Why do people get freaked out (GOMAD)

[Mehdi]

I am not suggesting some wierd health magazine diet that tries to avoid all sorts of fat, nor am I suggesting to cut out milk from your diet. I am merely against the idea of adding a major caloric excess with the greatest benefit being your put on a lot more fat compared to a diet that also consists of plenty of fats, protein and cholesterol enhancing food sources, but is putting you in less of a caloric excess.
There is indeed way more to gaining muscle than caloric excess. There is also more to gaining muscle than just drinking a lot of milk.

It may be me, but if I am to put on more weight I'd prefer it'd be muscle over fat. Although you can be too fuzzy about gaining fat, you can also be too careless in my opinion.

As mjh pointed it out and after rereading my post, I realize I may have come on more aggressively than I intended and if anyone feel insulted, be assured that it wasn't my intention. I don't think of Killerdude as ignorant in anyway nor am I trying to make judgements on anyone.

Anyway, I think I explained why I would be freaked out if someone told me I should drink an additional gallon of milk each and every day.

The problem with people giving opinions about things that they a) haven't tried themselves b) haven't seen work on somebody else c) have personal issues with for whatever reasons, is that they're speaking from their own limited point of view. You're stuck within your own thinking which prevents you to see the full picture.

For you the issue is avoiding body fat.
1) You won't gain more fat than muscle. You gain 2-3% body fat per month and most of it is gone when you stop the gomad. Actually one guy I'm coaching now gained 11kg during the past 4 weeks and his body fat didn't move (unless measurement is incorrect, waiting for pics). Please explain why you think you're going to gain more fat than muscle, I really would like to know where your thinking comes from.
2) Someone who is skinny often has about 10% body fat (exception skinny fat, but they should do it too). So they don't need to worry about 2-3% fat gain.
3) Whatever weight gain approach you choose, you'll be gaining fat anyway.

Put yourself in the shoes of someone who is skinny so you see the full picture:
* has tried everything, nothing works, believes he'll always be skinny
* tried to eat more but feels like vomiting all the time
* doesn't see progress, loses motivation, gives up, really believes he'll always be skinny now
* starts to believe they need steroids to do the job

You're only seeing "avoid fat loss". So you're recommending the slow route which is to eat more solid food. Liquid food is easier. Yes there's the bloating and what else, but they see weight gain the first week so that inspires them to continue.

Because in the end it's not the appraoch that matters. It's consistency. And to be consistent, especially coming from a frame of mind of "I can't do it, nothing ever has worked", seeing with your eyes the weight increase fast is the best way to get rid of those crappy believes you've put in your head.

[NoGood]

1) You won't gain more fat than muscle. You gain 2-3% body fat per month and most of it is gone when you stop the gomad. Actually one guy I'm coaching now gained 11kg during the past 4 weeks and his body fat didn't move (unless measurement is incorrect, waiting for pics). Please explain why you think you're going to gain more fat than muscle, I really would like to know where your thinking comes from.

Why won't you gain more fat than muscle? You are saying that if you put on 25lbs in 25 days (which you advertise with) you would have put on at least 12,5lbs of muscle? This may be possible in extreme cases as a natural or with steroids, but not for normal individuals. This applies in the case you are talking about as well. If what you are saying is true, he gained 8,8kg of muscle (with a stable 20% bodyfat) which is what you can usually achieve within a year of training, although it is often more as a beginner and less as an advanced.

What makes you think fat disappears once you stop the gomad? Fat is energy and has to be used in some way. You are right that the added 2-4 pounds of muscle from 2 months of gomad + the added energy expense of carrying more overall weight will have made your maintenance intake higher and you will, assuming you eat exactly as before the gomad, start losing weight. Chances are, though, that you will be accustomed to the higher food-intake and have more hunger and there is a chance you will start eating more, staying at the same bodyweight and bodycomposition (good if it's the goal) or increasing it at (for me) an undesireably high rate.
This is obviously speculation, but I think it can be a trap.

