So, I'm a couple days late on posting results, but its been a crazy busy week. Issues with the girlfriend and living situation, getting over being sick... BUT I am finally getting around to posting. I've been working hard and sticking to the experiment. Last week, I decided not to fast on Tuesday as I was just getting over my flu bug and thought it was best to keep myself satiated.
So, I started out with fairly bonkers results from the week before because of getting sick and apparently that wreaking havoc on my body fat reader. Things have stabilized a bit now that I'm feeling better (still not 100%, but more than 80%, which is good enough for me right now.
I did incorporate one day of fasting on Wednesday night through thursday night - 6 pm to 6 pm, a full 24 hours. I went from my bf reader thinking I am at 14% bf to it thinking I'm 12.6% bf. I did manage to drop 3 pounds and lose some inches. The inches are the keys that I'm looking at. Unless I get a professional skin fold test done each week, I can not trust the bipolar results of the body fat meter as much as I'd like. Unfortunately, its the only tool I have at the moment that is functional.. that's mainly the reason why I've been keeping accurate measurements of key body areas over the last few weeks. So, without further adieu, here's the results:
Weight: 156 lb
Body Fat: 12.6 %
Chest: lost .5 in - 35.5" to 35"
Waist: lost .75 in - 31.75" to 31"
Hips: Same, still 37.5"
Thighs: R and L lost .25 in - 21.25" to 21"
Biceps: Same, still 13.5" R, 13.25" L
Targets - I'm hoping that I see another decent decrease in body fat %. I know once you get down to about 10% these bioelectric impedance devices really start to wig out. Once I look at the results and feel like I'm in that range, I'll probably go to the local clinic or university and have a professional skin fold done, just to see how the results stack up.
I'm expecting to be around 11% by next week, and around 154 lb. I'd expect to see the chest and waist decrease a little, and the biceps and thighs remain relatively the same.
As far as the effects on my working weight for my strength training, I see a little difference, but nothing I'm too alarmed about. My squat and deadlift are just as strong as they were 2 weeks ago. I set a new personal record on the barbell row and on the power clean (140 lb, and 115 lb respectively). My bench and OHP are suffering a little, but they always suffer after I hit a plateau. I've decided to train on these exercises more. I do a 3x5 set of bench and overhead press each day, rather than leaving 4 o 5 days in between them. I've been doing stronglifts long enough now to know that I feel the long days in between exercises are hurting my progress, and its not merely a lack of rest and recovery. I will try this for one month and see how the progress looks.
Until next week, ciao suckaz!
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Monday, February 20, 2012
The Flu messes with everything!
Well, I know I promised I'd be posting results from the past week of experimenting with IF. And I had every intention to (as you can see by the check-ins over the last week). Things were looking pretty good, but then something horrible happened... something that will ruin every fitness plan... I got the flu. It is that time of year, and I'm not surprised that I've come down with it considering I've moved to a colder climate this winter. Results are extremely contradictory. And somewhat unbelievable when you think about it logically. I thought about postponing publishing my results, but that would go against everything I believe in. I will, however preface them with the following caveat: I am pretty sure that even if you ate junk food for 3 days straight, your body fat will not jump 5% in 3 days while simultaneously losing inches at almost all measurement points on the body. The one thing that is believable, though, is that Bioelectric Impedance Analysis (BIA - those little hand grip body fat calculators) are very sensitive to hydration level of the subject. When you're sick, you really can't drink enough fluids... especially water. And the past 3 days, I certainly did not drink enough. So when I stepped on the scale and saw "160 lb." I was cautiously optimistic. Then I took my bf reading.... 16% !! Are you shitting me? on Thursday, it was 11%!
On Thursday, I was ready to preach about how well things were working, how great I feel, etc. But sadly, today, I have to post the bizarre results with an asterisk.
Weight: 160 lb
BF %: 16 % *
Target caloric Intake: 2500 calories
Chest: lost 1/2 inch ( 36" down to 35.5" )
Waist: lost 1/4 inch ( 32" down to 31.75" )
Hips: lost 1/2 inch (38" down to 37.5" )
Thighs: lost 1/2 inch R 3/4 inch L (22 to 21.5" and 22 to 21.25" )
Biceps: lost 1/4 inch each (13.5" to 13.25" and 13.75" to 13.5" )
It just doesn't make any sense to me. You can't gain that much body fat and lose lean mass at the same time, and you can't lose body fat and gain a ton of lean mass in that short a time period.
