Intermittent Fasting

I work shifts 2 out of every 3 months. 8am-8pm or 8pm-8am, doing something weird like 4 days on, 7 days off, 4 nights on, 4 days off, 3 days, 3 nights, 4 days off.

I tried a few things but what I've ended up doing is pretty much:

Day shifts - 8am-8pm:
Rest day - lunch at around 2pm at work, dinner around 9:30pm at home (window 2-10pm). I have the bigger meal at work, smaller at home.

Training day - eat at 3pm and again at 6pm at work (sometimes I just eat everything at 3pm), dinner around 10:30pm at home (window 3-11pm, as I go to the gym after work from about 9-10pm). Bigger meal at home post-workout so I go to bed very full but sleep fine.

Night shifts - 8pm-8am:
Rest day - eat bigger meal shortly after getting up at 5pm, eat again at work around 12am (window 5pm-12am)

Training day - get up earlier at 4pm, gym, come home and eat big meal, eat smaller meal at work around 12am (window 5pm-12am)

With night shifts what I tend to do is eat dinner the night before, then fast for around 20 hours so my first meal on the first night shift is in line (5pm). Coming off nights I'll make my window even shorter so the next morning I'm closer to a day pattern again. The only penalty for adjusting the window by a few hours is hunger.

What I try and do though, especially for nights is to to keep the workout days as separate as I can whilst doing x3 a week, because it makes for a long day!

Mon-Thurs days = gym on Tuesday and Thursday after work (no rush with the latter as I have the next day off), then Saturday morning or afternoon depending on what I'm doing.

Thurs-Sun nights = gym Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon after I get up (so I only have to get up early gym it on one night shift).

Fri-Sun days = workout Mon/Wed and Friday evening after work.

Mon-Wed nights = Monday before work, then I usually do Thursday and Saturday.
 
Starting my IF from today bros.

Starting weight 104kg. I am not changing my diet at all just the times I eat. I cycle 15-20 miles 3 times a week and generally have a healthy diet apart from brewskis on the weekend. If i start getting shredded I will do a full write up.

IF come at me
 
I think I'm gonna give this a go.

What is the 16/8? 16 days of IF, 8 off? or 16 hours fasting then 8 eating?


Also, what is a good way of reducing carbs? All I tend to eat is carbs.. so what can I eat now? Meat, fruit, veg?
 
Fruit and Veg are also carbs.

Not too hard to google and find out the difference between carbs and protein.

I'd imagine its 16hours fasting 8 eating. I think this is more of a lifestyle change diet rather than a 'crash' diet?
 
Begbie said:
Fruit and Veg are also carbs.

Not too hard to google and find out the difference between carbs and protein.

I'd imagine its 16hours fasting 8 eating. I think this is more of a lifestyle change diet rather than a 'crash' diet?
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lifestyle diet for definite. I am going to fast from 8pm until 12pm and then eat as I would normally. This will remove my breakfast approx 400cals, snacks after 8pm maybe 200 cals that should save me 4200cal a week - just over lb
 
Begbie said:
Fruit and Veg are also carbs.

Not too hard to google and find out the difference between carbs and protein.

I'd imagine its 16hours fasting 8 eating. I think this is more of a lifestyle change diet rather than a 'crash' diet?
Click to expand...

I know the difference but what do people get by on a daily basis to lower their carb intake, what do they eat?
 
Scythe said:
I think I'm gonna give this a go.

What is the 16/8? 16 days of IF, 8 off? or 16 hours fasting then 8 eating?


Also, what is a good way of reducing carbs? All I tend to eat is carbs.. so what can I eat now? Meat, fruit, veg?
Click to expand...

16/8 is 16 hours fasting then 8 hours when you can eat. Upping veg and water are two easy ways to fill yourself up without the calories that come with pasta/rice/spuds (or any 'junk' food) but try to make sustainable changes otherwise you're more likely to fall back to old ways and/or feel like you're on a diet which isn't really the point of IF.

