Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

[burtonator]

So I've been reading about a bunch of small tricks that I can do to increase the effectiveness of Atkins.

- Take green tea supplements (or just drink decaf green tea) as it's supposed to increase metabolism

- Take 1800mg of L-Carnitine as Doctor Atkins and a lot of resources say it can accelerate weight loss.

- Have my fiber *before* the mean as psyllium husks. This is also supposed to help with weight loss (I just started this one).

I'm thinking of taking Chromium as Doctor Atkins says its will help with fat metabolism.

Anyone else have any additional hints?. I think these are probably providign less than a 5% boost but I'll take it...

Kevin

[FightingTheFight]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

Take 1800mg of L-Carnitine as Doctor Atkins and a lot of resources say it can accelerate weight loss.

What most people don't know is tat they are usally getting sufficent amount from the foods we already eat...and if you are start taking anymore than your body can process , its just pissing in the wind so to speak.

[NoMorePumpkin]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

I take 500 mg of L-Carnitine (in addition to other supplements). I really don't know if it helps, but like you, I want any boost I can get. I also just started CoQ10 (expensive stuff!).

EXERCISE is supposed to really boost weight loss too! I'm just getting started with that though. I hope to see a differrence.

My other tip: DRINK LOTS of WATER!!!!

Good Luck!
Punkin-kid

[CalvinFish]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

I also just started CoQ10 (expensive stuff!).

It is expensive!! I found 30, 30mg for $10. I kept looking an found 30, 50mg plus fish oil and 30 IU Vitamin E for $11.99. Are they milking bugs for this stuff?

[Peytonn]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

the green tea can't hurt... I need to get another bottle of the caps.. but when I couldn't figure out why I wasn't sleeping.. THEN I realized the green tea caps I had were full of caffeine

[burtonator]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

What most people don't know is tat they are usally getting sufficent amount from the foods we already eat...and if you are start taking anymore than your body can process , its just pissing in the wind so to speak.

Well.. This is actually from the book. DANDR... So if Dr. Atkins says it then its all right by me!

[2big4mysize]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

if and only if your dietary intake is low or you were depleted ( Dr Atkins says he prescribes vits and supplements because most folk are when they start) then it will help as Acetyl L-Carnitine is the carrier molecule for fastty acids across the membranes of the mitochondria

that is why it helps some folk and not others red meat is a big suply of it dietarywise.

[Devi]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

From all the stuff that read about Green Tea helping along weight loss, a big part of what made the GT good for it was the synergistic effect of the natural caffeines along with the antioxidants and other good stuff. I'm not scientist, but I wonder if decaff GT is really effective for weight-loss. It would still be of general health benefit, of course, but I just wonder about it's diet effects.

Personally, I haven't found caffeine to be a problem for me on Atkins (or ever in general), so unless you were cutting it out for addiction reasons or it was stalling you, I would just drink GT or take the caps that include the natural caffeines - making sure to drink enough water to keep hydrated, of course. But I know alot of Atkineers are very anti-caffeine, so it's a personal choice.

[not2late]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

Chromium helps to stabilize the blood sugar.

Anyhow, the vitamins are necessary because Dr. Atkins found that most of his beginner dieters lacked vitamins and minerals because their former diets were deficient in them. So, if you're a newbie taking those vitamins is a good idea because your previous diet (high in processed and refined foods) didn't provide those vitamins for you. The more processed and refined a food is the less vitamins and minerals they contain. For example in wheat, most of the nutrients are found just under the outer coating of the wheat grain. When that's stripped off to grind the grains, the nutrients are stripped off too. That's why these products are "enriched" with certain vitamins.

However, once you begin consistently eating the whole, minimally processed and refined foods, you'll be getting vitamins and minerals ---- provided you eat a variety of foods. If you limit yourself to something nutrient poor like lettuce, you won't be getting the full benefits of the diet.

[californiacasey]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

Green tea has nice cleansing effect on me. I have been substituting my coffee with Green tea most days of the week. Usually 2 cups in the morning.

[2big4mysize]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

green tea is one of many foods that has what is called a thermogesic effect. it causes your metabolic rate to slightly increase as it heats you up. If you have eatten a hot pepper and broke out in a sweat you have experienced it no the mouth burn but the hot sweating feeling BUT the amount of many of them to actually have a visible effect on you is great like black pepper takes over a tablespoon.
If you google themogesic foods you will see many of them.

And with the tea if you drink it warm then you have the negative effect of your body being heated up and not needing to activate the thermal heating system burning up cals warming you.

It all will add up but you'd do better to get up amd move around burning up more cals.

Happy low carbing.

[speedygt03]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

CALIFORNIACASEY, just saw your ticker-going to Hawaii! Same time as me. Where abouts are ya going? We'll be staying right on Waikiki Beach. Our hotel is 3 miles from downtown Honolulu. I've never been there before, im REAL excited. Anyone know if thats a good location?
**Sorry to interupt the green tea chat**I had to ask!

[californiacasey]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

We're staying in Kona!!! I am so excited. I've never been so I don't have any advice to give yet!

Have fun, when are you going?

2Big - Are you saying to drink green tea cold????

[speedygt03]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

We're going on Dec. 26th. And of course....its not coming soon enough! The flight is going to kill me. I've never flown before and the flight is 15 hours!

[not2late]

Re: Accelerating Atkins or Stupid Diet Tricks...

This is interesting. I was reading food chemist Robert Wolke's latest book last night. Being a tea junkie, I know that to get the "perfect" cup of tea you need to boil the water to a certain temperature. Black tea requires a different brewing temperature than green tea. But according to Wolke's book, if the brewing temperature is too high when you brew your green tea, it might destroy some of the phytochemicals thereby destroying the "health benefits" of the tea.

Editing to add....

According to tea expert James Norwood Pratt, the proper temperatures are:

212 degrees F for black teas
170-185 degrees F for most green teas, very delicate (and high quality) green teas needs a lower temperature than this.