Carbs Are A Super-Power: One Piece Got It RIGHT | Carbaphobia In The Fitness World

Carbophobia has gone too damn far. When people first begin training it's hard to separate the noise from the substance and there's a lot of perceived experts out there who want to pray on the insecurities of desperate people by making a narrative worthy of an anime story: that we're being poisoned by carbohydrates and the food scientists that are peddling this highly toxic deadly substance for financial gain. 

Except that's just not the case at all.

Some such claims from carbophobes include that 'fat is the preferred fuel source of the body' & 'when you eat fat, it turns into a fat burner because you're not burning off carbs'

Fat is not your bodies preferred fuel source, glucose is. It's why we store glycogen in the muscles; to use it instantly, fat has to be broken down into the bloodstream to be used.

To say dietary fat becomes a fat burner is a bit of a reach. In a traditional diet there is always a degree of fat & carbohydrate being used for energy which either comes from your food (calories) or your waistline (stored fat when you're in a calorie deficit). This is no different in a low carb diet except that instead of burning dietary carbs, you burn dietary fat instead. Calories are still in play here and matter above all, the amount of dietary fat or carbs burned simply varies in response to the intake in the diet.

So now we've established that neither dietary carbs or dietary fats are fat burners but fuel sources, what matters at this point is the efficiency rate of how carbs or dietary fat is stored as body fat. After all if eating more fat leads us to greater weight loss then there would be an advantage to a low carb diet, right?

Well the efficiency rate of turning carbs into fat through overfeeding humans (via de novo lipogenesis) is 75-85%. The efficiency rate of turning fat into fat through overfeeding humans is 90-95% (Source; https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7598063)

So the idea of eating more fat to burn more fat is not scientifically valid. Losing weight is down to calories whilst muscle retention is down to macronutrients, carbs are not the enemy and come with their own unique benefits. Fats also come with their own unique benefits (hormones, skin quality, joint health etc) so my advice: Eat a high protein diet and count calories for your bodyweight. If your protein remains high (lets say 1g+ per pound of bodyweight) then the carbs and fats should fall into place and you can eat either to your preference.

That's all for now folks, Be More Shonen