Dogface that IS odd. I clicked the link yesterday before making my second post (to count up the cites) and it doesn’t work today.
If you’re interested in the answer to your question then I guess we’ll all have to wait for the Atkins center to get their site back up 
(whole thing is down)
“Canadian” counts as a “descent” nowadays? When did that happen?
Sounds to me like a version of the so-called Paleo-diet.
I’m in a bit of a timecrunch, but the paleodiet is based on foods that our bodies were designed for thousands of years ago (hence the ‘paleo’)
Paleoman didn’t know such things as legumes, starches, processed sugar, partly hydrogenated…, high fructose corn syrup…You can eat as much as you want as long as you stay away from things like candy, pasta, bread, dairy, beans, etc, etc…my partnet has be paleoing for 2 years and never felt any better.
Just Google Paeo diet…
Sounds to me like a version of the so-called Paleo-diet.
I’m in a bit of a timecrunch, but the paleodiet is based on foods that our bodies were designed for thousands of years ago (hence the ‘paleo’)
Paleoman didn’t know such things as legumes, starches, processed sugar, partly hydrogenated…, high fructose corn syrup…You can eat as much as you want as long as you stay away from things like candy, pasta, bread, dairy, beans, etc, etc…my partnet has be paleoing for 2 years and never felt any better.
Just Google Paleo diet…
Sounds to me like a version of the so-called Paleo-diet.
I’m in a bit of a timecrunch, but the paleodiet is based on foods that our bodies were designed for thousands of years ago (hence the ‘paleo’)
Paleoman didn’t know such things as legumes, starches, processed sugar, partly hydrogenated…, high fructose corn syrup…You can eat as much as you want as long as you stay away from things like candy, pasta, bread, dairy, beans, etc, etc…my partnet has be paleoing for 2 years and never felt any better.
Just Google Paleo diet…
Sounds to me like a version of the so-called Paleo-diet.
I’m in a bit of a timecrunch, but the paleodiet is based on foods that our bodies were designed for thousands of years ago (hence the ‘paleo’)
Paleoman didn’t know such things as legumes, starches, processed sugar, partly hydrogenated…, high fructose corn syrup…You can eat as much as you want as long as you stay away from things like candy, pasta, bread, dairy, beans, etc, etc…my partnet has be paleoing for 2 years and never felt any better.
Just Google Paleo diet…
Or see paleodiet.com.
Sorry I haven’t been back yet - I’ve been reading the responses, but usually at work, when I can’t post!
This actually surprises me, especially because of the EXTENT of the no-carbness of his diet. I knew a little about the idea behind Atkin’s, but I never really read too much about it. I thought it was a minimum of carbs, but not an exclusion of it. I never made the connection with diabetes, although my aunt is diabetic. Even she eats SOME carbs from cereal and potato sources!
I guess part of me was kind of hoping this would be bad for him, because I dislike the guy intensely, and find him very ignorant and crude in almost everything else he talks about (and he talks a lot). It’s mean of me, I know, and I don’t really wish ill health on him, but more of an I-told-you-so kind of thing. Although it isn’t as if there aren’t enough opportunities for me to shut him up when he spewes some of his stupid and bigoted and ignorant nonsense! I know none of my complaints have anything to do with his diet, but…well, as I said, I dislike him, and I’d never heard of such an extreme diet actually being good for you! Consider some of my ignorance fought and beaten!
Not that it’s a diet I could live with. I survive off pasta
Thanks for all the responses so far!
I pointed you to their bibliography, which in turn points you to publications in peer-reviewed journals. Would you rather I had copied and pasted the links and not told you where I found them?
If they were promoting anything, would they be impartial any longer?
Last I heard (a few months ago), the US Department of Human Service and Health (or whatever it’s called nowadays) was just getting started on organising a large-scale prospective study.
Meanwhile, I seem to be doing okay.
Regards,
Agback
Eggs don’t contribute signifigantly to blood cholesterol. This is supported by findings by the Journal of the American Medical Association.
http://www.mercola.com/1999/archive/egg_a_day_ok.htm
And I agree with Ultrafilter, this works out way too much. Lifting for two hours will only slow gains, doing this two hours a day, FIVE days a week is just madness. His gains are probably non existant. However his diet seems just fine.
just because we evolved on a certain diet does not mean it is best for us. it just means that we can survive it.
eliminating high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated fat and other wonders of food processing is of course a good idea
but eliminating legumes is not.
Agback, flaxseed oil is bad for you? I never heard that before. I thought it was one of the best.
I don’t see anything wrong with what he’s doing.
I’m on a low carb diet myself. I’ve lost 40 pounds since January, have much more energy than I had before, eat like a goddess, and my cholesterol levels are lower than my low fat counterparts.
