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Keto for bodybuilding [Article, free download]

Posted by Pascal Landshoeft

Oct 3, 2019 9:00:00 AM

Keto for bodybuilding

Keto for bodybuilding

 
Keto might not be the perfect pairing for bodybuilding. The most successful bodybuilding diets are usually very high in protein and low in fat and carbohydrates. Even on a bulk, the preferred choice of bodybuilders is usually carbs over fat.
Download 5 free batch cooking plans
 

Keto batch cook

 
By clicking the button above you can get free access to my free batch cooking plans for keto which I have developed together with my wife. I usually take out 4 hours of my weekend to get the food ready for the entire week for us. There is also one pregnancy-friendly batch cook included as my wife craved the carbs when the little one was growing inside of her. Definitely recommend getting into the habit of batch cooking to save money and time. Also gets you some brownie points at home. The plans should save you a month of research and trial and error. Always consult with your doctor first whether you can eat the foods in the diet you are changing too.  

Overview of Keto 

 
The keto diet is a relatively new trend which has its roots in the successful treatment of patients with seizures. While this effect seems quite proven other claimed positive effects of the diet like slowing down cancer, Alzheimer’s and diabetes are still being investigated and the body of long term studies to support these claims still has to grow. 
 
The basic idea of the Ketogenic diet, or short keto diet, is to replace the carbohydrates in your diet through fat. By this, you want to achieve that your body switches into a state where the preferred source of energy is fat instead of carbohydrates. The effect is that your body becomes a fat-burning machine and you lose weight at the places where you normally store surplus fat. 
 
To get into Ketosis on a daily basis is very hard. Depending on the diet you are on the usual recommendation is to stay under 20g of carbohydrates to achieve this. You only look at a big of crisps the wrong way and you are already over that threshold. Eating one apple will also have the same effect. Therefore there are different approaches to the diet of which some make it more palatable than others. 
 
The standard Ketogenic diet divides your macronutrients in 75% fat, 20% protein, and 5% carbohydrates. Calculate whatever the recommended daily intake is based on your gender, age, height, and weight and distribute the calories on the macros accordingly. This version of the diet is very hard to maintain without changing your lifestyle completely and saying no often when food is offered at social occasions. 
 
Another take on the keto diet is the cyclical Ketogenic diet. Here you stick to the diet for five days and allow for more carbohydrates on two days of the week. You might as well call it the “I am allowed treats at the weekend” keto diet. 
 
Another version of the keto diet is the high protein keto diet. Here you apply a split of 60% fat, 35% protein and 5% carbohydrates. This is a version which might be favored by anyone who wants to build muscle. 
 
Things which you can eat on the keto diet
 
  • Meat 
  • Fish
  • Eggs 
  • Butter 
  • Cream 
  • Cheese
  • Nuts 
  • Olive oil 
  • Coconut oil 
  • Avocado 
  • Green vegetable 
  • Tomatoes 
  • Peppers 
  • Small amount of berries 
 
Things which you can’t eat 
 
  • Soda 
  • Fruit juice 
  • Smoothies 
  • Cake
  • Ice cream 
  • Candy 
  • Wheat 
  • Rice 
  • Pasta
  • Cereal
  • Fruit 
  • Peas
  • Beans 
  • Cereal
  • Lentils 
  • Chick peas
  • Potatoes
  • Sweet potatoes
  • Carrots
  • Parsnips 
  • Sauces 
  • Vegetable oil 
  • Mayonnaise 
  • Alcohol 
 

Pros of the Keto diet 

 
Keto is said to have positive effects on the following diseases: 
 
  • Diabetes 
  • Low blood sugar 
  • Epilepsy
  • Alzheimer’s 
  • Cancer 
 
I am no doctor so consult with your specialist for your specific case before deciding to go on the Ketogenic diet. The body of evidence for epilepsy seems to be strong while I always take the claimed benefits for diets to help with cancer and heart disease with a grain of salt before there is a lot of evidence to support it. If you want to sell a diet you have a way easier time if you claim it slows down cancer. So almost any leaflet of diet spinners claims this. What I can say is that I did see a marked improvement in my wife’s fibromyalgia symptoms when we stuck to the keto diet
 
What I can also vouch for is that the keto diet helped us to lose weight before our wedding. I went down by 7kg in 2 months and see wedding pictures look fabulous. I won’t talk about my wife’s weight because a wise man just simply does not. What you have to keep in mind is that any diet will work if you stick to it and there is quite a large body of evidence to support that. The weight loss is usually closer tied to the awareness how much food is eaten and a concerted effort to control it rather than the types of food themselves. 
 
Another benefit of the keto diet is that you can still eat fat. 
 
Steak? No problem. 
Berries with cream? Yes, sir, here we go. 
Platter of cheese? Bring it on 
 
If you like meat a lot and want to do a diet, keto is a great option. 
 
As you eat air of fat there is also a very low risk for you to eat too little calories. Fat is very highly condensed energy which comes in a high calorie per gram count. So eating a lot of fat will get you to your daily calorie prescription fairly fast. This is an area where vegetarians can really struggle without taking supplements. You have to eat a lot of cabbage to make it to 2000 calories. Not so much if you put a nice cream sauce on it. 

