Intermittent Fasting Precision Nutrition 2

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting
DR. JOHN M. BERARDI WITH DR. KRISTA SCOTT-DIXON AND NATE GREEN
Copyright 2011 by Precision Nutrition Inc.
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Table of Contents
Summary
All About Intermittent Fasting, in Under 10 Minutes

A quick, easily-digestible summary of everything I found in my six months of experiments with intermittent fasting.
Introduction Hi, My Name is John. And I Havent Eaten in 24 Hours.

I recently did a 24-hour fast, but I wasnt all that hungry. In fact, I felt ne. Here I discuss why I tried this strange experiment, how it led to 6 months of self-experimentation, and what a 24-hour fast can do for you. (You may be surprised.)
Chapter 1
Science or Fiction? Exploring the Benets of Intermittent Fasting

The growing popularity of intermittent fasting lends it mythical status in certain quarters of the web. What is IF actually supposed to do, and does it live up to the hype?
Chapter 2
Why Do Intermittent Fasting?

Ive been healthy and t for nearly 20 years, mostly by exercising consistently and by grazing (eating every few hours). New goals and insatiable curiosity inspired me to try IF for 6 months. Heres why.
Chapter 3
Intermittent Fasting Review: Comparing the Popular IF Programs

Intermittent fasting means a lot of different things to different people; here, I summarize the most popular IF styles and discuss the differences and similarities between them.
Chapter 4
The Weekly Fast: My First Intermittent Fasting Experiment

I started my intermittent fasting experiments with a simple intervention. Heres my initial IF protocol and what happened after the rst few weeks.
Chapter 5
The Twice-Weekly Fast: When Things Go Horribly Wrong

After my rst experiment, I tried several different full-day fasting variations. Unfortunately, they didnt go as planned. What I tried, and what went wrong.
Chapter 6
The Daily Fast: Back on Track

Next step: shorter, more frequent fasts. This brand of intermittent fasting is often considered more physiquefriendly. Lets see whether thats true for me.
Chapter 7
Wrap-up, Results, and Lessons On Self-Experimentation

A summary of my results, with pictures. Plus, a discussion of why the sort of self-experimentation practiced in this book is both cool and important. And how you can do it too.
Appendix A
How To Do Intermittent Fasting: Cheat Sheet with Our 3 Favorite Protocols

Want to try intermittent fasting yourself? Here we summarize the three methods we like best and help you choose which is best for you.
Appendix B Resources About the Authors
Intermittent Fasting Tips & Tricks

Key concepts and strategies we cover in this book. This book describes my own journey through IF. You may want to learn more after reading about my experience. These additional health, tness, and nutrition resources can get you started. If youd like to get to know me a little better, check out this section for more. And why not learn about my co-authors too? (Theyre also pretty cool.)
SUMMARY
All About Intermittent Fasting, in Under 10 Minutes

A growing number of experts claim short fasts can accelerate fat loss and make you healthier. So we spent 6 months testing the most popular Intermittent Fasting (IF) protocols ourselves. Find out what IF is, whether you should do it, and if so how.
For years, Dr. John Berardi, Chief Science Ofcer of Precision Nutrition, has advocated frequent meals, spaced 3-4 hours apart, consisting of nutrient-dense, healthy food. That strategy when combined with a smart exercise program and world-class coaching has helped thousands of our clients drop over 120,000 pounds of fat in the last ten years. Proponents of IF, on the other hand, eschew the idea of eating so frequently. Many claim to have achieved quicker fat loss and better health by deliberately skipping meals and sometimes going entire days without eating. The IF research is still in its infancy indeed, it may be 5-10 years before it reaches critical mass and becomes a mainstream nutritional idea but in certain quarters, the benets of intermittent fasting have reached almost mythical proportions. With research lagging behind at a snails pace, but enough anecdotal evidence to go off of, we decided to do what we do here at Precision Nutrition: test it ourselves. Heres what Dr. Berardi found, in his own words. WHY EXPERIMENT WITH INTERMITTENT FASTING? Im a professional dieter. In other words, Ive done nearly every diet or nutritional protocol thats around to test its efcacy. Intermittent fasting has a very small, yet strong, following and enough research to pique my curiosity. I wanted to test it myself to see what kinds of physiological and psychological changes would come from it. Also, as a competitive, masters-level track athlete and life-long tness enthusiast, I wanted to test a new way to drop fat and get extremely lean, while staying strong and powerful.
Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com
WHAT DID YOU TEST? Since there isnt one denitive intermittent fasting protocol, I decided to test six different methods over the course of six months. I kept meticulous notes on everything from scale weight, body-fat percentage, and blood/hormonal markers, to lifestyle markers like energy levels, cognitive thought, and pain-in-the-ass factors. WHAT HAPPENED? Over the course of six months, I dropped twenty pounds of weight, from 190 pounds to 170 pounds. I also reduced my body fat from 10% to 4% while maintaining most of my lean muscle mass. Finally, I found two intermittent fasting strategies that I could follow indenitely with no problem. Simply, I accomplished the goals I set for myself in a way that was easier and less time-consuming than traditional dieting. WHAT ARE THE BIG TAKEAWAYS? I think there are four main takeaways that readers of this book should come away with. 1. Trial fasting is a great way to practice managing hunger. This is an essential skill for anyone who wants to get in shape and stay healthy and t. 2. More regular fasting isnt objectively better for losing body fat. While my IF experiments worked quite well, the intermittent fasting approach (bigger meals, less frequently) didnt produce better fat loss than a more conventional diet approach (smaller meals, more frequently) might have. 3. More regular fasting did make it easier to maintain a lower body fat percentage. Intermittent fasting isnt easy. However, I did nd that using this approach made it easier for me to maintain a low body weight and a very low body fat percentage vs. more conventional diets. 4. Intermittent fasting can work but its not for everyone, nor does it need to be. In the end, IF is just one approach, among many effective ones, for improving health, performance, and body composition. SO INTERMITTENT FASTING IS GOOD, BUT NOT NECESSARY? Exactly. Intermittent fasting can be helpful for in-shape people who want to really get lean without following conventional bodybuilding diets, or for anyone who needs to learn the difference between body hunger and mental hunger. (And for the latter, I only recommend the Trial Fast.) Its a helpful tool and one Ill continue to use periodically. But its not the end-all, be-all of nutrition or tness. People have been getting in awesome shape and staying in awesome shape for decades without the use of intermittent fasting. HOW ARE IF AND GRAZING SIMILAR? Successful nutrition plans, whether they use smaller, more frequent meals or larger, less frequent meals all share a few commonalities. These include:
1. Controlling calories. When calories are controlled, progress is made. Whether you control them by eating frequent small meals or infrequent larger meals is up to you. 2. Focusing on food quality. Fresh, unprocessed, nutrient-dense food is a must, regardless of which eating style you adopt. 3. Regular exercise. Exercise is a critical part of the equation. Once those three have been taken care of, its a matter of personal preference and lifestyle considerations. ID LIKE TO LEARN MORE. WHATS NEXT? Have 10 minutes? Read Appendix A. Its a cheat sheet that shows you exactly how to do intermittent fasting, including specics on our three favorite protocols. Have 30 minutes? Read about the individual fasts in Chapters 4, 5 and 6. Then read the cheat sheet in Appendix A. Then check out Appendix B for some tips and tricks we learned along the way. Have an hour or two? Read the entire Experiments with Intermittent Fasting book. We spent a lot of time researching, conducting the experiments, and writing. Wed love to share it with you and hear your thoughts.
INTRODUCTION
Hi, My Name is John. And I Havent Eaten in 24 Hours.

I havent eaten anything in 24 hours. Am I starving? Craving something to eat? Well, no, not really. Im just mildly hungry.
Its weird. You know that hunger feeling you get about 4-5 hours after your last meal? Where your stomachs reminding you that its been a while? Im not even that hungry. Ive learned that hunger peaks at that point and immediately diminishes. After a while, even if you havent eaten, you get less hungry. About 20-24 hours later, hunger comes back again. But never as bad. Theres a good scientic reason for this hunger wave, although my hunger wave is probably different than yours. The explanation has to do with hormones like epinephrine, norepinephrine, insulin, glucagon, leptin, and ghrelin, and how our organs respond to these hormones. But this isnt a biochemistry text. Lets skip the heavy science. If youre a tness-conscious person whether you graze on small meals throughout the day or eat three squares like clockwork the thought of fasting for an entire day might scare the hell out of you. Most active people start to freak out about 4-5 hours after their last meal. Somebody sound the alarms! If I dont eat soon, Im gonna Youre gonna what? Explode? Die of starvation? Shrivel up and lose all your muscle mass? Actually, none of these happen. In fact, you might even lose a little body fat. New research suggests that a short, periodic fast might actually rev up your fat-burning machinery while helping you control glucose and insulin. Important hormonal changes mean that fasting might even help your muscles grow when the next exercise session (and meal) comes. You might lose more fat and gain more muscle, all by skipping a few meals. But even if you dont lose extra fat by fasting, I promise you will lose something important: that ridiculous, unarticulated fear of not eating every few hours. And damn
it, thats liberating. (Dont worry, you can still eat every few hours most of the time if thats what works best for you.) And even if you dont gain any extra muscle, youll gain something more important: perspective. I know I did. You see, Ive been experimenting with various fasting ideas for the last 6-months.
The one-day fasting experience

It started as a one-off assignment, part of a fat loss coaching program Precision Nutrition offers called the Lean Eating coaching program. Each year, we work with nearly 3,000 men and women. We provide them with workout programs, nutrition habits, daily lessons, and assignments, all designed to help them achieve the best fat loss results of their lives. The program works. To date, more weight has been lost in the Lean Eating program than in all 11 seasons of The Biggest Loser combined. Lean Eaters have gained lean muscle mass, shed thousands of pounds of fat, enhanced their health proles, and improved their lives. Anyway, one of our Lean Eating assignments is to go a full 24 hours without eating. Its scary, and it makes people uncomfortable which is exactly why we do it. Its not just a random dont eat instruction. Theres a specic plan. Assuming youre going to fast on a Sunday (and assuming youd like to try it), heres what to do:
10 PM SATURDAY:
Eat your last meal of the day Drink 500 mL (2 cups) of water
10 AM SUNDAY:
Drink 1 L (4 cups) of water + 1 serving greens powder Drink 250 mL (1 cup) of green tea Take 5 grams BCAA (branched chain amino acids) powder (or take 5 capsules)
3 PM SUNDAY:
Drink 1 L (4 cups) of water + 1 serving greens powder Drink 250 mL (1 cup) green tea Take 5 grams BCAA (branched chain amino acids) powder (or take 5 capsules)
10 PM SUNDAY:
Eat a small snack before bed Drink 500 mL (2 cups) of water

MONDAY:
Eat normally.
Whats the point of this exercise? Why starve yourself for a day? Heres what people learn when they do our fasting assignment for the rst time: HUNGER IS NOT AN EMERGENCY Many people think hunger is an emergency and panic when it kicks in. But hunger is just a feeling. Commit an entire day to fasting, and youll realize that hunger really isnt something to panic over. Nothing really bad happens if you miss a meal or two. After all, our prehistoric ancestors didnt have a Taco Bell on every corner. We evolved to deal well with hunger. Allow yourself to get hungry. Then sit with the feeling rather than trying to make it go away immediately. PHYSICAL VS. PSYCHOLOGICAL HUNGER Often when people think theyre hungry, theyre not experiencing true physiological (body) hunger, but rather psychological (head) hunger. The better you know the difference between the two, the better you understand your bodys signals. By the end of the day, youll feel real body hunger. In the future, use that feeling as a reference point to interpret your appetite correctly. EATING AS A PRIVILEGE Im the Director for a non-prot called The Healthy Food Bank. We raise funds and food for food banks throughout North America. Most of that goes to families who are food-insecure. Theyre not people sleeping on sewer grates. Theyre people who are barely scraping by. They have food, just not enough to feed their kids every meal, every day. Taking a day to fast reminds us that there are people out there who fast regularly - not voluntarily - but because they dont have food. Were reminded that eating is a privilege. EATING AS A RESPONSIBILITY Eating is also a responsibility. When we cram our bodies full of fast, processed, lowquality food, were not taking that responsibility very seriously. A day without food resets our perspective. We can remember to not take eating for granted. FOOD MARKETING Food advertising and marketing often ies under our radar when were fed. But thats exactly what makes it so effective: It works on our subconscious. When fasting, everything changes. Food marketing jumps out at us. Were aware of the manipulation. With awareness comes power. No more mindless junk food runs prompted by billboards or radio commercials. Now youre in control. As you can see, there are many benets to a single day, trial fast; most of which are psychological. But were only scratching the surface here. There are physiological ones, too. The cool part? You dont have to be an intermittent faster or follow some wacky diet plan to experience these benets. All you have to do is not eat for one day. Then you can get back to normal although I suspect your normal will be a little different afterward. My normal has changed dramatically since my rst Lean Eating-inspired fasting experiment.
WHAT TO LOOK OUT FOR

If youd like to try this, be aware that youll be hungrier than usual when you start eating again Sunday night and Monday. Plus, its easy to play little games like rewarding yourself for having such a low calorie day on Sunday. This combination means its easy to overeat either leading up to the fast or after the fast if youre not paying attention. So pay attention. On the other hand, if youre a diet junkie, you might think, If Dr. Berardi says one day of fasting is good, ve must be awesome! Dont do that either. Remember, this fast is short, its intermittent, and in this case its a one-time thing. In other words: Eat normally for the week. On one day, dont eat for a little while. Thats all.
In fact, over the last year Ive put at least half a dozen different fasting protocols to the test, recording everything along the way. Nearly every week, Ive tried some fasting-related strategy and recorded the results. This book explores that journey. Now, if youre expecting a masters level dissertation on the science of fasting intermittently, you wont nd it here. Although Im a scientist by training, I only briey touch on the research behind IF in this book. You see, this project isnt about an idea or a concept. And its certainly not about isolated laboratory research. Instead, this project is about putting ideas to the test in real life, in my life, through something I highly value: self-experimentation. This is where theory meets empty-stomach reality.
CHAPTER 1
Science or Fiction? Exploring the Benets of Intermittent Fasting

Intermittent fasting (IF) is the name some nutrition experts give to the practice of occasionally going for extended periods without eating. This fancy name implies that IF is the exclusive domain of the nutritional elite. Its not. In fact, we all do some form of IF every single day, except we dont call it that. We call it sleeping.
The time from your last meal at night until your rst meal the next day (assuming a typical sleep-wake cycle) makes up your fasting interval. And the time from your rst meal of the day until your last meal makes up your feeding interval. Put in simple terms, if you typically eat dinner by 8 PM and breakfast at 8 AM the next day, youre fasting for 12 hours and feeding for 12 hours. Some people refer to this as a 12/12 fast. I know its weird to give complicated names and numbers to normal patterns of eating and sleeping, but trust me, these will come in handy in a second. For now, Id like to talk about why IF is getting so much press.
When history meets research

Intermittent fasting is nothing new. Humans have fasted for most of their history, whether its during the typical overnight period, during more extended periods of food scarcity, or for religious reasons. What is new is that clinical research on IFs benets for health and longevity is beginning to catch up. Data show that IF, when done properly, might help extend life, regulate blood glucose, control blood lipids, manage body weight, gain (or maintain) lean mass, and more. Rather than something were forced to endure a result of poor food availability or cultural expectations IF is becoming something that health and physique-oriented people are seeking out in order to keep their bodies in top shape.
The proposed benets of IF in animals and humans read like a laundry list of look better, feel better, live longer physiological changes. These include: REDUCED blood lipids (including decreased triglycerides and LDL cholesterol) blood pressure (perhaps through changes in sympathetic/parasympathetic activity) markers of inammation (including CRP, IL-6, TNF, BDNF, and more) oxidative stress (using markers of protein, lipid, and DNA damage) risk of cancer (through a host of proposed mechanisms; well save them for another review) INCREASED cellular turnover and repair (called autophagocytosis) fat burning (increase in fatty acid oxidation later in the fast) growth hormone release later in the fast (hormonally mediated) metabolic rate later in the fast (stimulated by epinephrine and norepinephrine release) IMPROVED appetite control (perhaps through changes in PPY and ghrelin) blood sugar control (by lowering blood glucose and increasing insulin sensitivity) cardiovascular function (by offering protection against ischemic injury to the heart) effectiveness of chemotherapy (by allowing for higher doses more frequently) neurogenesis and neuronal plasticity (by offering protection against neurotoxins) With this list of benets, IF appears to be an amazing cure-all. So why isnt everyone doing it? Well, as Ive said, everyone is doing it! In most cases, people are fasting for 12 hours every single day. Unless youre waking up at night and raiding the fridge, youre probably already enjoying some of the benets of IF. You just didnt know it. However, current research is showing that some of these benets may only be realized after longer periods of fasting around 20-24 hours, depending on your activity levels. For example, if youre fairly sedentary during the fast, you may need the full 20-24 hours without food to realize the benets. However, if youre very active, or you exercise purposefully during the fasted state, you may be able to enjoy the same benets after only 16-20 hours without food. This brings up an important point: I strongly recommend you follow an exercise program regardless of whether youre experimenting with IF. Although exercise and IF share some of the same benets, many researchers believe their combined impact on energy balance and cellular adaptation enhances the benets of both interventions. However, in the absence of clear research data, this could just be wishful thinking.
Not so fast! (Sorry.)

