Category Archives: Intermittent Feast
7 Steps to a Flexible Diet: Miyaki on T-Nation
My latest T-Nation Article — a multimedia extravaganza about flexible dieting — was published last week.
What did we cover? The 7-step process I use to setting up flexible, year-round, lifestyle nutrition plans (as opposed to quick-fix diets) that can be adjusted based on activity levels, physique goals, feedback, progress, and shifts in physique focus:
1. Set Calories
2. Set Protein Intake
3. Set Baseline Fats
4. Account for Micronutrients
5. Distinguish Between Essential Nutrients and Energy Nutrients
6. Energy Nutrients for Fat Bastards
7. Energy Nutrients for Skinny Bitches.
Here’s the video component of it:
Here’s the intro section. As always on T-Nation, they let me be me. So the following article has been Rated-R by the Fitness Blogging Association of America.
7 STEPS TO A FLEXIBLE DIET
Spring is a time of dietary dilemma.
Defrosting from winter’s hibernation, the groundhog steps out to see if he can see his shadow.
What’s the physique equivalent? Can you look down and see your wiener beneath your bulk belly?
Should you continue with the winter’s “mass” plan – pack in the calories, pack on the mass, scare women and children, go for new PR’s, and get your rocks off from locker room high-fives?
Or should you hit a deficit, slash some flab, get skinny (I mean shredded), maybe improve your health profile, join a boy band, rock a Borat-like dong thong, and try to get laid?
There’s no right answer. You can borrow Harvey Two Face’s coin, flick that SOB into the air, and let chance be your guide for all I care.
To that end, here are 7 simple tools you can use to seamlessly take your plan in whatever direction your fickle heart desires, but first, a few words from our sponsor (okay, not really from our sponsor, but nevertheless a few important points before I get into the 7 steps).
Read the full article here: 7 STEPS TO A FLEXIBLE DIET: MIYAKI ON T-NATION
No Diet System is More Important Than Nutrition Basics
In this installment of the video Q & A series, we try to uncover some of the potential reasons why a dieter is suffering from low energy and increasing body fat.
WHAT WE COVERED
- The no bullsh*t truth. No diet structure — whether it be Intermittent Feast, intermittent fasting, traditional bodybuilding/fitness nutrition and the 6-Shooter Spread — is a “miracle cure” that allows you to overlook diet fundamentals. Don’t let anyone — including me — sell you that their system is more important than nutrition basics.
- Examples: Intermittent Feast will NOT allow you to lose fat if you’re in a calorie surplus. Intermittent Feast will NOT allow you to eat crap and be healthy. Intermittent Feast will NOT provide you miraculous energy if you are combining no-carb diets with anaerobic training, etc.
- 1. Get Your Diet Numbers Right. This is the most important step to achieve any body composition goal — targeted calories based on the physique goal, adequate protein to support lean muscle mass either way, the right distribution of carbs and fats based on activity levels, etc.
- 2. Optimize Food Choices. This takes care of the health aspects of a diet and can make it a lot easier to stay within your numbers (real, whole foods are way more satiating than refined foods).
- 3. Find a Sustainable Diet Structure. Meal frequency and food distribution is predominantly about making your diet plan practical, sustainable, and functional as a lifestyle plan. Use whatever works best. I believe in Da Feast!
- My continuing battles with my frickin’ Whiteboard.
Do Carbs at Night Inhibit Natural Growth Hormone Release?
First off, I just wanted to thank you for all of da love and support you’ve been giving me online. Really appreciate it. I want to return the favor by helping as many of you as I can, but I just can’t keep up with the amount of emails and questions I get while having some kind of a normal life. So I’m starting a weekly Q and A series on my YouTube channel to try to get more efficient at it. Here’s Da Intro and how to get your questions answered.
And we’re kicking this thing off with the most common question I’ve been getting. Doesn’t eating the majority of your carbohydrates at night inhibit natural growth hormone release and impair the body’s ability to burn fat?
What we covered:
- Yes its true, we get our biggest boost in natural growth hormone levels within the first 90 minutes of sleep.
- Yes its true, high insulin levels inhibit natural growth hormone release.
- The key to eating bit at night without inhibiting GH is to time it right.
- In a normal functioning body, insulin levels rise in response to a meal (even a big feast) and return back to baseline levels within 2-3 hours.
- Eat your big carb-loaded feast and allow enough lag-time for insulin levels to fall back to baseline levels before going to sleep.
- Don’t try to starve yourself for dinner and then eat a sugar-loaded snack right before bed to compensate.
Top Trainer Billy Polson’s Fat Loss Diet
In this interview, I talk with my friend and colleague Billy Polson. He talks about the specifics of the diet plan he’s been using to lose fat, build muscle, and improve energy all while keeping up with the demands of owning, operating, and training private clients at San Francisco’s top personal training facility, Diakadi Body.
Miyaki in Men’s Fitness and Muscle & Fitness
A wise friend once told me, “If you study your craft and create good content, eventually it will get out there.” Myself being kind of a hippie, it sounded like overly optimistic hippie talk to me. But I’m starting to see how it may just be da truth. The fitness industry is catching on my friends, and it seems as if they are digging the Intermittent Feast approach. I’m excited to say I have two articles in both Men’s Fitness and Muscle & Fitness this month. Here’s da preview
I. MUSCLE & FITNESS (FEBRUARY 2013)
In terms of mainstream exposure, I know Men’s Fitness is probably the bigger deal, but M&F is a huge personal accomplishment for me. Me and my brother Shawn used to collect Muscle & Fitness magazines as kids. We had drawers and milk crates full of them. I remember saying to myself that I was going to be in that mag one day. So to get to write for them now is a huge honor, and a dream come true.
#1 - How to Eat For Abs…And Say Hasta La Vista to Your Fat Stores (pg 38)
This is a quick break down of calorie and macronutrient calculations for cutting up. Its a 3-phase approach that includes establishing a baseline, the targeted fat loss phase, and a final cyclical diet plan to burn off the last layer of flab, carve in the 6-er, and take it home.
#2 – The Ultimate Clean Bulk: Forget the Cutting Phase and Get Ripped While you Bulk with Intermittent Feasting. (pg 120)
This is a full-on feature story that I’m proud of. I’m not a fan of the get huge and fat approach or sh*tloading, junk-loading, or whatever else you crazy kids are calling it these days. So I break down a bulking plan with optimized food choices, macro calculations, and the Intermittent Feast structure.
Arnold on the cover. Miyaki articles inside. How could you go wrong?
II. MEN’S FITNESS (FEB 2013)
It was a huge opportunity to get to write for Men’s Fitness. That’s some pretty big exposure for such a Little Shiitake. I’m stoked they gave Intermittent Feast some space, because it is a non-traditional approach that goes completely against what you normally hear about in fitness magazines regarding what you must do to lose weight — eat 5 small meals and snacks, cut calories/carbs and starve at night, find your favorite piece of cardio equipment, etc.
A. The Real Resolution Workout: Get Ripped and Strong This Year, Starting With this Six-Week Plan. Bonus: No Cardio Required! (pg. 94)
B. Your Guaranteed Muscle Meal Plan: It Seems Crazy, But Trust Us — You Won’t Believe the Results. (pg. 102)
This was a double feature with a 3-4 days-a-week strength training program and an accompanying diet plan based on Intermittent Feast. I couldn’t be happier. They really let me share my philosophy. Use diet as your primary weapon for fat loss and strength train to gain/maintain lean muscle mass and shape the body. Cardio is unnecessary at best.
A bonus for Kalai is that Jason Statham is on the cover. He’s in her Top 5. To be honest, I think she could care less about my article inside, hahaha.
