The ChillOut Log
- Thread starter Chillen
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Well TBH, I've been slacking over the last couple of months. Here's a summary
What makes you swing up and down on your fitness plans, Biggie-T? You should fear inconsistency (when its your fault, anyway), because this is a major killer of fitness plans and goals. Identify some triggers, and what to do about them.
Define what you mean by "diet hasn't been good", and what is your circumstances, maybe I can assist you in partitioning your money better, or making some suggestions (with the money you do have) on some food purchases.
Why Not?
Tom, you know better than this. In order to reach a goal, you have to first set it, make yourself accountable and it needs to be measured in some way, and you need to have a target of time (with education guiding this time frame).
You need to change this, can I help you here?
You mentioned some time back, that you see your friends drink (alcohol) and make good gains, and doing fine. Well, I have some eye-opening news for you: You are not them. You are you.
Part of your problem you are tussling with is: "the importance/priority-o-meter" between alcohol consumption and your fitness plans. And, (I know) its not just the alcohol consumption (alone) as the problem. Its the associated bleed-over effects "it can" bring to the table, such as: hang-overs, feeling sick and dehydrated, and missing some workouts as a result (and this isn't exhaustive).
How many times are you going to get thumped on the head, before you get the important-o-meter" figured out? And, to be clear, I am not saying to stop drinking (unless its necessary), but--working with it where it doesn't interfere?
Why Not?
I know you know the pros/con's of tracking weight. In your case, you should be doing this on a regular basis, because you know what to look for when you do.
This is the bleed-over-effect I spoke of earlier. You importance-o-meter is tipped more heavily on the alcohol/partying than it is toward your fitness goals.
Maybe I can assist you here.
Agreed.
Positives
-Get paid Monday (stock up on food etc
-This weekend i start going back to 1 x week drinking
-New routine will be starting in a couple of weeks (im considering U/L split)
So thats about it for now chillen
Can you give me an idea of this Upper/Lower split?
Just make sure you are not going through a revolving door so-to-speak, Where you drink 1X for at week, and then say ah f-ck it, and go back to 2X per week, and go on a merry-go-round.
Much success to you Tom.....You need to really wake up.
Best wishes,
Chillen
Last edited:
July 17th, 2009, Thoughts for the Day (1)
Written and posted by Lyle McDonald, July 07, 2009
Meal Frequency and Mass Gains
The issue of meal frequency for muscle mass gains would seem to be pretty well decided, right? Bodybuilders have been pushing for 6 (or more) meals per day spread out every 2.5-3 hours for decades and this is taken as an almost de-facto requirement for success in terms of optimal mass gains.
Then again, the people who have used Intermittent Fasting (for examples, check out Martin Berkhan’s LeanGains.com) appear to be making exceedingly good progress in terms of muscle gain despite not eating for 14-16 hours during the day suggesting that perhaps the above dogma regarding meal frequency isn’t quite as well established as folks might think.
Now, I’ve discussed meal frequency previously, in terms of its effects on weight, body fat and body composition in the research review on Meal Frequency and Energy Balance and won’t rehash those points here. Rather, what I want to discuss here is the potential impact of meal frequency on mass gains for athletes trying to increase muscle mass.
And since I covered the topic in exceeding detail in The Protein Book, I’m simply going to excerpt that section of that chapter. I’d note that I cover a tremendous number of other topics related to meal frequency in that chapter including many practical issues along with the impact of meal frequency on muscle mass maintenance during fat loss.
I’d also note that apparently Layne Norton (a professional natural bodybuilder and all around smart guy who is doing scientific research on the issue of protein and muscle gain) has been experimenting with the ideas I’m going to discuss below (he calls it protein bolusing) but I have no idea how or if it actually panned out.
Finally I’d note that I’m not going to include the reference list for this excerpt. It’s in the book.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Optimal meal frequency: A theoretical approach
In Chapter 3, I discussed how eating impacted on both protein synthesis and breakdown following a meal. To briefly recap, an increase in blood AAs primarily stimulates protein synthesis with a much lesser impact on protein breakdown; in contrast, increasing insulin levels appears to primarily decrease protein breakdown with only a small impact on protein synthesis. With that information as background, I now want to examine the topic of meal frequency from a slightly more theoretical standpoint by examining two separate questions:
1.Is it possible to eat too frequently?
2.How long will a typical meal maintain the body in an anabolic state?
By determining a potential maximum and minimum amount of time that should pass between meals, an optimal meal frequency can be developed. As well, I want to examine the idea that different meal frequencies might be optimal under different conditions (i.e. maintenance versus mass gains versus dieting).
Is it possible to eat too frequently?
It’s not uncommon to read about bodybuilders or other athletes taking the eat-more-frequently dictum to extreme levels, eating every one to two hours. The idea behind this is the idea that optimal results should occur by maintaining a near continuous influx of nutrients into the body. I imagine if they could find a way to do it, some enterprising athletes would set up a continuous intravenous drip with carbohydrates, amino acids and essential fatty acids.
This may not be a good idea in the first place. Some research, primarily using amino acid infusion, suggests that skeletal muscle can become insensitive to further stimulation of protein synthesis. In one study, amino acids were infused for several hours to 70% over normal levels (17). Protein synthesis increased after roughly 30 minutes and was maintained for the next two hours at which point protein synthesis decreased back to baseline.
Importantly, this decrease occurred despite the maintenance of high levels of blood amino acids. Additionally, there was an increase in urea production (a waste product of protein metabolism), indicating that the excess AAs were simply being catabolized in the liver to be excreted in the urine; that is, those AAs were wasted and never utilized by the muscle.
The researchers took this as a suggestion that there might be a maximum amount of protein synthesis that can occur at any one given time before a “muscle full” situation is reached (18). Perhaps more interestingly, based on the amounts of AAs infused, the researchers estimated that only 3.5 grams of AAs would be required to result in this “muscle full” situation (18). I want to make it very clear that this doesn’t mean that 3.5 grams of orally ingested AAs would cause the same effect. Rather, this represented the delivery of 3.5 grams of AAs to the muscle itself.
However, the total amount of dietary protein to achieve this amount wouldn’t be huge. Most dietary proteins are roughly 40-50% EAAs, and due to processing in the liver, slightly less than half of the ingested AAs actually make it into the bloodstream. To provide 3.5 g EAAs to skeletal muscle would require roughly 15-20 grams of whole protein over a two hour time span.
Interestingly, other more direct research supports this value. In a study I described in an earlier chapter, subjects received doses of EAAs ranging from zero to 20 g EAAs and protein synthesis was studied (19). In young subjects, muscle protein synthesis was maximized with an intake of 10 g EAAs and there was no further increase with 20 g EAAs. This represents roughly 20-25 grams of whole protein.
Consumed every three waking hours (roughly six meals per day), this would allow for a maximum protein intake of 120 grams per day before skeletal muscle protein synthesis is maxed out. For a 100kg (220 pound) athlete, this is only 1.2 g/kg, lower than even the most conservative estimates discussed in Chapter 4. As discussed previously, this research is a difficult to reconcile with other, much higher recommendations or empirical results.
However, recall from Chapter 4 that dietary protein has more functions for athletes than simply the stimulation of protein synthesis. Although the amount described above might very well maximize skeletal muscle protein synthesis, optimizing the function of other important pathways of AA metabolism would very likely raise requirements even further (20). As well, while excess amino acids may simple be oxidized off, there is evidence that increased AA oxidation is involved in the overall “anabolic drive” of the body.
Finishing up this discussion, in their most recent study, the same group examined the effect on protein synthesis of a variety of doses of infused AAs (21). Infusing AAs at four different ranges, the group saw a similar pattern to their earlier work, an initial increase in protein synthesis followed by a return to baseline despite maintenance of high AA levels. Additionally, while the lower infusion rates caused a significant increase in protein synthesis, further increases at the higher concentration levels showed smaller additional benefits. Essentially, providing low to moderate amounts of AAs gave the greatest result.
Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, the paper demonstrated conclusively that it was extracellular AA concentrations (rather than the concentration of AAs inside the muscle cell) that were involved in stimulating protein synthesis. The researchers suggested the existence of some type of amino acid “sensor” in the muscle cell membrane that sensed AA levels. The study also suggested that it was the changes in extracellular AA concentration, rather than the absolute amounts that were driving the changes in protein synthesis. That is, it was the change from lower to higher that had the effect more than the absolute amount of AAs present.
Along with the indication of a “resistance” to further stimulation of protein synthesis, it appears that raising AA concentrations (after a meal) followed by a decrease in concentrations yield the best results. Basically, spacing meals apart and allowing blood AA levels to drop, rather than maintaining AA concentrations at continuously stable levels, appears to have the greatest impact on protein synthesis. Unfortunately, this still gives no indication of how far apart those meals need to be spaced to allow a “resensitization” of the muscle to a subsequent increase in AA concentrations.
Additionally, since it was based on an amino acid infusion, it’s unclear how this would relate exactly to the consumption of meals. Between digestion and the hormonal response that occurs with eating, it may very well be that eating protein would yield a different result than what the above research found using AA infusion.
In this vein, it’s interesting to look back at the original casein versus whey research that I discussed in Chapter 2. In that study, whey protein showed an initial spike in protein synthesis followed by an increase in amino acid oxidation in the liver, a pattern not dissimilar to the work examined above (22). It seems plausible that once whey had maximally stimulated protein synthesis, the remaining AAs were simply metabolized in the liver.