When you feed your body with macronutrients the stomach processes it regardless of your actual need for it or lack of. Any excess in calories will instead be stored in the fat storages cause the body is built for survival. It is not certain when it will get food again.
This is why the sugar in candy and normal white sugar is bad (among other things, such as insulin spikes) and is a major contributor to fat gains. It is digested at a rate far higher than what the body normally needs and can put to use, but is good after or during a long run or weight training to refill the glycogendeposits as well as to fuel the highly elevated proteinsynthesis which occurs after exercising.

2) Someone who is skinny often has about 10% body fat (exception skinny fat, but they should do it too). So they don't need to worry about 2-3% fat gain.

They may not need to worry about it, but it is still undesireable in my opinion. This is obviously up to the individual to decide.

3) Whatever weight gain approach you choose, you'll be gaining fat anyway.

This is true, but you can reduce the fatgains. Again a question of opinion.

Put yourself in the shoes of someone who is skinny so you see the full picture:
* has tried everything, nothing works, believes he'll always be skinny
* tried to eat more but feels like vomiting all the time
* doesn't see progress, loses motivation, gives up, really believes he'll always be skinny now
* starts to believe they need steroids to do the job

You're only seeing "avoid fat loss". So you're recommending the slow route which is to eat more solid food. Liquid food is easier. Yes there's the bloating and what else, but they see weight gain the first week so that inspires them to continue.

Because in the end it's not the appraoch that matters. It's consistency. And to be consistent, especially coming from a frame of mind of "I can't do it, nothing ever has worked", seeing with your eyes the weight increase fast is the best way to get rid of those crappy believes you've put in your head.

I agree with many of your points here and since I've never had problems gaining weight if I set my mind to it, I had a hard time seeing it from the angle you depict. I never said the GOMAD approach was completely useless, I suggested it wasn't an ideal approach and I would understand and explained why someone would have their doubts starting on GOMAD. Anyway, thank you for this point of view, it was one I had overlooked.

We have officially derailed this thread and I think it would be more appropriate taking this discussion into another thread or in private, but I hope I have explained myself sufficiently.

[killerdude494949]

From reading most peoples stories, after cutting the milk they had a drop in bodyfat almost immediately. The more you drop your carbs, the faster the fat will come off...so things like the anabolic diet come to mind. While this sounds fool proof and all, I take into consideration that I will have a little too much fat on me for a month or two, which in my book is a lot of time. Thats why my first GOMAD will be when I am lean enough that I can afford putting on 3% bodyfat. I am by no means a skinny guy and I can afford to see consistent yet slow muscle gains for a while.

[BAZzy]

I think Rip sums it up best when he says this about milk:

Milk works because it is easy, it is available, it doesn't need any preparation, and it has all the components necessary for growing mammals, which your trainees most definately are. There also seems to be something special about milk that the equivalent amount of calories, protein, fat and carbs can't duplicate in terms of growth enhancement. It may be the fact that milk has been shown to have very high levels of insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), a peptide hormone that has been shown to have some tenuous relationship to accelerated growth in mammals. But that research is far from conclusive; suffice it to say that people who drink lots of milk during their novice phase get bigger and stronger than people who don't.

It isn't the be all and end all, but it has worked as a good food source for a lot of people trying to gain muscle for many years. It's thoroughly tried and tested. If you're worried about fats, then skimmed milk is always an option.

Good advice from someone who has tried and proved many things in the weight lifting world. Personally, I simply drink milk, lots of it, because it is far cheaper than the multitude of protein supplements on the market these days. A dietician told me long ago to stop using protein powder and just drink as much milk as you can get into you in any given day....good avice, bigger wallet these days, and muscle gains have never been better.....mind you coupled with a good diet..

Cheers

[Mehdi]

Why won't you gain more fat than muscle? You are saying that if you put on 25lbs in 25 days (which you advertise with) you would have put on at least 12,5lbs of muscle? This may be possible in extreme cases as a natural or with steroids, but not for normal individuals. This applies in the case you are talking about as well. If what you are saying is true, he gained 8,8kg of muscle (with a stable 20% bodyfat) which is what you can usually achieve within a year of training, although it is often more as a beginner and less as an advanced.

