Damage Control For Holiday Eating "Accidents" (Part 1)

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com

We've all been at the holiday get-togethers, and have quickly devoured something devilishly delicious with little thought. Some feel little shame for eating a cake or drinking half the bowl of punch, but others find themselves feeling guilty afterwards and can't help but think, "oops, I shouldn't have eaten that." I have to admit I do get a little chuckle out of the “accidental” part! Do you ever really “accidentally” eat anything? I think we are all responsible for everything we eat and how much we eat and until you consciously realize and accept this, and take the time to do some proactive meal planning, you will probably continue to have lots of “overeating accidents!”

After you overindulge, I definitely do NOT recommend skipping your next meal or skipping meals the next day to make up for it. I usually don’t even recommend cutting back either, although there may be exceptions where you could manipulate your meal size or macronutrient composition.

I generally recommend returning immediately to your “regularly scheduled meal programming,” because this continues to encourage the maintenance of positive habits such as eating 5-6 small meals every day.

I do suppose whether you cut back could depend on whether you’ve been on low calories a long time, how lean you were already, and on whether you were in a caloric deficit already. If you were in a calorie deficit for the day, then the extra calories might only bring you up to maintenance, not “over” your daily limit, which might not be as damaging as if you were in a calorie surplus.

If you were already very lean or had been dieting strictly for a long time (as in a bodybuilder coming off a competition), a large meal or entire high calorie day might not have any negative effect either. Your metabolism has a way of slowing down if you keep your calories too low 100% of the time.

With occasional (planned) higher calorie days, you’d be using the BURN THE FAT “zig-zag” or “cycling” principle, so eating more in this context can be a positive thing. (Note: You can learn more about this technique in the BURN THE FAT program at www.burnthefat.com). However, there’s a big difference between a planned “cheat meal” or a planned high carb, clean food “re-feed” day and a binge on junk food. Regardless of total 24 hour calorie intake for the day, you could still store body fat after heavy eating if it’s done at certain times and in a certain metabolic state.

Although I do prescribe calorie levels based on daily (24 hr) needs, I believe you should also pay attention to 3 hour “windows” when you’re thinking about adjusting your caloric intake. Calories and macronutrients (protein/aminos, carbs/sugar and fat) are partitioned into glycogen, muscle or fat tissue or burned immediately depending very much on present moment energy and recovery needs and on what’s going to happen over the next 3 hours or so as the food enters your system.

So, if you’re going to be plopping down on the couch to watch football games for the rest of the day and night after that big holiday meal, beware - you might just want to cut back on that next meal a little, especially starches and sugars.

Bottom line: It’s okay to eat small amounts of your favorite junk foods once in a while as planned “free meals,” and it’s a good idea to eat more in general from time to time to keep your metabolism humming along. However, your best bet if you’re really serious about fat loss is to avoid huge meals and avoid bingeing in the first place. ALWAYS practice portion control - even on holidays.

If you ever do slip, don’t beat yourself up, just get right back on the wagon with your next meal and remember, the past is behind you and today is a new day.

Your friend and coach,

Tom Venuto, CSCS, NSCA-CPT
www.BurnTheFat.com

P.S. If you’re interested in burning fat naturally in a healthy, sensible way, then be sure to take a look at Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle - it’s the best place to start your journey: www.BurnTheFat.com

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is a fat loss expert, lifetime natural (steroid-free) bodybuilder, independent nutrition researcher, freelance writer, and author of the #1 best selling diet e-book, Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle: Fat-Burning Secrets of The World’s Best Bodybuilders & Fitness Models (e-book) which teaches you how to get lean without drugs or supplements using secrets of the world's best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and increase your metabolism by visiting: www.burnthefat.com

How an Entire Year Can Go By With No Results

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com

If you've been doing the same nutrition, same calories, same cardio, same weight training and the same intensity for the entire past year with no changes, then you shouldn’t be suprised if you’ve continued to get the SAME results (very little).

If you do more of the same, you usually get more of the same.

Caloric intake, for example is not something you calculate once and then never pay attention to again. Calories have to be calculated and customized for each individual in the beginning and then adjusted continuously in “real time” during the course of a fat loss program, based on actual results. 

 

Just because you start at 1800, for example, doesn’t mean your caloric intake should stay there. Calories may need to be increased or decreased depending on whether your goals, your body weight and your activity levels change and based on your weekly progress (or lack of).

Which brings me to another point. I am a huge fan of using progress charts. There is a saying in business management and sports coaching: 

“What gets measured gets done.”

When you start “keeping score” and tracking performance right down to the numbers, it’s almost miraculous how this awareness of how you’re doing translates into improved results.