In contrast, when very small amounts of whey (a few grams at a time) were sipped over a six hour span to mimic the effects of casein, there was no increase in amino acid oxidation (23); however the impact on protein synthesis was also smaller. It may very well be that flooding the body with large amounts of AAs simply overloads the muscle’s ability to utilize amino acids, causing the excess to be burned off. This would also be consistent with the fact that the slower protein, casein, actually generated a higher overall gain in leucine in the body compared to whey; by never overloading the body’s protein synthetic machinery, overall better results were obtained.
Related to the above research, another group compared the body’s use of leucine with subjects either given small hourly meals or three separate meals (24). They found that protein oxidation was decreased (by 16%) in the group given three meals. Essentially, providing amino acids too frequently appears to decrease the body’s utilization of those aminos. Rather, having discrete meals where blood amino acid levels first increase (stimulating protein synthesis without overloading the body’s ability to utilize AA’s) and then decrease for some time (so that muscle can become “sensitive” to the effect of aminos again) would seem to be ideal.
At this point it would appear that eating too frequently (less than every three hours) has no real benefit, and could possibly be detrimental due to the muscle becoming insensitive to the impact of amino acids. It’s interesting to note the preliminary report above which found increased LBM gains with three versus six meals per day. Perhaps by spacing the meals further apart, greater stimulation of protein synthesis occurred when protein was eaten.
For the remainder of this chapter, I’ll take three hours to represent the minimum amount of time that should pass between meals. Eating more frequently is unlikely to be beneficial and may very well have a negative effect.
How long does a meal maintain the body in an anabolic state?
Having looked at the possibility that eating too frequently might actually be detrimental (or at least not particularly beneficial) given how long a typical meal takes to digest, I want to look at how long a given meal might possibly maintain an anabolic state.
Mentioned above, considering the relatively slow rate of protein and other nutrient digestion, it appears that even a moderate sized meal maintains an anabolic state for at least five to six hours (8). Individual whole food meals are still releasing nutrients into the bloodstream at the 5-hour mark (7). Very slowly digesting proteins such as casein may still be releasing AAs into the bloodstream seven to eight hours after ingestion (22). Considering this research, we might set a conservative limit of five hours as the absolute longest time that should pass between eating some source of dietary protein during waking hours.
Part two next
Meal Frequency and Mass Gains
Written and posted by Lyle McDonald, July 07, 2009
Meal Frequency and Mass Gains
The issue of meal frequency for muscle mass gains would seem to be pretty well decided, right? Bodybuilders have been pushing for 6 (or more) meals per day spread out every 2.5-3 hours for decades and this is taken as an almost de-facto requirement for success in terms of optimal mass gains.
Then again, the people who have used Intermittent Fasting (for examples, check out Martin Berkhan’s LeanGains.com) appear to be making exceedingly good progress in terms of muscle gain despite not eating for 14-16 hours during the day suggesting that perhaps the above dogma regarding meal frequency isn’t quite as well established as folks might think.
Now, I’ve discussed meal frequency previously, in terms of its effects on weight, body fat and body composition in the research review on Meal Frequency and Energy Balance and won’t rehash those points here. Rather, what I want to discuss here is the potential impact of meal frequency on mass gains for athletes trying to increase muscle mass.
And since I covered the topic in exceeding detail in The Protein Book, I’m simply going to excerpt that section of that chapter. I’d note that I cover a tremendous number of other topics related to meal frequency in that chapter including many practical issues along with the impact of meal frequency on muscle mass maintenance during fat loss.
I’d also note that apparently Layne Norton (a professional natural bodybuilder and all around smart guy who is doing scientific research on the issue of protein and muscle gain) has been experimenting with the ideas I’m going to discuss below (he calls it protein bolusing) but I have no idea how or if it actually panned out.
Finally I’d note that I’m not going to include the reference list for this excerpt. It’s in the book.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Optimal meal frequency: A theoretical approach
In Chapter 3, I discussed how eating impacted on both protein synthesis and breakdown following a meal. To briefly recap, an increase in blood AAs primarily stimulates protein synthesis with a much lesser impact on protein breakdown; in contrast, increasing insulin levels appears to primarily decrease protein breakdown with only a small impact on protein synthesis. With that information as background, I now want to examine the topic of meal frequency from a slightly more theoretical standpoint by examining two separate questions:
1.Is it possible to eat too frequently?
2.How long will a typical meal maintain the body in an anabolic state?
By determining a potential maximum and minimum amount of time that should pass between meals, an optimal meal frequency can be developed. As well, I want to examine the idea that different meal frequencies might be optimal under different conditions (i.e. maintenance versus mass gains versus dieting).
Is it possible to eat too frequently?
It’s not uncommon to read about bodybuilders or other athletes taking the eat-more-frequently dictum to extreme levels, eating every one to two hours. The idea behind this is the idea that optimal results should occur by maintaining a near continuous influx of nutrients into the body. I imagine if they could find a way to do it, some enterprising athletes would set up a continuous intravenous drip with carbohydrates, amino acids and essential fatty acids.
This may not be a good idea in the first place. Some research, primarily using amino acid infusion, suggests that skeletal muscle can become insensitive to further stimulation of protein synthesis. In one study, amino acids were infused for several hours to 70% over normal levels (17). Protein synthesis increased after roughly 30 minutes and was maintained for the next two hours at which point protein synthesis decreased back to baseline.
Importantly, this decrease occurred despite the maintenance of high levels of blood amino acids. Additionally, there was an increase in urea production (a waste product of protein metabolism), indicating that the excess AAs were simply being catabolized in the liver to be excreted in the urine; that is, those AAs were wasted and never utilized by the muscle.
The researchers took this as a suggestion that there might be a maximum amount of protein synthesis that can occur at any one given time before a “muscle full” situation is reached (18). Perhaps more interestingly, based on the amounts of AAs infused, the researchers estimated that only 3.5 grams of AAs would be required to result in this “muscle full” situation (18). I want to make it very clear that this doesn’t mean that 3.5 grams of orally ingested AAs would cause the same effect. Rather, this represented the delivery of 3.5 grams of AAs to the muscle itself.
However, the total amount of dietary protein to achieve this amount wouldn’t be huge. Most dietary proteins are roughly 40-50% EAAs, and due to processing in the liver, slightly less than half of the ingested AAs actually make it into the bloodstream. To provide 3.5 g EAAs to skeletal muscle would require roughly 15-20 grams of whole protein over a two hour time span.
Interestingly, other more direct research supports this value. In a study I described in an earlier chapter, subjects received doses of EAAs ranging from zero to 20 g EAAs and protein synthesis was studied (19). In young subjects, muscle protein synthesis was maximized with an intake of 10 g EAAs and there was no further increase with 20 g EAAs. This represents roughly 20-25 grams of whole protein.
Consumed every three waking hours (roughly six meals per day), this would allow for a maximum protein intake of 120 grams per day before skeletal muscle protein synthesis is maxed out. For a 100kg (220 pound) athlete, this is only 1.2 g/kg, lower than even the most conservative estimates discussed in Chapter 4. As discussed previously, this research is a difficult to reconcile with other, much higher recommendations or empirical results.
However, recall from Chapter 4 that dietary protein has more functions for athletes than simply the stimulation of protein synthesis. Although the amount described above might very well maximize skeletal muscle protein synthesis, optimizing the function of other important pathways of AA metabolism would very likely raise requirements even further (20). As well, while excess amino acids may simple be oxidized off, there is evidence that increased AA oxidation is involved in the overall “anabolic drive” of the body.
Finishing up this discussion, in their most recent study, the same group examined the effect on protein synthesis of a variety of doses of infused AAs (21). Infusing AAs at four different ranges, the group saw a similar pattern to their earlier work, an initial increase in protein synthesis followed by a return to baseline despite maintenance of high AA levels. Additionally, while the lower infusion rates caused a significant increase in protein synthesis, further increases at the higher concentration levels showed smaller additional benefits. Essentially, providing low to moderate amounts of AAs gave the greatest result.
Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, the paper demonstrated conclusively that it was extracellular AA concentrations (rather than the concentration of AAs inside the muscle cell) that were involved in stimulating protein synthesis. The researchers suggested the existence of some type of amino acid “sensor” in the muscle cell membrane that sensed AA levels. The study also suggested that it was the changes in extracellular AA concentration, rather than the absolute amounts that were driving the changes in protein synthesis. That is, it was the change from lower to higher that had the effect more than the absolute amount of AAs present.
Along with the indication of a “resistance” to further stimulation of protein synthesis, it appears that raising AA concentrations (after a meal) followed by a decrease in concentrations yield the best results. Basically, spacing meals apart and allowing blood AA levels to drop, rather than maintaining AA concentrations at continuously stable levels, appears to have the greatest impact on protein synthesis. Unfortunately, this still gives no indication of how far apart those meals need to be spaced to allow a “resensitization” of the muscle to a subsequent increase in AA concentrations.
Additionally, since it was based on an amino acid infusion, it’s unclear how this would relate exactly to the consumption of meals. Between digestion and the hormonal response that occurs with eating, it may very well be that eating protein would yield a different result than what the above research found using AA infusion.
In this vein, it’s interesting to look back at the original casein versus whey research that I discussed in Chapter 2. In that study, whey protein showed an initial spike in protein synthesis followed by an increase in amino acid oxidation in the liver, a pattern not dissimilar to the work examined above (22). It seems plausible that once whey had maximally stimulated protein synthesis, the remaining AAs were simply metabolized in the liver.