Research in favour of IF looks compelling. So, shouldnt you get started right away? Maybe, maybe not. Sometimes looks can be deceiving. Before we get all gung-ho and skip meals or entire days of eating, I think its important to mention a few things youre not going to read on most pro-IF web sites.
PROBLEM
MOST OF THE RESEARCH TO DATE HAS BEEN DONE USING ANIMAL MODELS.
Although animals (like rats and monkeys) are convenient test subjects, theyre not perfect models for predicting human response patterns. So, all the animal data suggesting strong benets with IF arent necessarily helpful in predicting what will happen when humans try it. When we look to the human data, we nd disappointingly that experiments using IF are very limited. Also, those experiments that have been done often use poor experimental control groups. This makes their descriptive and predictive power limited. (There are some excellent reviews on this and Ill point to them in the resources section in case youre interested.) I know this is annoying. I wish science were done perfectly every time, too. But right now, based on the available research, were left with far more questions about IF than answers. Nothing is denitive. As a side note, none of this is surprising. Human subjects are notoriously hard to recruit for research projects, unless theyre well-paid, especially for projects that seem inconvenient or uncomfortable.
NOTE FROM KRISTA: HOW RAMADAN GOT ME INTERESTED IN INTERMITTENT FASTING

I rst became interested in IF many years ago, when a client contacted me to ask about Ramadan and muscle loss. During the holy month of Ramadan, for about 30 days, observant Muslims fast every day from sunrise to sunset. The fast-breaking evening meal is often a big dinner. Seems like the perfect scenario for muscle loss and fat gain, right?
Well, Im glad I checked the clinical research before smugly assuming that Ramadan fasters muscles were dissolving and their bellies expanding. Turns out, even though many folks were chowing down on large meals every evening, they were sometimes healthier during Ramadan than the rest of the year. In particular, heart disease and markers of inammation decreased. Given the concerns over how well animal research applies to humans, observant Muslims make up a useful human study group for intermittent fasting. Theyre
highly motivated to be compliant, there are lots of them, and researchers can follow them for a month every year. Plus, more traditionally observant Muslims (also Mormons, another common fasting study population) typically avoid foods such as alcohol and junk food that might skew a studys results. About this time, new research also suggested that eating less (aka caloric restriction, or CR) could also improve longevity. But daily CR for the rest of ones life seemed horrible. CR advocates looked like walking
skeletons, and the chronic daily restriction slowed their metabolism (including hormone production) to a crawl. Sure, theyd live forever, but in that state, whod want to? Thus, fasting periodically seemed like a good way to combine the longevity benets of CR with the lowered inammation and other health benets of fasting, while still maintaining hormonal health and lean mass. This research got my attention. And like JB, I decided to experiment.
With IF, youve got a double-whammy. First, IF studies dont sound all that attractive. (Come to our lab so we can starve you for a day.) Second, there arent many bigdollar companies lining up to fund studies that support not eating. With IF youve got the double-whammy of non-science. First, IF studies dont sound all that attractive. (Come to our lab so we can starve you for a day.) Second, there arent many big-dollar companies lining up to fund studies that support not eating.
PROBLEM
2|
IF IS OFTEN COMPARED WITH NORMAL EATING.
Whether thats standard rat-chow (in the case of our furry little friends) or the North American diet (for our slightly larger friends), neither diet is best for health, body composition, or performance. In comparing study participants using IF strategies to those using suboptimal dietary intakes without fasting, we are actually stacking the deck in favour of IF. How so? To start, the standard North American diet is often hyper-energetic we eat more than we burn which leads to weight gain over time. Since IF protocols often lead to a negative energy balance burning more than we eat the comparison isnt exactly fasting vs. non-fasting. Its more like a comparison between under-eating and overeating. And that limits what such studies can actually tell us about intermittent fasting. You see, almost all controlled calorie studies not just the IF ones show improvements in a wide spectrum of health and body composition markers, especially when body weight and body fat are lost in the process. So maybe its not the IF protocol thats leading to all the benets described above. Maybe its just burning more than we eat that makes all the difference.
Inconclusive but interesting

Beyond calorie control, the typical North American diet is full of highly processed macronutrients, chemical additives, and environmental pollutants. By asking subjects in the IF studies to abstain from food for extended periods, perhaps were not only tricking them into eating fewer calories, were also limiting their intake of healthdegrading chemicals. Of course, you might argue, thats one of the main points of fasting. However, IF isnt required to reduce our intake of processed food, additives, and pollutants. Maybe we could just stop eating processed foods, additives, and pollutants and experience the same benets. Beyond this speculation, there are many other reasons why the IF-related research is inconclusive. But I dont want to bog this book down with too much exercise and nutritional science. In the end, Im not trying to argue for or against the benets of IF. I actually think IF can be a cool approach to solving a few health- and body composition-related problems. However, as a trained scientist, I am trying to keep it real. While IF research does look promising, this area hasnt yet evolved to the point where we can say with certainty that the benets come exclusively from fasting.
Right now, its equally plausible that: a) eating fewer calories than you burn; and b) eating a diet lower in processed foods, chemicals, and pollutants may offer most of the same benets as IF. Add in a good exercise program and you might be able to match benet for benet.
IS IT THE FASTING OR IS IT THE NEGATIVE ENERGY BALANCE?

My good friend Alwyn Cosgrove a well-known training expert and gym owner illustrates how hard it is to draw conclusions: 99% of the beginner fat loss clients at my gym come to us constantly skipping breakfast. They dont eat between 8 PM and noon or 1 PM every day. So they end up fasting between 16 and 18 hours most days, just like a lot of the fasting advocates recommend. Sure, their diets arent very good to start with. But theyre fasting and not getting leaner. In fact, many of them are gaining fat. When we add in a healthy breakfast within 15 minutes of waking up, we see big differences right away. I dont know if eating breakfast helps them control hunger, leading to fewer total calories eaten later in the day. Im not completely sure. Maybe there are other metabolic or nutritional differences that help here too. All I know is that stopping the fast rst thing in the morning
kicks off a host of positive changes for these clients. It works every time. In the real world. Of course, in Alwyns example, a few things change simultaneously. His clients start exercising regularly, which makes a big difference. They also start eating an extra meal each day (breakfast). Those are the direct changes. Indirectly, Id guess that adding breakfast affected their meals later in the day, causing them to eat less with each one. Because of the breakfast, they just werent as hungry at lunch or dinner. I also bet their new commitment to tness not only led them to join the gym and start eating breakfast, but to also change the types of food they ate, even if they werent told explicitly to do so. Thats why I suspect Alwyns clients benet from not fasting. The sum total of their two main changes (adding exercise and adding a healthy breakfast) and their two secondary changes (improving food type and amount later in the day) led to the most
important requirement for weight loss: a negative energy balance. Simply put, their energy burn began to exceed calories eaten. They lost weight, got healthier, and improved their lives by not fasting. But this isnt an argument for or against breakfast (or fasting). I suspect that if all else is equal a decent amount of exercise, controlled total calorie intake, appropriate food selection, and proper meal timing it doesnt matter all that much whether clients eat breakfast (a shorter fast) or skip breakfast (a longer fast). Theres only one problem: its really hard to make sure all else is equal. Exercise and eating decisions dont operate in a vacuum. One decision inuences the next, and so on. This happens on both the conscious and unconscious level. And theres an interesting crosstalk between the body (physiology) and the brain (psychology). Thus, people skipping breakfast without a plan usually overeat later in the day. In fact, evening
over-eating is one of the biggest problems for our fat loss clients too. This results in more body fat, a higher risk of diabetes, and a host of other health problems. Thats why many coaches recommend that people new to eating well and exercising should start eating breakfast. In other words: Its not the breakfast, but what happens after the breakfast thats important. However, it seems like those who have a good plan for controlling calories later in the day and stick with it can get away with skipping breakfast without any negative consequences. So really, breakfast only matters when its factored into your eating decisions for the entire day. Thats why selfexperimentation and lifestyle matching are really important. If you want to maximize your results, youll have to gure out how you respond to eating breakfast or skipping it. Things like your schedule, your unique physiology, and your own self-discipline will play a big role here. But more on all that later..
I will say this: Im paying attention. As the IF research program continues, Ill be watching closely to see what happens when calorie-controlled, nutrient-dense, healthy IF diets are compared to calorie-controlled, nutrient-dense, healthy diets that dont use extended fasts. Only when these studies are done will we really know whether the magic is in the IF or in improving food amount and food selection. [In fact, at Precision Nutrition were now putting together just such a pilot study with our own clients.] That research could take a long time, though. Heres my advice: Dont wait until these studies are done to start living better. Control your food intake and quality right now, start an exercise program right now, and youll get many, if not all, of the benets above. Of course, thats easier said than done. Fitness professionals have been telling people to eat less and exercise more for years now. And that hasnt been working so well. Thats why I prefer to actually give people strategies and best practices for improving their eating and exercise. To learn more about them, you can check out the Resources chapter at the end of this book. Ill link you to a free 5-day course that will help you build a strong foundation for improved body composition and health. You should only try more advanced protocols like IF after youve built this strong foundation. A one-time, one-day fast, as proposed in the introduction? Thats cool. Leaping as I did into more elaborate plans? Save that sort of self-experimentation for later. As they say in grade-school grammar: you have to learn the rules before you can break them. A guy like me whos been exercising and eating well for nearly 20 years has mastered the essentials. Now its time to break some rules.
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CHAPTER 2
Why Do Intermittent Fasting?

Ive been following sound exercise and nutrition practices for nearly 20 years. Thats not just hot air either. Im an evidence-based guy, and so of course, I have all the evidence to prove it.
Prior to my fasting experiments, I did a bunch of tests. Here are the results:
BLOOD MARKER VALUE 5.0 mmol/L 103 umol/L 72 mL/min/1.73 m2 34 U/L 3.78 mmol/L 2.24 mmol/L 1.15 mmol/L 3.3 0.86 mmol/L 154 g/L 4.3 xE9/L 4.95 xE12/L 87.1 fL 31.1 pg 357 g/L 12.2 % 1.3 x E9/L 2.2 x E9/L 0.6 x E9/L 0.2 x E9/L 0 x E9/L 169 x E9/L 10 U/L 1.62 mIU/L 28.9 nmol/L REFERENCE RANGE 3.6 6.0 62-115 60-89 7-37 <5.0 <3.36 >1.04 <4 <1.69 135-175 4-11 4.5-6.0 80-100 27.5-33.0 305-360 11.5-14.5 2.07.5 1.0-3.5 0.2-1.0 0-0.5 0-0.2 150-400 15-73 0.35-5 8.4 28.7
Age: 37 years Height: 59 Weight: 190 pounds Body Fat: 10% Bench Press: 350 pounds for 1 repetition Deadlift: 450 pounds for 1 repetition 40-yard sprint: 4.9 seconds Vertical jump: 32 inches
Glucose Creatinine eGFR AST Cholesterol LDL HDL Cholesterol/HDL Triglycerides Hemoglobin WBC RBC MCV MCH MCHC RDW NEUTS LYMPH MONO EOS BASO Platelet Count GGT Thyrotropin Testosterone
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As you can see, for a guy nearing 40, I started this experiment lean, strong, t, and muscular, and with a good blood prole that any doc would be satised with (notice all the values are within the reference ranges). Im very happy with that. And for the record, I didnt train for the pre-testing. This is just me. Ive been able to maintain this kind of health and tness prole, plus or minus 10 pounds of bodyweight, for nearly 20 years. So why change anything? I was curious. After my rst one-day fasting experiment, some colleagues asked if Id ever done any extended fasting experiments. I hadnt. But I had become very interested in the work of strong IF proponents like Ori Hefenkler, Brad Pilon, and Martin Berkhan. Reading the anecdotes from their website followers, I became intrigued with the idea that you could skip meals and sometimes entire days of eating without suffering lethargy, brain fog, and muscle loss. Even more intriguing was the idea that you could accelerate body fat loss and get healthier with strategic, well-timed fasts. These claims run counter to todays popular nutritional recommendations, which assert that small, frequent eating grazing, if you will is the best way to control appetite, blood sugar, and body weight. As someone whos averaged 4 to 7 meals per day for nearly 20 years, I was skeptical at rst. After all, the grazing concept has not only served me well, its helped over 100,000 of my own clients and readers (and millions of people worldwide) get into better shape. Especially in light of the infancy of the IF research, ignoring all the evidence and experience I have with grazing and higher meal frequency diets or throwing it out the window based on the theories and anecdotes of a few individuals would be an absurd overreaction. Instead, I wanted to test it out myself. Precision Nutrition is itself a sort of private nutrition research rm: in search of the fastest and easiest way to lifelong tness, well give any and all reasonable nutrition protocols a try. Testing IF is a natural t; were always experimenting, and were lucky enough to have a very large client base and data set to work with. I wanted some personal experience with IF before setting up a pilot study with a small group of clients. The only way to truly understand a nutritional system is to try it; in the elds of health and nutrition, the published research is always limited. (More on this later.) So, my rst reason for trying IF was a mixture of scientic and personal curiosity. The other, more compelling reason? I had a new goal. With the big 4-0 approaching, one of my old man goals is to compete in track and eld at the masters level in particular, 100 m and 200 m sprint races. (I was a sprinter back in the day and thought itd be fun to get started again.) However, I know my body well. At 190 pounds, I was too heavy and slow. So, I decided to drop my body weight to a more track-friendly 170-175 pounds, which seems to be my sweet spot. To accomplish this, I set out the following goals:
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LOSE 20 POUNDS. At 190 lb, I was just too big for my new goal of track and eld competition. In sprinting, every pound counts. Although I was already lean, I needed to lose between 15-20 pounds to support my training. LOSE BODY FAT. Of course, I didnt want to lose much muscle. Since I started this adventure weighing a lean 190 pounds, I knew that would be tough. Id need to proceed cautiously in order to achieve a t, healthy, high-energy, and absolutely ripped 170-175 pounds. STAY LEAN. In the past, Ive been able to get extremely lean through more conventional dieting strategies. But only for so long. A bad mood and even worse food cravings would drive me to eat ravenously once the diet ended. This rebound eating brought me right back up to 190 pounds in short order. This time, I wanted to lose those last few pounds of fat and stay super lean... indenitely. FEEL GOOD. My past diets made me cranky, miserable, and low in energy. Even though I looked great, I was mean. Plus, I didnt think very well. (Again, all of this can be explained scientically.) To keep Mrs. Berardi and my friends from punching me in the face, and to keep Dr. Berardi from turning into Mr. Hyde, my diets would normally have an end date. I didnt want an end date anymore. I wanted to nd a way to eat that would help me maintain my new body weight and conditioning while feeling great forever. STAY HEALTHY. I get my blood work done annually and all my values are in the healthy range, including my hormones. I wanted them to stay that way throughout the weight loss process. While properly losing weight helps with things like blood glucose and cholesterol, various hormones can get out of whack, negatively affecting health. So I wanted to make sure that all my blood values were in a healthy range even while dropping fat. Although these are all reasonable goals individually, together theyre a pretty tall order for a guy whos maintained his weight around 190 pounds for two decades. Although I could do it with a new training plan and a more conventional fat-loss type diet such as my very popular, and effective, Get Shredded Diet (see Resources), I wanted to put IF to the test. Could IF live up to the hype under these tough conditions? Honestly, almost any basic exercise and eating plan can help a beginner and/or signicantly over-fat person drop some weight. But it takes a pretty exceptional plan to help someone whos already lean and muscular get down into the lowest range of body fat without wrecking their performance or causing a massive rebound in body weight. I was up for the challenge.
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CHAPTER 3
Intermittent Fasting Review: Comparing the Popular IF Programs

IF sounds very promising as a general ideology. But things get messy when it comes to actually doing IF.
How often should you fast? For how long? Should you eat zero calories? Should you eat the same amount of food on non-fasting days that you normally would, or should you eat more? These are all questions that have no answers yet, so many IF proponents have come up with their own best guesses. Heres a quick review. ALTERNATE DAY FASTING (ADF) (36 hour fast / 12 hour feed) With this plan you simply eat every other day. So on Monday, youd eat within a 12-hour window, say, 8 AM to 8 PM. Then youd fast overnight on Monday, and all day/overnight on Tuesday. Youd eat again from 8 AM to 8 PM on Wednesday. And so on. Alternate day fasters are encouraged to make good eating choices, but theyre allowed to eat what they want on the non-fasting days. MEAL-SKIPPING (Random) Some IF proponents believe we should behave like our evolutionary ancestors did. As humans evolved to get their food and exercise randomly, so should we. This brand of IF includes eating unprocessed evolutionary friendly food (think Paleo-diet type), randomly cycling daily calorie intake, and randomly skipping a breakfast or dinner meal once or twice a week. The rules are very exible. (It is random, after all.)
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EAT STOP EAT (24 hour fast, 1 or 2 times per week) On this plan, you fast for a full 24 hours once or twice per week, eating sensibly (higher protein, minimizing processed foods, etc.) the rest of the week. Its exible: You can choose whichever 24 hours you want. Want to fast from breakfast to breakfast? Thats cool. Just eat breakfast on Monday, and dont eat again until breakfast on Tuesday. Want to fast dinner to dinner? Thats cool too. Eat dinner on Wednesday, and dont eat again until dinner on Thursday. LEANGAINS (16h fast / 8h feed) This brand of fasting is based on an 8-hour feeding period followed by a 16-hour fast. However, it also layers a few other food rules on top. The diet should be high in protein, should cycle carbohydrates, should include fasted training, and should use nutrient timing (eating the bulk of your calories during the post-exercise period). On this plan, you fast from, say, 9 PM on Monday night until 1 PM on Tuesday afternoon. If youre going to exercise, youd do so just before 1 PM on Tuesday, with 10 g BCAAs (branched chain amino acids) during training. After training, you eat 2-3 meals before 9 PM, with your biggest meal coming right after exercise. The fast begins again on Tuesday evening until Wednesday at 1 PM, and repeats every day. WARRIOR DIET (20 hour fast / 4 hour feed) On this plan, you would either fast, or eat very small amounts of specically recommended foods, for the rst 18-20 hours of each day, working out during this period of under eating. Then, you would eat the majority of your daily intake within a 4-6 hour over feeding window. After that 4-6 hour over feeding period, you would repeat the under eating/fasting for the next 18-20 hours. Generally, most people place their over feeding window at the end of the day, as its more convenient for family dinners and after-work training sessions. However, modications can be made based on individual and scheduling differences. As you think about these different IF variations, dont focus too much on the differences between them. Instead, take a second and ask yourself whats similar about each program. Youll nd theyre all variations on a single theme.
Theme and variations

