bonuschapter - amazon s3...unfortunately, there’s no such pill just yet, but there is something...

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Bonus"Chapter"

Body Hacks

Over the course of this book, we’ve covered the basic ways you can fight back against fat to live a healthy life with a slender new body. Stick to the plan and you will get results. However, there are a few other methods you can employ to accelerate your weight loss. If you’re feeling adventurous, give them a go.

USE$COLD$THERAPY$FOR$FAT$LOSS$

What if I told you about a new pill that could double your metabolic rate, im-prove insulin sensitivity in your muscles, reduce inflammation, and help you burn more fat, all without any nasty side effects? Would you be interested? Unfortunately, there’s no such pill just yet, but there is something that can achieve all of these wondrous effects. I’m sure, at this point, you’re ready to give it a shot, but I must warn you: It will give you the shivers, literally.

Cold therapy is a weight-loss measure that’s becoming increasingly pop-ular with each passing year. Here’s how it works: First, when you get cold, blood vessels close to the surface of your skin constrict, diverting blood back into your core to keep your vital organs warm. Thus, your body’s sole aim is to keep your important organs alive. Because Newton’s Law of Cooling dictates that heat moves from hot to cold areas, your body goes to great lengths to pre-serve your core temperature, even to the point of potentially sacrificing your limbs (which is why frostbite happens).

Second, when you get cold, your body responds by shivering. This is an automatic response with the goal of increasing your body’s temperature so that you don’t freeze to death. Earlier, I showed you how contracting your muscles

2""""The"All3Day"Fat3Burning"Diet"

generates heat and burns calories. Well, a similar thing occurs when your body shivers. Your body generates heat and you end up burning more calories as a result.

These are two ways your body responds to cold exposure. Neither sounds pleasant, but when you consider how much fat cold therapy can help you lose, it’s something you might want to consider applying in smart ways during this program. What’s more, it can also be used to cool inflammation and help you recover faster from your workouts. Let’s dive in.

Activate$Brown$Adipose$Tissue$$

Your body has two types of fat—white and brown fat. The former is the bad kind that just sits around and causes problems. Brown fat, however, is metab-olically active and generates heat, which has been shown to directly target and burn more white fat around your belly, hips, and thighs.1 Pretty amazing, right? This brown adipose tissue (BAT) is located primarily around your col-larbones, neck, and upper back.

Because its role is to generate heat to keep the body warm and reduce shivering, BAT is especially abundant in newborns and in hibernating mam-mals.2 In contrast to white fat cells, brown fat cells contain a much higher number of mitochondria and capillaries (which make this kind of fat brown), since it has a greater need for oxygen than most tissues.3

You can think of BAT as an invisible warm blanket that sits atop your upper back to keep you warm. The more exposure you get to cold tempera-tures, the more brown fat you have. Both exercise and fasting have been shown to increase BAT, but they pale in comparison to frequent exposure to cold.4 5

Cold thermogenesis (or CT, as it’s known), is the process by which our body generates heat when exposed to cold. Brown fat activation (nonshivering thermogenesis) and shivering are the two main things that happen when you’re cold, and as I mentioned, they can help increase your metabolic rate and burn more fat. In fact, CT can cause blood sugar to be burned more rapidly instead of converted to fat, as a means of heating your body.6

Studies have consistently shown a significant inverse relationship be-tween the activity and prevalence of BAT and body mass index (BMI), body fat content, and visceral fat accumulation.7 Thus, the more BAT you have—and the more active it is—the leaner you tend to be.

The$All'Day$Fat'Burning$Diet$$$$3$

The best way to benefit from BAT’s fat-burning powers is to expose yourself to frequent bouts of cold temperatures. I know that sounds odd and perhaps a little uncomfortable, but it’s actually doable, with a bit of training. Since I live in a city that is freezing cold half the year, it’s quite easy for me to do this. But even if you live in the desert, you can activate your BAT to burn more fat. Here are some ways.

• In wintertime, keep your home relatively cool (between 60 and 65 de-grees Fahrenheit). You’ll also save on your heating bills this way.

• Take a cold shower or alternate between 20 seconds of cold and 10 se-conds of warm water. Water is 25 times more thermally conductive than air, so this is a very effective way to quickly cool your body.

• Take an ice bath or jump into a cold river or lake. I know this may not be an option for many of you, but it’s a great thing to do if you can.

• While sitting at your desk or watching TV, wear cold compression gear (like a Cool Fat Burner vest from coolfatburner.com) or put a cold pack on your upper back.

• Get outdoors or shovel snow in your T-shirt—for brief periods of time. Yes, that sounds absurd, but it’s something I started doing when I dis-covered the benefits of short bouts of cold exposure.

If you think that I’m crazy for recommending getting cold as a means of burning fat, keep in mind that cold thermogenesis also enhances your immune system and increases cellular health and longevity. Ironically, I’ve noticed that shoveling snow without wearing a jacket or sweater has strengthened my im-mune system, making me less likely to get sick from cold exposure—another old wives’ tale blasted!

Cold thermogenesis strengthens the immune system by increasing your body’s most powerful antioxidant, glutathione, along with norepinephrine, which then stimulates immune cells like natural killer cells and interleukin-6.8 9 Exposure to cold and the resulting health benefits can also be viewed as an adaptation to repeated oxidative stress and is postulated as a mechanism for what’s known as “body hardening,” the increased tolerance to stress and dis-ease that results from exposure to a natural thermal stimulus.10

One of my childhood friends never gets sick. I’ve known him for more than 20 years and I’ve never seen him with a cold or flu or anything. I’ve also never seen him wear a winter jacket, and we live in Toronto! There’s some-thing to be said for your body’s beneficial adaptation to cold. The same can be


said for many Scandinavians and northern Europeans who, perhaps stereotypi-cally, seem to be “hardened” to cold weather and more resilient due to growing up in harsh environmental conditions.

The mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) protein regulates growth, motility, survival, protein synthesis, and transcription in all of our cells. When this mTOR protein is downregulated, it seems that our cells have a greater ability to clear out excess junk. This is known as “autophagy” (as I described in the 1-Day Fast section in an earlier chapter) and allows our cells to live longer. Cold thermogenesis (and fasting) has been shown to improve cellular health by downregulating these mTOR pathways.11

I should warn you, though, that if, after reading this, you feel like doing the next polar bear plunge, you should hold off for a bit, especially if you’re not fit and healthy already. After submersion in ice-cold water the “cold shock response” occurs, causing an uncontrollable gasp for air, followed by hyper-ventilation and, as blood in the limbs is cooled and returns to the heart, possi-bly fibrillation and even cardiac arrest.

This chain of events obviously does not happen to every “polar bear,” but I want to make sure you’re aware of what could happen. But again, I’m not recommending you jump into an ice-cold lake. Rather, I’m suggesting that you expose your body to small, frequent bouts of colder-than-normal temperatures. A light shiver for several minutes is what you want. You shouldn’t feel like your hands and feet are about to get frostbitten. In fact, if you’re outdoors, be sure to wear gloves and shoes to cover your extremities.

TAKE$NUTRIENTS$THAT$FIGHT$INFLAMMATION,$SPEED$RECOVERY,$AND$BURN$FAT$

Throughout this book, you’ve seen that a major theme is eating foods that fight inflammation. That’s important for better health and to lose weight and keep it off. In addition to the foods you’ll enjoy on the All-Day Fat-Burning Diet, you may want to consider adding a few supplemental nutrients to your daily regi-men. I personally use all of the following nutrients on a daily basis, in some form or another.


Vitamin$C$

Vitamin C is an inflammation-reducing antioxidant important for many aspects of your health and immune function. It also increases cell wall elasticity and joint mobility and is an integral component of your collagen and skin. It can be found in just about any dark-colored fruit or vegetable such as acerola cherries, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, pomegranates, broccoli, kale, tomatoes, and sweet potatoes—just to name a few.

