Carbs and water weight? How much?

[synonymous]

With calories being the same, how much do carbs bring in as far as water weight? If you were to eat 300 carbs a day for a week, at maintenance, and weigh yourself, then drop it to 100 carbs a day and increase protein/fat but still be at maintenance, how much water does the body lose? Or does this really depend on the individual?

 

[Megatron28]

What would your change in grams of stored glycogen be in this hypothetical?

 

[synonymous]

Apologies, I don't know exactly. How much does an intense chest or back workout and 20 minutes of cardio do for an average person?

 

[3J]

what tron is trying to tell you is that its highly individualistic syn...

 

[Mrrippedzilla]

As a basic guideline, you store 3g of water for every 1g of carbs.
So if calories are controlled and you drop from 300 - 100g carbs, and we remember that the increase in protein intake also means an increase in gluconeogenesis (the conversion of protein to glucose), you would lose around 1-1.5 pounds of water weight.

A basic bodybuilding type workout only depletes glycogen by 10-15% so this wont have much of an impact.
More high rep/sets, low rest type training could deplete glycogen by 30-35% easily but I'm assuming your not doing this since it takes 2hrs+ to complete and is horrible to get through.

In short, as 3J & Mega said its highly individual but it wont be much - a couple of pounds at best

 

[Megatron28]

As a basic guideline, you store 3g of water for every 1g of carbs.
So if calories are controlled and you drop from 300 - 100g carbs, and we remember that the increase in protein intake also means an increase in gluconeogenesis (the conversion of protein to glucose), you would lose around 1-1.5 pounds of water weight.

A basic bodybuilding type workout only depletes glycogen by 10-15% so this wont have much of an impact.
More high rep/sets, low rest type training could deplete glycogen by 30-35% easily but I'm assuming your not doing this since it takes 2hrs+ to complete and is horrible to get through.

In short, as 3J & Mega said its highly individual but it wont be much - a couple of pounds at best

Are you looking at the longterm effect of the diet change when equilibrium is established?

 

[Mrrippedzilla]

Are you looking at the longterm effect of the diet change when equilibrium is established?

I wouldn't say "long term" - maybe a week or so after the macro change.

Short term it depends on how quick the change is made.
If its a gradual introduction (30g extra carbs per day, etc) then it will still be nothing too noticeable but if its an overnight increase then the water weight may be higher due to the downregulation of certain enzymes involved in breaking down carbs.

Its difficult to explain without getting too into the science but basically the downregulation of enzymes means your body becomes extremely inefficient at digesting carbs (depending on how long & how low you've been low carbing).
This means that some of the water "leaks" outside of the cells its supposed to be stored in, causing the bloated look many are familiar with.
But again, this tends to sort itself out within a week or so.


On a sidenote, this is also why long term keto dieting is stupid from a long term sustainability POV
The longer your on keto, the more glucose intolerant & insulin resistance you become - these are adaptive changes caused by the diet to spare any glucose that is available for the brain.
Not good if you ever plan on reintroducing carbs, or actually building muscle at some point...but I digress.

 

[bonexyster]

I wouldn't say "long term" - maybe a week or so after the macro change.

Short term it depends on how quick the change is made.
If its a gradual introduction (30g extra carbs per day, etc) then it will still be nothing too noticeable but if its an overnight increase then the water weight may be higher due to the downregulation of certain enzymes involved in breaking down carbs.

Its difficult to explain without getting too into the science but basically the downregulation of enzymes means your body becomes extremely inefficient at digesting carbs (depending on how long & how low you've been low carbing).
This means that some of the water "leaks" outside of the cells its supposed to be stored in, causing the bloated look many are familiar with.
But again, this tends to sort itself out within a week or so.


On a sidenote, this is also why long term keto dieting is stupid from a long term sustainability POV
The longer your on keto, the more glucose intolerant & insulin resistance you become - these are adaptive changes caused by the diet to spare any glucose that is available for the brain.
Not good if you ever plan on reintroducing carbs, or actually building muscle at some point...but I digress.

Yep, keto is good for a quick blast at fat loss and then it's done. Long term keto users are more prone to diabetes then other diets and they don't even consume carbs. That should be proof enough that shit is bad for you.