I was talking with an old friend the other day about diet and lifestyle and the impacts lockdown may have had. We took into consideration food restaurants and pubs being closed, fast food chains closed and cafes and the likes, all closed. Although this may stimulate a spike in physical or physiological gain it may be at the expense of ones mental health as a result of being isolated in the surroundings they’re constantly looking to escape.

A point we got stuck on was nutrition. Me and Ash have conflicting views sometimes as, athletically we’re both different, he likes combat and power sports, and I like endurance sports predominantly. These are poles apart but the point we came to agree on that to best facilitate any gain whatsoever is the condition of your endocrine system, which is basically ‘the scientific goings on’ inside your body. Your body craves consistency in most things to achieve homeostasis (complete balance). Only when this happens is your body at its outright best, in terms of performance and how you feel.
While lockdown is happening I doubt there’s much ‘fasting’ going off but this is a popular method in a desperate attempt to control or systematically manipulate your body composition. The trendy 5/2 diet where an individual consumes 500 calories only on any two days of the week, and it’s business as normal for the other 5. On paper this creates up to a 2500 calorie deficit in the week but what it actually does to your body balance isn’t shown on the same page.
As we know, and we’ve explained that for weight loss to be achieved a calorie deficit must be in place. But losing 1000 calories twice per week is a big ask and has a knock on effect with the 5 days in terms of how your body performs and how you feel.
As ever this is all in a bid to lose weight fast. And as we know a 1lb of fat requires 3500 calories of energy to be burned in order to lose that!
If you cut your calories by 250 per day which is easily done by controlling your portion sizes, over 7 days that is 1750 calories a week deficit. Added to 3 or 4 training sessions per week burning 300 to 500 calories per session puts that up to 3250 which is far more balanced, and consistent than the 2 x 1000 calorie deficit days.
Added to this we know that there is EPOC (excess post exercise oxygen consumption) which increases metabolic rate following exercise and burns more calories in a resting state. There’s also NEAT (non exercise activity thermogenesis) which adds even more to the calorie burn. All those little benefits from the little habits we try to help people create are the glue that hold our programming as individuals together. Trendy fasting diets don’t offer the same all round benefits of what we preach at Body Planners. That’s why trying to lose weight fast never works out long term.
Jake.