THEME
1|
SHRINK THE EATING WINDOW; EXPAND THE FASTING WINDOW
With most IF protocols, you simply draw out your normal overnight fast for a specied period of time whether its 16, 24, or 36 hours. Likewise, you narrow your normal feeding window to 4, 8, or 12 hours.
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THEME
2|
BALANCE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES
As mentioned earlier, some IF proponents believe that the longer the fast up to but not over 36 hours the greater the health and disease-prevention benets. However, longer fasts are a double-edged sword. Gaining and preserving lean mass is a critical part of healthy living and healthy aging, not to mention looking good and being t. Unfortunately, longer fasts may harm muscle health and performance. They may also negatively affect nutrient intake: When you eat less of everything, you also eat fewer vitamins, minerals, and benecial phytochemicals. Thats why more physique- and tness-conscious individuals tend to prefer shorter fasts (in the range of 15-20 hours per day) that end in a workout, followed by an eating period of 4-9 hours. Although its mostly speculation, there are two proposed benets: 1. The fasted workout can stimulate a physiological state similar to an extended fast. 2. Eating most of your energy and nutrients in the post-exercise window can help with muscle recovery and nutrient partitioning. THEME
3|
KEEP IT REAL ON EXERCISE AND HUNGER

If you exercise regularly, you need more calories and nutrients than someone who doesnt. Your body will ask for those nutrients by making you hungrier. IF protocols designed for nonexercisers will probably make you feel awful. Of course, non-exercisers, beware of the same thing. Better yet, start exercising! Well talk more about fasting and exercise in Chapter 5 and 6.
Of course, theres always the compliance challenge. Even if science were to show that one specic fasting plan is best, if you cant actually do that protocol, youve got a problem. I suspect thats another reason IF proponents suggest shorter fasts. Doing a 24-36 hour fast once per week isnt that big of a deal. Doing a 36-hour fast every other day? Well, that kinda sucks. Especially if you exercise regularly, which makes you hungrier and increases your calorie and nutrient needs.
Why Self-Experiment?
Because the research is so spotty, no one really knows which type of fasting is best for different goals whether thats fat loss, muscle preservation, disease prevention, or longevity. And because no one really knows whether IF offers any additional physiological benets at all, everyone is just guessing. Thats not a problem as long as theres sane self-experimentation involved. As the various IF communities and early adopters test out their different ideas, the best ones will rise to the top. Eventually, scientists will catch wind of these and put them to the test. Right now, Id say were a good 5-7 years from knowing what exactly IF does in humans (and why), and a good 10-12 years from knowing which IF protocols are best. But dont use this delay as an excuse for not making changes in your life. As the old proverb says, the man who deliberates fully before taking a step will spend his entire life on one leg. Forget what science hasnt yet proven. Establish best practices in your own exercise and nutrition habits, right now. Then once you have that experience to rely upon, you can tweak away to your hearts content. Lets get started with the experiments.
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CHAPTER 4
The Weekly Fast: My First Intermittent Fasting Experiment

Fasting was new to me, so I chose to start simple. By intentionally biting off less than you can chew, you can achieve more than you thought possible.
I know its gratifying to think: Im gonna do my research, learn everything I can, adopt the perfect plan, and then Ill crush this. But thats just your ego talking. And its eyes are much bigger than its stomach. Under these conditions, people rarely ever crush it. Instead, heres how it usually plays out: You waste a lot of time reading books and researching on the internet. Youre looking for the perfect program and after precious days, weeks, months of inaction, you nally nd it. Hurray! You create a massive, all-encompassing, awe-inspiring action plan and begin to implement it. Out of the gate, youre a total champ. Youre 100% disciplined and committed. Nothing can stand in your way. Cue the Rocky training montage. After a few weeks, maybe a month, you notice tension developing. At work, at home, in your relationships somethings happening. Youre having trouble sticking to the program you created. You lower your head and tell yourself, Its just for a little longer. By now, youre either panicking or have succumbed to apathy. Your self-talk is on the decline. I guess Im not cut out for this. Maybe other people can do it, but they must not have a life. Me, Ive got a job, a family, responsibilities. This is impossible. You cant gure out whats going wrong. Eventually, somethings got to give. The quest ends prematurely. (Or, in some radical cases, it doesnt end, and you end up jobless and homeless, living in an old VW bus in Santa Monica, California.) The sad truth is that it never had to happen this way. If you had taken the smallest, simplest action step available to you even if it wasnt the perfect one you could have built some positive momentum. You could have built this new change into your life. As your capacity grew, you could have added new, equally simple action steps. You could have built things up, one upon the other, slowly, steadily, all the way to the ONE SLOW AND STEADY OPPONENT COMES AROUND
One of our biggest success stories is a high-prole lawyer who started out very critical of our slow and steady approach. He wanted more, he wanted it quickly, and he wanted it now. He even wrote us a strongly worded letter early in the program, asking for his money back. We convinced him to stay and, fortunately, he stuck with the program. Over the next 12 months he lost nearly 90 pounds of body fat, reversed his type-2 diabetes, and got into the best shape of his life. (Note: he didnt use IF, just a series of exercise and nutrition best practices.) The guy even won $10,000 of my own money as part of the Lean Eating body transformation challenge we run every year. The moral: Do less, and you could end up with more.
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achievement of your goal a goal you can now sustain because youve grown yourself along with the change. Trust me, I know all about this. Every year my coaching program gets 3,000 fresh new recruits, all of them thinking theyre going to come in and yep crush this. Yet only the ones who allow us to hold them back, to do change as its meant to be done slowly and steadily actually crush the program.
Experiment 1: The Weekly Fast

In the spirit of simplicity, I made my rst fasting experiment as manageable as possible. I decided to fast one day per week, every Sunday. Of course, I normally eat well high protein and veggie intake, mixed nuts, sh oils, properly prepared legumes, a fairly low starch and sugar intake, and 2 litres of water per day. Plus I exercise 4-6 times per week. I decided to keep all that the same. I just ate a little less food on my non-fast days (I dropped roughly 500 calories per day from normal intake), added an eat whatever I want day, and added a fast day. Heres what my schedule looked like:
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
Exercise
Upper body strength exercise 45 minutes Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)
Treadmill sprints 10 minutes
Upper body circuit exercise 30 minutes Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)
Lower body strength exercise 45 minutes Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)
100 push-ups before each meal Eat whatever I want, stopping at 10 PM (5000 kcal)
No exercise
Nutrition
Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)
Fast until Monday morning (0 kcal)
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How I trained during the Weekly Fast

Heres what my workout program looked like: DAY 1 MONDAY (Upper body strength: 45 minutes) Upper body warm-up A1. Flat dumbbell bench press 5 sets 3 repetitions A2. Pull-ups 5 sets 10 reps B1. Bent-over rows 5 sets 3 reps B2. Low cable crossover 5 sets 10 reps C1. Explosive bench press 5 sets 8-10 reps C2. Explosive inverted rows 5 sets 8-10 reps
Note: A1 and A2 mean that I alternated those sets. I did one set of A1, then one set of A2, then back to A1, for a total of 5 rounds. Same for B1/ B2 and C1/C2.
DAY 4 THURSDAY (Treadmill sprints 10 minutes) Walk 2 minutes Sprint 15 seconds at 9 mph and 12% incline Rest 15 seconds Repeat 10 times Walk 2 minutes DAY 5 FRIDAY (Lower body strength 45 minutes) Lower body warm-up A1. Front squat 5 sets 3 reps A2. Swiss ball leg curls 5 sets 10 reps B1. Deadlifts 5 sets 3 reps B2. Dumbbell squats 5 sets 10 reps C1. Kettlebell swings 5 sets 8-10 reps C2. Speed deadlifts 5 8-10 reps
Note: you might be wondering about the Saturday push-ups. Nothing magical there. My chest is my weakest body part in terms of muscular development, which is why I added an extra 400500 push-ups on one non-exercise day.
DAY 2 TUESDAY (Treadmill sprints 10 minutes) Walk 2 minutes Sprint 15 seconds at 9 mph and 12% incline Rest 15 seconds Repeat 10 times Walk 2 minutes DAY 3 WEDNESDAY (Upper body circuit 20 minutes) Upper body warm-up A1. Close-grip push-ups x 20 reps A2. Inverted rows x 20 A3. Flat DB press x 10 A4. Bent-over DB rows x 10 A5. Band crunches x 10 A6. Reverse hypers x 10 Go through exercises in order specied, with no rest in between exercises. Rest 1 minute after nishing A6. Repeat 5 times.
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What I ate during the Weekly Fast

I didnt follow a diet per se. I just followed these rules: MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY Meal frequency: Eat 4 meals per day, with about 4-5 hours between meals. Meal content: Most meals should contain: 2 palms (8 oz) of lean protein 3 sts (3 cups) of veggies 1/2 handful (1/4 cup) of raw nuts 1/2 handful (1/4 cup) of legumes 500 mL (2 cups) of water Supplements: Each day I took: 1 multi-vitamin 4000 IU vitamin D 15 mL (1 tablespoon) sh oil 10 g BCAA capsules before workouts SATURDAY Eat whatever I want, with the following rules: break most of the rules above eat until satised, not until sick focus more on increasing carbohydrates instead of fats do 100 push-ups before each meal stop eating at 10 PM SUNDAY Fast from 10 PM on Saturday till Monday morning. Eat 3 meals on Sunday, with each meal being: 1 L (4 cups) water with 1 scoop greens drink 250 mL (1 cup) green tea 5 g BCAA capsules SAMPLE MEALS MONDAY TO FRIDAY Here are some sample Monday-to-Friday meals: Sample 1 8 oz chicken thighs (marinated in olive oil and hot sauce) 3 cups of cole slaw, broccoli slaw, and carrot slaw salad 1/4 cup of lupini beans mixed in salad 2 tbsp raw mixed nuts in salad Salt, pepper, seasoning 2 tbsp white vinegar as dressing 2 tsp Udos oil as dressing
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Sample 2 5 whole eggs 2 slices bacon 4 tbsp homemade pesto (with basil, spinach, raw cashews, olive oil) 1/4 cup of refried beans 1/2 red bell pepper 2 tsp sh oil Sample 3 2 scoops unsweetened whey protein powder 1 cup unsweetened almond milk 1 scoop chocolate raspberry avoured greens+ supplement 2 tsp sh oil Sample 4 8 oz extra lean ground beef 2 cups of spinach, tomato, green pepper, and onion salad 1/4 cup of kidney beans mixed in salad 1/2 cup home-made guacamole in salad Salt, pepper, seasonings 2 tsp Udos oil as dressing Zone bar (chocolate mint avour) Sample 5 3 spicy turkey sausage links 2 cups of frozen vegetable medley 1 cup sauerkraut Salt, pepper, spices 2 tsp sh oil Of course, during these 8 weeks, I used a lot of different meal combinations. But the central theme was to include about 8 oz of protein (2 palms worth), a ton of veggies, some nuts, some legumes, and some healthy oils. Once in a while I threw in a protein bar or protein shake, but these were the exception rather than the rule. When I ate out at restaurants, I made it as simple as possible: large portion of protein, lots of veggies, hold the starches, and include some oil and vinegar dressing. Easy, easy, easy.
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SAMPLE MEALS EAT WHAT I WANT DAY On my eat whatever I want day, I did exactly that. Here are some examples from those days. Sample 1 2 small chorizo soft tacos 2 small beef soft tacos 2 small sh soft tacos 2 small chicken soft tacos 1/4 cup guacamole 1 Corona beer Sample 2 3 whole eggs 2 pieces bacon 1 green pepper 1/2 cup oatmeal with chocolate protein 2 tbsp peanut butter 2 tbsp chocolate chips Sample 3 2 chicken breasts in a large salad 1/2 pint of Ben and Jerrys ice cream 2 chocolate chip cookies Sample 4 15 pieces of sushi 1 cup seaweed salad 1/2 cup green tea ice cream CALORIE INTAKE Generally, I ate about: 2500 calories on my moderate intake days 4000-6000 calories on Saturday 0 calories on Sunday This made my daily average intake about 2500 calories for the entire week.
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FOR OBSESSIVECOMPULSIVE TYPES

Obsessive-compulsive people: I could go on and on about why you shouldnt focus all your attention on calorie counting and achieving the perfect calorie balance. But thats another topic for another day. Instead, Ill simply say this: Although I did write down what I ate each day in a little notebook, I didnt actually try to predict
my exercise expenditure or balance it out with my energy intake using one of those online calorie counter thingies. In fact, I almost never do any of that anyway. (Nor, probably, should you. Ever.) Instead, I followed the st and palm rules: a cup of veggies is about the size of my st; 4 oz of protein is a cut of meat, poultry, or sh about the size of my palm. These rules get me in the right
calorie zone without the stress and inconvenience of weighing and measuring every meal. Close enough and hassle free. I also listened to appetite and hunger cues, which is something every health- and tnessconscious person should learn how to do. 2500 calories per day is the number Id typically used to lose weight and body fat in the past, so
it was a good point of comparison. If this plan was more effective than previous attempts, or easier, Id know I was on to something. Of course, you will need to use a different calorie estimate that reects your own body size, metabolic rate, and activity levels. In other words, our sts and palms probably arent the same size. But Im sure you already gured that out.
So what happened to me?
The Weekly Fast: The Results

WEIGHT LOSS I lost 12 pounds of body weight during the rst 8 weeks on this plan. I started at a weight of 190 pounds and ended up weighing 178 pounds. Of course, this weight loss wasnt linear. It looked more like this:
WEEK 1
190
185 (-5 pounds)
WEEK 2
183 (-2 pounds)
WEEK 3
183 (-0 pounds)
WEEK 4
180 (-3 pounds)
WEEK 5
179 (-1 pounds)
WEEK 6
178 (-1 pounds)
WEEK 7
178 (-0 pounds)
WEEK 8
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As you can see, there was some immediate weight loss, probably from the initial body water losses common with a lower carbohydrate diet. After that, I saw a steadier loss of 1-2 pounds per week. Note that my weight and anyones weight, for that matter uctuates throughout any given week. This is normal, and exaggerated further when cycling calories. After my high calorie days, my weight was up 1-2 pounds. After my fasting days, it was down 1-2 pounds. Thats why its important to only compare the results of your reference day weigh-in each week, even if youre weighing yourself every day, like I did. My reference day was Friday morning. This was the furthest day from my last high calorie and fasting day, the day that my weight was most likely to be stable. Expect weight ups and downs. Dont fret over them. If your energy intake is right, the weight gain is not body fat. Its water weight. Just trust your reference day weight and if its progressively going down over time, all is well. BODY FAT According to my Intelimetrix body fat device, 60% of the losses (7.2 pounds) I experienced during the rst 8 weeks were fat pounds. The rest (4.8 pounds) was lean mass. I wasnt too worried about that. Lean mass is made up of all non-fat weight in the body, most of which is water. Because I was eating enough protein and my strength stayed stable during the phase, I expect that most of the lean mass I lost was actually water weight. MOOD AND ENERGY In describing mood and energy, I think its important to separate general feelings of mood and energy vs specic feelings on the day of the fast. Its also important to note that these feelings will change from week to week. When I began this experiment, the rst few fasting days were a challenge. Early in the day, as hunger signals accumulated, I found myself constantly thinking about food. Thats when I learned its important to stay busy with different errands and tasks. If I was idle, my inner adolescent acted up: Waahh, Im hungry! This sucks! When I kept busy, I thought much less about eating, and didnt feel compelled to eat. As the day progressed, my physical hunger actually diminished, although it came back in waves. However, I felt my energy progressively decrease, too; I didnt want to move around much, so I didnt. After about 4 PM on each fasting day, I just took it easy, spending time with my family around the house or in the yard. And denitely no workouts on the fasting days. I did feel a little short-fused and moody during the rst few fasting days. This is a normal consequence of the hormones released during fasting. Its to be expected, although it was still frustrating for my family and I. I needed to be extra vigilant about keeping myself calm, taking deep breaths before responding to a challenging comment, and not overreacting to small things. While Im sure none of this sounds all that appealing, I think its important to note that none of these feelings were as bad as I expected theyd be. Rather than making me totally miserable, they just slightly annoyed me. As long as I kept busy and was mindful of my interactions with friends and family, things were okay.
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Heres another hopeful message: As you practice this type of fasting, it gets much, much easier. My rst one-day fast was rough. With each subsequent one-day fast, it got better. By my 4th or 5th fast, I was barely uncomfortable at all. And by my 7th or 8th fast, I was having great days. This leads nicely into a discussion of my general feelings of mood and energy. While my body weight and fat changes were on par with previous fat loss experiments, I noticed a big difference in how I felt on the days I wasnt fasting. During previous diets, within four weeks my energy would go down, my training would suffer, and a brain fog would set in, all of which would kill my memory and concentration. I often described this feeling as the life being drained outta me. It wasnt a huge problem, but it was annoying. I couldnt wait to get back to normal. On the other hand, with this fasting plan, I didnt really experience the same complaints. In fact, I never really felt like I was dieting except for the one fasting day per week (see description above). Most of the time, I felt minimal brain fog, very few intense food cravings, and not much discomfort. With a family to care for and a company to run, this is very important to me. I attribute some of these benets to the high calorie days as well. On these days I got to eat all sorts of non-diet foods, within reason. And I got to eat till I was full, something you just dont get to do very often when trying to lose weight. Theres more to it than the psychological aspects, though. Im fairly condent there are some small metabolic and hormonal advantages to having at least one higher-calorie day each week, especially when youre eating at a decit for the rest of the week, you incorporate a day of fasting, and you plan on eating this way for a while. They might not be obvious in the short run, but I think something is going on. In addition, on the fasting days, I had lots of time for other things. I discovered how much time cooking, eating, and cleaning takes. Plus, after a solid day of fasting, I felt cleaned out and ready for another great week of fat loss. Again, I suspect theres more to it than the psychological element there may be some small metabolic and hormonal advantages to one extended fast per week. Nothing I could measure, though.
The Weekly Fast: lessons learned

