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CarbCycling Ebook
CarbCycling Ebook
Macronutrient Guidebook
Introduction
First, lets review some basics.
Everything that we eat causes a metabolic and physiological
response in our body. For cosmetic purposes, the most
important level to look at is the macronutrient levelthe
carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. Each macronutrient
causes a different response in our body. By manipulating our
intake, we can elicit the changes (fat loss, muscle gain) that
were seeking.
Carbohydrates: These are the sugars and starches that
make up the bulk of energy for all living things. The body
converts carbohydrates into glucose, causing a rise in blood
Males
Carbohydrate
Low to
moderate carb
day
Protein
Fat
as low as
weight
possible
0.15-0.35 grams
per pound of
pound of body
per pound of
body weight
weight
body weight
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Carbohydrate Cycling
Carbohydrate cycling is a style of dieting that Ive used with
hundreds of my clients over the years. It can be modified for
lean muscular gains or fat loss as well as weight
maintenance. The focus of this book will be using the
carbohydrate cycling methodology to lose fat, while
maintaining (and possibly even building) muscle.
Put in simple terms, carbohydrate cycling involves
consuming a high carbohydrate diet on some days of the
week and a low to moderate carbohydrate diet on the other
days.
The high carbohydrate days raise the bodys insulin levels,
fill glycogen stores, keep the metabolism burning efficiently,
and stave off muscle catabolism.
The low carbohydrate days are the fat burning days. They
keep insulin levels low enough to allow for maximum fat
burning while retaining muscle.
For most individuals, having one or two high carb days per
week is a good starting point for fat loss. Put high days on
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Sample Set-Up
The following are general guidelines for each macronutrient
on a typical high carb day and a typical low to moderate carb
day. Based on the individual, you may need to increase or
decrease the values slightly (see Assessing Progress for
more detail).
Note that we lower protein on our high carb days and also
keep fat as low as possible.
Keep in mind that for optimal blood sugar levels,
metabolism, and amino acid turnover, it is best to divide your
daily totals into 57 meals per day (about 2.53 hours or so).
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Females
High carb day
Low to moderate
carb day
Carbohydrate
Protein
0.75 grams per 0.6 grams per
pound of body
pound of body
weight
weight
0.2-0.5 grams per 0.8 grams per
Fat
as low as
possible
0.1-0.2 grams
pound of body
pound of body
per pound of
weight
weight
body weight
Note that these values only take into account the protein in
protein foods, the fat in fat foods, and the carbs in carb
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foods. In other words, don't count the fat and protein in oats,
for example, or the carbs and protein in peanut butter.
These incidental macros will typically add another couple
hundred calories per day or so, depending on your overall
macronutrient count.
Using the table above, a 250-lb male would follow a plan like
this:
High carb days: 375 grams of carbohydrates, 313
grams of protein, very low fat
Low to moderate carb days: 63 to 125 grams of
carbohydrates, 375 grams of protein, 38 to 88 grams
of fat
A 150-lb female would follow a plan like this:
High carb days: 113 grams of carbohydrates, 100
grams of protein, very low fat
Low to Moderate carb days: 30 to 75 grams of
carbohydrates, 120 grams of protein, 15 to 30 grams
of fat
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Cardiovascular Activity
Ideally, a fat loss diet is accompanied by both resistance
training and cardiovascular training. Put simply, the
resistance training builds and maintains muscle (your most
metabolically active tissue) and the cardiovascular training
burns fat and also helps keep the heart healthy.
When starting off with a carb cycling diet, have your clients
do 20 to 30 minutes of cardio, at least 3 to 4 days per week
(preferably the low and medium carb days, when insulin
levels are lowest). Have them keep their heart rate around
65-70% of their max (220 minus their age = their max.
Multiply that value by .65 to get 65%).
If they are willing and able, it would be beneficial to have
some of their cardiovascular sessions be of the high
intensity interval training nature. These raise the
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Bodyweight
Less than 200 lbs
3 to 8 pounds
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day and that will lower the overall carb consumption (and
insulin response) for the week, and allow for more fat
burning.
You can also increase cardio- by adding additional cardio
days per week, or increasing the duration of the sessions.
