Can you be honest, absolutely honest, with yourself? If so, you have my deepest respect and sincerest congratulations, for you have all you really need to make unlimited improvements to your health.

But absolute honesty in matters of health can be more elusive than staying with Steph Curry off a pick. Actually, it's easy for most people to "stay with" honesty to a point. But then he shakes and bakes, stutters, and accelerates.At that point, partial honesty strikes most people as good enough - especially when you can almost always find a study or two to support the good enough.But how you respond to a specific supplement or a change in diet may or may not be the same as the average response of 100 overweight middle-aged women or 100 underfed lab rats. That's why it's so important to perform experiments of your own and let those results rule.I remind you of that because of an apparent contradiction that could lead to carbohydrate consumption confusion. But it doesn't have to.To explain, you need to know how I work on this column. Usually on a Saturday, I proofread the article I wrote during the past weekend before reading the new information I gathered.Last week's column featured a study conducted at Ohio State University that found the ultra-endurance athletes who ate a very restricted amount of carbohydrates - only 10 percent of their total calories - burned 2.3 times more fat while working out than the ultra-endurance athletes who followed a diet that provided 59 percent of the calories as carbs. As a result, at the conclusion of the column you were encouraged to experiment with consuming a lower percentage of carbs before, during, and after exercise.While I still hope that you give that a try, I can't deny that the first article I read after finishing that column contradicted, in a sense, what I had written. Guess what this new study found mitigates some of the negative effects of the intensive training that high-level athletes such as ultra-endurance athletes must undergo?Eating more carbohydrates.Research performed at Loughborough University in England and published last year in the Journal of Sports Sciences had 13 advanced cyclists undergo two intense nine-day training blocks primarily to see how the heavy load affected sleep. They did so because the stress of intensive training often makes it hard to get quality sleep and that affects mood and performance.After intense training the body struggles to slow down. An amped-up athlete may spend the same amount of time in bed, but rarely will that result in the typical amount of sleep.So the researchers intentionally denied the 13 cyclists sleep during the two nine-day training blocks. As expected, those denied sleep recorded less quality sleep when they eventually did so and their moods changed as well.All recorded higher levels of tension, anger, fatigue, depression, and stress. Naturally, performance declined, too.When denied sleep a second time all of these negative effects were mitigated by one single change: consuming what the researchers considered a high level of carbohydrates. Even cyclists fed a moderate amount of carbs recorded more actual sleep time when total bed time was restricted.So what are you to do? Follow last week's suggestion to restrict carbs to burn more fat or this week's news and eat more of them to recover faster, feel better, and sleep better?You could do as I do: manipulate the percentage of carbs consumed daily based on the energy requirements of that day.But don't expect me to determine those percentages for you. I'm the guy who always stresses the importance of performing your own experiments and letting those results rule.I will, however, explain what I do to provide parameters for the experimentation you'll need to do.Keep in mind that my body is accustomed to about 15 hours of riding, lifting, and stretching during a typical school work week and that the number increases during any vacation time including the summer break.On any day that I lift weights or recover on the bicycle - each activity would take an hour - my carb consumption drops significantly. On these days, about 40 percent of my total calories comes from carbohydrates and most are complex carbs.The only simple carbs I ingest come from the lactose in the two dairy products I eat: fat-free Greek yogurt and fat-free cottage cheese.On any day that I ride the bicycle for three hours or more (and sometimes for shorter, extremely intense rides), I increase my carb consumption by about 50 percent. On these days, about 60 percent of my total cals come from carbs, but the ratio of complex to simple carbs stays the same.That's because my subjective experimentation contradicts to some degree the majority of research. While a few studies have shown that complex carbs immediately after intense exercise replaces the energy kept in the muscle cells best, other studies indicate - and mainstream medicine believes - that any sort of carbs immediately after exercise promote a restocking of muscle fuel.My muscle cells, however, seem to respond best to complex carbs.So if you really want to feel your good and train regularly, experiment with carb amounts and composition.