so i know we're all trying to figure out the best possible way to manage this health and fitness stuff. the conclusion that i've come to is that fasting is NOT worthwhile for most of us here. people like cole, the snake diet guy, who have been lifting for years and are basically at their genetic potential for muscle mass, may benefit from fasting. their bodies are maybe so used to having lean mass that they're more likely to hold on to that stuff? people who have never lifted in their lives may benefit from fasting too, as a means of cutting down before beginning a lean bulk phase.
me: female, < 1yr spent training, 6ish months of largely unintentional bulking. my highest weight was around 139lbs. as of right now i am 135.2lbs, and i followed a fasting routine for 2 weeks to get here.
basically i had 3 36+ hour fasts each week, and ate a ton on training days. on one of those days i have 4000kcal recorded. so i fasted 6 times in the past 2 weeks.
my legs and butt are visibly smaller, and all of my main lifts dropped somewhat dramatically.
max 5 rep squat dropped 12.5lbs max 5 rep hip thrust dropped 30lbs max 5 rep deadlift dropped 20lbs
i regret ever trying to fast, and feel like most of the weight i lost was muscle. after this failed experiment, i will be switching to a basic bitch cut of x many kcal each day.
has anyone else had any experiences with fasting? particularly people that aren't exactly brand new to the gym, but also have not reached their genetic potential? would be curious to hear about other's experiences with fasting. a dramatic loss of strength is not at all worth the -4lbs the scale shows...
Fasting was beneficial to me in that it taught me what actual hunger is and how much food I need.
I used it to drop 20lb. I now eat breakfast again and I’ve dropped another 15lb. As someone who is active (boxing and a physical job) fasting was just too hard.
Carter Johnson
did you notice any loss of strength or muscle mass while fasting? how long did you fast to lose the 20lbs?
male/female?
Adrian Thompson
post pics and i'll help
Charles Wright
help with what? how?
do i need your help for some reason?
Nathaniel Fisher
yes >has anyone else had any experiences with fasting? particularly people that aren't exactly brand new to the gym, but also have not reached their genetic potential? would be curious to hear about other's experiences with fasting. a dramatic loss of strength is not at all worth the -4lbs the scale shows...
Joshua Ross
>i fasting for no good reason and did it the wrong way and fucked up kys
Jaxson Harris
:)
wanting people to share their experiences so we might all learn something isn't quite the same as asking for help. if you have something to add to the discussion i'd love to hear it.
?
Parker Morales
Wow, the snack industry is really hurting
Zachary Nguyen
I have been fasting for the better part of 10 years. I'm not being hyperbolic when I say that it's the single greatest tool I've come across in terms of fitness and weight management. And it has been incredibly successful in me helping get fatasses not so planetary.
My contention with your post is that you were deliberately restricting your diet quite extensively putting stress on the glycogen storage system and then acting all surprised when your lifts dropped? You FEEL like the mass you lost was all muscle? Based on what? your feelings? Did you have any body composition measurements going into it and out of it? Of course your lifts went down. You were limiting your energy supply. I'm sorry to go all misogynistic here, but it's clearly evident you're a woman on account of your feelings and not cold hard data.
And you've only done this 2 weeks. Professional athletes who's very livlihood depends on their performance are seeing transition periods of 6 months or more. but two weeks and you're already throwing out the towel. More evidence of the internal genitalia.
Put bluntly, you're not a hamplanet regardless of what your super model ideation body dysmorphia complex tells you, and you therefore should not be using so much fasting. One day of fasting a week is more than enough to trigger significant body composition changes over the long term. And possibly two days of fasting if you want to see more quick changes. The only people who need to go longer than a day are hamplanets who have plenty of fat to burn through. Otherwise you need to eat big to get big.
Food for muscles, fasting for fat. It's literally so easy a woman should be able to get this.
Zachary Jones
stupid sexist bullshit aside, i'm glad you made this post. i should have measured things before going into it, and only decided to measure my thighs, waist, and butt after i noticed they were shrinking dramatically. the reason i fasted like i did was because of the plan outlined in this video: youtube.com/watch?v=I6s-n6AxeJI
fasting one day each week seems like an interesting way to lose weight. at this point i'm really kind of turned off to the idea of fasting though. i felt so miserable while doing it.
is running liver glycogen stores down to zero not the point of fasting for fat loss? i expected my lifts to go down some, but in 2 weeks i lost literally months of progress. that's a bit extreme.
to my mind, fasting can be a great weight loss tool. maximizes fat loss in a short period, but at a very high cost of lean mass.
