Intermittent fasting (IF) has surged in popularity as a health and fitness trend, lauded for its potential to aid weight loss, improve health, and streamline lifestyles. Leangains, a specific style of intermittent fasting, centers around structured eating, fasting, and resistance training. This guide delves into the principles of Leangains, its benefits, potential drawbacks, and how it compares to other IF methods, providing a comprehensive overview for those considering this eating pattern.
Understanding Intermittent Fasting
Intermittent fasting (IF) is an eating pattern that involves cycling between periods of eating and voluntary fasting on a regular schedule. It is not a diet that specifies which foods to eat, but rather when you should eat them. Fasting has been a practice throughout human evolution and is also common for religious or spiritual reasons.
Common Intermittent Fasting Methods
You can practice IF in several different ways, though they all involve splitting the day or week into eating and fasting periods. The most popular methods include:
- The 16/8 method: Also called the Leangains protocol, this involves an 8-hour eating period and a 16-hour fasting period. Some people do this by skipping breakfast, but you can also do the reverse and skip dinner or eat early.
- Eat-stop-eat: This involves fasting for 24 hours once or twice per week. Because this is a slightly more advanced version of fasting, you should only try this if you’re pretty comfortable with the practice.
- The 5:2 diet: With this method, you consume only 500-600 calories on two nonconsecutive days of the week but eat as usual the other 5 days.
What is Leangains?
Leangains, otherwise known as 16/8 intermittent fasting, involves eating all of your calories during an 8 hour period and fasting for 16 hours. It is a style of intermittent fasting created by Martin Berkhan, who is a personal trainer and a nutritionist.
Leangains Schedule
A typical Leangains schedule might involve a 12-1 PM pre-workout meal, followed by a workout, and then consuming the majority of your daily calorie intake in the post-workout period. However, it’s important to note that you don’t have to adhere to this specific routine. Everyone has different schedules and preferences. Despite which time schedule you decide to go with, be sure to stay consistent with it.
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Fasting Window
During the 16 hour fasted state, glycogen in the liver is depleted. When liver glycogen is depleted, the body enters a state of ketosis (fat burning). As the body burns fat, it produces molecules called ketones. No calories are to be ingested during the fasted phase, though coffee, calorie free sweeteners, diet soda and sugar free gum are ok (even though they might contain trace amount of calories). A tiny splash of milk in your coffee won’t affect anything either (½-1 teaspoon of milk per cup at the most - use sparingly and sensibly if you drink a lot of coffee). The fast is the perfect time to be productive and get things done.
Feeding Window
While many other intermittent fasting protocols focus on regular, small meals during the fed state, the leangains diet advises 3 larger meals. Small frequent meals require you to schedule your day around your diet, which requires a lot of time and is often hard to incorporate into a busy schedule. Meal frequency during the feeding phase is irrelevant. The feeding window should be kept somewhat constant due to the hormonal entrainment of meal patterns. We tend to get hungry when we're used to eating and maintaining a regular pattern makes diet adherence easier.
Leangains and Exercise
Leangains incorporates exercise into the fasting period. When you’re in a fasted state, since you consumed nothing in the previous hours, your body is already burning fat for energy. Focus your workouts on weight training. For fasted training, BCAA or an essential amino acid mixture is highly recommended. However, if this feels like too much micromanaging or simply questionable from an economic standpoint, you could also make due with some whey protein.
Macronutrient Cycling in Leangains
The leangains protocol typically recommends a diet that cycles macros throughout the week. Macronutrients and calorie intakes are always cycled through the week. Generally speaking, carbs and total calorie intake is highest on training days. On rest days, carbs are lower and fat is higher. On rest days, meal one should ideally be the largest meal, as opposed to training days where the post-workout meal is the largest meal. A good rule of thumb is to make meal one on rest days at least 35-40% of your daily calorie intake.
Benefits of Intermittent Fasting and Leangains
Studies have found that IF may have benefits for weight management and overall health. For many people, reducing their eating period also reduces the number of calories they eat on a daily basis. Over time, this can contribute to weight loss. The main reason IF helps with weight loss is that it makes it easier to eat fewer calories overall. If you eat massive amounts during your eating periods, you may not lose any weight at all.
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Here are the main health benefits of intermittent fasting:
- Weight loss: IF can help you lose weight and body fat without having to consciously restrict calories.
- Insulin resistance: IF can reduce insulin resistance, which happens when your body doesn’t respond properly to insulin, increasing your blood sugar levels. Managing your blood sugar can protect you against type 2 diabetes.
- Inflammation: Some studies show reductions in markers of inflammation, a key driver of many chronic diseases.
- Brain health: Studies in rats have shown that fasting increases the brain hormone BDNF and may aid the growth of new nerve cells.
