The raw deal on diets

We review three of the most highly trending diets, with a little bit of exercise thrown in.

Here at Bella Media HQ we’ve been diligently testing the best ways to shape up and trim down. Here, we take a look at three of the most highly trending diets – the Paleo diet, 5:2 diet and Atkins diet – and one truth about exercising for weight loss is revealed.

Paleo diet

The Paleo diet is built on the premise that humans existed for thousands of years without the artificial and processed foods so prevalent in the modern-day diet. This approach strips the diet from any refined sugars, refined grains and processed foods to mimic the way our ancient ancestors ate thousands of years ago.

It partners high amounts of protein and fat with low levels of carbohydrates, similar to the way Homo Sapiens thrived in the Palaeolithic era, or stone age. This intake is supplemented with high levels of whole grains, fruits and vegetables in a ‘plant and animal’ derived design.

In their book, The Paleo Diet for Athletes, Loren Cordain and Joe Friel associate the diet with both weight loss and overall health benefits.

‘Seventy percent of the US diet is made up of food that modern man has created, and this food is made up of the same ingredients: refined grains, refined sugars, processed vegetable oil, salt, artificial flavouring and perhaps some processed dairy product,’ the authors say. ‘These foods have displaced more healthful fruits, vegetables, lean meats and seafood in our diets, and it’s hurting our health.’

They go on to explain the Paleo diet typically results in weight loss, because of the way naturally derived foods work harmoniously in the body. The Paleo diet is also said to boost the immune system by consuming more trace nutrients, such as antioxidant vitamins and minerals that come from fruits, vegetables and lean meats.

The diet has received criticism for its practicality and the soundness of its background science. Critics have pointed out that our ancestors simply did not live long enough to suffer the diseases of the modern day – questioning the reliability of the diet’s heralded heath benefits.

5:2 (intermittent fasting) diet

Developed by medical journalist Dr Michael Mosley, the Fast Diet, or 5:2 diet, takes an unusual approach to dieting. Typically, weight loss regimens involve calorie counting, stringent food types and regular meals. The Fast Diet turns this platform on its head, with people eating normally for five days and then ‘fasting’ – or cutting calorie intake to a quarter of the normal level – for two days. It is touted to assist in weight loss (believed to induce an average loss of 0.46kg per week) and is believed to benefit overall health and longevity.

This effect on overall health, and not just body weight, is said to be associated with a reduction in inflammation, brought on by periods of fasting. The way we fuel our bodies – in the quantities and types of food we ingest – always incurs a larger systemic effect.

Meals high in saturated fat and calories have been associated with an increase in inflammatory markers in the body which, if continued, can lead to widespread chronic inflammation and disease. Intermittent fasting is said to be effective in relieving the body of this inflammation, leading to reduced oxidative damage and increased immune resistance.

Atkins diet

One of the problems commonly associated with dieting is the tendency to stick with the food plan for a certain amount of time, before reverting back to old habits. The Atkins diet attempts to change these habits, establishing a long-lasting and relatively easy-to-maintain approach to eating. In fact, it combines this promise of longevity alongside a food plan that includes the unthinkable – real butter, cream cheese, eggs and bacon and extra avocado, in a seemingly win-win dietary regime.

The aim of the Atkins diet is to break the carb and blood sugar cycle, where carbohydrates are used for energy, and excess carbohydrates are turned to insulin or fat in the body. Instead, by filling the diet with proteins, fibres and fats and drastically cutting the amount of carbohydrates consumed, the diet forces the body to adopt a fat-burning state. In this, fats are stored more efficiently and those stubborn pockets of fatty tissue are gradually broken down.

While this diet, like many carb-cutting diets, has been shown to achieve effective results in weight loss, the high reliance on foods high in fat has received some criticism for its implications on wider health. Some researchers have concerns whether a long-term adoption of the Atkins diet could be associated with increased risk of heart disease, stroke or cancer, because of the replacement of carbohydrates with a high-fat intake.

How much exercise do I need?

According to the World Health Organization, unhealthy diets and physical inactivity are the key culprits for major diseases such as cardiovascular disease, cancer and diabetes. They identify a lack of physical activity as the fourth leading cause of global mortality, accounting for six percent of deaths globally.

When it comes to getting mobile, the Australian government recommends adults (those aged between 18 and 64) integrate at least 30 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity on most, preferably all, days of the week.

Whilst the health benefits of moderate exercise are plentiful, when it comes to losing weight, an increasing body of research suggests you will do better to cut back on the length of time you commit to exercise whilst increasing the intensity of your workout.

A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association followed the exercise habits of over 34,000 women. It concluded that it took about an hour a day of moderate exercising to maintain weight. This research is backed up by the findings of the (US-based) National Weight Control Registry, which reported that 90 percent of people who have successfully lost weight and kept it off exercise on average for an hour a day.

However, this research also tells us that even one hour of moderate intensity exercise every day is not enough to lose weight.

A smarter way to workout

A much more efficient way to exercise – and one that scientific research is suggesting works a lot better both in terms of health benefits and fat burning – is to take part in high-intensity circuit and interval training.

Interval training be applied to any cardiovascular workout, be it cycling, running, or rowing, and refers to short bursts of high intensity exercise periods interspersed with rest or relief periods.

Researchers at the University of NSW reported that sprint training for just 60 minutes a week burns the same amount of body fat as jogging for seven hours a week. For the time-poor, that’s a saving of 180 minutes each week, for the same results.