So whats the plan? Re-baseline. I was still too sick to make it in for a Monday morning workout. I'm going to continue with my workout on Wednesday and Friday. I am not planning to fast on Monday night - Tuesday evening. I will fast on Wednesday evening - Thursday evening. and hopefully things will level out by then. Once my hydration levels are stabilizing, I have a feeling things will get back to normal. I will repost results next week.
Current conclusions: I think the IF is doing what its intended to do. I think I would have seen spectacular results had I not been sick for the past 3 days. I'm not ready to declare success or failure. I chose to do this experiment for 1 month to get some trend data behind it. One week won't do that for either case. I'll stick it out for another 3 - 5 weeks and see how the overall trend looks. Stay tuned!
On Thursday, I was ready to preach about how well things were working, how great I feel, etc. But sadly, today, I have to post the bizarre results with an asterisk.
Weight: 160 lb
BF %: 16 % *
Target caloric Intake: 2500 calories
Chest: lost 1/2 inch ( 36" down to 35.5" )
Waist: lost 1/4 inch ( 32" down to 31.75" )
Hips: lost 1/2 inch (38" down to 37.5" )
Thighs: lost 1/2 inch R 3/4 inch L (22 to 21.5" and 22 to 21.25" )
Biceps: lost 1/4 inch each (13.5" to 13.25" and 13.75" to 13.5" )
It just doesn't make any sense to me. You can't gain that much body fat and lose lean mass at the same time, and you can't lose body fat and gain a ton of lean mass in that short a time period.
So whats the plan? Re-baseline. I was still too sick to make it in for a Monday morning workout. I'm going to continue with my workout on Wednesday and Friday. I am not planning to fast on Monday night - Tuesday evening. I will fast on Wednesday evening - Thursday evening. and hopefully things will level out by then. Once my hydration levels are stabilizing, I have a feeling things will get back to normal. I will repost results next week.
Current conclusions: I think the IF is doing what its intended to do. I think I would have seen spectacular results had I not been sick for the past 3 days. I'm not ready to declare success or failure. I chose to do this experiment for 1 month to get some trend data behind it. One week won't do that for either case. I'll stick it out for another 3 - 5 weeks and see how the overall trend looks. Stay tuned!
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Check in #2
It's about 21 hours into the second fast of the week. I have a slight headache but I've heard thats commo for the first couple fasts. Not anything major. It does feel like a withdrawal headache though (almost like wheb I went off the Cymbalta for good).
Today, when I woke up, I weighed 157 lbs. This was before anything to drink too. Body fat % dropped by a full 1%. When fasting, you lose a lot of water weight I have read. I'm estimating my actual weight is about 160. That puts me right on track with my expectations. Look for official results on Sunday morning!!
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Check-in
Just wanted to do a quick check-in. I did a 24 hour fast monday-tuesday as planned. Wasn't as hard as I thought. Some hunger pangs, but mostly just an inconvenience. Tuesdays dinner was amazing though!! By the end of the fast, I dropped 2 lbs. Mostly water weight as when fasting, you retain less water. Sunday is the big day though. Main number to look at will be lean mass.
Until then!
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Intermittent Fasting
Its been a while since my last post (I should really stop opening with that line...) but the most recent research I've done has become more and more appealing to me, that I thought I would blog about it.
I first stumbled across this topic from email news letters from people promoting their "latest and greatest state-of-the-art, cutting edge, you're-doing-it-all-wrong, everything-they've-told-you-is-a-lie" product. I've done a very good job completely ignoring them, but one topic kept coming up, and for the hell of it, I've decided to dig in and learn a little bit about this new (but not really new) concept: Intermediate Fasting.
Fasting goes against everything I've been preaching. If you buy into the whole "5+ small meals to boost metabolism" this is going to sound completely insane. But what if I told you that was all a lie? Well, I'm not going to do that - it's not a lie, but it may not be as true as I originally thought. You see, it does work - being well fed is never a bad thing, but in my research, I'm becoming more and more sold on the fact that some fasting can actually be very beneficial.