 

Cons of the Keto Diet 

 
As with every diet, the biggest con is that you are depriving yourself of an entire component in your diet, carbohydrates. If there is no medical reason to reign this intake in, the risk-reward might be a little of. If your main goal is weight loss this can also be achieved, and maybe even easier is you don’t have to change your cooking, by taking control of your portions, cutting out desserts and alcohol. 
 
There are also claims that the higher intake of fat makes it more likely for you to get kidney stones. Your gut health might also be negatively impacted. 
 
A big personal downside to the keto diet for me is that it becomes very hard to have a proper side to your main meal. Most side dishes have a lot of carbohydrates in them so you end up only eating the meat and cheese. This went so far for my wife and me that we needed to take a break. It also doesn’t really work when your pregnant. 
 

Alternatives to the Keto diet 

 
There are alternatives to the keto diet if you don’t find this appealing. Some of them are: 
 
 
The low-fat diet was the trend which was based on studies that a high intake of fat would lead to cardiac arrest and other problems in your blood system. With the surge of the keto diet, these studies are being contested. Still, for decades, low fat was the way to go when you were on a diet. What food producers did not tell you was that they still wanted their products to taste nice so that you keep eating them. Things usually taste nice when they either have fat or sugar in them. When you combine both in a cake it is extra delicious. As food producers couldn’t add fat they opted for sugar. 
 
If you like sweet things you can try juicing. Juicing is a diet where you only take in food in liquid form in the form of juices. As with every diet, the idea is to cut out certain foods to make you lose weight and be healthier. The main effect is that you switch from stuffing anything in front of you in your mouth to making More deliberate decisions. 
 
Weight watchers or slimming world are dieting concepts where foods are being attributed points. For each day you get a certain number of points which you can use up. It doesn’t matter what you eat, as long as you don’t go over your daily allowance of points. You can even bank your points and budget for a week. Once a week or month you will meet with your local group to be held accountable for progress. My wife tried it and I went to one of the meetings with her. She didn’t stick long to it. To be honest, me and my wife usually like to do our own thing. For someone who likes to meet with other people to talk about their struggles on a regular basis this concept might be more appealing. There are many examples where weight watchers worked. Again, this is back to portion control, if your goal is weight loss. 
 

Bodybuilding

 
Bodybuilding has been made really famous by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the golden age of the sport. These were the sixties and seventies. Since then the industry has gotten a bit of a bad reputation because of steroids. Still, bodybuilding is a very popular sport all over the world and has many followers. 
 
The main goal in bodybuilding is to pack on the most amount of muscle onto your body in an aesthetically pleasing way. Here is where it gets a little fuzzy and always depends on the federation you are competing in and who is judging the event. Generally speaking aesthetically pleasing means in the context of bodybuilding that your body shape is symmetrical and you can see the Definition of the muscles. This is usually achieved by sculpting the body with different exercises and depleting it from water. Extreme dieting is, therefore, a steady component of bodybuilding as athletes go from the extreme of adding as much body mass as possible to the other extreme of depleting it of water and cutting fat to reach stage readiness. 
 
What else to consider for bodybuilding:
 
 

Pros of Bodybuilding

 
Bodybuilding will teach you a lot about the anatomy and functions of the body. As you have to know the names of the muscles you need to develop and show it has a higher emphasis on actually studying how the body works compared to CrossFit and powerlifting where you mostly focus on the performance rather than how the performance changes your body. The same goes for dieting and knowing more about foods. Bodybuilders are also more likely to develop skills in cooking as it is more likely that they want to have full control of their body. 
 

Cons of Bodybuilding

 
A big con of bodybuilding is that it is one of the sports where it is most apparent that success can not be obtained without using steroids. This makes it expensive and dangerous to your health, if you buy into the “any means necessary” mindset. Anything that involves injecting yourself on a regular basis for no apparent medical reason comes with a lot of health risks attached. Bodybuilders are also known for not being the best when it comes to endurance training. So if you want to run a marathon, maybe don’t go down this route. 
 

Alternatives to Bodybuilding 

 
Some alternatives to bodybuilding are 
 
 
Calisthenics is a relatively new trend which uses pull up bars and other machinery that you would usually find in a playground or outdoor exercise ground access to the public. The physiques some of these athletes achieve are as impressive as the ones from bodybuilding, just not as big. 
 
Gymnastics can be considered the classic form of calisthenics. The sport is Olympic and there are many different disciplines you can try. The physiques which are produced by this sport are also well defined and balanced and usually pleasing to the eye. 
 
Ballet, even though a more surprising addition to this list or dancing in general also sculpts some very impressive physiques. An added bonus to dancers is that they can go for hours. 
 

Keto for bodybuilding

 
Bodybuilding diets which are successful usually include chicken, rice and broccoli. Fat is often not that present in the diets of bodybuilders who make it to the top. Therefore bodybuilding might not be the best choice for you when you are going on a bulk or want to look your best onstage.
 
 
 
 

Topics: Keto