Adelfo Cerame - Road to The Wheelchair Nationals '12: Back From Thanksgiving and in Better Shape Than Ever!

Image 1: Some people just know how to improve their physique even when pigging out on thanksgiving. Or can you see any collateral damage the turkey, the pie and the pie and the turkey from last week have done?

Assuming that all of you have eventually overcome the physical and psychological consequences of your thanksgiving festivities, you should be about as ready as can be to kickstart the last three serious training weeks of the year. It alway amazes me how long some days (especially those without lectures and tons of paper work in the office) appear to be, when weeks and months fly by like nothing. I remember back in the day, when I first contacted Adelfo on behalf of the Suppversity Student Spotlight and we came up with the idea for this series, I was thinking to myself: "Damn, 2012? That is a going to be a hell long series of blogposts! Let's hope people will like it..." And now? Well, the title of the email I just received from Adelfo is "2 months down! And 3 1/2 more months to go!" And the positive feedback we are receiving week by week is overwhelming (keep it coming ;-). So what more can I say? I guess I better say nothing and let just Adelfo tell you what he has been doing the last days to make sure to pocket his pro-card at the 2012 Wheelchair Nationals...

Time flies by! 16 weeks out and keepin' it rollin'!

I am 16 weeks out from my show. Man! Am I glad that I started my prep 2 months ago, because it feels like the next 16 weeks are going to fly by. Today is the first of December and, as I mentioned in my last blogpost,  I have cut back another 200kcals from my diet and am now at daily caloric intake of only 1600 kcal. I actually have already the first day with 1600kcal under my belt, and it felt.... it felt like this is going to be a walk in the park! Although my carb-, and with the latest cut, even my fat-intake are pretty low, now (160g protein/ 50g CHO/ 75g fat per day), I still manage to get my schoolwork done, help my clients throughout the early part of the day and still have tons of energy to burn when I train later in the afternoon. Two years ago I would’ve been dead tired by the time 4 o’clock pm came around and would have just gone through the motions at the gym.

Figure 1: Adelfo's current macronutrient breakdown. Since December 1st, he is at a 1600kcal/day level.

I feel that I have been able to perform efficiently throughout the day and train optimally in the gym ever since I realized that my body prefers fat as a better fuel source than carbohydrates. I also feel that my body has adapted to using fats more efficiently, the reason why I really don’t get affected when I have to drop my carbohydrate intake. Since my body is now adapted to being a fat burning machine, it does efficiently utilize its own body fat stores as a source of energy, when carbohydrate and dietary fat intakes are low. And while I have deliberately not gone all the way, now, i.e. I have not yet dropped my carbohydrate to zero and my fat intake to similarly low levels, this may still happen in the last week(s) of the prep and I am confident that, even than, I won't be the walking Zombie I have become in the course of classic high-carb preps, where your energy levels plummet when you eventually have to drop the carbs to get stage ready.

Intermittent fasting gives me balance - physiologically and psychologically

In that, I am convinced that the high(er) fat approach aside, my decision to switch to an intermittent fasting protocol also has a lot to do with how smooth my prep and dieting has been going so far. I honestly can say, that I rarely feel hunger pangs, if any at all. I’m not pre-occupied with what I’m going to cook or eat next. My mind is not distracted with thoughts of food. I can even go a whole day without eating and I feel fine. When I take a look back, it’s amazing how much my diet controlled my everyday life. Don’t get me wrong, I love the science of nutrition, eating smart, making healthy food decisions and preparing for bodybuilding shows, but when you start getting OCD and letting the diet determine and control how you live your life. Dieting sometimes even goes so far that it starts to alter your personality! And this is, when you should now: It's time to make a change!

Natural hormone optimization - a new asset in my portfolio!?

Video 1: Mike Mahler's "Hormone Optimization" seminar on YouToube (click on the navigation on the right to see all parts). Big kudos to Mike for sharing so much great information for free!

So far everything from diet and training is going great. The one thing though that I’ve noticed that needs improvement in my prep is sleep. For some reason I’ve been having trouble sleeping…while searching for a solution to my issue and trying to find a reason why my sleeping patterns were so out of whack, I ran into a YouTube video by Mike Mahler, where he discusses hormone optimization in quite some detail. Leptin, insulin, adrenaline, cortisol, ... he covers them all and I thin that I may have found possible reasons for my suboptimal sleep patterns. In particular, I realized that my cortisol and adrenaline levels might be too high during the night. I try to get 7-8 hours of sleep but most of the night I’m tossing and turning. I don’t necessarily feel that it’s from stress, well nothing negative at least. I do think about a lot things at night though… like I said nothing negative, more like thoughts of future endeavors, excitement to compete, how I can make my business successful, ways I can improve training and nutrition… like thoughts of that nature.

Eventually I found myself digging deeper into this subject of hormones and hormone optimization trying to learn and educate myself on a topic I know nothing about, but yeah… anyway, I think I’ve found a subject that peaks my curiosity and will probably keep me busy for a couple of weeks trying to learn as much as I can and will most likely distract me from my school work ;-)

End of November: 4 weeks paying off...

A pros pos work, it's also time to evaluate where a hell lot of hard work in the gym has gotten me in the past couple of week. So here are some recent progress pictures that I took yesterday, as well as comparisons from the beginning of the month.

Image 2: Picture on the left hand side was taken on November 15, 2011, and the picture on the right hand side was taken yesterday on November 30, 2011 (photos by Adelfo Cerame, 2011).

As you can see with the most recent picture, the 2-day Thanksgiving holiday feasting I engaged in last week did nothing to hamper my forward progress.With the front pose, I definitely can see a difference especially my abdominals. Since I don’t have the luxury to weigh my self often, I always use my abdominals as marker to gauge and monitor my progress… and I advice that you should do so, too. Don’t get too pre-occupied on scale weight. The smaller your waist gets, the lower your body fat gets. Losing body fat and maintaining lean muscle mass is what’s important, not what the scale reads.

... yet a still not at my short-term goal of outperforming my friend Duong ;-)

To be honest from looking at the comparisons, I feel that I certainly could afford to stay at 1800 calories and still make some good progress by the end of December. In fact, I was tempted for about 5 minutes, but then I reminded myself of  the short-term goal that I set for myself, which is to achieve or better outperform Duong's already phenomenal physique by Christmas, which also happens to be the 12-week mark in my contest prep (sorry Duong, just my competitive nature ;-)

Supplement reviews: Since this past weekend there was a black Friday/Cyber Monday sale online @ TFSupplements (by the way, although I do not even get a discount there, I still want to mention that this is a very cheap place to shop for supps ;-) I picked up a bottle of Liquid Clenbutrx by VPX (yeah I know… the name sounded pretty sketchy to me also!), and a tub of Anadraulic State by LG Sciences. Both were at a very affordable price compared to retail.

Note: I just started on both supplements this week,
so you’ll have to wait until I finish them for a full review.

Image 3: VPX Clenbutrx, a solid product with a more than questionable name, which will yet have to showcase its fat burning magic in the weeks to come.