In his book/paper/article "East Stop Eat", or ESE, Brad Pilon discusses an age-old concept, but new to the "Western world" of fasting. He goes into the benefits of intermittent fasting (IF) for 24 hour periods. To summarize, the result of fasting is the following: decreased insulin levels, increased growth hormone, decreased blood glucose levels, increased lipolysis and fat oxidation (more on this!), and increase in epinephrine and norepinephrine. Some of this is actually related to your fat loss :)
Lipolysis is the release of fat from the fat cells, and fat oxidation is the process of fat being "burned" for energy. Fasting helps with this for an obvious reason: without food, your body is forced to use its fat stores as energy. The bonus: your body also releases more growth hormone after 18 hours of fasting... the awesome part about this? Aside from building muscle, growth hormone actually acts as a receptor that bonds to the fat cells. When it does this, it makes it impossible for fat to be stored in the cells. Think of it as a temporary plug in the fat cells that disallows fat from ever bonding with the fat cell... the result is less fat is stored in your body, and is used by your body.
So, wtf dude - you just told me in older posts that after 3 hours your body goes into a "starvation mode" and you immediately begin to lose muscle mass and your body clings to all things fat and stores as much of it as it can because it thinks its "starving". Why are you changing your story now, you bastard!
Well... I'm not really changing the story, just ... fixing it. See, the starvation response does happen, but after doing some extended research, I've come to agree with the fact that it doesn't happen THAT fast. Try like 3 days, as opposed to 3 hours. That's a BIG fuck up on my part. The fact is that multiple studies have shown that even fasting for 36 hours up to 72 hours, your metabolic rate doesn't change. Your Resting Metabolic Rate is what it is - whether you eat or not, your body needs to do things like breathe, pump blood, etc. What DOES change is Basal Metabolic Rate. This contributes more to your energy expenditure while active: walking the dog, climbing stairs, cooking din.. well not while fasting. This slows down when you don't eat for long periods of time (probably more than 3 hours, but much sooner than 24 I would imagine). The full story? It doesn't slow down much. In fact, if you fast for 24 hours, then eat your in your "normal" way (3 meals, 5 meals, 8 meals, whatever) you will hardly notice the difference. People that want you to buy a product will tell you that everything is a lie, and that the only way to do it right is within the pages of their latest fad are, well... lying business men. Their research is solid though; to sell anything, it has to be backed by some research, and this certainly is. I'm on board with the concept, but of course, I'm going to try it first before I go and preach that its the greatest thing in the world.
SO what's the plan? Go a day without eating, then what? Well, not exactly. I recently bought a product that I actually have no intention of using - I just bought it for the information, and the thought process behind what its selling. Wise investment? Maybe, I'm not sure yet. But here's the plan: rather than do a hybrid of ludicrous fasting/non-fasting intervals and strict workouts that may or may not help the cause, I'm going to continue what I do for my training, and I plan to eat at least once a day, every day, but still get my 24 hours of fasting in. Here's the plan:
Sunday: Eat Normally - bring in my 2500+ calories I'm shooting for to build mass.
Monday: Black coffee at 5:00 am, Gym at 5:30 am, big breakfast at 7:00 am. Cheat day until 6:00 pm (i.e. get my 2500+ calories, but from whatever I want including pie, ice cream, brownies, cheese steaks, etc). Begin 24 hour fast
Tuesday: Fast until 6:00 pm. Big dinner full of proteins, carbs, fats. Late night snack about an hour before bed.
Wednesday: Black coffee at 5:00 am, Gym at 5:30 am, big breakfast at 7:00 am. Eat normally until 6:00 pm (i.e. get my 2500 + calories). Begin 24 hour fast
Thursday: Fast until 6:00 pm. Same big dinner, and late night snack as tuesday.
Friday: Black coffee at 5:00 am, Gym at 5:30 am, big breakfast at 7:00 am. Eat normally.
Saturday: Eat normally.
Workout: Sticking with the Stronglifts plan. I can't say enough about how much I enjoy doing this routine!
Wait!!! Did I read Monday correctly??
Yes, yes you did. A cheat day is a good thing. It not only gives you the release you need to indulge in the foods you love, but it has a purpose. Eating foods like pizza and other junk in mass quantities releases a hormone called leptin. Leptin can be powerful, but only if you don't let it get out of control. When you eat a lot of calories in one sitting, leptin is released to take care business. It increases your thyroid output, increases your BMR temporarily, and helps take care of the mass quantity of calories you just ingested. Think of Leptin as the SWAT team that takes care of business in a no-bullshit kinda way. The three things I mentioned is what "turbo charges your metabolism". But the effects are temporary - when leptin levels drop, so does your fat loss. It takes about 5 days for these levels to fully deplete.