Have you read Bluestreak's story? Why do you think you can only gain 8.8kg muscle per year? I've seen guys gaining 40kg (88lbs) in a year doing 2GOMAD (2 gallons a day). No supplements, just extremely skinny. Of course we're talking about beginners, not advanced/elites.

What makes you think fat disappears once you stop the gomad? Fat is energy and has to be used in some way. You are right that the added 2-4 pounds of muscle from 2 months of gomad + the added energy expense of carrying more overall weight will have made your maintenance intake higher and you will, assuming you eat exactly as before the gomad, start losing weight. Chances are, though, that you will be accustomed to the higher food-intake and have more hunger and there is a chance you will start eating more, staying at the same bodyweight and bodycomposition (good if it's the goal) or increasing it at (for me) an undesireably high rate.
This is obviously speculation, but I think it can be a trap.

Please read Bluestreak's story regarding fat dropping. I'll try to get more case studies like that in the future. And the increased hunger after stopping GOMAD is exactly what we're trying to achieve here. Skinny guys struggle to eat more, do gomad and that problem disappears. Long-term solutions, no get big quick schemes.

When you feed your body with macronutrients the stomach processes it regardless of your actual need for it or lack of. Any excess in calories will instead be stored in the fat storages cause the body is built for survival. It is not certain when it will get food again.
This is why the sugar in candy and normal white sugar is bad (among other things, such as insulin spikes) and is a major contributor to fat gains. It is digested at a rate far higher than what the body normally needs and can put to use, but is good after or during a long run or weight training to refill the glycogendeposits as well as to fuel the highly elevated proteinsynthesis which occurs after exercising.

You'll agree that whole full fat free milk is a better food choice than candy or white sugar. Yes GOMAD will increase body fat, but junk food does it more off course.

2) Someone who is skinny often has about 10% body fat (exception skinny fat, but they should do it too). So they don't need to worry about 2-3% fat gain.

They may not need to worry about it, but it is still undesireable in my opinion. This is obviously up to the individual to decide.

That's why you usually get nowhere, trying to do 2 conflicting things at the same time.

3) Whatever weight gain approach you choose, you'll be gaining fat anyway.

This is true, but you can reduce the fatgains. Again a question of opinion.
Post on How to Limit Fat Gains on GOMAD coming up too btw, forgot to include it in list yesterday.

Put yourself in the shoes of someone who is skinny so you see the full picture:
* has tried everything, nothing works, believes he'll always be skinny
* tried to eat more but feels like vomiting all the time
* doesn't see progress, loses motivation, gives up, really believes he'll always be skinny now
* starts to believe they need steroids to do the job

You're only seeing "avoid fat loss". So you're recommending the slow route which is to eat more solid food. Liquid food is easier. Yes there's the bloating and what else, but they see weight gain the first week so that inspires them to continue.

Because in the end it's not the appraoch that matters. It's consistency. And to be consistent, especially coming from a frame of mind of "I can't do it, nothing ever has worked", seeing with your eyes the weight increase fast is the best way to get rid of those crappy believes you've put in your head.

I agree with many of your points here and since I've never had problems gaining weight if I set my mind to it, I had a hard time seeing it from the angle you depict. I never said the GOMAD approach was completely useless, I suggested it wasn't an ideal approach and I would understand and explained why someone would have their doubts starting on GOMAD. Anyway, thank you for this point of view, it was one I had overlooked.

We have officially derailed this thread and I think it would be more appropriate taking this discussion into another thread or in private, but I hope I have explained myself sufficiently.
No problem. forgive my laziness in the quoting.

[SamuraiMark]

I'll start with this: I am not suggesting GOMAD is bad. In fact, skinny bastard that I am, I might GOMAD myself once my weights get to a point where I'm actually doing real work, but the business around cholesterol and saturated fat is incorrect. Also, I am not an RD.

"Dietary cholesterol doesn’t affect blood cholesterol."