Liquid Clenbutrx: My initial thoughts were…  name and bottle alone of the VPX product (with the little injection dispenser) looked and sounded suspect to me. I mean look at the name… rhymes with clenbuterol right? And look how they make the bottle look all-pharmaceutical like with the injection dispenser to the side… "It looks like it can be illegal, so I guess it must work!" *rofl* Even with all the signs directing me to stay clear, the price was right, the majority of the reviews were positive (on a side note… when I read supp reviews I take into consideration the physique of the one making the review. You usually can find their profile picture on the left hand side of reviews), and even Mr super-critic Dr. Andro considers VPX among the most reputable companies in a business, where shady names of obviously have become part of the game...

• Taste: Tastes like shit and Nyquil mixed together! It’s gotta work if it tastes this bad right?
  
• Energy: So far for the past 3 days since I’ve been taking it… my energy is literally through the roof. In fact this elixir kept me up all night for the first day, because I took the 2nd dose to late in the afternoon… and I guess taking anadraulic state 30 minutes after does not help either - though this is actually a "non-stim" pre-workout product. I am, by the way, curious on how long these potent effects are going to last and whether they will have worn off before I will have gone through the whole bottle. Keep checking back for more info in the posts to come.
• Fat Loss: Don’t know yet, until I finish the bottle, but I get a good sweat in the gym.
• Side notes: So far no jitters throughout the day or while I workout. And so far it hasn’t ramped up my metabolism in the Ferrari-like way it claims to do. But hey - should I really have believed that? I guess no. So, not a bad product, so far.

Image 4: LG Sciences' Anadraulic State GT - for the 14$ I would hardly have gotten the 720g of ingredients in bulk.

Anadraulic State: My initial thoughts… Another pre- workout supplement that’s worth a try because 720g for $14 and a really sound ingredient profile, this was obviously a bargain!

•  Taste: Strawberry lemonade, well at least that is what the label says. I guess it's a good thing that it does not taste as if it was mixed with battery acid, though ;-)
• Energy: I did not buy it for the energy factor. It's a non-stim and with the potent effects of the Clenbutrx I really can't tell if you would feel some kind of energy rush from Anadraulic State, as well.
• Pump/ vascularity: I can’t really tell either because my body gets a good pump or gets pretty vascular even when I don’t take pre-workout supplements.
• Strength/ performance: So far it’s all me. But given the fact that the ingredients are meant to do their magic over time, I did not expect to notice it until being on it for at least 2-3 weeks.
• Side notes: Nothing to really report or rave about yet.  

I will keep you updated on the impact these two have on the results I am seeing in the mirror, as well as the gym in the future installments of this series. Every Thursday, right here at the SuppVersity - remember that ;-)

Image 5: Not exactly hitting the macro ratio is an issue only OCD bodybuilders will worry about... and as Dr. Andro likes to say "The stress due to too much thinking about what to eat and what not to eat is much worse than the one wrong food choice you could make".

If you want to know how this little precontest-contest turns out, I suggest you come back next Thursday and see how far I've gotten already, because, for today, that is all, folks! And with the supplement feature being this week's special, I will skip the weekly recipe and just leave you with a picture of 2 big ass turkey legs from the last of my holiday leftovers that I’m about to eat before I begin my fast.

I usually like to track my macros and actually don’t mind doing it, but since my last meal before I start my fast and hit the sack are P+F meals. It’s usually pretty easy for me to eye it and guesstimate my macros. My macro meal split for my protein and fat are around 50g protein, and 25g fat. I’m guessing these 2 turkey legs are a bit under my protein and fat, but I’m not too worried about it... buon appetito!

Adelfo Cerame - Road to The Wheelchair Nationals '12: Ambitious Short-Term Goals Pave the Way to Success.

Image 1: This guy likes to suffer - no, not
what you are thinking now ;-)

I don't know about you, but I cannot stand how people constantly complain about how bad things are, how hard they are working (mostly these are the laziest people I know), how little they are paid, how desperate the economy was,... you know the whole litany, don't you? Then, Adelfo Cerame's weekly blogpost is exactly the diversion you probably need today. I mean don't get me wrong. Adelfo is only human, so he likes to complain, as well. But believe it or not, this guy complains about not suffering enough!? So just to make sure you get this right. Adelfo Cerame Jr. aspiring future pro-wheelchair bodybuilder suffers, because he does not suffer enough... does not make sense? Well, I guess, I'll better have him explain his "problem", then ;-)


Goalsetting 101: Short-term goals keep you on track

You think you could use some advice on your own training, diet and supplementation regimen and want it from someone who obviously knows what it takes to build muscle and lose fat? You can reach out to Adelfo via Facebook.

When you want to achieve something in life, setting specific and testable goals is always the necessary first step. Mostly, you won't have any difficulties naming your long-term goals - in my case, for example the it is to win the 2012 Wheelchair Nationals. It is, however, also necessary to pick short-term goals in order not to lose yourself on your journey from A to B. After all, long-term goals are exactly what their name implies.... they are LONG. More often than not, you will feel that you have been working towards them for ages, which can become so discouraging that you end up in despair, negate all the small steps you have already taken and surrender to what you believe would be the "fate of the loser" that you are. Some people, on the other hand, react completely different. They become complacent, keep telling themselves how good they already look, how much they already achieved and how well everything worked out... obviously a completely different mistake, yet with similarly unrewarding outcome. To prevent these types of roadblocks, I have made a habit of setting up an exact time-line of short-term goals to accomplish. By doing this, I keep myself motivated, and on my toes (or in my case, on my wheels) to get to the one "distant" long-term goal of which you can lose sight so easily.

I am in week 7 of my contest prep, now. And, psychologically, this has been one of my easiest contest preparations, so far... this does not mean that it could eventually become tough further down the road, but based on my previous experience, I can usually tell if it's going be a rough cut pretty early on in my prep. When the hunger pangs, temptations and cravings are starting early, you know your in for a long cut. But so far nothing! No cravings, no temptations, and rarely any hunger pangs or none at all on most days of the week. I rarely even get excited or anxious on my designated re-feed / cheat days. I don’t feel sleepy, or tired, and my strength and energy is still up at the gym, and I haven’t been using any type of pre-workout, N.O. or creatine supplements, yet.

This is intriguingly easy - too easy!?

Ironically, the ease and smoothness with which things are rolling is what begins to scare me. Being used to the psychological stress, battles and mind games that I use to play with myself during dieting, I am constantly battling the thought that this ease is not what I am supposed to feel when I am dieting or preparing for a bodybuilding show… “If you’re not suffering, then you’re not doing it right!” But I’m not suffering. And yet I seem to be right on track or maybe even ahead of my schedule.

I mean, I do "suffer" the usual pain and fatigue you get while training heavy and intense, but if you remember the statement from Arnold about "da pump", Dr. Andro quoted a few blogposts ago, you will know that this kind of "pain" is what every serious bodybuilder is looking for. What I refer to as "suffering" is what the mental drain the incredible fatigue, the constant huger, the battle against cravings and hunger pangs... the kind of "suffering", when you you are dead tired from dieting so hard that you cannot even perform your daily routines... yet, thinking about it, even calling that "suffering" makes me feel somewhat ashamed. There are millions of people starving - these people have real issues, and people like you and me are complaining about something we are voluntarily doing to ourselves!? But anyway, let's get back to the topic at hand...