In contrast, when very small amounts of whey (a few grams at a time) were sipped over a six hour span to mimic the effects of casein, there was no increase in amino acid oxidation (23); however the impact on protein synthesis was also smaller. It may very well be that flooding the body with large amounts of AAs simply overloads the muscle’s ability to utilize amino acids, causing the excess to be burned off. This would also be consistent with the fact that the slower protein, casein, actually generated a higher overall gain in leucine in the body compared to whey; by never overloading the body’s protein synthetic machinery, overall better results were obtained.
Related to the above research, another group compared the body’s use of leucine with subjects either given small hourly meals or three separate meals (24). They found that protein oxidation was decreased (by 16%) in the group given three meals. Essentially, providing amino acids too frequently appears to decrease the body’s utilization of those aminos. Rather, having discrete meals where blood amino acid levels first increase (stimulating protein synthesis without overloading the body’s ability to utilize AA’s) and then decrease for some time (so that muscle can become “sensitive” to the effect of aminos again) would seem to be ideal.
At this point it would appear that eating too frequently (less than every three hours) has no real benefit, and could possibly be detrimental due to the muscle becoming insensitive to the impact of amino acids. It’s interesting to note the preliminary report above which found increased LBM gains with three versus six meals per day. Perhaps by spacing the meals further apart, greater stimulation of protein synthesis occurred when protein was eaten.
For the remainder of this chapter, I’ll take three hours to represent the minimum amount of time that should pass between meals. Eating more frequently is unlikely to be beneficial and may very well have a negative effect.
How long does a meal maintain the body in an anabolic state?
Having looked at the possibility that eating too frequently might actually be detrimental (or at least not particularly beneficial) given how long a typical meal takes to digest, I want to look at how long a given meal might possibly maintain an anabolic state.
Mentioned above, considering the relatively slow rate of protein and other nutrient digestion, it appears that even a moderate sized meal maintains an anabolic state for at least five to six hours (8). Individual whole food meals are still releasing nutrients into the bloodstream at the 5-hour mark (7). Very slowly digesting proteins such as casein may still be releasing AAs into the bloodstream seven to eight hours after ingestion (22). Considering this research, we might set a conservative limit of five hours as the absolute longest time that should pass between eating some source of dietary protein during waking hours.
Part two next
Last edited:
Part two:
Summary: Theoretical examination of meal frequency
It appears that eating too frequently could potentially be detrimental to the goal of gaining muscle mass in that muscle tissue becomes insensitive to further stimulation by amino acids, increasing protein oxidation in the liver. Eating more frequently than every three hours would seem to not only be unnecessary (based on the rate of digestion of whole proteins) but could possibly be detrimental.
Given a moderately sized whole food meal, the body will generally remain in an anabolic state for at least five to six hours (and possibly longer depending on the foods chosen). Conservatively, we might use five hours as the upper limit cutoff for time between meals.
This yields a duration between meals of anywhere from three to five hours. This should keep the body in an overall anabolic state without causing problems related to too frequent or too infrequent consumption of meals.
Full time athletes with time to eat very frequently are probably best served with the higher meal frequency simply to ensure adequate caloric intake. Again, smaller individuals with lower total energy intakes may want to use slightly larger meals eaten slightly less frequently for practical reasons. Similarly, individuals who work jobs and are unable to fit in a meal every three hours needn’t worry obsessively about becoming catabolic. A solid food meal containing a high quality protein, carbohydrates, fat and some fiber eaten every five hours will maintain an anabolic state readily.
Protein distribution throughout the day
Related to the topic of meal frequency is the question of whether the day’s protein should be spread evenly throughout the day, or if some other pattern of intake might be superior.
As discussed above, one early study examined whether providing 25% of protein at breakfast and lunch and 50% at dinner had any impact on nitrogen balance compared to spreading the protein evenly across the day’s three meals; no difference was found (9).
More recent work has examined a dietary strategy called “protein pulse” feeding. With that approach, 80% of the day’s protein was given at lunch with only 10% at the other two meals; this was compared to a “spread” pattern where the day’s protein intake was distributed evenly across four meals. In elderly women, the “pulse” pattern led to a greater protein gain compared to the “spread” pattern (25). However, in younger women, the “spread” pattern was superior and led to a greater nitrogen balance (26).
There is a substantial and increasing amount of data that putting some amount of the day’s protein around training is beneficial, a topic that is discussed in detail in the next chapter. Outside of ensuring adequate protein before, during and after training, there is no real indication that distributing the day’s protein in any pattern other than a basic spread pattern is beneficial (again, except possibly for older individuals).
So, for example, take an athlete who will be consuming 200 grams of protein per day with 40 grams of that placed around training. That leaves 160 grams of protein to be evenly distributed across the day’s other meals. With a four meal per day frequency, that yields 40 grams of protein per meal; at six meals per day, the athlete would consume roughly 27 grams of protein at each meal.
Is there an optimal intake pattern for different goals?
In the chapter on protein requirements, I mentioned Tipton and Wolfe’s contention that any discussion of protein requirements has to be context dependent: that is, the goals of the athlete determine what is optimal in terms of protein intake. While they were talking primarily about total daily protein intake, this idea can be extended to other aspects of nutrition including protein intake throughout the day and how it might interact with specific training goals.
Logically, gaining muscle mass versus maintaining muscle mass at maintenance calories versus trying to maintain muscle mass under conditions of caloric restriction (dieting) are different situations, potentially requiring different optimal intakes of protein, AAs, meal frequency or protein intake pattern. The possibility exists that different patterns of protein intake (in terms of both timing and type of protein) might exist for different goals (27).
For practical purposes, I’m going to consider the following discussion in terms of two different goals: muscle mass maintenance (either at maintenance calories or while dieting) and muscle mass gain. I want to note that most of this discussion will be somewhat hypothetical since little direct research exists to date.
The background for this discussion can be derived from a topic I’ve discussed previously in the book in terms of how different patterns of protein digestion (i.e. fast versus slow) can influence whole body metabolism differently.
Recapping briefly, large spikes in amino acid concentration appear to stimulate protein synthesis (recall also the infusion data I discussed above) with little to no impact on protein breakdown. In contrast, maintaining constant low levels of AAs appears to reduce protein breakdown with less of an impact on protein synthesis.
Consuming very large amounts of protein at once (as in the protein “pulse” studies discussed above) has an effect similar to a fast protein such as whey, spiking blood amino acids and promoting protein synthesis as well as oxidation (28).
In contrast, spreading protein out in smaller amounts throughout the day has an effect closer to that of casein, inhibiting protein breakdown with a smaller impact on protein synthesis (28).
I’d mention again that, in the original whey versus casein study, reducing protein breakdown via casein had a larger impact on net leucine balance compared to whey. Recall also that adding whey to other food, which had the effect of slowing down digestion, had a similar effect.
Given that data, it may very well be that simply maintaining relatively constant low levels of amino acids (with a spike around training, discussed next chapter) is optimal for all goals. This would be conceptually similar to the strategy of keeping insulin low but stable during the day with a spike around training. This is essentially the strategy that bodybuilders have empirically settled on under all situations: they eat small amounts of protein, carbohydrates and fat throughout the day with a relatively larger intake of nutrients around training.
With regards to muscle mass maintenance and dieting, there is little to discuss: based on the direct research available as well as the general difficulty in stimulating protein synthesis when calories are reduced, a slow/spread pattern of protein intake is clearly optimal. Maintaining continuous low levels of amino acids throughout the day (in addition to increasing total protein intake) to limit the body’s need to mobilize stored body protein from muscle and other tissues should be the goal. A combination of slow proteins combined with evenly spaced meals to keep blood AA levels stable throughout the day would seem to be optimal.
But is this also the optimal pattern for gaining muscle mass? On the one hand there is the suggestive study above where a group receiving three meals per day gained more LBM than a group receiving six per day; as well there is the research suggesting that maintaining constant levels of AAs might cause skeletal muscle to become “insensitive” to further stimulation; increasing extracellular levels of AAs and then allowing them to fall again appears to be superior. Both of these data points suggest that keeping blood AA levels stable throughout the day might not be optimal from the standpoint of muscle mass gains.
Another recent study throws a wrench in the typically held bodybuilder idea that simply maintaining continuous levels of amino acids with frequent meal feeding is optimal (29). In that study, two groups were compared. The first received three whole food meals while the second received the same three meals with an essential amino acid (EAA) supplement in-between. I should note that the study suffered from one huge design flaw: the groups got different amounts of total protein. It should have also tested a group that got 6 whole food meals and the same amount of protein as the EAA supplemented group.
Recognizing that limitation, the study made at least three major observations. The first was that the EAA supplement generated a greater protein synthetic response than the whole meals. The second was that the EAA supplement generated an anabolic response even when given in-between meals. That is to say, the previously consumed meal, which was still digesting when the supplement was given, didn’t blunt the effect of the EAA supplement. Finally, the EAA supplement didn’t blunt the anabolic response to the meal. Of course, the study didn’t examine what impact this would actually have in the long-term on muscle mass gains but is interesting nonetheless.
This study suggests that a potential pattern at least worth experimenting with for athletes seeking maximal muscle mass gains would be to alternate between slower digesting meals with faster acting sources (perhaps a whey protein drink or an EAA supplement) throughout the day (25).
It also plausible that a combination of slow and fast protein sources at a given meal could give the best of both worlds: a spike in AAs to stimulate protein synthesis followed by a slower increase to inhibit protein breakdown. Preliminary data that I discussed back in Chapter 2 supports that idea as well although it was being primarily applied to protein intake following resistance training. It’s interesting to note that old school bodybuilders often consumed copious amounts of milk to gain lean body mass as milk protein is a mixture of whey and casein.
