I won’t forget when I first heard about intermittent fasting. I had been reading a strength training article written by Ori Hofmekler titled “The Exercise Mistake Which Makes You Age Faster” He wrote it back in June 2011. When I ran across this article, I knew nothing of intermittent fasting nor was I interested. I was quite satisfied with my vegan lifestyle and just wanted to research workout methods for not only a strong body but a long lasting one throughout life. As I read through the article, I could see intermittent fasting being mentioned but because I didn’t care about it at the time, I simply payed my attention to and picked up on the short, heavy and high intensity workout advise he gave. This was in March of 2015. It wasn’t until September of that same year that I would come across a youtube ad – you know the ads that you normally wanna skip on the way to the videos you actually clicked?

Well for once, I didn’t it skip and I was interested enough to watch the ad through. That ad showed me the benefits of IF and also some basics on how to go about it. From there I learned more through further research. The more I learned the more hooked I became. By now, there are probably a lot of people in the fitness realm both professional and non-professional who practice or at least know something of intermittent fasting. Many people do it for weight loss purposes and yes it is good for that but it’s good for so much more. What hooked me was the testosterone and HGH (human growth hormone) increase. I mean what man doesn’t want that?

Hormone optimization is something I have come to understand as being very important not only to fat loss or muscle gain but also to overall wellness and IF gives that to you. The few benefits I just listed also contribute to the anti-aging effect on both the brain and body and again – who doesn’t want that? Speaking for my self here, I’ve personally been doing IF since 2015 and I feel awesome with more energy. My workouts are also just as good if not better when I’m in the fasted state. My personal favorite for fasting models is the warrior diet coined by Ori Hofmekler whom I mentioned earlier. That is the model I use at least 5 days a week. I may drop to the 16:8/lean gains model ‘coined by Martin Berkhan by the way’ on the weekends depending on what’s going on that weekend. For the few who might still not know of IF, I’ll say there are many benefits to be had and I highly recommend that you at least try it whether you’re just looking to shed a few, or you looking to take overall health to that next level, it is definitely worth the look.

FASTING METHODS

On the previous post, I talked about fasting and its benefits. As I saw and studied up on these benefits, I got excited ….. well as about as excited as a person can get about fasting. Interestingly enough, I have been able to talk some family, some friends and even some co-workers into giving it a try. You do remember my post where a stated I love talking about all things health and wellness… right? Well when they would come back talking about how “hangry” they were or how dizzy and light headed they feel, I find myself holding back the desire for 20 minute lectures about glycogen dependency and metabolic flexibility lol. I would however like to put in my two cents as to what I believe is the best way to start off with intermittent fasting. Now this particular model I’d mentioned in the previous intermittent fasting piece. That model is the 16:8 or the lean gains method which was coined by Martin Berkhan. The reason I suggest this as the best start off model is that you only fast for 16 hours. You can eat breakfast at 10:00 AM, eat lunch in the middle and finish your last meal by 6 :00 PM. If that is a bit challenging the the schedule, you can break your fast at 12 PM or 1 PM and finish your last meal by 8 PM or 9 PM respectively. However you decide to structure it the point is to fast for 16 hours and eat within the remaining 8 hour window. Now having been told that by a few that the 16 hour time frame sounds a bit daunting, I remind them that for 8 of those hours they are asleep anyway. Now being a big time foodie, I feel that if a person like myself can start with that model then anyone can. Once I started with the 16:8 split, I would start to gradually shrink the size of my first meal until I was down to just an apple or a hand full of peanuts. There’s a reason for my doing it this way personally which I’ll share on a later post. Until then, for those thinking of giving IF a test drive, I’ll say this is what worked best for me personally and I’m thinking it may work for you as well.