3-hour Bedtime Fast

[EastWind]

On this subject, I found this article.

It contains some explanations and hints regarding the insulin sensitivity approach and at the end of the article it makes suggestions regarding carbs consumption, depending upon the level of bodyfat. I doesn't say however what happens when you take carbs four hours before going to sleep, but as I think I'm below 10% body fat, I'll give it a try for a week or two.

I'm only having a 1:1 protein to carb ratio postworkout and these fruits at afternoon and evening.

[Razz]

Just a question:

How can a person know if his body is insuline sensitive or resistant? It's only by medical tests? As far as I understand, if it's insuline sensitive, he'll get more of the anabolic efect, so carbs can be higher in the diet. If he's insuline resistant, he'll get more of the lipolytic effects, so carbs should be lower.

I'm having some daily fruits and some are at evening, but I didn't notice any lipolytic effect, so maybe I'm insuline sensitive... that would be cool.

Bf% and fat around the midline

[EastWind]

Bf% and fat around the midline

I did an online test and it says I have 5.6% body fat: 69.9 kg of lean and 4.1 kg of fat. I feel really good since I dropped four kilos from 78 to 74, but I think I need to add one-two kilos of muscles. 69.9 looks like a price label at the supermarket.

I read more articles and I decided to have fruits right after training and maybe at afternoon, and veggies and proteins before going to sleep. I don't think they (fruits) will harm too much at evening, but they will help more as PWO.

[Razz]

You cannot measure bf% online man. Not at all. Most people underestimate their bf% by 3-5% in my experience. Mainly because people think a visible 6-pack means sub10%. I've been at 15% still having a 6pack, it's all about where you store your fat.

[Joshua Naterman]

I certainly believe eating your carbs around dinner is a good thing because it will raise serotonin before bed. I'm just not into the old school bodybuilding style of having to eat 1 second before going to sleep and waking up to cram down more food. Robb Wolf and Poliquin both support not eating 2-3 hours before bed.

The carbs at dinner study can't conclude anything though. Dinner and before bed are two different scenarios. Also if people have a large carb intake, moving it from the breakfast to dinner is advantageous for appetite control and cravings during the day and as mentioned serotonin.

I did do a quick search for studies but found nothing interesting, so I may be wrong. I doubt both Robb and Poliquin are wrong though, but they could be. Nevertheless I try never to eat a high carb meal right before bed that's all I care.

Personally I have found this to not matter as long as your diet is right enough. I'm dropping bodyfat like crazy and I eat 2-3 pieces of fruit before bedtime when I feel like it. Other times I don't eat for a while before bedtime, but usually I eat for about 8 hours straight right up to bedtime and I'm doing fantastic. Better than I ever have, I think. This is the easiest time I have ever had, I'm almost lean enough to do fitness modeling (I probably am that lean right now, I'm somewhere between 9.5 and 10% at 200 lbs even) and it's almost effortless compared to all the crap I did in the navy.

[Razz]

Yeah I as I said it's like item #50 on the list, personally eating if hungry comes before a bedtime fast for sure!

[Felix Schreiter]

@slizzardman:

how do you drop bodyfat that fast. do you have any tips on how to get leaner?

[Tarun Suri]

Use the search function for the optimal nutrition thread that Slizz created.

[chingyvang]

Bodybuilders believe in eating right before bed, and they are all huge. One summer I was on a bodybuilding training/ diet and I gained 20lbs just that summer, 3 months. And me being an ectomorph, I was 98lbs my entire high school year until I hit college and started my bodybuilding routine......98 Freakin pounds. So I can say from experience that eating right before bed doesnt suppress my growth hormones at all.

[Joshua Naterman]

It does suppress growth hormone secretion, but growth is largely hormone independent. No one really knows what signals growth, and while hormones can amplify it in large quantities, the 30% spike that lasts for like 1 hour before hitting baseline again isn't nearly enough to make a difference. It takes a 10x or greater increase in levels, sustained over time, to create a noticeable difference and our bodies don't make that kind of a spike. That's why there are steroids!Going from 500 to 650 ng of testosterone per dl for testosterone doesn't make a shit lick of difference, so to speak. Don't believe everything you read about the hormonal manipulation through exercise.

The guys who have the most in shape bodies often have LOWER levels of testosterone because of chronic adaptations to stress so don't believe that crap. The hormone levels that exist in non-drugged bodies are largely irrelevant unless you way way way on the low end, and even then eunichs got big and strong back in the day so keep that in mind too.