No.1 Nutrition Expert: Debunking Myths On Gut Health, Protein Intake & Calories

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In this episode, Jake joins world-leading nutrition expert Tim Spector to dive deep into the myths and truths about diet and health.
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Tim Spector is a renowned epidemiologist, geneticist, and author. Known for his work on personalised nutrition, he explains why calorie counting often fails in the long term. Emphasising the importance of food quality over quantity, Tim points out how ultra-processed foods can sabotage our health despite being low-calorie.
Tim breaks down the complex relationship between diet, exercise, and mental health, sharing insights on why exercise alone isn't enough for weight loss and how our food choices impact our mood and mental health.
He also talks about the transformative changes he'd make to our food systems, like ensuring real food in all institutions, stressing the interconnectedness of diet, exercise, and sleep for optimal health.
With practical tips on how to improve your diet and lifestyle, this episode provides trusted insights from one of the most respected experts in the health and wellness field."
0:00 Introduction
1:10 What Is High Performance?
2:56 The Quick-Fix Dilemma
8:35 🚨 Huel
9:14 The Problem With Calorie Counting
17:31 What Should Your Diet Look Like?
22:51 The Power Of The Gut
28:26 We're Getting Too Much Protein
29:36 🚨 Eight Sleep
30:30 The Dangers Of UPF
35:55 Fighting Big Business
41:46 New Food Laws
47:11 Diet Links To Mental Health
54:34 Exercise Misconceptions
1:08:34 A Good Day Of Nutrition
1:15:17 Quick-Fire Questions
#HighPerformance #TimSpector #Zoe

[@HighPerformancePodcast]

What is your favourite moment from the episode? 💪

[@MJ-nk7mp]

Laughed out loud when I got the Huel advert on Spotify 25 mins in 😂.

[@tobyninja6369]

Me too 😂

[@bb2021]

Same on the CEO blog. Eat real food - but first a word from our supplements sponsor! Credibility plummets!

[@MJ-nk7mp]

@@bb2021 Yep I stopped listening to that some time ago. Had too many moments with popular podcasts where the hypocrisy is just too much. Huel, AG1 etc, not a good look. No more of this stuff for me.

[@plantbased30somethingfemal59]

Me too xxx

[@cag19549]

Ditto!

[@hasilovich]

Very insightful discussion, always enjoy Tim Spector as a guest, thank you!

[@raymondjames3623]

Totally agree with Jake’s comment about calorie counting is likened to budgeting.

[@annetcell-ly4571]

Sharing the insights of new research is a good thing. The microbiome is a new frontier.

[@ericpullen1513]

No, 1 expert🤔

[@annettestephens5337]

Tim should put calories to one side and concentrate on satiating the appetite with whole food protein snd fats. It’s a hormone issue Tim. Check out Dr Ben Bikman.

[@Nocommentnotnever]

It would be great if you could get a coeliac nutritional expert on. I want to avoid preservatives, foods with lots of ingredients etc. but it’s near impossible in a gluten free diet, would be good to know how to strike the balance. Podcasts etc are surprisingly bad so far on this👊

[@septynets]

Kefir is extremely popular in Easter Europe. Even children love to drink it

[@FrozenDung]

I always saw it on the eastern European section in Morrisons/Sainsbury's but now they are British brands doing it too

[@juliaperkins3387]

For the past 10 years I have been walking 10.000 to 12000 steps a day, I have not lost 1 milligram in weight

[@chadfitch3293]

See Dr Eric Westman at Adapt your life academy - go to under 20 carbs a day. You will start loosing weight and you don’t have to exercise although the 12000 steps is very good for your health

[@chrisloynes7796]

There’s a saying Julia….”doing the same thing over and over with the same result …..!”

[@vatsmith8759]

But I'll bet you're a lot healthier than you would be if you hadn't walked so much.

[@harryturnbull1884]

No wonder if youre still scoffing

[@StoicAurelius1]

Then go back to being couch potato see if you will loose weight. I bet you will be a potato 😅

[@dorothybutterfield8428]

Tim speaks in a conversational way which I appreciate

[@Yeast85]

Conventional?

[@geoffstairmand3747]

At the beginning of the Cameron-led government, public health services (and particularly health promotion) was moved from the Health Service to the under-funded local government control. One of the consequences of this was the complete removal of health education to the public. We now completely rely on the (hardly) independent news services to educate us.

[@AdventuresWithQuinn]

people were still fat back then

[@vatsmith8759]

You mean the complete removal of health education to the public, apart from (off the top of my head) things like the NHS website, Public Health England and other government-funded advice sources and public libraries?

