The counterintuitive strategy of eating more to lose body fat
14 November 2005If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
I used to interview IFBB elite bodybuilders on their training and eating for a living and did this for years and years. One reoccurring theme that kept popping up when talk turned to diet/nutrition was how much food top bodybuilders packed away on a daily basis. On average they would eat between 6,000 to 10,000 calories a day in the off-season and pare that down to 3,000 to 5,000 calories per day prior to a competition. Amazingly, the mega-calories amounts were derived exclusively from low-fat protein sources and natural carbohydrates. You have to eat a hell of a lot of food, in terms of sheer volume, when all the calories are derived from 4-calorie per gram natural carbs and 4-calories per gram fat-free protein. It takes 1500 grams of 4-calorie per gram food to equate to six thousand calories; a pound is 450 grams so an average professional bodybuilder would eat over 14 pounds of food a day. Gary Strydom and Victor Richards both told me they ate 10,000 a day in the off-season. I remember one lunch with the late Sonny Schmidt when he ordered and ravenously consumed four steamed chicken, broccoli and rice dinners at a Chinese restaurant. He wasnt showing off, it was just another lunch on another day. Flex Wheeler was a smallish bodybuilder by IFBB standards but he would eat 15 to 18 chicken breasts per day. These men wanted to become as large as possible in the off-season (without going over 10-12% body fat percentile) then whittle down the enlarged off-season mass into an enlarged competition finished package. Using this method they would present an ever-larger final finished competitive physique: bigger in the off-season meant bigger (and leaner) at the competition.
El Sonbaty pushed his off-season bodyweight up to 330 and competed at 285. Yates weighed 300 in the off-season and competed at 260 so shredded his skin appeared translucent. Coleman weighs 330 to 340 in the off-season and competes at 290. These men taught their bodies how to handle continually greater amounts of calories without becoming fat. Contrast this with the typical obese person who eats one meal a day and adds body fat at the drop of a hat. I am working with crew of obese folks and having great success using modified bodybuilder eating tactics to help the obese lose body fat. The first order of business for the obese is to establish a multiple meal schedule. The obvious advantage to this strategy is it divides the daily calories in smaller chunks. I require the obese person to eat every three hours and this usually works out to five feedings a day. Secondly we insist they clean up the food selections. Some foods are easily converted into body fat (sugar foods, manmade foods and saturated fat) and some foods are near impossible for the body to convert into fat (lean protein, fibrous carbohydrates.) The bodys metabolism kicks into high gear to digest protein and fiber creates what is called the thermogenic effect of food. Body temperature actually increases when the digestive system is faced with the daunting task of breaking down hard to digest protein and fiber.
Multiple meals allow the body to deal with fewer calories at any one sitting and the repeated practice of eating 5-6 meals a day teaches the body to become adept at digesting and distributing food. Better to eat 3,000 clean calories a day divided into six five hundred-calorie daily meals than one 1,500 calorie mega-dirty fast-food meal. The results are astounding when the obese buy into the approach. I have one male who has lost 40-pounds of bodyweight in 40 days while simultaneously adding 12-pounds of muscle. He started at 240 and yesterday he weighed 200. This is far more impressive because didnt lose muscle in the process, he added muscle in the process. On day I he deadlifted 75-pounds for 10-reps and on day forty he pulled 275-pounds for 10. This was no ex-jock loaded with muscle memory; this is a 48-year old man with zero weight training experience. Obese folks who slash calories end up losing as much fat as muscle and end up as miniaturized versions of the old fat selves. My modified bodybuilder approach melts fat while simultaneously adding muscle: the obese person eats more and as a direct result feels energized and vibrant during the process. Contrast this with the calorie slasher who feels deprived, denied and continually on the verge of a binge. A person who eats wholesome foods every three hours is far less likely to binge and blow their diet than some poor obese person subsisting on 1200 calories a day. The calorie starved obese individual has set their caloric ceiling set so low that eating a candy bar or a bowl of ice cream causes them to add five pounds in 24-hours.
Adding functional muscle and building strength allows the obese person to become mobile and adept at climbing steps, getting out of a low chair and powering their bulk around. Compare this to the calorie slasher who actually weakens their already weak body. Those who depend on deprivation to trigger bodyweight loss weaken the immune system and continually contract colds and sickness. Those who live on 1000 to 1500 calories a day live in a stressful psychological world of denial. A person who has elevated their metabolism and consumes 3,000 calories a day can absorb an occasional binge far, far better than a person starving; I allow my folks a cheat meal once a week: this allows them to feel psychologically free. The interesting thing about the cheat meal (not cheat day cheat meal) is that by being good the other 6 7/8s of the time the sweets, fat and junk they crave and might eat are rejected by the body and classically results in diarrhea. I have five obese folks I currently work with and all are experiencing similarly spectacular results: all are losing unhealthy fat while building functional muscle and eating more food than they did before they commenced the process. This counterintuitive approach eat more to lose fat was torn right out of the playbook of champion bodybuilders and can be used to great effect by anyone interested in losing fat while adding muscle.
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