Now for the moment of truth: Was this plan more effective than conventional dieting approaches for fat loss? Heres what I found: Fasting once a week as described above worked very well, but wasnt measurably better than conventional dieting. Compared to previous fat loss experiments, I didnt lose fat faster, preserve muscle mass better, or even end up with a healthier blood prole using this IF strategy. I did, however, enjoy it more. In terms of my mood, energy, and lifestyle, as well as in terms of compliance, Id say this rst experiment was a big success. I enjoyed the plan a lot more while still losing fat and preserving lean mass at an acceptable rate. All good things. Id fast this way again. This is a denitely an eating style Id use again in the future if I had to drop some body fat or rene my body composition. I may even use it just to remind myself what real physiological hunger feels like. Its easy to forget over time.
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Weekly fasting suited my lifestyle quite well. Personally, as long as I mitigate the early side effects of full-day fasting, I can skip eating one day per week, compensating for the no calorie fasting day with a higher calorie eat what I want day, and lose fat, preserve lean mass, and not suffer most of the typical diet-related complaints. Thats a pretty cool revelation, and a fun experiment to try at home. Of course, your mileage may vary. But what about skipping two days of eating? Now thats another story.
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CHAPTER 5
The Twice-Weekly Fast: When Things Go Horribly Wrong

My rst fasting experiment was a relative success, but at the 8-week mark, my fat/weight loss progress slowed down. I itched to try something new.
With a few very small modications to my exercise plan (like spending an extra 30 minutes in the gym per week) or a few changes to my daily intake (like dropping my calories to 2,300 per day), Im sure I could have continued with the current plan, losing about a pound of body weight per week right up until I reached my goal. In fact, that would have been the right thing to do. (Its certainly what I would have recommended to a client. I tell my clients that the best next step when hitting a fat-loss plateau is to make the smallest possible improvement.) Yet I was in full-blown self-experimentation mode and feeling a little extreme. So I threw caution to the wind, skipped my own advice, and did something a little more aggressive. I added an extra day of fasting. For this next phase, I decided to fast both on Sundays and on Wednesdays. It certainly sounded like a good idea at the time.
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Experiment 2: The Twice-Weekly Fast

Heres what the new approach looked like:
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
Exercise
Upper body strength exercise 45 minutes Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)
Upper body circuit exercise 30 minutes Fast until Thursday morning (0 kcal)
Lower body strength exercise 45 minutes Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)
100 push-ups before each meal Eat whatever I want, stopping at 10 PM (5000 kcal)
No exercise
Nutrition
To make sure I was doing a decent job experimentally, I kept my exercise program the same (although I was using a progression model working a little harder, but not longer each week in the gym), and I kept the eating rules and meals fairly constant. The only real difference was the extra day of fasting. The logic here was that since I had lost body weight and my weight loss was actually slowing, my body was reaching a lower energy balance point. (When you lose weight, your total daily calorie needs drop because youre lighter.) If this were true, the additional fasting day would give me a new calorie decit of about 2500 calories per week (or roughly 350 calories per day when averaged out). This, I gured, would kick-start additional fat loss. What a great lesson in what not to do! Within two weeks of my new experiment, my morning weight had plummeted from 178 pounds to 171, with an estimated 4 additional pounds of fat lost but 3 pounds of lean mass lost. Yes, my plan worked kind of. I was still losing weight and fat. But now I was feeling small and weak, losing too much weight too fast. People even started commenting on how drawn and depleted I was looking, especially in my face. Worse yet, I was feeling really low in energy much worse than during my historical fat loss approach. Training was becoming a struggle. Heck, getting off the couch was becoming a struggle, especially later in the day. Of course, all these side effects are well-explained by science. But I didnt care. Research papers werent making me feel any better when I had to peel my butt off the couch to take my daughter to the park. Another major problem: I was becoming obsessively preoccupied by high fat, high sugar food. In fact, food was all I could think about. On my eat what I want days I went crazy and no longer ate what I wanted. Instead, I binged, made myself sick, and generally felt terrible.
NOTE FROM KRISTA: DO LESS

I had a similar experience to JB when I combined more frequent IF with heavy training for several months another thing not to do. In particular, people commented on how awful my face looked. (Thanks, guys.) I was lean (about 15%), but still a normal weight (110 lb at 50). Family members worried that I had a terminal disease. One person even told me I looked like a prison camp inmate. Not exactly the look most us are striving for. When it comes to fasting, do just enough to meet your goals. And maybe even a little bit less than you think you need. Dont overshoot your bodys capacity to recover, unless you want to look (and feel) like the proverbial Death sucking on a cracker. More on that below.
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The Twice-Weekly Fast, 2.0

Obviously, something had to change. I was still committed to the 2-day-a-week thing, so I decided to do an emergency revision. To help bump up my weekly calorie average, and to feed the crazy food-obsessed monster raging inside me, I added another eat what I want day. Heres what the new plan looked like:
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
Exercise
Upper body strength exercise 45 minutes
Treadmill sprints 10 minutes And 100 push-ups before each meal Eat whatever I want, stopping at 10 PM (5000 kcal)
Upper body circuit exercise 30 minutes
Lower body strength exercise 45 minutes
100 push-ups before each meal
No exercise
Nutrition
Fast until Thursday morning (0 kcal)
Eat whatever I want, stopping at 10 PM (5000 kcal)
Fortunately, this revision turned things around. Within 2 weeks, my weight stabilized at 171-172 pounds on my reference day, and I felt a little better. But my body was all over the place. After my higher calorie days I would weigh in at a full and bloated 177-178 pounds. After my fasting days Id weigh in at a leaner but at-looking 168-169 pounds. I didnt like how I looked or felt with these sorts of weight uctuations. And I was still preoccupied with food. It wasnt quite as bad as I felt during the previous two weeks, but I was still counting down the minutes to my high-calorie days. And when those days arrived, I would waste most of them thinking about and searching for high-calorie meals. My daughter loved the trips to Dairy Queen, but I wasnt having fun anymore. So what do I think of twice-per-week fasting? Not productive. Not mentally healthy. Not for me. Im sure I could have tried additional tweaks to my non-fasting days, but after a month of experimenting, it was time for something new.
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NOTE FROM KRISTA: FOOD CRAVINGS AND OBSESSIONS

In 2008, I sent JB a sheepish email: Ever heard of fat cravings? Like, not fat plus carbs but pure fat? At the time, he hadnt, but he helpfully pointed me to some studies. What I didnt tell him then was that I was bingeing on straight-up fat like a woman possessed, spooning nut butter out of the jar like it was a bowl
of soup. My body wanted fat butter, nuts, cream, olive oil heck, even beef tallow was looking good. Later, I suspect JB got up close and personal with the wacky food cravings and binge eating that can accompany over-zealous fasting combined with low calories and intense training. In my case, Id been training hard in BJJ and Olympic weightlifting, using IF to help cut weight for competitions and trying to stay lean.
My bodys revenge for this foolishness was swift and decisive: Plop into the butter dish. Inhale 10,000 calories. I tried harder. Fasted more often. Fasted longer. Which ended in more, and more epic, binges. My rst thought every morning, after I woke from a tful, hormone-disrupted sleep at 4 am when my body dumped adrenaline into the system to free up blood sugar because cortisol wasnt working
any more, was: How can I eat or not eat today? Repeat until insane. If youre considering IF as part of a fat loss program, use it wisely. If strong food cravings and binge behaviours appear repeatedly (especially if you are using IF to compensate for binges, or as a means to control and restrict your food intake), treat them as a signal from your body. Pay attention.
The Twice-Weekly Fast: lessons learned

With another month under my belt three months in and 18-19 pounds lost what did I learn? First, I can skip eating one day per week, compensating for the fasting with a higher calorie day and do pretty well as long as I didnt train on the fasting day and as long as I was mindful with friends and family. However, under the same conditions, when I add another day of fasting, I lose weight much too quickly and feel terrible. Even if I try to compensate for the extra fasting day with another higher calorie day, my weight stabilizes, but something still feels terribly wrong. So let this be a cautionary tale: Do as I say, not as I did. (Ive learned my lesson.)
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IF YOUR PROGRAM HAS STOPPED WORKING, MAKE THE SMALLEST POSSIBLE CHANGE THATS LIKELY TO GET YOU A MEASURABLE RESULT. Dont jump ship and try something radical or drastically different.
NOTE FROM KRISTA: MORE WHAT NOT TO DO

This is generally a manual about what you should do, rather than what you shouldnt. However, our experiments demonstrate some clear rules about what not to do, which are worth sharing. 1. If some is good, more is not better. Whether cure or poison, the magic is in the dose. Remember that fasting is a physiological stress. Keep it short, manageable, and intermittent. 2. Consider your overall stress load. If youre dealing with a sick child, a demanding job, poor sleep, travel,
etc., do not add extensive fasting to this list. Stress includes training. 3. Do not train too much or too hard on a regular fasting program, especially if you are also cutting calories. Too much will depend on you, but Id say a good general guideline would be: no more than 3-4 hours a week of heavier resistance training no more than 2-3 weekly and brief sessions of metabolic conditioning (i.e. intervals, high-intensity cardio, circuit training) no more than 1-2 hours a week of moderate intensity cardio (if any)
Endurance athletes, get real about your mileage. I was cycling and running several hours a week, often while fasted. And hardcore Crosstters, Im looking at you too. You know you love to push those body boundaries and nish your workouts with the puke bucket. I thought I was getting t and being a badass. I was being stupid, and doing everything Id tell clients not to do. (Apparently JB and I have the same problem.) Whether its total training time or intensity, overdoing it combined with fasting is a very, very bad idea. My experimental ndings were painfully clear: Dont do this.
4. However, low-intensity rambling-type exercise pairs nicely with IF. Our ancestors didnt kill themselves with tough training sessions. In fact, they wanted to do the opposite: conserve valuable energy and stay uninjured as long as possible. Most of their exercise was simply lowintensity rambling, such as walking, which goes perfectly with fasting. If youre looking for fat loss and overall health, try reducing your highintensity training and adding more dailylife rambling-type movement.
Also, my experience may highlight the risk of restricting calories too much when exercising regularly and intensely. If I wasnt exercising regularly, two days of fasting might have worked perfectly. However, with this fairly intense exercise effort, the stress of the exercise, plus the calorie restriction, it all may have been too much. Of course, this is just speculation. I regrouped and started on my next experiment.
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NOTE FROM KRISTA: HORMONAL HEALTH

Had JB peeked inside his body during this twiceweekly fasting experiment, he might have found that his sex hormone production e.g. his testosterone, DHEA, LH/ FSH, etc. was going down. For guys, this means mood swings, muscle loss, low energy, and a general absence of mojo. Luckily, with some refeeding and good food choices (including eating enough protein and fat), many mens sex hormones can be easily revived. For women, the consequences can be somewhat more serious. Our hormonal systems seem to be much more
sensitive to energy intake and uctuations in food intake than mens. Unfortunately, we healthand body-conscious women are likely to do exactly the things we shouldnt: we exercise too much (especially endurance training and cardio) and eat too little (especially of the nutrients we need). Female vegetarians/vegans are particularly at risk. Women, your menstrual cycle is the proverbial canary in the coal mine its an early indicator of hormonal disruption. When your period gets irregular and temperamental or worse, disappears you have a problem.
In my case, too-frequent fasting combined with too-heavy training as well as general life stress and an anxious temperament resulted in estrogen, progesterone, DHEA, LH/FSH and cortisol levels that were effectively zero. Nothing. Zilch. My hypothalamus, pituitary, adrenals, and ovaries closed up shop. Hormonally speaking, there was nothing left but dust and tumbleweeds. I was in my mid-30s and menopausal. Ive seen this situation in many of my female clients some as young as their mid-20s. Obviously, if youre pregnant, long periods of fasting are a bad idea.
Both sexes can be affected by adrenal injury or thyroid problems from too much physiological stress for too long. I still think IF is great stuff for improving many hormonal health indicators, particularly insulin sensitivity. This can have benets for your sex hormones if you have conditions such as PCOS (in women) or overconversion of testosterone to estrogen (in men). But for hormonal health, you must apply IF cautiously, safely, and sanely. And if your body speaks, listen.
So to summarize the twice-weekly fasting experience: One day of fasting per week, good. Once a week is the sweet spot for me and my lifestyle. Two days of fasting per week, bad. Increasing to two separate fasting days, even with all the extra calories to compensate, was just too much for me to handle. At this point, I even thought about wrapping this whole project up. After all, I was three months in and I had reached my goal weight and ideal body fat percentage. I was also getting tired of planning and recording. Annoyed with the food preoccupation that began when I fasted twice per week. And upset at my lack of focus and irritation with friends and family. Yet I was on a mission. I still wanted to take some of these shorter-duration fasting methods the ones people claimed to be more physique-friendly for a test drive. Maybe theyd work better? I regrouped and started on my next experiment.
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CHAPTER 6
The Daily Fast: Back on Track

So far, my experiments revolved around entire days of fasting, with varying success. However, in the IF movement, some fasting proponents prefer shorter, more targeted fasts, especially for those who work out and are interested in improving both health and body composition.
Perhaps the most prominent is Martin Berkhan, who is something of a nutritional contrarian. He blogs about loving alcohol, skipping breakfast, training in a fasted state, eating carbs before bed, and only eating 2-3 meals per day. Despite not following more commonly established healthy eating rules, he boasts of a 600-pound deadlift and a lean, muscular body, while claiming to never have used any muscle-building drugs. Intrigued, I decided to play around with his ideas, which he calls the Leangains method. The Leangains program is based on a few simple rules. Fast 16 hours every day. Eat within an 8-hour window every day. Exercise with high intensity, a few times per week, often while still in a fasted state. Use 10 g of BCAA before or during your exercise session. On your exercise days, eat 2-3 big meals of protein (meat), veggies, and carbs. Eat your largest meal directly after your workout. On non-exercise days, eat 2-3 meals of protein (meat), veggies, and fats. Eat mostly whole, minimally processed foods, instead of processed foods or supplements. As you can see from my description, this isnt just intermittent fasting; theres actually a lot more going on. In fact, the approach is based on a whole host of well-accepted and non-controversial practices: High protein intake Low processed food intake
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Carb cycling Calorie cycling Nutrient timing All solid strategies for body composition, tness, and overall health to begin with. To those, Leangains adds a few experimental twists.
What makes this approach different?

Heres where Leangains departs from more conventional nutritional methods. FASTING Most coaches are ne with a 12/12 schedule (12-hour fasting, 12-hour feeding window). Berkhan prefers extending it to 16/8 (16 hours of fasting, 8-hour feeding window.) BREAKFAST Most coaches recommend it; Berkhan skips it as a natural part of the extended fast. EXERCISE Most coaches recommend eating prior to training; Berkhan usually uses a small dose of BCAA instead. EATING FREQUENCY Most coaches recommend 4-6 small meals; Berkhan says have 2-3 larger ones. In my opinion, these are minor points of departure from the more commonly accepted nutritional best practices. But are they signicant enough to make a difference?
NOTE FROM KRISTA: START SLOW

If this style of fasting appeals to you, you dont have to jump right into it. I started gradually: by simply pushing back my meals a bit. If dinner was normally at 7 PM, Id eat at 6 PM instead. Next day, at 5 PM. Next day, at 4 PM. And so on. Same idea with breakfast. Try eating half an hour or an hour later than normal. Like salivating dogs, our appetite hormones are trainable, and theyre driven largely by our routines. They make us hungry when we expect to be hungry. If we have dinner every day promptly at 7, we can count on Ye Olde Hunger Hormone Factorie to start ring up around 6:30. Thus, you can use the cold turkey method of just jumping into a 16-hour fast, or you can train your appetite hormones to adjust slowly. From my fasting experiences, it seems that in many ways, hormones are just as trainable as any other skill. You get better at doing things when you practice and it almost never hurts to start slowly.
Whats the logic here?