Leangains is incredibly effective for promoting weight loss. It’s harder to eat as much food when you’re restricting your feeding period. By activating adaptive cellular stress response signaling pathways, intermittent fasting may be able to counteract disease processes. Intermittent fasting is a viable health intervention for people who have high blood sugar levels and insulin resistance, namely type 2 diabetics.
Metabolic Benefits
When you fast, several things happen in your body on the cellular and molecular level. First, human growth hormone (HGH) levels go up and insulin levels go down. Your body’s cells also change the expression of genes and initiate important cellular repair processes.
Here are some changes that occur in your body when you fast:
- HGH: Your levels of HGH increase. This can help with both fat loss and muscle growth.
- Insulin: When you fast, insulin sensitivity improves and levels of insulin decrease. Lower insulin levels make stored body fat more accessible.
- Cellular repair: When fasted, your cells initiate cellular repair processes. This includes autophagy, which means cells digest and remove old and dysfunctional proteins that build up inside them.
- Gene expression: Fasting can cause changes in the function of genes related to longevity and disease prevention.
Potential Drawbacks and Side Effects
As with all eating programs, there are some drawbacks and side effects to leangains. Hunger is the main side effect of IF. You may also feel weak, and your brain may not perform as well as you’re used to. This might only be temporary, as it can take some time for your body to adapt to the new meal schedule.
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Long periods of time can decrease your metabolism, due to adaptive thermogenesis. However, short term fasting may actually increase your metabolism. One study on 11 healthy men found that a 3-day fast increased their metabolism by 14%.
Who Should Avoid Intermittent Fasting?
Fasting is certainly not for everyone. If you’re underweight or have a history of eating disorders, you should not fast without speaking with your doctor first. Anyone who has an eating disorder should avoid any type of intermittent fasting routine.
If you have a medical condition, you should speak with your doctor before trying IF.This is particularly important if you:
- have diabetes
- have problems with blood sugar regulation
- have low blood pressure
- take medications
- are underweight
- have a history of eating disorders
- are trying to conceive
- have a history of amenorrhea
- are pregnant or nursing
Considerations for Females
Some evidence shows that IF may not be as beneficial for females. There are a number of anecdotal reports of females whose menstrual period stopped when they started doing IF and went back to usual when they resumed their previous eating pattern. This is likely because fasting can disrupt female hormones, affecting menstruation and overall health.
According to a 2023 research review, studies have shown that, for females who are an average weight, IF could harm reproductive health and performance if it causes insufficient calorie intake, especially in athletes. Experts suggest that females take care with IF. Females should follow separate guidelines, like easing into the practice and stopping immediately if they have any concerns like missing periods. If you are considering IF, it’s best to talk with a doctor or dietitian to determine whether it is right for you.
Calculating Macros for Leangains
The first step in calculating your required macros is to calculate your BMR or basal metabolic rate. Adjust your caloric intake for active and rest days. The final step of the process is to calculate your leangains macros. To calculate your carbohydrate intake you simply balance out what is left in your daily calorie targets, with carbohydrates having 4 calories per gram.
Simplified Approach: Don't Count Macros
You can also decide not to count your calories and macros. Plenty of people lose weight doing this, and intermittent fasting is exactly what helps them do so.
Tips for Success with Leangains
- Stay Consistent: Despite which time schedule you decide to go with, be sure to stay consistent with it.
- Be Flexible: It’s okay to be flexible. Whether or not your first meal accounts for 30% or 40% of your total daily calories is not what’s going to determine your success.
- Prioritize Adherence: Adherence is the most important metric for success.
- Listen to Your Body: Everyone’s different. Your body will adapt over the first few weeks, and symptoms should subside.
Leangains vs. Other Intermittent Fasting Protocols
Some intermittent fasting schedules require you to eat only one or two large meals for the day. Leangains, with its 8-hour eating window, offers more flexibility in meal timing and frequency compared to more restrictive IF protocols.
Alcohol Consumption on Leangains
Create a calorie buffer. Limit carbs to 1.5 g/kg body weight. Get all carbs from veggies and the tag-along carbs in some protein sources. You'll also want to limit carbohydrate-rich alcohol sources such as drinks made with fruit juices and beer. Good choices of alcohol include dry wines which are very low carb, clocking in at about 0.5-1 g per glass (4 fl oz/115ml). Sweet wines are much higher at 4-6 g per glass. Cognac, gin, rum, scotch, tequila, vodka and whiskey are all basically zero carbs. Dry wines and spirits is what you should be drinking, ideally. Take them straight or mixed with diet soda. For effective fat loss, this should be limited to one evening per week.
Protein Intake on Leangains
Eat as much protein as you want. Due to the limit on dietary fat, you need to get your protein from lean sources.