that we enjoy on the days we exercise, because that is the only time we can eat them. “There is indeed a risk of not channeling and eating too much, that’s clear,” concedes the weight loss expert. This diet which restricts our consumption of carbohydrates can therefore lead to as many “frustration” what excess.

Carbohydrates: the unsuspected risks that we run by cycling our intake

This way of eating can also have a negative impact on our sports sessions, because the reduction of carbohydrates and the sequence of days with and without carbohydrates does not always go well with energy expenditure, notes the doctor. “In fact, it’s really when we do sports that we have a risk of a blood sugar spike. Because in fact, as we have no sugar at all the day before and the next day too, we go to exercise, we eat a lot of sugar, and therefore we will have a peak in blood sugar which can really give a bar stroke during sport”.
In addition to being bad for blood sugar and weight gain, these blood sugar spikes are also bad for your health. “What’s bad for the body over short periods of time is playing with the pancreas like that, I give you sugar and I don’t give you any. This is not a good habit if you want to prevent diabetes”.

What is an alternative to the carb cycling diet?

Rather than starting a carb cycling diet and eating carbohydrates one day, before completely excluding them the next day to incur all the risks mentioned for your health, you can instead vary your carbohydrate consumption over longer periods in a weight loss perspective. “There is an inertia of the body that we must know how to respect in terms of metabolism”, recalls the nutritionist, who emphasizes that when we deprive ourselves “on a scale too short for the metabolism to give a positive response”, one cannot expect to achieve one’s goals on the scale. His recommendation? “Take a break from carbohydrates for two weeks or three weeks. And when you reintroduce them into your meals, be careful not to add too much for a week or two. And then just add a little more for a week or two again.” before resuming a traditional diet.

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