High carb days and Low carb Days Carbohydrate cycling is based on the concept of rotating low carbohydrate days with high carbohydrate days instead of keeping carbohydrates low all the time. Every fourth day your glycogen levels are restored with a “carb load” or “high carb day”, your energy stays up, your muscles fill out and tighten and your metabolic rate gets a dramatic boost. The high day also makes your entire diet easier to stick with because no matter how difficult it is to get through those three low days, you have a “high carb day” to look forward to. The “high carb day” also bypasses all the side effects. You get noticeably leaner with every three-day low carbohydrate cycle as your body dips deeply into stored body fat without the carbohydrates readily available for fuel. Surprisingly, you may even continue to get leaner even on the high carbohydrate days because of the boost in metabolic rate. Carbohydrate cycling also prevents your body from becoming inefficient at using carbohydrates for energy. When you cut your carbohydrates out for a long time, your body begins depending on fat for fuel and it learns how to use fat for fuel more efficiently. You often hear low carbohydrate diet proponents say that the low carbohydrate diet turns you into a “fat burner” while a high carbohydrate dieter turns you into a “sugar burner.” This may be true, but there’s a huge downside to staying on low carbohydrates all the time and becoming an exclusive “fat burner:” Your body becomes lazy and inefficient at burning carbohydrates. When you eat them again after a long absence, your body doesn’t know what to do with them. This is one of the reasons you will simply blow up overnight and gain weight back the minute you re-introduce carbohydrates after a long absence. Unless you plan on never eating a carbohydrate ever again, you’d better think twice about long-term carbohydrate restriction. Low carbohydrate diets are not lifestyle programs. What’s the alternative? Carbohydrate load every fourth day. When you carbohydrate load a depleted muscle, the carbohydrates are quickly soaked up by the muscle on that fourth day because the muscles are “hungry” for carbohydrates. By repeated cycles of depletion and re loading, your muscles become extremely efficient at storing carbohydrates as muscle glycogen rather than partitioning them to body fat. Fine tuning the carbohydrate cycling method As you get leaner and leaner, you may find that you lose weight too quickly on the 3:1 carbohydrate cycling plan. Furthermore, it’s not a wise idea to lose more than 1.5 to 2.0 lbs of body weight per week. If you lose more than two pounds per week, you are much more likely to be losing Lean body mass with the fat. If you lose lean mass or drop weight too quickly, you should adjust your high to low day ratio by increasing your carbohydrates (and calories) overall or by keeping your low days the same and adding more high days. You can do three low carbohydrate days followed by two or three high carbohydrate days. You can even throw in a moderate carb day if you like. Taking two or three high days after three low days will not only help reduce muscle loss, it may allow you to gain small amounts of muscle as you lose body fat.  It’s very difficult to put down one single example of 3:1 carbohydrate cycling as I’ve described it here and have it apply to everyone. A little bit of experimentation and fine tuning will be necessary to discover what amount of carbohydrate works best for your high and low days. It’s absolutely essential for these types of advanced diets to be customized. On average, women would consume about 90-130 grams of carbohydrates on low days and about 200 to 250 grams of carbohydrates on high days. Men would consume 150-200 grams of carbohydrates on low days and 300-400 grams of carbohydrates on high days. Here are examples of what “typical” high-low cycles would look like on a fat loss program for the average person: Men/2200 calories/3 days low carbs: Protein 45% = 990 calories = 247 g                    Carbs 30% = 660 calories = 165 g                       Fats 25% = 550 calories = 61 g       Men/2700 calories/1 day high carbs Protein 30% = 810 calories = 202 g Carbs 50% = 1350 calories = 337 g Fats 20% = 540 calories = 60 g Women/1400 calories/3 days low carbs Protein 45% = 630 calories = 157 g                    Carbs 50% = 900 calories = 225 g                       Fats 20% = 360 calories = 40 g     Women/1800 cal/1 day high carbs Protein 30% = 810 calories = 135 g Carbs 30% = 420 calories = 105 g Fats 25% = 350 calories = 39 g These are just averages, as every person is different. The Team will have advised you or will be advising your in your Personalized Plan. On your low carbohydrate days, eat protein and starchy carbohydrates in your early day meals (meals one through three), then in your late day meals (meals three to six) eat protein with only fibrous carbohydrates like green vegetables and salad – no starchy carbohydrates! On your high days, you can eat starchy carbohydrates with every meal (and if you’re going to have a “cheat day” do it on a high day). So that’s it! These are some very powerful techniques, but remember; carbohydrate cutting taken to the extreme will do more harm than good. Never cut your carbohydrates out completely and never stay on low carbohydrates for a long period of time. It's usually not wise to go to extremes in anything and this is as true for dieting as with anything else in life: Moderation is the key.