Image 2: Cream of Roast Beef, post-workout meal of the week.

Recipe of the Week: Cream of Roast Beef
(Post workout meal)

Ingredients:

• 7 oz roast beef (bottom round roast)
• 6 oz yam
• 5 baby carrots
• ½ c cottage cheese, topped w/ ½ c chopped apples, sprinkled w/ground cinnamon
• 2 tbs. low-fat sour cream
• 1 tbs. A1 steak sauce

Macros: 62g protein / 57g carbs / 20g fat

Quick tip: Personally, I eat more carbs around my workouts, but base all my meals on protein and fat on my off-days. So, if this was a rest day meal, I would take out the yam and replace the apples with a lighter fruit (lower in calories & carbs) like blueberries.

Raising the bar to outdo yourself: "Show ready" by week 12!

Since I’ve been cruising through my prep these past 7 weeks, I’ve decided to give myself a challenge or a short-term goal to prevent me from getting distracted and complacent, but to also keep me motivated (well I never really lost motivation, so I guess it's to add to my motivation) and give more light and focus to the real goal at hand, which is winning an overall title in March. The goal I picked is to be as close to "show ready" as possible by the 12-week mark, which should be Christmas day. Basically I’d like to be in the same type of condition Duong was in when he ended his 12 weeks (if you have not done that already, check out his amazing transformation in the SuppVersity Student Spotlight). Since it’s my first run at IF, I've been really gauging my progress with Duong's - from his macros, the type of foods he ate, to the schedule of his fast & feeding hours. I'm using Duong's progress as a checkpoint or marker, which means that if I am not in the same outstanding (or even better - sorry Duong ;-) physical condition as Duong was, when he hit his 12 weeks, then I need to pick up the pace and make some adjustments.

That being said, Duong gave himself "only" 12 weeks. I, on the other hand, deliberately started early and thusly do not have to cut my calories just as fast as he did ... it is nevertheless imperative that I do not develop the aforementioned complacency and eventually end up even worse than I would have when a relatively drastic, but short cut does not work out.

A log holds you accountable for your progress

My current plan is to maintain a daily caloric intake of 1.800 kcal/day until the end of November. This is in fact -100 kcal lower than the original plan. A plan, my instinct told me would not get me to where I decided I want to be by Christmas. Accordingly, I will drop my daily allowance to 1600 kcal/day in the first week of December '11. I am logging all my food and keeping track of all my calories and macros to a “T”, to be able to analyze which dietary tweaks worked, which didn't an which further alterations to my regimen will be most helpful.

Figure 1: Here’s an example of a program I made on my Macbook where I log my foods.

For the first month I was inconsistent with logging my foods. It was just easier for me to keep track in my head, but ever since giving myself this short-term goal, I made logging my foods just as much a priority as I do my training. Logging your foods and keeping track of your calories and macros also holds you accountable. You know every bite that you put in your mouth, so there’s no lying to yourself when you realize that you’re not making any progress, all the evidence is written down. When you look back and re-evaluate, you’ll know if you stuck to your diet or not... and what's more, logging my foods and keeping track of my numbers, soothes the feeling of "not suffering enough", it reassures me that I am doing everything to the literally "T" - no second guessing myself, no guilty conscious, and no elevated cortisol levels due to constant worries ;-)

It’s always a good idea to keep logs, especially if you’re just starting to learn about nutrition and dieting. Other than holding you accountable, food-logging helps you with learning about serving sizes, and how to count calories and macronutrients. And let me tell you, only when I began logging what I ate, I realized how little I actually knew about what I ate. Looking back four years, I have to admit that I did not even really know what a "protein" is, back in the days when I started.

Knowing your body and its limits is the key to success

On the non-dietary side of things, I noticed that I was getting a little burned out with the EDT in the course of the last week. My strength did not increase as much as it did the previous weeks, and I really felt fatigued the last training session of the week. So I took a break from EDT training this week and changed my workouts to a 5x5 routine, where I do 5 sets of 5 reps. I still lift heavy though. Depending on what muscles I train, I’ll do 7 exercises, and each exercise is 5x5. So for example on chest days, I’ll do 5 chest exercises and 2 triceps exercises, each exercise is 5x5, heavy. It felt pretty awkward going back to a regular split routine. I have gotten so used to the fast paced high-intensity EDT workouts that I wasn’t as hyped or amped during my workouts this week. Although I lifted heavy and intense (probably about the same if not more weight), I was not as mentally focused as I have been when I did the EDT cycles. I figure the best solution to this problem would be to alternate between a "regular" 5x5 split training and escalating density training regimen on a weekly basis. After all, the one week back on the "old" training split already paid off: my strength increased a lot! I guess after a few weeks without "classic" 5x5 training, my muscles were pretty shocked by what my brain tells me is an old hat ;-)

"In my opinion, classic cardio is way overrated and is for suckers!"

Image 3: Low-intensity cardio free! The only high intensity cardio I did during my prep in 09’ was hitting the heavy bag every other day for 30 minutes for the last 4 remaining weeks of my prep. I let my diet take care of the rest and suggest you do the same!

The comparatively low metabolic demand of 5x5 training also gave me the chance to pick up some 20-minute high intensity cardio during my rest days. I’m not a big fan of cardio, and I rarely do it, but when I do, I always enjoy doing high intensity cardio like hitting the heavy bag, doing sprints with my wheelchair or doing the burn machine (it’s a 10 pound hand cycle). I like to “get at it” for as hard as I can for 20 minutes, then I’m done. Don’t waste your time jogging on a treadmill for hours. That’ll get you nowhere fast (not even slow ;-)! Lift Heavy weights and do some sprints. That’s more productive and you burn more body fat than running on a treadmill for hour (assuming that you have your diet in check) .

You should never depend on cardio to transform your physique.

So whatever short- and long-term goals you may be setting in the course of the one week you will have to get along without another blogpost of mine, don't forget: "TRAIN SMARTER, NOT HARDER!"

High Reps vs. 5x5 - Revisiting the "High(er) Reps for Fat Loss"-Myth: Do You Really Believe that "Burning" +13 Extra Calories Will Make a Difference?

Image 1: Vince Andrich, here at the 1988 Nevada State Bodybuilding Competition, knew it all along: Hard work, not high reps will get you the stage-ready physique everybody aspires... and I mean look at him are you seriously questioning Vince's expertise?

If you have listened to the latest installments of BodyRX Radio, the idea that strength (and HIIT) training, not calorie restriction and endless cardio sessions pave the way to a leaner, more muscular physique. And although it may be of secondary importance whether you are burning 100kcal or 200kcal during those workouts, it stands out of question that you won't get rid of those damn spare tire, if you do not exert yourself in the gym (something Layne Norton is notorious for, as you may have seen in one of his workout videos or heard on BodyRX, lately) - because, after all, energy expenditure does count, even if the energy equation is much more complex than the simplistic calories in vs. calories out paradigm that is still upheld by mainstream dietitians. The results of a recent study from scientists from the Departments of Health and Sport Sciences at the Salisbury University and the University of South Carolina are may thus come handy to decide, to which extent workout intensity and volume influence acute and post-exercise energy expenditure (Mazetti. 2011). Or, to make it simple, does the good old bro-scientific high volume, high rep, low-weight training during a contest prep make any sense at all?

