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John Berardi, PHD, CSCS

INTERMITTENT

FASTINGScience or Fiction?

Anti-Jet-Lag DietDr Charles Ehret

Argonne National Laboratory

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*normal breakfast time but in new time zone

Day 1Feast

Day 2Fast

Day 3Feast

Day 4Fast

Day 5 Travel

Breakfast High protein feastVery light meal or

nothingHigh protein feast

Very light meal or nothing

High protein feast*

Lunch High protein feastVery light meal or

nothingHigh protein feast

Very light meal or nothing

Normal meal

Dinner High carb feastVery light meal or

nothingHigh carb feast

Very light meal or nothing

Normal meal

Military Medicine, 2002(188 US National Guardsmen)

US to Korea - 7.5x less jet lagKorea to US - 16.2x less jet lag

Anti-Jet-Lag FastDr Clifford Saper

Beth Israel Medical Center

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*fasting should last at least 14 hours but can last as much as 24 hours

Day Of Travel Arrival

Breakfast NormalEat soon after landing,

as close to local meal timeas possible.

Lunch Normal Normal

DinnerFast before and especiallyduring the flight - but drink

lots of waterNormal

JB’s Travel Diet(unpublished)

*if traveling, extend fast to about 20-24 hours and eat upon arrival

Day 1Strength

High

Day 2Condition

Low

Day 3Strength

High

Day 4Condition

Low

Day 5Strength

High

Day 6Condition

Low

Day 7OffLow

BreakfastGreen tea,

waterGreen tea,

waterGreen tea,

waterGreen tea,

waterGreen tea,

waterGreen tea,

waterGreen tea,

water

Lunch(post ex)

High calorie (P, C)

Low calorie(P, F)

High calorie (P, C)

Low calorie(P, F)

High calorie (P, C)

Low calorie(P, F)

Low calorie(P, F)

DinnerHigh calorie

(P, C)Low calorie

(P, F)High calorie

(P, C)Low calorie

(P, F)High calorie

(P, C)Low calorie

(P, F)Low calorie

(P, F)

*might have a snack in here somewhere

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STOP!(what ever happened to eating every 3 hours?)

Lowperformance

Road rage

FatigueNutrientdeficiency

Irritability

Muscle loss

Lowblood sugar

Highcortisol

The First Fast

Day Before Fasting Fasting Day

Breakfast Normal1000ml water w/greens

cup of green tea5g BCAA caps or powder

Lunch Normal1000ml water w/greens

cup of green tea5g BCAA caps or powder

Dinner Normal1000ml water w/greens

cup of green tea5g BCAA caps or powder

Snack at 10PMProtein and veggies

500ml waterProtein and veggies

500ml water

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KEY LESSONS

• Hunger is not an emergency

• Physical isn’t psychological hunger

• Eating is a privilege

• Eating is a responsibility

• Food marketing is powerful

The Research

BENEFITSReduced

• blood lipids (triglycerides and LDL)

• blood pressure (sympathetic/parasympathetic)

• inflammation (CRP, IL-6, TNF, BDNF, and more)

• oxidative stress (protein, lipid, and DNA damage)

• risk of cancer

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BENEFITSIncreased

• cell turnover and repair (called autophagocytosis)

• fat burning (fatty acid oxidation later in the fast)

• growth hormone (later in the fast)

• metabolic rate (later in the fast via epi/norepi)

BENEFITSImproved

• appetite control (PPY and ghrelin)

• blood sugar control (increasing insulin sensitivity)

• CV function (ischemic injury to the heart)

• chemotherapy (higher doses more frequently)

• neurogenesis/plasticity (neurotoxin protection)

Calorie Restriction?

Fasting?

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Popular IF Programs

Alternate Day (ADF)36h fast, 12h feed - every day

(eat every other day)

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Eat Stop Eatfull day fast - 1-2x days per week

(fast Sunday or Wednesday and Sunday)

Warrior Diet20h fast, 4h feed - every day

(eat at night, after workout, every day)

Leangains16h fast, 8h feed - every day

(fast until lunch every day)

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Meal Skippingskip breakfast/dinner - random

(sometimes skip a meal)

I’d NEVER try this stupid fasting crap!

