There are shady characters in every industry, but it’s seemingly within the nutrition and supplement industry where the shadiest of shady characters reside.
How else to explain an industry where (celebrity) doctors cut their ties to integrity and shill the miraculous fat loss properties of Raspberry ketones?
Or where some of the product descriptions on the backside of a bottle or package resemble that of a science-fiction movie?
Like this one for example:
“The World’s strongest vaso-anabolic psychoactive experience. Our secret cellular volumizing formula is patented to nanomolecularize your vascular expanders.”
For those scratching their heads, in supplement speak, I’m pretty sure “nanomolecularize” means you’ll cause an earthquake when you flex your pecs.
Or you suddenly gain the ability to fly.
I don’t know, something will happen.
Whatever the case may be, now, more than ever, with all the varying pills, powders, and diets being “sold” to us as the next great thing, we need someone we can trust to cut through the BS and help filter through the phony facade.
We need someone to serve as the “shadiness police.”
My friends at Examine.com have just launched their new and vastly updated Examine.2.0. They’ve built an amazing resource; one that’s hands-down THE most extensive, thorough, and UN-BIASED tool at our disposal as fitness/health professionals (or people who are generally more curious and proactive with their health information).
They stick to their lane – cute kitty pictures analyzing research information – and that’s it.
No fluff
No opinions
No up-sells
No BS
If one of my clients or athletes walks in and asks about Keto, creatine, vitamin D, caffeine, or whether or not Deer Antler Root dipped in Unicorn tears harvested from a remote mountain range in Minas Tirith is worth trying…I can usually provide a competent, well-informed answer.
However, if I ever get stumped – which definitely happens – I can gather all the information I’d ever need from Examine 2.0.
And I know it’ll be the most recent, relevant, and scientifically peer-reviewed information out there.
What’s more, they include monthly updates and they also provide CEUs for American RDs, NASM, as well as the NSCA.
Starting today (through 8/25) you can take advantage of their re-launch sale:
Monthly Membership – usually $29/month will be $19/month
Yearly Membership – usually $199/year will be $144/year
The fitness/health community isn’t much different than every other community out there.
It’s just as “tribal” as the next.
There are factions who feel that heavy back squats cure everything (except herpes1) and that not including them in a program is sacrilegious and that it’s impossible to add muscle or get stronger without them.
And at the opposite end of the spectrum there are those who think if you even look at a barbell you’ll turn into He-Man.
The same dichotomy plays out in the nutrition realm as well. One week dietary fat is the enemy, and the next you’re the spawn of Satan if you offer someone a Diet Coke.
In both cases many are failing to recognize that the key to long-term progress, and progress that sticks, is the concept of focusing on PRINCIPLES.
In order to lose weight you need to elicit a caloric deficit. There are myriad ways to to do so.
In order to gain muscle you need to elicit progressive overload. Squats. There are myriad ways to do so.
In today’s guest post via Michigan based trainer, Alex McBrairty (whom you may recall from THIS spectacular read), he elaborates more on this concept.
The Future of Fitness: Principle Based Coaching vs. Plan Based Coaching
The fitness industry is failing.
After a decade of working as a fitness professional, I see firsthand how many of the most popular products and programs leave people worse off—with the only benefits going to the people selling the products and services.
But I believe this is changing.
Slowly, a new approach to fitness is emerging. It’s one based in sound reason, eliminating the need for marketing gimmicks and fads. It’s called principle-based coaching.
Principle-based fitness coaching uses practices and strategies informed by first principles—ideas, concepts, and information that we know to be objectively true. The most base layer knowledge; Ideas and insights from psychology, human physiology, nutrition, and exercise science.
It’s the type of information that most traditional fitness plans cherry-pick to sell their particular spin on fitness.
Paleo tries to limit processed foods.
Keto tries to limit carbohydrate intake.
In reality, both of these diets work because they limit calorie intake.
The first principle being applied in both cases is calorie management. To lose weight you need to eat fewer calories than you’re expending. Both of those diets approach this problem in a different, hyper-focused way.
This more traditional style of coaching is called plan-based fitness coaching. Plan-based coaching, as the name suggests, uses specific plans to help users see the intended results. The main pitfall of plan-based coaching is the extra leap these plans take to reach their conclusions.
Plan-based coaching takes the objective facts of first principles and then makes additional assumptions about them to reach different conclusions.
If calorie management is the first principle, a Paleo plan jumps to the conclusion that processed foods are the reason you overeat.
A Keto plan jumps to the conclusion that carbohydrates are the reason you overeat.
Plan-based coaches make unverified claims to leap from first principles to their principles.
This results in fitness plans that are rigid, inflexible, and disconnected.
For someone following a Paleo or Keto (or other) plan, there is a rigid structure for selecting which foods are “good” or “bad.” This leads to a lot of black and white thinking.
“Good” Paleo foods are unprocessed, whole foods that our caveman ancestors consumed before agriculture. “Bad” Paleo foods are foods we didn’t begin to consume until we began to grow our own crops, including anything processed and produced in the modern era.
“Good” Keto foods are foods that are low in carbohydrates. High-fat foods like butter, bacon, cheese, or red meat are green-lit. “Bad” Keto foods are anything with carbohydrates. Don’t even think about consuming bread or pasta. Even fruit is considered bad in the Keto plan.
In each of these plans there is no room for nuance. There is good and there is bad. Pick a side.
It’s because of this rigidity that these plans are inflexible and less effective for most people.
The plan pays no attention to the accessibility of the good foods. Say you want to follow a Paleo plan but live in a food desert, where access to fresh, natural foods is scarce or nonexistent. In this reality, how can you stick to the tenets of such a rigid diet?
Just try harder.
At least, that’s the prevailing advice. And it isn’t much help.
Imagine that you attend a dinner party where you’re excited to see your friends. The food offered is a spread of vegetables, a bit of meat, some potatoes, and a fruit pie for dessert. If you’re following a Keto plan, instead of enjoying the company of your friends and eating sensibly, you spend your evening upset that the only thing you can eat is the meat.
The specific rules of the diet force you into inflexible eating patterns, causing even more stress and deterioration in your relationship with food.
Because these plans are rigid and inflexible, they remain disconnected from the real lives of the people they attempt to serve.
They may be helpful for some individuals, but that list is very short. Plan-based coaching might help give people more direction and a clearer focus on how to achieve their goals, but it is a far cry from addressing the complexity of human lives.
Even worse, what happens if the assumptions of the plan are wrong?
What if cutting out carbohydrates leads to additional stress and strain in navigating our carb-rich world? You find yourself giving up your favorite foods, avoiding social events, and worrying about your diet all day, every day. What if, after all of that, you come to find that carbohydrates were not the real problem the whole time?
Would it have all been for nothing?
This isn’t just a risk of eliminating carbohydrates. It’s the inherent risk of following a plan that is rigid, inflexible, and disconnected. It’s the risk of any plan based on unverified claims, a plan not based in first principles.
Principle-based coaching results in a program that is adaptive, flexible, and integrative.
Unlike plan-based coaching, which builds on additional, unverified assumptions about what is true, principle-based coaching begins with all the base-layer information that is objectively true:
Ideas like calorie balance, progressive overload, and self-efficacy.
The principles allow coaches to evaluate what must be true in order to see results, and then gauge how the program can be adapted to the needs of the unique individual in front of them.
If two individuals need to improve their calorie management, the principle-based program does not limit one from enjoying carbohydrates while the other decides they’d prefer to eat fewer carbohydrates. Both can coexist and see great results.
Principle-based coaching does not put every individual in the same bucket, nor make the same assumptions about each.
This ability to mold the program specifics to the individual makes these programs adaptive.
Because the means of achieving the first principles is non-specific, they are also inherently flexible to changing circumstances.
If you live in a food desert, where access to fresh, natural foods is scarce or nonexistent, you are empowered to make alternative choices based on what’s available. Not only are you empowered to make these changes, but you can do so and see the same (if not better) level of success as following a rigid plan.
If individuals find themselves at a dinner party, a social event, or traveling across the country, they will be able to adjust the specifics of their plan—the particular foods they choose or the types of movement they do—in order to satisfy the first principles.