So why don't I just gorge once per day?
Well, the higher your leptin levels are, the less you will actually want to eat. Think of the last time you ate too much... did you feel like eating again in 3 hours? 5 hours? the next day?? Exactly. Think of it this way: every so often your brain sends a text message to its bff, leptin, and says "dude, am I hungry?". Leptin replies "no, you fat bastard, you just ate 3/4 of a cow. Chill bro!" So, you gorge yourself too often, two things can happen: you just don't want to eat any more and you don't get the required calories for the day, or you force yourself to eat, and do a much more dangerous thing: psychologically condition yourself to eat when you're full - which makes overeating a possible and incredibly dangerous side effect.
As a side note, low leptin levels is the main reason that fat loss plateaus, especially in individuals that only have a short way to go. As leptin levels decrease, your fat loss power goes with it, so it becomes harder to lose that "stubborn" fat that just wont' go away. So in short, do it once a week, and make Leptin your bitch! As a side note to a side note, I chose Monday as a cheat day because its immediately followed by a fast. This makes the fast easier, and at the same time hits the body fat with a double-whammy: high leptin levels and forcing your body to burn fat for energy. Ka-BOOM!
Conclusion
I want to point out that what I posted in the past does work. I have proven this by doing it myself. The point here is try something new and at least think of the possibility that maybe something else works too, just as well (an open mind is hard to come by in the fitness world). If you're on board, let me know, I'd love to hear your results. I will be experimenting with this as well, and will post some results weekly. To start, here's my current state:
Weight: 163 lb
Body fat %: 13%
Lean Mass: ~142 lb
Target caloric intake: 2500 kCal
I first stumbled across this topic from email news letters from people promoting their "latest and greatest state-of-the-art, cutting edge, you're-doing-it-all-wrong, everything-they've-told-you-is-a-lie" product. I've done a very good job completely ignoring them, but one topic kept coming up, and for the hell of it, I've decided to dig in and learn a little bit about this new (but not really new) concept: Intermediate Fasting.
Fasting goes against everything I've been preaching. If you buy into the whole "5+ small meals to boost metabolism" this is going to sound completely insane. But what if I told you that was all a lie? Well, I'm not going to do that - it's not a lie, but it may not be as true as I originally thought. You see, it does work - being well fed is never a bad thing, but in my research, I'm becoming more and more sold on the fact that some fasting can actually be very beneficial.
In his book/paper/article "East Stop Eat", or ESE, Brad Pilon discusses an age-old concept, but new to the "Western world" of fasting. He goes into the benefits of intermittent fasting (IF) for 24 hour periods. To summarize, the result of fasting is the following: decreased insulin levels, increased growth hormone, decreased blood glucose levels, increased lipolysis and fat oxidation (more on this!), and increase in epinephrine and norepinephrine. Some of this is actually related to your fat loss :)
Lipolysis is the release of fat from the fat cells, and fat oxidation is the process of fat being "burned" for energy. Fasting helps with this for an obvious reason: without food, your body is forced to use its fat stores as energy. The bonus: your body also releases more growth hormone after 18 hours of fasting... the awesome part about this? Aside from building muscle, growth hormone actually acts as a receptor that bonds to the fat cells. When it does this, it makes it impossible for fat to be stored in the cells. Think of it as a temporary plug in the fat cells that disallows fat from ever bonding with the fat cell... the result is less fat is stored in your body, and is used by your body.
So, wtf dude - you just told me in older posts that after 3 hours your body goes into a "starvation mode" and you immediately begin to lose muscle mass and your body clings to all things fat and stores as much of it as it can because it thinks its "starving". Why are you changing your story now, you bastard!
Well... I'm not really changing the story, just ... fixing it. See, the starvation response does happen, but after doing some extended research, I've come to agree with the fact that it doesn't happen THAT fast. Try like 3 days, as opposed to 3 hours. That's a BIG fuck up on my part. The fact is that multiple studies have shown that even fasting for 36 hours up to 72 hours, your metabolic rate doesn't change. Your Resting Metabolic Rate is what it is - whether you eat or not, your body needs to do things like breathe, pump blood, etc. What DOES change is Basal Metabolic Rate. This contributes more to your energy expenditure while active: walking the dog, climbing stairs, cooking din.. well not while fasting. This slows down when you don't eat for long periods of time (probably more than 3 hours, but much sooner than 24 I would imagine). The full story? It doesn't slow down much. In fact, if you fast for 24 hours, then eat your in your "normal" way (3 meals, 5 meals, 8 meals, whatever) you will hardly notice the difference. People that want you to buy a product will tell you that everything is a lie, and that the only way to do it right is within the pages of their latest fad are, well... lying business men. Their research is solid though; to sell anything, it has to be backed by some research, and this certainly is. I'm on board with the concept, but of course, I'm going to try it first before I go and preach that its the greatest thing in the world.