In general, organic foods tend to have higher amounts of vitamin C be-cause plants exposed to nature’s elements (without pesticides) tend to adapt by generating greater levels of antioxidants to protect themselves.

As with any nutrient, your best bet is to get vitamin C through food, es-pecially since most supplements provide it in a fractionized, synthetic form known as ascorbic acid. If you are supplementing with vitamin C—or any oth-er vitamin or mineral, for that matter—do your best to choose a whole foods–based supplement, one in which the vitamins and minerals come from actual food that your body knows how to assimilate most efficiently.

Although some studies have shown modest benefits of vitamin C sup-plementation on recovery from workout (and workout soreness), studies of its ability to speed recovery are still inconclusive. One study found that just 200 milligrams of vitamin C (as ascorbic acid) daily for 14 days had beneficial effects on muscle soreness and muscle function after a grueling 90-minute shuttle run test.12 Another study using the same exercise protocol found no beneficial effect of vitamin C supplementation on recovery when it was started immediately after the workout.13

Although vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin, and so does not get stored in the body, it’s interesting that longer-term, consistently higher vitamin C intake seems more beneficial when it comes to exercise recovery than a short- term surge. This “too little too late” idea may also apply to vitamin C’s general health and disease-preventing benefits. Thus, eating a whole foods diet loaded with vitamin C on a regular basis is your best bet.

Vitamin C’s true power begins to surface when we look at how it reduces nasty inflammation throughout the body. A great example is in atherosclerosis, which remains a major inflammation-mediated cause of mortality.

A big contributor to this disease (which is essentially the hardening of your arteries) is oxidative stress, which is generated by the inflammatory re-sponse of atherosclerosis. Among other amazing benefits, vitamin C has been shown to decrease oxidative stress related to the activation of dangerous LDL


cholesterol particles and globally improve the earliest stages of atherosclero-sis.14

Since the inflammatory response is also a critical component in the de-velopment of strokes, vitamin C’s anti-inflammatory benefits have been inves-tigated as well. A 2004 study compared the nutritional status and levels of inflammatory markers of stroke patients and controls to assess which antioxi-dant was most associated with levels of inflammatory markers and oxidative stress. Researchers found that stroke patients had significantly lower levels of vitamin C and much higher levels of C-reactive protein (and other inflamma-tory markers) than did controls.15

But can vitamin C really help your body handle demanding exercise or a stressful lifestyle? And does it do anything to help you stay lean? The answer is yes and yes.

Long-distance running is a big stressor known to compromise immune function in those who partake in it regularly. It sends cortisol skyrocketing, which we know is terrible for long-term health and fat loss.

An interesting study on ultra-marathon runners looked at whether sup-plementing with 1,500 milligrams versus 500 milligrams of vitamin C for 7 days before a 90K race would be of any benefit in fighting the subsequent stress and inflammatory response in the body. The findings revealed that post-race cortisol, adrenaline, and inflammatory markers (interleukin-10 and inter-leukin-1Ra) were significantly lower in the group that had the daily intake of 1,500 milligrams of vitamin C for just those 7 days before the race.

How does vitamin C help you stay lean? When obesity persists for a long time, antioxidant sources such as vitamin C are known to become depleted, which decreases the activity of vital anti-inflammatory enzymes such as super-oxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase, furthering the development of obesity-related problems.16

Thus, ensuring proper antioxidant intake by eating lots of fresh foods (and supplementing if needed) can be an important element in your fat-loss journey. The key is that you shouldn’t just take vitamin C for a day or two when you’re stiff, sore, or sick but rather make it an integral component of your daily diet. In cases where more is needed (such as when you’re sick or injured), you may safely increase the supplement dosage to bowel tolerance.

Curcumin$


If I could recommend just one spice to add to your diet from this point for-ward, it would have to be curcumin. The research on this miracle spice is abso-lutely astounding, and I consider it the most powerful anti-inflammatory nutrient on this planet.

Curcumin is found in turmeric and curry powder, for the most part. Ob-viously, those are two spices that most North Americans don’t eat in regular amounts. Thus, supplementing with curcumin is likely your best approach. I routinely take 500 to 1,000 milligrams per day.

A lot of good research shows that curcumin reduces inflammation and exercise-induced soreness and turns your body into a 24/7 fat-burning ma-chine. Let’s have a look.

Downhill running is one of the best (and by that I mean most brutal) ways to cause muscle damage. It’s the ultimate stress on your body. A study in mice subjected the little guys to torturous amounts of damaging downhill run-ning. It found that curcumin feedings ahead of time offset these deleterious effects on running performance. Curcumin also blunted the increase in in-flammatory cytokines 24 and 48 hours postrun seen in the mice who were not fed curcumin.17

A 2013 study in humans found that curcumin supplementation attenuates exercise-induced oxidative stress by increasing blood antioxidant capacity. Here, participants were randomly assigned to one of three curcumin supple-mentation trials: (1) placebo (the control group), (2) single dose of 90 milli-grams before exercise, and (3) double dose, 90 milligrams before and 90 milligrams immediately after exercise. Each participant walked or ran at 65 percent of VO2max on a treadmill for 60 minutes—nowhere near record-breaking intensity. However, blood samples revealed that reactive oxygen me-tabolites (markers of oxidative stress and inflammation) were significantly higher than pre-exercise values in the placebo trial but not in the single or dou-ble curcumin supplementation trials.18

I could go on all day about the benefits of curcumin, but I’ll sum it all up with a large review of the literature that showed that curcumin directly inter-acts with adipocytes (fat cells), pancreatic cells, liver cells, macrophages (im-mune cells), and muscle cells. There, it suppresses inflammatory transcription factors (nuclear factor-kappa B and others) and downregulates the release of inflammatory adipokines (cytokines released by fat cells), including tumor necrosis factor and interleukin-6. It also increases adiponectin, which regulates fat metabolism and is inversely related to the amount of fat in the body. These curcumin-induced alterations reverse insulin resistance, hyperglycemia, hyper-


lipidemia, and other symptoms linked to obesity.19 Remember, when inflammatory signals are excessively activated in your

fat cells (white adipose tissue), a constant “alarm” message is sent to your im-mune cells to come and join in the inflammatory party. In much the same manner that an influx of immune cells causes the swelling of a sprained ankle, an influx of immune cells to “damaged” fat leads to swelling of your fat cells. By lowering such inflammation, you stop overweight-induced disease at its source.

Need any more evidence that curcumin is the heavyweight champ for fighting inflammation and keeping your body from packing on the pounds? I didn’t think so. But I’ll give you a few more nuggets to drive home how cur-cumin reduces inflammation and keeps your weight down. After all, new re-search has now revealed the many ways in which curcumin works its fat-burning magic.20 Some of these I alluded to above; here are a few more.

• It helps lower inappropriately high levels of leptin (reducing leptin re-sistance), while boosting the all-important levels of adiponectin (which lowers insulin resistance).

• Curcumin helps activate the fat-burning gene signal PPAR-gamma, which also helps to make fat cells more metabolically active.

• Curcumin directly reduces major inflammatory events inside white adipose tissue (tumor necrosis factor alpha, interleukin-6, and mono-cyte chemotactic protein-1).

• Curcumin acts directly on pancreatic beta cells to help them produce insulin normally so that you can better manage blood sugar.

Ideally, you want to get curcumin into your body through the foods you eat. Eating more curries or turmeric-based dishes is a great start. Some of the recipes in this book include this wonderful spice. However, the more potent route for most of us is to supplement, which as you’ve now seen is probably a very good idea. About 500 milligrams per day is all you need.

Fish$Oil$

Fish oil is one of the best sources of the omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) so important for the health of our brain, joints, cell membranes, heart, and more. The main reason they’re so beneficial is because fish oils mostly


contain the omega-3 fatty acids eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahex-aenoic acid (DHA), precursors of certain eicosanoids (fast-acting signaling molecules) known to reduce inflammation in the body.