The ability to adjust strategy, without negatively impacting results, makes these programs flexible to changing life circumstances.
Since principle-based coaching adapts the program to the unique individual and inherently allows for flexibility in how to achieve optimal outcomes, these programs integrate very well into the lives of those who follow them.
No matter the goal or phase of life, because these programs are rooted in objective truths, they can be molded to meet the needs of the individual as those needs change over time.
Another advantage of the adaptability and flexibility of these programs is that they allow for greater adherence and consistency—two important variables for successful outcomes. Greater levels of adherence and consistency lead to better results, both in the short- and long-term.
Principle-based coaching allows individuals to integrate good behaviors into the fabric of their lives, ensuring permanent success.
Fitness programming began as a way to educate people on how to live healthier lives. As time went on, we began to realize it wasn’t working. As the fitness industry grew, so too did the obesity rates.
The solution was to begin making assumptions about what people were doing wrong.
That led to the plan-based model previously described. That model is the most pervasive model for fitness programming that we currently have. The result?
Obesity rates continue to climb.
As of 2018, over two-thirds of the U.S. Adult population was overweight or obese.
Clearly something isn’t working.
And that’s because education is not the problem.
Sure, most people could benefit from a little more information about healthy lifestyle practices, but not in the traditional way of what’s good versus bad. If we’re going to educate people, educate them in first principles.
Because what we need is more action.
We need people to learn how to practice healthier habits consistently, not sporadically. We need to eliminate the prejudice around good and “good enough.” We need to empower people to make change, even if their life circumstances are less than ideal.
We need fitness programs that are adaptive, flexible, and integrative.
We need principle-based fitness coaching.
About the Author
Alex McBrairty is an online fitness coach who owns A-Team Fitness in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Obese as a child and teenager, he blends fitness and psychology to help his clients discover their own hidden potential.
He has a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Michigan and is certified by the National Academy of Sports Medicine.
His articles have appeared in Breaking Muscle and The Personal Trainer Development Center, and he’s contributed to Muscle & Fitness, USA Today, Men’s Fitness, and Prevention.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of Minneapolis based personal trainer and nutrition coach, Megan Schall. Megan’s been a distance coaching client of mine for a number of years (I write her training programs), but is someone I’ve referred many other clients to when they have any nutritional needs or questions.
She’s an awesome coach.
I’m always excited when I can provide sound and accessible nutrition based content on the site and I think you will appreciate Megan’s down-to-Earth approach and tone.
A regimen of eating or drinking sparingly so as to reduce one’s weight
To eat according to prescribed rules
(Added by TG) Doing everything in one’s power not to throw their face into an ax after avoiding carbohydrates for a week.
I’m guessing for most people, hearing the word diet brings up thoughts of the latter two definitions (excluding Tony’s brief interlude) – eating and drinking according to certain rules and/or with the aim of losing weight.
And when you have goals relating to your health, wellness, physical performance, or aesthetic appearance, what you eat is certainly a key player.
It would seem that if following a certain diet is going to help you reach your goals, you’d be motivated and excited to hop on board, yes? Shouldn’t it be easy to stick to a diet, see results, and keep it up?
Um, no.
If you’ve ever followed (or attempted to follow) a diet before – whether that means eating or avoiding certain foods, counting calories, points, or other numbers-based programs, or eating according to a specific schedule, you’re probably well aware of the challenges that come up.
(Of course, some people will need to follow certain “diets” to manage conditions or diseases, or for ethical or religious preference – being gluten free if you have Celiac for example, or avoiding animal products etc. For the purpose of this blog post, I am NOT referring to these kinds of diets. There will always be exceptions to any rule!)
So, why do diets routinely fail to produce results? And what can you do instead?
In my view, diets are problematic for several reasons:
1. Diets Are Inherently Restrictive and Create a Deprivation Mindset
As I mentioned, the very definition of the word diet is to eat sparingly or according to rules – to restrict your eating.
When you create restrictions or try to follow a rigid plan, your brain is in a state of stress and anxiety.
And when your brain is feeling stress and anxiety, it’s not just an uncomfortable place to be, but it’s also extremely difficult to make or sustain change.
Plus, restrictions – and the stress and anxiety they produce – usually result in a feeling of deprivation. Which creates more stress and anxiety.
Have you ever had the experience of trying to avoid a certain food, only to find that all you’re doing is thinking about the food you’re supposed to avoid?
Your brain is in a negative feedback loop: Restrictions –> anxiety and stress –> deprived –> anxiety and stress etc.
When you’re caught in this negative head space, it’s a pretty miserable place to be. And being miserable does not bode well for forward progress or positive change.
2. Diets Take Away Your Autonomy
Diets are telling you what to do. No one likes to be told what to do. And when you are told what to do, what usually happens? You rebel and do the exact opposite.
Having a sense of autonomy and control over your choices is key when it comes to behavior change that lasts. Giving away your autonomy to a diet plan is almost always going to backfire in the long run.
Not only that, you’re essentially outsourcing your hunger and fullness cues and food enjoyment to your diet plan.
You’re letting a diet dictate what you eat or when you eat or how much you eat, and it’s easy to lose touch with what your body really wants and needs.
This often leads to less enjoyment of food and eating, and you may feel unsatisfied even if you’re consuming more than enough.
It’s a lose-lose situation.
3. Diets Are Unsustainable
I think we’ve established that there isn’t a lot of enjoyment in a diet. And when there is no enjoyment, there is no sustainable, lasting change.
You might be able to follow a diet for a certain period of time – and you might even see great results – but eventually the restriction, stress brain, and lack of autonomy is going to catch up with you.
The whole idea of being “on” or “off” a diet makes it clear that these approaches are not built for the long haul. They may provide a quick fix, but they’re not helping you create long-term strategies that last.
5. Diets Don’t Factor in Your Real Life
This is a big one that I think gets overlooked: Diets are not meant for the actual life you are living.
Diet plans might work when conditions are ideal – when you don’t have a lot of other stressors going on, when your life is fairly stable and routine, and when you can put a lot of energy and effort into it.
But this is not reality for most people most of the time. Not everyone has the luxury to be able to make free range kale smoothies made with organic acai berries grown using unicorn tears and almond milk harvested from Jesus’s belly button.
You have jobs and families and responsibilities and crises…and that’s on a good day!
Real life is not counting calories or macros. Real life is work lunches and dinners with friends and family barbeques and birthday parties.
Diet plans don’t tend to fit seamlessly into real life. And if something doesn’t fit naturally into your reality, it’s not going to last.
6. Diets Ignore Underlying Factors
Another important consideration that diets miss are the many underlying issues that prevent people from making better nutritional choices, or really just implementing any change in the first place.
For example, if you’re chronically sleep deprived, it’s going to be extremely difficult to make the choices you want to make around food and eating, or movement, or whatever else in your life.
If you’re unable to manage stress appropriately, it’s going to affect those choices as well (not to mention make it hard to get good sleep! Cue the vicious cycle).
Diets work on the assumption that these other key factors of your health and well-being are taken care of, but at least in my experience, that is rarely the case.
Just like you can’t out-exercise a poor diet, you can’t out-diet poor sleep or stress management.
Addressing the foundational principles of good health needs to happen first.
Ok. Diets Don’t Work. Now What?
Perhaps you’re wondering:
If diets don’t work, what am I supposed to do? What are my other options?
I’m so glad you asked!
In a nutshell: You want to find what works best for *you* and fits into *your real life*, by developing skills and strategies that you can implement consistently over time and adapt as needed.
Instead of relying on a diet plan to tell you what to do, you can learn how to create your own path by building your toolbox and practicing the steps that move you in the right direction.
Learning and practicing the skills you need to get you where you want to go will be far more valuable -and get you far better results – than following a set of strict rules ever will.
Instead of trying to follow a certain diet plan, you could practice eating more slowly and noticing your own hunger and fullness cues.
You could try noticing and naming other factors that affect your food choices (sleep, stress, exercise etc.), and see if making changes in those areas is an effective way to change your eating habits.
Instead of counting calories or macros or points, you could experiment with what portion sizes work for you, and learn how to adapt depending on your hunger, appetite, or activity levels.
You could take note of how different foods make you feel or perform, whether that’s in the gym, at work, or just life in general.