When you track your body composition results every week, if a week or two goes by with no results, then you don’t continue with more of what got you no results, you change some variable in your program immediately!

An old Turkish proverb that says, 

“No matter how far you’ve traveled down the wrong road, always turn back!”

Of course, you don’t have to throw out your entire program, you can simply “tweak” ONE or maybe two variables within the same program.

Also, when you measure, track and analyze muscle versus fat (body composition), instead of just scale weight, you might even discover you’ve gained some lean body mass and this offsets the drop on the scale (which means it’s possible you made more progress than you thought). 

Now, back to the calories. To break a plateau, you can take a reduction in calories, or an increase in activity, either of which will create a deficit if you are currently in energy balance, or increase your existing caloric deficit.

At the end of the day, fat loss boils down to calories in versus calories out, so if you plateau, you may need a simple calorie reduction, provided you don’t restrict too low for too long (which tends to trigger your body’s “starvation response.”)

As for your cardio program, 3 days a week of cardio works for many people, but usually, I would consider three weekly cardio sesssions a maintenenance workout or at best a starting point for beginners, NOT a “maximum fat loss” program.

Example: this week, you could increase your cardio from 3 sessions to 4 sessions (or 4-5). If you combine the decrease in food intake with an increase in calories burned through activity, that will almost certainly get you burning fat again.

If it does, then stay with that cardio plan. If not, the next week go up to 5 days a week. Repeat this simple “feedback loop” process as many times and for as long as necessary. 

Also remember that more (often) is not always better. You can also increase the intensity and get more calories burned in same amount of time. This feedback loop process can be used to make decisions about your training intensity, duration and type, as well as frequency. 

Whichever strategy you choose to break the plateau, remember Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity:

“Insanity is to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.”

Although this seems like common sense to some people, what happens is really quite common because it does appear that you’re doing everything you’re “supposed to be doing” with perfectly good intentions.

You may have all the key elements there: You’re exercising (weights and cardio). You’re watching your nutrition, and you’ve been disciplined and consistent in following it. 

The trouble with many popular programs - even good ones - is that they are too dogmatic. Their entire program may revolve around “X” number of calories, “X” days per week of cardio and “X” days a week of weights…. 

And you’re not allowed to “tamper” with that “holy grail” formula. 

I can understand the rationale for a simple diet and exercise prescription for a beginner in order to not confuse them with too many choices, but what if it doesnt work after a month, three months, six months, A WHOLE YEAR? What if there are no options, what then? 

In NLP, there’s a principle, (borrowed from cybernetics), called The Law of Requisite Variety, which says,

“The person with the most flexibility is the person with the most power and the greatest chance for success.”

You need to know what to do when you’re not getting results… you need options and choices for breaking plateaus, and that’s important because plateaus happen to everyone - including me.

Some people think that hitting a fat loss plateau means there’s something wrong with them. But plateaus are natural and normal. In fact, you could look at it this way: 

Hitting a plateau means your body is healthy and your body is functioning normally, because normal function of the body is to adapt effectively to stress, to protect you and to maintain homeostasis. 

 

Exercise is a stress. Dieting is a stress. It’s natural for your body to adapt to them. When you adapt, you must place a new “positive stress” on the body if you want continued improvement.

If you want to learn more details about how to change your program to break plateaus and make continuous progress as fast as safely possible, then I recommend you take a look at Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle (BFFM). 

BFFM has flexibility, feedback and performance tracking built right into it. Chapter 4 in BFFM teaches the “BFFM feedback loop method”, and shows you how to chart progress and adjust your diet and workouts on a weekly basis, to keep you making progress or get you back on track if your progress stalls out.

There is no reason to allow even a few weeks, let alone an entire year to go by without results. But you can’t expect to get different results if you continue doing more of what’s not working.

Keep after it! Be persistent… but also be flexible!

Your friend and coach,

Tom Venuto, CSCS, NSCA-CPT
www.BurnTheFat.com

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is a fat loss expert, lifetime natural (steroid-free) bodybuilder, independent nutrition researcher, freelance writer, and author of the #1 best selling diet e-book, Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle: Fat-Burning Secrets of The World’s Best Bodybuilders & Fitness Models (e-book) which teaches you how to get lean without drugs or supplements using secrets of the world's best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and increase your metabolism by visiting: www.burnthefat.com

Does Cold Weather Make You Store Body Fat?

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com
 

Do you get fatter in the cold weather? It’s a good question right now, considering that this year’s farmer’s almanac is predicting a frigid winter and true to the prediction, the Huffington Post just ran a story, “Cold Temperatures Greet The New Year.” It’s FREEZING here in New Jersey and it’s not like this is the Yukon territory.

