Weight Gain On 1000 Calories A Day?

This post, like last weeks “controversial cholesterol” article will probably spark a raft of interesting emails in my mail box.

However, like everything I post i am keen to show you the “other” side of conventional wisdom. The problem with conventional wisdom in health and fitness is that it obviously isn’t working! If it was working we wouldn’t have the state of health at all time lows that we do today.

I’ve spent much of my career in the fitness industry fighting against the idea of counting calories as a way to control weight and fat levels. The idea of ‘calories in vs calories out’ has never really made much sense. If we believed that 1000 calories of snickers bars and 1000 calories of brocolli created the same results then we are just fooling ourselves!

The study I am quoting here is not exactly new (Kekwick and Pawan 1956), but extremely illuminating.

I actually found this study quoted in the most recent book by Tim Ferris (The 4 Hour Body), and interesting this whole book is a great example of breaking conventional wisdom!

The study includes a semi-starvation diet of 1000 calories a day, with three groups on calorically equal diets with 90% fat diet (yes this is possible, think eskimos eating whale meat), 90% Protein or 90% carbohydrate.

The results are just plain incredible:

The Fat group, on 1000 calories a day, 90% being Fat LOST on average 408g weight per day
The Protein group, on 1000 calories a day, 90% being Protein LOST on average 272g weight per day
The Carbohydrate group on 1000 calories a day, 90% being Carbs GAINED on average 108g weight per day

Whilst it is impossible to really understand how well the people on the study maintained strict control on such a diet, the results given show a significant trend (half a kilo difference in weight loss per DAY between the Fat group and Carb group). If we were looking at smaller differences you would dismiss the significance of the study!

There are two things to take away from this information.

1. 1000 calories a day diet and you can still GAIN weight if you consume the wrong food stuffs!
2. A calorie is quite clearly NOT a calorie. So it kinda makes the whole concept of counting calories or points utterly POINTLESS

Whilst I will not be converting my own nutrition plan to a 90% FAT based diet any time soon, it does mean that the “Fat makes you Fat” statement you hear and read is rubbished as well.

What can you take away from this information for your own use on a day to day basis?

I would certainly say you can ditch the calorie counting charts for a start. But how should we be controlling our food portions so we don’t eat too much?

Your body is the perfect self regulation tool, BUT (and this IS important), only if you are consuming the types of foods you body can easily self regulate, for example I challenge anyone to eat too MUCH brocolli, it takes the body just too long to consume large enough quantities to over eat. On the other hand, we all know that we can eat just too much bread, or pasta, chocolate cake… these food stuffs are much harder for the body to self regulate.

Stick to the obvious eat clean, natural produce as much and as often as you like and you really can’t go wrong!

Feel free to fire the comments at me again, I don’t mind… If we manage to break a few conventional wisdoms along the way and forge a healthier world then I’m all for that.