This paper summarizes the findings of the 2017 CrossFit Foundation Academic Conference, “Diet and Cardiometabolic Health - Beyond Calories.” The conference was convened to consider a specific question from multiple angles: Do specific dietary components have an impact on metabolism and/or disease risk that is not fully explained by their caloric value? The paper demonstrates the inherent flaws in existing evidence in nutrition science and highlights the single strongest conclusion that emerged from the conference: that compared to other carbohydrates (e.g., starch), added sugars lead to greater increases in a variety of cardiometabolic risk factors.