SO what's the plan? Go a day without eating, then what? Well, not exactly. I recently bought a product that I actually have no intention of using - I just bought it for the information, and the thought process behind what its selling. Wise investment? Maybe, I'm not sure yet. But here's the plan: rather than do a hybrid of ludicrous fasting/non-fasting intervals and strict workouts that may or may not help the cause, I'm going to continue what I do for my training, and I plan to eat at least once a day, every day, but still get my 24 hours of fasting in. Here's the plan:
Sunday: Eat Normally - bring in my 2500+ calories I'm shooting for to build mass.
Monday: Black coffee at 5:00 am, Gym at 5:30 am, big breakfast at 7:00 am. Cheat day until 6:00 pm (i.e. get my 2500+ calories, but from whatever I want including pie, ice cream, brownies, cheese steaks, etc). Begin 24 hour fast
Tuesday: Fast until 6:00 pm. Big dinner full of proteins, carbs, fats. Late night snack about an hour before bed.
Wednesday: Black coffee at 5:00 am, Gym at 5:30 am, big breakfast at 7:00 am. Eat normally until 6:00 pm (i.e. get my 2500 + calories). Begin 24 hour fast
Thursday: Fast until 6:00 pm. Same big dinner, and late night snack as tuesday.
Friday: Black coffee at 5:00 am, Gym at 5:30 am, big breakfast at 7:00 am. Eat normally.
Saturday: Eat normally.
Workout: Sticking with the Stronglifts plan. I can't say enough about how much I enjoy doing this routine!
Wait!!! Did I read Monday correctly??
Yes, yes you did. A cheat day is a good thing. It not only gives you the release you need to indulge in the foods you love, but it has a purpose. Eating foods like pizza and other junk in mass quantities releases a hormone called leptin. Leptin can be powerful, but only if you don't let it get out of control. When you eat a lot of calories in one sitting, leptin is released to take care business. It increases your thyroid output, increases your BMR temporarily, and helps take care of the mass quantity of calories you just ingested. Think of Leptin as the SWAT team that takes care of business in a no-bullshit kinda way. The three things I mentioned is what "turbo charges your metabolism". But the effects are temporary - when leptin levels drop, so does your fat loss. It takes about 5 days for these levels to fully deplete.
So why don't I just gorge once per day?
Well, the higher your leptin levels are, the less you will actually want to eat. Think of the last time you ate too much... did you feel like eating again in 3 hours? 5 hours? the next day?? Exactly. Think of it this way: every so often your brain sends a text message to its bff, leptin, and says "dude, am I hungry?". Leptin replies "no, you fat bastard, you just ate 3/4 of a cow. Chill bro!" So, you gorge yourself too often, two things can happen: you just don't want to eat any more and you don't get the required calories for the day, or you force yourself to eat, and do a much more dangerous thing: psychologically condition yourself to eat when you're full - which makes overeating a possible and incredibly dangerous side effect.
As a side note, low leptin levels is the main reason that fat loss plateaus, especially in individuals that only have a short way to go. As leptin levels decrease, your fat loss power goes with it, so it becomes harder to lose that "stubborn" fat that just wont' go away. So in short, do it once a week, and make Leptin your bitch! As a side note to a side note, I chose Monday as a cheat day because its immediately followed by a fast. This makes the fast easier, and at the same time hits the body fat with a double-whammy: high leptin levels and forcing your body to burn fat for energy. Ka-BOOM!
Conclusion
I want to point out that what I posted in the past does work. I have proven this by doing it myself. The point here is try something new and at least think of the possibility that maybe something else works too, just as well (an open mind is hard to come by in the fitness world). If you're on board, let me know, I'd love to hear your results. I will be experimenting with this as well, and will post some results weekly. To start, here's my current state:
Weight: 163 lb
Body fat %: 13%
Lean Mass: ~142 lb
Target caloric intake: 2500 kCal
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