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Interview with Anthony Colpo
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The following interview was conducted with Anthony Colpo (Nutrition & Health author, Independent Researcher). This interview is packed with quality information.
J Hale: Anthony you have gained a reputation as being a top nutrition myth buster. What influenced you to publicly debunk many of the popular nutrition myths?
A Colpo: The main inspiration was the negative effects I myself experienced from following bogus diet and health information. At the ripe old age of 21, I was told by a doctor that my “moderately high” cholesterol level was placing me at “moderately high” risk of heart disease. He gave me some literature recommending restriction of saturated fats, so I started avoiding foods rich in animal fats. To learn how I could further reduce my risk of heart disease, I started reading everything about diet and health I could get my hands on. Unfortunately, this was in 1989, when low-fat mania reigned supreme. So everything I was reading was reverberating the same message: “Fat is bad, complex carbs are good!”
I really got sucked in by all the anti-fat idiocy, and began consuming a very low-fat diet. The problem was that, as I became more and more active, I required a higher caloric intake. Trying to maintain a high caloric intake on a very low-fat diet means that most of your calories have to come from carbohydrates. I began eating large amounts of so-called “healthy” complex carbohydrate foods like brown pasta, brown rice, rye bread, millet, buckwheat, oats, and so on.
After several years of this, I couldn’t help but realize I was feeling much worse, not better. I actually felt healthier when I was 21, when I had “moderately high” cholesterol and was eating whatever I wished. My blood sugar control had deteriorated markedly, my blood pressure had risen, I was often feeling lethargic and had started using caffeine to perk myself up for workouts, and I’d often feel bloated after eating. Thanks to roller coaster-like blood sugar status, my energy levels swung between normal and feeling totally drained. There I was, a very health conscious non-smoker and non-drinker in my mid-20s, the peak years of my life, and I was feeling like complete crap.
So I eventually began experimenting with other dietary strategies, and it wasn’t until I settled into a non-ketogenic low-carb diet that my symptoms disappeared. My fasting blood sugar readings normalized, my blood pressure dropped back down, I started feeling far more even-keeled in terms of mental and physical energy, and my digestive function became a whole lot smoother.
At the time, low-carb diets were experiencing a surge in popularity, and health authorities seemed to be doing everything in their power to kill this resurgence. I was perplexed – here was a dietary pattern that had just done wonders for my health, and authorities were dumping all over it and trying to convince me to go back to eating the same diet that was previously ruining my health.
I couldn’t help but wonder what motivated them to make such illogical statements. When I looked at the anti-low carb commentators a little more closely, something became readily apparent; most of them had a vested interest in upholding the low-fat diet paradigm. Some were health organizations that received money from low-fat food manufacturers and cholesterol drug producers, some were low-fat book authors, and others were promoters of vegetarianism. When it came to attacking low-carb diets, they all had a self-serving agenda, one that was not necessarily based on good science or true concern for the public welfare.
I realized that if I wanted to know the truth about diet and health issues, I simply could not rely on popular books, magazines, media stories and health authority propaganda. I knew that if I wanted the facts, I was going to have to start examining the primary research literature myself. So I started hitting the local medical libraries, and what I discovered was astounding.
The whole anti-fat, anti-cholesterol paradigm was based upon shamelessly skewed data; it was a total sham. Decades of long-term epidemiological and clinical intervention studies did not support the anti-fat/anti-cholesterol paradigm. In fact, some of them flatly contradicted it.
I also learnt that the diet humans were designed to eat was not a Spartan low-fat affair based on cereal grains, but one centered around nutrient-rich meats and non-cereal plant foods that could be hunted, gathered, and eaten with a minimum of processing. Consumption of cereal grains by humans began in earnest only 10,000 years ago, a period of time that did not allow complete genetic adaptation. As for refined vegetable oils and sugars, these were not consumed on a wide basis until around 150 years ago. The problem with the modern diet is not that it is too much like the meat and fat-rich diets of our ancestors; rather, it is not nearly enough like the diet of our ancestors. Nowadays, we are attempting to nourish our bodies on substandard foods that the human body was never designed to eat.
The more I learnt, the more I realized just why my low-fat diet had been such a disaster. By eating a low-fat, cereal grain-based diet, I was trying to push a square peg into a round hole. If you keep running a high performance vehicle on the wrong fuel, something’s eventually going to give. In my case, it was my health that began to suffer because of the low-fat diet. And the reason I had adopted that diet in the first place was because of faulty information being disseminated both to the public and to health professionals.