The Leangains protocol attempts to use the extended fast (and fasted workout stimulus) as a powerful time of fat-burning. According to Berkhan, fasting (and training) this way means: Blood ow to fat cells increases. Concentrations of epinephrine and norepinephrine go up. Metabolic rate goes up slightly. Insulin goes down. Fatty acids are released for energy. Berkhan reasons that this scenario is the perfect storm for fat loss. However, as discussed earlier, extending the fast for too long could become counterproductive. So Berkhan suggests jamming in as many growth and recovery promoting nutrients as possible after the fast and during the post-workout period without overeating, of course. After intense exercise, the body is most sensitive to nutrient uptake and subsequent protein synthesis. Thus, he recommends eating as much of your food as possible as
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soon after your workout as you can. In practice, that means eating your largest meal of the day immediately after your workout. With this plan, Berkhan reasons, you get fat-burning during one long, 16-hour stretch of the day and lean muscle building during another 8-hour stretch. Each day is the same. Rinse and repeat.
The Daily Fast: the program

I wanted to test these theories. So I committed to following the Leangains principles fairly closely for the next few weeks with the shorter fasts, more often approach. I planned to fast for 16 hours each day from 9 PM until around 1 PM (skipping breakfast along the way). Id train at the end of the fast; starting my workout around noon and then eating 2-3 fairly large meals (depending on my hunger and the size of the meal) between the end of my workout and 9 PM. As recommended, I also took 10 g of BCAAs (in capsule form) just before my workout. On my intense weight training days Mondays and Fridays my meals included mostly protein, veggies, and starchy carbs. And on the other 5 days, my meals contained mostly protein and veggies.
My schedule
Heres a single days schedule. 8:00 am 9:00 am Noon Wake up, drink 500 mL (2 cups) water Drink 1 L (4 cups) water with 1 serving greens+, 250 mL (1 cup) green tea Workout session with 10 g BCAA during session
11:00 am 250 mL (1 cup) green tea 1:30 PM Eat rst meal, largest of the day 4:30 PM Eat second meal, moderate sized meal 8:30 PM Eat third meal, moderate sized meal
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Heres what a week of the plan looked like:
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
Exercise
Upper body strength exercise 45 minutes 100 pushups before each meal
Lower body strength exercise 45 minutes 100 pushups before each meal
No exercise
No exercise
Nutrition
Higher calorie and carb (3200 kcal)
Lower calorie and carb (2200 kcal)
As you can see, there were no eat whatever I want days and no days of complete fasting, as Id used in the previous plans. Just a daily 16-hour fast followed by a workout and then an 8-hour feeding period. There were also 2 higher calorie and higher carb days and 5 lower calorie and lower carb days. Despite the differences between this plan and previous plans, my average calorie intake was still around the same: 2500 calories per day.
NOTE FROM KRISTA: WHEN IS THE RIGHT TIME TO FAST?

Theres no good answer although, of course, there are many theories. I didnt want to give up my big breakfasts, so I chose evening fasting rst. I simply pushed dinner earlier and earlier until I eliminated it completely. I normally
trained in the mornings, so this worked for me. However, I noticed three things about my sleep when fasting in the afternoons/evenings. First, I was much more tired. Once my battery ran out, I was done. Getting up the stairs to bed was a terric ordeal. Second, although Id conk out quickly, I didnt sleep well. And third, I woke
up early at a consistent 4 am when my body released adrenaline to free up some stored blood sugar. Since many of our hormones run on a daynight cycle, this blast of adrenaline was nearly as accurate and painful as a buzzing alarm clock. Later, I experimented with skipping breakfast and lunch. At rst, that felt like much more of
a sacrice, but it took advantage of the fact that I was already deep into the better part of fasting after 10-12 hours overnight. Eventually I got to like the efciency of getting up, grabbing a cup of tea, and getting straight to work. And I slept a lot better after a good meal in the evenings. Bottom line, as always: Do what works for you.
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What I ate during the Daily Fast

Of course, my food rules had to change a little. First, I needed to cram the same number of calories especially on the high-carb days into 2-3 daily meals instead of 4 meals. Second, I needed to gradually taper down my calorie intake after the post-workout meal. With this in mind, my menu looked like this, although it did vary from day to day: LOW CALORIE, LOW CARB DAYS
MEAL 1: IMMEDIATELY AFTER EXERCISE
HIGH CALORIE, HIGH CARB DAYS

MEAL 1: IMMEDIATELY AFTER EXERCISE
4 palms of protein (about 100 g of protein) 3 sts of veggies 1/2 handful of raw nuts 1/2 handful of legumes 500 mL (2 cups) of water
MEAL 2: ABOUT 3 HOURS LATER
4 palms of protein (about 100 g of protein) 3 sts of veggies 2 sts of starchy carbohydrate (about 100 g carbohydrate) 1/2 handful of raw nuts 1/2 handful of legumes 500 mL (2 cups) of water
3 palms of protein (about 75 g of protein) 3 sts of veggies 1/2 handful of raw nuts 1/2 handful of legumes 500 mL (2 cups) of water
3 palms of protein (about 75g of protein) 3 sts of veggies 1 st of starchy carbohydrate (about 50 g carbohydrate) 1/2 handful of raw nuts 1/2 handful of legumes 500 mL (2 cups) of water
2 palms of protein (about 50 g of protein) 2 sts of veggies 1/2 handful of raw nuts 500 mL (2 cups) of water
DAILY SUPPLEMENTS:
2 palms of protein (about 50 g of protein) 2 sts of veggies 1 st of starchy carbohydrate (about 50 g carbohydrate) 1/2 handful of raw nuts 500 mL (2 cups) of water
DAILY SUPPLEMENTS:
1 multi-vitamin 4000 IU vitamin D 1 tablespoon sh oil 10 g BCAA capsules before workouts
1 multi-vitamin 4000 IU vitamin D 1 tablespoon sh oil 10 g BCAA capsules before workouts
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Another reminder to the obsessive-compulsive: I wasnt counting calories in or calories out. I just followed this general plan and wrote down what I ate in a little notebook. I analyzed everything much later, so I could report the results in this book. SAMPLE MEALS LOWER CALORIE AND CARB DAYS Here are some samples of meals I ate during the lower calorie and carb days: Sample Meal 1 16 oz extra lean beef burgers 3 cups of cole slaw, broccoli slaw, and carrot slaw salad 1/4 cup of chickpeas mixed in salad 2 tbsp raw mixed nuts in salad Salt, pepper 2 tbsp white vinegar as dressing 2 tsp Udos oil as dressing Sample Meal 2 12 oz scallops 3 cups of frozen vegetable medley cup of black beans mixed in salad 2 tbsp raw mixed nuts in salad Salt, pepper 2 tbsp white vinegar as dressing 2 tsp lemon avoured sh oil as dressing Sample Meal 3 9 oz turkey sausage 2 cups of spinach, tomato, green pepper, and onion salad 1/4 cup of kidney beans mixed in salad 1/2 cup home-made guacamole in salad Salt, pepper 2 tsp Udos oil as dressing Sample Meal 4 3 scoops of protein powder 2 tbsp raw mixed nuts 2 tbsp natural peanut butter 2 tbsp raw cacao nibs A few tablespoons of unsweetened almond milk mixed in
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SAMPLE MEALS HIGHER CALORIE AND CARB DAYS Here are some samples of what I ate during the higher calorie and carb days: Sample Meal 1 4 whole eggs, 3 egg whites 2 slices chicken bacon 1/2 cup refried beans 1/2 red pepper 1/2 cup oatmeal with raspberries and blueberries 1 scoop protein powder 1 tbsp peanut butter Sample Meal 2 16 oz steak 15 asparagus spears 12 oz sweet potato fried in coconut oil Salt, pepper Sample Meal 3 8 oz tuna steak 3 cups salad with Italian dressing 1 cup cole slaw 1 cup wild rice Sample Meal 4 3 scoops of protein powder 2 cups raspberries and blueberries 1 tbsp raw mixed nuts 1 tbsp natural peanut butter 1 tbsp raw cacao nibs A few tablespoons of almond milk mixed in While most of my higher carb meals during this phase looked something like this, there were a few times during this month, on the higher calorie days, when I ate a postworkout bacon cheeseburger, a few slices of vegetarian pizza, and a few hot wings, making sure to enjoy these foods, while still keeping my total intake in check. (I didnt have a single binge session, which was awesome.) Heres what one of those meals looked like:
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6 oz beef burger with 1 slice of bacon and 1 slice of cheese (no bun) Lettuce, tomato, onion, ketchup 1 cup of salad with Italian dressing 3 slices vegetarian pizza 4 hot wings
ON CLEAN FOOD VS. JUNK FOOD.

Lets be clear. I didnt go for pizza and wings regularly. I really do prefer eating lean meats, loads of colourful veggies, and more natural, unprocessed carbohydrates, and I eat this way 90% of the time. Its much more physiqueand health-friendly to eat real, whole foods most of the time.
Yet Im also careful not to let orthorexia a psychological term for developing a xation with healthy or righteous eating sneak into my lifestyle. Yes, food quality is on a continuum and some foods are higher quality than others. But its not an all-or-nothing, good versus bad thing. Using healthy or unhealthy to qualify food choices isnt all that useful. In some cases, its
downright confusing. Most importantly for this book, occasionally eating lower quality food wont likely harm your physique or health. Just dont eat too much of it, too often. Bottom line: If you ever choose to follow an approach like this, make sure you eat high quality foods most of the time, while allowing a little latitude too. Of course, you dont have to eat junk food. But do
allow yourself to have a few whatever you want meals after working out. Just be sure to follow the rest of the rules. Get enough protein, some carbs, some veggies, dont eat too much relative to your own needs, and dont eat so much that you make yourself sick. Youll feel terrible (especially if your stomach is used to going without food for long periods), and it wont help your progress or health..
So, how did this style of eating work out for me?
The Daily Fast: the results

This plan went really well. We have another winner almost. BODY WEIGHT Within the rst four weeks my weight actually increased by about 4 pounds, from 171 pounds to 175 pounds on my reference day. According to my body fat measures, this increase was all lean mass with no body fat. Very impressive, considering my weekly calorie average was about the same. (Im guessing this weight increase is a function of increased carbohydrate stores and body water stores, which increase as carbohydrate stores increase. With two higher carbohydrate days per week and no extra fasts, this makes sense.) In addition, the wild weight uctuations I saw in the last phase were almost completely gone. The most Id uctuate from day to day was about 1-2 pounds, which is pretty normal. MOOD AND ENERGY: CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM In addition to my body composition, I started feeling better within 14 days. However, be warned. I did go through a rough transitional period while my body adapted to this program.
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Here are some of the things I experienced for the rst 10-14 days: I really missed breakfast, both physiologically and psychologically. Massive stomach rumblings. Hunger cravings. Low mental focus until my rst meal. And big-time morning moodiness. I did my best to stave off the breakfast cravings with a greens+ shake in 1 L of water and a few cups of green tea or coffee, which helped. But I still felt really bad. Speaking to the mood problems, I was cranky and unfocused from my wake-up time of 8 am until my workout at noon. I was mentally sluggish. Sometimes when speaking to my wife or a member of my team, I spoke so slowly that they must have thought I had a stroke overnight. Of course, this affected my relationships and my work. I started ignoring my family until after my rst meal. I never scheduled meetings before 1 PM. I should also note that for the rst 10-14 days I was much quicker to anger than usual. Comments or situations that I would have been able to let slide just a few weeks earlier lead me down an unhealthy path of smart-ass comments or bubbling rage. It got to the point that I didnt even like being around myself. Luckily, I told my friends and family what was going on. And theyre a pretty understanding bunch. Also, I had some practice in the art of mindful interaction and self-soothing from the one-day fasts. As a result of these experiences, I felt like bailing on the plan altogether during the rst few days. However, because Ive dieted before, I knew that these feelings are pretty normal when in a negative energy balance. I also knew that the body typically adapts in a few weeks. So I kept going.
ONE CLIENTS EXPERIENCE.

One of my clients whos following this approach sent me the following email, which highlights some of the early pros and cons of this approach: I thought Id be more productive in the morning yesterday and today, but Im almost catatonic. On the plus side, Ive dropped about 10 lbs in a week, not all of it water. Compared to where I was
when I got back from vacation, its night and day. People are noticing it right away, in normal clothes. Some of it is also probably attributable to the addition of caffeine (of which I had had only miniscule amounts for the last year), but not all. This is super effective. The only downsides are that I think this would be disastrous for anyone with a history of disordered eating (probably a signicant number of
your clients and readers) because it makes me almost obsessed with food. A one-habit approach is denitely a more solid, healthy way to go because I feel this may feed peoples obsessions and hinder the development of a healthy, sane approach to eating. But thats just conjecture on my part. The other downside is that without having preprepared healthy meals waiting for me after the workout, I (personally)
would be totally screwed. Im certain Id binge. The discipline to prepare your food in advance would HAVE to be there, otherwise I suspect this diet would fail early and badly. But I suppose thats true of most calorie restricted diets anyway. The upside is that it feeds into the instant gratication side of my mind. Seeing substantial results just four days in is super motivating, at least for me.
As I expected, something magic happened after 10-14 days on the plan. Thanks to some key changes in my metabolic and neuroendocrine systems, everything got better.
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I pretty much stopped thinking about breakfast altogether by the 10-day mark. By 12 days, my moodiness was in check. And by 14 days, I was productive again. Not only was I back to normal, I was actually starting to enjoy the program. My gym workouts got substantially better than they had been for a few months since I started the experimentation. In fact, they seemed as good as my pre-fasting days. In addition to having more energy to train and lifting heavier weights, I started to get really great pumps during my workouts. (The pump is the feeling of fullness you get in the muscle during a workout.) Considering I wasnt eating anything except 10 grams of BCAA for 15-16 hours, it was weird, but understandable, if indeed my body carbohydrate and water stores went up. LOOKIN SWOLE Speaking of the pump thing, I started to appear more vascular during my workouts and after, which means that the veins in my arms, legs, and even abdominal area, started to become more prominent. This effect only shows up in very lean people who have even blood ow and are able to maintain a normal blood volume. With this protocol, even my friends and training partners started commenting on how much more muscular and vascular I was looking, even though I was only a few pounds heavier. It was also weird because just a few weeks prior they were saying how scrawny and sickly I looked. Its amazing what a few pounds of well-proportioned muscle glycogen and water can do visually. FOOD ISSUES One of the most welcome changes, beyond the great workouts and improved appearance, was that the weird food compulsions went away. The insistent food and carb cravings I suffered during the last month completely disappeared. I slipped into an easy-to-follow routine of skipping breakfast, training at noon, eating a few well-planned meals before bed some days more, some days less and repeating it all the next day. Very tolerable and sustainable considering my lifestyle. SOME ADDITIONAL CHALLENGES But it wasnt all roses. There were a few other things worth mentioning. Body Temperature and Cold Extremities Beyond the breakfast transition I had to go through which might be minimized with the slow adjustment period Krista recommends each morning Id get colder and colder as the fast extended, especially in my hands and feet. Even in the sunshine, while drinking hot green tea, Id be shivering. It wasnt terrible, but it was annoying. I veried this same pattern in two different clients who also tried this IF approach. Interestingly, I didnt experience this same effect with the full day fasts. Some speculate I should be thankful for the cold extremities, as fasting may increase blood ow to adipose cells, helping them release fatty acids for eventual burning. Because of this, it may also cause vasoconstriction of the peripheral vasculature, namely ngers and toes. If this is true, I guess a little extra fat loss is worth the shivering. (Theres a lot of speculation here, though, so Im not yet convinced.)
ON VASCULARITY AND BLOOD PRESSURE/ VOLUME

When you see someone whos very lean, but not vascular, it means one of two things: either theyre cold and blood is being shunted to their core to preserve their core temperature, or their blood volume and blood pressure have dropped, usually due to a low carbohydrate intake and low body uid levels. In the past when I dieted hard and got very lean using lower carbohydrate diets, my blood pressure would drop down. (I used to do research with a cardiovascular medicine group and used ambulatory blood pressure monitors to measure this. My lowest recorded blood pressure was 75/35.) During those days, if I wanted to appear more vascular, Id have to eat a bunch of carbohydrates, add sodium to my diet, and drink more water. Do that, and voil: blood pressure pops up to 110/70 and you get instant vascularity.
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Appetite and Fullness Another odd annoyance was struggling with the larger meals. I know some people love stufng themselves and many IF proponents rave about this aspect of IF-style eating. Because you have to meet your daily calorie quota within fewer meals, you sometimes have to eat until youre feeling more than 100% full. For many chronic dieters, this is like a dream, since theyre used to smaller meals that leave them unsatised. For me, it wasnt a huge selling point. At times the meals felt too big, like I was force-feeding myself. (Sometimes I wasnt even able to nish my 10001500 calorie meals.) While I certainly dont prefer tiny, unsatisfying meals, I dont need to swing to the opposite end of the spectrum to feel good about things. Fortunately, just like my breakfast cravings, I adapted to feeling full in roughly two weeks. Mental Performance Its fairly common to struggle during the rst few weeks of any new dieting approach, whether its a low carb diet, calorie restriction, or IF. Before the body adapts to the new calorie balance and new pattern of fuel utilization, there are all sorts of physical and mental complaints. However, after the initial period of adaptation, most people start feeling better. After I adapted to the 16/8 pattern, the rst thing I noticed mentally was an extremely acute improvement in focus and concentration, especially during the fasting part of each day. (Many IF proponents talk about this effect, and I can denitely corroborate it.) During this time, I found it very easy to ignore distractions and focus deeply on single tasks. Of course, this granted me a big boon in productivity. When doing analytical tasks the work traditionally thought of as left brain my performance was greatly enhanced. Everything from statistics to article editing was easier to dig into. I was excited. Unfortunately, I quickly realized that what I gained in focus and analytical performance, I lost in creative, synthetic thinking the work traditionally thought of as right brain. While I worked really well alone, real-time collaboration with others suffered big-time during the fasting portion of my day. In addition, my early morning article-writing and strategic thinking sessions were worse than ever. Once I noticed this pattern, the solution was straightforward. I shifted my left brain work to the rst half of the day. So, no meetings, no real-time collaborative work, and no article writing before eating. Instead, I focused on editing, statistics, and project management. Then, I shifted my right brain work to later in the day. Body Weight One last thing worth mentioning, relative to my goals: Although this new approach was working out fairly well, I was actually gaining weight. While this is a very cool observation, and likely explained by increased glycogen and body water, I didnt actually want to be heavier. Instead, I wanted to maintain my weight in the 170-175 pound range. I had to do something.
THE AMAZING, ADAPTABLE METABOLISM

