Good to hear about your experiences with keto. I do cyclic keto, going into ketogenic diet for periods and then coming back to "normal" (still relatively low carb). Cyclic keto has shown benefits, and it doesn't have the trade-offs of going full keto.
For people who struggle with symptoms of keto flu (ie, those ~3 days ramping up to the keto diet, and blood glucose is low but the body is not yet producing ketones in high levels) the drink could help alleviate this as people transition.
Yes, this is a big part of why people like ketogenic diets and intermittent fasting. Avoiding carbs, and initiating a state of ketosis, means your brain is fueled on ketones -- many people subjectively like the feeling.
Sort of! You can enter ketosis through IF and keto diet (we run WeFast, a big facebook fasting group, and I fast 36 hours every week).
What's special about HVMN Ketone is that you can get into ketosis with just a drink. And it lets you maintain carb levels at the same time, unlike keto diet & IF, which is a big plus for the sports performance gains.
Can you provide the research or documentation proving that this drink will immediately get you into ketosis? How long does it last? Are you actually just faking out ketone strips for some period of time?
Can I eat carbs every day but drink this and stay in ketosis? That seems really unlikely.
The graph on their website (if to be believed) shows a comparison between their ketone ester and a ketone salt.
Also, if I remember correctly, ketone esters were originally developed for use in rebreather SCUBA diving. The concentration of oxygen makes seizures much more likely. Since ketogenic diets are useful for preventing seizures, the military wanted a "ketogenic diet in a pill".
Our GO CUBES chewable coffee is super popular ^_^ I personally still love a fine coffee/espresso, but what's nice about GO CUBES is they let you keep coffee in your pocket - take it anywhere, no stress no spills, etc. I end up popping a couple GO CUBES throughout the day, they are great to have around. And it's got precise 50mg caffeine + 100mg l-theanine + b vitamins, for better performance profile than normal coffee.
However today's news is much more exciting -- HVMN Ketone! It's a game changer for the sports performance world, and has v interesting implications beyond bc it affects metabolism in a fundamental way.
Like: when you say "ketone" you mean what kind of ketone/ketone ester...? My first thought when they complained about it tasting like nail polish remover was that if it involves acetone, it is nail polish remover.
Second, I wonder what this would be doing to metabolism of other carbs... I've read that using these ketone esters without decreasing carb intake might actually make things worse from a certain perspective, metabolically speaking...
When taken with carbs, as was done in the athlete studies, performance output increases because the body has access to both types of energy. The ketones are used first, protecting the glucose for later use.
My understanding is that many elite-level athletes can still achieve ketosis while consuming a significant amount of carbs (around what most people would probably consider normal intake) because they're training so much and burning so much glycogen.
What happens when it's an average person who doesn't have the same energy expenditure and metabolic efficiency as an elite athlete?
I'm one of the creators of GO CUBES. I loved the point-counterpoint here. Startups often toe the line between absurd & interesting, because that's where innovation happens. Making nootropics as accessible as cup of coffee is no small feat.
Tylenol may be "hazardous" when abused, but doesn't it say something that it remains over-the-counter? It suggests to me that the benefits outweigh the risks, and the same could be true of a nootropic.
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To call it a "marketing exercise" glosses over all of the important subtlety. Identifying a brand, messaging, form factor, and specific combination of ingredients to appeal to mass market is non-trivial. Isn't Red Bull just a marketing exercise? What about Chobani and Muscle Milk? The original Apple computers were just a "marketing exercise" around the Homebrew Computing Club, packaging up things that were already available, but doing so elegantly and building a trustworthy brand. There's considerable value in that.
I think time will tell if the gamble here is correct. Currently nootropics are quite niche - a small minority of people even know what they are or take them. This is odd, given how beneficial they can be. By serving nootropics to the public on a silver platter, we hope to evangelize the benefits, assuage people's concerns, and become defacto leaders in the biohacking space.
Imagine a world where the boogey man has access to smart phones, encryption, and chemical weapons. Yes it's scary. Technology provides a multiplying effect on society, both the good and the bad segments. Typically the good outweighs the bad, and one has to believe that technological advancement is generally a positive thing for society.
The point about feeling pressured to use nootropics because of competitors or peers is interesting. This type of soft coercion already exists with Adderall, and you could say we are "coerced" into learning to read or getting a college degree or owning a cell phone (BTW - for all we know, cell phones give you cancer if you carry it in your pocket everyday for 30 years - no one knows the exact risk). It only feels like coercion when there are significant worries and risks, otherwise it's just a positive behavior shift. No one has a crystal ball, but I would bet that society will decide that the benefits of nootropics outweigh the risks & harms, especially if there's a nootropic that's milder, safer & more equally distributed than Adderall.
For people who struggle with symptoms of keto flu (ie, those ~3 days ramping up to the keto diet, and blood glucose is low but the body is not yet producing ketones in high levels) the drink could help alleviate this as people transition.