I became highly indignant at the idea that my health had suffered due to misinformation emanating from commentators with vested interests. I realized that there were many other people out there who were still being subjected to this misinformation and who were suffering health problems as a result. I felt I had an obligation to begin sharing my information with others, so I established the first of several websites and began posting articles discussing my findings. Not long after this, I started toying with the idea of putting my findings into book form and the rest, as they say, is history.
J Hale: What would you suggest consumers do to better educate themselves on the Fitness and Health industry?
A Colpo: I would recommend the following, for starters:
1) Stop uncritically accepting information simply because it comes from authoritative-sounding spokespeople or organizations. The reality is that doctors are not infallible, many health authors and journalists are downright clueless, and health agencies almost always have a vested financial interest in the dietary guidelines they promote.
2) Be prepared to open your mind and discard cherished beliefs when the scientific evidence shows them to be wrong.
3) Start examining the literature for yourself. When I say the literature, I’m not talking about the latest batch of hyperbolic diet books to hit the shelves at your local Borders. I’m talking about the scientific literature, primarily peer reviewed journal articles that report the actual results of studies. By directly examining the research papers for yourself, you are no longer relying on the assertions of third party commentators with questionable agendas. You have the data right there in your hands, and you can see for yourself whether the study confirms or contradicts the hypothesis it is testing.
The problem with telling people to start reading study papers for themselves is that a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. You’ve got to properly understand what you’re reading for it to be of true benefit to you. I’ve had people come on to my Low Carb Muscle forum, triumphantly citing studies that they believed disproved my assertions that metabolic advantage dogma (MAD) is untenable. When I read their comments, then read the actual studies, it quickly became apparent that: 1) they had not read the full study, or; 2) if they had read the full study, they had absolutely no idea how to correctly interpret what they were reading.
If you’re going to hit the literature, you must do it with a good fundamental grasp of physiology, statistics, study design and so on. You need to understand what is meant by terms such as probability and statistical significance, you need to understand the fundamental requirements of randomization (e.g., similar baseline characteristics in each group), and how to read tabulated data. You need to learn how to use reference lists and databases like Pubmed to track down as many possible studies on a certain topic. You must avoid the temptation to cherry-pick only those studies that support your preconceived beliefs.
Unfortunately, many people will decide this is all too hard and will continue on in a perpetual state of confusion. Diet Guru X will make a statement that sounds very convincing to them, but then Guru Y makes an equally convincing but totally contradictory statement, and they simply don’t know whom they should believe. The correct answer of course, is that they shouldn’t believe anyone until they’ve checked the research for themselves.
For example, when I state that seven decades’ worth of tightly controlled metabolic ward studies have failed to show a weight loss benefit for isocaloric low-carb diets, I’m not pulling this statement out of thin air. I am basing it upon the actual clinical findings, and wholeheartedly urge you to check the research for yourself. That way, people will see that I’m not yanking their chains. And when some huckster who’s made millions promoting a weight loss “metabolic advantage” for low-carb diets tells you that I’m wrong, you’ll know first-hand that he’s the one full of bullpucky.
J Hale: What steps can consumers take to educate themselves on better understanding research findings?
A Colpo: Some research papers are quite easy to read, others are very complex and require extra careful reading and a thorough knowledge of the subject being discussed. The problem is made worse when researchers use excessive technical jargon that lay readers may not be familiar with, or when they use statistical chicanery to make the data look like it supports a preconceived conclusion when it really doesn’t.
There are a number of online resources that people can use to gain a better understanding of how to read research papers. The following is a good introductory primer about the basic structure of research papers, and some key issues to consider when reading through a paper:
http://www.biochem.arizona.edu/classes/bioc568/papers.htm
Here’s another:
http://www.sigcomm.org/ccr/drupal/files/p83-keshavA.pdf
A more advanced series called "How to Read a Paper" can be found here:
http://www.health.library.mcgill.ca/ebm/greenhalgh.htm
It will take some time to read and learn about this area, but I personally think the effort is well worth it.
J Hale: Of the books you have written which one are you the most proud of? What has the feedback been like on that book?