Instead of restricting foods, you could practice enjoying meals without feeling guilty or overeating.
Instead of following a meal plan, you could develop planning and prepping strategies that fit into your life – so you can create your own meal plans that adapt to life’s ups and downs.
Obviously, this all takes time and effort, and may feel like it will be way harder than being given a set of diet rules or a meal plan to follow.
But by making small changes over time, you can build the skills and strategies you need to make the best choices for you, your lifestyle, and your goals. (Hint hint: having a coach can come in handy!)
This approach is the opposite of an extreme diet: It’s sustainable, it gives you autonomy, it’s not restrictive or depriving, and it takes into consideration underlying issues and the context of your real life.
Ditch the diets.
Build skills that will last for the long-term.
Get results without hating life.
Dominate the world.
(Ok, I can’t guarantee that last one – but if it works…you’re welcome.)
About the Author
About the Author
Megan Schall is a certified nutrition coach and personal trainer located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Through her customized online nutrition coaching programs, Megan helps you clarify your goals and take action to address all aspects of well-being: nutrition, sleep, stress management, movement, mind-body awareness, and more. By building skills and routines that fit into your real life, Megan will help you make changes to your nutrition and self-care habits to meet your health and wellness goals and create sustainable, lasting results.
Do you recall a few years ago when (then) NYC Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, initiated a proposed ban on the sale of large-sized sugar-sweetened beverages such as sodas, sweetened teas and coffees, as well as energy and “fruit” drinks?
The Big Gulp Experiment
The idea was that by prohibiting restaurants, delis, sports arenas, movie theaters, and food carts from selling sugary beverages larger than 16 oz – with a hefty fine of $200 for failing to downsize – people would be less inclined to drink copious amounts of said beverages.
What’s more, they’d be healthier, happier, smile, and say “good morning” as they passed one another on the street2
It worked, right?
People stopped drinking those ginormous ‘Big Gulps’ and instead starting crushing almond milk kale smoothies laced with organic acai berries harvested from a unicorn’s rectum (<– I’ve been told they’re super delish).
Um, no…it didn’t work.
First: We’re talking about NYC here folks. A lovely city by most counts, full of diversity, sports, art, music, fashion, food, and an obsession with hip-hop loving dead Presidents.
Second: People in general, whether we’re referring to NYC or not, hate being told what they can and cannot do.
When this happens, we revolt.
Just look at teenagers. We tell them not to drink alcohol and not to have sex and we usually end up with more costly and less than ideal consequences.
In much the same way, the soda experiment didn’t work.
Consumption of sugary beverages DOUBLED!
Why?
It’s a topic I first heard a handful of years ago from Dr. Gnel Gabrielyan of Cornell University’s PHENOMENAL Food & Brand Lab.
In short, he brought up a litany of valid points with regards to our food biases and how (ir)rational we tend to be when it comes to the decisions we make.
Let’s just say the food industry is sneaky and shady as f*** when it comes to marketing their products. Portion distortion and how that interplays with recommended serving sizes comes to mind here.
Likewise, ever notice how many sugary cereals have their characters looking down?
Do you know why?
It’s to target the kids looking UP at the shelves. They feel the character on the box is looking at them.
“Tell your mom to buy me little Johnny. No, beg her. Fall to the ground and scream and flail your legs until she submits. Do it. DOOOOOOOOO It.”
I mean, talk about brilliant marketing.
However, one point I remember Dr. Gabrielyan highlighting – which I felt helped explained the phenomena of what happened during the soda experiment above (and why it failed so miserably) – is the concept of REACTANCE.
“Reactance is a motivational reaction to offers, persons, rules, or regulations that threaten or eliminate specific behavioral freedoms. Reactance occurs when a person feels that someone or something is taking away his or her choices or limiting the range of alternatives.”
Basically, you tell someone that they can’t do “x” or that they have to do “y,” and they’re going to get a little irritated.
Possibly punch you in the face. Who knows.
Framing
Another point Dr. Gabrielyan touched on was the idea of framing.
“The framing effect is an example of cognitive bias, in which people react to a particular choice in different ways depending on how it is presented; e.g. as a loss or as a gain.”
A quintessential example of framing would be the North Dakota Wine Experiment.
117 Diners; Pre-fix meal of $21.
All diners given the SAME wine, but with two labels. One marked “Wine from California” and one marked “Wine from North Dakota.”
Post Meal Measures: People rate “California Wine” as tasting better than “North Dakota” wine and believe that the food served with the California wine tastes better too.
How we “frame” a product or service can absolutely effect its perception by the consumer.
Priming
Another Jedi mind-trick to consider when attempting to change people’s perceptions or behaviors is the concept of priming.
“Priming is an implicit memory effect in which exposure to one stimulus (i.e., perceptual pattern) influences the response to another stimulus.”
While a bit sensationalistic, here’s a good example from the Will Smith movie, Focus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwS68ixemAQ
Another great example of priming people is a well-known grocery store study whereupon the premise was this: Can exposure to healthy samples lead to healthier shopping?
118 participants at a large grocery store.
Conditions: Apple sample, cookie sample, no sample.
Amount spent on fruits and vegetables then recorded.
No surprise: people receiving an apple sample spent more money on fruits and vegetables.
Note to self: Figure out ways to “prime” my wife into buying me an Xbox for Xmas this year.
Even cooler (and bringing this whole conversation full circle), another well-known and relevant study to bring to light is one where participants were given a carrot prior to sitting down to eat at a restaurant to see if it would increase the likelihood of them making “healthier” good choices.
It didn’t go quite as planned, because, as we learned above, people don’t like being told what to do, and more to the point, people like CHOICES.
Not many people accepted the carrot(s).
The next layer to the study was to then offer participants a choice of either a carrot or celery.
Ding, ding, ding…..success.
More participants grabbed a vegetable prior to sitting down to dinner and subsequently were “primed” to ingest more vegetables at dinner.
How Can We Frame & Prime Our Clients?
As personal trainers and coaches, anything we can do to set our clients up for a higher rate of success and enjoyment in their training, the better.
Some Suggestions
1) Allow your clients to choose their main lift of the day. Squats or deadlifts?
2) Allow them to choose the variation of the lift: Back Squat vs. Front Squat? Sumo Deadlift vs. Trap Bar Deadlift?
3) Allow them to choose their mode of exercise: Barbells only? Kettlebells? Maybe they dig Landmine exercises?
4) I often like to give my clients a window at the end of their training session to do whatever they heck they want. If they want to thrash their biceps, go for it. Add in some additional glute work? Go! Push the Prowler around (you psycho), have at it. Turkish get-ups dressed as He-Man? Whatever floats your boat, dude.
4) Here’s a cool trick I did with one of my female clients this week to “prime” her into lifting more weight. After a “top set” of deadlifts I was like “that looked awesome. Easy! Wanna maybe add 5-10 lbs and up the ante on your next set?”
I gave her the choice to stay put or go heavier. Either way it was a win, but she chose correctly…and added weight.
[Cue evil strength coach laugh here]
Giving your clients a sense of autonomy and control over their own training is a powerful tool in their long-term success.
Don’t get me wrong, you should still be the boss. They’ve entrusted you to coach them and write programming that best fits their needs and goals.
However, it’s never a bad thing to give them a little of what THEY want.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of United Kingdom based strength & nutrition coach, Harry Archer.
Harry wrote a popular article for the site a few weeks ago titled Why Tony’s Pecs Can Cut DiamondsWhy Gym Bros Should Periodize Their Nutrition that you can check out HERE.
He’s back with another edition of “Gym Bros Nutrition,” this time going into the weeds on caloric intake when attempting to put on muscle.
Math For Gym Bros: How to Set Up Calories For a Mass Gaining Phase
So you’ve decided to get jacked.
You, my friend, have made a very very excellent decision because let’s face it – being jacked is awesome.
Filling out T-shirts from the Traps/Shoulders/Chest down instead of gut-up, walking sideways through doors and generally having massive biceps – being Yoked is an awesome feeling.
Before you start eating everything in sight for the gains there’s a few things we need to go over to help you optimize your Massing phase.