A large review of 26 publications since 2002 showed that dietary omega-3 fatty acids are associated with lower levels of inflammation, cardiovascular disease, and other chronic and acute diseases, including chronic renal disease, sepsis, and acute pancreatitis.21 Since reducing inflammation is such a key component of the All-Day Fat-Burning Diet, I’m sure you can see why I’m recommending fish oil here. But does it help us with fat loss as well?

In general, high doses of fish oil in rats (levels impractical for human consumption) are able to reliably reduce weight gain if the rats are concur-rently fed a fattening diet. The same result appears to occur to a smaller extent with smaller doses, which may be more relevant to humans. It’s also been in-dicated that DHA is more important than EPA when it comes to fat loss (and most health benefits of fish oil).22

Fish oil has also been noted to increase the expression of the carnitine palmitoyltransferase-1 (CPT-1) enzyme in muscle cells, which is required for burning and turning long-chain fatty acids into fuel.23 Thus, fish oil may help burn fat at the muscular level by increasing caloric expenditure in the mito-chondria.

Fish oil may play a role in reducing fat mass in obese people, but it does not have an inherent fat-loss effect. This effect is dependent (and often syner-gistic) with other weight-loss habits, like exercise or caloric restriction. None-theless, when looking at the research, there appears to be an inverse relationship between dietary fish oil intake and obesity rates. Thus, the more fish oil in one’s diet, the lower his or her body fat tends to be.24 For instance, one study in otherwise healthy, lean men noted that replacing 6 grams of fatty acids with fish oil for 3 weeks resulted in greater fat loss.25

And another study on young, overweight men showed that the inclusion of either lean or fatty fish, or fish oil, as part of a calorie-restricted diet resulted in a weight loss of approximately 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds) more after just 4 weeks than did a similar diet without fish or fish oil.26 That’s quite profound when you consider that having a little more fish or taking a few tablespoons of fish oil each day is really quite simple. It’s just one reason why I’ve included several fish-based recipes in this program. If you’re eating fish two to four times per week, then you’re ahead of the game. But do your best to eat smaller, wild fish that haven’t bioaccumulated as many toxins as larger, farmed fish. Wild Alaskan and Pacific salmon are great choices, as are my personal favor-


ites—sardines and anchovies. For optimal health, you need between 2 and 9 grams of omega-3s per

day, spread throughout the day, depending on your current health. The more banged up and inflamed you are, the more you’ll need. Within that recommen-dation, 1 to 3 grams per day should be in the form of EPA and DHA. For most people, that requirement might be tough to meet via food alone, and that’s why fish and/or algae oil supplementation can be important.

So, if you want to supplement with fish oil—which I recommend you do unless you are on blood thinners—here’s how to choose a good one.

• The supplement should be derived mainly from small fish such as sar-dines, anchovies, and herring.

• It should be molecularly distilled, thus ensuring removal of all toxins. • It should be in triglyceride (TG) form, not ethyl ester (EE) form, to en-

sure better absorption. • It should contain at least 1,000 milligrams of omega-3 fatty acids per

serving (with at least 400 milligrams of DHA).

Since fish oil is very unstable, like all PUFAs, remember not to expose it to air, heat, or light. Keep it sealed in a dark glass bottle in your fridge. But always remember that fish oil alone is no magic bullet. Even though it may produce some fat-loss benefits, its true powers emerge when used over the long term and when combined with a lower-calorie diet and regular exercise—just what you’ll be experiencing in this program. A 2007 study on obese sed-entary individuals showed that 6 grams per day of fish oil lowered triglyc-erides, increased HDL (good) cholesterol, and reduced body fat. These benefits were more pronounced when supplementation was combined with walking 45 minutes per day just three times per week.27

EMPLOY$PROBIOTICS$AND$PREBIOTICS:$THE$GATEKEEPERS$OF$YOUR$HEALTH$

As we discuss reconsidering the foods you regularly eat, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the massive role played by healthy bacteria in your gut. After all, since most of us are suffering to some degree from intestinal permeability


(aka leaky gut), which creates further inflammation and immune havoc, it’s a good idea to see how we can repair this problem.

As a refresher, remember that everything you put in your mouth is con-sidered “outside” your body until it crosses the lining of your small and large intestines. If large gaps are present between each of the cells lining your gut, then big protein molecules can enter your bloodstream and trigger an inflam-matory and heightened immune response, which over time can lead to serious health issues, including fat gain. For that reason, we want to close those gaps and ensure that the environment inside your gut is, ideally, populated with a variety and abundance of good bacteria.

There are two main ways to increase the number of good bacteria in your gut. The first is to consume more fermented foods like sauerkraut and water kefir. These are staples in my diet and deliver a better variety and number of probiotics than store-bought probiotic supplements, which is the second option for repopulating your gut with healthy bacteria. But the reality is that most people are simply not eating fermented foods at all (or eating very few), and thus supplementing with a good probiotic is likely a smart idea.

Here’s a synopsis of some of the powerful ways in which probiotics help you, courtesy of recent research out of the journal Current Pharmaceutical Design:28

• Probiotics alter the gut flora pattern to your benefit and adhere to the intestinal wall, crowding out harmful bacteria.

• They produce antimicrobial substances (enzymes or proteins). • They produce compounds that can be used as energy by the cells of the

gut lining. • They boost immunity by increasing production of secretory IgA and

mucin, which help fend off foreign invaders in the saliva and the mu-cosal linings of your GI tract.

• They produce antimicrobial substances, such as organic acids and bac-teriocins.

• They downregulate the inflammatory response. • They assist in early programming of the immune system to result in a

better-balanced immune response and reduced risk of developing al-lergy.

• They improve the gut mucosal barrier function. • They decrease pathogen adhesion to gut walls.


Not bad, right? That’s a long list of benefits you’d be crazy to take a pass on. So probiotics are pretty darn important. With that said, and assuming that you’re likely to get most of your probiotics in supplemental form, here are a few things you want to look for when choosing a good probiotic. It should:

• Have at least 10 billion CFU (colony-forming units) per capsule at the time of consumption (not production).

• Be microencapsulated or enteric-coated to prevent destruction by stomach acid.

• Contain several different types of beneficial bacterial strains, such as Lactobacillus acidophilus, L. rhamnosus, L. bulgaricus, L. plantarum, L. casei, Bifidobacterium longum, and B. breve.

Most people’s guts get out of whack because of excessive sugar intake, which directly feeds bad bacteria. Combine that with stress and antibiotic use, both of which destroy healthy bacterial balance, and it’s easy to see why re-population with healthy bacteria is important. In doing so, remember that pro-biotics themselves require the right nourishment in the form of prebiotics, indigestible carbohydrates that act as food for probiotics. Think of probiotics as the seeds in your garden, while prebiotics are the water they require to grow and flourish.

Research has demonstrated beneficial effects of prebiotics on calcium and other mineral absorption29 and immune system effectiveness,30 and a low-ered risk of colorectal cancer.31 Many of these health effects emanate from the ability of prebiotics to stimulate production of short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) by the beneficial bacteria.

In this program, I’ve recommended incorporating resistant starches like cooked, then cooled, potatoes; unripe bananas; and even raw potato starch. Although that may seem odd, these resistant starches are terrific prebiotics and create large amounts of beneficial butyrate—a powerful SCFA.

Butyrate is one of the most effective SCFAs at tightening the junctions between the cells in your intestinal lining. That’s huge! Incorporating foods that can literally repair your gut is a big step in protecting your body from damaging food proteins and other unwanted inflammatory triggers. And with less inflammation, your body can more easily let go of excess weight.

