Jamie: When should I be carb cycling my diet?

Hi,

The best thing I can reccomend that you do is to write down exactly what you are consuming at the moment. You need to know how many calories that you are consuming, the amount of protein, carbs and fat.

There is a great website and free iphone app that can help you do this

http://www.myfitnesspal.com

alternatively you can look on the back of everything and work out the amounts that you consume.

you then need to work out what kind of carb cycle you want to do? there are 3-6 day ones so its all a case of experimenting, here is mine

http://www.askjayfitness.com/2012/02/my-new-diet.html

What you do is start off with your high carb day and write it all down. (aim for 250-300g of carbs on your high carb day)

Then all you do is remove the carbohydrates from certain places when you are on your medium and low carb days (take these carbs from Breakfast Mid Morning/Afternoon snacks and Lunch)

try to have a meal plan like this and spread your macronutrients throughout the day

Breakfast
Mid Morning Snack
Lunch
Mid Afternoon Snack
Dinner
Pre Breakfast Snack

anything else I can help you out on just reply back

All the best

Jamie Alderton
Team Grenade

Thanks Jamie.

I would like to follow a 5 day carb cycling routine as in your case. I do weightlifting 3 times a week and cardio+abs twice a week. Do you do carb cycling all year round or only for specific events?

How did you obtain the amounts for low/medium/high carbs days. Is this done according to bodyweight?

Thanks man!!

Hi,

I dont do carb cycling year round, I only usually do it 2-4 weeks out from a Photoshoot/Expo and I will be more strict on this diet if I was to compete.

Finding your low/medium/high days can be a bit of trail and error so test the following for a month and if you are finding its too much or not enough for you then alter it

High Carb day - 250g of carbs
Medium Carb day 150-180g of Carbs
Low Carb Day 50-70g of carbs

2, Medium, 2 Low, 1 High, Repeat

Aim for consuming 0.5g of fat per lb of bodyweight and 1.5g of Protein per lb of bodyweight to get you started.

Check out my Blog for the Appropriate Carbs, Fat, Proteins to consume

http://www.askjayfitness.com/2012/02/list.html

All the Best!

Jamie Alderton
Team Grenade

Hi Jamie,

I notice you mention you do NOT carb cycle long term any 2-4 weeks out from a shoot, is there are reason for this? Is it just simply because it becomes hard to maintain or something else such as it can become detrimental to training/health?

Also, would there be any negatives to cycling these sort of plans long term?

Thanks mate!

Kind regards