Important things, like what to focus on to maximize your hypertrophic potentiation during your deliberate hyper-caloric overfeeding stage, and using individualized nutrition protocols to accrue muscle protein synthesis at a maximal rate of gain whilst preventing muscle protein breakdown and attenuating increases in adiposity.
Stuff like that.
How Many Calories?
You might have heard before that total calories are the most important variable for slabbing on some size.
It certainly helps, but total protein intake is actually the real MVP.
“Once individual protein requirements are met, energy content of the diet has the largest effect on body composition” – Rozenek et al, 2002.
See inadequate calorie intake doesn’t actually undermine muscle gain if protein is adequate. You can still gain size if your protein intake is on point EVEN IF you’re not eating enough calories (although this is less ideal)
Gaining muscle comes to the relationship between Muscle Protein Synthesis (MPS) vs Muscle Protein Breakdown (MPB). MPS is the process of building our muscle tissue, MPB is the process of breakdown muscle tissue.
Think of it like this:
MPS = good for gains
MPB = bad for gains
We wanna promote the muscle building process (MPS) and fend off breaking down muscle tissue as much as possible.
We can do this two ways:
Stimulate the shit out of Muscle Protein Synthesis via lifting weights
Stimulate MPS by eating enough Protein – namely, Leucine – often enough
Lifting weights is a pertinent stimulus for muscle protein synthesis. So let’s assume you’ve got training to a T – you’re doing all the big lifts, hitting that sweet progressive overload each week/month and generally being a badass.
(If you’re not, you really need to do something about that…HERE)
As your lifting is taken care of we need to look at stimulating MPS via your protein intake.
Muscle Protein Synthesis occurs on a cycle throughout your day:
You’ll stimulate it (by training & eating Protein)
You’ll get a “Muscle Full” effect after 1-2 hours
You’ll hit our Refractory Period after approx 2 hours
You’d then stimulate it again (by eating Protein)
So as you’re trying to keep MPS stimulated, and prevent gains catabolism, you need frequent protein feedings to keep MPS stimulated. You can do this by eating enough protein every 3-4 hours.
So What’s Enough Protein?
To optimize muscle gains we’re looking to create what’s called a “Muscle Full Effect” – this is where there’s enough protein to saturate the muscle tissue which helps it grow bigger.
Like all good things anabolism only lasts a short-time so we need to constantly stimulate it.
Now, you might be thinking “yeah but Harry, what if there’s still amino acids leftover, from our previous protein intake, can’t my body just use those to keep stimulating MPS for all eternity?”.
You’d think that would be a groovy thing to do, but unfortunately, it doesn’t work like that dude. We need a constant supply of Leucine and nitrogen to keep synthesizing new muscle tissue.
– REGULAR servings of protein — 4-6 “feeds” per day
– Meals 2-4 x 0.4-0.5g/kg (do the math = bodyweight in kg x 0.4 or 0.5)
– Post-exercise recovery shake 1-2 scoops
– Large Bolus before bed
So if you’re 80kg (<— Note from TG: ~175 lbs for us Americans)
You can realistically eat three meals per day, with a shake post-workout and a bolus before bed:
3 Meals of 0.4g/kg protein per meal = 0.4 x 80 x 3 = 100 (rounded)
2 Scoops PWO shake = 35g (+100)
1 Large Bolus = 30-40g (+135g)
= 165-175g protein per day, spread evenly throughout the day (as above).
Calories, FTW
Once protein intake is sorted, it’s ideal if we’re eating in a calorie surplus.
WTF is a calorie surplus?
A calorie surplus is the principle of consuming a certain amount of calories above your maintenance calories.
See, a calorie surplus is what huge biceps are for Instagram likes – the most important thing ever.
This is a period of deliberate overfeeding of our body (aka Massing or Bulking or Getting Swole), coupled with resistance training, in order to optimally synthesize muscle tissue growth.
Whyyyyyyyy?
‘Cos it’s the best chance you have of off-setting muscle protein breakdown of course.
A surplus is one of the most effective ways to off-set muscle protein breakdown because you literally have enough calories to make sure muscle protein breakdown doesn’t happen.
Eating above your maintenance caloric intake is how you’re going to get the most out of your time building muscle mass.
I mean sure, whilst you could build lean muscle tissue in a deficit (eating less than you expend), or in maintenance (maintaining bodyweight), you’re just going to build more mass, quicker, AND have a higher overall potential growth rate if you eat in a mild surplus.
Which is the goal right?
Synthesize as much new muscle tissue (whilst keeping fat gain to a relative minimum preferably) as your body will allow you to.
Calculating the Gains
To grow new muscle tissue it’s best practice to eat in a surplus.
24 x body-weight in kilograms (bw/kg) = Maintenance
Men expend approximately 1 calorie per kilogram of bodyweight per hour (24 hours in a day)
Step 2: Figuring Out Activity Level Demands:
Sedentary (little or no exercise) Maintenance x 1.15
Mostly Sedentary (office work + 3-6 days of lifting) Maintenance x 1.35
Lightly Active (Active job + 3-6 days of lifting) Maintenance x 1.55
Highly Active (Super Active job + 3-6 days of lifting) Maintenance x 1.75
This gives you an idea of how your activity level influences your maintenance weight.
*MAC Method for Calculating Energy Intake, Martin MacDonald.
Adding In Mass Phase Calories
Now we’d need to add in a surplus.
This will depend where you’re at as to what kind of surplus is necessary for you to start bulking on. All listed are calculated based on monthly bodyweight gains.
New lifter = 2% per month (>6 month of lifting)
Novice = 1.5% (Progresses training loads weekly)
Intermediate = 1% (Progresses training loads monthly)
Advanced = 0.5% (Progresses over multiple months/years)
To calculate growth rates:
Target Rate of Gain: Recommended (as above) * Body-weight in KG
g. Intermediate Lifter, 80kg bw x 1% = 0.8kg per month
(Bear in mind, it takes approximately 2500 calories to gain 0.45kg muscle tissue (1lb) and we’d be looking at that over a month).
Putting It Together
Let’s say you weigh 80kg (or 175 lb for the ONLY country in the galaxy that doesn’t use the metric system).
You’re an intermediate lifter, you’ve been lifting 5x per week in your home gym, but you’ve got a sedentary job due to being sat on your ass on Zoom now because a global pandemic forced you to work from home.
Step 3: Total Calories – Protein + Fat Calories = 2637 – 1495 = 1142/4 (4 cals/g Carbs)
Step 4: Carbohydrate Calories = 285g (what’s left after you’ve accounted for Protein + Fat)
So all putting that altogether, you’d start with:
Calories: 2796
Protein: 176g
Carbs: 285g
Fats: 87g
This is based on recommendations for protein intake, maintenance calories, activity level and surplus based on desired rate of gains.
It’s worth mentioning that initial calculations are….guidelines.
Energy balance is fluid, as our energy intake and expenditure usually fluctuates every day, however, it’s a useful starting point.
We’d usually monitor progress variables and make changes off of that data anyway.
So figure out what you need using the step by step formula (or have someone do it for you), and track bodyweight changes over the month so see how you’re getting on vs desired rates of gains.
You can change and adjust every 2-4 weeks, depending on growth rates/activity level.
About the Author
Harry Archer is a Strength and Nutrition Coach based in Bedford, UK.
Having worked in the fitness industry for nearly a decade, he’s worked in commercial gyms, private gyms, performance gyms, health clinics and more recently online (thanks COVID), with a variety of clients, ranging from helping the John’s from Project Management get Jacked With Abs, to coaching Strength-Sport performance athletes attempting World Records.
He’s usually happiest when lifting and eating, and when thinking about lifting and eating. Follow him on his Insta HERE.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of Minneapolis based nutrition coach, Megan Schall.
Megan contributed a guest post to the site a few weeks ago that ended up being very popular, and today she’s back with another gem that I feel can help a lot of people.
Nutrition can be a highly confusing and convoluted topic to write about. Countless books have been written saying fat is the enemy; no, protein is; oh, wait, actually, it’s carbohydrates. May you forever be sequestered to the depths of Mordor for having the audacity of partaking in an apple.
Asshole.
Facetiousness aside, Megan has a unique ability of recognizing that it is a mess out there, that information is uncannily biased (book sales over common sense!), and that, more often than not, it’s the simple things that most people need to focus on.