 

Some of my friends up in the great white yonder think that temps in the 20’s are balmy. Yeah right. With the wind chill, even my bones had goose bumps today. I can’t even fathom the sub zero stuff those guys live in. Adding insult, my friends in LA and South Florida have been more than happy to share their local January weather reports with me. 80 degrees and sunny. Thanks guys –you suck. 

Back to the question. I just got an email from a burn the fat reader who asked, “Tom, is there any evidence that during cold winter weather it gets harder to lose body fat? For me, it seems easier to drop fat during the hot weather.” 

Yes, there is. 

First there’s the psychological explanation: in warm climates, people are wearing less clothes and enjoying the outdoors and people want to look good when they’re exposing more flesh! In the cold, you’re covered up, so there’s less self-consciousness and no public accountability. Therefore, most people tend to stay on a diet more diligently and train harder when summer rolls around. 

Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) has been studied at length by psychologists. Often more than just the “winter blues” but an actual type of depression, SAD occurs during the short days and long nights of winter and fall, when there’s less sunlight and colder temperatures. Symptoms include depression, cravings for specific foods, loss of energy, hopelessness and oversleeping. Obviously, these types of symptoms can contribute to weight gain. 

Because of their tendency for fall and winter weight gain, many people have suspected that cold temperatures influence weight gain on a metabolic level, not just eating more. Exposure to cold temperatures can cause a shivering thermogenesis which means there’s an increase in metabolism to produce more heat (heat production = calories burned). 

However, if you just got the bright idea of turning off the heat in your house, or going for a swim in the cold surf every day to “burn more fat”, I wouldn’t recommend it. Deliberate exposure to the cold, either cold air or cold water doesn’t pan out into real world fat loss results, even though there are actually “fat loss gurus” who recommend it. 

Here’s why: 

If your body uses some energy for shivering or heat production, it can compensate later for that energy loss by increasing your appetite. Not only that, research at the hyperbaric environmental adaptation program at the Naval Medical Research Institute in Bethesda Maryland reported that, “The combination of exercise and cold exposure does NOT act to enhance metabolism of fats… Cold-induced vasoconstriction of peripheral adipose tissue may account, in part, for the decrease in lipid mobilization.” 

It’s just not practical to freeze your butt off in an attempt to speed up your metabolism a tiny little bit, so your fat loss scheme wouldn’t last long if you tried. 

A great example of how cold temperatures affect energy balance is in the case of swimming. For years, people thought swimming actually made you fat. There were all kinds of theories, like, “it makes you retain a layer of fat for insulation, like seals.” Actually, the most recent research shows that swimming is a perfectly good fat burning exercise, except for one thing: Swimming, especially in cold water, increases appetite dramatically. 

The seasons affect your activity levels too. Pedometer research published in the journal Medicine and Science and Sports And Exercise uncovered a huge difference in the number of steps taken between the summer and winter: 

7616 steps per day in summer
6293 steps per day in fall
5304 steps per day in winter
5850 steps in spring 

Most people blame winter weight gain on the food, but it’s not just the Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s celebration feasts, it’s less winter activity that also contributes to the holiday pounds. 

You have to keep up with your training and nutrition program in the winter, or else.

Although studies have found that seasonal weight gain is usually very small, it’s the type of slow weight creep that goes unnoticed. Over a period of 10, 15 or 20 years, it’s enough to accumulate into becoming overweight or obese. 

Thus many men and women wake up one morning at age 40 or 45, look in the mirror and ask themselves, “How did I get so heavy?” Answer: just a pound or two a year, after each winter season, left unchecked. 

To stay lean all year round, you have to remain alert about increases in your appetite and decreases in your activity. This is a YEAR-ROUND LIFESTYLE! Stay active, stay diligent about nutrition, stay accountable, and if you start to experience weight gain, nip it in the bud - fast! 

Train hard and expect success,

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

Founder & CEO of
Burn The Fat Inner Circle

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is a fat loss expert, lifetime natural (steroid-free) bodybuilder, freelance writer, and author of the #1 best selling diet e-book, Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle: Fat-Burning Secrets of The World’s Best Bodybuilders & Fitness Models (e-book) which teaches you how to get lean without drugs or supplements using secrets of the world's best bodybuilders and fitness models. Learn how to get rid of stubborn fat and increase your metabolism by visiting: www.BurnTheFat.com or http://www.BurnTheFatInnerCircle.com

Autumn-Delicious Pumpkin Pancakes Recipe

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com
 
These pumpkin pancakes are surprisingly delicious and packed with excellent nutrition. They can be served as breakfast any day of the week, a "finger food" at a holiday party, or packed for a meal later in the day. These are so tasty that you won't even miss the maple syrup or powdered sugar, and you won't have to worry about those holiday temptations when you have such a delicious and healthy alternative. Any kitchen dummy can have these prepared in 15 minutes or less. Enjoy!