If you get right down to it, what did cavemen eat? It wasn’t pasta, baby! And it certainly wasn’t donuts. Your co-worker is on the right track. It’s a natural diet. He’s fine.
It is supposed to be very good for you under the belief that polyunsaturated oils are good for you. Flaxseed oil is 75% polyunsaturated.
But it seems that the belief that polyunsaturated oils are good is based on two errors. The first is that when evidence that olive oil helps stave off arterial disease first emerged it was over-generalised to unsaturated oils (whereas in fact the important consideration seems to be that olive oil contains a proportion of the universal fatty acid linoleic acid, and the saturated fats used in teh comparison contained high proportions of arachidonic acid). The second error was the wholly unsupported belief that if mono-unsaturated oils are good, poly-unsaturates must be better. There never was the slightest evidence for this.
The upshot of this pair of errors is that people have started eating rapeseed (canola) and linseed (flaxseed) oils, which we never used to do. And they turn out to contain 10% and 57% alpha-linolenic acid respectively.
Data from well-conducted prospective studies of diet are (so far as I know) lacking, but biochemistry suggests that ALA interferes with the action of Delta-6 desaturase in such a fashion as (indirectly) to constrict arteries, suppress the immune system, increase inflammation, decrease oxygen transport, promote the aggregation of platelets, constrict airways in the lungs, and promote the proliferation of cells.
Of course, this is all according to those horrid Dr MR Eades MD and Dr MD Eades MD, who are wickedly promoting a low-carbohydrate diet, and therefore not to be trusted. Try Googling such terms as “alpha-linolenic acid”, “delta-6 desaturase”, “linoleic acid”, “series II eicosanoid”, “arachidonic acid” for utterly reliable information from random posters to the Web.
Regards,
Agback
This is mostly anecdotal…
I work out regularly. 5 days/week weight training w/ 20 min cardio sessions on 3 of those days. I did the atkins thing kinda loosely (ate very little carbs, cheated at most twice per week but usually not at all), and IMO atkins doesn’t work well for those who are weight-training.
You will lose some weight initially, but working out seems to REQUIRE a balanced diet. I posted my diet to a website (seems to be excellent resource for working out; forums are full of useful info), and I was told to increase my complex carb. intake.
The site is www.abcbodybuilding.com
Once I included slow-cooking oatmeal & sweet potatos/yams to my diet, I found it MUCH easier to maintain lean body mass. All of my lifts have gone up, yet my weight has remained about the same. I haven’t had my body-fat % tested accurately so I can’t be more specific. I do notice that my arms are more cut & my waist is a little thinner. This is over a 2-month time frame.
other random comments:
From what I’ve read, fructose is a poor source for sugar. Articles on the site that I linked state that fructose has a tendency to be processed through the liver which apparently makes it more likely to be stored as fat. I presume other complex carbs are metabolized differently.
“Starvation mode” is FOR REAL. By limiting the amount of complex carb intake (only getting sugar from fruits & fibrous carbs from veggies), it is HIGHLY LIKELY that your friend is forcing his body to store excess calories as fat.
Other articles linked on www.abcbodybuilding.com state that working out for over 1.5 hrs can be detrimental depending on one’s diet. IANAEndocrinologist, but the site I linked seems convincing about the effects of cortisol release after weight-training & cortisol’s effect on protein synthesis & metabolism.
I’m not sure how your friend spends his time at the gym, but you may want to link him to the site I refer to for info. I’ve gotten a lot there.
Specifically, that site advocates spiking a post-workout protein shake w/ dextrose & maltodextrin after working out. The site mentions that an increase in insulin level after weight-training will counteract the stimulus for the release of cortisol, and adds that after weight-training your body is less-likely to store the extra carbs as fat. I.E. the extra sugar will be used to replenish muscle energy stores before anything else.
I lost my anatomy & physiology text, so I don’t have a really easy way to confirm part of this, but if anyone here knows about the subject, can you please comment on this?
Thanks.
Agback, Flax oil is not good for you because its polyunsaturated but specifically because most of that polyunsaturated in it is Omega3. Modern diet is deficient in Omega3. Corn or Canola is also polyunsaturated but is BAD for you because it has much Omega6 and little to no Omega3. Omega3 to Omega6 ballance in the diet is what taking Flax is about.
there, well canola doesn’t look so bad, but still.
a ratio of 1/3 to 1/1 is advocated for Omega3/Omega6 and a typical diet has a lot less Omega3 than that.
one probelm with polyunsaturates ( both Omega3 and Omega6 are polyunsaturates ) i hear is that they’re easily oxidized. so too much of them is probably bad.
the idea is to both supplement Omega3 ( Flax oil, Fish ) and to limit Omega6 ( Corn oil, Soybean oil ).