Enjoy, a very good read.
Chillen
Meal Frequency and Mass Gains
Summary: Theoretical examination of meal frequency
It appears that eating too frequently could potentially be detrimental to the goal of gaining muscle mass in that muscle tissue becomes insensitive to further stimulation by amino acids, increasing protein oxidation in the liver. Eating more frequently than every three hours would seem to not only be unnecessary (based on the rate of digestion of whole proteins) but could possibly be detrimental.
Given a moderately sized whole food meal, the body will generally remain in an anabolic state for at least five to six hours (and possibly longer depending on the foods chosen). Conservatively, we might use five hours as the upper limit cutoff for time between meals.
This yields a duration between meals of anywhere from three to five hours. This should keep the body in an overall anabolic state without causing problems related to too frequent or too infrequent consumption of meals.
Full time athletes with time to eat very frequently are probably best served with the higher meal frequency simply to ensure adequate caloric intake. Again, smaller individuals with lower total energy intakes may want to use slightly larger meals eaten slightly less frequently for practical reasons. Similarly, individuals who work jobs and are unable to fit in a meal every three hours needn’t worry obsessively about becoming catabolic. A solid food meal containing a high quality protein, carbohydrates, fat and some fiber eaten every five hours will maintain an anabolic state readily.
Protein distribution throughout the day
Related to the topic of meal frequency is the question of whether the day’s protein should be spread evenly throughout the day, or if some other pattern of intake might be superior.
As discussed above, one early study examined whether providing 25% of protein at breakfast and lunch and 50% at dinner had any impact on nitrogen balance compared to spreading the protein evenly across the day’s three meals; no difference was found (9).
More recent work has examined a dietary strategy called “protein pulse” feeding. With that approach, 80% of the day’s protein was given at lunch with only 10% at the other two meals; this was compared to a “spread” pattern where the day’s protein intake was distributed evenly across four meals. In elderly women, the “pulse” pattern led to a greater protein gain compared to the “spread” pattern (25). However, in younger women, the “spread” pattern was superior and led to a greater nitrogen balance (26).
There is a substantial and increasing amount of data that putting some amount of the day’s protein around training is beneficial, a topic that is discussed in detail in the next chapter. Outside of ensuring adequate protein before, during and after training, there is no real indication that distributing the day’s protein in any pattern other than a basic spread pattern is beneficial (again, except possibly for older individuals).
So, for example, take an athlete who will be consuming 200 grams of protein per day with 40 grams of that placed around training. That leaves 160 grams of protein to be evenly distributed across the day’s other meals. With a four meal per day frequency, that yields 40 grams of protein per meal; at six meals per day, the athlete would consume roughly 27 grams of protein at each meal.
Is there an optimal intake pattern for different goals?
In the chapter on protein requirements, I mentioned Tipton and Wolfe’s contention that any discussion of protein requirements has to be context dependent: that is, the goals of the athlete determine what is optimal in terms of protein intake. While they were talking primarily about total daily protein intake, this idea can be extended to other aspects of nutrition including protein intake throughout the day and how it might interact with specific training goals.
Logically, gaining muscle mass versus maintaining muscle mass at maintenance calories versus trying to maintain muscle mass under conditions of caloric restriction (dieting) are different situations, potentially requiring different optimal intakes of protein, AAs, meal frequency or protein intake pattern. The possibility exists that different patterns of protein intake (in terms of both timing and type of protein) might exist for different goals (27).
For practical purposes, I’m going to consider the following discussion in terms of two different goals: muscle mass maintenance (either at maintenance calories or while dieting) and muscle mass gain. I want to note that most of this discussion will be somewhat hypothetical since little direct research exists to date.
The background for this discussion can be derived from a topic I’ve discussed previously in the book in terms of how different patterns of protein digestion (i.e. fast versus slow) can influence whole body metabolism differently.
Recapping briefly, large spikes in amino acid concentration appear to stimulate protein synthesis (recall also the infusion data I discussed above) with little to no impact on protein breakdown. In contrast, maintaining constant low levels of AAs appears to reduce protein breakdown with less of an impact on protein synthesis.
Consuming very large amounts of protein at once (as in the protein “pulse” studies discussed above) has an effect similar to a fast protein such as whey, spiking blood amino acids and promoting protein synthesis as well as oxidation (28).
In contrast, spreading protein out in smaller amounts throughout the day has an effect closer to that of casein, inhibiting protein breakdown with a smaller impact on protein synthesis (28).
I’d mention again that, in the original whey versus casein study, reducing protein breakdown via casein had a larger impact on net leucine balance compared to whey. Recall also that adding whey to other food, which had the effect of slowing down digestion, had a similar effect.
Given that data, it may very well be that simply maintaining relatively constant low levels of amino acids (with a spike around training, discussed next chapter) is optimal for all goals. This would be conceptually similar to the strategy of keeping insulin low but stable during the day with a spike around training. This is essentially the strategy that bodybuilders have empirically settled on under all situations: they eat small amounts of protein, carbohydrates and fat throughout the day with a relatively larger intake of nutrients around training.
With regards to muscle mass maintenance and dieting, there is little to discuss: based on the direct research available as well as the general difficulty in stimulating protein synthesis when calories are reduced, a slow/spread pattern of protein intake is clearly optimal. Maintaining continuous low levels of amino acids throughout the day (in addition to increasing total protein intake) to limit the body’s need to mobilize stored body protein from muscle and other tissues should be the goal. A combination of slow proteins combined with evenly spaced meals to keep blood AA levels stable throughout the day would seem to be optimal.
But is this also the optimal pattern for gaining muscle mass? On the one hand there is the suggestive study above where a group receiving three meals per day gained more LBM than a group receiving six per day; as well there is the research suggesting that maintaining constant levels of AAs might cause skeletal muscle to become “insensitive” to further stimulation; increasing extracellular levels of AAs and then allowing them to fall again appears to be superior. Both of these data points suggest that keeping blood AA levels stable throughout the day might not be optimal from the standpoint of muscle mass gains.
Another recent study throws a wrench in the typically held bodybuilder idea that simply maintaining continuous levels of amino acids with frequent meal feeding is optimal (29). In that study, two groups were compared. The first received three whole food meals while the second received the same three meals with an essential amino acid (EAA) supplement in-between. I should note that the study suffered from one huge design flaw: the groups got different amounts of total protein. It should have also tested a group that got 6 whole food meals and the same amount of protein as the EAA supplemented group.
Recognizing that limitation, the study made at least three major observations. The first was that the EAA supplement generated a greater protein synthetic response than the whole meals. The second was that the EAA supplement generated an anabolic response even when given in-between meals. That is to say, the previously consumed meal, which was still digesting when the supplement was given, didn’t blunt the effect of the EAA supplement. Finally, the EAA supplement didn’t blunt the anabolic response to the meal. Of course, the study didn’t examine what impact this would actually have in the long-term on muscle mass gains but is interesting nonetheless.
This study suggests that a potential pattern at least worth experimenting with for athletes seeking maximal muscle mass gains would be to alternate between slower digesting meals with faster acting sources (perhaps a whey protein drink or an EAA supplement) throughout the day (25).
It also plausible that a combination of slow and fast protein sources at a given meal could give the best of both worlds: a spike in AAs to stimulate protein synthesis followed by a slower increase to inhibit protein breakdown. Preliminary data that I discussed back in Chapter 2 supports that idea as well although it was being primarily applied to protein intake following resistance training. It’s interesting to note that old school bodybuilders often consumed copious amounts of milk to gain lean body mass as milk protein is a mixture of whey and casein.
Enjoy, a very good read.
Chillen
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Will see you all 2morrow.
I have a special "thoughts for the day" post planned for ya' all.
Also, I will have a question for Hoss (hope he is still occasionally reading) 2morrow, and will post it up here.
Hang in there, work hard, and do not ever give up. Solid. Always solid. Never weak.
Best wishes,
Chillen
I have a special "thoughts for the day" post planned for ya' all.
Also, I will have a question for Hoss (hope he is still occasionally reading) 2morrow, and will post it up here.
Hang in there, work hard, and do not ever give up. Solid. Always solid. Never weak.
Best wishes,
Chillen
My question for Hoss:
My in-law (76 years old), after a blood and urine examination, was determined to have reduced kidney function (renal failure, I believe they called it). She has a list of foods she can eat, and a list of foods she needs to stay away from.
Most of the off-foods-list are veggies and fruit (not all, but a large majority), For example, Tomatoes. Another example are sweet potatoes. However, she can have it canned or in syrup (?)
Is the canned variety (during processing eliminate, ruin, etc), the potassium in the process? Is this the reason she can have the canned variety of sweet potatoes as compared to the raw (baked or cooked at home variety)?
What is the deal with Potassium and reduced renal function?
Best wishes,
Chillen
My in-law (76 years old), after a blood and urine examination, was determined to have reduced kidney function (renal failure, I believe they called it). She has a list of foods she can eat, and a list of foods she needs to stay away from.
Most of the off-foods-list are veggies and fruit (not all, but a large majority), For example, Tomatoes. Another example are sweet potatoes. However, she can have it canned or in syrup (?)
Is the canned variety (during processing eliminate, ruin, etc), the potassium in the process? Is this the reason she can have the canned variety of sweet potatoes as compared to the raw (baked or cooked at home variety)?
What is the deal with Potassium and reduced renal function?
