The FastDay Forum

Dear all,

I have been reading through many posts-articles etc. and could summarize my understanding of the issue in this way:

.fasting is not for everyone (a no for children-teenagers-pregnant woman-metabolic disease patients)
.exercising during fast days is ok (no endurance-best strenght training)

My question then is,what about body fat %? Is anyone with an healthy bf% safe to fast? I am now on my third day fast (second week) and find it really harder than the second day. my bf% is around 18, I am a female, 23. I usually keep a lighter session of strenght training (about 40 mins) for fast days and so far worked well but today I felt so incredibly shakey afterwards. I feel HUNGRY and weak, I am trying to focus on a research proposal I urgently need to work on and words are blurry on the screen and my concentration is almost non-existing.
I wonder if this is due to the fact I have loaded up on sugar and carbs over the weekend (thus leaving me shakey today), and if so if I just need to avoid sugar the night before a fast (which I find quiet hard), or due to the fact it is a bit more difficult for my body type to get energy from fat stores as there is not so much overall.
Any word of advice will be greatly appreciated.
Also, to anyone who will be tempted to suggest I should not do 5:2 ,my rational is a marked interest in keeping IGF-I levels low. I have been working in labs feeding on high fat diets rodents; interestingly, these animals were behaving similarly to other rodents for models of Alzheimer's disease in all the cognition and memory tests.
What Dr Mosley pointed out is well beyond weight loss and should be considered from anyone who is interested in keeping their mind and body sharp.
Good luck to all!

I started with 'healthy' body-fat levels and lost about 14 lbs of it, now below 10% I believe. I have done endurance exercise whilst fasted, up to 4 hours or so, but when I regularly did long days in the hills years ago fasted was my usual state - I struggled to eat during long events. I suppose the key is being fat-adapted and able to access storage for energy. Sugar is bad, try and wean yourself off it as much as possible, and it suits many on this forum to reduce carbohydrates generally and add more fat into their regular diet. After strength workouts is probably one time when carbohydrate is a good idea...

I can't help with exercise issues but I do eat very low carb. I'm fine in the week but just lately have tended to wander off piste at weekends. I always struggle on Mondays after a carby weekend. Seems all too easy to undo a weeks worth of getting keto-adapted! Might be worth thinking about your weekend intake. I'm hoping it will be easier to get off this particular treadmill when all the pre-Christmas food and chocolate adverts are done with!

Break out the bulletproof coffee.

It's your brain having a hissy fit. It will calm down in time. Clean up your diet if you do a lot of weights, it's easier. Over the year, I have done lots of variations & now train 3 x a week on a 16:8 regime.

I don't compare myself to others so don't know but today was cleans 5 heavy sets of 1, clean deadlift 10 x 2 @65kg, then 30 x lifting 10kg plate overhead finishing with conditioning of rowing & GHD situps. It takes a while to adapt but eat your good fats to gain or preserve muscle. Eat if really hungry, don't suffer...

I should perhaps add I was super unfit to start with but now I'm coached. I have high bf too so living on it but it's common for lifters to fast, see Leangains...

Break out the bulletproof coffee.

It's your brain having a hissy fit. It will calm down in time. Clean up your diet if you do a lot of weights, it's easier. Over the year, I have done lots of variations & now train 3 x a week on a 16:8 regime.

I don't compare myself to others so don't know but today was cleans 5 heavy sets of 1, clean deadlift 10 x 2 @65kg, then 30 x lifting 10kg plate overhead finishing with conditioning of rowing & GHD situps. It takes a while to adapt but eat your good fats to gain or preserve muscle. Eat if really hungry, don't suffer...

I lift weights fuelled by bulletproof coffee too and sometimes take l-glutamine afterwards. My body fat started out high, but I have lost 5% since I started out. I agree that you should cut down on sugars. Try bouillon or miso during the day to maintain your electrolyte balance.