Exposed! The absurdity of going to the gym to "burn calories"

Scott A. Mazetti and his colleagues recruited 10 resistance trained young men (22+/-3.6 years) with an average body mass of 84+/-6.4kg, a height of 180+/-5.1cm, and a body fat percentage of 13+/-3.8% - an adequate model of the "average gymrat", if you asked me. After a 3-week familiarization and testing period, all participants performed every of the following four different explosive strength training regimen in a randomly assigned, but counterbalanced order (cf. figure 1)

Figure 1: The four training protocols all trainees performed after an initial 3-week familiarization and testing period in a randomly assigned, but counterbalanced order (Mazetti. 2011)

Now, you may complain that there is neither a "high rep" nor a "heavy group" in the conventional sense of 15+ pump training with an endless amount of sets, or the minimalist 1-2 rep approach of the hardcore HIT faction... granted, you are right. Nevertheless, we should see a significant difference in energy expenditure between a 5x5 and a 4x10 (both normally considered as "hypertrophy training) regimen, already, if the good old saying "high(er) reps" for increased energy expenditure and subsequent fat loss had any merit.

Figure 2: Energy expenditure (kcal/min) during and after squatting, and bench pressing in the four training groups and total energy expenditure during the whole workout and 60min post-workout window (data adapted from Mazetti. 2011)

As figure 2 goes to show, there are differences in energy expenditure between the different protocols, during the squat, the deadlift and up to 5 minutes post exercise, nevertheless, the "the differences in total energy expenditure among protocols were not significant". So, even if there were any merit in exercising primarily to burn calories during your workout (a ridiculous way of trying to lose weight, which is predestined to fail, anyway), the -6kcal difference between the -13kcal difference between the least energy consuming form of training, i.e. 5x5 and the one with the highest energy demand, i.e. 4x10, would not even suffice to "make up" (another hilarious idea) for proverbial "apple à day", which keeps the doctor away.

Image 2: Don't let your lazy love handles decide what type of "cardio" you are doing!

A brief note on what Lane already pointed out in the last installment of Body RX Radio: Classic low-intensity cardio training may "burn" calories for a week or two. Afterwards, this type of chronic low-grade stressor is yet notorious for shutting down your metabolism and reducing your resting energy expenditure. Of high intensity aerobic exercise with intensities way beyond the 70% VO2max limit (YES! This is aerobic, two - cf. "HIIT is the Hit! Even for Patients with Myocardial Infarctions!"), we have known for decades that it increases your resting energy expenditure by "5 ±15% for 24 ± 48 h" (Hunter. 1998). So, I suggest you get off the stationary bike you are just riding while browsing the web, get your running shoes out and do a couple of sprints. Your spare tire won't like that, but I bet you will like the effect it's going to have on the person you see in the mirror, each morning ;-)

In view of these results, it appears prudent to reassess the often-heard advice of doing high reps for fat loss. Even if you insist that you need to "burn calories" in the gym, it is very unlikely that those few extra calories would make a noticeable difference in terms of how you look on stage - or just in front of your private mirror. Moreover, even this small advantage vanishes as soon, as you increase the workload by doing 2x7 + 2x6 with a heavy weight, or put simply: Identical workload identical calorie expenditure.

The Fallacy of Working Out To "Burn Calories" + Exercise Shuts Down the Carb Cravings: Bench Press, Leg Press HIIT & LISS Are Not Meant to Incinerate the Junk You Eat

If you work out to be able to allow yourself to eat, you know you have a serious problem.

So, what was that about the bench pressing consuming as much energy as leg presses and the "exercise just makes you hungry myth" on the last installment of the Science Round-Up? If that's what you have been asking yourself this morning, when you showered I am impressed - or should I be worried?

If you have not done so already, this would be the right time to download + listen to the Science Round-Up - I promise there is much to learn and not all of it is going to be repeated here.

Whatever... in the end it does not matter how urgent you were waiting to take a look at the data that supports my argument that (a) exercise does not just make you hungry, and that (b) the notion to work out primarily to burn energy is hilarious.

Chest vs. legs what's energetically more costly?

While I could imagine that the comparison would have yielded a different result if the 10 healthy young men (>1 year of resistance training experience; BMI ~24kg/m²) had performed squats instead of regular leg presses, I have to admit that I was still surprised to see that Magossoa et al. actually found no difference in the total energy expenditure between 3 sets of 10 reps (70% 1RM) of bench vs. leg presses (Note: The researchers determined the total energy expenditure using the oxygen uptake (aerobic component) the EPOC and lactate production (anaerobic component)).

Table 1: Workload, energy expenditure total, per minute per weight lifted (Magosso. 2013)

If you look at the data in Table 1, you will have to concede: The only difference between the energy expenditure during the leg and the leg press was the inferior energy consumption per kg of weight on 'the bench'.

If you were one of the lazy (and mostly ignorant) buggers who "already have big enough legs", you could probably use these results to argue that leg presses and the rest of the leg workout was a pretty unnecessary undertaking - I mean, if you don't want bigger legs it should at least help you with that sixpack by burning a couple of calories, right?

Only a fool will work out to "burn energy"

Suggested Read: "Busting the 3,500kcal = 1lbs Weight Loss Myth! Debunking the rule of thumb with the power of science" | read more

Once they're there, it does usually you not take very long until people will remember this ingeniously simply (and about s flawed) rule of thumb that says: To lose 1lbs of fat you got to burn 3,5000kcal. Here, in our concrete example, that would mean that it would not matter if you did another 228 sets of bench presses or leg presses to lose 1lbs of pure body fat.

Once you've gotten caught in calculations such as the above, i.e. 229 sets x 46kcal / 3 sets  > 3500kcal, or in words "I got to do 228 sets of bench presses to burn one pound of body fat!", you are lost.

Firstly, the equation 3,500kcal caloric deficit = 1lbs fat loss if flawed (learn more).

Secondly, and even more importantly, doing more, which is what all the "I workout to lose fat" weekend warriors do, is not going to yield superior results. If you don't believe that, I suggest you go back to my "How to Burn 27,300 Kcal Extra W/out Losing a Single Extra Pound of Fat!"-article and take a look at the results of the Rosenkild study from 2012 (figure 3).

Gary is ... no, not a fool, but he is still wrong

Now, I obviously cannot forbid workout extra and luckily even Gary Taubes can't because even if you insisted to burn 600kcal, instead of just 300kcal, you can at least console yourself that this is not going to increase your appetite (learn more). Especially if we are talking about relatively intense exercise for similarly "relatively obese" individuals, working out will not only reduce your window of opportunity to eat (for some people even that may make a difference, believe me), but rather work like a gastric bypass - one that won't allow you to hit your obesogenic macros on the subsequent meals.