Spoiler Alert: This blog post is *not* going to be about how you must never eat bananas or how, if you stop eating after 6pm, all your dreams will come true (although, if either of those things are working for you – that’s cool! Keep doing your thing!)
This one trick is going to sound stupidly simple and maybe even too good to be true. It’s something you can do anywhere, with any food, and it costs zero dollars.
What’s the secret?
Eat slowly.
Yes, you read that right. It may not be sexy but slowing down when/how you eat can be a complete game changer.
If you’re thinking this sounds a little too simplistic or basic to be of any real use, I get it. But before you close this tab and go back to watching hilarious goat videos, let’s break down some of the reason why this works:
1. Eating Slowly Helps You Register Your Hunger and Fullness Cues
You’ve probably heard it takes about 20 minutes for your brain to register that you’re full.
When you take your time and eat more slowly, you give yourself a chance to actually feel when you’re no longer hungry vs. wolfing down everything on your plate.
If you eat super fast, it’s very easy to eat more food than you need.
Taking your time to relax, breathe, and chew your food well helps turn down the stress and activate your ‘rest and digest’ state. This means you’ll not only taste and enjoy your food more, but you’ll also experience better digestion.
Win-win!
3. Eating Slowly Can Improve Your Food Choices.
When you slow down and really savor your food, you can pay more attention to the taste and texture.
Try eating a processed “food-like” item slowly and mindfully and you’ll likely find it to be rather disgusting. Or you may discover certain foods make you feel not so great, while others leave you feeling like a rock star. That oatmeal you’ve been eating for breakfast for the last ten years? You might discover that you actually kind of hate it (true story from one oatmeal hating client).
4. Eating Slowly Can Be Done In Any Situation Involving Food3
You don’t have to follow a certain meal plan or eating window or count points or macros.
Whether you’re alone or in a group, you can eat slowly.
If you’re eating out (remember when we did that?) you can eat slowly. If you’re at home or traveling or eating while you’re working or driving, you can still eat slowly (although maybe try not to eat while driving).
But How?
Now that we’ve established that eating slowly is a good thing, how do you actually go about it? While eating slowly is a simple thing to do, that doesn’t mean it’s easy – a deadlift is a simple motion but takes a lot of practice and is always a work in progress.
Eating slowly is no different.
If you don’t believe me, I’ll challenge you to try a little experiment: At your next meal, start a timer. Eat normally. See how long it takes. (Don’t worry if it’s an appallingly small amount of time. This is totally normal.)
At another meal, set a timer for 20 minutes. Sit down at the table. Do not get up until your timer goes off. Try to make your meal last that long.
Luckily, there are many strategies you can employ to make it easier to practice.
Setting a timer and trying to stretch out the number of minutes it takes you to eat is a great place to start. Maybe try adding 1-2 minutes to each meal.
You can put down your utensils between bites, or take a few deep breaths or a sip of water.
Put away your phone, turn off the TV, and sit down at an actual table. Eliminate distractions and focus only on your food. It’s much easier to eat quickly and mindlessly when you’re also.
If you’re eating with other people, try pacing yourself with the slowest eater (and if you’re eating with small children even better! Kids tend to eat quite slowly and can be great pacers).
Engage in conversation with your eating partners. Take a pause from eating to listen to what they say.
Pick a time when you know you can schedule a slow and mindful eating experience and go all in. See how long you can stretch it out.
Set an alarm on your phone or put a post-it note somewhere you will see it with a reminder to eat slowly.
Or, if you really want to go all in you could do what I did and get braces as an adult. Not necessarily the first strategy I’d recommend, but it is ridiculously hard to eat in general, much less to eat quickly.
Again, just because it’s simple doesn’t mean it’s easy.
In our world of constant distractions and noise, it’s really hard to sit for 15-20 minutes with no interruptions and just focus on eating. Our culture doesn’t exactly support the concept of slow and mindful eating, so it may take some practice and no one is going to be able to eat slowly all the time.
But it’s worth taking the time (literally) to give it a try and it’s something you can always return to if you feel your food or eating habits are getting off track. Even if weight loss is not your goal, being able to tune into your hunger and fullness cues and notice how food is affecting you is a useful tool to have in your tool belt!
If you’re trying to make changes to your nutrition habits, becoming aware of what’s happening when you are eating and how that is affecting your choices is a great place to start. And you can’t observe what is happening unless you slow down.
Try a slow eating experiment and you just may be surprised by the results.
About the Author
Megan Schall is a certified nutrition coach and personal trainer located in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Through her customized online nutrition coaching programs, Megan helps you clarify your goals and take action to address all aspects of well-being: nutrition, sleep, stress management, movement, mind-body awareness, and more.
By building skills and routines that fit into your real life, Megan will help you make changes to your nutrition and self-care habits to meet your health and wellness goals and create sustainable, lasting results.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of United Kingdom based strength & nutrition coach, Harry Archer.
He took my subtle hint from a few weeks ago when I made note of the dearth of nutrition content on my site and how I tend to not touch it with a ten-foot pole.
Not because I don’t know what gluconeogenesis is4, but because I know my where my expertise isn’t and I respect scope of practice.
Nevertheless, he reached out and offered to provide some nutrition-related content for the site.
Let’s face it – as a lifter and fellow enthusiast of all things getting Yoked, chances are you wanna be jacked/strong and lean all at the same time.
Admirable goals friend, join the Swole Club.
Unfortunately our physiology doesn’t really like us doing all three at once, so it’ll make excuses and half ass any adaptations and responses to lifting.
IKR, ffs, c’mon physiology.
Fortunately there’s a groovy nutrition concept that allows us to maximize training adaptations over time so we can indeed get massiver, stronger-er and more shredded..
It’s called Periodizing Nutrition, and I’m going to take you through it today.
All aboard the Gainz Train.
What Does Periodizing Nutrition Even Mean?
“The planned, purposeful, and strategic use of specific nutritional interventions to enhance the adaptations targeted by individual exercise sessions or periodic training plans, or to obtain other effects that will enhance performance longer term” – Juedenkup
In bro-terms it’s organizing what you eat around the type of training you do to get the best results.
You can’t maximize (<– note key term here) both strength and hypertrophy at the same time very well, nor can you do either of these things whilst dieting down to single-digit body fat at the same time.
This is why training periodization exists – we can logically and systematically create training stimuli to produce different physical adaptations. We can lift heavier loads to create neural/strength stimuli, or we can lift moderate weights a lot of times to create hypertrophic stimuli, and we can do a load of cardio to help lose fat.
(Just kidding on that last one – don’t be THAT person).
The central idea of Nutritional Periodization is to match what you eat/how much you eat/specific macro ratios to the goal of your training block.
If you’re getting jacked, we can use calories and macros strategically to maximize gains.
If lifting heavy is your thing, I feel you homie, we can use certain nutrition protocols to maximize that.
If you’re #teamnogains, then certain dieting nutrition protocols can attenuate losses in fat-free mass as you’re dieting so you can hold onto your gains as you spend time choosing to deliberately catabolize your gains.
Developing Your Very Own Periodized Nutrition Plan
Why not just eat “well” or eat “good foods” or have seven protein shakes a day?
Because, whilst that’s lifting nutrition’s most ok-est advice, we’re more interested in our goals than “just eating right.”
What happens if your “just eating right” doesn’t support the hypertrophic goals you have and training in a hard volume block doesn’t result in the desired muscle gain?
What happens if “just eating right” doesn’t support the maintenance of lean muscle tissue during a deficit?
What happens if “just eating right” isn’t a sufficient amount of carbohydrates to offset perceived exertion during exercise leading you to feel like you’re the weakest dude in any gym that ever gymed?
You put a limit on how much progress you’ll make. Let’s not do that…
Training x Nutrition Periodization
If we look at training periodization, we have different training goals for different blocks. Each goal has a different objective, to produce a certain physiological adaptation or response so we normally use three different phases:
Increased Load = hypertrophic adaptations
Maintenance Load = Context dependent – could be transitions, could be a strength block after hypertrophy training
Decreased Load = usually transition between different blocks of training e.g. hypertrophy to strength or strength to deload
So, we can manipulate our nutrition to match the goal of the block right? Like so:
Increased Load = ideal for gains, so ideal for a surplus!