So if you have a client that starts off with 2 high carb days
per week, 2 medium carb days, and 3 low carb days, the first
thing you could do when progress plateaus is drop down to 1
high carb day, 3 medium carb days, and 3 low carb days.
You could also add a cardio session on that new medium
day, going from 3 or 4 sessions per week, to 4 to 5. I usually
have my clients do cardio on ALL the medium and low days
per week, so with that setup they would just have the 1 high
day per week as an off day from cardio.
The next time you hit a plateau, you could look at increasing
each cardio session by 10 minutes (from 30 to 40 minutes,
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work done, most notably their thyroid, and for males, their
testosterone levels.
In practically every instance that I have asked them to do
this, the levels come back as lower than normal, to the point
of needing medication to correct (thryoid medication,
testosterone replacement therapy, etc.).
You can have the best plan in the world, but if your
hormones are out of whack, you'll be spinning your wheels
forever.
So if you have a client that been working hard at thediet and
cardio and not seeing the results they should, you might
suggest they talk to their doctor about getting some blood
work done.
Note: Thyroid levels are common on pretty much any
standard blood panel, but testosterone and other sex
hormones are not, so make sure those are requested too if
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8 grams fat
! 1 ! teaspoons all-natural peanut butter
! 1 ! teaspoons healthy oil (olive, flax, walnut, safflower,
etc.)
! 8 fish oil capsules or other encapsulated fats (make sure
theyre 1,000 mg each)
! 16 almonds or other nuts (medium-sized)
10 grams fat
! 2 teaspoons all-natural peanut butter
! 2 teaspoons healthy oil (olive, flax, walnut, safflower, etc.)
! 10 fish oil capsules or other encapsulated fats (make
sure theyre 1,000 mg each)
! 20 almonds or other nuts (medium-sized)
15 grams fat
! 2 tablespoons all-natural peanut butter
! 1 tablespoon healthy oil (olive, flax, walnut, safflower,
etc.)
! 30 almonds (medium-sized)
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Shopping List
This is a basic
shopping list that
you can use to
make sure you
cover all the dieting
necessities.
Not all of these
items are required, but its a good list to work from.
Protein sources
! Boneless, skinless chicken breast
! Top round steak
! Eye of round steak
! Protein powder (whey, casein, egg)
! Fish (salmon, tuna, tilapia, orange roughy)
! Fresh eggs
Carbohydrate sources
! Old-fashioned oats
! Rice (brown, white, basmati)
! Sweet potatoes
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! Green salads
Condiments and spices
! Salt
! Pepper
! Mrs. Dash seasonings
! Cinnamon
! Soy sauce
! Salsa
! Hot sauce
! Dijon mustard
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Additional Tips
! Save time and money by doing all your grocery shopping
on one day each week.
! Buy in bulk. Do your grocery shopping at a warehouse
grocer such as Costco or Sams Club.
! Start off your mornings with a blended shake consisting
of dry oats, a protein powder blend, and some healthy
fats like walnuts or flaxseed oil. Prepare the shake dry
at night by putting all the ingredients in a Tupperware
container. In the morning, all youll have to do is put some
ice and water in the blender, dump in the contents of the
container, and blend for about thirty seconds. This way,
you can prepare and consume your first meal of the day
in just a few minutes.
! Prepare all your meals on one day of the week. Choose a
day when you're not very busy, like Sunday, to cook all
your meats, vegetables, rice, and other foods. Divide
what you prepare into meals that you can freeze in
separate containers (Ziploc, Tuppeware). Then, each
night before you go to bed, take out what you need for
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for an hour or two every day, like the gym that I train at.
There's people that have been there forever and they're
always in there. But they're always fat. Year after year after
year, they're fat. So it's not the training that's not doing it for
them. I can guarantee that every one of them has a crappy
diet outside of the gym. So if you're just looking for cosmetic
effect, if you have to choose I would say choose the diet and
don't even go to the gym. But obviously, having both
together is a better situation.