Best wishes,
Chillen
Chillen,
Sorry to hear about your mother in-law. As your kidney function deteriorates, your ability to excrete potassium progressively becomes impaired. Initially when the kidneys are still able to excrete lower amounts of potassium, the patients are educated on "renal diets" which restrict potassium intake in order to prevent the need for dialysis. Unfortunately, most patients with this level of renal insufficiency deteriorate until dialysis is a necessity for reducing potassium levels, reversing acidosis, and preventing fluid overload conditions such as congestive heart failure.
The problem with hyperkalemia is that it impairs the ability of electrical conduction of the heart which is dependent on sodium-potassium pumps and calcium concentrations. If the potassium level gets too high, the heart will suffer arrhythmias, eventually leading to ventricular fibrillation (sudden cardiac death).
My mother suffers from chronic renal insufficiency, so I know how it feels to have someone close suffer from this disease and to fear the consequences.
I wish you and your family the best,
TopKnife
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I thoroughly appreciate the thoughtfulness and degree of depth of your post. I appreciate the time you have taken to make it, sincerely.
I have a more of an understanding now. The amounts and types of fruits and Veggie items were quite interesting and surprising at the same time.
My wife's mother (of which we are speaking about) lives with us, and has for about 2 years now. She is about 35 pounds over weight, and is literally obsessed with food. She uses it as a personal comfort tool, even at the slightest amount of stress. Seriously. Something as small as missing her favorite TV show could trigger an eating response. She had quadruple bypass surgery (which her kidneys failed during and after surgery, but came back, and Doctors believe the current renal problem stems from this, and partially from age). Since her surgery, she was prescribed an eating list of bad/good foods, and it has been difficult to make her stay on it; but, I have been working with more recently with some success. The cardiologist wants her to exercise on a stationary bike. The only way I can get her to do this, is to do it with her; therefore, I bought another bike (let her use the one I have used the past couple of years), and ride along with her 3 to 4 times per week, and put up with her Big Band Music in the process
. I enjoy doing it though. Its a joy to improve the life of the mother, of the one I love.I am currently in discussion with my wife (and son's) on how to deal with her eating habits, and how we can restrict access to foods she shouldn't have (but are advantageous and healthy for us, and eat all the time): The Veggie/Fruit situation is going to be a problem, since we (the entire family) eat these all the time, and some of them are restricted or off limits to her.
I have a plan and will post this up, after we have a family meeting tonight.
Again, thank you very much for your insightful information, it was very much appreciated.
Best regards,
Chillen
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When hunger pains got you down, do not frown.
Strike fear and extreme anxiety to the biological beasts within, and have a party squashing the bugs of pain:
Through educating yourself in what you are attempting to accomplish in diet and fitness.
Its the only way to win.
Strike fear and extreme anxiety to the biological beasts within, and have a party squashing the bugs of pain:
Through educating yourself in what you are attempting to accomplish in diet and fitness.
Its the only way to win.
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Chillen,
It's the least I could do. Your posts have been inspirational and I feel indebted. You have helped me not only get closer to my body sculpting goals, but also supercharged my progress.
Thanks!
TopKnife
A quote comes to mind:
“As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.”
(Henry David Thoreau)
==============================
We can't solve problems by using a similar type of thinking we used when we created them, we expand and grow to such an extent these thoughts intertwine and blend within our daily lives. We have to believe. We have trust ourselves we have the ability and capability to carry out the functions necessary to see our goals through.
Everyone of us have this ability, and I post the way I do, in the attempt to make people realize they have their own unique friendship with there "own person" to be come their own personal artist to sculpt the person that want to be. This kind of artistic music is difficult to hear by others; but it can be seen.
(Chillen)
I am deeply moved by your kind words, TopKnfe. Assisting others with their problems within diet and fitness is what the heart of this form is about. It is the soul of the forum and its single most important expression.
In life and on the forum, I live by:
Do more than belong: participate. Do more than care: help. Do more than believe: practice. Do more than be fair: be kind. Do more than forgive: forget. Do more than dream: work.
Again, thank you. I am extremely happy that I was able to help you within your health and fitness goals.
Best regards and much success to you,
Chillen (Don)
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Off to my little room of loud music to train. Today is the lower portion of the circuit split.
I dropped one of the 10lb cast iron weights on my foot the other day, and my big toe is swelled up a tad, and the throbbing is a constant reminder of my dumbness. A little tape, a little toughness, and it will withstand the pressure of Lower work today without a problem. :violent:
Peace and happiness to all on the forum,
Chillen
I dropped one of the 10lb cast iron weights on my foot the other day, and my big toe is swelled up a tad, and the throbbing is a constant reminder of my dumbness.
A little tape, a little toughness, and it will withstand the pressure of Lower work today without a problem. :violent:Peace and happiness to all on the forum,
Chillen
I have had quite a few mishaps in the gym, LOL. I think its fair to say that if one trains consistently long enough and has a lot of heart in what they are doing, unfortunate mishaps, doing stupid things, and injuries happen.
We live and learn in the gym. It is always the teacher, if one "listens" and "observes with keen eyes" to what's happening.
In this case, I was quickly changing weight between sets to set up the next (what I term) metabolic circuit, and lost grip on the 10lb weight, and my throbbing toe was very thankful and appreciative of my action. :luxlove: :action4:
Instead of my normal tennis shoes when doing squats, I put on a pair of soft sole sandals, and it work out pretty good; I was going to do it any way whether it hurt or not-cementing my former dumbness.
During this passed year, the greatest gains have come in the legs, back, traps, and shoulders. It accounts for most of my weight gain this passed year.
On a side note: I wanted something different (as far as bending, stooping, pulling, pushing, twisting, angles of movement etc, in real life real time), and decided add a part-time job for the next few months three times per week, and donate my pay to a homeless children charity in Lawrence. I help unload a 48 foot trailer (for McDonald's, while holding on to a full-time employment at a different establishment). Boxes can weigh any where from 1lb to 100lbs, and it usually takes about 2 hours. My strength training the passed three years or so, proved to be most valuable, and it wasn't anything all that demanding. Wasn't even breathing all that hard, and didn't seem taxing: I can thank taking care of my fitness, because three years ago, I probably would have felt like being dead........>
I was throwing the boxes around like I was 20 something and this felt good. Not that I am surprised. I was confident because I know my personal training history. Its for a good cause, and I get my exercise in, and all ROCKS OUT! How are you ^wG?
Best wishes,
Chillen
July 23rd, 2009:"Thoughts for the Day"
We continue (just for a short while), with some of Lyle McDonald's opinions.
Here is explaining the: Almighty Calorie Deficits.
The link (to give credit) is here:
Setting the Deficit - Small, Moderate or Large
(Part one: Text is too long for one post)
Today I want to look at setting up caloric deficits for fat loss. So we’re clear, I’m going to start from the assumption that you must create some form of deficit (e.g. an imbalance between your intake and expenditure) for fat or weight loss to occur. I know that there are a lot of arguments that this is not the case but simply, decades of research says that it is.
I’m also going to assume, and realize that this is more for simplicity than anything else that whether you create the deficit via diet or activity, the end result is basically the same. Note that this is absolutely not a correct assumption. But to save space and keep things less confusing, I’m going to work from that basic assumption; at some later date I’ll address that particular issue in more detail.
What I want to look at is the various pros and cons of using small, moderate and large caloric deficits when setting up a fat loss deficit. As is usually the case you can find people arguing adamantly that only one or the other is appropriate; as usual I take a little bit different view: each approach can be relatively more or less appropriate for a given situation.
For the sake of this argument, I’m going to define the deficits as follows:
■Small: 10-15% below maintenance
■Moderate: 20-25% below maintenance
■Large: anything bigger than 25% below maintenance
Note, I’m not saying that these definitions are the exactly right ones, they are simply how I define the terms.
As I examine each, simply for the sake of putting some real world numbers to what I’m talking about, I’m going to use two sample dieters. The first is a relatively ‘average’ female who weighs 130 lbs and has a maintenance caloric expenditure of 1950 calories per day (15 cal/lb or 33 cal/kg, let’s just call it 2000). Our male weighs 180 lbs with a maintenance caloric expenditure of 2700 calories/day. I’ve discussed why and how I came up with the value of 15 cal/lb in the article How to Estimate Maintenance Calories.
Finally, I’m going to estimate weekly fat loss for each of the deficits as I go through. I’ll use the standard estimate of a 3500 calorie deficit equaling one pound of fat loss. I’ll only note that real-world fat loss will never actually achieve the estimated value, it’s always a little bit lower. I’ll explain why this is the case in a future article, for now simply accept that that’s the way things work.
And on with the show.
Small Deficits: 10-15% Below Maintenance
It’s not unheard of to hear of athletes or bodybuilders using very small caloric deficits to generate fat loss with a 10-15% deficit below maintenance being used. As well, some diet experts tend to recommend small deficits for even the general dieting public. Before looking at the pros and cons, let’s look at how this deficit will end up impacting on caloric intake as well as estimated weekly fat loss.
Dieter-----Maintenance Cals---------Total Deficit--------Estimated Fat Loss
Female----------2000 cal-------------200-300 cal---------0.5 lbs. per week
Male-------------2700 cal-------------270-405 cal----0.5-0.8 lbs. per week
Notice that the male, by simple dint of having a larger maintenance requirement will end up with a larger caloric deficit than the female and a larger predicted fat loss. This was actually one of the reasons that I argue for using percentage based deficits in my first book The Ketogenic Diet, they take into account the individual needs of the diet. That’s compared to either giving people absolute caloric recommendations or telling people to reduce their calories by some fixed amount.