I've been doing it for a while and have lost weight/fat pretty effectively when combined with daily exercise. The first few days are quite tough but not that bad, it does help if you can have a positive association with hunger, I just think to myself that if I feel hungry that just means by body has had to start using fat for fuel and that's a good thing. I feel fine in terms of energy levels and no downsides to report so far.

I posted some comparison pics in the weight loss thread if you're interested - http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=22657126&postcount=917 taken about 10 months apart.
 
Not having to worry about breakfast/supper is great - it's also impossible to justify having a little sneaky snack (By thinking, ahh well I did an extra 20mins run today).

With the 8 hour feeidng window, you simply don't eat outside of it - no way around it, you can't really cheat.

As long as you eat sensibly during the main eating period its pretty easy.

The only downside is when you get to 11AM, an hour before you can eat you really do start to get ravenous, but at least it's genuine hunger, not greed.

Had no problems with my weight training, I just take 5g of BCAA in the morning, 5g of BCAA at night (to stave off muscle catabolism) along with black coffee (no sugar) during the day (along with loads of water).

I found that taking psyllium husks with the first meal of the day also keeps you regular (As most of my fibre came from breakfast before).
 
Scythe said:
I know the difference but what do people get by on a daily basis to lower their carb intake, what do they eat?
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You shouldn't need to remove carbs entirely from your diet. Just eat better carbs.

EDIT: I'm not clued up on If, so no idea if that's what's been suggested or not
 
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jordan282 said:
lifestyle diet for definite. I am going to fast from 8pm until 12pm and then eat as I would normally. This will remove my breakfast approx 400cals, snacks after 8pm maybe 200 cals that should save me 4200cal a week - just over lb
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So as usual when it comes to doing your write up after 'getting shredded' you wil be singing the song and dance of praise for IF, when in actual fact you dropped 600 cals a day from your diet which is what will be the main contributing factor to any weight loss :rolleyes:
 
Skillmister said:
So as usual when it comes to doing your write up after 'getting shredded' you wil be singing the song and dance of praise for IF, when in actual fact you dropped 600 cals a day from your diet which is what will be the main contributing factor to any weight loss :rolleyes:
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To be fair, that's all IF is - a calorie control lifestyle.

I personally prefer the little and often approach as I respond better to it - having done an IF style lifestyle for a while whilst working on yachts in the past. It's fine, but with work and my training it just doesn't fit in, and getting the calories I need when I want them is more important to me.
 
Freefaller said:
To be fair, that's all IF is - a calorie control lifestyle.
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Done properly it's not. I still eat the same amount on IF or not. I wouldn't be surprised if people ate more calories on IF as part of subconscious super compensation if they weren't actively monitoring macros/cals.

Calories in>out is king, but IF can bring benefits of better insulin sensitivity & hormone levels etc. which is really what we're looking for from IF.
 
Well I still argue that it's not THAT different. However, everybody responds better to different things. I think it's good for overweight people who will have issues with insulin sensitivity - however for a lot of advanced guys, who have their hormonal balances well tuned (i.e. GH, insulin, cortisol etc....), IF is just another eating protocol. :)
 
Freefaller said:
Well I still argue that it's not THAT different. However, everybody responds better to different things. I think it's good for overweight people who will have issues with insulin sensitivity - however for a lot of advanced guys, who have their hormonal balances well tuned (i.e. GH, insulin, cortisol etc....), IF is just another eating protocol. :)
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Yes I agree, I think it helped me a lot on my forevercut as getting your hormones back in check is one of the most important things imo. I think it's a good lazy combo with IIFYM to reap the positive hormonal changes of something resembling a BB'ers diet without the monotony of chicken, rice & brocolli every 3 hours please. Though I have no proof for that whatsoever it's just an observation, and more power to Steedie/Monkee/LiE who are able to do that BB diet I would go INSANE!

Delvis said:
As said, my understanding is that you consume the same amount of food as you would while NOT following an IF regeime?

Or have I got that incorrect?
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That's how it SHOULD be done IMO. But people will often interpret it as any easy/strict way to drop X amount of calories without thinking about it. If you did a full day fast and ate as normal other days you just effectively cut say 300-500kcals a day from your daily diet.
 
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