Latest / Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40 / Is Allulose the New GLP-1 Alternative to Weight Loss Drugs? | Ep 281

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Is Allulose the New GLP-1 Alternative to Weight Loss Drugs? | Ep 281 · Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40

• 0:01
  Philip Pape: You've probably heard about the GLP-1 medications, like Ozempic, transforming the weight loss industry, but what if I told you there is a natural sugar that stimulates the same pathway, a sugar that can help control blood sugar, reduce appetite and might enhance fat loss?
• 0:15
  Philip Pape: Today we're uncovering the science behind allulose, a rare sugar that's getting attention for potentially offering some of the metabolic benefits of the modern weight loss drugs without the side effects or the cost.
• 0:27
  Philip Pape: You'll discover how this molecule works, what the research shows about its effects on GLP-1 and metabolism, and whether it could be a useful tool in your fat loss toolbox.
• 0:37
  Philip Pape: Welcome to Wits and Weights, the show that helps you build a strong, healthy physique using evidence, engineering and efficiency.
• 0:54
  Philip Pape: I'm your host, philip Pape, and today we're going to look at allulose.
• 0:57
  Philip Pape: It is a unique sweetener that is generating some news, some buzz, for potentially offering some similar metabolic benefits as modern weight loss medications, but through natural pathways.
• 1:10
  Philip Pape: And the timing couldn't be more relevant, because the GLP-1 drugs like Ozembic and Monjaro have exploded on the scene.
• 1:18
  Philip Pape: They're being talked about all the time, as am I, and they're changing how we think about weight management, fat loss, lifestyle combined with these drugs, understanding alternatives, and it's really cool to have something that might work through similar pathways.
• 1:34
  Philip Pape: That's more of a natural approach, not as a replacement for medication.
• 1:39
  Philip Pape: Again, that is outside my scope.
• 1:41
  Philip Pape: You work with your medical professional.
• 1:42
  Philip Pape: If you have a prescribed need for med, so be it.
• 1:46
  Philip Pape: We're not going to talk about that today, but what makes this topic fascinating is how a natural sugar might actually help control blood sugar and appetite rather than spike it, although, again, we're not going to fear monger over spikes in blood sugar.
• 1:59
  Philip Pape: It's totally natural when you eat any form of carbohydrates that have glucose.
• 2:03
  Philip Pape: It's more of using this for specific mechanisms that are similar to the GLP-1 agonist, and the science behind this shows some insights into our metabolism that go beyond just finding another sugar substitute.
• 2:17
  Philip Pape: So I definitely want you to stick around to hear the more in-depth findings when we get into them.
• 2:21
  Philip Pape: I want to give a special shout out to Michael Kay, one of our longtime listeners.
• 2:26
  Philip Pape: He's a fellow coach.
• 2:27
  Philip Pape: He and I talk all the time over uh, over DMS, and he brought this research to my attention, so I definitely want to give you a shout out, michael.
• 2:34
  Philip Pape: Uh, you have definitely a commitment to evidence-based nutrition.
• 2:37
  Philip Pape: I know you are always reviewing the studies.
• 2:39
  Philip Pape: You have Google alerts and stuff set up and you shared this with me, so now I can share it with the audience and help make this show what it is, but also help people learn and apply this to their lives.
• 2:50
  Philip Pape: All right, before we get into the science of allulose, I have a quick favor to ask If you've been enjoying these evidence-based deep dives, these Monday deep dives into nutrition, physique optimization, all of it.
• 3:01
  Philip Pape: Take a moment and submit a question so that I can answer it and turn it into a podcast episode.
• 3:07
  Philip Pape: I'm going to give you a specific reply anyway, a personal reply, and then I very likely will turn it into an episode and give you a shout out.
• 3:14
  Philip Pape: Go to witsandweightscom slash question or click the link in the show notes witsandweightscom slash question.
• 3:21
  Philip Pape: And that will continue to shape the topics that we cover and ensure we cover what matters to you most.
• 3:28
  Philip Pape: Now let's build our mental muscle by getting into today's topic.
• 3:32
  Philip Pape: Let's start by understanding exactly what allulose is, and I'll never forget when I first learned about this compound, because I saw it as an ingredient on, I think, some sort of Quest bar.
• 3:44
  Philip Pape: I'll say a sweeter version of the Quest bar.