Tom Venuto’s “pumpcakes” (pumpkin pancakes)
7.5 oz (212 g) of canned pumpkin
1/3 cup (27 g) oatmeal dry
1/3 cup (40 g) multigrain or whole wheat pancake mix
1 scoop (26 g) vanilla (or plain) protein powder
4 egg whites
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp ground ginger
2 tsp cinnamon
Sweetener (brown sugar, stevia or splenda): Optional
Yield: makes 2 large (5 inch wide) pancakes

Nutrition information for 2 pancakes, unsweetened
Calories: 507
Protein: 44.1 g.
Carbs: 69.7 g.
Fat: 5 g.

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

Founder & CEO of
Burn The Fat Inner Circle

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is the author of the #1 best seller, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle: Fat Burning Secrets of the World’s Best Bodybuilders and Fitness Models. Tom is a lifetime natural bodybuilder and fat loss expert who achieved an astonishing 3.7% body fat level without drugs or supplements. Discover how to increase your metabolism and burn stubborn body fat, find out which foods burn fat and which foods turn to fat, plus get a free fat loss report and mini course by visiting Tom's site at: www.BurnTheFat.com

The Truth About Fast Weight Loss

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com

 

WEIGHT LOSS POP QUIZ: What are 3 things that ALL 8 of these advertisements have in common? 

“Burn 30 lbs in 3 weeks - no diet!”

“Lose 9 Pounds Every 11 Days!”

“Lose a pound a day without diet or exercise!”

“Lose 2 pounds a day without dieting!”

“Lose 30 pounds In 30 Days!”

“Lose 20 lbs in 3 weeks!”

“Burn 30 lbs in 25 days!”

“Lose 10 Pounds This Weekend!”

ANSWER: (1) They are all FALSE, (2) they are all DECEPTIVE…
 

I just did an Internet search for “how fast should you lose weight” and these are just a small sample of ACTUAL ADS that are running this very moment. They sure are enticing, aren’t they? They play on your emotions and on your desire for instant gratification.

But did you know that…

(3) these claims are all actually ILLEGAL, says the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)
“We have known for some time now that there is a serious problem with weight-loss product advertising,” said FTC Chairman Timothy J. Muris. “Reputable marketers continue to take care to avoid false and misleading claims, but it appears that too many unscrupulous marketers are making false claims promising dramatic and effortless weight loss to sell their products. It is not fair to consumers; it is not fair to legitimate businesses, it is illegal, and it will not be tolerated.”

You might be asking, “Ummm, if it will not be tolerated, then why do we keep seeing these ads?” Ah yes, well, God bless the Internet, On Google, you can put up an ad and have it showing in 15 minutes. You can then have it taken down just as fast. Same goes for websites. The FTC couldn’t keep up with OFFLINE false advertising, how are they possibly going to keep up with it ONLINE??? And it’s only going to get worse.

There’s only so much the FTC and other consumer watchdog organizations can do. It’s up to YOU to educate YOURSELF and know the red flags and warning signs of bogus weight loss claims.

Here’s what else the FTC says about why these types of advertising claims are so damaging:

• “The deceptive promotion of quick and easy weight loss solutions potentially fuels unrealistic expectations on the part of consumers. consumers who believe that it really is possible to lose a pound (of fat) a day may quickly lose interest in losing a pound a week.”
• “The proliferation of “fast and easy” fixes undermines the reality of what it takes to lose weight. People who need to lose weight are buying empty promises.”

I believe that the weight loss education industry has been knocked a few steps backward in the last few years due to (1) the internet and (2) the horrendous reality TV shows that actually encourage people to attempt “extreme” body makeovers or see who can lose weight the fastest. The winners (or shall we say, the “losers”, as if that’s a flattering title to earn), are rewarded generously with fortune, fame and congratulations.

These shows are damaging and despicable. I’m shocked that so many millions tune in and I’m even more surprised how many people think this garbage is “inspiring.”

Let’s face it. Everyone wants to get the fat off as quickly as possible - and having that desire is not wrong – it’s simply human nature. Patience is the one thing you never seem to have when you’ve got a body fat problem. You want the fat gone and you want it gone now!

Like the FTC said, with what we see on TV these days and with web page after web page of fast weight loss claims, you actually start to believe it’s doable and you’re no longer interested in a healthy 1-2 lbs weight loss per week. In fact, you even see people with your own eyes losing weight incredibly fast. How do you deny it’s possible when you see THAT?

