The Ultimate Diet 2.0
BOOK EXCERPT
By Lyle McDonald
Read this first if you are not knowledgeable in low-carb dieting
Chapter 1: What this book is and who it's for
So here we are again, another book, another chapter on defining the problems. If you read my last book, you already probably have some idea what I'm going to say. In short, dieting to low bodyfat levels sucks. Actually, dieting sucks across the board but the real problems start when you start to get far below normal. So what's normal?
In modern times, an average male may be carrying 18-25% bodyfat, an average female 21-28%. Many, many (too many) people are much fatter than that.
Healthy bodyfat levels are considered to be 11-18% for men and 18-25% for women. To the body-obsessed, except maybe at the lower levels, that's still fat. Male bodybuilders (and other athletes) think in terms of sub-10% bodyfat levels, females typically in the low to mid teens. Researchers would probably debate the validity of such beliefs but who cares; if you believe it, it's true to you. Perhaps more important is that it is your goal.
Most diets or diet books are aimed at the folks who are trying to get somewhere in the realm of average. There are tons to choose from out there. Any discovery or piece of research that might affect these folks can be turned into a quick fix diet book. One of these days, I'm going to write my own, make a zillion dollars and retire.
For obese folks just trying to lose weight, pretty much any non-retarded diet will work. The main issues to deal with there have more to do with anxiety and the issues involved in changing long-term eating and activity patterns. And even though some readers might disagree, getting a male to 12-15% bodyfat or a female into the 18-22% range usually isn't that difficult. Basic food control, adequate protein and exercise will usually get it done without too much trouble. This book isn't aimed at either group.
By the time folks get to the 12-15% (18-22% for women) range, anxiety, food control and changing habits usually aren't the problem. For bodybuilders and athletes meticulous food control and training is part of the lifestyle. It's when folks start trying to achieve the lower extremes of bodyfat percentage that other problems start to occur. Ravenous hunger, severe muscle loss, metabolic slowdown and screwed up hormones are a few of the usual problems. Women and some men have an additional problem mobilizing and getting rid of stubborn fat (hip/thigh area for women, ab/low-back fat for men).
In presenting the UD2, I'm going to assume that you already have the discipline and anxiety issues well under control. While they are less of a problem on this diet than on many others, it's the real physiological problems I'm setting out to address and fix.
Who am I?
I imagine most readers know me as the author of The Ketogenic Diet, which is more or less considered to be the be-all, end-all book on low-carbohydrate dieting. Fewer readers seem to be aware of my second book, which dealt with the drug Bromocriptine. If you've read either book, you'll have a better background to understand the information in this book. If not, don't worry, I'll try to give you enough background to understand the UD2. To be honest, to give the rationale for everything in detail would take more pages than I want to take. I'm going to cover the basics and you'll just have to take my word for the rest.
Who are you?
So who are you, the ideal UD2 candidate? Actually, let me backpedal a bit and talk about who this diet isn't for. It's not for rank beginners. The training and dietary recommendations simply aren't appropriate for someone just starting out. Get 3-6 months of basic training under your belt and get your basic diet dealt with first before even considering the system described in this book. As above, it's not for the general fat folks out there. In general, until males hit 12-15% bodyfat and females 20-22% bodyfat, a more standard approach is probably fine (and desirable). I recommend folks use the simplest approaches they can until those approaches stop working.
First and foremost, if you're a male, you should have no more than 15% bodyfat, female no more than 22% bodyfat. Most likely you want to get leaner while maintaining or even increasing muscle mass. This could be for a bodybuilding contest, for some special event, or simply because you want to see where the body has veins. Alternately, you may want to gain muscle without the accompanying fat gain (or even slight fat loss). Perhaps you're a performance athlete like a powerlifter or an endurance athlete who needs to lean out while maintaining performance. The UD2 can be used for all those goals.
