Dr. Andy Galpin

Grant Tinsley in Texas Tech has done a lot of awesome work and many others on 16-8 intermittent fasting, right? Really, really common. You eat all your calories in an eight-hour window. Let's just say you don't eat breakfast. You start eating at 11 a.m. and you eat dinner at 7, right? Really common thing. Lots of research on that compared to normal feeding, three meals a day, six, five, whatever.

Grant Tinsley in Texas Tech has done a lot of awesome work and many others on 16-8 intermittent fasting, right? Really, really common. You eat all your calories in an eight-hour window. Let's just say you don't eat breakfast. You start eating at 11 a.m. and you eat dinner at 7, right? Really common thing. Lots of research on that compared to normal feeding, three meals a day, six, five, whatever.

And the evidence is pretty clear at this point. Intermittent fasting does nothing particularly special. Doesn't help you lose fat any faster or anything like that. No, not at all. Wow. As long as you equate for protein and you equate for calories, you'll get basically the same result. Wow. Some studies have reported maybe like a half a kilogram extra fat loss, others not.

And the evidence is pretty clear at this point. Intermittent fasting does nothing particularly special. Doesn't help you lose fat any faster or anything like that. No, not at all. Wow. As long as you equate for protein and you equate for calories, you'll get basically the same result. Wow. Some studies have reported maybe like a half a kilogram extra fat loss, others not.

But if you look at the research on aggregate, it's about the same. If it fits your lifestyle, if it helps you be more adherent, tremendous. I'm all for it. That's great. Nothing's super special about it for caloric restriction, right?

But if you look at the research on aggregate, it's about the same. If it fits your lifestyle, if it helps you be more adherent, tremendous. I'm all for it. That's great. Nothing's super special about it for caloric restriction, right?

Probably 15, 20 studies from different labs at this point. So like generally they're all kind of saying the same thing. What we were interested in though is what about if you're trying to grow muscle? What happens, right? Because all those studies have put people in a caloric deficit, trying to lose weight, right? So you bring them down there for the most part or caloric maintenance.

Probably 15, 20 studies from different labs at this point. So like generally they're all kind of saying the same thing. What we were interested in though is what about if you're trying to grow muscle? What happens, right? Because all those studies have put people in a caloric deficit, trying to lose weight, right? So you bring them down there for the most part or caloric maintenance.

So we took young, highly trained people, that were trying to grow muscle. We put them in a caloric surplus. We went way above energy needs, put them on very high protein. One group did 16-8, one group did not. And we did everything. We took muscle biopsies, looked at molecular signaling, genetic signaling, single fibers adaptations. We looked at muscle size. We looked at sleep.

So we took young, highly trained people, that were trying to grow muscle. We put them in a caloric surplus. We went way above energy needs, put them on very high protein. One group did 16-8, one group did not. And we did everything. We took muscle biopsies, looked at molecular signaling, genetic signaling, single fibers adaptations. We looked at muscle size. We looked at sleep.

We looked at digestion. We looked at hunger. We looked at happiness, complaints of how hard or easy the diet was. We looked at all of it. Net result, there were differences. But in terms of muscle growth, about the same. One of the biggest things with the fasting group was there was just a lot of anecdotal like, oh, this is hard. It's just hard. And specifically the problem was carbohydrates.

We looked at digestion. We looked at hunger. We looked at happiness, complaints of how hard or easy the diet was. We looked at all of it. Net result, there were differences. But in terms of muscle growth, about the same. One of the biggest things with the fasting group was there was just a lot of anecdotal like, oh, this is hard. It's just hard. And specifically the problem was carbohydrates.

It was hard for them to get their carbohydrates in without getting a lot of GI distress. We had that come up a number of times. Performance, specifically leg strength,

It was hard for them to get their carbohydrates in without getting a lot of GI distress. We had that come up a number of times. Performance, specifically leg strength,

started to come down in the fasting group and i think we have pretty good rationale to suggest if you're trying to maximize because we were progressively overloading them basically you can imagine this like you're in the gym training and you finish every set this isn't exactly what we did but it gives you the concept you finish every set and let's say you do a leg press at 200 pounds and you do 10 reps okay next time you come in you're going to do 11.

started to come down in the fasting group and i think we have pretty good rationale to suggest if you're trying to maximize because we were progressively overloading them basically you can imagine this like you're in the gym training and you finish every set this isn't exactly what we did but it gives you the concept you finish every set and let's say you do a leg press at 200 pounds and you do 10 reps okay next time you come in you're going to do 11.

If you did 11, next time we're going to do 12. So like every single session, if they were getting, they were going to, so they were training really hard for eight weeks. I just don't think they had the recovery capacity. I think either there was under-reporting Because it was just like, I can't, I'm just going to write the number down, but I can't really eat that food.

If you did 11, next time we're going to do 12. So like every single session, if they were getting, they were going to, so they were training really hard for eight weeks. I just don't think they had the recovery capacity. I think either there was under-reporting Because it was just like, I can't, I'm just going to write the number down, but I can't really eat that food.

That's always possible in like real human studies.

That's always possible in like real human studies.