Ryan Ramirez
>cole snake vid >immediately disregarded You're a fucking moron for listening to that drivel. The guy literally thinks fasting cures aids and vaccines are causing autism. He needs to be dragged out behind a barn and shot in the head to eliminate the possibility of him spreading his genes.
> but at a very high cost of lean mass. you mean the exact opposite of what clinicians are seeing and researchers have documented?
Wyatt Wood
As this poster said, when you diet you lose a little bit of strength. You will quickly gain it back after the diet. This is especially true for squats and deadlifts.
>my legs and butt are visibly smaller You look smaller on a diet because your muscles have less glycogen.
Landon Young
Male. No loss of strength. I’ve been going the gym/boxing for years. Just always had a poor diet. Weight loss took about 6 months.
Colton Nguyen
>You're a fucking moron for listening to that drivel. The guy literally thinks fasting cures aids and vaccines are causing autism. He needs to be dragged out behind a barn and shot in the head to eliminate the possibility of him spreading his genes. yeah he is clearly an idiot, but the fasting stuff made sense to me when thinking about it from an evolutionary standpoint. and, besides...
>you mean the exact opposite of what clinicians are seeing and researchers have documented? even you have bought into it.
going from 285lb hip thrusts down to 255lbs (and seriously struggling to move that weight) seems like a little more than a little bit of strength loss. 255 used to be downright easy. i hope you're right, about the strength coming back quickly. not sure how possible that will really be on a cut though.
interesting. could it be that high(er) testosterone levels make fasting more viable for men than women? kinda makes sense that test would make a body hold onto the good lean mass longer
Justin Walker
Running glycogen down has no significant added benefit to weight loss other than losing the associative water weight. It can be helpful in individuals who have symptoms of metabolic syndrome such as: elevated insulin, insulin resistance, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, etc.
You lost month of progress because your muscles didn't have the energy to continue to perform at the same level. You're not adapted aerobically to the new energy paradigm you're trying to force your muscles into. Your muscles are used to having plenty of free floating energy sitting around and the ability to just aerobically ferment sugars for hard fast energy. Transitioning to a condition where there's enough mitochondria around to supplement the limited availbility of fermentable sugars with oxphos can take months of training.
For some data, When I take psychedelics I fast for 3 or 4 days leading up to the experience. I only do cardio in a fasted state and so there's a lot of cardio in those days and I end up glycogen depleted. I can lose as much as 90lbs off a maximum effort in this state even though I'm plenty well adapted to my ketogenic diet after this entire time. But as soon as I refeed and everything goes back to normal that capacity comes back.
Henry Perry
It will come back quickly after the cut. That's the key. Right after you cut do a quick linear progression program. See you lifts shoot back up.
Brandon Lewis
>even you have bought into it. No, I haven't bought into it.
I train fatties with fasting. It's the only major tool I use in curing them of their fucking habits and it works. And I regularly fast for two weeks at a time with them for "moral support". Yes my lifts go to shit. But as soon as I refeed I go back to EXACTLY where I was at before the fast.
Brandon Reed
i was under the impression that depleting glycogen was the way to force your body into ketosis, to start burning up fat right away.
today is day 2 of my last "refeed" and my lifts are still awful. it took every ounce of determination i had to finish my lifts and now i feel fucking exhausted and dead.
suppose maybe that's because i've only eaten 1700kcal today, and that includes my post-workout meal.
well that will be months from now. at this point i'm just hoping my pathetic lifts don't go down anymore as i get through this cut lol :)
maybe you're one of those people who've hit their genetic potential? after so many years of lifting your body is maybe just used to being lean mass and it's easier to get it back there.
who knows, though.
Nolan Gray
>i was under the impression that depleting glycogen was the way to force your body into ketosis, to start burning up fat right away. It does speed along the transition into a ketogenic state, but it doesn't speed up weight loss any faster. The idea that it speeds up weight loss is from the associated water weight. Glycogen requires sodium to be stored away, and with that sodium is a certain amount of water to maintain isotonic levels. Quickly depleting glycogen will release that sodium and water which you will eliminate through urine. This typically amounts to about 3-4 lbs of water but it will come right back as soon as you refeed.
Your lifts are still awful after your refeed because you tore your shit up trying to do maximum or near max efforts in a memtabolically depressed state. You were restricting nutrition and energy at the same time as you were causing trauma and injury to the muscle. Did you even stop to think that this might actually hinder your progress and even make you regress?
In a fasted state being not adapted you shouldn't be going for maximum efforts or even heavy lifts on a regular basis. You aren't providing enough energy for repairs and you're just piling up the metabolic stress on top of more stress. If you must lift in a fasted state, then de-load by as much as 50%. There's nothing wrong with that at all. I have no problem going into the gym and doing sets of lmao1plate!! bench in a deep fasted state. I don't have the energy to rebuild so why fuck my shit up.