Figure 1: Macronutrient intake (lunch + dinner in g) on control vs. exercise day (David. 2013)

Those of you who have not listened to the podcast yet will now probably be wondering what I am talking about, right? Well, take a look at the 3D bars in Figure 1. They represent the results of a study David et al. conducted earlier this year. A study that involved both lean and obese kids and a study that demonstrates that a relatively short (3x10 min) but comparably hard workout (75% VO2max) is not going to make the sugar junkies crave for more - quite the opposite, it will reduce their apperite for carb(age) to a normal level [similar appetite-reducing effect were observed by Sim et al. (2013) in adult men and Rosenkilde (2013; already discussed at the SuppVersity].

I mean, a voluntary 35% reduction in carbohydrate intake during lunch and dinner and a total reduction in energy intake of 475kcal are impressive ballpark figures considering the fact that exercise is often said to "just make you hungry" - wouldn't you agree?

EPOC should not determine your choice of exercise either

If you are sprinting because of the increase in EPOC, you are a fool.

From the article I referenced in yesterday's write-up ("More Than 3x Higher EPOC Induced Energy Expenditure With HIIT vs. LISS! But Does That Really Matter?" | read more) you already know that  HIITing it hard on Wingate tests will yield a pretty pathetic increase in EPOC of ~20kcal over a casual 30min jog.

So even if it was about burning calories the jog would be far superior because the increase in Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption (EPOC) is not going to compensate the additional kcal the subjects in the Townsend study burned during the steady state exercise.

The latter is by the way not much different if you compare two different HIIT regimen - a very intense short one (HIIT1) and a somewhat longer slightly less intense alternative regimen (HIIT2):

• HIIT1: 10 x 1min, 1min pause between intervals; cycling at 80-90RPM at 90% of the HRmax

• HIIT2: 10 x 4min, 2min pause; cycling at 60-80RPM and without a prescribed minimal heart rate

In their trial that involved 9 lean, healthy male subjects, Kelly et al. obeserved that the HIIT2 trial was more than two times more energetically costly (675kcal vs. 275kcal) - the EPOC effect on the other hand did not lead to any significant differences in post-exercise energy expenditure, so that the HIIT1 group was stuck with their ~400kcal inferior energy expenditure... now, that sounds as if it was a bad thing, but if we consider that they spent less time on the ergometer and were rewarded with a greater stimulus for mitochondrial expansion and even muscle growth (see "The Anablic Effects of HIIT" | read more), I would not say that they came off second best - would you?

Practical suggestions for your workout week...

• health focus - 2-3x resistance training + daily LISS as in walking (min. 30-60min)
• performance focus - 3x resistance training + 1-2x HIIT + 6x LISS as in walking (30-40min)
• physique focus - 3-4x resistance training + 1x HIIT +  6x LISS as in walking (30-40min)

Don't forget that the reason you do the LISS training is not because you want to burn calories, but rather because you want to spend some time doing what you actually would have to do everyday: Walking from place A to B; and if you belong to the few of us who don't sit on a desk all day, you may skip the walk in the park.

So what's a good reason to work out, then? Health! I know that does not sound as sexy as six-pack abs and bigger sleeves, but there is not denying it: Exercise is your vaccine and magic pill. It's what's going to make you feel good, look good and age well and unless you want to end up debilitated in a nursing home it is not optional even if you follow an energy restricted diet for the rest of your life. What is optional, though, is exercise as a means to increase athletic performance or influence the shape of you body withing your individual very specific limits.

Within this health ↔ performance ↔ looks triangle you will often encounter conflicts, where the optimization of one compromises the realization of another. I am nevertheless convinced that classic light intensity steady state (to make up for our modern sedentary lifestyle), en vogue high intensity interval training (to increase your VO2max) and classic and modern forms of resistance training (to build and maintain muscle mass) all have their place in a routine that does not lose sight of any of the vertices of the triangle.

What? How you can ever lose weight without doing endless hours of cardio? Well what about dieting?

References:

• David T, et al. Obese but not lean adolescents spontaneously decrease energy intake after intensive exercise. Physiol Behav. 2013 [epub ahead of print]
• Kelly B, King JA, Goerlach J, Nimmo MA. The impact of high-intensity intermittent exercise on resting metabolic rate in healthy males. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2013 Oct 6. [Epub ahead of print]
• Magosso et al. Energy Expenditure during Multiple Sets of Leg Press and Bench Press. Journal of Exercise Physiology online. October 2013.
• Rosenkilde M, Auerbach P, Reichkendler MH, Ploug T, Stallknecht BM, Sjödin A. Body fat loss and compensatory mechanisms in response to different doses of aerobic exercise--a randomized controlled trial in overweight sedentary males. Am J Physiol Regul Integr Comp Physiol. 2012 Sep 15;303(6):R571-9.
• Rosenkilde M, Reichkendler MH, Auerbach P, Toräng S, Gram AS, Ploug T, Holst JJ, Sjödin A, Stallknecht BM. Appetite regulation in overweight, sedentary men after different amounts of endurance exercise - a randomized controlled trial. J Appl Physiol (1985). 2013 Sep 19. [Epub ahead of print]
• Sim AY, Wallman KE, Fairchild TJ, Guelfi KJ. High-intensity intermittent exercise attenuates ad-libitum energy intake. Int J Obes (Lond). 2013 Jun 4. doi: 10.1038/ijo.2013.102. [Epub ahead of print]

A Bomb Calorimeter You Are Not! And That's Why Even the "Adjusted" Energy Values on Food Labels Are 5% Off

How productive are you?

A couple of you will probably remember the SuppVersity news from ~1 year ago in which I discussed the revelation that nuts (pistachios and almonds) effectively deliver much less energy (-25%) than the "label" or databases on the Internet will tell you. In other words, while these healthy snacks are still extremely calorie dense, our bodies are not exactly as well equipped as a bomb calorimeter to use that energy.... "bomb calorimeter"? That reminds me of a study I read about a week ago and remembered, today, when I was thinking about writing an article on a topic that is not the 10214124x study on how aerobic exercise is good for elderly obese diabetics, or how extract XYZ from whatever TCM medicine ameliorates the weight gain in obese rodents.

The study, I was thinking of was conducted at the Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, VU University Medical Centre in Amsterdam (Wierdsma. 2013) and with it investigating the practically highly relevant ability of our tummy to extract and digest (=make bioavailable) the energy from the foods, we eat, it is truely one of a kind. After all, corresponding ...

"[...] reference values for energy and macronutrient absorption are scarce, especially for adults in an outpatient ambulatory setting, which forms the usual circumstances for dietetic and nutritional interventions or therapy." (Wierdsma. 2013)

That may seem hilarious in view of the bazillions of money we are spending year by year to figure out "why we are fat", but believe it or not, due to the lack of data we (=science) simply estimate the ‘standard’ energy absorption to be at a level of 95%.

"We use 95% of the energy we eat" - says who?

What's the significance of the data? It goes without saying that measuring the energy that is not absorbed is only one of the things that will eventually be necessary to elucidate "how much calories the average dietary carbohydrate-, fat- and protein calorie effectively delivers. This information would yet still have been something we'd have to have before the dozens of studies on the thermic and other metabolically relevant effects of foods had been conducted. Why? Well, at least in those cases (a non-negligible part of the currently available research), where this effect was estimated by simply monitoring the weight gain of the subject over longer time periods, the result critically depends on the amount of energy from carbs, fats and protein that did even make it into the participants organism. If the latter is not 95%, but only 90% and differs from macronutrient to macronutrient, all previous results would be skewed.