First, some of the pros of this approach. Clearly the deficit is fairly small and can be achieved relatively easily. A small food restriction will usually accomplish it and often times, the deficit can be achieved by making simple qualitative changes in the diet (e.g. replacing 2% milk with fat free milk may save 40 calories and across three meals that’s 120 calories).
Even if absolute food intake has to be restricted, the difference is relatively small compared to normal eating patterns. For some people, this is beneficial behaviorally since they tend to do better with small non-intrusive changes.
It’s also often argued that this type of tiny deficit will have less of an impact on some of the counter-regulatory responses, the metabolic slowdown and such that can occur. There is arguably some truth to this although the compromise for this is much slower fat loss (discussed next).
Finally, related to the fact that the adjustments are often small, it is often argued that long-term adherence may be better than more extreme diets; since there is less overall restriction involved in the first place, the odds of the person slipping or losing control is lower. Again, there is some truth to this.
Finally, for performance type athletes, since there is never much extreme dietary restriction, the odds of hurting training or performance are lowered. Big deficits can destroy training or at least require that it be modified to avoid the person crashing hard. Small deficits generally avoid that.
But what about the cons? The biggest issue with this approach is that the fat loss is so exceedingly slow. Typically when I have seen people use this approach it is with folks who are relatively lean and don’t have much fat to lose in the first place.
A contest dieter (bodybuilder or figure person) who is starting close to their goal may only need to drop 10 pounds of fat to get into shape. Of course, for our female, that still may require 20 weeks of straight dieting. But for some people, and this is usually with folks who really know their bodies, this may work better.
For larger individuals, even with the relatively faster rates of fat loss, the slow rate of loss may be discouraging and frustrating. As I discussed in another context in The Full Diet Break, individuals who have 50-100 or more pounds to lose often have a great deal of psychological struggle to overcome; losing a mere 1-2 pounds per week can make the diet take forever and that can lead to failure.
The final con with this approach is this: it’s real easy to screw up. The small deficit makes it possible for even tiny mis-measurement of true food intake to obliterate the deficit. I discussed this idea in a different context in the Q&A on Not Losing Fat in a 20% Deficit but it is potential problem.
Again, in my experience the people who make this approach work are absolutely meticulous with their diet, they measure everything to the gram. Otherwise, it’s altogether too easy for what you though was a 300 cal/day deficit to be nothing but a 100 cal/day deficit.
For the most part, I think the small deficit approach is best for the type of dieter I’ve described a couple times above: advanced dieters and/or athletes with relatively less fat to lose who are obsessively meticulous with their calories. For others, a moderate or large deficit will probably be a better choice.
Moderate Deficit Dieting: 20-25% Below Maintenance
Next let’s look at moderate deficit dieting which is probably the most commonly advocated approach especially in the bodybuilding and athletic subculture. As noted, I’ll be defining this as anywhere between 20-25% below maintenance calories. Again, let’s look at what this makes the deficit and what the estimated weekly fat loss will be for our two sample dieters.
Dieter-----Maintenance Cals---------Total Deficit--------Estimated Fat Loss
Female----------2000 cal-------------400-500 cal-------0.8-1 lbs. per week
Male-------------2700 cal-------------540-675 cal----1.1-1.3 lbs. per week
Now we’re getting into more standard fat loss diets with recommendations of 1-1.5 pounds fat loss per week being a common recommendation. Of course, the drawback is that a larger deficit must be created to get that level of fat loss.
Generally speaking moderate deficit diets tend to use a combination of food restriction and activity to accomplish the full deficit; I know I said I wouldn’t really talk about this in this article but it’s worth mentioning. 250-300 calories/day of activity with a 250-300 calorie/day food restriction is still pretty manageable and requires neither massive amounts of exercise or massive amounts of food restriction. It is entirely possible to do the full deficit through food restriction of course.
This tends to allow much of the food flexibility and such that small deficit diets have as one of their pros; the diet only has to be changed minimally to achieve the necessary deficit. Even there, moderate deficit dieting does feel like more of a diet than small deficit dieting, the individual will feel more restricted overall (unless they create the entire deficit through activity).
For athletes and performance types, this is a benefit since it tends to have a small impact on gym or sports training. This is especially true if concepts such as the refeeds and full diet breaks discussed on the site and in my A Guide to Flexible Dieting are adhered to.
Of course, since the fat loss is faster, the diet tends to get finished quicker. While some larger individuals with a lot of weight to lose may still find the prospect of dieting for a year to be overwhelming, at least things will be happening a lot more quickly than with small deficits.
In terms of screwing up, it certainly is possible to offset some of the deficit of a moderate fat loss diet with mis-measurement but it’s far harder to eliminate the deficit completely. It can be done, make no mistake about it, but its relatively more difficult (what usually happens is that an expected 500 cal/day deficit ends up around 250-300 cal/day and people wonder why the fat loss is only half what it should be).
Metabolically, moderate deficit dieting does have an impact for reasons I’ve discussed endlessly on the site and in my books and won’t discuss again here. But between the rate of fat loss and impact of caloric restriction on hormones like leptin, etc. there’s no getting around the fact that the body will fight back to some degree with moderate deficit dieting (realistically: this will happen on any diet no matter what you do).
Frankly, outside of the fact that moderate deficit dieting may take really extended periods for very overfat individuals, I’d probably say it has the fewest overall cons relative to the potential pros. Which is probably why it tends to be one of the most widely recommended and used approaches.
Of course, some people are still impatient (or have their own reasons for wanting or needing) faster fat loss and the moderate fat loss of the moderate deficit can be both a pro and a con in that regard. And that brings us to large deficit dieting.
Part Two NEXT
We continue (just for a short while), with some of Lyle McDonald's opinions.
Here is explaining the: Almighty Calorie Deficits.
The link (to give credit) is here:
Setting the Deficit - Small, Moderate or Large
(Part one: Text is too long for one post)
Today I want to look at setting up caloric deficits for fat loss. So we’re clear, I’m going to start from the assumption that you must create some form of deficit (e.g. an imbalance between your intake and expenditure) for fat or weight loss to occur. I know that there are a lot of arguments that this is not the case but simply, decades of research says that it is.
I’m also going to assume, and realize that this is more for simplicity than anything else that whether you create the deficit via diet or activity, the end result is basically the same. Note that this is absolutely not a correct assumption. But to save space and keep things less confusing, I’m going to work from that basic assumption; at some later date I’ll address that particular issue in more detail.
What I want to look at is the various pros and cons of using small, moderate and large caloric deficits when setting up a fat loss deficit. As is usually the case you can find people arguing adamantly that only one or the other is appropriate; as usual I take a little bit different view: each approach can be relatively more or less appropriate for a given situation.
For the sake of this argument, I’m going to define the deficits as follows:
■Small: 10-15% below maintenance
■Moderate: 20-25% below maintenance
■Large: anything bigger than 25% below maintenance
Note, I’m not saying that these definitions are the exactly right ones, they are simply how I define the terms.
As I examine each, simply for the sake of putting some real world numbers to what I’m talking about, I’m going to use two sample dieters. The first is a relatively ‘average’ female who weighs 130 lbs and has a maintenance caloric expenditure of 1950 calories per day (15 cal/lb or 33 cal/kg, let’s just call it 2000). Our male weighs 180 lbs with a maintenance caloric expenditure of 2700 calories/day. I’ve discussed why and how I came up with the value of 15 cal/lb in the article How to Estimate Maintenance Calories.
Finally, I’m going to estimate weekly fat loss for each of the deficits as I go through. I’ll use the standard estimate of a 3500 calorie deficit equaling one pound of fat loss. I’ll only note that real-world fat loss will never actually achieve the estimated value, it’s always a little bit lower. I’ll explain why this is the case in a future article, for now simply accept that that’s the way things work.
And on with the show.
Small Deficits: 10-15% Below Maintenance
It’s not unheard of to hear of athletes or bodybuilders using very small caloric deficits to generate fat loss with a 10-15% deficit below maintenance being used. As well, some diet experts tend to recommend small deficits for even the general dieting public. Before looking at the pros and cons, let’s look at how this deficit will end up impacting on caloric intake as well as estimated weekly fat loss.
Dieter-----Maintenance Cals---------Total Deficit--------Estimated Fat Loss
Female----------2000 cal-------------200-300 cal---------0.5 lbs. per week
Male-------------2700 cal-------------270-405 cal----0.5-0.8 lbs. per week
Notice that the male, by simple dint of having a larger maintenance requirement will end up with a larger caloric deficit than the female and a larger predicted fat loss. This was actually one of the reasons that I argue for using percentage based deficits in my first book The Ketogenic Diet, they take into account the individual needs of the diet. That’s compared to either giving people absolute caloric recommendations or telling people to reduce their calories by some fixed amount.
First, some of the pros of this approach. Clearly the deficit is fairly small and can be achieved relatively easily. A small food restriction will usually accomplish it and often times, the deficit can be achieved by making simple qualitative changes in the diet (e.g. replacing 2% milk with fat free milk may save 40 calories and across three meals that’s 120 calories).
Even if absolute food intake has to be restricted, the difference is relatively small compared to normal eating patterns. For some people, this is beneficial behaviorally since they tend to do better with small non-intrusive changes.
It’s also often argued that this type of tiny deficit will have less of an impact on some of the counter-regulatory responses, the metabolic slowdown and such that can occur. There is arguably some truth to this although the compromise for this is much slower fat loss (discussed next).