Studies have also shown resistant starch to be helpful in weight loss (par-ticularly loss of abdominal fat), partly because it stimulates the satiety hor-mones—gut peptide YY (PYY) and glucagon-like peptide (GLP)-1—so that your brain gets the message that you’re no longer hungry.32 Prebiotic fiber also


comes in the form of inulin, oligofructose, fructooligosaccharides (FOS), ga-lactooligosaccharides (GOS), and pectin. It’s most commonly found in many fruits and vegetables, such as the tubers (potatoes, sweet potatoes, yams, ya-con, cassava) that our ancestors are known to have consumed in high amounts, apple skins, onions and garlic, Jerusalem artichokes, and beans.

Additionally, you can look for foods that contain inulin—the most com-mon prebiotic oligosaccharide (carbohydrate). Chicory root is by far the great-est known source of inulin. Unfortunately, the minute amounts of fiber in each of these foods—1 to 2 grams per serving—make ingesting enough fiber ex-tremely difficult. Most people should consume at least 30 grams of fiber every day, and the foods highest in prebiotic fiber—chicory root is an example—are nearly impossible to eat in large quantities every day. That’s one reason why it’s a prominent ingredient in my All-Day Energy Bars (alldayenergy-bars.com). In supplement form, prebiotic fiber is mild in texture and nearly tasteless, making it easy to add to water or your favorite smoothie. I think add-ing 1 to 2 tablespoons of raw potato starch to your daily diet is one of the easi-est and best things you can do for your gut and your ability to burn fat.

Before you run out and load up on prebiotics and other healthy fiber, I should remind you that the immediate addition of substantial quantities of pre-biotics to your diet may result in an increase in gas, bloating, or bowel move-ments. If this happens, just remember that it’s likely due to the fact that your body is not accustomed to this level of indigestible fiber. However, with a little training (i.e., consistent consumption), your body will tolerate those fibers much better. 1 Yoon, M., Lee, G., Chung, J., Ahn, Y., Hong, S., & Kim, J. (2006). Adiponectin increases fatty acid oxidation in skeletal muscle cells by sequential activation of amp-activated protein kinase, p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase, and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor alpha. Diabetes, 55(9), 2562-70. 2 Gesta S, Tseng YH, Kahn CR (October 2007). "Developmental origin of fat: tracking obesity to its source". Cell 131 (2): 242–56. 3 Enerbäck S (2009). "The origins of brown adipose tissue". New England Journal of Medicine 360 (19): 2021–2023. d 4 Barbara Cannon, Jan Nedergaard. Yes, even human brown fat is on fire! Published in Volume 122, Issue 2 J Clin Invest. 2012; 122(2):486–489 5 Haruya Ohno, Kosaku Shinoda, Bruce M. Spiegelman, Shingo Kaji-mura. PPARγ agonists Induce a White-to-Brown Fat Conversion


through Stabilization of PRDM16 Protein. Cell Metabolism, 2012; 15 (3): 395 6 Vallerand, A., & Jacobs, I. (n.d.. Influence of cold exposure on plas-ma triglyceride clearance in humans. (1990). Metabolism: Clinical and Experimental, 39(11), 1211-8. 7Saito, M. (2013). Brown Adipose Tissue as a Regulator of Energy Ex-penditure and Body Fat in Humans. Diabetes & Metabolism Journal, 37(1), 22–29. 8 Saito, M. (2013). Brown Adipose Tissue as a Regulator of Energy Expenditure and Body Fat in Humans. Diabetes & Metabolism Journal, 37(1), 22–29. 9 Brenner, K.-Shek, P. Immune changes in humans during cold expo-sure: effects of prior heating and exercise. (1999). Journal of Applied Physiology, 87(2), 699-710. 10 Saito, M. (2013). Brown Adipose Tissue as a Regulator of Energy Expenditure and Body Fat in Humans. Diabetes & Metabolism Journal, 37(1), 22–29. 11 VERIFY THIS => Shibata, R., Ouchi, N., & Murohara, T. (n.d.. Ad-iponectin and cardiovascular disease. (2009). Circulation Journal: Offi-cial Journal of the Japanese Circulation Society, 73(4), 608-14. 12 Thompson, D., Williams, C., McGregor, S. J., Nicholas, C. W., McArdle, F., Jackson, M. J., & Powell, J. R. (2001). Prolonged vitamin C supplementation and recovery from demanding exercise. Interna-tional journal of sport nutrition and exercise metabolism, 11(4), 466-481. 13 Thompson, D., Williams, C., Garcia-Roves, P., McGregor, S. J., McArdle, F., & Jackson, M. J. (2003). Post-exercise vitamin C supple-mentation and recovery from demanding exercise. European journal of applied physiology, 89(3-4), 393-400. 14 Aguirre, R., & May, J. M. (2008). Inflammation in the Vascular Bed: Importance of Vitamin C. Pharmacology & therapeutics, 119(1), 96. 15 Sánchez-Moreno, C., Dashe, J. F., Scott, T., Thaler, D., Folstein, M. F., & Martin, A. (2004). Decreased levels of plasma vitamin C and in-creased concentrations of inflammatory and oxidative stress markers after stroke. Stroke, 35(1), 163-168. 16 Fernández-Sánchez, A., Madrigal-Santillán, E., Bautista, M., Es-quivel-Soto, J., Morales-González, Á., Esquivel-Chirino, C., ... & Morales-González, J. A. (2011). Inflammation, oxidative stress, and obesity. International journal of molecular sciences, 12(5), 3117-3132. 17 Davis, J. M., Murphy, E. A., Carmichael, M. D., Zielinski, M. R., Groschwitz, C. M., Brown, A. S., ... & Mayer, E. P. (2007). Curcumin


effects on inflammation and performance recovery following eccentric exercise-induced muscle damage. American journal of physiology. Regulatory, integrative and comparative physiology, 292(6), R2168. 18 Takahashi, M., Suzuki, K., Kim, H. K., Otsuka, Y., Imaizumi, A., Miyashita, M., & Sakamoto, S. (2013). Effects of curcumin supplemen-tation on exercise-induced oxidative stress in humans. Int J Sports Med 35(06): 469-475 19 Aggarwal, B. B. (2010). Targeting inflammation-induced obesity and metabolic diseases by curcumin and other nutraceuticals. Annual re-view of nutrition, 30, 173. 20 Shehzad A, Ha T, Subhan F, Lee YS. New mechanisms and the anti-inflammatory role of curcumin in obesity and obesity-related metabolic diseases. Eur J Nutr. 2011 April 50(3):151-61. 21 Rangel-Huerta, O. Omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids supplementation on inflammatory biomakers: a systematic review of randomised clinical trials. British Journal of Nutrition. Volume 107. Supplement S2. pp S159-S170 22 Ruzickova J, et al. Omega-3 PUFA of marine origin limit diet-induced obesity in mice by reducing cellularity of adipose tissue. Lip-ids. (2004) 23 Dietary Fatty Acids Influence the Activity and Metabolic Control of Mitochondrial Carnitine Palmitoyltransferase I in Rat Heart and Skele-tal Muscle 24 Ka He, M. (2002). Fish Consumption and Risk of Stroke in Men. JAMA. 288(24):3130-3136. 25 Couet C, et al. Effect of dietary fish oil on body fat mass and basal fat oxidation in healthy adults. Int J Obes Relat Metab Disord. (1997) 26 Thorsdottir, I. (2007). Randomized trial of weight-loss-diets for young adults varying in fish and fish oil content. International Journal of Obesity. 31, 1560–1566; 27 Hill, A. (2007). Combining fish-oil supplements with regular aerobic exercise improves body composition and cardiovascular disease risk factors. Am J Clin Nutr. vol. 85 no. 5 1267-1274 28 Lomax A, Calder P. Probiotics, Immune Function, Infection and In-flammation: A Review of the Evidence from Studies Conducted in Humans. Cur Pharma Des 2009;15(13):1428-1518. 29 Scholz-Ahrens KE, Schrezenmeir J (Nov 2007). "Inulin and oli-gofructose and mineral metabolism: the evidence from animal trials". J Nutr. 137 (11 Suppl): 2513S–2523S.