This is factually incorrect. Dietary cholesterol does impact blood cholesterol. However, like dietary fat vs. body fat, it is not a 1-for-1 exchange. A gram of dietary cholesterol is not a gram of blood cholesterol. Nonetheless, the two are linked and an increase in dietary cholesterol does result in an increase in blood cholesterol.

More importantly, saturated fat, which GOMAD is very rich in, has a direct and significant impact on blood LDL levels. A 1% increase/decrease in dietary saturated fat results in a 2% increase/decrease in LDL levels which leads to a 2% increase/decrease in risk of heart disease.

A person on a 2000calorie/day diet has a DV of about 20g of saturated fat. That same person on GOMAD is going to increase their saturated fat intake almost 5X. That leads to a 10X increase in blood LDL, 10X increase in CHD risk.

What I do not know at this point is, how long does it take? Does GOingMAD for a month present some sort of risk? No idea. But saturated fat is very closely linked to blood LDL which is closely linked to your risk of heart disease.

Do you need saturated fat in your diet? Yes. Do you need an additional 72g/day? I haven't a clue.

Just trying to help people understand what is happening under the hood.

See page 3260: http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/reprint/106/25/3143


Cheers,
Mark

[Mehdi]

I'll start with this: I am not suggesting GOMAD is bad. In fact, skinny bastard that I am, I might GOMAD myself once my weights get to a point where I'm actually doing real work, but the business around cholesterol and saturated fat is incorrect. Also, I am not an RD.

"Dietary cholesterol doesn’t affect blood cholesterol."

This is factually incorrect. Dietary cholesterol does impact blood cholesterol. However, like dietary fat vs. body fat, it is not a 1-for-1 exchange. A gram of dietary cholesterol is not a gram of blood cholesterol. Nonetheless, the two are linked and an increase in dietary cholesterol does result in an increase in blood cholesterol.

More importantly, saturated fat, which GOMAD is very rich in, has a direct and significant impact on blood LDL levels. A 1% increase/decrease in dietary saturated fat results in a 2% increase/decrease in LDL levels which leads to a 2% increase/decrease in risk of heart disease.

A person on a 2000calorie/day diet has a DV of about 20g of saturated fat. That same person on GOMAD is going to increase their saturated fat intake almost 5X. That leads to a 10X increase in blood LDL, 10X increase in CHD risk.

What I do not know at this point is, how long does it take? Does GOingMAD for a month present some sort of risk? No idea. But saturated fat is very closely linked to blood LDL which is closely linked to your risk of heart disease.

Do you need saturated fat in your diet? Yes. Do you need an additional 72g/day? I haven't a clue.

Just trying to help people understand what is happening under the hood.

See page 3260: http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/reprint/106/25/3143


Cheers,
Mark

You're link to the American Heart Foundation. They don't agree with a lot of what Weston Price says. I can link to books & studies that say the opposite of what you linked to and I can link to books & studies that agree with what you're saying. So we're not getting anywhere with this. Choose a camp, find out in 50 years if you were right.

Weston Price vs. China Study. If you paid attention, you’ll have noticed that the nutritional advice on StrongLifts.com is inline with Weston Price’s studies. Which is: omnivore diet with lots of veggies & quality animal products.

The China Study, however, claims correlation between consumption of animal products & diseases of affluence like cancer or heart diseases. They’ll advice you vegetarianism or even veganism.

I’ve chosen my camp. Choose yours. Educate yourself, make your own decision on what you’ll believe & apply and experiment.
http://stronglifts.com/cholesterol-satu ... ggs-daily/

[Doo]

The OP mentioned several reasons people get freaked out about GOMAD. I found an interesting discussion where the argument against it wasn't the volume of milk but the fact that one would drink any milk. There are anti-milk groups who believe humans should not drink milk after being "weaned". It's not just that they don't drink milk. They have a crusade to get you to not drink it. Similar to the vegetarian extremists.

[SamuraiMark]

Choose a camp, find out in 50 years if you were right.

I mostly agree. What we "know" about nutrition and fitness is always in flux. But I like this one better:

Choose a camp, continue to stay informed, adjust/change camps if warranted, and find out in 50 years if you were right.