I never cease to be amazed at how adaptable the body is. In two weeks, I went from being a serious breakfast person to not needing breakfast at all, likely due to something called the hormonal entrainment of meal patterns. Because of this, one can literally train themselves to love and crave breakfast even if they think theyre not a breakfast person. Likewise, they can train themselves to easily skip breakfast even if they think theyre a total breakfast person. It just takes a few weeks to adapt, and most people give up before they reach this point. Fascinating stuff. Also, in two weeks I went from being stuffed with every single meal to feeling a little more normal. Again, physiological adaptations like these and there are lots of them do take about two weeks to kick in. Therefore, when trying any new and different exercise and nutrition approach, dont bail at the rst sign of discomfort. Give yourself two weeks to adapt. Thats usually when the magic happens.
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The Daily Fast: version 2.0

My next outcome-based decision was to modify the 16-hour fasting/8-hour feeding schedule to create more of a negative energy balance that would drive my weight back down. I had a couple of options here: I could increase my exercise volume, which I didnt really want to do, since more exercise with fewer calories usually makes people feel terrible. Or I could reduce my weekly calorie average, which is what I decided to try. With lots of options for reducing calorie intake at my disposal, I decided to go back to where I started: the one-day-a-week fast. According to this plan, Id keep following the 16-hour fasts Monday through Saturday, but Id incorporate a full day of fasting on Sunday.
A NOTE ON OUTCOMEBASED DECISION MAKING

I hope its now becoming obvious how I make my exercise and nutrition decisions when trying to achieve a goal. In fact, this is how I make almost all of my decisions when going after a goal. I call the process outcome-based decision making, and it goes like this: 1. Try something that makes sense, is simple, and that you can do every day. 2. Commit to doing this one action every day for a reasonable period of time, usually a few weeks.
3. Measure the things thatll give you objective feedback on how its going. 4. Stick with the intervention until your pre-determined time is up, even if your measures go up and down. 5. Assess the success of your actions based on the overall measures the general trend over time. 6. At the end of the predetermined period, if the interventions working, keep doing it. 7. If its not working, or stops working, make a small change, one youre condent you can do.
8. Keep repeating until you reach your goal. While the process seems like common sense, its damn hard to follow and takes uncommon patience and discipline. When we want to reach a goal badly enough, the days can seem long and progress can feel exceptionally slow. Thats why you have to remember that any progress you make is great. In fact, this has to become your mantra. Lost only half a pound in two weeks? Thats great. In a year youll be down 25 pounds while your friends will have gained 5-10 pounds. Know someone whos making faster progress than you? Thats nice. Just dont forget that 95%
of the people who crash diet and lose 15 pounds will gain 25 back for their trouble. Like most people, they made the weight loss project either physically or practically unsustainable. Losing weight fast often means a huge calorie decit, and a huge decit means an impending rebound. Also, working out like crazy or cloistering yourself away from food temptation leads to a rebound of a different kind. By using outcome-based decisions and making the smallest reasonable change when your measurements tell you its time to make a change, youre vastly more likely to succeed in the long term.
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Heres what version 2.0 looked like:
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
Exercise
Upper body strength exercise 45 minutes And 100 push-ups before each meal
Lower body strength exercise 45 minutes And 100 push-ups before each meal
No exercise
No exercise
Nutrition
As you probably guessed, I kept exercise time and volume the same (although I kept doing a little more and a little better each week in the gym). I also kept my food selections the same as the last phase. I simply didnt eat from Saturday night at 10 PM until Monday morning, using green tea, greens+, water, and BCAAs during the day on Sunday. This dropped my weekly calorie average by 2200 calories (or 300 every day). As expected, my weight dropped again within these next two weeks. I shed about 4 pounds (2 pounds fat, 2 pounds lean), dropping down to 171 pounds on my reference day, which is right where I wanted to be. I maintained this for two additional weeks. However, after getting used to eating every day for the prior month, and having success with the shorter fasts, I wasnt looking forward to the Sunday fasts any longer. They were starting to become a drag. And although I was getting extremely lean and looking like an anatomy chart, I was starting to feel sluggish on the days between the higher calorie and carb days. My enthusiasm for the workouts and movement in general was reaching a new low. As I was looking for something thatd both help me achieve my body weight goals, as well as something I could stick to for as long as I wanted, I decided to make another small change after this month.
The Daily Fast: version 3.0

Wanting to stick with the 16/8 plan as laid out in Version 1.0, but not wanting to gain additional weight beyond 175 pounds, I decided to get rid of the full day fast on Sunday, opting to use a 20/4 approach on the weekends instead. So, Id do the 16/8 thing for Monday through Friday and the 20/4 thing on Saturday and Sunday.
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Heres what that plan looked like:
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
Exercise
Upper body strength exercise 45 minutes 100 pushups before each meal
Lower body strength exercise 45 minutes 100 pushups before each meal
No exercise
No exercise
Nutrition
Fast until 5 PM, eat 1-2 lower carb meals (1500 kcal)
Fast until 5 PM, eat 1-2 lower carb meals (1500 kcal)
As I had done all along, I kept my workouts and food choices/rules the same. In fact, this program was very similar to my rst shorter fast iteration; I just lengthened the fast by 4 hours on Saturday and Sunday, having 1-2 meals instead of 2-3 meals. By making this shift, my weekly calorie average jumped by about 800 from the last program, giving me an extra 100 calories a day, on average. This made a big difference. Within the next two weeks, my weight increased to 173 pounds with surprisingly few day-to-day uctuations. It remained there for another two weeks.
NOTE FROM KRISTA: FASTING AND EXERCISE

Studies of Muslim athletes who fast during Ramadan nd that many athletes do worse in the early weeks of Ramadan. It takes time for the body to get used to fasted training. And your body may never really take to it. However, research also shows that it depends on the exercise type and the athlete (more experienced athletes tend to have fewer problems). Research results vary widely. And
often, any difference in performance is small. What seems to get worse, on average, with daily sunup-to-sundown fasts: activities that require more intense but longer effort (such as 200-400 m runs) speed endurance, such as repeated short, intense runs in soccer repeated powerexplosive movements like jumping some types of strength work capacity
how much athletes want to train or be generally active how well athletes thought they performed (which may not always be accurate) overall energy levels What seems to be more or less unaffected: sprint performance single explosive movements, like one jump or a judo throw non-maximal lower-rep weight training overall aerobic capacity
agility Again, this isnt denitive, and it may not apply to you. Since fasting Muslims usually have a small breakfast, the results might be different with training after a full overnight fast (i.e. no breakfast). After trial and error, I prefer to eat before really tough workouts. But I have no problem doing lowerintensity activities, such as moderate swimming or walking, fasted. As always, experiment and nd what works for you.
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The Daily Fast: v2.0 and 3.0 lessons

I learned a lot about my body during these last few phases of experimentation. LESSON
I REALLY LIKED AND DID WELL ON THE DAILY 16/8 LEANGAINS PROTOCOL.
After a terrible rst two weeks on the program, my body nally adapted. I then felt strong, energetic, and very lean after another two weeks. Kudos to Martin Berkhan for really perfecting these general principles of eating and training. (Although damn you, Martin, for that transition period.) However, as mentioned, the rst plan I designed was causing my body weight to creep up. And although it was all lean weight, and lots of folks would love to have that problem, I needed to rein things in. Thats why I decided to try v2.0 following 16/8 on Monday through Saturday and one full day of fasting on Sunday and eventually v3.0 16/8 on Monday through Friday and 20/4 on Saturday and Sunday.
LESSON
2|
WHILE I CAN DRIVE MY BODY WEIGHT DOWN INTO THE 170-171 POUND RANGE WITH LONGER, MORE FREQUENT FASTS, I DONT FEEL GOOD WHEN I DO IT.
Whether its the low body weight thats triggering the feelings of low energy and preoccupation with food, the low body fat percentage, or the energy decit itself, Im not sure. (Different physiologists have different theories on this, and Im not sure anyones pinned it down yet.) Whatever the reason, Im not willing or able to live with the blahs and food hang-ups. As a side note, these feelings of low energy and food preoccupation usually occur later in the day when I hit this magical low body weight/low calorie combination. It doesnt matter if Im having a moderate calorie day, using a 16/8 feeding schedule, a 20/4 feeding schedule, or fasting for a full day. If its not a high-calorie or high-carb day, my energy goes down signicantly, starting around 4 PM. This lasts until the following morning. Its like Im a video game character starting off with 10/10 on the power bar and by late evening there are only 3 bars left. Of course, this happens because my body is conserving calories, which keeps me on the couch. Unless I force myself to get up and do stuff, Im effectively neutralizing my negative energy balance. Again, behold the power of human adaptability and our built-in survival mechanisms. If your body weight dips too low, or your negative energy balance is too extreme even when youre exercising a lot and keeping your calorie intake in check your body will adapt by decreasing your spontaneous activity. In other words, lying on the couch starts to look like the best possible option. LESSON
3|
I DO WHAT WORKS FOR ME.
Folks on the internet tend to be loud proponents of what worked for them, urging others to do the same exact thing in all situations, always, and forever. And its tempting to buy into their condence. However, after years of self-experimentation, I realize its more important to discover what works for me.
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Thus heres my plan for the future. 1. Stick with less frequent fasts and/or fasts of shorter duration. 2. Keep my energy intake in the 2500 calorie range until I start increasing my exercise volume, which is coming soon. (I start my track workouts shortly.) When my training time increases, energy intake will go up too. 3. Keep my body weight in the 173-175 range, just in case low body weight is triggering the discomfort Ive been feeling in the 170-173 pound range. Of course, none of this is set in stone. And thats the beauty of self-experimentation and outcome-based decision-making: It empowers me to make ONE small change at a time; measure how that change works for at least two weeks, and then make small subsequent changes as needed, one at a time, to keep moving toward my goals. That last part is important. If I expect that Ill reach my goals in two weeks, and then bail on the whole program because I dont, I probably deserve to fail. The only criterion for success is moving in the right direction even painfully slowly. Anything else is false expectation.
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CHAPTER 7
Wrap-up, Results, and Lessons on Self-Experimentation

About 6 months from the start of my IF journey, after my last round of 16/8 fasts, I wrapped up these experiments, considering them a success.
For a quick visual recap of what I did (and when), see the following timeline:
MONTH #1
MONTH #2
MONTH #3
MONTH #4
MONTH #5
MONTH #6
1 full day fast
2 full day fasts
Daily 16/8 fasts
Daily 16/8 fast w/ 1 full day fast
Daily 16/8 fasts with 2 20/4 fasts
Body weight from 190-178 pounds
Bodyweight from Bodyweight from Bodyweight from Bodyweight from 178-171 pounds 171-175 pounds 175-171 pounds 171-173 pounds
I consider this project a success because I accomplished the following: I lost 20 lb: I dropped my body weight from 190 pounds to 170 pounds. I lost 6% body fat: I dropped my body fat % from 10% to 4% (as measured via ultrasound device). I lost minimal lean mass. I maintained my weight in the 170-175 pound range for almost 4 months. I found at least two different IF protocols that I could probably follow indenitely the one day per week fast and the 16/8 fasting. In the end, this is pretty cool because the only mid-term body weight and nutrition goals I have left to accomplish are to: Rene my eating approach to accommodate my upcoming track workouts Maintain my current body weight indenitely
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For those of you who prefer visuals, here are some before and after photos, documenting the changes I made:
BEFORE FRONT AFTER FRONT
BEFORE FRONT FLEXED AFTER FRONT FLEXED
BEFORE BACK AFTER BACK
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In addition, heres my before and after blood work (the most signicant changes have been bolded):
BLOOD MARKER
PRE-EXPERIMENTATION
POST EXPERIMENTATION
REFERENCE RANGE
Glucose Creatinine eGFR Cholesterol LDL HDL Cholesterol/HDL Triglycerides Hemoglobin WBC RBC MCV MCH MCHC RDW NEUTS LYMPH MONO EOS BASO Platelet Count Thyrotropin Testosterone
5.0 mmol/L 103 umol/L 72 mL/min/1.73 m2 3.78 mmol/L 2.24 mmol/L 1.15 mmol/L 3.3 0.86 mmol/L 154 g/L 4.3 x E9/L 4.95 x E12/L 87.1 fL 31.1 pg 357 g/L 12.2% 1.3 x E9/L 2.2 x E9/L 0.6 x E9/L 0.2 x E9/L 0 x E9/L 169 x E9/L 1.62 mIU/L 28.9 nmol/L
4.9 mmol/L 105 umol/L 69 mL/min/1.73 m2 5.0m mmol/L 2.98 mmol/L 1.64 mmol/L 3.1 0.95 mmol/L 140 g/L 3.1 x E9/L 4.36 x E12/L 91.3 fL 32.1 pg 352 g/L 12.8% 1.1 x E9/L 1.5 x E9/L 0.4 x E9/L 0.1 x E9/L 0 E9/L 150 x E9/L 1.21 mIU/L 23.8 nmol/L
3.6 6.0 62-115 60-89 <5.0 <3.36 >1.04 <4 <1.69 135-175 4-11 4.5-6.0 80-100 27.5-33.0 305-360 11.5-14.5 2.07.5 1.0-3.5 0.2-1.0 0-0.5 0-0.2 150-400 0.35-5 8.4 28.7
There werent large changes in my blood work, and I certainly didnt get dramatically healthier by following the IF protocols. However, there were some alterations worth mentioning. BLOOD LIPIDS As you can see in the table above, my total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, and triglycerides all increased. While some might suggest this is a result of the high meat and high fat/low carb intake and that this increase is a problem many well informed physicians and physiologists would suggest otherwise. Well-respected naturopathic physician, Dr. Bryan Walsh, suggests that increased cholesterol levels within certain limits can actually be an indicator of better health;
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especially when the cholesterol/HDL ratios are lowered and the triglyceride/HDL ratios decrease, as they both did during my experiments. In his words: When it comes to blood lipids, Id much rather have those after results than the before results. RED AND WHITE BLOOD CELLS Moving in the opposite direction of my cholesterol levels, signicant decreases in my haemoglobin, red blood cell, white blood cell, and platelet counts were observed. While this may indicate a nutrient deciency (not good), it also could indicate a decrease in bone marrow cell production (due to the negative energy balance and the intermittent fasting) or even an increase in the efciency of these cell lines (which could actually be a good thing). Again, after talking with Dr. Walsh, we concluded that my chronic negative energy balance probably lead to the decrease in cell production at the bone level. This probably contributed to some of the fatigue I experienced during my experiments. Id be interested in measuring these values again after a few months of weight stability, a bit higher training volume, and a few more calories. Perhaps these will come back to my pre-testing values. THYROID HORMONE AND TESTOSTERONE Both thyroid hormones and testosterone are sensitive to energy balance. In other words, when energy balance is negative, these tend to drop. Therefore, I expected this small decrease in hormone levels. However, Im not worried about the reductions since theyre very small. In studies with more extreme energy decits, testosterone and thyroid hormone levels drop to well below the reference range values. Since mine saw only small decreases, I didnt suffer any testosterone or thyroid related problems, and I ended up preserving most of my muscle mass and strength while getting extremely lean. Id say these drops arent anything to worry about. To the contrary, according to Dr Walsh, with intermittent fasting, these reduced values could mean that I was becoming more efcient at using these hormones, reducing my requirement for their production. While this is pure speculation, there may be some merit to the idea. In fact, if intermittent fasting does contribute to increased lifespan/ longevity, this potential increase in physiological efciency may contribute to the effect.
Whats next?
At this point youre probably wondering whats next for me. Will I continue intermittent fasting? Will I go back to more frequent meals? Will I try something else altogether? Although I cant say what Ill be doing a few months from now outcome-based decision making will determine that here are some of the important ideas Ill carry with me. ILL INCREASE MY CALORIE INTAKE WHEN TRACK WORKOUTS BEGIN. Adding track workouts to my training schedule will change things quite a bit. Even though Ill be starting off slowly with only 1-2 sessions per week, Ill be burning quite a few more calories each week.
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Ill need more recovery, because of the demand that track work puts on my central nervous system. So Ill denitely need to increase my food intake while incorporating additional recovery techniques. Im not sure yet how many calories Ill add. Thats where more self-experimentation will come into play. ILL KEEP CALORIE/CARB CYCLING. Calorie and carb cycling is something Ive done for a long time. In fact, I think most exercisers, regardless of their goals, should use some method of nutrient cycling. So Ill continue eating more food (by increasing the carbs) 2-3 times per week after my hardest workouts and less food (by keeping carbs low) the other 4-5 days of the week. Protein will stay high throughout. Im not sure yet how many days Ill carb up. Again, Ill play around with a few different options and then make my decisions based on measured outcomes. ILL EAT MORE FOOD IMMEDIATELY AFTER HARD WORKOUTS AND LESS FOOD AS THE WORKOUT GETS FURTHER AWAY. Nutrient timing eating my largest meals after exercise is something Ive tried to do for a long time. However, I will say that this experiment forced me to get even better at it, and I think it made a difference. Im going to be very conscientious about eating my biggest meal of each day postexercise, regardless of when that workout occurs, and decreasing the size of my meals the further I get from a workout. This includes keeping any pre-workout meals I might eat small. ILL STICK WITH A WHOLE FOOD APPROACH, LIMITING BARS, SHAKES, AND WORKOUT DRINKS. Eating mostly whole, unprocessed food has always been high on my list of nutritional priorities. However, I must admit, there are times where I get supplement-crazy and allow too many bars, shakes, and workout drinks to displace real food choices. For some of my hard-training Olympic and professional athletes, who train with high volume and intensity, these meal substitutes help them meet their energy needs or boost recovery. But neither I, nor most of my clients, need them. Eating plenty of meat, veggies, and high quality carbs along with a few simple supplements like vitamin D, a multi-vitamin, BCAAs, and some sh oil is good enough. So thats probably what Ill stick with from now on. ILL EAT BREAKFAST ON SOME DAYS, BUT NOT OTHERS. These experiments taught me that any meal is negotiable. I skipped all kinds of meals breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks during these last 6 months. And as long as I didnt pig out during my next meal and controlled my energy intake for the entire day, I didnt notice a big difference. Now I no longer believe that skipping a meal can have disastrous consequences. However, that doesnt mean Im going to swing in the opposite direction and always skip meals. Ill probably eat breakfast some days and skip it on other days. Ill probably choose based on how hungry I am, what activity I did the day before, and what my body weight has been doing for the last day or two. More fun with experimentation.
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ILL KEEP TRAINING AROUND NOON SOMETIMES FASTED, SOMETIMES NOT. In the past, I trained every evening after work. Ive grown to prefer training around noon. It breaks up my work day nicely. Ill probably keep that up. On the days I skip breakfast, Ill probably train in a fasted state. And on days I eat breakfast, I wont. Again, Ill use hunger, what I did the day before, and my current body weight to help me decide whether to train fasted. ILL FAST FOR A FULL DAY OCCASIONALLY. When its a rigid thing I have to do every Sunday, I dont love fasting all day. However, when its an occasional thing, its no problem. So, Ill probably throw in a few full-day fasts each month, but theyll likely be random and unscheduled. Maybe Ill do one when Im traveling all day. Or maybe Ill do one when Im working on a project and dont want to be bothered to eat. Maybe Ill do one if I see my body weight creeping up. Im not sure yet how Ill decide, but Ill experiment with a few options and see what works out best. ILL KEEP WEIGHING MYSELF DAILY. Some people use the scale as a judge of their past decisions, which is why theyre intimidated by it, and why it causes such crises of self-esteem. I dont use my scale that way. In fact, I loved weighing in every day during these experiments because my scale doesnt judge my past actions. Instead, it informs my future ones. Every day my scale gives me important information about what to do next. Thats why Ill keep weighing in every day. Body weight measures help me make key decisions about my food intake and training. (Note: the scale works for me because body weight manipulation is an important goal of mine right now. Over time, body weight is a reection of energy balance. However, if your goals are different from mine, you should choose different measures that better reect what you want to accomplish.) ILL KEEP CONTROLLING MY APPETITE WITH PARTICULAR FOOD CHOICES. Although body weight is largely determined by calorie balance, I learned that my food choices strongly affect my appetite and cravings. If I ll up on proteins, large portions of veggies, legumes, and mixed nuts, Im satised for hours and eat less each day. If I drink a protein shake or eat a protein bar, Im hungry within an hour and tend to eat a little more during later meals. And if I eat fast food, Im craving more within minutes and the day gets rough. Thus, Ill continue to eat lean proteins, healthy fats, veggies, legumes, and unprocessed carbs most of the time. When my appetite is under control, Im less likely to overeat. That means Ill control my intake and body weight better. ILL KEEP WRITING DOWN WHAT I EAT. Take in more energy than you burn and you gain weight. Burn more energy than you take in and you lose weight. Duh. But nding your own energy balance point can be a pretty tricky thing, especially as your body weight and exercise program change. Although I didnt try to count calories
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during my experiment, having a journal helped me notice how much food I was eating day-to-day. This meant that Id have an actual reference point for eating more, less, or the same amount, based on what my body was doing. It also meant I could occasionally go back and tally up my calorie intake, just for the sake of curiosity. ILL TURN THESE EXPERIMENTS INTO A LARGER TRIAL. These experiments have prompted me to do some additional IF experiments with larger numbers of men and women. In fact, as we wrapped this book, we started putting together a well-controlled IF study with 80 clients. To stay-up-to-date on the results of that study and other research were doing, put your name on our newsletter list on the Summary page.
Intermittent fasting: a success for me