My 6 Monthsof Fasting

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MY GOALS

• Try something new and different

• Lose 20 lb. of body weight

• Lost mostly body fat

• Support my training

• Feel good while “dieting”

• Stay healthy through the process

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Nate’s 6 Monthsof Fasting

GOALS

• gain 20 lb. in 4 weeks• lose 20 lb. in 5 days• gain 20 lb. in 1 day

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Day 1Strength

High Calorie and Carbs

Day 2Strength

High Calorie and Carbs

Day 3Condition

Moderate Calorie

Day 4Strength

High Calorie and Carbs

Day 5Strength

High Calorie and Carbs

Day 6Condition

Moderate Calorie

Day 7OFF

Full Day Fasting

3 Large Meals

Peri-Workout Nutrition

3 Large Meals

Peri-Workout Nutrition

3 Moderate Meals

3 Large Meals

Peri-Workout Nutrition

3 Large Meals

Peri-Workout Nutrition

3 Moderate Meals

Green Tea, Water, Greens,

BCAA

Before 170 lb. After 190 lb.

Erin’s Fasting Experiment

(and a cautionary tale for women)

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SummaryFasting is an option

(So, too, is frequent feeding)

WHO IT MIGHT BE FOR:• history of monitoring calories/food• experienced exerciser• single or have no children• extremely supportive partner• flexible job and lifestyle• low lifestyle stress• want athletic look, not to be huge

WHO IT’S MAYBE NOT FOR:• new to diet and exercise• married and have children• have performance oriented job• have client facing job• compete in elite sport/athletics• excessive lifestyle stressors• some women

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40

The end.

precisionnutrition.com

Intermittent Fasting: Can It Help You Get Leaner, Stronger, and Healthier? By John Berardi, PhD Do you remember when you decided to start “eating right?” Whether your goal was to lose fat, build muscle, or perform better, odds are you spent the first few weeks doing plenty of reading and asking a lot of questions. After hours of study and annoying the heck out of your fellow gym rats, you likely came away with what you thought were the basic rules of healthy eating: 5-7 small, nutritious meals a day, spread 2-3 hours apart. This stimulates the metabolism and over time turns our bodies into muscle building, fat burning machines. That’s the foundation. Or is it? Enter Intermittent Fasting An interesting practice called Intermittent Fasting is challenging everything we’ve been taught about eating to lose fat, build muscle, or improve health. What Is Intermittent Fasting? Intermittent fasting (IF) is the practice of occasionally going for extended periods without eating. While the name might suggest something complicated, it really isn’t, as we all do some form of IF every day, during sleep. In essence, the time between our last meal of the current day, and first meal of the next day, is our fasting period. IF proponents, however, advocate extending this normal overnight fast anywhere from a few hours to a full day (or more) to accelerate fat loss and improve health and well being.

Benefits of Intermittent Fasting

IF disciples argue that eating 5-6 times a day is inconvenient, unnecessary, and even counterproductive. They contend that going very long periods between feedings – up to 16 to 20 hours in some cases – stimulates some interesting physiological reactions, including:

• Faster fat loss • Easier to maintain low body fat levels • Better muscle gain, through a rebound effect • Improved appetite and blood sugar control • Reduced blood lipids, blood pressure, improved markers of inflammation, cardiovascular function, and oxidative stress. • Much less time spent prepping food. IF Best Practices? This might sound intriguing to busy folks with kids, commutes, and no time for extensive meal plans. But be careful. Increasingly, IF devotees have begun pushing their own spin on the IF process. Some of these tweaks are just minor modifications of the original plan, while others are major overhauls. To the fasting tire-kicker, this can be confusing and frustrating. So what are the Intermittent Fasting “best practices?” Unfortunately, none have been established yet. Because it’s so new and the research still in its infancy, it may be 5-10 years before IF becomes a mainstream nutritional idea. Until then, we’re forced to rely on anecdotal evidence, which is where this article will help -- by outlining and reviewing the popular IF programs, so you can choose the plan that’s right for you. The IF Programs

Alternate Day Fasting (36-hour fast/12-hour feed)

With this plan you simply eat every other day. So on Monday, you’d eat within a 12-hour window, say 8am to 8pm. Then you’d fast overnight on Monday, and all day/overnight on Tuesday. You’d eat again from 8am to 8pm on Wednesday.

While good food choices are encouraged, Alternate Day fasters are allowed to eat what they want on the non-fasting days.

Positives: Lots of flexibility in terms of food choices.

Negatives: 36-hour fast may be too long; not enough emphasis on healthy foods.

Meal Skipping (Random)

Some IF proponents believe we should behave like our ancestors did. As humans evolved to get their food randomly, so should we. This plan stresses Paleo-type food choices while randomly cycling daily calorie intake, along with skipping breakfast or dinner several days a week. This variation is a favorite of the Paleo crowd.

Positives: Emphasis on Paleo foods is very healthy.