Finally, related to the fact that the adjustments are often small, it is often argued that long-term adherence may be better than more extreme diets; since there is less overall restriction involved in the first place, the odds of the person slipping or losing control is lower. Again, there is some truth to this.
Finally, for performance type athletes, since there is never much extreme dietary restriction, the odds of hurting training or performance are lowered. Big deficits can destroy training or at least require that it be modified to avoid the person crashing hard. Small deficits generally avoid that.
But what about the cons? The biggest issue with this approach is that the fat loss is so exceedingly slow. Typically when I have seen people use this approach it is with folks who are relatively lean and don’t have much fat to lose in the first place.
A contest dieter (bodybuilder or figure person) who is starting close to their goal may only need to drop 10 pounds of fat to get into shape. Of course, for our female, that still may require 20 weeks of straight dieting. But for some people, and this is usually with folks who really know their bodies, this may work better.
For larger individuals, even with the relatively faster rates of fat loss, the slow rate of loss may be discouraging and frustrating. As I discussed in another context in The Full Diet Break, individuals who have 50-100 or more pounds to lose often have a great deal of psychological struggle to overcome; losing a mere 1-2 pounds per week can make the diet take forever and that can lead to failure.
The final con with this approach is this: it’s real easy to screw up. The small deficit makes it possible for even tiny mis-measurement of true food intake to obliterate the deficit. I discussed this idea in a different context in the Q&A on Not Losing Fat in a 20% Deficit but it is potential problem.
Again, in my experience the people who make this approach work are absolutely meticulous with their diet, they measure everything to the gram. Otherwise, it’s altogether too easy for what you though was a 300 cal/day deficit to be nothing but a 100 cal/day deficit.
For the most part, I think the small deficit approach is best for the type of dieter I’ve described a couple times above: advanced dieters and/or athletes with relatively less fat to lose who are obsessively meticulous with their calories. For others, a moderate or large deficit will probably be a better choice.
Moderate Deficit Dieting: 20-25% Below Maintenance
Next let’s look at moderate deficit dieting which is probably the most commonly advocated approach especially in the bodybuilding and athletic subculture. As noted, I’ll be defining this as anywhere between 20-25% below maintenance calories. Again, let’s look at what this makes the deficit and what the estimated weekly fat loss will be for our two sample dieters.
Dieter-----Maintenance Cals---------Total Deficit--------Estimated Fat Loss
Female----------2000 cal-------------400-500 cal-------0.8-1 lbs. per week
Male-------------2700 cal-------------540-675 cal----1.1-1.3 lbs. per week
Now we’re getting into more standard fat loss diets with recommendations of 1-1.5 pounds fat loss per week being a common recommendation. Of course, the drawback is that a larger deficit must be created to get that level of fat loss.
Generally speaking moderate deficit diets tend to use a combination of food restriction and activity to accomplish the full deficit; I know I said I wouldn’t really talk about this in this article but it’s worth mentioning. 250-300 calories/day of activity with a 250-300 calorie/day food restriction is still pretty manageable and requires neither massive amounts of exercise or massive amounts of food restriction. It is entirely possible to do the full deficit through food restriction of course.
This tends to allow much of the food flexibility and such that small deficit diets have as one of their pros; the diet only has to be changed minimally to achieve the necessary deficit. Even there, moderate deficit dieting does feel like more of a diet than small deficit dieting, the individual will feel more restricted overall (unless they create the entire deficit through activity).
For athletes and performance types, this is a benefit since it tends to have a small impact on gym or sports training. This is especially true if concepts such as the refeeds and full diet breaks discussed on the site and in my A Guide to Flexible Dieting are adhered to.
Of course, since the fat loss is faster, the diet tends to get finished quicker. While some larger individuals with a lot of weight to lose may still find the prospect of dieting for a year to be overwhelming, at least things will be happening a lot more quickly than with small deficits.
In terms of screwing up, it certainly is possible to offset some of the deficit of a moderate fat loss diet with mis-measurement but it’s far harder to eliminate the deficit completely. It can be done, make no mistake about it, but its relatively more difficult (what usually happens is that an expected 500 cal/day deficit ends up around 250-300 cal/day and people wonder why the fat loss is only half what it should be).
Metabolically, moderate deficit dieting does have an impact for reasons I’ve discussed endlessly on the site and in my books and won’t discuss again here. But between the rate of fat loss and impact of caloric restriction on hormones like leptin, etc. there’s no getting around the fact that the body will fight back to some degree with moderate deficit dieting (realistically: this will happen on any diet no matter what you do).
Frankly, outside of the fact that moderate deficit dieting may take really extended periods for very overfat individuals, I’d probably say it has the fewest overall cons relative to the potential pros. Which is probably why it tends to be one of the most widely recommended and used approaches.
Of course, some people are still impatient (or have their own reasons for wanting or needing) faster fat loss and the moderate fat loss of the moderate deficit can be both a pro and a con in that regard. And that brings us to large deficit dieting.
Part Two NEXT
July 23rd, 2009: "Thoughts for the day" (2)
Part two:
Large Deficit Dieting: 25% Below Maintenance or Greater
While I’m going to define large deficit dieting as anything greater than 25% below maintenance, for the sake of this discussion, I’m actually going ot use a massive deficit: a full 50% below maintenance. Just to illustrate the point.
I actually advocated this size deficit in the first phase of my Ultimate Diet 2.0 but it’s also only for 4 days. The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook actually revolves around protein intake rather than caloric intake per se but,on average, the deficit may end up at 50% below maintenance or even more. So that’s why I’m going to use 50% for this illustration.
Dieter-----Maintenance Cals---------Total Deficit--------Estimated Fat Loss
Female----------2000 cal-------------1000 cal---------2 lbs. per week
Male-------------2700 cal-------------1350 cal---------2.7 lbs. per week
I’d note that for very large individuals, with high maintenance caloric expenditures, greater rates of fat loss are possible with one-half to two-thirds of fat loss per day being possible when calories are low enough.
Now, clearly the biggest pro (to some) of this approach is that the rate of fat loss is maximal. Even our smaller woman is losing a significant amount of fat per week and the male is dropping fat at a pretty absurd rate. As noted, for bigger people, the numbers go up further and fat losses of 4-5 pounds per week are not unheard of.
Of course, a pro of that is the diet ends much more quickly than it otherwise would. A diet that might have taken 2-3 months may be compressed into a month. For some people, this is a huge pro, they can get back to serious training or what have you since the diet isn’t interrupting things for extended periods.
As well, in some situations (e.g. class reunion, wedding 2 weeks away), people may only have a limited time to lose the maximum weight/fat possible; that requires an extreme approach because there simply isn’t time to use anything slower.
As well, for people with a large amount of weight to lose, seeing a quick initial drop can provide some nice positive reinforcement to continue with the diet. Again, someone with 50-100 pounds to lose will likely be disappointed to drop only a pound or two in the first week. A large deficit diet may generate a scale drop (and some of this is water weight) of 7-10 pounds in the first week.
This can help with long-term adherence. Even a 2-4 week period with a large deficit to get some quick initial weight/fat loss before moving into a more moderate deficit approach can be beneficial here.
And, assuming the diet is set up appropriately (adequate protein) with the right kind of training (heavy weight training as discussed in Weight Training for Fat Loss, muscle loss actually turns out to be minimal or zero. I know this runs counter to the commonly held belief but it’s 100% true (as people following my The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook properly have demonstrated).
Certainly early research suggested that bigger deficits and very low caloric intakes led to more muscle loss but invariably they had inadequate protein and didn’t have weight training as part of the program. When someone is on 300 cal/day and half of that is carbs, well, that’s only 40 grams of protein. Of course muscle is lost, but not because calories are low per se; rather it’s because the diet is set up stupidly.
Which brings us to one of the cons: because of the massive deficit involved, most of it almost has to come from diet. Most can’t spend the hours per day to expend the types of calories inherent to large deficit dieting so it comes down mostly to diet.
And since so few calories are being consumed, this allows for very little food flexibility. My large deficit diets always end up being high-protein, low-carb and relatively low fat because that’s the only way to achieve the necessary deficits while providing sufficient protein. There simply isn’t room for much else.
From a long-term adherence standpoint, that can be a problem. Of course, my diets also always include free meals, refeeds and diet breaks to account for that but some can go crazy with such a limited number of foods available. Then again, large deficit diets are rarely meant to be used in the long-term in the first place and often the short-period of extreme restriction seems to ‘reset’ some food issues for people. They can lose their taste for a lot of the stuff that they used to over-eat previously and that can help in the long-term.
Which brings us to the issue of adherence. Again, contrary to popular belief, as I discussed in Is Rapid Fat Loss Right For You? there is actually some data suggesting better long-term weight loss with faster initial weight/fat loss.
But this is predicated on the diet being set up in certain specific ways: the diet must change long-term food patterns (meaning it should revolve around whole foods, not protein shakes), it must include exercise, it must work on behavioral aspects of eating. Not all large deficit diets are set up that way and the ones that aren’t are destined to fail. Diets based around living on shakes or what have you may generate amazing fat loss but they do nothing to help in the long-term, nothing has been changed about long-term eating habits to help the person know what to eat when the diet ends.
Of course, with a deficit that massive, it’s nearly impossible to completely offset the deficit without some pretty major screw ups in terms of food choices. Make no mistake, it can happen, people end up choosing high-protein foods that contain too many tagalong fats and carbs and this offsets the deficit. But even with that, the deficit ends up being pretty damn big and fat loss is pretty quick.