Well, the answer comes to you when you expand your time perspective and see where those people are 6, 12, 18 months from now. Deep in your heart, you KNOW the answer…

The faster you lose weight, the more muscle you will lose right along with the fat, and that can really mess up your metabolism.

An even bigger problem with fast weight loss is that it just won’t last. The faster you lose, the more likely you are to gain it back. It’s the the “yo-yo diet effect” - weight goes down, but always comes back up.
 
What Really Matters Is Not How Much WEIGHT You Lose, But How Much FAT You Lose 
 
Where did your weight loss come from? Did you lose body fat or lean body mass? “Weight” is not the same as “fat.” Weight includes muscle, bone, internal organs as well as lots and lots of water…
 
Don’t Be Fooled By Water Weight Losses

One thing you should also know is that it’s very common to lose 3 - 5 pounds in the first week on nearly any diet and exercise program and often even more on low carb diets (because low carb diets deplete glycogen and every gram of glycogen holds 3 grams of water). Just remember, its NOT all fat - WATER LOSS IS NOT FAT LOSS - AND WATER LOSS IS TEMPORARY!

The only way to know if you’ve actually lost FAT is with body composition testing. For home body fat self-testing, I recommend the Accu-Measure skinfold caliper as first choice. Even better, get a multi site skinfold caliper test from an experienced tester at a health club, or even an underwater (hydrostatic) or air (bod pod) displacement test.

From literally hundreds of client case studies, I can confirm that it’s rare to lose more than 2 to 3 lbs of weight per week without losing some muscle along with it. If you lose muscle, you are damaging your metabolism and this will lead to a plateau and ultimately to weight relapse.

The Biggest Weight Loss Mistake That Is FATAL To Your Long Term Success

Lack of patience is one of the biggest mistakes people make when it comes to losing body fat. If you want to lose FAT, not muscle, and if you want to keep the fat off for good, then you have to take off the pounds slowly (of course, if you want to crash diet the weight off fast, lose muscle with the fat and gain all the fat back later, be my guest!).

This is one of the toughest lessons that overweight men and women have to learn - and they can be very hard learners. They fight kicking and screaming, insisting that they CAN and they MUST lose it faster.

Then you have these TV shows that encourage the masses that rapid, crash weight loss is okay. To the producers of these shows, I say SHAME ON YOU! To the personal trainers, registered dieticians and medical doctors who are associated with these programs, I say DOUBLE SHAME ON YOU, because you of all people should know better. These shows are not “motivating” or “inspiring” - they are DAMAGING!

They are a DISGRACE!

The rapid weight loss being promoted by the media for the sake of ratings and by the weight loss companies for the sake of profits makes it even harder for legitimate fitness and nutrition professionals because our clients say, “But look at so and so on TV - he lost 26 pounds in a week!”

Sure, but 26 pounds of WHAT - and do you have any idea what the long term consequences are?
Short term thinking… foolish.

Do it the right way. The healthy way. Take off pounds slowly, and steadily with a sensible lifestyle program like my Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle system that includes the important elements of cardio training, strength training and proper nutrition.

Measure your body fat, not just your body weight, and make this a new lifestyle, not a race, and you will never have to take the pounds off again, because they will be gone forever the first time.

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

Founder & CEO of
Burn The Fat Inner Circle

 

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is the author of the #1 best seller, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle: Fat Burning Secrets of the World’s Best Bodybuilders and Fitness Models. Tom is a lifetime natural bodybuilder and fat loss expert who achieved an astonishing 3.7% body fat level without drugs or supplements. Discover how to increase your metabolism and burn stubborn body fat, find out which foods burn fat and which foods turn to fat, plus get a free fat loss report and mini course by visiting Tom's site at: www.BurnTheFat.com

Night Time Eating And Fat Loss

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com
 
“Eat breakfast like a king, eat lunch like a prince and eat dinner like a pauper.” This maxim can be attributed to nutrition writer Adelle Davis, and since her passing in 1974, the advice to eat less at night to help with fat loss has lived on and continued to circulate in many different incarnations. This includes suggestions such as:

“Don't eat a lot before bedtime”
“Don’t eat midnight snacks”
“Don’t eat anything after 7pm”
“Don’t eat any carbs at night”
“Don’t eat any carbs after 3 pm”
and so on…

I too believe that eating lightly at night is usually very solid advice for people seeking increased fat loss, especially for people who are inactive at night. However, some fitness experts today, when they hear “eat less at night,” start screaming, "Diet Voodoo!”…

Opinions on this subject are definitely mixed. Many highly respected experts strongly recommend eating less at night to improve fat loss, while others suggest that it’s only "calories in vs calories out" over 24 hours that matters.

