For my presentation, I will be focusing on “fad” diets and how they affect a person during exercise. Fad diets are diets that are popular for a certain amount of time, similar to scrunchies in the 90’s (but they are making a comeback!) These fad diets are the “get rich quick” way to lose weight, or gain other health advantages, however most of them show no long term benefits because most people go back to their bad habits after a month to 6 weeks.
A lot of these fad diets, such as the “Keto”, “Whole 30”, and “Paleo” diets, want you to completely cut out complex carbs, such as grains, bread, rice, pasta, etc. and your main source of carbohydrates (if any!) are from fruits and veggies. Here is the conundrum… if everyone online and in info-mercials is telling you that to lose weight you need to eat right and exercise, how are you able to exercise if one of your main fuel sources is being completely cut out?
I will admit I have tried some of these fad diets, and working out multiple days a week I did not last very long because I felt so weak when I was at the gym. And once I got home I was looking for as much carbs. as I can possibly get.
So my main question for my presentation would have to be: If you aren’t a highly trained aerobic athlete, how does cutting out carbs./a lot of calories affect your workouts? I believe the results would yield very poor exercise routines after a few days and maybe if you stuck with the fad, which most people do not, your body may acclimate to the food deficit.
This topic is incredibly relevant to my life right now as my entire family decided to try the Whole 30 starting this month. My brother claims he wanted to do it because he’s experiencing a lack of energy and thinks it is more from his diet rather than just getting old. I’m interested to see how it affects him over the 30 day period as someone who exercises and lives a very active lifestyle, compared to my dad who is a firm believer in “mowing the lawn is the best exercise you can get”. Will the sudden change in food sources affect the active person more than the more sedentary person? Will they both be miserable and sluggish and craving a bowl of pasta? And will it actually change their overall lookout on health and fitness like they keep claiming it will? It’ll be incredibly interesting to see how their fad diet plays out alongside the information and data that you find for your presentation.
(I’m an idiot who forgot to log in before commenting so I am very unsure if my comment actually posted the first time so here it is again)
This topic is incredibly relevant to my life right now as my entire family decided to try the Whole 30 diet this month. My brother decided to try it because he is convinced his energy loss is from his diet and not from getting old. I’m interested to see how suddenly cutting out so many food groups affects him as someone who lives an active lifestyle and exercises regularly, compared to my dad who lives a sedentary lifestyle and believes mowing the lawn is the best and only form of exercise he needs. Will it affect my brother more since he needs more fuel sources? Or will he adapt better to the change in diet because it was his idea and he is committed to it (i.e. is there a mental component)? Or will both of them be tired, sluggish, and craving a bowl of pasta by week 2? I’m interested to see how their diet affects their day to day life and see how their experiences correspond to the information you find during your research. I think looking into the mental component (similar to Endure) could be an interesting angle, to see if the motivation for the diet affects the overall success of it.
This is a super cool topic and I’m glad someone is researching it because nutrition plays such an integral role in daily life, exercising, weight maintenance, etc. I completely agree with your point of it not making sense to cut out carbs because it is a main fuel source. I wonder if it’s a lack of education that causes people to want to try these carb-free diets because knowing what I know now about carbs as a fuel source, I definitely wouldn’t try one of the fad diets. I actually tried one last year that was similar to paleo and I didn’t even last 1 week. I felt so sluggish and weak and was super low energy at practice. The one I tried was started by someone who worked at a camp I worked at and it’s called Peak Primal Health. He claims that, like you said, your body gets acclimated to the new, supposedly cleaner, fuel sources. I think your main question is super interesting especially since you’ve had an experience of your own with it so you’ll be able to see how the research compares. Another thing I wonder about is how one of these diets impacts people who don’t really exercise. Do they still feel weaker than normal just going through their daily routine? Or do they not notice as much of a difference?
Lastly, scrunchies have most definitely made a comeback 🙂