Hi,

As I promised a few days ago, I’d like to share something with you about a substance called glycogen… and why it’s a good reason for you NOT to get into a panic when your weight goes up or down seemingly at random.

We talk a lot about nutrition at our weight loss boot camp and one of the tings we discuss is glycogen. Glycogen is made in your liver, your muscles and to a lesser extent in your brain and stomach from carbohydrates and water. The reason your body makes it is it’s a great source of fuel when your body needs energy. So, why do you care about this?

Well, if you’ve been exercising and not eating a lot of carbs… your weight can drop by a large amount in a very short time. This is called glycogen-depletion. It’s not harmful or dangerous, although it can make you feel lethargic and short of energy. And the flip-side of this is if you eat a carb-rich meal… your body preferentially uses the carbs to replenish the glycogen… and your weight shoots upwards. Yet, as you can now see, you don’t need to panic at all – because the weight isn’t in extra body-fat at all. This is a good thing. Even better: see that word “preferentially”?

It means you can perform a biochemical trick which seemingly violates the rule saying if you eat more calories than you expend, you’ll get fat. Because if you eat a reasonably low carb diet, and you’re depleted of glycogen, if you then go out for and eat the “less nutritious options” – potatoes, pasta, chocolate dessert — those “wasted” calories won’t necessarily be stored as fat. No, they’ll go towards replenishing your glycogen instead. Now, this does NOT give you carte-blanche to stuff yourself silly with carbs and pretend to yourself you’re “refeeding” and building up your glycogen reserves. But it DOES give you a hint as to how you could have your cake and eat it every so often and still be ahead of the game. More on that in my next post.