Low Carbohydrate Diet Wins Again

Ho-hum. Another day, another study showing a low carbohydrate diet is superior to a low fat diet for weight loss. Gee, ya think?

Still, always happy to have more validation, to get more attention from researchers, and to see this positive stuff in the news. Here's how this study went:

A twelve week study was funded by Jenny Craig, and was done at the University of Nevada School of Medicine, Reno. 45 obese women with insulin resistance were put on one of two diets. The diets were designed to have the same calorie count, but a different macronutrient balance. The low fat diet got 60% of its calories from carbohydrate, 20% from protein, and 20% from fat. The low carb diet got 45% of its calories from carbohydrate, 20% from protein, and 35% from fat. After 12 weeks, the low carb group had lost, on average, 3.4 more pounds than the low fat group.

Now, 3.4 pounds isn't a tremendous amount of weight, but look at it another way: The low carb group lost an average of 19.6 pounds, while the low fat group lost an average of 16.2 pounds -- which comes out to a 21% greater weight loss in the low carb group, while eating the same number of calories.

Can you hear Bob Atkins saying "I told you so" from The Great Beyond?

Of course, 45% of calories from carbohydrate is a heckuva lot more carbs than the average low carber is eating, and I know I get a lot more than 35% of my calories from fat -- I shoot for 65-75%. I may write Dr. Raymond Plodkowski, the lead researcher, and ask him if, considering the outcome of this study, he'll consider doing another study, this time comparing his moderately carb restricted diet to a true low carb diet.

It would be interesting, no?

Another interesting thing I noticed: Though this study was done in the US, so far it appears to be getting coverage mostly in the Indian press -- as in India, not Native American. What's up with that?