On that note, the severe restriction can be too much for people although, interestingly, many report that hunger actually isn’t a huge issue. Between the hunger blunting effect of massive amounts of protein and other issues, hunger often goes away. Odd but true and this certainly isn’t universal.
As well, long-term adherence can be an issue and returning to maintenance caloric intakes is a problem for some. This is actually a big part of why large deficit diets are best set up around whole foods. When the diet is based around protein shakes, the dieter has no idea how to ‘eat normally’ when the diet is over.
When the core of the diet is based around whole foods (e.g. lean protein, veggies, essential fats), the dieter simply adds other foods back to that core when the diet ends (or they choose to move to a more moderate deficit). Even there, some people simply can’t make large deficit diets work, they end up yo-yoing back and forth and should consider something else.
Of course, metabolically, large deficit dieting can have the biggest impact on metabolic parameters. But that’s the price to pay for faster rates of fat loss. As I’m fond of saying, life she is full of these little compromises. If you want to have a minimal impact on metabolic rate and such, use a smaller deficit; the price is simply slower fat loss and a longer diet.
Of course, properly scheduled refeeds and full diet breaks help to offset much of this so large deficit diets can still be made workable if you do it right. Again, they still aren’t for everyone.
Finally, large deficit diets have the greatest impact on training and ability to train. It actually turns out that too much activity with a large caloric deficit can cause more problems than it solves and, generally, training has to be massively curtailed during the diet. For people who simply love training, or must train a lot for whatever reason, large deficit diets are unworkable. They must do something else.
Then again, for some athletes, a 2 week block on a large deficit (with training severely cut back) can be used to let them get back to training and may have less of an impact on training than having to diet moderately for 10 straight week. This simply depends on the specifics.
Summing Up
So that’s that, a look at three different approaches to setting up the caloric deficit for dieting and their pros and cons. Clearly none of the three is inherently the best approach although, on the whole, moderate deficit dieting probably has the most pros with the least cons. Even there, there are times when either a very small or large deficit diet may be appropriate. Hopefully the above will help you decide which is right for you.
==========================================================
“Out of intense complexities intense simplicities emerge.”
(Churchill)
=========================================================
“The most intense conflicts, if overcome, leave behind a sense of security and calm that is not easily disturbed. It is just these intense conflicts and their conflagration which are needed to produce valuable and lasting results.”
(Jung)
=========================================================
"An intense anticipation itself transforms possibility into reality; our desires being often but precursors of the things which we are capable of performing.”
(S. Smiles)
Peace brotha an Sista's,
Chillen
Part two:
Large Deficit Dieting: 25% Below Maintenance or Greater
While I’m going to define large deficit dieting as anything greater than 25% below maintenance, for the sake of this discussion, I’m actually going ot use a massive deficit: a full 50% below maintenance. Just to illustrate the point.
I actually advocated this size deficit in the first phase of my Ultimate Diet 2.0 but it’s also only for 4 days. The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook actually revolves around protein intake rather than caloric intake per se but,on average, the deficit may end up at 50% below maintenance or even more. So that’s why I’m going to use 50% for this illustration.
Dieter-----Maintenance Cals---------Total Deficit--------Estimated Fat Loss
Female----------2000 cal-------------1000 cal---------2 lbs. per week
Male-------------2700 cal-------------1350 cal---------2.7 lbs. per week
I’d note that for very large individuals, with high maintenance caloric expenditures, greater rates of fat loss are possible with one-half to two-thirds of fat loss per day being possible when calories are low enough.
Now, clearly the biggest pro (to some) of this approach is that the rate of fat loss is maximal. Even our smaller woman is losing a significant amount of fat per week and the male is dropping fat at a pretty absurd rate. As noted, for bigger people, the numbers go up further and fat losses of 4-5 pounds per week are not unheard of.
Of course, a pro of that is the diet ends much more quickly than it otherwise would. A diet that might have taken 2-3 months may be compressed into a month. For some people, this is a huge pro, they can get back to serious training or what have you since the diet isn’t interrupting things for extended periods.
As well, in some situations (e.g. class reunion, wedding 2 weeks away), people may only have a limited time to lose the maximum weight/fat possible; that requires an extreme approach because there simply isn’t time to use anything slower.
As well, for people with a large amount of weight to lose, seeing a quick initial drop can provide some nice positive reinforcement to continue with the diet. Again, someone with 50-100 pounds to lose will likely be disappointed to drop only a pound or two in the first week. A large deficit diet may generate a scale drop (and some of this is water weight) of 7-10 pounds in the first week.
This can help with long-term adherence. Even a 2-4 week period with a large deficit to get some quick initial weight/fat loss before moving into a more moderate deficit approach can be beneficial here.
And, assuming the diet is set up appropriately (adequate protein) with the right kind of training (heavy weight training as discussed in Weight Training for Fat Loss, muscle loss actually turns out to be minimal or zero. I know this runs counter to the commonly held belief but it’s 100% true (as people following my The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook properly have demonstrated).
Certainly early research suggested that bigger deficits and very low caloric intakes led to more muscle loss but invariably they had inadequate protein and didn’t have weight training as part of the program. When someone is on 300 cal/day and half of that is carbs, well, that’s only 40 grams of protein. Of course muscle is lost, but not because calories are low per se; rather it’s because the diet is set up stupidly.
Which brings us to one of the cons: because of the massive deficit involved, most of it almost has to come from diet. Most can’t spend the hours per day to expend the types of calories inherent to large deficit dieting so it comes down mostly to diet.
And since so few calories are being consumed, this allows for very little food flexibility. My large deficit diets always end up being high-protein, low-carb and relatively low fat because that’s the only way to achieve the necessary deficits while providing sufficient protein. There simply isn’t room for much else.
From a long-term adherence standpoint, that can be a problem. Of course, my diets also always include free meals, refeeds and diet breaks to account for that but some can go crazy with such a limited number of foods available. Then again, large deficit diets are rarely meant to be used in the long-term in the first place and often the short-period of extreme restriction seems to ‘reset’ some food issues for people. They can lose their taste for a lot of the stuff that they used to over-eat previously and that can help in the long-term.
Which brings us to the issue of adherence. Again, contrary to popular belief, as I discussed in Is Rapid Fat Loss Right For You? there is actually some data suggesting better long-term weight loss with faster initial weight/fat loss.
But this is predicated on the diet being set up in certain specific ways: the diet must change long-term food patterns (meaning it should revolve around whole foods, not protein shakes), it must include exercise, it must work on behavioral aspects of eating. Not all large deficit diets are set up that way and the ones that aren’t are destined to fail. Diets based around living on shakes or what have you may generate amazing fat loss but they do nothing to help in the long-term, nothing has been changed about long-term eating habits to help the person know what to eat when the diet ends.
Of course, with a deficit that massive, it’s nearly impossible to completely offset the deficit without some pretty major screw ups in terms of food choices. Make no mistake, it can happen, people end up choosing high-protein foods that contain too many tagalong fats and carbs and this offsets the deficit. But even with that, the deficit ends up being pretty damn big and fat loss is pretty quick.
On that note, the severe restriction can be too much for people although, interestingly, many report that hunger actually isn’t a huge issue. Between the hunger blunting effect of massive amounts of protein and other issues, hunger often goes away. Odd but true and this certainly isn’t universal.
As well, long-term adherence can be an issue and returning to maintenance caloric intakes is a problem for some. This is actually a big part of why large deficit diets are best set up around whole foods. When the diet is based around protein shakes, the dieter has no idea how to ‘eat normally’ when the diet is over.
When the core of the diet is based around whole foods (e.g. lean protein, veggies, essential fats), the dieter simply adds other foods back to that core when the diet ends (or they choose to move to a more moderate deficit). Even there, some people simply can’t make large deficit diets work, they end up yo-yoing back and forth and should consider something else.
Of course, metabolically, large deficit dieting can have the biggest impact on metabolic parameters. But that’s the price to pay for faster rates of fat loss. As I’m fond of saying, life she is full of these little compromises. If you want to have a minimal impact on metabolic rate and such, use a smaller deficit; the price is simply slower fat loss and a longer diet.
Of course, properly scheduled refeeds and full diet breaks help to offset much of this so large deficit diets can still be made workable if you do it right. Again, they still aren’t for everyone.
Finally, large deficit diets have the greatest impact on training and ability to train. It actually turns out that too much activity with a large caloric deficit can cause more problems than it solves and, generally, training has to be massively curtailed during the diet. For people who simply love training, or must train a lot for whatever reason, large deficit diets are unworkable. They must do something else.
Then again, for some athletes, a 2 week block on a large deficit (with training severely cut back) can be used to let them get back to training and may have less of an impact on training than having to diet moderately for 10 straight week. This simply depends on the specifics.
Summing Up
So that’s that, a look at three different approaches to setting up the caloric deficit for dieting and their pros and cons. Clearly none of the three is inherently the best approach although, on the whole, moderate deficit dieting probably has the most pros with the least cons. Even there, there are times when either a very small or large deficit diet may be appropriate. Hopefully the above will help you decide which is right for you.
==========================================================
“Out of intense complexities intense simplicities emerge.”
(Churchill)
=========================================================
“The most intense conflicts, if overcome, leave behind a sense of security and calm that is not easily disturbed. It is just these intense conflicts and their conflagration which are needed to produce valuable and lasting results.”
(Jung)
=========================================================
"An intense anticipation itself transforms possibility into reality; our desires being often but precursors of the things which we are capable of performing.”
(S. Smiles)
Peace brotha an Sista's,
Chillen
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