Where Carb Cycling Comes From
So anyways, I'm most known for being a nutritionist. I myself
am also a competitive bodybuilder. I compete on the national
level. I have actually placed in the top five at the national
level in three different weight classes currently; might be
making that four, eventually. I've also done a little bit of
competing in powerlifting a while back. I suffered some
injuries in powerlifting; had a pec rupture and some shoulder
injuries. So now I focus pretty much on bodybuilding. That's
my passion, for sure.
And I've also written for a lot of magazines; written for Flex
Magazine, Muscle & Fitness, some of the online magazines.
People probably know me from Testosterone Magazine -- TNation -- Want to be Big, etc. So that's who I am.
CM: Yeah. You have a really big following in this community.
And it's funny. You mentioned the fat guys in the gym. And I
call them "the fat guys with great forearms." And I was
actually one before. You're strong as shit; you know what I
mean? But you look like just a guy who works in a
construction site all day. And there are so many dudes in the
gym that have that look. And if they would just dial in their
diet, everything would change.
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a ton of fat. You burn most fat on the low days. So you have
to balance them to get the best of both worlds.
What Foods Should You Be Eating
CM: Let me ask you this. What foods do you suggest people
get their macronutrients from? From the proteins, carbs, and
fat, what kinds of proteins should people be eating, what
kind of carbs, and what kind of fats?
SS: Well, really you can use pretty much anything. But I
don't like a lot of processed foods. A friend of mine once
said, if you can't grill it, pick it, or kill it, you probably
shouldn't be eating it. So in other words, stay to the
perimeter of the grocery store when you're shopping. So
you're looking at meats from the butcher. You're looking at
vegetables; fruits. My main carb sources, what I like my
clients to use is mostly complex carbohydrates like oats,
rice, Ezekiel bread, sweet potatoes. Fruit is also fine.
For proteins, I like a good lean protein; chicken breast,
turkey breast, fish, eggs, egg whites, protein powders, lean
red meat. And then for additional healthy fat sources I like
omega-3 fish oil capsules; omega-6, like evening primrose
oil is a very good oil, good source of GLA -- gamma-linolenic
acid, which is basically a fat that burns fat. And then other
more food fat sources, like nuts, peanut butter, olive oil,
macadamia nut oil, things of that nature.
How Trainers Can Use Carb Cycling For Clients
CM: So let me ask you this. How can trainers use carb
cycling to help their clients get better results?
SS: Well, in the book we have a table where you can go by
bodyweight to come up with a base diet plan for your clients,
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real fine, and eat it. And that's a meal that took you two
minutes to prepare. There's no cooking. There's minimal
cleaning. Anything like that.
Protein Shakes
I definitely don't recommend people trying to do all whole
food every day, because that's just going to turn into a lot of
work. Doing six or seven whole food meals a day is just a big
chore. And it also turns out to be more expensive. So the
protein shakes help with time as well as expense.
CM: I notice you're a big proponent of protein and carb
meals and protein and fat meals. So like on my low days, the
first few meals will be protein and carbs, minimal fats; and
then the last ones are proteins and fats with minimal carbs;
and the high day is mostly protein and carbs throughout the
whole day. And medium, the first meal is protein and carbs;
the last are kind of protein and fat; there's just more carbs in
the protein and carb meals. What is the reasoning behind
not having meals that are high in carbs and fat at the same
time and breaking it up like that?
Mixing Carbs And Fats
SS: Well, to be completely honest, a lot of people think that
you can't mix carbs and fat. And I'll be the first to say that
that's not true. You can mix them. But you have to do it the
right way. And most people don't know how to do it the right
way. They want lots of carbs and lots of fat, because that
equals good -- that tastes good when you mix lots of carbs
and fat.
I separate it mainly -- it's one, for caloric control; two, on a
medium day, you only get so many carbs per day. You're not
getting a ton of carbs on medium days. So you want to have
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the most carbs that you can at the times when you need
them most or should have them most. I like them in meal 1,
meal 2, and then after your workout. So that's three meals
with carbs. And if you get, let's say, 100 grams of carbs per
day, you can maybe do something like 40 in meal 1, 20 in
meal 2, and then 40 in your post-workout meal to make up
the balance in calories in the other meals.