A Colpo: I’m proud of all my books, but if I had to pick a favorite, I’d say The Fat Loss Bible. It’s ironic, because I originally had no intention of writing a fat loss book. To me the weight loss industry seemed like a real den of thieves, one full of unscrupulous hucksters who would say and do anything to make a buck. I really didn’t want to be associated in any with such a dodgy bunch of operators. But when I came under attack from the MAD fanatics, I realized that a hard-hitting book destroying common weight loss fallacies was long overdue. I threw my reluctance aside and promptly began writing The Fat Loss Bible.
The feedback on The Fat Loss Bible has been fantastic. The most common theme among the feedback I’m receiving is that, after reading my book, people finally understand what’s really important when it comes to weight loss. Reading the book has allowed them, in one fell swoop, to brush aside all the BS myths and get down to the business of doing what really works. As that was a major goal for me when writing The Fat Loss Bible, I find it extremely gratifying to receive such feedback.
J Hale: Recently I read that Dr. Michael Eades (author of Protein Power) was going to offer what he called a dissection of Chapter 1 of The Fat Loss Bible. I have not seen the dissection yet. Any idea of what is going on with that?
A Colpo: I have no idea what the deal is with that, I guess you’d need to ask Eades himself where he’s at with his threatened “dissection”.
Personally, I think this whole Eades scenario is getting a little old, but if he attacks my book then rest assured I’m coming right back at him.
The guy is a perfect case study of irrational devotion to dogma. It all started when he posted a preposterous comparison of two totally incompatible studies on his blog, and then proudly trumpeted his absurdly biased comparison as evidence for the superiority of isocaloric low-carb diets for weight loss. He proclaimed that anyone who thinks weight loss is all about calories is a “fool” and told a reader he thought I was “wrong” for stating that there is no metabolic advantage.
I asked him in an open letter to justify these comments, and three months later, he still has not done so. He has not answered in any coherent manner why decades of tightly controlled metabolic ward studies have failed to show any fat loss advantage to low-carb diets. He has failed to explain why half of the free-living studies conducted to date have also failed to find any fat loss advantage for low-carb diets. He repeatedly claims that carbs and insulin are the main players in weight loss, but offers no explanation of the comparative ward and free-living studies that found marked reductions in insulin levels on low-carb diets but no greater fat loss.
What he has done is generated some of the most bizarre defenses for MAD I’ve ever heard. He’s treated us to dissertations on Karl Popper, “lazy” and “obnoxious” teenagers, ketotic mice, the caloric content of wieners…but no rational explanation of the fact that tightly controlled research in real live humans comparing isocaloric low- and high-carb diets has failed to demonstrate any fat loss advantage for the former.
He launches one ad hominem attack after another at me, whining about everything from my writing style, my shutting down of the old TheOmnivore web site, the “acknowledgements” page of The Fat Loss Bible, my blasting of a deranged Internet stalker on my web forum, and on and on. None of this of course, has anything to do with the metabolic advantage theory. It is simply a gutter-level attempt by Eades to cast aspersions on my character. Again, for all his insults and character assassination, Eades offers no explanation of why decades of tightly controlled clinical research with real live humans has failed to demonstrate any fat loss advantage for isocaloric low-carb diets.
He cites the work of his buddies Richard Feinman and Eugene Fine, insisting that a metabolic advantage must exist because their calculations predict it. Predictions are one thing, but - as anyone whose ever lost a bundle of money on an “expert” analyst’s stockmarket tip or been caught in a rainstorm after the weatherman forecast fine and sunny weather will attest – actual real life results are often another thing. Predictions are just that: predictions. They cannot be accepted as correct until validated by real world findings. Feinman and Fine’s writings are theoretical in nature, they present a hypothetical explanation for a phenomenon that has never been demonstrated to exist. No matter how clever their writings may sound to Eades, their belief in the MAD theory of weight loss has been disproved by metabolic ward studies dating back as far as 1935.
While happy to accept uncontrolled and notoriously unreliable free-living studies as proof of MAD, Eades attempts to dismiss ward studies as “rife with inaccuracies”. He offers no factual evidence to support this statement, which raises the suspicion that he simply made it up to bolster his argument. If you read through the following study, you’ll see the kind of rigorous restrictions imposed upon folks taking part in ward studies:
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/reprint/20/2/139?maxtoshow=&HITS=…//
Eades claims metabolic ward studies are "rife with inaccuracies”, but take careful note of the level of control exerted by the researchers in this study (which found no difference in isocaloric diets of varying protein and fat content):
"Prior to admission, all the patients were carefully screened for their interest and motivation for continued participation in the study and they were fully informed concerning the demanding schedules of diet, exercise, and the limitations of freedom imposed by a strict metabolic ward schedule."