This assumption is based on a single study from the 1970s, in which the amount of non-absorbed healthy adults is reported to be approximately 5% when digesting a standard diet (Southgate. 1970). A study like the one at hand, which was designed to

"[...] assess faecal energy, subdivided in its major contributors of fat, protein and carbohydrate losses, to quantify standard intestinal absorption capacity in healthy adults on a Western European diet in an ambulatory setting in The Netherlands by using a feasible and unique methodology of intestinal absorptiometry reflecting routine practice." (Wierdsma. 2013)

Put differently, the scientists wanted to find out (a) whether a calorie is a calorie or maybe just half a calorie and (b) whether this relation is different for the three main macronutrients, carbohydrates, fat and protein. What? Yeah, you'd think we'd know that all along, but aside from certain experts who know exactly "why we are fat", we obviously don't.

So what did the scientists do?

The Dutch researchers recruited 25 healthy subjects who had been deliberately picked from the staff of institutional healthcare workers at the facilities the authors are working at all had specific dietetic and healthcare knowledge and were thus skilled in adequately registering nutrient intake and meticulously collecting stools. Yep, you read me right: Over the course of 4 subsequent days, the study participants did not just have to track everything they ate and drink, they also had to collect specimen from what left their bodies "undigested" (=stool samples ;-).

"All faeces were collected during 72 h (day 2–4), as per the protocol, in specifically designed 5-L buckets. Faeces were weighed (faecal wet weight in g/day ), homogenised and immediately stored at <4°C until analysis. To measure faecal macronutrient content and to calculate intestinal absorption capacity of the healthy subjects, the faeces were analysed for energy, fat and nitrogen content." (Wierdsma. 2013)

Based on the nutrition data and the stool samples, which had been recorded and collected by all, but two male lazi-a**es who failed to comply to the rigorous requirements of the study protocol the scientists determined the intestinal absorption capacity and the faecal production and composition of male and female subjects separately:

Figure 1: Relative energy and nutrient absorption in male and female subjects (Wierdsma. 2013)

As you can see in my plot of the data in figure 1, the mean (SD) intestinal absorption capacity (as a percentage of nutritional intake) was different for fats, proteins and carbohydrates, so that the average subject digested only

• 89.4% (3.8%) of the total energy their meals provided,
• 92.5% (3.7%) of the "fat calories",
• 86.9% (6.4%) of the energy from protein and
• 87.3% (6.6%) of the calories from the carbohydrates

in their meals (the values in the brackets denote the corresponding standard deviations). Accordingly, fats are not only the most energetically dense macronutrient, they are also the one healthy individuals digest best an with the lowest inter-personal differences. Overall, ...

"[w]omen had a statistically significantly lower energy absorption capacity compared to men (88.0% versus 91.8%, respectively, P=0.02). A similar trend was seen for fat and carbohydrate absorption, although this was not statistically significant (P=0.19 and 0.06, respectively)" (Wierdsma. 2013)

The latter may be surprising, after all, it's usually the women who complain they'd only have to 'look at a piece of cake to gain weightÄ and how unfair it was that men 'can eat whatever they want and still stay relatively lean' (obviously, the latter is not only a function of how much you eat, but also of how much energy you expend and the symbolic piece of cake may well satify 50% of a woman's, but only 25-30% of a man's daily energy requirements).

What goes in must go out again ;-)

Figure 2: Daily faecal production (g/day; x-axis) negatively correlated with intestinal energy absorption capacity (% of the energy intake; y-axis) (n = 23) (Pearson’s r = 0.46, P < 0.05 for the total group, r = 0.65, P < 0.05 for women and r = 0.71, P = 0.05 for men; Wierdsma. 2013).

The mean daily stool production for both sexes was 141 (49) g (29% dry weight) and amounted to an energy loss of 891 (276) kJ, while the individual contribution of  fats, protein and carbohydrates was 5.2 (2.2) g, 10.0 (3.8) g and 29.7 (11.7) g, respectively. Accordingly, the average nutrient contribution to faecal energy content was

• 23% (10%) for fat,
• 20% (8%) for proteins and 
• 57% (23%) for carbohydrates.

With the stools of the female study participants containing a lower percentage of water than those of men (P<0.05), the energy content per gram of wet faeces was higher in women than in men (P<0.05), while the daily faecal nutrient losses were not statistically significantly different between men and women. Moreover, the scientists observed that ...

"[...]"the daily faecal production was positively correlated with faecal energy loss in kcal (Pearson’s r =0.80, P<0.001) [and negatively] correlated with intestinal energy absorption capacity (%) (Pearson’s r = 0.46, P<0.05)." (Wierdsma. 2013)

- an observation that means nothing else, but "the more you eat, the more inclined your body will be to have some energy pass through undigested"... or, in other words: Once you starve yourself, your body will try it's best use each joule of energy it can get! 

---

Bottom line: With the main results of the study at hand being that the average calculated standard for energy absorption in healthy Dutch adults is 90% and thus 5% less than it was previously assumed, it should be obvious that the already skewed "energy in vs. energy out" calculations you may have been conducting (against my explicit recommendation!) based on food labels and co are even less reliable than previously assumed.

"Accept There is No Magic Macronutrient Ratio" (read more)

On the other hand, the 5% more or less energy won't make a difference anyway, after all a main characteristic of our bodies is that they are no overtly simplistic bomb calorimeters, and their energy demands, as well as uptake depend on the total amount and composition (macronutrients, vitamins, minerals and other co-factors) of what we eat. If you want to gain or lose weight you will therefore not be able to forebear doing a 2-week food-log. Record all the foods and energy containing drinks you consume, sit down and (a) re-evalute the food quality, (b) take stock of the macronutrient ratios and (c) add / subtract foods, not calories or "energy" to establish a 20% caloric defict or 10% caloric surplus as a starting point for your diet / bulk. It's easy, it's bullet proof, but it's less convenient than relying on unreliable formula and databases.

References:

• Southgate DA, Durnin JV. Calorie conversion factors. An experimental reassessment of the factors used in the calculation of the energy value of human diets. Br. J. Nutr. 1970; 24:517–535.
• Van de Kamer JH, Ten Bokkel Huinink H,. Weyers HA. Rapid method for determination of fat in feces. J. Biol. Chem. 1949; 177: 347–355.
• Wierdsma NJ, Peters JH, van Bokhorst-de van der Schueren MA, Mulder CJ, Metgod I, van Bodegraven AA. Bomb calorimetry, the gold standard for assessment of intestinal absorption capacity: normative values in healthy ambulant adults. J Hum Nutr Diet. 2013 May 6.

Adelfo Cerame Road to Wheelchair Championships: Six Diet Tips to (Six-)Pack on Lean Mass Between Two Shows

Image 1: The drafter, he is, Adelfo is probably enjoying the increased workload inside and outside of the gym.