[@gazlives]

i don't understand how you can be deficient in fibre but at the same time it is not an essential nutrient. No fat you die, no protein you die, no fibre nothing. no carbs nothing.

[@AdventuresWithQuinn]

Your microbiome needs fibre. So you won't die, but you'll be weak and susceptible to a lot of issues.

[@gazlives]

@@AdventuresWithQuinn but people who only eat meat are demonstrating every day that that hypothosis is false. not even including the eskimos and african tribes that don't eat fibre either traditionally. the hypothesis you need fibre for any reason is demonstrably false. maybe one could argue it's needed in the context of eating rubbish modern processed food.

[@AdventuresWithQuinn]

@@gazlives You keep using the word demonstrating/demonstrably without any backing. Give a carnivore an apple and see how much pain they're in. "i don't understand how you can be deficient in fibre but at the same time it is not an essential nutrient. No fat you die, no protein you die, no fibre nothing. no carbs nothing." - I have explained this to you, in very simple terms. You seem to want to argue against reality for some reason. If you want to be carnivore have at it! (It does come with a higher chance of all cause mortality). I was carnivore for two years. Felt great at times.

[@annettestephens5337]

@@AdventuresWithQuinnI’m 3 years into carnivore, no fibre diet and still feel amazing. Lucky lucky me 😊

[@annettestephens5337]

I eat zero UPF on my meat, eggs and fish diet. My microbiome has gone from painful and gasssy to calm and pesceful. Tim teally needs to take a look at the many mamy thousdands of people who are thriving on whole food, animal products diet.

[@libbyhocking5516]

Tim is doing a wonderful job by educating the public on the relationship between good nutrition, disease prevention and optimum health.

[@clovermark39]

He’s too vegetarian loaded to be advocating for good nutrition. Where does the vit b12 and iron come from in a vegetarian diet.

[@raewynannbenten1385]

@@clovermark39. Green leafy veges, cruciferous veges, legumes, beans, nuts and seeds. 15 years a vegetarian, nothing wrong with my iron or any of my vitamin B profiles on my blood work. Do your homework.

[@drwhooves6581]

And for those of us that can’t tolerate beans, pulses, nuts and get bloat from cruciforous veg?

[@polibm6510]

@raewynannbenten1385 Did you ever hear about "bioavailability"?

[@jkelly1701]

Amazing

[@lynneward8845]

So many great messages here. Yes, many are already known, some less so, all are good to hear again so they are reinforced. Lessen UPF's to 10% or so, eat more fiber (that one is overlooked quite a bit), eat a large variety of plants and veggies (how many of us pay much attention to variety), feeding the gut microbiome will improve the probability of good health significantly in ways most of us did not know, all good stuff. Tim Spector is one of the top 100 most cited scientists, so his scientific rigor is well-established, though he has not been a nutrition expert most of his career. He has conducted and participated in so many well-regarded studies that many doctors on KZbin doctors have not even dreamed about. He is a bit of an awkward speaker, but the content is so strong!

[@StephenMarkTurner]

The real experts are in the comment section of course (as I am sure will be demonstrated) :-) :-)

[@chewiewins]

Calories matter and one does need less to lose weight. Counting it alone is possible, just hard to maintain but key is finding way to eat less eg Intermittent fasting.

[@katejacobs5491]

I agree with every word.

[@AnneMB955]

Had no fibre for a whole year, protein and fat only. Fibre and carbs are not needed in our lives. Not sure if I want to listen more, what else is incorrect?

[@13Pandam]

Mixed bag of pros and cons there. I don’t doubt that Tim’s heart is in the right place, I detect a slight bias because of his vegetarian past. I agree that we should be listening to our bodies more. If he is doing this how come he hasn’t noticed that he says “ you know” every other sentence!

[@CAEO416]

He does eat meat. Just not a lot of it. Like in blue zones.

[@gazlives]

@@CAEO416 ah the blue zones myth. yes. the one where in reality they eat a lot of animal product.

[@GreenTurtle181]

He had me listening until he said exercise is no use for losing weight! Oh yes it is.

[@cag19549]

No it isn't. A diet that will pull your insulin down will help you drop weight

[@paulbailey7641]

My over 100 year old mum eats 2 ginger nut biscuits with every cup of tea. She loves Sugar. She looks great

[@250txc]

UR heel ADs cheapen Mr. Spectors words...

[@StoicAurelius1]

Who made this guy number one nutrition expert???

