Primal for female athlete not working?? page 3

[Edje Noh]

Any news on how you're doing now?
I'm having similar challenges and would like to hear other people's experiences that have gone thru it/are going thru it?

[Ciri]

Report after 2 weeks:

Not much of a progress as of now. I did incorporate yums and potatoes on the days of my heavy training (that's when I do double training = crossfit + sand). Increased my carb intake to about 120grams on those days. Keep myself to 80g on remaining. No weight change, no visible muscular changes, no measurement change. The only noticeable difference are energy levels and ability to fall asleep. When I was eating 80g or less, I was having very difficult times falling asleep even though my body was exhausted and needed a good sleep to recover. Normally on SAD diet, I would hit the pillow and be asleep but I suspect low carb diet messes up with my brain ability to shut down. When I upped my intake to 120g, I can fall asleep much faster and sleep soundly.
Energy levels seem to be much better too - I can sustain myself throughout the day on 3 square meals even with all the training. I know the training is not what Mark recommends but you have to touch the ball this much in order to compete on that level. I want to give it a full month which would be the end of May to see if anything changed before trying to tweak things again.

[Edje Noh]

I read somewhere that melotonin release is effected by blood glucose levels (so carb intake) and it takes the brain time to adjust to a diet lower in carbs. I had it (difficulty falling asleep) too a few times, but it never lasted longer than one hour before I fell asleep. I do eat more carbs (100-150) per day, but I also eat more calories (2600-3200).
Good to hear that you're energy levels have improved. For me the improvements have been very gradual and I started off with pretty intense low carb flu. I hope the gradual improvements keep coming

[Ciri]

Update after another 2 weeks:

FIRST CARB REFEED:

I got little pissed off that my performance declined. Screw the 9lbs weight gain, that is something I can deal with but low energy levels again while training really make me mad as I . Prior to PB I could play 10hr tourney on sand and be completely fine. Now I do my regular crossfit and go sand training after and am super lightheaded during entire practice and all evening afterwards. So I decided to do carb refeed, whole day of low fat and high carbs....my final split was 25g of fat, 230g of carbs, 60g of protein.

Observations:
1) some carbs do not taste as good anymore
2) energy levels were great - I did 2hrs practice and unscheduled 10k walk and felt great...definitely better performance
3) I am more bloated today
4) sleep was no problem - I hit the pillow, was asleep within 5 mins for 9 glorious hours

So I am back to guessing this whole PB transitioning....obviously my body trains better if I have carbs and I think maybe females may need more carbs in general...I am already taking in 100-120g of carbs in daily....I may need to do more carb refeeding in the future? Not sure though...grrr this tweaking of PB is just making everything so difficult...

[Edje Noh]

It's certainly challenging if you have to lay low, when you want to perform in physical activities. I can totally relate to that. However, I do see advantages of PB eating style. I'm definetely less hungry between meals. I used to eat around the clock. Now, I feel satieted thru-out the day on 3 meals. However, my energy levels and degree of focus suffered. As for carb-refeed. I had several during the semi-transition phase and I had one in the second week of my full-transition on a night where I just felt so sad and bummed about my 'energy crash', that I ate cereal with vanilla-sugar-yoghurt crap, some sugar bomb processed food and a heap of dairy. Than again, before PB, my entire life was a carb refeed xD.
I kept dairy out for the most part, except for two times when I ate some molten cheese on top of my cauliflower.
I think most of this for me was just sugar withdrawal symptoms + my body in pit-stop repair mode as I finally gave it some quality materials. And switch from glucose fuelling to more beta-oxidation. I think I'll just keep eating like this untill my body adjusts to it and I'll eventually even out at a caloric intake of 50-60 % from fat, 20-25% from carb and 20-25% from protein. I've decided to keep it going for another four weeks after I've completed the initial 28 days.

Also beware of generalizing the carb intake, it might just be your mind feeding the carb addiction, but I can't tell, maybe athletes do need more carbs to perform well. I'm still in the process of figuring that one out.

[arthurb999]

A pro athlete with long grueling sessions probably needs more carbs than your average office worker. If you're eating heathy stuff even if you have an extra sweet potato and fruit or even a glass of OJ in the morning with your eggs.

[Alex Good]

Female athlete? Isn't that an oxymoron? (Kidding!)

[Ciri]

Edje and Arthur: Thanks for suggestions and support. I have been adding sweet potatoes and did my first carb-refeed. No OJ but I will add some berries here and there. It's getting better as far as energy levels. The progress is just sooo slow - 2 days decent, one day crap and awful training, another 2 days ok, then 2 days terrible again. I am trying to zoom in onto workout and training details as well and figure out exactly what causes those highs and lows and track my diet + training together to see if there is any pattern emerging. I need to give it at least another full month of training, competitions and eating PB...feel like a lab rat sometimes

Alex: Female professional beach volleyball player and female crossfitters...yep total oxymoron

[arthurb999]

Think of it like this... you spent your entire life running on carbs... it may take time to adjust to running on fat.

[jacky001]

I'm just interested to know about women's thoughts on dating and who should make the moves. Do you feel that it's up to the man to do the chasing and initiate the dates/where to go? How often would you expect a man to call you if you have been dating for a while, say 1-2 months? Do you like a man to tell you about how he feels or SHOW you?