Time is, and I am probably not writing this for the first time, flying by, these days. It is yet another Thursday and once more, I am about as intrigued about Adelfo's progress in the past seven days, as you (probably?) are. We have been talking quite a lot, actually, but not so much about his own regimen, as about other stuff, such as the first boydbuilding seminar, Adelfo attended as an official Myotropics Physique athlete. Kind of amazing how things are taking off for him and I am truly happy that all the hard work he has and still is putting not only in his physique, but also in his education is starting to pay off. That being said, you are lucky that he has found some time to compile his weekly blogposts in-between his homework assignments at school, his training and the marketing events for Myotropics, who are just about to release their first product, Physique 2.0. So, let's get right to the grind, as Adelfo would probably say...

Three weeks of training: Time to (re-)evaluate the plan

Six weeks, since the Florida show and another 11 weeks to go until my next show, the USA's in New Orleans. In the past three weeks I have really stepped up my training. Not just because I changed my plan and incorporated different training techniques (cf. "Adelfo Cerame's Hypertrophy-EDT-5x5 Crossover Regimen") but first and foremost due to the application of different training techniques such as modified times under tension, increased workloads in my EDT regimen and the higher volume training in the hypertrophy part of my training split.

While I stuck to the EDT/5x5 part of the split in the first two weeks after the Florida Nationals, I am now on my first week of the hypertrophy + 5x5 combination and will stick to it for the next two weeks, thusly alternating the EDT/5x5 and the 5x5/hypertrophy split, every other week. Even that is a departure from the original weekly rotation, but after the first  round on the hypertrophy/5x5 split this week, I am actually considering to keep training this way for the majority of my prep, just throwing in the the EDT sessions every other three weeks or so.

Figure 1: Current hypertrophy + 5x5 routine (Adelfo Cerame Jr. 2012)

As you can see, I vary my rep schemes depending on the exercises I do; I feel that my muscles need more stimulation and time under tension during certain exercises compared to others. Therefore I vary the reps between 8-10 and 10-12 reps per set and go down into the 6-8 rep range, whenever I feel that the exercise is particularly suited to go real heavy. That being said, I am not even trying to lift moderate, let alone light weights, I still try to lift as heavy as I can, but pick weights which will allow me to hit the prescribed amount of reps.

A note on setting your rep ranges right: With my 5x5 routine, I’ve learned in the past that 5x5 regimen work particularly well with compound movements; and while I have tried doing cable flys, triceps pulls and the like with five or even less reps in the past, you really don’t get much out of those exercises in the lower rep ranges. When you are training on a higher volume hypertrophy split, on the other hand, you do obviously want to incorporate more of these isolation movements into your routine, where - as Dr. Andro's hypertrophy routine exemplified - you will then train at the other end of the hypertrophy range, incorporating the occasional real high rep work (15-25 reps) as a means to really exhaust the muscle.

So far, I am very satisfied with my training regimen and very pleased with the way my training has been going. I feel that with these alternate splits of heavy lifting combined with hypertrophy training, I’ll be able to gain a little bit more muscle within the small time-window I have before I gradually start to taper down my calories within the next week or so…

Apropos caloric intake: A brief lesson in tapering up and down your food intake

I mentioned in previous blogposts here at the SuppVersity that I would be gradually increasing my calories to take full advantage of the small window of opportunity I have before I really have to start dialing it in again for the USA’s in New Orleans. Fortunately I did not ruin my physique after my Florida show (for a breakdown on how Adelfo did that, click here), and was able to maintain a very low body fat percentage. That gave me the luxury to play around and try to increase calories (rather than cutting them back again, right away), while still trying to burn fat or at least keep fat gains to a minimum.

Adelfo Cerame's In-Between the Shows Mini-Bulking Guide - Physique athlete, bodybuilder or just someone who "wants to look good naked", I guess at least the male part of the fitness community, will (and the female should) be faced with this question at some time: "How do I manage my energy intake to maximize my lean muscle gains and minimize fat gains?" As Dr. Andro would probably say it, "I don't have the hubris to tell you that I knew the answer to this question", but I still feel that some of the things I have learned in the past may well guide you on your way to a more muscular, yet not fattier self:

1. It’s always smart to slowly increase calories so your body has time to adjust. For myself, I usually prefer a 200-300kcal increase/week, which would be a 50-75g increase in carbohydrates; which is the macronutrient that I usually adjust when I make increases or decreases. The reasoning behind this strategy is that I like to keep my protein intake fairly constant and my fats moderate to high, depending if I’m cutting or trying to build lean mass; I have yet learned from past (low) fat mistakes, and will never go lower than 50g/day with my fats.
    
2. Adding carbs gradually here and there is a good way to slowly increase calories, like I mentioned above, you manage your caloric surplus by modulating your carb intake and in order not to overwhelm your body, you better make sure to go slowly, in order to make sure that you do not pass over your individual threshold (I emphasize "individual" here, because the latter will not only vary from person to person, but is also susceptible to influences from previous diets, your current training regimen, your stress levels and, obviously, your current body fat levels and overall health). Personally, I have found that 50-60g of carbohydrates immediately after my workouts (shakes + fast carbs) and another 100g in the vicinity of the workout (most of them as starchy carbs in my post-workout meal) appear to be my magic numbers.
    
3. When you do intermittent fasting, your body is tuned to run on fats for fuel so, I that I don't see any reason to ingest large amounts of carbs before I work out or during my rest days. I thusly ingest the lion's share of my weekly carbohydrate intake after my workouts. With carbohydrates being the macronutrient by which I adapt my total caloric intake, this does also mean that I have a built in "high calorie / low calorie cycle", with currently 180g protein/ 200g carbs/ 55g fat on my workout days; 50g immediate following my workout and 100g in the real food meal thereafter. The rest of the 50g are trace carbs from my raw milk, cottage cheese and, not to forget, my Physique 2.0 meal supplement shake, I ingest before my workouts and pre-bed to take advantage of the protein anabolic effects of the slow releasing total milk proteins and the increased fatty acid oxidation from the WM HDP in it's carbohydrate fraction.
    
4. Never surpass your individual carb threshold, to monetize on the muscle building performance enhancing effects of carbs, without compromising your physique. For me 200g of carbohydrates are (currently) the sweet spot, with a maximum of 100g of carbs (mixture of slow and fast digesting) in my post workout meal being the upper limit on a "per serving" basis. If you stick to clean foods and refrain from the artificial flavored junk you buy on every corner, it is actually not that difficult to distinguish between being really full and satisfied and having surpassed the threshold of reasonable glycogen replenishment.
    
5. Judge your diet by the way you look in the morning, and don't get fooled by the intermediate bloat right after a meal. Specifically if you are eating whole maximally satiating foods with a high volume, that alone will make your stomach stick out. Add to that any intermediate bloat in response to the temporary fluid loss and replenishment during and after your workout and you know why the same waist that looked disgustingly protruded after your PWO meal is back to its normal size on the morning thereafter.
    

6. 

   Image 2: If you don't acknowledge that bodybuilding is an art, you will never make it to the stage.

   Don't calculate calories as if your body knew what a "calorie" is. I know that it's difficult and even I am guilty of it from time to time, but think about it, can you say exactly how many meters you will be able to make with one tankful of gas? I don't think so and that despite the fact that you car is a much less sophisticated machine than your body. Just as you won't get as far at 130mph as you would get with 30mph, your bodies caloric expenditure depends largely on your current metabolic rate, which in turn is influence by your weight status, our prior diet, your endocrine health, etc.
   