The problem isn't that fasting "destroyed" your lifts and progress. the problem is that you decided to take an easy way out to lose some fat without putting any real consideration into the implications and metabolic stress that you'd be subjecting your body to, and now you're facing the repercussions of your ignorantly made decision to fast.
Jeremiah Sanchez
>the problem is that you decided to take an easy way out to lose some fat without putting any real consideration into the implications and metabolic stress that you'd be subjecting your body to, and now you're facing the repercussions of your ignorantly made decision to fast. Dropping some hard hitting truth up in this shit.
How come you don't post as frequently in the /fast/ generals any more? I really miss your intelligent and down to earth advice there.
Kayden Wright
Listen here little baby. You're gonna get a lot of hurtful and degrading comments, but that ain't what I'm about. Let me just say, you are perfect the way you are. You hear me sugar? PERFECT. Don't ever change. You deserve anything and everything you want. Stay safe for me, baby girl.
>mfw thinking of you hurting
Brody Bennett
>How come you don't post as frequently in the /fast/ generals any more? I really miss your intelligents and down to earth advice there. Because of the culture of doing dangerous extended fasts of insane duration with a circle jerk effort to minimize the associated risks without any real eye to establishing a long term training program to develop and maintain a lean base to maximize health and basal energy demand.
Landon Watson
go to /fast a new thread about "muh experience" doesn't add shit and you are wrong why the way, been doing omad and lost 20kg in the last 4 months. now fuck off.
Blake Carter
>i felt so miserable while doing it. that's called discipline faggot
James Lopez
>me: female Opinion discarded
Robert Turner
Okay. So for someone like me, a normal girl who isn’t fat but has some fat to lose (and does not have body dysmorphia), you think fasting one day a week is the way to go.
When doing just a normal cut, do we still need to dramatically deload? What is the best way to lose fat without losing even more muscle?
Robert Richardson
OMAD
Joseph White
Fasting is literal torture and is a punishment.
Daniel Davis
This /thread
Logan Williams
tell me about your "genetics" now user
Ryan Anderson
This is correct, all exercise is torture and punishment.
Joseph Morales
dat fucking book cover
correct, discipline is literal torture and is a punishment. let's go to McDonalds tehee ~
Julian Davis
I don't advocate for a so-called "normal" cut. Or even calorie restriction. Metabolically healthy people who make intelligent healthful decisions about their dietary choices and eat to satiety generally don't overeat when they only eat when hungry.
Carefully read. and re-read that statement.
>People who are metabolically healthy: and have no insulin resistance. No elevated blood pressure, cholesterol etc. >Intelligent choices about diet: No processed foods, lots of veggies for fiber, variety of meats and fats. >eating to satiety: triggering the satiety response causes a hormonal cascade that has a LOT of power over your perceived hunger.
>do you think fasting one day a week is the way to go? Absolutely. It restricts a shitload of calories from your weekly total while not significantly impacting your performance and ability to heal and restore from exercise related stress.
It really is as simple as "Food for muscles; fast for fat". If you're not making the strength gains you want then you need to be eating more and stressing those muscles hardcore. If you have fat to get rid of then fast. If one day a week isn't cutting it then add in another NON-CONSECUTIVE day of fasting in during the week as well.
By following this schedule you'lll get the best of both worlds. The ability to eat big and encourage muscle growth, while at the same time limiting fat accumulation. You also get the benefit of not having to fuck around with calorie counting. Personally I only count protein. fuck calories, I'll take care of my abs with fasting I like my food too much to worry about limiting myself.
Anthony Watson
>fuck calories
Samuel Jackson
unironically this or at least 16/8 IF or lower.
Logan Ramirez
No matter how you slice it, aiming to lose fat/weight is a catabolic process while trying to build strength and/or muscle is an anabolic process. These are conflicting goals. It's possible to do both at the same time to some extend if you take a moderate approach. Fasting is NOT a moderate approach. It is an extreme approach. Of course there are many ways to fast and some are more extreme than others. The way you did it (36 hours 3/w) is absolutely on the extreme end of things, and as such you can expect nothing but a drop in strength, muscle BUT also bodyfat.
By the way, eating 4k calories as a small woman in a single day while fasting other days borders on eating disorder territory. Seriously. And this practice has probably limited fat loss quite a bit.
I'm not opposed to fasting, I've done it myself in the past. But what you did wasn't very clever. Still, cool to see a fit related post for once and it's always interested to hear people's experiences.
