Is Carb Cycling Good for Muscle Gain?

Should you carb cycle on a low-carb diet to improve your performance?

If you’ve been reading about the keto diet, you may have stumbled upon a type of cyclical keto dieting called carb cycling.

On carb cycling, you eat high-carb, for example two days of the week, & low-carb for the other days of the week.

But, is carb cycling good for muscle gain?

Would it improve your performance compared to a normal low-carb or keto diet?

In this article we’ll go over if carb cycling is good for muscle gain or not, & who should carb cycle.

What Is Keto?

Keto is a diet where you reduce your intake of carbs to below 5 percent of your total calories, & consume mostly protein & fat. This can be done for various reasons. Some people do keto for weight loss or for improving mental health.

In the context of gaining muscle, the keto diet is not good or bad.

The keto diet is just a high fat, low carb diet but it doesn’t have an impact on muscle gain because you still eat the same amount of protein.

However, the adapting phase to keto will take around six weeks to get your body adjusted to using fats as fuel, so until the six weeks have been reached, your performance will see a decline.

What Is Carb Cycling?

Carb cycling is a type of eating pattern where you eat low carb for most of the week, for example five days of the week, but then the rest of the week, you eat high carb for example two days of the week.

The biggest goal with carb cycling is to make a low-carb or keto diet easier. However since you won’t be on a low-carb or keto diet the whole time, then you would lose much less weight.

However some people are carb cycling to improve their fitness performance.

Does Carb Cycling Improve Performance on Keto?

No, carb cycling doesn’t improve your performance on keto. If you add carbs into your diet, then your body wouldn’t be able to use fats as fuel since you be kicked out of ketosis, so your performance would decrease.

Muscle glycogen, the stored form of carbs in your muscles, is depleted when you reduce carbs for a prolonged period of time.

This means that you’ll likely perform better during low-carb training, but you may be slightly less effective during high-carb training.

That is why carb cycling, especially on a low-carb diet, would be worse than just eating low-carb because your body isn’t used to using carbs as fuel.

It would be much better to just eat low carb throughout the whole week, so your fitness performance wouldn’t suffer.

Keep in mind that if you are just adjusting to a keto diet, eating high carb may improve your performance, but that’s just because your body hasn’t adjusted to a low carb diet. So if you want to fully improve your performance you should actually just keep doing a keto diet and then your body would eventually adjust to using fats.

Is Carb Cycling Good for Muscle Gain?

No, carb cycling is not good for gaining muscle. This is because if you ate a low-carb diet 100%, then your body would be able to use fats as fuel. But if you ate carbs and fat, like carbs cycling, then you wouldn’t get the benefits of eating carbs or fats.

So, if you wanted to gain muscle, then you should pick one side as your fuel source, either fats or carbs.

If you choose both, then your insulin would be raised, so you wouldn’t be able to use the fats as fuel.

Who Should Carb Cycle?

If you have lost all the weight you wanted to on a keto diet, then you should consider carb cycling.

However, there are two different types of carb cycling.

The Two Different Types of Carb Cycling

There is short term carb cycling and long term carb cycling.

In short term carb cycling, you may eat carbs for let’s say two days of the week, and eat low carb for the rest of the week.

However, on long-term carb cycling, you may eat carbs for around two months of the year, and eat keto for the rest of the year.

But, long-term carb cycling is much better than short term carb cycling for your health.

This is because in long-term carb cycling, your body has time to adjust to using either carbs or fats as fuel 100%.

It takes around six weeks for your mitochondria to go through their life cycle. So, if you keep eating carbs some days of the week and fats the other days of the week, then you’re mitochondria can’t adapt 100%

This would leave you stuck in the middle, and you’d be more tired, and your workout performance would decrease.

This would negatively impact how much muscle you could grow on a keto diet.

The Benefits of Long-Term Carb Cycling

The benefits of long-term carb cycling are:

• You Become “Dual-Fueled” — When you do long-term carb cycling, you give your body time to adjust to using either carbs or fats as fuel. This means that you essentially become like a hybrid vehicle, meaning your body would be able to process carbs or fats. This would make your overall health better since you’d be more balanced.
• You Can Stick to Keto for Longer — If you do long-term carb cycling, like eating carbs for two months of the year, then you can stick to keto in the for longer. Having more dietary freedom can be really helpful when eating out or when you are on vacation.
• Your Gut Health May Improve — If you eat healthy carbs on your carb cycle, like corn, beans, peas, sweet potatoes, etc, your gut’s biodiversity would increase. This would make your overall gut health better since your good gut bacteria would grow.

However, if you haven’t lost all the weight you wanted to on a keto diet, then you should not consider carb cycling since it would slow down your weight-loss progress.

How To Carb Cycle

To do carb cycling, you should eat keto for 10 months of the year, and eat high carb for the other two months of the year. This would give your body the full amount of time it needs to adjust to using both types of fuel sources.

I, and many other carb cyclers, spend their carb cycle during their longest vacation.

For me this is my summer vacation, and it lets me enjoy my vacation to a better extent.

Having more dietary freedom can definitely improve your overall satisfaction from your diet.

Conclusion

In conclusion, carb cycling does not improve your workout performance or help you build more muscle. This is because your body cannot use both fats and carbs as fuel at the same time. So, it is better to just eat strict keto to build the most amount of muscle.

If you want to start intermittent fasting to boost the affects of keto, then you can read my article here going in depth on the benefits of OMAD & how to start. *Helped me lose 40 pounds*