The critics say that it’s ridiculous to cut off food intake at a certain hour or to presume that “carbs turn to fat” at night as if there were some kind of nocturnal carbohydrate gremlins waiting to shuttle calories into fat cells when the moon is full. They suggest that if you eat less in the morning and eat more at night, it all “balances itself out at the end of the day.”

Of course, food does not turn to fat just because it’s eaten after a certain “cutoff hour” and carbs do not necessarily turn to fat at night either (although there are hypotheses about low evening insulin sensitivity having some significance). What we do know for certain is that the law of energy balance is with us at all hours of the day - and that bears some deeper consideration when you realize that we expend the least energy when we are sleeping and many people spend the entire evening watching TV.

I had the privilege of interviewing sports nutritionist and dietician Dan Benardot, PhD, and he gave us a very interesting perspective on this.

Dr. Benardot said that thinking in terms of 24 hour energy balance may be a seriously flawed and outdated concept. He says that the old model of energy balance looks at calories in versus calories out in 24 hour units. However, what really happens is that your body allocates energy minute by minute and hour by hour as your body’s needs dictate, not at some specified 24 hour end point.

I first heard this concept suggested by Dr. Fred Hatfield about 15 years ago. Hatfield explained how and why you should be thinking ahead to the next three hours and adjusting your energy intake accordingly.
Although it’s not really a new idea, Dr. Benardot has recently taken this concept to a much higher level of refinement and he calls the new paradigm, “Within Day Energy Balance.”

The Within Day Energy balance approach not only backs up the practice of eating small meals approximately every three hours, AND the practice of “nutrient timing” (which is why post workout nutrition is such a popular topic today, and rightly so)… it also suggests that we should adjust our energy intake according to our activity.

Let’s make the assumption most people come home from work, then plop on the couch in front of the TV all night. Let’s also assume that the majority of people go to bed late in the evening, usually around 10 pm, 11 pm or midnight. Therefore, nightime is the period during which the least energy is being expended.
If this is true, then it’s logical to suggest that one should not eat huge amounts of calories at night, especially right before bed because that would provide excess fuel at a time when it is not needed. The result is increased likelihood of fat storage.

From the within day energy balance perspective, the advice to eat less at night makes complete sense. Of course it also suggests that if you train at night, then you should eat more at night to support that activity beforehand and to support recovery afterwards.

Those stuck on a 24 hour model of energy expenditure would say timing of energy intake doesn't matter as long as the total calories for the day are in a deficit. But who ever decided that the body operates on a 24-hour “DAY”?

Try this test (or not!): Eat a 2500 calorie per day diet, with nothing for breakfast, nothing before or after your morning workout, 500 calories for lunch, 750 calories for dinner and 1250 calories before bedtime.
Now compare that to the SAME 2500 calorie diet with 6 small meals of approximately 420 calories per meal and then tweak those meal sizes a bit so that you eat a little more before and after your workout and a little less later at night.

Both are 2500 calories per day. According to “24 hour energy balance” thinking, both diets will produce the same results in performance, health and body composition. But will they?

Does your body really do a calculation at midnight and add up the day’s totals like a business man when he closes out the register at night? It’s a lot more logical that energy is stored in real time and energy is burned in real time, rather than accounted for at the end of each 24 hour period.

24 hour energy balance is just one way to academically sort calories so you can understand it and count it in convenient units of time. This has its uses, as in calculating a daily calorie intake level for menu planning purposes.

Ok, but enough about calories, what about the individual macronutrients? Some people don't simply suggest eating fewer calories at night, they suggest you take your calorie cut specifically from CARBS rather than from all macronutrients evenly across the board. Is there anything to it?

Well, there’s more than one theory. The most commonly quoted theory has to do with insulin.
The late bodybuilding guru Dan Duchaine was once asked by a competitor,
“I want to get cut up for an upcoming contest. Should I eat at night? I heard I shouldn’t eat carbs after six pm.”

Duchaine answered: “It’s true that insulin sensitivity is lowest at night. Let’s discuss what is happening in your body that makes it dislike carbs at night. Cortisol, a catabolic hormone, is highest at night. When cortisol is elevated, your muscle cell insulin sensitivity is lowered…”

More recently, David Barr wrote a tip on “lower carbs at night” for T-Muscle Magazine. He said:

“Even when bulking, you don’t want to start scarfing down Pop Tarts before you go to bed. Our muscle insulin sensitivity decreases as the day wears on, meaning that we’re more likely to generate a large insulin response from ingesting carbs. Stated differently, we’re more predisposed to adding fat mass by eating carbs at night because our body doesn’t handle the hormone insulin as well as it does earlier in the day.”