• 3:48
  Philip Pape: Oh man, what was it called?
• 3:49
  Philip Pape: You guys probably even know what it is.
• 3:50
  Philip Pape: I should have looked that up.
• 3:52
  Philip Pape: And you know I was skeptical because I didn't know what it was, and we've all heard claims about miracle sweeteners and all these brand new artificial sweeteners.
• 4:00
  Philip Pape: But allulose is fundamentally different.
• 4:02
  Philip Pape: When I started to look into it, it is what we call a rare sugar, because it does exist naturally in foods like figs and maple syrup, but it's in tiny amounts.
• 4:12
  Philip Pape: And while it's structurally almost identical to fructose, which is just regular sugar from fruit, our bodies handle it differently.
• 4:20
  Philip Pape: Our bodies handle it differently.
• 4:21
  Philip Pape: Instead of being converted to energy, like regular sugar, around 90% of allulose gets eliminated in your urine, so you only absorb 10% of it, meaning 10% of the calories, and during its journey through our system it triggers some metabolic effects and this is what I want to cover today that I wasn't aware of.
• 4:41
  Philip Pape: The most intriguing of those is the ability to stimulate GLP-1, which is the same hormone targeted by the weight loss medications like Gozembek and Manjaro.
• 4:50
  Philip Pape: Now I want to be crystal clear here.
• 4:52
  Philip Pape: I'm not suggesting allulose is equivalent to these medications.
• 4:56
  Philip Pape: The GLP-1 response from allulose is equivalent to these medications.
• 4:58
  Philip Pape: The GLP-1 response from allulose is more modest.
• 4:59
  Philip Pape: It's shorter acting, but that's what makes it interesting.
• 5:04
  Philip Pape: It works within our body's natural systems rather than overriding them, and so, combined with lifestyle which we should always have lifestyle in there it could be a great natural alternative to at least start with, if you are considering those drugs.
• 5:17
  Philip Pape: And that brings me to what the science actually shows.
• 5:20
  Philip Pape: There is a 2018 study in Nature Communications this is the study that Michael sent me that when subjects consumed allulose with a meal, their post-meal blood sugar rise was reduced by up to 50% Kind of like the effects you would have on having a more balanced meal or having fiber in there.
• 5:40
  Philip Pape: Even more interesting, it wasn't from blocking sugar absorption.
• 5:46
  Philip Pape: The allulose was actively helping the body's process carbohydrates more efficiently.
• 5:51
  Philip Pape: So that's pretty cool.
• 5:53
  Philip Pape: But what about fat loss?
• 5:54
  Philip Pape: Animal studies have shown that adding allulose to a high fat, high-sugar diet significantly reduced weight gain compared to control groups, and the mechanism appears to be three different things going on.
• 6:06
  Philip Pape: Number one is reduced appetite, and that's from the GLP-1 stimulation.
• 6:11
  Philip Pape: The second is improved insulin sensitivity and the third is enhanced fat oxidation.
• 6:17
  Philip Pape: Now, we never want to compare animal studies to humans.
• 6:21
  Philip Pape: We know there's a vast majority of them that do not translate and the human evidence is still emerging but it is promising.
• 6:28
  Philip Pape: Dr Charles Cavo.
• 6:30
  Philip Pape: He's a physician who specializes in metabolic health, and he's reported success using allulose to help patients transition off GLP-1 medications while maintaining their results, which is really crucial, because the weight regain after stopping these medications is currently a major concern.
• 6:47
  Philip Pape: My caveat here is I've worked with clients to help them come off of these drugs.
• 6:51
  Philip Pape: We never had to use allulose and you can still do it, as long as you are eating nutritious foods, you're lifting weights, you're not cutting calories dramatically, and I'll tell you just as a side tangent one effective way to do this if you are on these drugs right now, like terzapatide or something like that, is when you get to a reasonable level of body mass that you're going for with the drugs.
• 7:12
  Philip Pape: You can titrate down the drugs in conjunction with your medical professional and come out of the calorie deficit.
• 7:19
  Philip Pape: So it helps, of course, to be tracking, to understand your calories and macros, to be eating sufficient protein and fiber and to be lifting weights and being active.
• 7:27
  Philip Pape: Those are the lifestyle changes you have to put in place in parallel.