[@harryturnbull1884]

No no no. Tim et al keep barking out this headline Calories Dont Count yet the first question he is asked about burning more energy than you take in to lose weight he admits is correct! He then starts to ramble about things to explain this which dont when what he really means is reduction in base metabolic rate. Sadly, what people think on seeing these headlines is that its maybe ok to eat that 1000 calorie burger in Wetherspoons. Its a bad headline grabber. Keep counting folks.

[@BartBVanBockstaele]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/fZKqc2usj9l9l9E This is nonsense. The reason "calorie-counting diets" don't work is because people go off them or because they forget that counting calories does nothing for us. Only using the information calorie-counting provides does. IOW, the calorie-counting diets work just fine, on the condition that one follows them.

[@helencooney1363]

Controlling calorie intake isn't incompatible with also eating nutrient dense wholefoods. And keto isn't always considered a 'quick fix'. Less diet tribalism please Tim!

[@tusker4954]

I dispute that Tim is #1 Nutrition expert. Firstly, he is an epidemiologist which is unreliable science. It does not result in facts but hypotheses to be investigated. e.g. hypothesis; firemen are always seen at house fires - therefore firemen cause fires. 2. I don't trust scientists that have their own product to sell e.g. Zoe. 3. He pushes a plant based agenda which is a flawed strategy.. (too long an explanation for here - do the research) We have to get our educational institutions and staff away from being sponsored by Big Food.

[@hasilovich]

What do you mean by "pushing a plant-based agenda"? He is correctly advocating mainly eating whole grain, vegetable and seeds/nuts etc. which is consistently shown to be the healthiest option for our immunity, gut health and general well-being.

[@Jack-tk3ub]

Where do you get your information on nutrition from?

[@tusker4954]

@@Jack-tk3ub I started with Tim but as a T2 diabetic, which is fundamentally an inability to digest carbs, I now get info from Eric Westman & Ben Bikman and I am ketogenic/ketovore. Carbs

[@marcfavell]

It is true that epidemiology primarily deals with studying patterns, causes, and effects of health and disease conditions in defined populations. While it often generates hypotheses, it also provides valuable data that can lead to significant public health interventions. The analogy with firemen and fires is a misrepresentation; epidemiologists use robust statistical methods to avoid such fallacies. But Tim is 💯 grifter you're correct

[@Jack-tk3ub]

@@tusker4954 Type 2 diabetes is not an inability to digest carbs. Check out Roy Taylor's research. It is a result of a fatty liver and pancreas not functioning normally. His research shows that it can be resolved with a low calorie diet. Not eating carbs is masking the effects without treating the root cause I am glad that you have lost weight and that the keto approach is working for you. It doesn't invalidate Tim's general health advice, which is not targeted at type 2 diabetics

[@richardmiddleton7770]

I used to like this guy but his 'plant foods only, protein is bad' approach is annoying and inaccurate as the studies are flawed, biased or twisted.

[@ziggy2255]

Protein isn’t found only in meat. He advocates nuts, legumes and other proteins that are plant based.

[@vatsmith8759]

Where doe he say either plant foods only or that protein is bad?

[@mike.999.s]

Tim Spector is NOT the #1 nutrition expert. Stating that is a JOKE 🥳 I will here mention a couple of Doctors that have way much more nutrition knowledge than Spector. They are; Dr Fuhrman, Dr Greger, Dr Esselstyn and Dr Goldhammer 😉

[@gazlives]

vegan cult leaders are not experts in anything except making money for cultists

[@polibm6510]

@mike.999.s Oh! You mean "liars". Ok.

[@magicf7076]

Boring. The common KZbin diet influencers. Science? Laughable. All epidemiology. Nonsense. NEXT ➡️

[@raymondjames3623]

Get a grip!

[@maybeide8078]

These two jokers claim highly processed food is the devil and drink coffee, a super highly processed food.

[@vatsmith8759]

Coffee beans are just roasted and then ground - simply processed but not 'super highly processed'.

[@annettestephens5337]

@@vatsmith8759how come the jar of coffee can ladt up to 2 years on the supermarket shelf?

[@vatsmith8759]

@@annettestephens5337 I'll bet my pension that Dr Spector is drinking real coffee and not any cr@p bought in a jar from a supermarket!

[@RobbieB2606]

@@annettestephens5337 Shelf stable instant coffee is ultra processed and should probably be avoided. I assume Tim and those who advocate drinking coffee mean actual ground coffee beans, which go off relatively quickly. James Hoffman has done a lot of work on this.

[@AdventuresWithQuinn]

Shame he's wrong on red meat, and can be hard to realllly hear what he's saying sitting there like this🫃