The Primal Podcast Ep 122 - Prof Noakes | Stop Eating Carbohydrates (Fix Insulin Resistance)
Jun 14, 2025
Professor Tim Noakes, a world-renowned physician and endurance athlete, challenges long-held beliefs about carbohydrates. He reveals how quitting carbs for 30 days can dramatically improve insulin resistance and promote fat burning. Noakes shares insights from his research on low-carb diets, debunks myths around carb-loading for athletes, and discusses the potential to reverse diabetes symptoms through dietary changes. He emphasizes that humans are designed to metabolize fat and advocates for a lower-carb approach to optimize health and performance.
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Carbs Aren’t Required For Performance
- Carbohydrates are not essential for human metabolism or exercise performance according to Tim Noakes' research.
- Low-carb diets can maintain performance while dramatically increasing fat oxidation during exercise.
Noakes’ Personal Diabetes Reversal
- Tim Noakes recounts that he developed diabetes due to family history and high-carb eating despite heavy running.
- The instant he reduced carbs he lost weight and his diabetes came under control.
Two Separate Glucose Pools Explained
- The body has two distinct glucose pools: a small blood/liver pool (~5 g) and a larger muscle glycogen pool.
- Consuming >5 g glucose spikes insulin and forces rapid storage in liver or muscle, driving insulin resistance if repeated.