"No patient was permitted to leave the Clinical Research Center area without an escort, and all were under the continued surveillance of our staff. A schedule of occupational therapy was provided in the form of “hobby activities.” The patients tolerated this restrictive and tightly controlled regimen with no more than a healthy amount of grumbling, and patient cooperation on the whole was splendid."
And to see the lengths some researchers go to ensure truly isocaloric intakes during metabolic ward studies, check out the following article from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition:
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/reprint/2/5/336
Yet while he’s willing to dismiss the results of tightly controlled ward studies that contradict MAD, he’s happy to cite the work of Feinman and Fine, who have cited the famous Kekwik and Pawan ward study in support of MAD. Those who are familiar with this study will know that it was a short-term endeavor that really was “rife” with cheating; so much so that Kekwik and Pawan were driven to describe many of their subjects as having “inadequate personalities”.
Amazingly, after all his pro-MAD ranting and raving, and after all his twisting, distorting and evading of the facts, Eades finally ends up unwittingly acknowledging that I am correct when he writes:
"Both MD and I have had patients who complained to us that they were following our program to the letter and weren’t losing any weight. When we asked them for their diet diaries we found that they were consuming huge amounts of food but were rigorously keeping their carbs below 30 grams per day. Sometimes we calculated that these patients were eating 4000+ kcal per day, which could have even been higher given that patients tend to under report what they eat instead of over reporting. What was amazing to us was that they weren’t gaining. They were pretty much maintaining their weight on an enormous number of low-carb calories.
We would explain to them about how they needed to create a caloric deficit to lose. Most people will create the caloric deficit when they go on a low-carb diet because the increased fat and protein in the absence of carbs is extremely satiating."
Eades’ claims about his patients’ inability to gain weight at high caloric intakes must be taken for what they are: unverifiable and anecdotal. But notice what he is revealing here: he’s admitting that it’s only after their patients fail to lose weight that the Eades feel compelled to mention the importance of a calorie deficit. No matter how much Eades wishes to believe that carbs and insulin are the key players in weight status, he’s admitting his patients fail to lose weight because they fail to establish a calorie deficit.
That’s been my main point throughout this whole MAD saga, that you must establish a calorie deficit to lose weight. It doesn’t matter how much you cut carbs, or fat, or sugar, or whatever other macronutrient you’ve chosen to blame for fat gain – without a calorie deficit, you won’t lose diddly. My beef with the MAD theory of weight loss is that – besides being a complete sham – it distracts people from the real requirement of weight loss, which is a calorie deficit. As a result, many people will fail to achieve their weight loss goals.
Eades claims that anyone who thinks weight loss is all about calories is a “fool”, but then publicly admits that some of his own patients fail to lose weight even when cutting carbs to less than 30 grams per day. Why? Because, by his own admission, they are eating too many calories. He has personally attacked me and bent over backwards to justify MAD every step of the way, but now inadvertently acknowledges that I am correct. He might have made millions promoting MAD, but at the end of the day, neither Eades nor his patients can escape the laws of reality. No calorie deficit, no weight loss. Period.
That’s what happens when you try to defend an untenable theory – you eventually trip up on your own contradictions and reveal to the world that you’re wrong.
J Hale: Do you currently have any projects in the works?
A Colpo: My next project was going to be the completion of a partially written Paleo nutrition and lifestyle book that I have sitting in my files, but since releasing The Fat Loss Bible I have been getting a lot of requests to write a book about training. I must admit, that is something that appeals to me, so I definitely am looking at that. I’ve also had people suggest I put out some sort of video content, like a DVD series or documentary. I recently helped comedian Tom Naughton with the narrative in the heart disease section of his up-coming movie “Fathead”, which is a kind of rebuttal to Morgan Spurlock’s “Super Size Me”. Tom suggested that I consider putting together a documentary. The idea definitely interests me, so when time permits that is something I would like to explore more deeply.
But my main priority right now is to start promoting The Fat Loss Bible in a far more efficient and organized manner. It’s selling well at the moment despite my totally disorganized and haphazard marketing efforts. My problem is I’m a researcher and writer foremost, I really don’t care for the whole marketing side of things, but it’s something I have to do. My New Year’s resolution is to get that area much better organized. I don’t see much point in starting another book when The Fat Loss Bible is only reaching a fraction of its potential audience.