• 7:31
  Philip Pape: You just have to put those in place so that you're at least going in a reasonable deficit, you don't lose muscle mass, you maintain all of these things and you set yourself up so that it actually is not that big a deal in terms of the food noise and the satiety when you come off the drug.
• 7:46
  Philip Pape: And then, when you do that, don't do it while in a dieting phase, you know, come out of it at maintenance or even into a muscle building phase.
• 7:53
  Philip Pape: That's a whole separate topic.
• 7:54
  Philip Pape: Um, so I just wanted to have that caveat because, yes, I could see that if you lose, use allulose, it's almost like a stepping stone and that is actually pretty cool.
• 8:03
  Philip Pape: I do think that is pretty cool as we start to see allulose in more and more food products, or it's something that you can buy off the shelf and incorporate and, like I said, it's already in like a certain line of the quest protein bars and it's probably in lots of others.
• 8:16
  Philip Pape: At this point, in fact, I think it might be in that magic spoon cereal.
• 8:20
  Philip Pape: Take a look at your ingredient labels, folks, and see where you find it.
• 8:24
  Philip Pape: Anyway, back to the topic how can we use this information?
• 8:26
  Philip Pape: First and foremost, always, always, always.
• 8:30
  Philip Pape: Dosing matters, the dosage.
• 8:32
  Philip Pape: When we talk about efficacy and we talk about toxicity and you hear about fear mongering about different things, dosing always matters.
• 8:40
  Philip Pape: Dosing in context.
• 8:41
  Philip Pape: Research suggests starting with 5 to 10 grams per serving, working up to 15 to 20 grams if well tolerated and the timing appears optimal, with meals Kind of makes sense.
• 8:53
  Philip Pape: If you're talking about blood sugar and fullness signals and all that, it makes sense that you're doing it with meals, although I could see why people might think doing it between meals could have its own positive effect of potentially reducing your hunger signals, for example.
• 9:07
  Philip Pape: And then they said especially carbohydrate-containing meals where you want to minimize blood sugar spikes.
• 9:12
  Philip Pape: I have to go on a little side diatribe here.
• 9:15
  Philip Pape: Blood sugar spikes are not to be feared.
• 9:17
  Philip Pape: I had somebody come to me saying I'd stopped eating potatoes because I wore a glucose monitor and my blood sugar spiked.
• 9:24
  Philip Pape: I said oh, how far we've come in this industry where you think just a blood sugar spike itself is somehow a problem.
• 9:30
  Philip Pape: It is not.
• 9:31
  Philip Pape: It is not unless you already have your pre-diabetic, your diabetic insulin, as a concern For a healthy individual who's active.
• 9:37
  Philip Pape: It's not Now.
• 9:39
  Philip Pape: It could cause fluctuations in your energy levels.
• 9:42
  Philip Pape: It can cause different usage of nutrients where maybe it's suboptimal in certain cases if you're just eating lots of carbs at individual meals, and that is why I definitely recommend balanced meals that always have some protein and fiber, and that usually mitigates the concern.
• 9:57
  Philip Pape: And then walking after meals is the other thing.
• 9:59
  Philip Pape: So again, just my little side diatribes here that I think are important in context of all of this.
• 10:05
  Philip Pape: So back to allulose.
• 10:06
  Philip Pape: I think the beauty of allulose is it's a pretty versatile sweetener, right?
• 10:10
  Philip Pape: Unlike a lot of alternative sweeteners which can have an aftertaste or bitterness or like doesn't behave the same way when you cook with it.
• 10:17
  Philip Pape: Allulose behaves almost identically to sugar when you cook or when you bake.
• 10:23
  Philip Pape: It even caramelizes.
• 10:24
  Philip Pape: And again, intuitively, that makes sense because it's derived naturally from basically a fruit sugar type situation.
• 10:33
  Philip Pape: So it makes sense that it would act naturally.
• 10:35
  Philip Pape: But you never know, right.
• 10:36
  Philip Pape: So for real world use it's pretty practical.
• 10:39
  Philip Pape: But the caveat always caveats.
• 10:42
  Philip Pape: Some people might experience digestive discomfort if they consume too much too quickly.
• 10:46
  Philip Pape: But that's like anything Same thing with sugar, alcohols.
• 10:49
  Philip Pape: Some people tolerate them just fine.
