Building lean mass as a Type 1 diabetic following a Ketogenic diet.

I'm interested to hear from any other T1 diabetics who are following (or have followed in the past) the Ketogenic diet. I use a pump and have been eating this way for around 9-10 months with great success. My diabetes is under much better control, I feel better overall and I have seen numerous health benefits as a result. The one problem that I am struggling with is gaining a decent amount of lean muscle mass on such a low carb diet.
Since going very low carb, my bolus requirements for carbs have changed a lot and as my body is now fully fat adapted. I think that cycling between carbs and no carbs is likely to be challenging as I no longer use any sort of standard carb:insulin ratio, it's all based around meals at macro's consistent with the keto diet.
Has anyone tried the Targeted Keto Diet or the Cyclical Keto Diet? I have experimented with TKD using around 20g dextrose monohydrate before or after a gym session however I have only tried this a few times as I am unsure whether;
a) the amount of carbs is significant enough to make a difference to muscle growth;
b) I am going to kick myself out of ketosis if I increase the carb intake too much.
The few times that I have accidentally kicked myself out of ketosis, I have been able to get back in relatively fast - the speed has increased over the last few months.
I think that the CKD may be necessary to get the results I am looking for and if anyone has any first hand experience of this, it would be much appreciated.

nickm said:

Speaking as a 57yo with long-standing T1, who is still very successful in a range of power sports - including track sprinting, skating, bouldering and sport climbing, I would not recommend any of the strategies you have mentioned above.

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Interesting. Is there a particular reason you would not recommend this? Is it from having tried these methods previously without success or just that you have managed to be successful in your aims following a more ‘traditional’ way of eating?
I’m also a long term T1 and have found no better way of controlling BG than the Keto diet.

tim2000s said:

The key to build muscle mass is the resistance training program you use. Carbs are not really that important - it's a combination of the damage done by the resistance training and protein consumed that really drives muscle growth. What you use carbs for in this context is to replenish glycogen stores for the purposes of an energy boost in lifting.

Most ketogenic diets won't have you consuming enough protein to help with muscle growth, indeed, while I was training and low carb, I was far from low protein, consuming 200g per day of protein. Keeping Ketogenic at that stage is very difficult.

You can check out ketogenic bodybuilding sites, but it is much harder if you remain in that state.

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Thanks. My thoughts were that the carbs in a TKD would be beneficial as not only do they replenish glycogen stores but the additional insulin along with the carbs will assist with muscle growth.
I’ve found that I can maintain around 1g protein per lb of lean body mass whilst staying in ketosis, sometimes slightly higher/lower depending on the day and the amount of training.