Mind you, Barr is a not a “voodoo” guy; he is a respected scientist who also happens to be well known as a “dogma destroyer” and “myth buster”… and Duchaine, although he had a shady past and some run-ins with the law, was nevertheless highly respected by nearly all in the bodybuilding world for his ahead-of-his-time nutrition wisdom.

As a result of advice like this, word got out in the bodybuilding and fitness community that you should eat fewer carbs at night. Real world results and the “test of time” have suggested that this is an effective strategy. I also don’t know a single nutrition or training expert who doesn’t agree that insulin management and improvement of insulin sensitivity aren’t effective approaches in the management of body fat.

However, it’s only fair to point out that not all scientists agree that cutting carbs at night will have any real world impact on fat loss, outside of any additional calorie deficit created by it. Dr. Benardot, for example, doesn’t think there’s much to it. He says that exercisers and athletes in particular, usually have excellent glycemic control, so the ratio of macronutrients should not be as much of an issue as the total energy balance in relation to energy needs at a particular time and the meal frequency (eating every 3 hours).

Regardless of which side of the “carbs at night” debate you lean towards, if you consider the within day energy balance principle, it makes perfect sense not to eat large, calorie-dense meals late at night before bedtime.

Keep in mind of course, that cutting back on your calories and/or carbs at night makes the most sense in the context of a fat loss program, especially if fat loss has been slow. It’s quite possible that I might give the exact opposite advice to the skinny “ectomorph” who is having a hard time gaining muscular body weight.

Also consider that this doesn’t necessarily mean eating nothing at night; it may simply mean eating smaller meals or emphasizing lean protein and green veggies (or a small protein shake) at night.

Many programs suggest a specific time when you should eat your last meal of the day. However, I’d suggest avoiding an absolute cut off time, such as “no food or no carbs after 6 pm, etc,” because people go to bed at different times, and maintenance of steady blood sugar and an optimal hormonal balance even at night are also important goals.

A more personalized suggestion is to cut off food intake 3 hours before bedtime, if practical and possible. For example, if you eat dinner at 6 pm, but don’t go to bed until 12 midnight, then a small 9 pm meal or a snack makes sense, but keep it light, preferably lean protein, and dont raid the refrigerator at 11:55!

An important rule to remember in all cases, is that whatever is working, keep doing more of it. If you eat your largest meal before bed and lose fat anyway, I would never tell you to change that. Results are what counts. On the other hand, if you’re stuck at a fat loss plateau, this is a technique I’d suggest you give a try.
Night time eating is likely to remain a subject of debate - especially the part about whether carbs should be targeted for removal in evening meals.

However, perhaps even those who are skeptical can consider, that if cutting out carbs at night is effective for fat loss, it may be for the simple reason that it forces you to eat less automatically.

In other words, setting a rule to eat fewer calories or to eat fewer carbs at night may be a very effective way to keep your daily calories in check and to match intake to activity, whereas people who are allowed to eat ad libitum at night when they’re home, glued to the couch and watching TV, etc., may tend to overeat when food is readily available, but the energy is not needed in large amounts.

Me personally? Unless I’m weight training at night, I have always reduced calories and carbs at night when “cutting” for bodybuilding competition. It’s worked so well for me that I devoted a whole section to it in my program, Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle (BFFM) and I call the techniques “calorie tapering” and “carb tapering.” For more information on how I use these methods to help me reach single digit body fat, you can visit: www.BurnTheFat.com

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

Founder & CEO of
Burn The Fat Inner Circle

 

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is the author of the #1 best seller, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle: Fat Burning Secrets of the World’s Best Bodybuilders and Fitness Models. Tom is a lifetime natural bodybuilder and fat loss expert who achieved an astonishing 3.7% body fat level without drugs or supplements. Discover how to increase your metabolism and burn stubborn body fat, find out which foods burn fat and which foods turn to fat, plus get a free fat loss report and mini course by visiting Tom's site at: www.BurnTheFat.com

---

The See-Food, Reach-Food Diet

By Tom Venuto
www.BurnTheFat.com
 
You’ve heard of the “See-Food” diet haven’t you? No, that’s not the diet where you load up on fish, lobster, crab and mussels. The See-Food Diet is the one that so many of us crack jokes about – it’s the diet where you eat everything in sight! But don’t laugh too hard. Scientists at Cornell University and other research institutions have proven that you actually WILL eat more food if you see food more. In fact, if you can see it and it’s within arm’s reach, you could eat yourself obese within a few years and not even know what hit you because the eating happens unconsciously.

