Keto Means
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How many times a day do you eat on keto diet?

It's common for people to pair the keto diet with intermittent fasting, usually 16:8, which means someone only eats during an 8-hour window each day and fasts for 16 hours. Speed Keto takes this further by advocating for one meal a day.

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Share on Pinterest Speed Keto combines keto with intermittent fasting. Here’s what experts have to say about the benefits and potential health risks of this diet. Getty Images Speed Keto is a high fat diet program meant to get you into a fat-burning state called ketosis more quickly. Speed Keto combines keto with intermittent fasting, when you eat only one meal a day.

Experts say Speed Keto is unsustainable in the long term and could be unhealthy for some people. Keto evangelists have popularized the high fat, low carb diet as a lifestyle. But for the majority of people, the keto diet is restrictive, making it hard to maintain. Now Speed Keto, an even more extreme form of keto, has arrived on the diet scene. The newest twist on keto promises to tap into the body’s fat-burning system faster by integrating a controlled version of fasting. It’s common for people to pair the keto diet with intermittent fasting, usually 16:8, which means someone only eats during an 8-hour window each day and fasts for 16 hours. Speed Keto takes this further by advocating for one meal a day. The meal should be keto-approved, of course. Potential weight loss is the primary selling point for a majority of the keto curious. It’s also been found to lower the risk of diabetes, heart disease, and cancer, but it may have negative health effects for other people. We asked two nutrition experts to review Speed Keto’s protocols for benefits and dangers and answer the question: Should you try this diet?

What is Speed Keto? “Speed Keto is a means of achieving faster ketosis and was created by Harlan Kilstein, who is not a medical professional or nutrition pro, but a coach,” said Cynthia Thurlow, NP, who specializes in nutrition and intermittent fasting. The Speed Keto program is similar to the traditional keto diet in that it requires individuals to eat a high fat, low carb diet. Similarly, it also focuses on putting the body in ketosis, a metabolic state when your body burns fat instead of glucose for energy. When your body is in ketosis, it’s basically a fat-burning machine, thus giving keto its reputation as a weight loss tool. The difference with Speed Keto? You can only eat one meal a day. The meal should follow the traditional keto guidelines of high fat and low carb macronutrients. “It’s main goal is to attempt to become fat-adapted faster than a more traditional ketogenic diet,” Thurlow told Healthline. “Fasting can help speed the process of getting into ketosis,” explained Tony Castillo, MS, RDN, LDN, nutrition consultant for RSP Nutrition. “It can typically take 2 to 4 days to enter ketosis if you have less than 50 grams of carbs per day,” he continued, pointing out that several factors, from what you eat to age and activity level, can extend the amount of time it takes to enter ketosis. Even though you may enter fat-burning ketosis more quickly on Speed Keto, seeing a lower number on the scale might be misleading. “Since the traditional keto and Speed Keto focus on [eating] fats, your body will excrete more water because fats do not like water. This means the weight loss you see is most likely water weight or even muscle weight, not true fat loss,” Castillo said.

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