   This is why you should never start out from any sort of calculated baseline, but just build on what you are eating now and go from there re-evaluating your diet on a weekly (not a daily) base), closely monitoring the way you look, feel and perform (weekly progress pics and a measuring type for your waist, are a must, scales - even those showing you random bf% are obsolete).

I guess, some of you may have expected some sort of formula or "magic number" that will work for everyone and will now be disappointed that you still "don't know how much to eat" - so if that's you, you do at least know why all your efforts to build a better physique have failed. If you don't acknowledge that bodybuilding is at least as much an art, as it is a science, you better attend Dr. Andro's physics classes, instead of studying his bogposts, here at the SuppVersity.

After a few conversations with Adel, ah.. I mean Dr. Andro ;-) I decided to slowly build up to caloric intake in the 2000-2100kcal range and see how this affects my body. Having hit the mark this week with seeing hardly any negative and a lot of positive side effects, I am now at the point to decide whether

• to stick to where I am and try to build some more muscle mass on what I suspect would be a maintenance level,
• to kick it up a notch and try go for a "hardcore mini bulk" trying to build as much muscle as possible even if this goes hand in hand with a minor increase in body fat levels, or
• to start cutting back again and hope that - just as with my last prep - the gradual and slow decrease in caloric will facilitate a minimal gain in muscle mass while I am still gradually losing body fat

Take a look at where I am now. What would you do? Put an end to the "mini-bulk" I am on right now, keep rolling, increase or decrease the energy intake?

Figure 1: Adelfo Cerame Jr after 2+1/2-weeks of "mini-bulking" before the USA Wheelchair Championships.

I guess I have already put on a little more muscle mass, or at least, I have gotten a lot fuller over these past weeks - at the expense of some water retention, yeah... specifically in my lower abs. But I will take care of that once I start dialing in my calories again. So, what do you think SuppVersity Readers? Keep pushing it another three weeks?

Busting the 3,500kcal = 1lbs Weight Loss Myth! A Scientific Deconstruction of a Dumb Rule of Thumb Reveals that Women Need More, Men Less Than the "Rule" Predicts

Image 1: If you are still putting your Happy Meal on a scale, you should not wonder why your weight loss falls short of your "calculations" - especially if you happen to be a woman (img. elementsofwellness.com)

While I would hope that most of you have by now embraced the notion that a calorie is not a calorie (at least, when it comes to nutritional calories), I suspect that one or two of you have still just been reviewing how much "calories" they have already eaten, or how much "cardio" they will have to do to compensate for the piece of pizza they are going to eat tomorrow at a friends party... > "STOP!" < this is what you should tell yourselves whenever thoughts like that are passing your mind (well, unless you are in the end-stage of your prep for a bodybuilding contest, I guess ;-) After all, a very recent study that is based on the results of two large-scale weight-interventions (Heymsfield. 2012), i.e. the CALERIE study, conducted at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center and the Kiel study, which was named after the German town Kiel, where the 13-week weight loss intervention took place, confirms the fallacy of number games like that.

A physicists would know: A pound of fat weighs 500g, not 3,500kcal ;-)

In order to establish the "actual" energy deficit that was necessary to elicit the loss of 1lbs of body weight in the 98 obese subjects in the CALERIE and the Kiel studies (average initial BMI of ~35 (25-43) kg/m²; mean age of ~38y and ~34y for the female and male participants, respectively), Steven B. Heymsfield and his colleagues (re-)analyzed the detailed nutritional and weight loss data from the studies and came up with the more or, I should say, less surprising result that the still widely accepted rule that a caloric deficit of 3,500kcal would result in a 1lbs reduction of body weight has to be revised ...

Figure 1: Energy deficit (in kcal) that was necessary to shed 1lbs of body weight at different time-points (in weeks) of the -25% reduced energy intake and the 890kcal/day arm of the CALERIE study (data adapted from Heymsfield. 2012)

If you take a closer look at the data in figure 1, which shows the actual amount of energy (in kcal) that was necessary to shed 1lbs of body fat, it becomes obvious that there was actually not a single time-point in the 24week dietary intervention, when the men and the women on the -25% (figure 1, left) or 890kcal/day (figure 1, right) both lost 1lbs of body weight per 3,500kcal.

Women have a harder time losing weight than men, but retain more lean tissue

If we go by the logarithmic regressions (red and blue lines; coefficients of determination see figure 1), the following important trends become obvious:

Figure 2: (a) increase in calories necessary to shed 1lbs of BW from week 1 to week 24; (b) average calories necessary to shed 1lbs in men and women over the whole study period (data adapted from Heymsfield. 2012)

1. Independent of the degree of calorie reduction (low calorie = -25%; very low calorie = 890kcal per day) and the sex of the subject, the caloric deficit that was necessary to shed 1lbs of body weight (not fat!) increased from week 1 to the end of week 3 (cf. figure 2, a)
    
2. Both, the baseline, as well as the gradual increase in calorie reduction that was necessary to shed 1lbs of body weight in the course of the 24d study period was greater in the very low calorie arm of the CALERIE study (cf. figure 1 and figure 2, a). This, btw, is clearcut evidence for the fallacy of starvation diets.
    
3. On both diets, women had a significantly harder time losing weight than men. This was even more obvious in the low calorie (-25%) than in the very low calorie arm (cf. figure 2, b).

In that it is also important to note that the relation of fat free mass to total body weight loss (ΔFFM/ΔBW) was maximal (60% for men and 50% for women) at the beginning of the study, had a nadir after about 15 weeks (~40% for men and ~20% for women) and showed a trend to increase again at the end of the 24 week study period of the CALERIE study. In other words, while women have a harder time losing weight, they maintain more of their lean muscle mass, than men do. A results that was, at least with regard to total weight loss, supported by the results of the Kiel study (no data on body fat / fat free mass loss available).

My advice: Forget about the rule of thumb, about calories and body weight!

Other than Heymsfield et al. who obviously still believe that it will by whatever means be possible to calculate the exact amount of calories to shed 1lbs of body weight, my take home message from the results of this study is that all the calorie counting, the daily disappointment, when you step onto the scale and the notoriously unreliable dietary rules of dumb... ah,  pardon "thumb", are something you banish from your weight loss inventory, right away.

Feel lost without your calories? Don't know where and how to start? Afraid of throwing the scale out of the window? Then it's time to (re-)read the Intermittent Thoughts on Stocktaking, Goal Setting, -Tracking & -Resetting to Achieve a Healthy Weight & Shed Excess Body Fat

A food log, where you record food and not calories  (I mean I still eat food, you know, things like eggs, butter, a steak, potatoes... those things without nutritional information on it!), a general understanding of the macro-nutrient (fats, carbs, protein) ratios in those foods and a measuring tape to access your progress, is all it takes access and adapt your food (not energy!) intake and evaluate the success of your diet (which does not equal weight loss!)... and I guess I don't have to tell you that the results of the very low calorie (890kcal) arm of the CALERIE study clearly suggest that dieting on a single cup of broccoli and a single serving of chicken breast sprinkled with some olive oil, is not an option, regardless of your sex, do I?