And I should point out that, while the paper in question is from the AHF, on the specific subject of saturated fats and their impact on blood LDL levels, the paper cites 6 other studies. The AHF paper is simply an amalgamation of research results turned into general recommendations. The AHF paper doesn't pretend to be authoritative itself. The 'authority' comes from the >1100 individual studies, papers and documents that it refers to. And as you might expect, Weston Price is not amongst the >1100 citations.

Thanks,
Mark

[Mehdi]

Choose a camp, find out in 50 years if you were right.

I mostly agree. What we "know" about nutrition and fitness is always in flux. But I like this one better:

Choose a camp, continue to stay informed, adjust/change camps if warranted, and find out in 50 years if you were right.

And I should point out that, while the paper in question is from the AHF, on the specific subject of saturated fats and their impact on blood LDL levels, the paper cites 6 other studies. The AHF paper is simply an amalgamation of research results turned into general recommendations. The AHF paper doesn't pretend to be authoritative itself. The 'authority' comes from the >1100 individual studies, papers and documents that it refers to. And as you might expect, Weston Price is not amongst the >1100 citations.

Thanks,
Mark

I like your quote. Myeah I've got the China Study here, it makes a lot of sense, but a complete different advice than Weston Price. What can I say, guess I'm biased of doing Anabolic Diet for so long in the past and seeing body fat going down and no cholesterol problems.

Weston Price is listed on quackwatch by the way. It makes me question quackwatch (which seems biased against anything that isn't western medecine too).

[killerdude494949]

SamuariMark, find me a tightly controlled study which showed that a diet high in saturated fat and protein and low in sugar and starches caused coronary heart diease, diabetes, and/or cancer.

You won't find one.

American Heart Foundation is yet another puppet of agriculture. They'll tell you saturated fat is bad and whole wheat bread is good. As a result you go and buy more bread, and then agriculture makes sure their products are promoted healthy.

Do you live in the US? Have you noticed that there are NO commercials on TV about anything natural? Its all sugar, processed carbs, and drugs. And I have yet to find a commercial that doesn't claim these are good for you and do their best to make you buy it. The people behind these are the same people making sure your doctor is more ignorant than a 2 year old child.

As a rule of thumb, don't always believe the mainstream, if ever. You'd be surprised to find out how much misinformation is out there.

[SamuraiMark]

SamuariMark, find me a tightly controlled study which showed that a diet high in saturated fat and protein and low in sugar and starches caused coronary heart diease, diabetes, and/or cancer.

You won't find one.

The AHF document I linked to cites a number of studies that have established a direct correlation between variation in saturated fats and blood LDL levels (sat. fat up, LDL up. Sat. fat down, LDL down), and over 1100 studies/papers related generally to heart health.

American Heart Foundation is yet another puppet of agriculture. They'll tell you saturated fat is bad and whole wheat bread is good. As a result you go and buy more bread, and then agriculture makes sure their products are promoted healthy.

...

As a rule of thumb, don't always believe the mainstream, if ever. You'd be surprised to find out how much misinformation is out there.

I'm not going to speak to the conspiratorial stuff. I live in Canada, but Canada and the US operate a collaborative committee for the establishment of dietary recommendations. Your recommended daily doses are established by this joint committee, and those recommendations include recommended amounts of saturated which are considered to be essential to the diet. No qualified professionals, the AHF included, are saying "no saturated fat".

I cannot comment much on the AHF's own dietary recommendations, but the Canada Food Guide and the US Food Pyramid both promote balanced dietary recommendations. I certainly don't get my nutritional advice from TV commercials, I assume you don't, and I would hope the majority of StrongLifts readers don't either. "Mainstream" and "based on mountains of research" are not the same.

I don't think there is anything wrong with adopting a specialized diet in order to achieve certain goals. AD and GOMAD I would consider specialized. If I bothered to pay close enough attention to my day-to-day diet, I'd ordinarily stick to the AMDRs, Food Guide recommendations, etc. But I don't bother to pay attention to my diet. Whole foods, quality meats, fruits, veggies and grains, 10% junk. Diet is easy.