Ive become a fan of periodic intermittent fasting, for me. In particular, I liked the weekly fast (coupled with an eat what I want day). And I really beneted from the daily fast approach too. For my clients? As always, each person is different. Nutritional age (how much a person knows about nutrition, and how well they can apply that knowledge) plays a huge factor in my recommendations. I wouldnt give a Level 1 client (whos just learning the basics) the same advice Id give to a Level 3 client like myself. (For more on nutritional age, see the references section at the end of the book.) My recommendations also depend heavily on lifestyle. In my own experiments, and in my work with clients, Ive found that the dieting approaches outlined in this book are more successful when: you have a history of monitoring calorie and food intake (i.e. youve dieted before); youre already an experienced exerciser; youre single or you dont have children; your partner (if you have one) is extremely supportive; and, your job allows you to have periods of low performance while you adapt to a new plan. On the other hand, these programs seem to be much more challenging for those who: are new to diet and exercise; are married and have children; have performance oriented or client-facing jobs; and, compete in sport/athletics. In addition, women seem to fare worse on the stricter forms of intermittent fasting than men do; for women, I recommend beginning with a very relaxed approach to fasting or avoiding it altogether.
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IF and adherence
Most IF advocates will suggest that their approach drastically improves adherence. They claim that having few, larger meals per day tends to help them stick to the plan better than having more frequent, smaller meals per day. I wont dispute that because theyre probably right for them. On the other hand, I hear a lot of people saying the exact opposite as well; that fasting triggers a binge response, and so on. And theyre probably right too for them. I suspect, however, that rigid adherence to any schedule whether its a 4 meal per day schedule, a 6 meal per day schedule, a 16-hour fasting/8-hour feeding schedule, or a full day fast every Sunday is what makes a lot of people drop out of any eating plan. Indeed, whenever you tell folks what they cant do, they immediately obsess about it. Eventually that obsession becomes an all-out rebellion, leading to a f*%! this moment where you ip your diet the bird and soothe your fatigued willpower muscles with ice cream and self-pity. As for me, Ive gotten great results on dozens of different eating systems over the years, including grazing methods and fasting methods, so Im happy to consider these IF techniques as simply an interesting addition to my list of what works. Nothing more. Thats why with my current goals, Ill probably keep doing some form of intermittent fasting. However, itll be less structured, more random, and driven by outcome-based decision making, rather than rigid adherence to a pre-determined plan. In essence, Ill be an intermittent faster on some days, a grazer on others, a low carb/ high fat eater on some days, and a high carb/low fat eater on others. Of course, what Im doing isnt as important as how Im doing. So Ill make sure my weekly calorie balance is on track and that my body weight is in check. Im not sure what this approach makes me or what nutritional camp I fall into. Regardless, I strive to be as open-minded and evidence-based as possible. I do these self-experiments because I want to look, feel, and perform my best. Interestingly, as I get older, my denitions of best change as do the techniques I employ to achieve this best. Im also learning that the only way to improve is to try new things, measure what happens when I do, and then change things when they need to be changed.
Self experimentation: Try this at home!

If you havent guessed it by now, this book isnt about what I think you should do with your diet and exercise program. (Although if you read between the lines youll probably pick up some great pointers.) Rather, this book is about what I did with my diet and exercise program over the last few months. If you want to know where to start, I recommend you check out the free 5-day courses I link to in the resources section at the end of this book. Theyll give you a great baseline of habits to follow. But even these habits arent immutable. Theyre a great foundation for improving your body weight, body composition, health, and energy levels, but youll eventually want to experiment on yourself. I wholly support that.
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Ive found self-experiments to be great for many reasons. For instance: SELF-EXPERIMENTS INSPIRE ACTION. Self-experiments get you started now. Instead of action-less reading, theorizing, and debating which can paralyze even the best of us you can try new things right away, as soon as you learn about them or they occur to you. If they work, thats great. You just added another effective strategy to your approach. If they dont work, thats great too. Not only did you eliminate an ineffective strategy, you practiced the most important habit you can develop: your ability to take action. SELF-EXPERIMENTS CREATE SELF-AWARENESS. In coaching thousands of clients, Ive learned that a clients best friend is selfawareness paying attention. When people stop paying attention in their lives, they dont think clearly, act independently, or make positive changes. They become automatons who mindlessly react to life circumstances. Self-awareness and self-control grow through the deliberate process of selfexperimentation. These skills can lead to powerful life changes. SELF-EXPERIMENTS GIVE US CONFIDENCE. In our culture, we idolize experts. Were trained to expect them to make important decisions for us. Although this is good sometimes, this also strips us of our power to think and decide. Its a power we all have, and one that we must practice. By allowing us to make small, low-risk decisions, and to test the results of these decisions, self-experiments turn us into scientists. They turn us into experts on the one thing most important to us: ourselves. SELF-EXPERIMENTS HELP US START SMALL. We often make new habits and procedures far too big and, therefore, unsustainable. Then we fail to accomplish important goals. Self-experiments are powerful because they force us to narrow our scope. Scientists design their experiments by changing only one thing at a time, while other variables remain the same. Modelling this behaviour drastically increases the likelihood that well learn something important about ourselves and achieve our goals. SELF-EXPERIMENTS KEEP US MOVING FORWARD. I recently did a survey of my staff, all folks whove exercised and eaten well for years. I asked them what helps them keep exercising when people all around them quit. They told me that trying new exercise programs and nutrition ideas is a regular part of their lives.
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Of course, theyre not just jumping around randomly, changing programs with the prevailing winds. Rather, they use a systematic approach and the best practices of self-experimentation. All across the internet, theres a self-experimentation movement going on with a few key websites leading the charge. With this movement, budding self-scientists use small single-subject experiments to generate, test, and develop new ideas that might later lead to important scientic discoveries. People are doing one-person sleep experiments, brain imaging experiments, nutrition experiments, acne experiments, and experiments with psychoactive drugs. While thats all really cool, its not exactly what I mean here. Rather, I mean developing a strategy exclusively for you. A strategy thatll help you gather condence, gain personal expertise, and nd what really works in your life all the while learning, practicing, taking action, and having fun..
How to do your own self experiments

How do you do your own self-experiments? The steps are pretty simple.
STEP
DEFINE YOUR GOAL.
What do you want to achieve? Do you want to lose body fat? Gain lean mass? Lower your cholesterol? Lift more weight? Have more energy between the hours of 4 PM and 9 PM? Take time to gure out what exactly you want to accomplish. (This is easier said than done. While some people say they want to lose weight, thats not really what they want. Sometimes it takes a little deeper introspection to understand what they truly seek.) If you have a hard time narrowing down your many goals, edit ruthlessly. Figure out your most important one. With my IF experiments, I had several goals, but my most important one was to lose body weight. Thats what I focused on and dened success by.
STEP
DECIDE WHAT YOULL MEASURE AND WHEN YOULL MEASURE IT.
Youll need to measure something to know if your experiment is working. You could use an already established measure, or you could make something up. I wanted to lose body weight, so I bought a good, calibrated weigh scale and measured my weight every day. Some other goals might not have such clearly established measures. For example, if you want to improve your energy later in the day, you cant just drop by the local pharmacy to pick up an energy scale. So youll have to come up with something on your own. Maybe you could create a 10-point scale with 0 being no energy and 10 being the most energy youve ever felt. Then you could rank your energy every day at the same critical time, by placing an X on the area of the scale that best represents how you feel.
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Regardless of the measure you choose, its important to start small and measure as few variables as possible. One or two outcome measures is perfect. Try to track more during the same experiment and youll either get overwhelmed or confused.
STEP
COLLECT A BASELINE.
Now that you have a goal and an established metric, its time to collect a little data. I suggest about 2 weeks worth. You see, every metric has variability body weight, intelligence scores, strength, speed, happiness, etc. In other words, if you do 100 measures over 100 days, even without any substantial changes in your life, the measures would vary by a few percent. We cant always pin down why; they just do. Thats why youll need to collect at least 14 days worth of data before testing your rst idea. This way youll know what your baseline and normal variability is, and you can understand what the day-to-day variations mean during your testing period. In my experiment, I had a suitable baseline because I already measured myself every day and knew the normal day-to-day variability. Thus, Id know that if larger changes were happening, they were the result of my experiment.
STEP
TEST YOUR IDEAS.
Now, begin testing. Will you try a new dietary supplement? Will you try removing a food from your diet? Will you add a new type of exercise? Whatever you choose, stay with the power of less approach and make sure your manipulation is small and simple. I recommend this for a few reasons. First, itll help you understand whats going on. If you try testing four nutritional supplements at once, you wont be able to draw conclusions about whether any particular supplement is working (or not working). Likewise, if you try an entirely new diet, you wont know if its the change in food type, amount, or schedule that made the difference. Second, a small, simple intervention ensures that you can actually complete the experiment. I hate to keep harping on this, but if you go too big, itll probably be more than you can handle, and youll quit. So stay small. Change only one variable at a time. And make sure the manipulation you choose is something sure you can do every day. In my experiments, you may recall that I kept my training consistent throughout. On the nutrition side, I typically kept weekly calorie intake the same, manipulating only one variable when I fasted.
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STEP
FOLLOW YOUR NEW PLAN FOR AT LEAST 14 DAYS.
For the same reasons you collected two weeks worth of baseline information, follow your new plan for at least two weeks. Thats often enough to give your program a chance to produce a measurable result. Further, itll help you stick to the program even when the day-to-day variability starts freaking you out. To illustrate my point, heres a sample 2-week block of body weight data from one phase of my experiments:
Week 1 - New Protocol
182
MON
SUN
Week 2 - New Protocol
178
TUES
177
WED
177
THURS
175
176
FRI
175
SAT
MON
176
TUES
WED
174
175
THURS
172
173
FRI
176 171
SAT
SUN
Notice that the two week trend indicates successful weight loss. (Remember, my reference day was Friday.) However, if you just looked at the day-to-day variation, you wouldnt know if the protocol was working. As an example, check out week 1. It looks like Im losing weight in a nice, steady way and then on Friday and Sunday my weight jumps, with Sundays weight being higher than at the start of the week. Pretty much the same for week two. Of course, if I didnt understand how day-to-day variability worked I might have panicked, and perhaps done something drastic. Fortunately, I had the data and simply kept going. Follow your plan despite the ups and downs youll see in your measurement data. In other words, dont freak out. If your two week data show that youre moving in the right direction, even if the changes are small, thats great news.
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STEP
IF ITS WORKING, KEEP GOING.
If what youre doing is working and by working I mean that youre moving in the direction of your goals simply keep doing it. Even if it feels slow. When youre chasing an important goal, it always feels slow, and youll always consider trying something more drastic. Dont do it. Youll either get physically or mentally overwhelmed and either one will lead to a crash. In my very rst fasting experiment, the program consistently brought me in the direction of my goals, so I kept doing it for four blocks of two weeks each. Youll notice the same pattern throughout. If the program was working, I kept going.
STEP
IF ITS NOT WORKING, MAKE SMALL CHANGES.
If after two weeks the plan doesnt lead to any positive changes or, worse yet, produced negative changes, its time to try something new. But dont forget the rules. Make sure the change is small, that you keep the other variables consistent, and that you choose something youre sure you can do every day. Again, using my experiments as an example, I ended my rst fasting experiment, planning something new, after two weeks of no additional weight loss. Youll notice the same pattern throughout. If I didnt move toward my goals or I moved away from them I made a change.
STEP
WORK WITH A COACH.
If youre feeling intimidated by the process, at any time, work with a coach. An experienced coach will be able to help you better set goals, decide upon metrics, and evaluate your results. This effectively turns self-experimentation into guided experimentation, something many of us need from time to time.
STEP
REPEAT UNTIL YOU REACH YOUR GOAL.
This process is awesome because its based on the outcomes most important to you your own data. You can use it to continually learn new things about yourself. Theres always a next step and never a dead end, since there are thousands of manipulations you can try.
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I reached my body weight goals through the process outlined in this book. However, things are about to change. Ill be adding more training, and Ill need to manipulate my diet to accommodate this. In addition, Ill still be experimenting to nd the perfect balance of body weight, calorie intake, and body fat to help me feel my best while staying lean and in the 170 pound weight range. Dozens of self-experiments right there. I cant wait. This is a simple, powerful process. Apply it to all aspects of your life (one small piece at a time), and youll accomplish amazing things. But beyond the results, youll start feeling in control of your decisions and your ability to revise and rene your own life. As Jews often say to one another before Yom Kippur, tzom kal: May you have an easy fast.
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APPENDIX A
How To Do Intermittent Fasting: Cheat Sheet with Our 3 Favorite Protocols

So youve gone through the book, read every word (right?), and decided you want to try intermittent fasting. Good for you. But which style should you choose? We outline our suggestions below.
1. The Trial Fast

WHAT IT IS Simple, you try it out. The Trial Fast is what we have our own Lean Eating clients do: try going without food for 24 hours. WHY DO IT To experience hunger intentionally in order to get accustomed to the feeling, and, well... not freak out. The ability to manage hunger is essential to tness and good health, and this is a great way to get better at it. (Check out more benets of the trial fast in the Introduction.) WHO ITS FOR The Trial Fast if for anyone who wants to try fasting without committing to it full-time. Its also an excellent way to see if more advanced forms of fasting will be right for you. Get a little spacey during your trial fast? A little irritated at people? Well, those are actually common responses. Nothing to worry about. Want to put your head through a wall or yell at everyone who enters the room? That could be a problem. But youll never know until you try.
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HOW TO DO IT Essentially, you pick any 24-hour period, and dont eat during it. But we like to add a few things to make it easier. Here, well assume a Sunday fast: 10 PM Saturday: Eat your last meal of the day Drink 500 mL (2 cups) of water 10 AM Sunday: Drink 1 L (4 cups) of water + 1 serving greens powder Drink 250 mL (1 cup) of green tea Take 5 grams BCAA (branched chain amino acids) powder (or take 5 capsules) 3 PM Sunday: Drink 1 L (4 cups) of water + 1 serving greens powder Drink 250 mL (1 cup) green tea Take 5 grams BCAA (branched chain amino acids) powder (or take 5 capsules) 10 PM Sunday: Eat a small snack before bed Drink 500 mL (2 cups) of water Monday: Eat normally Tips and Strategies for the Trial Fast The tea, greens, and BCAAs arent essential to fasting, but in our experience, they make it a lot easier. Drinking water in particular helps to mitigate feelings of hunger. Be aware of your body cues. Feeling stressed out or upset during your fast? Relax. Take a few deep breaths, and pay close attention this is what hunger can feel like. The more you know about the feeling, the easier it is to manage in the future. Have healthy food (lean meats, veggies, etc.) in the house and ready to go when you break the fast on Sunday night with a small meal. We suggest a tablespoon of almond butter and some celery. Also, having healthy food in the house is good insurance that you wont binge on Monday when you return to normal eating.
2. The Periodic Fast