Negatives: Randomness might not suit serious dieters who crave structure.

Eat Stop Eat (24-hour fast, one or two times per week)

On this plan, you fast for a full 24 hours once or twice per week, while eating sensibly the rest of the week. It’s flexible: You can choose whichever 24 hours you want. Want to fast from breakfast to breakfast? No problem. Prefer to fast dinner-to-dinner? Go ahead.

Positives: Lots of flexibility for when to fast.

Negatives: 24-hour fast may be too long, especially for exercisers.

Lean Gains (16-hour fast/8-hour feed)

This brand of fasting is based on an 8-hour feeding period followed by a 16-hour fast. However, it also has a few other rules. The diet should be high in protein, cycle carbohydrates, include fasted training, and should include eating the bulk of your calories during the post-exercise window.

For example, on this plan, you’d fast from 9pm on Monday night until 1pm Tuesday afternoon. If you’re going to exercise, you’d do so Tuesday afternoon, consuming 10g BCAAs (branched chain amino acids) before training.

Following training, you’d eat 2-3 meals before 9pm, with your biggest meal coming right after exercise. The fast begins again Tuesday evening until Wednesday at 1pm, and repeats every day.

Positives: The most “anabolic” of the programs, often leading to muscle gains while losing fat.

Negatives: Extremely structured and highly inflexible.

Warrior Diet (20-hour undereating/4-hour feed)

Not technically an intermittent fasting plan, it’s very close. On this plan you eat very lightly for the first 18-20 hours of each day, working out during this period of under eating. Then, you’d eat the majority of your daily intake within a 4-6 hour over feeding window. Most place their over feeding window at the end of the day as it’s more convenient for family dinners and after work training sessions.

Positives: Flexible with food choices, and an excellent option for practicing Muslims during Ramadan.

Negatives: Long-term sustainability is questionable.

Why the Variations?

As you can see, these protocols are all variations of a single theme. The length of your normal overnight fast is extended for a specific time while reducing the duration of the feeding window accordingly.

Why? Well, as mentioned earlier, some IF proponents believe that longer fasts enhance the health and disease-prevention benefits.

However, longer fasts also greatly increase the likelihood of lean body mass being sacrificed for energy, which no one wants. They may also negatively affect nutrient intake, as when you eat less food, you also eat fewer vitamins, minerals, and nutrients.

That’s why more physique-minded individuals tend to prefer shorter fasts (15-20 hours per day) that end in a workout, followed by an eating period of 4-9 hours. These shorter fasts offer the following benefits:

• The fasted workout can stimulate a physiological state similar to an extended fast.

• Eating most of your energy and nutrients in the post-exercise window can help with muscle recovery by taking advantage of nutrient timing. My Experiments With Intermittent Fasting I believe that while reading is nice, action is always better. Studying the various fasting protocols was intriguing, and while I still wasn’t convinced, my curiosity was piqued enough to decide to test them out -- on myself. Remember, I’m what you call a professional dieter. I’ve been testing different dietary protocols for over 20 years. I’d also recently set a new goal of returning to Masters level sprinting, which required I lose about 20 pounds off my already relatively lean (10% bodyfat) frame. I wanted to see whether IF would help me accomplish this goal easier than traditional dieting practices. I also wanted to see, as someone approaching 40, if this could be something I could maintain for life. The yo-yo pattern of bulking and cutting no longer appealed to me. Most importantly, I wanted to see first hand if this could be a viable option for busy clients who have trouble managing frequent feedings.

Experiment #1: The Weekly Fast (24 hour fast, once per week)

What I did: I made my first foray into fasting as simple as possible. I decided to fast one day per week, every Sunday.

I ate as I normally did – perhaps a bit less – on non-fast days, focusing on lean proteins, veggies, mixed nuts, fish oils, and legumes, with very little starch and sugar and two liters of water per day.

I also added an “eat whatever I want” Saturday, along with the Sunday fast day. Outcome: I lost 12 pounds of body weight in 8 weeks, starting at 190 pounds and ending at178 pounds. Observations: I found this very easy to do. The “eat anything day” set up the fast the following day nicely. I felt quite hungry during the fast day but got used to it. However, although my results were good, they weren’t better than what could be achieved through conventional dieting. Experiment 2: The Twice-Weekly Fast (24 hour fast, two times per week) What I did: To see if I would get faster results, I added a second day of fasting (Wednesday and Sunday).