• 10:51
  Philip Pape: Some people have gas, bloating, lots of things that are not great.
• 10:54
  Philip Pape: So always start slowly, look at the dosage, increase gradually.
• 10:58
  Philip Pape: If you are an athlete or a lifter which should be most of you listening if you lift weights, you are an athlete.
• 11:04
  Philip Pape: If you listen to this podcast and do it the way we talk about it.
• 11:06
  Philip Pape: You are an athlete, I don't care your age, your gender, your previous lifestyle.
• 11:10
  Philip Pape: So for us, some evidence suggests that allulose might help preserve muscle glycogen and that can potentially benefit performance and recovery.
• 11:20
  Philip Pape: So that piques my interest.
• 11:21
  Philip Pape: Okay, now, I haven't done it myself, using it as a pre-workout, but maybe you're going to see this in more pre-workouts, I don't know.
• 11:27
  Philip Pape: We'll, we'll see how it goes.
• 11:28
  Philip Pape: Um, all of this evidence is preliminary, so it always takes a while, like years, for this stuff, stuff, get it to get in there.
• 11:34
  Philip Pape: Uh, but the mechanism makes sense because of its effect on glucose disposal, that it would help preserve muscle glycogen.
• 11:41
  Philip Pape: Um, so something fascinating that I think is going to tie all this together, because this episode isn't going to be too long.
• 11:47
  Philip Pape: Allulose isn't just affecting our metabolism through GLP-1.
• 11:51
  Philip Pape: The latest research suggests it might help reprogram how our bodies handle carbohydrates entirely.
• 11:58
  Philip Pape: Okay, so think about that.
• 12:01
  Philip Pape: This is a sugar that teaches your body to process other sugars more efficiently, and kind of working with our metabolism in a way, and who knows what that's gonna result in.
• 12:10
  Philip Pape: I'm always skeptical of these kinds of things because at the end of the day, I think we can overthink it and again having balance, having the right level of macros.
• 12:18
  Philip Pape: Having nutritious foods, having sufficient fiber and protein, are plenty to focus on for most people and will do the job.
• 12:24
  Philip Pape: But if you're looking for little optimalities or ways to sweeten things up that are not sugar or not an artificial sweetener, this could be a really cool little corner case.
• 12:36
  Philip Pape: So just to recap first, allulose is a natural sugar that stimulates GLP-1, similar to, but a lot more modestly than, modern weight loss meds.
• 12:45
  Philip Pape: Second, research shows promising effects on blood sugar control, appetite and, potentially, fat loss.
• 12:51
  Philip Pape: And third, its practical use is important in terms of its ability to use for cooking and baking, but always start gradually and dose up so you can see how you tolerate it.
• 13:02
  Philip Pape: All right, whether you're looking to optimize metabolism, manage blood sugar, support fat loss, iolos is a very interesting tool out there in our nutrition toolbox.
• 13:11
  Philip Pape: It's not a miracle Like none of these things are miracle, or superfoods or anything like that but it seems to be a scientifically supported option that works with our body's natural processes and I wouldn't fear it, just like I wouldn't fear pretty much any food at this point, and we're already seeing it in approved products.
• 13:27
  Philip Pape: So there is that.
• 13:28
  Philip Pape: All right.
• 13:29
  Philip Pape: If today's episode sparked any questions about this or any other aspects of nutrition and body composition.
• 13:34
  Philip Pape: I do wanna hear from you with our new Ask a Question form.
• 13:38
  Philip Pape: Go to whitsonweightscom slash question or click the link in the show notes Again.
• 13:43
  Philip Pape: Whitsonweightscom slash question Sub question.
• 13:50
  Philip Pape: Or click the link in the show notes Again.
• 13:51
  Philip Pape: Witsandweightscom slash question.
• 13:51
  Philip Pape: Submit a question to me and you will get a personal answer by email and then I will turn it into an episode and feature you on the podcast, if you want.
• 13:54
  Philip Pape: That helps shape the podcast and give you what you want.
• 13:56
  Philip Pape: All right, until next time, keep using your wits lifting those weights and remember sometimes the most powerful solutions are the ones that work with our biology and not against them.
• 14:06
  Philip Pape: This is Philip Pape, and you've been listening to the Wits and Weights podcast.
• 14:11
  Philip Pape: I'll talk to you next time.