It should go without saying that you have to be exercising for the diet to work. By exercise, that means weight training (I'll talk about endurance athletes separately). Again, if you're new to weight training, the UD2 isn't appropriate; get 3-6 months of training under your belt first. If you're not planning on exercising, this diet will not do you any good. In fact, it'll probably just make you fatter.
You'll need a reasonable (but not insane) amount of diet discipline and you should have a basic understanding of nutrition and diet setup. If you don't know what a protein or carbohydrate is, or how to set up a diet, you're going to be totally lost reading this. I've tried my best to provide all the information you need but I'm going to make some assumptions about basic knowledge. If you meet this rather narrow set of criteria, read on.
Why not just use standard dieting approaches?
You may be wondering why you shouldn't just use one of the myriad standard dieting programs out there. I mean, pick up any bodybuilding magazine, and there are tons of plans that claim to let you achieve everything the UD2 does without all of the hassle. Why is the UD2 superior?
The main problem I have with the standard advice is that it's just so standard. High protein, low to moderate fat, low to moderate carbohydrates, weight training and aerobics is the standard prescription for getting ripped up. If all of the magazines are writing it, it must work, right? Well, yes, up to a point.
Frankly, I have no problem with the standard advice as long as it's producing results. As I said above, I actually prefer simpler approaches as long as they work. In many people, who frequently have genetic advantages that they might not even be aware of, they work just fine. But based on observations at the gym and the feedback I get, not everybody is so lucky (I'll talk about some of the reasons the genetically lucky are lucky next chapter). The reality is, only a small portion of the people who try actually achieve their goals using the standard advice. That tells me that, standard or not, it's not effective.
And don't get me started on the advice given by pro bodybuilders. It shouldn't even be taken into consideration unless you've got the array of steroids, thyroid medications, thermogenics and appetite suppressants that they use to get ready for a contest. A current pro is reported to have said the following about contest dieting "There is no magic diet, buy as many drugs as you can afford and starve yourself for as long as you can stand it."
For the majority, the genetically average (or disadvantaged), any number of problems can stop the diet in its tracks. A metabolically average dieter may lose 1 lb of muscle for every 3 lbs of fat lost trying to get to single digit bodyfat levels. Women have even more problems with muscle loss, not to mention issues with lower bodyfat mobilization. For some, metabolic adaptation causes fat loss to slow or stop completely long before goals are reached. There are all kinds of reasons these problems occur, most of which can be traced to the body's many annoying ways of adapting to a diet. Those same individuals have an equally hard time adding muscle without gaining too much bodyfat at the same time. Fundamentally, this is an issue of partitioning, where the calories are going (or coming from) when you eat (or diet).
What you should expect during the diet
I'll say up front that the UD2 is not an easy diet. You'll have to count/decrease calories and carbohydrates 3-5 days out of every 7. While you don't get to eat everything in sight on the other days, it'll sure seem like it. On some days you can even eat some junk food.
If you use the fat loss variant, you should be losing a pound or more of fat per week, while gaining some muscle. At the very least you'll maintain muscle without loss which can be an improvement for most people. Performance athletes can lean out while maintaining or even increasing performance as well. For the muscle gain variant, it's a little harder to predict. Women, of course, will have slightly smaller changes overall for what should be obvious reasons.
Despite what you may be used to, you'll only be lifting 4 days per week. Each workout should take about an hour or so, with one running maybe an hour and a half. If you can't find 4 hours per week to train consistently, this diet won't do you much good. Cardio is optional for men, but generally necessary for women to lose their lower bodyfat at any decent rate. Still, you shouldn't need a ton of cardio with this diet, not nearly as much as you think anyhow.
There are only one or two required supplements, although there are some that can be genuinely helpful. Beyond that, the diet revolves around basic foods that you can get at any supermarket (I assume that bodybuilders and athletes have no problem with protein powder). While I'll mention drug options to further optimize the diet, they are by no means required.
Copyright Lyle McDonald
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