The FastDay Forum

Caroline: Sounds reasonable, but I feel nervous about not having something to eat after major exercise (for muscle repair etc.) and fasting days fit in well with exercise days at the moment. What are your feelings about this magic 30 - 45 minutes after exercise when the body needs something to start rebuilding damaged tissue? And how is it supposed to get any benefit from intake that quickly anyway unless you just guzzle sugary drinks/fruit?

CreakyPete, this is new to me (about needing food immediately after exercise), look forward to hearing Caroline's views.

Yes, that was the 'myth' sold to us, that it is easier!

I want my money back now!

Yes I think Caroline's idea is what you do Susan on your semi-fast day - but to do this 2 days per week. I might try it. As well as the weekends (visiting in London for the last two hasn't helped) I have a difficulty in the late evenings with 'grazing' - not on a fast day of course because then it is banned, but on a semi-fast day I can see it might be a problem...

That is why I have kept to at least one strict fast day. I would have a problem with the evening grazing too. On a strict fast day I don't drink any alcohol either - on a non fast day it is too easy to have a glass or two with a meal and that in itself can lead to a weakening of the will not to graze afterwards!

Hi there,
I am only doing 24 hour fasts (evening to evening) although mostly three per week. Strict 5:2 is to hard for me I was never overweight (BMI approximatly 24 when I started). With this eat stop eat way of fasting I was reasonably successfull. Although I have the same issue as most of us with evening grazing it works okay for me. I still do not buy sweets and only have these treats outside of my house on my feast days. That works well and I am still loosing. I am thinking about doing two 24 hour fasts to maintain my weight starting in in one or two weeks. Hopefully, that works for me.
My BMI is very close to 20 now, and at least by German standards in my age being below 20 is classified as "underweight". So even if the fashion industry tells me, I am still fat I am not sure whether an even lower BMI should be an aim ;-(
Abby

Hi Abby
It's good to know that 24 hour fasts work for you. In fact they did for my brother too, although he did 3 times a week to lose 8kgs.
Are the German BMI standards different to the UK ones?

Hi there,
I think so. The German recommendations increase by age are:
Age optimal BMI
19-24 19-24
25-34 20-25
35-44 21-26
45-54 22-27
55-64 23-28
>65 24-29

And there are some supporters that currently recommend to increase the upper bound recommendations. They claim that the life expectency is highest for the End 20s something BMIs. However, being sick seem to increase with a BMI in the middle to the 20s.
I am not a huge supporter of BMI at all, however I do understand that there is a lot of scientific support that the optimal weight increases with age (and the wrinkles decrease )

Increasingly off-topic but very interesting Abby!

NHS web page about it here, discussing the results that indicated better life expectancy for those with BMI 25-30 than those with lower BMI. The page makes the point (as you know!) that there are better simple measures of health than BMI such as waist-based WHtR and WHR.

Here is a report of a 2005 study that identified that at the same waist circumference (WC), higher BMI meant reduced mortality in the elderly (65+), whereas at the same BMI, a wider waist was associated with increased mortality - regardless of sex, age, and disease status.

These authors speculated that BMI is a reflection of lean mass for individuals with the same WC, whereas WC is a reflection of total and abdominal fat content for individuals with the same BMI. This is an important observation, which suggests that, after consideration of WC, greater BMI may represent a unique aspect of body composition—one that decreases health risk.

And Dr Margaret Ashwell wrote a paper about the different measures of metabolic risk here. The gist of the article is that WHtR (waist:height) is the best simple measure (should be between 0.4 and 0.5), although differences between age groups is not discussed (except for children).

But can we control our WC (waist) independently of our BMI (weight)?

[carorees]

Caroline, would 2 x 24 mean that you always ate normally in the evenings? If you do 8pm to 8pm for example. Would that be fewer calories than what I do to maintain, one full 36 fast with 500 cals and one day missing breakfast and lunch and not eating until the evening, but eating normally then?
If it was an 8pm - 8pm fast would you eat a normal evening meal every night?

The idea behind "eat stop eat" is that you fast for 24 hours and then just carry on as normal. Of course, there are endless possibilities for modifying it...fast for 24 hours, eat a low carb dinner and no snacking/wine for example! Fast for 24 hours, eat a specific number of calories that may be more than 500, keep fasting until breakfast. I think anything that complies with the general premise of fasting: have a good long period between eating a few times a week, will be fine. You just need to play with it to see what works. If 2 x 24 hours then 500 cals doesn't work, try 2 x 24 hours then 800 cals or 1000 cals! Or one 36 hour complete fast...whatever floats your boat!