You don't want to just have protein meals. So we add some
healthy fats; maybe olive oil or fish oil or nuts or something
like that. Since you've already used up your carbohydrates
for the day, we switch over to fats in those meals; protein
and fats so you don't really have too big of an insulin jump in
those meals.
Feeling Fuller Longer
And also, the fats help keep you fuller for longer. A lot of
people will tell me that they feel best on low days. They feel
much better on low days than high days. And that's probably
because on high days you get a lot of blood sugar
fluctuations with the carbs. On low days, your blood sugar is
pretty stable because the carbs aren't really high; you're not
going erratic with them. And then, you also get more dietary
fat, which kind of keeps everything slower-digesting and
more stable during the day.
CM: Yeah. I love the high-carb day. The high carb was like
magical to me, especially the next day. And the next day I'd
get awesome workouts. Like I love high-carb days.
SS: I have some clients that don't like them. They say
they're too much work. It's a lot of meals, it's a lot of carbs.
Everyone's different. So it's interesting to hear that.
Bottom line is it works.
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I'm not going to say that results are going to be better with it,
because they probably aren't as long as the rest of the diet is
regulated properly. But I mean, one of the biggest things with
diet success is whether the dieter sticks with it or not. If not
having any cheat meals means they're going to quit the diet,
then obviously you've lost the game immediately. But if going
out to a restaurant meal with their family or friends once a
week and having something a little bit off the diet is enough
of a reward for them to keep motivated and focused during
the rest of the week, then by all means go for it. Keeping on
the diet is the key.
Is Sugar-Free Okay?
I say the same thing with things like diet pop, diet Snapple,
Splenda, spices. There's a website called
WaldenFarms.com. And they sell all these zero-calorie
treats, like barbecue sauce, salad dressing, peanut butter, all
kinds of stuff. My clients ask me about that, and I say, yes,
go for it. Drink as much diet pop as you want. It's zero
calories. Use as much Splenda as you want. Drink as much
diet Snapple as you want if it keeps you on the diet. Because
that's the key. So if your clients have these things that help
them stay on the diet, then by all means let them do it.
CM: Yeah. And what's really helped me -- and I've been
actually 95 percent perfect with your diet -- is the three areas
that are different from what you wanted me to do in the front
that I told you about. You said, hey, as long as you're still
getting results. And one was I love these damn low-carb
Monsters, even though there's six grams of sugar in each
one. And you said, just a couple of week. I actually have a
few of them a day. But that's one thing I've deviated. And
then you were like, no, have a meal after you work out, not
one of these sugary, dextrose-type drinks. But I'm so used to
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them, I kept having those, and I kept doing the cheat meals.
With those three deviations -- and that's really the only place
I've deviated -- I still have gotten amazing results with that
little bit of flexibility. And it's helped me stay on.
SS: Yeah. That's another thing, too. That's what I was
getting at, the flexibility. Allowing some flexibility keeps you
on the diet. And you're seeing progress. That's the key;
you're seeing progress.
Progress On Your Diet
Like we talked about before, you were a very large
individual; 330 pounds. So your metabolism was burning a
lot more calories. You had a little bit more margin for error.
You could do things like that. And also, you're not looking to
get into contest condition. You're not a bodybuilder trying for
4 percent body fat or whatever. So all these things play a
role.
CM: Yeah. Under about 8 or 10 percent really starts to mess
with my chi. I've got businesses and a family and I've got to
be cool to everybody. And I get too low, and I stop being
cool. So I've got to find what's the balance in life for me.
Let me ask you this. Are there any kind of people who should
not want a carb cycling diet?
SS: No. The carb cycling diet is a very balanced diet. I
mean, you're not eliminating any food group. I mean, carb
cycling diet -- you could carb cycle for the rest of your life
and have a better diet than 90 percent of Americans. It's not
like a ketogenic diet, where you eliminate the carbohydrates,
which you can only do for a certain period of time.
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fitness and they just become better people and more positive
and more successful and more happy. So the ripple effect of
what you do here goes far beyond just the trainers and their
clients. It actually goes on and on and on, to many degrees
of separation. So I really want to thank you again, Shelby.
SS: Awesome. Awesome. Thank you, Chris. Thanks for the
opportunity.
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