Sports Nutrition Guide - Part 3 The Glycemic Index & Food

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The Glycemic Index (GI) & Food You Eat

When you eat certain foods, insulin release results from the food you eat, and you have a good control of this by the foods you choose to eat. There are simple carbs, and complex carbs - actually I think there's something like 5 types of carbs like monosachrides, polysacharides, and etc... To keep things simple, we just say simple and complex carbs.

Carbs are just sugar. Simple carbs are just sugar, and is absorbed into the blood stream very fast. Complex carbs like that from rice, bread and pasta, take time to breakdown, and takes longer to absorb.

So what's this got to do with the glycemic index?

The Glycemic Index measures the ability of how quickly (or slowly) a carbohydrate food can raise blood sugar levels. In general, simple carbs tend to be high on the glycemic index (since they raise blood sugar levels relatively fast), and complex carbs are lower on the glycemic index - since they take more time to break down.

Significance of The Glycemic Index for Foods

As mentioned above, the glycemic index relates to your blood sugar's effect on the hormone insulin, which plays many key roles in your bodily functions. As a simple example, let's consider dextrose - a simple carbohydrate many use together with creatine post workout - see my homemade cell-tech recipe here.

When you take a large amount of dextrose (35g to 70g), your blood sugar level increases rapidly, and in response, your body releases insulin to quickly bring your blood sugar level down to normal. What it's doing is forcing the excess blood sugar into the cells, and at the same time, the creatine gets a piggy back on this "shoving" process, and gets absorbed better.

When you eat foods low on the glycemic index (complex carbs), the insulin response is much more mild, since the food increases your blood sugar level at a slower rate, unlike simple carbs. Below lists some significance of the glycemic index:

Low glycemic index food keep you fuller for longer
Low GI food can help improve diabetes control
Low glycemic index foods help improve your body's sensitivity to insulin
Low GI foods are beneficial for people trying to lose weight
Low glycemic foods lead to smaller rise in blood sugar
About the only time you would want to consume a high glycemic index carbohydrate is immediately after workouts

Below are the glycemic index of various foods.

The Glycemic Index of Food

Cereals	GI	Snacks	GI
All Bran	51	chocolate bar	49
Bran Buds + psyll	45	corn chips	72
Bran Flakes	74	croissant	67
Cheerios	74	doughnut	76
Corn Chex	83	graham crakers	74
Cornflakes	83	jelly beans	80
Cream of Wheat	66	Life Savers	70
Frosted Flakes	55	oatmeal cookie	57
Grapenuts	67	pizza, cheese & tom	60
Life	66	Pizza Hut, supreme	33
muesli, natural	54	popcorn, light micro	55
Nutri-grain	66	potato chips	56
oatmeal, old fach	48	pound cake	54
Puffed Wheat	67	Power bars	58
Raisin Bran	73	pretzels	83
Rice Chex	89	saltine crakers	74
Shredded Wheat	67	shortbread cookies	64
Special K	54	Snikers bar	41
Total	76	strawberry jam	51
Fruit		vanilla wafers	77
apple	38	Wheat Thins	67
apricots	57	Crackers
banana	56	graham	74
cantalope	65	rice cakes	80
cherries	22	rye	68
dates	103	soda	72
grapefruit	25	Wheat Thins	67
grapes	46	Cereal Grains
kiwi	52	barley	25
mango	55	basmati white rice	58
orange	43	bulgar	48
papaya	58	couscous	65
peach	42	cornmeal	68
pear	58	millet	71
pineapple	66	Sugars
plums	39	fructose	22
prunes	15	honey	62
raisins	64	maltose	105
watermelon	72	table sugar	64

The Glycemic Index

Pasta	GI	Beans	GI
cheese tortellini	50	baked	44
fettucini	32	black beans, boiled	30
linguini	50	butter, boiled	33
macaroni	46	cannellini beans	31
spagh, 5 min boiled	33	garbanzo, boiled	34
spagh, 15 min boiled	44	kidney, boiled	29
spagh, prot enrich	28	kidney, canned	52
vermicelli	35	lentils, green, brown	30
Soups/Vegetables		lima, boiled	32
beets, canned	64	navy beans	38
black bean soup	64	pinto, boiled	39
carrots, fresh, boil	49	red lentils, boiled	27
corn, sweet	56	soy, boiled	16
green pea, soup	66	Breads
green pea, frozen	47	bagel, plain	72
lima beans, frozen	32	baquette, Frnch	95
parsnips	97	croissant	67
peas, fresh, boil	48	dark rey	76
split pea soup w/ham	66	hamburger bun	61
tomato soup	38	muffins
Drinks		apple, cin	44
apple juice	40	blueberry	59
colas	65	oat & raisin	54
Gatorade	78	pita	57
grapefruit juice	48	pizza, cheese	60
orange juice	46	pumpernickel	49
pineapple juice	46	sourdough	54
Milk Products		rye	64
chocolate milk	35	white	70
custard	43	wheat	68
ice cream, van	60	Root Crops
ice milk, van	50	french fries	75
skim milk	32	pot, new, boiled	59
soy milk	31	pot, red, baked	93
tofu frozen dessert	115	pot, sweet	52
whole milk	30	pot, white, boiled	63
yogurt, fruit	36	pot, white, mash	70
yogurt, plain	14	yam	54

So to get an idea of what these numbers mean, here's a general guide line:

Low glycemic food = 55 or less
Medium glycemic food = 56 - 69
High glycemic foods = 70 or higher

Simple right? All you need to do, is try to consume foods lower than 55 on the glycemic index. ;-)

For my diet, below are some foods which I ate often as primary sources of carbohydrates for my meals:

Long grain white rice - 56
Yams - 73
Green beans - 30
Carrots - 49
Grape fruit - 25
Grapes - 46
Pine apple - 66
Corn - 56
Green pea - 47

In general, most vegetables and fruits are good choices since they are low on the glycemic index - not to mention the many healthy benefits eating plenty of greens provide. Depending on your diet and nutrition preferences, you can use the glycemic index to make ideal selections of foods to eat as part of your diet.

>> Continue to part 4: Meals and planning

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