Maintenance Load = maintain body weight
Decreased Load = ideal for a deficit
So how do we plan nutrition around our block of training?
I Wanna Bulk Up
Ok, now we’re talking. So how can we periodize nutrition for them sweet gains?
The goal of hypertrophy blocks is to accumulate maximum recoverable volume (MRV) at a sufficient intensity to elicit muscle hypertrophy.
Basically?
Recover from lifting enough weight, enough times, multiple times a week so you get jacked.
When training load increases, guess what else should increase? If you said “calories, carbs and my biceps” you guessed right! Periods of high volume massing just need higher total calories and higher amounts of carbohydrates.
If we don’t periodize calories and carbohydrates to energy demands of our training, then very bad, super non-awesome stuff happens like overtraining, injuries and worst of all, you can’t fill out your Gymshark stringer Vest.
Topless gym selfies won’t be the same again.
How Fast Should You Gain?
When massing, we want to keep muscle:fat gain ratios favourable right? Keep rates of gain between 0.25-0.5% of your body-weight per week.
How Long Should You Gain?
You could probably make enough gains in 6 weeks, however, longer massing phases would see better results so push it to 12/16 weeks.
Is there a limit?
16 weeks. Outside of this, we run the risks of desensitising ourselves to training, the ratio of muscle:fat starts tipping in favour of fat, we start running into health issues and ultimately it means longer, and more frequent dieting + maintenance phases as you’ll have accumulated too much fat that you don’t want to keep.
Macros For Gains Phases
Calories = 30-45 kcals/FFM (fat-free mass)
Protein = 1.6-1.8g/kg
Fats = 0.2-0.4 % of total calories
Carbs = whatever’s left (calculate other needs first)
Bit Fluffy From Your Last Perma-Bulk? I Got You
The goal of fat loss blocks shouldn’t really be to lose as much fat as possible. Instead, productive fat loss phases should really centre on maximizing FFM/LBM during the dieting phase, pushing close to MRV and promoting recovery from training load.
There’s mixed opinion on training volume when dieting. General bro rules dictate trying to keep MRV (max recoverable volume) high to keep lean muscle mass during your dieting phase. There might be drops over time due to recoverability factors but cross that bridge when you get to it.
How Long Should This Phase Be?
Typically between 6-12 weeks, depending on how aggressive you want your deficit to be/how much you can handle. 6 week diets aka “Mini-Cuts” open themselves up to more aggressive losses, although these are typically fluctuations in water/glycogen and salt which aren’t fat.
Still, you can look pretty decent to your gym crush.
Longer dieting phases give us a better chance of retaining FFM due to slower losses, as long as you regulate training load. Otherwise, whilst you’re losing fat, you’re also increasing FFM losses, increasing injury risks and generally having a miserable time of it.
Proposed Rate of Losses?
Losses between 0.5-1% of total bodyweight per week is sufficient. Whilst a more aggressive approach may initially increase those %’s, most of that is water/glycogen and salt fluctuations. Higher rates of loss will come back to kick your ass with stuff like poor muscle retention, being hungry all the time, low sexual desires (what’s the point of looking decent if you can’t get laid?) and generally being a bit of a dick to everyone ‘cos you’re moody.
Is There a Limit?
There’s a concept of “Single Phase Limits” – up to no more than 10% of total body weight loss is recommended for a single dieting phase. The goal isn’t to hit maximum fat loss per phase, the goal is to retain maximum muscle mass and recover from training loads per phase. Always has been, always will be.
More aggressive losses are a wild ride. For most, lower rates of loss will be easier to mentally and physically manage which honestly increases your chances of sustaining your fat loss efforts. I mean, don’t go so slow that you can’t see any results because that’s not fun for anyone but keep it psychologically and physiologically sensible.
Macros For Fat Loss
Calories = 30-45kcals/kg FFM
Protein = 1.6-2.4g/kg
Carbs = whatever is left
Fats = 0.2-0.5% total calories
Ok, You’re Shredded. Now What?
Now your gym crush is following you on Insta, now is the time to avoid rebounding post diet.
Here’s where maintaining gains comes in.
Maintenance blocks are important as you don’t really wanna go straight into a bulk, rebound, and regain all of the layers of fat you’ve just spent months slowly peeling off now do you?
The goal here is to keep lower body weights stable, and to reduce any diet fatigue. It takes a while for your body to recover from dieting, so maintenance blocks should be about as long as the dieting block.
Or at least until you stop fantasizing over food more than your gym crush.
If you want to sequence several fat loss blocks together (Rule of 10%) then diets with maintenance phases are very necessary as each period of dieting becomes a little bit more difficult
Each maintenance phase should progressively get longer than the dieting period as you’ll accumulate diet fatigue across each phase, life sucks when you diet a lot and dieting gets super hard and takes longer as you get leaner.
Choosing how to sequence your very own periodized nutrition plan is going to depend on where you’re currently at.
If you’re looking to pack on some size, then maybe string a few massing cycles together – with the appropriate maintenance blocks obviously, and see how you grow.
If you’re looking to shift a bit of timber in time for 6 Pack season, then sequencing dieting:maintenance cycles could be a good choice for you right now.
Ultimately you’ve got to decide what you want to achieve and then periodize your nutrition to match the goals of your training blocks.
Now, go get strong, jacked and shredded.
About the Author
Harry Archer is a Strength and Nutrition Coach based in Bedford, UK.
Having worked in the fitness industry for nearly a decade, he’s worked in commercial gyms, private gyms, performance gyms, health clinics and more recently online (thanks COVID), with a variety of clients, ranging from helping the John’s from Project Management get Jacked With Abs, to coaching Strength-Sport performance athletes attempting World Records.
He’s usually happiest when lifting and eating, and when thinking about lifting and eating. Follow him on his Insta HERE.
Anyway, he also knows a thing or two with regards to helping his clients/athletes shed fat and the “minor” nutritional tweaks that they may need to consider; like calorie cycling.
We humans are cyclical creatures in terms of our overall behavior, and when it comes to nutrition and our calorie intake there are no exceptions.
The fundamental reason for why we need to cycle calories over the course of weeks and months when attempting to lose weight/fat is because of natural adaptations and guaranteed reduction of our metabolic rate and calorie burn that naturally occur when calories are lowered below a certain level necessary to cause effective weight/fat loss.
Fortunately for you, all guesswork for how to cycle calories will be eliminated for you through a specific diagram provided for you shortly.
Cycling calories is so powerful and essential that our body literally fights back and sets our body’s natural weight range, otherwise known as our “metabolic set point,” higher when we attempt to keep our calories fixed aggressively too low for too long.
So the take home message here is that cycling calories is inevitable and there is a very specific way you can approach this nutritional law and have it work to your advantage so that you maximize all aspects of your results and feel physically and mentally satisfied in the process.
Some of the most notable evidence supporting the idea of cycling calories in the “short term” centers around the hormone, leptin.
According to Lyle McDonald and his research on the matter, leptin levels drop dramatically within the first week or so of dieting.
The drop can be as much as 50%.
For the non-nerds reading, leptin is our primary metabolic regulator, acting on several areas of the body. So in theory, if we cycle our calories during the week we can boost leptin and keep our metabolism higher.
Note From TG: For a more thorough discussion on the topic of Leptin and it’s affects on metabolism you can check THIS out. Grab a cup of coffee. You’ll need it…;o)
Moving forward I want to break down three categories of structured eating that will need to be built into your collective nutrition plan that feeds into (<—HA, see what I just did there) and supports the concept of calorie cycling.
Free Meals
Structured Refeeds
Full Diet Breaks
Free Meals (Cheat Meals)
Free meal(s) can be considered structured eating where calories are higher and you overfeed more.
Key Word: Structured. Also, meal (as in singular).
This is basically where you pick one single meal of your liking, set aside all the rules, and you enjoy some pizza or tacos.
Or both…;o)
To note: There’s really no inherent physiological benefit happening here. One single meal isn’t going to break or make a dietary approach or be the panacea of success.
It can’t help, nor can it hurt you in terms of actual fat and weight loss, so you shouldn’t worry much.