30 Lomax AR, Calder PC (Mar 2009). "Prebiotics, immune function, infection and inflammation: a review of the evidence". Br J Nutr. 101 (5): 633–658. 31 Geier MS, Butler RN, Howarth GS (Oct 2006). "Probiotics, prebiot-ics and synbiotics: a role in chemoprevention for colorectal cancer?". Cancer Biol Ther. 5 (10): 1265–1269. 32 Keenan, M. et al. (2006). Effects of Resistant Starch, A Non-digestible Fermentable Fiber, on Reducing Body Fat. Obesity. Volume 14, Issue 9, pages 1523–1534

1"

SUGAR&AND&INSULIN&

You’ve certainly heard about insulin with regard to diabetes, but it’s crucial to proper body function even if you don’t have this dreaded condition. Produced and secreted by your pancreas, insulin is a storage hormone tasked with mak-ing sure your blood sugar doesn’t get too high by chaperoning excess sugar in the food you eat from your blood to your muscle, liver, and fat cells.

If this happens in a balanced manner, then everything is quite fine, and sugar doesn’t become quite the villain it’s often made out to be. However, the problems begin when you eat too much sugar. Since your muscles and liver can store only so much sugar in the form of glycogen, any excess is sent to your fat, which has infinite storage space. This “spillover” is one of the reasons why eating too much sugar (and too many carbs) all the time is not a smart idea—it makes you fat. Not only that, but it can make you feel terrible as well. As you’ve likely experienced at some point—perhaps after bingeing on too many sugary doughnuts or sweet desserts—blood sugar imbalances disrupt our body, our mood, our ability to sleep, and so much more. A sugar rush may be briefly satisfying, but when you crash, you crash hard.

And, actually, things can get much, much worse. Chronically elevated blood sugar can lead to insulin resistance—a condition where your cells no longer respond to insulin and therefore cannot get glucose inside for energy production. This means that blood sugar stays dangerously elevated. If you’re wondering how this is possible, imagine an annoying life insurance telemar-keter who repeatedly cold-calls you every night at dinnertime no matter how many times you tell him you’re not interested. You know what these guys are like, right? Perhaps, he even starts calling from an “unknown” number to trick you into answering the phone. After a while, you can’t be bothered to pick up the phone anymore. You just ignore it. You’ve become “cold caller resistant.”

When your body becomes insulin resistant, this increased fat synthesis boosts production of malonyl-CoA. That, in turn, inhibits CPT-1, the protein responsible for fatty acid transport into the mitochondria, where it would nor-mally be converted into energy and not stored as fat. So what you get as a by-product of insulin resistance and high blood sugar is more fatty acids being converted back into fat rather than burned as fuel in the mitochondria of your

2""""The"All)Day"Fat)Burning"Diet"

cells.

Gut&Health&and&Fat&Loss&

Consider the following facts about your gut.

• Seventy-five percent of your body’s immune system is located in and around your gut. (It’s known as “gut-associated lymphoid tissue,” or GALT.)

• Your gut is where most of your nutrients are absorbed. If you laid out your entire GI tract, it would have as much surface area as a tennis court. That surface area (assuming it’s healthy) is what allows your body to absorb nutrients from the foods you eat.

• There are more than 400 different types of microorganisms totaling more than 100 trillion microorganisms in the intestines—that’s 10 times greater than the total number of human cells in the body.1

Obviously, our gut is pretty important. It’s a vast ecosystem that stems from the earliest beginnings of life on this planet. If this delicate ecosystem is unhealthy, you will be too. If you suffer from regular symptoms like gas, bloating, burping after meals, undigested food in your stools, constipation, or diarrhea, you can be sure that you have some type of GI dysfunction, which could be holding you back from permanent fat loss.

For instance, the proteins in gluten closely resemble those in your thyroid tissue. This can lead to Hashimoto’s disease, which severely compromises your thyroid function. Some of the proteins in dairy closely resemble those of the insulin-producing beta cells of your pancreas, which can lead to the devel-opment of type 1 diabetes. This protein confusion is called “molecular mim-icry,” and it’s not good. In my case, my immune system began attacking my hair follicles, which led to the complete loss of hair on my body.

Another theory of autoimmunity is called the “bystander effect.” It’s similar to molecular mimicry in that bacteria, viruses, or food proteins directly damage certain tissues in the body, which then causes your body to attack those parts of itself. But not everyone who eats a crappy diet develops auto-immunity. Having a genetic predisposition is an important factor. But so too are environmental triggers. That’s why, even though our biology hasn’t changed that much over the past thousands of years, environmental factors are

The All-Day Fat-Burning Diet 3

altering our genes, which is part of the reason why there’s been an explosion of autoimmune diseases.

Since I lost all my hair when I was 17 years old, my hair has come back in and fallen out again a few times. I’ve noticed that the regrowth tends to fol-low periods of lower stress and clean eating, when I’m not exposing my body to inflammatory foods. This makes sense, since new research by Alessio Fasa-no, MD, chief of the Division of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition at MassGeneral Hospital for Children, has conclusively shown the intricate relationship between leaky gut and autoimmunity.2 Thus, the autoimmune re-sponse can theoretically be stopped and even reversed if the interplay between genes and environmental triggers is eliminated.

As Dr. Fasano’s research has shown, zonulin is a protein that regulates the tight junctions in the gut lining. Zonulin is overexpressed in people with autoimmune diseases like celiac disease, which means the more zonulin they have, the more leaky their gut. Thus, more problematic food proteins can enter their bloodstream.

Here’s an example: If someone with a genetic predisposition to, say, ce-liac disease, or gluten intolerance, eats gluten, an increase in zonulin produc-tion will occur, which then increases inflammation, causing tight junctions in the gut to open like floodgates. This allows the passage of antigens from the gut into the blood, the body mounts an immune response, and then inflamma-tion occurs in the gut and everywhere else throughout the body. We’ve seen the damaging effects of inflammation numerous times already, haven’t we?

But as Dr. Fasano has revealed, this process can be completely reversed in people with celiac disease if they remove gluten from their diet. Removing the environmental trigger (gluten) decreases zonulin levels, which leads to a newly fortified gut lining. Antibodies drop off, the whole autoimmune process shuts off, and if you avoid gluten long enough, the damaged gut repairs itself completely. It’s as if the brick walls surrounding the castle have been rebuilt and the castle is once again safe—so long as further bombardment is avoided. 1 Björkstén, B. et al. (2001). "Allergy development and the intestinal microflora during the first year of life". Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology 108 (4): 516–20. 2 Fasano, A. (2012). Leaky gut and autoimmune diseases.Clin Rev Al-lergy Immunol. 2012 Feb;42(1):71-8.

1"

PUTTING'OUT'YOUR'BODY’S'FIRES'

Fasting is by far the cheapest and most surefire way to reduce deadly inflam-mation inside the body and kick-start weight loss. It’s also one of the surest ways to increase your life span without doing anything to your diet or popping a bunch of pills. The reason why fasting is so helpful is because it gives our body a break from all the eating we do. Since we’re usually eating, our body is always working to digest food when it could be breaking down and repairing damaged cells.

Fasting harnesses the power of autophagy, the basic catabolic mechanism for breaking down and recycling your dead cells, damaged proteins, and other debris. This amazing process is your body’s way of clearing out the clutter and keeping you youthful and healthy. But if you’re always eating, your body can-not perform these important “delete and repair” duties properly.