Outcome: Within two weeks, my weight plummeted from 178 pounds to 171. I lost about four pounds of fat, but also three pounds of lean mass. Observations: Three pounds was way too much lean mass to lose! I ended up adding second “eat whatever” day each week, but all the yo-yoing grew tiresome. With fasting or feasting, more is not always better. Experiment #3: The Daily Fast (16-hour fast/8-hour feed)

What I did: I fasted daily, from dinner until about 1pm the following day. I broke the fast with 10g of BCAA’s followed by a workout, and then 2-3 meals. Twice a week I ate higher calorie, high carb meals, the other days were lower calorie, lower carb meals.

Outcome: Within the first four weeks my lean mass actually increased by about four pounds. Very impressive, considering my weekly calorie average was about the same. I also enjoyed great workouts and got stronger. Observations: It took me 14 days to get past the morning hunger pangs, but I soon felt better than ever. Unfortunately, adding lean mass was not what I wanted, so I adding another full day fast on Sunday. I finally settled on the 16/8 system Monday to Friday and a 20-4 system on the weekends. This was the sweet spot for me.

Summary of My Fasting Adventure Despite being a fasting skeptic, I consider my experiment with IF to be a success.

• I lost 20 lbs, dropping from 190 to 170 lbs. • I lost 6% body fat, from 10% to 4% • I lost minimal lean mass, and with some protocols got even stronger. • I’ve maintained those results for over four months.

Before Intermittent Fasting

After Intermittent Fasting

Cautionary Note As noted, Intermittent Fasting is very attractive for certain populations. Eating a good breakfast, much less eating healthy meals throughout the day, is a real challenge for many busy people. A system that allows eating less frequently while still building a lean, strong, healthy body sounds appealing. But just because you say you’re too busy to prepare food doesn’t mean IF is the best option for you. Based upon my hands-on experience, a good fit for IF should:

• Have a history of monitoring calorie/food intake. In other words, have “dieted” before. • Be used to dealing with cravings and, at times, extreme hunger. • Be legitimately too busy to eat and prepare small, frequent meals – not just too lazy or bored. • Understand how to make good food choices. • Be in a relatively low-stress world (single and no kids, or with a very supportive partner).

Granted, exceptions can always be made, but for those who don’t fit the above criteria, I suggest focusing on “the basics” more than anything. What Are The Nutrition Basics? The basics aren’t cool or sexy, and they don’t have a catchy-sounding name or websites filled with devoted followers. But they work, and have worked for thousands of people:

• Eating fresh, unprocessed, good quality food. Choosing bags over barcodes is a good start. • Eating slowly. It not only improves your enjoyment of eating, it helps control intake. Try putting your fork down between bites. • Eating reasonable portions. Whether it’s low carb, low fat, or IF, when calories are controlled, progress is made. Try keeping track of your food intake for just three days – the number of calories you’re really eating might surprise you. • Eating when you’re hungry, and not eating when you’re not. The next time you find yourself on the couch craving chips or crackers, ask yourself: “Am I hungry, or just bored?” • Exercise. Those who’ve won the fat loss war exercise regularly, usually a combination of resistance training and cardiovascular exercise. Trying to get in shape without it is a lost cause.

Fasting Summary I’ve seen a lot of fads come and go in my 20 years in the field. They all follow a similar pattern, starting as “underground diets” that gain popularity

quickly yet fizzle out once dieters realize they’re either unhealthy, unsustainable, or just less effective than simple healthy eating. But Intermittent Fasting is different. While not superior to the basics mentioned above, it certainly works. And for many folks, it’s a plan they can confidently follow with a high degree of compliancy -- which, in the end, is the most important thing of all. Want More? If you’re intrigued by Intermittent Fasting and would like to learn more, I’ve published a free e-book on the subject that goes into much greater depth called Experiments with Intermittent Fasting. In the book, I get into all the different fasting approaches I tried, including exercise programs and exact eating plans, so you can test-drive an Intermittent Fasting program you think might be right for you. About The Author

Dr. Berardi received his PhD in Exercise Physiology and Nutrient Biochemistry at the University of Western Ontario, Canada. He's currently an Adjunct Professor at Eastern Michigan University and the University of Texas.

As an elite nutrition coach and exercise physiologist, Dr. Berardi has coached hundreds of elite amateur and professional athletes. In fact, in the last two Winter Olympics alone, his athletes collected over 25 medals, 12 of them gold. In addition, he’s a high performance nutrition consultant for Nike and The Oregon Project.

Further, for the last 5 years, Dr. Berardi has acted as the director of the world's largest body transformation project. This one-of-a- kind fat loss coaching program has produced more total weight loss than all 12 seasons of The Biggest Loser combined.