Rather, the main benefit here is psychological.
The feeling of complete deprivation of desired and enjoyable foods for weeks and months on end can become very stressful and completely depressing.
A free meal is one method that provides a “light at the end of the tunnel” per se.
Research has shown consistently time and time again that flexible dieting strategies are far more effective than extremely strict and rigid approaches both in terms of overall results and healthy eating behavior.
Structured Re-feeds
A structured reefed is simply a 4-5 hour window where you don’t count calories and you deviate from both the quantity and type of food that you are eating with your normal fat loss diet.
Moreover, carbohydrates are supposed to be higher during the re-feed.
It’s also worth noting that carbohydrates are highly “anti-catabolic” in nature. Meaning they prevent muscle tissue and others from degrading or breaking down through the increases in insulin production. For example, a recent study from Campbell et. al 2020 found that a two day reefed in resistance trained individuals preserved RMR, and FFM a.k.a muscle mass. 2 .
Lastly, in my experience re-feeds should generally come in the evening for two reasons.
1) It’s psychologically much easier to resume normal dieting and healthier eating at the start of the next day where you interpret a clean slate rather than attempting to pwn a industrial sized bag of Skittles in the middle of the day and then attempt to get back on track after the fact.
2) It just seems to work well and mirrors normal human behavior.
A good general rule of thumb is to reefed from 5-10pm.
This works well since structured re-feeds are programmed on the weekend where a majority are partaking in social activities and get-togethers where higher food consumption is almost guaranteed to occur.
SIDE NOTE: It’s also ideal to perform a workout at or near a re-feed so that the carbohydrates and other nutrients are automatically soaked up in the muscles. This is especially true for those who are overweight or have sensitivity issues to carbohydrates. When you eat your carbohydrates around intense lifting times you are conditioning your cellular components to better handle and manage carbohydrates to help limit potential feelings of hunger and overeating.
Full Diet Breaks
Just as the name states, full diet breaks are periods lasting as high as two whole weeks where you increase calories to maintenance levels and are allowed much more leniency with food selection.
Recent research has also supported that intermittent calorie maintenance may be ideal for faster fat loss.
Not only from a psychological standpoint, but also in terms of feelings of “confidence” that you’ll be able to stay on track once stricter eating resumes again.
Another huge potential benefit to diet breaks is that they can programmed around periods of vacation or special events.
Anecdotally, it has been shown that breaks from dieting can be viewed much more positively by dieters, since it’s actually part of a strategic plan, and people report an easier time returning to diet once the break is over.
General Diet Breaks Guidelines
1️⃣ Raise calories by 500-1000 calories daily.
2️⃣ Keep weight training hard and regularly and maintain at least 50% of your cardio work.
3️⃣ Don’t worry about counting macro’s until the end of the break.
Body-Fat Percentage (Men / Women)
Diet Break Frequency
<10% / 18%
Every 6–8 weeks
10-15% / 18–23%
Every 8–12 weeks
>15% / >23%
Every 12–16 weeks
(I.e., the leaner you are, the more frequent “breaks” you can get away with).
(Chart courtesy of Andy Morgan, RippedBody.com “How to Use a Diet Break for Fat Loss to Get Shredded Lean”)
About the Author
Travis Hansen has been involved in the field of training for over a decade, and he has over 60,000 hours of hands-on training experience.
He graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Fitness and Wellness, and he holds three training certifications—from the ISSA, NASM and NCSF.
He was the Head Strength and Conditioning Coach for the Reno Bighorns of the NBA D-League during their 2010 season, and The University of Nevada-Reno golf team in 2015.
He was the former Director of the Reno Speed School. He has worked with hundreds of athletes from almost all sports, ranging from the youth to the professional ranks.
He is also the leading authority on speed development for the International Sports Sciences Association. Check out his website HERE.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of Minneapolis based personal trainer and nutrition coach, Megan Schall. Megan’s been a distance coaching client of mine for a number of years (I write her training programs), but is someone I’ve referred many other clients to when they have any nutritional needs or questions.
She’s an awesome coach.
I’m always excited when I can provide sound nutrition based content on the site and I think you will appreciate Megan’s down-to-Earth approach and tone.
I hope this will be the first of more submissions from Megan (hint, hint. nudge, nudge).
When I first started distance coaching with Tony, I told him one of my goals was to be able to do a pull-up. So for the first several months my program included a shit-ton of upper back work (so. many. rows.) and core stability exercises.
After a steady progression from month to month, the day finally came and…
…I walked up to the bar (well, I walked up to a box underneath the bar because I’m short) and did my first strict pull-up, no problem.
I admit I was a little nervous that it wasn’t going to happen! But looking back I realize I had no need to worry – Tony had set me up for success. His plan had created an environment where it was basically impossible for me to ‘fail’ because all the pieces were already in place.
This same concept applies when it comes to our eating habits and food choices: setting up your environment in a way that makes better choices easy and less great choices difficult (or impossible) allows you to conquer your nutrition goals.
Enter the Kitchen Refresh
The kitchen refresh is exactly as it sounds: You are going to clean out and refill your kitchen, updating it to support your needs and goals.
It’ll be fun, I promise!
This can be especially helpful right now, as most of us are spending a lot more time at home and thus a lot more time in or near the kitchen. As hard as it might have been to avoid treats in the office, having your kitchen a few steps away (or maybe your kitchen is your office now) makes it that much more challenging, not to mention the stress, boredom, and social isolation also affecting our food and eating choices.
Let’s walk through it step by step:
Step 1: Prepare
This is where you will make a plan for what will stay and what will go. Determine criteria that will make it easy to decide whether to keep or toss items – there’s the obvious ‘toss’ items (anything that has expired or that looks like a lab experiment), but otherwise this will vary for everyone. Defining clear guidelines for what you want to have around and what needs to go will make the cleaning out process much easier.
One strategy for doing this is to make a list of red, yellow, and green light foods.
Red Light Foods = Things that you know don’t make you feel good or are just too tempting if they’re in the house (this may include things like highly processed foods and/or certain ingredients, and anything that feels mentally challenging to have around or you find difficult to eat in moderation).
Yellow Light Foods = Those that may not be the ‘best’ choice but that you are comfortable keeping around and can eat in moderation.
Green Light Foods = Items that make you feel great and help you reach your health and wellness goals (generally all whole/fresh foods, fruits and veggies, etc.).
(Note From TG: My “red light foods” are honey wheat pretzels, Cheez-Its, cereal, and those pills that Bradley Cooper took in that movie Limitless).
Step 2: Toss
Grab a trash bag (or several) and get to work. Read labels carefully. Remove red light foods and move yellow light foods to harder to reach areas or out of sight.
Put green light foods front and center.
This can also be a chance to clear out some of the extra “stuff” that might be hanging around the kitchen. Those 17 extra spatulas you never use? Give one to each of your friends, donate them, or find a creative new use.
Step 3: Restock
Use your green/yellow light foods to make a grocery list and stock up. Rearrange or reorganize so the “better” choices are also the easiest – keep fruits and veggies accessible and visible in the kitchen or fridge. Keep the items you use most often in easy to reach places.
BONUS Step 4: Upgrade
Is there anything that would make life easier when it comes to your food prep or kitchen organization?
A great blender that would make you happy to put together a post-workout smoothie?
A sharp knife and good cutting board to chop veggies?
Decent food storage containers?
A time machine to head back to November 2019 to invest in Zoom stock?
Investing in some equipment can make a world of difference, and now’s the chance to take inventory of what you might want or need.
Wasn’t That Fun?
Okay, “fun” may have been a bit of a stretch. The kitchen refresh isn’t like demo day in an actual renovation where you get to pile drive your old cabinets.
However, what WILL be fun is the better sense of control you’ll have over your eating habits.
Cleaning out the kitchen can feel overwhelming, and it certainly does not have to be done all at once. Start with one drawer or cabinet. Set a timer for five minutes and go to town. Maybe you keep a trash bag in the kitchen and get rid of whatever isn’t working for you whenever you come across it, or aim to toss one item a day.
Make a game out of it and get the whole family involved!
Use this as a guide, but feel free to be creative and find what works best for you.