As I discussed in my previous book—The All-Day Energy Diet—your body’s energy is really a zero-sum game. If it’s spending most of its energy on digesting a heavy meal (think Thanksgiving), then it doesn’t have the energy to direct inward toward healing and repair. And, contrary to common belief, fast-ing does not eat away at your muscle. In fact, autophagy is required to main-tain muscle mass, and it even inhibits muscle breakdown.1 So let me ask you: Do you want slow the aging process and enjoy a strong, lean body? If yes, then fasting one day every week is the surest way to make that happen.

Remember, prolonged fasting is a big stress on the body. That’s not what we’re looking to do here. The trick is to become temporarily calorie deficient. After the initial discomfort, you’ll gradually begin to find relief in your day of fasting. After all, the best part of not eating anything is that you don’t have to worry about . . . well, . . . eating anything. No special recipes. No cooking. You just live your life.

FASTING'FOR'FASTER'FAT'LOSS'


Now, you might be asking, “But what about my metabolic rate? Won’t it slow to a halt if I don’t eat anything?” It turns out that’s absolutely false. In a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in June 2000, 11 sub-jects went through 4 days of fasting to determine the impact on their resting energy expenditure, which is the amount of energy your body needs to carry out all of its basic functions when you’re resting. The findings would surprise most people: For the first 3 days, the subjects all saw their resting energy ex-penditure increase!2

In another study by a different group of researchers, people who fasted every other day for 22 days had no decrease in their resting metabolic rate. In addition, people who were on very-low-calorie diets and on a resistance exer-cise program (i.e., lifting weights) did not see a decrease in resting metabolic rate, and these people were eating only 800 calories a day for 12 weeks!3

In another interesting study, women who ate half the amount of food they normally ate for 3 days saw no change in their metabolism either.4 In still more studies, there was no change in the metabolic rate of people who skipped breakfast, or people who ate two meals a day compared to seven meals per day.5

The bottom line is that food has virtually nothing to do with your me-tabolism. In fact, your metabolism is much more closely tied to your body weight. If your weight goes up or down, so does your metabolism. The only things that can affect your metabolism (in both the short and longer term) are exercise and weight loss. Even in the complete absence of food for 3 days, your metabolism remains unchanged. But wait, there’s more!

Uncoupling protein-3 is a very important protein found in our muscles that is associated with fat burning. Simply put, when fat burning increases, so does the amount of uncoupling protein-3 in our muscles. Amazing research has shown that as little as 15 hours into a fast, the gene expression for uncoupling protein-3 increases fivefold!6

Probably the most revealing information comes from a study published by a group of scientists from the University of Texas. It examined how short-term fasting affects fat and sugar metabolism in our bodies. They found that after only 24 hours of fasting, the amount of fat being released from people’s fat stores (lipolysis) and the amount being burned for fuel (oxidation) had in-creased by more than 50 percent.7

Bringing a few of these studies to your attention has hopefully shown you that short-term fasting can provide incredible benefits. There’s nothing to be scared of, and hopefully I’ve eased any misconceptions you’ve had about


fasting forever. My not-so-secret hope is that, if anything, this information has made you eager to fast!

FASTED'OR'PREWORKOUT'MEAL:'WHICH'IS'BETTER'FOR'FAT'LOSS?'

If, like me, in spite of all this evidence, you can’t tolerate exercising first thing in the morning or in a fasted state, that’s okay. The other argument holds that if you have more energy from a preworkout meal or shake, then you can theo-retically push yourself harder during your workout, which by itself could make a big difference.

If you need something in your stomach, I recommend an easily digestible protein shake before your workouts. Quite of a bit of research shows this to be a good idea. Remember that drinking a preworkout protein shake might be a slight compromise compared with training completely fasted, but again, it may not—as you’re about to see. And if you do decide to have protein before a workout, the science tends to show a benefit to doing so on strength-training days. It’s safe to assume similar benefits would be seen for high-intensity in-terval sessions too.

For example, a 2010 study in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise had participants with weight-training experience ingest 18 to 19 grams of either whey protein or carbohydrates 20 minutes before a workout. The workout consisted of a full-body session, with nine different movements consisting of four sets each of 10 to 12 reps, with a 2-minute rest between sets. Results showed that resting energy expenditure was significantly greater 24 hours after the workout in the group that had the protein before their workout than in the carb group. The researchers concluded that ingesting protein before a resistance-training workout could facilitate fat loss and improve body com-position.8

All of which is to say, don’t beat yourself up if you feel like you need to have a little protein shake before your morning workout—it’s okay. And it may even be helpful for some people because protein intake improves muscle protein synthesis, a metabolically costly process that increases the amount of calories burned at rest.

Preworkout protein is also better than preworkout carbs (at least for the


goal of losing fat) because it shuttles amino acids (the building blocks of pro-tein) to your working muscles, which in turn may increase protein synthesis for up to 48 hours after your workout.9 What’s more, preworkout protein also blunts cortisol throughout the day, which is another effect not seen in fasted subjects or those who ate preworkout carbs only. Cortisol promotes the break-down of protein, so having lower levels of it after a workout is a good thing.

In short, fasted training is great for fat loss. But so too is having a bit of protein before your workout if you need something in your stomach because of its beneficial effect on your metabolic rate.

To summarize:

• Ideally, do your interval speed bursts on an empty stomach to keep in-sulin levels low and to allow your body to rely more heavily on fat.

• Alternatively, ingest 30 grams of protein 10 to 15 minutes before your workout.

• Break your fast postworkout. Your biggest meal should come within 1 hour of your workouts except on your Low-Carb Days, when I chal-lenge you to stay in a fasted state for 1 to 2 hours postworkout.

If you have blood sugar issues and feel you need to eat something right after your workout, then please do so. That’s better than passing out, right? As always, consult with your doctor.

1 Masiero E et al. (2009). Autophagy is required to maintain muscle mass. Cell Metab. Dec;10(6):507-15 2 Zauner, C., Schneeweiss, B., Kranz, A., Madl, C., Ratheiser, K., Kramer, L., & Lenz, K. (2000). Resting energy expenditure in short-term starvation is increased as a result of an increase in serum norepinephrine. The American journal of clinical nutrition, 71(6), 1511-1515. 3 Bryner, R. W., Ullrich, I. H., Sauers, J., Donley, D., Hornsby, G., Kolar, M., & Yeater, R. (1999). Effects of resistance vs. aerobic training combined with an 800 calorie liquid diet on lean body mass and resting metabolic rate. Journal of the American College of Nutrition, 18(2), 115-121. 4 Author"must"provide"source. 5 Author"must"provide"source."6 Pilon, B. (2007). Eat Stop Eat. Ontario, Canada: Strength Works Inc. 7 Author"must"supply"source. 8 Hackney K. et al. (2010).Timing protein intake increases energy ex-penditure 24 h after resistance training. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2010 May;42(5):998-1003. 9 Author"must"supply"source."

1"

PUTTING'OUT'YOUR'BODY’S'FIRES'

Fasting is by far the cheapest and most surefire way to reduce deadly inflam-mation inside the body and kick-start weight loss. It’s also one of the surest ways to increase your life span without doing anything to your diet or popping a bunch of pills. The reason why fasting is so helpful is because it gives our body a break from all the eating we do. Since we’re usually eating, our body is always working to digest food when it could be breaking down and repairing damaged cells.

Fasting harnesses the power of autophagy, the basic catabolic mechanism for breaking down and recycling your dead cells, damaged proteins, and other debris. This amazing process is your body’s way of clearing out the clutter and keeping you youthful and healthy. But if you’re always eating, your body can-not perform these important “delete and repair” duties properly.

As I discussed in my previous book—The All-Day Energy Diet—your body’s energy is really a zero-sum game. If it’s spending most of its energy on digesting a heavy meal (think Thanksgiving), then it doesn’t have the energy to direct inward toward healing and repair. And, contrary to common belief, fast-ing does not eat away at your muscle. In fact, autophagy is required to main-tain muscle mass, and it even inhibits muscle breakdown.1 So let me ask you: Do you want slow the aging process and enjoy a strong, lean body? If yes, then fasting one day every week is the surest way to make that happen.

