Sorry, keto fans, you're probably not in ketosis (2018)

It looks like a pretty typical keto/low carb hit job piece.

You get a couple quotes from nutritionists who are ignorant of the current science, add a couple turns-out facts, and you have a great click bait article.

I recently started a keto-style (high fat low carb) diet after reading a book on fasting [0]. I also picked up a ketone/glucose meter out of curiosity. Much as the book describes, fast for about 24-36+ hours and there's a good chance you'll be in ketosis.

After about 36 hours I've consistently measured 1.3-6 mmol/L. Between 48-60 hours I've measured around 4.4-4.6. As I understand it, anything above 0.5 is essentially ketosis. I agree with you in that, at least to me, there is a feeling of when you are in ketosis.

Ketosis is the generation of ketone bodies in the absence of glucose, ketoacidosis it the generation of ketone bodies despite the fact that the bloodstream is flush with glucose. Ketoacidosis is clearly a real concern, however as I understand it it's primarily an issue for type-1 diabetics.

This article feels awfully superficial, but I find the final statement, "maybe not being in ketosis isn’t so bad after all—now just cut back on the saturated fats", to be very reasonable.

[0] https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Guide-Fasting-Intermittent-A...

Sure blood is much more accurate than urine, but it's my understanding that the urine strips will at least tell you reliably if you're in ketosis or not. The ketone concentrations just might not have a simple mapping onto your blood ketone concentrations.

Build muscle and make sure you have enough protein intake to burn the fat while you do it:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/26817506/

You should also note that type of calories is more important than overall calorie count. Make sure that lean meats and vegetables are a large portion of your diet. Minimize processed food intake. Use carbs as side dishes, not main courses.

Fasting is the best way to burn fat. Either intermittently or for extended periods of time. I've done 7 day water fasts with minimal muscle loss. Caloric deficits don't work longterm since you're decreasing your basal metabolic rate, so your body needs less calories to maintain your weight. Whereas when you fast, the opposite occurs. Your basal metabolic rate goes up. This makes sense from an evolutionary perspective, since if you're going long periods without food, you want to make sure you have sufficient energy to actually chase down some prey. This is why your noradrenaline and VO2 max increase during a fast.

> I am in a caloric deficit and do long exercises but I'm not sure if it actually works

Being in caloric deficit while exercising must work by definition. All advice that I've seen for exercising though is that, modulo specific advice from your doctor[0], you should do high intensity heavy lifting exercise (like squats) for shorter periods for maximum effect. It's both more gratifying (and therefore sustainable) and more efficient.

[0] - a person who suffers from lumbar disc degeneration, for instance, could carry only half or less of the weight but do their squats one leg at a time with a balance assist for the same overall muscle building with significantly less back strain.

Use exercises that burn a lot of energy. High intensity is most effective. Energy will be taken from all deposits, trying to target only fat deposits is very inefficient when it comes weight loss. If you want to keep as much muscle mass as possible use muscle building exercises.

I'm sure you're doing fine. If your weight's down, how aren't you burning fat? Concerns about burning too much muscle IMO are extremely overblown for most people. I would recommend the eye test (look in the mirror) or feel test (poke at your flabs). Progress pics might help. I think there's calipers and other measurement tools too.

Keep in mind your fat deposits will get smaller, but they don't go away. You'll likely still have some flab, even if you're pretty lean. The process is also very gradual. I'm 6'2" male and had a gut/tits @185lb, and even in high school @155lb. In either case, it was still quite noticeable, unfortunately.

If you haven't put on enough muscle already, that could seriously effect your results. There's still benefits to maintaining strength / muscle even during weight loss, but progress will be slow. Generally, you just want to get a balance of nutrients, and be at caloric deficit. You'll lose fat, that's it.

I was 240 went on antibiotics.. cipro was the last. Completely changed my gut bacteria. Lost 70 pounds in a month..over a hundred a year later. Wish I could weigh more.

Gut bacteria is the key.

Keto is great. I've been in ketosis for a year now and can even eat a moderate amount of fruit. The only complex carbs I eat is fibre. I also eat quite a bit of protein including shakes. I combine this with endurance exercise. I didn't need to lose any weight and still lost 10kg. I have to add ~1000 calories of virgin coconut/olive oil to my diet daily to maintain my weight. Pretty sure the article is factually incorrect.

It happens a LOT ... many people "try" keto, but they wind up just eating low calorie, cutting the carbs, but not adding fattier foods in. You still want a calorie deficit and it isn't magic. Calories and Hormones (insulin, etc) are both huge, overriding factors.

I run anywhere from 30 to 70 miles per week and I just couldn't follow a keto diet. I have a hard time even just picturing it. Just the other day I was reading about a recent study showing that low-carb diets affect your running. That already made intuitive sense if you had been in a marathon and hit the proverbial wall at mile 20, roughly when you have depleted the glycogen stores in your legs and start burning fat. Of course the general population is different and doesn't obsess over their 10K times.

There are other factors that play a major role. I don't like meat much. I'm lactose intolerant. I've always had a sugar tooth. Thanks to lucky genes, a very active thyroid and the running, though, my body fat stays around 8-9%. Over the years, I learned to crave carbs less and to pay more attention to protein. I do some form of intermittent fasting, by accident, in the sense that I have early dinner, mostly for sleep hygiene, and rarely eat again until after my morning run, about 14 hours later.

There's no single approach that works for everyone, of course. Worse than that, though, is that even if you find the motivation to try a variety of them, you probably want to spend at the very least several weeks on each before you can start extrapolating useful observations.

While I agree with you... Keto is best for people who are type 2 diabetic or borderline. And with that I would say Paleo + Keto macro profile. If you are closer to a healthy weight, then Paleo and good habits goes a long way. One Meal a Day also helps a lot simply because it's harder to overeat in a single meal.

IMHO grains/refined carbs (bread/starch/pasta) etc should be limited to a couple meals a week... and refined sugars should be limited to one or two treats a month.

Is food as a hobby and an escape anything new? There have been feasts since the beginning of time. You can find plenty of stories of people enjoying making and eating food before the modern time. I do agree it's much more widespread now. Also, food has become extremely affordable. Totally agree about our sedentary lives though.

100% agreed, the issue I have with Keto and other related fashionable diets is that for the majority of people who attempt they aren't necessary to what they are trying to achieve and like you say, born out of poor relationship to food and health.

As someone who has also tried a lot of different diets and training plans to me the most sane approach to weight loss is still moderation with calorie/macro tracking which is far simpler to implement, not restrictive and personally, more enjoyable.

Every individual on the planet has a different optimal diet. Any generic advice is useless.