WHAT IT IS The Periodic Fast is exactly what it sounds like: you fast periodically. So while you should still eat well (high protein, lots of veggies, a balance of fats, and a moderate intake of minimally processed carbohydrates) youd periodically take a full day to fast (just like the Trial Fast).
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You can do this once a year, once a month, once a week whatever works for you. But we recommend no more frequently than once a week; as you can read in Chapter 5, twice a week proved disastrous. Fair warning. WHY DO IT To further practice hunger management and experience more of the potential health and fat loss benets of intermittent fasting. WHO ITS FOR The Periodic Fast is for anyone who responded well to the Trial Fast. HOW TO DO IT The Periodic Fast is exible: you can choose whichever 24 hours you want. Want to fast from breakfast to breakfast? Thats cool. Just eat breakfast on Monday, and dont eat again until breakfast on Tuesday. Want to fast dinner to dinner? Thats cool too. Eat dinner on Wednesday, and dont eat again until dinner on Thursday. To do it, simply follow the rules above from the Trial Fast. Tips and Strategies: I like to do the Periodic Fast when traveling. When Im in and out of airports and good food is hard to come by, Ill throw in a full-day fast when it makes sense. Other people nd that travel stresses them out, and fasting may exacerbate that feeling. You may prefer to pick the least stressful day in your week or month and start with that.
3. The Daily Fast

WHAT IT IS The Daily Fast is an 8-hour feeding period followed by a 16-hour fast. WHY DO IT To pursue extreme leanness. WHO ITS FOR The Daily Fast is best for people who are already t, have plenty of experience eating healthy and want to be extremely lean. Men generally respond best to the 16-hour fast, 8-hour eating split; women seem to need a longer eating window and shorter fast (try a 14-hour fast with an 10-hour eating window) or a more relaxed approach in general. But it can work for both men and women as long as they have good self-discipline and dont have a history of eating disorders. WHO ITS NOT FOR Pregnant women, people who have or have had eating disorders, and people simply looking to be healthy and t with no particular desire to be extremely lean. The Daily Fast will typically be much harder to adhere to for men over 15% body fat and women over 22% body fat. Furthermore, there are far easier ways to make rapid and lasting change for people in those categories. See How to get in shape without fasting below.
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HOW TO DO IT The Daily Fast is outlined in more detail in Chapter 6. The basic principle? You eat during an 8-hour feeding period and fast during a 16-hour fasting period. But there are other key principles as well: High protein & vegetable intake: During the 8-hour eating window, eat a ton of protein (meat, poultry, sh) and vegetables (think green growing things). Err on the side of eating too much of these foods. Fasted training: Do intense resistance training 3 times per week, right before you eat your rst meal. In other words, youll be training on an empty stomach. Carb cycling: On training days, add carbs (quinoa, rice, whole grain bread, fruit, etc.) to your base diet of protein and veggies. Nutrient timing: On training days, eat as much of your food as soon after training as possible. Your biggest meal should come right after your workout. Most people who follow this protocol fast from 9 PM until 1PM the next day, exercising around noon while consuming 10 grams of BCAAs (branched chain amino acids) during training. After training, eat 2-3 large meals before 9 PM, with your biggest meal coming right after exercise. (Note: If you cant get away for a workout in the middle of the day, there are other was to set this up. Also, this protocol is more strict and therefore suited for more advanced trainees. Not for newbies.) Sample Single-Day Schedule 8:00 AM 9:00 AM Wake up, drink 500 mL (2 cups) water Drink 1 L (4 cups) water with 1 serving greens+, 250 mL (1 cup) green tea
11:00 AM 250 mL (1 cup) green tea 12:00 PM Workout session with 10 g BCAA during session 1:30 PM 4:30 PM 8:30 PM Eat rst meal, largest of the day Eat second meal, moderate sized meal Eat third meal, moderate sized meal
Tips and Strategies Dont fool yourself into thinking you can just skip breakfast and get shredded; what makes it work is combination of all the principles at play, including the food selection, fasted training and nutrient timing. This is an advanced strategy, not a magic bullet. Even if you think you can do the Daily Fast, consider choosing the Trial or Periodic Fast rst. Make sure to re-read Chapter 6 for a full outline on how to perform the fast safely and effectively.
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If you nd eating this way is too strict, try a) extending the eating window from 8 hours to 9 or even 10 hours, or b) turning your hardest training day into an eat what you want day to relax things a little. Or try two eat what you want days. These arent rules, just guidelines; better to follow a more relaxed plan than abandon a stricter one.
Not a t for you? Heres how to get in shape without fasting

So how does intermittent fasting t in? In three ways. First, its a great way to intentionally practice being hungry. The better you can manage hunger, the less likely you are to react compulsively to it. To get t and stay t you need that skill. Second, its a lesson in disguise for people who care about their health and tness: relax. So you missed a meal. Who cares? Might even be good for you. Just keep going. Third, its great as an advanced strategy for extreme leanness. If you want that, and youre prepared, you may nd this protocol easier to follow than the typical bodybuilding-style diets. I did. But ultimately, fasting is a nice-to-have. Its unnecessary to get in shape, and alone its insufcient. You know whats both necessary and sufcient? Things like eating good quality food in the right amounts at the right times. Things like learning to prepare healthy food in the rst place. Those things are enough for most people to get in the best shape of their lives. I know, because my team and I have helped thousands of clients get there; none of them did any more than the Trial Fast, but all of them are taught those essentials. So if youre looking at all this intermittent fasting stuff and arent sure where it ts in for you, what should you do? Learn the essentials of good nutrition. Its by far the best thing you can do for your health and tness.
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APPENDIX B
Intermittent Fasting Tips & Tricks

Heres a quick overview of some of the key concepts of IF and what to keep in mind if you want to try it. 1. FIRST, DECIDE IF ITS RIGHT FOR YOU. Although there are some neat benets, IF is not for everyone. Your exercise and nutritional experience, and your lifestyle, should determine whether you try IF. If youre new to exercise and nutrition, I strongly recommend you learn the essentials rst. 2. START SLOWLY. START SIMPLY. START SMALL. START GRADUALLY. If you decide youd like to try IF, theres no rush. Pick one small thing to try, even if thats just adjusting regular mealtimes by an hour. Try it. See how it goes. 3. FOCUS ON WHAT IF APPROACHES HAVE IN COMMON, RATHER THAN GETTING BOGGED DOWN IN THE DETAILS. Sometimes you eat. Sometimes you dont. That pretty much sums it up. 4. STAY FLEXIBLE. See #3. 5. KNOW THYSELF. OBSERVE YOUR OWN EXPERIENCES CAREFULLY. Be a scientist. Get started, gather data, gain insight, and draw conclusions that you use to guide future action. Do whats right for you. 6. GIVE IT TIME. There is no rush. Especially since it usually takes a few weeks just to adapt to your new program. 7. EXPECT UPS AND DOWNS. They happen, its part of life, and its part of the process. By staying open-minded and not panicking during the downs youll gure out how to have more ups.
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8. THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU TRULY WANT FROM IF. FOCUS ON THE QUALITY OF THE PROCESS, NOT THE OUTCOME. IF is a great way to: go deeper into the psychological and physical experience of true hunger; learn the difference between head hunger and body hunger; learn not to fear hunger; improve insulin sensitivity and re-calibrate your bodys use of stored fuel; respect the process and privilege of eating; learn more about your own body; lose fat, if you are careful about it; and, take a break from the work of food prep and the obligation to eat. IF is not healthy if: youre using the pretext of health as a way to have an eating disorder and/or rigidly control your food intake (which is really the same thing); you fast too often, too long; youre also overexercising or not getting enough sleep (i.e., under too much additional physiological stress); youre using a lot of supplements, legal or otherwise, to kill your appetite so you can make it through your fasts; youre food-obsessed and/or binge during your non-fasting periods; and, you use IF as a way to compensate for poor food choices or over-eating. 9. WHAT YOU DO EAT IS AS IMPORTANT AS WHAT YOU DONT. Get the nutritional basics down rst. Eat good quality food, in the right amounts, at the right times. For most people, this is enough to get into great shape. No IF required. For more on this, see our 5-Day Fat Loss course, in the Resources section. 10. RESPECT YOUR BODY CUES. Pay attention to what your body tells you. This includes: drastic changes in appetite, hunger, and satiety including food cravings; sleep quality; energy levels and athletic performance; mood and mental/emotional health; immunity; blood prole; hormonal health; and, how you look.
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11. EXERCISE, BUT DONT OVERDO IT. We strongly recommend you combine exercise with IF to get the most out of it. Just dont overdo it. See #12. 12. CONSIDER WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON IN YOUR LIFE. Think about: how much exercise/training you do, and how intensely; how well you rest and recover; how well IF is tting into your regular routine and normal social activities; and, what other demands and stress life offers you. Remember: IF is one of many nutrition styles that work. But it only works when its intermittent, exible, and part of your normal routine not an obligation, and not a chronic source of physical and psychological stress.
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Resources
Last I checked, there were over 63,000 diet books and 97,000 exercise books indexed at Amazon.com. I dont know about you, but that feels like way too many.
Here are some of my favourite books, websites, and resources to help you narrow things down. If youre looking for more on the topics of exercise, nutrition, tness, and self-experimentation, these provide a great starting point.
Our websites
Precision Nutrition This is my own companys website. Its a huge resource full of free exercise, nutrition, and lifestyle information. With over 500 free articles and a popular, friendly, supportive discussion community, it may be the only tness and nutrition site you ever need to visit. Stumptuous The premier womens weight-lifting site on the web, hosted by coauthor Dr. Krista Scott-Dixon. This site is free of advertising and sponsorship and is devoted 100% to promoting and supporting no-nonsense exercise habits for women. In other words, no pink dumbbells allowed. The Nate Green Experience A cool lifestyle blog in which co-author Nate Green explores what it means to be a young guy trying to nd his way around the gym and around the world all while becoming his own hero.
Resources referenced in the text

5-Day Fat Loss Course For Men (Free) and 5-Day Fat Loss Course For Women (Free) These free 5-day video courses for men and women, respectively, cover the best practices of exercise, nutrition, and lifestyle for improving your health and getting into great shape. Brief and concise, yet probably the best fat-loss quick-start guide youll ever nd, complete with printable habits, recipes, and workout routines. Act Your Nutritional Age This article covers the topic of nutritional age, and why we recommend different starting points based on different nutritional ages. Brad Pilon and Eat Stop Eat Brad Pilons web site, home of his Eat Stop Eat intermittent fasting system. Brad recently updated the book, and its worth checking out if youre interested in IF. Intermittent Fasting Research Review This is an excellent review (although its a few years old now) of what the scientic community knows about intermittent fasting. Lean Eating Coaching for Men and Lean Eating Coaching for Women The very successful mens and womens fat-loss coaching program we run each year. We provide
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expert coaches to small groups of motivated clients, and we guarantee their results. Plus, theres $50,000 in prize money for the best transformations in the group. Leangains Mentioned in Chapter 6, this is Martin Berkhans web site, home of his Leangains intermittent fasting system, one of the protocols I did quite well on. Results Fitness Home of Alwyn Cosgroves gym (in Santa Clarita, California), voted one of the top 10 gyms in America by Mens Health magazine. Alwyn is a good friend and often acts as one of my sounding boards for new nutrition and tness ideas. Plus, his gym is a testing ground for many of our nutritional theories. The Power of Less An outstanding book describing author Leo Babautas analysis of his own growth and change. If you want to understand how change happens and how new habits are actually formed in the real world, there isnt a better book than this one. The Warrior Diet Ori Hofmeklers web site, home to his Warrior Diet intermittent fasting system. The Get Shredded Diet A more extreme, bodybuilding-style fat loss plan designed to be followed for short periods of time when trying to get very lean. Its highly effective, but not suitable for everyone. The Getting Unshredded Plan When ending The Get Shredded Diet, its quite common to overeat and experience rebound weight gain. Thats why its best to use the strategies outlined in this article when ending an extreme bodybuilding-style diet. Wikipedia: Alternate Day Fasting Alternate Day Fasting is reviewed here on Wikipedia, complete with short reviews of both the animal and the human studies.
Self-experimentation resources
Self-Experimentation As A Source of New Ideas Seth Roberts review, in the Journal of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, on the art of self-experimentation. Roberts reports on 10 different self-experiments hes done and the surprising things he found. The 4 Hour Body Tim Ferriss song of praise for the art of self-experimentation. With hundreds of experiments, this book covers Ferriss research into fat loss, muscle gain, sleep quality, sexual prowess, muscle performance, and much more. Quantied Self A web site for people interested in self-tracking. Here you can gather with other self-trackers, share knowledge and experiences, and nd tons of self-experimentation related resources. A great jumping-off point if youre interested in doing more self-experiments.
Nutrition coaching resources

The Essentials of Sport and Exercise Nutrition As an author of this book, Im obviously biased. But I have to say it: If you work with clients in the area of exercise and nutrition, this is a book you need to read. Ryan Andrews and I produced this 500-page academic textbook because, frankly, nothing like it existed. There are over a dozen different elds of study involved in body transformation, from molecular biology, to food science, to behavioural psychology (to name just a few). Ive spent most of my academic and professional careers trying to synthesize as many of those elds and ideas as possible. This text is the result, and its the text I wish Id had when I started my own training.
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About The Authors

About Dr John Berardi
For the last 3 years, Dr. Berardi has been the director of the worlds largest body transformation project. This one-of-a-kind fat loss coaching program has produced over 120,000 pounds of fat loss. Dr. Berardi has also coached hundreds of elite amateur and professional athletes. In the last two Winter Olympics alone, his athletes collected over 25 medals, 12 of them gold. He also serves as a high performance consultant for Nike. In addition to the athletes and recreational exercisers he coaches, Dr. Berardi recently created a mentorship program for tness, strength, and nutrition professionals. This train the trainers program has become widely regarded as the industrys top nutrition mentorship. For more about Dr. Berardi and his work, visit www.precisionnutrition.com.
About Dr Krista Scott-Dixon

A former university researcher and teacher in the eld of gender, work, and public health, Dr. Scott-Dixon now serves as the research director for the Healthy Food Bank foundation and the editor-in-chief of Spezzatino magazine the food magazine that really feeds people. Dr. Scott-Dixon has coached three cohorts of Precision Nutritions Lean Eating coaching program, and now designs and develops both the mens and womens body transformation programs. Passionate about womens tness since her own body transformation in the mid1990s, Dr. Scott-Dixon has run the extremely popular womens weight training and nutrition site www.stumptuous.com since 1997.
About Nate Green

Nate Green is the author of Built for Show and The Hero Handbook and has been featured in the LA Times, Mens Health, and Mens Fitness. Hes had over 100 articles published in print and online magazines and currently serves as a master storyteller for Precision Nutrition. In this role, he proles clients whove undergone major transformations, writes exercise and nutrition articles, and supervises the lesson and habit development for the Precision Nutrition Scrawny to Brawny coaching program. He blogs about working out, nutrition, lifestyle hacks, and other cool things at: www.thenategreenexperience.com.
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Intermittent Fasting Precision Nutrition 2

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Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

Copyright 2011 by Precision Nutrition Inc.

All About Intermittent Fasting, in Under 10 Minutes

Introduction Hi, My Name is John. And I Havent Eaten in 24 Hours.

Science or Fiction? Exploring the Benets of Intermittent Fasting

Why Do Intermittent Fasting?

Intermittent Fasting Review: Comparing the Popular IF Programs

The Weekly Fast: My First Intermittent Fasting Experiment

The Twice-Weekly Fast: When Things Go Horribly Wrong

The Daily Fast: Back on Track

Wrap-up, Results, and Lessons On Self-Experimentation

How To Do Intermittent Fasting: Cheat Sheet with Our 3 Favorite Protocols

Appendix B Resources About the Authors

Intermittent Fasting Tips & Tricks

All About Intermittent Fasting, in Under 10 Minutes

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

Hi, My Name is John. And I Havent Eaten in 24 Hours.

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

The one-day fasting experience

Eat a small snack before bed Drink 500 mL (2 cups) of water

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

WHAT TO LOOK OUT FOR

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

Science or Fiction? Exploring the Benets of Intermittent Fasting

When history meets research

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

Not so fast! (Sorry.)

NOTE FROM KRISTA: HOW RAMADAN GOT ME INTERESTED IN INTERMITTENT FASTING

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

IF IS OFTEN COMPARED WITH NORMAL EATING.

Inconclusive but interesting

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

IS IT THE FASTING OR IS IT THE NEGATIVE ENERGY BALANCE?

Precision Nutrition | www.precisionnutrition.com

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

Why Do Intermittent Fasting?

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Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

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Intermittent Fasting Review: Comparing the Popular IF Programs

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

Theme and variations

SHRINK THE EATING WINDOW; EXPAND THE FASTING WINDOW

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BALANCE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

KEEP IT REAL ON EXERCISE AND HUNGER

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

The Weekly Fast: My First Intermittent Fasting Experiment

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Experiment 1: The Weekly Fast

Treadmill sprints 10 minutes

Treadmill sprints 10 minutes

Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)

Moderate calorie intake (2500 kcal)

Fast until Monday morning (0 kcal)

Experiments with Intermittent Fasting