Remember, prolonged fasting is a big stress on the body. That’s not what we’re looking to do here. The trick is to become temporarily calorie deficient. After the initial discomfort, you’ll gradually begin to find relief in your day of fasting. After all, the best part of not eating anything is that you don’t have to worry about . . . well, . . . eating anything. No special recipes. No cooking. You just live your life.

FASTING'FOR'FASTER'FAT'LOSS'


Now, you might be asking, “But what about my metabolic rate? Won’t it slow to a halt if I don’t eat anything?” It turns out that’s absolutely false. In a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in June 2000, 11 sub-jects went through 4 days of fasting to determine the impact on their resting energy expenditure, which is the amount of energy your body needs to carry out all of its basic functions when you’re resting. The findings would surprise most people: For the first 3 days, the subjects all saw their resting energy ex-penditure increase!2

In another study by a different group of researchers, people who fasted every other day for 22 days had no decrease in their resting metabolic rate. In addition, people who were on very-low-calorie diets and on a resistance exer-cise program (i.e., lifting weights) did not see a decrease in resting metabolic rate, and these people were eating only 800 calories a day for 12 weeks!3

In another interesting study, women who ate half the amount of food they normally ate for 3 days saw no change in their metabolism either.4 In still more studies, there was no change in the metabolic rate of people who skipped breakfast, or people who ate two meals a day compared to seven meals per day.5

The bottom line is that food has virtually nothing to do with your me-tabolism. In fact, your metabolism is much more closely tied to your body weight. If your weight goes up or down, so does your metabolism. The only things that can affect your metabolism (in both the short and longer term) are exercise and weight loss. Even in the complete absence of food for 3 days, your metabolism remains unchanged. But wait, there’s more!

Uncoupling protein-3 is a very important protein found in our muscles that is associated with fat burning. Simply put, when fat burning increases, so does the amount of uncoupling protein-3 in our muscles. Amazing research has shown that as little as 15 hours into a fast, the gene expression for uncoupling protein-3 increases fivefold!6

Probably the most revealing information comes from a study published by a group of scientists from the University of Texas. It examined how short-term fasting affects fat and sugar metabolism in our bodies. They found that after only 24 hours of fasting, the amount of fat being released from people’s fat stores (lipolysis) and the amount being burned for fuel (oxidation) had in-creased by more than 50 percent.7

Bringing a few of these studies to your attention has hopefully shown you that short-term fasting can provide incredible benefits. There’s nothing to be scared of, and hopefully I’ve eased any misconceptions you’ve had about


fasting forever. My not-so-secret hope is that, if anything, this information has made you eager to fast!

FASTED'OR'PREWORKOUT'MEAL:'WHICH'IS'BETTER'FOR'FAT'LOSS?'

If, like me, in spite of all this evidence, you can’t tolerate exercising first thing in the morning or in a fasted state, that’s okay. The other argument holds that if you have more energy from a preworkout meal or shake, then you can theo-retically push yourself harder during your workout, which by itself could make a big difference.

If you need something in your stomach, I recommend an easily digestible protein shake before your workouts. Quite of a bit of research shows this to be a good idea. Remember that drinking a preworkout protein shake might be a slight compromise compared with training completely fasted, but again, it may not—as you’re about to see. And if you do decide to have protein before a workout, the science tends to show a benefit to doing so on strength-training days. It’s safe to assume similar benefits would be seen for high-intensity in-terval sessions too.

For example, a 2010 study in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise had participants with weight-training experience ingest 18 to 19 grams of either whey protein or carbohydrates 20 minutes before a workout. The workout consisted of a full-body session, with nine different movements consisting of four sets each of 10 to 12 reps, with a 2-minute rest between sets. Results showed that resting energy expenditure was significantly greater 24 hours after the workout in the group that had the protein before their workout than in the carb group. The researchers concluded that ingesting protein before a resistance-training workout could facilitate fat loss and improve body com-position.8

All of which is to say, don’t beat yourself up if you feel like you need to have a little protein shake before your morning workout—it’s okay. And it may even be helpful for some people because protein intake improves muscle protein synthesis, a metabolically costly process that increases the amount of calories burned at rest.

Preworkout protein is also better than preworkout carbs (at least for the


goal of losing fat) because it shuttles amino acids (the building blocks of pro-tein) to your working muscles, which in turn may increase protein synthesis for up to 48 hours after your workout.9 What’s more, preworkout protein also blunts cortisol throughout the day, which is another effect not seen in fasted subjects or those who ate preworkout carbs only. Cortisol promotes the break-down of protein, so having lower levels of it after a workout is a good thing.

In short, fasted training is great for fat loss. But so too is having a bit of protein before your workout if you need something in your stomach because of its beneficial effect on your metabolic rate.

To summarize:

• Ideally, do your interval speed bursts on an empty stomach to keep in-sulin levels low and to allow your body to rely more heavily on fat.

• Alternatively, ingest 30 grams of protein 10 to 15 minutes before your workout.

• Break your fast postworkout. Your biggest meal should come within 1 hour of your workouts except on your Low-Carb Days, when I chal-lenge you to stay in a fasted state for 1 to 2 hours postworkout.

If you have blood sugar issues and feel you need to eat something right after your workout, then please do so. That’s better than passing out, right? As always, consult with your doctor.

1 Masiero E et al. (2009). Autophagy is required to maintain muscle mass. Cell Metab. Dec;10(6):507-15 2 Zauner, C., Schneeweiss, B., Kranz, A., Madl, C., Ratheiser, K., Kramer, L., & Lenz, K. (2000). Resting energy expenditure in short-term starvation is increased as a result of an increase in serum norepinephrine. The American journal of clinical nutrition, 71(6), 1511-1515. 3 Bryner, R. W., Ullrich, I. H., Sauers, J., Donley, D., Hornsby, G., Kolar, M., & Yeater, R. (1999). Effects of resistance vs. aerobic training combined with an 800 calorie liquid diet on lean body mass and resting metabolic rate. Journal of the American College of Nutrition, 18(2), 115-121. 4 Author"must"provide"source. 5 Author"must"provide"source."6 Pilon, B. (2007). Eat Stop Eat. Ontario, Canada: Strength Works Inc. 7 Author"must"supply"source. 8 Hackney K. et al. (2010).Timing protein intake increases energy ex-penditure 24 h after resistance training. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2010 May;42(5):998-1003. 9 Author"must"supply"source."

1"

DECREASED'THYROID'HORMONE'LEVELS'

As we discussed back in Chapter 2, the thyroid hormone triiodothyronine (T3 for short) is responsible for almost every physiological process in your body, including growth. Low levels of T3 can lead to symptoms similar to those of underactive thyroid, in which you constantly feel cold and sluggish, your hair and skin become brittle, and you often feel depressed. This is because T3 and other thyroid hormones are the body’s metabolic spark plugs, and when they’re not being produced, activated, or utilized in adequate amounts, your body’s “motor” idles at a slower speed, essentially halting weight loss.

These results can clearly be seen in a 1979 edition of the Journal of Clin-ical Investigation that documented the results of an overfeeding study at the Vermont State prison. A group of prisoners who volunteered for the study was split into two smaller groups. Both groups were fed more than usual so they would gain weight; however, one group was fed a high-calorie diet high in carbs for 7 months, preceded and followed by a high-carb maintenance diet. The other group ate a high-calorie, high-fat diet for 3 months, preceded and followed by a low-carb maintenance diet.