[killerdude494949]

SamuariMark, find me a tightly controlled study which showed that a diet high in saturated fat and protein and low in sugar and starches caused coronary heart diease, diabetes, and/or cancer.

You won't find one.

The AHF document I linked to cites a number of studies that have established a direct correlation between variation in saturated fats and blood LDL levels (sat. fat up, LDL up. Sat. fat down, LDL down), and over 1100 studies/papers related generally to heart health.

American Heart Foundation is yet another puppet of agriculture. They'll tell you saturated fat is bad and whole wheat bread is good. As a result you go and buy more bread, and then agriculture makes sure their products are promoted healthy.

...

As a rule of thumb, don't always believe the mainstream, if ever. You'd be surprised to find out how much misinformation is out there.

I'm not going to speak to the conspiratorial stuff. I live in Canada, but Canada and the US operate a collaborative committee for the establishment of dietary recommendations. Your recommended daily doses are established by this joint committee, and those recommendations include recommended amounts of saturated which are considered to be essential to the diet. No qualified professionals, the AHF included, are saying "no saturated fat".

I cannot comment much on the AHF's own dietary recommendations, but the Canada Food Guide and the US Food Pyramid both promote balanced dietary recommendations. I certainly don't get my nutritional advice from TV commercials, I assume you don't, and I would hope the majority of StrongLifts readers don't either. "Mainstream" and "based on mountains of research" are not the same.

I don't think there is anything wrong with adopting a specialized diet in order to achieve certain goals. AD and GOMAD I would consider specialized. If I bothered to pay close enough attention to my day-to-day diet, I'd ordinarily stick to the AMDRs, Food Guide recommendations, etc. But I don't bother to pay attention to my diet. Whole foods, quality meats, fruits, veggies and grains, 10% junk. Diet is easy.

How come everytime a study was conducted to prove the Atkins diet increased chances of heart disease actually proved the opposite?

It's not a conspiracy, you can call it that if you like, but remember your ancestors evolved on a diet high in animal foods. I can't seem to find evidence showing that my ancestors my 150 years ago ranging to 2 million years ago having an epidemic of obesity, heart disease, diabetes and the such.

Before you tell me that just because its not recorded it doesn't mean we didn't get sick, think of all the other epedemic recorded from the past. For example, the Black Death. We would have had it in documents and the anti-saturated fat bandwagon would definetly have had these documents made public..too bad they don't exist.

Ever heard of the Japanese paradox? Over the last hundred years their intake of animal protein and fat increased yet their cholesterol remained the same for the most part? Why don't you heard about this in the mainstrean?

I've exposed you to information and my responsibilty stops here. No need to reply, even if you disagree.

[SamuraiMark]

How come everytime a study was conducted to prove the Atkins diet increased chances of heart disease actually proved the opposite?

I'm not familiar with any of these studies so I cannot comment on them.

It's not a conspiracy, you can call it that if you like, but remember your ancestors evolved on a diet high in animal foods. I can't seem to find evidence showing that my ancestors my 150 years ago ranging to 2 million years ago having an epidemic of obesity, heart disease, diabetes and the such.

I'm not sure there is decent evidence that our ancient ancestors were eating a diet high in animal foods. Is there such evidence to back that up? You also ignore many obvious flaws in your logic:

Our ancient ancestors:

• certainly did not live the leisurely lifestyle we live today
• were lucky to see 30 years of age
• did not live with the easy abundance of foods we have today

You cannot reasonably compare the nutritional needs of ancient humans to those of humans today. You also make an implicit assumption that "the way we ate then is the way we should eat now". Even if our ancient ancestors did eat a diet rich in animal foods, that doesn't mean we should do so today.

Ever heard of the Japanese paradox? Over the last hundred years their intake of animal protein and fat increased yet their cholesterol remained the same for the most part? Why don't you heard about this in the mainstrean?

I have had considerable exposure to Japanese culture, and there is no paradox. The Japanese, and in particular the Okinawans, have some of the longest life expectancies in the world in part due to their excellent diet, which is based largely on seafood rich in "good fats".

[killerdude494949]

Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCFZoqmKf5M