It should be common sense that when you’re constantly surrounded by food, you tend to eat more.
But one thing that hasn’t been clear until recently was how seeing food (visibility) and having it within reach (proximity) could influence unconscious eating (and how it influences what I call “eating amnesia”).
Developmental psychologists tell us that the more effort or time you invest in a unique activity, the more likely you’ll be to remember it.

In other words, if you have to go out of your way to get food, you’ll remember eating it. If the food is right there within arms reach, you’ll munch away and more easily forget it.

For years, Dr. Brian Wansink of the Food and Brand Laboratory at Cornell University has been conducting fascinating experiments to find out what really makes you eat more food than you need.

Some of his previous studies revealed that taste, palatability, mood, stress, social context, role models (parental influence), visual cues, visibility and convenience can all influence how much you eat (Eating behavior is environmentally and psychologically influenced – appetite is not just biological).

To explore the influence of food proximity and visibility on eating behavior, Wansink set up an experiment using 40 female staff members from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champain. The subjects were not told it was a weight loss or calorie-related study. They were told that they would be given a free candy dish filled with chocolates (candy “kisses”) and they’d be contacted and surveyed about their candy preferences. They were also told not to share the candies, take them home or move the dish.

Participants were divided into four groups:
1) Proximate and visible (can see and reach)
2) Proximate and non-visible (can reach but not see)
3) Less proximate and visible (can see but can’t reach)
4) Less proximate and non visible (can’t see, and can’t reach)

During each day of the four week study, 30 chocolates were placed in 20 clear containers and 20 opaque containers and delivered to the 40 subjects. The containers were replenished every afternoon. They were kept in the same location for 4 straight business days and then rotated on the following week. Researchers kept a daily record of the number of chocolates eaten from each container and comparisons were made from the data collected.

At the end of each week, each subject was given a questionnaire which asked them how much they thought they had eaten over the entire week and asked them about their perceptions regarding the chocolates (such as “it was difficult to stop eating them,” “I thought of eating the chocolates often,” etc).

When the results were tabulated, here’s what Dr. Wansink and his research team discovered:

The visibility and proximity of the candy dish also influenced the subject’s perceptions. Regardless of whether participants could actually see the chocolates, if the candies were sitting on the desk (as opposed to being a mere 2 meters away), they were rated as more attention-attracting and difficult to resist. Candies in the clear containers were also rated as more difficult to resist and more attention attracting.

Most interesting of all, this study confirmed that when food is close by and visible, you’ll not only eat more, you’ll also be likely to forget that you ate them and therefore, underestimate how much you’ve eaten (I like to call that “eating amnesia.”)

Is a few extra candies a day really a big deal? 

If it becomes habitual it sure is! Over a year, the difference between the candy dish placement would mean 125 calories per day which adds up to 12 extra pounds of body fat over a year.
When given the advice to keep junk food out of the house and office, I often hear complaints that it’s “impossible” to do because the rest of the family would have a fit, or simply not allow it. As for the office, one of the biggest excuses I’ve heard for diet failure is that the temptations are always there and it’s out of your control to change. Invariably someone else brings doughnuts or candy to the office.

Now you know what to do to reduce temptation and successfully stick with your program more effectively: 
 
If you can’t keep it out of your office or house, keep it out of sight and out of arm’s reach. That alone is enough to reduce consumption.

At home, if your significant other or family is not willing to remove all offending foods from the premises, then get their agreement that their food is not to remain in plain sight - it goes in the back of a refrigerator drawer and not on the shelf at eye level, or if non-perishable, it goes inside a cupboard that is exclusively the domain of the other person.

At work, tell your office pals to keep the candy, doughnuts and other temptations off your desk, at a distance and out of sight. If they put any unhealthy snacks on your desk, promptly remove them!

Environmental cues can trigger you to eat impulsively. If you can see it and reach it, you’ll eat more of it, and you’ll forget how much you ate. So get the junk out of your home and office now and if you can’t, then get it out of your sight. If you can’t do that, get it out of arms reach.

Better yet, setup an "environment for success" with a lifestyle program like my Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle system.

Tom Venuto, author of
Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle

Founder & CEO of
Burn The Fat Inner Circle

About the Author:

Tom Venuto is the author of the #1 best seller, Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle: Fat Burning Secrets of the World’s Best Bodybuilders and Fitness Models. Tom is a lifetime natural bodybuilder and fat loss expert who achieved an astonishing 3.7% body fat level without drugs or supplements. Discover how to increase your metabolism and burn stubborn body fat, find out which foods burn fat and which foods turn to fat, plus get a free fat loss report and mini course by visiting Tom's site at: www.BurnTheFat.com