Newbie Question?

[brianj]

I am a new Vegan (only a few months) and I have a question. A few friends of mine were debating recently which diet was "better" for body fat reduction, Low Carbohydrate diets or a no carbohydrate diet. One guy is a natural bodybuilder who has been competing in local contest for the last seven years. He maintains a body fat percentage year round of less than 12% and lowers his body fat to 6% for contest. The other guy is a former "fat" guy who went from 398lbs. to 178lbs. today, in less than two years. The bodybuilder swears that after seven years of competition he has found that the only successful way to reduce his body fat to such low numbers is through a low carbohydrate ketogenic diet. Our other friend who focused on eating low-fat foods to loose his weight said his diet was best.

How can a Vegan Practice A Ketogenic Diet?

Any response would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you,

Brian[/URL]

[NZVeggie]

Ketogenic diets are a great way of losing weight quickly.... but they are also extremely unhealthy in the long run.

Ketogenesis is associated with starvation. Basically your body thinks its starving if you don't get enough carbohydrates. In the long term this can damage your health, plus you put the weight back on very quickly because your body doesnt know when its going to eat again so it stores everything. A low fat diet on the other hand retrains your body and means that the weight loss will be a long term change... as long as your lifestyle reflects this.

As a vegan I imagine it would be quite difficult to sustain a no carb diet.... as that would require high protein foods to fill you up typically meat/dairy based foods. Although with enough planning you could probably do it, though you might not get much variation in your diet an need a multi-vit.

[Caroline G.]

I second that, NZVeggie! Low carb diets are extremely effective in losing weight quickly but are extremely dangerous if continued over a long period. Also, when you stop the low carb diet, the weight immediately reappears, so it isn't an effective way to keep weight off. Did you know there's a vegan bodybuilding website? If you Google it, I'm sure there's lots of discussion on their forums about this.

[godxisxagnostic]

well you probably shouldn't go on a super low carb diet but i've seen a ton of articles on law carb veggie diets. i'd think you just eat a lot of tofu, nuts, beans, and vegetables, as well as seitan i guess.

it would probably get pretty boring and id think you wouldn't feel too hot but it is doable. most vegetables are pretty low carb.

[SunVamp]

Eat a variety of foods without animal products, and exercise moderately, and you should lose weight, I reckon.