J Hale: Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
A Colpo: Lounging on the beach of a remote tropical island, surrounded by a bevy of beautiful young bikini models, and debating issues of monumental importance with them, like whether we’ll travel to the mainland via my helicopter or luxury yacht to stock up on supplies.
OK, seriously…in case the remote island thing doesn’t quite work out, I see myself continuing to research, write, and train. No matter what happens, I will always strive to advance my knowledge when it comes to training, nutrition and health. My main target audience will always be the kind of person who wants to look and feel great. I’m not real interested in the kind of folks who train only for vanity purposes. Over the years I’ve known more than a few blokes with pretty impressive physiques who would stay out until all hours hitting the booze and party drugs. And I’ve known others with awe-inspiring muscular development, but when you got them to work the heavy bag or go for a run they’d be totally exhausted within minutes. I don’t get it - why look like a stallion but perform like a broken down old donkey? To me, that kind of incongruence just doesn’t make sense.
On the flipside, I also have little time for people who say things like, “Oh, I don’t want a great body, I’m happy just to drop a few pounds”, or skinny guys who say, “I don’t want to get too big”. To me, what these people are really saying is “I doubt my ability to achieve an above average body, so I’m going to settle for mediocrity and avoid the possibility of failure and disappointment”. They needn’t worry; with such low expectations, they are in no danger of accidentally attaining physical excellence. Personally, I think life’s too short to settle for mediocrity – I want to work with those who aspire to stand out and achieve something special.
My training and nutrition philosophies are designed to make people look and perform at a high level. Improving agility, co-ordination, posture, strength, power generation, stamina…these things aren’t just for athletes. Everyone can benefit from developing these qualities, which is why my weight training routines are always based on the big compound movements that most closely replicate real-life movements. If you improve your strength in the squat, deadlift, and clean, then that has a lot of carry-over to real life, and you don’t need to be lifting world record poundages to experience these benefits. These movements will help you when lifting things around the house or at work, hoisting young children from the ground and carrying them around, they will help you if you have a physical job, and they will make you more injury-resistant when playing sports or exerting yourself in non-sporting activities. Improving your concentration curl or pec dec, on the other hand, will do little to nothing to improve your ‘real world’ physical performance.
So basically I see myself playing a role in promoting the old Greek and Roman ideal of the well-rounded person who attains a high level of all-round physical and intellectual development.
Another thing I see myself focusing on more closely is the whole anti-aging aspect of training and diet. I’ve always been interested in this area, but having just turned 40, it’s starting to take on even greater relevance for me personally. So I’ll definitely be doing more research in this area.
Over the next ten years, I see myself striving to be one fit 50-year old. I was recently talking with one of my youthful-looking cousins who’s also heavily into fitness and who will also be turning 40 soon. We were discussing how we can now do stuff training-wise we simply couldn’t do when were in our early twenties. And there are a lot of world-class athletes now doing things that were unthinkable not so long ago. You have guys like Randy Couture coming out of retirement and kicking butt in the UFC at 43 years of age. I find that hugely inspirational. There’s no excuse for getting fat and unfit as you grow older; keep training hard and eating right and you will be pleasantly surprised just how fit and healthy you can keep yourself.
In 10 years time, I aim to make a lot more people around the world familiar with my writings. I also would like to see a lot more people familiar with the writings of people like yourself, Lyle McDonald, and Alan Aragon. A lot of people have never heard of the aforementioned names, which is unfortunate because these are the writers who are really on the cutting edge and really up to date with the science. In contrast, many people are very familiar with folks like Atkins, Eades, and Ornish, but the weight loss writings of these guys, quite frankly, leaves a lot to be desired.
The diet and weight loss industry is a little like the music industry – some of the highest quality music comes from relatively unknown bands on independent labels, while much of what you see in the mainstream charts is banal garbage promoted by the big labels. It’s the same with popular hard copy diet books; volume of sales typically enjoys an inverse relationship with quality of information. Maximizing sales by cashing in on ‘hot’ and novel themes and/or author notoriety are the prime concerns of the major publishing houses. Ensuring a thorough scientific foundation of the books they publish is of little concern to them; if it were of any concern, you wouldn’t see books promoting veganism, low-carb diets and low-fat diets emanating from the same publishing house.
J Hale: Thanks Anthony for the information you shared with us.
Visit Anthony Colpo’s website at www.anthonycolpo.com
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