Hi there,
I think so. The German recommendations increase by age are:
Age optimal BMI
19-24 19-24
25-34 20-25
35-44 21-26
45-54 22-27
55-64 23-28
>65 24-29

Wow, that is really interesting. I'm quite underweight then, for someone of 47! I agree it is good to have some reserve when older in case of sickness, but the BMI indicators for Germany still seem on the high side. 23 is fat for me.
Are people in Germany generally slim or is there an obesity problem Abby?

[carorees]

Caroline: Sounds reasonable, but I feel nervous about not having something to eat after major exercise (for muscle repair etc.) and fasting days fit in well with exercise days at the moment. What are your feelings about this magic 30 - 45 minutes after exercise when the body needs something to start rebuilding damaged tissue? And how is it supposed to get any benefit from intake that quickly anyway unless you just guzzle sugary drinks/fruit?

I don't know much about exercise physiology in that respect. I am in the process of trying to collect together the various scientific studies we have discussed into various collections. Here is the one I am compiling on exercise: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=4906

Look at the studies on athletes/sportsmen doing Ramadan fasting for an indicator of how important eating immediately after exercise might be.

If you were to do something to repair damaged muscle then sugary drinks would not be the best choice, you would want a protein drink. I did see a programme that said drinking milk was an effective way of reducing post-exercise aches and pains, but I can't remember if you were supposed to drink it just before or after exercising.

The idea behind "eat stop eat" is that you fast for 24 hours and then just carry on as normal. Of course, there are endless possibilities for modifying it...fast for 24 hours, eat a low carb dinner and no snacking/wine for example! Fast for 24 hours, eat a specific number of calories that may be more than 500, keep fasting until breakfast. I think anything that complies with the general premise of fasting: have a good long period between eating a few times a week, will be fine. You just need to play with it to see what works. If 2 x 24 hours then 500 cals doesn't work, try 2 x 24 hours then 800 cals or 1000 cals! Or one 36 hour complete fast...whatever floats your boat!

Thanks Caroline, the possibilities are endless, as you say!It's just a question of experimenting. I know it works for some, but for me just skipping breakfast isn't really a 'fast' as such and I'm still keen to get the benefits of a longer fast period (assuming they do exist!).

Very interesting thread. I wanted to add my short experience to the original question of "How is everyone else doing?" After losing 13 lbs. to get to target, I decided (only 3 weeks ago) to go to 1000 cal. days on Mon. and Thurs. I was also coming back from a 9 day vacation with no fasting and every meal eaten at restaurants, which had resulted in +2 lbs. Not being concerned about the theoretical health benefits of extended fasting, I knew I'd feel happier with 1000 cal. over 3 meals. The result is that I have continued to lose weight-I've lost 4 lbs in the last 3 weeks and I am 2 lbs less than my lowest weight before vacation. This is working for me and going to 1000 cal 2x/week still keeps me in practice for tolerating hunger pangs. I wouldn't mind stopping the weight loss, but there is still belly flab at a BMI of 21+, so I would like to tone up my muscles. I've also noticed that I am not losing inches in the waist as much, but more in the chest and hips--I need to tone my abs.

Thanks for your post MCC, it is great that you have found an effective way to maintain. Do you still do fasting on your 1000 calorie days, or are the calories spread over 3 meals?

Not been around much of late so have been interested to read how you've been doing on 6:1 Franglaise. You're right, it doesn't sound as easy as MM suggested!
I've faithfully kept at 5:2 and am now only about 3-4lbs away from my goal weight of nine and a half stone now (and I did make it into size 10 clothes afterall - something I never believed possible!) so maintenance is definitely on the horizon for me now. As yet I've no idea how it will work or whether I'll need to do 6:1 one week and 5:2 the following week. I guess I don't mind because this WOE is flexible enough to mean you can adjust it to suit. But we'll see. My weight might be all over the place when it comes to actually doing it!!

Do you still do fasting on your 1000 calorie days, or are the calories spread over 3 meals?

I was never good at extended fasting (even while "fasting" at 500 cal/day, I would eat a 100 cal protein bar at lunch), so I spread the calories over 3 meals. I'm eating my 100 Cal/cup high fiber cereal with light soymilk right now; then I'll split 800 cal or so between lunch and dinner. These spring days I'm getting a fair amount of exercise outside with gardening and barn work and I need something circulating for energy.