One more thing to note: This process can be challenging if you have multiple family members who all have different wants/needs/food allergies etc.
Some compromises may need to happen – if your red light foods include ice cream and tortilla chips but your significant other or kids likes to have them around, are there compromises that make it work for both of you? (eg: buy smaller containers and keep them in the back of the freezer or out of sight.) It may take a little problem-solving to make sure everyone’s needs are met, but it can be done!
Just as your workout program helps you reach your fitness goals, the kitchen refresh is a great way to make your environment work for you and set yourself up for success. Give it a try and you’ll be well on your way to your first nutrition pull-up!
About the Author
Megan Schall is a certified nutrition coach and personal trainer located in Minneapolis, Minnesota.Through her customized online nutrition coaching programs, Megan helps you clarify your goals and take action to address all aspects of well-being: nutrition, sleep, stress management, movement, mind-body awareness, and more. By building skills and routines that fit into your real life, Megan will help you make changes to your nutrition and self-care habits to meet your health and wellness goals and create sustainable, lasting results.
It’s one thing to get a client on board with lifting heavy things on a somewhat regular basis and how it can have positive effects on their overall health and well-being.
It’s another thing altogether to get them to commit to the nutrition & recovery side of the equation and how that too plays a significant role in the grand scheme of things. I’ve often joked that I’d rather wash my face with broken glass than attempt to get a client to try some kale.
That being said, it behooves any trainer/coach/fitness professional to have a system in place to address their clients’ nutritional & recovery needs. My good friend, Dr. Mike T Nelson, has opened up his Flex Diet Certificationto my readers only this week. It includes 30 hours of continuing education and covers anything and everything as it relates to nutrition coaching
You can click HERE to sign up for a FREE 1-hour webinar and to learn more about the certification and whether or not it’s a good fit for you.
(Ahem: you should also check out his guest post below)
Top 2 Mistakes Trainers Make With Nutrition & Recovery…and How to Fix Them
The old saying is true. . . at best you are only with a client for one hour a day and they have the other 23 hours to hose it all up.
This is reality.
You are not going to follow them around to their workplace and bat the doughnut that coworker Betty brought into work out of their hand.
What you do with clients in the gym and online for programming matters tons, but what are you providing them for the time when they are not with you?
Here are the top 2 mistakes I see trainers making in this area. A big reason I know this is that I’ve made these two mistakes in the past and wish someone would have grabbed me by my undies, dragged me to the curb and showed me how to do it better.
Mistake #1: Prioritizing the Wrong Items
I know you.
You love to spend time working on getting better at your craft. That is commendable and kudos to you. The fitness world needs more people like you, and Tony G will even give you a virtual high five.
Note From TG: Better yet, I’ll toss over a “bearded Robert Redford playing a lumberjack (?)” head nod of approval.
The downside is that everyone is pushing the latest and greatest nutrition/ recovery item you should have your clients do.
“No way Bro, you have to be doing keto esters between every meal to recover and get ripped.”
“What, you don’t need any veggies. Don’t you know they have these nasty ass compounds in them to prevent other animals from eating them, so they are bad for you. Just eat more meat you, wimp.”
“You are missing out Bro-ette since this corset is what you really need to get toned in your abZ.”
You get the idea.
Much of what you read is walking BS on a stick and easy to spot. But even legitimate items can be overwhelming from veggie intake to protein to breathing techniques to sleep.
How do you know where to start with a client?
Here is where the concept of leverage can be helpful to figure out what interventions may be best for your clients.
You remember the concept of leverage from Physics class right? In case you slept through it, leverage allows you to amplify a small input for a much bigger output. It was also a semi-ok now defunct TV series . . .
If you have a big enough lever, you can move huge amounts of load with less effort.
Think of the concept of the kingpin.
If you’ve ever looked at logs going down a river all jammed up. It looks like a mess, and you would need massive effort to get them flowing again. Then, suddenly some crazy ass lumberjack removes just one log and instead of being all jammed up, all of the logs seem to flow much better.
That one log had a lot more leverage than the other logs around it.
This concept can also be applied to when you’re working with clients to determine what kind of intervention should you do on the recovery side on nutrition and different aspects related to that.
In regards to your client’s other 23 hours, sleep is something that’s trending now, which is great, but most conversations about sleep with clients does not end well.
We know that sleep is an absolute requirement for survival. We know that if you don’t sleep for several days, you’re going to have a whole bunch of physiologic changes that are not going to be good, right?
All sorts of things that kind of go offline with sleep on the physiology side. I can make a huge argument that sleep may be near the top.
I did a lot of discussion about sleep and why I think they should get more sleep. And the short answer is, and again, if you’re a trainer, you’ve run into this, I absolutely guarantee it was excruciatingly hard to get clients to make large changes in sleep.
Most client’s response when you tell them to sleep more
The reality is at the end of the day, having someone who only sleeps five to six hours and trying to get them up to maybe a seven to eight hours of sleep was very difficult. I felt like I was beating my head against the wall because I had all this data, all this research to show how important sleep actually is.
But the mistake that I made was I was only rating that on the physiology.
And as you know, when you work with clients or even yourself, I rarely find that physiology is the main rate limiter. It’s definitely a factor for sure, but I find the psychological ability to change as the biggest thing that will limit your results.
I took my physiologic rankings, and I put them on just an arbitrary one to 10 scale, kind of based on the research and what I had found.
Next, I took the same interventions, and I ranked them on the client’s ability to change (psychology). This was primarily based on my own experience, from talking to a lot of other trainers and polling trainers at seminars and education.
Coaching Leverage = Physiology Effect x Client’s Ability to Change
Back to topic of sleep, the psychologic ability to change with sleep is very low despite a very high physiologic effect; thus, our coaching leverage score for sleep turns out to be crazy low.
The concept of coaching leverage is a cool way to then rate all the different interventions that you can do.
When I set up the Flex Diet Cert, that’s exactly what I did . . . I ranked all eight possible interventions in order with the highest coaching leverage being the first one to focus on and the lowest one being last.
My recommendation is to start with the higher ranked items first.
Here is a clue, eating more dietary protein ranked as #1.
Rig the system in your client’s favor.
Allow them to see some change, some positive wins, and try to do the things that are easier for them to change and have an also bigger physiologic change.
This allows them to see results with less effort.
Mistake #2: Not Using a System
You use a system for training right?
What system do you use for the other 23 hours a day for your clients?
Many trainers don’t have a system and just lob 30-day challenges at clients with a dash of “hope and pray.”
There are lots of great systems out there, and of course I am biased to the one I created (cough… Flex Diet Cert…cough cough).
Heck, even if you opt to not use my system (you crazy person), please pick one and implement it. Your clients will get better results, which makes you look even better.
Summary
Above you have two mistakes that many trainers are making and two solutions to fix them.
To make your life even easier, I have opened up the Flex Diet Cert for only 7 days exclusively for fans of my buddy Tony G.
Go to the link below to learn more today and implement solutions to your clients other 23 hours a day for better results.
Mike T. Nelson, PhD, MSME, CSCS, CISSN, is a research fanatic who specializes in metabolic flexibility and heart rate variability, as well as an online trainer, adjunct professor, faculty member at the Carrick Institute, presenter, creator of the Flex Diet Cert, kiteboarder, and (somewhat incongruously) heavy-metal enthusiast.
The techniques he’s developed, and the results Mike gets for his clients have been featured in international magazines, in scientific publications, and on websites across the globe.
In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his wife, lifting odd objects, reading research, and kiteboarding as much as possible.
Megan Schall is a certified nutrition coach and personal trainer located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Through her customized online nutrition coaching programs, Megan helps you clarify your goals and take action to address all aspects of well-being: nutrition, sleep, stress management, movement, mind-body awareness, and more. By building skills and routines that fit into your real life, Megan will help you make changes to your nutrition and self-care habits to meet your health and wellness goals and create sustainable, lasting results.
Travis Hansen has been involved in the field of training for over a decade, and he has over 60,000 hours of hands-on training experience.
Mike T. Nelson, PhD, MSME, CSCS, CISSN, is a research fanatic who specializes in metabolic flexibility and heart rate variability, as well as an online trainer, adjunct professor, faculty member at the Carrick Institute, presenter, creator of the 