Both groups gained weight—no surprise there. However, the scientists noted that the group fed the high-carb diet required more calories to maintain their weight than the other group. Also notable was that, during the mainte-nance period, those eating the high-carb diet had high levels of T3. When those on the low-carb diet switched to the high-carb diet, their T3 levels rose as well! The only prisoners who didn’t experience a T3 increase were those who stuck to the high-fat, low-carb diet.1

The results make it pretty clear: Carbohydrates impact T3 levels, and fats do not. When calories and carbs are too low, your T3 levels drop. In fact, carb consumption also limits the production of rT3, or reverse T3, a hormone that inhibits the production of T3! It’s quite common to hear people celebrating the weight loss they experienced on a low-carb diet. It’s not as common to hear them talking about the hair loss and energy drain that may have accompanied it. A lot of people just don’t make the connection.

I don’t mention this to scare you out of going the low-carb route, but be-


cause both science and my experience in training and nutrition have taught me that a balanced diet with the right carbs is essential for maintaining a healthy weight.

Elevated'Cortisol'and'Decreased'Testosterone'

There’s a phrase I often use to scare my male clients into making a better effort to relax and take care of themselves: “When stress is up, sex is down.”

That’s a bit of a wake-up call, isn’t it? It isn’t just a cute phrase, however; it’s also very, very true. There’s a di-

rect relationship between the stress hormone cortisol and testosterone, the hormone often responsible for your libido. What this means is that when you’re worrying about bills, your job, or any persistent source of stress, your interest in sex and even your ability to reproduce are hampered.

Stress doesn’t just mean our modern worries, however. For our ancestors hunting on the plains of Africa, famine was the ultimate source of stress. We have the convenience of going to the supermarket or—God forbid—a drive-thru window for a dollar deal when we’re hungry, but for them, an unsuccess-ful hunt could mean days without eating. You can bet they weren’t thinking about any hanky-panky when they were faced with starvation.

Even though it’s good for you, exercise is also a form of stress on your body, and research consistently shows that people who exercise regularly need to eat enough carbs or their testosterone will fall while their cortisol levels rise. Over time, the combination of too much exercise and inadequate carbohydrate intake is a surefire recipe for losing muscle and gaining fat, not to mention hindering your baby-making abilities. As you begin to incorporate even mod-erate exercise into your weekly routine, it’s essential that you have carbs in your diet.

In a study in the journal Life Sciences, men who ate a high-carbohydrate diet for 10 days had higher levels of testosterone and lower levels of cortisol than those who ate a low-carbohydrate diet.2 A subsequent study expanded upon this research by including men and women who exercised regularly. As expected, when the subjects ate a low-carb diet, their testosterone went down and their cortisol went up.3 The other consideration with following a low-carbohydrate diet for more than a few days is that it severely depletes your


body’s glycogen reserves. Glycogen is how your muscles and liver store car-bohydrates and, along with blood sugar, is the main source of fuel during in-tense exercise. Naturally, if you deprive yourself of carbohydrates, you won’t have much fuel left in the tank for a good workout.

Carb restriction certainly does aid in weight loss, but it’s not sustainable beyond a day or two, which is why I’ve limited it to the first day of your 5-day cycle. This way, you can experience all of the benefits your low-carb friends boast of without any of the drawbacks.

Carbohydrates'and'Female'Hormones'

If you’re a woman, you might be thinking that you don’t have to worry as much about all this testosterone stuff. Sure, you have a little bit of it in your body, but it’s really not that much compared to your male counterparts.

I hate to break it to you, but your body is even more sensitive to low calorie and carbohydrate intake, even without the testosterone-cortisol rela-tionship to stress over. Among other things, evolution has built your body for childbirth, meaning you are physiologically prone to holding on to more fat and nutrients. In both men and women, our hormones are controlled by a tiny area in our brain called the hypothalamus, which is finely tuned to a host of physiological changes like energy availability and stress. It sends instructions to another small area in the brain called the pituitary gland, which acts as the messenger to your thyroid and other hormone-producing glands.

When women don’t eat enough calories or carbohydrates, they run the risk of developing hypothalamic amenorrhea. This means disrupted hormones and cessation of periods as the hypothalamus responds to perceived starvation. In this case, hormone levels plummet, and because low carb intake increases cortisol production, pituitary function is further curtailed as well because corti-sol decreases pituitary activity.

Nothing in your body happens independently of anything else. Your hy-pothalamus and pituitary regulate functions such as your stress response, mood, digestion, immune system, libido, metabolism, and energy levels, so if they’re impaired, you can end up feeling pretty broken rather quickly. This sad state of affairs is, unfortunately, encountered by more than a few women who take up these fashionable low-carb diets. Jumping aboard the no-carb craze can lead to side effects such as:


• A stopped or irregular menstrual cycle • Impaired fertility and ability to bear children • More body fat • Loss of bone density • Anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues

I once worked with a fellow personal trainer who had suffered with weight issues for most of her life. When she got into fitness training, she trans-formed her body and started competing in fitness model competitions. When she was in “competition mode,” all she ever ate was the standard chicken and broccoli. Yes, she was lean (temporarily), but almost unhealthily so. She was always moody and even developed a weird body odor and bad breath. Is it really worth it? Would things have been different for her if she had known this information? Most likely. I don’t want you to make the same mistakes.

Muscle'Loss'

In my line of work, I’ve attended dozens of health conferences and I stay abreast of all the latest fads and ideas in the fitness world. I can say this with authority: The supplement and fitness magazine industry has gotten one over on you time and time again, and even worse, it has likely led you to profoundly misunderstand how your body works. For example, how much protein do you think you actually need? My bet is that it’s a lot more than you really do.

If you go by the barrage of advertising in fitness magazines, television commercials, and even product placement in movies, all pushing the vision of a lean, healthy, muscled body at you, you probably believe you need heaping amounts of meat or regular doses of protein powder to get ripped. I’ll discuss protein in more detail elsewhere in this book, but for now, you need to know that research shows that lowering carb intake can affect your muscle mass even when protein remains constant. In other words, even if you’re guzzling protein shakes or eating steak five times a day, you could be losing muscle if you aren’t getting enough carbs.

Let me illustrate this by sharing a recent study from the Netherlands. This study compared three diets.

Diet #1 = high-carb diet (85 percent carbs)


Diet #2 = medium-carb diet (44 percent carbs) Diet #3 = low-carb diet (2 percent carbs)

All diets had the same total calories and the same amount of protein, a constant 15 percent of calories

The result? First, researchers found that T3 and reverse T3 levels stayed the same

with high and moderate carbohydrate intake. Second, they found that T3 and reverse T3 levels declined on the low-carb diet. The third finding was the most interesting: By measuring urinary nitrogen excretion (an indicator of protein breakdown), the researchers showed that Diet #3 (the low-carb diet) increased muscle breakdown!4

This is all thanks to insulin, which plays an important role in building muscle mass. When you get enough carbs to meet your needs, you replenish muscle glycogen and create an anabolic (building-up) hormonal environment, which helps build and maintain your muscles. This is a good thing. Con-versely, when you don’t eat enough carbohydrates, muscle glycogen is de-pleted and a catabolic (breaking-down) hormonal environment is created. This means more protein breakdown, which also means slower muscle growth or even muscle loss. 1 Danforth, E. et al. (1979). Dietary-induced Alterations in Thyroid Hormone Metabolism during Overnutrition. J. Clin. Invest. Volume 64. 1336-1347 2 Anderson, K. E., Rosner, W., Khan, M. S., New, M. I., Pang, S., Wissel, P. S., & Kappas, A. (1987). Diet-hormone interactions: protein/carbohydrate ratio alters reciprocally the plasma levels of testosterone and cortisol and their respective binding globulins in man. Life sciences, 40(18), 1761-1768. 3 Volek, J. S., Kraemer, W. J., Bush, J. A., Incledon, T., & Boetes, M. (1997). Testosterone and cortisol in relationship to dietary nutrients and resistance exercise. Journal of Applied Physiology, 82(1), 49-54. 4 Author"to"provide"source.

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